by Ed Gorman
“Blast it and damnation, Monica! Why can’t you organize these meetings in some seamen’s dive or rank back alley like a respectable spy?”
Monica chuckled, resting her hands on her hips. “Because, my dear George, having a dashing sailor lover climbing onto my balcony in the moonlight merely adds to the rather brisk reputation of the rich Widow Van Telflin. On the other hand, skulking about in the odd dark corner with the Union’s Military Attaché to Bermuda could attract the undue attention of our old friend Captain Fair-weather, not to mention the rest of Her Majesty’s authorities. I can do much better work as a somewhat loose and vapid expatriate socialite then I could as a suspected Federal secret agent.”
The devil induced her to preen back her fall of glossy brown hair. “Besides,” she continued airily, “there are any number of eligible men on this island who would have no objection whatsoever to being invited to my boudoir on a regular basis.”
“And that has absolutely nothing to do with anything,” the tall and dark haired Navy man growled, focusing his attention on a thorn puncture rather than on the tenuous fabric of Monica’s wrap.
Monica suppressed an impish grin. Beyond her late husband, George had to be one of the most solid, steadfast, and outright honorable men she had ever encountered. Possibly that was why he was so much fun to tease on occasion.
“You said in your drop message that we have a new problem,” Garrett continued. “What’s happened?”
“This has. Come take a look.”
At the other end of the balcony, a powerful mariner’s telescope stood atop a tripod. Taking advantage of the vista available from the second story of Repose House, it permitted a very effective reconnaissance of the colony capital of Hamilton and its port facilities a scant mile distant across the harbor.
Monica lined the telescope up on a target and stepped back. “Observe.”
Hunkering down slightly, Garrett peered through the eyepiece. The expensive Swiss-made spyglass had excellent light-gathering qualities. He could readily make out the silhouette of a docked ship in the glow from the stars and the town street lamps.
She was a paddlewheel merchant steamer. Schooner-rigged and slim-hulled, her outsized paddle boxes and twin, sharply raked funnels promised an exceptional turn of speed.
“That new British blockade-runner,” Garrett grunted, “the Reindeer. We’ve been keeping an eye on her over townside, trying to find out something about her.”
“I can tell you more than you want to know, George,” Monica paced off a few slipper-footed steps. “I was aboard her today. In fact, I took a cruise on her. And that ship represents a far greater threat then just another blockade runner.”
Garrett straightened, frowning. “How so?”
“She could be a harbinger of things to come if a Mr. Titus Greenly has his way.”
Garrett’s dark brows narrowed. “Greenly? He’s listed as the Reindeer’s owner, I believe.”
“Um-hm, her owner, her creator, her financier, and the driving force behind her. He’s a little Midlands industrialist who looks rather like a balding pigeon. He knows absolutely nothing whatsoever about ships or naval warfare. Yet he may represent the greatest threat to our blockade of the Confederacy since the launching of the Merrimac.”
Garrett scowled, “What do you mean?”
“While our Mr. Greenly is greatly deficient in naval matters, he does have a nose for money. He’s aware of the vast profits that can be made running cargo through the blockade into the Confederate ports and he intends to tap those profits on a massive scale.”
Monica turned again, facing the attaché. “He intends to form a business syndicate. A syndicate to run contraband into the Confederate states, supported by an entire fleet of fast merchantmen specifically designed for blockade-running.”
“Damnation!”
“Indeed. The Reindeer is the model the fleet will be built around. That cruise I wangled myself aboard was a demonstration run for some of the Bermuda money. Mr. Greenly is seeking investors for his new enterprise.”
“What’s she like under way?”
Monica’s brows rose. “She’s a bundle of pine boards with the beam of a butcher knife. Get her in heavy seas and she’ll either capsize like a canoe or come apart like a cigar box. But she’s fast, George. Faster than sin. I’ll swear they had her up to eighteen knots today and she wasn’t even trying. Full out, nothing we have on the blockade could touch her.”
Garrett didn’t even consider disregarding Monica’s judgment. “Did you get a look at her clockworks?”
“Mr. Greenly gave all of his potential investors a bow-to-stern tour. I trailed along and was careful to act suitably awed and ignorant in the right places. She’s got a set of Armstrong Whitworth engines worthy of an ironclad ram. Six forced-draft locomotive boilers feeding through a pressure stepdown. Terrific horsepower for the weight.”
The naval officer shook his head. “That rig will never stand up for long.”
“Nothing about Reindeer will stand up for long. She’s so overengined for her hull that she’ll shake herself to pieces in a matter of months. But in those months she can make numerous very profitable dashes into Charleston.”
“I begin to see what you mean,” Garrett nodded. “Who cares how long she lasts? It’s the money she makes while she’s running that matters.”
“Exactly. There are huge turnovers in smuggling. The profits from the first run will pay for the ship and the rest will be gravy of a particularly tasty kind for potential investors. One ship like her would be bad enough, but there is an even greater threat involved.
“Something else is very rapid about the Reindeer, her construction time. Greenly had her specifically designed so that she could be quickly and cheaply copied. A good British shipyard could slap a sister ship or ships together in a matter of weeks. By the end of the year, we could have a dozen just like her moored across the harbor and Mr. Jefferson Davis would have a marvelous new supply line for a Christmas present.”
Garrett scowled, gazing across the harbor at the lights of Hamilton. “God save us, but you’re right. This could be considerably more serious than just another blockader. How is Greenly’s proposal being received by the island investors?”
“Cautious interest. They know there’s money to be made, but the more nautically knowledgeable have doubts about the Reindeer’s design and about Greenly’s plan for the rapid production of a fleet. I suspect those doubts will dissipate with the first cargo of cotton Greenly brings out of a Southern port.”
Garrett bent over and peered through the telescope again. “When is the gentleman going to make his try?”
“Next week,” Monica seated herself on the edge of her bed. “They have to complete the transferal of the Reindeer’s registry from Great Britain to the Confederate States and they have to load cargo.”
“Any word on what she’ll be carrying inbound?”
“The usual runner’s burden. Low-bulk, high-value luxury goods mostly. But they’ll also be loading half a million Enfield percussion caps and a couple of miles of bomb and shell fuse for the Confederate army.”
Garrett straightened from the telescope, brushing thoughtfully at his mustache. “Hmm. I daresay that a slab of guncotton and a yard or so of slow fuse in the same hold with those munitions could put a considerable crimp in your Mr. Greenly’s prospects.”
“Were it but that simple, George. Blowing up one of Her Majesty’s merchant ships in one of Her Majesty’s harbors would considerably aggravate Her Majesty’s Government, even if said ship was false-flagging under the Stars and Bars. Mr. Lincoln doesn’t need that complication to his life just now. Besides, simply destroying the ship is inadequate.”
Garrett glanced back over his shoulder. “How so?”
Monica crossed her legs and propped her chin in her palm. “Greenly is a clever little chap when it comes to merchandising. He could use the fact that we scuttled his ship as a selling point to his investors. The Federal Government recognizes
his blockade-running syndicate as a threat. Ipso facto, his ideas must be valid and workable. Even slipping a touch of hemlock into his afternoon tea would be insufficient. Someone else could pick up his concepts where he left off. It’s the concepts themselves that we have to destroy.”
“How in blazes do you destroy an idea?” Garrett demanded.
“By publicly discrediting it, my dear George. And I have some ideas along that line.”
“What will you need?”
“Five things. Two of which, an invitation to dine aboard the Reindeer and a rather special new gown for the occasion, I can provide. The other three items I’ll need your assistance with.”
“Name them,” Garrett replied promptly.
Monica smiled. “Your company for an evening, a fast navy steam frigate, and twenty feet of telegraph wire.”
* * *
Hooves clopping on coral cobbles, Monica’s carriage rolled along Port Hamilton’s Front Street. The last trace of the day’s light was fading, as was the oppressiveness of its heat. The little port town was coming alive as Bermudans, white and brown alike, roused from the afternoon’s torpor to conclude the affairs of the day. Figures occulted the glow of lamp-lit shop windows, mellow voices spoke from the shadows and the sound of a strummed guitar issued from a tavern doorway.
It was a superb evening to go riding with a handsome gentleman, Monica reflected. A pity it had to be wasted on business matters.
“Have we any more word on our warship, George?”
“The dispatch was countersigned by the ambassador and gotten off aboard last week’s fast packet inbound for Baltimore. Her skipper had instructions to relay it to the first Federal Navy vessel he spotted. Good Lord willing, somebody will be out there when the Reindeer sails tomorrow morning.”
“Well, that’s the best we can do in that department,” Monica replied, patting a lock of her upswept hair back into place. “The rest wilt be up to us.”
“Indeed. I can understand how you were able to wangle an invitation back aboard for the Reindeer’s departure dinner, but I’m still amazed that you were able to procure an invitation for a Union naval officer.”
“It wasn’t all that difficult really. Mr. Greenly, like many Englishmen, doesn’t take our Civil War all that seriously. He looks upon it as just another irregularity by those peculiar Americans.”
“Hmm. Well, I’ve had a look at some of the Rebel officers and crew who’ll be taking the Reindeer across and they take this war very seriously indeed.”
“I daresay, George, and you will provide a marvelous distraction for them. While they’re keeping an eagle eye on the damn Yankee in their midst, I, sweet, helpless flower that I am, will be able to go about committing barratry to my heart’s content.”
Garrett responded with a noncommittal grunt, looking out the carriage window.
“Anything wrong, George?”
“I just don’t like it,” he replied gruffly. “Damn it, Monica, this isn’t your place, fighting in a war. It’s no place for any woman. If something goes wrong, you could end up in a British prison for years … or considerably worse. With me it’s different. It’s my duty. But for you … I just don’t like it.”
She lightly rested her hand on his blue-clad shoulder, “It’s my choice, George. It always has been.”
“Damnation, I know it! I just wish…”
“I wish a lot of things, too.” Monica’s voice hardened. “At the beginning of the war, Rebel agents tried to seize my husband’s ship for use as a Confederate raider. My husband James stopped them, but he died doing it, defending his quarterdeck.
“A man might have been able to look upon his death as an act of war, but I’m a woman. I take things far more personally. I looked upon his killing as an act of bloody-handed murder. I swore that the secessionists and slavocrats would pay for it, and I intend to see that they do.”
“And I’ll help you, good Lord willing. Now, any last minute changes to the plan?”
“No. I’ll need about fifteen minutes alone forward of the paddle boxes. I’ll give you the sign when.”
* * *
Reindeer lay moored across the T-head of one of the Port Hamilton piers. A number of the local dockside hangers-on carried Monica’s coin in their pockets and they had reported to her that precautions were being taken around the blockade-runner.
A pair of police constables paced the length of the pier while, from the darkened waters beyond the ship, there came the thump of rowlocks and the occasional gleam of a bull’s-eye lantern. A port picket-boat circled in the night, guarding to seaward.
Two burly seamen also lounged at the foot of the gangway that bridged the gap between the pier and the Reindeer’s quarterdeck, while the third mate stood port watch at its head.
As was common with the blockaders, the Reindeer was manned by a mixed bag of British, Bermudan, and Confederate seamen with a Confederate captain and mates. By their clothing and accents and from the cold glares aimed at George Garrett, Monica presumed that this night’s watch-standers were all Confederate. She also noted that all three men carried British-made Adams revolvers holstered at their belts.
As she and her escort were ushered aboard and below to the main cabin, Monica checked off the key points of her surroundings. No smoke or heat shimmer over the stacks, Reindeer’s plant was still cold. All cargo hatches forward of the quarterdeck were battened down and secured for sea. The only topside illumination issued from the watch lantern at the binnacle, the remainder of the blockader’s narrow deck being left to the shadows.
Far forward, a dim glow leaked from the open foc’sle hatch, along with a faint murmur of voices. The majority of the crew would be ashore, saying an enthusiastic farewell to Bermuda. Only the port watch replacements and the black gang that would kindle the furnaces and set the steaming watch after midnight remained aboard.
All was well.
As with the crew, a mixed bag of a dinner party awaited them in the Reindeer’s cramped main salon. The Confederate contingent consisted of Captain Welden Enoch and his first and second mates. Enoch was of the lean and hungry kind with graying, muttonchop whiskers and pale suspicious eyes. His mates were of the same breed, differing in appearance but not in attitude. The gentlemanly coldness focused upon Commander Garrett was readily apparent.
Another positive check on Monica’s list. Be ready to trail your coat, George, she thought. Keep these hounds drawn off.
The island contingent consisted of the right honorable Harriman De Vere of the Colonial Banking and Trust. A heavyset and intensely solid middle-aged worthy, he likely knew the exact location and status of nine out of ten of the island’s pounds and dollars, his advice having been sought in their investment. He would be Greenly’s prize this night. Where De Vere led in money matters, others, many others, followed.
Likewise present, a long-jawed and deceptively relaxed individual in the uniform of Her Majesty’s Navy, Port Captain Andrew Fairweather, one of the few men in Monica’s experience who could actually unsettle her. He was one of the few men she could not effectively “read.”
Since her establishment in Bermuda as a Federal agent, she had performed a complex and at times nerve-wracking dance with this gentleman, her affairs brushing close to his on a number of occasions. Monica suspected that Fair-weather suspected her true intents. In turn she could only be sure that he did not know for sure. If he ever did learn to a certainty, she’d be peering out through the bars of “King George’s Inn” in short order.
Still, as the tall smiling English officer bent over her hand, she had the unnerving feeling that he could peer through her gown to the myriad secrets hidden beneath it.
And there was Titus Greenly himself, small, rounded, enthusiastic, and totally oblivious to the lightning that played around him in the stuffy little cabin.
“I’m so pleased you could join us again this evening, Mrs. Van Telflin,” the little man gushed. “Your presence brightened my investors’ cruise and it certainly will do the
same for our little departure party this evening.”
Monica nodded and smiled. “It’s most certainly my pleasure, Mr. Greenly. I so enjoyed my voyage with you last week. May I introduce my escort, Commander George Garrett of the United States Navy. I do hope you don’t mind the … irregularity but George so wanted to have a look at your lovely little vessel.”
“Somehow,” Captain Fairweather murmured from the background, “that doesn’t surprise me.”
The dinner proved … interesting. The meal was excellent but the atmosphere veered between a cold correctness on the part of George and the Confederates, and an engineered gaiety from Monica and Greenly. Events merely washed over the stolid De Vere, while Fairweather only looked on, that knowing smile of his hovering close to his lips.
As the sole woman present, a withdrawal was not mandated when the brandy, cigars, and business were brought forth at the end of the meal. As Monica listened, the true intent of the night’s entertainment became clear. The banker De Vere had also been a guest aboard Reindeer during the investors’ cruise and had displayed a degree of interest in Greenly’s propositions. Now Greenly was pushing for the kill.
“Every investment has its risk, sir,” Greenly pontificated, “but here the risks are calculated and the potential returns magnificent.”
“Indeed they are,” George commented softly to the rim of his snifter. “All you have to do is not mind the promotion of slavery.”
Captain Enoch looked up sharply from the head of the table. “The War of the Rebellion is an affair of states’ rights, sir, not of slavery.”
“Indeed, sir.” Garrett lifted his cigarillo from the saucer at his side. “Unfortunately, the only ‘states’ right’ anyone seems to be in essential disagreement over is the right to buy, own, and sell our fellow human beings like livestock.”
Enoch’s face flushed and Greenly hastily cut off his captain’s retort. “Gentlemen, please. We do have a lady present. Commander Garrett, I most certainly understand your, ah, apathy toward our venture here, but you must understand. We are only businessmen taking advantage of an opportunity. Good business, nothing more. I assure you there is nothing political or personal involved.”
