The Seekers (46 page)

“I’ll have to answer you honestly—”

“I’d have it no other way.”

“I don’t know if I’m the sort to run a printing house.”

“Very well. Should anything happen to me, you must then rely on my general manager, Franklin Pleasant. He would be a good steward of the Kent interests until such time as you might decide to throw your lot with the firm—or, barring that, sell it. Naturally I’d hate to see it sold. But I won’t force you into a mold of my own devising. Your father was almost—never mind, that’s extraneous. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

Jared nodded slowly. He hesitated to speak what was in his thoughts. But his uncle’s frankness and the fire-shot darkness conspired to make his mood as somber as Gilbert’s. “I think you’re saying decisions should not be trusted to Aunt Harriet.”

“Yes, God forgive me.”

“I still think it’s premature to imagine something will hap—”

“Perhaps, perhaps,” Gilbert interrupted. “But indulge me a little while longer, if you please. It’s often struck me that a man’s life is something like one of those gambling games the clerics abhor. In cards, for instance, the outcome depends partly on what you’re dealt and what you draw by chance. At the same time, you have the opportunity to make choices—to show skill or lack of it, boldness or cowardice—in your disposition of the hand. A man also has certain things given to him. His capacity for learning. Sometimes his health—but those factors needn’t control him completely. They needn’t defeat him if they capriciously take charge for a while. That happens in this world, despite our best efforts to order our own lives—”

Jared remembered Stovall, remembered Ollie Prouty’s death.

“I know.”

“I want to share some thoughts about your life, Jared. How you might control and guide it in the years to come. As I said before, I’d never tell you exactly what to do, for reasons we won’t go into. But whatever you do and wherever you go, I do want and expect you to remember one thing. You are a Kent. A member of a family not content to simply prosper without concern for this country which makes prosperity possible for all. Everything we are—you are—is summed up in our odd penchant for collecting little souvenirs of the times in which we’ve lived. I’ve noticed the books and scientific samples in your room, for instance. During your absence, your aunt wanted to store them away. I said no. Those things are signs that you’re a Kent—as is that splinter of wood you brought home.”

He returned to the mantel. “As a Kent, I want you to share the reverence I have for these objects”—a hand encompassed the sword, the rifle, the bottle—“because they are the sum and symbol of the way your grandfather pledged his life to what he believed. Many men—and women—pledge themselves to nothing but their own self-interest. That’s not the Kent way. Not my way, and I hope not yours. If Kent and Son must vanish one day because you choose another course, don’t let these objects vanish—or what they represent. Guard them as you would your own life. Humor me in this, Jared—promise me you will revere and protect what you see before you.”

In a whisper, Jared said, “I will.”

And the voice of his doubt whispered in turn,
If I am strong enough. If I am not what my father was
—

He was conscious of Amanda’s upturned face, evidently still unnoticed by Gilbert. With an almost mystical fascination, she stared at the bottle and the firelit weapons.

“See that you live up to the words on that fob as well.”

“I’ll try.”

“Finally—take care of your cousin. I fear you are the only one who can do that adequately.”

Jared opened his mouth, ready to tell his uncle Amanda was listening. Young as she was, she apparently sensed the reason Gilbert spoke as he did; she understood his references to poor health and the possibility of death. Nestled against the chair, she had tears in her eyes.

Jared said, “I’ll take care of her, sir.”

Gilbert walked to the front windows, stared at the rainy darkness beyond the one remaining glass.

“If we survive and win this war—as we must—there will be great challenges for a man who is willing to look for them without fear. We are gaining new territory all the time. The pace of invention and technical progress is astounding. The United States can expand, and prosper. Despite greed and faulty thinking and all the cruelties and aberrations of the human condition, this nation can become something unlike any other state or kingdom in the world’s history. Your grandfather recognized that, I have tried to, and I want you to do the same. I hope you will not be drawn into selfish byways, but will stay on the high road—the road of cause and contribution and commitment. In the Kent family, that’s a kind of religion. Those are its altarpieces”—Jared’s gaze followed the slender hand back to the mantel—“and you are called to be one of its priests. Strong men of conviction will be needed, Jared. They are always needed, but they will be needed more and more urgently in the years ahead.”

He began to pace. “The country’s still in its infancy—growing, experimenting. Like a child, it could fall and flounder—and be abandoned by the march of history. Many questions over and above the immediate ones of this war remain to be resolved. The nation’s survival depends on their resolution. One is the matter of the franchise. I have thought long and hard on it, and I’ve concluded that although the men who founded this country had great wisdom and courage, in some respects they were narrow traditionalists. Influenced by an English heritage—a heritage of aristocracy. It was natural that American aristocrats should lead the drive for independence. It’s easier to find leaders among the rich simply because the rich can concern themselves with issues larger than making a living. But we’ve gone past that stage. If the principles of freedom Mr. Jefferson expressed so well are to have any validity, all men must have the basic right to control their government through their elected officials.
All
men, not merely those who meet their state’s voting requirements—so much money, so much property, so much education. Such requirements must be abolished or the democratic ideal is a sham.”

“Did President Jefferson really believe in freedom, Uncle? He still keeps slaves down in Virginia, doesn’t he?”

“Yes, he does. Like all human beings, he’s a study in contradictions. I doubt he’d ever favor granting the vote to a black man.”

“How do you feel about that?”

“I’d be horsewhipped for saying it, but I feel it must come. First, however, the whole slavery question must be addressed—and God knows where that confrontation will lead.”

“Would you even let women vote?”

“Oh, no, I draw the line there! Men are temperamentally suited to the tasks of the world. By their very nature, women are domestic creatures.”

Unseen by her father, Amanda scowled. Gilbert went on. “Another problem is this dreadful business of the northeast seceding—or talking about it. Some of my acquaintances claim that since the Constitution grants only certain powers to the central government, it therefore implies that the states retain all others—including the privilege of deciding whether to remain in the union or withdraw. However, that same document begins with the words, ‘We the people.’ It does not say, ‘We of the several states.’ Once founded by the consent of all, the union can’t be sundered at the whim of a few. Any other interpretation could tear this country apart. Men must recognize that danger. Be prepared to counter it—”

Again he pointed to the fob Jared was wearing.

“No matter where you are, or what you are, I expect you to be one of those men.”

Stunned into silence by everything his uncle had said, Jared simply stared into the dark, sunken eyes. At last, Gilbert smiled. “I think that’s quite enough for one evening. Shall we have another glass of port?”

“You didn’t finish the first one, sir.”

“So I didn’t! My mind wanders lately. Damned annoying—”

He passed a palm over his forehead. With a start, Jared saw that his uncle’s brow was wet with sweat. He was breathing in a raspy way. He groaned softly as he lowered himself into his chair, tousling his daughter’s hair.

Jared said, “She’s been listening too, Uncle.”

Gilbert looked at him. “Yes, I was aware.”

“You were? I thought—”

“I wanted her to hear. She’s just as much a Kent as you are, Jared.”

He bent and kissed his daughter’s cheek. The rain rattled on the planks. Jared helped himself to more wine, wondering whether he could ever live up to all his uncle expected of him.

Accompanied by a harpsichord moved in for the occasion, the baritone sang every verse of the song Jared now knew by heart:

The first broadside we poured

Swept their mainmast overboard,

Which made this lofty frigate look

Abandoned-O—

Then Dacres he did sigh,

And to his officers did cry,

“I did not think these Yankees were

So handy-O!”

Jared reflected dully that the songwriter had gotten things a bit mixed up;
Guerriere
’s mizzen, not her mainmast, had gone down under the first salvos.

Two more verses, he thought. Then the toasts begin. We’re going to broil here half the night.

But most of the several hundred men gathered in Faneuil Hall were enjoying the performance, tapping or stamping the beat of the drinking song to which new words had been set. Copies of the lyrics were available all over Boston in a fast-selling broadside.

With appropriate fervor, the baritone launched into the final verse:

Now fill your glasses full,

Lets drink a toast to Captain Hull,

So merrily we’ll push around

The brandy-O—

For John Bull may drink his fill,

And the world say what it will,

The Yankee tars for fighting are

The dandy-O!

Loud applause greeted the end of the song, and earned the baritone several bows. Jared sat back in his chair, folded his arms and closed his eyes. The hall was an inferno, and the dinner had made him sleepy. He ached for a breath of outside air, hot as it was. But since he couldn’t make a spectacle by walking out, a surreptitious nap was the next best thing.

A voice droned from the dais. Another was still droning when he woke up to discover nothing had changed, except for the temperature, which seemed more hellish than ever, and the quantity of pipe and cigar smoke, which had reached asphyxiating proportions.

In his place of honor, Captain Hull still looked quite alert and attentive, however. His cheeks gleamed like polished apples and his dress uniform was resplendent. At his right hand lay a velvet box containing a commemorative medal struck in gold at the order of the Congress. Silver medals had been struck for the officers. All of them were present on the dais except for Morris and Stovall, who were still under medical care.

“Won’t they ever stop?” one of the boys at the table whispered as yet another well-dressed gentleman rose to offer a toast.

“That’s only sixteen so far,” a second boy said.

“Fourteen,” said the first.

“It damn well seems like a hundred and fourteen!”

A gentleman at the next table shushed them. The speaker raised his glass. “Our infant navy! We must nurture the young Hercules in his cradle, if we mean to profit by the labors of his manhood!”

Every man in the hall stood up, and drank. Many stamped or shouted, “Hear!” The boys were required to stand but not to drink. Only the hardiest topers among them kept pace with the toasts, and that group didn’t include Jared.

The guests resumed their seats. Waiters brought more wine to each table. Jared perked up slightly when Gilbert, seated at the extreme left end of the dais, stood up with glass in hand. Jared noticed a few sour expressions when his uncle rose.

“Christ, he’s white as chalk,” a boy whispered as Gilbert cleared his throat. Jared sat forward, wide awake and alarmed. The boy was right.

Gilbert held his glass aloft.

“To unconditional victory! We have suffered the injuries and insults of despotism with patience, but its friendship is more than we can bear—”

A groundswell of grumbling greeted the extreme anti-British sentiment. But it hushed the instant the glass fell and broke.

Gilbert swayed, his eyes rolling up in his head. His fisted left hand jammed against the center of his chest. In the silence, his gasps could be heard in every corner of the hall.

Jared jumped up. Gilbert toppled, smashing china and dragging the tablecloth after him as he slid to the floor.

In the sharp air of late October,
Constitution
put to sea. Jared Kent was aboard. So was a new sixth lieutenant.

After the frigate passed Boston light, Jared looked back at the blur of the channel islands. Uncle Gilbert had suffered a seizure from which he had not yet recovered. His heart rhythm remained irregular. He’d been unconscious when Jared slipped in to kneel at his bedside and bid him a silent goodbye.

As the familiar coastline receded and the noisy routine of shipboard began in earnest, Jared remembered the responsibility with which Gilbert had charged him on the night of his homecoming. Gilbert had spoken of a premonition, too. Although the doctor continued to refuse comment, Jared still had the feeling his uncle had known much more about his own failing health than anyone in the household realized.

In a way, Jared was thankful Bainbridge had put to sea in company with
Hornet,
a twenty-gun sloop of war.

Shipboard gossip said they were to rendezvous with Captain David Porter’s
Essex,
thirty-six guns, then proceed south to search for enemy convoys bound around Cape Horn on their way to the Far East. Dangerous duty—but preferable to remaining behind while Aunt Harriet raved and wept over the injustice of her husband being struck down at age twenty-nine.

Constitution
swept out into the Atlantic. But distance couldn’t relieve Jared of worries about his uncle—

Or about his own ability to cope with the future, if he came home from the cruise to find himself the surviving male of the Kent family.