The Smuggler's Curse (2 page)

I feel myself shrink even smaller. At once, I take off my hat and hold it against my chest. ‘I'm Red Read, sir. I'm … I'm … to be the new ship's boy,' I stammer, unsettled by the big man looming over me. His eyes are small, and half-closed as if the sun shines too bright, and his skin, brown and weather-beaten like most sailors, looks like leather cut from a horse's saddlebag.

‘Ship's boy, eh?' He looks across at another crewman. ‘Well then, Mr Cord, we do need a new buoy. Tie a rope around his neck and fling him overboard. We'll see if he floats — just like that buoy over there.' He points to the half-sunk wine barrel that the ship is moored to.

I feel my face turning red, and I wonder if he is serious.

‘Very amusing, Bosun Stevenson,' smiles the Captain. ‘But he's Mary Read's boy. Drown him, and you'll be feeling the full weight of her wrath before the day's out. You'd be a braver man than me. You can put him to work instead. Not that he looks like he's ever done a stroke of real labour in his life.'

The Bosun shrugs. ‘No, not a muscle to be seen, or a callous I'll be betting. Let me see your hands, Master …' he pauses, trying to remember my name.

‘Red, sir.'

‘Green, more like. As green as grass,' I hear someone behind me snicker.

My day has started badly and is getting worse by the minute. I wish the deck would just open up and swallow me. Working after school at the pub, I am used to being teased by the customers, but this is different. Everything about the boat is alien. The crew are not complete strangers as I have seen most of them in town, but I do not really know them, and none of them seem to want to know me. I just want to go home.

I nervously hold my palms out for inspection.

Bosun Stevenson nods, apparently unimpressed, then reaches forward, grabs my upper arm, and squeezes it tight, feeling my muscle. Again, he shakes his head in disapproval. ‘On a frigate in the old days, we would have made fish food of you, with weedy arms like that. On a pirate ship, they would have sold you to grave robbers for the mortuary doctors to experiment on. How about we do that? Make a profit,' he laughs.

I look down at the deck, fighting off a vision of me being sliced open by a mad, sadistic doctor.

‘It's time, Bosun,' says the Captain looking out at the water. ‘There is a tide in the affairs of men, which taken at the flood, leads on to fortune. Omitted, all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and in miseries. On such a full sea are we now afloat. And we must take the current when it serves, or lose our ventures.' He pauses for a moment. ‘My faithful friend, Mr Shakespeare. But now, take us to sea, Bosun.'

I know about William Shakespeare. I like history at school. He was around when Queen Elizabeth was on the throne years ago, so he can't be the Captain's friend, unless the Captain is three hundred years old, and I don't think he is quite that.

‘Let's see how strong you really are, boy,' says the Bosun. ‘Up the ratlines with you.'

I have no idea what he's talking about and look blankly back at him.

The Bosun rolls his eyes and sighs heavily. ‘A bleeding landlubber. The Lord preserve us. I should have known. Right then, listen carefully, boy. These,' he says, pointing at the thick ropes attached to the sails, ‘are called sheets. The sheets control the sails. This big one in the middle is the foresail. Those little triangular ones at the bow, the front of the boat, are the jibs, and that big one at the rear is the mainsail.' The mainsail flaps energetically,
cracking like a pistol shot. The wind is picking up and my head is reeling.

‘Facing the front of the boat, starboard is to your right, and port is to your left because if you're lucky, there's always a little port left in the bottle. The ratlines are what we tars call the rope steps there by the railing, for landlubbers like you. Now enough. To the top of the mast with you, boy. The crow's nest, as close to heaven as you can get, then the shortest way down.' He points to a rope stay running at an angle from the top of the mast back down to the deck.

I don't fancy that one little bit, but what am I to do? I look up. The crow's nest seems to reach the clouds. Nervously, I climb onto the side rail and then scramble up the ratlines hand over hand towards the platform. Each step takes me steadily higher, and I am soon sweating with effort and nerves. As I draw close to the top, I can hear Bosun Stevenson below me shouting orders through a speaking trumpet.

As I reach halfway up the mast, the ship suddenly keels over at a sharp angle to starboard as the inner jib sail is hauled in and catches the wind. The canvas stretches tight and powerful. Without warning, the deck is no longer beneath me. I hang precariously over the dark water and white waves from the ship's bow. The wake
grows smoother as the ship picks up speed. Within a few minutes, the wind increases even more, and because the mast is at such a steep angle, I have trouble holding on. I grip the rope even tighter.

Eventually, the Bosun guides the ship out beyond the protected waters of Roebuck Bay and alters course slightly, and the Black Dragon's masts come more upright. For just a few seconds, I feel relief. But then the ship begins ploughing headlong into the waves with the mainmast swaying and bucking wildly in time to the water crashing over the bow. My arms are tired from hanging on so tightly, but now, at least, the deck is below me, and not an expanse of shark-infested water. Though, thinking about it, that is probably worse. Terrified, I let go with my left hand and reach out for the rope I am supposed to ride down to the deck. Clutching it as tightly as I possibly can, I quickly let go with my other hand and grab at the stay, but then I'm dangling in the air, with nowhere to put my feet. I now have no choice. I try twisting my foot around the tight rope, but the angle is too steep. I will have to climb down hand over hand, my aching arms carrying my whole weight. If I slide down, the rough hemp will rip the skin from my palms, and I'll probably drop all the way to the deck anyway. As I hang there, like an over-ripe mango about to fall from a
branch, I wonder if my seafaring career is going to be the shortest in history.

My survival instincts take over. I dare not look down, in fact, I dare not even open my eyes, but somehow I manage to edge my way downwards, hand over hand, my arms and shoulders screaming in pain. My feet finally hit the deck with a thud and I land with a painful bump. I lie on my back, spread-eagled, my heart thumping in my chest and my mouth dry with fear.

I did not have much to eat this morning, but the climb has scared me so much that every morsel comes rushing up from the depths of my stomach with a sudden gush. I turn on my side and vomit up a putrid puddle onto the deck. I feel as miserable and pathetic as can be.

‘He'll do Captain, at a pinch, God willing,' laughs Bosun Stevenson. ‘As soon as he learns to stand on his own two feet. Or keep his breakfast down. I'll toughen him up, so help me — or so help him more likely.'

Several sailors start laughing, which makes it worse. The only sensible thought I have is that at least I am not splattered all over the deck like so many pounds of strawberry jam.

After I've cleaned up my own mess, the Bosun sends me below decks with the tar-smeared boy. His name is Teuku Nyak King. It is a traditional Sumatran name, he says, but everyone on board just calls him Teuku, or sometimes Your Majesty, as a bit of a joke.

A smell just like that of the Curse fills my nose and makes me long for home — must, sweat, stale ale and damp timber. The space is the width of the boat, running about half the length and narrow near the bow. Light from a grating in the deck above filters in, casting a checkerboard pattern on the floor at the far end. Canvas hammocks fill the area on each side and a long table, stained and well-worn, runs down the centre. Against the sides of the cabin, wooden chests of all different sizes take up the confined space.

‘You can have Markham's hammock — that one,' says Teuku. ‘He don't need his hammock, no more.' His voice sounds slow and sad.

‘Why? Why won't he need his hammock? Where's he going to sleep?' I ask.

‘He was ship's boy before you, but the Dutch got him last time the Captain was on Sumatra. Got three of them. All good'uns too. We won't be seeing them again for a good few years, I think. Even if they do keep their heads attached to their necks. Those Dutchy colonials, they invaded, and now they believe they own Sumatra. They are a nasty lot. Shoot you as quick as look at you. Killed hundreds of us on Sumatra they have. Thousands. Men, women, children. They are butchers. And they call
us
savages.'

‘Oh,' I reply rather pathetically, not knowing at all how to respond. ‘Is that where you are from, then?'

‘Not any more,' he answers. ‘I'm from here now. This boat. I have nowhere else. They killed all my family, burned down our village. They killed everyone. In reprisal, they say. Captain Bowen found me on the beach half-dead.' He lifts his shirt to show me a white scar, vivid against his dark skin, running vertically down his chest and across his stomach. Another even uglier scar cuts across his forearm.

I look at him, my eyes widening in shock. I don't know what to say. What can you say?

‘Sam Chi, the cook, he stitched me up.'

‘Oh,' I reply, again, stupidly. ‘Is there no one left at all? You've got nobody?'

‘Just Captain Bowen.'

‘Where do you think we're headed?' I ask, trying to change the subject.

‘North,' he says. ‘It nearly always is north. The Captain hasn't told us just where yet. Maybe Aceh again to finish off his business. We had to get out of there in a hurry last time.'

Aceh. There has been lots of talk at the Curse about Aceh, and reports in The West Australian newspaper of all sorts of death, destruction and atrocities in those parts.

‘The Dutch bombarded the main town of Banda Aceh,' continued Teuku. ‘They took over. Slaughtered a lot of people. The Sultan fled into the hills, formed the resistance and is fighting to win back our land. But the Dutch have sent thousands of soldiers from Holland to enslave everyone. They want Sumatra and are going to any lengths to keep it.'

‘Why?' I ask. ‘Why do they want Sumatra so much?”

‘They are greedy,' he replies fiercely. ‘They want the spices we grow. They want the pepper and chilli and
tobacco. Especially the tobacco. And they'll kill everyone to get them.'

I peer into the gloom of the crew's quarters. I am becoming increasingly worried about my future. Whatever was my mother thinking?

‘Get some sleep,' Teuku says. ‘You'll be on the last dogwatch. Eight bells. We all do watch. Even the Captain. But fall asleep on watch, and it's over the side for you. No discussing it, no second chances. Splash. Food for the fishes. Be warned, ship's boy, Captain Bowen, he's fair, but he's tough. He don't stand no nonsense when we're at sea. Break his rules and he'll break you. Into little pieces.' Teuku runs his finger across his throat like a dagger and winks at me. I guess he is joking about that part at least. I certainly hope so.

‘Are there headhunters in Aceh? Same as in Borneo?' I ask. I have read all about savage headhunters in an old copy of the Illustrated London News a pearling master left in the Saloon Bar. They shoot you with poisoned blowpipes then they cut your head off as a souvenir.

‘The headhunters of Aceh are even more fierce than on Borneo. I'd watch myself if I were you. Them headhunters, you're just their type.' He laughs lightly at my discomfort. ‘But the real savages are the Dutch soldiers. For every man they lose they burn down a
village and kill everyone they find. Everyone. Then they leave their bodies to rot in the sun, as a warning.'

Without another word, Teuku turns and leaves, bounding up the steps to the deck.

Had my mother any idea when she sold me that those shiny golden coins meant my probable death? A deep sense of unease settles on me. I have never been away from home before, and now I am expected to look after myself. I somehow know no one is going to help me out. And I have to share a cabin with a bunch of smelly men who all hate me and couldn't care if I died in my sleep. They'd just throw my body overboard and get in on with it.

How can my life have changed so much in such a short time? Only last week my biggest worry was keeping out of Ma's way, or wondering if Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn were was about to be killed by Injun Joe in
Chapter Twenty
-
eight
. Now though, my outlook is decidedly bleak, to say the least. And what's worse, we could be heading into the middle of the Aceh Independence War between the Sumatrans and the Dutch.

I sit on the edge of Markham's hammock and swing my legs in, and very nearly upend the hammock and topple straight out again. The hammock swings wildly from side to side while I clutch on tightly. Luckily, Teuku is not there to see me.

I close my eyes, but it is no use. I've never been able to sleep in the middle of the afternoon at the best of times, let alone here, in a hammock, with everything that's happened. I open them again to find someone standing over me.

‘Red, it's me. I made a brew. Youse want one?'

I almost cry in relief. Mr Smith is easy to recognise, with the right side of his face scarred and blackened from an old misfired musket wound. He stands shorter than most of the crew, but he has the look of a house brick, square and solid. His skin is like old leather and his arms are strong and scarred. He has several tattoos, including a picture of a woman wearing no clothes across his chest. I know Mr Smith, but I don't know much about his life. He does not seem to have a family, at least not in Broome. But then Broome is often where men go to get away from their families.

He is a regular at the Curse and a decent bloke. The pleasure of seeing a friendly face after all the scowls and teasing feels good.