Infernal Revolutions

by Stephen Woodville

  He turned round, looked at me for a few moments without comprehension, then smiled and walked over as though crossing a ballroom at Bath. I, clutching on to a rail for dear life as the ship rolled and lurched along, reluctantly extended a hand in greeting.

  ‘You will get used to it,’ he laughed, as I clamped my hand back on the rail pronto. ‘Everyone does.’

  ‘Maybe I am an exception, Mr…er…’

  ‘Tetley. Isaac Tetley. Chief gunner of this ship, before you ask. Heard the cannon every morning after breakfast? That’s the work of my boys. Firing practice.’

  I registered genuine admiration with a whistle and a raise of my eyebrows.

  ‘’Tis nothing, really. The same to me as firing a musket is to you, just a job after a while.’

  ‘A more dangerous one though, Sir.’

  ‘Not on this voyage it isn’t!’ exclaimed Isaac with an amused grimace, dashing that giant fist down in stage exasperation, ‘That is the problem. No enemy, no battle, no danger. I am bored out of my skull.’

  ‘Have you been in a real sea battle?’ I gulped, eyes no doubt boyishly aflame.

  ‘Oh, yes,’ said Isaac, his own eyes now lighting up, ‘oh yes, yes, yes.’

  We goggled at each other for a few moments, taking it all in from our different perspectives.

  ‘Noise? Smoke? Death? Blood?’ I offered, visions raging.

  ‘All of ‘em aplenty,’ confirmed Isaac, ‘and enough excitement to sink a frigate.’

  I shuddered with fearful pleasure. What ecstasy there was to be had in this life, if only one were brave or stupid or lucky enough to find it. Isaac, though, was clearly not stupid.

  ‘But never fear,’ he went on, ‘you will have your own share of excitement when you fight in America. I have been watching your daily drill and musket practice, and by God, you scare me!’

  I was not sure whether this was an insult or a compliment, and dithered accordingly.

  ‘Now, if you’ll excuse me, Mr…er….’

  ‘Oysterman. Harry Oysterman.’

  ‘Mr Oysterman…I am off up the rigging. Not my job, but I need exercise and danger to purge myself of bad humours. The officers allow me to do it because they know I would dash their brains out if they didn’t. Coming?’

  I recoiled instinctively, almost toppling into the heaving sea.

  ‘We will meet and talk again then, Sir.’

  ‘Indeed, Sir.’

  And off he went, climbing at first slowly and carefully, then speeding up as he became accustomed to the roll of the ship. Within five minutes he was at the fore top, and within ten he was at the fore topgallant yard, standing easy and chatting amiably with a sailor on duty up there.

  Still glued to the rail, I was watching the tiny figure with astonishment, unable to comprehend how anyone could achieve such a task, when a new voice piped up with a possible answer.

  ‘The workings of God are mysterious, my son. He distributes talents in a seemingly random manner.’

  I looked down in puzzlement at a frail old man in black who had appeared under my nose.

  ‘Your friend may have the talent to climb the rigging, but what talent do you possess that he doesn’t?’

  Taken aback, I couldn’t think of anything – no, not even my poetry – so I just shrugged my shoulders despondently,

  ‘Because depend upon it, my son, you do have a talent, perhaps many. Find it, find them, and stick to what you are good at.’

  ‘Have we been introduced, Sir?’

  ‘My name is Parson Blood, and I am your regimental chaplain, here to offer spiritual nourishment in these troubled times. I am slowly working my way round the ship in order to speak to everyone, but I am afraid my pace is rather slow, due to my age and constant seasickness.’

  I thought he looked pale, but had attributed that to the Bible in his hand.

  ‘Please to meet you, Sir,’ I said, shooting my hand out as quickly as I had to Isaac Tetley, ‘but I don’t think it’s spiritual nourishment I need.’

  ‘What sort of nourishment do you need then?’

  I hesitated, wondering whether to be truthful, but the haggard look on his face suggested he had heard it all before. I looked around to make sure none of my comrades were in earshot, and whispered:

  ‘Food, proper food, and sex.’

  As surmised, he expressed no shock at this answer.

  ‘I understand that, Mr…?’

  Truly, I needed a name badge on my jacket this day.

  ‘Oysterman. Harry Oysterman.’

  ‘Mr Oysterman. I understand that. I would like those things myself sometimes. Indeed, I would also include wine on the list, but we can’t always get these things, and if we could, we would soon tire of them. God, on the other hand, is Someone you can never tire of. He is always there for us, even in our darkest hour, providing support, solace, uplift. Ask for what you really want, and He will always give it.’

  This sort of talk was nonsense to me – how could He give me Vickie Tremblett naked, drunk and squirming on a plate? – but I liked the man and his sincerity. I also admired him for enlisting in the army when clearly too old for the job, and trying his best in hopeless circumstances. He was nothing like the parsons I had met in Brighthelmstone, pasty wet mollies who knew more about afternoon tea and muffins than God or the sufferings of the poor. This was the man I wanted beside me when I was dying, or having a leg amputated, or some other horror. Indeed, so comforting was his presence – perhaps after all a gift from the God he was so mad about – that I decided to tip my Vickie Tremblett heartache all over him, knowing he would listen, and relay to me God’s message of support.

  ‘You have had a lucky escape, my boy. This girl was clearly not the one for you. Better that her wantonness appeared immediately, rather than after you had married her, when it would have caused even more misery. Try to forget about her; indeed, try to forget about all girls for the moment. What good can it do to torment yourself with imaginings? Reserve your strength for the fine upstanding Christian girl who will surely come your way if you only persevere in the ways of manhood. An excellent wife is far more precious than jewels, and God will guide you towards her if He sees you are worthy enough.’

  ‘God must have guided you towards a cracker then, Sir, as you are far more worthy than I.’

  ‘He did – a beautiful woman called Rose – but it also pleased Him to take her away from me in childbirth. I have remained alone since.’

  This was a bit depressing, and made God seem as capricious as a woman, not worth fawning over, but nevertheless I was heartened by the general tone of the parson’s speech.

  ‘And is there any authority for all of this in that thing there?’ I nodded towards his Bible.

  ‘Oh yes – 1 Corinthians 7:1; Proverbs 7: 24-27 and Proverbs 31:10-31. Amongst others.’

  He seemed to know his stuff, and I was duly impressed, though the texts referred to could have been racehorses for all I knew of the Bible. I thanked him for his kindness, and went away feeling invigorated and spiritually cleansed. I even found – possibly thanks to God – that I could walk a little way on the swaying deck without holding on to anything. So inspired had I been by the meeting, that once back in my dark fetid quarters I began to hanker after a miniature Bible of my own, so that I could give it a crafty peek now and again when my messmates were asleep and thereby build up my reserves of worthiness, which I would then unleash on the first passing Christian girl. In the absence of a Bible, however, I had to make do with my homemade thoughts about God. What was He exactly? Indeed was He even a he? Perhaps He was a She or an It or just Another Name For The Unknown? Had He, She or It started the world and then left it running of its own accord, or did He, She or It have an active hand in its steering? Was He, She or It all Good, or all Bad, or like humans a mixture of both? Was there a Devil, and if so, what did He, She or It plan to do about it? I was back to metaphysical musing, and soon my brain was as fuddled as it h
ad been on that fateful morning in my garret. Having no poetry around, I attempted to steady myself by thinking of calm things, and the most reassuring image that offered itself was not of Jesus, but of the imperturbable Isaac Tetley. I reflected that Isaac seemed to get his spiritual calm not from the Bible like Parson Blood, but from climbing the rigging and gazing out to sea, and this gave me an idea, which continued to nag me until an opportunity arose to put it into practice. So, all the while pursuing my spiritual purification (ie. no dirty thoughts, and no grog which induced them), I waited and waited until the real and metaphorical clouds lifted together, and the time was right.

  This magical moment finally occurred when we slipped into a region of blissfully fine weather about four hundred miles south-west of Greenland. I awoke early one morning not with my usual sickness, but with a strange sensation of calmness and wellbeing. Finding my way with remarkable aplomb past my sleeping, swinging comrades (who I normally enfiladed vomit over), I rose up the companionways as light as a bubble, until I entered the square of pure cobalt sky that had been my destination. At first staggering a little beneath the shock of the fresh, cold air, I eventually made my way to the forecastle and settled myself in a snug position alongside a smasher, or carronade. There, unnoticed or disregarded by the skeleton crew, I breakfasted on a couple of biscuits and – like Isaac Tetley – simply watched the sea as it rose and fell in slow twenty-foot swells. Now undulating meadows instead of the usual Alpine peaks, it was still frightening enough if you thought about its depth and immensity and mutability, but on this particular morning I was in awe of its majesty, and taken more with its inspirational aspects. ‘Twas a Wonderland, or perhaps a Wondersea, and I fell into a reverie that the rise and fall of the sea was the pulse of God; indeed, so pleasing was this conceit that I indulged myself in it, until I slipped into a religious euphoria no parson or Bible could induce. Quite taken out of myself, I was apparently on the verge of tossing myself overboard when Dick found me and punched my senses back into me. The euphoria, ‘twas later opined by the ship’s surgeon, was a sort of non-tropical calenture, brought about by lack of anything pleasurable combined with an excess of anxiety and misery. I never went alone on deck again, or talked to Parson Blood about religion.

  Thankfully, the other days were less sublime, being largely spent helping the sailors with their daily tasks. Before breakfast, and depending on the weather, we were usually set to work scrubbing the decks with holystones until our knees were raw, while after breakfast we worked up junk, ie. picked shreds off old pieces of tar-covered rope to make oakum, a filthy convict’s job that blackened our hands and completely ruined our nails. After dinner at midday we had drill and musket practice, then after supper at five we sat around cleaning and polishing our equipment until our bedtime yawns and yarns. Other duties, foisted upon us at any time just to keep us busy, included the splicing together of parted ropes, the washing of hammocks and bedding, and the hated job of hoisting up barrels of water from the hold, which caused many a man to join Thomas Pomeroy in the Hernia Club. Also, after the calenture scare, ‘twas considered good for my personal recovery to be assigned even more menial tasks, such as emptying the officers’ slop buckets. Naturally, the sight of me struggling to the empty gunports laden with appetizing buckets of human dross did nothing to promote my Leader Of Men image, but I endured it – even when the Atlantic wind blew the stuff straight back into my face – by persuading myself that I was playing the Dark Horse, a role prominent in the early lives of all aspiring Heroes.

  Not all ordure came my way, however, for the six heads or seats of ease at the front of the bows catered for most of the crew’s needs. Exposed to the elements, but protected from the bigger waves by safety nets, we would sit and deposit our waste straight into the dizzying sea below. The only trouble was, queues built up, owing to the constipation that was an effect of our oversalted diet. This in turn meant that fights broke out, which in turn meant that when I did go, I tried to do so at the same time as Isaac Tetley, that Samson of the High Seas. Seated next to each other as we mutually strained, we engaged naturally in pleasant conversation, much to the frustration of the waiting toughs. By this means I got to know him very well over the remaining weeks of our voyage, so that I found out, for example, about his family (mother and sister in Westward Ho!, father dead); what his ambitions were (to retire to a remote castle in Scotland, and to live there drinking whisky until his liver burst); what his fears were (catching yellow fever in the tropics, worms); and what he thought of Americans (fine people – open, generous and tough). ‘Twas all most civil and informative, and I felt honoured to have met such a man; there was no doubt that he would end up immortalized in my Night Thoughts, albeit undercover of some pretentious Italianate name.

  The only problem with having Isaac as a friend was that it put me in an awkward position vis-à-vis the Tumbling Monkey Sweepstake. This was a betting pool that had been created by the troops on the day we left Portsmouth Dockyard, on which sailor would be the first to fall to his death from the rigging. I had drawn Isaac without knowing who he was, but now that I did I felt increasingly uncomfortable and ashamed, not to mention fearful of the consequences if he found out about the sweep’s existence. Only the thought that gambling was an illegal activity at sea – and therefore not openly talked about – kept me from asking for my stake back.

  Needless to say, the sweepstake had been organized by Dick, who had launched into a frenzy of betting activity the moment he stepped on board ship, eager to explore a new world of gambling possibilities. There were bets going on the Death of Captain Dobermann, the Number of Crew Who Would Die of Fever on the Voyage, the Number of Maggots in Biscuits, the Time it Took in Days to Reach New York, and many other subjects. Whilst waiting for these bets to mature, Dick wiled away his spare time at more quickly realized gamings, such as backgammon, crown and anchor, and that bête noire of mine, brag. Personally I found all but one of them tedious, and would only join in when evasion was impossible. The exception was the game of Hartley’s Paw, which did actually appeal to me. Only playable on fine days when Hartley was supinely asleep on the quarterdeck, this involved the placing of bets on which of his four paws would next spasm and shoot skywards. All the more enjoyable for its infrequency, the game would provide hours of tension and fun, for if Hartley awoke and saw us all gathered around him, he would simply shake himself and settle down in a new spot a few yards away. Only after several rude awakenings would he suspect something was amiss, and then he would growl at us, make his way back to his master’s cabin, and scratch on the door for admittance.

  And sometimes he would have a long wait, for Pete, after the disaster of the first day, was very much the man about the poop deck as the voyage progressed. Many was the time I peeped over the crusty rim of my slopbucket to see him up there on stage, waving a telescope about as though he knew what he was doing, or chatting familiarly with his superior officers. For some reason all seemed to have forgiven him for his moment of weakness, and I was glad of it for Pete’s sake. Not wanting to jeopardize his rehabilitation, I tried to keep my distance from him as much as possible. I was also wary of intimacy in case I let slip some faux pas which would result in a promotion-seeking whipping after all. So, on the occasions I was secretly summoned to his cabin to partake of tea and swop Burnley Axelrod anecdotes, I was at such pains to be correct in my behaviour that I was constantly upbraided for being unnecessarily stiffish. Still, I stuck to my punctilio, and vowed to keep fraternization to the bare minimum until we were off the ship; then, being away from those who had witnessed his humiliation, I would revert to more relaxed relations with the powdered wonder, and see what could be done in the mutual backscratching department.

  Amongst those already relaxed with him, if not actually scratching his back, was Anne Pomeroy. Being a woman, she was spared the indignity of the heads and the buckets and allowed the use of Pete’s private jakes, a privilege she took advantage of at all hours. Indeed, had Pete not expresse
d genuine disgust at this arrangement, I might have begun to believe the incredible rumour that he was in fact swiving her.

  ‘No, of course ‘tis not true,’ he confided to me on one occasion. ‘The very thought of it turns my stomach. But I’ll tell you this, Harry…’ He leaned in close to whisper to me, ‘…my fellow officers think that it is true, and my reputation has shot up accordingly. Much as I try to disabuse them of the notion, they simply will not believe me; they wilfully misinterpret my protestations of innocence as gentlemanly modesty. As a consequence I am lionized amongst them, and already I have been invited to several parties in New York. In short, I have become a pocket Don Juan, and find myself consulted in all matters of sexual mores. Why, even Captain Dobermann wants to know my secret.’

  ‘You do not think they are simply making fun of you?’

  ‘I do not think so, Harry. But even if they are, what does it matter when so many doors are being opened for me? Why, at this rate, even Burnley Axelrod will be hearing of me.’ The hallowed name brought a new light into Pete’s eyes, and I was plied with more tea. ‘Now, Harry, tell me again, what exactly did Burnley say about the brevity of life?’

  Puritanical at heart, despite my best endeavours, I was worried about Pete’s initiation into the corrupt adult world. I did not like to think he was being made a fool of, and I did not like his hero-worship of Burnley Axelrod, knowing only too well the dangers of it; but what could one do? Warning him would only make him hate me, and I could not antagonize someone who had the power to have me stroked. Equally I was not happy about the defilement of Anne’s reputation. From dour wife to Jezebel was a long drop, and it struck me as ironic that in the act of protecting her modesty, she had lost it. Once again, however, worrying was otiose, for after an initial period of embarrassment when the slander became known even amongst the ranks, neither Anne nor her husband seemed unduly perturbed. On the contrary, they appeared to revel in the notoriety, and went around with the smug glow of celebrities. Anne adapted to her role of hardened Jezebel, and continued her use of Pete’s lavatory, while Thomas beamed pride at the stories of his wife’s infidelity, for it proved that she was desirable after all, and to a young officer to boot. This was good to watch, and it made me envy the solidarity of a marriage that could withstand outside attacks in such a manner. Even Young Pomeroy added his twig to the wattle by hiding in his mother’s petticoats, and sticking his tongue out at smirkers.