The skipper shook his head.
"Dad-blamed smoke! I can smell it still, seems as if."
Beach swallowed again, and turned his gaze toward the brig. The skipper had been commendably careful there. Not a one of them was to get ha'penny—the skipper got it all—but he'd had them take a good look around the brig first, one by one, and then he had each one sign or make his mark under a statement of what he had seen. Willis Beach approved. You couldn't be too careful when you were dealing with port officials, admiralty lawyers and affiliated vermin. As for the stink of the scorched cabin. Beach hadn't much minded it, not any more than he had minded the stain on the deck. He supposed that he was sorry for the poor blokes who'd had their throats slit; but that had been some days ago, some miles back.
"Aye, aye, sir," he said, all the time eying the sword.
The skipper pinned a fluff of wool to the top of the taffrail, and then from a considerable distance he began thrusting at this. It looked gawky, the way he lunged, his palms up, his head back, feet flat on the deck; but he was good; he skewered the thing every time.
He was still breathing easy when he straightened.
"Why do you hold your left hand over your head like that, before you rip loose?" Beach asked.
Immediately afterward he gasped at his own temerity. Aboard a man-of-war had he dared to ask so flip a question of any officer the dreaded cry "Start that man!" would rise, and a bosun's mate would came on the double to beat him all about the head and arms with a rattan. It could be almost as bad as the cat. Beach had seen a man's left wrist broken that way once, and he'd heard of a man who had one of his eyes put out when he looked up to plead for mercy. It was against regulations; but it was done all the time. Not only the officers but even the bosun and bosun's mates, the master-at-arms, the marine sergeant, the ship's corporals, were just as likely to light into a hand they didn't like with a cane or a knotted rope.
Captain Long, however, answered mildly.
"Balance. Grant you it looks daft, but you throw that arm out and down when you lunge and you get in quicker."
"Looks awkurd[1]. Ever fight a man with one of them things, Cap'n?"
"No."
"Ever going to?"
"Yes."
The skipper sheathed. He spread his legs, fisted his hips.
"Now let me ask you some questions—"
Beach nodded. He had expected this.
"You deserted from the Navy?"
"I told you that, in Kingston."
"Why?"
"I'd been pressed, beat up, near broke me bloody jaw! After that they treated me crool. Not enough to eat, no rum at all. The quarters was wet. They worked you to the bone. They 'eld up your wiges. Didn't like my mites, either. Scum. And there was other reasons. But most of all I was afride of getting the cat again."
"Flogging?"
"Aye."
"What had they flogged you for the first time?"
"Last man down."
"Down from where?"
Puzzled, and as always suspicious, Beach looked at him.
"Why, from the tops. I was a topper. We always riced mast aginst mast when there was any canvas to be mide or shortened. 'Smart' they calls it. 'Ad to be bleedin' acrobats, we 'oped to go on living. 'Op around like fleas up there, with the wessel rolling. Then when you'd worked an' pounded yourself barmy, with all them officers screechin' at you, then last one down rited two dozen. Every day. 'Cept Sunday. Our captain was a religious man."
"But the last man down had probably been the first one up!"
"Didn't mike no difference. 'E got two dozen. Wonst I saw a topper smash both 'is ankles, 'urrying to get down. Another time a messmite of mine get killed. But they still did it."
The skipper glanced at the cabin hatch, which was closed, no doubt to assure himself that that juicy ripe redhead he had down there wasn't listening to all this rough talk.
"How did you get to Providence?"
"Why, aboard of a wessel."
Adam Long looked at him. "Ax" for "ask," "fit" for "fought," and such possessives as "ourn," "hern," "yourn," and "hisn" he was familiar with, while other expressions this Londoner used were not wholly strange —for instance. Beach would say, "I wouldn't do it without I had some help," whereas a Rhode Islander would have said "withouten I had some help"—but the transposition of "w"s and "v"s never failed to bring him up short.
Beach, who didn't fancy the look, stared at the horizon, and he swallowed yet again, making his Adam's apple fairly leap.
"Well, I didn't expect you'd sxvum it," the skipper said at last. "But what boat? And where did you find out about it?"
"At Walter's. The plice that press gang tried to nap me. It's where you go when you wants to find out anything about the lads that're on the account. That's what I was doing there. Looking for transportation. Thought I was sife, specially in the daytime."
"I see," slowly. "You seem to have picked up a lot."
"I got big ears. Always 'ad."
Beach, prodded, told him something about the political situation in Jamaica. The governor, General Selwyn, had died, and soon after that had come the fleet under Benbow, and then the news that William was dead and Anne was Queen. But the official notification of this had not yet arrived, any more than had the official news of the declaration of war. This was why nobody knew for sure whether the lieutenant governor, a rich and disagreeable planter named Beckford, who held his appointment of course from the late King William, had any right to be acting as governor. Beckford had many enemies; and it was customary for the local assembly to be at loggerheads with the governor and council anyway; but what really threw things nine ways from the middle was the arrogant attitude of Admiral Benbow.
"What's this Benbow like, personally?"
"Adisey, sir."
"Yet you served on his ship and they flogged you."
"Not the admiral didn't! That was the captain! When my back was patching and I couldn't go aloft they used me for a clerk—because I can write, y'know. Then there wasn't no flogging. Not that old Benbow wouldn't 'ave 'ad your 'ide off, 'e thought you was sodgering! 'E's a lamby, that 'un. When 'e gives a command it's thunderbolts, and when 'e grits 'is teeth there's sparks fly."
"I see— And now you want to go to the continent?"
"Aye, sir."
"Providence too rough for you?"
"Too dishonest, sir. I don't mind a bit of thievery now and then, but they was thieves all the time! It don't seem right."
"It ain't," Adam agreed. "Some one of these days somebody's going to stamp that nest out. Maybe it'll be your Benbow. He'd sure like to! It's costing him warships for convoy. And yet if they go clear around the other end of Cubic they're likely to run into Spaniards."
He saw the cabin hatch move, and he straightened.
"Well, you seem a good enough worker. Stay aboard of us—if they don't get you in Kingston."
"I won't go ashore, sir."
"And no wages. By rights I ought to make you pay for transportation, but we'll take that out in work."
"Thankee, sir."
The hatch cover slid open, and the lady emerged, wearing a blue that shamed the sea, smiling a smile that shamed the sun.
"You've met Admiral Benbow," Adam said to her a little later, as they strolled the deck. "What sort of man is he?"
1
Здесь и далее не ошибки оцифровки, а кокни — тип лондонского просторечия.
awkurd – awkward
crool – cruel
wiges – wages
mites – mates
afride – afraid
rice – race
aginst – against
rite – rate
mike – make
wonst – once
messmite – messmate
wessel – vessel
plice – place
sife – safe
Adisey – Hard to say