Even as he heard the words, Hawkwood thought there had to be a mistake. He stared down at the drawings. A boat? The contraption didn’t look like any boat he’d ever seen. And what the hell were plans for an undersea boat doing in Warlock’s baton?
“Oh, I know what you’re thinking,” Congreve said, misinterpreting Hawkwood’s look of confusion. “But it’s possible, believe me. I’ve seen it with my own eyes.”
James Read said, “The inventor’s an American. His name’s Robert Fulton.”
“And the bastard’s working for Bonaparte,” Charles Yorke growled.
Hawkwood felt as if he was wading thigh-deep through thick mud. Try as he might, he still could see no resemblance to a boat. If not a clock, his next best guess would have been the inside of a music box.
“Come,” the colonel said, taking pity on Hawkwood’s bewilderment. “I’ll show you.”
Hawkwood approached the table. The first thing he realized, as the colonel turned the first drawing on its side, was that he’d been viewing it from the wrong angle. He’d been looking at it as if the cylinder was standing vertically instead of lying horizontally.
The colonel took a pencil from a tray on the table. “Let’s see if I can make it a bit clearer.” The colonel traced the outline with the pencil point. “This is the hull. Here, the curve of the bow, the keel, deck, and stern. Now, if I add a mast and boom, you’ll get the idea.” The colonel drew quickly. “There, you see?”
Unbelievably, Hawkwood could. “And this?” Hawkwood pointed to what looked to be a raised section of deck, just forward of the drawn-in mast.
“A metal dome. It’s from here that the vessel is controlled. Imagine an upturned barrel placed over a hole on the deck. It allows the commander to stand upright inside the boat. His head and shoulders would protrude into the barrel. Understand?”
“How can he see where he’s going?” Hawkwood asked.
“The dome has windows. They’re small and made of very thick glass. If you were to ask me, I’d say it’s like looking through the bottom of a brandy decanter.”
Hawkwood was sorely tempted to say that he’d known a number of army officers who’d spent their entire careers in similar straits, but discretion forbade him. He made do with what he hoped was a sage nod of comprehension. “What makes it go?”
“Muscle power. The crewman turns a crank, which operates a set of revolving blades at the stern. They serve to push the craft through the water. Here – see?” The colonel pointed to the drawing.
Hawkwood looked sceptical.
“Oh, it works very well, Captain. On the surface, with two men working the crank, it’ll travel as fast as two men rowing. Submerged, it’s about the same. You have to appreciate that the watchword is stealth, not speed.”
“How’s it constructed?”
“Copper skin over a wooden frame, iron ribs for supports.”
Hawkwood watched and listened as the colonel explained and gradually, incredibly, it began to make a kind of sense. What at first sight had appeared to be a confusing jumble of cranks, cogs, spools and spindles had now acquired a totally new meaning. Hawkwood looked on in astonishment as the outer hull and interior of the submersible boat began to take shape before his eyes.
“How does it go up and down?”
“Pumps. They regulate the submergence of the boat underwater. There’s a ballast compartment along the bottom of the hull. To sink, you pump water in. To rise, you pump water out. Ingenious!” The colonel shook his head at the wonder of it. “You steer it like an ordinary boat, by the rudder here. That’s also controlled by a system of gears. There’s a second, horizontal rudder, which turns on a pivot passing through the main rudder. You use that to maintain depth. The keel, by the way, is metal. The weight keeps the vessel level. It’s detachable in an emergency, to allow for rapid ascent.”
Hawkwood’s brain was spinning. “How big is it?”
The colonel shrugged. “Hard to say for certain. The first one was twenty-one feet long, with a diameter of seven feet.”
“The first one?” Hawkwood said.
“Oh, didn’t I say?” The colonel raised an eyebrow. “The weapon’s not new. It was offered to us seven years ago.”
James Read said softly, “I think, perhaps, we should start at the beginning, don’t you?”
“We’ve been following his career for some time,” the colonel said. “A very industrious fellow is our Mr Fulton: artist, engineer, canal builder …”
“Canals?” Hawkwood echoed dully.
Congreve nodded. “Came to Europe from Philadelphia in ‘87, originally. For his health, if you can believe that. Worked with Bridgewater and Brindley for a time.”
Hawkwood’s face betrayed his lack of knowledge.
“Lord Bridgewater? Came up with a plan to link Manchester to the sea? You remember?”
Vague memory of a rumoured scheme stirred distantly in Hawkwood’s brain.
Undeterred by Hawkwood’s ignorance, Congreve continued. “It was Fulton who came up with the idea to use winches to haul canal barges over hills. Even wrote a book about canal navigation, versatile bugger. That’s what took him to France in ‘97. Hoped to take out a patent, get the Frogs interested in the idea. Grew sympathetic to the revolution, stayed, and became an engineer for the Directory.”
“And this … submersible?”
It was Blomefield who broke in. “Ah, that stemmed from a notion he had that the welfare of nations could only be achieved if liberty of the seas was maintained. In other words, destroy the world’s navies, establish free trade, and everyone lives happily ever after. Total rot, of course. My apologies, Colonel. Didn’t mean to butt in. You were saying?”
“I was going to say that the man’s half Irish,” Congreve said, without rancour. “So three guesses as to whose navy he planned to destroy first.”
The First Sea Lord, a man clearly unused to someone else holding the floor for any length of time, snorted derisively. Unflustered, Congreve resumed his story.
“He took the idea from an American revolutionary, name of Bushnell. Bushnell built himself a diving boat. Called it the Turtle. The plan was to sail it under Earl Howe’s flagship in New York harbour, attach an explosive device, then withdraw. Fortunately for the admiral, the plan failed. Not enough control of the vessel underwater, plus the flagship’s hull was too tough. But Fulton thought the idea was sound enough to attempt improvements. Turns out Bonaparte thought so too. He financed the vessel’s design and manufacture. Took the bugger three years, used the Seine as a test site. Even gave the thing a name: called it Nautilus.”
“From the Greek,” Blomefield cut in. “Some sort of mollusc, apparently.”
“Indeed,” the colonel observed patiently, before continuing. “Well, by this time we’d begun to pick up reports from our agents in France that Bonaparte’s engineers were conducting experimental underwater explosions. Didn’t think too much of it at the time, but a gradual increase in rumours led us to believe the Frogs were developing a secret weapon, and then Fulton’s name kept cropping up.
“At first we thought it was some kind of sea mine. We’d heard reports of barges being blown up and so forth, but then we heard about something else. A submersible boat. Sounded fantastical, but the rumours persisted. Then we had a stroke of luck.
“We heard the vessel had been tested at sea, but we weren’t able to confirm it until a month or so later, when the captain of a Revenue