Scarborough Fair - Chris Scott Wilson [54]
He took a deep breath. “I have given it much thought. The nearest I can come is that Paul Jones personifies what America is all about. Untamed, yes, but capable of so many things. And his officers, I swear, would follow him to a man. Wherever he went.” Dale was flushed as he fell quiet, as though astonished he had made the speech. When he looked again at the surgeon, if was as if he was defying him to contradict his opinion.
Matthew Mease was nodding. “Richard, I could not have put it better myself.”
Dr. Brooke wore the smile of a teacher whose pupil has absorbed his lessons well before forming his own conclusion.
“I agree with Matthew. For a farmer, Richard, you have a good mind. And your tongue bears its first coat of silver. You’ll make a politician someday.”
It was then Richard Dale realized it had been a test. His eyes sparked before he broke into a smile. “Thank you sir, but unlike a politician, I meant every word.”
***
Fifteen days later off the Inchcape Rock on the east coast of Scotland, Paul Jones derived little pleasure when he captured two colliers bound from Leith who had sailed blindly under Bonhomme Richard’s guns. He was still smarting from Landais’s outright disobedience. After the incident with Purser Mease and the two French marine officers, Landais had again parted from the squadron without permission. While the commodore sailed back and forth among the Shetland Isles, waiting for Pallas to catch up, Landais took Alliance out on his own initiative and returned with two small prizes. When ordered aboard the flagship for a conference he had flatly refused and again sailed off to hunt. In bad weather, the squadron made headway south. After taking the two colliers they found themselves at the mouth of the Firth of Forth.
The estuary was choppy, wind flicking the wave tops so they broke white like a million gulls flexing their wings. Paul Jones walked the length of Richard’s deck, the wind coloring his cheeks. Listening with half an ear to his heels rattling on the quarterdeck, he glanced at the boats on the sea as they took prize crews to the two colliers. Their return journey would bring more prisoners to crowd Richard’s ’tween decks. The loss of fighting men in a trade for worthless passengers annoyed him. And what for? Two little colliers probably infested by rats and with rotting timbers worth a bare few pounds. If only he could take a prize whose loss would be keenly felt by the enemy.
He paused to lean on the rail. If he didn’t do something soon, he would have no men left to do it with; they’d all be crewing captured colliers and fishing boats. He wondered how the war was faring in America. He had received little news since his days in Paris when Benjamin Franklin had kept him informed. In Lorient there had been little to hear, and since setting sail, nothing. He wondered whether the Royal Navy had been plundering ports. His last news had been that Sir George Colliers had landed at Chesapeake in May, taking the war at sea to the land.
Why not? Why couldn’t he do it too? The very audacity of it, the American Navy taking an English town and demanding ransom. By God, that would hurt them; cut them to the very heart. They valued nothing more highly than freedom. Weren’t they always bragging they had never been invaded since 1066? Well, it would not be an invasion, certainly not by Norman standards, but the shock value would be tremendous. It would show them that