Chapter Text
The pressed men were a foul band, fists clenched at their sides and steel eyes glinting under the threat of the bosun’s lash. One of them, a lad not a day over eighteen, stood tall and pale amongst the ranks, a deep flush—or was it a sunburn?—spreading over his cheeks. Each and every one of his glares was directed not at the bosun’s mate but at the wardroom officers themselves, of whom Laurence, as first lieutenant, made the most enticing target, short of Captain Foley himself.
January bit at their bones through a harsh winter breeze: all the more incentive for the hands to answer at the call of their name. Twice they had been mustered since first they had left port, and still the worst of the lot mumbled and fidgeted until a strike reminded them of their place. Laurence kept still, back stiff and chin raised high above a tightly knit neckcloth; for he was an officer, bound to set a prime example. Despite having been brought here by the harsh necessities of the service, these men could and would learn to execute the duty that was expected of them. Their superior officers were to accompany them on that path, through discipline and models of behaviour: a task Laurence deemed most important when faced with a newly formed crew.
One by one they crossed the deck when called; the tall lad, one of the youngest of the crew, stepped so close to the master’s mate one might have thought he was about to bump into him. He thought better of it, however; Laurence could not help but notice him as a potentially troublesome fellow.
His attention was soon diverted as another pressed man stepped forward; he answered to the name of Tenzing Tharkay, which was unusual enough for whispers to skim over the deck. Though his skin was no darker than many experienced sailors’, there was a slant to his eyes and a blackness to his hair that marked him as a foreigner. He answered “Present” with defiance in his voice, in a drawing-room accent few of the Goliaths could hope to match.
“There will be trouble with the new hands,” Lieutenant Poole said later that afternoon. “There always is: I only wish we had not needed so many pressed men to complete the crew.”
“It is what it is,” Laurence said soberly, though he too found himself uneasy. The Goliath had suffered more losses than she could bear, and there were no able seamen to be found at the nearest port: at least none that her fellow sailing ships could easily part from. “The midshipmen will benefit from the experience, at least: most of them have never suffered a watch alongside recalcitrant men.”
Midshipman Riley stopped halfway down the ladderway, the freckles on his cheekbones suddenly standing out against his worried expression; he dared not interrupt, but Laurence brushed his distress off with a smile.
“Though I am sure the worst we can expect of those men is drunkenness and escape attempts at the nearest port.”
The first escape attempt happened, however, before they even lay eyes on the nearest port.
Seagulls danced around the Goliath like leaves in a storm, white wings against white sails and an even whiter sky. Although they fought for attention, their cries went ignored; the birds would leave soon enough, the sailors knew, when land would away with its promises of safety, and they would have no choice but to get back to their nests.
They would leave soon enough, but for now had not left; and did not wish to, if the gull perched on the rail was any indication. From the quarterdeck where he stood by Captain Foley’s side, Laurence found himself losing track of their conversation despite his best efforts. Indeed it was difficult to estimate the effect the rising wind would have on their speed, while a sailor seemed to all appearances to be conversing with the bird.
A closer look revealed the man to be the foreigner Laurence had earlier noticed, whose name was, if he remembered correctly, Tharkay. Though he spoke but his native tongue and had no notion of the East’s practices and customs, Laurence knew with relative certainty that in no strange land could man communicate with bird. Those specific man and bird looked utterly unaware of this fact, for the former spoke in hushed tones, in total disregard of his lack of—human—interlocutor. The bird itself frequently turned towards him one yellow, questioning eye; the man raised his hand, and only then did Laurence notice the food he was presenting it.
One had to have taken leave of his senses not to realise the value of the biscuit discarded with such indifference. Did the Articles of War ever mention, wondered Laurence, a need for punishment for a man feeding a bird out of his own pocket? Surely it did not come down to ‘receiving an enemy with victuals’, Laurence thought with some irony. ‘Wasteful expense of the ship’s stores’ sounded closer to the truth, although those biscuits had been given to that man as his daily ration: was he free of wasting them however he saw fit, at the expense of his own health? Laurence could hardly imagine himself punishing a man for so fanciful an act.
Captain Foley’s opinions on the wind could not be farther from his mind. He forced himself to consider the calculations, approved of the ones he could safely concur on, and suggested for the rest of them to be submitted to the midshipmen as an additional exercise. Such hypocrisy left a sour taste on his tongue, for it was unbefitting of a gentleman; but by God, those calculations had been done twice already, and if he did not investigate the matter further he feared he would go mad. As soon as the captain dismissed him, Laurence approached the quarterdeck’s rail, in order to peer most unceremoniously at the deck before him: the man had not moved, and the gull was now picking voraciously at the remnants of biscuit in his open palm.
“Is that a damned seagull?”
Laurence started as the voice crashed onto the rail before him—an incredulous exclamation in a heavy Newcastle accent. The gull and its master turned toward the tall young lad in a single, worryingly fluid movement.
“Of the few birds an Englishman might recognise, I would have thought the seagull to be high on the list,” Tharkay said dryly.
“And I would have thought it to be high in the sky,” the newcomer said, “except this one seems a touch more comfortable down here than I’d like it to be.”
Laurence did not make it a habit to spy on others’ conversations, and it was clear that these men were lounging on the deck instead of setting to their duties; were they not on watch, they ought to be on the forecastle, rather than in precisely everyone’s way. Hastily—before they had time to carry on an exchange he did not wish to overhear—Laurence rushed down the ladder to join them.
“Gentlemen,” he said, adopting a carefully neutral tone.
The three of them—man, man, seagull—eyed him somewhat dubiously. Granby, for it was the tall fellow’s name, stared at the white lapels of his coat as though trying to remember what rank they indicated. Uncertainty was still writ clearly upon his face’s every line, but he must have reached some conclusion, for he raised a hand to his cap and said, in the falsest drawl Laurence had ever heard in his life: “Good day to you, sir.”
Laurence was still trying to remember the last time he had been this offended when the gull suddenly leapt aloft. He and Granby jumped away from the malignant creature, while Tharkay followed its flight with an unreadable expression. Soon it was gone, vanishing into the clouds as though borne by their own aerial embrace.
“If there is a time and place for admiring birds, surely it is not the Goliath,” Laurence said coldly. “I would recommend you return to your duties.”
“Certainly, sir,” Tharkay said, and touched his hat.
A cannonball had splintered the hull weeks ago near the lieutenants’ berths, and the carpenter had done a dreadful job of repairing it; as a result, Laurence slept but poorly, haunted by the cold air’s caress on his neck, breathing over his skin like a sea ghost creeping in the cabin. He was no light sleeper, and used to savour all the rest he could get, for such a lesson was promptly learnt at sea; but that tenacious January cold clung to the droplets of sea water gathered on his sleeping self and roused him even from the deepest slumber. After being woken thrice in such a manner in the span of half an hour, Laurence heard ringing the fifth bell in the middle watch, and gathering his clothes went to check on the officer on deck.
He remembered the role being assigned to Riley at this time of night; indeed the young man stood watching the distant waves on the quarterdeck. He touched his hat at Laurence’s arrival, and together they lay eyes on the restless sea, its ever-changing surface dark as a second night under the starlit sky. They were cruising steadily along the coast, following a south-southeast course due to carry them back to the duty they had had to abandon.
The men on deck were no more than lurking shadows—spectres, perhaps, to the eyes of the superstitious; the illusion tended to lessen, however, as the sounds of their inexperienced feet scratching over the rigging and bumping into the capstan reached one’s ears. An able seaman was introducing a landsman to the art of climbing in the rigging: Laurence watched as he jumped from one line to the next. As far as quiet went on a ship, this one was pitiful; louder even than usual, the men on watch tonight spat and swore every time they ran into something, which was often. Had he been the officer of the watch himself, Laurence would have called their behaviour out; as Riley was supposedly in charge of these men, and doing otherwise an excellent job of it, Laurence forbore.
A splash: then the cry of “Man overboard—larboard side!” Laurence rushed across the quarterdeck. Indeed there was a head bobbing in the water—the current lashed out at the thrashing limbs, quickly carrying the man away from the ship.
“Mr. Riley, a line!” Laurence ordered. Riley went instantly; but throwing it was of no use, for already the desperate silhouette reached the utmost limit of the light cast by the ship’s lanterns. The man, whoever it was, knew how to swim: he struggled against the current but could not overcome it: this, however, granted them time to rescue him. “Mr. Riley, lower a boat! You, there, look alive—this man’s survival depends upon our efficiency!”
Were their circumstances less severe, Laurence should have winced at the eagerness which saw the cutter hurled towards the water. Presently he contented himself with jumping in the boat alongside Riley and the four men closest to him; they all of them started rowing in earnest, for enough time had already been lost.
Darkness pressed in on their faces to prevent their gazes from reaching their target. The night clawed at their eyes and wrapped itself over their throats, swallowing both their sights and their voices. Their calls went unanswered but for the waves lapping at the wooden hull; despite the lantern dangling at the cutter’s bow, the fallen sailor remained invisible. Then a cry—a seagull’s cry: there were three of them, flying in circles over a limp body.
“Over there!” Granby exclaimed, pointing.
His dark hair floating about his head, the man had evidently resolved to lying on his back and wait for the cutter to reach him. Seeing them approaching, he raised a hand and cried out. They reached him in a matter of seconds: Laurence, together with the men alongside him, pulled him up and into the boat. It was Tharkay, Laurence saw; he spat out seawater and sat up, shivering and bright-eyed though his hands were set firmly on his thighs.
“I must thank you, lieutenant, for sending out a boat,” he croaked out.
Still the seagulls were circling them; two more had joined the flock; were those birds even nocturnal?
“Thank goodness you know how to swim,” Laurence said, shrugging off his coat and presenting the dry garment to Tharkay, who refused it with a lopsided smile.
“Do you, sir?”
“Only enough to keep myself afloat, I am afraid,” Laurence politely replied, gesturing for the hands to carry them back to the ship.
“How fortunate,” Tharkay said, and kicked him overboard.
The weight of his body instantly doubled as chains of ruthless water wrapped themselves around his limbs. Laurence kicked and struggled to reach the unattainable surface—a dagger of air breached his lungs, painful rather than comforting. He had not lied: he was a poor swimmer—thank God he had taken his coat off. The lantern swayed before him as a token of hope. He did not have his sword nor pistol, the latter of which would have been rendered useless by the water anyway; but his boot held a knife strapped securely against his ankle: he must only reach the cutter’s side.
Riley tumbled in the water, grappling with one of the men they had brought along. A miniature mutiny was breaking out on the cutter—Tharkay struggled to take control of the ship’s boat against two loyal seamen, helped along by Granby and a whole flock of screaming gulls. Grey and white feathers shot through the air as the birds dived repeatedly towards the fighting men, for a reason Laurence could not fathom.
Laurence’s numb hands grasped at ungiving wood. He clasped the rail and pulled himself up—halfway there, his upper body leaning forward into the boat—if only he could tumble across Granby’s legs and reach for his knife—
Tharkay threw a generous fistful of bread crumbs at him, and fifteen seagulls dived for their supper.
Beaks in his hair and webbed feet over his back—pain exploded in his temple, and he fell backwards into the sea. The sky was but a fortress of wings—bread floating everywhere around him—men thrashing about to avoid sinking—gulls gulping down crumbs and oars cutting through the water.
“Do you expect me to jump in the water and wait for my court-martial?” Granby exclaimed as Laurence struggled to keep afloat. “I’m coming with you—you need help to row that damned boat anyway. Come on, land’s this way.”
“It most definitely is not,” Tharkay snapped, “and if you insist on coming, I would rather you row instead of misjudging our direction.”
The boat was promptly withdrawing, two silhouettes aboard bending their backs over the oars they had not abandoned to improve speed.
“Did you truly plan to carry this out by yourself? How long have you been feeding those gulls for them to follow you?” Granby asked incredulously.
“They are most rewarding creatures,” Tharkay replied. “Did I not tell you to shut up and row?”
“Avast rowing this instant!” Riley roared. “You mutineers, you will be hanged!”
He yelped as a gull nipped his ear.