He stepped down the lines of men, drawn up to greet him. There was a genuine warmth in their welcome. Bowater was touched, and not a little surprised.
“Tanner.” He stopped in front of the seaman, dressed out in his best uniform. Tanner, and some others, Bowater noticed, had embroidered “Cape Fear” on the silk bands around their caps. “I don’t recall much of what happened that morning at Fort Hatteras, but I do have some memory of your tending to me. Thank you.”
Tanner shrugged, hemmed, looked genuinely uncomfortable. “Whatever I could do, sir…” he managed to get out before Bowater released him from his discomfort, offered him a hand to shake, moved on down the line.
Hieronymus Taylor and his small engineering department were drawn up at the end of the line. Burgess, Moses Jones, Joshua Beauchamps, Nat St. Clair, and two new faces Samuel did not recognize, black men, one a big, burly fellow, the other more slight, around Bowater’s height.
“Welcome back, Cap’n,” Taylor said, hand outstretched. Samuel took the offered hand and shook. Taylor’s clothing, his frock coat and shirt and pants, were perfectly clean, with a crispness that far exceeded even Lieutenant Harwell’s. Bowater looked down the line. It was true of all of the black gang; their clothes were as clean as if they sent them out. How do they do that?
“Cap’n,” Taylor was saying, “these here are two new members of the engineering division, hired on by permission of Lieutenant Harwell. This big fellow is Lafayette Jefferson—how’s that for a patriotic name—and the little fellow is Tommy. Jest Tommy, he says. I took ’em on as coal passers.”
And not just their clothes. There was a generally scrubbed appearance about their persons—none of the coal smudges and sweat stains and matted hair Bowater associated with the engine room, as if they had access to a bathtub, or a shower bath. How do they do that?
“Ahh,” Bowater continued, “is that not an excessive number of coal passers, for one boiler?”
“Well, suh, I’m bringing ol’ Moses along as fireman, see? I think he’s ready for a step up in the world.”
“Very well.” Samuel’s head was swimming. He wanted desperately to sit.
“You will forgive me, Chief…” he said, and making his goodbyes he headed off to the privacy of his cabin, with Jacob close behind.
Da, da-da, da-da-da-da-daaa… He’d been back two and a half months. His strength had returned. With the rolling deck underfoot, the ladders to negotiate two dozen times a day, and Johnny St. Laurent’s cooking, he was soon nearly back to his former self.
The first week in November brought no relief to the monotony of patrolling Albemarle Sound, the Cape Fear now one of the mosquito fleet under the command of Flag Officer William Lynch.
From the south, reports arrived of the Union capture of Port Royal, South Carolina. Big Federal men-of-war pounding the little Confederate forts to dirt—it was a virtual reenactment of Hatteras Inlet on a somewhat larger scale. But on Albemarle Sound, there was little happening. Except a concert by the Norfolk and Elizabeth City Symphony Orchestra, and it was taking on an importance all out of proportion with its promise.
Bowater finished dressing, let Jacob help him on with his coat, pulled his cap over his eyes, and stepped out into the cold. There was the distinct smell of winter in the air, carried on the lashing wind. The Cape Fear thumped against her fenders, rocked hard in the short waves piling up around her hull, a lot of motion for a vessel tied to the dock. Bowater stepped down the ladder and ducked behind the deckhouse, catching a lee from the wind.
He tramped down the side deck, opened the engine-room door. The blast of heat was welcome now. He looked down the fidley. Burgess was hunched over the workbench. At the sound of the door opening he looked up.
“Chief Taylor down there, Burgess?”
“Naw. ’E’s inna gaal-lay, Cap’n,” Burgess said.
Bowater nodded. What the hell did he say? It was not worth asking him to repeat it. “Thank you, Burgess.”
Down the side deck came the scrape of a violin, the first pass of the bow before tuning the instrument. The note had come from forward—they must be staging their evening concert in the warmth of the galley.
Samuel hurried along, stepped into the galley, the smell of baking bread and a simmering cheese sauce like a warm blanket. Most of the Cape Fears were seated around the place, Taylor and Moses on stools at the forward end. It was a very congenial affair, and it made Samuel sad, that such a thing could go on and he, as captain, could have no part of it.
Not that he wished to, with their crude folk ditties and dreary sentimentality.
“Cap’n, come to join us, sir?” Taylor lowered his violin from his chin and called out.
“No, Chief, I fear not. I…ah…I’m off, just now, and I wanted to tell you we’ll be underway at first light, so we’ll need steam up then.”
“Never fear, Cap’n, the engineering division stands ever ready. Got them boys to clean the grates and the fireboxes, blew the boiler down, topped off the feed-water tanks…they don’t get no music unless the engine room’s up to snuff.”
“Very good. Well, then…”
“Where you off to, Cap’n, if you don’t mind my askin? Y’all are dressed to the nines, I mean, and it ain’t often we poor navy men have a chance for such formality.”
“Oh, well…as it happens I am off to a concert. Mozart. What they might term ‘classical music.’”
“Mozart…his music kinda like that Bach fella’s?”
“Yes, sort of. In a broad sense. You should take in some classical music, Chief Taylor. With your interest in the violin you might find it instructive.”
“Well, that’s damned kind of you, Cap’n.” Taylor stood, set his violin back in the box. “Sorry, boys, no fiddlin tonight. I’m goin to hear ‘classic music’ with the Cap’n!”
“Oh, well…” Bowater began, over a chorus of disapproval from the men. “It’s just that I don’t know what to expect from this quintet. Sort of a local, amateur thing. I’d hate to subject you to something that turned out to be awful.”
“Ah, it’ll be all right,” Taylor said, closing and latching the violin case. “Reckon if I started with the best I wouldn’t have nowhere to go.” He straightened, looked around the galley. “Seems a shame, though. These boys were sure looking forward to their music tonight.”
“I should think so, Chief. I don’t think it would be fair for you to deprive them.”
“Not fair at all. All right, boys. Get your shore-goin rigs on. We all goin to listen to classical music.”
“Oh…”
“And Cap’n, what about the darkies?”
“Well, there is generally a place in the balcony for servants to sit.”
“Well, that’s fine. Servants, coal passers, it don’t make no difference. Go on, boys, git your shore-goin rigs on.”
The galley cleared out as the men went to make their preparations for a run ashore. Hieronymus Taylor began to pull his overcoat on, and stopped. “Cap’n, I’m sorry. It just occurred to me, might be you didn’t intend for all the men to come to this here shindy of yours.”
“No, no, Chief, that’s quite all right. I am always happy for the chance to introduce people to the beauty of fine music,” Samuel said, and he knew that if he was a better man he would have meant it.
30
Every day regiments march by. Richmond is crowded with soldiers. These new ones are running in, fairly. They fear the war will be over before they get a sight of the fun.
— Mary Boykin Chesnut
They fitted Jonathan Paine with a prosthetic leg. They made him stand while they did it, made him endure their happy banter about his being as good as new, about how the girls were all swooning for a young soldier with an empty pant leg in his uniform. Jonathan said nothing.