finding worn. but clean clothing in her chest. Then she hurried from her cabin down to the master's quarters. If Tippoo had been able to find her chests, then he might be able to find and free her people, the Hottentots and porters who had gone upon the auction block in the firelight.
Mungo's bunk was empty, the vest and bloodstained shirt bundled and thrown into a corner of the cabin, and the bedclothes in disarray. She turned swiftly for the deck, and as she came out into the sunlight she saw that it would be only a temporary respite from the monsoon, for already the thunderclouds were boiling up over the horizon.
She looked about her quickly. Huron lay in the centre of a broad estuary, with mangroves on each bank, and the bar and the open sea was not in sight, though the tide was ebbing, rustling down the ship's hull and leaving the mud flats half exposed.
There were other vessels in the roadstead, mostly big dhow-rigged buggaloos typical of the Arab coastal traders, but there was another fully rigged ship at anchor half a mile further downstream, flying the flag of Brazil at her peak. Even as Robyn paused to watch her, there came the clank of her capstan, and men ran up the ratlines and spread out along her yards. She was getting under way. Then Robyn realized that there was unusual activity all about her. Small boats were plying from the shore to the anchored dhows, and even on Huron's deck there was a huddle of men on the quarter-deck.
Robyn turned towards them, and realized that the tallest of them was Mungo, St. John. His arm was in a sling and he looked drawn and pale, but his expression was forbidding, the dark curved brows drawn together in a frown, and the mouth a thin cruel line as he listened attentively to one of his seamen. So absorbed was he that he did not notice Robyn until she was only a few paces away. Then he swung towards her, and all the questions and demands stayed behind her lips for his voice was harsh. Your coming was an act of God, Doctor Ballantyne, he said. Why do you say that? 'There is a plague in the barracoons, he said. 'Most of the other buyers are cutting their losses, and leaving.'
He glanced downstream to where the Brazilian schooner had set reefed main and jib and was running down towards the bar and the open sea, and there was activity aboard most of the other vessels. But I have over a thousand prime blacks afattening ashore, and I'll be damned if I'll run now. At least, not until I know what it is.'
Robyn stared at him. Her mind was a whirl of doubts and fears. 'Plague' was a layman's word, it covered everything from the Black Death to syphilis, the grand pox, as it was called. I will go ashore immediately, she said, and Mungo St. John nodded. I thought you would say that, he said, 'I will go with you. 'No. ' Her tone brooked no argument. 'You will aggravate that wound, and in your weakened conditionyou will be easy prey to this plague, whatever it is. ' She glanced at Tippoo, and his face split laterally into that broad toadlike grin and he stepped up beside her. By God, ma'am, I've had them all, said Nathaniel, the little pockmarked bosun. 'And none of them killed me yet And he stepped up to her other hand.
Robyn sat in the stern while Tippoo and Nathaniel handled the oars, and as they pulled across the ebb towards the shore the bosun explained what they would find ashore. Each of the traders has his own barracoon built and guarded by his own men, he told Robyn. 'He buys from the Portos as the blackbirds are brought in.'
As Robyn listened to Nathaniel, she realized the answers to questions that had worried her and Zouga.
This was the reason why Pereira had tried so desperately to persuade them not to bring the expedition south of the Zambezi river, and why, when all else had failed, he had attacked it with his armed brigands and the to destroy it. He had been protecting his brother's trade routes and selling area. It was not mere avarice and lust, but a logical attempt to preserve this lucrative enterprise from discovery.
L She went on listening to Nathaniel. -1 'Each trader fattens his wares ashore, like pigs for the market. That way they are stronger for the crossing, and he makes sure that they are healthy and not going to bring sickness aboard with them. There are twenty-three barracoons here, some small ones with twenty blacks or so, belonging to the small traders, right on up to the big ones like Huron's, with a thousand and more prime blackbirds in the cage. We have the slave-decks set up in Huron's hold, and we would have begun taking them aboard any day, but now- Nathaniel shrugged, and spat on the horny calloused palms of each hand in turn, and then plied himself to the oars once more.
Are you a Christian, Nathaniel? ' Robyn asked softly. That I am, ma'am, ' he said proudly. 'As good a Christian as ever sailed out of Martha's Vineyard. 'Do you think God approves of what you are doing here to these poor people? 'Hewers of wood, ma'am, and drawers of water, like the Bible says, the weather-beaten sailor told her, so glibly that she knew that the reply had been put in his mouth, and she guessed by whom.
Once they were ashore, Tippoo led the small party with Robyn in the centre and Nathaniel carrying her chest in the rear.
Captain Mungo St. John had chosen the best site available for his barracoon, on a rise of ground at a distance from the river. The sheds were well built, with floors of sawn timber raised above the mud and good roofs thatched with palmetto leaves.
Huron's guards had not deserted, proof of the discipline which Mungo St. John maintained and the slaves in the barracks had evidently been carefully chosen.
They were all well set up men and women, and the copper cookers were filled with boiling farina so that their bellies bulged and their skins were glossy.
At Robyn's direction they were lined up and she passed swiftly down the ranks. There were some mild ailments, which she singled out for later treatment, but she found none of the symptoms which she so dreaded. There is no plague here, ' she decided. 'Not yet.'
Come! ' said Tippoo.
He led her through the palm groves, and the next barracoon had been deserted by the traders who had built it and stocked it. Already the slaves were hungry and confused by their sudden liberation. You are free to go, ' Robyn told them. 'Go back to your own land.'
She was not certain that they understood her. They squatted in the mud and stared at her blankly. It was as though they had lost all power of independent thought or action, and she knew that they would never be able to make their way back along the Hyena Road, even if they survived the coming epidemic.
With a flash of horror Robyn realized that without their slave-masters these poor creatures were doomed to a lingering death by starvation and disease. Their masters had cleared out the store rooms before they left, there was not a cupful of farina or corn meal left in any of the barracoons they visited that morning.
We will have to feed them, ' Robyn said. We have food for our own, that is all, Tippoo told her impassively. He is right, ma'am, Nathaniel confirmed. rWe feed them, then we'll starve our own blackbirds, besides, most of them are poor goods, not worth the price of a cup of farina.'
