Sacred Hunger (12 page)

“Well, there’s a piece o” news,”

Jane said. ‘More’n two weeks you been here, takin” up space.” Once in that time, when she had been drinking alone, Deakin had come back in the afternoon and they had lain together on Deakin’s pallet and coupled without tenderness and she had clutched at his hard body and felt the welts of old floggings on his narrow back. ‘Then you go waltzing off,” she said, “without so much as a kiss my bum.” Her rage was rising again, directed now at Deakin’s uncluttered life. Casually, just like that, he could walk away, disappear—and the money with him, she thought suddenly: within half a minute of his leaving the price on him would be lost to them for ever…

“You leave him alone,” Britto said. “He has got the right to go when he likes.”

But she could tell that Britto hadn’t known either.

“Don’t you talk about rights,” she said. “What is it to me that you was shipmates? Very fine, ain’t it?

He’s run from a navy ship, you tell him he can stay here. You does the favour, I gets the extra work.” The idea expanded steadily in her mind while she was talking. It might be as much as three pounds that Deakin was worth. For twopence a day and keep she could get a girl to mind the little ones. She could buy a grinder, get scraps from the butcher, make sausages and sell them in the street. There was profit in sausages. Perhaps they could save the baby …

“Little place called Sheepwash,” Deakin said. “That’s where I am going.”

“No one is askin” where yer goin’.”

‘allyou aren’t asking but I am telling you,” he said mildly. “I was born there, see, an’ I’ve not been back since I ran away when I was twelve.”

‘allyou done some runnin” in yer time,” she said bitterly. She paused, looking at Deakin’s composed, fair-browed face, the remote blue eyes that always seemed to look beyond people. The intention to sell him had come to her like sudden hope and blossomed with her rage.

Without rage to keep it fresh she was afraid it would wither. ‘never bring a penny in!” she shouted.

“Catch a few bloody fish in the river. I’m killin” myself at this mangle. They are callin’ me a whore in the court because I have got two men in here. An’ you spent it all, didn’t you? Call yerselves men?”’

Britto moved towards her. The voice of the little girl on the bed rose in remonstrance or fear. The woman moved back sharply, felt round behind her for the long-handled pan on the stove. ‘Keep off,” she said.

“The bebby’s sick,” she said. “It can’t hardly cry any more.” A storm of weeping shook her suddenly, even while she felt for a weapon.

“I dunno,” she said. “I dunno. You could of brought a drop o” gin back.”

Britto went to the crib in the corner, looked down at the bloodless, crumpled face, with its inflamed lids, the glaze of vomit on its chin.

The baby looked up at him with an impersonal solemnity, its hands curled against its breast like tiny, shell-less crabs. After a moment Britto turned away, raising his own hands in a clumsy gesture of helplessness, and he was again the man she knew, dogged and ashamed.

She felt something like pity for him then: he had tried for work all day and come back to this. ‘It has got somethin” wrong with its stomick,” she said.

‘It can’t keep anythin” down.” She could not tell him what she was going to do. Not then, because she knew he would prevent her; and perhaps never—not only because of the thrashing, but because such a hurt to his pride would make him unpredictable and she was afraid he might leave her. She could conceal the money, she could say it came from somewhere else, she would think of something. ‘allyou goin” out again?”’ she said, looking at both men.

‘not me,” Deakin said. “I’ll get my gear together. I want to get an early start. Not that I have got much,” he added with a faint smile.

“There is cockfightin” over behind the Pickerel,” Britto said. “I had a hand in tra” two of them. The owner might put somethin’ on for me.”

She knew this indirectness meant he wanted to go but would stay if she liked—the look of the baby had softened him. ‘When’s that then?”’

“Ten o’clock. They’re fightin” our birds first.”

‘allyou go,” she said. “You might win somethin”.”

Britto grinned, relieved at her change of tone. ‘That would make a change.”

“I’m goin” out to see about some washin’. There is a bit of bacon an’ some “taters in the stove. You could hot ‘em up.”

She put on bonnet and shawl and went out quickly without looking any more at Deakin. The Bell was the inn named on the poster. It was a mile off but the rain had stopped now and the moon rose clear in the sky.

At the inn she was directed upstairs, where she found two men at a table.

“You the ones takin” on crew for a slaver?”’

‘That’s right, my pretty. Hunnerd per cent.” The man who answered her was sharp-faced and smiling and had an alert, peering sort of way with his eyes. “Liverpool Merchant,“‘1 he said, “a spanking new ship that anyone would be proud to sail with, only we ain’t takin” any ladies on, not this partikkler voyage.”

‘Mr Barton, you go too fast,” the other said in a hoarse monotone. He was in a grey wig and a stiff blue coat with brass buttons and his cocked hat lay on the table before him.

“You the skipper?”’ she said. “I know where there is a man for you. I can tell you where you can find him.

Once you get a hold of him, he can’t choose but go. He’s run from the navy.”

‘Has he so? Been treating you badly, has he? You tell us where he has put into, my dear, we will take him off your hands.”

“I can take you,” she said. “I can show you the place. If we was to go now we would find him on his own. How much will you give me for him?”’

‘Able seaman, is he? Fore the mast? Sound in wind and limb, is he? How old is he?”’

This hoarse questioning caught her unprepared. She met the gaze of raw-looking blue eyes. They were small in the dark red 9dg square of the face and they held no kindness for her.

” ‘Bout twenty-five,” she said. “I dunno. He’s been on an” off ships most of his life. I want three pound.”

‘If we can secure him, and if he has got all his arms and legs attached to him, I will give you two pounds. That is the going rate and that is what we are paying.”

“Haw, that’s a good ‘un, arms an” legs,” the other man said.

‘I want three pound.”

The man in the wig sighed harshly. “Explain to the woman, Mr Barton,” he said.

“My pretty, I am afraid you do not unnerstand the finances of it. To take in hand a able-bodied man what has his full copplement of arms and legs and what doesn’t see eye to eye with you as to the tack he should foller and is inclined to be disputacious, that needs three stout men. Them men has to be found and them men has to be paid and that pay has to come out of the price. That leaves two pound for you, or there’s the door.”

She had not wanted to think about Deakin, but now something resigned about his face came into her mind and she remembered the scars she had felt upon his back.

Her resolve did not change but the composure that had sustained her so far began to break at last. She felt tears gathering. She wanted gin so badly now that she could hardly keep her limbs still. “Blast yer livers an” yer eyes,” she said with a sob.

‘allyou neither of you worth him pissin” on. Make it guineas, for God’s sake, give me two guineas for him.”

Having assembled his few possessions and made a bundle of them, Deakin lay down on the pallet in the narrow space against the wall at the far end of the cellar. The damp from the wall came against his face.

He heard a catch of breath from the exhausted baby.

The children on the bed were silent, perhaps sleeping. He began to think about the next day. He had no money and no plans, no sense even of a likely sequence of events. All his programme was imagined sensation, the silent street he would step out into, dawn coming slowly over the tips and brick kilns and dirty pools on the outskirts, then the open fields, and himself moving through luminous spaces, with the sun rising and the fields filling with light and himself always moving, unimpeded, totally free and yet awaited—he knew the impossible ambition of the escaper to find welcome horizons.

He had not been back for fourteen years. He did not know if his mother was still alive. He wanted now to know—she had pleaded for him as far as her fear allowed. Whether his father was alive or dead he did not care. He had a memory of the place he had started from, as simple and brightly coloured as a child’s picture book, soft green folds of hills, lush grass, red earth, brindled cows grazing knee-deep in buttercups. Embedded in this like a splinter was the stone farmhouse on the coomb-side, the dark little shed where his father locked him up after beatings for tasks neglected or badly performed, though this was a dark mystery as the beatings came regularly in spite of all effort, and pardon did not depend on anything he could do or say but had to be wrought by the darkness of the shed comsometimes an hour or two, sometimes whole nights he had spent in the dark, the pain of his stripes receding to make way for fear.

The shed itself had no place in the picture, no shape or form, only the darkness within it and the plenitude of light he had stepped out into the morning of his escape, that dawn he had found a short bar inside and used it to wrench the door off its hinges.

He had never forgotten this violent conquest of the dark, the feel of the metal, the joy and fear of the splintering wood, the revelation of light that cold morning with sheep coughing in the field above and the distant sound of a dog barking. Within half an hour he had been on the upland road and begging lifts to Bristol.

He had run away often since then, but all flight had been attended by the radiance of that dawn.

He was thinking of it now, when he heard steps on the stairs coming down.

Billy Blair woke from stupor to find himself lying in fetid darkness in the hold of some old flat-bottomed hulk like a barge. She was moored in deep water—he could feel how she moved in her chains. His face was stiff with dried blood and his right eye gave him pain. Someone not far away was whimpering tearfully. ‘Wha’s that snufflin”?”’ he said. Faint light came through the ill-fitting planks of the deck above and he heard sounds of movement there. ‘Got any grog up there, shipmate?”’ he called up. “I am parched.”

Someone brought a face down close to the deckboards and spoke through: “You can have water.”

“Water’s no bleddy use, man. My throat is on fire.” He paused, casting round for further arguments. “The bastids have cooped us up down here,” he said, with pathos.

After a moment or two longer the hatch was raised and he saw the tousled head of a man looking down at him. “You keep yer napper stowed below there and don’t try no tricks. I have been set over you till we gets aboard an” I will do it. I ain’t riskin’ the bilboes for you, so you better not think of tryin’ to cut loose.”

‘now there’s a friendly soul,” Billy said.

“All I am askin”, from yen Christian to another, is have you got any grog?”’

There was a short silence and then to his delight Billy saw a bottle swinging down to him, tied with a cord round the neck. ‘God bless you,” he said, grasping at it. “I will overlook them former threats.

What’s yor name?”’

‘Cavana,” the man said. “The other one here with me is Hughes.”

“I am Billy Blair.” He took a drink from the bottle, felt the spirit take its fiery course down his throat. “Ah, by God,” he sighed, “that’s better.”

The hatch was lowered, leaving him once again in darkness. A melancholy voice spoke from somewhere near him. “Give us a drop, Billy, for the love of God.”

“Wha’s that?”’

“It’s me. Michael Sullivan.”

“Sullivan! How the pox did you get here?”’

“Same way as you. They knocked me senses out of me an” brung me over an’ threw me down in this fioatin’ stink-hole.” The voice paused a moment, then said with deepened sadness, ‘An” me givin’ them no cause for offence at all.”

‘Were you whimperin” an’ crying just now?”’

‘no, I was not. I was lyin” quiet here, thinkin’ of me troubles.”

‘Well,” Billy said, “it serves you right.

I am passin” the bottle to you, because it is a charity, but I don’t know that I would choose to drink wi’ you in other circumstances, now that I see what you have come down to, playin’ the fiddle in a whorehouse an’ helpin’ to sell poor sailor lads.” He saw a dark form raise itself in the dimness of the hold, made out the pallor of the face.

He extended the bottle, felt it taken from him, heard Sullivan take a long swallow. ‘That is not work to be proud of, Michael,” he said.

“An” just gan easy wi’ that bottle, will you?

Here, let’s have it back.”

‘I was doin” fine till you come on the scene,”

Sullivan said, in a stronger voice.

‘now it’s my bleddy fault, is it?”’

“You had to come into that place, didn’t you? An” just the time when I was in it. Sure, the divil directed your steps. That wasn’t the only place I played in an’ they wasn’t all whorehouses an’ snuffle-dens. If a man finds himself in bad company he keeps mum. That is a first rule an’

I broke it like a idjit. I could get a bite to eat an’ a dram an’ a place to lay me head an I could play me fiddle. Then you come in, full of piss an’ wind, an’ I remember you straight off because you always was full of piss an’ wind, you haven’t changed one iota, an’ I does my best to warn you but you are too drunk to understand anythin’ at all. Like a idjit I get in the way of the fightin’ and get knocked off me feet an’ end up here.”

‘Well,” Billy said, after a pause for reflection, “I see how it was. You played the part of a friend to me an” Billy Blair does not forget his friends. Here, I forgive you, have another pull at the bottle.”

‘allyou forgive me? Holy Mary, that’s rich.”

“There is someone else here has a thirst,” a quiet voice said from the darkness forward of them.

Raising himself on one elbow, Billy peered through the dark, made out a man sitting upright where the boat narrowed at the bows.

“Wha’s that?”’

“The name is Deakin. I been pressed here, same as you.”