The Continental Risque (34 page)

And then with the sound of the riot in his pounding head, the sound of the ship's company tearing themselves apart, Rumstick saw Mr Midshipman Weatherspoon, like some vision, a pistol in each hand and two more thrust in his belt, leap up onto the quarterdeck. He shouted something, fired one of the guns, fired the other, and was reaching for a third when Rumstick finally lost consciousness.

President John Brown pulled his horse to a stop at the White Ground, the sandy point halfway between Fort Montegu and Fort Nassau. He had been riding hard, and for a moment he just sat in his saddle, head thrown back, breathing deep.

The rebels were on the move. It was still dark but they had already assembled and marched out of Fort Montegu and were on the road to Nassau, bent on God knows what kind of mischief. Brown had ridden far enough along the road to see them coming, which was all he needed to see, then turned and rode back to the White Ground. He did not care to talk to the rebels again, not until he had proven himself in their eyes.

They had not been quite as conciliatory as he had hoped; they were apparently quite determined to sack the town if they met with resistance. And what was worse, they would think that he, John Brown, had betrayed them. They were already furious over the loss of the military stores. It would go hard on him if they met with further resistance, the naval captain had promised. Very hard. Brown did not know what that meant, exactly, but he knew that he did not want to find out.

It would take the Americans an hour and a half at least to reach Fort Nassau. He pulled his watch from his waistcoat and squinted at the face. Five o'clock in the morning. By six-thirty the barbarians would be at the gate. He had an hour and a half to convince the governor and the remaining militia to abandon the fort or he himself would be hunted down by the damnable rebels.

He slid down off the horse and looped the animal's reins around a small tree. He took off his coat, then unbuttoned his waistcoat and took that off as well, then pulled his shirt over his head. The morning air was cool on his bare skin, and it felt good after the hard riding he had done. He pushed the arms of the shirt through the arm holes of the waistcoat, then stuffed them back into the arms of his coat. He held the clothes out at arm's length and pulled a pistol from his belt.

He hated this type of histrionics, but it had to be done. The fort had to be emptied before the Americans arrived. He grimaced as he placed the barrel of the gun against the coat at about where his ribs would be, were he wearing it, turned his head, and pulled the trigger. The flash from the pan and the barrel were blinding, and the loud report of the gun made the horse shift nervously, but the animal was trained to gunfire and it did not spook.

Brown examined the hole that he had blasted through three layers of clothing. It was impressive; a gaping wound in the cloth, charred and hanging open. He struggled back into the shirt, waistcoat, and coat.

He pulled a folding knife from his pocket and grit his teeth as he unfolded it, moving quickly before he lost his nerve. He placed the blade against the skin that was exposed by the hole in his clothing and with a jerk of his arm cut his flesh, opening up a wound six inches long.

He gasped, then grit his teeth again and cursed. It was not a deep cut, but still it was painful and, more to the point, bled copiously. He sucked in his breath and held it. He felt the blood running down his side and saw the dark stains it made on the tattered cloth. Satisfied that he had manufactured a quite convincing and, he hoped, frightening wound, he took up the horse's reins, swung himself up into the saddle, and charged off toward Fort Nassau.

Ten minutes later the great front gate of the fort was opened for him, the lookout on the wall having apparently seen him coming. He swung his horse off Bay Street and charged past the surprised sentry and toward the fire in the center of the parade ground, its flames less bright now in the gathering daylight. He pulled the horse to a stop in a great spray of dust and fairly leapt from the saddle to the ground, gasping for breath.

‘Brown, Brown, what on earth?' the governor said, lifting his great bulk off the stool on which it was planted and rushing over to him. He put his arm solicitously around Brown's shoulder, saying, ‘My God, what has happened to you? You're wounded, man! Did the rebels do this?' as Brown, doubled over and gasping for breath thought, ‘As far as you know.'

At last Brown straightened, and his labored breathing, half of it the result of hard riding, the other half playacting, subsided enough for him to speak. ‘The rebels are a mile or so up the road, Governor, coming on the quick march. I doubt there's above six hundred of them, though in the dark it was hard to see.'

‘They shot you? Did you try to speak with them? What do they …?' The governor's words trailed off as he stared at the president's bloody wound.

‘I tried to speak with them, but they'd have none of it. They called me a bloody rascal and shot me. It's just a scratch, thank God. They're quite enraged, I've never seen the like.'

The sixty men who remained to defend the fort were gathered around him now. They listened with eyes wide and growing wider as he gasped out his tale. It needed no art to know what every man was thinking.

‘What about Frazer?' one of the citizen soldiers asked. ‘What happened to Frazer?'

Brown shook his head. ‘Frazer didn't make it. The rebels captured him. I think they may have … I don't know what they did to him.'

This last bit of intelligence was enough to send a wave of panicked speculation through the crowd of militia. Brown saw heads shaking and arms waving and fingers pointing at the crumbling walls of Fort Nassau and the heavy gun still lying on its side at the north end of the parade ground.

‘Well, damn those rebels to hell, I say,' the governor said in a loud and commanding voice. ‘We'll hold fast here, and when they come, then we'll send them right to hell, help the Lord in his work. We'd best see to manning the great guns.'

The militiamen, far from manning the great guns, began to collect their muskets, haversacks, cartridge boxes, and free pistols.

‘Beg your pardon, Governor,' said the company's sergeant as he slung his cartridge box over his shoulder, ‘but President Brown said there was six hundred men at least, and they shot him on no provocation. And last night they sent that broadside around, promising no harm if they got what they came for. I don't see the sense in risking the destruction of the town for a few unserviceable cannon and what stores we have left.'

That statement was followed with a general murmur of agreement as the militiamen turned and headed for the gate, which, since Brown's return, had remained open. The crowd split up on hitting Bay Street, each man heading off for his own home, and soon they were lost from sight. Brown pulled his watch discreetly out of his pocket and tilted the face toward the fire. Half past five.

‘Well, as for me,' said Governor Browne, ostentatiously pulling his pistol from his belt and checking the priming, ‘I shall not leave this fort while any one man will stand by me.'

And there was, President Brown noted with some dismay, even more than one man still standing by him. Besides himself, five members of the council and two lieutenants of militia, as well as Babbidge, still remained. A total of ten men, not one of whom was a professional soldier, to fight off the invading rebels. And it seemed as if the governor still intended to mount some defense. It was absurd. And Brown had less than an hour to get them out of there.

‘Governor,' said Councilman John Gambier, ‘I think perhaps we should revisit this defense of the fort,' and his words were greeted up by various ‘Yes's' and ‘Indeed's' among the councilmen and officers gathered around. ‘As noble as your effort has been, I think perhaps it is time to abandon the fort to the rebels.'

Ah, good old Gambier, ever the voice of reason, Brown thought.

The governor looked at the men around him and was greeted on all quarters by nodding heads. ‘Babbidge, you're the regular military man here, what say you?'

‘I don't think we can hope to defend the fort with ten men,' Babbidge said wearily, ‘and if we try, there's nothing to stop the rebels from just ignoring us and sacking the town.'

The governor took one last look around, and Brown could see him, actually see him, come to a decision. ‘Yes, yes, indeed, we'll let those rebels march right in! And won't they be surprised to find the powder gone and we've outfoxed them again! They won't know if those twenty-five barrels left are all the powder there was, or if we sent it away under their damned noses, and all the time we're in our homes, ready to defend them. Yes, gentlemen, we shall further confound these damned rebels. Let us go now, to the defense of our homes!' At that the governor picked up his musket, handed his stool to Babbidge, and led the last of the defenders out of Fort Nassau.

President Brown, following behind the general exodus, pulled his watch from his pocket one more time. A quarter to six. He had engineered the entire capitulation of the island with forty-five minutes to spare.

Though the sun had yet to appear above the eastern horizon, there was sufficient light for Biddlecomb to see all of Nassau harbor and Hog Island beyond. He looked impatiently at his watch. He had left ordinary seaman Fletcher behind at Fort Montegu to see if the
Charlemagne
was still at anchor. He was to catch up with the invading force and report the moment the sun was high enough for him to see the fleet.

Nicholas had ordered a rest, and now the road was strewn with weary marines and sailors. In ten minutes they would march again, and as yet Biddlecomb had no word from Fletcher.

‘Damn that fool's eyes, damn them to hell,' he muttered to himself as he walked awkwardly over the sand toward the water's edge. Fletcher was far from the brightest of men, but Biddlecomb had to imagine he could handle so simple a task as the one assigned.

He stopped where the soft, dry sand turned firm and wet and peered off toward the east in hopes of seeing the fleet at anchor. The effort was no more productive than was cursing the unhappy Fletcher, but like cursing Fletcher it eased his discomfort a bit.

The fleet of course was not visible; the eastern end of Hog Island obstructed his view of Hanover Sound, as he knew it would. As he cursed again and began trudging back toward the troops, Fletcher, breathing hard and lathered in sweat like a draft animal, came running up.

‘Sir, sir,' he called, and Biddlecomb silently retracted all of the curses he had heaped on the man's head.

‘Fletcher, good man. Here, catch your breath. Okay, now, tell me what's acting?'

‘First light, sir, I looked out over the fleet, like you said.'

‘And …?'

‘Fleet's still there, sir, anchored in Hanover Sound.'

‘And the
Charlemagne
? Is the
Charlemagne
still at anchor?'

‘
Charlemagne
, sir?'

‘Yes, the
Charlemagne
,' Biddlecomb said, mentally adding, you bloody idiot. ‘You know, the brig I command? That you serve aboard?'

‘Oh, bless you, sir, I know what the
Charlemagne
is' – Fletcher grinned – ‘but I don't know if she's still at anchor or not.'

‘Well, what in hell were you looking at?'

‘I was looking to see if the fleet was still there, sir, which it is.'

‘You idiot,' Biddlecomb said out loud. ‘I don't give a damn about the fleet, I want to know if the
Charlemagne
's still there. Now get back to the fort and see if she's there and come back and tell me.'

‘Aye, sir, tell you if the
Charlemagne
's there,' Fletcher said, saluting and heading back up the beach.

‘Oh, and Fletcher?' Biddlecomb called.

‘Yes, sir?'

‘Run.'

With that prompting Fletcher stumbled off over the sand in an awkward gallop. Biddlecomb, watching him retreat, wondered how long it would take him to realize that he could just as easily run on the road rather than the soft sand beach.

Biddlecomb shook his head as he walked back up to the front of the column. Perhaps he should have sent someone a bit brighter this time. No, even Fletcher couldn't twice make a hash of so simple an order.

‘Time for us to move, Biddlecomb,' Nicholas said. The captain of marines was already standing at the head of the column; indeed, he alone had not sat down for the entire time that the column had halted on the road. ‘First Sergeant, get the men up. We're marching.'

Orders were shouted down the line, and three minutes later the invading army was on the move again, as if it had never stopped. The sun had by then made its appearance, and the island and the harbor were illuminated with the orange light of dawn. Before the marching men, long shadows led the way down the dirt road, and the thick vegetation of the island, wet with dew, was once again alive with twittering and buzzing and shrieking. Lizards still groggy from the morning cool sat on rocks along the road, gathering up the sun on their green and brown backs.

Twenty minutes later the dirt road yielded to cobblestones and the town of Nassau hove into sight. It was as lovely as Biddlecomb remembered: pastel brick houses, battened down with brightly colored shutters, spread over a low hill overlooking the western entrance to the harbor.

They marched on, and the road became Bay Street, lined on the inland side with stores of various descriptions, as well as taverns and less affluent homes. The sergeants no longer called for silence, having themselves joined in the animated discussions among the troops.

‘There.' Nicholas pointed toward the most imposing and prominent building, perched at the crest of the hill around which the town was built. ‘That ain't Fort Nassau, is it?'

‘No, no,' said Biddlecomb. ‘That's Government House, the governor's residence. Fort Nassau's just up this road a piece, about half a mile.'