Out on the deck the scene was reminiscent of that—now seeming to the prisoners a whole lifetime away—which had taken place barely ten days earlier when Circe had crossed the Tropic of Cancer. There was no canvas bath and the dais was lower, but on it was the same pair of big chairs which had been used as thrones, and to either side of an open space before them the whole ship's company was congregated.
The thrones were occupied by Joao de Mondego and Lucette. In front of them was an upended cask of rum, the top of which had been stove in. Everyone present held a pannikin and most of the men were still avidly lapping down their first tot. As the captives appeared they were greeted with cheers, boos and cat-calls. The hunch-back led them up to the cask, pannikins were produced from somewhere and Pedro the Carib, who was doing the honours behind it, ladled out a portion equivalent to a fifth of a bottle for each of them; then ordered them to drink it.
Amanda and Jenny only sipped theirs; Clarissa took a mouthful, then choked and spluttered; Georgina flung hers at Pedro's feet.
Instantly Lucette's voice rang out: "Fill for her again, Pedro. If the noble Countess abuses more of our good liquor we will make her lick it up off the deck."
A shout of laughter greeted her threat. Pedro refilled the pannikin and again handed it to Georgina. Roger said in English loud enough for those with him to hear. "For God's sake drink the stuff, and more if you can get it. 'Twill deaden your sensibilities."
Obediently, between chokes and gasps, they swallowed the fiery liquor. Then the hunch-back led them to a wooden bench, placed opposite the dais but some distance from it, and signed to them to sit down. A moment later he seized Roger's arms from behind, thrust a cord between them and his back, then drew it tight and knotted it firmly. Instinctively Roger strove to free himself, but his struggles only provoked more raucous laughter from the spectators: and, having secured his arms, the hunch-back next firmly lashed his ankles, so that should he stand up with the intention of moving forward he would fall flat on his face.
His last hope was gone of grabbing a knife from someone and, perhaps, bringing this ghastly parry to a premature end by stabbing Joao or Lucette; his left eye was now completely closed, but with the other he took stock of the assembly. Including Joao, Lucette, Pedro, and the hunch-back, the prize crew numbered only a dozen, with probably a man at the wheel and another on look-out duty.
Bloggs was present with nine of his cronies, and all eight of the Porto Ricans.
The ship's fiddler had been one of Bloggs's following from the start; and now, seated on a chair in front of the rum barrel, he struck up a merry tune. Darkness had come with the swiftness usual in the tropics, but the bizarre scene was lighted by lanterns hung in the rigging. Some of the men began a rhythmic clapping, then four of them came out on to the circle of deck amidships that had been kept clear and danced a hornpipe.
After it the revellers lined up for another tot of rum. Then one of the pirates sang a soulful ballad in a deep baritone. The ship was moving almost silently over the deep waters, and in any other circumstances the captives would have been enraptured by his untutored talent; but, as things were, they could only listen with an awful apprehension of what might yet befall them as the night advanced.
Thunderous applause led to an encore, but after it the less musical among the men had had enough and called loudly for a country dance. Marshalled by Pedro the Carib, they formed two lines, and to the scraping of the fiddle began to tap their feet, bob awkwardly at one another, then utter loud shouts and leap about in a travesty of a gavotte.
The country dance was followed by more rum, then a succession of rollicking choruses in which the French-speaking pirates, the English mutineers and the Spanish-reared Porto Ricans at first were given a hearing in turn, but later endeavoured to out-shout one another; so that their combined voices merged into an ear-splitting babel of sound.
At length, when the din subsided, someone called for a pavan.
Most of them had asked others to be their partners, when one of the Circe's men came up to Jenny and said: "Please, Missy, will 'e dance wi' me?"
Jenny cast an anxious glance round, but there seemed nothing for It but to accept. Reluctantly she stood up. The sailor put his arm round her and whirled her away. Others nearby saw them move off and swiftly followed his example. Half a dozen claimants squabbled over which of them should lead out Clarissa, Georgina and Amanda. Two free fights ensued, but those not involved seized upon the three girls and pulled them willy-nilly into the dance.
Roger now sat on the bench alone, suffering the worst torments that hell has to offer. He had fooled Catherine the Great of Russia, defied a Spanish Prime Minister, beaten the unscrupulous Fouché at his own game, tricked France's Minister of War, the shrewd Carnot, stood up to Robespierre, Danton, Hubert, and a legion of other evil, ruthless men. He had caused a Spanish hidalgo to be hung from a lamp-post, and had slain the finest swordsman in all France in single combat: but now, against this filthy, villainous, verminous, brainless, besotted crew he was utterly helpless.
Staring with his single good eye at his wife in the close embrace of a bearded, broken-nosed ruffian, he cursed the day when he had opposed his old master's wish that he should return to France, and instead lightly declared his intention of going off to the West Indies.
Better a thousand times Paris in the throes of Revolution, with all its horrors, squalor and dangers, for they were things with which, given courage and wits, one stood a fair chance of coping.
Yet, when the dance ended, to his unutterable relief, the partners of the four women brought them back to the bench. The night was hot and they were panting from the exertions to which they had been forced, but otherwise showed no ill effects from their unwelcome experience.
Soon the fiddler struck up again, and this time there was a wild scramble to secure the women as partners. Bloggs was in the forefront of the rush, and buffeting two other applicants aside with his huge fists seized upon Jenny. Lucette had taken the deck with Joao. Pedro grabbed Georgina, a British seaman Amanda and one of the Porto Ricans Clarissa.
The moon had risen silvering the sea. Again Roger crouched on the bench, straining against his bonds in agony of mind while the nightmare dance went on; but once more all the women were brought decorously back when from temporary exhaustion the fiddler ceased his scraping.
Now that Pedro had abandoned his post at the rum barrel the men were helping themselves, and some were already reeling about the decks so drunk that they were barging into their fellows. It was then that one of the Circe's men shouted: "The Mermaid! Come, Mermaid, show us your pretty tail!"
The cry was taken up by the rest of the mutineers, and some of them volubly explained to the pirates about the fancy-dress that Clarissa had worn at the crossing of the Tropic of Cancer. Soon a deputation was crowding round her, urging her to don her Mermaid's costume. Her face, paper-white, she stubbornly refused, but one of Bloggs's friends, known as Marlinspike Joe, shouted at her:
"Go put it on wench, or we'll strip you and put it on for you."
Stark fear in her blue eyes, Clarissa looked at Amanda. Feeling that worse might befall unless the raucous crew were humoured, Amanda nodded, and beckoned to Jenny. Together the three women stood up and walked towards the cabins beneath the poop, followed by Marlinspike Joe and a few of his companions.