On the second day following, helped by the constant flow of the stream and a fair wind from the south-east, they drew level with Anastasia Island and by the middle of the afternoon, crossing the bar at high tide, they had anchored in the harbour of St Augustine.
Turned out as elegantly as conditions at sea permitted, in a cocked hat and dove-grey suit, and accompanied by Harvey in sober black and a powdered pigtail, Erasmus stepped on to the quayside to find himself being saluted by a young lieutenant of Dragoons, resplendent in full dress uniform, waiting for him beside an ancient, creaking four-wheeler. Word of the ship’s approach had come post from Anastasia Island, the lieutenant explained, flicking with his gloves at the cracked leather seats of the coach. The Governor was detained in the port at present over some business with stores. He apologized for the state of the conveyance, but there was nothing better to be found, the Spanish having allowed things to run down to a degree quite shocking. With the Colony now in British hands, things would very soon be improved …
At a pace consistent with the powers of their skinny horses and ragged, consumptive-looking driver, they proceeded over the bridge and causeway spanning the estuary of the St Sebastian River, with the decayed fortress of St Mark, built by the Spanish, looming up across the flat, marshy landscape. The city was built along a narrow ridge of land between marsh and river mouth and lay a good two miles from the ocean, though within sight of the bar and lighthouse.
The lieutenant, who was very young, had been instructed to make himself agreeable to the distinguished visitor from England and he strove to fulfil his instructions, pointing out features of the landscape, apologizing yet again for the Governor’s absence. Colonel Campbell had left word he would be back within the hour. Would Mr Kemp care to wait at the Residence? The lieutenant ventured to think they could make him tolerably comfortable …
Erasmus considered. He had never taken easily to waiting; and there would be some advantage, slight but ponderable, in having himself properly announced and received, rather than appearing to wait on the governor’s pleasure. They had entered now the precincts of the city. A pleasant, well-shaded avenue led between gardens and orange groves. ‘If you will be good enough to set me down in the principal square,’ he said, ‘I will walk for an hour and view the town.’
The offer of an escort was declined with polite firmness. In a short while Erasmus was sauntering through the lanes that ran north and south, parallel to the sea wall, Harvey a pace behind, laden with his sword and his gloves and the small box containing his letters of introduction and soon – since the afternoon sun was still hot – his coat and hat.
He was struck by the silence and abandonment of the place. There were no surfaced roads. There were no pavements or sidewalks. The houses were built in the Spanish style, with projecting balconies and latticed verandahs. Time and weather had softened their colours and crumbled the walls surrounding their neglected gardens. For the most part they were shuttered and silent. The whole city lay under the hush of desertion. The stores in the square were boarded. A few listless Indians sat on the steps of the Spanish Mission Church. He encountered small groups of red-coated soldiers from the garrison, but no European civilians at all. The British, it seemed, had taken over an empty city.
It was early evening when he presented himself at the Residence, a white, Spanish-style mansion of good proportions, facing to the sea. He was conducted to the drawing-room, where he found Campbell, together with another man, an officer in uniform, awaiting him. He delivered his letters and expressed himself delighted to make the Governor’s acquaintance.
‘And I yours, sir,’ the Governor said. ‘I bid you heartily welcome here in our new Colony of Florida.’ He was a lean, wiry man, with an energetic manner and the accents of his native Banffshire. His eyes were small and watchful and they held a twinkling light. ‘I have the honour to present Major Redwood, the commander of our garrison here,’ he said.
‘Your servant, sir.’ The major brought his heels together with a jingle of spears. He was big and fair-browed, with a good-humoured, careless face. ‘We have a damned good brandy here,’ he said, ‘if you want to celebrate being on terra firma again. I hate ships myself. The Spanish left a cellarful of it. Just about all they did leave, apart from rusty cannon and dying Indians.’
‘Come, Redwood, we must not give our visitor the wrong impression.’
This had been said with a smile, but Erasmus heard the note of reproof and understood it perfectly. He was swift and acute where his interest was involved. There were two different types of men before him here and the difference might be useful. ‘We should drink to them for leaving it,’ he said with a smile of good-fellowship for Redwood. ‘Then another bumper in gratitude to them for taking themselves off and allowing us to drink in peace.’
This was a sentiment that appealed to the major, who broke into a loud laugh. Erasmus turned back to the Governor. ‘They could not take this happy climate away with them,’ he said, ‘nor the fertility of the soil.’
Campbell showed some cautious pleasure at this. ‘You are right, sir,’ he said. ‘I perceive you to be a man of sense and observation. Why, you can get three crops of vegetables a year out of this soil and figs and oranges in abundance. This could be a paradise, if settled with subjects of King George and properly cultivated.’
‘Let us drink to that and be damned to the Dons,’ Erasmus said, raising his glass.
‘You are proposing to remain some time with us, I believe?’ Campbell said, after they had drunk. His small, twinkling eyes rested steadily on Erasmus for some seconds. ‘Such at least is my hope,’ he added.
‘You are very good, sir. Yes, some little time. There is much of interest here, and I shall need to inform myself before I can make a full report to my partners in London as to the prospects for development in the Colony.’
Campbell nodded with the vigour characteristic of all his movements. When he spoke, however, his voice was softer and the Scottish accent more clearly audible. ‘Yes, sir, we shall hope you carry away with you a favourable impression. But perhaps there is something more particular that you will be requiring from us?’
Erasmus sipped his brandy. There had been more than politeness in this query. It was almost as if the other were reaching for an accommodation between them already. Campbell was a shrewd fellow, by no means the simple soldier he might have wanted to be thought. ‘There are things we might profitably discuss, sir, bye and bye,’ he said. ‘Time and your other engagements permitting.’
‘In the meantime, what do you say to some more brandy?’ Redwood said, turning towards the sideboard. He moved lightly for a man of his bulk. ‘ ’Twill evaporate completely if left too long.’
‘You will stay with us here, of course, for the length of your visit?’ the Governor said. ‘I dare say we can make you rather more comfortable than you will have been aboard ship.’
Erasmus made some demur, but not much; he had been expecting the offer. He was engaged to dinner and shown his quarters, while Harvey, who had just discovered a source of grog below stairs and had begun to harbour designs on a serving girl with Spanish brows and Indian colouring, was dispatched back to the ship for some further necessities of his master’s.
There were only the three of them at dinner. An orderly in uniform served them with quail pie and roast venison and an assortment of fresh vegetables, accompanied by a good Burgundy. Erasmus commented on the excellence of the meal.
‘We owe it to Redwood,’ Campbell said, glancing at the commandant with his usual careful, close-mouthed geniality. The major, it was now explained, had been in charge of the British occupation force when the Colony was handed over by the Spanish, and had served as administrator until the Governor’s arrival eighteen months later. A good deal of his time had been spent on food, one way and another – organizing field kitchens for the garrison, recruiting and training kitchen staff for the Residence, ensuring a supply of fresh meat and vegetables from the surrounding countryside.
‘Well, my congratulations, sir,’ Erasmus said. ‘The results do you credit.’ Much of what Campbell had just been telling him he knew already, though he was careful to give no indication of this. In his usual methodical way, he had made enquiries before leaving England and he knew more about both men than either would have suspected. As they sat after dinner on the terrace with their brandy and cigars, he reviewed this knowledge in his mind. Redwood had been a professional soldier from the age of eighteen when he had joined as an ensign in a regiment of infantry. Since then he had seen service in a dozen campaigns. He was brave, competent, perhaps not greatly ambitious, though he would doubtless be hoping for promotion now, after his services in this interim period. He struck Erasmus as a man who would do much for the sake of friendship or even from a careless kind of generosity. Not so Campbell …
He thought again about the Governor’s record. A cavalryman by training, he had fought with Cumberland against his fellow Scots and held a command under Ligonier in the expeditionary force to Flanders. He had come to North America in 1757 and fought the French and their Indian allies in Pennsylvania and South Carolina. In 1761 he had helped in the defeat and decimation of the Cherokee nation, distinguishing himself as much by his adroit manipulation of rivalries among the tribes as by skill in the field. His present post was a recognition of these services to the Crown. He would need all his diplomacy now, since the main task facing the new administration was to persuade the fierce and numerous Creek Indians to the north and west of them to surrender large tracts of their territory. Campbell had risen on a certain kind of shrewd and dogged merit, without great influence or flavour. He would not want to make enemies at home now.
The knowledge of all this was present to Erasmus as he sat there at his ease in the warm evening, with the land breeze bringing a scent of autumn roses, and the sound of the sea in his ears. Speculation, if not knowledge, there must have been on Campbell’s part too, as he now broke a short period of silence by saying in that softer voice he used for more deliberate speech, ‘You suggested earlier, if I am not mistaken, that we might be of some service to you. But perhaps you would prefer some later occasion to talk of it?’
‘No, no,’ Erasmus said. ‘I have no objection to discussing the matter now, none at all.’
He began to speak about the Liverpool Merchant, the delayed return, the assumed loss, the lapse of twelve years, the visit of Captain Philips, the ship as he had last seen her, grounded and abandoned. He spoke of his belief that the mutineers and the remnants of the negroes had survived and the possibility they had continued living together in the wilds of south Florida. ‘Life would be possible there for a small number and they had women with them,’ he said. He had not mentioned his cousin. ‘It is my intention to pursue these men and bring them to account. I know I can count upon your help as the newly invested Governor. These men have formed a colony of criminals within His Majesty’s Colony of Florida and they must be rooted out and punished with the law.’
A short silence succeeded this. Then Campbell said, ‘You are speaking of a company of renegade whites and runaway negroes beached up in south Florida twelve years ago. Sir, the times have been violent. They are most likely to be dead or scattered long ago.’
‘It is the violence of the times that affords me reason. It is obvious that they did not plan to escape by sea. And the overland route northwards would have been difficult, extremely so, with the Spanish here and the tribes hostile. Their safety would have been in keeping together. They had blood on their hands, if I am right. Where were they to make for?’ He had spoken with confidence but as the silence continued he felt a touch of panic. These were men of experience. He had not realized until now how much he wanted his reasoning to prevail with them. ‘Then there are the stories that the Indians tell,’ he said, into the silence. ‘They talk of a community of black and white living in the south part of the peninsula.’
‘I have heard of no such community,’ Campbell said. ‘The evidence for it seems slight to me, sir.’
This brought a welcome anger. Scepticism from such a quarter was only to be expected – it afforded the best excuse for denying help. ‘I have judged the evidence sufficient,’ he said coldly. ‘I have given you full and adequate reason. I am the one who is injured in this. I have the same right to redress here as I would anywhere else within His Majesty’s dominions. Those negroes who were on the ship originally and any offspring they may have had subsequent to their escape are mine by right of purchase.’
‘Speaking of those same negroes …’ Redwood had leaned forward and was regarding him with a look of good-humoured curiosity. ‘Tell me,’ he said, ‘did it never occur to you that the negroes might have risen against the crew and killed them? Such rebellions have been frequent enough on slaveships – more frequent than mutinies. In that case, none of the seamen would have survived and the blacks might have made south for the Keys. I don’t say this is what happened but I am surprised that you do not think of it as the first possibility.’
The question took Erasmus completely by surprise. He returned the major’s gaze for some moments without being able to think of an answer. He did not like the expression of curiosity on Redwood’s face; it was the look a man might have on seeing something odd, but not dangerously so. The silence on the terrace lengthened from moment to moment. It came to Erasmus in his disarray that his cousin’s guilt was not a matter of logical deduction but a terrible necessity … ‘Why, but of course,’ he said, ‘it could not have been the negroes. It would have needed able seamen to bring her in so close, find the mouth of the inlet and then take soundings so she could be towed.’ He felt as if he had passed some crucial test.
Redwood nodded. ‘Certainly men unused to the sea could not have done it,’ he said. ‘When you say help, I take it you mean troops. You can hardly go down there on your own, waving a warrant.’
‘I have estimated that I shall need a force of fifty men under an officer and two sergeants, and two light cannon,’ Erasmus said.
The Governor uttered a short exclamation, somewhere between a laugh and a snort. Thereafter there was silence, which neither wanted to be the first to break. It was Campbell who yielded. In a voice that this shock had softened almost to the caressive, he said, ‘I beg you will listen to me, my good sir. I intend to be quite frank with you. I am a plain military man, so you will forgive my bluntness. In the days before us there is no slightest prospect of your obtaining five troops, let alone fifty. I should be compelled to say the same whoever asked me and whatever bad report I might suffer for it back home among people who do not understand the exigencies of the situation. You could not have come at a more awkward time with such a request. Perhaps you know something of how things stand with us here?’
‘I know you are on the eve of talks with the Creek Indians.’
‘Sir, the tribes are camped in the woods on the west side of the St John River. They will not cross the water yet. They give the care of their horses as excuse. They are cunning and they have had things their own way in East Florida for a long time.’
‘It is a monster of our own making,’ Redwood said. ‘The Lower Creeks were allied with us in these late wars. We supplied them with muskets and rum in equal measure. They helped us to victory here by keeping the Dons cooped up in their forts.’ He was in the light that fell on to the terrace from the dining-room behind them and Erasmus saw that he was smiling, it seemed rather bitterly. ‘Now they think we owe them something, the poor benighted heathen,’ he said.
‘Aye, man, we know all that, those are the necessities of war,’ Campbell said impatiently. ‘What I am talking about are the problems of peace. The tribes are assembling at the river, not thirty miles off. We have a force of fewer than two hundred men, cavalry included. That is all they have thought fit to give me, sir. There is no prospect of raising a militia, the province is empty, the resident population have followed the Spanish to Havana. In three days we ride out to Picolata to receive the chiefs. The Indian agent is due to arrive from Georgia some time tomorrow to take part in the talks.’
‘And the talks will be directed …?’
‘To the establishment of mutually agreeable frontiers between the lands of the red people and those of the white.’ This came with a certain suavity, as if Campbell were rehearsing his lines for the conference. He had a way of turning his irritation into an occasion for rhetoric.
‘In short,’ Redwood said, ‘our red brothers have to be persuaded to surrender large areas of their traditional hunting grounds. What makes it just a trifle delicate is that they outnumber us at present by roughly twenty to one.’
Campbell made an irritated bridling movement of the head. It was clear that he found the major’s sarcasm irksome. The sarcasm itself seemed to Erasmus in some way factitious or assumed and he was once again aware of stresses between these two men.
‘No question of using force,’ Campbell said. ‘The future of the colony depends on settlement. A fair and proper settlement which will lay the basis for lasting peace. We must secure land in quantity enough to bring settlers from England and we must be able to guarantee the frontiers.’
‘I quite understand the situation,’ Erasmus said. ‘I will be content to wait until these discussions have been completed.’ He knew this form of words would not be greatly agreeable to Campbell, suggesting as they did that a promise had been made. ‘I can employ my time very profitably in the interval,’ he added quickly, ‘by making a survey of the surrounding countryside. I suppose I may have the use of a horse?’ This laying of a small question over a larger one was a device he had found useful in the past.
‘Why, as to that, certainly,’ Campbell said. ‘And a groom, if you like. But I cannot be so definite –’
‘You will have read by now the letters I brought with me?’
‘I have read them, yes.’
‘You will know, then, something of the interests I represent. I don’t go into it at present, it is something we can discuss in the days ahead, but they are very considerable, especially in the matter of capital at disposal for investment –’ He broke off and drew out the watch from his waistcoat pocket. ‘Is it really so late? Time passes quickly when spent in company so congenial. I will not keep you from your rest any longer, gentlemen.’
With this he got to his feet. Redwood walked with him as far as the courtyard which gave access to the guest-rooms. The stables were on that side, the major explained; he had a ride of a mile or so to the house where he was quartered; the officers and a good number of the men had been accommodated in private houses, which had caused trouble in the early days.
‘The Spanish generally quit the houses when someone was quartered on them,’ Redwood said. ‘Then they made a claim on us for compensation, a hundred and eighty dollars a week in the case of Cochrane and me. You have met Cochrane, I think – he came to meet you. I told them that British subjects all over America had troops quartered on them when there were no barracks to contain them, without any expense to the Crown, and how could I put the Crown to expense in their favour when it was not allowed to British subjects?’
He paused, smiling. The moon was up and a pale wash of light lay over the courtyard, silvering the silent stone fountain in the centre and the sharp leaves of the orange trees lining the sides. ‘We took a stand on principle,’ the major said. ‘Always a very convenient thing to do. In fact we had no money to pay. But Campbell will tell you about that – shortage of money is one of his favourite subjects.’
He was silent for a moment, then said in a different tone, ‘There is something I was intending to tell you … I thought it better not to speak of it before the colonel. It is an old maxim in the army not to seem to know more about anything than your superior officer, but he has only been here a few months, you know. The fact is, there is some evidence for the existence of this settlement you spoke about just now. What I said about the negroes rising was only my curiosity.’ Something of the same slightly quizzical expression was on his face as he looked at Erasmus now. ‘It struck me as odd, you know, that you hadn’t thought of it. Anyway, in the first weeks I was here, early in 1763, I talked to a half-breed trapper who had brought in some skins to sell and he told me he had seen black men and white fishing together in a creek back behind the shore. He had heard them shouting to drive the fish into the traps and had gone to look. I remember he said they had bamboo harpoons and there were some children watching from the bank. He said he spoke to them. They talked a lingua franca among themselves, a kind of pidgin. It was summer and they were naked save for loincloths and they had oiled themselves with something fishy-smelling. One of them asked him if he could get horsehair, offered him racoon tails for horsehair, a good trade, the trapper thought, but of course he hadn’t got any …’
‘Horsehair,’ Erasmus repeated wonderingly. ‘What would a man in that wilderness want with horsehair?’
‘It was a garbled story. A fiddle came into it somewhere. I don’t recall the details, perhaps I never knew them. The trapper’s English wasn’t exactly –’
‘You need horsehair to make a fiddle-bow …’ Erasmus looked for a moment across the moonlit courtyard. ‘There was a fiddler,’ he said with sudden and rather startling loudness. ‘He was mentioned … They had a fiddler aboard to dance the slaves.’
‘Did they so? That may be it then. I didn’t think too much of it at the time. In the months after the Peace Treaty people came with all sorts of stories, just to gain our goodwill.’
‘Did he say where it was?’
‘He did not say exactly. It was in the country north of Cape Florida and the Miami River. That is a region of pinewood ridge and jungle hummock, completely trackless – it has never been mapped.’
‘Could the man be found again?’
‘I shouldn’t think so. Not in time to be of any use to you. These fellows go off for months into the wilds. But I can make enquiries among the Mission Indians who have stayed on here. Most of them speak some Spanish, it is not difficult to find an interpreter. Someone may be found who knows something of the matter. There may be trade links. It is not really so improbable that a small settlement could have survived down there. They are marshlands mainly, I believe, but game must be plentiful, fish too, and it is healthier than the west side because of the sea breezes. During the years of the war there were no troop movements or landings in the far south of Florida. What would have been the point? Miles from anywhere, no use to anyone. There are reports of mixed bands of negroes and Indians from Mississippi raiding in West Florida, but nothing south of the St John River. I’ll see what I can find out.’
‘I would be extremely grateful.’ Despite his efforts at containment, Erasmus’s voice quivered slightly. He had felt his soul expand with delight at this confirmation of his hopes.
‘It means a lot to you, doesn’t it?’
Erasmus straightened up at this and glanced away. Only feelings of gratitude to Redwood prevented him from resenting this intimate question more. He felt the eyes of the other man fixed on him still. ‘I have come from England expressly to see justice done,’ he said.
‘Ah, yes, I forgot – justice.’ Redwood raised his head and smiled and his strong teeth gleamed in the moonlight. It was a careless smile, though with something bitter in it, not the smile of a stupid man. ‘Justice is a mighty fine thing,’ he said.