Hoare and the Portsmouth Atrocities (6 page)

She was as safe here as she would be anywhere in England. Guilford the docker-watchman was alert and sober, well paid by a group of amateur sailors to keep pilferers off their darling yachts. Among these gentlemen, Hoare himself was a mere hanger-on, tolerated for his competence and general courtesy rather than for the depth of his pockets or his obscure lineage.

Guilford knuckled his forehead. “There's a norficer been askin' for ye, sir. 'E'll be waitin' for ye up to the Anchor,” he said.

“The warning's welcome,” Hoare whispered. “My little girl could use watering if you have the chance, eh?” He handed the man a shilling.

“Aye aye, sir,” Guilford said.

Hoare let himself out of the dock enclave through the barred gate set in its wall and crossed the cobbled Shore Street, bearing to starboard a point or two to make the inn where he lodged. The sign over its open half-door displayed a huge ornate fishy creature with rolling eyes, about to engulf an anchor being cast into the sea by the panicked crew of a galleon tempest-toss'd. The sign's whole effect was quite well suited to the Swallowed Anchor Inn that it proclaimed.

If Hoare's visitor was an officer, he would be in the snug—the private bar to the right of the entrance. So there Hoare went, having adjusted his neckerchief. Upon seeing him, the room's sole occupant rose from his seat and advanced.

“Mr. Hoare?” A half-head shorter than Hoare, the speaker would outweigh him by a full stone. Life had painted him in primary colors. Beneath his carefully tousled corn-yellow hair were bright blue eyes and lobster-red cheeks. Before someone or something had broken his aquiline nose, his handsome face must have broken many hearts among the fair sex. A bit of a naval fop, perhaps, thought Hoare, but probably a man of his hands withal.

“Bartholomew Hoare, at your service, sir,” Hoare whispered, taking the other's outstretched hand. “And whom do I have the honor…?”

“Peter Gladden, sir, second in
Frolic,
22.”

“You have a fortunate berth, sir. I have heard good things about your brig.”

“She is a fine vessel, to be sure,” Mr. Gladden said. “But I am not calling on
Frolic
's business.

“Will you take wine, sir?” he added.

Hoare smiled and folded his considerable length into the seat across the table as if he were one of those novel American jackknives.

“Happily, Mr. Gladden. But I insist on being host. I live here, after all.” Hoare laughed. A young lady of his acquaintance had once described his breathy little laugh as sounding like a kitten trying to blow out a candle.

“The house offers a very nice Canary,” he went on. “Can I entice you?”

“Very willingly, sir,” Gladden said.

Hoare drew his boatswain's call and blew a soft trill.

“Coming, sir, coming!” came a cheerful soprano voice from the next room. “Just let me finish the sandwiches for you and your guest. You'll be having our Canary, sir?”

Tweet
went the call.

“And coffee?”

Hoare looked inquiringly at his guest.

“Later, perhaps,” Gladden said.

Tweetle.
Hoare stowed the call. “You see, Mr. Gladden,” he said, “I have the staff of the Swallowed Anchor well trained. I hope you will forgive me my unkempt appearance,” he went on. “I just came across from Weymouth, you see. Aboard small craft I find seaman's trousers handier than breeches.”

“I saw you bringing your yacht into the dock,” Gladden said. “Odd rig, is it not?”

“Quite unusual,” Hoare said. “I saw the Bermuda natives using it in their work boats when
Sybil
called there in ought-one. It struck me as easy for one man to handle, and efficient as well. So when I bought her last year, I copied the rig as best I could remember.”

He stopped for breath and then continued, “I have been quite pleased with her behavior ever since. She points closer to windward than any other craft I know.”

Hoare did not add that, since
Insupportable
had more than supported herself on her winnings last summer, he was now hard put to it to find a match except at impossible odds-on.

A sturdy, pink young woman in a bright blue gown that matched her eyes stepped into the parlor and set a tray on the table between the two officers. It bore sandwiches, glasses, and a decanter of Canary.

“There you are, gentlemen,” she said briskly.

“Thank you, Susan.” Hoare filled both glasses and raised his. “To
Frolic.
”

“To…,” Gladden began in reply, “… but how have you named your yacht?”

“Insupportable,”
whispered Hoare with a smile of anticipation. He had traveled this road before.

Gladden spluttered and nearly spilled his Canary onto his snowy waistcoat.

Hoare went on with the practiced recital he had given Dr. Graves, Sir Thomas, and so many others before them. He ended as usual by saying, “She just answers her helm, and very well, too, at that.”

Gladden's peal of laughter was genuine. “So you are commodore of an entire magical squadron,” he said. “Hope you have kept your secret from Boney.”

“I think I have,” Hoare said. “But one never can tell. ‘The spies of France are rife among us,' as they say. But, Mr. Gladden, I am sure you have not called on me to investigate my ability to keep the secret of my ‘squadron,' as you kindly call her.” He paused, eyebrows raised in inquiry.

“No, sir, I am here to trouble you on a matter of justice.”

“Of justice, sir?”

“Yes. Although you and I have never met, my surname may be familiar to you. My younger brother, Arthur, served with you at one time.”

“Arthur Gladden?” Hoare said. “Why, yes. He was unlucky enough to be assigned me in Lymington for some weeks, to help in the horrid Impress Service …
ah.
Of course. Am I mistaken? Has an officer of that name not just been put ashore at the dockyard, under close arrest?”

“I fear so. He is third lieutenant of
Vantage.
You may not know of her; she is newly built and just commissioned.”

“Oh, dear. Yes. He is accused of murdering her captain, I believe … Adam Hay.”

“I fear so,” Gladden said again. “And, since
Frolic
happened to be in port, he asked me to be his friend.”

Hoare nodded. “His advocate and defender, yes. Naturally.”

“But I know nothing about courts-martial, sir,” said Gladden. “I'm a seaman, not a damned lawyer. I hardly know how to begin.” Gladden's voice rose. “And he cannot have done such a thing, He is a gentle man as well as a gentleman. He hates killing. Father was never able even to get him to shoot. Frankly, he should have taken orders, but Father would not have it. No, he had to become a sailor, just like Father, and just like me.

“It is right enough for me. I like the life. Always have. But for him … for him, it has been slow death.”

Hoare forbore to remark that, under the circumstances, death for Arthur Gladden might not be so slow after all. To be shot to death in action was a faster matter than dangling and strangling for minutes at some yardarm. The outcome, of course, was the same.

“And what is it you want of me? To undertake your brother's defense in lieu of yourself? As you know, of course, the service doesn't look kindly upon officers who cannot defend themselves before a court-martial. They feel it reflects upon the ‘friend' as well as upon the defendant.”

Hoare's whisper began to fade. He paused and took a sip of wine before continuing. Even so, the whisper was now a weary rasping noise, nasty to listen to and hard to make out.

“Besides, Mr. Gladden, I find it very tiring to speak at any length. You may have noticed that after a bit I must … er … set storm canvas, so to speak, if I am to be understood even in a quiet spot like this. No. If that is what you are seeking of me, I fear I am not your man.” Hoare sat back, unconsciously rubbing the scar just above his kerchief.

“But, sir, Admiral Hardcastle tells me you have an uncanny talent for ‘untying knotty problems.' Forgive the flight of fancy, but that is precisely what he said.”

“I know. The Admiral's secretaries have been known to refer to me as ‘the Whispering Ferret.' Quite gothick, it seems to me, but why trouble myself about it? Those pompous, preening pen-pushing pimps would hardly say it to my face, and I need not worry about what they call me behind my back. I have been out too often.” Hoare's whisper began to fade again.

Mr. Gladden would be neither diverted nor discouraged. “Admiral Hardcastle also said he would be greatly obliged if you would take poor Arthur's case in hand.”

“Admiral Hardcastle said that, did Admiral Hardcastle?”

Admiral Sir George Hardcastle, KB, was currently Port Admiral at Portsmouth, one of the highest and most lucrative posts to which a naval officer could aspire. Bartholomew Hoare's current ultimate commander, he was known as a grim, merciless man.

“Well, sir, that puts a different face on things, does it not?” Hoare said. “Let me think a bit.” He refilled both glasses. “Tell you what,” he added. “Suppose you carry on officially for your brother. And I shall stand just behind your ear and … er …
whisper
instructions into it with my foul rum-laden breath as long as you can stand it.”

“I should be overjoyed,” Gladden said. “How are we to begin?”

“Begin at the beginning,” Hoare replied. “Go on to the end, and then stop.”

“Well,” began Gladden, “on Tuesday last, as Arthur tells me, Captain Hay summoned him to his cabin ‘to give an account of himself.' It seems the captain was displeased with the lack of discipline shown by the men in Arthur's division. All waisters, they are; of course, all the crew are new hands—new to
Vantage,
that is, and most of them new to the service. Lumpkins who have yet to see their first anchor weighed. Arthur had to get all of these.

“Even the standing officers are new to the ship and to one another. They have a long way to go before they shake down together.

“Do you—did you—know Captain Hay, Mr. Hoare?”

“Know
of
him, sir.”

“Hot-tempered. Greedy. Bullying,” Gladden suggested.

“Command sometimes changes a man in disappointing ways, don't you find?” Hoare replied, managing to make his whisper sound noncommittal. “I have also heard,” he continued, “that he is—was—a believer in hard, continued practical training, at anchor as well as at sea. And I confess that I agree. After all, the crew of any vessel must be ready to work their ship and fight it, too, night or day, and in all weathers. Should they not have done so as a part of their training in harbor before they face reality at sea and in battle? But I interrupt you.”

“In any case,” Gladden went on, “Captain Hay made it clear to Arthur that he expected his division to show a marked improvement in discipline and in their performance in the drills to which he had set
Vantage
's entire crew.”

“Which were?”

“As you might expect, they included exercises on deck and aloft—setting up and housing topmasts, exercising the great guns, setting and furling sail, and the like. The men were expected to respond intelligently to emergencies. Arthur tells me the captain took special pleasure in ‘killing off' key men—quartergunners and the like—and watching the confusion that resulted. The more confusion, the more wrathful was Captain Hay, and the happier.

“But it was apparently his captain's manner toward my brother that caused the explosion between the two. It seems that Captain Hay was extremely partial to what he called ‘drunken lobsters'—lobsters stewed in hock instead of seawater as is usual. I understand he claimed that because they died dead drunk and happy, the creatures ate more tender. His steward had made up a brace of them for his dinner.

“Arthur had reported aft the moment the order reached him. That would have been shortly after six bells of the second dogwatch. We know that, for unfortunately, his arrival in the cabin coincided with the lobsters'. Captain Hay insisted on having his dinner served at six bells precisely.

“As soon as Arthur reported, the captain began to recite a virtual litany of my poor brother's manifold sins and wickednesses. He had failed to report cases of insubordination in his division—answering back, for instance. His gunners were by far the slowest to run out their guns and complete dumb-show firing at anchor, his few topmen fumble-footed.

“The captain accused him of having interrupted his feast on purpose, out of perverse insolence. It was this accusation, I gather, that led poor Arthur to protest his captain's abuse … at length. It seems Captain Hay was so enraged at my brother's outburst that he roared with anger, sprang from behind his dining table, and actually grappled with him.”

“Dear me,” whispered Hoare.

“Here, sir, the stories diverge. Arthur swears to me he broke free by an extreme effort. My brother is not a very strong man. He fled the cabin at a panicked run, not stopping until he had gone the full length of the frigate and reached the heads. Here he was overcome by nausea and a looseness. I am ashamed to say he admits to having fouled his breeches before he could drop them—as indeed I could sense all too well when I visited him in his place of confinement ashore.

“Others of
Vantage
's people tell a somewhat different story. A quartermaster, one Patrick Lynch, had the watch on the quarterdeck. Lynch says that he heard the altercation, even from two decks below, and that in his opinion it culminated with a shout of pain and not of rage. Yet John McHale, master, was within feet of Lynch and says he heard nothing.”

“‘Altercation,' Mr. Gladden? ‘Culminated'? The man Lynch sounds more like a schoolmaster than a quartermaster. Were those his very words?”