The Convict Ship, Volume 1 (of 3)

I lay thinking just as one would in bed through the blackness of a long night: and in this way three or four hours went by.

It was then I heard a noise overhead, a very great hurry of feet, and sounds as of drunken shouts and singing dulled to the ear by the thickness of the plank. I knew by this that the crew were come, and I felt mighty grateful, for now I could be sure that we should soon be under way for the Channel. I supposed that the ship had brought up at a mooring buoy; certainly I should have heard the thunder of her cable roaring just over my head had she let go her anchor.

I got some biscuit and meat, and whilst I was eating in my sail the hatch was lifted. I immediately whipped under the canvas and lay like a mouse, watching in my fashion, that is, with one eye at the edge of the bolt-rope of the sail. Three men came down, and a minute later a fourth followed. I lay motionless and terribly frightened, for they stood under the hatch looking round as though considering where to seek for what they came for. The open hatch yawned in a square of pale gray light; I was able to see the men, but the forward part of the place where I lay was sunk in gloom. The biggest of the men, a great burly fellow of a seaman, advancing two or three steps, stopped and began to count. I understood he was counting the casks.

‘Eight,’ said he.

‘I told you that, sir,’ said the voice of Will. ‘I saw them stowed.’

‘So much the better,’ answered one whom I reckoned to be a mate, perhaps the second or third mate. ‘I’ve allowed for six. There can’t be too much spare water for such a company as we’re carrying.’

‘Right you are there, sir,’ exclaimed the burly man in a deep voice. ‘Sails, here’s twine for ye.’

‘I see it,’ said the third man, stooping and seeming to feel. They continued for a short time to talk about the contents of this store-room. I heard Will say the chief mate had ordered him to count the spare buckets.

‘Do so,’ said the man whom I supposed to be the second or third mate.

‘Bo’sun, hand us down a light. I can’t strike fire with my eyes,’ said Will.

The three men went up through the hatch, leaving Will standing alone under it. I now distinctly heard the sound of many voices; most of the newly-arrived crew seemed intoxicated if I might judge from their tipsy laughter and maudlin songs and calls. A light was handed down; Will screened the lantern by setting it beside a cask; he then came over to me. I lifted my head.

‘There you are,’ said he softly. ‘How are you getting on, old girl?’

‘Very well, Will. I have slept right through the night, and very comfortably. Give me all the news.’

‘You may hear it,’ said he, laughing. ‘The crew are aboard, drunk as casks. A sweet and noble lot of hearts. You never saw such a crew. The most ruffian-looking convicts are gentlemen beside some of them. The crimp who brought them down fished every gutter ’twixt Houndsditch and Limehouse Hole, and rejected half he hooked as not bad enough.’

‘Then we’re off Gravesend?’

‘Ay.’

‘When do we start?’

‘The tug will be catching hold of us before dark. Any rats here, Marian?’

‘None, so far. Have you seen anything of Tom, dear?’

‘Nothing.’

He stepped to the lantern and held it to my face to look at me.

‘It’s a good job,’ said he, ‘that you’ve got no hair to dress. But how jolly bright your eyes are! Perhaps I may have you out of this sooner than you expect. Pray for a fresh north-easter, Marian.’

‘Take your light away and count your buckets. Somebody may come below.’

‘I’m not going to count any buckets,’ said he. ‘I invented that yarn as an excuse to see you.’

He carried the lantern to where my provisions lay, and was looking at them and softly speaking, when a man fell right through the hatch. He fell with a mighty thud, and I screamed out. You would have supposed him killed or stunned, but he had not lain quiet one or two minutes, not long enough indeed for Will to get to him, when he began to laugh and mutter drunkenly. He then sat up, and, looking about him, exclaimed: ‘Rum casks, be gob! Whist, ye drunken teef, and they’ll lock ye up down here!’ So saying, he got upon all-fours and crawled toward the casks stowed in the left wing of this store-room.

‘What are you doing here?’ cried Will, stepping up to him.

‘Is it you, honey? Bedad, then, that makes two. Quick, sweetheart, with your gimlet and pannikin, for supposin’ it should be threacle!’ said the man, sinking into a sitting posture.

My terror was extreme. I feared that others of the drunken crew would follow this fellow and come tumbling down after him to rummage for drink, and discover me before enough sober men could be got together to turn them out.

‘Now, up you go!’ cried Will. ‘Out you get!’ And he put his lantern down to lay hold of the man.

‘Why, what divvle are you?’ answered the brute, in a voice suddenly savage and dangerous as the growl of a fierce dog. ‘What’s this?’ he roared. ‘A stowaway? Hooroo! A stowaway, bullies! Hooroo!’ and, staggering on to his legs, he lurched towards the lad, with his fist raised.

Will was as stout a young fellow as ever buttoned a pea-jacket over his chest. He struck, and the man dropped like a shot from the hand. Excitement and fright had carried me out of the sail. I grasped the broom-handle and was in the very act of rushing to help Will, when the fellow was dropped by my cousin’s fist.

‘What’s going on down there?’ roared a hurricane voice through the hatch.

I sprang back upon the sail and covered myself.

‘Here’s a drunken scoundrel, bo’sun, pitched headlong down here and refuses to turn out!’ cried Will.

The burly figure of the boatswain came in a sprawl down the ladder. Then followed a real forecastle scuffle. The boatswain went to work with legs and hands, kicking and hauling. The drunken Irishman blasphemed most horribly. Heads collected at the hatch, and the fellows up there roared to their wrestling, drunken, cursing shipmate to fight it out and die game. But Will and the boatswain between them proved too much for the ruffian, and, after a fierce struggle, they dragged him up through the hatch, with his old coat in ribbons. Will then descended for the lantern. He breathed very hard, and looked my way as though he would speak. I sat up and passionately waved to him to depart. He saw my gesture by the light he held, flourished his hand, and, climbing the hatch, put the cover on.

This was a terribly narrow escape, and I felt all the weakness of my sex’s nature as I sat in the blackness and realised that had the other drunken sailors tumbled below I should have been discovered and my hopes ruined.

After this I passed some wretched hours, for I never knew but that the drunken Irish sailor had told the others there were casks under the forecastle full of strong drink, for all he could guess, and I kept on fearing that amongst them they’d lift the hatch and descend. However, nothing of the kind happened; I got more heart as time went on and the hatch remained untouched. I heard a great deal of thumping overhead, and treading of feet as of men coming and going, and then I felt once more the same straining sensation in the ship I had before taken notice of; I supposed we were under way, in which case the Childe Harold had fairly begun her voyage.

Saving the occasional lifting of the hatch at long intervals when a man went below into the fore-peak to shovel coals and send them up in buckets, nothing broke the overwhelming monotony of that black and silent time of concealment. But there came an hour, whether it was in the day or night I cannot tell, when I was awakened out of a deep sleep by many violent noises and a wild movement. The ship was at sea; she was breasting the waters of the Channel; and seemingly a strong sea was running, for she pitched deep and raised a most extraordinary roaring noise of foaming brine all about her bows, in the very ‘eyes’ of which I lay. For some minutes I was not sensible of the least inconvenience; I sat up in my bed of sail wondering at the novelty of the motion and the noises; but then I was visited by a most deadly nausea—I felt as though I were swooning into death; indeed, the pitching motion was outrageously heavy for one inexperienced as I was to waken up to. I was just in that part of the ship where the pitching is most felt. I sank back and suffered—oh, how I suffered! Think of me, alone in that midnight blackness, without a sup of cordial to give me a little life, as incapable of stirring as though I were dying, feeling to the height of its anguish the sickness that is the worst of all sickness, hearing nothing but the cataractal rushing of water against the bows, the sudden shock and thunder of a great sea smiting quick and hard as the blow of a rock, the crazy straining of timber and cargo and strong fastenings.

In this wretched state I continued for two days. I afterwards calculated this time, and found that it must have run into two days and a night. I never ate nor drank; I may say I neither slept nor waked; I lay in a sort of middle state. Will never came near me; but through no fault of his; he later on told me his hands had been full whilst on deck, he could not invent an excuse to visit the store-room, and without a good excuse he durst not lift the hatch lest I should be discovered and he be charged with hiding me.

However, whether it was that nature could suffer no more, or that the movement of the ship even in this extreme fore part had fallen into softness and rhythm, I slept and awoke, and, awaking, found myself free from nausea and hungry. I sat up and lighted a candle; my hand shook with weakness, and I could scarcely stand. I drank from a bottle of water, took such food as I wanted, and made a meal. I kept the candle burning, for I was now thinking that my term of imprisonment might be drawing to an end, and that I could afford the luxury of a light. Indeed, I had not as yet consumed a whole candle since I had been in hiding.

I sat by the light of the candle till it was burnt out; the light cheered and soothed me. It was something for the eye to rest upon, and the flame was a sort of companion in its way. Once it put a horrid, frightful fancy into my mind. I thought to myself, suppose I set fire to the ship? The vessel has boats! besides, we are still in the English Channel, and help is near and abundant. The convicts would scatter, some going in one boat, some in another, or the ship might be run ashore to save life, and Tom escape. I shuddered, and blew out the light, which was now burnt to within half an inch of the candle.

I felt stronger and more comfortable. The ship plunged softly; I heard no roaring of the brine outside, no blows as from the shock of thunderbolts; I guessed that the weather was fair and gentle; but was it night or day? I could not imagine. I had figured the high sun pouring upon the white canvas and the sea blue and splendid under him, and in that deep, vault-like blackness I’d pant for the sweetness of the air above and yearn but for ten minutes of the glory of the day. Then, in the same breath, I’d think ‘It may be midnight. The sun has sunk, and a thousand stars tremble over the mastheads, and a corner of moon is lifting out of a length of ragged, black cloud hanging low over the blacker water.’

When would it be time for me to beat upon the hatch and take my chance of what was then to follow? In any case, I dared not reveal myself till Will gave me notice, for how should I be able to tell where the ship was—whether she was not still close in with the English shore, so that the captain could land me, end my scheme, and render all I have done and suffered useless? I must be patient; better that Will should make no sign for a month than that I should emerge one hour too soon.

The time crept on. I heard an occasional movement of feet overhead, but all the noises were small and brief. Indeed, it was the ship’s forecastle, the place where the sailors ate, drank, and slept; where, unless all hands are on deck, there is always a watch below and consequently sleepers; so that when the voyage has fairly begun and the men have settled down to their work, there is no quieter place in a ship than her forecastle.

END OF THE FIRST VOLUME

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