"What news do you bring, Brother?" Arthur Gladden asked anxiously in a tense tenor, before Peter could even introduce Hoare.
"None good yet, lad, none bad," Peter Gladden said. "But I have enlisted a wizard on your behalf. Let me make you known to Lieutenant Bartholomew Hoare of Admiral Hardcastle's staff, who has agreed to serve you as counsel on Thursday."
"But I thought you were going to stand for me!"
"I am, dear boy, but you know quite well how little I know about all the pettifogging details of court-martial proceedings. Mr. Hoare will back me up with all his experience."
"Hoare. Is that your real name?" asked Arthur Gladden with what sounded like genuine interest.
"Yes," whispered Hoare.
"Oh, you needn't whisper here," said Arthur. "Nobody bothers to listen. In fact, I believe I could walk right out of this place without anybody's stopping me." He paused, as if thinking the idea over, and brightened. "But then they'd catch me, and they'd be sure I was guilty." He sighed.
"Are you guilty?" asked Hoare. "And I do not whisper for secrecy's sake but because I cannot speak in any other way. It is a nuisance, I know, but one has to make the best of it."
"No, sir, I am not guilty. I admit Captain Hay's outburst made me tremble with anger, which is why I spoke up to him. I realize I never should have done that. But he was so angry that he turned purple and laid hands on me, forcibly. That is why I-"
"Fled," said Hoare. "Have you any way of proving what you say, that you grappled with the captain only in order to escape him?"
"No, but I would suppose the Marine guard would speak up for me," Arthur replied.
"Then there was a Marine guard at the cabin door?"
"Of course there was, Mr. Hoare." The prisoner's voice was stiff. "Have you ever known the captain's cabin in any of His Majesty's ships not to be guarded?"
For the first time, Hoare thought, the man sounds like a naval officer.
"Who was he, do you know?" he asked.
"A Marine, just a Marine," Arthur replied. "Truly, I don't think anyone can tell one Lobster from another-except perhaps another Lobster. They're all statues in red coats and heavy boots. Don't you think so?"
Hoare looked at Peter Gladden as if to say, "I told you so."
"As I said," Arthur went on, "there was a Marine on guard when I reported to Captain Hay's cabin. In fact, he opened the door and announced me, just as they always do. Frankly, I did not notice him as I left, since I was pressed by an urgency."
The morning dawned bright, clear, and busy on the day of Lt. Arthur Gladdens court-martial on charges of having murdered his captain, Adam Hay. Flotillas of watercraft made their way across the sparkling harbor to converge on Defiant, 74, the venue selected by Charles Wright, her captain and president of the court-martial.
Vantage's own vacant cabin would have been the proper place for the court-martial of one of her officers. But both the prominent and the curious were expected; rumor had reached Portsmouth that even royalty might appear. On these grounds and Mr. Bennett's advice, Captain Wright allowed his own life to be disrupted and his own cabin in Defiant to be taken over.
On the table behind which the members of the court were to sit, among the quills, inkwells, and sand, lay Arthur Gladden's sword. It was placed athwartships. If the court arrived at a "guilty" verdict, the blade of the sword would face him on his return to the cabin after the court's deliberations.
"Make way!" called a Marine. As the members filed into the cabin along the way cleared for them, the audience rose almost to a man. One guest, a massive figure in admiral's gold braid and the vivid blue Garter ribbon, remained seated in his comfortable chair squarely in front of the court.
"Does Your Royal Highness wish to be made part of this court?" Captain Wright asked.
Admiral of the White Prince William, Duke of Clarence, shook his head. The head, which bore a jovial expression, was shaped like a pineapple.
"Gad, no, old boy. Came down to get away from court, don't ye know?" The cabin filled with appreciative chuckles. Royal ribaldry, Hoare observed to himself, always amuses.
When the chuckles had died down, Captain Wright read out Admiral Hardcastle's order convening the court-martial, concluding with the words: " '… that, on the twenty-first day of June, eighteen-oh-five, in His Majesty's ship Vantage, Lieutenant Arthur Gladden did assail and murder his captain, Adam Hay.' "
Recognizing Hoare's lanky figure standing beside the prisoner's friend, Captain Wright raised his eyebrows and interrupted himself. "Does the accused really require two 'friends,' sir?" he asked.
"Actually, sir, he does not. The accused officer asked that, as his brother, I stand as friend for him. Both blood and certainty of his innocence required that I agree to do so. However, Mr. Hoare is a far more skilled investigator than I-"
"Mr. Hoare is well-known to me and to others on this court," Captain Wright said impatiently. "But which of you speaks for the accused officer? You or he?"
"I shall do so for the most part, sir, if only because of Mr. Hoare's impediment of speech. And Admiral Hardcastle suggested Mr. Hoare and I collaborate."
"Irregular, but I see nothing wrong with it, nor, of course, with the Admiral's point of view. Do any of you gentlemen?" Captain Wright looked left and right along the table, clearly expecting no contradiction. "Very good," he said. "Now, Mr. Bennett, will you give us your opening remarks? I know you, at least, have no difficulty in speaking up." A soft titter ran through Defiant's cabin.
Bennett now outlined the case against Arthur Gladden: how he had been overheard in disputation with his captain; how Captain Hay had cried out; how Arthur had fled the full length of Vantage; how Mr. Watt had discovered his dying captain; and the last words the clerk had heard. That, except for Watt, who hardly had the strength to have stabbed his captain, Arthur was the last man known to have seen Captain Hay alive.
Mr. Hopkin, the surgeon, made the same statements under oath that he had made to Hoare and Peter Gladden. He was followed by the man Lynch. The quartermaster, too, had no more and no less to say than he had a day or two before.
John McHale sounded more evasive.
"And what did you hear through the skylight, Mr. McHale?" asked Mr. Bennett.
"I resent the implication, sir! I am no eavesdropper, especially not upon my captain!"
"Then you are prepared to state-under oath, remember, Mr. McHale-that, at anchor on a calm night, on deck, at your proper post within feet of the cabin skylight, you heard nothing through it? Not even any raised voices?"
"Under penalty of perjury, Mr. McHale?" interjected the junior member of the court, a commander, from his place at the left end of the table.
Vantage's master gulped.
"In the face of what Lynch said he heard, and he well forward of you, leaning against the quarterdeck rail?"
Mr. McHale paused for a thoughtful moment. "Gentlemen, I retract my earlier evidence. Mr. Gladden is a weak man, gentlemen, but an honest one."
From his seat behind the prisoner Hoare saw Arthur Gladden's ears redden.
McHale continued, "He wouldn't hurt a flea, let alone his captain. Why, he hasn't the gumption of a rabbit. His division of men was already well on the way to becoming a very mob because he couldn't bring himself to control them. I pity him. He doesn't belong in the Navy. I do not wish him to lose his life by my doing, on my evidence. But I have my own wife and children to consider."
"Confine yourself to the facts, Mr. McHale," warned Captain Wright. "What, then, did you overhear?"
"I heard Captain Hay order Mr. Gladden to put his division through an exercise on the morrow."
"What sort of exercise?"
"Fire drill, sir," said McHale, "followed by a simulated battle against a French frigate on either side. Then, if I knew the captain, he'd declare our mainmast shot away at the crosstrees or the like, kill off all the senior officers, and leave Mr. Gladden to get himself out of it. A hard trainer, sir, was Captain Hay, but a good one.