Nemo Rising Page 6

  “But they’re problematic.”

  “What reasonable and intelligent man wouldn’t accept such an explanation? Surely not the President.”

  Duncan said, “Your disdain’s misplaced. No leader’s accepting these wild claims, except to blame us, even harking back to your terrorism as an example. The truth is under the sea, which you will find, following a search pattern we devise, and reporting the true evidence of each sinking.”

  “To exonerate the United States?”

  “Completely,” Duncan said. “We’ve nothing to do with any of this.”

  “But in my proving, I’m to follow your plans, using only the evidence that you provide.”

  Duncan said, “I’m the one who has complete faith you’ll use your best judgment in all situations.”

  Nemo said, “I can’t tell if that’s a warning or an endorsement.”

  “My advice is not to stray from the plans. For your own benefit.”

  “Or it’s back to the hangman,” Nemo said. “Unfortunately, there’s a major flaw in your plan’s conception. No part of this can be accomplished without the Nautilus, and I’ve seen no evidence of her.”

  Duncan presented a leathered billfold from his pocket that held a map made of pressed tin, its six hinged sections unfolding like a Chinese puzzle in Nemo’s hands, his fingers tracing the punched surface with its coded shapes and ciphers.

  “You know what that is?”

  “I do,” Nemo said. “I do indeed.”

  “Then you know it only functions with mechanics found on the Nautilus. We’ve taken great pains to make you part of this mission.”

  “I’ve never before met a government official who claimed to be an ally.”

  “At this moment, it’s more than a claim,” Duncan said. “And it’s imperative that you succeed.”

  Nemo considered Duncan’s words, turning the billfold over in his hands, looking as if he were about to hurl it into the Virginia surf, but pocketed it instead.

  “Lead on, Mr. Duncan.”

  * * *

  The livery was a mutt on waterfront row, common-walled with a rope-maker, and only suited for nags that towed milk wagons. Duncan worked the stable’s large door, forcing bent hinges and rotting wood, until it opened.

  Duncan said, “The United States government welcomes you to the fold, Captain.”

  They made their way past the stalls, swaybacks swatting flies with their tails, and Nemo saying, “Not what I expected, but then doesn’t all American invention have its origins in a barn?”

  “Your elitism’s showing again,” Duncan said.

  He cleared the hay dust from his throat. “But then, I believed the Monitor and Alligator were great accomplishments until I saw your Nautilus. That’s when I thought I should be mucking stalls.”

  Nemo said, “You improved on Dilleroi’s design for the Alligator, and built truly workable submarines. You had to satisfy a government; I only had to satisfy myself.”

  Duncan pulled at the termite-eaten gate to the stable boy’s closet. “I appreciate the buried compliment.”

  “Find what you like, it’s just an opinion,” Nemo said, spying four tall, perfectly groomed horses in a corner stall and draped in brown netting, making them almost invisible. “Fine military mounts, well camouflaged. And the weapons cache, under their tails?”

  “Actually, I’ve been afraid to look,” Duncan said.

  He pushed aside the old stall’s bridles and cobwebbed tack, then removed a piece of wooden slat, revealing a polished steel crank.

  Duncan turned the crank quickly. “My world has always existed on paper, so this business is all new to me. An academic, not a commando, if you haven’t gleaned that already.”

  “Grant trusts you.”

  “The President has his doubts, and if we fail, we could end up on a gallows together.”

  Nemo said, “I’d never make it to the thirteen steps. I’ve been incarcerated long enough to know when a rifle’s trained on me. How many guards have you stationed outside this barn?”

  “A precaution. That wasn’t my decision,” Duncan said, winded and still furiously cranking. “But your actions won’t necessitate sniping, so, no worries.”

  “Just fingers on the trigger,” Nemo said. “Your way of putting people at ease, I find very disquieting.”

  The cranking mechanism caught.

  Nemo felt the vibration of meshing gears somewhere below him and took a step back as a section of the hay-sticky floor elevated, revealing gear-driven steel plates jigsawing into place. They shifted and locked, becoming a ramp to an open area beneath the stables.

  Duncan said, “She’s waiting for you, Captain.”

  Nemo walked the plank, footsteps on steel, down to the submarine pen that stretched beneath the Norfolk waterfront. It was a man-made cavern, completely enclosed, running from the shops and taverns directly above to the edge of a small fishing pier half a mile to the south.

  The side facing the water and larger ships was hidden by an enormous curtain of heavy canvas, painted to blend with the dark shadows under the waterfront buildings. Perfect camouflage.

  The submarine repair dock was a wide structure, designed to access any craft from either port or starboard, with built-in ladders and a bracing system to raise bow or stern for repair in the slip.

  Walled chambers for a blacksmith, furnace, specialty glass, and metal works were set back from the dock, all fully stocked, ready for use. Large crates, labeled U.S.N. TOP SECRET were stacked six-high beside the chambers, along with open drums of scrap iron.

  Duncan’s expression was a melding of pride and nervous expectation. A schoolboy waiting to be graded.

  Nemo gave a beat of recognition before making his way around the Nautilus for a captain’s inspection. Each step was deliberate, singular, hands behind his back, as he walked the dock’s circumference, taking in his creation.

  The Cyclops-eye viewing port and jagged, retractable dorsal fin wafted above the waterline, but the submarine’s monstrous characteristics that Professor Arronax had described in his diary were now rust-eaten openings and smashed, twisted wreckage.

  The Nautilus’ seventy-five meters had been torn by cannon and neglect. Her iron frame was a fractured skeleton, the riveted skin struggling to keep her famous cigar shape from breaking apart. The Navy had done a thorough job ravaging her, but the sea had picked over the corpse.

  Nemo knelt on the dock’s edge, reaching out to a split in the submarine’s glass-domed prow, now riddled with bullet holes. A jolt of shoulder pain ripped him, his fingers smearing along the iron plating, coming back covered in bloody rust.

  “The saber of the ocean,” Duncan said.

  “Of course, it would have been expecting far too much of the United States Navy to keep a captured vessel, only the most advanced in the world, shipshape.” Nemo stood, wiping his hands. “Yes, too damned much.”

  * * *

  Cincinnati jumped the fence, hooves smartly over the top rail, before landing at a full run. The Morgan Horse’s legs never stopped: galloping through the air until perfectly meeting the ground again, then charging for the next obstacle. Grant stayed just above the saddle, knees locked and leaning forward, knowing the rhythms of his horse and reining Cincinnati’s direction.

  A half-minute behind, General Sigel and his tall Arabian made the fence, landing hard before he gave the animal his heels. Sigel had the reins tight, breaking the horse into a hard run, when a bullet tore a flank, blood jetting.

  The Arabian screamed, legs collapsing.

  They somersaulted across the wet grass, the Arabian’s head twisting back, its mouth wide. Sigel dove out of the saddle, landing hard, just as the horse’s side pummeled into the ground, water and mud erupting on impact.

  Grant swung Cincinnati wide, then cut across the field that was the White House back property. He had the horse in a full gallop, keeping his head low, and body leaning away from the saddle.

  Another shot. The sound of a high-veloci
ty rifle.

  Grant reined his horse quickly to the ground, legs properly tucked, and head flat to the earth. He leapt from the stirrups, rolled, and came up the other side of the animal, putting his arms flush across its neck and calling out, “Franz, you hit?”

  Sigel stayed behind the Arabian’s heaving belly, checked his Gasser pistol. “No, no—I don’t think so!”

  The Arabian twisted its neck around, fighting the ground, and Grant said, “If he bolts, you’ll lose cover!”

  Sigel leaned into the blood-wet horse, patting it down. Stroking and calming. A slug tore the ground an inch away. Back legs thrashed, violently chopping air. Sigel, pistol down, moved across the Arabian’s wide body, got to its ear, and brought it to his mouth, letting the animal feel his warm breath. The horse settled.

  “I can’t see where the damn shots are coming from!” Grant said, scanning the far tree line that was the natural barrier around the White House grounds. Deep, fully grown protection in the Spring, but now winter-bare, offering no refuge.

  “Mr. President! Sir!”

  Grant waved off the Guards charging from beside the stables. “Stay the hell down, we can’t spot him!”

  He thumbed back the Navy Colt from his shoulder holster and took aim, but gray, winter light flattened out everything in view, making it indistinct and anonymous.

  Guards broke from the greenhouse, running in low, dropping at the training obstacles and leveling rifles on the wooden posts. Again, the call, “Mr. President—Sir!”

  Grant ordered, “On your bellies, and hold fire ’til we get a sighting!”

  “At least now he’s positive we can’t see him,” Sigel said, pressing a strip torn from his shirt against the Arabian’s wound, sopping it.

  “Let him,” Grant said. “Let the bastard get cocky. Give him long enough to spit, then fire three blind. Left, center, right.”

  Sigel fired three times then dropped back behind his horse. The return shots were a roar. Bullets punched mud, blasted the fence rails, and exploded a Guard’s knee. But the rifle flame was just to the right of a tree break, coming from a tangle of scrub, the shooter’s silhouette vague behind the bushes.

  Grant rolled to one side, came up firing. Cincinnati stayed down as Grant emptied his six, reloaded. Guards supplied quick cover, shots echoing for miles, then dying. Sigel pointed to the first trees, a shadowed movement.

  Grant threw the Guards a signal and they opened up again, gunfire into the trunks and hanging branches. Union sentries on the White House roof laid down shots from their Springfields, the trees taking the slugs, bits of bark, and pine cones spinning away.

  The shooter fired back from a new position, at the base of a Blue Spruce, rifle barrel peeking from the shadows.

  Grant narrowed on him, using Cincinnati’s neck to brace the shot. He fired once. Waited. The shooter’s last bullet flamed wildly upward, breaking the treetops. Sparrows panicked from the branches, darting in all directions at the blast. Paint spattering against the sky.

  Then, nothing.

  Grant emptied his spent brass.

  The Guards ran for the woods, covering both sides of the tree line, as Grant and Sigel stood, bringing up their horses.

  Even as Guards surrounded, Grant checked the crease along the Arabian’s left flank, “It skidded into muscle, but he’s standing strong. I don’t even think he’ll take stitches.”

  General Sigel nodded to the trees. “Sam, there.”

  Grant watched the shooter’s body being dragged through the mud by the heels, red spreading from the single bullet wound in the center of his chest.

  A Guard, shouldering a rifle with scope, said, “That was a humdinger of a shot, Mr. President.”

  Grant holstered the Colt. “I want to know who the hell he was, and his fellow travelers. Living names, not just the dead man.”

  Quick salute as the Guard joined the others who were running into the field from all sides, barking orders and taking charge after the fact. Troopers laced the trees, plunging bayonets into bushes and shrubs, and setting loose howling pack hounds. The roof sentries rolled cigarettes, eyeing all, rifles cradled.

  Sigel took the leather satchel from the Arabian’s saddlebag before a stable hand grabbed hold of the two horses and led them away at a trot, with Rifle Guards quick-stepping alongside.

  He said, “If he’d wanted to kill us, he could have.”

  “There’s no way the dead one could have fired those first shots from that side of the field. There were two shooters, and he was the sacrifice. Always best to divide the enemy’s attention,” Grant said. “This ‘attempt’ was to see if we’re paying attention to the coming storm.”

  The dogs yowled in unison, and Grant said, “The only thing they’re going to tree now is a possum.” He looked back at the gray woods, the dead man being rolled over, pockets searched. “Hell, spotters could have been in the trees all morning, waiting for my daily ride, and there’s no fence on the far side of those woods.”

  “They’ll start building it straightaway,” Sigel said. “They may not have known my purpose here, but they knew I’d be riding with you.”

  “You’re sure you’re the one they were aiming for?”

  Sigel smiled. “Didn’t mean to insult you, Sam.”

  Sigel handed Grant the leather satchel, a spot of horse’s blood smeared across it. “I made it clear to von Bismarck that I would deliver his communiqué, but I’d not act on it.”

  “Even if Germany and the other countries do?”

  “I’m a General. In your Union Army. That never changes.” Sigel patted Grant’s shoulder. “We’re both of us targets, Sam.”

  Grant said, “Hell, we’ve had bull’s-eyes on us for the last thirty years, and these ships gone missing only make it worse.”

  “It was on every front page this morning.”

  “Like that dead bastard will be tomorrow.”

  Sigel said, “And a chance to stir this up even more—an assassin, motivated by sea monsters.”

  “We’re taking action to trash this horse dung,” Grant said. “Get some common sense back to the table.”

  “Mr. President, that would be your greatest achievement. Just be quick about it.”

  Grant laughed at his old friend’s truth, before looking toward the White House.

  Julia Grant, on the gravel walkway that curved from the stables to the old back steps to the President’s office, was in royal blue from neck to ankle. She sidestepped her way through the crowd of reporters, guards, and White House staff. More guards gathered.

  The First Lady kept her smile in place, and her damaged, crossed eyes for all to see as she continued to the edge of the lawn, her hand out to her husband. She was all pride and strength, but quick-walked to him.

  Grant angled through the uniformed guns surrounding him, taking his wife’s hand as she reached him, squeezing his assurance, and was about to speak when he saw the bundle of red, urgent telegrams tucked in the crook of her arm. “You tell me who gave you that bad news to deliver, and they’ll be guarding the chicken coops by morning. That’s not the job of the First Lady.”

  “It is when you ask for it.” Julia smiled. “We’ve faced troubles before, and always together.”

  Grant said to his wife, “I thank God you’re here,” then drew her close.

  12

  INSIDE THE BEAST

  The Nautilus was moving, and the Diver angled around its side, face covered by a celluloid cone, reed-thin tubing trailing from it to a device on the docks. Only twenty feet deep, the water was murky, silt rising from where the flat underbelly of the submarine rose and fell, stirring mud.

  Pulling a small pontoon, a section of thin, plate steel lashed to it, the Diver swam to a gaping tear in the hull where a cannonball had blown through it. The wrecked area had been masked with luminous cloth, trimmed to exact dimensions.

  The Diver fit the plate over the cloth, matching its sides precisely before bolting it down with a specialized wrench. Legs braced aga
inst the Nautilus, leveraging every turn, the plate was secured, the cloth filling in the seams around it like healing flesh.

  The Diver surfaced.

  Nemo’s words were the first thing heard: “Of course it would have been expecting too much of the Navy to keep a captured vessel, only the most advanced in the world, ship-shape.”

  Diver climbed onto the dock, the other side of the Nautilus, pulling off the face mask and tubing.

  Nemo continued: “Too damn much.”

  Duncan said, “We’ve been a tad occupied these past few years.”

  “Why avoid saying ‘war’?”

  Duncan sidestepped his words: “Despite obstacles, I made arrangements for the Nautilus’ care.”

  “Not much of it.”

  “Captain, it’s a true miracle the ship exists at all.”

  Nemo said, “Miracle? Who are you suggesting I be grateful to?”

  Sara Duncan, in her athletic twenties, strode around the dock’s side access where she’d been hidden by the submarine. Walking directly to Nemo with a greeting hand, water dripping from her hair and the man’s red-striped swimming togs she’d tailored for her needs, she said, “Captain, this is a rare moment.”

  He wasn’t what she expected, in torn and bloodied clothes, the beard and hair a tangled mask. She noted the purple bruises around wrists and ankles, the dirty bandage around one arm. This wasn’t the great stalwart Sara had always imagined, but she kept her hand extended, her admiring smile intact.

  Nemo took her hand, freezing his own reaction at the strength in her grip, or the figure she cut. She was a young, silly girl, obviously headstrong and therefore, to him, instantly dismissible.

  Sara said, “I know all about you, this ship, all you’ve done. I know it as well as I know myself.”

  “That much knowledge would be rare in one so young. And very doubtful.”

  “I certainly didn’t mean to offend,” Sara said, breaking her grip, then pecking her father on the cheek. She was aware of Nemo’s stare, as if examining a slide under a microscope, as she unhooked the belt of special-forged brass tools, freeing herself of the weight, tossing it aside. Sara was in constant motion, words and body never still.