Tide of War (33 page)

“I am in the service of God and my Church,” replied the monk mildly, “and as to any division of spoils, unhappily sworn to a vow of poverty, though a small donation to the Franciscan Order would not be refused.”

“So God and His Britannic Majesty are on the same side in this war?”

“It is unusual I agree but yes, it would seem so, for the time being. As we face a common enemy.”

“Satan? Or the French?”

“You are splitting hairs. At least while the French pursue their current policies with regard to the Church of Rome.”

Gabriel returned with the wine. Nathan raised his glass. “Well, let us drink to their confusion.”

“And the blessing on those that confound them.” The monk drank with satisfaction and raised the bottle to the light. “An excellent Bordeaux. Your own choice?”

“I regret not. I know very little of wines. It was in the stock of our late, lamented captain.”

“Ah yes. Whom we are about to avenge.”

“Let us hope so. You are to advise me on the Army of Lucumi, I am told.”

“Really?” The monk raised an ironic brow. “I fear someone must have taken my customary loquaciousness for knowledge. What was it you wished to know?”

“ Well, an assessment of their number and disposition would be helpful, along with an inventory of the weapons at their disposal and an opinion of their ability to use them.”

“There you have me,” said the monk, shaking his head. “I am an innocent in such matters.”

Nathan regarded him with a curious smile. “Perhaps, then, it is as a spiritual adviser that you have been attached to me.”

“Do you
need
spiritual advice?”

“Very probably. But I have been exposed to so many heresies, it would only depress you.” He frowned. “Lucumi? Now I think on it, is
that
not a heresy?”

“It is. Sometimes known as Santeria, the worship of the saints, and widespread among those of African descent. However, there are those in the priesthood that are inclined to tolerance, provided it poses no threat to the Roman religion and its adherents continue to observe the approved forms of worship. The Army of Lucumi may provoke a change of view.”

“Do
you
consider them a threat?”

The monk considered. “It is a little early to say. Certainly, given what has happened in Hispaniola one must be on one's guard.” He lapsed into a brooding silence, staring into his glass, but just as Nathan was about to speak he looked up and said, “I am opposed to slavery, by the way. Probably as much as your Mr. Wilberforce. But what has
happened in Hispaniola—in both the French and Spanish parts of the island—is gross beyond imagining. What the whites have suffered is nothing to what the blacks will suffer—and are suffering—in retaliation. And were I myself black I believe I would be wary of the promises of those that have been sent from France to stir the slaves into rebellion. The moment they are rid of the Spanish and the English and the tricolour is flying in Port-au-Prince and the people of France are clamouring for their coffee and their sugar, there will be as much liberty, equality and fraternity as there was before—or there is in Paris now—and Toussaint L'Ouverture will be one of the first to comprehend it.”

“ Well, that may well be the case but I must be honest with you, my prime concern is with the mutineers. I have neither the desire nor the means to crush a slave revolt in Cuba.”

“Even if the French become involved?”

“Is there a danger of that?”

“A very great danger. In fact, I should not be surprised if the French commander and your friend Mr. Imlay were not discussing the possibilities at this very moment in the stern cabin of the
Virginie”

Nathan considered him carefully. He was aware that the monk would be telling him a mere fraction of what he knew.

“What does Imlay have to do with this, or the
Virginie
for that matter?”

“A good question—and one that has been occupying my mind for some little while.” He studied his glass thoughtfully and Nathan, seeing that it was almost empty, refreshed it from the bottle at his elbow.

“Thank you. Yes. Imlay. When I met him, in the Havana, I could not be certain that he was the same man, though I had my suspicions.”

“The same man?”

“Gilberto. Agent Number 37. The
American
agent.”

Nathan recalled what he had been told by Carondelet. Agent Number 37 had clearly made something of a name for himself. But it was better to plead ignorance in the hope of learning more.

“I am afraid you will have to explain yourself, for I am entirely at sea.”

“As was I until recently, when I had news of Imlay's more recent activities in Paris.”

“Imlay's activities in Paris?” Nathan repeated slowly, as if these too were a total mystery to him. As indeed at times they had been. From the look he received in return he had to wonder if Brother Ignatius knew something of his own adventures in the French capital—but that could not be possible, even for a man of his insights and connections.

“Indeed. A veritable web of intrigue. It has taken me a little time and energy to unravel and even now I would not claim to comprehend more than a small part of it. However”—he took another sip of wine—”let me tell you what little I know. In 1783, the year that gave birth to the United States, Gilbert Imlay found himself unemployed in Philadelphia. He claimed the rank of captain in Washington's Army but no-one seemed sure of what he did to earn it. Certainly he appears to have seen very little active service. Some say he had been working as a spy behind British lines in New Jersey, others that he had been spying for the British. Certainly there are those in his own family who appear to believe this to this day and have entirely disowned him. But he retained—he still retains—the friendship of a select group of former officers known to be loyal to General Washington and known colloquially as ‘Washington's Boys.' Those with an interest in such matters speculate that he was what is known in the profession as a double agent, apparently working for both sides, though his true loyalties are something of a mystery, if indeed he
has
any true loyalties, apart from to himself.”

Nathan made no comment, though he sensed from the look he was given that the monk was rather hoping for a contribution at this stage.

“Well, within a year or so of the war's end he has become an explorer, a frontiersman, a companion of mountain men and adventurers—oh, and a land speculator, for whatever else he is there is always the hard-headed businessman in it somewhere. And as the frontier pushes westward and southward, he becomes involved in a conspiracy to invade
Spanish Louisiana, to either claim the territory for the United States or to declare an independent republic. But alas for these adventurers, the conspiracy is exposed by the Spanish authorities and denounced by the United States Government who, fearing that it may lead to war with Spain, order the arrest of the leading conspirators, Imlay included. He goes to ground, not for the first or the last time, and turns up, interestingly, in the Spanish territory of western Florida where he is employed by the authorities there as a spy—Agent Number 37. You do not appear surprised. Perhaps you have heard this story before.”

“It was the suspicion of the Baron de Carondelet,” Nathan admitted. “But I am interested to hear what more you can add to the account.”

“Ah yes, Baron de Carondelet, an excellent man. His superiors should heed him more, but I fear that the Spaniards have a very poor estimation of the Flemish, considering them dull, even stupid. Much as the English regard the Irish.”

“I do not believe the English have ever considered the Irish dull,” Nathan informed him. “Indeed we would wish them duller at times. But do not let me divert you.”

“Well, let us stay with Imlay. In as much as we can. Some time in the early nineties he turns up in Paris, then in the throes of Revolution. He makes important friends on the Committee of Public Safety. In particular Citizen Robert Lindet and Citizen Lazare Carnot, who have an interest in international affairs. At some stage—shortly after Spain and Great Britain have entered the war—he writes a memorandum for them in which he details plans for the invasion and conquest of Spanish Louisiana.”

He observed Nathan's expression. “You had no intimation of this?”

“None at all. I am astonished.”

“ Well, knowing that the French are more interested in sugar and coffee than they are in swamps and the creatures that inhabit them, Imlay proposed that the region of New Orleans and its adjoining coastline would make a perfect base for an assault upon the British and Spanish possessions in the West Indies. Indeed he had plans for a general revolt, not only among the French settlers of Louisiana—the
Cajuns—but also among the slaves of the West Indies. But”—he spread his hands—”the plans come to nothing. The French have other preoccupations. It is the time of the Terror. The time of Robespierre. The only man of any importance who appears interested is Citizen Danton—but he is not in power. Indeed, he is very much out of power and in April of that year he himself becomes a victim of the guillotine. Imlay goes to ground. Or underground perhaps.”

Again that little smile of secret understanding and though Nathan kept his expression carefully bland he felt that the monk could see the images that flashed across his brain, of himself and Imlay groping their way blindly through the catacombs under Paris, of the skulls that lined the Empire of the Dead and the macabre icon of the Beast under the palace prison of the Luxembourg.

“And there he remains until July, 1793, when suddenly”—the monk spread his hands in the manner of a conjuror—
”voila.
It is the month of Thermidor. Robespierre is overthrown. The Terror is ended. New men come into power. Among them Paul Francois Jean Nicolas Barras, one of the most important of these new men, if not
the
most important. And who is Barras but a friend of Gilbert Imlay? Or at least, an associate, a drinking companion—who knows the extent of their intimacy? Now Barras is a man of vision, very like Danton, whom he resembles a little, though he is not of peasant stock like Danton, but very much the
ci-devant
aristocrat, a former viscount in fact, and an officer in the King's army. We will hear more of this Barras, I think. But I digress. In the course of their acquaintance, Imlay tells Barras of his plan—the Louisiana Conspiracy, let us call it, as others do. And Barras is intrigued. I am merely speculating, of course—I was not privy to their conversation—but it is a speculation that fits the facts. Barras looks into the plan and discovers that far from being quietly dropped, it has been secretly activated. Citizen Carnot—also a man of vision—has despatched a flotilla to the West Indies under Commodore Lafitte, with a political adviser, one Citizen Delarge, and a number of agents who are familiar with the territory in question. Imlay is horrified. Why was he not told, why
was he not consulted? Well, I imagine Citizen Carnot did not trust him. Do you think that might be the case? Possibly Citizen Carnot believed him to have other loyalties than to the French, especially as he was then on the run as a suspected British spy.”

His eyes regarded Nathan shrewdly above the brim of his glass—but the glass was almost empty. Nathan reached for the bottle and poured.

“Thank you. So, let us say that Imlay insists that the plan cannot succeed without his participation—and the backing of his contacts in New Orleans. Barras is persuaded. Particularly when he learns that the flotilla has been intercepted by a British squadron off the Ike d'Oberon. Only the flagship, the
Virginie,
is thought to have reached the Caribbean. So Barras makes a proposal. Or perhaps Imlay does. Either way, what is proposed is that Imlay travels to London—which he is free to do of course, as an American citizen—and offers his services to the British. Perhaps he is already in their pay, who knows? At any rate, his task is to discover what the British know of the French plan
—his
plan. And what of Britain's own plans for the region? It is known in Paris that an expedition is being prepared—a great armada—the biggest ever to leave the shores of England. But what are its targets? Saint-Domingue? Or one of the other French islands. Saint Martinique? Guadeloupe? Or the North American mainland? Or all of them? And if the Spanish make peace with the French, will the British also attack Louisiana and the Floridas? These are the questions which interest the French. And, of course, they are of some interest to the United States, also. So Imlay travels to London and—with the ingenuity for which he is famed—manages to get himself employed as a political adviser to a certain young captain, bound for the West Indies.”

“So you think we were duped?” demanded Nathan, who had been listening to this with increasing fascination. “You think he tricked us into giving him a ride to Cuba so he could go about putting this plan of his into effect?”

Brother Ignatius spread his hands. “What do
you
think, my friend?
For I believe you must know him a great deal better than I.”

“I think …” Nathan paused. What
did
he think and, more to the point, what did he wish to reveal of his thoughts? “I think Imlay himself does not know half the time what he is about. And I think I would be better occupied in considering how I am to deal with the situation in Boca del Serpiente.”

The monk sighed. “Ah well, it is less interesting than the great affairs of nations but, as you wish it. The situation in Boca del Serpiente. Well, although I can claim no great insight into the Army of Lucumi, I do know one who has a far greater knowledge than myself, and if you will set me down in the port of San Juan Bautista some thirty miles south of our Serpent, I will endeavour to learn what I may.”

Nathan gave him a sharp look. “Is that safe? Stupid question. But should I send people with you?”