“This Captain Pierre Landais, Doctor,” he begins, “who is to sail the Alliance in my company?”
“Yes?” interrupts the Doctor.
“You know him?—you have confidence in him?”
The Doctor purses his lips, but says never a word.
“Then I’ll tell you what I think!” cries Captain Paul Jones, who reads distrust in the good Doctor’s pursed but silent lips; “I’ll tell you what I think, and what I’ll do. Already I’ve had some dealings with this Landais. The fellow is mad—vanity-mad. Jealous, insubordinate, he has twice taken open occasion to disobey my orders. This I have stomached in silence—being on French shores. I now warn you that as soon as I find myself in blue water, at a first sign of rebellion against my authority, I’ll clap the fellow in irons. By heaven! I’ll string him to his own yard arm, sir; make a tassel of him for the winds to play with, if it be required to preserve a discipline which his example has already done much to break down.”
Doctor Franklin meets this violent setting forth concerning the recalcitrant Landais with a negative gesture of unmistakable emphasis.
“You must do nothing of the kind, Paul!” he replies. “Captain Landais, as you say, is doubtless mad—vanity-mad. But he is also French; and we must do nothing to estrange from our cause French sympathy and French assistance. I urge you to bear with Landais in silence, rather than jeopardize us with King Louis.”
Captain Paul Jones growlingly submits. “It will result disastrously, Doctor,” he says. “We shall yet suffer for it, mark my word.” Then, disgustedly: “I marvel that the Marine Committee in Philadelphia should turn over to such a madman a brisk frigate like the Alliance.
“Your friend, the Marquis de Lafayette, had something to do with it, I think. You observe that on his present visit to France, it is Landais with his Alliance who brings him.”
Captain Paul Jones says no more, but seems to accept Landais as he accepts the Richard, desperately. His final comment shows the uneasy complexion of his thought.