A different kind of hono.., p.4
A Different Kind of Honor, page 4
In a corner of the Peruvian naval yard, by a shed near the boiler works, Wake saw some men crawling over a large iron cylindrical object with oddly shaped appendages. He guessed it as a boiler tube, but had never seen one that long. It sat on a cradle, had pointed ends and some sort of box perched atop it amidship, with a large pipe standing up near each end. He asked an officer standing nearby about the contraption. The man offhandedly said it was an engine under repair, then changed the subject to the artillery emplacements being constructed around the harbor. But to Wake’s eye it wasn’t a boiler or an engine, but something else. What exactly, he couldn’t fathom. That bothered him.
After Union had edged alongside the pier, Wake faced Garcia. “I’ll be leaving now, sir. Thank you for your assistance.”
Garcia nodded. “Good luck on your journey, Commander. I suppose your superiors need to have a professional assessment of the naval developments in this war.”
“Yes, sir, they do. But rest assured that along with my professional assessment, I will tell them what I have personally seen of the considerable bravery of the men of the Peruvian Navy. I have never seen anything like it, Captain. It’s the stuff of legend, sir. A heroic legend.”
The captain nodded gently. “Una leyenda heróica. Yes, Commander, I think you are right about that. Perhaps that will be the lasting legacy of Admiral Grau’s final battle, and a unifying rallying cry for our people in the difficult times to come.”
Wake held out a hand. “As a neutral naval officer, I must professionally wish you only safety, sir, and not victory. I’m not allowed to tell you my personal wishes or show bias, but I suspect you can imagine them.”
“I hope your country’s leadership will share them, Commander. For if they do not, soon my country may disappear.”
4
El Toro
November 1879
The U.S. legation was squeezed between tenements on a grimy side street off the Plaza de Armas in dreary central Lima, almost three hours by rickety cramped coach from the naval docks at Callao. Not a breath of afternoon air, or anything else, was stirring in the city—it was siesta—and a morose Wake thought the limp American flag outside the building a perfect symbol for his country’s lack of power and influence in the region. He didn’t anticipate much help from the legation, but knew he was expected to at least ask them.
Gibbs, the head of the legation with the rank of minister, was off trying to find President Prado at a Peruvian army camp outside the city, so Wake talked with the chargé d’affaires, a twenty-year careerist named Kronburg with a flaccid face and condescending attitude.
“There aren’t any ships to get you out of Peru, Commander. I suppose you could go overland to Ecuador through the mountains, but that would take a month. At least a month. I hear an American warship might stop by sometime early next year, though.” He smiled. “You could always wait for that boat.”
Wake swallowed the rebuke forming in his mouth. “Look, you know from my previous visits to the legation that I’m on official duties here. Time is of the essence—Washington’s waiting for this report and I need to get to Panama. You’ve got no influence with anybody?”
“The only influence around here right now is money, Commander, and this office doesn’t have much of that at all. Of course, if we had any kind of real American naval presence on this coast perhaps we could do more, but then you wouldn’t be here asking me for a ride, would you?”
Wake sighed. He wanted to smack the smirk off the man’s face. “All right. I’ll try the Brits. I saw one of their ships in the harbor at Callao when we came in.”
“Don’t think you’ll have any luck there either, Commander. They aren’t exactly alongside us on this one. They’re on the Chileans’ team.”
The sun was setting into the smoky sky of the city as Wake marched out of the building carrying the bulky sea bag on his shoulder. He was tired, hot, and angry, mostly at himself. He should’ve left Chile earlier, thereby avoiding the delay of being captured by Huascar. Then he could’ve gotten to Panama before chaos gripped Peru and transport disappeared.
Cursing, he walked toward the Plaza de Armas to seek a cab for the long ride back to Callao. Siesta was over and the streets echoed with shouts and hoofs in the shadows of late day. As he rounded the corner by the giant Cathedral de Lima, his eye was drawn to a landau clattering by. It had a Union Jack painted on the side, which reminded him of something. An idea flashed in Wake’s mind.
“You there! In the British carriage! Please stop for a moment.”
The landau slowed, then stopped as the driver turned around in his seat cautiously. “You speaking to me, sir?”
An imperious gray head emerged out of the curtains and yelled, “Keep going, we don’t have all day!” The head turned and registered the American naval officer. “Good God, now what!”
Wake recognized the man and thought it too good to be true. It would save time. He nodded politely to the driver, leaped up to the carriage step and opened the door. The lone man inside recoiled, obviously expecting lunacy or worse. “What the bloody hell are you about, man? Do you know who I am?”
Wake knew, or at least hoped he knew, exactly who and what the man was. If he was wrong, this could get bad. Very bad. Dungulph Egglestone was the British commercial attaché—officially. But Wake had deduced two months earlier that Egglestone was actually a political operative and the local spy for the Foreign Office. And for the Chileans.
His mind flashed through the points of his deduction beginning with the man’s behavior around the Peruvian naval officers at a banquet in July, where he had frowned while they described their navy’s victory at Iquique. Egglestone insistently asked detailed questions of them about the disposition of the Peruvian fleet, and about any innovations they were working on. On the other side of the conflict, in Valparaiso, Wake had heard Captain Patricio Lynch of the Chilean Navy mention Egglestone’s name in a conversation, saying that he wished the American diplomats understood Chile’s needs and grievances as well as Egglestone—an unusual compliment about an officially neutral diplomat who was stationed in your enemy’s capital.
And the final and most compelling point—Wake had learned that Egglestone had arranged a shipment of three hundred Winchester Model 1876 repeating rifles to a militia regiment of ex-patriot Chileans that had been raised in the occupied Bolivian coastal town of Antofagasta. Clearly flaunting neutrality and his diplomatic immunity, the Englishman had facilitated the shipment from a surplus supply at the Canadian Northwest Mounted Police via a Mexican merchant. Over rum in a Valparaiso harbor tavern back in August, Wake had learned about it from the Colombian schooner captain who transported the rifles to Antofagasta.
Wake leaned forward into the carriage. “You aren’t the commercial attaché and you aren’t neutral. I know that and so will the Peruvians if I don’t get a passage request to Panama from your office to HMS Shannon within the next hour. Tell your driver we’re going to your office. Now.”
“This is preposterous. I am the attaché for commerce and am bloody well offended by your behavior. The American minister will most certainly hear of this! Now who the hell are you?”
The man wasn’t weakening and Wake’s doubt was growing. Was he wrong? It didn’t matter anymore, he had to continue the bluff and get passage on that ship. “Lieutenant Commander Peter Wake, but you knew that already. You’ve kept track of me all along the coast. The passage request for my silence. A simple quid pro quo.”
Egglestone looked down. “A request from me means nothing. They probably wouldn’t take you—”
“An official request from the political officer to take a fellow naval officer aboard? They’ll take me and you know it.”
“I don’t know where they’re headed—”
“Panama, and they get under way at dawn. The whole harbor knows that. Stop delaying, Egglestone. If I get out of this landau my first stop will be Peruvian naval headquarters. It’ll take them about thirty minutes to track you down. You won’t get away.”
The driver called back. “Sir, continue onward or a new destination?”
Egglestone brought his gaze up from the floor, his eyes boring into Wake. He wasn’t playing the confused bureaucrat anymore. The voice was graveled, the contempt spewing from him. “You will regret this, Wake. You are way beyond your depth with this.”
“Time will tell on that, Egglestone. I’m a real neutral and have kept my mouth shut so far. This isn’t my fight. You’ve nothing to fear if you help me.”
Egglestone leaned out of the curtain and called forward. “Take us to my office. Quickly.”
It was a silent, brooding ride to Egglestone’s legation as Wake tried to exhale slowly, without showing his relief.
***
“Lieutenant Commander Peter Wake, United States Navy, with a passage request from Dungulph Egglestone of the British Legation. Permission to come aboard, sir?”
The lieutenant on HMS Shannon’s deck watch took the proffered document, read it, and one more time surveyed the tall American standing before him on the quarterdeck. A Yankee naval officer here on a British warship? Wanting passage? With official support?
“Please wait here, Commander. I’ll need to inform Captain Nagle immediately.”
Wake smiled to himself—I’ll bet you do, he thought. Moments later the gold-braided arm of a full commander in the Royal Navy grasped the coaming of the after hatchway and the captain appeared, causing a commotion among the watch standers. The captain made for the American.
“Lieutenant Commander Wake, is it? I’m Commander Nagle, captain of Shannon. How exactly can the Royal Navy help you?”
Commander John Nagle stood ramrod straight for all of his five and a half feet. His eyes and speech were direct and Wake decided quickly that candor was the best policy.
“Sir, I am on an official fact-finding mission regarding this war and need passage to Panama. I’m required in Washington as soon as possible. Mr. Egglestone of your legation was kind enough to officially request that passage aboard Shannon. Word is that you’re getting under way at dawn for Panama City.”
Nagle pulled out Egglestone’s letter from a pocket and read it again. Finally he spoke. “Fact-finding mission, hmm . . . This is quite unusual, Commander Wake. I’m not sure I understand, but I suppose there is a good enough reason for Egglestone to make this request.” He turned to the watch lieutenant. “Lieutenant Carter will be sharing his cabin with Commander Wake. See to it that Commander Wake is welcomed in the wardroom and given every consideration.”
Nagle resumed his examination of Wake. “I’m not happy our departure and destination are so well known, but am looking forward to your company, Commander. Yes, our destination is Panama—but not directly. Circumstances have changed and we’ll get there by way of various ports. We should be in Panama City in three weeks, if all goes well, which it seldom does on this coast. Good evening to you.”
Wake’s attention was diverted by a shout that came up from the ship’s launch bumping alongside. The midshipman boat officer leaped up the entry port steps, braced up straight and first saluted the ensign floating off the stern staff, then the lieutenant of the watch. “All crew members accounted for and back aboard now, sir. Oh, also, there was a bit of a blowup ashore, sir. Seems somebody did in one of our senior diplo’s. Did him in frightfully efficient—shot him dead as a doornail right outside the building where he lives.”
Nagle stopped in his course and spun around. “Mr. Quail, who was killed from the legation?”
The youngster suddenly paled at being addressed by the captain. “Sir, a man named Egglestone. Murdered on the street beside his home just now. Shot four times in the face, sir.”
“And the murderer?”
“Nobody knows, sir. But the legation clerk who handled our reprovision orders thinks it’s got something to do with Peruvian fanatics and the war.”
Nagle shifted to Wake, his tone even. “Looks like you got that official request just in time, Commander Wake. How very fortunate. Say, when was it that Mr. Egglestone signed that for you?”
Wake felt his cheeks flush. This was an incredible turn of events. “Not more than an hour ago, sir. Mr. Egglestone signed it in his office at the British legation. Once I had it, I came out to the ship straight away. Mr. Egglestone must’ve gone directly home.”
Nagle nodded pensively, holding Wake in his gaze. Then he walked aft.
***
HMS Shannon was a good ship. Built only a couple of years earlier, she was unlike anything Wake had seen in the U.S. Navy. Her iron hull had an armor belt nine inches thick protecting her central vitals, backed with another thirteen inches of wood, and her steam engine—as her Welsh engineering officer proudly pointed out—drove a lifting propeller for a speed of up to twelve knots. Her main guns, shown to Wake by the gunnery officer, consisted of two eighteen-ton, ten-inch rifles that were deeply embrasured in the iron hull near the foremast so that they could fire forward as well as abeam. The sail plan was a full square-rig, but Wake learned she was a poor sailer and only carried five hundred fifty tons of coal, not nearly enough for that station. That meant that her long-distance transits would be slow, which was significant from a naval strategy point of view.
He admired the easy way her crew worked the vessel, without confusion or threats, and the competence of her officers in handling her. They had been on the coast for about six months and were beginning to know it well, having repeatedly traversed from Chile to Peru to Panama on a routine patrol route.
Dinner that evening was a stilted affair, with conversation limited to events of that day, and polite inquiries and references to Wake’s career. He got the impression they were far more curious but were counseled or ordered to refrain from any in-depth discussion with him. No one would talk about Panama or Shannon’s route there, nor their opinion of the war raging along the coast.
And no one asked him about Egglestone.
***
Shannon got under way the next morning as the sun flared over the peak of Cerro El Cristóbal, east of the city of Lima. Callao’s harbor front was quiet except for heavy clanging coming from the naval yard. A steam hammer echoed deeply off metal, the staccato beat interrupted by the occasional shout of a workman. Wake thought it odd to hear such industrious effort so early on a Sunday morning. As they steamed slowly past he peered through the gloom to find the source of the noise.
“Their new submersible craft,” said Nagle as he offered his telescope and pointed. “Over there, by the shed. The fools think it’s a secret but everyone knows about it.”
Wake swung the glass and focused. It was the boiler-tube thing. It hardly appeared threatening, or even able to float.
“Thank you, sir. I saw it when I arrived yesterday, but couldn’t deduce it’s meaning. I was told it was an engine under repair. So it’s a real submersible, eh? With torpedoes?”
“Yes, they’ve had a crew of men working on it for some time, since June. The theory is that they’ll use timers in torpedoes placed under the hull of an enemy—not automotive torpedoes like a Whitehead. If it works, it could prove a nuisance for the Chileans. If it works.”
Wake remembered Egglestone asking Peruvian naval officers about any innovative ideas they had. He wondered if the British spy had gotten too close to the secret project. “Well, sir, if the Royal Navy knows about it, I imagine the Chileans do.”
“Yes, I would think they do. A German engineer named Othon’s been working on the design for years. He started during Peru’s war with Spain in the mid-sixties, but that ended before he could get it built. Othon continued off and on since then, especially since the Peruvian rebel pirates’ run-in with HMS Amethyst back in seventy-seven. You may remember hearing of that—we used a Whitehead torpedo for the first time in combat. Somewhat successfully, I might add. It made the enemy turn and run.”
As Nagle paused, Wake recalled an article about some sort of maritime dispute during a military coup in Peru where the Amethyst had battled one of the revolutionaries’ vessels that had been harassing British ships. There was some concern at the time that use of a Whitehead automotive torpedo might be considered against the rules of war, and the captain receiving the order had asked for it in writing. The torpedo missed the target but forced the other ship to flee the scene. Then he recalled which ship the British had used it on—it had been Huascar.
“Well, since then, this Othon chap’s accelerated his project. Since last June he’s gone into high speed to complete it. Worked on it in a guarded location at the railroad’s property in Paita. We heard he tested it in the water there three weeks ago and actually managed to get the bloody thing down to around seventy feet below the surface. Then they even got it back up, with all eleven crew alive. Germans—amazing engineers, aren’t they? Remarkable, really . . .”
“And now it’s here, sir,” said Wake, his mind reeling with the possibilities for the use of such a weapon. It could turn the war around.
“Yes, quite so. They brought it here a week ago, hidden in a transport, the Limeña. Been keeping it in the shed and putting the finishing touches on it since then. Yesterday was the first time they’ve had it out of the shed. I should think it’ll be in the water soon.”
“Ready for action?”
Nagle ruminated for a moment, then shook his head. “I think not. But they’ll have to get it ready soon, now that Huascar’s gone. They don’t have much left. The Chileans went behind the Peruvian army lines and landed 10,000 troops in the area of Pisagua a few days ago.”
“They did?”
“Yes, the Chilean navy has been working well on moving their army troops forward along the coast—leapfrogging them, as it were, around the enemy. The Peruvian army in Iquique under General Buendia is now cut off from reinforcements.”
