The Golden Ocean (25 page)

‘Good afternoon,’ said Mr Brett, hurrying in. ‘Better, Palafox? Taking nourishment, I see’—glancing at the monstrous pile of stones, pips, and fruit skins. ‘Excellent. But dear me, we shall have to straighten this out. The Commodore is coming. Mr Keppel, bear a hand, if you please. That pillow-case. Hair-brush. O’Mara, pass the towel—you have Mr Stapleton’s leave to be here, I trust?’

‘Oh sir,’ cried Sean, with a tear in his eye, ‘and would I ever quit my duty without the lieutenant’s good word?’

‘Hm,’ said Mr Brett. ‘Well, take that bucket and swab him down. I want him shining in forty-five seconds. Mr Keppel, hold the pillow case open.’

One minute later the Commodore walked in, accompanied by the surgeon. His eye fell with approval on the apple-pie order—Peter’s sheet squared with geometrical nicety, and the patient himself in a high state of polish, if somewhat breathless and worn.

‘I hope you are feeling better, Mr Palafox,’ he said kindly.

‘Thank you very much sir,’ said Peter, sitting rigidly up; ‘I am exceedingly well.’

‘I am happy to hear you say so,’ said the Commodore, with a smile. ‘But I hear that you joined the ship without permission this morning. That will not do: it may have an adverse effect, eh, Mr Woodfall?’

‘Yes, sir,’ said the surgeon. ‘Show me your tongue.’ This was to Peter, and it was said rather sharply, for Peter was not Mr Woodfall’s favourite patient. Some weeks back he had been persuaded by Sean—and thinly-veiled threats of murder had formed part of the persuasion—to dose Peter with acidulated whiskey: and the patient had eventually presumed to recover. ‘However,’ he said reluctantly, having peered down Peter’s gullet (for he was a just man, and kind when not vexed in his professional capacity), ‘I find no relapse. Still no beef or mutton: but I think we may proceed to a little swine’s flesh, gently seethed; and we may perform light duty the day after tomorrow.’

‘Very good,’ said the Commodore. ‘We can do with all our really capable officers,’ he added, to Peter’s inexpressible gratification. ‘And here, Mr Palafox, is a trifling book that may help you to pass the time between meals. It was among the poor purser’s dunnage, and I beg you will keep it, if it amuses you at all.’

‘You are very good, sir,’ cried Peter, red with pleasure, ‘and I am extremely grateful for your attention.’

‘Listen to this, Sean,’ he said, five minutes later. ‘“What said the fellow to the chandler that had a gross of candles stolen from him? Take not your loss to heart, friend; no question but they will be brought to light.”’

‘Ha, ha,’ said Sean. ‘What kind of a book may it be?’

‘It is called,’ said Peter, turning to the title-page, ‘The New Help to Discourse, or, Wit and Mirth, intermix’d with more serious Matters, consisting of Pleasant, Philosophical, Physical, Historical, Moral and Political Questions and Answers: with Proverbs, Epitaphs, Epigrams, Riddles, Poesies, Rules for Behaviour, etc., with several Wonders, and Varieties: particularly, A concise History of the Kings of England. Together with Directions for the true Knowledge of several Matters concerning Astronomy, Holy-Days, and Husbandry, in a plain method. By W. W., gent.’

‘Sure it’s a great deal to be in such a little small book,’ said
Sean. ‘What a learned man Mr W. W., gent., must have been, your honour, dear. And does it tell you how to behave, so?’

‘It does. Listen to this—“Cast not your eyes upon others trenchers, nor fix them wishfully upon the meat on the table. Put not your meat to your mouth with your knife in your hand, which is clownish. Cleanse not your teeth with the table-cloth or napkin, or with your fingers; but if others do it, let it be done with a toothpick. Gnaw not your nails—” ’ He broke off, and looking out through the door, he hailed, ‘Ransome, ahoy.’

‘Ahoy,’ answered Ransome. ‘Can’t stop a minute, cully,’ he said hoarsely, pausing on the threshold. ‘I got to get the casks run up. How are you, cock?’

‘Famous,’ said Peter. ‘But just lie-to for a second and read this.’

Frowning heavily over the book, Ransome slowly wheezed out, ‘“One being much abused by a miller, the fellow at last told him, that he thought there was nothing more valiant than the collar of a miller’s shirt; and being asked the reason, answered, Because every morning it had a thief by the neck.”’

A profound silence followed. Then Ransome’s frown could be seen to dissolve; his face became more and more suffused, and a slow grin spread broad and delighted. A strangled gasping began. ‘Oh, hor hor hor,’ he went. ‘The thief, hor, hor, is the miller, the cove he’s a-talking to. Do you smoke it? I didn’t hardly get there all at once. The collar, do you see, goes round the miller’s throat, hor, hor. Ain’t it deep? Did you understand it, O’Mara?’

‘No, your honour,’ said Sean, very obligingly. ‘It was too deep for me.’

‘Oh, it
is
plaguey deep,’ said Ransome; ‘but stand by, and I will make it plain. There is this fellow, you see, what the miller is blackguarding and calling out of his name: so he says, “Which I always heard tell a miller’s shirt was the bravest thing in the world,” says he. “Why so?” asks the miller, suspicious. “Because why?” says this first cove, the one the miller was blackguarding so. “Because why?” says he; “for because it has a thief (meaning the miller, you understand
me—he means the miller is a thief; because in his trade the miller steals the flour. Which is true), because it has a thief by the neck every morning.” Do you smoke it now? When the miller puts on his shirt, he means, the collar gets a thief (that is, the miller) by the throat. Or put it this way …’

‘What about those casks, Ransome?’ asked Peter, seven labourous jokes later.

‘Damn ’em,’ said Ransome, with his bright blue eyes starting out of his head. ‘Hark to this one. “A fellow going in the dark, held out his arms to defend his face; coming to the door—oh Lord, I can’t go on, hor, hor, hor—coming to the door, he ran his nose against the edge of it, whereupon he cried out—oh, I’ll never get it out, hor, hor—cried out, Hey, day, what’s the matter, my nose was short enough just now, and is it in so short a time grown longer than my arms?”’

‘Mr Ransome, sir,’ said a ship’s boy, darting in. ‘First Lieutenant’s compliments and would like to see you
at once
.’

‘Oh,’ said Ransome, his enormous grin fading. ‘Oh. Thankee. Well, it was worth it.’

‘Ransome. Hey, Ransome,’ shrieked Peter after his flying back. ‘The book. You’ve taken the book—you’ve taken … The devil lie in your plate, you false dog. Did you ever see such a thing, Sean? To rob a palsied comrade, Sean? Is it not the black shame of the world?’

‘Though slow in appearance, your honour, dear, Mr Ransome has a wonderful presence of mind,’ said Sean, in some admiration.

Light duty began on Wednesday, in the sweet dawn of the day; and Peter, strongly reinforced by a little swine’s flesh (the greater part of a sucking-pig—the creature having indeed been a little swine), was already bounding about the deck. Like nearly all the invalids at Tinian he had recovered with astonishing speed.

Light duty consisted of moving all the forward guns aft, to get the
Centurion
by the stern, in order that the carpenters could come at the leak. Peter had been busy: somewhat too busy, as the following harsh words revealed. ‘No. Not a parbuckle,’
cried Mr Stapleton. ‘I said straight through the fairleads, didn’t I? Why will you always improve on your orders, Mr Palafox?’

‘But sir, don’t you think—’

‘No, I do not. You do what you are told, and leave the thinking to me. You start off by advising me to run a tackle to the capstan, and now you—confound your impertinence. There are some midshipmen who will never have the decency to lie down and die, whatever the circumstances. Because they are born to be hanged, no doubt,’ added the lieutenant darkly. ‘And don’t stand there smirking. Rouse out the hawser as I said, and look lively.’

One by one the heavy guns rumbled aft, preceded with anxious care by the hands who would have the task of holystoning out the ridges made by their wheels in the deck. Slowly the Centurion himself, the figure-head, rose to turn his battered, but irredeemably insipid, simper to the lower sky, and the carpenter’s crew swarmed down to her cut-water and stem.

‘We brought her by the stern,’ wrote Peter, ‘and the carpenters worked until three bells. Rolled the guns back—hot work with the tide making and a swell setting E. The leak started at once. Moved guns aft again. Carpenters worked harder. Guns for’ard: leaks worse. Crew vexed with carpenters. We are to try again tomorrow. Ransome hides when off duty, and can be heard laughing like a whale in the woods.

‘September 14th. The Commodore is not well and is come ashore at last to sleep: the men much put about, but Mr Walter assures me it is not grave—Mr Anson would stay aboard to see everything done, and his steward could not bring him to eat anything but a biscuit in his hand while there was any work forward. But the land and fresh provisions will recover him, everybody says; and Mr W. explained that the land counteracts the gross humours of the sea. Ransome still lurking, in a sort of perpetual slow fit. Leak botched up within-board; carpenters abhorred by all, and blamed. We are to have a whole day’s liberty.’

Keppel, Bailey, Preston, Balthasar of the
Tryal
, and Peter stood looking at the small Spanish bark: at their heels ranged a pack of nondescript, vaguely hound-like dogs, brought from the Spanish garrison of Guam by the prisoners for the purpose of hunting the wild cattle of Tinian, and fallen upon by the
Centurion
’s people with that brisk and determined compulsion to domesticate everything from alligators to apes which characterises a man-of-war’s man in all latitudes. The dogs, at first dismayed and appalled, now responded with unbounded and indeed embarrassing affection.

‘She’s a pretty little craft,’ said Keppel. ‘About fifteen ton.’

‘Trim lines,’ observed Preston.

‘Bah,’ said Peter. ‘Don’t you see the burke from her plashing-strake to her pawdle? How do you suppose she could ever lie close to the wind with a prowlburke like that? It is the way she could never come within six points of it. It stares you straight in the eye, that horrible prowlburke.’

‘It is not so plain from where I stand,’ said Keppel, after a moment’s silence, ‘but I see what you mean.’

‘It is their country build, I dare say,’ said Bailey.

‘Not what we are used to,’ said Preston, shaking his head.

Balthasar said nothing; but when they moved off in a cloud of eagerly whining dogs, he lingered behind, gazing at the bark. After a while he caught Peter up, and begging him to stop for a moment, he said, ‘It is very stupid of me, I am sure, Palafox, but please would you tell me what you meant? I thought I understood most of the parts of a ship, but’—he glanced down to see that nobody heard—’I somehow do not remember the prowlburke, nor its effect on sailing close to the wind. And if they were to ask me at the lieutenant’s examination, why, Lord, I should be properly posed.’

‘They won’t,’ said Peter, with a grin, ‘for it don’t exist. I made it up. And they never smoked it, ha, ha. Prowlburke and pawdle, oh Lord, what stuff.’

‘What a fellow you are, Palafox,’ said Balthasar, staring very hard.

‘Tace is Latin for a candlestick,’ said Peter, looking uncommonly
sly. ‘Mum is the word, you follow me? We will invent some more.’

‘But why?’ asked Balthasar, still far behind.

‘Why?’ asked Peter. ‘Do you know what those swabs did when I first joined? I was as green as could be, and when they sent me to the gunner for a couple of fathoms of right thin firing line, I went like a lamb. And when they told me to tell that to the Marines, I trotted off to the nearest redcoat and told him. There was no end to it. Wasn’t it the same when you first went aboard?’

‘Yes,’ said Balthasar, going pink, ‘it was. They made me—never mind. We must certainly invent something more, and I will back you up.’

‘The glooming-pot bowse,’ said Peter.

‘The praliday-hankins,’ cried Balthasar.

‘But don’t go and overdo it,’ said Peter, his confidence in Balthasar’s discretion beginning to wane.

‘Come on, you slugs,’ shouted Keppel, a great way off; ‘we’ve got a boar in this bush. Loo into him then,’ he shrieked to the reluctant dogs. ‘Loo into him, break him and tear him. Come on, my hero,’ he cried as Peter came snorting up the hill. ‘We’ve got a boar in this bush. Come and get him out for us.’

‘In there?’ cried Peter.

‘Yes, thrashing around—no, don’t go in, you flaming idiot, he’ll rip you to pieces. Hold him. God help us, he’s gone in. Oh—’ This gasping cry was forced out of Keppel by a blow that flung him on his back, the furious barge of an enormous wild sow that exploded out of the bush with Peter attached to her tail.

‘What … do … you want … me to … do with it?’ roared Peter, in jerks, scudding madly along with the pig.

‘Hang on,’ cried Bailey, fleeting over the lea. ‘Think of the hams.’

‘Never let go,’ howled Preston, just keeping up.

‘Work up to windward,’ said Keppel, drawing ahead of the dogs with a prodigious burst, ‘and as soon as I see daylight between you, I’ll fire.’

‘No,’ cried Peter, ‘you mustn’t … she’s … very much … in pup.’

‘Cast her off, then,’ said Keppel. But as Peter let the tail slip through his hand the sow whipped round with astonishing agility, and foaming with rage she rushed upon her pursuers. The tide changed on the instant, and now, scouring the grassy plain with feet that twinkled in the sun, Keppel headed the urgent rout. Immediately behind him came Bailey, whose laboured gasps persuaded Keppel that the sow was on his back: then came a mixed flight of midshipmen, running with the utmost perseverance, then the dogs, mute with alarm, and then the gravid, persecuting sow, with glaring, crimson eyes, skimming over the flowery turf, the embodiment of pallid fury.

Peter sat before his open book, refreshing his powerful mind with beef. He wiped his fingers, dipped his pen (an albatross plume) and wrote: ‘September 22nd. Variable airs all day. W and WSW. Mr Blew was quite mistaken when he said that the moon would bring a change. The new moon was on the 18th, and since then we have had nothing but a small gale ESE½E. Which is just as well, since this is the foulest ground that can be imagined—coral rocks like razors even in 50 fathom water. Though indeed we are safe enough now, having gackled with the fire-grapnel chains; which is a prodigious example of caution. Mr Blew is almost recovered and grows wonderfully cantankerous, which we are all very glad to see, his former meekness being against nature. I also sat with Crooke (of the fore-top) and Carlow, who are in a fair way. The coopers are still very sick, however, which makes watering tedious slow. I desired Hume to show me how to fashion a cask, but he said the cooper’s mystery needs 7 years. I borrowed his tools though, and mean to attempt a barrel tomorrow. Mem. to warn Balthasar against flying too high: drooling board-prittle is coming it too much; and the pussif tasset can hardly be attempted to be believed. But so far it succeeds to admiration, and it is a pure joy to see them conning their manuals. I have thought of—’ But this valuable contribution was lost in a
sea of ink: a sudden gust had overset the inkhorn, and now it ruffled the pages in wild disorder.