Brave Old Salt Part 6

"It must be done; that is the view we must take of the matter."

"It will be easier to believe it than to do it."

"This is to be your share of the enterprise."

"Mine?"

"Yes."

"Well, I think you have given me the biggest job in the work."

"It can be done," said Coles, confidently. "Somers is a mere boy in years, though he is smarter and knows more than any man in the navy in the prime of life."

"I'm afraid he is too smart, and knows too much to be caught in such a sc.r.a.pe."

"No; he is young and ambitious. Offer him a commission as a commander in the Confederate navy, to begin with. I have the commission duly signed by the president of the Confederacy, countersigned by the secretary of the navy, with a blank for the name of the man who receives it, which I am authorized to fill up as I think best. Somers must have this commission."

"If he will take it."

"He will take it. In the old navy he is nothing but a paltry ensign. He has been kept back. His merit has been ignored. He must stand out of the way for numskulls and old fogies. Even if the war should last ten years longer, he could not reach the rank, in that time, which I now tender him. He will at once be offered the command of a fine steamer, and may walk the quarter deck like a king. He is ambitious, and if you approach him in the right way, you can win him over."

Somers listened with interest to this precious scheme. He did not even feel complimented by the exalted opinion which such a man as Coles entertained of him. It would be a pleasant thing for a young man like him to be a commander, and have a fine steamer; but as he could regard only with horror the idea of firing a gun at a vessel bearing the stars and stripes, he was not even tempted by the bait; and he turned his thoughts from it without the necessity of a "Get thee behind me, Satan,"

in dismissing it.

"Where is this Somers?" asked Langdon.

"He is at the Continental," replied Coles. "He has been appointed fourth lieutenant of the Chatauqua; but what a position for a man of his abilities! He is better qualified to command the s.h.i.+p than the numskull to whom she has been given. Waldron, the first lieutenant, is smart: he ought to be commander; though I think Somers did all the hard work in Doboy Sound, for which Waldron got the credit, and for which he was promoted. Pillgrim, the second lieutenant, is a renegade Virginian."

"We had some hopes of him, at one time," said Langdon.

"He is worse than a Vermont Yankee now--has been all along, for that matter. I tried to do something with him, but he talked about the old flag, and other bosh of that sort."

"Let him go," added Langdon, with becoming resignation.

"Let him go! He never went. He has always been a Yankee at heart. If the navy department wouldn't trust him, it was their fault, not his, for the South has not had a worse enemy than he since the first gun was fired at Sumter. He is none the better, and all the more dangerous to us, because he gives the South credit for skill and bravery."

Somers was pleased to hear this good account of Lieutenant Pillgrim; not because he had any doubt in regard to his loyalty, but because it confirmed the good impression he had received of his travelling companion. If the conspirators would only have graciously condescended to resolve the doubts in his mind in regard to some indefinite previous acquaintance he had had with the second lieutenant of the Chatauqua, he would have been greatly obliged to them. They did not do this, and Somers was still annoyed and puzzled by the belief, patent to his consciousness, that he had somewhere been intimate with the "renegade Virginian," before they met at the house of Commodore Portington.

"Now, Langdon, you must contrive to meet Somers, sound him, and bring him over. You must be cautious with him. He is a young man of good morals--never drinks, gambles, or goes to bad places. He is a perfect gentleman in his manners, never swears, and is the pet of the chaplains."

"I think I can manage him."

"I know you can; I have picked you out of a hundred smart fellows for this work."

"How will it do for me to put on a white choker, and approach him as a doctor of divinity."

"You can't humbug him."

"If I can't, why should I try?"

"If you should pretend to be a clergyman, and he smelt the whiskey in your breath, he would set you down as a hypocrite at once."

"That's so," thought Somers.

"He wouldn't listen to a preacher who drank whiskey. He is a fanatic on these points."

Somers could not imagine where Coles had obtained such an intimate knowledge of his views and principles; though, if he wanted his services in the Confederate navy, it was probable he had made diligent inquiries in regard to his opinions and habits.

"I think I could blind him as a D.D., but I am not strenuous."

"You had better get acquainted with him in some other capacity."

"As you please; I will think over the matter, and be ready to make a strike to-morrow morning. What time is it?"

"Quarter past ten."

"So late! I must be off at once."

Somers heard the clatter of gla.s.s-ware again, as the conspirators took the parting libation. He listened to their retreating footsteps, heard Langdon return the key, and then began to wonder what had become of Tom Barron and his mother. He had waited more than two hours in the front room, and no summons had come for him to see the wounded sailor. It was very singular, to say the least; but while he was deliberating on the point, a hand was placed on the door of the chamber. The key turned, and a person entered.

Now, Somers had a very strong objection to being seen after what had occurred. If discovered in this room, Coles might see him, and finding his plans discovered, might change them so as to defeat the ends of justice. And the listener felt that, if detected in this apartment by the conspirators, they would not scruple to take his life in order to save themselves and their schemes.

For these reasons Somers decided not to be seen. The person who entered the room was a rough, seafaring man, and evidently intended to sleep there, which Somers was entirely willing he should do, if it could be done without imperilling his personal safety. He therefore crawled under the bed again, as quietly as possible. Unfortunately it was not quietly enough to escape the observation of the lodger, who, not being of the timid sort, seized him by the leg, dragged him out, and with a volley of marine oaths, began to kick him with his heavy boot.

Somers sprang to his feet, and attempted to explain; but the indignant seaman struck him a heavy blow on the head, which felled him senseless on the floor.

CHAPTER V.

SOMERS COMES TO HIS SENSES.

When Somers opened his eyes, about half an hour after the striking event just narrated, and became conscious that he was still in the land of the living, he was lying on the bed in his chamber at the Continental. By his side stood Lieutenant Pillgrim and a surgeon.

"Where am I?" asked the young officer, using the original expression made and provided for occasions of this kind.

"You are here, my dear fellow," replied the lieutenant.

This valuable information seemed to afford the injured party a great deal of consolation, for he looked around the apartment, not wildly, as he would have done if this book were a novel, but with a look of perplexity and dissatisfaction. As Mr. Ensign Somers was eminently a fighting man on all proper occasions, he probably felt displeased with himself to think he had given the stalwart seaman so easy a victory; for he distinctly remembered the affair in which he had been so rudely treated, though there was a great gulf between the past and the present in his recollection.

"How do you feel, Mr. Somers?" asked the surgeon.

"The fact that I feel at all is quite enough for me at the present time, without going into the question as to how I feel," replied the patient, with a sickly smile. "I don't exactly know how I do feel. My ideas are rather confused."

"I should think they might be," added the surgeon. "You have had a hard rap on the head."