To us, though—ship's boy or Able-bodied Seaman—the midshipmen are officers and they command divisions throughout the ship, and we must knuckle our brows to them and obey their every command, even though some of them are not yet twelve. If they hit us, we must take it, and not even raise a hand in our own defense.
My Sea Dad
All the ship's boys and all the midshipmen get with an experienced sailor to teach them the things they need to know, like how to splice a line (Davy didn't know, the liar) and how to tie the knots and how to sew and mend and row and sail the small boats we have aboard. These sailors ain't exactly told to do this teachin', it's more chancy than that. Like if a man is the sort that likes to teach what he knows, well, us young ones can sense that and we drift together. The Royal Navy smiles on this way of teachin' 'cause it figures that if we're around long enough we might grow up into Able-bodied Seamen and be able to replace the poor sod what's just had his head blown off and ain't able bodied no more.
In my usual connivin' way, I seeks out Liam, the sailor from Ireland who was nice to me that first day, and he seems willin'.
"Liam Delaney, a name that won't shame me," he sings as he guides my clumsy fingers over the rough rope—"Line, Jacky, line. It's line when it's runnin' loose, it's rope when it's coiled up and put away. Makes perfect sense"—showin' me how to separate the strands with a marlinespike and how to weave them together in a splice or a bight. I get it, but I'm better with the needle and thread.
Liam is tall and strong and he has a lilty way of talkin'. His hair is as black as the coal. He plays the pennywhistle and has given me one and is teachin' me to play it, but I'll never be able to play it as good as him.
"Black Irish, I am," he says proudly. "My ancestor was some poor Spanish sailor, one of the many what washed ashore after the Armada was beat and wrecked and our Irish girls took them to their hearts and their beds, bless 'em, and here I am today." Some of the sailors hangin' about smirk, like they'd like to offer a comment on Irish girls and their beds, but a look from Liam warns them off. He's known as a willin' and fearsome fighter.
"Ah, yes," he says wistfully, "we Irish have always been kind to strangers, we have, and not always for the better for us."
The Officers and Men
The Captain is Captain Locke and the First Mate is Lieutenant Haywood and the Second Mate is Lieutenant Lawrence. The Sailing Master is Mr. Greenshaw and the Gunner's Mate is Mr. Stanford. Beyond that I don't know right now as there are many more officers and mates but I can't even name them as they have very little to do with me. We've even got Marines with their grand bright red uniforms, who stand about stiffly guardin' things and sweatin' in the heat in their high collars.
There are four hundred and five seamen and boys aboard and they are a mixed bunch. Most are English, of course, with a lot of Scots and Irish and Welsh and Americans thrown in, but there are also some Italians and Portuguese and even some black men, the first I'd ever seen. They don't look at all like the cartoons of 'em in the newspapers back in London. I suppose I must have been starin' at the one with the fierce tattoos all over his chest and arms and face, tattoos that were raised like bumps, and he caught me at it and so he growls and bares his teeth at me, teeth which I'm shocked to see are sharpened to points, and I yelps and runs away, but I hear him laughin' as I leaves:
"Be careful when you stare at the lion, boy. He may charm you and eat you."
Most of the men aboard are good-natured, some silent, some solemn, and some free and easy. But some are scary, too, of course, there being so many men aboard and some are bound to be bad ones. One man 'specially gives me pause and makes me nervous. He's named Sloat, Bill Sloat, and I noticed him early on 'cause he always seemed to be lookin' hard at me, which seemed to me strange, as being a ship's boy I'm certainly of no account and not worth noticin'. But I'd be walkin' along and I'd turn a corner and there he'd be, smirkin' at me and sayin' things like, "Well, and if it's not our little Jacky," and, "Ain't you a fine little sailor boy then, Jacky." I thought at first that he was just bein' friendly, but no, I don't think that's it at all.
Sloat has long greasy black hair and a black beard with red in it and dead white skin, and you can be sure he was there at our hosin' down. I don't like him and neither do the other boys. He stares at them, too, but he keeps his evil eye 'specially on me, and when I find it fallin' on me, it takes all of the joy out of whatever I'm doin' and I slink away and hide. I think he knows that I'm in fear of him, and I think he likes it.
I tell Liam about him and Liam scowls and says that I'm to keep away from the likes of him and to stay out of dark corners and out-of-the-way places.
"Up in the riggin' in the sunlight is the safe place for a ship's boy, not crawlin' around down in the dark hold. You listen to your old sea dad, now."
Liam don't know it but I've already done some crawlin' around belowdecks, and I've found a few secret places where I can practice my whistle as it's not allowed above decks except on Sunday and how can I learn otherwise? And I got to have a place to wash up and do other stuff out of sight. I've got a right-little chamber pot rigged up so I don't have to use the head, but I still go to the head sometimes when I know there's no one in there and go up to the trough as if I'm properly rigged out to use it, and I wait till I hear someone trompin' in and then do the shake-and-wiggle action the boys do and cinch my pants and leave, havin' furthered The Deception.
I find I like bein' clean, and I keep after the others to hold up their end so we won't have a repeat of the hose-down humiliation. I don't miss the lice, either, even though I never ate 'em, like some did. Almost never.
***
It's not all work-and-learnin' on the ship. Us boys spend a lot of time climbing in the riggin', daring each other to go higher and higher and swingin' out over the abyss, the ship's deck so small down below. I think we're not yelled at 'cause they want us to get used to the scary heights for when it's our turn in later years to man the top. And if we fall to the deck or go over the side, well, what's one ship's boy, more or less?
There's singin' and dancin', too, on Sundays after Church and Inspection, with the great louts stompin' about and roar/in' out songs. Liam plays the squeeze box, too, and is much admired for his skill.
It's official now. We're off to the coast of North Africa to fight the Barbary pirates and protect fair England's merchant fleet, which sounds grand to me, but I am somewhat fearful of being there off the coast of the Barbary lands, 'cause if I'm discovered and put off into one of their ports, wouldn't I be made a slave right off?
Chapter 10
We ship's boys are all tight pals now. We lay about in the foretop together as much as we can, when our jobs are done and we're not on watch and we're not racin' around the rigging like demented monkeys. The foretop is a platform built high in the foremast, which is the mast in front, where the foretopmen climb up to when they got to change the sails. There is a little platform built on the mainmast, which on the Dolphin is the highest mast, and that's called the main top and then high above that is another, smaller platform called the crow's nest, and that's where the lookout stands, gazing out over the sea, looking for pirates and such.
Not for us, though, we stick to the foretop, which is big enough for the six of us and is our second kip, a club, like, where we're generally not bothered, being hidden by the sails billowing all around us. The officers and midshipmen usually stick to the rear of the ship, so we're out of their sight and hearing, which is good, 'cause if they saw us lazing about they'd sure find something for us to do.
We sprawl about in the sun and talk. The boys talk about how brave they're going to be when we come upon some luckless pirate. Jaimy especially talks fierce about how he'll be the first across, and he waves a pretend sword and allows as how he'll be made an officer 'cause of his bravery, and Davy stands up with his pretend sword and they joyfully hack at each other. I reserve judgement on how brave I'll be in a fight, 'cause I don't think I'll be brave at all and I'm just hoping I don't disgrace myself.
Today after our duties, I'm sitting down with me shiv in my lap and I'm carving a rooster's head on the hilt of it in remembrance of Charlie whose shiv it was original. I borrowed the carving gouge from Liam, and I'm making the outline. I figure I'll rub some colors in later when I get 'em. We start talking about our old gangs and I'm tellin' 'em about Charlie and Hughie and the girls, when Tink pipes up with, "Me and me gang had a run in wi' Charlie Rooster's crew once ... I recalls a really big bloke and a bunch of girls throwin' rocks and red-haired Charlie, of course, but I don't recall you. Funny, that." Tink peers at me, curiouslike.
"That's 'cause I was up on Blackfriar's Bridge with a big rock ready to drop on your stupid head if you got any closer to our kip," says I, "and it would've been good riddance to the likes of you—and I wish I had done it."
Tink grins his good-natured grin. "You're right. It was at a bridge." He leans back against the mast and smiles up into the sun. "And now we's mates. Ain't it strange?"
Stranger than you know, lad.
Jaimy has loosened up considerable since he first came on board all stiff and horrified by the likes of us. He's one of us now, but there's chinks in his knowing about life and the lives of others. Like now we're all talking about our past lives and I'm talking about Charlie and the gang and then I tells about That Dark Day when me family died and how Muck come for me sister and I'm startin' to choke up a bit and then Jaimy up and says he don't believe a word of it.
"Ah, you're all having me on," he says, resentfullike. He don't like being made fun of.
"Nay, it's true, Jaimy," says Benjy. "Muck was one o' them what come and got the dead uns and sold 'em to the doctors."
But Jaimy's still sittin' there not believin' it, and for some reason I loses me head and gets all hot and I'm quick up on me hands and knees facing him and me eyes are wellin' up and I says, "Of course you ain't believin' it when all ye ever did then was ride in yer damn fancy coach and stare out at the kids in the street with their hands out to ye, and if ye ever did wonder where they come from, yer high-and-fine mum'd tell you they all come from the fancy houses, aye, and all their mums tarts and all their dads villains and drunkards, too, right?"
I jumps up to go and sticks me shiv and me carvin' tool in me vest.
"Come on, Jacky, it ain't his fault," says Davy.
"Yes, it is. He's a bleedin' toff what don't know nothin'!"
Jaimy's face is red and he looks at me mad and I glares back at him. "Watch your mouth, Jack," he says through his teeth. He clenches his fists.
"Piss off, James," says I through me own teeth. "I bet ye thought the street scum could go to fine orphanages and such anytime they wanted. They couldn't, James, 'cause there ain't no orphanages! There's only Muck and sickness and cold and starvin' and shame and brothels and the gallows!"
The tears are runnin' down me face for real now, and I turns and grabs a shroud and wraps me legs around it and slides down to the deck. Then I goes down to one of me hidey-holes way below deck and curls up and hugs me knees and looks off in the dark.