The Barbary Pirates

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

It was almost morning. We told the prisoners to make their break, hoping the exodus would distract the janissaries as the alarm was raised. As those released stormed and staggered out the tavern gate and soldiers began to shout and fire, Pierre showed us the side tunnel that Fulton had taken to try to get closer to the mirror. We followed, Astiza confirming we were going in the right direction.

Little Harry had sensibly fallen into exhausted sleep in her arms.

I felt naked again without my rifle or any other weapon, but carried Astiza’s shield. There was a Greek Gorgon embossed on its surface, her hideous grimace and hair of snakes enough to turn any enemy into stone. The hero Perseus had used a mirrored shield so he didn’t have to look directly at the monster, cutting off her head and ultimately giving the trophy to Athena for use on the goddess’s armor. This piece, inspired by the story, might predate Arab manufacture and stem back to Archimedes’ time or before.

We emerged on a terrace that faced away from the town’s harbor and the coming sun. Yussef’s blocky castle loomed high behind us. The sky was aglow with approaching dawn, the last pink flushing away. Across a gap of flat-roofed houses was that smaller fort on a rocky knob that gave a clear view in all directions. Atop it was the mirror, its edge crisp as a planet, men hurriedly pulling tarps from its glittering surface. The weapon had been shined to a little sun itself, and its petal-like extensions were being unfolded. It was a bronze flower, set to embrace and reflect the coming morning.

“Ah, my necessary counterweights,” Fulton greeted. “Just in time!”

“Counterweights?”

“A way to prove useful.” The inventor had lashed together a tall trestle frame from pole lumber being used to repair a roof, and across this at right angles was a beam some twenty feet long. It was lashed in the middle so each end could bob up or down like a child’s seesaw, or a scale. One end was pointed skyward, aimed at the mirror. The other end, down on the ground, was being fussed over by the inventor.

“It would be most appropriate to build a catapult of Archimedes to combat the ancient Greek’s own mirror,” Fulton said. “But a true torsion device of the kind the mathematician most likely built against Roman ships would take far more time, tools, and craftsmanship than we can muster on this exposed balcony.”

There was a flash, and the sun cleared the eastern horizon. Even lit from the side, the mirror across from us began to shimmer.

“As you can see, to reach the fort where the mirror is, we’d have to leave Yussef’s complex, find our way through the winding streets of an aroused city, and somehow break into another fortress defended by hundreds of men. The only alternative I can think of is to hurl my torpedo through the air and have it fall at the base of the mirror. Fortunately, there seems to have been some tumult in the palace behind me and the sentries watching this terrace disappeared.” He raised a questioning eyebrow in my direction. “If we time the fuse correctly, it will explode shortly after landing and, if in exactly the right place, will damage the mirror beyond repair.”

“We’re working with Ethan Gage,” Pierre warned. “Do not expect precision.”

“No, he improvises. But that’s good, too. I see you have fetched your woman and child, Gage, and by the sound of it have woken half of Tripoli doing it, and maybe the dead as well. Perhaps the distraction will give us enough time.”

“We emptied their prison.”

“How helpful. Now, I’ve constructed a small version of a simple medieval war machine the French called the trebuchet. I attach the bomb to this end of my pivoting beam here, tie that end to the terrace floor, and weight the other end of the beam. When I cut the rope holding the lower end, the counterweight comes plunging down, the missile end goes flying up, and our mine with its fuse flies over these houses. We destroy the mirror, run to the harbor, and make our escape.” He counted us. “I thought by now that one or two of you would be dead. It’s going to be very crowded in my submarine.”

“My son doesn’t take much room.”

“Well, I’d include him before you in any event—and your pretty woman, too.” He grinned. “But we’ll squeeze in Ethan Gage as well! Now, the sun is climbing. Are you ready? They haven’t spied us yet.”

“Ready for what?”

“Notice that the opposite end of the trebuchet has no counterweight. Nothing came readily to hand. Then I realized three adults represent a good five hundred pounds. So what you must do is climb up to grasp the very end of my makeshift catapult. When I cut the rope from this other end you will crash down, the bomb will fly up, and my experiment will be completed.”

“Crash down?”

“Think of it as fun.”

Sunlight was flooding the rooftops of Tripoli.

“What about Horus?” Astiza asked.

“I’ll hold him,” Fulton said. “I’m good with children.”

She looked from one of us to the other. “Absolutely not. Not one of you men has been good for him yet. And this is just the kind of stupid device boys would invent. You three climb up there and I’ll cut the rope. I’ve already had to leave my son with his father, and he’s had so much misadventure it will be a miracle if he doesn’t grow up as disturbed and incorrigible as Ethan.”

“I’m not incorrigible. Just improvisational.”

“I’m heavier anyway,” Fulton conceded. “It’s as you say, Gage: your wife is smarter than any of us. Here, let me cut the fuse to length.”

She glanced at me. “Did you call me your wife to your friends?”

I swallowed, and grinned. “Possibly.” Had I? I couldn’t remember.

“Without informing me?”

“Just as you neglected to tell me I was a father.”

She considered our mutual miscommunication, her expression inscrutable. My grin was growing anxious. I worried that I’d annoyed her—or the opposite, pleased her! Both seemed risky, even calamitous. It’s easier for women, I thought jealously. In our world they need a provider and protector. So a man provides, giving up a variety of quim for one, and gets…what? Love, help, constancy, and a sum greater than its parts: a family. He gets a son, and a lifetime of pride, worry, and responsibility. He gets the half of him that’s missing.

Not such a terrible bargain.

I swallowed, as afraid of Astiza as a janissary regiment.

So I turned to look at the mirror of Archimedes. It was dazzling, a beautiful golden sun in itself, a sight that must have terrified the Roman galleys by its brilliant sheen alone. I realized that if Lieutenant Sterett was returning for us as planned, the schooner Enterprise would already be in sight. The mirror would look like a glowing lighthouse. Would he dare come close?

“How will we ignite the fuse?” Pierre asked.

The inventor stopped. “I hadn’t thought of that.” He peered eastward. “Does anyone have a glass we can focus in the sun?”

“For the sake of Apollo, this is the nineteenth century,” I said. “We’re also in the shade. Pierre, prime the pan of your pistol. That will give flash enough to light the fuse.”

“Of course,” said Fulton. “Such a modern man you are, Ethan! All right, up we go! Gage, you’re biggest, out to the end. Yes, yes, we’ll hug each other, no time for squeamishness.” I clung like a monkey to the end of the beam. Pierre wrapped around me, and Fulton half dragged himself on top of both of us while looking backward. “Astiza, light the fuse and then use my cutlass to cut the rope.”

“You’re certain of your aim?”

“I’ve spent the night in calculations.”

“Then I’m ready.” She carefully cradled our snoozing Harry on one shoulder and picked up Pierre’s gun with her free hand.

“Hold the pan of the pistol next to the fuse and pull to let the hammer fall.”

There was a flash but no sizzle.

“It didn’t catch.”

“Try it again.”

The sun was climbing higher. Across at the fort, men were starting to yell and point at the spectacle we made, knotted at the end of a beam like an octopus. More figures appeared in long robes. Egyptian Rite! How would they react when they learned their intended queen was dead, her body mangled?

Astiza poured more powder on the pan of the pistol and pulled the trigger again. Another flash, and this time the fuse caught. The burning cord was very short, just enough for a quick flight through the air.

“Now, now, cut the rope holding the trebuchet arm! Hurry, before we blow up!”

She swung and the sword bounced, only chopping partway through.

“Saw it! There’s a hundred pounds of powder there!”

She began desperately slicing the strands. We tensed. Now more men at the fort were yelling and gun smoke blossomed. Bullets thudded into the stucco around us. The fuse let off a bright hiss and wink of sparks.

“Please!” Fulton shouted. “We make a perfect target!”

Finally the rope snapped, we plunged, and the other arm of the fulcrum jerked up. The bomb shot skyward, leaving a thin trail of smoke. Men began shouting warning, and running from the mirror. The mine plunged down, a lovely parabola…

And fell just short of the mirror’s parapet, landing on a lower ledge fifteen feet below.

We waited.

There was no explosion. We could see the bomb sitting impotently.

“Damn,” Fulton hissed. “The fuse went out!”

“Mon dieu,” Pierre groaned, picking himself up off the ground where we’d fallen. “Why do I get involved in the schemes of the donkey? I might also point out that you missed the mirror completely, Monsieur Inventor. Just what calculations did you make all night long?”

“If the beam were two feet longer…”

“Ethan, use your rifle!” Astiza said. “Maybe we can set it off with a bullet!”

“My piece was smashed in the dungeon. And Robert’s pistol won’t hit anything at that range, even if a bullet could by a miracle detonate the charge.”

“We’d better retreat,” Fulton said. “They’ll signal the other janissaries to trap us here.”

“Wait,” Astiza said. “Look! They’re turning the mirror.”

And indeed the Egyptian Rite’s robed warriors had run back to the contraption and were beginning to swing it toward the climbing sun and, coincidentally, toward us. Where before it had seemed to gleam, now it positively blazed, the petal-like arms beginning to twist and bend as they were hauled on tackle to help focus the power of the rays. They were going to aim Archimedes’ death ray at our little party.

“Retreat!” I had my family.

“No, this is our chance!” Astiza seized the sword and began hacking at the cords holding the beam to the trestle.

“What are you doing?” Fulton cried.

“We need to hammer that shield onto the beam and catch the heat ray when it comes this way,” she said. “If we hold the shield itself we’ll be burned, but we can use the beam as its handle. Ancient records in Memphis and Dendara suggest just such a countermeasure.”

“You want to reflect their beam back at them?”

“Yes, until they scatter. Then I want to aim it at your bomb.”

“Ah!” cried Pierre. “It is the pretty woman who is the sorcerer, not you, donkey!”

“Well, I’m the one who found her.” And I remembered just how much I was in love.

We fetched an iron nail and used the butt of Pierre’s pistol to pound it through the shield onto the beam, crouching below the parapet. I glanced over. Ropes, gears, and pulleys were sharpening the mirror’s focus. That would be necessary, I realized, to hit a moving target like an enemy ship. The Egyptian Rite savants had figured out the old design of Archimedes, and perhaps improved it.

“Stand! Let them aim at us!” said Astiza.

“And risk burning?”

“So we can burn them.”

There was a flash and a ray of light pulsed across the rooftops and hit our terrace. The heat was instantaneous and terrifying. Astiza twisted away to shield Harry with her back, wincing, my son waking with a start. “Now, now, pick up the beam and use the shield!”

Grunting, we lifted our crude reflector into the path of the death ray, the head of the Gorgon flaming in the light. Immediately there was another flare of illumination, a counterbeam bouncing back as we struggled to aim, and then we tilted the shield just enough to run the reflection across the Egyptian Rite technicians at the mirror.

They screamed. Two robes burst into flames. Men began running from the controls.

“Now, now, the mine!” Fulton ordered.

Carefully tilting, we deflected the mirror’s ray onto the torpedo we’d hurled. In seconds it began to smoke again. Flame curled. We waited, praying.

And at last a roar!

The mine and its hundred pounds of gunpowder blew up in a great gout of fire, smoke, and stone, the wall just beneath the mirror blown to pieces. The platform the wall had supported tilted and sagged, and the mirror lost focus and abruptly dimmed, as if there were an eclipse of the sun. Several soldiers and technicians on the opposite side had been knocked down by the blast, and one or two controlling ropes snapped.

But that was it. The mirror was tilted, not destroyed. Hurled chunks of rock clattered down on the city’s rooftops, the smoke blew away, and our failure was plain. There was a gaping hole in the wall beneath the mirror and small fires burning inside the fort, but no serious damage.

“I should have brought a second torpedo,” Fulton groaned.

“No,” I said, “it’s enough to keep them from roasting us and the Enterprise while we escape, if we go quickly enough. Let’s run, and maybe we still have a chance!”

“A fulcrum of Archimedes can prop up that damaged rooftop in seconds,” the inventor insisted. “Look, they’re already running to fix it. Not only are we doomed, but so is Sterett.”

“I’ll go down fighting before I go into that pit with that lizard,” Pierre muttered.

“As will I before I lose my wife and son to slavery,” I vowed, realizing I’d said wife again without thinking. By the eye patch of Odin, was I making a commitment? Ethan Gage, rootless adventurer, tireless womanizer, who thought too often only of me?

“Ethan?” Astiza asked. Women do like to know. Yet what could we say when there was so much unsaid, because we hadn’t had time to say anything yet?

And then there was a truly titanic explosion, a thunderclap that knocked us over and sent mirror, Rite, and the top half of Yussef’s fort skyward in a monstrous fountain of fire and smoke. Glittering golden shards of an ancient weapon flew apart as if a rock had been hurled into a glass mirror, and they glinted like stars as they radiated. Bits of rock and metal and human beings flew in all directions, raining down on Tripoli. There was a rattle as bronze fell like hail. Our ears ached from the punch of air.

Fulton swayed to his feet, looking in stupefaction at the smoking stump of ruins where the mirror had been. “They stockpiled powder and guns to protect it,” he said dazedly. “Our fires reached the magazine, and it went off.” He looked at our shield, bent by the heat. “Medusa turned them to rubble.”