“What is it, Dick?” asks Commodore Paul Jones, alive in a moment.
“Something too deep for me, Commodore, or I shouldn’t be here with the tangle. Commissioner Lee, with Landais, has taken the Alliance.”
“What?”
“It’s as I say. Lee declares that Doctor Franklin had no authority to depose Landais. He, Lee, has restored him to command, and the pair have possession of the ship.”
“What did you do?”
“I did nothing. I’m a sailor, and pretend to no knowledge of the limits of Mr. Lee’s authority. Speaking for myself, I refused to serve with Landais; and Lieutenants Stack, McCarty and Lunt, and Midshipman Lindthwait did the same. We came ashore, and Bo’sen Jack Robinson at the head of sixty of the crew came with us.” Commodore Paul Jones, while Lieutenant Dale talks, is thinking. What is to be done! Manifestly nothing. Doctor Franklin is out of reach. Without the Doctor’s authority no one can meddle with Arthur Lee, who still has his powers as a commissioner. Besides, there’s the Serapis; it is only a question of weeks when he, Commodore Paul Jones, will be given its command. Meanwhile, Lieutenant Dale and the others can disport themselves ashore, as he does. Let Lee and Landais keep the Alliance, since they already have it.
“You’ve done right, Dick,” he says. “Stay ashore then, and keep the lads together; we’ll wait for the Serapis. Also, King Louis has given Doctor Franklin the Ariel, a ship-sloop the size of the old Ranger. When I take the Serapis to sea, Dick, you shall sail Captain of the Ariel.”
Lieutenant Dale goes his way, and Commodore Paul Jones returns to Aimee, pleased in secret to think he may continue unhindered to sun himself in her smiles. It grinds a bit to think of the “dog Landais,” and the “traitor Arthur Lee,” in control of the Alliance. Still, all will come right; for is he not to have the Serapis? And while he waits, there is Aimee; and love is even sweeter than war. So he goes back to his goddess, with her deep eyes and red-gold hair, and puts such caitiff creatures as Lee and Landais outside his thoughts. It is for Congress to deal with them.
Commodore Paul Jones is not permitted to forget Lee and Landais. Within the hour, he is again called from the side of Aimee by his friend Genet, a noble upperling in the French foreign office.
“I come to tell you,” says Genet, “that Captain Landais and Monsieur Lee have got the Alliance.”