Rapscallion

by James McGee

  Lasseur gave a sigh. "Kings and generals have much to answer for."

  "Presidents and emperors, too," Hawkwood said.

  Lasseur chuckled.

  The boy moved to the port and stared through the grille.

  Hawkwood did the same. Over the boy's shoulder he could see ships floating at anchor and beyond them the flat, featureless shoreline and, further off, some anonymous buildings with blue-grey rooftops. He heard the steady tread of boot heel on metal. He'd forgotten the walkway. It was just outside the scuttles. He waited until the guard's shadow had passed then gripped the grille and tried to shake it. There was no movement. The crossbars were two inches thick and rock solid.

  "Well, I doubt we'll be able to cut our way out," Lasseur said, running an exploratory hand over the metal.

  "Planning on making a run for it?" Hawkwood asked.

  "Why do you think I would never ask for parole?" Lasseur said. "You wouldn't want me to break my word, would you?" The Frenchman grinned and, for a moment, there was a flash of the man who had arrived in the gaol cell at Maidstone looking for a means to light his cheroot. He regarded Hawkwood speculatively.

  "I'm still considering my options," Hawkwood said.

  Lasseur chuckled.

  The irony was that Lasseur wouldn't have been entitled to parole anyway, even if he hadn't already proved he was a potential escape risk by virtue of his earlier breaks for freedom.

  There were stringent rules governing the granting of parole, which entitled an officer to live outside the prison to which he'd been assigned. It meant securing accommodation in a designated parole town, sometimes taking a room with a local family or, if possessed of sufficient funds, within a lodging house or inn. In return, the officer gave his word he would not break his curfew but would remain within the town limits and make no attempt to escape. The penalty for transgressing, if apprehended, was a swift return to a prison cell.

  The rules were stricter for men like Lasseur. A privateer officer's eligibility for parole status depended upon the size of the vessel in which he'd been taken. If the ship was less than 80 tons and mounting less than fourteen carriage guns of at least four-pound calibre, he would not be accorded parole status. Lasseur's command, at 125 tons and mounted with six-pound cannon, qualified, but unfortunately for the privateer he had not been captured on his own vessel.

  Lasseur's ship, Scorpion, was a ten-gun schooner and his eyes lit up whenever he spoke of her.

  "She may not be the biggest vessel afloat, but she's as fast as the wind and her sting is deadly, and she's all mine." Lasseur had given a rueful mile. "And if I'd had her beneath my feet, we'd not be having this conversation."

  Scorpion had been laid up in Dunkerque for repairs following a difference of opinion with a British fifth-rate on blockade patrol. On that occasion Scorpion had not been fast enough to avoid the British gun crew's aim, but with the aid of a convenient fog bank she had managed to give her pursuer the slip and make a successful run for home. While awaiting repairs, Lasseur had been talked into delivering dispatches between ports along the North French coast. His transport had been a two-masted caique or - as Lasseur had described it - a floating piece of excrement, and no match for the British sloop that had appeared out of nowhere and which, with a twelve-pounder carronade, had blown the caique's main mast and rudder into matchwood and taken her crew and temporary captain captive. Lasseur had told Hawkwood that he didn't know which would prove the most embarrassing experience, his capture or the ribbing he'd receive when he was reunited with Scorpion's crew: "They will make my life intolerable."

  When Hawkwood hinted that any reunion was liable to be some way off, Lasseur had fixed him with a steadfast gaze. "They know I'm a prisoner. When I escape, I will send word and they will come for me."

  Recalling Lasseur's words and watching him test the strength of the bars, it was hard not to admire the man's faith, though Hawkwood still couldn't help but feel that the privateer captain was being a tad over-optimistic. He wondered whether Lasseur, confronted with the reality of his incarceration, was secretly harbouring the same thought. If he was, the man gave no sign.

  Hawkwood's musings were interrupted by a sudden warning shout, followed immediately by the clatter of boots on the stairs. The prisoners seated around the gun ports scrambled to put away their paper and pens. Standing up, they moved towards the centre of the hull. Not knowing why, Hawkwood, Lasseur and the boy followed suit and watched as a dozen guards wielding lanterns and iron bars, led by a bovine corporal, thrust their way on to the deck.

  CHAPTER 4

  "Here they come," a man next to Hawkwood muttered. "Sons of bitches!"

  "What's happening?" Hawkwood asked.

  The prisoner turned. His uniform hung off his bony frame. His hair was grey. A neat beard concealed his jaw. The state of his attire and the colour of his hair suggested he was not a young man, yet there was a brightness in his eyes that seemed out of kilter with the rest of his drawn appearance. He could have been any age from forty to seventy. He was clutching several books and sheets of paper.

  "Inspection." The prisoner looked Hawkwood up and down. "Just arrived?"

  Hawkwood nodded.

  "Thought so. I could tell by your clothes. The name's Fouchet." The prisoner juggled with his books and held out a hand. "Sebastien Fouchet."

  "Hooper," Hawkwood said. He wondered how much pressure to apply to the handshake, but then found he was surprised by the strength in the returned grip.

  Fouchet nodded sagely. "Ah, yes, the American. I heard we had one on board. You speak French very well, Captain."

  Jesus, Hawkwood thought. He didn't recall seeing Fouchet in the vicinity of the weather-deck when his name had been registered. Word had got round fast.

  "How often does this happen?" Hawkwood asked.

  "Every day. Six o'clock in the summer, three o'clock in the winter."

  The guards proceeded to spread about the deck. There was no provision made for anyone seated on the floor, nor for the items upon which they might have been working. Hawkwood watched as boot heels crunched down on to ungathered chess pieces, toys and model ships. Ignoring the protestations of those prisoners who were still trying to retrieve their belongings, the guards proceeded to tap the bulkheads and floor with the iron clubs. When they got to the gun ports they paid close attention to the grilles. The deck resounded to the sound of metal striking metal. Hawkwood wondered how much of the guards' loutish behaviour was for effect rather than a comprehensive search for damage or evidence of an escape attempt. Not that the strategy was particularly innovative. It was a tried-and- tested means of imposing authority and cowing an opponent into submission.

  Satisfied no obvious breaches had been made in the hulk's defences, the guards retraced their steps. Peace returned to the gun deck and conversation resumed.

  "Bastards," Fouchet swore softly. He nodded towards Lasseur and then squinted at the boy. "And who do we have here?"

  Hawkwood made the introductions.

  "There are other boys on board," Fouchet said. "You should meet them. We've created quite an academy for ourselves below decks. We cover a wide range of subjects. I give lessons in geography and geometry." Fouchet indicated the books he was holding. "If you'd like to attend my classes I will introduce you. It is not good for a child to while away his day in idle pursuits. Young minds should be cultivated at every opportunity. What do you say?" Fouchet gave the boy no chance to reply but continued: "Excellent, then it's agreed. Lessons will commence tomorrow morning, at nine o'clock sharp, by the third gun port on the starboard side. Adults are welcome to attend too. For them the charge is a sou a lesson." He pointed down the hull and turned to go.

  Lasseur placed a restraining hand on the teacher's arm. "Did you see what happened to the men in the boat?"

  The teacher frowned. "Which boat?"

  "The one before ours; the one left to drift. The men were too weak to board."

  "Ah, yes." The teacher's face softened. "I hear th
ey were taken on board the Sussex."

  "Sussex?"

  "The hospital ship. She's the one at the head of the line." Fouchet pointed in the direction of the bow.

  Lasseur let go of the teacher's arm. "Thank you, my friend."

  "My pleasure. There'll be another inspection in an hour, by the way, to count heads, so it wouldn't do to get too comfortable. I'll look out for you at supper. I can show you the ropes. In return, you can tell me the news from outside. It will help deflect our minds from the quality of the repast. What's today, Friday? That means cod. I warn you it will be inedible. Not that it makes any difference what day it is; the food's always inedible." The teacher smiled and gave a short, almost formal bow. "Gentlemen."

  Hawkwood and Lasseur watched Fouchet depart. His gait was slow and awkward, and there was a pronounced stiffness in his right leg.

  "Cod," Lasseur repeated miserably, closing his eyes. "Mother of Christ!"

  The next contingent of guards did not use iron bars. Instead, they used muskets and fixed bayonets to corral the prisoners on to the upper deck. From there they were made to return to the lower deck and counted on their way down. The lieutenant who had overseen the registration was in charge. His name, Hawkwood discovered, was Thynne.

  The count was a protracted affair. By the time it was completed to the lieutenant's satisfaction, shadows were lengthening and spreading across the deck like a black tide. In the dim light, the prisoners made their way to the forecastle to queue for their supper rations.

  The food was as unappetizing as Fouchet had predicted.

  The prisoners were divided into messes, six prisoners to a mess. Their rations were distributed from the wooden, smoke-stained shack on the forecastle. Sentries stood guard as a representative from each mess collected bread, uncooked potatoes and fish from an orderly in the shack. The food was then taken to cauldrons to be boiled by those prisoners who'd been nominated for kitchen duty. Each mess then received its allocation. Fouchet was the representative for Hawkwood's mess.

  Lasseur stared down at the contents of his mess tin. "Even Frenchmen can't make anything of this swill." He nudged a lump of potato with his wooden spoon. "I shall die of starvation."

  "I doubt you'll die alone," Hawkwood said.

  "It could be worse," Fouchet said morosely. "It could be a Wednesday."

  "What happens on Wednesdays?" Lasseur asked, hesitantly and instantly suspicious.

  "Tell him, Millet." Fouchet nudged the man seated next to him, a sad-eyed, sunken-chested seaman whose liver-spotted forearms were adorned with tattooed sea serpents.

  The seaman scooped up a portion of cod and eyed the morsel with suspicion. "We get salted herring." Millet shovelled the piece of fish into his mouth and chewed noisily. He didn't have many teeth left, Hawkwood saw. The few that remained were little more than grey stumps. Hawkwood suspected he was looking at a man suffering from advancing scurvy. Hardly surprising, given the diet the men were describing.

  Lasseur regarded the man with horror.

  "We usually sell them back to the contractor." The speaker was seated next to Millet at the end of the table. He was a cadaverous individual with deep-set brown eyes, a hooked nose, and a lot of pale flesh showing through the holes in his prison clothes. "He gives us two sous. The following week, he returns the herring to us so that we can sell them back to him again. Most of us use the money to buy extra rations like cheese or butter. It helps take the taste of the bread away."

  Lasseur picked up a piece of dry crust. "Call this bread?

  This stuff would make good round shot. If we'd had this at Trafalgar, things would have been different."

  "What do you think the British were using?" Fouchet said. He lifted his piece of bread and rapped it on the table top. It sounded like someone striking a block of wood with a hammer. He winked at the boy, who up to that moment had been trying, without success, to carve a potato with the edge of his spoon. "Give it here," Fouchet said, and solved the problem by mashing the offending vegetable under his own utensil. He handed the bowl back and the boy smiled nervously and resumed eating. He was the only one at the table not to have passed comment on the food.

  "Do they ever give us meat?" Hawkwood asked.

  "Every day except Wednesdays and Fridays," Millet said, with a marked lack of enthusiasm. "Don't ask what sort of meat it is, though. The contractors keep telling us it's beef, but who knows? Could be anything from pork to porcupine."

  Fouchet shook his head. "It's not porcupine. Had that once; it was quite tasty."

  Lasseur chuckled. "How long have you been here, my friend?"

  Fouchet wrinkled his brow. "What year is it?"

  Lasseur's jaw fell open.

  "I'm joking," Fouchet said. He stroked his beard and added, "Three years here. Before this I was on the Suffolk off Portsmouth." He jabbed a finger at the tall, hook-nosed prisoner. "Charbonneau's been held the longest. How long has it been, Philippe?"

  Charbonneau pursed his lips. "Seven years come September."

  Seven years, Hawkwood thought. The table fell quiet as the men considered the length of Charbonneau's internment and all that it implied.

  "Anyone ever get away?" Hawkwood asked nonchalantly. He exchanged a glance with Lasseur as he said it.

  "Escape?" Fouchet appeared to ponder the question, as if no one had asked it before. Finally, he shrugged. "A few. Most don't get very far. They're brought back and punished."

  "Punished how?" Hawkwood pressed.

  "They get put in the hole," Millet said, removing a fish bone from between his teeth and flicking it over his shoulder.

  Hawkwood scraped his lump of cod to the side of his mess tin. "Hole?"

  "The black hole." Millet's tone implied that he could only have meant the one hole and Hawkwood should have known that.

  Fouchet laid down his spoon. "It's a special punishment cell; makes the gun deck look like the gardens at Versailles."

  Across the table, Lasseur considered the description. He stared hard at Fouchet and said, "What about the ones who got away, how did they do it?"

  Fouchet shrugged. "You'd have to find them and ask them."

  "You don't know?" Lasseur said.

  "Sometimes it pays not to ask too many questions."

  "You've never considered it?"

  The teacher shook his head. "It's a young man's game. I don't have the energy. Besides, the war won't last for ever."

  "The Lord loves an optimist," Charbonneau muttered, scratching the inside of his groin energetically.

  Lasseur pushed his tin to one side. "I have to ask, Sebastien: how, in the name of the blessed Virgin, did someone like you end up in a place like this?"

  Fouchet smiled, almost sadly. "Ah, if you only knew how many times I've asked myself that very same question."

  "You going to eat that?" Millet sniffed, indicating the remains of Lasseur's fish.

  Lasseur gave him a look as if to say,What do you think? He then watched, fascinated, as the seaman reached over and, with grubby fingers, helped himself from the tin.

  "I committed an indiscretion," Fouchet said. "I was a professor of mathematics at the university in Toulouse and I had a liaison with the wife of one of my colleagues. He did not take kindly to the title of cuckold and insisted on calling me out. Unfortunately for him, I proved the better shot. His friends took it rather personally. They had influence, I did not. I lost my position, along with what little that remained of my reputation. When I applied for alternative teaching posts, I found doors were shut in my face. I sought solace in the grape; a panacea not exactly conducive to the furtherance of one's career. That would have been the end of it, had it not been for a miracle."

  "What happened?"

  A rueful smile split Fouchet's creased face. "I was conscripted."

  The grins began to circulate around the table until Millet, who started to laugh, forgot he was still trying to digest Lasseur's discarded cod. He was turning red when Charbonneau slapped a palm between his shoulder blade
s, bringing him back to the vertical and the rest of the table to their senses and reality.

  Hawkwood guessed Fouchet's situation wasn't unique. The latter's reference to the hulk's self-founded academy and the standard of workmanship he'd observed looking over prisoners' shoulders as he'd traversed the gun deck was proof of that. It was one of the notable differences between the British and French forces. Whereas Britain swelled the ranks with volunteers - which in many cases meant felons and homeless men looking for a roof and a meal - Bonaparte's troops contained a large portion of conscripted men from all walks of life. In all likelihood, there were probably as many skilled craftsmen and teachers among the mass of prisoners on board Rapacious as there were in any of the small towns lining the shores of the surrounding estuary.

  "I see you favour your right leg," Lasseur said. "You were wounded?"

  Fouchet smiled. "Musket ball; just below my knee." He tapped the joint. "It's the devil in cold weather; doesn't work too well in the damp either."

  The teacher turned to Hawkwood. "So, Captain Hooper; what's your story? How did you come to be captured?"

  "There were more of them than there was of me," Hawkwood said.

  Fouchet smiled. "I believe I overheard Murat say it was at Ciudad Rodrigo?"

  Hawkwood nodded.

  "That's a long way from home. What was an American doing there?"

  The question Hawkwood had been expecting and of which he was most wary.

  "Shooting British soldiers; officers mostly."

  "Why?"

  "Your Emperor was paying me."

  Fouchet smiled. "I meant why you}'"

  "I'm a sharpshooter: First Regiment of United States Riflemen. I thought you might need my help."

  "Cheeky bastard," Charbonneau said. "What makes you think France needs your help?"

  Millet rolled his eyes. "Look around, idiot."

  Construct a biography based on your own expertise, James Read had told him. An officer from the Regiment of Riflemen had been the obvious choice. The American equivalent of Hawkwood's former regiment, the Rifle Corps, used the same methods as its British counterpart, combining the tactics of the Light Infantry and, in the case of the Americans, native Indians, to harass and disrupt enemy movements. The first into the field and the last to leave.