Old Glory

by Christopher Nicole

  Desperately he pulled on the rope holding his wrists, and it immediately slackened, allowing him to drop away from another bang on the keel. Instantly he worked his wrists together and found they would slip out of the knots easily enough, as promised. God save the boatswain.

  No sooner were his hands free than the rope of his ankle tightened, and he was dragged backunder the hull with tremendous force; he could imagine the boatswain shouting aft that the rope must have parted. But he had no intention of being hauled back up on deck; better to drown than suffer another flogging, continued humiliation. His head bumped the keel, and he grasped the lead with his right hand. The rope tugged, and again, before slackening; he could imagine the men screaming that he was foul of something and surely dead. But with his free hand he reached up to slacken the rope holding his ankles — it was only a running bowline and not a tight knot, and could be pushed free with no great effort. A moment later he was loose, and striking out under his own power. He broke the surface just in time, for he was already inhaling water. He gasped and spat, took enormous breaths, and discovered that he was on the starboard side of the ship, looking up at the faces staring down at him.

  ‘There he is,’ shouted Mr Canning. ‘There’s the bugger. Throw him a line.’

  Harry struck out again, to swim farther away.

  ‘He’s gone mad,’ shouted another officer.

  ‘Put down a boat,’ bawled another.

  By now the frigate had sailed right past him. He saw men being sent aloft to trim the yards and wear the ship to return for him, but he saw too that the rainstorm had finally reached them. The surface of the water was peppered with enormous drops, and churned by the sudden gale force gusts of wind; the frigate disappeared entirely as the rain, thick as fog, swept over it. Harry wasted no time; although the sun had gone, he had no doubt as to which direction lay Dominica, and he swam towards it with all his strength. There might be sharks waiting to swallow him, and there might be man-eating savages waiting to welcome him, but he was prepared to take those on all together rather than be dragged back on board the frigate.

  He swam for several minutes at full speed, amazed at the buoyancy of the warm sea, then slowed to rest and catch his breath, treading water and looking back. The squall had already disappeared into the distance, and the sun was again breaking through the clouds. The frigate was more than half a mile away. She had come about, to be sure, but she had no hope of finding him as the surface of the sea remained choppy. And the land was now less than three miles away, looming large, and green, and vaguely terrifying. But he did not think anything could ever be terrifying to him again.

  He resumed swimming, slowly and purposefully now, occasionally looking over his shoulder. The frigate sailed north for perhaps a mile, and then came about again and made off to the southwest. Another man overboard, to be entered in the log, lost without trace. He wondered if that foretopmasthand was still swimming.

  But now it was time to concentrate. He was becoming tired, and he knew that many of the West Indian islands were surrounded by reefs formed out of razor-sharp coral. But not here in the Windwards, where the volcanic rock rose straight out of the ocean bed a hundred fathoms down. How high the mountains looked as he approached, and now he saw that the beaches were not pink or yellow, as further north, but black, from the centuries of volcanic ash deposited on them.

  On and on he swam, refusing to allow himself to consider that he might not make it, concentrating on swinging one leaden arm over another, changing his styles, from overarm to breaststroke, and then to backstroke, resting his arms and using his legs. The sea rapidly calmed as the wind died behind the squall, and but for his tiredness and his constant awareness of what might be swimming beneath him, it would have been a delightful experience; the water was the warmest he had ever known, and he had not enjoyed the freedom of swimming naked since he was a boy.

  Close now. He could look up, and up, and up, at the towering green cliffs, and he could hear the rushing sound of innumerable rivers, tumbling down to the sea. Indeed he could see one, only a hundred yards to his right, and for this he made, stumbling out of the water on to the black sand, and lying there, panting and drinking alternately, feeling the afternoon sun warming his back, feeling too the exhaustion rippling through his system. But once again he was free. At least for a while.

  A very little while. No more than a few minutes. Some inner sense made the hair on his neck seem to prickle, and he rolled over and sat up, to gaze along the beach at the men who had emerged from the tree fringe, from where they had clearly been watching both the frigate and his own approach. They were naked men, like himself, but with copper brown skins and carrying long spears, made of wood with sharpened tips. Harry did not doubt that he was face to face with the Caribs.

  *

  ‘May I say, Miss Bartlett, that you have quite the most beautiful hands I have ever seen,’ remarked Mr Burtinshaw. ‘Would it be considered forward of me to hold one?’

  ‘It certainly would, Mr Burtinshaw,’ Elizabeth replied, and poured him another cup of tea. He was one of the oldest of the men her father had introduced into the house over the past year, at least thirty, and was apparently very well thought of in New York financial and social circles.

  ‘Ahem,’ Josiah Bartlett remarked, from his favourite position in front of the mantelpiece, where he was carefully filling his long, thinstemmed pipe, so as not obviously to be overlooking the young couple seated in the bay window. ‘Elizabeth is a shy girl, you’ll understand, Mr Burtinshaw.’

  ‘Of course,’ Burtinshaw agreed. ‘I’d seek nothing different.’ Although he looked somewhat puzzled, as he had observed little shyness in Elizabeth Bartlett’s demeanour, but rather a determined resolution not to be attracted to him, he suspected.

  ‘She needs to know a man well,’ Josiah continued, smiling at his daughter.

  Mr Burtinshaw gazed anxiously as Elizabeth gazed coolly back at him.

  ‘May I say that is a most delightful gown you are wearing,’ he ventured. ‘So … ah … daring.’

  ‘It is a common polonaise, Mr Burtinshaw,’ she explained. ‘If you mean that my underskirt is exposed …’ as it was, because the material of the gown, as in all polonaises, was stitched up to fall in three huge loops over the equally decorative underskirt, ‘I am sure you must have seen the style everywhere in New York. You do go everywhere, do you not, Mr Burtinshaw?’

  ‘I … ah … meant the colour,’ Mr Burtinshaw tried gamely. ‘Pale blue so perfectly matches your eyes.’

  ‘But my eyes are pale grey, Mr Burtinshaw.’

  Burtinshaw gave up, and looked at Josiah for aid.

  ‘I think Mr Burtinshaw would appreciate a look at the apple orchard, Lizzie,’ Josiah suggested.

  ‘I am sure he has better things to do, father.’

  Josiah’s smile stiffened. ‘It is something I would like you to do, Lizzie.’

  ‘Of course, if you so wish it, father,’ Elizabeth said dutifully. She rose, went into the hall for her bonnet, which she tied resolutely beneath her chin, allowing the golden hair to flow out from beneath it and down the back of her dark blue bodice. Mr Burtinshaw held her pelisse for her, and his hands stroked across her shoulders as he settled it.

  ‘I trust I am not being forward now,’ he said.

  ‘What you are, Mr Burtinshaw, must depend upon my father’s mood, it seems,’ she told him, and led him out of the side door into the spacious garden which was Josiah Bartlett’s pride and joy — after his daughter and his ships — and in which he spent most of his leisure time. Walled off from the hustle and bustle of the rest of the town, it was a delightfully quiet and secluded spot, which stretched past a green lawn bordered with flower beds to the small orchard at the end, where a large number of apples still clung to the trees. But in November the garden was at once damp and soft to the feet, and Elizabeth clicked her tongue as her shoes were immediately wet and stained.

  ‘How attractive,’ Mr Burtinshaw remarked, deciding ag
ainst pursuing her ambiguous reply to his last question.

  ‘We find it so, in summer.’ She walked in front of him.

  Mr Burtinshaw said nothing for some moments, as they slowly strolled across the lawn, but he was clearly working himself up. This was the fourth time he had come to call, and she had been unfailingly cool on each occasion — but he was Father’s current choice. Her continued bombardment with possible suitors was a surprise to her. Relations between her father and herself had remained strained for some weeks after her flogging, although he had gone out of his way to be as pleasant as he could. Her seventeenth birthday had come and gone, with a handsome gold locket for her to wear around her neck as a present … and then had arrived, throughout the summer, a succession of young men, all apparently selected by her father to come courting, all of good families, and all either arrogantly brash or tongue-tied and embarrassed. She had found them at best amusing. But now there was Mr Burtinshaw, an up and coming young attorney, who apparently was making a name for himself in the House of Assembly, by speeches denouncing colonial intransigence to English rule, a rule, according to Mr Burtinshaw, required by religion, law, nature, and commonsense. This point of view, if it earned him the occasional rotten egg on the street, was very much in line with Josiah Bartlett’s thinking, and thus with Elizabeth’s as well; it did not make Mr Burtinshaw any the more attractive as a man. Nor did she believe that father was truly in favour of this, or any, match. He merely understood that she still spent too much of her time thinking about Harry McGann, even if Harry had now been gone several months and the chances of her ever seeing him again were growing more remote with every day. So Father had decided to distract her, that was all. What he lacked was the wit to understand that the man to distract her from Harry McGann would have to be someone bigger and better in every way than Harry McGann — and she doubted such a creature existed.

  Certainly it did not exist in Mr Burtinshaw, who was not much taller than herself and inclined to corpulence.

  But Mr Burtinshaw was unaware that Harry McGann existed, understood only that so far as he could tell Josiah Bartlett smiled on him as a prospective son-in-law, and that quite apart from Josiah’s well known wealth, here was a most beautiful young girl into the bargain, however completely unresponsive she might endeavour to appear. So at last, as they reached the shelter of the trees, he cleared his throat. ‘You understand that it is my dearest wish to make you my wife, Miss Bartlett?’ he asked.

  Elizabeth turned to gaze at him; his cheeks were pink. ‘Is it, sir? I had no idea.’

  ‘Ah … perhaps I have not been forward enough?’ he ventured.

  ‘I doubt that is the reason, sir,’ she said, taking a step backwards as he took a step forward.

  ‘I have spoken with your father,’ Mr Burtinshaw continued, still advancing. ‘And he assured me we shall have his blessing, providing you will but agree.’

  Elizabeth found herself with her back against an apple tree, and a branch drooping down to set her bonnet askew. ‘But I will not agree, sir,’ she snapped.

  Mr Burtinshaw checked his advance, looking utterly bewildered. ‘You do not wish to marry me?’

  ‘There you have it,’ Elizabeth said.

  ‘But … why not?’

  ‘Because I do not love you.’

  ‘Ah, well, love … a girlish emotion. These things take time, and are based upon mutual respect, and affection, and … ah … desire.’

  ‘There is not sufficient time in either of our lives, for me to achieve any of those, Mr Burtinshaw.’

  He gazed at her, then scratched his head. ‘Well, I’m damned,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, Mr Burtinshaw,’ she agreed. ‘As far as I am concerned, you are damned. I will bid you good day.’

  He stared at her for several seconds, then turned on his heel and walked back to the woods. Elizabeth allowed him several minutes actually to leave, then she squared her shoulders and followed him; Father would now have to be faced.

  *

  Harry tensed all of his muscles, got his breathing firmly under control, and walked towards the men. They were even better armed than he had concluded at first sight, as, although naked as regards clothes, each man wore a kind of belt, made from plaited vines, through which was thrust a very serviceable looking bone knife, to be used at close quarters after the spears had been thrown.

  But they were very little men, only an inch or two over five feet each, he estimated, and as he approached, and they could more properly estimate his size, they insensibly moved closer together, muttering at each other in a somewhat gutteral tongue. Clearly they had never before seen anyone quite as massive, and therefore at this moment the advantage lay with him. But equally clearly it was an advantage which would have to be used to the maximum effect, immediately and irrevocably. And it was something he wanted to do. Tired as he was, the fury still boiled in his veins. At this moment he did indeed hate all of mankind, wanted only to destroy any member of that accursed species he could lay his hands on. These four men came top of the list, as they were closest.

  Having discussed the situation, the men now separated, each with his spear held in his right hand, the arm drawn back. Their teeth bared, and he could see that they were filed, which removed his last doubt that if he did not destroy them they would destroy him, most unpleasantly; the realisation only seemed to add to his anger a sense of almost demoniac glee.

  ‘Have at you!’ he bellowed, and began to run straight at them with all his speed, which was considerable; his months in the Navy had left him hard and fit. One of the Caribs immediately turned and fled. Another endeavoured to do so but had not reached the trees when he slipped and measured his length in the sand. The remaining pair, bolder, stood their ground and threw their spears, but one was from the side and entirely missed its target; the other was the man in the centre, after whom Harry was actually running, and his spear had hardly left his hand when Harry caught it in his right hand, swung across to grasp it in his left as well, and without checking his stride broke the stout wood into two pieces.

  The Carib stared at him in horror; clearly he had never before witnessed such a display of strength, and now anticipated a similar fate. Correctly. Harry seized him by the shoulder as he reached for the knife which hung at his waist, lifting him from the ground while his other hand grasped a shuddering thigh, and twisted his body to and fro from these two extremes. The Indian uttered a shriek of pain and terror as his bones and ligaments were torn apart. Harry did not relax his grip, but aware that the second man was rushing at him with upraised knife, swung the dying man with all his force, releasing his right hand to increase his range, and sending the man thudding into his compatriot, with a force which knocked the charging Indian off his feet and tumbled him to the sand, unconscious before he ever hit the ground.

  Still holding his now collapsed victim under his left arm, fingers of his left hand locked in the muscular thigh, Harry strode for the trees where the remaining men had disappeared. Here the third Carib had regained sufficient courage to stand his ground, but lost it again as he saw the man mountain bearing down on him, waving the stricken body of his friend. He too fled into the trees. Harry did not pause, but continued to follow him. He heard bushes crackling to his right, and turned, to see the fourth man thrusting at him. Instantly the inert body he carried was dropped to provide a shield, into which the spear point entered; if the man had not already been dead, he certainly died now. Harry’s latest assailant gasped in dismay at what he had done, lank black hair flopping over his high cheekbones, and Harry reached out and seized him by that hair, jerking him forward and causing him to drop his knife. The man fell to his knees, panting and wailing. Harry pulled him back to his feet, and with a single movement of his arm tossed him on to his left shoulder. The man landed with a thump which must have winded him, for he stopped shouting. He still attempted to wriggle, and was held by Harry’s hand clamping his back with a force he knew could crush his ribs like twigs. The dead body Harry laid across h
is right shoulder, and then set off again behind the fourth man, who was following a fairly well defined path.

  He was aware of a tremendous mixture of emotions. A sense of horror with himself for what he had done, for how he had used his strength as he had never used it before for any purpose — certainly never for killing a human being — mingled with an enormous elation at the understanding he had just gained, consciously for the first time in his life, of what he possessed. And mingled with that was still a fierce anger, and a fierce determination to continue in this vein for as long as was necessary, until he either was finally brought down, or he triumphed absolutely. It was an elation which laughed at fatigue, despite his long swim and the fact that it was now nearly evening and he had not eaten since dawn — although he understood that physical collapse, when it came, would be total. Meanwhile he marched through the forest, up and down, for the path he followed was a most tortuous one, clinging to the lower contours of the mountains which rose one, two, three thousand feet on either side, winding its way down into deep valleys where the setting sun was totally obscured and the trees and leaves still dripped from the noonday rain storm. And grew more thickly than he would ever have imagined possible. He saw no human or animal life, although there were birds and insects in abundance. But he had not been walking for more than an hour when his nostrils were assailed by a ghastly odour, which he immediately recognised as sulphur. A volcano? Yet the path continued.

  The smell of the sulphur awoke the unconscious man on his left shoulder, who attempted to move and was promptly clamped back into place by the iron fingers. He screamed and shouted, but was quite unable to move more than a fraction, and soon subsided again.