THE
EIGHTEENTH CAPTAIN
A Novel of John Paul Jones (#1)
Author: Nicholas Nicastro
2012 Reissue Edition
5.5"x 8.5" Trade Paperback
Retail: $15.95US; 336pp
ISBN 978-1-62268-006-1
LCCN 2012942641
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THE
EIGHTEENTH CAPTAIN
A Novel of John Paul Jones (Vol. I)
Author: Nicholas Nicastro
I.
At 30, man suspects himself a fool;
Knows it at 40, and reforms his plan.
EDWARD YOUNG, Night Thoughts
PAUL JONES conquers
worlds at night, but would rather sleep.
Writing useless letters, you have wasted
your last candle. Now you are sentenced to a torment of closely watched
darkness.
He has been contemplating his invasion of
India for many weeks. He spends hours sitting on a bench in the Luxembourg
Gardens, thinking about the project. Crossing the Rue de Vaugirard, it
occurs to him that the best route to the subcontinent is the ancient onethe
one through Egypt. Jones stops, smiling to himself, oblivious to the manure
cart bearing down on him, missing him by inches. The driver turns to curse
at him in French, so he does not understand.
Fool! You have lost the capacity to navigate
street traffic, much less the blue.
There would be war between England and Russia.
Those powers, one preeminent at sea, the other on land, must try conclusions
for the mastery of Europe. The man who contrives the plan to strip John
Bull of her Asian possessions would earn the lifelong gratitude of the
Empress Catherine. That monarch, if she be rational, must instantly restore
his flag rank and furnish him with the fleet he needs. That slander about
a rape in St. Petersburg would evaporate like mist before the sunshine
of his strategical genius.
But where will you get the money to post
the letter to St. Petersburg?
Jones is dressed to go out by half past
seven. At table, his porridge lies like wet plaster troweled upon his
tonguehe has lost his capacity to taste his food. Instead, he sits
there in his little apartment on the third floor, upstairs from an insurance
clerk, next door to a composer of sentimental snuffbox inscriptions. He
eyes himself in the mirror, wondering how the material of his stock came
to be so dull, and how the lapels of his admiral's uniform coat happened
to be of different widthsor are they? Jones stands up, steps closer
to the mirror to see. Apparently, an optical illusion. It is only twenty
to eight! He sits again, his eyes still on the mirror, and turns his head
first to the right, then the left. From a distance of eight or nine feet,
he fancies the gray hairs multiplying at his temples are barely discernible.
He coughshack hack hackand swallows. Egypt. (This only takes
a few seconds.)
You think of everything but the Woman,
don't you? But you see, you've thought of her just now! Her married hands
lay in yours, years before, in some toilet at Passy with a coffered ceiling.
How thin married hands are, how fragrant and trembling! To have that oh-so-aristocratic,
perfumey knuckle beneath your nostrils again, and her married lips on
the other side of a short space traversed by your quickening breathLa
Vendahl! The woman was nothing to you. You must write a letter to her
and explain.
With the tactical advantage of his plan,
seven or eight ships of the line would be all he'd need, with an additional
handful of frigates, of course, to bear his messages and convey his intelligence.
Seven ships, less than five thousand men, and he would pry the lid off
an Empire!
But I am so sick of the sea and ships!
It is nine o'clock. Assuming he walks slowly,
he could contrive to appear at the American legation just as Gouverneur
Morris arrives at ten. He leaves his apartment and descends the stairs,
noting, with some annoyance, that the buckles on his shoes have lost their
shine. On the street, he stops and checks his pockets for his handkerchief,
but finds he has forgotten it. No matter: there is a large Revolutionary
rosette of blue, white and red on the curb, left there no doubt by one
of the political processions that occasionally rattle his windowpanes
and disturb the course of his thoughts about the likely occupation of
Pondicherry. He plucks the rosette off the ground and uses it to buff
his shoe buckle to a presentable luster, then drops it back in the gutter.
He encounters Morris some distance from
the legation. Jones smiles, grasps the man's hand. Two old friends. Two
men of quality. But there is an expression on Morris's face, an inertial
disposition of his body away, away. . . . He still grasps Morris's hand,
shaking it, smiling, smiling, and then coughing, choking, bending in two
with the pain of it. Morris steps forward, alarmed. But what pleasantly
cool weather for July, yes! They must surely dine together again soon,
yes! Morris, reassured that his visitor is not suffering an inconvenient
death, is once again receding, gravitationally attracted to the mass of
the legation house. But Mrs. Morris is fine, yes! And you will surely
receive your back pay by the next vessel over, yes! Busy, busy, must read
over the day's dispatches. Barbary situation worrisome, dangerous. . .
. But Jones has a plan for that, too! Just three or four sloops of war
would do nicely, slipping into Tripoli with a handful of fire ships, but
. . . what? No time to hear it all now. Well, now they have something
to discuss over dinner, yes!
"By the way, might you slip this in
with the pouch to St. Petersburg?" Jones finally asks, holding forth
his sealed invasion plans for Empress Catherine.
A cloud passes over Morris's brow. They
look at each other for a silent moment. The pretense hangs in the balancetwo
old friends, two men of qualityuntil Morris, with a heaviness suddenly
afflicting his arm, takes the letter in hand.
"I'm in your debt, old man."
Morris responds only with his eyebrows,
knitting them in a gesture that might be understood as either salutation,
or puzzlement. Then he has turned away, waving faintly, and is gone .
. .
But wait! They have forgotten to set the
date and time for dinner!
Jones resolves to drop by the legation again
later.
For the moment, he makes his way down the
street, idly fingering the tasselled cord on his cane, picking his way
around the rude barricades left there for no reason but to commemorate
the thuggery of the mob. He has the whole day ahead of him, and he has
already stopped in once to see Morris! He really must organize his time
more wisely. He really must . . .
It is July the sixth. You barely remembered
the date yourself!
A pang of self-pity taps his soul and descends,
weightless, to the pit of his empty stomach. He knew no one else in Paris
who would care. So he sets himself the task of whiling away, alone, the
burdensome hours of his forty-fifth birthday.
copyright
© 2012 Nicholas Nicastro
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