truck.
It was the work of moments to heave himself up and past the cap - and then he was standing erect on the bird-slimed truck, trembling with fatigue and exhilaration and holding the lightning rod in a death grip. He flung up an arm to indicate his position, but before starting his descent he snatched a look at the panorama. Every part of the vessel was now at a level below him, decks, masts, sails. Not a single thing intruded to spoil the totality of his three-hundred-and-sixty-degree view.
Carefully lowering himself back down the mast, he slid the few feet down to the royal backstay. Transferring his grip from mast to stay he soared hand over hand down the backstay to the deck again.
'I do confess I am at a stand. It's no parcel of lubberly landmen we have here, Mr Spershott,' Powlett said to the lean officer next to him.
It took a moment or two for Kydd to realise why the mess deck was so different. There were the same mess tables and ship's side racks for cutlery and mess traps, but here there were no massive cannon regularly spaced along the sides. Aboard the battleship Kydd was used to having his living space between a pair of massive thirty- two-pounder long guns, sharing his domestics with the smoke and blast of broadsides, but here there was only a single function.
It was noon and the berth deck was alive with gossip and laughter after the issue of grog. A ship's boy had shown them to their new mess, half the party to a starboard mess, the other to larboard. They stood awkwardly.
'Hear tell they's promising ter send us some real man-o'-war hands,' said a thin-looking older man at the ship's side. Kydd knew enough about unwritten mess etiquette to realise that this was the senior hand of the mess. Like the others, he deliberately chose not to notice the newcomers.
A handsome, well-groomed sailor replied, 'As long as they're not ship-of-the-line jacks is all I asks. Them big- ship ways — no room fer marching up an' down in this little barky.'
The older man snorted. 'Nor all that there flags an' buntin' all th' time. An' yer've gotta be slow in th' wits to be big ships, else yer intellects rot, waitin' while the ship wants ter tack about.'
'Has t' be a big ship,' came back the other, 'all them pressed men - why, they has to batten 'em down when they makes port, else they'll think to ramble off home, like.'
The older man started, as though seeing the arrivals for the first time. 'Well, look who it ain't. A parcel o'
Self-consciously Kydd edged over and sat next to a neat, slightly built sailor who held out his hand with a pleasant smile. 'Guess we have t' take ye aboard, we being grievous short-handed 'n' all!' he said. 'Adam - Nathan Adam.'
'Kydd, Tom Kydd.' He flushed with pleasure, quite unconscious of the striking figure of a seaman he now made. His dark, strong features were well set off by the short blue jacket, white duck trousers, and a red kerchief knotted carelessly over a blue striped waistcoat. His ebony hair gleamed in a tight clubbed pigtail, his tanned, open face bore a broad white smile.
Sliding in easily next to Kydd, Renzi sat opposite. Curious looks met his from around the table, for he was most definitely at variance with the usual man-o'-war's man with his careful, intelligent dark eyes and a face with incised lines of character suggesting dangerous mystery. Renzi's black hair, short to the point of monasticism, also hinted at an inner discipline quite unlike the carefree sailor's.
He was next to a well-muscled black man, who turned to greet him. 'Never bin in a ship-o'-the-line, meself,' he said. 'Guess there's plenty more room in them big ships.'
'Know where I'd rather be,' Kydd said.
The senior hand interrupted. 'Got yer traps?' Kydd fished around in his ditty bag and drew out his tankard, an old brass-strapped wooden one that had once belonged to a close shipmate, now dead.
'Me apologies about the blackstrap,' the man said, upending a bottle into the tankard. 'Cap'n thinks to give us this'n instead o' the right sort.' He shrugged. 'Took a thousan' off a Frenchy last week.'
Renzi's eyes widened. He picked up the bottle eagerly and stared at the label. 'My God!' he said. 'Haut Brion,
'Hey, now, yer mate likes our grog, then,' the black man said happily.
The senior hand banged on the table with his grog can, a little of the rich dark wine spilling. Mature and lined, with an oddly soft voice, he announced, 'We has new chums, mates.' The others paid attention. 'Name's Petit, Elias Petit, 'n' yer already knows Nathan. Yon hulkin' blackamoor — we call 'im Quashee, 'n' if yer wants ter raise a right decent sea-pie, he's yer man.'
Kydd nodded. 'Tom Kydd, an' Nicholas Renzi,' he said, gesturing towards Renzi. He noticed the curiosity that Renzi's manner had evoked, but continued, 'and Pinto, er—'
'Fernando da Mesouta Pinto, your service,' the wall-faced Iberian added smoothly.
'Pinto is a Portugee,' Kydd said, 'and Nicholas is my particular friend,' he concluded firmly.
A thatch-haired lad brought up two kids of food and thumped them on the table.
'Thank 'ee, Luke,' Petit said. The lad up-ended a wooden tub to sit on and looked at the newcomers with the frankness of youth. Petit lifted the lid of one wooden container. 'Tis poor stuff only/ he announced defensively, and began doling out the food.
Kydd could hardly believe his eyes. Real china plates instead of squares of dark wood, a pewter spoon and even a fork. And the food! The oatmeal was not only seasoned with herbs but the meat was pig's trotters with collops of real meat — this was a feast.
Petit looked at Kydd curiously. 'So yer likes our scran too,' he said.
Kydd thought of the single galley in the ship-of-the-line serving eight hundred men. You could have anything so long as it could be boiled in the vast coppers. 'Yessir!' he answered. 'We has a saying in
