The Fort: A Novel of the Revolutionary War - xaviantvision

Chapter FourThe fleet sailed eastwards, driven by a brisk southwesterly, though the privateers and naval ships, which were the quickest, had to shorten sail so that theydid not outrace the lumbering transports. It took only a day's sailing to reach the Penobscot River, though it was a long day, dawn to dusk, that was livenedwhen a strange sail was seen to the southward. Commodore Saltonstall ordered the Hazard and the Diligent, both brigantines and both fast sailors, toinvestigate the stranger. Saltonstall stayed inshore while the two brigs crammed on more sail and raced away southwards, leaving the fleet to creep upthe coast past rocky headlands where the great seas broke white. Every few moments a thump would echo through a ship as her bows struck an erranttree trunk that had been floated down one of the rivers and had escaped the loggers at the river's mouth.This was Commodore Saltonstall's first voyage in the Warren and he fussed over her trim, ordering ballast moved forrard to improve her performance.He twice ordered more sails set and let the frigate run at her full speed through the fleet. "How is she?" he asked the helmsman during the second run andafter Midshipman Fanning had supervised moving another half ton of ballast from the stern."She isn't bridling as much, sir. I reckon you tamed her.""Seven knots and a handful!" a seaman who had trailed a log line from the taffrail called. Men on the transport ships cheered at the fine sight of thefrigate charging under full sail through the fleet."We might have tamed her upwind," Saltonstall said wearily, "but I dare say she'll need trimming again before she goes close.""I dare say she will, sir," the helmsman agreed. He was an elderly man, barrel-chested, with long white hair twisted into a pigtail that reached his waist.His bare forearms were smothered with tattoos of fouled anchors and crowns, evidence that he had once sailed in Britain's Navy. He let go of the wheel,which spun clockwise, then checked itself and moved slowly back. "See, sir? She's well liking it.""As I am," Saltonstall said, "but we can do better. Mister Coningsby! Another two hundred weight forrad! Lively now!""Aye aye, sir," Midshipman Fanning said.The Hazard and Diligent caught up with the fleet late in the afternoon. The Diligent shortened her sails as she slid to the leeward of the Warren andmade her report on the strange sail that had been glimpsed to the south. "She was the General Glover out of Marblehead, sir!" Captian Philip Brownhailed Saltonstall. "A cargo vessel, sir, carrying baccy, rum, and timber to France!""Take station!" Saltonstall shouted back and watched as the brig fell aft of him. Captain Brown, newly appointed to his command, had been firstlieutenant of the sloop Providence when it had captured the Diligent from the Royal Navy and his ship still bore the marks of that battle. Brown's old ship,the Providence, her hull similarly patched with new timber, now sailed at the van of Saltonstall's fleet where she flew the snake and stripe banner of therebel navy.The fleet was impressive, and had been joined by three more ships which had sailed direct to Townsend so that forty-two vessels, half of themwarships, now sailed eastwards. Brigadier-General Lovell, gazing at the spread of sails from the afterdeck of the sloop Sally, was proud that his state,his country indeed, could assemble such number of ships. The Warren was the largest, but a dozen other warships were almost as formidable as thefrigate. The Hampden, which carried twenty-two guns and was thus the second most powerful ship in the fleet, had been sent by the state of NewHampshire, and when she had arrived at Townsend she had sounded a salute, her nine-pounder guns thumping the air with their percussive greeting. "Ijust wish we could encounter one of King George's ships now," Solomon Lovell said, "'pon my word, but we'd give her a pounding!""So we would, by God's grace, so we would indeed!" the Reverend Jonathan Murray agreed wholeheartedly. Peleg Wadsworth had been somewhatsurprised that the rector of Townsend had been invited to join the expedition, but it was evident that Murray and Lovell liked each other, and so theclergyman, who had appeared on board the Sally with a brace of large pistols belted at his waist, was now the expedition's chaplain. Lovell had insistedthat they sail from Townsend in the sloop Sally, rather than in Saltonstall's larger frigate. "It's better to be with the men, don't you think?" the brigadierinquired of Wadsworth."Indeed, sir," Wadsworth agreed, though privately he suspected that Solomon Lovell found Commodore Saltonstall's company difficult. Lovell was agregarious man while Saltonstall was reticent to the point of rudeness. "Though the men do worry me, sir," Wadsworth added."They worry you!" Lovell responded jovially. "Now why should that be?" He had borrowed Captain Carver's telescope and was gazing seawards atMonhegan Island.Wadsworth hesitated, not wanting to introduce a note of pessimism on a morning of bright sun and useful wind. "We were expecting fifteen or sixteenhundred men, sir, and we have fewer than nine hundred. And many of those are of dubious usefulness."The Reverend Murray, clutching a wide-brimmed hat, made a gesture as if to suggest Wadsworth's concerns were misplaced. "Let me tell yousomething I've learned," the Reverend said, "in every endeavor, General Wadsworth, whenever men are gathered together for God's good purpose, thereis always a core of men, just a core, that do the work! The rest merely watch.""We have enough men," Lovell said, collapsing the telescope and turning to Wadsworth, "which isn't to say I could not wish for more, but we haveenough. We have ships enough and God is on our side!""Amen," the Reverend Murray put in, "and we have you, General!" He bowed to Lovell."Oh, you're too kind," Lovell said, embarrassed."God in His infinite wisdom selects His instruments," Murray said effusively, bowing a second time to Lovell."And God, I am sure, will send more men to join us," Lovell went on hurriedly. "I'm assured there are avid patriots in the Penobscot region, and I doubtnot that they'll serve our cause. And the Indians will send warriors. Mark my words, Wadsworth, we shall scour the redcoats, we shall scour them!""I would still wish for more men," Wadsworth said quietly."I would wish for the same," Lovell said fervently, "but we must make do with what the good Lord provides and remember that we are Americans!""Amen for that," the Reverend Murray said, "and amen again."The waist of the Sally was filled with four flat-bottomed lighters commandeered from Boston harbor. All the transports had similar cargoes. The shallowdraughtboats were for landing the troops, and Wadsworth now gazed at those militia men who, in turn, watched the coast from the Sally's portside rail.Tall plumes of smoke rose mysteriously from the dark wooded hills and Wadsworth had the uncomfortable feeling that the pillars of smoke were signalfires. Was the coast infested by loyalists who were telling the British that the Americans were coming?"Captain Carver was grumbling to me," Lovell broke into Wadsworth's thoughts. Nathaniel Carver was the Sally's captain. "He was complaining thatthe state commandeered too many transports!""We anticipated more men," Wadsworth said."And I said to him," Lovell went on cheerfully, "how do you expect to convey the British prisoners to Boston without adequate shipping? He had noanswer to that!""Fifteen hundred prisoners," the Reverend Murray said with a chortle. "They'll take some feeding!""Oh, I think more than fifteen hundred!" Lovell said confidently. "Major Todd was estimating, merely estimating, and I can't think the enemy has sentfewer than two thousand! We'll have to pack two hundred prisoners into each and every transport, but Carver assures me the deck hatches can bebattened down. My! What a return to Boston that will be, eh Wadsworth?""I pray for that day, sir," Wadsworth said. Did the British really have fifteen hundred men, he wondered, and if they did then what possible reason couldLovell have for his optimism?"It's just a pity we don't have a band!" Lovell said. "We could mount a parade!" Lovell, a politician, was imagining the rewards of success: the cheering