pacing around the walkway.
He was totally unprepared for the sudden attack. An iron-hard pair of hands gripped him by the throat and dragged him choking and helpless across the deck to the gratings of the main hatch. “Shall I croak ’im?” his attacker whispered hoarsely. Kydd was forced to his knees.
“Wait – we’ll find out what he knows first,” returned an urgent whisper.
A tiny light, a purser’s glim – a reed in an iron saucer burning rancid fat – was uncovered, and in its sputtering light Stallard’s face appeared, devilish and delighted. “Well, if it ain’t me old royster, Tom Kydd.” There was just enough luminosity to reveal about half a dozen other figures among the shadows.
The pressure on his throat eased and he dropped to the deck, heaving burning breaths in spasms. A hand grabbed his hair and forced his head back. “Just we needs to know why you’re creepin’ around down here, Kydd. Stands to reason you’re not here for the sake of yer health,” Stallard said.
Kydd gulped air and tried to order his thoughts against the roaring in his ears and the savage adrenaline rush. “Couldn’t sleep – needed to -”
His hair was jerked savagely back, and a meaty hand gripped his throat. “You gull us ’n’ you’re shark bait, matey.”
“No – he’s square, I know him from a-ways back.” Stallard’s look became speculative. “See, me ’n’ me friends here don’t think it right we should have to go out to sea in this leaky old boat and drown like rats, so we’re goin’ to take action.” He looked around for confirmation, which he got. “The committee has to meet here, ’cos you know why, and we voted we stand for our rights as human beings, not poxy slaves.
“We’re now goin’ to organize the whole crew, and when those fuckin’ whistles blow to force us to sea, we’re just goin’ to refuse to sail.”
Kydd’s reply was left unsaid at the sight of Stallard’s wolfish grin.
“And that means we ain’t a-goin’ anywhere! Like to see their faces when we stands up for the first time and demands our rights. Fair stonkered, they’ll be! They can’t do a bloody thing if we’re all together in this.” He nudged Kydd. “And that’s why we wants to know where you stand in all this, me old mate.”
Kydd said nothing.
“Don’t forget, Kydd, you make a noise, someone finds us, you’ll be seen right here with us all, so you may as well come in now and do somethin’ useful.” Stallard rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “Yeah – for some reason, people like you, they’ll listen to what yer say, and we’re gonna need leaders when we makes our stand.” He stood up. “We starts work tomorrow, Tom, ’n’ first meeting at the tables at noon. See you then, mate.” Stallard held out his hand, and Kydd knew that if he didn’t take it he would never leave the orlop alive.
In the blackness he couldn’t find his way back to his hammock. Not that sleep was possible – his mind was racing. He crawled over to the side of the ship and sat with his back to the hull and his head in his hands. There would only be one end to such madness: mutiny in the Navy could never be allowed to succeed, whatever the provocation – even he could see that. According to a local penny broadsheet, even after four years they were still ranging the Great South Sea for the remaining mutineers of the
His thoughts rushed on. Supposing he were to warn the quarterdeck right now? He would not be believed without evidence, and in any event his very being rebelled against betrayal. Should he wake Bowyer and ask him what to do? Easier said than done – all he knew was that Bowyer slung his hammock with the mizzen topmen, and they were lost somewhere in this vast city afloat.
Restlessly Kydd eased his aching limbs. The deep groans and creaks seemed to take on disturbing meaning in the claustrophobic dark. Perhaps Stallard was right: if the ship was a deathtrap, then indeed they had a case. The newspapers always seemed to carry reports of ships lost at sea for unknown reasons; it was easy to think of one now. But Stallard was a hothead, fomenting trouble to satisfy his craving for cheap adulation; he had no real idea of the consequences of his actions. This situation was different: there was nowhere to hide afterward and it was most certainly a hanging matter.
Time dragged on and Kydd began to feel drowsy. He would leave decisions to the morning, after he had spoken to Bowyer.
He was drifting off, hardly noticing the bumps and thuds on the hull, when he was jerked awake by the urgent squeal of boatswains’ calls and pandemonium everywhere. “
There was groaning, curses and lanthorns waving about in the gloom. Kydd was jostled violently in the confusion. He tried to make sense of what was going on, and grabbed the arm of a boatswain’s mate.
“Haven’t you heard, mate? Captain’s returned aboard sudden-like, and it’s the French – they’re out! The Frogs are at sea!”
“What the stinkin’ hell are yer doin’ still here?” Elkins pulled Kydd round to face him. “Yer station for unmoorin’ ship is the main sheets – geddup there!” He knocked Kydd away from him and stormed about in the chaos, looking for the men of his division.
It was bedlam on the night-black lower deck, its hellish gloom lit fitfully by lanthorns – a struggling mass of men, white eyes rolling in the shadows, the occasional gleam of equipment. Kydd’s heart thudded. In a matter of hours he might be fighting for his life out there, somewhere. His mind flooded with images in which he could see himself cut down by maddened Frenchmen as they swarmed aboard after a fierce battle. He gulped and mounted the ladders for the upper deck.
On deck, the darkness was lifting, slowly, reluctantly. A dank, cold dawn began the day.
The decks themselves were unrecognizable – braces, sheets and halliards were off their belaying pins and led out along the decks for easy running. The upper yards were alive with men. Urgent shouts shattered the dawn.
Along the somber line of warships there was a similar bustle and lights began to appear all along the shore.
Bowyer was already there, but did not answer Kydd’s greeting, shoving a rope into his hand. “Clap on ter that and don’t move from there.”
The landmen were pushed into place, their slow incomprehension maddening the petty officers, who used their starters liberally on backs and shoulders, while the seamen moved far above them – on the tops, out along the yards and to the end of the jibboom.
The pace slowed, and Kydd saw a coalescing of groups about the officers. Tewsley paced deliberately, accompanied by Elkins, whose face wore a look of dedicated ferocity.
“
One by one, the massive lower yards were altered from their perfect cross-ship position to a starboard- farthest-forward angle, the better to catch the cold, steady breeze from the northwest.
On the fo’c’sle Kydd could see the men crowded around the anchor tackle, although he could not see what they were about. He knew that deep below him at that moment the capstan would be manned by every hand left over from duties on deck, and he was grateful to have his work out in the open.
The bustle subsided, and Kydd ventured a glance at Bowyer. He was looking up to the men waiting on the yards, and sniffing about for the precise direction of the wind.
He noticed Kydd and said quietly, “Easy enough – she’ll cast under topsails to larb’d, ’n’ then out going large. He shouldn’t have anythin’ to worry of.”
Bowyer was subdued; Kydd realized that he was probably thinking of the woman he was leaving. “Joe, d’you think there’ll be a battle?”
“Mebbe, and then again mebbe not. Who knows?” Bowyer looked away, and down to the rope he held. He let it drop and walked to the side of the ship facing Portsmouth and did something with a coiled line. There seemed no point in following.
“Grapple that buoy, damn it!” came faintly from forward, followed by a triumphant, “Man the cat! Walk away with it, you lead bellies!”
From the quarterdeck echoed a booming shout. “Make sail there! Lead along topsail sheets and halliards. Lay out and loose!”
Kydd saw sail suddenly blossom from the topsail yards. The men on deck worked furiously at the tacks and
