Nobody's Slave (14 page)

‘Then let us keep 'em below, so that only
they
may suffer by the stench, and not we!’ said Fitzwilliam, with that dry, cynical laugh that so often amused the Admiral. But this time it failed.

‘No,
George! That is just what we must
not
do!’ Hawkins' voice cracked like a whip. ‘Make no mistake, sirs! A dead slave is worth nothing, and a sickly skeleton little more. Your Spaniard is no such fool as to buy two bags of skin and bone and think he has one healthy man. So I charge you, gentlemen, for the sake of all our purses - keep your cattle healthy! Bring 'em up on deck, and make 'em dance! It will amuse the crews, and get blood in their limbs! If any sailor misbehaves himself, send him into the hold to swill out the filth. That way we keep the slaves alive, the holds clean, and the hands on their best behavior!’

He paused again, a wry smile on his face. Fitzwilliam looked unhappy, his pouting face greeny-pale with the seasickness. Hawkins raised his hand, to ward off questions.

‘But enough of my homilies, gents - I am no preacher. Nor do I say this out of no tender heart, nor religious mania; good Christian though I hold myself to be. 'Tis a pure question of profit, sirs. Each one of those slaves we carry is worth 25 ducats to us in New Spain, so any man who kills them before they arrive is robbing himself and the company, which is no part of good sense.’  He raised his cup. ‘So gentlemen, let us drink - to a quick passage, healthy blacks, and a fat profit at the end of it; both for ourselves, and our partner Queen Elizabeth, in whose ship we sail!’

As they raised their cups and drank, the ship lurched more heavily than usual. George Fitzwilliam set his cup violently back on the table, clapped his hand urgently over his mouth, and reeled towards the door, dark eyes staring out of a ghastly, greenish-white face. Tom knew how he felt, but could no more keep from laughing than the rest.

‘We’ll be doing well enough to get
him
safe across the sea, never mind the slaves!’ Robert Barrett boomed. ‘Though 'tis no profit to me if I do get him there; rather less, since he's a shareholder!’

‘Aye, and he shared in the danger ashore, too - don't forget that, Rob,’ said Hawkins, pointedly. Fitzwilliam was his protégé, and he did not like him abused. Barrett looked up calmly.

‘No offence meant, John - he did too. But such desperation to be rid of a good feast has always seemed droll to me. I heard an old mariner say that Father Neptune makes men seasick because he has no teeth in his head himself, and so likes his meat ready chewed!’

When the feast broke up and the captains and gentlemen reeled on deck into the blustery, freshening breeze, Tom helped the sailors haul the
Judith's
longboat round from the stern, where it had been towing. His short, curly-haired cousin Francis clapped him heartily on the back. ‘Thanks, lad - 'tis good of you. Are you about to beg a passage in the
Judith
, to get out of this leaky tub, or what?’

‘No, cousin,’ said Tom, grinning back. ‘But 'tis good to be in the fresh breeze - it makes me feel like a sailor again.’

‘Aye, so it does.’ Francis breathed the sea air deeply, glancing ahead at the flash of leaping spray from the forepeak, as the great, full-bellied sails drove the ship steadily through the waves. Ahead was nothing but the changing pattern of clouds above the wide horizon; astern, beyond the gulls that planed and soared effortlessly in their wake, the thin green line that was the coast of Africa was already dwindling into nothing, a smudge no clearer than the shadow of a cloud.

‘So it does indeed!’ Francis’s boyish, bearded face, crinkling pleasantly under the windruffled hair, made him seem more like Tom's elder brother than the captain he had become. But Francis Drake had been at sea, up and down the coasts of Britain, most of his young life. ‘You'll make a mariner yet, young Tom - you've the appetite and energy, I know.’

Tom looked away, to where the
Judith
was coping easily with the breeze, staying level with the heavier
Jesus
under topsails alone. There seemed to be a cluster of men on the forecastle, wandering about in an odd, unseamanlike fashion. Francis saw Tom's puzzled frown and laughed.

‘Look a bit lubber-like, don't they! But that's not the seamen, Tom - 'tis some o' the Africans. I don't need John Hawkins to tell me a black man needs air to breathe. After all, they're men, made in God's image, near enough, same as we - if a bit overcooked! And 'tis a cruel enough trick we play on the beggars, to sell 'em as slaves - no need to make it worse on the way.’

‘I don't see they deserve kindness,’ Tom said bitterly, memories of Simon flooding back. ‘They kill us quick enough when they can - and look what they do to each other! Driving their prisoners into the sea to drown! 'Tis the acts of animals, not men!’

Francis rubbed his hand thoughtfully through his beard, and the steady stare of the pale blue eyes made Tom feel awkward, clumsy - in a way he not felt since Simon died

‘That hardly sounds like Christian words, cousin,’ he said at last. ‘Remember, they have a right to kill us, if we attack their towns - any man would do the same ...’

‘But the slaughter of prisoners, murdering women and children in the marshes! And worse than that! One of the sailors told me - he saw them
eating
a prisoner, in the town after the battle that night! He was there, Francis, he saw it with his own eyes!’

‘That was foul sin, I grant you. It shows how far the heathen are from God. But remember, those men were our friends, Tom - or allies at least. So what does that say about us?’

‘We don’t do that. We couldn’t …’

‘No, of course not. But think now, young Tom – ‘tis a thought that disturbs me more, on this trip, than before - there's more than one nation of Africans, and they don't love each other overmuch, as we saw. Indeed, there may be more difference between one tribe of Africans and another than between an Englishman and a Spaniard, or a Turk. And just as it don't follow that an Englishman loves the church of Rome and the fires of the Inquisition because a Spaniard does, so it may be that one black man will eat his enemy where the other will do no such thing, and if so…’ Francis was vehement now, waving his finger in Tom's face in the full flow of his fervour. ‘... if so, I say, what sort of black men have we traded with, and what sort have we made prisoner? Think of that, lad, before you damn 'em all as animals! We've traded with the sinners to buy these saints!’

Tom was silent, stubborn, his face flushed with anger. Several sailors and gentlemen were listening to this lecture. ‘But they killed Simon!’ he said at last.

‘Aye, they killed Simon.’ Francis sighed, a little, short sigh that fled away in the wind, taking all the malice with it. He put his hand on Tom's shoulder. ‘They killed our cousin, and I am sorry for it, and shall be even sorrier when I go with you to tell his father. But they killed more than him, and had a right to, as well - for wouldn't you fight like them, if a galley full of Turks came to Devon, to take English boys as slaves to the Grand Turk in Istanbul? It's happened before now, you know! Wouldn't you fight to be free?’

‘Of course I would, but ...’

‘Well so do they, and I respect 'em for it - more'n I do the heathen we bought 'em from, or the heretics we'll sell 'em to. So if you’re to be your brother's keeper, you bring ‘em on deck sometimes, young Tom. If not for love of your fellow man, just do it for a laugh. They cut up a fine old caper, some of 'em, first time they see they're out of sight of land! 'Twill split your sides, likely.’

And then he was gone - hand over hand over the side, and a quick, practised leap into the jollyboat, just as it steadied on the top of a wave. Tom watched it pulling swiftly over towards the
Judith
, where the group of bewildered black figures were being shepherded roughly off the foredeck, down into the hold below.

W
HEN THE rocking motion first began there was panic. There had been panic before - the horrible, dreadful fear of being chained in a vile, dark hole where it was difficult to see or breathe, and quite impossible to escape the screams and moans of the mass of humanity packed all around. Some, like Madu, believed it was an oven in which they were to be cooked alive; others that it was a grave in which they would be left to die; and several thought it was a form of larder, in which they would be kept alive until the red-face felt hungry, when they could come down and choose those which looked most succulent.

Many, like Madu, exhausted themselves by trying, again and again against all reason, to free their legs from the shackles, or to free the shackles from the bolts in the oaken beams. Then, when they found it was impossible, they huddled over the bolts in the darkness, weeping through utter weariness. Others cried to their village gods or hammered their heads against the hull or fought futilely with their neighbour for more space; some vowed vengeance or cried for a lost child or friend; a few even bore it all in stillness, or called into the unheeding racket for calm and unity; but in the end it was all the same. After an immeasurable time exhaustion set in, and each lay or sobbed where he was, imprisoned in his own pool of semi-darkness, all energy spent, unable to resist or hope any more.

Then the rocking began. It followed a period of shouting up above, which Madu had been dimly aware of without heeding. But the rocking could not be ignored. It grew steadily worse until a man cried out in the darkness that there must be a storm in the river, and the great floating house would be blown over, sink, and drown them all. About the same time came another sound - water gurgling, moving back and forth among stones just below the floor; and there came a cry of alarm from those chained up ahead, who felt it lap around their buttocks and feet. Surely they were sinking! Again Madu felt the surge of panic rise, beating against the walls of his chest as they all beat against the walls of their prison. They yelled to the red-face, cajoling, pleading, promising anything if only they were let out, rather than left in here to drown, like snakes in a bag.

But there was no response; and gradually, as the water below them rose no higher, the rocking became an urgent, personal problem in itself. Madu felt his stomach churn, his head throb, and vomited miserably, again and again until the floor was slimy and few stomachs had anything left. There was no possibility of cleanliness here, no escaping one's own filth; Madu realised with horror that the man next to him had been worse than sick, and turned away with a shudder of weary disgust, knowing that sooner later he would have to do the same.

Then, after another indefinite time, which Madu measured only by the moments when he was forced to bend his head between his knees and try to vomit what was no longer there, something happened. There was a loud crash from the hole in the roof where they had come in; the wooden grating was drawn back, and a group of red-face clattered down. They held up a light in a glass box, coughing and making loud noises of disgust amongst themselves. Then, to Madu's utter stupefaction, they began to unlock some of the shackles.

So this was it, he thought. Now he would be eaten! But he was past horror - he only felt a strange, dazed excitement, and a fear that they would not choose him, but leave him here. Nothing could be worse than this! The man opposite him was unlocked, and the man beside him, and then ... the red-face with the keys straightened up, as though he had finished, and spoke to the one who was their leader. Madu groaned. Then the red-face shrugged, bent down to undo his shackles too, and pulled him contemptously to his feet.

Madu found he could not stand; a roll of the floor sent him slithering sideways so that he cracked his head on a beam of the curved wall, and fell to his hands and knees. A man heaved him up, muttering, and shoved him crouching under the low roof towards the ladder. Madu wanted to vomit, but he knew he must not - they might leave him down here after all. He stood below the ladder, and dimly, unquestioning, stood with the others while a rope was knotted tightly around their waists, so that they were all tied together and none could escape alone. Then he followed the rest up two ladders to the world outside.

The sudden white glare dazzled him. He flung his forearm over his eyes and stumbled forward, blindly at first, feeling his way only by the tug of the rope round his waist. Then the tug stopped, and he stood, blinking at the crowd of hairy, jeering figures around him, framed obscurely against the blaze of white light from the sky. There was laughter too - and a swoosh of cold shock as a torrent of water hit him full in the face. He slipped and fell backwards on the deck. There was more water, more laughter as he scrambled to his feet, and twisted and dodged to see where it was coming from. But there was more than one source – a dozen or more red-face had buckets tied to ropes, which they threw into the sea, hauled up and flung over their prisoners, again and again. Madu leapt with each shock as it hit him, and jerked and staggered at the end of the rope as his movements conflicted with those of the others. And all the time there was laughter, more water, and the harsh scratch of a long brush on the end of a stick, until he was utterly soaked, and nearly all the filth of the prison was washed from him.

It ended at last, and he stared around, wondering. What next? After the stifling heat of the prison, the cold water and the breeze on his skin made him shiver. He held his arms warily in front of him, ready to ward off another attack. But none came. Some of the red-face moved away, losing interest, and the rest merely lounged idly against the side, staring at Madu and the rest with open curiosity.

There was nothing behind the men. No trees, no riverbank, no shore. Madu turned quickly, to see where the shore was, but there was nothing behind the men on the other side, either - nor ahead nor behind. Nothing but ...
water!
Water ... and then more water and more, rising and falling in endlessly diminishing waves to ...
the edge of the world!
Madu reeled, staggering with more than the lurch of the deck. It could not be true! The shore could not have moved, the trees could not ...