‘I was merely speaking metaphorically, Mr Gladstone. Of our parliamentary swords.’
‘Oh,’ sniffed Gladstone.
Napier turned back to Grafton. ‘Sir George, I wonder if I might have a word with you in camera.’
‘By all means, but I pray you be brief. I have important business to conduct…’
‘As have I. Channel fleets don’t run themselves, you know.’
‘You must excuse me, Mr Gladstone. I’ll speak further on this matter with you at a later date.’
‘I shall look forward to it,’ said Gladstone. ‘Good day to you, Sir George, Sir Charles.’ He doffed his top hat to them, and wandered off in the direction of the Haymarket.
‘Now then, Sir Charles. How may I be of assistance to you?’
‘Shall we walk a little way?’ suggested Napier. ‘It’s a splendid morning, and the exercise will do us good.’
‘As you will.’
The two of them set off down Pall Mall towards Trafalgar Square, Napier limping. ‘I’m just trying to tie up my parliamentary affairs before I hoist my flag on HMS St Vincent,’ he explained. ‘As grateful as I am finally to be given an important command, I am a little concerned that I shall be absent from the House of Commons at a not-entirely opportune moment. Now, while I realise that we have not always seen eye to eye over the past few years, I know I can rely on your honesty and decency as a gentleman to fight my corner for me in my absence.’
‘Why, Sir Charles, I should be delighted to. And may I add that I am honoured that you should choose me for such a task?’
‘Well, I have so many affairs that need to be looked after in my absence, I’m trying to spread them as thinly as possible. Most of my trusted friends have been given my more important matters to deal with, but there are still one or two insignificant ones that nonetheless would benefit from having a fatherly eye kept on them.’
‘Indeed?’ Sir George said drily.
‘I dare say you recall Lieutenant Christopher Killigrew?’
‘Ah, yes. That unfortunate young naval officer who disgraced himself so… er… disgracefully. Drinking, I believe, and being responsible for the death of a little girl.’
‘That’s the way it looked,’ agreed Napier. ‘Sir George, before we proceed any further in this matter, I must ask you to keep what I am about to tell you in the uttermost and strictest confidence. You must swear not to reveal this to another living soul until the time is right, on your word of honour as a gentleman.’
Grafton was intrigued. ‘You have it, by God.’
‘Mr Killigrew did not kill that child.’
‘But… did he not confess to it?’
‘A ruse the lieutenant and I cooked up between us,’ Napier explained smugly. ‘We wanted to disgrace him.’
‘I’m not sure I understand. This fellow Killigrew and yourself cooked up a calumny to blacken his name, with his consent? But to what object?’
‘Through my work with the Slave Trade Department at the Foreign Office I have lately become aware that there is someone in this country who is living off the profits of that most evil trade. And, I fear, a senior member of the British Establishment. Perhaps even a member of the House of Commons.’
‘That is the most outrageous suggestion I have ever heard!’ blustered Sir George. ‘Do you have any evidence whatsoever to back up this assertion?’
‘No. But I am relying on Mr Killigrew to provide me with it. That is why we had him disgraced, you see. As a private individual he was able to do what he could not as an officer of the Royal Navy: take ship aboard a slave vessel.’
‘No slave vessel would ever take an ex-naval officer on as a member of its crew.’
‘One already has. Even as we speak, Mr Killigrew is bound for the Guinea Coast on board the Madge Howlett, a suspected slave vessel. I have every confidence in that brave young man’s ability to expose the name of the man who is financing the voyage.’
‘The Madge Howlett? I cannot say I am familiar with the vessel. How many other people know about this scheme of yours?’
‘No one. Except yourself, now, and once again I must entreat you to keep this matter in the strictest confidence. If word should get to the slavers that Mr Killigrew is acting as a spy aboard their vessel then his life would be imperilled.’
‘To be sure, to be sure.’
Napier sighed. ‘And that is why I need your help, Sir George. Both Mr Killigrew’s trial and court-martial were real enough, I fear, though based only on his confession. I have promised that when he returns he will be exonerated and both his rank and good name restored. But if I’m with the Channel Fleet there will be no one in Britain who can speak up for him.’
‘Say no more. You may rest assured that if… I do beg your pardon, when… Mr Killigrew returns, he shall have the full influence of my position to support him.’
‘Thank you so much, Sir George.’ Napier pumped Grafton’s hand vigorously. ‘I knew I could rely on you.’
‘And now if you’ll excuse me I have urgent business to attend to. Good day to you, Sir Charles.’
* * *
‘What are you reading?’ growled Madison, turning away from the helmsman.
‘The Good Book,’ said Killigrew, lifting up his Bible so that Madison could see the title on the spine.
‘I never figured you for a religious man, Mr Killigrew. Not that I disapprove, of course. Quite the opposite.’
Killigrew smiled beatifically. ‘“Happy is the man that findeth wisdom, and the man that getteth understanding…”’
‘…For the merchandise of it is better than the merchandise of silver, and the gain thereof than fine gold”,’ continued Madison. ‘“She is more precious than rubies: and all the things thou canst desire are not to be compared unto her.” Proverbs, chapter three, verses thirteen to fifteen.’
‘He’s just trying to curry favour,’ sneered Coffin. ‘Any fool can read the Bible.’
‘Maybe you should try it, Mr Coffin,’ Madison said drily. Coffin shrugged. He and Madison had sailed together for many years and if they disagreed over the issue of Killigrew’s trustworthiness, then in most other respects they were of one mind, as Killigrew had not been surprised to discover over the past few weeks.
As soon as the Madge Howlett had been well out into the Atlantic they had radically changed the brig’s whole appearance by the simple expedient of rearranging the spars and rigging; changing the figurehead and painting out the name ‘Madge Howlett' and replacing it with ‘Leopardo’ was merely the icing on the cake. After that the voyage had been as dull and uneventful as only a sea voyage could be. Killigrew’s duties kept him busy. He was in charge of the boatswain’s locker and it was his job to issue spun-yarn, marline, marline- spikes and serving boards to the hands. Although he was next in seniority after Coffin, there was a wide gulf between the chief mate and the second mate. Killigrew was expected to go aloft with the rest of the crew to reef and furl the topsails, and yet in spite of this he was expected to maintain his dignity before them in the interests of discipline. But in this respect his years of service in the Royal Navy put him in good stead: as a midshipman he had been expected to go aloft with the hands, and the skills of reefing and handling the sails soon came back to him. It had always been a tricky balance, maintaining one’s superior dignity while working alongside men, but a good officer knew how to turn it to his advantage by showing he was not ashamed to get his hands dirty without making any pretence at being just one of the lads. Once again he found he was neither one thing nor the other, but it was a position he was growing accustomed to.
Even though he shared a cabin with Coffin he was spared the chief mate’s hostility, for on the whole the two of them lived a box-and-cox existence, one working while the other slept. When they did encounter one another, at first Coffin would growl some barbed comment, trying to provoke Killigrew into a fight. But Killigrew did not rise to the bait; in truth he welcomed Coffin’s hatred, for it meant that Madison did not suspect him; if he
had, then he would have taken the chief mate aside and ordered him to mask his hostility. After a while Coffin grew bored of needling Killigrew, or at least ran out of barbed comments to make, and settled for a growled acknowledgement. But his hatred remained unabated, as the occasional venomous glance he shot at Killigrew bore witness. Still, at least they made no attempt to poison him or slit his throat while he slept, and after a while Killigrew knew he could allow his vigilance to drop a little.
The days slipped by one after another as the waves were broken beneath the Leopardo’s prow and left churned by her wake; the future turned into the past, and the days became weeks, the weeks marked off by Madison conducting a prayer meeting on deck for the crew every Sunday morning. Attendance was compulsory. Nearly three weeks after they had sailed from Liverpool they entered the Tropics, and a few days later they made landfall at São Tiago in the Cape Verde Islands to take on board fresh water and fruit and vegetables. The Leopardo and her crew seemed well known there, and although it must have been obvious that she was a slaver no one made any attempt to stop her. Without the transatlantic trade the Cape Verde Islands would die, and for the moment the greater part of the transatlantic trade meant the slave trade. Killigrew realised all over again that the slave trade would never be crushed as long as men could make money out of it.
Perhaps the answer was to make it too expensive a trade to carry on.
From São Tiago they steered south-east, angling in towards the Guinea Coast, and that afternoon Killigrew was making his way to the boatswain’s locker when he glanced in the galley as he passed. He was surprised to see the cook reading.
Like any cook on any ship Killigrew had ever been on, the cook was known only as ‘Doc’. A short, wiry but broad-shouldered slave somewhere in his mid-twenties, with skin the colour of mahogany, Doc seemed to accept his status cheerfully. He played the guitar during his off-watches, sometimes a seaman-like shanty for the benefit of his shipmates, sometimes a haunting Spanish air which added a kind of beauty to the long watches of the night. He was always free for a chat whenever Killigrew popped into the galley for a light in the middle of the night watch, although so far he had failed to impress Killigrew with anything approaching mental acuity. Killigrew had met educated free slaves on the London lecture circuit, uneducated slaves on the Guinea Coast, African slaves and black seamen, and his experience was broad enough to suggest that those ethnologists who claimed that black people were mentally inferior to whites was so much gammon. But just as there were intelligent whites and foolish whites, there were intelligent blacks and foolish blacks. In Doc’s case, there seemed to be no getting away from it: he was just plain thick.
So when Killigrew saw Doc reading, he was surprised to discover that the cook knew how. As he approached the galley, Doc quickly put the volume aside and placed a pan over it to hide it.
‘Good afternoon, Doc,’ Killigrew said cheerfully.
Doc grinned broadly and rolled his eyes like any Ethiopian minstrel. ‘Why, good afternoon, mas’er.’
‘What were you reading?’
‘Reading, mas’er?’
Killigrew tried to reach past and lift the pan off the book, but Doc moved to one side to block his path. Killigrew tried to reach past him on the other side, but again Doc moved to block his path, still grinning inanely. The two of them continued this comic ballet in the cramped confines of the galley for a few seconds more, until Killigrew feinted to the left and then lunged past the cook on the right. He lifted the pan and seized up the book: Shelley’s Prometheus Unbound.
Doc actually looked ashamed.
‘Heady stuff,’ said Killigrew.
‘Why, I can’t make head nor tail of it myself, mas’er. Mr Tristão, he been learning me to read and all, but I ain’t a good learner, nossir.’
Killigrew flicked through the pages until a couplet leaped out at him, and he read it out loud: ‘“Kingly conclaves stern and cold/Where blood with guilt is bought and sold.”’
‘I don’t know what it means, mas’er, but that sho’nuff pretty,’ said Doc.
Killigrew gave him back the book. ‘Are you happy on board this ship, Doc?’
‘Happy, mas’er? Why shouldn’t I be happy? Mas’er Madison, he hardly ever beats me, and the others treat me good. ’Cepting that Mas’er Coffin…’
There was a commotion outside the galley and Killigrew left Doc to his cooking, emerging to see Duarte dragging one of the hands up the companionway to the forward hatch. Killigrew followed them up on deck.
The man staggered, partly because of Duarte’s rough handling but also because he seemed to have limited control of his own legs. The man giggled at Duarte’s curses, and the more Duarte cursed him the more the man giggled. At last, when the boatswain had dragged him the length of the deck, he threw him down at Madison’s feet.
‘Drunk, senhor capitão,’ said Duarte.
Seeing Madison standing grim-faced over him, the man stopped giggling and the light of fear shone in his eyes as he realised how perilous his situation was. His name was Nicolau Tristão and he had a wife and baby son waiting for him in Maranhão. Killigrew had not wanted to get to know the hands other than their names: the names of men he would be sending to prison if all went well, or to their graves if anything went wrong. He did not want to know about Susana and little Rico waiting at home for a husband and father who might never return. But you could not spend weeks on board ship with men without getting to know something about them. About how they had gone to sea, driven by starvation or shanghaied by crimps, or even willingly in the hope of adventure and riches.
‘I don’t abhor alcohol on this vessel, Mr Killigrew,’ said Madison. ‘Unlike your navy, I believe in treating men like equals. If I am allowed to drink, there is no reason why they should not enjoy the same pleasure. But I do abhor drunkenness.’
‘Isn’t that asking for trouble?’ asked Killigrew. ‘The one generally leads to the other.’
‘I treat my men like adults, Mr Killigrew, and expect them to exert their own judgement from time to time. But tell me, what would you do with this man if you were in your navy?’
‘It’s not my navy any more,’ Killigrew reminded him, and then continued cautiously, ‘but that would depend upon the captain. There are some men who would have him flogged to within an inch of his life. And a few who would flog him beyond.’
‘And you?’
‘On my ship I wouldn’t allow men to drink any more than their daily ration of rum. If they exceeded it – and sailors always seem to be able to exceed it – then I would hang them upside down over the side and dunk them into the sea a few times to sober them up. A flogged man cannot work.’
‘And a man who cannot trust himself to stay sober cannot be trusted at all. Mr Coffin, show Mr Killigrew why there are so few cases of drunkenness on board the Leopardo.'
Coffin grinned. ‘With pleasure,’ he said, taking a crowbar from where it was clipped alongside a boat hook.
Duarte hoisted Tristão to his feet and left him standing there. The sailor had sobered up with remarkable rapidity and he turned to Madison with tears in his eyes. ‘Por favor, senhor capitão… I will never be drunk on duty again, I swear it…’
‘Damn right you won’t,’ snarled Coffin, circling Tristão while gently tapping the crowbar against the palm of his left hand. The sailor tried to turn to face him, but Coffin put a hand on his shoulder and span him back to face away. Then he smashed the crowbar across the sailor’s kidneys.
Tristão cried out and sank to his knees, but the punishment had only just begun. A blow to the head or neck from that iron bar might have killed him at once, but Coffin was careful not to deliver such a blow: he wanted to make this last.
The bar swung down again and Killigrew winced as he heard the distinct sound of a rib cracking. Under different circumstances he would not have hesitated to intervene, but it suddenly occurred to him that Madison and Coffin had been waiting for an opportunity like this ever since they had set out from Liverpoo
l. They were testing him once again, wondering if he had the callousness in his heart to stand by and watch a man being beaten to death. Seeing the other men on board going about their duties as if this was a not-infrequent occurrence, Killigrew tried to display the same nonchalance.
Coffin continued to swing the bar expertly, breaking Tristão’s arms and legs. Duarte might have been a more suitable man to inflict the punishment, but Coffin was too obviously enjoying it.
‘Proverbs, chapter thirteen, verse twenty-four,’ said Madison. ‘“He that spareth his rod hateth his son: but he that loveth him chasteneth him betimes.”’
Splintered bones burst out through the skin and blood ran across the pale deck. Killigrew felt sick and wondered when Coffin would stop. For a while it seemed as if the chief mate would not cease until he had beaten Tristão to death, but then he stopped abruptly: he had other plans for this man. He ordered Duarte to have a rope looped about Tristão’s ankles, and then the sailor was hoisted from one of the yards on the foremast and swung out over the ship’s side. He screamed in agony and terror. They dangled the man less than a foot above the waves, his blood dripping into the blue sea.
Those crew who were not engaged in other duties crowded the rail to watch. They were laughing and joking, betting with each other as to how long it would take, but Killigrew could see that the laughter was forced. They knew that a similar fate awaited them if they made a mistake.
As it waited for Killigrew.
The sharks did not take long to arrive. They had no difficulty keeping up with the ship, their dark blue-grey fins cleaving effortlessly through the water. One burst out of the water, jaws snapping, and narrowly missed Tristão before crashing back down into the waves.
Tristão screamed. He was blubbering in terror now, pleading for Madison to forgive him. But Madison was not even paying any attention to him, instead discussing something with the helmsman. Killigrew wondered which was the more repulsive, Madison’s indifference or Coffin’s enjoyment.
By glancing at Madison, Killigrew was mercifully spared from witnessing the end. There was a splash and a cheer, and when he glanced back Tristão’s head had been bitten clean off at the neck. Blood gushed from the torso. Killigrew choked back the bile that rose to his gorge.
Killigrew of the Royal Navy Page 22
