16

The Old World

February 1874

“Not exactly the sunny Italy you read about, is it?” said the engineer as the Trinidad steamed up the channel toward Genoa’s harbor.

“No, Mr. Monroe, it’s not,” agreed Wake, standing at the rail bundled up in his great coat. It was freezing cold. “And I thought it would be a bit more . . . historic. Quaint.”

“Reminds me of Liverpool. Even the stink is the same. Ach, I’m going below to my domain and a better sight for my old eyes—my beautiful iron darlins!”

The city slowly came into view through the winter rain squalls. Wake took it all in, overwhelmed by the magnitude, first seeing an ancient stone lighthouse on a point of land, then the jumbled gray city surrounding the crowded harbor, finally the brown hills rising rapidly from the city. The colors were faded and tired. Ornate cathedral domes, utilitarian government buildings, and bustling commercial blocks covered his view, and smoke from a thousand chimneys melded with the rainy mist to present an unreal aspect to the scene. Rancid sewage and smoky cooking fires filled his nostrils. The shriek of steam cranes and clattering of hooves echoed around the stone buildings. Frenzied motion was everywhere.

The harbor held dozens of steamers and hundreds of smaller sailing vessels. Wake saw warships from Austria, France, Italy, Spain, and the Ottoman Empire at anchor. All of them were more powerful than any American naval vessel he had known since the war. Genoa wasn’t anything like what Wake expected.

As they came alongside a dock crowded with jumbled piles of cargo, he heard shouts from the stevedores in several languages—French, Italian, and German, from what he could tell. The Italian passengers aboard were excitedly showing others the points of interest, and seeing their euphoria, Wake was plunged into sadness. They were going home, but he was on the far side of the world from his own home and family, in a place as alien as any jungle he had known in the Caribbean.

Beyond his sense of remoteness, he was worried about heading for a staff officer assignment as flag lieutenant to the admiral—a task he didn’t understand, wasn’t trained for, and which was far more daunting to him than facing an armed enemy.

Carmena and Manuel came to his cabin just before they disembarked. Thanking him for getting them out of Spain, Carmena lost her composure. A flood of tears burst and Manuel took over, asking Wake if they could please continue to use the aliases he had given them. He said yes and wished them luck. Then with hugs and a chorus of hopeless “hasta luego” the three were parted—Wake knowing that he would probably never see the two lovers again.

As he descended the gangway into the throng of people on the dock an hour later, the rain started to pour down even harder. He felt the gloomy weather fill his soul.

“Well, this isn’t starting out very impressively,” Wake said to no one in particular as he felt his uniform soak through.

***

The Marino Hotel was a cheap one by the docks. The consulate used it for naval officers and state department officials in transit, but Wake was the only American there at the time. Vermin could be heard scurrying about all night, a rancid smell permeated the place, the food was atrocious, and the servants were sullen. It reminded Wake of a naval vessel that had been at sea for several months.

A week after checking in with a harried clerk at the consulate, Wake still languished in his musty hotel room. The rain was almost constant, but in between the squalls that swept down from the surrounding mountains he took walks around the harbor, speaking Spanish, for few spoke English, and trying with difficulty to learn the northern Italian dialect. He considered stopping by the French consulate to see if Catherine Faber had returned to her husband in Genoa—she should have been there a month already—but decided that might not be a wise thing to do. He didn’t want to get involved in her marital life and was afraid of what she might do to his.

Desperate for something to do, Wake read a novel he had brought with him, John Esten Cooke’s Her Majesty the Queen, which had become a bestseller the year before. He thought Cooke’s depiction of early colonial Virginia’s countryside appealing and the characters’ complicated inter-twinings rather absorbing. It made for a nice diversion. Wake had never met an author before and wondered how a novelist could put it all together, creating a world within a book. Perhaps I’ll meet one among the cultured elite of Europe on this assignment, he pondered, then speculated about when his assignment would actually begin. He hadn’t heard any word about when the squadron was due to arrive, or even where it would arrive.

His mind was constantly on Linda and the children, wondering what they were doing, where they were going, how they were feeling. He worried that they were slipping away from him, and his worry turned into melancholy. He knew it wasn’t healthy to dwell on such things, but he couldn’t help it. The melancholy grew into a deep depression and he lost his fortitude to do the simplest things. He stopped eating in the dining room or shaving in the morning. The following day he stayed in bed. Then, after three days of mind-numbing lethargy, when he saw the dawn light enter his room he cursed the ceiling and forced himself to get cleaned up and go for a walk.

On the afternoon of the eighth day he received an invitation from the consul general himself, whom he had never met. It was to a diplomatic reception at the British Consulate the following evening. Attire was full dress and Wake, in the absence of any senior American officers, would represent the United States Navy. The invitation was not worded as a request, or he would have ignored it. It was more of a summons, so he felt compelled to go.

He walked to the room’s tiny window and peered out. He needed to take a walk, be outside, see the sky, and think. Think about his life and his career. It was raining heavily, again. He returned to his bed and sat there, staring at the novel, wishing he was anywhere but there.

***

“Lieutenant Peter Wake, United States Navy!” called out the major-domo above the sound of the string quartet’s waltz.

No one in the crowded ballroom obviously noticed his introduction, for which Wake was grateful, and he made his way toward a bar table set up in the far corner. He felt uncomfortable in his heavy dress mess uniform and was already starting to sweat, for even though it was cold outside, the room was jammed with people and stuffy. And he was worried about meeting Catherine Faber, or her husband. A servant was handing him a fluted glass of cold champagne when a tall fair-haired young man in coat and tails approached him, held out his hand, and spoke in the clear voice of a Midwesterner.

“Lieutenant Wake? I am Daniel Davis, chargé d’affairs to Consul General Strom. Thank you for coming. I must sincerely apologize for not getting with you before this evening, I hope your stay in Genoa has been pleasant.”

Wake wasn’t in the mood for small talk. “No, it’s been a bit boring really. Does it always rain constantly like this?”

Davis grinned disarmingly and let out a laugh. “Only in the winter, Lieutenant. And admittedly, this winter has been worse for some reason.”

“Do you have any word on the squadron? When are they returning? Are they going to Villefranche, or where?”

“Yes, well that’s the good news I have for you. We got a telegraph today that they will be here soon. They left Lisbon yesterday. There is some sort of problem with them staying at their normal anchorage at Villefranche—I don’t know for sure what, but I’ve heard various rumors—so their winter station will be here at Genoa.”

Wake quickly worked out the navigation in his head. Barring severe headwinds, the squadron could sail the thirteen hundred miles and be at Genoa in approximately seven days at eight knots under canvas. He sighed. Another week alone in that room.

“Thank you, Mr. Davis. I suppose I’ll wait in Genoa then.”

“And I understand you’ll be the flag lieutenant to Admiral Case?”

“Yes, I will.”

“Excellent. Then you and I will be working a lot together while the squadron is at Genoa. Oh, the consul general wants to meet you too.”

“Listen, before I meet him, can you fill me in on the situation here?” Wake asked. “This is my first time in this part of the world and I don’t have a clue, except that it’s all completely alien to me. I need to understand what’s going on and who is who.”

“Well, I’ll be damned, a man who admits it when he doesn’t know something.” Davis slapped Wake on the shoulder. “What a breath of fresh air you are! I like that. So you really want to know what goes on around here?”

“Got to, Mr. Davis—before the admiral gets here. He’s got a reputation in the navy for not tolerating fools at all.”

Davis smiled. “So I’ve heard. Of course, he’s been very engaging when I’ve been with him, and the consul general gets along famously with the admiral. War hero, I think. Got over here last year from duty at Washington. A gunnery expert, I believe.”

Wake knew that. Case was well known in the navy for being an innovator and stickler for practice in gunnery. He also was the senior officer who implemented the torpedo station at Newport, Rhode Island, for prior to taking over command of the squadron he was chief of the Bureau of Ordnance in Washington. “What about the diplomatic situation here, though? The international politics. And please, call me Peter.”

“All right, and I’m Dan. Now there, ah yes, the politics. For that, we’ll need at least one more drink.” Davis paused and looked around the crowded room. “Come with me, Peter, and we’ll talk outside.”

Davis signaled the bar servant for more champagne, put a glass in each hand and beckoned Wake to do the same, then they headed away from the noise of the guests to one of the several balconies that ran along one wall. The rain had just stopped and the gentle breeze felt good as Wake violated regulations and opened his coat to cool off once they were outside. Davis downed one glass straight away.

“A briefing on the situation here? Very well. Start out with your mindset, Peter. You are in the Old World now. Forget honesty. Forget trust. Forget right and wrong. The situation right here, right now, started a thousand years ago. And every one of those two-faced bastards in that ballroom knows each twisted facet, each perceived slight and insult, and each moment of supposed glory, of that convoluted history for every single one of those thousand years. They think that we in the New World are children because our history is only a couple of hundred years old. We’re naïve children that should be seen but not heard, and grateful for what our mother countries have given and taught us.”

Wake remembered what Catherine had told him that night at St. Pierre about European attitudes toward Americans. “That’s pretty cynical, Dan. How long’ve you been in the diplomatic business?”

Davis downed his second glass and reached for one of Wake’s. His tone was completely different from the jovial one he had displayed inside the ballroom.

“I call it realistic, and I’ve been with the Department of State for four years. You know, when I started I used to think Washington was bad. Did my first two years there. For the last two years I’ve been here among these pompous, antiquated blowhards. That’s time enough to get cynical enough to deal with them without illusions. Welcome to the Old World, Peter Wake of Uncle Sam’s not so glorious navy . . .”