Treason, page 24
“Well, thank God! They’ve been released, then?”
The officer’s face reddened. “No, ma’am, not till they’re replaced. They’re needed— Leopard will have to find someone to take their place before they can be released.”
She stared at him. “That is obscene,” she said.
He cleared his throat. “Yes, ma’am, I supposed you wouldn’t find that attractive.”
“I find it maddening. It doesn’t make sense. What—”
“Well, you understand the whole reason the Royal Navy looks for men is because the ships are short-handed. So if it takes a wrong man it’s willing to restore him but since the ship always comes first, they’ll want a replacement before they willingly turn him loose.”
“Good God. So that’s why it takes three or four years or more to get a man released when everyone knows he’s been illegally taken in an open act of piracy.”
He winced at that, but said, “Sometimes it does, yes, ma’am, not always.”
“Often enough. How perfectly rotten, forcing Robbie Jones to serve indefinitely until they—the powers that be—decide in their majesty and their wisdom—and who’s deciding, some officer with his own ax to grind, who cares nothing for human decency—”
She went on in this vein for some time. When at last she ran down, he said, “Yes, ma’am, but there’s another side too.”
“What, pray tell?”
She let him talk, his voice modest and quiet in the still of the office in the empty warehouse but threaded nonetheless with a vibrancy that spoke of strength. She heard a passion for his homeland that made her think of her own feelings for New Orleans now transferred to the new nation. He said Britain was under desperate threat from a mad tyrant who had bamboozled the French and was determined to conquer the world. Napoleon Bonaparte had the military genius to sweep all of Europe and on to the steppes of Russia. In due time the Orient and the Americas would be within his reach as he poured the world’s treasure into France. The Americas too? Oh, yes, as one country and another fell, the world would be his. America too.
Only the British Isles and their doughty people stood between the French tyrant and this apocalyptic vision— and the Royal Navy, which was their personification as well as their protection. All their hopes rested on the navy as did their commerce, dependent as it was on ships exporting manufactured goods and importing raw materials. Yes, the French had a navy, but it didn’t compare, and Lieutenant Bigbee believed that the great Admiral Nelson soon would seek it out and destroy it.
Royal Navy ships in turn depended on their crews. Had Danny ever been aboard a man-of-war? A magnificent sight, especially under sail. Seventy-four guns, with a crew to manage each. Thousands of square yards of canvas bent to spars and masts, men balanced on spars aloft and handling sail, mast whipping as the ship plunges, enemy shot crashing through rigging and tumbling men to the deck below, the ship twisting and turning and coming about in mad pursuit of advantage, every turn meaning take in and let out and reset sail, guns roaring, clouds of smoke, the enemy coming about and you see his guns lined on you and then the broadside’s vast billow of smoke and in another second massive balls will batter the rigging and small shot fired with cannon force will slice among men who can only hold on and hope while splinters fly like poison darts—
“Well, you can see that you’ll be losing some men, and those who survive sooner or later will start thinking on running away, and when you add desertion to losses you can have a crippled ship, and then how people feel and whether they are Americans and whether its fair really doesn’t matter very much. The nation depends on your ship and the others, and your duty is not to be fair but to have your ship ready to fight.”
She started to protest and he raised a hand. “Miz Mobry, any nation will do what it must to survive.”
There was a silence. “You’re saying,” she said slowly, “that A, if his survival is at stake, may destroy B. You’re saying that the little United States is B and powerful Great Britain is A. So the end justifies the means.”
He had the grace to color at that. “We search for our own deserters, ma’am. They are all over American ships. Our officers walk your docks and literally see their own men on your merchant ships. Sometimes the men see their old officers watching and make an obscene gesture. It’s maddening.”
“But two of the three from Carlito were Americans and you just told me you’ll keep them for years.”
He sighed. “I won’t argue that it’s fair, only that it’s necessary. We fight a deadly war.”
She left the marlinespike on the desk and gave him her hand. “Thank you, Lieutenant. Thank you very much.”
He held her hand a moment. “If I’ve done you a service, perhaps you’ll grant me a boon—you might call me Terry.”
A little too forward, yes, and it struck her again, and again it surprised her, that she liked him.
“All right,” she said, “... Terry.”
And back in the shadow of the Capitol Aaron Burr had Mrs. Simpson, mistress of his boarding house, hard at work on what would be the most important dinner of his life. He kept it simple, plain food excellently prepared, nothing elaborate, no sign that he attached any special importance to this dinner among many. But he found a superb wine and a twenty-five-year-old cognac. The dinner would be in his suite where none could overhear and great issues could be decided.
FIFTEEN
Washington, early 1805
“Aaron,” Jim Wilkinson said, “you should go west. See for yourself. They’ll receive you with open arms—indeed, my friend, they’ll love you—you’re their kind of man.”
Burr settled back with a small smile. He had begun to wonder if he would have to raise the subject himself. They were having that supper he’d planned so carefully. A fire glowed in the suite’s sitting room. Mrs. Simpson had spread a cloth of white linen and brought out her finest dishes and silver. But the fare, as he’d decreed, was plain, direct, soldierlike, cold beef with fresh bread and butter with the last hothouse tomatoes. He had set the wine aside; they would wash down this repast with tankards of porter, the cognac to follow. Wilkinson was dressed in a plain black suit with black hose instead of his usual gaudy uniform. Always cautious, he obviously hoped to slip in and out of the disgraced vice president’s quarters unnoticed. From someone else that would have been insulting, but Burr understood the general. He was the way he was, plumper still after the cuisine of New Orleans, veins breaking in his cheeks, his small blue eyes unchanged in their knowing shrewdness.
Wilkinson waved a fork for emphasis. “Their kind of man,” he said, “strong, direct, to traduce you is to pay the penalty, and yet wise, skilled, experienced in the ways of the world and the command realities of nations—a man, in short, whom they can trust, turn to, cling to! Go, and you’ll find all I tell you is true, you’ll be thrilled by your reception. It’s a garden of opportunity, too. Why, you could start a whole new career there. Any western state would send you to the Senate in a flash. Senator Burr of Kentucky! How does that sound, eh? You could put some sticks in their spokes then, I’ll warrant.”
Burr stared at him. The room suddenly felt chill. “I’ve been the senator from New York. I’ve been—am—vice president of the United States. Senator from Kentucky— that does not have very strong appeal, Jim.”
From Wilkinson’s grin Burr saw he’d just been tested. “There’s more, of course,” Wilkinson said, “for a man of courage. A man of vision with the daring to carry it out.” His voice fell to a dramatic whisper. “Mexico lies just beyond the horizon. A veritable treasure house. A golden apple awaiting the man with the stature to pluck it.”
Now, that was more like it. “Mexico, eh?”
“Understand, Aaron, the Spanish empire is dying. Dying with its hands full of gold. That popinjay Yrujo—the ambassador, you know him?—yes, all his talk about Spanish honor and power is mere cloak for a man who sits with a deuce in the hole. Why do I say that empire is dying? Because it’s rotten at its heart, its time has passed, revolution stalks its edges and leaves it embattled and inert. That’s why Mexico is so vulnerable. The people there will separate on their own in a few more years. A hundred men could land at Vera Cruz, march into the Valley of Mexico in twenty days, and hammer open the vaults. I know about this. I’ve had reconnaissance in detail under the guise of commercial traveling. Reports on the defenses of every town, every pass as the road leads into the mountains—and there are no defenses. It’s pitiful, it demonstrates the inherent collapse of the Spanish empire that awaits only the trigger. So who shall pull that trigger? Ah, that is the question.”
“A hundred men, you say?”
“A hundred, five hundred. Tell me, Aaron, have you heard of the Mexican Association of New Orleans? No? I suppose not—secret society, more or less, been around a number of years and could hardly advertise itself with Spanish officials in charge. Now it’s in full bloom, a good three hundred members, significant men in New Orleans, all dedicated to the idea of seizing Mexico.”
“Of dreaming, you mean? Or of doing?”
“A brilliant question, Aaron! You see— you have the kind of trenchant mind that is crucial for such an enterprise. In answer, I suppose some of both, but there are strong men involved. New Orleans is different from anyplace you know. The pirate Jean Lafitte is an honored figure—the loot he takes from Spanish vessels feeds the economy of New Orleans. Such men won’t hesitate over the niceties of international ownership.”
“I talked to their commissioners,” Burr said. “Apparently the town is bitterly dissatisfied with American rule.”
“To say the least. On the knife edge of revolt right now.”
“That’s what they hinted.”
“They’re being polite. Look, these people didn’t ask to be Americans and don’t want to be. And the U.S. is treating them like so much dog manure. The governor, Claiborne—he’s a fool. A donkey. A peanut. Rules them in English that they can’t understand and refuses to learn their language. I don’t have it either, no talent for languages, but I’m not ruling them. I believe your French is—”
“Adequate, certainly. I met these gentlemen at a reception and they poured their hearts out. Seemed thrilled to be talking to an official, even one in dubious odor. Everything you say was reflected. There was a fury in them and the more they talked the more I felt they were skirting the edge of revolt.”
“You’re quick, Aaron. You just got here and already you have the lay of the land. That’s it, precisely. They are ripe for change and they don’t much care what change. The Spanish weak, the French abandon them, the Americans buy them but treat them like dirt, refuse them citizenship, deny them the vote, impose leaders, give them no say—they’re just waiting for a man of strength—”
“They said my old friend Ed Livingston actually drafted their petition.”
“You know Ed? Splendid! He’s made himself a strong figure in the Mexican Association. He’s after a gorgeous Creole widow, she’s teaching him the language, probably they’ve wed by now.”
Burr was delighted. He’d served in the House with Livingston about the time Tennessee was coming in and afterward they’d both gotten to know the Tennessee delegate, Andrew Jackson, and what a character he was! Ed had been badly used in New York, the defalcation wasn’t at all his fault, and Burr knew something about being badly used. Yes, indeed! And his heart went out to a good man and a friend who’d faced some of the same calumny. So Ed was a figure in this Mexican Association .... Immediately it took on stature in Burr’s mind.
“You know,” Wilkinson said, “that New Orleans is the choke point for the entire American West.” He was slathering butter on bread and didn’t look up, but Burr heard a subtle shift in his voice and realized he was moving to a new subject. “Everything, everything, depends on the river, and the river is easily plugged.”
He took a huge bite of the bread and Burr saw butter smeared on the side of his mouth. “I remember when I first went to Kentucky, right after the Revolution,” he said, his tone reminiscent. “Even then it was stressed and strained. Still part of Virginia, you know, having to petition Richmond for everything. Well, a sizable movement for independence arose and you may be sure I was at its forefront. After statehood, it kept right on, what folks call the Kentucky Conspiracy. Well, hell’s bells, I can tell you the conspiracy was real!”
He took a swallow of porter and belched. “And it’s still there. ‘Course, when I reentered the army I had to tone down my enthusiasms, but they haven’t changed. Kentucky, the whole West, what’s it doing tied to the moribund East? The East abuses us, takes advantage of us, takes our money with its manufactured goods and gives us damned little in return at outrageous prices. It overwhelms us in the Congress, the administration ladles out lip service on election day and forgets us for four years—God Almighty, why are we so anchored to the East?”
Burr’s heart seemed to be thumping in his chest. “Are you saying ...”
“Well, I don’t know, I’m just a simple soldier, I’m not really saying anything. But I do know that a lot of men in the West are dissatisfied. I know that New Orleans is ready to turn and if it does it can control the West and those men would be doing a lot of thinking. From there—well, what do you think?”
“They say the West is the land of opportunity,” Burr said softly.
Wilkinson pushed his plate aside. He sat lower in his chair, elbows on the table, hands holding his head. His voice was a whisper. “Do you know what the West lacks—what it always has lacked? A man of power. Of authority. Who can draw pictures for the ignorant masses, make them see what they’re too dense to see on their own, who can show them the holy grail of their own desires buried in their hearts, a man who can raise his fist and make them leap to follow ...”
A silence stretched. At last Burr sighed, and said, “And you’re saying—”
“I’m not saying anything,” Wilkinson said, rather sharply, Burr thought. They were coming to the crux. Soon he would discover whether the general was real or merely a talker.
“I’m a dreamer,” Wilkinson said, “a spinner of air castles. I see great things—I see empire. Think of it, Aaron, stretching from the gold vaults of Mexico City to Cincinnati on the Ohio to the River Columbia on the Pacific, New Orleans its center, its controlling heart, its opening to the trade of Europe. It would take its place among great nations instantly, it would reduce the pitiful thirteen on the Atlantic seaboard to their actual impotence. That is empire, my friend; it lacks only an emperor.”
“A role,” Burr said, “in which you might see yourself.”
“Ah, but I’m just a simple soldier.”
Burr laughed outright.
Wilkinson smiled. “You think I’m falsely modest. Well, I have an eye for combinations and possibilities and I know men. I recognize hungry men. Perhaps I have a talent, such as it is, for drawing out, even for exploiting, their hungers. But leading a new nation, leading men to glory—that isn’t my role.”
Leading men to glory—Burr’s dreams were summed in that phrase. In a flash he saw Wilkinson’s purpose. The general would never have the rare power to rally men to storm the barricades. But Burr knew how to seize men’s minds and hearts, make them hunger to be near the leader and earn his smiles, make them willing to follow him into the jaws of hell. Wilkinson was a schemer, not a leader, and he needed Burr out front. But then, for the moment at least, Burr needed him too. Instinct told him it was time to bring the general to heel.
Softly, Burr said, “Yet the greatest leader can’t lead alone.”
“Yes, he must have structure, support, weight.”
“Weight, yes ... military weight.”
“Aye ... military weight.”
Burr stared at him. The room was silent. A horse’s hoofs clattered on cobblestone outside. “You run the army,” he said.
“I do indeed, and I keep it on tight rein. It does what I say, that and no more, no less. No one questions me.”
“Three thousand men or more?” Burr said. “Concentrated in the West, I believe?”
“Yes, but now you must take care, sir!” Wilkinson slapped the table hard, rearing straight in his seat, a sudden glare showing the formidable man often disguised behind his easy exterior. “I am saying nothing at all. I am a patriot, sir! Perhaps more a patriot to my region than to my nation, but a patriot always. Now, faced with circumstances I can’t predict, I suppose I’d have to decide what’s best ....”
It was time. Burr leaped up, letting rage flash across his face. “No, by God!” He saw Wilkinson rear back startled and silenced. “You will not leave it up in the air. You sing your song but you fade away on the last verse. Now it’s time to sing out loud and bright, or shut your mouth.”
“Well, now,” Wilkinson said, and Burr held up a hand.
“Listen to me, Jim. You want to seize the West and peel it off from the eastern states. You want to take Mexico, you say it’s ready to swing. You say New Orleans is the natural capital of a new nation and the gold in the coffers of Mexico is ample to fund that new nation. You tell me—how did you put it?—’Mexico yearns to be taken as a woman yearns for a man.’”
“Hold on,” Wilkinson said, a hand raised, whether in warning or resistance Burr had no idea.
“Be silent, sir,” Burr snapped and watched the general sag back in his chair. “You’ve had your say. Now it’s time to hear me. And hear me well, for I won’t say this again.” He jabbed a finger almost against Wilkinson’s nose, expecting the general to react with anger or at least offended dignity, but instead a calm watchfulness swept his fat face.
“Say on, Aaron,” he said softly. “But keep your voice down. This is dangerous talk.”
“We can do great things together, General. I can swing New Orleans behind me in a week’s time—that was obvious from the way those delegates talked. Come and take charge, they were saying. They found the understanding in me they can’t find elsewhere in America. Simpatico, they said. We can put that oaf Claiborne in a rowboat and float him out to sea. The men of Kentucky— why, I know them too, Brown and Smith and Adair, they all served in the Senate or on the bench, and believe me, I can make them listen. I can make them see how the East patronizes them, how little it gives them, how quick it will be to take from them—and then, I can make them see how they will profit in a new country that’s under their control, not that of Virginia power grabbers.
