Seaflower k-3

by Julian Stockwin

  'An' a right shellback you is turnin' into, if'n I says so,' Stirk said warmly.

  Clearing his throat, Renzi attracted attention. 'A great pirate - I have to disagree. He was only a merchant, an investor of Wall Street, which is in New York, no seaman he. But he married a lively lady, and bethought to go a-roving — one voyage only, and his crew is so dissatisfied with his conduct they set him ashore, stranded, in Antigua.'

  Renzi grinned at Kydd. 'But he gets another ship, and continues - and finds an East Indiaman, which in course he captures with a great treasure. A simple-minded creature, he sails straight back to New York, but takes the precaution first of burying the treasure nearby to bargain with in case he meets trouble for his actions. It didn't work, and he pays with his life at Tyburn tree. The treasure is still there, my dear friends, but somewhere close by New York, not here in the Caribbean, I do regret.'

  Stirk growled, 'Aye, but y' had some real pirates hereabouts.'

  'Take Calico Jack, mates,' Stiles began. 'Lures an Irish lass ter leave 'er 'usband fer a life a-piratin' together. They takes a Scowegian hooker an' in it there's this other lass. So he has this Anne 'n' Mary too, an' they are the equal ter any in bein' ready ter board, and the cuttin' of throats.'

  Stirk broke in: 'But in th' end, as ye knows, Calico Jack wuz turned off at Tyburn, but 'is women, both on 'em, pleads their bellies. And says he weren't no fighter, lets 'em all be captured.'

  The thoughtful quiet was broken by Renzi. 'Not all came to a bad end,' he said, 'Take Henry Morgan—'

  'You musta 'eard o 'im while you wuz clerkin' in Spanish Town.' Stirk chuckled.

  'Indeed,' said Renzi. 'And you can say in truth that we are here today because he was the one who secured Jamaica as our Caribbean centre for trade. Top class as a freebooter, as you know, took Campeche just in order to seize fourteen prizes in one go, and there was so much plunder after the sack of Panama that Spanish pieces of eight were legal tender in Jamaica for years afterwards.'

  Kydd's shipmates became preoccupied: it was not beyond the bounds of possibility that Spain could join in the present war, the old times return.

  'Morgan came back to Jamaica?' prompted Kydd.

  'Yes — when it was peace with Spain, he retired to England, but it was war again, and the King thought he was best placed of all to know the Caribbean, and appointed him Governor of Jamaica with an eye to its defence, and a fine fist he made of it, too. Sad, really, he missed the buccaneering life, and spent much government time in the Port Royal taverns, lifting a glass with his old shipmates. That's when Port Royal was at its most lively, a rousing good time guaranteed for any seaman ... He drank himself to death, and within three, four years a mighty earthquake finally sent most of Port Royal into the sea. Let's raise a pot to Cap'n Henry Morgan!'

  Wiping his mouth, Stirk said loudly, 'If y' wants a reg'lar-built pirate, then m' grand-daddy can tell ye -he saw Blackbeard 'imself! Back in Queen Anne's day only, scared th' piss outa him. Comes swarmin' aboard, black beard wi' ribbons, an' all this slow-match strung through, alight 'n' smokin' away, roarin' and shouting. Carries four pistols an' a 'eavy cutlass, ain't none can stand against him.

  'Colonies see their trade go somewhere else, so they puts a King's ship on to his tail, sloop-o'-war. Lootenant Maynard — that's it. Hides 'is crew below while Blackbeard boards, then takes 'em! Th' l'tenant meets Blackbeard face on, 'n' isn't shy. There's this great fight, the two on 'em, but Maynard wins, and sails back t' port wi' Blackbeard's head a-danglin' from the bowsprit fer all to see.'

  The anchor was won the next morning in a sullen rain squall, hissing and lashing at the men on the windlass and sending Seaflower in a skittish whirl around her moorings. When the anchor finally tripped, the cutter was facing inshore, into the swollen river current emerging to carry her seaward. At the same time the wind strengthened from the sea, prevailing over the current, and Seaflower duly drifted towards the shore, not three hundred yards distant.

  'Sheet in the main, y' bastards!' It was the first time Kydd had heard Jarman swear as he gave orders to carry sail aft with sheets a-fly forward. The cutter would rotate to face the sea under the leverage of the big after sail.

  'What? Belay that, you dogs!' yelled Swaine. His eyes were red and hair plastered down his face by the rain. 'What are you about, sir?' he threw at Jarman, before screaming down the deck, 'Let go anchor!'

  The men forward were making ready to cat and secure the anchor shank painter and were totally unprepared, the windlass taut and the cable on the pawl. The gawky Parkin had charge of the operation and floundered.

  'God rot me bones!' spluttered Merrick, and thrust forward hastily, but the situation was already in hand: Doud's furtive bringing in of the main sheets had given force enough for the bows to swing. Swaine seemed to ignore his previous order with the promise in the bow's swing. 'Carry on, then, Mr Jarman,' he said testily, handing the deck to the master.

  'Never seen such a dog's breakfast,' Doud muttered, under his breath — but not quietly enough.

  'You, sir!' Swaine rounded on him. 'Damn your sly ways — I heard your vile words. Y' think to slander your ship, do you? Bo'sun! Do you gag this infernal rogue.'

  Kydd watched with growing anger as Stiles found an iron marline spike, which he forced between Doud's teeth, securing it in place with spun-yarn. The quarterdeck fell quiet at the manifest injustice. Doud would wear the 'gag' until given leave to remove it

  Seaflower made the open sea and shaped course for Port Antonio, some small hours away. There they landed their packets and bags and took on two slim packages before resuming their voyage to St Kitts and thence Barbados.

  Kydd thought it an unworthy spite that Swaine did not have the gag removed until after the noon meal — and the grog issue. In the way of sailors Doud would later enjoy their sympathy and illegally saved rum, but that was not the point.

  A fine north-easterly had them bowling along the familiar passage south of Hispaniola and by evening they had the precipitous knife shape of Cape Rojo abeam. 'Up spirits' was piped, but there was not the usual happy hum on the berth-deck as the grog was measured out. The popular Doud was well plied with good cheer, but all the talk was on the Captain's character.

  Watch-on-deck turned to; there was not a lot for them to do in the steady sailing weather, and they hunkered down in the warm breeze. Doud made himself comfortable on the main-hatch gratings and, looking soulfully at the stars began singing softly, his voice coarsened with rum:

  "Tis of a flash frigate, La Pique was her name,

  All in the West Indies she bore a great name;

  For cruelly bad using of every degree,

  Like slaves in the galley we ploughed the salt sea.

  So now, brother shipmates, where'er ye may be

  From all fancy frigates I'd have ye steer free ...'

  Too late Doud recognised the dark figure of Swaine looming and scrambled to his feet. 'Do y' wan' the second verse?' he said truculently, to his captain.

  Swaine didn't answer at first. Then he bawled, 'Mr Merrick!' down the deck to the helm.

  'Aye, sir?' said the boatswain, hurrying to the scene.

  'What's this, that you have a man on watch beastly drunk?' A thick edge to the words betrayed the Captain's own recent acquaintance with a bottle, but there could be no answer to his question: there was a fine line to be drawn between the effect of the usual quarter-pint of spirits and that of more. Swaine turned back to Doud. 'I came to tell this rascal to hold his noise but I see this - seize him in irons, and I shall have him before me tomorrow.'

  'We have no irons in Seaflower? said Merrick, expressionless.

  'Then shackle him to the gratings right here, you fool,' Swaine hissed.

  At seven bells of the forenoon the following day, the ship's company of Seaflower mustered on the upper deck. Kydd saw the sanctimonious expression on Swaine's face as he gave a biting condemnation on drinking. The inevitable sentence came. 'Twelve lashes - and be very sure I shall visit th
e same on any blackguard who seeks to shame his ship in this way!' Kydd felt a cold fury building at the man's hypocrisy.

  Doud was stripped and tied to the main shrouds facing outboard. Stiles came forward, slipping the ugly length of the cat out of its bag. He took position amidships and experimentally swung the lash, then looked at Swaine.

  'Bo'sun's mate — do your duty.' There was none of the panoply of drumbeat and marines, just the sickening lash at regular intervals and the grunts and gasps of the prisoner. Seaflower's company stood and watched the torment, but Kydd knew that a defining moment had been reached. The fine spirit that had been Seaflower's soul was in the process of departing. His messmates cut Doud down, and helped him below. On deck Swaine glanced about once, to meet sullen silence and stony gazes.

  The cutter sped on over the sparkling seas, but the magic was ebbing. Kydd felt her imperfections slowly surfacing, much as a falling out of love: the suddenly noticed inability to stand up below, the continual canting of the decks with her fore-and-aft rig, the discomfort of her small size. He pushed these thoughts to the back of his mind.

  Parkin was mastheaded at three bells for 'rank bone-headedness' but at the beginning of the first dog-watch it was Stirk who ran afoul of the increasingly ill-tempered Swaine; told to flat in the soaring jib he turned and ambled forward, his scorn for the uselessness of the order only too plain. 'You bloody dog!' raved Swaine. 'Contemptuous swine! But I'll see your backbone at the main shrouds tomorrow — silent contempt — depend upon it. Mr Merrick!'

  Shackled on deck Stirk was a pitiful sight, not so much in degradation but in the sight of a fine seaman brought to such a pass. Merrick carefully avoided the side of the deck where Stirk lay, but Stiles merely stepped around him — in the morning he would be the one to swing the cat on Stirk's back and there was no room for sentiment in a boatswain's mate.

  The evening arrived, and with it a convenient anchorage off an island south of Hispaniola. Seaflower immediately swung on her anchor to face into an offshore current of quite some strength, and as soon as the longboat was placed in the water it streamed astern to the full length of its painter, ready with its oars aboard for any lifesaving duty.

  'Holding should be good even so,' Jarman told Kydd. 'Sand an' mud because o' the river yonder.' Swaine disappeared and, after securing the vessel at her moorings, supper was piped.

  It would be a dispiriting meal. Thinking of Stirk, Kydd winced as he heard rain roaring on the deck overhead. The berth-deck filled as men chose its heat and fug over the deluge above, leaving the luckless lookouts and Stirk the only ones topside.

  'What cheer, Luke?' Kydd said, when the lad brought the mess kid of supper. Luke didn't look up, his bowed head sparking concern in Kydd. 'How's this?' he tried again, but the boy didn't respond. 'Luke, ol' cuffin, are you—'

  'He called me names, Mr Kydd, no call fer that,' Luke said, in a low voice. His eyes were brimming. He had served the Captain first, so there was no need to know who it was had taken it out on this willing soul.

  'F'r shame, o' course,' Kydd said softly, 'but a good sailorman knows how t' take hard words fr'm his officers.'

  Luke stared back obstinately. 'But he called me ... it ain't right what 'e called me.' He turned and, with great dignity, left.

  'I seen bilge rats worth more'n he, the shonky fuckster,' Doggo growled.

  Renzi said nothing, but stared at the table. Kydd tried to lift the mood: if things got worse, Seaflower could easily turn into a hell-ship. "There's no one seen him with a Frenchie in sight - could be he's a right tartar, he gets a smell o' prize money.'

  'Don't talk such goose-shit, cully,' Stiles said wearily.

  The table lapsed into a morose quiet, and the wash of talk outside on the larger berth-deck became plain. Patch's voice came through loud, his tone bitter. 'I teU yer, we flogs up 'n' down the Caribbee in this ol' scow, yer ain't never goin' ter feel a cobb in yer bung again!'

  'Yair, but—' someone began.

  Patch's tone rose in contempt. 'Drops hook fer the night, never 'eard o' such shy tricks. We choked up inter this squiddy cutter . . .' The never-ceasing background babble rose and fell, and Kydd pictured the pugnacious seaman glaring wildly about'... blast me eyes if it don't stick in m' craw, nothin' but this fer ever . . .'

  There were sounds of scuffling and mess traps falling to the deck, then Alvarez calling, 'Where ye goin' camaradd?

  'Topsides — I've had a gutful.'

  'Wait—'

  Kydd met Renzi's eyes. 'It can only get worse,' said Renzi slowly. Kydd knew he was right: Seaflower’s captain was alienating his own ship's company, treating them as some necessary evil in his own problem.

  Kydd agreed. 'No chance o' this one gettin' a promotion out o' Seaflower, he added. The probability was that he had been given the command of a lowly cutter to satisfy some Byzantine relationship of obligation, knowing that he would not be put to the test so easily. Seaflower would gradually decay from within, her heart and spirit wilting and fading under the disinterest and neglect of her captain. It was intolerable that the willing and exuberant soul of their vessel was to be wasted so.

  A discordant sound — it might have been a muffled shout, thumping — jarred Kydd's ear against the general noises. It seemed to originate from on deck. If the lookouts had failed to see an approaching attack in time . .. Kydd scrambled to his feet. 'Somethin' amiss on deck.'

  Renzi did not move, but looked up with a dry smile. 'I can conceive that Toby Stirk may well be a trifle restless!'

  No one else seemed to have noticed as he forced his way aft. Kydd had no idea what would he would see on deck, and his mouth went dry as he mounted the ladder. It was dark, and he stopped short of emerging on deck while he blinked furiously, trying to pierce the murk. It had stopped raining, but the deck was wet and slippery. He caught movement around the stern but could not detect any other as he climbed out on to the upper deck.

  He hurried aft, to where bumps and thuds sounded, and nearly fell over the lookout, who was on all fours trying to pick himself up. Kydd looked around hastily. In the longboat were Patch, Alvarez and two others. Patch had his knife, was sawing at the painter. Kydd shouted, and the chorus of snarls and laughter from the boat as it fell away left no doubt as to what they intended. The oars came out and it disappeared quickly into the night.

  'What is it?' puffed Merrick, appearing next to him.

  'Deserters,' Kydd replied. 'Skelped th' lookout an' took the longboat.'

  'Who?'

  'Patch, Alvarez 'n' a couple of others.'

  Desertion was a continual worry for the navy - a good seaman could greatly improve his wages in the merchant service, or do even better by shipping out in a privateer. Theoretically, it could be punished by death or, worse, flogging around the Fleet, but practical considerations usually led captains who recovered men to treat the offence lightly rather than lose a good hand. But Swaine . . .

  'Get below an' tell the Captain,' Merrick muttered. Without another boat there could be no pursuit.

  Kydd went down by the after companion, and knocked at the door. 'Cap'n, sir!' he called.

  There was movement inside, and the unmistakable clink of glass. 'What is it?' came a hoarse reply through the closed door.

  'Sir, the longboat's been taken b' deserters.'

  At first there was no response, then Swaine's angry face appeared. 'Deserters? Did y' say deserters?' He pulled on his coat. The thick odour of drink in the tiny cabin turned Kydd's stomach.

  'Vile set o' lubbers, I'll have y'r livers at the gangway t'morrow, try me like this!' The diatribe continued until Swaine had made the upper deck, where he staggered upright. 'Poxy crew, this's an aggravated offence an' I'll see you all at th' yardarm, so I will!' he shrieked into the darkness.

  To his disgust Kydd saw that Swaine had on his naval officer's coat, but no breeches. Lurching along the deck forward Swaine continued until he came to Stirk, still shackled to the main-hatch grating. 'Don' ye dare cross my bows li'
that, y' scowbunkin' brute,' he snarled, kicking viciously at Stirk, who recoiled against the blow. It threw Swaine off-balance — he flung out an arm to seize a shroud batten, but missed, and fell headlong into the sea.

  The current carried him swiftly down the side of Seaflower, splashing and choking. A line was thrown but Swaine was in no condition to snatch it, and within seconds he was disappearing into the dark astern. The knot of men stood paralysed. There was no boat to go to the rescue, and nervous eyes turned to the boatswain. 'We has to get under way an' go after him,' Merrick said, shaken.

  Jarman appeared, drawing on his shirt 'No! We have blashy weather an' coral under our lee, no time t' be standing in t' the land in the dark—'

  'Y' misses m' point!' Merrick said, in a stronger voice, and with a peculiar emphasis . 'I says we have t' get under way, Mr Jarman.'

  Jarman stared at the boatswain. Then his face turned mask-like, and he replied, 'O' course we must.' It was madness - but there was a chilling reason for the dramatic play. Each of the warrant officers was acting a part, knowing that every word and action would replay at the court of investigation that was certain to come.

  'Haaands to unmoor ship!' Stiles' pipe was made in a complete and appalled silence, the deck filling with apprehensive men. No good would come of this night, that much was clear, but they would go through the motions all night if need be.

  At noon the next day Seaflower sombrely reversed her course after spending all night and the following morning searching for her captain. His body was never found. At Port Royal Jarman and Merrick both went to the flagship; they swiftly returned, and with them a lieutenant and file of marines. Seaflower was effectively under arrest.

  The court of inquiry was over almost as quickly as it was convened — the overwhelming number of witnesses made it so, and it became clear that their evidence concerning Swaine came not as a complete surprise.