Now the lash of the whip coiled out to make a crack that split the overheated air like a bolt of lightning.
Despite the heat of the sun the Captain's words had chilled Paulette to the marrow. As she looked around her now, she could see that many of the girmitiyas were in a trance of fear: it was as if they had just woken to the realization that they were not only leaving home and braving the Black Water – they were entering a state of existence in which their waking hours would be ruled by the noose and the whip. She could see their eyes straying to the island nearby; it was so close that its attraction was almost irresistible. When a grizzled, middle-aged man began to babble, she knew by instinct that he was losing his struggle against the pull of land. Although forewarned, she was still among the first to scream when this man made a sudden turn, shoved a lascar aside, and vaulted over the deck rail.
The silahdars raised the alarm by shouting – Admi girah! Man overboard! – and the girimitiyas – most of whom had no idea what was happening – began to mill about in panic. Under cover of the commotion, two more migrants broke through and made the leap, hurling themselves over the bulwark.
This sent the guards into a frenzy and they started to flail their lathis in an effort to herd the men back into the dabusa. To add to the confusion, the lascars were busy ripping the covers off the jamna longboat; when they tilted it sideways a flock of squawking hens and roosters descended upon the deck. The malums too had converged upon the boat, shouting hookums and pulling at the devis, raising clouds of chicken-muck that plastered them in feathers, shit and feed.
Temporarily forgotten, the women were left to huddle around the jamna devis. Craning over the deck rail, Paulette saw that one of the three swimmers had already disappeared below water; the other two were thrashing against a current that was sweeping them towards the open sea. Then a great flock of birds appeared above the swimmers, swooping down from time to time, as if to check whether they were still alive. Within a few minutes the swimmers' heads vanished, but still the birds remained, wheeling patiently above, as they waited for the corpses to float back to the surface. Although the bodies were not seen again, it was clear, from the way the birds were circling in the sky, that the corpses had been seized by the outgoing tide and were being swept towards the horizon.
This was why, when at last the long-awaited wind began to blow, the crew was exceptionally slow in making saiclass="underline" because, after everything that had happened already, the prospect of crossing wakes with the three mutilated corpses had filled the lascars with an unspeakable dread.
Nineteen
Next morning, under a lamb's-wool sky, the Ibis ran into swells and gusts that set her to a frolicsome pitching. Many of the girmitiyas had begun to experience stirrings of discomfort while the Ibis was still on the Hooghly, for even at her most placid the schooner was a great deal livelier than the slow river-boats to which they were accustomed. Now, with the Ibis tipping all nines in a jabble-sea, many were reduced to a state of infantile helplessness.
Some half-dozen pails and wooden buckets had been distributed through the 'tween-deck, in preparation for the onset of seasickness. For a while, these were put to good use, with the steadier of the migrants helping the others to reach the balties before they spewed. But soon the containers were filled to overflowing, and their contents began to slop over the sides. As the vessel plunged and climbed, more and more of the migrants lost the use of their legs, emptying their stomachs where they lay. The smell of vomit added to the already noxious odours of the enclosed space, multiplying the effects of the vessel's motion. Soon it seemed as if the hold would be swamped by a rising tide of nausea. One night a man drowned in a pool of his own vomit, and such were the conditions that his death went unremarked for the better part of a day. By the time it was noticed, so few migrants could stand upright that the consigning of the corpse to the water was not witnessed by any of them.
Deeti, like many of the others, was oblivious to the fatality that had occurred nearby: even if she had known, she would not have had the strength to look in the dead man's direction. For several days she could not rise to her feet, far less leave the dabusa; it was a near-intolerable effort even to roll off her mat when Kalua wanted to wipe it clean. As for food and water, the very thought of them were enough to bring her gorge rushing to her lips: Ham nahin tál sakelan – I can't bear it, I can't…
Yes you can; you will.
As Deeti began to recover, Sarju grew steadily worse. One night her moaning became so piteous that Deeti, who was feeling none too spry herself, took her head into her own lap, and covered her forehead with a piece of moistened cloth. Suddenly she felt Sarju's body growing tense under her fingers. Sarju? she cried: Are you all right?
Yes, whispered Sarju. Hold still for a moment…
Alerted by Deeti's cry, some of the others turned to ask: What's happened to her? What's the matter?
Sarju raised a wavering finger to silence them, and then lowered her ear to Deeti's belly. The women held their breath until Sarju opened her eyes.
What? said Deeti. What's happened?
God has filled your lap, Sarju whispered. You are with child!
The one time when Captain Chillingworth was unfailingly present on deck was at noon, when he was joined by the two mates in shooting the sun. This was the part of the day that Zachary most looked forward to, and not even Mr Crowle's presence could diminish his pleasure in the ritual. It wasn't just that he enjoyed using his sextant, though that was no small part of it; for him this moment was a reward for the unceasing tedium of watch-on-watch and the constant aggravation of having to be at close quarters with the first mate: to see the schooner changing position on the charts was a reminder that this was not a journey without end. Every day, when Captain Chillingworth produced the schooner's chronometer, Zachary would go to great pains to synchronize his watch with it: the moving of the minute hand was evidence, too, that despite the unchanging horizon ahead, the schooner was steadily altering her place in the universe of time and space.
Mr Crowle did not possess a watch, and it irked him that Zachary had one. Every noon there was some new jibe: 'There he goes again, like a monkey with a nut…' Captain Chillingworth, on the other hand, was impressed by Zachary's exactitude: 'Always good to know where you stand in the world: never does a man any harm to know his place.'
One day, as Zachary was tweaking his watch, the Captain said: 'That's a pretty little gewgaw you've got there, Reid: would you mind if I took a look?'
'No, sir – not in the least.' Zachary snapped the cover shut and handed over his watch.