by James McGee
Hearing Lasseur grunt, Hawkwood looked up to see a familiar figure limping towards them, carrying two knapsacks held high.
"I received permission to bring you these. Thought you might need them," Fouchet said. "And we can't have you going hungry." Handing over the knapsacks, the teacher fumbled in his pockets.
"Please tell me it's not pork again," Lasseur pleaded.
"Breakfast - the usual. Don't eat it all at once."
Hawkwood looked down at the hunk of dry bread Fouchet was pushing into his hand. It would keep the hunger pangs at bay for a short while.
"You'd have made someone a lovely wife, Sebastien," Lasseur said.
Fouchet chuckled. "Someone's got to look out for you." The smile slipped suddenly. "Remember what I said; you might want to save that for later."
Lasseur stiffened, the bread paused halfway to his lips.
"You've heard when they're shipping us out?" Hawkwood reached into his sack and extracted his one spare shirt. It wasn't much cleaner than the one the surgeon had cut off him. He put it on, taking care not to dislodge the dressings covering his wounds.
The teacher turned to look towards the aft compartment where, through the open hatchway, the orderlies could be seen sewing the bodies of the hanged men into sailcloth burial sacks and where Millet and the others, under the bored eyes of the two militia guards, were awaiting instructions.
As Lasseur and Hawkwood followed the teacher's gaze, two more men appeared at the bottom of the stairs. One wore a militia uniform; the other caused Lasseur's face to cloud over. It was the interpreter, Murat.
The guard nodded towards the orderlies. "Tell the buggers the burial boat's 'ere and that Lieutenant Hellard wants the bodies off the ship in double-quick time. This bleedin' tar bucket stinks bad enough as it is." With a grimace at the smell in the sick berth, and after throwing a look of sympathy at his two colleagues, the guard retreated back up the stairs.
Murat relayed the information in French to the orderlies and the waiting men. "You can start taking them out."
Hawkwood, Lasseur and Fouchet watched as the first body- bag was picked up by the head and feet and carried out towards the stairs. It was a laborious business. The men carrying it were nearly bent double, both by a combination of the corpse's dead weight and the space in which they had to manoeuvre, which included the restricting height of the deckhead. There was no sense of reverence. The team's curses were as vociferous as they had been when the bodies of the hanged men had been brought down for wrapping.
As the first of the dead began their journey up the stairs under the supervision of Murat and the surgeon, inside the compartment the orderlies continued sealing up the rest of the sailcloth burial sacks.
Watching the procedure, Hawkwood wondered how many times the surgeon had carried out this particular duty.
It was as the seventh or eighth bundle was being hefted up the stairway that the calamity occurred. There was a clattering sound and a cry of woe, followed by a loud thump and barrage of invective as the man supporting the corpse's head and shoulders lost his footing and his grip. As man and cadaver slid down the stairs, careering into the pair coming up behind, a second sack slid from its handlers' clutches. Within seconds the stairs were a tangle of tumbling bodies, both alive and dead.
Alerted by the commotion, the two sick-berth guards turned quickly. With insults and accusations flying around their ears as to which imbecile had lost his footing, the militia men waded in to restore order.
The moment the guards' attention was distracted, Fouchet grabbed Lasseur's sleeve. "Come with me now," he hissed urgently. Leave your knapsacks." Reaching out, the teacher extinguished the lantern strung from the nearby deckhead.
Instinctively, Hawkwood looked towards the rumpus. Another lantern blinked out, but there was just enough light remaining for him to see two men - prisoners - hurrying towards them through the cots; Millet and Charbonneau. Each of them had a body slung over his shoulder.
Hawkwood rose to his feet. "Do it," he snapped, quickly seizing his jacket.
Lasseur looked beyond Hawkwood, to where a third man was standing by the aft compartment hatchway. Murat, beckoning furiously.
The guards' backs were still turned.
Lasseur sprang to his feet. Keeping his head low, he dodged under the beams and, half stumbling in his haste, followed Hawkwood and Fouchet towards the aft compartment.
Hawkwood knew, as sure as night followed day, the guards were going to turn round. He was still thinking that as he ducked through the hatchway and realized to his astonishment that he'd made it. Twisting, he saw that Millet and Charbonneau were placing the bodies in the vacated cots and covering them with the sheets. Then Murat was pushing him towards two half- sewn, blood-splattered sailcloth cocoons laid out side by side on the deck.
Murat pointed to the sheets. "Get inside. Cross your wrists over your stomachs. Try to remain still. Quickly!"
Hurriedly, Hawkwood and Lasseur did as they were told. As soon as their feet were at the foot of the sacks, the orderlies pulled the two lapels of the cloth around them, tight enough to prevent displacement of their bodies, yet just loose enough to still allow movement in their limbs.
At a nod from Murat, the orderlies took up their needles.
"Wait! Out of the way!" Thrusting Murat and the orderlies aside, the surgeon bent down next to Hawkwood, a wooden bowl in his hands. "Close your mouth."
"Hurry!" Fouchet hissed from the hatchway. "We haven't much time."
Hawkwood clamped his jaws shut. His eyes widened as the surgeon lifted a blood-soaked rag from the bowl and hastily squeezed it out over his lips, chin and jowls. The surgeon repeated the process with Lasseur.
"It won't fool a close examination, but it's the best I can do under the circumstances." The surgeon started as two shadows appeared in the hatchway behind Fouchet. Relief flooded across his face when he saw it was Millet and Charbonneau.
"It's done," Millet said.
Murat glanced through the hatch. "All right, the excitement's over. Get ready to start passing out the rest of the bodies." He nodded towards the two orderlies. "Sew them up." He paused. "And don't forget to piss on them."
He looked down at Hawkwood and Lasseur, at the horror on their faces. "Would you want to look inside something that was bloodstained and reeking of piss? No, me neither. And remember, you're supposed to be dead men. Not a sound. It will seem like a lifetime and the smell will be terrible. Try to keep your breathing steady. I'm sorry we had no time to warn you earlier. We received word that your passage has been agreed. We thought we had another day, but I overheard the commander and Lieutenant Thynne talking. You're due to be transferred to the Sampson tomorrow. This was our only chance to get you off the ship. We've managed to signal to our contact ashore. No matter what happens, remain calm. Millet and Charbonneau are part of the burial party. Trust them. They both know what to do. God speed."
"Hellard will know you helped us," Hawkwood said.
Fouchet shrugged. "What can he do to us that's any worse than what we have to endure now?"
"I hope you get a good price for our sleeping spaces," Lasseur said.
"Sold them already." Murat grinned. He snapped his fingers at the orderlies. "Come on! We need to get them out of here."
"They could put you in the hole," Hawkwood said.
Fouchet smiled. "They'll have to move Juvert out first. Though I could do with some peace and quiet."
"Be careful what you wish for," Hawkwood said. He looked up at Murat. "Is this how the others got out?"
Murat's face darkened. "No."
Despite the heat, Hawkwood felt a chill. "Matisse?"
Murat nodded unhappily.
"How many?"
"Two, according to Sarazin. One through the heads, the other -"
Christ! Hawkwood thought.
"We managed to get two off," Fouchet said.
"How?"
Fouchet glanced at Murat, who somehow managed a weak smile as he said, "You
expect us to reveal all our little secrets, do you, Captain?"
"Give them our regards, if you see them," Fouchet said. "Lieutenant Masson and Captain Bonnefoux."
"I'll do that," Hawkwood said.
Lasseur looked up at Murat. "I might have misjudged you, Lieutenant. I'm sorry."
"You're not free yet, Captain."
Lasseur glared at the orderly who was sealing him in. "Put that stitch through my nose and I'll have your guts. And your piss had better smell of roses."
The orderly said nothing, but as he secured the final suture in the cloth, his hands shook. Lasseur's blood-smeared features disappeared from view.
Hawkwood's last sight was of Fouchet staring down at him. The teacher's mouth formed the whisper, " Vive la France/"
Not the words I want to hear going to my grave, Hawkwood thought as the needle punctured the cloth over his face for the last time.
Murat had been right. The smell inside the sack was truly appalling. The tang of urine filled his nostrils while the coppery taste of blood lingered unpleasantly at the back of his throat. He wondered what other body fluids the cloth had been subjected to. It was probably best not to think about that.
He assumed Lasseur was suffering the same discomfort. A perverse part of him hoped so.
Suddenly, the hands under his shoulders shifted their grip and then his legs dropped. They were ascending the stairway. At least they were bearing him up head first, he thought.
It was a strange sensation, being carried and sightless at the same time. It was too dark below deck for him to make out anything through the cloth, other than subtle changes in the density of shadows, but his other senses had already started to compensate. Every footfall, every groan of timber, every thump, every vocal emission, from a shout to a whisper, began to take on a new resonance. When he'd climbed into the burial sack, his first instinct had been to let his body relax so as to mimic dead weight. Now, with his senses heightened, there was not a muscle, tendon, nerve or sinew in his entire body that wasn't drawn as tight as a bowstring. The fear of discovery had become all-consuming. So when he heard Charbonneau murmur throatily, "We're coming on deck," he felt the sweat burst from his palms.
The transformation from gloom to daylight was instantly noticeable. Hawkwood still couldn't discern anything specific through the cloth, but the mere fact that there was light beyond the confines of the material made the inside of the sack seem marginally less claustrophobic.
His mind shifted back to the day he and Lasseur had been witness to the burial barge's previous voyage. On that occasion there had been seven corpses requiring passage. This time there was more than double that number. Pray to God, Hawkwood thought, they wouldn't have to make two trips.
"Belay there!" The shout came from somewhere close.
The men carrying Hawkwood froze. Hawkwood felt sure they would be able to hear his heart thudding like a drum against his chest.
The same voice came again. "All right, shift your arses, then! Toss the bloody thing! Lively, now! He ain't goin' to feel anythin'. He's bleedin' dead already!"
The order was greeted by a cascade of laughter.
They moved off. Hawkwood exhaled and heard Charbonneau swear under his breath. He tried to recall how many corpses had been removed from the sick berth before him. He had a vision of being placed into the net and smothered by the pile of bodies being tossed in after him, and fought to quell the rising tide of panic.
And then he was being lowered. He felt the strands of the net through the cloth and the pressure of another burial sack against his flank. He allowed himself to take several slow and cautious breaths. The blood the surgeon had daubed around his jaw had dried and he ran his tongue along his lips to moisten them. He wondered if it was his imagination or if it really was piss he could taste.
The sounds of the hulk enveloped him on all sides: the clatter of wheels in their blocks, the flap of lines against the yards, voices conversing - in a variety of accents, both muted and strident - gulls protesting from the mastheads, the tramp of boots across the decking.
He wondered if the body next to him was Lasseur. Pulse pounding, despite his attempt to breathe evenly, he waited for the cry of alarm that would indicate their disappearance from the sick berth had been discovered. How long would the surgeon and Murat and the orderlies be able to conceal their absence? Was this how prisoners before them had made their escape?
Another shout rang out and the sack next to him moved.
Hawkwood felt his breath catch.
Was it Lasseur easing a cramp, or a suspicious guard making an inspection? Then something rolled against his other thigh. He heard the rattle of a winch and realized the net was being hauled into the air. The movement had been caused by gravity settling the bodies. He had a flash of memory, mackerel in a basket, heads and tails jumbled, and wondered if that was what the net-ful of burial sacks looked like to an observer.
Murat hadn't only been right about the smell. Hawkwood knew it couldn't have been much more than ten minutes since the orderlies had applied their final stitch, yet it seemed a lifetime ago. His nerves were stretching with each passing second.
He detected another shift in the net's trim. A sixth sense told him to brace himself. He did so just in time. The net landed with a thump. It was more of a collision than a grounding - no sympathy for the dead from the man on the winch - and the motion beneath him told Hawkwood that they had been deposited in the thwarts of the boat. He felt the craft rock as the burial party and the militia escort arranged themselves. Then came the command to cast off and wear away, followed by the unmistakable sound of oars turning in rowlocks as the boat was edged out from the side of the ship.
It was warm inside the sack and the squeaking of the oars and the gentle pitching of the boat were starting to have an hypnotic effect. Hawkwood was deeply conscious not only of the stench in his own burial bag but the aroma of the bodies around him, all of them caked in either piss, blood or shit, or in some cases all three. The accumulated smells would become worse as the sun continued to rise, which was why Hellard had wanted the bodies removed. There were too many for them to remain on board. Hygiene was difficult to maintain at the best of times. Conditions would have become untenable, particularly in the already tainted sick berth, had the remains of the dead been kept on board.
Hawkwood knew they were close to their destination when he heard the order to boat oars. A brief silence, followed by a shudder as the boat's keel grated against the shingle, confirmed it.
Hawkwood could hear digging sounds as he was carried up the foreshore. A strong, sickly bouquet began to infiltrate the sack the closer they drew to the crunch of the spades, so cloying it even masked his own scent. Hawkwood knew what it was. He'd come across it before, in field hospitals and mortuaries. It was the smell of putrefying bodies. Lying on the ground, pebbles digging into his back, nose pressed against the rancid cloth, it was all he could do to prevent himself from retching.
"All right, toss the buggers in!"
The order, Hawkwood realized, had come from several paces away. He suspected the escort were trying to remain upwind and some distance from the burial pit.
A voice came close to his ear and he recognized Charbonneau's whisper. "Not long now, Captain. It's nearly over."
Hands slid under his shoulders again, dragging him across the mud. He felt the sharp edge of a stone rake his shoulder blade, and then the ground dipped sharply and he had the sensation of being deposited atop what felt, from the lumps and bumps and other, sharper protrusions, as if it might be a stack of logs. The stench of rotting corpses was suddenly far worse than anything that had come before.
His ears picked up the dull clunk of a blade being driven into the ground.
Hawkwood gasped as the first spadeful of mud and pebbles landed across his legs. His heart lurched as the second load was deposited over his chest. The mud was damp and heavy. He tried to move his arms, but he was prevented from doing so by another fusillade of stones that ra
ttled against the outside of the cloth like rain striking the side of a tent.
He heard a voice call softly. "Goodbye, Captain."
And then the earth closed over his face and the world went dark.
CHAPTER 11
Hawkwood uncrossed his wrists and brought his right arm down by his side. He flexed his fingers and tried bending his knees and experienced a wave of relief when he found he was able to accomplish both tasks, albeit with some difficulty. He couldn't bend his knees to any great angle, but he knew there was probably enough leeway, despite the weight of the earth, for him to achieve his objective.
He could still make out tiny patches of daylight through the cloth, which meant the filling in of the burial pit had either been half-hearted or deliberately slipshod, with just enough dirt having been cast over the newly interred burial sacks to deceive the militia.
He could no longer hear voices. They had faded as the burial detail returned to the boat. He could hear seabirds in the distance and the lap of waves along the shoreline. He could also hear sheep bleating. It was a sound the prisoners had grown used to, for when the wind was in the right direction the animals' plaintive cries could be heard clear across the marshes, even as far as the hulks.
He drew his right knee towards him, extended his right arm, stretched his fingers and began inching his hand down his thigh. It wasn't as easy as he'd hoped. There wasn't enough room in the sack to allow him the flexibility he was looking for while laying on his back. He paused, muscles straining.
Then, taking a deep breath, he twisted on to his left side. Immediately, he felt the corpse beneath him move. A wave of putrescence enveloped him. He bit down on the sour taste and tried the manoeuvre again. This time, he almost made it. His fingertips moved beyond his kneecap. Hunching his shoulders, he reached down once more. The muscles in his shoulder shrieked as his thumb and forefinger drew the knife out from the inside of his boot.
He rested, chest heaving, and waited for his shoulder to stop protesting. Then he turned on to his back once more and brought his arm up. With the knife less than a hand's breadth from his face, he infiltrated the razor-sharp blade into the gap between the stitches in the sailcloth and began cutting.