Heartstone

splashing into the water beside us.

Chapter Thirty-nine

OUR BOATMAN hauled the ladder aboard, then turned to us. 'Climb up, sirs. One at a time, please.'

Leacon grasped the ladder and climbed onto it. He began to ascend. I watched apprehensively as he moved upwards steadily, hand over hand. I started with surprise as, a little above my head, a gun port suddenly swung outwards. There was the sound of squeaking wheels from within, and the mouth of a huge cannon appeared in the gap with a strange, juddering movement. 'That axle needs greasing,' a sharp voice called. The cannon was withdrawn, and the gun-port lid banged shut. I looked up to where Leacon had reached the top of the ladder. Hands reached through the opened blind and he squeezed through the narrow gap.

'Now you, sir,' the boatman said. I took a deep breath, grasped the rungs, and climbed up. I did not look down. The gentle bobbing of the boat was disorientating. I reached the blind and hands stretched out to help me through. It was a drop of several feet to the deck, and I stumbled and nearly fell. 'It's a fucking lawyer,' someone said in wonderment.

Leacon took my arm. 'I've asked a sailor to go and look for Master West.'

I looked around. Thick rope netting with a small mesh enclosed the deck, secured to the rail above the blinds and, in the middle, to a wooden central spar seven feet above our heads supported by thick posts running the length of the open weatherdeck. The wide spar formed a walkway above us, running between the two castles; a sailor was padding across in bare feet. I looked up at the twenty-foot-high aftercastle. Two long, ornate bronze cannon projected from it, angled to fire outwards. Two more projected from the forecastle, pointing in the opposite direction.

'What a creation,' I said quietly. I looked along the weatherdeck. It was around forty feet wide and almost as long, dominated by three iron cannon on each side, a dozen feet long and lashed to wheeled carriages. The deck was illuminated by haloes of dim light from tallow candles inside tall horn lanterns. Perhaps sixty sailors sat in little groups between the guns, playing dice or cards; they were barefoot, most with jerkins over their shirts and some with round woolly hats, for there was a cool breeze now. Many were young, though already with weatherbeaten faces. A small mongrel greyhound sat beside one group, avidly watching a game of cards. Some of the sailors looked over at me with cool curiosity, doubtless wondering who I was, their eyes little points of light. One group was talking in what I recognized as Spanish, another sat listening intently to a cleric reading aloud from the Bible: 'Then he arose, and rebuked the winds and the sea; and there was a great calm.' A rancid meaty smell and little wafts of steam rose from some of the hatches with heavy wooden grilles set along the deck.

'First time aboard a warship, sir?' One of the sailors who had helped me aboard had stayed with us, from curiosity perhaps.

'Yes.' I looked up, through the netting, to the fighting top high on the foremast. There the man who had called out our presence stood looking out to sea once more. A small boy was clambering up the rigging, as rapidly as the Queen's monkey in its cage at Hampton Court.

A sailor sitting nearby turned and spoke to me in a heavy, jocular tone. 'Have you come to make them fetch up our dinner, master lawyer?' I noticed that nearly everyone had wooden spoons and empty bowls beside them. 'Our bellies are barking.'

'Let's hope it's edible,' another man grumbled. He was poking something from under his fingernails with a tool from a tiny steel manicure set. He winced as he extracted a large splinter.

'That's enough, Trevithick,' our sailor answered. 'This gentleman's on official business.' He lowered his voice. 'The food's corrupted through lying too long in the barrels, sir. We don't like the smells coming from below. We were supposed to get fresh supplies today but they ain't come.'

'Food is ever the main concern among the soldiers too,' Leacon said. He looked at the barefoot sailors. 'Food and shoes, though you sailors don't seem to worry about those.'

'The soldiers should go barefoot like us, then they wouldn't slip and slide whenever they come on board.'

The Mary Rose moved slightly with the breeze, and I almost stumbled again. On the walkway above me two sailors, carrying a long heavy box between them, barely checked their stride as they walked across. They disappeared through a doorway into the aftercastle. Our sailor, bored with us, moved away.

'I can see why your men were intimidated,' I said quietly to Leacon. 'I've been on ships before, but this —'

He nodded. 'Ay, though I don't doubt their courage in the rush of battle.' I looked up again at the aftercastle. I saw more netting there on the top deck, secured to a central spar, dimly illumined by light from lamps below. Someone up there was strumming a lute, the sound drifting down. Leacon followed my gaze. 'We practised on the aftercastle of the Great Harry today, firing through the blinds on the top deck. It was hard to get a good shot.'

'The sailors seem in a poor humour.'

'They're hard to discipline, they've been dragged together from all over the realm and beyond. Some are privateers.'

I smiled. 'Are you showing your prejudices, George?'

'They didn't mind showing theirs earlier, laughing at my men.'

A thin wiry man in a striped jerkin picked his way towards us; he carried a horn lantern whose light was brighter than the sailors', a good beeswax candle inside. He bowed briefly, then addressed Leacon in a Welsh accent. 'You have business with Master West, Captain?'

'This man does. He needs to speak with him urgently.'

'He's down in the galley with the cook. You'll have to go to him, sir.'

'Very well. Can you take me?'

He looked at me dubiously. 'The galley is down in the hold. Can you manage it?'

I answered sharply, 'I got up on the ship, didn't I?'

'Your robe will suffer, sir. Best take it off.'

Leacon took it. 'I'll wait for you here,' he said. 'But please do not be long.'

I stood in my shirt, shivering slightly. 'Don't worry, sir,' the sailor said. 'It's warm enough where we're going.'

He led the way along the deck to the forecastle. As I followed I tripped beside a group of card players, accidentally sending a tiny dice flying; a man retrieved it with a quick scooping motion. 'I am sorry,' I said. He looked at me with hard hostility.

Just before the aftercastle we reached an open hatch where a wide ladder descended into darkness. The sailor turned to me. 'We go down here.'

'What's your name?'

'Morgan, sir. Now, please follow me down carefully.'

He put his feet on the ladder. I waited till the top of his head disappeared, then began to descend.

I had to feel carefully for the rungs in the semi-darkness, and thanked God the ship was barely stirring. It grew hotter. Water dripped somewhere. At the foot of the ladder there was some light, more lanterns hanging from beams. I saw it was the gundeck. Well over a hundred feet long, it ran below the castles, almost the whole length of the ship. Further down the gundeck some areas were partitioned off into little rooms, the backs of cannon projecting between them. To my surprise there was enough headroom to stand. I looked down at the cannon on their wheeled carriages. The nearest was iron; the one next to it bronze, stamped with a large Tudor rose, a crown above, gleaming with an odd sheen in the lantern light. A harsh smell of powder mixed with the cooking smell; pods of broom and laurel leaves tied against the walls to sweeten the air had little effect.

Men were checking stone and iron gunballs for size against wooden boards with large circular holes, then stacking them carefully inside triangular containers beside each cannon. Two officers looked on: one bearded and middle-aged, a silver whistle round his neck on a silk sash, the other younger. 'This job should have been finished before dark,' the older officer growled. He saw us and stared at me, raising his chin interrogatively. Morgan bowed