by Simon Mayo
There was laughter and some encouraging cheers, but Ned batted them away.
‘You know what happens. We moved at night, a few miles where we could, find friends where we could. Lot of us didn’t make it. Bounty-hunters, slave-catchers, white devils of all kinds, traitors, too, they all come after us.’ Ned’s voice tailed away. He closed his eyes and shuddered, the remembrance too easy, too familiar. There was an almost-silence, the closest to quiet Habs could recall for many years.
‘You want me to finish it for you, Ned?’ he whispered.
‘No, I’m not an imbecile jus’ yet,’ Ned replied. ‘We was in North Carolina, hidin’ in some woods outside o’ Wilmington, I think it was, when we got news of a ship would take us north. There’s only three of us by now. Me an’ two boys, names of Otis an’ John. They don’t trust no boat captains but I persuade ’em to stow away, as we ain’t fit for walkin’ an’ hidin’ no more. The captain, he put us in crates, an’ I arrived in Boston June 18th 1809, sharing a box with some printin’ press machinery stuck in my face.’
‘That explains why you so ugly, then!’ called Habs.
‘Oh, I was pretty back then, real pretty,’ Ned said over laughter. ‘Everyone said so. S’jus’ the war and that cannonball gone an’ done for me.’
From a distant mess: ‘An’ what happened to the boys? Otis an’ John?’
Ned dropped his head, his shoulders sliding forward. ‘You know what happened,’ he said. Ned lay back on his hammock as the word ‘slavecatcher’ was muttered around the block.
‘A penny for Mr Penny,’ growled the King.
2.9
Block Seven
9 p.m.
‘AND NOW WE need the house to order! I said, this house to order!’ The straining voice was at least a mess away and Joe turned in his hammock to see what was happening. A tired-looking man in a long brown coat was pacing the aisle, shouting through a rolled-up newspaper in the hope it would provide some means of amplification. ‘House to order! Please, gentlemen, bring this house to order!’
Above Joe, Roche’s head appeared over the edge of his bed. ‘This house is playin’ backgammon, scratchin’ them bugs away, drinkin’ ale an’ sleepin’. It does not want to come to order.’
The men of the Eagle had been scattered around the two floors of Seven, Joe and Will eventually finding berths with some privateers from Maine, most of whom had passed out.
‘But he’s the President,’ said Joe. ‘I think we’re supposed to take notice.’
‘President?’ Roche’s inverted face had appeared again. Even upside down, he looked baffled. ‘What kinda nonsense is this?’
‘We vote, Will,’ said Joe. ‘That’s how they do it here. We vote on who’ll be President for the week, who’ll be the judges, who’ll be the committeemen …’
‘And who, pray, is our President, then?’ said Roche, peering at the increasingly irate man in the coat. ‘He’s no Madison, and that’s the truth.’
Across the aisle, a voice from under a tarpaulin. ‘His name is Rose, and I wouldn’t trouble yourselves with anythin’ he tells you.’
Joe and Roche exchanged a surprised glance.
‘So why is he President?’ asked Joe.
‘’Cos he wanted to be,’ came the reply. ‘But mark my words, he’s an imbecile.’ The top of the tarp flipped down. ‘Joseph Toker Johnson. How d’you do?’
Joe just got sight of a pile of ginger hair before the tarp flipped up again. He was about to introduce himself when ‘President’ Rose returned, now armed with a frying pan. ‘And here come the ship’s bells!’ said Joe.
This time, the ‘House to order!’ was accompanied by a vigorous, clanging assault on one of the metal stanchions.
It worked. Everywhere, the buzz and jaw died, the games halted, the sleepers awoke. Looking rather startled, ‘President’ Rose jumped into the silence, speaking fast.
‘Men, we need a tub inspector, a master-at-arms, a sailor-lawyer and three committeemen for next week. Do I have any names to take forward?’
Close to two hundred voices all bellowed their suggestions at once, and the hapless Rose scribbled what names he could pick up out of the babble.
Roche’s face again. ‘Did I jus’ hear Uncle Sam and Dolley Madison’s names bein’ called out? ’Cos if the President’s wife is in charge of the beatin’s, I might just sign up for a few stripes myself!’
Joe addressed the man under the tarp. ‘Mr Johnson, do the committeemen decide the punishments here? Or is it the British?’
The tarp was pulled away and Toker Johnson swung himself over the side of his hammock. He pulled a tall, slightly conical hat over his red, unkempt hair and folded his arms tightly across his chest. His eyes narrowed as he stared at Joe.
‘We don’t need them British to tell us how to run our lives. We punish them that needs punishin’, no matter if he’s one of ours. There’s an order of things. Sailors in Two last month had to give a thief fifty stripes, but he fell after fifteen. So he was handed to the British, who put him in the cachot. That’s the way of it. And one of the cooks here – man by the name of Wilston – he was caught skimming coppers. Them cooks are always at it, but this rogue was caught doin’ it. Eighteen lashes tomorrow after turn-out.’
Joe was about to argue with Toker Johnson when a judicious cough from the hammock above alerted him to his imminent folly. He slumped back, his eyes closed. The sea was his life and sailors his family, but their brutality always angered him.
Once Toker Johnson had disappeared again beneath the tarpaulin, Joe whispered through the hemp.
‘So we hate the British for their brutality, then, just to make sure they know how superior we are, we’re even more brutal? Can that be right?’
Roche’s upside-down head appeared above him again. ‘Joe Hill. Have you learned nothing? We don’t hate the British ’cos they’re brutal – we kind of admire ’em for that. Didn’t you read how we behaved in York? No, we hate the British ’cos they’re British. And they all have faces you want to punch. Those two things together. And that’s quite enough.’
2.10
Block Six
9 p.m.
THREE NEW FLAGS had been hung. A thin rope had been tied between two stanchions and the unfurling was the cause of much merriment. Roughly cut from sheets and painted with black and red ink, they formed rough and ready American flags: fifteen horizontal stripes, and the blue square with fifteen white stars. But there were additions. New, eye-catching additions.
The first flag had crude images of the King, the Agent, Elizabeth Shortland and farm animals in each of the stars; the second depicted black men hanging from gibbets; the third had a new verse for ‘Yankee Doodle’ written in the longer white lines.
‘I’m enjoyin’ your handiwork tonight, Mr Cobb,’ said Lane, gazing up at the colours. ‘I knew you could paint pretty much most things, but these are somethin’ else.’ He laughed as he read the words; it was a shrill, discomforting sound.
‘Ol’ Miss Shortland, she’s a witch,
Of that we can be certain.
She casts her spell, goes straight to Hell,
Goes home and fucks the surgeon.’
He laughed again then clapped himself. ‘Bravo!’ he said. ‘We must sing that out loud when we see the Agent next. You wrote the words, too?’
Cobb, spreadeagled on his hammock, an empty bottle on his chest, nodded. ‘Wrote the words, drew the pictures.’ He pulled his stovepipe over his eyes. ‘They’re not as useful as the dollars I used to print. But so much more fun.’
As each sailor read the rhyme, they toasted Cobb. Their spirits were raised; they weren’t ready to sleep.
‘Tell us the trial story, Mr Cobb,’ called one.
‘Too tired, too drunk. And you’ve heard it before. Know every word,’ Cobb replied.
‘The crew of Imperious only came in last month. They ain’t heard one word. Not a single word. They know nothin’. Tell ’em.’
Horace Cobb lay still for a mome
nt, then peered from under his hat to check the status of his drink. Finding it empty, he offered it to Lane, who swiftly found a full bottle to replace it. Cobb leaned towards an oil lamp that was hanging on a stanchion, touching the tobacco to the flame. He inhaled sharply as the leaves caught then blew a cloud of smoke into the thick, swirling curtain that fell from just beneath the ceiling.
‘All right, so this is the old days. We’d been operating out of Queens for three years. Had a good business there, just the three of us. My two brothers and me. We did documents and we did ’em all day and all night. There wasn’t nothing we couldn’t do. Certificates, divorce papers, travel documents – we could make ’em all. If you wanted some paperwork to prove you were a magician from Paris, we could do it. If you wanted to be a lawyer from Pennsylvania, that was no problem at all. What you did with them papers once you got ’em was your lookout. But there was this one customer, name of Smith, got himself a new set of papers to show he owned this piece of land. Well, he got himself into a fight with some Irish and was about to explain to them nice gentlemen where he got his documents when he found he had his throat cut from here to here.’ Cobb drew the bottle across his neck to cheers from his audience. ‘And then, just to make sure …’ He reversed the action, to even louder cheers.
‘What happened next, Mr Cobb? Come on, tell us.’
Those who were near a stanchion began a slow tapping like a drumroll, others banged pipes against lamps.
‘Me and my brothers stood trial, o’ course we did.’
The noise and speed of the drumming increased.
‘But it turned out – and praise be to Almighty God for His ways are mysterious! – that the judge’s recent divorce was less than entirely legitimate. Some of his documents weren’t so very legal.’
The percussion was reaching a crescendo now.
Cobb sat bolt upright, waving the cigarillo in one hand, the bottle in the other. ‘And so, gentlemen!’
The drumming stopped abruptly. Cobb looked around at the keen, expectant faces, nodding at them all. ‘And so His Honour declared me not guilty!’ Wild cheering greeted this news and, in the neighbouring mess, two fiddles began a reel.
Edwin Lane, lying across the aisle from Cobb, raised his bottle in salute.
‘It’s a good story,’ he said.
Cobb smiled. ‘It is, isn’t it?’ he said, and relit his cigarillo.
Lane leaned forward, then nodded towards the second flag. ‘You’re showin’ what we need to do, I think.’
‘The hanging pictures?’ Cobb looked surprised. ‘You think we should go hang the men of Four?’ He laughed, a staccato burst that dropped ash on to his pillow. ‘You been drinkin’ too long, Mr Lane. They’re just cartoons.’
‘Maybe,’ said Lane, acknowledging the rebuke. ‘But I got me some money to pay my favourite turnkey. I got a trip planned. The blackjacks are jumpin’ too high for my likin’.’
Cobb was intrigued. ‘You think they need … cutting down a little?’
‘Somethin’ like that, Mr Cobb,’ said Lane. ‘Somethin’ like that.’
2.11
The Agent’s Study
King Dick has been shown in by two members of the guard who wait, fidgeting nervously, for the Agent. The King walks the bookshelves, stopping every now and then to read a title and run his hand down its spine.
SHORTLAND (arrives, bustling, late; takes off his greatcoat): Mr Crafus! You are an educated man, I see. Tell me, what has caught your eye?
KING DICK: It all catches my eye, Captain, every single one. We have some books in Seven. But the choice is poor and I believe I have read everythin’ that takes my fancy. These, on the other hand …
SHORTLAND: Well, select one, then. I can trust you, I believe. They are underused, I’m afraid. I inherited most of them from my father. They are mainly military history, the classics, that kind of thing. I don’t get a lot of visitors who browse the shelves.
KING DICK (still looking at the books): Perhaps that’s because most of your men can’t read, Captain. When they deal with us, they seem … slow-witted. Maybe it’s them you need to lend your books to.
SHORTLAND: My men are the best I can find, Mr Crafus. While there are wars to be fought, I fear Dartmoor will never receive the finest the British Army has to offer. Added to that, my major is sick and unlikely to be replaced anytime soon. Now, about that book …
KING DICK: I’ll play along with your game, Captain. (He pulls a small book from the shelves, leafs through its pages, selecting one; looks at Shortland.) You have some poetry on your shelves, Captain Shortland.
SHORTLAND: I do?
KING DICK: William Wordsworth. His poem to Toussaint L’Ouverture, the leader of the Haiti slave revolt.
SHORTLAND: (astonished) Really? I never knew …
KING DICK: You should know your people better, Captain. It concludes (he reads):
There’s not a breathing of the common wind
That will forget thee; thou hast great allies;
Thy friends are exultations, agonies,
And love, and Man’s unconquerable mind.
SHORTLAND: I’m not quite sure what to make of that, I’m afraid. (He takes the book and reads.) He calls him ‘O miserable chieftain’. Is that you, Crafus? Is that what you’re telling me? I hope not, because I know where I am with you and with Four. I can speak directly to you, and I know you can speak directly to your men. (He throws the book on the desk.)
KING DICK: And so?
SHORTLAND: So do your men understand that, though the war is over, for them, nothing can change until the ratified treaty arrives back in England?
KING DICK: But it has changed already, Captain, you gotta feel that. You can wave papers at us, but we know we should be goin’ home. And when Congress has ratified, you’d better be gettin’ us out swiftly or you’ll have a riot so big you’ll need a whole army to deal with us.
SHORTLAND: Are you threatening me, Mr Crafus?
KING DICK: I’m jus’ tellin’ you how it is. Once there ain’t no war, we can’t be prisoners-of-war. Many of us will likely wanna jus’ walk outta those gates.
SHORTLAND: Then you will be shot.
KING DICK: Then you will have a riot.
SHORTLAND (exasperated): If there is a breakout, your men will end up arrested, impressed back into the Royal Navy or dead. If you stay here, at least you will be safe until your ships come. You have to make them see that!
KING DICK: Safe here? Where so many of us have died? Have you visited the graveyard recently, Captain?
SHORTLAND: I regret every death, Mr Crafus. Dartmoor is an unforgiving place and, when disease takes hold, I know the results can be devastating. British prisoners-of-war face similar conditions in American jails, you know that? And usually chained up with common thieves and murderers too. The food, allowance and medical treatment you have been given are the best available – but out there? That’s an awfully unforgiving part of the country, Mr Crafus, it’s one hell of a walk to civilization once you’re out those gates. How many of your men would actually make it home?
KING DICK: We fought you and your country to be free. Your guns, locks ’n’ keys tell us we are still not free. Did you know, your Navy offered freedom to the slaves of Mathews County, Virginia, if they came on over to your ships? Did you know that?
SHORTLAND: I had heard, yes …
KING DICK: Well, the war is over, Captain, the war is done. So we ain’t goin’ to ‘come on over’, but you can offer us hope. If you choose to. You better be ready for ratification, Captain. That’s all I’m sayin’. (He reclaims the book from Shortland’s desk and waves it at him.) The poem says it is possible for a powerful white man to be on the side of righteousness. If he chooses to be.
3.1
Friday, 6 January
The Blocks
‘THE TURNKEYS’ MESSAGE was different this morning. After the usual dreaded ‘Tumble up and turn out!’ they added an extra cry. ‘Snow-clearing at Russets, Rounders and Hexwor
thy. First two hundred.’ The response in all blocks was instantaneous.
The hammocks spun.
‘Sixpenny crash!’ yelled Habs and a hundred others, as the more sober, able-bodied and awake inmates tipped out of their beds. The deliberate painful self-tipping ensured that the more robust inmates snatched an extra few seconds in the dash for the courtyard. Habs and Sam almost fell over each other in their eagerness to volunteer. ‘Crashing’ promised an extra sixpence in wages and, tantalizingly, a chance to leave the prison.
‘How much snow?’ called Sam, pulling gloves from his makeshift pillow.
‘Enough,’ said Habs. ‘Enough to warrant that extra sixpence. Where are my damn boots?’
They snatched what bread they had saved and threw coins at an early riser who had fired up an illegal stove for some coffee.
Still buttoning, tying and wrapping, sailors from each of the seven prisons swarmed to the courtyard gates. The few inches of snow that had fallen overnight ensured that those with poor boots had a precarious sprint. Everywhere, men were sliding and falling. Habs and Sam were amongst the first out of Four, merging quickly with the fastest of Three and Five. They could see the gates to the square were open, the lines of militia poised, waiting to slam them shut again once they had the number they wanted.