Kydd

by Julian Stockwin

  A ship’s boy led the way up the ladder for several of the group who had mess numbers on the lower gundeck. It was deserted, and at a point where the bows began their curve in, forward on the starboard side, Kydd took a long hard look at the place that would be his home in his new life.

  It was the space between two monster long guns, now with their fat muzzles lashed upward against the ship’s side. As he had seen the previous night, there was a table that could be lowered, revealing neat racks for the mess traps — wooden plates, pewter cutlery and bowls. Selfconsciously Kydd added his new canvas ditty bag to the others hanging up along the ship’s side. Each bag had an access hole halfway up the side, which was a practical means of keeping clothing and personal effects ready for use. Even in the dimness the impression he had was of extreme neatness and order, a Spartan blend of lived-in domesticity and uncompromising dedication to war. The whole purpose of the ship’s existence was as an engine of destruction to be aimed at the mortal enemies of his country.

  He emerged warily on deck to slate-colored skies and fretful seas. The sails were braced round at an angle to the northerly, and there away to starboard, from where the wind blew, was a mottled coastline, all in greens and nondescript browns. There was no way of telling where this was. To Kydd it might be England or a hostile foreign shore. It was entirely different from what he could remember of the rolling greensward of the North Downs.

  “Damn you, sir! Do you think this is a cruise, that you are a passenger on my fo’c’sle?”

  Kydd had not noticed the officer standing among the men at the foot of the foremast. In confusion he faced him and attempted to address him.

  “Respects to the officer when you speaks to him, lad,” a petty officer said testily.

  Kydd hesitated.

  Exasperated, the petty officer said more forcefully, “You salutes him, you lubber.” Seeing Kydd’s continued puzzlement, he knuckled his forehead in an exaggerated way. “Like this, see.”

  Kydd complied — it was no different from when he had to address the squire at home. “Kydd, sir, first part of starboard watch.”

  “Never mind your watch, what part-of-ship are you?” the officer asked tartly.

  The question left Kydd at a loss. He saw the great bowsprit with its rearing headsails soaring out over the sea ahead. “Th’ front part, sir?”

  The men broke into open laughter and the officer’s eyes glittered dangerously. Kydd’s face burned.

  A petty officer took his paper. “Ah, he’s afterguard, sir, new joined.”

  “Then he’d better explain to Mr. Tewsley at the forebrace bitts why he is absent when parts-of-ship for exercise has been piped!” The officer turned his back and inspected the clouds of sail above.

  “Get cracking, son!” the petty officer snapped. “You’ll find ’em just abaft the mainmast — that’s the big stick in the middle.”

  Kydd balled his fists as he set off in the direction indicated. He had not been treated like this since he was a child.

  Around the mainmast there were scores of men, each in defined groups. They were all still, and tension hung in the air. A group of officers stood together in the center, so he approached the most ornate and saluted. “Kydd, first part of starboard watch, and afterguard,” he reported.

  The officer’s eyebrows rose in haughty astonishment, and he looked sideways in interrogation at the young officer at his side.

  “One of the new pressed men, I think, sir,” the officer replied, and turned to Kydd. “Report to Mr. Tewsley at the forebrace bitts — over there,” he added, pointing impatiently to the square frame at the base of the massive mainmast. Kydd did so, feeling every eye on him.

  “Thank you, Kydd,” a lined, middle-aged lieutenant replied, looking at Kydd’s paper. “Bowyer, your mess,” he told a seaman with iron-gray hair, standing near the maze of belayed ropes hanging from their pins at the square framing of the bitts.

  “Aye, sir,” the man replied. “Over here, mate. Jus’ do what I tells you to, when I does,” he muttered. The group of officers in the center of the deck conferred, the rest of the ship waiting.

  Bowyer leaned forward. “That was the Cap’n you spoke to, cully. Don’t you do that again, ’less you’ve got special reason.”

  The discussion among the officers grew heated in the inactivity, the Captain standing passive.

  Bowyer looked curiously at Kydd and said in a low voice, “’Oo are you, then?”

  “It’s Tom — Thomas Kydd, who was o’ Guildford.”

  “Joe Bowyer — an’ keep it quiet, lad,” Bowyer said, from the corner of his mouth. “It’s always ‘silence fore ’n’ aft’ when we’re handling sail for exercise.” He snatched a glance aft. “Jus’ that we’ve done a dog’s breakfast of the sail drill, and someone ’as to catch it in the neck,” he muttered, his voice oddly soft for a long-service seaman.

  Kydd noticed the petty officer closest to Tewsley: his face was set and hard as he watched the officers and in his fist was a coiled rope’s end. Kydd stood with the others, unsure even where to put his hands, but the confidence in Bowyer’s open face was reassuring.

  Tewsley had the calmness of age, but he also kept his eyes fixed on the group on the quarterdeck.

  The Captain turned on his heel and took position before the man at the wheel. He looked up once at the maze of sails and cordage, then down to the teams of waiting men. “Hands to make sail,” he ordered. His voice came thinly, even with the speaking trumpet.

  “Sod it!” Bowyer’s curse made Kydd jump. “Captain’s taking over.” Kydd puzzled at the paradox. “Th’ Captain shouldn’t take charge?” he asked.

  Bowyer frowned. He gave a furtive look aft and replied gravely, “’Cos he’s not what you might call a real man-o’-war’s man — got his step through arse-lickin’ in Parliament or some such.” He sucked his teeth. “Don’t trust him in sailorin’, yer might say.”

  The Captain raised his speaking trumpet again. “Stations to set main topsail.”

  Lifting his voice, Tewsley called, “Captain of the quarterdeck!”

  Kydd looked about in surprise, expecting another gold-laced officer. Instead the hard-faced petty officer came forward.

  “Carry on, Elkins.”

  The petty officer rounded on his men. “Youse — double up on the weather buntlines, and you lot t’ the clewlines.” To Bowyer he ordered tersely, “Lee clewlines.”

  Elkins moved to the bitts at the base of the mast from which hung masses of ropes, and Kydd noticed that there were openings in the deck on each side down which ropes passed to the deck below. “Stand by topsail sheets, you waisters!” Elkins bellowed.

  Bowyer crossed quickly to the row of belaying pins at the ship’s side, just where the shrouds of the mainmast reached the bulwarks — the men already there moved to make room for him.

  As much to them as to Kydd he said, “Now, Kydd, when I casts loose, you tails on to the line with the rest o’ them land toggies.”

  The tension was almost palpable. Most of the ordinary sailors Kydd could see around him were clearly not of the first order, and he guessed that they were stationed here because they could be brought more under eye from the quarterdeck. All were uneasy and watchful.

  The man at the wheel now had a second assisting him in the freshening wind, and the ship showed a more lively response to the hurrying seas.

  The Captain brought out a large gold watch and consulted it ostentatiously. “I shall want to see topsails set and sheeted home at least a minute faster. If this is not achieved” — he glanced about him — “then hands will not be piped to dinner until it is.”

  At Bowyer’s snort, Kydd turned. “He means no grog until he gets ’is times,” he growled.

  “Stand by!” A boatswain’s mate placed his call to his lips, eyes on the Captain, who nodded sharply.

  The peal of the call was instantly overlain with shouts from all parts of the deck.

  “Lay aloft and loose topsail!”

  M
en shot past Kydd and into the main shrouds to begin a towering climb to the topmast. Bowyer jumped to the clewline fall and lifted clear the coil of rope, thumping it to the deck behind him. Kydd was shouldered roughly out of the way as the line was handed along until all had seized hold of it. He joined hesitantly at the end. Bowyer expertly undid the turns until one remained, the line of men taking the strain. He looked across in readiness.

  Tewsley was staring hard upward and Kydd followed his gaze. Men had made the ascent up the shrouds to the maintop, and were even now continuing on past and up the topmast shrouds, moving up the ratlines in fast, jerky movements. They reached the topsail yard — an arm waved.

  “Lay out and loose!”

  Kydd was startled by Tewsley’s roar, which seemed too great to have come from his slight frame. In response seamen poured out along the yard on each side and began casting off the gaskets retaining the sail. Watching them moving far above, he felt his palms go clammy at the thought of the height at which they were working, much higher than the top of any building he had ever seen. He stole a glance back at the Captain, who stood impassively, still holding his watch before him.

  The sail began dropping from the yard.

  “Sheets!” Tewsley snapped.

  “Topsail sheets!” roared Elkins, to the deck below, and was answered by an instant rattling of ropes against the mainmast.

  “Clewlines!”

  Bowyer cast off the last turn and the lee topsail clewline swung clear.

  The rough hairiness of the rope felt alien to Kydd, but being at the end of the line, he manfully put all his weight on it — and was immediately pulled off his feet.

  He scrambled up, roundly cursed by those in front.

  From nowhere came the hiss and fiery crack of a rope’s end over his back. The pain caught him by surprise, clamping his chest in a stab of breathlessness. He swung round to see Elkins coiling his rope for a second lash. Instinctively he threw up his arms to shield himself.

  Surprise, then cruel satisfaction passed over Elkins’s face. “Well, damn me eyes! Raise yer ’and to a superior officer, then, you mangy dog!”

  Bowyer threw in his position as first on the line. Racing up behind Kydd, he felled him with a glancing blow to the ear. “No, he wasn’t, Mr. Elkins — he’s a iggerant lubber who doesn’t know ’is ropes yet.” Panting and staring at Kydd rather than Elkins, he continued, “Give ’im a chance to learn — only bin aboard a dog-watch.”

  Ears ringing, Kydd staggered to his feet.

  “Silence!” Tewsley strode over, his face red with anger. “Take charge properly, Elkins, or I’ll have you turned before the mast this instant.”

  Elkins wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, his eyes following Tewsley. “Ease away clewlines.”

  Taking up position in front of Kydd, Bowyer threw over his shoulder, “Sorry fer that. See, yer heaves on the sheets, but when settin’ sail you overhauls the clewlines ’n’ buntlines — let it out, mate,” he said, tugging at the line to let it go forward.

  Kydd did as he was told, too stunned by events to question anything.

  “Handsomely!” Tewsley growled, as the rope surged.

  On the main yard, at the weather tip, a man sat astride the yardarm, his feet in the “Flemish horse” footrope at the end, his task to keep the loose line of the sheet fed into the sheave at the best angle as the sail was sheeted home.

  Querulous, the Captain called across, “Get your men to work, Mr. Tewsley-they seem to have gone to sleep!”

  “Er — sir, we —” began Tewsley, in astonishment.

  The men at the clewlines and buntlines didn’t hesitate: unskilled as they were, and under the Captain’s eye, they lost no time in paying out the line faster and faster.

  “Avast there,” roared Tewsley, but it was too late. At the topsail, the clewline dropping the corner of the sail had been slackened faster than the sheet pulling from beneath could keep up. Instead of a controlled glide to the yardarm, the topsail was now free to flog itself about in sweeping lashes. The topsail sheetman at the end of the yard ducked and parried, but there was nowhere to hide. The cluster of three massive blocks at the lower corner of the topsail, now a plaything of the hundred-foot expanse of sail, bounced the man off the yard. He fell in a wide arc outward and into the sea, his piercing shriek of despair paralyzing Kydd until it was cut off by the sea.

  Kydd rushed to the side and saw the man, buffeted by the side wake of the ship, quickly sliding astern and away into the gray seas. The man’s arm raised briefly to show he had survived the fall and Kydd turned to see what would be done. The Captain, however, did not move, frozen in a stare forward.

  “Sir!” the young officer of the watch entreated. It was not clear whether the Captain had indeed taken over the deck. “Sir, do we go about?”

  The Captain stood as though in a trance.

  Tewsley threw himself toward the wheel and roared, “Down helm — hard! Get that hatch grating overside. Let go lee main braces, main tack and sheet!” Spinning on his heels, he bawled forward, “Flow head sheets — clear away the lee cutter!” Ponderously the ship’s head fell away from the wind. Tewsley paused and looked toward the Captain, who showed no apparent recognition. “Main clewgarnets and buntlines — up mainsail!”

  The great mainsail spilled its wind and began to be gathered up to the yard.

  Glancing aft to the far-off tiny dot in the sea, Tewsley snapped, “Brace aback — heave to!” The effect of the backed sails balancing those normally set allowed the vessel to come to a stop, drifting slowly downwind. Touching his hat, Tewsley reported to the Captain, “Ship heaving to, sir. Larboard cutter on yard and stay tackles for launching.”

  The Captain’s eyes seemed to focus slowly. “That is well, Mr. Tewsley, but I was looking to Mr. Lockwood to act in this matter.” He stepped over to the poop deck ladder, touching it as though curious, and nodded to the young officer of the watch. “Carry on, Mr. Lockwood,” he said, almost without interest.

  From his place Kydd saw the boat hoisted from its chocks and lowered overside. It was a complex process and took far more men to achieve than the size of the boat seemed to suggest would be needed. He joined the crowd at the ship’s side to watch.

  It was too distant to see what was happening, and many opinions were expressed, but eventually when the boat drew near again, the chatter died away at the sight of a canvas-covered form lying along the thwarts between the rowers.

  The bowman stood in the foresheets and neatly hooked the mizzen chains. The boat lay bobbing alongside, oars tossed vertically. The coxswain stood and cupped his hands. “’E’s dead!” he shouted.

  Kydd tailed on to the yardarm whip that hoisted the dead man inboard, secured to the grating. The surgeon, a lugubrious man in rumpled black, pushed through the throng and bent over the still form. “Broken bones and morbid cold — there was never any question.” He did not look up.

  * * *

  The two bells remaining of the exercise time went slowly for Kydd. The sailor’s sudden transition from hero of a lofty world to dead clay was much to take in. His experiences of death previously had been like Old Uncle Peel in a huddle on the high street, and the solemnity of the succeeding funeral. He pulled himself together. There was nothing he could do for the man.

  At eight bells — midday — the peal of the boatswain’s calls ended their drill. The Captain evidently did not wish to press the point about times. “Hands to dinner!”

  Bowyer turned to him and said sourly, “Let’s get below. I’ve a need to get outside a grog or two after this.”

  Grateful for his invitation, Kydd followed him down the fore hatch-way, arriving in the now familiar gloom of the lower gundeck. It was alive with talk, and the tone of the voices and glaring eyes left him with no doubt about the subject.

  They thrust past to reach their mess, which Kydd noticed was conveniently not far from the hatchway, just at the point where the round of the bows straightened into the long sweep aft. He
thought to count the number of guns from forward. His mess lay between the third and fourth guns. It was already nearly full and now he would be meeting his messmates. What would they make of an unwilling outsider like himself, who knew not the first thing about their strange, dangerous world?

  Bowyer grabbed the lanthorn that hung above the table and held it up next to Kydd’s face. “Listen, you bilge rats,” he said against the din, “this here’s Tom Kydd, pressed man o’ Guildford, an’ he’s our new messmate.”

  There was a hush, and Kydd watched the faces turn toward him, varying in expression from frank curiosity to blank disinterest. “Pleased to meet you,” he said, in as neutral a tone as he could manage.

  A scornful “Pleased ter meecher!” came from a sharp-faced man on one side. “We don’t have that sorta talk here, cully.”

  “Stow it, Howell,” Bowyer said shortly. “Don’t you pay no mind to ’im, the old snarley-yow. He is — or was, I should say — a merchant jack and pressed same as you, ’cept he’s makin’ more noise about it.”

  Next to Howell a pleasant-faced lad stood up and leaned over to offer his hand. “Dick Whaley, pressed outa the Maid o’ Whitby, same as Jonas here.” Kydd took the hand gratefully.

  Howell snorted. “What he’s not sayin’ is that I was bo’sun aboard while he was afore the mast — and don’t he forget it!”

  Whaley laughed. “And here we’re a pair of foremast jacks both. At least we’ve a chance fer some prize money. In the old Maid we was just floggin’ up and down the coast with a belly full of sea-coal, and never the sight of a frolic.”

  “Let him sit, Joe.” At the ship’s side was a considerably older seaman, nearly covered with faded tattoos. His mild, seamed face gazed steadily at Kydd.

  Bowyer thumbed at the old sailor. “That’s Samuel Claggett, fo’c’sle-man to the quality. Been aboard since the last age, so we ’as to keep ’im in humor.”

  While Kydd found his place at the end of the bench the conversations took up again. Diffident, he said nothing and tried to listen to the others. His eyes slid to the men opposite and were caught, to his astonishment, by the glittering black orbs of a Chinaman, the first he had ever seen. The man sat without speaking, his shaven head reflecting the lanthorn glow. Bowyer noticed Kydd’s start of surprise and said, “Say ‘how’ to Wong, then.”