Hoare and the Portsmouth Atrocities (8 page)

The two stopped on the quarterdeck long enough to quiz Mr. Kingsley. He had nothing good to say about his late captain. Arthur Gladden had been by no means the only officer to suffer from Adam Hay's intemperate tongue. A few days before, Kingsley himself had withstood a half-hour diatribe on his slipshod work aboard and his whoremasterly work ashore. But unlike Arthur Gladden, Kingsley had kept tongue and temper in hand and had escaped undamaged except in his pride.

“He could say what he pleased about me performance as one of his officers,” said Kingsley, “but he had no business criticizin' me as a man of parts. Me parts are me own business, damn him,” he said. He sounded, Hoare thought, a trifle smug.

Hoare already knew this swarthy, saturnine officer by reputation. He had hired a little sailing shallop that he kept in the same slip where Hoare kept
Insupportable.
Kingsley was known to be a “man of parts” indeed, a ready and randy man with busy privates. He apparently cared nothing for a female's age or her looks as long as she was usable. Many hearts would weep for Peregrine Kingsley when
Vantage
sailed. There was a rumor that one heart in particular, one that should have been devoted to its owner's husband, was heavily smitten. However, the woman's name had not reached Hoare.

Mr. Kingsley had witnessed Arthur Gladden's flight from the cabin and had been one of the fascinated crowd that invaded it when word of the murder spread. That was all he knew, he said. Now, would the gentlemen mind if he deputized an intelligent midshipman to act as messenger for them? Things were a trifle busy aboard
Vantage,
as they may have noticed, and he had ten green gun crews to whip into shape.

The cabin reeked of stale shellfish and old tobacco smoke. Andrew Watt, captain's clerk, was already there, leafing anxiously through the papers littering his late master's table.

“A file is missing,” he said accusingly as the visitors entered.

“What sort of file?” Hoare asked.

“The file of Captain Hay's personal correspondence. There were several letters in it: one from Mrs. Hay ashore, several from tradesmen, and one which I could place in no category. The writing appeared to be that of a woman—self-taught, perhaps.”

“You are a student of handwriting, Mr. Watt?” Hoare whispered.

“Any man of my trade must attune himself to various scripts, sir,” the clerk said. “But I confess I have made a somewhat deeper study of the writing art than most of my associates.”

“Interesting,” murmured Hoare soundlessly.

Mr. Watt's eyes dropped to his hands.

“Yes?” Hoare whispered.

“I did not read them, of course, except that … The one from Captain Hay's wife. I assure you that under ordinary circumstances I would not have dreamed of reading it. I may not be a gentleman, but I try to behave as if I were. It was the enclosure with her letter which caused me to depart from propriety. Frankly, gentlemen, I am no longer ashamed that I did so.”

“Why?”

“In my service to Captain Hay, Mr. Hoare, I have occasionally dealt with highly confidential matters—matters so confidential, in fact, that they were recorded in ciphers. Captain Hay entrusted their decipherment to me. The enclosure with Mrs. Hay's letter to her husband was such a ciphered message. I could tell at a glance that it was not enciphered in any way familiar to me. Its presence, and that alone, led me to read Mrs. Hay's letter.

“It was no more than a note. As far as I recall, it read in part as follows:

“‘I found this in his uniform pocket last night. I know the sort of thing it is, and I do not believe he should be in possession of such a thing. But perhaps you gave it to him in connection with
Vantage.
'

“There was more, but nothing of a nature that would bear on this unhappy affair.”

“What do you make of that letter?” Hoare asked.

Obviously distressed, Mr. Watt shrugged. “I really do not know what to make of it, sir,” he said. “If we knew who
‘he'
was … but the letter gives us no clue.”

As a matter of fact, Hoare said to himself, the letter from wife to husband seemed to imply that “he”—whoever he was—was Mrs. Hay's lover, and known by the captain to be such. Here was an unwanted complication, and a doubly cryptic one at that.

“And the letter from the ‘uneducated woman,' Mr. Watt?”

“It appeared to be a threatening letter, sir. She appeared to want money for revealing something to the captain, or perhaps for not revealing it to someone else. I do not know which was the case, if either.”

“Well, then, Mr. Watt…” Hoare sighed. “Tell Mr. Gladden and me, in your own words, about the events of Friday night.”

“I came aft at seven bells, gentlemen, to deliver some dispatches which I had decoded for the captain. There was no guard at the cabin door, so I knocked twice and entered.”

“No guard, Mr. Watt? Was it not Captain Hay's standing order to have guards at his door and the spirits locker?”

“Yes, sir. But the Marine contingent was new-joined and may have been a bit confused, I think.”

“Unheard of,” Gladden said. “Never, never does one leave those posts unmanned.”

“Very good, Mr. Watt,” Hoare whispered. “Carry on with your story, if you please.”

“I stepped directly into a sticky, slippery mess.” Mr. Watt's voice trembled. “I found Captain Hay just outside the quarter-gallery. He was lying on his face in a trail of blood, as though he had been struck down near his cabin door. The blood flowed from a wound under his right shoulder blade.

“I knelt down beside him, sir, to see if there was anything I could do. I heard him say something about ‘the lobsters,' and then he choked. And…”

The clerk gulped but recovered himself.

“He coughed up his life's blood, sir, right across my knees, and … gave up the ghost then and there.”

“‘The lobsters'?” Hoare whispered. “Are you sure that's what you heard Captain Hay say?”

“That is what I understood him to say, sir. Of course, he was not speaking clearly, and I … I was a bit upset. I ran out the cabin door, shouting for help, and reported to Mr. McHale on the quarterdeck.

“Then, sir, I am ashamed to say I swooned and knew no more until I came to my senses as a result of being trampled by members of the crew. I am a peaceful man, sir, and the sight of blood disturbs me greatly. And it has ruined my second-best pair of breeches, which I can ill afford.”

“All things considered, Mr. Watt,” said Hoare, “you acquitted yourself creditably. You did your duty when it had to be done, and no captain could ask for more.”

He dismissed Mr. Watt now, with a request to find the midshipman who was supposed to be serving as messenger boy. Watt had no trouble finding him, for he opened the cabin door into the ear of a towheaded imp in a round jacket. Taking the child by the injured ear, Watt hauled him into the cabin, stood him up, and introduced him to the two officers as Mr. Prickett.

“You are to follow these gentlemen's orders, you young monster, and on the run. D'ye understand, then?” He shook the ear as if shaking his words into it to make sure they were absorbed.

“Yes, Mr. Watt, yes! Don't whang me so!” Mr. Prickett bleated, and began to snivel. He could not have been in uniform long, for when he wiped his nose on his sleeve it caught on the row of buttons placed there precisely to prevent his doing so. He began to weep in very earnest. He looked to be about eight.

“Be kind to him, sirs,” said Mr. Watt fondly. “He is very new, and very small.”

Wondering about the relationship between Mr. Watt and Mr. Prickett, Hoare again dismissed the clerk. Hoare was sensitive to anything smelling of sodomy.

“Do you know Mr. Watt well, then?” he asked the child.

Mr. Prickett cheered up immediately. “Oh, yes, sir! He was Papa's clerk before he decided to go to sea, and he prayed the captain to take me into
Vantage!
He has six daughters! Papa's a solicitor!
Vantage
is my first ship, sir, you know! I was first aboard, sir! After Mr. Courtney and the captain, that is! I came aboard with Mr. Watt! Isn't she a smacker?”

Hoare assumed the “smacker” the child was referring to was
Vantage.
He wondered if the six daughters were the reason why a “peaceful man,” as the clerk had described himself, had decided to join the Navy.

“Indeed. Now, Mr. Prickett,” Hoare said, “have you been aboard long enough to know Mr. Hopkin, the surgeon? If so, is he aboard?”

“Yes, sir! He was just telling us men of the gun-room mess about Mr. Wallace's Awful Wound and how it bled!”

“Well, please be so good as to find him, present my compliments, and ask him to favor us with his company in the cabin.”

Hoare had Mr. Prickett repeat his orders and found that, while he was apparently unable to speak without exclaiming, he had a good memory, so he sent the lad on his errand.

*   *   *

“W
ELL MET AGAIN
, gentlemen,” said Mr. Hopkin upon entering. Like the other officers, he had to stoop to clear
Vantage
's five-foot overhead, so all three seated themselves. “I wish I could say this occasion is a more pleasant one.”

“I am of a similar mind, sir,” replied Gladden for them both. “But so it is in war.”

“I hope your patient is none the worse for his misadventure of this morning?” Hoare asked. “With your permission, I would like to interview him.”

“I would not mind, sir, not in the least, provided he is sober enough to talk. I find that the drunker a man is, the faster the work proceeds. The ball passed through only one of Mr. Wallace's buttocks, missing the anus entirely. It cut no important vessels on its way and carried into the wound only a few fragments of his breeches. I probed them out easily, he having had the sense to wear buckskins for the encounter. Leather extracts much easier than fabric, you know.

“To tell the truth, the man's probably better for a bit of bloodletting—a plethoric nature, you understand. And, of course, he now has not one arsehole but two, in case he should mislay the one he was born with.”

Mr. Hopkin had no apparent interest in ending his case history. Hoare ended it for him with a terse request that the surgeon address himself to the matter of his late captain's death.

“It was a simple wound, sir. Triangular in cross section, from a blade thrust into the victim's back on the right side. It slipped between the ribs and slanted to the left and forward as it entered. It nicked the aorta and pierced the left lung. The damaged aorta burst, perhaps as the victim collapsed on the deck, and he exsanguinated through the wound and from his mouth.”

“Was Captain Hay's death immediate, or could he have spoken before he died?”

Hopkin looked at Hoare pityingly. “Since he crawled nearly twenty feet, sir, I would expect him to be able to speak a few words. It takes a pig a minute or more to bleed to death, and I'm sure you've heard
their
dying prayers.”

Gladden paled.

“Now as to the wound,” Hoare whispered. “You say it was triangular in cross section?”

“Yes,” the doctor replied. “Or
V
-shaped. Narrow at the base, long on the edges. It was obviously inflicted by the Marine bayonet that lay on the deck halfway between the captain's table and the door. There it is, on the table, under those papers, where I put it.

“The man using the weapon worked it about in the wound before withdrawing it, as though he wanted to be sure to accomplish his fell purpose.”

“Not my poor faint-hearted brother,” said Peter Gladden. He rose and begged leave to excuse himself and go ashore. “I want to take Arthur a clean pair of his breeches, at least,” he added.

“Of course,” said Hoare. “Perhaps you would undertake a task for me when you get to shore?”

“Anything.”

“Have the watch and the Portsmouth beachcombers keep their eyes peeled for a discarded Marine uniform coat. It might have come ashore on any of the last few tides, since we are coming up on the spring tides. Either on the Portsmouth or the Gosport side of the harbor mouth.”

“A Marine uniform?”

After a pause, Hoare went on. “Lobsters. Captain Hay was dining on lobsters Friday evening, was he not?”

“That's what we are told.”

“And the clerk said he overheard the captain say something about ‘lobsters' as he died. But no one has even suggested the man was poisoned by tainted lobsters, have they?”

“Not that I know of,” said Bennett.

“Then he would have been referring to the other kind of lobster.”

“Eh?”

“The other kind of Lobster. Marines,” Hoare whispered. “Yes. Find Jom York. He will dig the uniform out if it is there to be dug.”

“A Marine uniform. Jom York,” Gladden repeated in a bemused voice, rising to leave. “Aye aye, sir. Perhaps you will tell me about Jom York sometime?” he asked.

“Let us meet at the Anchor,” Hoare said, “and I shall do so then. We must also question your brother, for there is not a minute to be lost. Thursday is almost upon us.”

Upon Gladden's departure but before dismissing Mr. Hopkin, Hoare asked him if he had any notion of why Captain Hay would keep a Marine bayonet in his cabin.

“It's common knowledge, sir,” Mr. Hopkin said. “He was in hopes of introducing into the Marine service a hilted sword bayonet of his own design, similar to the ‘swords' carried by Riflemen. He kept two bayonets here: a regulation socketed one and one with a grip of his own design. Here.”

Without asking Hoare's leave, Hopkin ruffled through the papers on the captain's table and uncovered two bayonets. They were as described, Hoare saw. Taking them from the surgeon, he inspected them closely.

“This one is clean, Mr. Hopkin, but the regulation one still has dried blood on it. Are you quite sure you did not wipe off the sword bayonet after removing it—as a matter of professional habit?”