Higher Cause Read online

  HIGHER CAUSE

  HIGHER CAUSE

  JOHN HUNT

  Copyright © 2012 by John F. Hunt

  All rights reserved.

  www.readJohnHunt.com

  Published by Laissez Faire Books

  Baltimore, Maryland

  lfb.org

  ISBN: 978-1-62129-058-2

  Cover art: Susanne Clark

  Acknowledgements

  ALTHOUGH IT COULD be said that I didn't write Higher Cause completely on my own, I assure you that the government had absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with it. There are some very important actual contributors whom I am eager to recognize. Kimberly Johnson, who encouraged that I keep writing and keep writing. My two children who put up with me through all sorts of travails. They all are waiting for me to buy a boat to sail around the world with them. CAPT Brown Word, USN (ret) provided character to the characters who populate the antisubmarine warfare community, and he is quite the character himself. William Kennedy, a great author who read the first draft and sent me on the road to noveldom. B.K. Marcus who read the submitted manuscript for Laissez Faire Books, successfully served as internal champion, and nurtured every word through editing and processing. I. Harry David, who examined and evaluated for correctness every word in the document, and changed every other word in the name of said correctness. Finally, to my parents and the publishers, editors, and authors of Laissez Faire Books, to all of whom I owe my education and whatever common sense I have.

  Contents

  Prologue

  1. Impending Doom

  2. Two Brothers with Four Guns

  3. A Bleeding-Heart Libertarian

  4. Mysterious Wealth

  5. A Possibility of Fusion

  6. Recruitment

  7. Creative Destruction

  8. Paradise Found

  9. Exploring Paradise

  10. Conspiracy

  11. Fatal Shot

  12. Survival

  13. A Drinking Club with a Running Problem

  14. Rekindling the Fire

  15. Death on the High Seas

  16. Lust and Magic in a Volcano

  17. Destroyers of Wealth

  18. Critical Mass

  19. Investigator

  20. Tunnel of Fusion

  21. Sophia’s Secret Ally

  22. Mexican Threat

  23. The Manner of Destruction

  24. Arrival and Assault

  25. A Righting

  26. Abuse

  27. Search and Destroy

  28. Medic

  29. The Bounty Is Near

  30. Women

  31. Intent to Nationalize

  32. Spy and Destroyer

  33. Dissent and Exploration

  34. A Man from Maine

  35. Activation

  36. Conspiracy Realized

  37. The Motivations of Men

  38. Kidnap

  39. Kill Her Now

  40. Escape and Evade

  41. Evacuation

  42. A Bowl of Oranges

  43. Tension

  44. Canisters of Death

  45. Sink It Now

  46. Teaming Up

  47. Arrival of the State

  48. The Product of Your Effort Is Ours for Taking

  49. Mutual Demise

  50. Trial

  51. Force

  52. Annihilation

  53. Prior Claim

  54. Jaws of Defeat

  55. Fraud and Force

  56. Observe and Report

  57. Mexican Standoff

  58. Treasure Ship

  59. Hope Lost

  60. Look Up

  Epilogue

  Prologue

  Year 1791

  THE SMALL BOAT was as tired and beaten as the lone man who struggled to control her. On the verge of foundering, the craft had taken water to a level far above what any sailor would consider the bilge. The man’s knees and all below were immersed. Yet his feet felt no more damp than the remainder of his body. The tropical sea that leaked through the seams in the hull was warm, quite unlike the hammering rain that soaked through his clothes. This warmth decreased his drive to continue bailing the water that had been invading the sanctity of the little boat for the last two days. How easy it would be to slip over the side into the soothing and protecting waters of the ocean. The pain in his ears would end; the constant noise, the whipping and torture of the slicing rain would immediately cease. He would be surrounded in peace and comfort.

  But he was not yet willing to die. He was still a young man, although his appearance belied it. And whereas guilt had once pushed aside every noble feeling, the crime that had led him here had been atoned for repeatedly, and the self-condemnation was finally fading. Many would not consider it a crime at all, had they known the full truth, but rather an act of heroism. The man himself did not consider it to be either. It was just what he had done. A long time ago.

  He pulled on the oars again and again, keeping the bow into the wind. If he let the boat turn broadside to the waves, he would certainly be capsized. A wave crashed over him, its mass hurtling into his back and forcibly knocking him off the thwart. His head smashed against the flat, hard wooden board, and, briefly, blackness overshadowed his senses. It was but a momentary reprieve from his pain, for consciousness soon returned completely, and with it full awareness of the anguish of his battered body.

  He clambered back onto the hard seat and grasped the oars. The oars had been his consistent friends for these several days, never breaking the faith, always staying with the ailing craft despite being released from his grasp on so many occasions. He looked at them through the painful slits of exhausted eyes. They were made of British pine, hand carved by an unnamed craftsman. They were heavy and rough, having suffered years of exposure to the elements, resting inside the small hulls of any number of wooden dories. They had traveled around the world, perhaps several times.

  On this voyage alone, these oars had traversed the Atlantic Ocean from the British Isles, across the South Atlantic through the storms of the Horn, then back across the ocean to South Africa and through the tropical waters near New South Wales to the island called Otaheite and beyond. All this distance, they lay lashed abreast the gunwales of the starboard cutter, hoisted high above the water by the wooden slings of the His Majesty’s Armed Vessel Bounty.

  The voyage of the Bounty was certainly one of the most extraordinary imaginable. The ship’s captain had been a competent man — dedicated to his ship and his mission. And also dedicated to his country. But perhaps most of all he was dedicated to his ambitions. The captain had been Lieutenant William Bligh.

  William had been his mentor and friend. A good friend. And as a friend, William had been a good man: generous, conscientious, concerned, supportive. Very particular, yes, but he could even be described as fun loving and jovial. And he cared for his men. He was calm and controlled. That self-control had been manipulated away from him.

  The rain continued its assault on the thin and weathered body of the man struggling at the oars. His tortured mind drifted over the events that had led him here. It had been a brief but remarkable period — a moment in time that had defined his life for him, and certainly to the Admiralty as well. By the Admiralty he had been branded a mutineer. Mutiny: that crime considered to be worthy of only one punishment — hanging.

  He, too, thought of himself as a mutineer. It nauseated him to think what he had done. But what choice had he? Had he not given William — Lieutenant Bligh — every opportunity to avoid the events of that miserable day? He had reasoned with him, begged him, pleaded, demanded, and even threatened him. But William, damn him, had stood fast.

  Partly in an effort to block out
his current water-soaked misery, Fletcher Christian imagined himself standing on the dry deck of the Bounty. At least the weather then had been perfect. The clear memory of Bligh’s gruff voice came to him unhindered by the time that had passed.

  “One could not find a more pristine day, would you not say, Mr. Christian?”

  “Aye. God has his hand near us, for certain.” Fletcher Christian looked out over a blue sea with only an occasional cloud in the sky. Those that were there were high and full, white carved with deep grey caves and canyons — white and grey like new sails. His eyes moved over and gazed up the masts to the courses, topsails, topgallants and royals. These sails were neither new, nor white, but every one was flying and full, propelling the Bounty through the water at better than eight knots.

  Unfortunately, they were moving at eight knots in the wrong direction — toward home, yes, but away from their mission. It was time once again to enter the debate with William. This would be the last time. After this, the reserve plans that he so carefully, conscientiously, and guiltily had put into motion over the previous weeks would by necessity have to be employed. He prayed briefly. One more time.

  Christian looked around the ship. At ninety feet, she was a small vessel, and after the long voyage she felt so much the more diminutive. Her three masts were solid and true, linked to the ship and to each other with iron rings and thick rope stays. Thick webs and individual lines of hemp were precisely and thoughtfully placed for the crew to be able to manage the extensive sails. The decks were bare and rough. Her guns had been fired only thrice on this voyage, never in offense. Only two of the original three ship’s boats were still present: the launch, and the partially rotted cutter. A brass lamp was near his feet, left behind from the night’s watch. Barely four years old, the Bounty appeared more worn than one should expect. Likewise the men who sailed her. Two of those men were in the rigging always looking out, several aft working lines, and a man on the helm. The rest were below decks. Here up near the foc’s'le, he was out of earshot from any of them.

  He moved abreast of Bligh. “William, I would ask you to reconsider your position.”

  “Your language is civil today. Am I to take it that we are friends again, Fletcher? I thought that by now you truly hated me.” Bligh scratched at his shaven and prominent chin as he said this, and looked steadily into his master’s mate’s eyes.

  Christian, a taller man by far, could not hold the gaze, and so he let his dark eyes wander out over the sea. The men stood side by side, looking over the water.

  “I have never been anything but your friend, William. You are wrong to think otherwise of me.”

  “What am I supposed to think when you openly defy me in front of the crew, eh? Even worse, situations have arisen on a frequent basis that could have been prevented by a few words from you, but instead come to a head and require severe and immediate response from me. My God, man, if discipline has to be doled out from the level of the captain, then it will be doled out the way this captain sees fit!” Bligh paused, then turned toward Christian again. “I am, no doubt, thought of by some of the men as harsh and unjust. This, I blame on you.”

  If Bligh only knew just how true that was, he would immediately restrict him to his quarters, or more wisely, throw him in the brig. Actually, it was not some of the men, but rather all the men that considered Bligh to have become a brutal man. And it was Christian who had orchestrated many things to make him appear so. As a captain he was rigid, it was true. But he was not heavy-handed with his discipline. He despised applying the lash. Lieutenant Bligh would not usually discipline indiscriminately. Nor unjustly. However, during these last two weeks, Christian’s plan was centered on that exactly: making the captain appear unjust, unpredictable, and out of control. And, although he was not proud of it in the least, Christian had been very successful at the task.

  He pictured the able-bodied seaman who had been lashed for defying a direct order. And the midwatch, who nine days later were still eating only dry bread and water for failing to stay on course while the captain rested. Then the young midshipman who had been loudly berated by the captain, in front of the men no less, for requesting that a command be repeated. The whole ship’s complement was on half water rations, despite the heat, so that the plants in the hold could be watered. And then there were the three deserters who were chained together in the bilge with the rats, sweating and suffocating in that kiln, far below where the captain and Christian now stood. Christian, surreptitiously, had been an initiating party to each one of these offenses, as well as many more, seeking ways to provoke the captain’s wrath. He was becoming too efficient. He had manipulated Bligh into defying his natural gentle demeanor, and had made him hated and untrusted.

  Christian did not want this conversation to deteriorate into a personal battle. He said, quietly, “I am surely to blame for some of the crew’s ire, William. I am sure we both are, to some extent.”

  Accepting some responsibility seemed to defuse Bligh’s anger for a moment, and he said merely, “Hmmm.”

  “William, again, I ask you to reconsider. We must turn back to Otaheite.”

  Bligh closed his eyes. He was a stout man, but with solid features that served to affirm his stronger-willed nature and that suggested his physique should not be interpreted as weakness. Christian tried to ascertain whether or not he was angry, but could not yet tell.

  Bligh sighed, as if resigned to having to undergo another useless argument with his ship’s master’s mate. He responded slowly, “We are now fully three weeks out of Otaheite. The breadfruit that we carry in our hold will not stay hardy long, so we find ourselves under some pressure of time. You have been arguing your point for each of the last twenty days. Why should you think you might be more successful on this occasion, Fletcher?”

  “This will be the last time I ask, William, I promise you. That is, as long as you let me present all the issues one final time.” Christian hoped beyond reason that his friend would see it his way — or else the consequences would be dire.

  “Your word on it? The last time?”

  “I so promised it.”

  Whispering, the captain spit, “Get on with it then.”

  It was Christian’s turn to close his eyes. He had been up for hours the previous night, strategizing his argument. He planned to choose his words well. He could not allow emotions to overtake him, as had so often happened before. For if William refused to hear him out this time, he knew he would be granted no further chances.

  “William, what is the purpose of this voyage?”

  Bligh responded, curtly, “I will play along with you only briefly.”

  “I thank you, sir. I ask again, what is the purpose of this voyage?”

  “As you well know, we have been ordered to obtain breadfruit saplings from Otaheite, as we have done, and transport the young trees alive to the West Indies. There they will be planted, nurtured, and harvested by the king’s plantationers, and the product so obtained used to inexpensively, yet adequately, feed the slaves and indentured servants.”

  Impatiently, Christian responded, “Yes, William, yes, and you have done that well so far. However, that is not the true purpose.”

  But Bligh interrupted, ignoring Christian’s last words. “So far, we have done it poorly, indeed! We spent four months on that pagan island of Otaheite, dawdling around and fornicating with the natives. You, I might add, were one of the chief culprits in becoming so completely involved in their immoral customs. With your tattoos and your skin as tanned as a bull, you even now look like a Maori native! No, we should have been there for two weeks, not four months.”

  “But our hold is now full of freshly potted young saplings. Full to the brim.”

  “Yes, despite your efforts at delaying the departure further so you could stay with your bare-chested woman, we did indeed fill the hold.”

  Christian’s nostrils flared. “You know full well why I tried to delay you, Captain! I was so close! They had fully accepted me. The high chie
f’s daughter was my woman. I supped with the elders almost nightly. They planned to take me to the volcano. They were going to let me watch the ceremony! I would have seen the device. I could have proved its existence. I know it!” Christian tried to restrain his animation and his passion, but was unable.

  Captain Bligh shook his head slowly, impatiently, “It doesn’t exist, Fletcher. The damned thing doesn’t exist! It never did. It was just Banks’s fantasy. That’s all it ever was.”

  Christian breathed deeply. Almost a minute passed in silence. “Captain… William… in this whole vast ocean, only you and I know the true purpose of this voyage. You and I. And perhaps only ten people in all of England, including Banks. That makes a dozen people in the entire world. But it is you and I, William, who are here, and who have been assigned to accomplish it, to acquire that amazing artifact that has such power. God, man, we cannot just forget the real reason why we came! The success of this mission rests on our shoulders.”

  “Yes, Fletcher, it rests on our shoulders. Let me remind you of what the first part of that ‘real’ mission was. We were to determine whether there was any reliable basis to John Carver’s log entry and attestation to the Admiralty. We have, to my satisfaction, determined that there was no basis whatsoever. And that the young man, whom I knew, mind you, and you did not, was under the influence of grog and smoke and the potions of love when he wrote his journal entry. It was not a true report. And that is that. Thus, our ‘real’ mission as you call it, has been fulfilled.

  “No, William. It is not so simple. You know full well that the Admiralty was convinced of the truth of his report. They had Captain Cook’s logbook!”

  “That is your hypothesis, Fletcher. I never saw that logbook.”

  “And the suspicions of Sir Joseph Banks, whom you well knew was on that island long before you. He bedded the Maori queen!”

  “Again, Fletcher, rumor. And had he bedded her, why do you think he never got to the ceremony?”

  “But why else would the Admiralty give any credence to the rambling writings of a young midshipmen, who admittedly had been drinking to excess that evening? Indeed, the Admiralty took his statements so seriously that they financed this voyage, under the guise of obtaining breadfruit, solely so we could follow up what Captain Cook failed to do and bring this amazing device of which Carver speaks to British soil. Would the Admiralty have done this if there were no firm corroborations in Cook’s log?”