Mr. Hollybrass, the first mate, would approach slowly, seeming to take his own silent soundings about the captain’s demands. He might lift his shaggy eyebrows as if to object, but I never heard him actually contradict the captain in words. Indeed the captain would only repeat his commands, and then Mr. Hollybrass would obey.
“Have Mr. Dillingham redo the futtock shrouds,” he’d say. Or, “Get Mr. Foley to set the fore gaff top sail proper.” Or again, “Have Mr. Morgan set that main clewgarnet to rights.”
The men of the crew, hardly finished with one task, would have to set about another, though they did so with dark looks and not-so-silent oaths.
The captain, gentleman that he was, appeared to take no notice. But more than once I watched him call upon Mr. Hollybrass—or less often Mr. Keetch—to punish a man for some slackness or slowness I could not detect. If provoked sufficiently, the captain might resort to a push or a slap with his own open hand. And, much to my surprise, I saw him strike Morgan—a short, stocky, squinty-eyed monkey of a man—with a belaying pin, one of the heavy wood dowels used to secure a rigging rope to the pin rail. In dismay, I averted my eyes. The fellow was tardy about reefing a sail, the captain said, and went on to catalog further likely threats: Confinement in the brig. Salary docking. No meals. Lashings. Duckings in the cold sea or even keelhauling, which, as I learned, meant pulling a man from one side of the ship to the other—under water.
“Miss Doyle,” he might say when we took our daily tea, “you see them for yourself. Are they not the dirtiest, laziest dogs?”
“Yes, sir,” I’d reply softly, though I felt increasingly uncomfortable because I could sense resentment growing among the crew.
“And was ever a Christian more provoked than I?”
“No, sir.”
“Now,” he would always ask, “what have you observed?”
Dutifully, I would report everything I’d seen and heard, the dodges from work, the clenched fists, the muttered oaths of defiance that I had tried hard not to hear.
When I’d done he always said the same. “Before we hove home, Miss Doyle, I shall break them to my will. Each and every one.”
One afternoon the wind ceased. And for days after the Seahawk was becalmed. It was like nothing I’d ever experienced. Not only did the breeze vanish and the heat rise, but the sea lay like something dead. Air became thick, positively wringing wet, searing to the lungs. Fleas and roaches seemed to crawl out from every timber. The ship, festering in her own malodorous breath, moaned and groaned.
Five times during those days Captain Jaggery ordered the jolly boats lowered. With Mr. Hollybrass in command of one, Mr. Keetch the other, they towed the Seahawk in search of wind. It was useless. No wind was to be found.
Then the captain, abruptly accepting the ship’s windless fate, set the men to work harder than ever, as though the doldrums had been prearranged in order that he might refit and burnish the Seahawk as though new-made. “Sweet are the uses of adversity,” he instructed me.
The complaints of the crew grew louder. The oaths became, by perceptible degrees, darker yet.
When I reported all this to the captain he frowned and shook his head. “No one ranks for creative genius like a sailor shirking work.”
“The crew is tired,” I murmured, trying to suggest in a hesitant, vague way that even I could see that the men were fatigued and in need of rest.
“Miss Doyle,” he said with a sudden hard laugh, even while urging a second sweet biscuit upon me, “you have my word. They shall wake up when we run into storm.”
How right he was. But the storm was—at first—man-made.
Chapter Nine
For three more days we drifted upon the glassy sea. The helplessness of it, I could tell, drove Captain Jaggery nearly to distraction. Though the sun grew fiercer, he kept sending the men out in jolly boats to tow the Seahawk for two hours at a time in search of wind. He found only more to complain about.
And then it happened.
It was late afternoon, eighteen days into our voyage. The first dog watch. I was on the forecastle deck with Ewing. Ewing was a young, blond Scot—handsome, I thought—with a shocking tattoo of a mermaid upon his arm. That and his Aberdeen sweetheart, about whom he loved to talk, fascinated me. I rather fancied sweetheart and mermaid were one.
At the time he was sitting cross-legged, quite exhausted. That morning the captain had ordered him to spend the day in the highest reaches of the yards, putting new tar on the stays. The sun was brutal. The tar was sticky. Now an old canvas jacket lay in his lap, and with trembling fingers he was attempting to patch it, using needle and awl.
While he labored I read to him from one of my favorite books, Blind Barbara Ann: A Tale of Irving Poverty. He was listening intently when his needle snapped in two.
He swore, hastily apologized for cursing in my presence, then cast about for a new needle. When he couldn’t find one, he murmured something about having to get another from his box in the forecastle and made to heave himself up.
Knowing how tired he was, I asked, “Can I get it for you?”
“It would be a particular kindness, Miss Doyle,” he answered, “my legs being terrible stiff today.”
“Where should I look?” I asked.
“Beneath my hammock, in the topmost part of my chest,” he said. “In the forecastle.”
“Will someone be able to point it out?”
“I should think so,” he said.
Without much thought other than that I wished to do the man a kindness, I turned and hurried away.
I had scampered down the forecastle entryway before pausing to think. The forecastle was one of the few areas I had not been in before—the one place on the Seahawk that the sailors called their own. Not even Captain Jaggery ventured there. No one had ever said I was not to go. But I assumed I would not be welcome.
With this reservation in mind I hurried to the galley in hopes of finding Zachariah. I would ask him to fetch the needle. The galley, however, was deserted.
Since I did not wish to disappoint Ewing, I decided I must go and fetch the needle myself. Timidly, I approached the forecastle door. As I did I heard muted voices from within. Indeed, it was only because they were vague and indistinct that I found myself straining to listen. And what I heard was this:
«... I say I’ll be the one to give the word and none other.”
“It had better be soon. Jaggery’s pushing us hard.”
“How many names do we have?”
“There’s seven that’s put down their mark. But there’s others inclined.”
“What about Johnson?”
“It doesn’t look right. He’s not got the spirit.”
“It won’t do. He needs to be with us or not. No half way. And I don’t like that girl always spying.”
“Her being here isn’t anyone’s fault. We tried. You remind yourself—we kept those other passengers off.”
I heard these words—spoken by at least four voices—but I did not at the moment fully grasp their meaning. Understanding would come later. Instead I was caught up in embarrassment that I should be eavesdropping where I hardly belonged. It was not a very ladylike thing to do. Yet I was—in part—the subject of their conversation.
And the errand was still to be done. Wanting to do what I’d promised, I knocked upon the door.
Sudden silence.
Then, “Who’s there!”
“Miss Doyle, please.”