Home, I thought, and for the thousandth time wished I were there.
Again and again the bow of the Formidable rose as the vessel climbed a monstrous wave; I tumbled in a heap at the foot of my bunk. When the Formidable reached the crest of the wave, there was a moment of hanging, indecision, almost—and then down she plummeted into the trough between this wave and the next one as I slid to the other end of my bunk, banging my head and crunching my neck. Screams of terror echoed throughout the ship.
And mixed with those screams, I heard a cry.
A baby’s cry.
A newborn.
Just one cry, then nothing.
And as I crashed from one end of my bunk to the other, waves hammering the bows like thunder, I hoped I’d imagined it. I knew what happened to babies born aboard the Formidable.
Moments later, to my anguish, I heard the cry again. It was cut off quickly, as if a hand had been placed over its mouth. It would’ve been easier for me to cover my ears, to pretend that the cry had been lost in the storm’s rage. But I couldn’t. “Oji, did you hear that?”
“Yes.”
“We must find it before my uncle does.”
“Yes, and we must hide it. Quickly.”
The women’s hold reeked of vomit.
We were surrounded by shrieks of terror, sobbing, children crying for their fathers and mothers in their African tongues.
And because they weren’t chained like the men, many women and children were lying in the aisles. Tossed from side to side, I lurched down the passage, stumbling over and between them, my gorge rising. Oji followed, his hand gripping my upper arm with a strength of which Ikoro would have been proud.
Then Oji asked in a loud voice where the baby and its mother were. As he spoke, it seemed to me that the shrieking abated. No doubt the women were surprised to hear the voice of a male, and not just a male, but a native African. He told them to trust him, not to worry. That we were there to help them.
Someone called out to Oji—a woman’s voice, speaking in a dialect I didn’t completely understand, though I recognized a few of the words.
“This way,” Oji said to me, and he pulled me in the opposite direction, until I was completely disoriented. All the while, Oji conversed with the woman and her voice grew closer.
And then a baby was in my arms. A scrawny, bony baby.
“The mother wants to know where you are taking them.”
“Them?” Until that moment, it’d not occurred to me that I’d need to take the mother too.
But Oji voiced what I should’ve known: “A baby belongs with its mother. It will die without milk.”
The baby moved. Let out a mewling sound. I shielded it as the Formidable pitched, tossing me into the tiers and bruising my shoulder. Fresh screams pounded my ears.
“The mother says one of the girls has broken her leg. And a little boy his wrist.”
“The infirmary,” I replied, surprised at the steadiness in my voice. “No one goes in there anymore. Can you carry the girl with the broken leg, and can the boy and the mother follow?”
Again Oji spoke to the women, then said to me, “Yes. Let us go.”
It was a long way to the infirmary. Three times the baby cried and I had to clamp a hand over its mouth. Twice we lost our way. Once we bumped into a fellow whose voice I recognized as Roach’s, but he merely carried on about how we were all going to die miserably, that he didn’t know how to swim and that his father and his brother had both died at sea. After that burst of wretchedness, Roach pushed past us, leaving us alone in the corridor.
In the infirmary I settled the mother and baby as best I could considering that we were being tossed about like rag dolls. The boy refused to lie down, instead clutching the waist of my trousers with his good hand. The girl whimpered as I probed her broken leg. I spoke to her in the only African language I knew, telling her it’d be all right, that I’d take care of her. That I was a surgeon. That it’d hurt only for a moment and then all would be well. Oji interpreted for me when I faltered.
I pulled hard on her leg, feeling the bones move back into alignment, feeling her squirm. Hearing her pant as she stifled her cries.
Dear Lord, how it must hurt!
Next to me, the boy began to cry softly, his arm now about my waist, his hand clutching my shirt. And in the midst of the storm, like a dam trembling under the pressure of the water until it finally rips asunder, my heart tore open and I was flooded with compassion, not just for the girl, but for all of them. For the mother, the newborn, the boy with the broken wrist. For Oji, and for every African aboard—all of whom had names, families, villages, where loved ones watched the horizon, awaiting their return.
During the three days the storm lasted, Oji and I brought all the injured to the infirmary—men, women, and children. It was easy to do, in a manner of speaking, for there were no guards at the holds and, as surgeon, I’d a skeleton key that unlocked any shackle. Together Oji and I set and splinted broken limbs, clumsily stitched gashes, and bound wounds.
Although I was the surgeon and it was rightfully in my capacity to act as such, I’d decided not to tell anyone that I was filling the infirmary with injured Africans. I’d a dread of what would happen to slaves who broke their limbs—rather like horses, I supposed, they’d be quickly dispatched. For the slaves’ part, like the little girl, they stifled their screams, Oji having warned them to be silent.
Oji and I raided the food stores and the spirit-casks as well, all unguarded during the storm. Once, while I was loaded with an armful of yams, a wave dashed me off my feet. Horrified, I smashed into the bulwarks in a cascade of seawater and yams. Surely another wave would’ve washed me overboard, but Oji’s strong hand grasped my ankle. I clung to him, choking, fighting the waves, until we made it safely back into the storage locker. There, both of us sopping wet, Oji filled my arms with more yams.
“Oji, listen.” I spoke above the storm’s clamor. “There’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you. Why, during the rebellion, did you spare my life? Why did you protect me from harm instead of killing me? I know you broke my nose, and that hurt like the dickens, but you could’ve killed me and you didn’t.”
Oji continued to pile yams into my arms. Finally he said, “My father ordered me not to kill you.”
“Ikoro ordered you not to kill me?” I remembered Ikoro turning his back on his opportunity to kill me, instead killing Mackerel. “But why—”
“He believed you had a powerful god, a powerful chi, and that you would do great things in your life because of your chi.”
“Then—then you only spared my life because your father said so?”
“On that day, I wanted you to die. I thirsted for your blood. And in my homeland we keep the heads of our enemies as trophies. I wanted your blood and your head.”
I was shocked into silence.
He continued. “But my father insisted. We were to kill all the white men except you.”
A lump grew in my throat, and my eyes burned. “Then why are you standing here talking to me if you hate me so much, Oji?” My voice sounded as hurt as I felt. “Why do you share my quarters, and why did you give me water when I was thirsty? And why did you just now save me from being washed overboard? You should’ve just let me go.”
Water swirled about my ankles, cold and biting. My teeth began to chatter. The door to the storage locker slammed shut, then opened, then slammed shut again with the rocking of the ship.
“Are you really so blind?” said Oji, his voice as calm as if he were talking of yam soup. “Does a man beg for the life of another if he has hatred in his heart? When you begged for my father’s life, I knew then that you were not like the others.”
“That’s not saying much. They’re murderers, the lot of them. And if they’re not murderers, it’s only because they’ve not had the chance yet.” The door flew open again, and the wind roared through the shelter. I braced my legs against one of the shelves, still hurt that Oji had admitted to hating me for so long.
I staggered under the weight of so many yams. “Well, my chi is getting tired and hungry, and I can’t carry another yam. Please, let’s go.” But as I turned, Oji caught my arm.
“Do not be angry. I no longer hate you.”
“Well, that’s some comfort,” I said, and though I’d meant it sarcastically, I realized that this was indeed a comfort. That what Oji thought of me was actually quite important.
The six executed slaves gathered round my berth and watched me, looking inside my dream. And in my dream, as in all my dreams, I could see.
The Formidable, her sails as tattered as a battle flag, her hull thickened with barnacles, had arrived on the coast and dropped anchor. The air smelled of jungle—rich, damp, alive. Thousands stood along the shore, waiting. Boatloads of slaves from the Formidable were rowing ashore. As each boat scraped the sand, the occupants sprang out and into the crowd, leaving their chains behind.
They flung themselves into the arms of those who’d been waiting. There were exclamations of joy, tears, laughter. Fathers were reunited with sons. Daughters with mothers. Brothers with sisters.
Oji cradling the baby.
And me, standing at the helm alongside the Gallaghers, smiling.
Then, like a strike of lightning on a sunny day, cruel and unexpected, my uncle cried, “Fire!” and the cannon blasted. The crowd disintegrated like matchsticks.
I screamed—a real scream, shrill and loud. I sat up in my berth, my blood roaring with the pounding of my heart.
“Philip?” It was Oji.
He killed them! He killed them all!
Then Oji was beside me. “Philip? Are you ill?”
I was trembling, panting, my mind’s eye still seeing the bodies—of men, women, children. Everyone dead.
Oji pressed his hand against my forehead. “Philip, if you die, we all die.”
My corn-husk mattress crunched as I sank back. Water slapped gently against the hull. Timbers creaked. And in the women’s hold, someone was singing:
“My apple tree grow, Nda-a,
“Grow, grow, grow, Nda-a,
“Grow for the fatherless, Nda-a,
“Grow for the motherless, Nda-a …”
I said, “The storm has stopped.”
“Yes. We have life.”
And as I lay there listening to the woman sing, my breathing still ragged, I remembered what Oji had said. “What did you mean when you said that if I die, everyone dies?”
For the longest time, he didn’t answer. He didn’t move, nor could I hear him breathe. If I’d not known he was there, I’d have thought I was alone. Finally he whispered, “When you asked me why my father and I spared your life, I did not tell you everything.”
I said nothing, waiting for Oji to continue.
“He had a vision that you would be the one to lead us back to Africa. He said that because of your knowledge of how the great hut sails on the water, you would use this knowledge to help us.”
I was stunned.
Lead them back to Africa? Me?
If he’d told me this even a short time ago, I’d have laughed. But now I thought of the six slaves who always visited my sleep; of my increasing shame; of my dream of families reuniting while the scent of jungle lingered in the night.… “Oji, this vision of your father’s … I’m just a boy, and a blind boy at that.”
“The gods do not lie.”
“But—but I don’t believe in your gods.”
“But you believe in yours.”
I said nothing.
“And your chi, your god, is powerful.”
The song from the women’s hold faded into a silence filled only with the sounds of the ship. “She was singing a song of my childhood,” whispered Oji. “Philip, I will return to Africa again. I will be free. We will all be free. It is our right.”
In the dark I groped for his hand and clasped it. It was warm and dry. “Yes, it is your right. Your right as human beings.” My voice tightened. “And I pray that someday you will all return to your homeland.”
I was surprised by the ferocity with which Oji now clutched my hand. “Take us there, Philip.”
“But—but I don’t know how.”
“The gods will show the way. Your chi will lead you. Take us there. Please, I beg you. Bik. In the name of every African aboard.”
I swallowed, my throat dry as parched earth, my heart hammering as if I stood at a great precipice and had been asked to leap off. But something larger than me was at work. As if my whole life had led me to this moment, to hold the hand of Oji, to prompt me to say, with all sincerity, “If I weren’t blind, and if it were in my power, I’d take you there. All of you.”
Then an odd thing happened. As soon as I had uttered them, my words went beyond me, no longer belonging to me alone. They echoed through my cabin, piercing timbers, whispering through the deepest shadows and holds of the Formidable, penetrating my being, written upon my heart with the finger of every black man, woman, and child aboard.
And in that moment it was as if Oji and I were no longer alone—as if six male slaves stood in the cabin with us, filling the space with their presence.
Goose bumps danced up my arms like wind rippling across the water’s surface. I bowed my head, thinking, Is it really possible? Can such a thing be done?
I don’t know how much time elapsed before I awoke again—two hours? three?—but I sat up straight, the ship still gripped in the silence that followed the storm.
Something was different.
I crawled out of my bunk and felt for Oji’s to determine if he was still there.
He wasn’t.
That’s when I noticed something that caused my heart to skip like a rock tossed across the surface of a pond.
In the direction of the porthole, I saw a hazy light. I blinked. Thinking it’d disappear. That it was another dream. A cruel dream. But no, it was there. A light. Grayish, like the pre-light of dawn.
My heart began to thump wildly, a bird trapped in my chest. As if Uncle had just screamed “Fire!”
I hauled on my trousers and hastened into the passageway, up the dim outline of the companionway, and out onto the deck. I gasped. About me I saw rigging hanging like vines in a jungle, sails torn and shredded, yards askew, everything damp and puddled.
And there, in the east, hues of purple light brushed the predawn sky.
I basked in the sights all morning and afternoon.
The sun. The freckles on the backs of my hands. The infant suckling at the breast of his young mother. The towering masts. Oji. A beetle crawling across the deck. All of it amazed me, as if I were seeing everything for the first time.
Yet when in the late afternoon I joined the crew as we gathered about Uncle on the quarterdeck, I was equally appalled by the desperation and ugliness that now surrounded me.
Uncle’s left eyeball was rotting out of his head.
His clothes hung slack on his frame. His cheeks were sunken, his whiskers unkempt; his usual healthy complexion had been replaced by a gray pallor. “We collected several casks of rainwater before the storm became too violent,” he was saying. “If we ration them carefully, our supply will last another few weeks. After that, well …” His voice trailed away.
The sky was clear, the air stiflingly hot. Steam curled up from the deck. The crew was a filthy and haggard lot, their clothing sweat-stained and damp. Their eyeballs covered with a cloudy film, they stared blindly at nothing. Billy the Vermin plucked something from inside his nose and ate it.
Uncle continued. “Men, we’ve been dealt a harsh blow, I judge. But God wouldn’t have preserved us had he not intended for us to accomplish the task entrusted to us from the beginning. We’ve been divinely commissioned.” His voice rose, as if h
e were delivering a fiery sermon. “And just as Paul the Apostle obeyed the laws of the Lord by returning the runaway slave Onesimus to his master, we too must obey. And for our deliverance and continued safety, I give praise to the Almighty, who governs the heavens and the seas. Could I see to read a prayer of thanksgiving, I’d do so.”
“Amen,” murmured several of the men.
I looked away, sickened. My uncle’s capacity to twist words—to procure the blessing of everyone, even God Almighty, for his purely evil purposes—amazed me.
How wrong you are, Uncle.
“But what can we do?” asked the gunner. “Our sails have been torn to shreds and we’re sailing as blind as we ever were.”
“Again we must trust to Providence to deliver us,” replied Uncle. “You’re born sailors. Nimble as cats in trees, you are. And while the wind is mild and the weather friendly, we’ll bend new sails to the yards.”
“Blind?” someone asked incredulously. “You expect us to climb up there blind? Even cats can see!”
“Trust God to preserve you. Mr. McGuire will oversee.”
Now was my time. My moment of performance, a performance that Oji and I had planned carefully. “Uncle!” I cried.
He peered sightlessly in my direction. “Philip? Is that you?”
“Aye, Uncle. I believe that—” I gasped, and paused for effect. “Yes, yes indeed, it’s true! I believe I’m recovering my sight!”
Everyone gasped.
Surprise splashed across my uncle’s face, as if he’d been dashed with a bucket of water.
I continued my charade. “Just now I saw a glimmer of light, and even as I speak it grows stronger. Yes, I’m certain of it now. The light grows stronger and clearer!”
“Is it—is it true?” Uncle pushed through the crowd, arms groping, until I reached out and took hold of his sleeve, pulling him in front of me.
“See, Uncle? I saw you coming toward me. I can see. I can see! You’re wearing a white shirt with gray trousers, and you’ve forgotten your hat.”
Uncle’s face crumpled. He sobbed and embraced me. I endured the damp smelliness of his embrace, surprised to realize that a part of me still loved my uncle. Finally he pulled away, holding me by the shoulders as if to inspect me with his sightless, rotting eyes. “You’ll guide us,” he pronounced, his voice clogged with emotion. “Praise God that I took care of you for all those years so you could succor me in my hour of greatest need. Praise God that I’d the foresight to teach you navigation. You’ll guide us home. You’ll sing out the compass readings. I’ll tell you how we must trim the sails, and you’ll guide us through the rigging. You’ll restore the well-being of the ship and of the stock.”
Voyage of Midnight Page 14