about three days from 'ere, and after that, I will takes us out onto th' Grume. We then turn left, and travel east to 'igh Vesting. All up ye'll be with us for a little under a week.'
He looked sidelong at Rossamund. 'Been on a cromster before, lad? 'Cause, if ye like, when we is well clear of th' morning's fog, I can show ye about th' 'umble dimensions of me own vessel.'
Despite his strong stink and his original gruffness, Rivermaster Poundinch now seemed a very friendly fellow, as pleasant as Rossamund could have hoped for.
'Aye, a few times, sir,' he answered, 'though I've not actually been on many craft, sir.'
Of all the fascinating things about watergoing craft, Rossamund was fascinated by gastrines. These were large boxes in the bowels of ironclads housing great muscles that turned the vessel's screw-or propeller-and their limbers, which were much smaller versions of a gastrine that were used to warm up the greater. Without limbers the muscles of a gastrine would soon tear and bruise and seize up. 'Could I see the gastrines, sir? I've been told they have to be mucked out every hour or they get sick.'
'An' who told ye that?'
Rossamund's chin lifted as he answered proudly, 'Dormitory Master and Ex-Gunner Fransitart, one of the masters of the marine society.' Rossamund liked to use his dormitory master's full title, but he almost never had an opportunity.
'Frans'tart, eh…?' Poundinch frowned long and plucked at some rogue hairs on his patchily shaven chin. 'I reckon I remember 'im-a terrerfyin' fellow, if me memory serves. Knew 'ow to get us to shoot straight, that's fer sure! Well, ye were told rightly, m'lad, an' I'd expect no less from Frans'tart.'
'You knew Master Fransitart?' Rossamund was agog at this. 'What was he like? Did you serve at the Battle of the Mole with him?'
'Aye, aye.' Poundinch chuckled. 'Only briefly, not nearly so long to know 'im well, but long enough to get a feel for 'im-and th' switch of 'is rod…' He muttered this last bit into his neckerchief, but the foundling heard it anyway.
'Didn't you like him, sir?'
'Aye! Oh, aye! Ol' Poundy likes ever-ry-one. I find it's mores a matter of who likes ol' Poundy. Frans'tart was as fine a petty officer as a navy or th' ladies could ev'r want!'
Ladies! Rossamund had sometimes wondered if there had ever been a Goodlady Fransitart. 'Was he married, sir?'
Poundinch guffawed. 'Oh ho! No, there was no wife that I knew of. He weren't like th' marryin' kind to me. Now that's enough on 'im, lad. Let me con-cerntrate on th' steerin' for a bit, an' then we'll take ye to 'ave a peep at them there gastrines.'
Remaining by the rivermaster, Rossamund tried to imagine Fransitart plying his old trade with noble vigor and cavorting with the refined ladies of lofty and fashionable courts. How strange it would have been to see him pacing the decks of some great ram bawling orders stoutly amid the smoke and terror of a sea battle. The kind of sea battle Rossamund was never to get a chance to see. He had his new trade, far inland. He thought again about Sebastipole's too-brief instructions.
'Rivermaster Poundinch?'
'Aye, lad?' Poundinch looked down at him.
'Would you know where the'-Rossamund frowned as he read aloud from the instructions-'the 'offices of the Chief Harbor Governor' are?'
'Er… I gather ye're meaning in 'igh Vesting?'
'Aye, sir.'
'Well, most cert'nly, I do. Need to be shown to 'em, when we get there, do ye? Ol' Poundy can do that for ye in a trice!'
Gratified and relieved, Rossamund doffed his hat and bowed to the rivermaster-as he had seen men in the streets do-and said earnestly, 'I am most obliged to you, sir.'
Poundinch burst with powerful laughter, sweeping off his own hat and returning the formality. 'Why, 'tain't nothin', me good sir.'
The Hogshead proved more solid than she had first appeared, pushing sturdily through many of the submerged snags that hindered their progress. Rossamund was informed that the fifty-odd crew slept on the upper deck-right down the middle of the vessel, between the guns-and, as there was no room in the hold, he would be expected to do the same. He did not mind, for the hold was more cramped than the marine society and stunk horribly of pigs, sweat and other worse unnameable things. There were no cabins upon the flat, flush upper deck except for the hold-way about halfway down the vessel, a low boxlike structure with doors which opened onto the ladder that descended into the hold. There were also the twelve bull-black twelve-pounder cannon in staggered rows down either side and taking up a goodly amount of room. Six cannon were in a line on the steerboard or right side and six down the ladeboard or left side of the vessel. Rossamund admired them.
Despite his anxieties, he found that he was actually excited to be on his first real voyage-the movement of the cromster in the water, the bustle of activity and the routine of the watches, the silent throbbing of the gastrines. The Hogshead was no oceangoing ironclad, yet it was much more thrilling than the small craft on which Rossamund had made day trips in the past.
In map-reading classes back at the foundlingery, he had been taught about the oceans-the vinegar seas. He had been taught that they were a rainbow of different colors: reds, greens, azures, yellows, and black-shown on the charts as the Pontus Nubia. These lessons made him long to see the sea, and now that he was almost upon such waters, he sorely regretted that an oceangoing life was not to be his.
By the third bell of the middle watch the fog had lifted sufficiently for Poundinch to trust the course of the Hogshead to Mister Pike and make good on his offer to show Rossamund the gastrines. The ladder creaked frighteningly as the rivermaster led him down into the hold. It was painfully cramped below deck. Poundinch stooped low and even lower to pass beneath the beams. The stench of the place made Rossamund's eyes water. He never thought anything could be so putrid, so foul. He was determined to make a brave showing, however, and pressed on. The rivermaster did not seem to mind, or even notice.
Poundinch waved vaguely to the forward parts, where the barrels were lashed and obscured with canvas tarpaulins. 'No need to be showin' ye that, just filthy ol' swine's lard. It's aft ye wants to be-follow me, lad, and see all th' wonder of this beauty's gastrines.'
Rossamund followed and there they were-the gastrines. His sense of disappointment was much the same as when he had spied Sebastipole's sthenicon box. As that device was just a small ordinary box, so these gastrines were just very large, ordinary wooden boxes bound with copper-but at least these were big. They almost reached the planking of the deck above. Running down either side of them were much smaller boxes of hardwood, two on each side for each gastrine. These were the limbers. From the top of each rose great cranks and several many- jointed shafts that pivoted perpendicularly and entered the side of the gastrines. They were still now, the limbers not being in use. With such a crowd of machinery there was barely enough room to press along the grimy, curving inner walls of the hold to pass. Rossamund was amazed at the sturdy pulsating of the muscles within the gastrines; he could sense it in the air all about as they squeezed past, feel it powerfully in the planks and beams beneath his feet and at his back. What surprised him most was the warmth that came from the great brass-bound boxes, a sickly heat which made the rotten air of the hold thick and clinging. In a cramped space at the stern they met a wizened man in an apron surrounded by a complicated array of levers, his long, thin white hair dripping in the humidity. He looked up at the rivermaster with a silent, surly question in his eyes. Poundinch introduced him to Rossamund as Mister Shunt the gastrineer. It was the gastrineer's task to feed, muck out and care for the gastrines, make sure they were always limbered properly and keep them in good health. He ranked highly in a vessel's crew.
'Hello, Mister Shunt, sir,' said the foundling.
Shunt the gastrineer ignored him.
'Well, there ye are.' Poundinch patted the nearest box. 'These be gastrines. Not much to look at, eh? But a powerful sight more constant than a sailing vessel, and no mistake. I'll leave ye with dear ol' Shunty 'ere, so's he can talk technicalities with ye. Come straight up when ye're done, mind-no dalliancing about down 'ere.'
The rivermaster retreated.
Rossamund carefully pressed a hand against a gastrine. It was most certainly hot, like the brow of someone in a fever. The mighty throbbing of the muscles working within transmitted up his arm, and he felt his whole body
