The Bombay Marines

by Porter Hill

  Horne leaped out of the cot. He looked through the small window above the cot and saw dawn bleaching the sky.

  Pulling on his breeches as he moved towards the door, he lifted the latch and found Midshipman Bruce standing outside on the doorstep.

  The round-cheeked Midshipman snapped a salute, blurting, ‘Sir, there’s a fight by the Barracks!’

  Horne’s mind cleared. ‘Where’s Sergeant Rajit?’

  ‘Aboard the Eclipse, sir. I sent the Dutchman, Groot, to fetch him, sir.’

  Horne grabbed for his boots. ‘Who’s fighting?’

  ‘McFiddich and your man, sir.’

  Horne stood like a stork in the middle of the room, one boot in mid-air. ‘My man?’

  ‘The prisoner called Jingee, sir. The man who cooks and washes for you.’

  Horne drove his foot into the boot with a slam.

  Bruce held both arms stiff at his side. ‘It appears, sir, that your man started the fight.’

  Horne buckled his belt, thinking that if Jingee had instigated a fight with McFiddich it meant that it was McFiddich who had locked him in the prison last night. Jingee was seeking revenge. Horne cursed himself for not suspecting what Jingee would do. It was the natural action for a man who put so much store in honour and self-respect, for someone who had been imprisoned for murdering a foreigner who had violated Hindu caste laws.

  ‘Are you armed, Bruce?’

  ‘Yes, sir. A brace of pistols.’

  ‘Good. What barracks is it?’

  ‘Barracks One, sir.’

  ‘Who’s on guard there this morning?’

  ‘Wheeler, sir. He has that big African as his partner. Both men are armed with muskets, sir, but they’re waiting for your orders to fire.’

  ‘Let’s go.’

  Horne led Bruce out of the door.

  * * *

  The two men crossed the harbour yard at a quick pace, approaching a crowd encircling the front of the stone-and-mortar shed known as Barracks One.

  The men parted for Horne to pass through the circle, all except for Tom Gibbons who stood in Horne’s path. ‘Your man started it, Captain Horne.’

  Horne pushed Gibbons aside and continued through the crowd, halting when he saw McFiddich and Jingee, both crouching forward and armed with knives.

  The circle closed round Horne as he faced the fighters and shouts rose for the favourite.

  ‘Watch out for him, Kev.’

  ‘Take him slow, McFiddich.’

  ‘Clip his other wing, McFiddich. Go for him. Go for him.’

  McFiddich played his knife with back flips of the wrist, stepping on one foot, then the other, revolving clockwise around Jingee.

  Jingee wore his usual white turban and dhoti. His bare feet danced in a constant movement as he stabbed his blade at McFiddich, poking the knife back and forth in the air until – in a flash – he lunged for his opponent.

  McFiddich dodged. But Jingee’s knife nicked his shoulder cap and a line of scarlet trickled down McFiddich’s bicep.

  Horne reached back so that Midshipman Bruce could hand him the pistols. Taking the primed flintlocks, he stepped forward and shouted, ‘Enough!’

  Jingee faltered.

  McFiddich seized his opportunity and stabbed for Jingee.

  Jingee smiled. He had anticipated McFiddich’s movement. He stepped to his left and McFiddich fell face down on the ground.

  Pouncing onto McFiddich’s back like a cheetah, Jingee locked both legs around the other man’s shoulders and clenched a forearm around his neck, positioning the knife to his throat.

  Horne kicked the knife from Jingee’s hand and, raising both pistols, pointed a barrel at each man. ‘Move and I’ll blow your brains out.’

  McFiddich lay gasping on his stomach, loosening the hold on his knife. But Jingee remained where he was, both legs locked over McFiddich’s shoulders.

  Horne pressed the barrel against Jingee’s temple. ‘I said stop.’

  Jingee remained firmly on McFiddich’s back.

  Horne clicked the pistol’s hammer.

  Dropping his arm, Jingee slumped to the ground.

  Horne beckoned to one of the Marines, Wheeler. ‘Seize the weapons.’

  Stepping back while the Marine retrieved the two knives, he looked from Jingee to McFiddich. ‘Who got the knives?’

  Jingee’s voice was quiet, respectful. ‘Me, Captain sahib. From the kitchen.’

  ‘Did McFiddich lock you in the prison last night, Jingee?’

  McFiddich raised from the ground. ‘Yes. But so what? That’s where pets belong, isn’t it? Locked in cages?’

  Horne swung the flintlock against the side of McFiddich’s head.

  McFiddich’s body slumped to the ground and, standing over it, Horne ordered, ‘Wheeler, escort this man to the old prison grounds. Lock him in one of the small prisons. Midshipman Bruce will accompany you with padlock and chains.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Horne raised his voice. ‘Has Sergeant Rajit returned to shore yet?’

  Rajit’s voice boomed behind him. ‘Here, suh!’

  Horne kept his eyes on Jingee as he ordered, ‘Sergeant, I want you to take this other man aboard the Eclipse. I want him locked in bilboes. If he gives you any trouble, tie his hands behind his back, shoot him in both legs, and throw him overboard.’

  ‘Yes, suh!’

  In the circle of men behind Horne, Fred Babcock looked from Tom Gibbons to Martin Allen to Fernando Vega, at all eleven men so far recruited for the escape plot. How did McFiddich’s imprisonment affect the mutiny? Babcock suspected that the time had come for him to start making his own plans.

  * * *

  Kevin McFiddich’s wrists and ankles were bound tightly to the iron rings embedded into the floor of the stone prison. He lay spreadeagled on his back under the rusty iron doors and, as the late morning sun fired the metal above his face, he kept turning his head from left to right, trying to avoid the blistering heat.

  Salty rivulets of sweat flooded his eyes. The heat dried his lips. Thickened his tongue. Parched his throat. He called for the guards to give him water but nobody replied.

  He kept turning his head from side to side. He wiggled his fingers in the chains. He took deep gulps of air. He did everything he could to quiet his heartbeat, hoping to calm the panic caused by the iron doors locked shut a few inches above his eyes.

  Periodically, he heard the sound of the drill squad as they rounded the island. When they stopped passing his prison, McFiddich guessed that it must be midday, and that the men had gone to eat under the sun shelters on the hillside.

  To keep his mind off hunger and thirst, he studied a small shaft of light piercing the stonework to the right of his head. He saw an ant crawling along the stones and moving towards the iron doors above him.

  The ant was joined by a second ant, larger and red and crawling faster than the first ant.

  A third ant joined them, and another, and another …

  McFiddich’s body was covered with ants. There were ants on his arms, ants crawling across his neck, between his shoulder blades, through his crotch, into his ears, up his nostrils …

  Telling himself he was only imagining that he was lying on an anthill, he tried to forget about the present and to concentrate on the past, to remember life as it had been before he had been imprisoned in Bombay Castle.

  A woman’s voice hissed in his ear.

  May you burn forever in hell!

  Kevin McFiddich had been imprisoned for rape. He had accosted a scrivener’s wife in a back alley of Bombay. Her name was Jane Morgan and McFiddich had made the mistake of going into the bazaar, so giving Jane Morgan the opportunity to identify him to patrol guards.

  Flaxen-haired and fair-skinned, Jane Morgan had attended McFiddich’s hearing in Bombay Castle. She had sat silently in her chair throughout the trial. But when the time came for the sentence to be read, she sprang from the chair, pointing her finger at McFiddich and cursing, ‘May you and every man li
ke you burn forever in hell!’

  Burn in hell.

  Had Jane Morgan put a curse on him? Was it coming to pass? Had she willed him into this prison?

  But why had he not suffered from other curses in the past? What about the women he had taken in England? The cobbler’s daughter? The tiny-boned dressmaker? The housemaid with raven locks who had bitten him so hard when he had held his hand over her mouth? Why had none of his other victims cursed him like Jane Morgan?

  A sudden tap, tap, tap on the iron doors brought McFiddich’s thoughts back to the present and he thought that someone had finally come to free him.

  The tapping sound continued. McFiddich’s heart sank as he realised that the noise was not someone tapping a signal to him: it was the pounding of heavy raindrops on the iron doors.

  The sound of rain grew louder, falling faster on the doors, the shower quickly becoming a deluge, and the vent which had admitted light to McFiddich’s shallow prison now channelled torrents of water into the rock box.

  As the rain fell harder, water began to rise around McFiddich’s body, flooding him with dirt and floating insects and more water. McFiddich began to dig with his fingernails, to claw at the rocks in his shackles. The manacles burned the skin on his wrists. The irons rubbed against his ankles. But he tried to claw, to kick, to gouge some kind of niche or hole for the water to escape from this quickly-filling reservoir.

  A voice outside the prison stopped him. Who was it? He listened.

  The voice called, ‘Kev?’

  ‘Who is it?’

  ‘Kev, it’s Tom here. Tom Gibbons. Don’t talk, Kev. Just listen …’

  ‘Gibbons, get me out of here! Damn it to hell, Gibbons, I’m drowning in here!’

  ‘The rain’s stopped, Kev. You’ll be okay. There’s a change of guard coming on duty. Just try to hold on till tonight.’

  ‘You going to help me, Gibbons?’

  ‘We’re going to help you. We got more men. One’s the guard coming on duty with Vega.’

  ‘Promise me! Promise me you’re going to help me!’

  ‘I promise you, McFiddich. I promise.’

  McFiddich heard the sound of footsteps crunching away from him and he relaxed, smiling at the thought that he would soon be free to sail for Oman.

  * * *

  Tom Gibbons walked slowly away from McFiddich’s prison, filled with sudden doubts about the man who had become his new friend.

  Gibbons tried to imagine how Adam Horne would act if he were locked in a prison like McFiddich. Would Horne beg to be let out? Would Horne panic? Call to be rescued?

  Gibbons suspected that if Horne suffered it would be in silence.

  Only a few weeks ago it had been an honour for Gibbons to serve under Horne. The mission to the North Arabian Sea had been a high point of his life. He had gone with Horne into the Maratha camp in the hills above the Gulf of Maniy. He had fought with a dirk and a branch from a tree. Horne had praised him for his courage and Gibbons had never felt prouder.

  But ten days ago Gibbons’s world had collapsed. He had fought with Kevin McFiddich aboard the Eclipse and Horne had humiliated him in front of the crew. Gibbons could not forgive the Captain for doing such a thing to him. Nevertheless, he was still secretly ashamed that he had to throw in his lot with a man as gutless as McFiddich.

  * * *

  Sergeant Rajit saw that the day was progressing from bad to worse.

  Two men collapsed from heat stroke during morning drill. Before midday, Tyson Lovett spotted the sails of an unidentifiable brig against the southern horizon as Rajit passed the Sentry Post with the drill squad. By the time that Horne had rushed from Headquarters with his spyglass, the mysterious ship had disappeared. Later, the deluge had collapsed the roof on Barracks Two and, after the midday meal, Raj it sprained his ankle in the gallows jump.

  Frustrated, he sat on the edge of a cot in Flannery’s makeshift infirmary and insisted that he could walk, that the injury was not serious.

  Flannery knelt in front of him on the dirt floor, examining the ankle. ‘Just take a swig of that bottle I gave you, bucko, and let me do the deciding about what’s serious or not.’

  The pain throbbed up Rajit’s leg but he was determined not to complain. Being a teetotaller, and knowing that Flannery was a tippler, he was also determined not to drink from the small brown bottle which Flannery had given him.

  ‘Take a drink of that medicine,’ the Irishman urged, ‘or you’ll never get out of here.’

  Rajit bit back a scream as the pain shot through his leg, and, recognizing the Sergeant’s stubbornness, Flannery twisted the ankle more ruthlessly.

  Rajit’s scream filled the room.

  ‘Are you ready to listen to me, bucko?’

  Raj it gulped at the bottle.

  ‘Aye, that’s a good lad.’

  Rajit’s mouth felt sticky, coated with a sweet-tasting film. Looking at the bottle he had half-emptied, he asked, ‘What is this?’

  Flannery ignored the question. ‘You’ve got to stay off your feet for two, maybe three weeks. Read some of those fine books of yours.’

  ‘I can’t stay off my feet for two weeks. Horne can’t drill those men without …’

  Rajit stopped. He felt dizzy. His head was spinning. ‘What kind of medicine was that you … gave me?’

  Flannery moved across the room to make a salt bath. ‘Laudanum.’

  ‘Laudan …’ Again, Rajit faltered, shaking his head. He felt drowsy.

  Returning to the bed with a basin, Flannery found his patient slumped across the mattress. He smiled at the pot-bellied Asian. There was a way to handle men who wouldn’t listen to him.

  Setting down the salt bath on the floor, he pulled his brandy flask from his pocket. Feeling the liquor burn his throat, he thought how much closer he was to subduing – once and for all – the man who had killed his dearly beloved brother thirty-one years ago. Laudanum would be child’s play compared to the weapon he would use in his vendetta. Flannery’s lips lifted in a thin smile.

  Chapter Thirteen

  THE CHOSEN FEW

  Adam Horne awoke on the seventh morning in Headquarters with one thought foremost in his mind: he was wrong to weigh himself down with the problems that had developed on Bull Island when the goal of his mission was not here but at Fort St George.

  As he shaved and dressed, he realised that he would utilize his time better by relegating all administrative duties – including discipline – to his officers and concentrating his own efforts on choosing the final candidates for the squadron.

  Thinking about his officers, Horne remembered how Tim Flannery had reported last night that Sergeant Rajit’s ankle would take ten days to two weeks to mend. Horne wanted Rajit with him at Fort St George and, as departure was only three weeks away, he faced the fact that Rajit would have to stay off his feet and not help him in preparing the team.

  Glancing out of the window as he dried himself, he looked across the harbour yard at the men pouring from the two barracks. Why not begin separating the wheat from the chaff this morning at breakfast? By the end of the day’s drill, he could make the next eliminations.

  Of the one-hundred-and-twenty men on Bull Island, Horne suspected there would be little more than a dozen or so potential candidates for the mission. Why not start discovering today exactly how many fit and truly able men he had?

  Leaving Headquarters, he crossed the yard at a smart pace, feeling enthusiasm for the work building inside him. It was the same glow of excitement he had felt before the fight between Jingee and McFiddich. Perhaps he was losing himself in duty, but the spark of renewed energy made every problem seem surmountable again.

  * * *

  ‘Groot, climb that wall! There’s a hound snapping at your arse … Can’t bloody Turks jump higher than a foot off the ground, Mustafa? … You’re a good shot with a musket, Bapu, but you throw that grappling iron like a girl.’

  Adam Horne heard himself mimicking Rajit’s staccato commands as he pus
hed the sixteen men he had selected at breakfast through the drill courses dotted around Bull Island. As the morning sun crested in the sky, he led the single file of men over stone hurdles, snaked them on their bellies across stony ground and improvised bridges, barked them up greased poles planted in sand.

  ‘Babcock, when I say run, you ask “how far, sir?” … Put more weight into that fist, Kiro. You’re not going to kill a man with your knuckles. Not the way you hit … Sweet-water, you tackle that sandbag like an old maiden aunt.’

  Three of Horne’s training team came from the Eclipse’s Marine unit, Tyson Lovett, Cable Wendell and Randy Sweetwater. Brett Dunbar and Geoff Hands belonged to the ship’s crew. The other eleven men were prisoners from Bombay Castle: Allen, Bapu, Babcock, Kiro, Groot, Jud, Mustafa, Poiret, Quinte, Scott and Vega.

  Horne broke drill for the midday meal earlier than Rajit’s usual hour, but instead of allowing the team time to rest after eating, he ordered them back up on their feet and began them running in the blazing sun. Groaning, the men trudged from the island’s main settlement towards the southern plateau, dragging their feet up the slope, a few vomiting as they mounted the hill.

  Horne pushed them, and when Randy Sweetwater was unable to rise from the ground, he left him on his knees retching, the first man to be eliminated from the final contenders for the mission.

  As the sun began sinking towards the western horizon, Horne detailed the remaining fifteen men to dig new latrines, split firewood, mend fishnets and join guard duty. He moved from post to post, observing which men still had some energy after a gruelling day’s exercises, which men complained about long hours, which men pushed themselves to obey orders.

  The time came for supper, but Horne postponed his own meal. He remained in Headquarters to inform two more men that he was eliminating them from the squadron.

  Brian Scott, brawny and loyal, did not understand silence. Horne hated to lose a rugged man like Scott but one badly timed cough, one clank of the musket could betray a unit’s location and endanger the entire mission.