Stars and Stripes in Peril (30 page)

"Still working for the
gringos,
Don Ambrosio?"

"Some scouting, yes."

"Better you than me. I had very little success, and lost good men, testing the strength of the British here. I am very glad that this little war is over for my soldiers. Let the Yankees from the cold north and the invaders from across the sea fight with each other. It is no longer my battle."

"They invade your country and occupy Mexican soil."

"This does not bother me. We shall let the gringos do our fighting for us here in the jungle. They have big guns and many troops. I encourage their enthusiasm. But I think that they are not doing that well. Is that true?"

True or not, O'Higgins would not permit himself to agree. "The General Grant is a mighty warrior. He has the guns—and the soldiers—to fight with. He has never been beaten."

Diáz shrugged noncommittally and pushed a twig into the fire, then lit his black Orizaba cigar from its flame before he continued. "I have been called to the
District Federal.
President Juarez is assembling a new cabinet and he has honored me by his request to aid him in this great endeavor. We must rebuild this war-shattered country. He has such great plans! There will be elections soon, real ones, not corrupt public displays, the sort of thing that the French did when they elected Maximilian."

"May what you say come true," O'Higgins said with feeling. "I only pray that it does." He did not mention the cruel men who would want to usurp power once again, the combined powers of the landlords and the church that had hung like a dead weight from the tired neck of Mexico for centuries. Perhaps this was a new start, a fresh beginning. May it only be so.

"I am off to join President Juarez," Diáz said, swinging up into the saddle. "Why don't you come with me?"

"Perhaps, later. I would dearly love to be a part of the new Mexico. Meanwhile I must bring my report to the general."

They would go on in the morning—but first a little rest was very much in order. In the morning he paid Ignacio the promised American silver and watched him disappear into the jungle with his tribesmen one last time. There was no point in any more scouting—and he would tell Grant that. The defenses were there and, for all important purposes, impregnable. What the Americans would do now, he had no idea.

At noon he came to the first of the army encampments and asked to see the commanding officer, a one-eyed veteran named Colonel Riker.

"Been looking at their lines, have you, O'Higgins?"

"I have been doing just that, sir, and mighty impressive they are."

"They are indeed," Riker sighed. "I'll have a runner take you to the general."

There was a mighty army camped here upon the Mexican plain. Rows of tents and batteries of cannon. There was a steady parade of wagons bringing supplies, vast encampments of soldiers in both blue and gray. It seemed impossible that anything constructed by man could not be destroyed by these powerful warriors. But O'Higgins had seen the defenses that they were facing. Even the most determined soldiers, the most powerful shells of massed cannon, would not prevail against the British lines. It was a sad and unhappy truth, but it was one that he was duty-bound to tell General Grant. He was stopped by an officer before he could reach the large headquarters' tent.

"The general is meeting with his staff now. You'll have to wait."

"Can you at least tell him that I am here? I have the most valuable of reports to give to him."

The lieutenant rubbed his jaw thoughtfully. "Well, mebbe. I have to give these messages to his staff. I'll tell them that you are here."

"I appreciate the aid."

He did not have long to wait. A few minutes later a sergeant popped out of the tent, looked around—then waved him over.

"General can't talk to you now. But he wants you in the meeting. There's a chair to the back. Just ease into it and keep your mouth shut."

As O'Higgins slipped into his chair he realized that there was only silence in the tent. General Grant had his watch on the table before him, was scowling at it from behind a cloud of cigar smoke.

"Five minutes to the hour," he said, and there was the quick susurration of whispered voices. O'Higgins started to ask the officer next to him what was happening, then changed his mind. Obviously something important was happening on the hour.

General Grant finally stubbed his cigar out in the metal tray, stood and seized up the watch.

"That is it! That is the hour!" Only murmurs of puzzlement greeted the announcement and O'Higgins realized that all of the others were as ignorant of events as he was.

But not Grant. He had a great wide grin on his face as he put the watch back into his pocket—then hammered his fist happily on the table.

"As of this moment our siege of the British positions here is lifted. There will be no more attacks—and no more of our soldiers shall die here in this godforsaken corner of Mexico. But we will still keep up our bombardment of the lines, make our presence known. And stay alert. If they make any sallies I want them wiped out as soon as they start. But for all apparent purposes the war on this front is over."

"Why—General? Why?" An officer shouted, unable to control his curiosity.

"I'll tell you why. Because at this very moment a new front was opened to attack the enemy. I cannot tell you where this is happening, not yet, but I do assure you that it is a massive and deadly blow that is being struck right now. So strong and mighty is it that I can speak with some authority when I tell you that the war here in Mexico is over. We only wait now for the British to disengage and leave."

O'Higgins thought he knew what was happening—but had brains enough not to speak his mind. Great powers were on the move. Great events were heralded. The United States of America was fighting back.

In the State of Mississippi, in the city of Jackson, L.D. Lewis sat in his cell and listened to the growing crowd in the street outside. Reverend Lomax had stayed with him on the long walk to the jail, waited there while he was booked. The sheriff had sent two deputies in a wagon to get Jefferson Davis's body—told Lomax to go with them to the church. There was no way he could refuse so, reluctantly, he got into the wagon.

That was when the sheriff had gone to L.D.'s cell and had beaten him unconscious.

"No Yankee nigger can come to the South and shoot the likes of Mr. Davis. If you ain't lynched first, you gonna have a fair trial and then get hung—you got my word on that."

The sheriff had been worried about a lynching—only because he was worried about his jailhouse getting burnt down, people getting killed. When the wagon returned he had the corpse laid out reverently in his best cell, swore his deputies to silence. And then had gone to Judge Reid and told him everything.

"Folks hear about this they'll burn the whole town down" was the judge's learned judicial opinion. "Gotta try him fast and hang him. Meanwhile I'm sending for those Texas troops camped outside of town. Let them stand guard. They pretty uppity, might be good to knock them down a bit."

Meanwhile L.D. Lewis sat in his cell. The blood had dried on his jacket in the heat of the day. One eye was battered shut; he couldn't see very well out of the other. Well, at least he was still alive.

But for how long?

BOOK TWO

INVASION!

THE MIGHTY ARMADA

Never had the little island of Graciosa in the Azores seen such a sight. In the past, there had been two, sometimes three, ships that might be taking on coal in the harbor at the same time. But this—this was unbelievable. Black steel warships filled the ocean outside the small port, dark guns pointed menacingly at the city and the sea. Anchored close offshore was a sailing ship and two small steamers. The three-master—which had flown the Union Jack—was now a prize of war. The captains of the other two ships, one French, one German, had protested mightily when the American marines had boarded them. Politely, but firmly, they had been promised release after the fleet had sailed.

But for the moment not only wasn't it sailing—it was being reinforced. It seemed that the entire population of the island was gathered now on the shore staring, gape-mouthed, at the horizon. Where vessel after vessel appeared, until the sea was filled with ships.

But there was a logic among all the bustle and apparent confusion. Signalmen relayed orders: two ironclads passed through the anchored fleet and pulled up at the coaling wharf. At the same time a steam launch made its way out through the ironclads, stopping at each one just long enough for the ship's captain to step aboard. When it made its last call the crowded launch then returned to USS
Dictator.
The most powerful battleship ever launched, where Admiral Farragut hung his flag. The captains crowded the Officers' Mess, talking intensely among themselves. The murmur of sound died down when the admiral entered, followed by his aide heavily burdened with sealed envelopes.

"Gentlemen," the admiral said, "this will be our last meeting. At dawn tomorrow we sail for Ireland." He waited, smiling, until the voices had died down. "I know that until this moment you have heard only rumors about the invasion, knew only our destination. Rumors were circulated that we were going to Scotland, to attack England herself, and, of course, Mexico. As far as we can tell the British have been completely duped and their forces are preparing for our invasion of Mexico. But that does not mean that there are none of her warships now at sea that may be encountered—nor does it mean that the continuing threat of the armed might of the British Isles has been neglected. Many of her ships must now be at sea. That is the one thing we must guard against—being observed before our forces are put ashore in Ireland. Therefore I want an outer screen of your ships around the convoy. No other vessels, enemy or otherwise, will penetrate this shield to see the convoy that you are guarding. Neutrals will be boarded and seized, enemy vessels captured. Now—here is the course that we will be taking."

There was a bustle as the captains stirred and moved about so they could see the chart that had been fixed to the bulkhead. Farragut stood next to it.

"Our course will have two legs. We will first start out from the Azores on a bearing of north-north-west, to stay offshore, well away from the coastal trade of Spain and France. But you will note that this also means that we will be cutting across their transatlantic sea lanes. Therefore we will double our lookouts, who must be alert at all times. Then here," he touched the map, "when we have passed the Bay of Biscay, when we are at forty-eight degrees, sixty minutes north, on the same latitude as Brest in France, we change course to north-north-east. This is when the two invasion groups will separate. Group A will take a more westerly approach towards the Atlantic coast of Ireland. While group B will sail for the CelticSea. Into the heartland of the British Isles. This is a momentous occasion, gentlemen, for we are at last carrying this war to the enemy..."

The distant sound was more felt than heard, through the steel of the deck. "What was that?" the admiral asked.

"Find out," Captain Johns ordered his first lieutenant, who hurried from the compartment. The officers were silent, all of them commanders of steamships, aware that something was very wrong.

The lieutenant was back in less than a minute with a sailor in grease-smeared clothing. Obviously an engine room artificer. "This rating was on the way here," the lieutenant said.

"Tell us," the captain said.

"Explosion in the main boiler, sir. Two men killed."

"How long will it take to repair?"

"First engineer said a day at least. It's the feed pipes..."

"Dismissed," Captain Johns said. All eyes were now on Admiral Farragut. He looked once at the map, then turned back to the officers.

"Nothing can be changed. The invasion must go ahead as planned.
Dictator
will remain here in port until she has made repairs. I am shifting my flag to
Virginia.
We will now revise the order of battle to allow for
Dictator's
absence in the opening phases of the invasion."

The officers were unusually quiet when they turned to their papers. The invasion would go ahead—but their earlier enthusiasm had been replaced by dogged determination. Seamen are a superstitious lot. None of them liked this grim omen so early in the operation.

In the Cabinet Room, in the White House, the meeting was getting very scrappy, with almost every member insisting that his concerns were more in need of attention than any of the others. Salmon P. Chase, the Secretary of the Treasury,
knew
that his problems took precedence. He seldom raised his voice, depending instead upon the force of his arguments to convince others of his wisdom. Today he almost lost his temper.

"Gentlemen—I insist that you cease this wrangling and face facts. You, Mr. Stanton, will have none of the new guns you say that the army needs, without the funds to purchase them. Before all else we must discuss the necessary taxes to pay for this war."

"I beg to differ," Judah P. Benjamin said in his rich Louisiana drawl. "Matters of war and taxation in this country must be put aside while we consider if we have a united country or not. You must face the fact that these nightriders are enemies of the Union, enemies of the Freedmen's Bureau, enemies of the fragile peace now existing between the North and South. I have tragic news to convey to you and was but waiting for Mr. Lincoln to arrive to unburden myself upon you. Mr. President," he said, standing and nodding towards the head of the table as Lincoln entered and settled himself in his chair. The other voices died away as Benjamin sat down as well and began to speak.

"Despite our efforts to consolidate the peace in the South there are still immense difficulties. In spite of our payments for freed slaves, despite the founding of mills, steelworks, even gunmakers, there is still an element that will not accept the new South. They harass freed slaves, threaten, even burn, Freedmen's Bureaus, are even against the education of Negroes. There have been lynchings and burnings—and now this." Benjamin held up a folded piece of paper.