Norton, Andre - Novel 08 (11 page)

           
 
But if he did walk off the privateer, he would
leave behind him an unfinished business which he knew would plague him the rest
of his life. For some reason Ninnes hated him—almost as much as he had disliked
Ninnes from the start—hated him enough to risk the Captain's good will which he
valued above everything else. And Fitz could not go now, allowing Ninnes to
believe that he had been driven away.

 
          
 
And even if there weren't Ninnes to think about
—Fitz looked around the narrow cabin where he crouched, every inch of it so
jealously used. Overhead he could hear the shuffle of feet as the watch
changed. The thick smell of salt, bilge water, and unwashed clothing made a fog
about him. Somehow all of this was right and proper and belonged. It was harder
for him to recall riding planted fields. He fitted into a place in this new
world—awkwardly perhaps, like a nail not driven in quite straight—but in the
right place to hold some essential boards together.

 
          
 
He was not leaving ship in St. Malo—if Crofts
would keep him on. He would simply not remind the Captain of their agreement.

 
          
 
Somewhat comforted, as if he had escaped an
alarming but elusive menace, Fitz crawled into his hammock and fell asleep at
once.

 
          
 
I often have been told

 
          
 
That the British seamen bold

 
          
 
Could beat the tars of
France
neat and handy.

 
          
 
But they never met their match,

 
          
 
Till the Yankees did them
catch,

 
          
 
For the Yankee tars for fighting are the
dandy.

 
          
 
—the Constitution and the Guerriere

 
          
 
For generations St. Malo had existed as a
well-regulated hornets' nest, which even the redoubtable
Marlborough
—though he had burned her sister town of
St. Servan
across the bay—had not been able to reduce
to a proper humility. The fishermen of that old island town, who dared to sail
the North Atlantic and take their toll from the Grand Banks half the world
away, were not men to be dictated to easily or often. And when war came they
turned joyfully to the business of privateering, needling their ancient enemy
across the Channel with force and fervor.

 
          
 
The Retaliation might have had some trouble
winding her path through the maze of granite blocks, half hidden in the sea,
which guarded the outer approaches to the safety of the harbor. But shortly
after dawn she | fell in with one of the Malouin raiders, port bound,
shepherding before her two fat prizes. Compliments having been exchanged in the
grand manner, the American fell in behind the victor and won into an anchorage
which was probably safer for her than her own
Baltimore
.

 
          
 
St. Malo rose out of the Ranee's mouth like a
vision from a fairy tale. With foundations on the solid granite of a small
isle, the town was completely enclosed by a thick wall built in the
middle ages
, with only the tops of the castles and towers
showing above it. Fitz had never seen anything to equal it as he stood on deck,
marveling at the activity on the docks, while the welcoming cannon boomed out
salutes to the successful Malouin ship and her escort from overseas.

 
          
 
The American
crew, one and
all, were
determined to get ashore as soon as possible. A town which
made its living from the sea would know best how to enter-i tain a
sailor,
and Fitz guessed that Crofts might well have a real
mutiny on his hands if he did not grant shore leave. He himself was as eager as
any to see what lay behind those massive walls which girt the French
stronghold.

 
          
 
However, as the youngest and least important
officer on board, he saw no way of realizing that desire—until j after his
elders and betters had done as they wished.
' But
an
interview with the Captain changed his prospects.

 
          
 
"Mr. Lyon," the Captain spoke
abruptly before he had time to come to full attention, "do you find
yourself at ease in the French tongue?"

            
"I can speak it a little,
aye, sir."

            
“With as murderous an accent as
all the rest of us, I suppose. Well, since most ashore speak Breton anyway, I
cannot complain too much. Dr. Watts wishes to gather some supplies and has
asked that you accompany him. If you are not on duty, you may do so. I need not
remind you, sir, that ashore my
crew are
to conduct
themselves in as circumspect a manner as possible. These Saint Malouins are
somewhat hot of temper and do not brook a haughty spirit in return."

 
          
 
Fitz thought resentfully that the Captain need
not retravel this familiar road. He was as thoroughly sick of his exploit on
the dark deck as Crofts could wish him to be. And if the Captain thought he was
going to act the gamecock ashore he was badly mistaken.

 
          
 
However he could not suppress a thrill of
excitement as he walked with
Watts
through the gate, past the thick walls of the rampart. The surgeon prodded the
stone with his cane as they passed.

 
          
 
"You can walk all around the town on top
of this. If we have time we shall try it.
Lord, what a smell
and what a noise!"

 
          
 
The streets of St. Malo were cramped, and the
ancient houses looked like thin slivers of stone pointing up into the sky. Fitz
could well imagine armored crossbow men clanking down the cobbled way before
him. Though all that really walked there, was an amply pet-ticoated matron, her
starched Breton bonnet wide as a sail in the breeze. The screech of oxcarts and
the smell of very dead fish made a vigorous assault on the ear and the nose, as
Watts
had already remarked.

           
 
"How do they breathe here?" Fitz
wondered. The closely packed houses certainly shut off all air except a certain
musty exhalation which appeared to belong to the ages themselves.

 
          
 
"One doubtless becomes used to it,"
Watts
answered absently, consulting a list he had
taken from his pocket. "I grant you that it seems a little confined. But
this is a rich town—it lives on loot. Look you
here "

 
          
 
He pulled Fitz's sleeve until the marine came
to stand before a small, many-paned shop window. Behind the polished bluish
glass hung a length of stuff which made the Marylander gasp in surprise. The
filmy golden tissue, caught here and there with a flashing star which appeared
to be a part of the fabric, was like nothing he had ever seen before.

 
          
 
"East Indian,"
Watts
identified it.
Taken out
of one of the worshipful company's homeward-bound ships, no doubt.
Malouins can bathe in tea and drape their persons in that kind of thing to
their heart's content if they so desire. They've been bred to the privateering
trade while we're as yet the merest dame-school boys learning the horn book of
it."

 
          
 
Fitz looked wonderingly at the brown-faced,
rather soberly dressed citizens who passed. "They're not so tough
looking," he observed a bit doubtfully.

 
          
 
"You haven't seen them in action. And
then, too, this is the merchants' quarters. Go down into the waterfront dens
our men are yearning for and you'll see Saint Malo's teeth, all shining and
bright. They have a regular procedure which they follow in wartime—they load
one of their fishing boats with as many fine fellows as they can pack aboard,
sail out into a homeward-bound English convoy, dump a round number of fighters
on the nearest merchantman and leave them to battle it out, while their boat
sails on to repeat the trick with the next ship. And very seldom is such a
boarding party pushed back into the sea. Malouins can fight. And here we are
"
Watts
had been reading street signs, and now he
popped into a shop doorway. Fitz followed, rather disliking
to
change
the open street for a dark shop where the strong and awful smells
fought in savage battle.

 
          
 
By the bunched herbs on the wall and the jars
set around on the shelves, he identified the place as an apothecary's shop.
Watts
, in stumbling French, had plunged into a
duel of words with the owner. Each raised his voice to make his speech more
intelligible to the poor benighted foreigner, and each understood perhaps one
word in four of what the other spouted forth.

 
          
 
Fitz stared at a jar on the counter and
recognized in the viscous liquid it contained a kind of lizard creature. The
thing's white and sightless eyes were slewed around so that they were
apparently regarding him in a most disconcerting fashion. He speculated as to
how it was intended to serve the cause of medicine, as
Watts
won his side of the argument. At last the
shopkeeper was bringing out a series of packeted powders and roots, each of
which the surgeon opened and smelled or tasted before he accepted or rejected
them.

 
          
 
"That's finished." With a sigh of
relief
Watts
watched the packets being made into a
bundle, which was ticketed with a slip he had written out.

 
          
 
"What—no lizards?" Fitz tapped the
jar on the counter with his fingernail and the lizard obediently swayed a
trifle.

 
          
 
Watts
examined the glassed creature.
"Ugly brute.
I
suppose that sells as a genuine dragon or some such nonsense. As if a bit of
that pounded up would stop lung fever! Short of scaring a child out of his wits
I cannot see that it has any value. Now I'm for a shore meal that is not
flavored with bilge water and shark broth."

 
          
 
Fitz speedily forgot the lizard. "For the
first time this morning I am one with you," he returned. "Where does
one dine in Saint Malo?"

 
          
 
"There is the Golden Cock,"
Watts
began to count on his fingers, "and
the Basket of
Plums "

 
          
 
"You've been here before?"

 
          
 
"No. But Saint Malo has been a port of
call for other ships from
Baltimore
and such information gets around. Clauswitz of the Fidelity made a list
for me six months ago when I was first put in mind of sailing on a privateer.
I've some good addresses in
London
, too. Remind me to name them for you."

 
          
 
Fitz laughed dutifully but
Watts
remained sober.

 
          
 
"I mean that, my boy. If were snapped up
out in the
Channel "

 
          
 
"We go to Mill Prison and starve,"
Fitz returned. "I've heard plenty of tales about that, and your addresses
in
London
wouldn't be worth much to anyone in a
Plymouth
prison."

 
          
 
"Not if he stays there, naturally. But a
good many men have won free. There was
Henderson
of the Darter —he racketed around half of
England
after he walked out of Mill before he
decided he'd done enough sightseeing and shipped out on a smuggler to the
continent. No, Mill Prison is not the final end for any American if he is
resourceful. And there are those who will help him along his way, too. Not that
I should have to worry —being noncombatant I'd probably give my parole and rot
until I could get passage home again. Well, here is the Golden Cock. Shall we
dine?"

 
          
 
Fitz and
Watts
were bowed to one of the better tables by
the proprietor himself. But the marine was more interested in what the surgeon
had been saying than he was in the proffered refreshment.

 
          
 
"You mean that there are Englishmen who'd
help an escaped prisoner of war out of the country?" he demanded, after
the waiter had taken their order.