They had no tools except their swords, and the ground and sodden grasses had resisted their attempts to grub out a shallow hole. They had turned to the rick in expectation, and been maddened by its own resistance. The hay was old, hard-packed and blackened, with the air of being derelict. Warren also, abandoned like a broken doll in front of it, his head at an angle, his behind grotesquely in the air, one arm snapped askew.
It was the big man, Peter, of whom Yorke had been conscious on occasions during the long hours of their drab ordeal, who broke through the hard black outer layer of the rick and gave a cry. Others thrust in arms next to his, tearing out lumps of sodden hay they then cast to the ground before plunging in for more. Their renewed whoops, although triumphant, tended towards the hollow in Yorke's ears, as if something was coming to an end. Indeed, the rampage had been on for untold hours; if Warren were to be stuffed out of sight at last, it must be huge relief to them. One man gone mocked, outraged, abused, despatched. Which left just him. Charles Yorke watched them pick up Warren's body, still without emotions. The gentlemen had said that he might live, if he would throw his lot in with them, become a secret agent for the wild men of the east, a cancer in the heart of Customs House. What was he meant to do? Ask these half-drunken savages? Indicate that he had come to a decision? Or merely wait, until they spoke again of it, more clearly? He did not know, but thought more likely they would kill him, in the end. It was not, somehow, a quite unwelcome prospect.
Warren's corpse disappeared fast and suddenly. Seven or eight men surrounded it, lifted it, and thrust it home into the rick headfirst, like a ramrod. The feet, in their black muddy boots, stuck out, then were seized and pushed by several hands, with added shoulder thrusts, then covered with wet hay. Now me, thought Yorke, but could not move, despite he wanted to sit up to face his nemesis.
But no. Not him. The men struck flame and tried to fire the rick, which at first would hardly smoulder. No breeze, many hours of a downpour, old, rotten hay. They conferred, he watched them at it, there was some argument. At last they brought some brandy from their saddlebags, poured it on liberally, bottle after bottle, which spoke not just of easy come but wretched surfeit, as if they'd drunk furlongs beyond their fill. This time the rick did take when fire was applied; at first slowly, then with appetite. In two or three minutes after ignition it was going from the heart, although the smoke was black and heavy, not blue and dancing like a normal summer rick set off by men in drunken rage against their betters. Rick-burners hanged, thought Yorke, but doubted in his heart that these men would. If they did, though, he would not be there to see it. Poor Charlie Warren. He could see his boot, twisting in the sun. And hear it crackling.
Eight
Life on the Biter was an easy life, Bentley could see that and he could comprehend it. He could not, however, quite believe it, and he passed the next few hours in expectation that the truth would be revealed. For William's truth, from his experience, was that life was hard, especially Navy life. As the day wore on no hardness came, and the general tenor of the ship and crew, if anything, became more comfortable, not less. The missing last ingredient was Lieutenant Kaye, her commanding officer; so William built his fears on him. Lieutenant Kaye would provide the hardness, whatever Samuel said.
Lieutenant Kaye turned up that evening, at after six o'clock, by which time the midshipmen, between them, had achieved a remarkable great deal. Sam Holt had mustered the men 'the walking wounded' when he and Bentley had returned from their 'coffee run' ashore, and introduced them to their new officer in a parody of the formality that William remembered from his days in Welfare. He had lined the people up beside the gangway, and told off their names without any prompting from Jem Taylor. Silas Ayling, Tom Hugg, Tom Tilley, Billy Mann, John Behar, Joshua Baines, Geoff Raper, cook. There was another in the scuppers still, Peter Tennison, and five more not on board, including the carpenter and the sail maker who was in love and probably in tears somewhere (which joke of Sam's had the men in tucks). They were, Sam told him loudly, good men all, who took their orders, were keen and clean, and most of all were sober. Amid renewed merriment, he told Jem Taylor to set them to on the essential tasks, behind the dockyard men: all cordage checked and coiled, misplaced rigging overhauled, and filth and mess cleared up and overboard. Then, stripping to his shirt, he chose a crew of four and pointed to the mast.
"Mr. Taylor, I will take this task, you take the foredeck and the bowsprit. Mr. Bentley, might I suggest you go alone and tour from top to keelson and get to know her lie? At dinner we will confer."
Throughout the day Will looked, and searched, and crawled, and wandered. In the large hold, with its ranks of chains and irons for the Pressed men, in the bilges, where he noted several gushing springs among the seams and a dockyard team with mallets and oakum tending them in the steering flat, the lazaret, the powder room (unlocked and empty), the sail maker store, the carpenter's workshop, the galley. He came to this just before midday, and was spoken to by Geoff Raper, a thin, shaking man with only half a left leg no peg one eye, and a Scotch way of speaking he could make hardly head or tail of. The broth was good though, strong enough in smell to mask the spirit-stale that rose from Geoff and others of the people, and he had baked bread of sorts flat but very tasty.
At times he spoke with Samuel, now sweating like a common man himself. William also, when he'd finished his tour, had peeled off his outer garments of a gentleman and pitched in, which apparently had gone down well with most of the people. Dressed, he looked rather soft, his face unlined and only lightly whiskered, but in his shirtsleeves he was a different matter. William sailed alone and frequently, winter and summer, and often in the sun went lightly clad. His hands were rough from rope and rowing, his arms were brown and hard and muscular. But it was his facility with the common seamen's tasks that most impressed them. He could splice and whip with the fastest and the neatest, and his eye for necessary tasks or small improvements was like lightning. It was a commonplace that young officers and gentlemen should learn sailors' tasks by doing them, and even more a commonplace that they did them like ham-fisted dogs (whatever compliments were passed for form and safety's sake). But William could do it all, and passing well. Most liked him for it; and in men's way, some would loathe him, for obscure reasons. This afternoon he got the benefit of the doubt, he thought. The men worked well, and not unkeenly and the tasks got done. As in the morning, he felt an unaccustomed pleasure on this grubby little vessel.
Geoff, the hopping cook, served them tea late in the afternoon, with a batch of cakes spread liberally round the company, and some left over for the dockyard men. Samuel and Will, by now, had rinsed the dirt off, and were smartened up and formal, within their lights. The tide was full, almost on the turn, and the weather had stayed beautiful. The Thames was a mass of vessels, of every shape and size, with the first big traders coming slowly down to be shot out to the Nore and then the Downs when the tide should start to run its fastest. The two young men were leaning on the rail looking at the southern shore where young girls were herding cows.
"What do you think of them?" asked Samuel. "I mean our stalwarts, not the maids. You played a good hand, mucking in like that."
"It was for pleasure, not to make my mark," said William. "Indeed, they seem a handy bunch. Whatever else they are not lax! Jem Taylor handles them right well."