by Carla Kelly
Break my heart, child, Able thought in utter anguish. “No, I am not going to kill you,” he said softly in French. “Let’s go home.”
He knew the child could run away if he let go of him, but he let go anyway. To his supreme gratitude, the boy didn’t run. He took a few steps and Able saw the T and O more clearly on his shirt, mostly faded out, unless viewed at the right angle. Transport Office. All prisoners wore such shirts, courtesy of the British government, even little prisoners, apparently. They walked behind Smitty and John, and as they walked, the French prisoner of war put his hand in Able’s.
“I wish I knew what is going on,” Able said in English. He watched the harbor. Seven prison hulks. “I wish I knew. Any advice, Euclid? No?”
— Chapter Twenty-two —
Prison Hulk HMS Captivity
Seriously, how could a man numbered One Dash Eighty-Seven make himself small on a prison hulk? Jean realized that his survival depended on Ianthe Faulke saying nothing about his presence in the steward’s pantry. He also realized that he trusted her not a whit.
Calm, calm, he told himself twenty times that day, and the next. Maybe the men in the kegs were able to slip away from the dock, because the hoy had come in late and the dock was shrouded in shadow. Or perhaps the man who knew where they were – the other end of the conspiracy – had an argument with his wife and remained behind to patch up the quarrel. Quite possibly this conspirator had taken ill and lay at death’s door. By evening Jean allowed himself to breathe. He was a generally optimistic man.
Two days later, when Jean began to breathe easier, his optimism vanished. They had assembled on their deck for the tedious roll call before breakfast of watery oats. He answered when his turn came, already bracing himself against the slime of oats sliding down a throat that in good times savored buttery brioche, poached pears, café au lait, and perhaps two eggs.
He hadn’t slept well last night, not that he ever did, but some nights were better than others. He imagined the distress of drowning in a keg of water and finally just lay there swinging in his hammock, hopeful that Ianthe Faulke had said nothing.
The buzz started quietly, and seemed to pass from row to row: “Did you hear?” “Can it be?” “Drowned in the keg?” “You heard this from the damned Englishmen swinging aboard the fresh kegs this morning?”
Jean held his breath. Perhaps it was some other prison hulk, and not the Captivity. Alas, no. Why was there always someone who seemed to know a little more than the others? Hiding behind a taller man in the line in front of him, Jean watched Claude Pascal move from row to row, whisper a little and move on. Jean knew he was watching the origin of the dreadful story, and it sickened him.
By the time roll call ended, the story had fleshed itself into a narrative of two men held down in the kegs and nearly drowned, then nailed into the water-filled kegs. Oddly, there was another story of a woman rushing up with a small boy in some sort of uniform. A brawl followed, with the woman knocked into the water.
And then this from the man in the next row, who made no effort to hide his horror: “Someone claims there was a little boy dressed in a yellow shirt like ours who ran up with the uniformed lad.”
“Pierre Deschamps,” another prisoner whispered. “Little Pierre? The child who fled in the first water keg? What about the gunner Remillard who escaped in the other keg with him?”
Several of the prisoners clustered around Claude Pascal, since he was their self-proclaimed leader and the man who did his best to smooth over their wretchedness.
Upon later reflection, Jean knew this was the moment when he should have denounced Claude Pascal. He could have stood on a table and declared in ringing tones that this man they thought as their sympathetic friend had begun his vile career of picking them off one by one for money. Pascal was going to dictate how and when they arranged escapes, which would always be fouled - or at least enough of them to keep suspicion away from Claude’s sorry carcass – so Captain Faulke could get the credit, and Claude the money.
He said nothing. Wise of you, the cowardly side of his brain told him. It’s every prisoner for himself. Jean knew he had a better side to his character, so he waited for that side to chide the cowardly side. Nothing.
He slumped against the bulkhead, aghast at himself, acutely aware as never before that he was no better than the coward Rene Caillou, who drew himself into a ball and shuddered and shook through each day, screaming when anyone approached him. No better than the rafalés, who darted around naked, insane and disgusting.
“Mes amis, hear me,” Claude Pascal was saying. “We had better lay low for a few more weeks.”
A subdued lot now, the other prisoners looked at each other and nodded.
“We’ll never give up, because we are Frenchman and devoted to the cause of liberty, equality and fraternity,” that scum Pascal said. “We must simply be more cautious.”
Every inch the righteous leader, Pascal looked around. Jean shrank back against the bulkhead. To his horror, the leader and traitor without parallel stared at Jean Hubert. He continued his surveillance finally, as if taking his own roll call of their bravery or their cowardice. “Listen, all of you: there may be traitors in our midst. We must be very careful. If you hear of any escape plots, let me know.”
No, no, tell anyone but Claude Pascal, Jean wanted to scream. He remained silent, moving closer to a pile of oily rags, trying to conceal himself, uncertain and afraid. “I am next,” he whispered softly.
He stayed where he was, as his fellow prisoners talked among themselves, looking over their shoulders as if wondering who they could trust. “Thank God for Claude Pascal,” Jean heard. “He will get to the bottom of this.” “He will keep us safe.”
Under the oily rags now, Jean forced himself to think rationally. He had no idea if Ianthe Faulke had told her father he had been in the steward’s cubby when the two scoundrels plotted ruin for the men in the water kegs. Possibly she had said nothing. He shifted uneasily, not able to convince his mind that Ianthe could be trusted even slightly.
I have to leave somehow, he thought, and could have cried with the futility of such a statement in such a place. The only people who got off the hulks easily were the dead.
Strength in numbers, or hiding in solitude? As foul as breakfast was, his stomach overruled solitude and he joined his fellow prisoners in the line. The food went down easier than he would have predicted, until he realized that slimy oats were the least of his problem.
Instead of snatching the opportunity to paint in the few moments of sunlight allowed in through the iron grating of the porthole by his hammock, Jean stayed in the shadows, watching for Pascal. Perhaps he was already in Captain Faulke’s quarters, finding out that Jean Hubert – prisoner, painter, and eavesdropper – had overheard their earlier conversation. Perhaps they were waiting for him to knock on the door to Faulke’s quarters, sketchbook and paints in hand, to begin this morning’s lesson? It was time, after all.
What could he do? His mind a jumble, Jean took the usual precaution of taking his modest leather pouch of money from under his pillow and putting it around his neck. His hands shook as he picked up the leather satchel containing his painting supplies. One deep breath and another took him to the guard at the top of the narrow companionway leading to the deck.
The guard barely gave him a glance as he motioned Jean toward the little alcove where he had been given permission to store those clean clothes that Madame Faulke had insisted upon. Nerves practically humming, he changed clothes and climbed the last flight to the deck.
He took his usual deep breath. The air was still foul, but so much better than the air belowdecks. He stood for a moment gazing on a gray day, one of many endured in England. He noticed the usual guards, none of them interested in him because they were used to seeing him on deck. Two played cards; a third scratched himself and stared out to sea, probably wond
ering why fate had sentenced him to service on a prison hulk.
Not a religious man, Jean nevertheless crossed himself to see the pile of dead bodies underneath a tarpaulin, ready to go ashore for burial in a mass grave somewhere. They were the lucky ones, liberated from prison and surely in a better world, if one believed in God, which he didn’t. Still, he had crossed himself.
In the afternoon, a vessel would come alongside the Captivity. Practiced by now in harvesting the dead, seamen would snare hooks in the tarp grommets and swing the bodies all at once onto the cutter’s deck. They would go down the line of hulks, adding corpses to end up in a mass grave somewhere. All over France, wives, daughters and mothers would spend the rest of their lives wondering what had happened to their men. C’est la guerre.
What happened next would never have happened if Jean Hubert had given the matter careful consideration. He was not a man to rush into anything, but this was a bold idea requiring instant action and little thought.
He took another look around and strolled toward the corpses under the tarp. He quickly lowered his satchel over the railing, sank down and crawled under the tarp.
Some bodies were still loose, some in rigor, but all were cold to his inadvertent touch. The unmistakable, unforgettable odor of decay filled his nostrils and lodged in his brain. Resisting the simultaneous urge to vomit, and shriek and evacuate his bowels, Jean sidled underneath the closest corpse, a skeleton of a fellow who perhaps even last year said adieu to his family as he sailed to glory and plunder.
To his horror, the body seemed to move. Jean peered closer into the gloom of the tarp. No, the man did not live, but he was covered with lice that moved about, because this was their haven, too. He felt the little beasts crawl in his hair and ears, and wondered why he had done this impulsive thing.
He listened, alert for any sign that someone had seen him and heard nothing. What he did hear disturbed him in the extreme. Some of the bodies were giving off gas, especially the corpse under him. Even Jean’s slightest move seemed to press on some organ or other that hadn’t quite finished dying.
Alive one day, dead the next. C’est la mort. Jean closed his eyes, decided he wasn’t an atheist after all, and commended himself to God.
— Chapter Twenty-three —
Meridee hadn’t exactly pushed him from the house, but she had assured Able in forceful tones that she was fine now, and he had promised the Gunwharf Rats an afternoon’s sailing to the Isle of Wight in the Jolly Roger.
“It’s Saturday and you sail,” she reminded him.
She had sweetened the pot considerably with a kiss, and the promise that yes, tonight would be no exception to their midnight swimming lesson in the stone inlet.
What a darling she was. The second night after her near drowning, Meri had informed him after their lodgers were in bed and Ben asleep that he was to accompany her to that stone basin and continue the swimming lessons abandoned last year when she was carrying their baby.
She had sobbed into his shoulder when he led her into the basin, and not from the cold. She hung onto him like grim death until her great well of courage filled to the top and she let go, leaning back and pushing her stomach up and legs out until she floated. He could not have been prouder of her. She did require a wheedling talk to turn onto her stomach and float, but it was a short talk. She hung onto the rope they had stretched around the edge of the basin and kicked her feet. Her triumphant grin told him everything he already knew about his wife.
Tonight after he returned with his crew from their weekly seamanship sail, he would see if she could coordinate her arms and legs and actually swim. All signs indicated such an outcome. He was a good teacher, and she was a determined pupil.
Other Rats were already waiting at the wharf when he, Nick and John showed up that morning at the berth where resided Sir B’s yacht Jolly Roger. Everyone knew what to do, so they were soon in the harbor, heading toward the Isle of Wight with a spanking wind and following seas.
He watched his boys, mindful that John wasn’t much of a sailor and prone to mal de mer. He had included Smitty as a reward for escorting John and Pierre to the block factory all week, and because he knew the lad was fearless. In fact, Able plucked one idea from the constantly generating pot that was his brain and approached the boy as they sailed.
“Mister Smitty, I need your help,” he said, speaking loud because of the wind.
“Aye, sir.” Smitty did not take his eyes from current duty, which was conning the helm. He pointed. “Beg pardon, sir, but what sort of flag is that?”
Able looked where he pointed. “That’s the death flag,” he said. “That cutter you’re looking at is a death boat. The hulks collect the dead for the week and take them ashore to a mass grave.”
“Beg pardon, sir, but don’t they feed the prisoners?”
“They don’t feed them enough.” Might as well tell all. “And if you’re ever captured, they won’t feed you much either. At least, that was my experience.”
Boy regarded master. Able knew Smitty understood. He also knew that Smitty wasn’t as deferential as some of his students, making Able wonder if the boy had ever seen the inside of a workhouse. “But we’re pretty good at doing without, aren’t we, Master Six?” he said.
“None better. I have an assignment I’d like you to consider. I’ve observed your skills and you impress me.”
“Thank you, master,” Smitty replied, his face lighting up with his kind words. Able also knew how many compliments ever came to a poor child, workhouse bastard or not.
“Trinity House, and by extension, the Admiralty, has advised me to use the Gunwharf Rats to form a harbor surveillance crew,” Able said. “More of a midnight watch.”
“Beg pardon, master, but don’t the Royal Marines already do that?”
“They do, and so do the Landport Gate constables occasionally. I’ll admit to you that I did wonder about effective use of St. Brendan’s lads in such a venture, but lately, I own to some uneasiness about the hulks.”
Another thought pounded in. “Now that I consider it, we at St. Brendan’s have perhaps the best viewpoint of the hulks.” Able warmed to the idea. “Think of it strategically. We’re on a quiet, seldom-traveled street and there is just enough bend in the lay of the land to make us obscure.”
Able considered little Pierre, who had somehow showed up out of nowhere. “Think of the valuable work the block pulley factory will do when it is running. A mischief-maker could slow down the entire Royal Navy by destroying it. Or the ropeworks. And think how easy the naval stores could be set ablaze: one match to turpentine or pitch and bam! We’re vulnerable on the docks.”
“You would like us to watch the hulks exclusively, sir?”
“I would, for I do not believe anyone else is doing that. Maybe two Rats for First Watch, to be relieved by another two Rats for the Middle Watch, and two more for the Morning Watch. Six Rats each night. What do you think?”
Smitty’s expression changed from doubt to interest. Able saw the pride that someone like Master Six wanted his opinion, and next, the duty and how to organize it. Perfect. The Royal Navy needed all the Smittys St. Brendan’s could train.
“Organize it quietly. Let me know in a day or two what you have arranged.”
“Aye, sir,” Smitty said. “I can do this.”
“I know you can. It’s for the good of the fleet, and perhaps the entire Royal Navy.” Was that going too far? Able wondered. No, it wasn’t, he decided. True, these were lads of nine years to thirteen or so. He could sweeten the pot. “I do know this: the crews standing the watch will, in all likelihood, have sandwiches. The grog will be well watered down, or I will get in such trouble with Mrs. Six.”
Smitty laughed out loud, then looked around, as if wondering who had laughed.
“You can laugh,” Able said quietly, then couldn’t resist. “Ser
iously, Mrs. Six may not appear so, but she is a tough’un.”
Smitty smiled broadly at that. “You’ll have your watch, Master Six.”
The winds were fair and the sun actually shone, after the gloom of a long winter. In moments like this, Able found himself wishing that the deck underneath his feet was far out to sea, with nothing in sight except albatross and whales. At least the wind blew from land, which meant the stink of the hulks was headed away from them, as they skimmed across the water on Sir B’s wonderful yacht.
Then he thought of his students who needed him right here at St. Brendan’s, and his wife and son, who needed him even more. Or maybe he needed them more. He had not a doubt in his mind that Meri could manage a household quite well for a sailing master gone more than he was home, except that he didn’t want to sleep in any bed that didn’t have Meri in it, not even for a plum assignment at sea. And yet…and yet. The sea called to him faintly like the voices in his brain, Euclid’s chief among them, but Newton’s and Galileo’s and now and then jolly Van Leuvenhoek’s. William Harvey was usually too much of a grouch to say much.
“Master Six! Please look! Tots thinks I am crazy.”
Able snapped to attention as John Mark held up the class telescope. Tottenham, a student in the older class, was laughing and twirling his finger around his ear. A frosty glance from Able ended that, but the boy still looked amused.
“Aw, sir, John claims he saw someone slide off that cutter. And we know how seasick he gets. Maybe he’s hallucinating.”
“I saw something, I did!” John said, his voice anxious. “Please, sir, take a look.”
Able took the telescope and balanced his way carefully to the other side of the yacht. “Back the sails, Smitty,” he said as he wrapped his arm around a sheet. “Where away, John? Point.”
John Mark pointed and Able aimed the ‘scope in that direction. He relaxed his eye and closed the unnecessary one, moving the ‘scope to the death boat, where he saw a black tarp and an arm and leg angled out, stiff in rigor mortis. Lord help us, he thought. Surely they aren’t dumping the bodies in the harbor.