Rapscallion. James McGee

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СКАЧАТЬ gambled all their belongings away. It’s how they exist. They have a mania for it. Cards and dice dominate their lives. Most start with money. When that’s gone, they wager their clothes and their bedding, even their rations. Sometimes they starve themselves, hoarding their rations to sell them off and then start over again. When they run out of belongings or food they steal from others or roam the decks looking for peelings or fish heads. Even the rats aren’t safe. Now and again they send out raiding parties, like the one you just saw.”

      “Rafalés,” Hawkwood murmured.

      “Some call them that,” Charbonneau said, eyes narrowing. “You’ve heard of them?”

      Hawkwood nodded.

      “Why don’t the guards punish them?” Lasseur asked.

      Charbonneau gave a dry laugh. “How? Look around. You think this place isn’t punishment enough? In any case, the commander’s hands are tied. They can’t be flogged. No prisoner can. Direct physical punishment’s forbidden, unless a British soldier or crew member is harmed.”

      “So he wouldn’t have given the order to fire?” Lasseur said.

      “Not unless there’d been a full-scale riot which threatened the safety of his men. As far as our commander’s concerned, any disagreement between prisoners is dealt with by prisoners’ tribunal.” Charbonneau sniffed dismissively. “What goes on below deck stays below deck. It’s got so that the guards hardly ever enter the orlop now. They leave them to get on with it. The rest of us don’t go down there either. It’s not safe. You saw what they were like.”

      Hawkwood remembered the scream he’d heard on his first night and the lack of reaction it had provoked. He looked across the Park towards the quarterdeck and watched as the hulk’s commander removed his hat, turned his face to the sun and closed his eyes. The lieutenant stood still, letting the warmth soak into his skin. His hair was dark and streaked with grey.

      After what must have been half a minute at least, the lieutenant opened his eyes and dropped his chin. Running a hand through his hair, he placed the hat back on his head and turned to go. Abruptly, he paused, as if aware that his unguarded moment had been observed. He looked over his shoulder. Hawkwood made no attempt to glance away as the lieutenant’s brooding eyes roved slowly along the line of prisoners. As Hellard’s gaze passed over his own, it seemed for a second as though the hulk commander’s attention lingered, but then, as the lieutenant’s stare moved on, the moment was gone. Hawkwood decided it had been his imagination, which was probably just as well. Clad in civilian clothes rather than the ubiquitous yellow jacket and trousers, Hawkwood knew he’d risked drawing attention to himself by making eye contact with the lieutenant. It had been an unwise move.

      “Unless I’m mistaken,” Lasseur commented softly as the lieutenant made his way from the deck, “there’s a man who spends a lot of time in his own company.”

      The world began to revolve once more. Charbonneau drifted away. Beneath Hawkwood’s and Lasseur’s vantage point, a fencing class was being conducted. In the absence of edged weapons, the students were reduced to wielding the thin sticks that had been used to quell the recent invasion – still a risky venture given the confines of the classroom – and the Park echoed to the click-clack of wooden foils.

      “Can’t say I care much for their instructor,” Lasseur said dismissively, looking down at the scene. “The man’s style is abominable. Do you fence?”

      “When the mood takes me,” Hawkwood said.

      Lasseur grunted at the noncommittal answer and then said, “A splendid exercise; the pursuit of gentlemen. Perhaps we should give lessons, too? Earn ourselves some extra rations.”

      The dry tone in the privateer’s voice hinted that Lasseur was being sarcastic, so Hawkwood didn’t bother to reply. He looked out across the water. Lasseur did the same. The two frigates were nearing the mouth of the river. Close hauled, yards braced, their nearness to one another suggested a friendly rivalry between the crews, with each ship determined to steal the wind from her opponent, knowing the loser would be left floundering, sheets and sails flapping, her embarrassment plain for all to see.

      From Lasseur’s distant gaze and by the way his hands were holding on to the rail, knuckles white, Hawkwood sensed the Frenchman was thinking about his own ship. Hawkwood tried to imagine what might be going through the privateer’s mind, but suspected the task was beyond him. His world was so far removed from Lasseur’s that any attempt to decipher the faraway look was probably futile.

      While there were inherent dangers attached to both their professions, it was there the similarity ended. Hawkwood’s world was one of ill-lit streets, thieves’ kitchens, flash houses, fences, rogues and rookeries. Lasseur’s, in total contrast, was the open deck of a sailing ship, running before the wind. It seemed to Hawkwood that, whereas his world was an enclosed one, almost as dark and degrading as the hulk’s gun deck, Lasseur’s was one of freedom, of the open main and endless skies. For Lasseur, being cooped up on the prison ship would be like a bird whose wings had been clipped. Small wonder his desire to escape was so strong.

      “How long will it take, do you think?” Lasseur asked. He did not look around but continued to follow the frigates’ progress towards the open water.

      “Murat?”

      Lasseur nodded.

      “He has the advantage,” Hawkwood said. “He’ll probably be content to keep us waiting, even if it’s just to teach us who’s pulling the strings. It could be a while.”

      Lasseur turned. There was a bleak look in his eyes. “Any longer in this place and I swear I’ll go mad.”

      “One day at a time,” Hawkwood said. “That’s how we have to look at it. I hate to admit it, but the bastard was right about one thing.”

      “What’s that?”

      “We should be patient.”

      Lasseur grimaced. “Not one of my better virtues.”

      “Mine neither,” Hawkwood admitted, “except, we don’t have a choice. Right now, I don’t think there’s much else we can do.”

      Lasseur nodded wearily. “You’re right, of course. It does not mean I have to like it, though, does it?”

      Hawkwood didn’t answer. In his mind’s eye he saw again the mob of prisoners rising out of the hatches and the mayhem they had created. Lasseur had referred to the hulk as a version of Hell. From what Hawkwood had witnessed so far, the privateer’s description had been horribly accurate. In his time as a Runner, Hawkwood had visited a good number of London’s gaols: Newgate, Bridewell, and the Fleet among them. They were, without exception, terrible places. But this black, heartless hulk was something different. There was true horror at work here, Hawkwood sensed. He wasn’t sure what form it took or if he would be confronted by it, but he knew instinctively that it would be like nothing he’d encountered before.

       6

      The interpreter had been wrong about the smell. After four days, Hawkwood still hadn’t grown used to it. Grim smells were nothing new, living in London had seen to that, but in the enclosed world of the gun deck, four hundred bodies generated their own particular odour and, despite the open ports and СКАЧАТЬ