william Price and the Thetis 10

 

Chapter 10

 

Three weeks of boredom was interrupted only by half a day or so of more excitement than was comfortable, as they skirted a hurricane. They were running before the wind wherever it might take them. Frid and his crew had managed to keep Thetis in sight, and was glad of his new rudder; and the two ships resumed their station once the hurricane was safely over, grateful to be undamaged and with no casualties.

“Deck there!” the hail came from above. “Ship fine on the larboard bow; looks to be in bad shape.”

“Lord,” said William. The midshipman scuttled up the ratlines like a monkey to employ his telescope.  “General quarters,” said William, hardly hearing as Tom beat the drum to send the ship’s company to quarters, as he watched Lord. The child closed his telescope, and was back down in a trice.

“Looks like a brigantine, sir; a fast ship, in any case, or it would be if two masts hadn’t gone by the board.”

“Alter course to come up on her,” said William. “It’s our duty to render assistance to anyone in trouble on the high seas. Bring us close enough to pass within hail, Mr. Scully,” he added, as Scully was on the wheel.

The wind was at their back to come up on the other ship, but as they came closer, William’s nose suddenly twitched.

“Slaver!” he hissed. “Most of the stench blown the other way! Our colours… pull them down!”

“Too late, sir,” said Scully, dismayed, as a shout went up from the other ship. Suddenly, before their eyes, a hatch was wrenched open, and slaves forced on deck, naked and shackled, and the bewildered slaves thrown overboard before their eyes.

The whole ship’s company gave vent to a growl of fury.

“Taff! Bessy!” said Colin, kicking off his shoes. Taffy, startled, reached in his pocket for a metal object on a short piece of string. Colin pulled off his jacket, tied the string to his braces, and dived overboard.

“Get the boats out to support Mr. Prescott,” snapped William.

“I’ll go ʼelp ʼim,” said Walden, pulling off his own shapeless coat and kicking off the shoes worn for the dignity of a quartermaster. He dived after Colin, and swam with ungainly but powerful strokes after the young midshipman. Adou was right on his tail, but overtaking the older man.

“What’s the boy up to?” asked Scully.

“They haven’t cut away all their cordage,” said William, as the boat swung out, Wick taking charge of it as coxswain, stepping the mast to make use of the wind from astern. “Some of the lighter slaves have landed on the mass of spars and canvas and are holding on. Mr. Stark! Your sharp-shooters to pick off anyone who tries to shoot them or our swimmers!”

“Who are technically ‘run,’” said Gubbins.

“Damn your eyes, Mr. Gubbins, surely you heard me make a call to do what was possible to save human life?” said William.

“You… oh. Yes, of course, sir,” said Gubbins.

A stickler could charge the midshipman and the hands with desertion,  but Gubbins was willing to abide by the casuistry of knowing the Captain’s mind, and assuming his permission as standing orders.

 

 

Colin reached the sail, to which clung a youth about his own age.

“Hold on!” shouted Colin, unnecessarily. He slid off the bracing of his trousers on the right where the bessy, or lockpick, was tied, rather than untie the string and risk dropping it in the ocean. Quickly, he jiggled it in the simple lock of the manacles, and they snapped open. Colin grinned at the youth, a universal gesture of good will, and moved on to the young woman, little more than a girl, who also clung on for dear life. Colin got busy with his Bessy, wincing as a shot barely missed him.

He heard another shot and ignored it. It came nowhere near him.

There were no further shots, and Colin grinned as he realised the second shot had probably been to discourage people from shooting at him.

Walden was beside him now, and Adou.

“I swim to boat with people,” said Adou.

“Good man, carry on,” said Colin.  Adou spoke in his own tongue to the boy, which the lad seemed to understand sufficiently to follow orders. Adou slipped into the water with the boy holding his shoulders and kicking.

Bullets whined overhead, and Colin glanced at the ‘Thetis’ to see that the marines were winnowing through anyone trying to shoot at those in the water. His next rescues were barely more than babies, caught on spars, but mercifully unshackled.

“Adou!” Colin called, as Adou returned.

Adou rolled on his back, and Colin put the two infants on his broad chest. Adou spoke comfortingly to the sobbing children, and they clung to him.

Then Colin saw the young woman, desperately holding her tiny baby on the mess of ropes, as she slipped lower in the water. He dove deep and used his lockpick under water to unlock the shackles that were dragging her down to the fathomless stygian depths. He felt his other brace slide down, and  hastily let it slide rather than trap his arm, the weight of the breeches dragging on him. The rough metal of the shackle quickly sawed through the string holding the life-saving bessy, and then he had the shackle undone, falling down, catching in his breeches and taking them with them. Lungs bursting, he came to the surface breathing out to use the bubbles to lift him, and was able to push the young mother up onto a spar. Then there was Adou, taking the baby and telling the mother to cling to him. Colin leaned over the spar he had taken her from, feeling light headed.

He must have lost consciousness for a moment and came to being towed by Walden.

“Jeb?” said Colin, coughing,

“Shut yer bleedin’ mahf, sir, or you won’t be ʼarf drahnded, you’ll complete the job,” said Walden.

Colin was pushed into the boat.

“I can’t report! I have no breeks, and I wasn’t wearing drawers, as I had none clean after the storm!” cried Colin.

“There, Mr. Prescott, don’t you worry, the captain won’t care, and the surgeon’s seen stranger things than a midshipman’s wedding tackle,” said one of the seamen.

“Your shirt’s long enough to cover your modesty, Sir,” said Walden.

“Oh, good,” said Colin. “I need to look for some more breeks so I can go and kill slavers.”

“You might be too late,” said Walden, grimly. “From the look of it, Mr. Stark’s men have been very good at hitting more than those shooting at you.”

“Good,” said Colin.

And then the boat was being hoisted in, with its sobbing passengers. All told, they had saved some eight children, for Colin doubted if either of the young women was more than a year older than him. He leaped out of the boat, blushing to be confronted by Emma Green.

“Where are your breeches?” she demanded.

“I suppose you wouldn’t believe they were stolen by a mermaid, overcome by lust?” said Colin.

“No,” said Emma.

“My braces slid down and I didn’t want to be trapped in them a fathom or so down,” said Colin.

“And what were you doing a fathom down?” demanded Emma.

“Lockpicking the shackles of a woman being dragged down,” said Colin. “The one with the baby.”

“Oooh!” said Emma.

“Yes, I couldn’t leave her to drown,” said Colin.

“No, quite right too,” said Emma. “If you scramble, you can report properly dressed.”

 

 

The Thetis came alongside the slaver with more speed than finesse, and William did not need to give the order to board and storm. The ‘Thetises’ flowed over the side with cutlasses and pistols, and the crew of the slaver fell before them, mown down by the inexorable wrath of the seamen.

Not all the slaves had yet been put overboard, and William, on the second wave of attack, fought his way towards a big mulatto who was trying to throw them over on the other side.

His head flew over the side instead, and William upended the rest of him, patting the shoulder of the young man he had saved from a watery grave. He was rewarded with a shaky grin.

 

Colin came on deck after most of the fighting was over, and Taffy sang,

“Old Neptune he looked from his throne

In Davy Jones’s Locker-oh

He saw Mr. Prescott trying to drown

In Davy Jones’s Locker.

 

Old Neptune said, ‘I’ll have that boy

In Davy Jones’s Locker-oh

To stroke his curls and bring me joy

In Davy Jones’s Locker.

 

But bold Mr. Prescott would not drown

In Davy Jones’s Locker-oh

He kicked off his breeks and sent them down

As Davy Jones’s knickers!”

 

“You’re a cunt, Taff,” said Colin, blushing and grinning both at the same time. “Here’s your bessy; I saved that, it’s probably worth more to you than my four guinea breeks and two guinea braces.”

“Thanking you kindly, whateffer, Mr. Prescott,” said Taffy. “I’m learning knotwork one handed with a crochet hook in my mouth, look you, and I’ll knot you some new braces.”

Colin beamed.

“Oh, if you would, I’d like that much more than bought ones that any middy might have.” He added, “It wasn’t Neptune, though, it was a cheeky mermaid who was after me, but I failed to catch her with my breeches or we might have had mermaid tail at long last, to rival Walden’s mermaid from the Goodwin Sands.”

“I’m not sure deep-water mermaid is good eating, Mr. Prescott,” said Walden. “At least, not unless vere’s an ‘R’ in the month.”

“Well, perhaps it was as well she got away,” said Colin. “Thanks for coming to help.”

“Couldn’t leave you when I’ve me own bessy,” said Walden. “Adou says their language is close enough to his to be able to talk to vem, which is dead ʼandy.”

“What does he mean, ‘rivalling Walden’s mermaid from the Goodwin Sands?” asked one of the newer hands.

“Why, didn’t you know, fy ngwas, Walden found a mermaid stranded at low tide on Goodwin Sands, before we shipped with Mr. Price, mind, and he said the tail fried up lovely and tasted like salmon, look you, issn’t that right, Jeb-bach?”

“Right it is, Taff,” said Walden.

The new hands gave them funny looks.

“It isn’t true,” said one, uncertainly.

“Why, fy ngwas,  you’ll be telling us next that you don’t believe Mr. Price sent Jeb here to find a crankel-boggin in Scotland, to keep the ruddy kelpies from chewing on our rudder.”

“Now, Taffy! You know the crankel-boggin was for fitting to the sadden-spiggot to help turn the rudder shaft; there was no officially-recorded sighing of the kelpie, and no evidence that was what was biting chunks out of the rudder,” said Colin.  “Anyway, the new rudder is made of mahogony, which is poisonous to kelpies.”

“You’re having us on, Mr. Prescott, there ain’t no such thing as mermaids and kelpies,” said the hand, one of the debtors.

“Oh, carry on believing that,” said Colin, “But don’t blame me if you have too close an encounter with an aggressive mermaid in breeding season.”

He was given a funny look.

“Don’t mind Mr. Prescott, Sunny, he likes his practical jokes, he does,” said a more experienced ‘Thetis.’ “And Walden, he does tell outrageous stories.”

Colin gave an enigmatic smile.

Teasing the lubbers made up for missing the bloody fight, killing slavers.

 

 

William managed not to fall into blood lust this time. Many of the landsmen he had shipped had done, and one of them was on his knees, sobbing.

“Are you hurt?” asked William.

“No, sir… but I killed this man and it was so easy, and… and I haven’t never killed anyone before but I wanted to!” he said.

“I’ve had the red mists of rage myself,” said William, gently. “Taking the ship captained by the pirate who had kidnapped my wife. It was a righteous rage.  Get back aboard and clean up, and I’ll muster everyone aft to hear about why, sometimes, it’s not wrong to kill in such rage.”

The bodies of slavers he ordered thrown overboard summarily; a couple more slaves had hidden under the sails and had to be persuaded out, and a dozen or so had not yet been thrown overboard. He put a team on board under Frid, replacing him in the lugger with George and Arthur Cosgrove, to see if the slaver could be made seaworthy.

He ordered the slaves clothed from a mix of clothing taken from the slavers and such slops as were available. It meant, in most cases, a pair of trousers and shirt, which was better than nothing. They were sat at two mess tables to eat, and then William mustered all hands aft.

“I’m not going to discipline you all for running amok and killing willy-nilly,” he said. “I am sure some of you experienced a red rage which kept you killing without thinking. I’ve had it happen myself.”  He explained about the taking of the ‘Nancy Beth,’ this very ship, and how Mr. Scully had stopped him from going too far by reminding him of duty. “Remember, even our Lord Jesus fell into a rage and threw the moneychangers out of the temple. Rage is not wrong, so long as it is rightfully directed, and none of us I think were unaffected by that moment of sheer callous cruelty. But lads! Now you’ve been there, you know what it’s like, and in future you will be able to contain that righteous rage, and use it when fighting slavers, without letting it use you.  We knew in theory that they kill slaves, now we’ve seen it. So, in future, we will sail without colours, and we will try to fool any other slave ship for as long as possible into thinking we are Americans. I’m not hugely bothered what happens to the slavers when we board, but keeping the officers to question is politic. We can always maroon them on the coast in Africa later and see how well they fare.”

An angry little laugh went round at that.

“Sah,” said Adou, “Dere was over t’ree hundred when dey is started, but dey put some over in dat storm, which killed some slavers too when de masts dey come down. We’s got nine an’ twenny of dem, mos’ly kiddies. Sah, we can’t put women wit small children an’ nippers ashore in dis Freetown, how is dey gwine to live?”

“Let’s let them get used to being free for a few days, Adou; you can sound out any of the men into signing up for the navy, and perhaps we can absorb the women with our own, and the unattached children might be adopted,” said William, a little nonplussed.

“Sah, I is gwine to marry Nanny, an’ adopt her baby, Fiba, an’ dem two liddle ones in de sail, Ebo, an’ Beniba, Nanny know dere names. Her man be put over in de storm, an’ I promise her I look after her an’ she done say she happy for me to be her man.”

“Well done, Adou, there will be an award coming your way for helping to save human life,” said William. “I won’t have any of the women coerced into any form of marriage, or treated with disrespect. They are all under the protection of the Surgeon.”

There was rueful laughter.

Amelia minced no words if she was displeased.

And their first confrontation with slavers had filled the men with an urge to fight more.