His face worked in a sudden paroxysm. ‘This now’s the cool o’ the seasons — while yer wait fer the monsoon t’ break, whoi, it’s hotter ‘n a griddle in hell — an’ full uniform on parade or Sar’n’t Askins’ll ‘ave yer!’ His head dropped, and he stared hopelessly at the deck.
Kydd thought quickly. ‘We sails soon, need t’ get ye out o’ sight.’ His eyes strayed over the man’s dark skin. How would it be possible to conceal such a colour? ‘No idea where we’re bound, but y’ can get ashore easy enough — we got no pressed men aboard.’
The man caught Kydd’s look. ‘Ah, me dark skin. Walnut juice.’
Kydd smiled. ‘Wait here.’
‘Look, Oi know this looks bad, but ye’ve got t’ unnerstan’ what it’s loike—’
Clapping him on the arm, Kydd stepped outside. He cannoned into a lascar waiting there, who had obviously followed them down. He gestured at the fore ladder. ‘Up! You gettee up there!’
“Eard what yer said ter Ralf,’ began the lascar.
Kydd groaned. ‘Not you as well!’ He should have known by the pale eyes, incongruous in the dark brown face.
‘Well, yeah, but only the pair o’ us, mate - Ralf Bunce and me, Scrufty Weems,’ the man said.
‘Get in there with y’ chuckle-headed frien’,’ Kydd told him, and shoved him forward.
*
To his credit, Renzi only hesitated a moment when Kydd told him. Aiding a deserter was a Botany Bay offence in England; here it might be worse. There was no way the soldiers could mix in with the two hundred odd of the ship’s company, for every face was familiar after the long voyage. They would have to be found a hidey-hole until they made port. ‘The orlop,’ Renzi suggested.
‘No - mate o’ the hold checks every forenoon, bound t’ find anything askew.’ Kydd remembered his hiding place from King Neptune’s bears. ‘The forepeak?’
‘In this heat? Have mercy, Tom!’
However, even for this, the soldiers proved pathetically grateful and dropped down the tiny hatch into the malodorous darkness without a word.
Storing complete, the ship’s company looked forward to liberty ashore, but instead they were set to scraping and scrubbing, painting and prettying in a senseless round of work that sorely tried their patience. Tales of shoreside in India grew in the telling, but Parry gave not an inch. The ship was to gleam and that was that.
Kydd and Renzi knew it was impossible to keep their secret from their shipmates. The others found it amusing that deserters from the Army thought they could find sanctuary in a man-o’-war, but in the generous way of sailors, they made their guests welcome.
Immured in the forepeak during the day, they could creep up to the fo’c’sle under cover of dark and join the sailors in a grog or two. They talked about the boredom and heat, the dust and disease of a cantonment on the plains of India. They told also of their struggle to the coast and their final bribing of the serang — and his confusion when told to beat a white man.
The sailors heard of the other side of life in India, the bazaars and what could be bought there, the heartless cruelty of the suttee funeral pyre and the deadly thuggees. Their desire for shore leave diminished.
Bunce heard Kydd recall his experience on their first morning at anchor. Sent down as part of the duty watch to clear the hawse, he had looked over the side of the beakhead forward and seen an untidy bundle wrapped around the anchor cable. He had slid down to clear it away, but closer to, it took form — a grossly misshapen corpse bleached a chalky white, barely recognisable as a young woman. It belched pungent death smells when he tried to pry it away, the sickly gases catching Kydd in the back of the throat, and there were ragged holes in the face where the kites had been tearing at it. When he prodded with a boat hook parts of it detached, floating away in the muddy river. Every day there were always one or two to clear like it.
Bunce had just nodded. ‘When y’ dies in India, proper drill is t’ burn th’ body on a pile o’ wood. But there’s some uz are so dirt poor, they has t’ wait until dark an’ then they heaves their loved ‘un in th’ river.’
The seamen, no stranger themselves to hardships, shuddered and vowed to see their guests safely ashore in some haven far away rather than return them to such horrors.
Two days later when the Captain returned he immediately disappeared below with Fairfax. Within the hour boatswain’s mates were piping at the hatchways.
‘Clear lower deck — all the hands! Haaaands t’ lay aft!’
The rush to hear the news caused pandemonium, but
Powlett’s appearance on deck brought an immediate expectant hush. He turned meaningfully to the sergeant in charge of marines. ‘Sergeant!’ ‘Sah!’
‘A sentry at the boats, another on the fo’c’sle! No one to leave or board the ship without my express permission.’ ‘Sah!’
Unbelieving looks and an exasperated grumbling spread over the assembly.
‘Silence!’ Powlett roared. The muttering died down. He stood near the deserted wheel with a forbidding expression. ‘I am now able to tell you of our mission and why we have been at such pains with our ship.’
He paused and let his words sink into the silence. ‘Artemis has been honoured to be chosen as the vessel to convey a special envoy from His Majesty King George to the Emperor of China in Peking.’
Chapter 7
That evening Lord Elmhurst and his retinue arrived, plunging the man-o’-war into a state of confusion. Eighteen souls was more than it seemed possible to cram into the spaces aft. All officers lost their cabins, but even so, with Lady Elmhurst, her daughter and maids to find privacy for, it was a near insurmountable task.
Fairfax hurried about late into the night, pursued by the shrill, demanding voice of Lady Elmhurst. The seamen retired to the forward end of the ship and let the upheaval spend itself — there would be no interference in their way of life, although in deference to the quality aboard, they would have to don shirts and for the time being forswear curses.
The frigate would sail in the morning at first light, ready or not, for there was no time to lose. There would be no touching at land en route, their first port of call would be Canton in South China, the only touching point allowed for vessels trading with China. It hardly seemed credible — a voyage to China! There was no more distant or exotic land; there were few aboard who had ever been as far east as this.
At dawn the anchor was won from the sticky mud. What followed was a particularly difficult and perilous piece of seamanship. The problem was the rapid current. The Hooghly was wide enough, but with so many other vessels at anchor it was necessary to get control on the ship as fast as possible after she was freed of the ground. But she had a leeward tide - the northerly monsoon wind was in the same direction that the current was drifting the ship. This meant that although they were moving smartly relative to the river bottom, they were not actually moving through the water. The rudder, therefore, could not bite and the ship had no steerage way — she would drift away out of control in the crowded fairway.
The solution was not obvious and Powlett’s seamanship caused dismay to some but a growing respect from others. With topgallants and courses hanging in the brails, the frigate set topsails, jib and driver, with the main topsail backed. Trimmed this way Artemis drifted broadside to the current, apparently helpless. But at every obstruction, an anchored vessel or a creeping line of barges, either the fore-topmast staysail forward would be hoisted or the driver aft would be hauled out. This would send Artemis slowly across the breadth of the river and the hazard would be cleared. For those spectators on deck it was a tense time, but where the estuary widened as it met the sea, the current slowed and it was then possible to cast to the right tack and shape their course, at last outward bound.
Passing the Sandheads and with the mangroves and lush jungle slipping away astern, the deck began to crowd with strangers and parasols, chattering and promenading, an amazing thing in a warship. Once again the harried Fairfax made the rounds, and
the sightseers were given to understand that their territory would be aft, around the wheel and the neat expanse of the quarterdeck abaft.
The tall figure of the dour and abstemious Lord Elmhurst was easy to spot, pacing slowly in conversation with Powlett, obstinately in full breeches and frock coat in defiance of sea conventions. Lady Elmhurst, a somewhat mannish figure with a fan constantly at work, always seemed to be the centre of attention, a formidable woman who looked quite as capable as her husband.
Once in the open sea, Artemis hove to, drifting quietly, as she waited for the stately East Indiaman that would accompany them with the rest of the envoy’s entourage.
The Walmer Castle emerged from the Hooghly and stiffly acknowledged their presence as she fell in astern. The two vessels foamed ahead.
At the end of the afternoon watch Kydd went to go below, but Renzi caught his sleeve. ‘You will scarcely credit what I have been able to borrow.’
Kydd had not seen him the whole afternoon, but guessed where he had been. ‘What have you got then, shipmate?’
‘A treatment of the metaphysick of China in four volumes,’ he said triumphantly. It had cost him dear, an hour of sympathetic weaselling of a crabbed old savant, but it was a thousand times worth it. ‘There are learned men and counsellors in the entourage, sadly overlooked.’ He sighed happily. ‘Now I shall know the truth of the soul-stealers of the Kao Hsuang and the greatness of the saindy Confucius.’
Kydd couldn’t help smiling. He had never seen Renzi so animated, and was happy for him. No doubt in the fullness of time, there would be a watch on deck in the tropical dusk and he would hear Renzi exploring these philosophies. He would use Kydd as a foil to worry happily over some arcane point, and then with dawning comprehension Kydd would see it slowly unfold into an important point and then a great truth, and they would both end up deeply satisfied. They clattered down the fore hatchway for their evening meal, pleased to be away from the deck with its high-born passengers and awkward atmosphere.
‘Hey, Wong! How d’ye say in Chinee, “Come under m’lee, me lovely, an’ I’ll steer ye fer a safe port”?’
‘Wong, mate, is there a reg’lar-built tavern, be chance, in Peking?’
‘Tell us — do yer Chinee fillies like it, you know—’
Wong sat rigid, a dogged frown on his glistening face. Suddenly, he slammed his fist on the table and shouted hoarsely, lDa choh, lei kau tik!’ The mess table subsided.
‘Woulda thought he’d be happier, the sad dog,’ Doud said, in puzzlement. ‘Goin’ to visit his folks, like.’
Wong rose, knocking over the other seamen of the mess on his way back on deck. ‘Heathen prick!’ Cundall snorted.
Kydd saw that Wong had more than paying a call on his family on his mind: normally impervious to lower-deck banter, he was now touchy and morose. ‘We got other things t’ consider right now, mates,’ Kydd said seriously. They looked at him. ‘Yon lobsterback friends o’ ours,’ he said. In the tropics the men could not survive for long in the stifling heat of the forepeak, and strangers aboard would be spotted as soon as they set foot on deck.
‘He’ll ‘ave ter set ‘em ashore, first port o’ call, o’ course,’ Cundall said, dismissively.
‘Yeah — which is China, ain’t it?’ Doud retorted. ‘Nah, he strings ‘em up as Army deserters, o’ course.’
‘What? Wi’ women aboard ter see? Don’t give me that. He’ll ‘ave t’ put ‘em in bilboes an’ send ‘em back fust ship he sees,’ said Petit.
‘Steerage ‘as all the women in, anyways — d’ye like ter ‘ave them trippin’ over the condemned men every time they goes topside?’
‘Condemned?’
‘Yair — in course, they gets topped soon as they gets sent back ter the barracks.’
Kydd leaned forward. ‘Not if Black Jack don’t know. Look, we finds ‘em in the forepeak. They’re stowaways, see, wants to ship in Artemis ‘cos they’ve heard we’re famous, an’ wants a piece o’ the prize money.’
‘What prize money?’ grunted Cundall.
‘We rigs ‘em in sailor’s gear, teaches ‘em the lingo and I’ll wager Black Jack’ll snap ‘em up.’
Doud laughed. ‘Yeah, he could at that — we landed sick more’n a brace at Calcutta.’
Petit looked doubtful. ‘Aye, but y’knows that a sojer is always a sojer. How, then, are yer goin’ ter make sailors outa them?’
The breeze freshened on the open ocean, and the blue sea with its hurrying white horses seemed to sense the urgency of the mission. The frigate’s movements became more lively, a barrelling roll in the following wind and sea, and the deck gradually cleared of passengers, returning to its usual seamanlike expanse.
Revelling in the crispness of the air after the heavy humidity Kydd went forward. They loped along under easy sail down the long swells of the ocean, the Indiaman trying its best two miles astern. Kydd went to the ornate voluted beakhead and leaned on the rail. Below him the bow-wave foamed and roared, a broad swash of white spreading out each side from the stem. The figurehead, the chaste white figure of Artemis, thrust out a hunting bow as if to urge the rest of the ship to follow, a splendid icon for a prime predator of the seas.
The sea was much closer than in his previous ship, the big three-decker, and the sensation of speed was thrilling. Everything about the frigate suggested speed - her sails were perfectly cut to the yards and sheeted in so taut they hardly bellied. Her clean lines resulted in a fine-drawn wake and the jib and fore staysails flying down to the bowsprit-seemed to arrow the ship forward. Reluctantly Kydd made his way back: this was his favourite place.
He stepped behind the canvas screen of the sick-bay and groaned at the sight of the two soldiers. ‘Now y’ please to pay attention.’ They looked eagerly up at him from their cross-legged position. ‘Y’ didn’t do so well on th’ last sea word I gave ye — here’s a new one, see if y’ can do a bit better. Show th’ Captain how you know y’ ropes.’
Their guileless expressions made Kydd sigh, but he persevered. ‘Th’ word “start”, we uses it with care, f’r it has more’n one meaning. If we use it about a cask o’ water, this means t’ empty it, see, but if we talks about our anchor, then o’ course it means to move it a piece. An’ to start bread has the meaning f’r us to turn it out of its bags and casks an’ stow it together in bulk — but when we talks about t’ start a butt-end of a plank, why, that’s serious, it means that the seas have sprung it an’ we’re takin’ in water fast.’ Kydd tried to ignore their glassy stares. ‘On deck, if we starts the tack or sheet, it means t’ loosen it, like “raise tacks an’ sheets” when we goes about. An’ the carpenter, when he wants t’ move a contrary bolt, he starts it with a starting bolt.’
Scrufty Weems muttered, ‘If this is yer “start” then God ‘elp us at the “finish”!’
‘An’ if you’re slack in y’r ways on deck, you c’n be sure there’s a bo’sun’s mate’ll start ye with his rope’s end, sure enough.’
Kydd knew they had to get the two soldiers before the Captain very shortly, for any real stowaways would have shown themselves as soon as the ship reached the open sea. ‘Now, c’n ye tell me, what are the sea watches in order, startin’ with the middle watch?’
With the northerly monsoon driving boisterously at them from astern, and the positive effect of the clockwise ocean vortex of the Bay of Bengal, they made excellent time south, aiming for the Malacca strait, the narrowing passage between Malaya and Sumatra.
‘Down, y’ scurvy dogs!’ Kydd thrust the two soldiers at the feet of Captain Powlett, who had just begun his morning pace of the quarterdeck.
‘What the devil?’ Bunce and Weems had on old sailors’ gear, but their walnut juice disguise had faded to a scrofulous blotchy streaking.
‘Stowaways! Found ‘em in the forepeak, sir.’
Powlett stared. The men got to their feet, staggered slightly at a playful heave of the deck, but touched their foreheads smartly enough.
‘Aye, sir, we’em fr
om the old Mary Jane brig, ‘n’ we want t’ be part of the crew o’ the famous Artemis?
Powlett glowered. ‘So you thought to desert your shipmates and join the King’s Service when it suited you.’
‘Whoy, no, sir!’ Bunce replied. ‘The boat is in, er, ball’st, waitin’ this two month fer a cargo, an’ we’re rare flummoxed as t’ how to get out ter sea agen.’
‘What rate are you?’
‘Sir?’
Kydd said quickly, ‘Claims they’re able seamen, sir.’
‘Oh, yez, that’s what we are, then,’ said Bunce.
‘Then be so kind as to climb the larb’d mizzen shrouds and touch the cro’jick tye block,’ said Powlett lazily.
Bunce caught Kydd’s hurried hand signal. ‘Ah - we would, er, do that if’n we worn’t so bad in th’ back. See, we had to ‘aul up on this mast thing, an’ it did fer me back, it did. Be roight in a coupla days, I guess.’
Powlett’s smile thinned. ‘And you?’ he asked Weems, who started with apprehension.
‘Me too, yer honour, I wuz with ‘im when we both did in our backs.’
Fairfax pushed forward. ‘Wharf rats, that’s what they are!’ he spluttered. ‘They’re no seamen! We must put ‘em ashore, sir, before—’
‘No — recollect, sir, we are on a mission of some delicacy,’ Powlett said. ‘No one goes ashore.’
He paced around the pair, jaw clamped. ‘We landed three sick at Calcutta, I must allow as the appearance of this pair is not unwelcome.’ He stopped, and a thin smile appeared. ‘Mr Fairfax, rate these two Landman, but as Mr Kydd found them, he can be responsible to see they measure up.’
The two soldiers snapped to attention, saluted smartly Army fashion and doubled away forward. Jaw dropping, Powlett stared after them; Kydd quickly touched his hat and mumbled, ‘I’ll see they measure up, sir,’ and hurried after them.
A bare week later they had passed the new settlement of Penang to larboard, keeping close in with the land to catch the useful southward current, and entered a different, more airy kind of tropical regime. The sailing master had not passed this way since his youth, but his memory was sure, and they sailed on confidently past Malacca.
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