The Fort: A Novel of the Revolutionary War - xaviantvision

could conceal men from the guns of the fort and the broadsides of the sloops."Young Fletcher would guide us," Wadsworth said. James Fletcher had rescued his fishing boat, Felicity, and was using it to carry wounded men to thehospital the rebels had established on Wasaumkeag Point on the far shore of the bay. "But I still think a direct assault would be best," Wadsworth added."Straight at the fort, sir?""Why not? Let's attack before they make that nearer wall any higher." A cannon fired to the north, the noise sudden, close and loud. It was an eighteenpounderof the Massachusetts Artillery Regiment and it fired from the trees on the high ground at the redcoats working to raise the fort's curtain wall. Thesound of the cannon cheered Wadsworth. "We won't need to get behind them now," he said to Dennis. "Colonel Revere's guns will batter that rampartdown to nothing!""So we attack along the ridge?" Dennis asked."It's the simplest way," Wadsworth said, "and I have a mind that simplicity is good.""Captain Welch would approve, sir.""And I shall recommend it," Wadsworth said.They were so close, the fort was unfinished, and all they needed to do was attack."I hate New York," Sir George Collier said. He thought New York a slum; a fetid, overcrowded, ill-mannered, pestilential, humid hell on earth. "We shouldjust give it to the bloody rebels," he snarled, "let the bastards stew here.""Please stay still, Sir George," the doctor said."Oh Christ in his britches, man, get on with it! I thought Lisbon was hell on earth and it's a goddamn paradise compared to this filthy bloody town.""Allow me to draw your thigh?" the doctor said."It's even worse than Bristol," Sir George growled.Admiral Sir George Collier was a small, irascible and unpleasant man who commanded the British fleet on the American coast. He was sick, which iswhy he was ashore in New York, and the doctor was attempting to allay the fever by drawing blood. He was using one of the newest and finest pieces ofmedical equipment from London, a scarifier, which he now cocked so that the twenty-four ground-steel blades disappeared smoothly into their gleaminghousing. "Are you ready, Sir George?""Don't blather, man. Just do it.""There will be a slight sensation of discomfort, Sir George," the doctor said, concealing his pleasure at that thought, then placed the metal box againstthe patient's scrawny thigh and pulled the trigger. The spring-loaded blades leaped out of their slits to pierce Sir George's skin and start a flow of bloodwhich the doctor staunched with a piece of Turkey cloth. "I would wish to see more blood, Sir George," the doctor said."Don't be a bloody fool, man. You've drained me dry.""You should wrap yourself in flannel, Sir George.""In this damned heat?" Sir George's foxlike face was glistening with sweat. Winter in New York was brutally cold, the summer was a steamy hell, and inbetween it was merely unbearable. On the wall of his quarters, next to an etching of his home in England, was a framed poster advertising that London'sFive Acts written by Sir George Collier." London, he thought, now that wasa city! Decent theater, well-dressed whores, fine clubs, and no damned humidity. A theater owner in New York had thought to please Sir George byoffering to present Selima and Azor on his stage, but Sir George had forbidden it. To hear his songs murdered by caterwauling Americans? The verythought was disgusting."Come!" he shouted in response to a knock on the door. A naval lieutenant entered the room. The newcomer shuddered at the blood smearing SirGeorge's bare thigh, then averted his eyes and stood respectfully just inside the door. "Well, Forester?" Sir George snarled."I regret to inform you, sir, that the Iris won't be ready for sea," Lieutenant Forester said."Her copper?""Indeed, sir," Forester said, relieved that his bad news had not been greeted by anger."Pity," Sir George grunted. HMS Iris was a fine 32-gun frigate that Sir George had captured two years previously. Back then she had been called theHancock, an American ship, but though the Royal Navy usually kept the names of captured warships Sir George would be damned and condemned toeternal hell in New York before he allowed a British naval ship to bear the name of some filthy rebel traitor, and so the Hancock had been renamed for asplendid London actress. "Legs as long as a spritsail yard," Sir George said wistfully."Sir?" Lieutenant Forester asked."Mind your own damned business.""Aye aye, sir.""Copper, you say?""At least two weeks' work, sir."Sir George grunted. "Blonde?""Ready, sir.""Virginia?""Fully manned and seaworthy, sir.""Write them both orders," Sir George said. The Blonde and Virginia were also 32-gun frigates and the Blonde, usefully, had just returned from thePenobscot River, which meant Captain Barkley knew the waters. "Grayhound? Camille? Galatea?""The Grayhound is provisioning, Sir George. The Galatea and Camille both need crewmen.""I want all three ready to sail in two days. Send out the press gangs.""Aye aye, sir." The Grayhound carried twenty-eight guns, while the Camille and Galatea were smaller frigates with just twenty guns apiece."The Otter," Sir George said, "to carry despatches." The Otter was a 14-gun brig."Aye aye, sir."Sir George watched the doctor bandage his thigh. "And the Raisonable," he said, smiling wolfishly."The Raisonable, Sir George?" Forester asked in astonishment."You heard me! Tell Captain Evans she's to be ready for sea in two days. And tell him he'll be flying my flag."The Raisonable was a captured French ship, and she was also a proper warship fit to stand in the line of battle. She carried sixty-four guns, theheaviest of them thirty-two pounders, and the rebels had nothing afloat that could match the Raisonable even though she was one of the smallest ships ofthe line in the Royal Navy."You're going to sea, Sir George?" the doctor asked nervously."I'm going to sea.""But your health!""Oh, stop twittering, you imbecile. How can it be bad for me? Even the Dead Sea's healthier than New York."Sir George was going to sea, and he was taking seven ships led by a vast, slab-sided battleship that could blow any rebel warship clean out of thewater with a single broadside.And the fleet would sail east. To the Penobscot River and Penobscot Bay and Majabigwaduce.