A Burial at Sea

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

It dated back two years, with a red silk marker between the pages that recorded the two distinct voyages the Lucy had taken in that time, first to India, now to Egypt. He decided to read entries about the newer journey first, the entries of the last fortnight.

First, however, he flipped through all the pages of the book, to get a sense of its manner. Captain Martin’s style, if it ought even to be permitted such a name, was laconic in the extreme. Entry after entry after entry reported simply the date, the latitude, longitude, barometer reading, and so forth, and perhaps two or three words on the conditions, “Squally,” for example, or “All clear,” or “Exceptionally stiff wind.”

Every seven to ten days Martin might write a slightly longer entry. These could be on nearly any subject, though most often they concerned discipline and sightings of other ships. For instance:

Able Seaman Danvers given six strokes for theft and six strokes for insubordination. Weather clear.

Or there was an entry that was typical of many others, which read:

Blackwall Frigate

Northfleet

sighted, flagged, and met. Exchange of news with Captain Knowles of that ship, bound for Portsmouth with a cargo of silk. Lunch aboard the

Lucy

for the officers of both ships.

This one caught Lenox’s notice because of the frigate in question. At the time of Martin’s mention it had been another anonymous trade ship going between India, China, and England—the Blackwall Frigate being a class of ship that had replaced the more cumbersome Indiaman that had dominated the seas earlier in the century—but which was now famous throughout the British Isles. That winter, not many months before, the Northfleet had been in the English Channel when she was forced to drop anchor in bad weather. Almost immediately a Spanish steamer had run her down, quite by accident, with the loss to the Northfleet of three hundred and twenty men, women, and children. This Captain Knowles, whom Martin had met in happier times, had gone down with his ship.

Still Lenox only skimmed these entries, turning before too long to the pages concerning the ship’s present voyage.

Unsurprisingly, perhaps, these were more elaborate. On the second day, for instance, Martin had recorded the ship’s position and condition and then written at length about Halifax’s murder. The last line of the entry was:

Have asked the Honourable Mr. Charles Lenox, formerly a private detective, to investigate the murder. Hopeful of bringing this matter to a swift and decisive conclusion.

Subsequently Martin had recorded with dogged precision the hints of a mutiny through which the Lucy had suffered, as well as the reports Lenox and Tradescant had given him.

For all this thoroughness, no detail leapt out from the page and grabbed Lenox’s attention. He read all of the entries twice, and then, with a great sigh, went back to the front of the book to begin reading about the ship’s previous history.

He could pass by whole pages at a glance, because they offered nothing except the noon readings Martin and his first lieutenant, along with the midshipmen, had taken each day. Gradually, however, an accumulation of small details began to present a more complete picture. Both Billings and Lee were repeatedly chastised for mistakes of seamanship or discipline with the men, while, to Lenox’s surprise, Mitchell’s name almost never appeared. Halifax, it was obvious, had too gentle a hand with the men. Then there were entries that piqued his interest, like this:

Much dismay and disagreement in the wardroom over a game of whist whose stakes and winners have gotten badly confused, such that no man of four can agree with any other about the sums owed to each, etc. Have had a firm word with Billings and Carrow about gambling.

Or there was this one:

Carrow far too violent in his discipline of Forecastleman Bacon.

And then this, several days later:

Forecastleman Bacon given six lashes for insubordination.

Every week church was rigged, storms were survived, men were disciplined, grog and salt beef were disbursed, other ships were met along the water and left behind; there was an almost gentle rhythm to it on the page.

Several men died. There was Topman Starbuck, for example, killed after falling from the foremast, whose death Lenox contemplated with a grimace. During a storm one seaman named Sugar had taken a heavy splinter, longer than nine inches, in his thigh. Tradescant having been taken ill, Mr. Billings inspected the wound and recommended amputation. It hadn’t been necessary, however; by the next morning Sugar was gone. Then there was the rope maker, shoemaker, tinsmith, caulker, painter, and trimmer, Elias, drowned in the bilge, signs of a struggle; Mr. Billings, Mr. Carrow, and Mr. Halifax investigating. There was no further mention of Elias, however. Whatever man had held him down in the water was likely still aboard the ship.

Might any of these cryptic mortalities have anything to do with the fresher deaths the Lucy had suffered? It was impossible to say.

Men survived, too, however. A month later, Martin wrote:

Seaman Wiltshire fell overboard, and, unable to swim, called for help. Sank several times in succession, before at the last possible moment being gaffed through his frock. Upon his recovery on deck, Seaman Wiltshire evinced not the smallest degree of perplexity at the prospect of death, nor any particular exhilaration at his survival. He returned to his place on the spar without any display, in even the slightest degree, of gratitude toward his saviors.

That one made Lenox laugh.

The longest entry in the book recounted a meeting the ship had with pirates, in which she lost four men but won a valuable prize-ship and a great deal of stolen cargo. Of particular valor were Lieutenants Billings, Carrow, and Mitchell, the log recorded, as well as Midshipman Cresswell. Lenox smiled to himself. Evidently Halifax was more of a fisherman than a soldier.

In India they took on a young midshipman, Mercer, and his saga absorbed Lenox greatly:

Mr. Midshipman Mercer fell ill during watch, and was permitted to go below deck. This morning Mr. Tradescant ruled out seasickness as a potential cause of the illness, but expressed no great anxiety over the boy.

Then, the next day:

Mr. Midshipman Mercer significantly worse, diarrheal and emetic.

Then:

Mr. Midshipman Mercer very close to death, according to Mr. Tradescant. Only human comfort as possible treatment.

Finally, two days later, Lenox read with great joy:

Mr. Midshipman Mercer all but recovered, and, though pale, has taken the air of the quarterdeck. Mr. Tradescant at a loss to explain the recovery.

There was good news! Only after living and dying with the lad in the pages, however, did the truth click into place, and Lenox remembered, slapping his knee at his own stupidity, that Mercer was the proper name of the lad Teddy had introduced him to as Pimples. The poor chap, to have been through that!

Lenox read over all of this carefully, pausing and reading twice wherever he found an entry that he thought might merit attention. When at last he stood up and closed the book the sun was turning orange, occasionally throwing a brilliant flood of light through the bow windows and across Martin’s cabin, so that Lenox had to squint. Had he learned anything? Perhaps he had, and perhaps not. The answer must be close, he felt, with a trace of desperation.

Or were his skills rusted and beyond repair, like the Northfleet all these months after she had fallen at the bottom of the English Channel? Would more and more people die, because he wasn’t sharp enough to see who was killing them? As he had been reading he had grown to like Martin’s style; a human hand had written those words, one which would write no more.