The midshipmen were crowded together by one of the quarterdeck carronades, opposite the gangway where a grating had been rigged upright. Close by, but separated by years and experience, the warrant officers had already assembled. The backbone in every man-of-war: no ship would sail, fight, or even survive without them. Tobias Julyan, as sailing master, had grown to know them in the long months since Onward's commissioning. In their faces now he saw resignation, even impatience, as might be expected from men who had seen almost every aspect of a sailor's life.
From where he stood Julyan could hear the occasional creak of the wheel, beyond some of the hands on watch, and saw the helmsman in his mind's eye, a good man, not the sort to let his attention stray from the compass.
He looked at the rigged grating and felt his mouth go dry, and glanced at the midshipmen. Youngsters, full of hope. They looked to him now. That other memory should have died, with so many others. But at times like these…
Over twenty years ago. He had been as young as the seaman at the wheel. Some of the older hands still yarned about the Great Mutiny in the fleet at the More and Spithead. France was poised to invade, and the horror of the guillotine and the fear of revolution was stark and very real.
Reason had triumphed eventually, and guilt been admitted by both factions, quarterdeck and forecastle. Julyan remembered one captain who had ordered a man flogged because he was slow to obey an order: showing disrespect to an officer, he had claimed. And there had been others… maybe there had always been others… who would treat a pressed man like scum, even though he had been torn bodily from the arms of his family or lover and dragged aboard.
One mutineer had been sentenced to four hundred lashes, and to be flogged through the fleet. Julyan could see it now.
Hear it. The procession of boats, crewed by witnesses from each vessel at anchor that day, pausing at each rated ship while a proportion of the punishment was awarded alongside.
Four hundred lashes. How could that thing have survived? Some movement made him turn his head and he saw that one of the midshipmen had crouched down behind the carronade. The youngest, who was always being sick. He had heard them joking about it. Even if the ship was in dry dock! The youngster next to him had leaned over and put his hand on the boy's heaving shoulder. It was Napier, the one who had survived Audacity. Sponsored by the Captain. Somehow it was seemly…
"Attention on the upper deck!"
Like a little parade. Rowlatt, the master-at-arms, and the ship's corporal, with the prisoner lurching between them. Two boatswain's mates, one carrying the tell-tale red baize bag which contained the cat. Lastly Murray, the surgeon, to ensure that the prisoner did not lose consciousness.
The surgeons must have been deaf and blind that other, terrible day.
High above them some one called out: a topman needing assistance from his mate. Nobody looked up.
Adam Bolitho walked to the quarterdeck rail, his coat heavy in the heat and already clinging to his shoulders. Would he never become hardened to the demands and the doubts? He was no longer that young and often unsure commander in his first ship, the one he had evoked for Lowenna during their last waterfront stroll in Falmouth. Would she believe him if she could see him now? Vincent was making his report, but his back was to the sun, his face in shadow and impossible to read.
Adam looked the length of the ship, at the upturned faces and the figures in the shrouds, silhouetted against the sea and sky. Some were still strangers, others emerged from obscurity with names and voices, a living force.
He looked down at the prisoner for the first time.
"John Dimmock, you are accused of neglect of duty, that you were asleep on watch. "He sounded hoarse, and wanted to clear his throat. Some of the silent onlookers would not be able to hear him. "… and that you showed contempt to a superior officer."
Dimmock was staring up at him intently, his eyes red rimmed as if from heavy drinking. Smuggled rum from messmates, despite the risk of discovery.
"Have you anything to say?"
Dimmock seemed to straighten his back. "Nuthin'!"
The master-at-arms gripping his wrist hissed, "Nothin', sir!"
Adam stepped back slightly and said, "Carry on."
Behind him he heard some one take a deep breath. It was Luke Jago. Always the same, every time he saw or heard the ritual of punishment. Jago had been flogged in error. The officer responsible had been court-martialled and dismissed the service in disgrace, and Jago had received a written apology from an admiral and a sum of cash which had amounted to a year's pay.
But he would carry the scars of the cat to his grave.
"Seized up, sir!"
Adam felt the Articles of War pressing against his side, against the old sword. Jago's way of telling him. Of sharing it.
He removed his hat, and knew others were following his example. Dimmock was stripped to the waist and pinioned against the grating. There was a tattoo of some kind on his right shoulder, faded now and probably acquired when he had been a much younger man, as was the habit of landmen and raw recruits, as an act of bravado or when awash with too much rum. It was usually regretted afterwards.
Adam took the Articles of War from Jago and spread the final page: Article number thirty-six. He had heard it read aloud often enough, and could remember reading these same words for the first time.
"All crimes not capital, committed by any person or persons in the Fleet…" Once he felt the deck tilt more steeply, with the responding slap of canvas. The wind was dropping, or had shifted slightly due to the nearness of land. But his voice remained level, unhurried. "… shall be punished according to the Laws and Customs of such cases used at sea. "He closed the folder. "One dozen lashes."
One of the boatswain's mates had pulled the cat-o'-ninetails from its bag and shook it so that the tails fell free, but his eyes were on the captain, not the prisoner.
Adam replaced his hat.
"Do your duty."
The man's arm swung out to its full extent and the cat struck Dimmock's bare back with a sickening crack.
"One. "The master-at-arms had begun to count, his voice matter-of-fact.
Jago had been watching a strange, dark-winged seabird he did not recognize as it swooped past the foretop, but felt his eyes drawn relentlessly to the gangway and the figure tied to the grating. Under a spell, unable to escape, like the prisoner.
He could feel it like that day, the force of the blows driving the breath from his lungs, his body unable to move or to yield against the grating. And then the pain. Like nothing you could believe or describe.
"Two."
There was blood now, the force of the lash opening the flesh as if by the claws of a beast. Jago could recall the blood nearly choking him. He had bitten through his lip or tongue. The surgeon had stopped the flogging to examine him, but only briefly, and the ordeal had continued. He remembered his own half-mad sense of triumph when the last blow had fallen across his torn and blackened body. Hatred had saved him then, and for countless days afterwards.
"Three."
Jago saw the captain's fingers on the hilt of his sword. His hand was tanned, but the knuckles were white from the force of his grip. Jago had known captains who would order two or three dozen lashes merely for spitting on the deck.
"Four."
The boatswain's mate faltered, the cat swinging in mid-air and blood spattering his arm, while Rowlatt twisted round, mouth open and ready for the next count.
An explosion, like distant thunder, echoing and re-echoing across the unbroken water. But sharper, and drowned by the shouts and confusion as men stared outboard or at each other, then, inevitably, to the figure in blue with one hand on his sword.
Adam leaned over the rail and tried to see beyond the starboard bow, but the headsails made it impossible. Nautilus should be in sight. Otherwise…