Tombs was ambitious and energetic, one of the finest naval officers in the Confederacy. He was a short, handsome-faced man with brown hair and eyebrows; a thick red beard, and a flinty look in his olive black eyes.

Commander of small gunboats at the battles of New Orleans and Memphis, gunnery officer on board the fighting ironclad Arkansas, and first officer of the infamous sea raider Florida, Tombs had proven a dangerous man for the Union cause. He had assumed command of the Texas only a week after she was completed at the Rocketts naval yard in Richmond, having demanded and supervised a number of modifications in preparation for an almost impossible voyage downriver past a thousand Union guns.

He turned his attention back to the cargo loading as the last wagon pulled away from the dock and disappeared into the night. He slipped his watch from a pocket, opened the lid, and held up the face toward a lantern that hung on a dock piling.

It read eight-twenty. Little more than eight hours left before daylight. Not enough time to run the last 20 miles of the gauntlet under the cloak of darkness.

An open carriage pulled by a team of dappled horses rolled up and stopped beside the dock. The driver sat stiffly without turning as the two passengers watched the final few crates being lowered through the hatch. The heavier man in civilian clothes slouched tiredly while the other, who was wearing an officer’s naval uniform, spied Tombs and waved.

Tombs stepped across the plank onto the dock, approached the carriage, and saluted smartly. “An honor, Admiral, Mr. Secretary. I didn’t think either of you would have time for a farewell.”

Admiral Raphael Semmes, famed for his exploits as captain of the Confederate sea wolf, Alabama, and now commander of the James River squadron of ironclad gunboats, nodded and smiled through a heavily waxed moustache and a small goatee protruding beneath his lower lip. “A regiment of Yankees couldn’t have kept me from seeing you off.”

Stephen Mallory, Secretary of the Confederate States Navy, stretched out a hand. “Too much is riding on you for us not to take the time to wish you luck.”

“I’ve a stout ship and a brave crew,” said Tombs with confidence. “We’ll break through.”

Semmes’ smile faded and his eyes filled with foreboding. “If you find it impossible, you must burn and scuttle the ship in the deepest part of the river so that our archives can never be salvaged by the Union.”

“The charges are in place and primed,” Tombs assured Semmes. “The bottom hull will be blown away, dropping the weighted crates in the river mud while the ship continues a safe distance away under full steam before sinking.”

Mallory nodded. “A sound plan.”

The two men in the carriage exchanged strange knowing looks. An awkward moment passed. Then Semmes said, “I’m sorry to lay another burden on your shoulders at the last moment, but you will also be responsible for a passenger.”