“Yes, the cannons rather give it away, don’t they? The Spanish have been expecting war to be declared for the last six months. General Hevia brought these ships in last November, and they’ve been lying in wait here ever since.”
“Ah.”
Malcolm gave him a raised brow.
“Ah, indeed. De Prado’s expecting a declaration any day. That’s why I sent Olivia and the children to the country. De Prado’s staff all treat me with exquisite courtesy”—his mouth twitched a little—“but I can see them measuring me for leg-irons and a cell.”
“Surely not, Malcolm,” Grey said mildly. “You’re a diplomat, not an enemy combatant. Presumably they’d either deport or detain you, but I can’t see it coming to chains.”
“Yes,” Malcolm agreed, eyes fixed again on the ships, as though he feared they might have begun to move in the last few moments. “But if they find out about the revolt—and I really don’t see how that can be avoided—I rather think that might alter their views on my claim to diplomatic immunity.”
This was said with a sort of calm detachment that impressed Grey—reluctantly, but still. He glanced round to be sure they were not overheard.
There were a lot of soldiers up here but none close to them; the gray stone of the rooftop stretched away for a hundred yards in all directions. Grey could hear, faintly, shouts between an officer at the far end of the battlement and someone in the watchtower above. There was a small group of regulars—most of them black, Grey saw—stripped to the waist and sweating despite the wind, repairing a gap in the battlement with baskets of stones—and there were guards. Four guards at each corner of the battlements, stiffly upright, muskets shouldered. The fortress of La Punta was prepared.
A detachment of twelve men marched past, two by two, under the command of a young corporal shouting the Spanish equivalent of “Hup!” as they wheeled past the stubby watchtower. The corporal saluted smartly; Malcolm bowed and turned again to the vast expanse of the harbor. It was a clear day; John could just make out the great boom chain at the harbor mouth, a thin darkness in the water, like a snake.
“It was Inocencia who told me,” Malcolm said abruptly, as the soldiers disappeared down a stairway at the far side of the rooftop. He cut his eyes at Grey, who said nothing. Malcolm turned his face back to the harbor and began to talk.
The revolt was planned among slaves from two of the large sugar plantations near Havana. The original plan, according to Inocencia—whose cousin was a servant at Hacienda Mendez but was having an affair with one of the house slaves, whose brother was one of the ringleaders of the plot—had been to band together and kill the owners of the haciendas, loot the houses, which were very rich, and then escape through the countryside to the Golfo de Xaguas, on the other side of the island.
“Thinking that the soldiers wouldn’t pursue them, being distracted by the imminent arrival of the English on this side, you see.” Malcolm appeared quite unmoved by the putative murder of the plantation owners. “It wasn’t a bad plan, if they chose their moment and waited ’til the English did arrive. There are dozens of small islands in the golfo; they might have hidden there indefinitely.”
“But you discovered this plan, and rather than mentioning it to the comandante…”
Malcolm shrugged.
“Well, we are at war with the Spanish, are we not? Or if we weren’t, it was obvious that we would be at any moment. I met with the two leaders of the revolt and, er, convinced them that there was a better way to achieve their ends.”
“Alone? I mean—you went to meet these men by yourself?”
“Of course,” Malcolm said simply. “I wouldn’t have got near them had I come mob-handed. Didn’t have a mob to hand, anyway,” he added, turning to Grey with a self-conscious grin that suddenly took years off his careworn face.
“I met Inocencia’s cousin at the edge of the Saavedra plantation, and she took me to a big tobacco shed,” he went on, the grin fading. “It was almost nightfall, so darkish inside. Lots of shadows, and I couldn’t tell how many men were there; it felt as though the whole place was moving and whispering, but likely that was just the drying leaves—they’re quite big, did you know? A plant is almost the size of a man. They hang them up, up in the rafters, and they brush against each other with this dry sort of rustle, almost like they’re tittering to themselves…put the wind up me, a bit.”
Grey tried to imagine that meeting and, surprisingly, could envision it: Malcolm, artificial foot and all, limping alone into a dark shed to convince dangerous men to forgo their own murderous plans in favor of his. In Spanish.
“You aren’t dead, so they listened to you,” Grey said slowly. “What did you offer them?”
“Freedom,” Malcolm said simply. “I mean,—the army goes about freeing slaves who enlist—why oughtn’t the navy to be similarly enlightened?”
“I’m not so sure that a sailor’s life is noticeably better than that of a slave,” Grey said dubiously. “In terms of food, they may be better off as they are.”
“I don’t mean they’re to enlist, booby,” Malcolm said. “But I’m sure I can persuade either Albemarle or Admiral Pocock that they should be freed in token of regard for their service. If they survive,” he added thoughtfully.
Grey was beginning to think that Malcolm might actually be a decent diplomat. Still…
“Since you mention service—what, exactly, are you proposing that these men do?”
“Well, my first notion was that they might creep along the shoreline after dark and detach and sink the boom chain across the harbor mouth.”
“A good notion,” Grey said, still dubious, “but—”
“The batteries. Yes, exactly. I couldn’t very well go down and ask to inspect the batteries, but…” He reached into his coat and withdrew a small brass telescope.
“Have a look,” he said, passing this to Grey. “Wave it around a bit, so it doesn’t look as though you’re spying out the batteries particularly.”
Grey took the telescope. His hands were chilled and the brass, warm from Malcolm’s body, gave him an odd frisson.
He’d seen one of the batteries close to, on the way in; the one on the opposite side of the harbor was similarly equipped: six four-pounders and two mortars.
“It’s not only that, of course,” Grey said, handing back the telescope. “It’s the—”
“Timing,” Malcolm finished. “Yes. Even if the men could swim from down shore rather than come through the battery, it would have to be done with the British fleet actually in view, or the Spaniards would have time to raise the chain again.” He shook his head regretfully. “No. What I’m thinking, though—and do say, if you have a better idea—is that we might be able to take El Morro.”