Ama (50 page)

There was laughter on the main deck: the seamen were relaxing now that the slaves had been locked up for the night. Then there was a cough just behind her.

“Don't move!”

She recognised Williams' voice. His speech was slurred, as if he had been drinking. She kept quite still. Then she felt cold metal sticking into her bare back.

“Captain Williams,” said Ama.

He stepped back.

“Oh, it's you, Pamela.”

He uncocked his pistol. He was dressed in slippers and a red silk gown. He had a towel over one shoulder.

“What are you doing here? Why aren't you in the hold? I trust you were not planning to visit the sharks?”

He laughed his humourless laugh. She could smell the liquor on his breath.

“I fell asleep,” she said. “When I woke it was already dark.”

“When did you last have a bath?” he asked abruptly. “You stink.”

Ama swallowed a tart reply.

“You had better come along with me. Tonight you are in luck. I came up on deck just now to take my bath, but my olfactory organ tells me that your need is greater than mine. The only person on this ship who is permitted to bath with fresh water is Captain Williams. Sea water does not agree with my delicate white skin, you see. There is the water, warm water I'll have you know, and here is soap and a towel. When you have finished, I shall be waiting for you in my cabin.”

A piece of sailcloth had been hung over a rope in a corner of the deck to give the captain some privacy while he bathed. Ama slipped behind it.

What luxury
, she thought as she soaped herself. Then:
you have sold your soul to the white devil, Miss Pamela
. And then again:
to hell with you all. I will survive. I shall survive.

She went down the steep stair and knocked gently on the door. There was no answer. She tried again, a little louder. Still no answer. She tried the door. It opened. Williams was busy stowing bottles and glasses into an open cabinet.

“You told me to come. I knocked but there was no answer.”

“Sit down,” he said.

“You had better wrap yourself in the cloth I gave you the other day,” he continued. “You see I have taken a little brandy this evening and I am at least two and a half sheets to the wind. If you sit there naked like that, I might be tempted to emulate your friend Knaggs. This is a lonely job, you know.”

He was standing with his fingers spread out on his desk.

“You have seen the punishment I inflicted on Knaggs, I believe?”

Ama said, “I only used one jug of the water. There is plenty left in the basin if you want to take your bath. And thank you. I haven't had a real bath since Mijn Heer died. You had better go now if you are going, or the water will be cold.”

“You have a confounded cheek, speaking to me like that. Have you forgotten that you are my slave, my chattel?” he grunted as he took a fresh towel and his gun..

Ama waited for him to reach the top of the stairs. Then she quietly closed the door.

The ink and quill and a bowl of sand were lying conveniently at hand. Nervously, she opened a drawer in Williams' desk and found a sheet of paper.

She looked at the quill. It needed sharpening, but she could see no knife. She had no time to waste and would just have to manage. Her hand shook as she dipped the quill in the ink. She had written exercises for Van Schalkwyk before but this was the first time she had had to write a real letter.

“The Reverend Philip Quaque,” she wrote at the top of the sheet.

“Sir,

“I am called Pamela. I hope and trust that you will remember that we met at Elmina during the wedding of Jensen and Rose.

“After Mijn Heer De Bruyn died, Jensen sold me to Mijn Heer's friend, Captain Williams. I am writing this to you from . . .”

She heard a sound and stopped to listen.
Williams surely can't have finished his bath already?
But it was nothing, just a ship's noise.
I must hurry
.

“I am writing this to you from Captain Williams' ship
The Love of Liberty
, now anchored off Cape Coast Castle.

“I beg you to save to me. If you would buy me, I would serve you faithfully for the rest of my life. I could teach the children in your school to read and write. I must close now. I beg you sincerely.

“Pamela.”

She sprinkled sand on the paper to dry the ink. The stairs creaked. This time it was not a false alarm. She whipped off the cloth he had given her and concealed the letter in it. As the door opened, she was holding the bundled cloth in her hands.

“Oho,” said Williams as he saw her.

He had wrapped his towel around his waist and was carrying his gown. He put the gown down and Ama did the same with her bundle.

* * *

“This is a hard job,” he told her when he had finished his business with her.

They were squeezed alongside each other on the narrow bunk, both naked and sweating.

“A hard job and a lonely one.”

Ama said nothing. She had allowed him to have her. Overcoming the dislike she had felt for the man since their first meeting, she had simulated lust and excitement.
The loneliness you complain of means nothing to me,
she told herself.
I have degraded myself in your bed for one reason only: to serve my own best interest.

He squeezed her breast. Then he kissed her. She could feel his penis rising against her thigh.

“What, again?” she asked him, trying to make some space between them. “Already?”

He laughed.

“I haven't slept with a woman since I left England. And that was no more than a brief sordid interlude with a prostitute. You are an expert lover. You have awakened my desire. I want to fuck you again and again.”

“It is time for me to go back to my place,” said Ama and tried to climb over him.

“Eh, eh. What is your hurry? We have the whole night.”

He forced her back alongside him.

“It is hot here,” she said, “and your bed is not wide enough for two.”

Her mind was on her letter to Quaque and how she might take it away without being detected.

“But more comfortable than the boards in the hold, surely?”

Ama said nothing.

“What would you say if I asked you to move in here with me?”

“So that you could use me during the voyage and then, when you get to your country, sell me at a good profit?”

“I have already promised you that I will sell you only to a good master. Probably my friend Jones, in Barbados.”

“Sir, I don't want to go to Barbados. I want to stay in my country.”

“I have told you before. That is completely out of the question.”

Ama was silent.

“I ask you again. Will you move in here with me and keep me company during the voyage? I will treat you well. You will be better off than my seamen, even than Mr. Butcher, who, like them, sleeps on deck. You will eat from my table. And have regular baths. What do you say?”

“Is it up to me to say yes or no?”

“Of course. Why do you think I asked you?”

“Then my answer is no.”

“Why not, for goodness' sake? Are you crazy? “

“I would prefer to be with the women, that's all.”

“Will you at least come to me when I send for you? Please don't refuse me, Pamela. I need you.”

“Sir, as you told me, I am your slave. I must do as you command.”

“In that case, I command you.”

* * *

When Ama came out of the female hold the next morning, she had her letter concealed in her blue cloth.

There was an unusual bustle of activity on board that morning. Ama rubbed her eyes as she came into the light. She heard shouts and looked up. There were several sailors high up in the rigging, working on the ropes and the sails.

The cook summoned them to take their morning meal. This was irregular: as a rule they were fed in mid-morning, not at dawn. As soon as she had eaten, Ama went to her place at the gunwale nearest the shore, to keep watch for the canoe captain to whom she would entrust the delivery of her letter.

A ship which must have been lying a safe distance offshore during the night approached, carrying just enough sail to bring it to a convenient anchorage.

Williams hailed the captain.

“What news?” he shouted into his speaking trumpet when they had exchanged names and greetings, “Where are you from?”

Captain Eagles, the master of the brig
Bluebird
, property of the old trading firm Vernons of Newport, Rhode Island, cried back, “>From Anomabu. The Governor there, Miles, is visiting in Cape Coast. I have come to call him back.”

“That sounds like trouble.”

“Richard Brew is seriously ill. You don't have a doctor on board by any chance, do you?”

The
Bluebird
's crew were dropping their bow anchor and preparing to swing out their longboat.

“I certainly do. Doctor Butcher, a surgeon as good as his name!”

Williams laughed at his own stale joke.

“If you are heading that way, you might like to stop and see if Doctor Butcher can be of any service.”

“I certainly shall. As you can see, we are about to sail. I have a young nephew working for Brew. Also called Williams. I brought him out on my last voyage. Did you come across him?”

“Of course. Excellent lad. A pillar of strength in Brew's establishment.”

Eagles was now in the boat and his crew had their oars raised and ready.

“Are there stocks at Anomabu?” Williams asked.

“Not many slaves but plenty of promises. There were eight ships in the road when I left late yesterday. But I must go now. We shall meet again soon no doubt. Perhaps even later today.”

As Ama listened to this conversation her hopes fell. It was clear that, unless Williams decided to backtrack along the coast after calling at Anomabu, she would not be able to send her letter to Philip Quaque. But Anomabu presented a new opportunity.

Williams was standing alongside Arbuthnot, quietly issuing instructions, which the mate transmitted to the Bosun, who in turn called them out to the men in the sheets.

“Knox, Hatcher. Get the females back into their hold,” the Bosun barked out.

Ama stepped out of the line and stopped behind Williams.

“Captain Williams,” she said quietly.

“Not now,” he snapped. “Can't you see that I am busy?”

“Sir,” she said quietly, ignoring his reprimand, “I couldn't help hearing your conversation. I know Mr. Brew. Would you let Mr. Butcher take me ashore with him to help?”

Williams said nothing. He just pointed to the line of women proceeding down the stairs and cocked his head in that direction.

* * *

In the early afternoon the funeral procession wound out of Castle Brew, which lay hard up against the high white walls of its official neighbour. Then the Castle cannon blasted out a salute and each ship added its noisy respects. Ama was already half deaf by the time it was Arbuthnot's turn to give the order to fire. She closed her eyes and squeezed her hands over her ears, trying to block out the sound, but it was no good. Then, at last, it was all over. For a moment only the gulls and the lapping of the swell on the boards of the ship disturbed the silence. And the ringing in her ears. She hated the noise of the guns so much.
Why do they do it?
she wondered.
Perhaps they have to give notice to their god, sitting up there in his heaven, that another dead white man is on his way?

It was now late afternoon. The conversation of even the most talkative of the women had run dry. Soon it would be time for them to be sent back into the hold for the night. Ama was bored. Not for the first time, she thought of asking Williams to let her have a book to read. But she was afraid of the reaction of the other women. They would think she was a witch. She stood up and stretched. Above her, in the shrouds, she saw George Hatcher, climbing. He paused to rest on the main top platform. Then she heard him call.

“Mis-ter Ar-buth-not.”

The Mate appeared. Hatcher pointed along the coast but his shout was lost in the onshore breeze. Ama walked around to the opposite side of the deck to see what had attracted his attention. A great blackness had risen out of the sea. To the west the sun was dropping to the horizon in a cloudless sky. But there, approaching rapidly from the east was this monstrous tower of darkness. It announced its advent with an extraordinary flash of forked lightning and a clap of thunder louder than a cannon shot.

Arbuthnot's voice rang out. With the old man and half the crew out of reach ashore, his first real test of command had come at last.

“Get the women back into their kennel. Run up the try-sails on the fore and main masts. Secure the guns. Batten down the hatches,” he ordered. “Look lively there now!”

The women tripped over one another as they were herded through the narrow doorway. Inside the hold their apprehension was almost palpable.

“Curse the white man that he should bring us onto this miserable ship to drown,” called one.

Another began to scream wildly.

Then the door slammed shut behind them. Moments later a piece of black sailcloth was nailed over the barred grating on the door. The narrow beams of red light from the four small vents seemed only to accentuate the darkness.

The first squall swept up on them swiftly and fiercely. One instant the ship was rocking gently in the swell. The next it was if they had been seized by a giant hand, viciously twisted, lifted and then tossed down again into the depths. Ama's head struck the boards above her. A moment later she felt herself thrown off the platform, airborne. Alongside her other bodies were hurtling through the darkness. Her cloth went its own way. Instinctively she threw out her arms to cushion the inevitable impact. The floor leaned away. Women who only seconds before had been lying at the end of her trajectory, had rolled away into a heap under the far platform. She landed on the bare boards. The impact took her breath away. Her momentum and the slope of the floor took her onwards, sliding and rolling until her progress was halted by the tangle of screaming limbs and naked torsos. Now the ship righted itself and began to keel back to port. Ama clawed the darkness, desperately searching for some anchor in this maelstrom of terror. But all she found was the limbs of her companions in hell, and these were as free in space as her own. Last to arrive on the heap, now she was the first to be propelled back against the port wall. Trying to scramble to her knees she struck her head on the unseen edge of the platform. Then she was lying against the hull, buried beneath a pile of bodies. She struggled to free her arms. Her face was pressed down into another's belly. There was no air. She panicked and felt herself losing consciousness, her life slipping away. Then the ship began to roll back to starboard and she was free. So it went on, a terrible shaking of human bodies on and on, back and forth, port to starboard, starboard to port, forward and aft, aft and forward again, on and on, without end.