From above, it was impossible to see the size of the underwater ship, nor a name plate, nor any means of propulsion. The gangplank flexed under Elizabeth’s weight as she edged out from the jetty. But when she stepped onto the back of the craft, it felt steady under her feet; more solid than the edge of the island.
From a distance she’d thought it constructed of wooden staves, like a huge barrel. But the surface she stepped onto was made of copper. The stave-lines were an imprint of the structure within, as if the sheet metal had been beaten and pressed hard over ridges and grooves.
Indeed, this is how it proved, for lowering herself through an opening on the beast’s back, she saw the inside surface, which was a wooden construction, braced with iron. The ladder she descended was wooden also, as was the small chamber beneath. A short, heavily freckled woman stood waiting for her, a shy smile on her face.
“Welcome,” she said.
Anxiety and distress had been gnawing at Elizabeth since the shooting down of the airship. She wanted to run or to fight. She wanted to do something, anything that might save Julia. But there would be no running enclosed within the limits of this claustrophobic vessel.
She looked around herself, taking in the unfamiliar architecture. It seemed more a drawing room in miniature than an underwater fighting machine. The ceiling was so low that she had to stoop in order to step away from the space below the hatch.
“What should I call it?” she asked.
“Sea Wasp,” said the freckled woman. “Our newest submarine ship.”
“It’s… extraordinary.”
The skin around the woman’s eyes wrinkled as her smile broadened. “My name’s Bonny, by the way. Is this your first time? Underwater, I mean. I’ll show you what goes where. Come. Follow.” All this came in a rush of pride and enthusiasm.
The purpose of the small compartment, Bonny said, was to keep water from flooding the rest of the ship when the hatch was opened in heavy weather. Going in for an attack, the boarding crew waited below until all was in place. Then they swarmed up the ladder and out. Water might crash down to fill the little room, but it would go no further. And being so low to the surface, the ship presented no profile for the enemy to see or to fire on. The doors from the little compartment were watertight. Pumps would make the chamber dry again once the hatch had been closed.
“Why isn’t it made of metal?” Elizabeth asked as they edged forward through a narrow passageway. Everything was panelled.
“Condensation,” said Bonny. “You breathe down here and iron walls get slick with water. It only takes a few minutes. But this kind of wood absorbs it. It keeps the air good to breathe. Whenever we’re on the surface, we blow fresh air through the ship and the wood dries out again. Down here it’s all about air, water and carbon dioxide. Get those right and you’re good.”
She stopped at the end of the passage. The shy expression had returned to her face. “We’re really honoured to have you,” she said. “On Sea Wasp, I mean. And in the Nation.”
Before Elizabeth could respond, the woman had opened the door and ducked through.
The chamber in the foremost part of the ship seemed to be a control room. The walls and ceiling curved inwards, meeting at the very nose of the craft, at which point was a circle of glass about the size of a dinner plate.
Other crewmembers hurried about tasks that Elizabeth didn’t understand. Banks of gauges to port and starboard connected to a maze of brass pipes running across the inside of the hull, disappearing into the floor and aft wall. She saw a mass of levers and valves, not unlike the controls of a steam engine, but more numerous. The helm wheel stood at the centre of the room. The strangest arrangement was a chair suspended below the crest of the roof. There sat another small woman. Elizabeth had never seen such dark skin. Her bare arms had a sheen like polished ebony in the daylight that shone down from what seemed a small window directly above her.
She spoke into a tube. “Is the hatch made watertight?”
Elizabeth couldn’t hear the answer, but the woman seemed satisfied. Looking into the overhead window she called out: “Ahead one quarter.”
There was a faint whining sound, and Elizabeth felt her balance shift as the craft started to move.
“Two points starboard.”
The officer at the helm adjusted the wheel and they began to turn.
“Straighten out. Engine three-quarters power.”
“Would you like to see?” asked Bonny, beckoning her forwards.
Elizabeth had to crouch to look out of the dinner plate window in the nose of the submarine. All outside was water. Above, the colour was blue with flashes of gold from sunlight refracted through the waves. The colour darkened by degrees towards the black depths.
“What’s that?” she asked, looking directly up to a spar that jutted from the front of the submarine like a bowsprit from a regular ship, but somewhat downward in angle. She had to get out of the way for Bonny to see what she’d indicated.
“On the other submarines they call it the saw. We call it the stinger. It’s jagged at the top. Sharp and hard enough to cut through a gunship’s keel if we aim it just right.”
Elizabeth looked through the window again. “And how do you aim it?”
“From up there,” she pointed to the glass in the roof above the captain. “It’s a kind of lens. It lets you see forwards. When we’re out from the island maybe you can have a look.”
For all its elegance and the marvel of its construction, the submarine was a killing machine. The science of destruction, John Farthing had said. Weapons are being developed out there beyond our power to stop them. We don’t understand what they are. But they threaten to cut Europe from America. How prophetic his words now seemed.
“You spoke with Mother Rebecca,” Bonny said, breaking in on Elizabeth’s dark thoughts. It seemed not a question, but the statement of a marvellous fact. “And now here we are – the day we’ve planned for. I’ve been twenty-three years in the Nation. All our struggles have been for this.”
“For what?” Elizabeth asked.
Bonny seemed taken aback by the question. Then she laughed, as if realising she’d been teased. “The end of hiding. We’ll be rulers of the ocean. The Unicorn will sail!”
The crew of the Sea Wasp were eighteen in number, not counting Elizabeth. They slept in cots rather than hammocks. But the vessel seemed less thrown about by the waves than a regular ship.
“Two fathoms down, you won’t feel them at all,” Bonny said.
The ships of the fleet moved at different speeds. The Iceland Queen and the other paddle steamers were fastest. The submarines made fair progress on the surface, but were slow submerged. The speed of the sailing boats varied, depending on the strength and direction of the wind.
In anticipation of the Company gunboats taking a direct southerly course to Freedom Island, Siân had set them on a northwesterly path, giving enough space for the two fleets to pass without making sight of each other. That also allowed the sailing boats to take advantage of the prevailing winds, which circled around towards the coast of North America.
With no horizon to gaze on and no sky, one day blended into another. To Elizabeth, the slow passing of time felt unbearable. She lay awake in her bunk, trying to picture the faces of her friends and to remember their voices. When she thought of John Farthing, she cried. He could have used his position as a Patent Office agent to stop her from leaving. But he was the gentlest of men. She longed for his touch.
At last, the rhythm of activity in the submarine began to change. And there were new noises; the sound of a pumping engine working, water and air being forced through narrow pipes. The Sea Wasp began to wallow in the swell.
“We’re pumping out the ballast!” Bonny said. “It’s pushing us higher in the water. Hope you don’t get sick.”
An unfamiliar light shone through from the dinner plate window in the nose of the submarine as it emerged from the water. Desperate to see the outside world, Elizabeth got down on her knees next to it and looked up at a blue sky streaked with mackerel cloud. Then a wave came and the window was underwater. But only for a second before the blue was above them again, and the dark line of the stinger. The sight of it made her skin crawl. Somewhere ahead Julia was held captive by the Company. Even if she spoke freely, they’d believe she was hiding the truth. Elizabeth’s breathing became shallow as she fought back a creeping nausea.
“Did you ever see America?” asked Bonny, who’d come up silently behind her.
America. The very name stirred Elizabeth to the core. The skies were wide there, people said. There was space enough to become lost from the world. It evoked a freedom beyond her reach. The land where John Farthing had been born; a man who might never again hold her close.
“Come on!” said Bonny, taking her hand. “You should look at it. Just to say you have.”
There were safety lines to tie before they’d let her up the ladder to the hatchway in the Sea Wasp’s back. The harness went around her waist and over her shoulders. Bonny clipped the lines onto an iron loop in the wood-panelled wall before scampering up the ladder. Elizabeth followed more slowly, inhaling the fresh air. As she emerged, the wind whipped her hair against her face and she tasted the saltwater spray. Bonny had shifted a couple of paces down the beast’s back. Her feet were planted apart and she’d gathered in the slack of her safety line so that it pulled tight. Doing the same, Elizabeth found she had enough stability to stand.
The light was dazzling after a day and a half in the submarine. Shielding her eyes, she looked around her. Some of the Sargassan fleet had already arrived. More ships were steaming in from the south. Haze clung to the western horizon. Squinting to get a better look, she made out a faint line between the clouds and the sea.
“That’s the Carolinas,” Bonny said. “Ten miles further and we’d be in their waters.”
“I used to dream of going to America.”
“We’ll not be going there today! This is our furthest west. If the Company’s out to attack us, their gunships will be passing way over there.” She pointed east. “This is where we make our turn. The rest of the Company fleet is north and east of here. Without any protection!”
Elizabeth had never been greatly afflicted by seasickness. But inside the wallowing submarine her stomach felt unsettled. It was partly the tension of waiting for the battle to begin, and partly that she had no horizon at which to stare. She took to sitting on the floor of the control room next to the dinner-plate window, looking out between waves.
More of the fleet arrived through the afternoon. A few minutes after four bells, she glimpsed a steam launch ploughing its way between two of the larger ships. It appeared again from time to time after that. She began to look out for it, trying to guess the nature of its errand. An hour later it passed close enough to the Sea Wasp’s prow to cast a shadow over the dinner-plate window. Its wash splashed over the glass.
When Bonny came from the galley bringing mugs of broth, Elizabeth asked her about it.
“Siân’s going from ship to ship with the battle orders.”
“Will she come to Sea Wasp?” Elizabeth asked.
Bonny beamed with pride. “She’s already here. She’s talking with the captain.”
Elizabeth found them in the captain’s cabin, bent low over the small table, consulting the Atlantic chart.
“Did you enjoy the voyage,” Siân said, on seeing her.
Elizabeth folded her arms. “What are our orders?”
“Good news,” said the captain. “We’re to be first into the attack.”
“A submarine won’t sink the mother ship,” Elizabeth said. “I’ve seen the hull from the inside. You won’t cut that thickness of metal.”
The captain seemed embarrassed. “I’ll leave you to talk,” she said, then stepped out of the cabin.
“We won’t be attacking the mother ship,” Siân said, when they were alone.
“But we must!”
“You said it yourself – we can’t sink it. But they’ll surrender once the rest of their fleet is lost.”
“You promised I’d be first onto the mother ship.”
“The decision’s made. But you shall be first. After their other ships are ours.”
“They’ll kill Julia!”
“She won’t be the only one to die.”
“I voted with you for a chance to rescue her! You cheated me.”
Siân shrugged. “You saw what you wanted to see.”
Elizabeth’s nausea was suddenly worse. The strength went from her legs and she sat heavily on the captain’s bunk.
“We’re throwing a net,” Siân said. “They’ll try to escape. They’ll send out their fastest ships. But we’ll have submarines positioned around their fleet. We’ll pick them off until that leviathan is all they’ve got left. Then they’ll surrender. You’ll see.”
A thought came to Elizabeth; the memory of the unspooling drum. “You’re wrong,” she said. “There’s a cable being paid out into the water under the mother ship. I believe it sends messages all the way back to the Patent Office in England.”
Siân angled her head, as if confronted with a curious new creature. “I don’t believe you.”
“I saw it. It’s in the central hull.”
“Then why didn’t you tell me before?”
“I wasn’t sure of what it meant. I’m still not. But it’s the only answer that makes sense. It’s how they got an airship to the island with such speed. When they see our fleet, they’ll use it to call for help. Every gunship in Europe will sail for us. The mother ship won’t give up. All they have to do is hold us off for a few days. But if you attack the mother ship first, you’ll have the prize by the time their reinforcements come.”
Siân didn’t answer directly. She looked down at the cabin floor as if considering the question. Then she nodded. “You’d surely make up any story to save your friend. I don’t blame you.”
“It’s the truth!”
“So you say.”
Siân turned to go. Elizabeth jumped from the cot to block the doorway with her body.
“Step down!” Siân growled.
“You don’t believe me. Nor do I believe you. You won’t let me be first onto the mother ship.”
“You push too hard!”
“Write it, then. Write it like one of your orders.”
They were staring eye to eye, very close in the small cabin. It seemed Siân might barge her out of the way, but abruptly she turned, snatching paper and pen from the captain’s desk. Elizabeth watched as she dipped the nib and wrote: You shall be first to board the mother ship. Then she signed it with an angry flourish, leaving no room below for any words to be added. There was a dangerous light in her eyes as she held out the paper.
“You push yourself to danger, Elizabeth. One day soon you’ll find you’ve pushed too hard. But then it will be too late.”
There was one more ship to arrive that night; one final piece in the puzzle of the Sargassan Nation. Bonny called Elizabeth up onto the back of the Sea Wasp to bear witness. Cloud in the western sky had been lit yellow by the setting sun, deepening to bronze near the horizon. The ocean had become strangely calm.
In the golden light she saw the approach of a squat steamer with a tall black funnel. Towed behind it, seeming more like a vision than reality, came the broad curve of a sailing ship, though without masts or rigging.
“What is it?” Elizabeth asked, not believing the evidence of her eyes.
“This is the day,” said Bonny. “The Unicorn will sail!”