Fragments of the Ark by Louise Meriwether

Author:Louise Meriwether
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: University of South Carolina Press

Book Three

Hostages of War

I have toiled all my life for this failure.

—DEREK WALCOTT,

“Another Life”

15

Union Headquarters, Hilton Head

March 1863

The wharves were crammed with warships and transports, more than seventy vessels at anchor. It was a beautiful kaleidoscope to Peter, the sun gleaming on white sails and smokestacks jammed so closely together it was difficult to tell where one boat ended and another began, all of it mirrored in the gently rippling blue water. He spied the frigate Wabash, a grand sight to his eyes, and next to it a strange-looking contraption resembling a box on a raft which was the vessel he was looking for, the Cayenne.

Lieutenant Mellon was aboard her talking to another naval officer, both men spic and span in white tunics and gold braid. As Peter approached them the lieutenant stopped talking and, turning toward him, smiled. It was a warm, infectious smile of welcome. Peter saluted smartly, glowing inside, and smiled back at his blond, gray-eyed commander forgiving him for everything, for his abrupt dismissal and the vexatious wait to be recalled. And he thought, with a silent chuckle, fifty dollars a month was more than he had ever earned. Thank you, suh, for that.

“Captain,” Mellon said, turning to his companion, “this is my pilot, Peter Mango. He knows Charleston harbor like the palm of his hand.”

“Really?” The captain barely glanced at Peter who was staring at the craft fascinated. She was peculiar, sitting low in the water, and appeared to be made of iron. She had two huge turrets, round like a stack of pancakes, and a thick smokestack between them. A stanchion for hauling a small boat was fenced in with a railing.

The lieutenant grinned. “Quite a little monster, isn't it. She's an ironclad. Like the Monitor. We're going on an expedition with a fleet of them.”

“They're improved monitors, or so we've been told,” the other man said acidly. “Let us pray that they're considerably improved. I find it hard to forget that on the Monitor's maiden voyage the waves completely submerged the wheelhouse, flowed down the smokestack to douse the fires and suffocate the firemen with gas. Idiots who walked on deck during a strong wind were blown overboard. The crew arrived at their destination more dead than alive.”

Lieutenant Mellon said with deceptive calmness, “Our boat has a freeboard of five feet so her deck is safer.”

Peter's heart was beating double time. He was going to pilot an ironclad? When the derisive captain departed, Peter was glad to see him go, and Mellon also seemed relieved.

“Do you know anything about ironclads?” he asked. “About the Monitor and the Merrimac?”

“I read ‘bout they fight in the newspaper,” Peter said. “They the first two boats made of iron. Sesesh drape they wooden boat, the Merrimac, in iron and she attack a Union fleet. She slam into them like a iron monster and they shells cain't pierce her hide. Her gunfire set the Union boats on fire. Then here come the Yankee Monitor. Them two iron gunboats rear back and ram each other like bulls.

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