The Corvette

Waller on the left, smoothed the chart out and nodded. 'Aye, 'twill do,' he said thoughtfully. Drinkwater saw his three visitors to their boats. The sun had disappeared behind a bank of cloud as they came on deck.

'I shall hoist the signal to weigh at noon tomorrow then, gentlemen.' They all agreed. Drinkwater looked across the Sound at the whalers. Odd shapes had appeared at their mastheads.

'Crow's nests,' explained Sawyers in answer to Drinkwater's question. 'It is necessary to provide an elevated lookout post both for sighting the fish and for navigating through the ice. I myself have spent many hours aloft there and have a nest of my own devising.'

'I see… Good night, Captain Waller.'

'They are also indispensable for shooting unicorns, Captain,' added Harvey.

'Unicorns? Come sir you haze me…'

'A name given to the Narwhal or Tusked Dolphin, Captain Drinkwater, after which my own ship is named. He may be hit from the masthead where a shot from the deck will be deceived by the refraction of the sea.'

'Ahhh… Your boat, Captain Harvey.'

Harvey's ugly face cracked into a grin and he held out his hand. 'If a King's Officer won't.take offence from an old man, may I suggest that excessive concern will have a bad effect on you. Whatever heated air may have been blown about back in Hull, no-one expects the impossible. While we don't want to be attacked by plaguey Frenchmen we are more anxious to hunt fish.'

'I fear I cut a poor figure.'

'Not at all, man, not at all. You are unfamiliar with our ways and your zeal does you credit.'

'Thank you.'

'And I'll go further and say, speaking plainly as a Yorkshireman, you'm a damned sight better than that bloody Palgrave.' Harvey went over the side still smiling. Drinkwater turned to say farewell to Sawyers. The Quaker was staring aloft.

'Thou woulds't oblige thyself, Captain, by constructing a similar contrivance aloft.'

'Crow's nest? But it would incommode the striking of my t'gallant masts in a gale, Captain Sawyers.'

Sawyers nodded. 'Thou hast a dilemma, Friend; to keep thy lofty spars in order to have the advantage in a chase, or to snug thy rig down and render it practical.'

Drinkwater looked aloft and Sawyers added, 'Come, Friend, visit the Faithful tomorrow forenoon and familiarise yourself with the workings of a whale-ship.'

'I am obliged to you, Captain.' They shook hands and Sawyers clambered down into his boat. Drinkwater watched him pulled away, across the steel-grey waters of the Sound.

Immediately after Lieutenant Germaney had seen the captain over the side the following morning he returned to the gunroom and kicked out those of its occupants who lingered over their breakfasts. He took four glasses of blackstrap in quick succession and sent for the Reverend Obadiah Singleton.

'Take a seat, Mr Singleton. A glass of blackstrap?'

'I do not touch liquor, Mr Germaney. What is it you wish to see me about?'

'You are a physician are you not?'

Singleton nodded. 'Can you cure clap?'

Singleton's astonishment was exceeded by Germaney's sense of relief. The wine now induced a sense of euphoria but he deemed it prudent to restrain Singleton from any moralising. 'I don't want your offices as a damned parson, d'you hear? Well, what d'you say, God damn it?'

'Kindly refrain from blasphemy, Mr Germaney. I had thought of you as a gentleman.'

Germaney looked sharply at Singleton. 'A gentleman may be unfortunate in the matter of his bedfellows, Singleton.'

'I was referring to the intemperance of your language, but no matter. You contracted this in Hull, eh?'

Germaney nodded. 'A God da… a bawdy house.'

'Were you alone?'

'No. I was in company.'

'With whom, Mr Germaney? Please do not trifle with me, I beg you.'

'Captain Sir James Palgrave, the Lord Walmsley and the Honourable Alexander Glencross.'

'All gentlemen,' observed Singleton drily. 'May I ask you whether you have advertised your affliction to these other young men?'

'Good God no!'

'And why have you not consulted Mr Macpherson?'

'Because the man is a drunken gossip in whom I have not the slightest faith.'

'He will have greater experience of this sort of disease than myself, Mr Germaney, that I can assure you.'

Germaney shook his head, the euphoria wearing off and being again replaced by the dread that had been his constant companion since his first intimation of the disease. 'Can you cure me Singleton? I'll endow your mission…'

'Let us leave it to God and your constitution, Germaney. Now what are your symptoms?'

'I have a gleet that stings like the very devil…'

Germaney described his agony and Singleton nodded. 'You appear to be a good diagnostician, Mr Germaney. You are not a married man?'

'Affianced, Singleton, affianced, God damn and blast it!'

The deck of the Faithful presented a curious appearance to the uninitiated. Accompanied by Quilhampton, Gorton and Frey, Drinkwater was welcomed by Sawyers who introduced his son and chief mate. He directed his son to show the younger men the ship and tactfully took Drinkwater on a private tour.

The Faithful gave an immediate impression of strength and utility, carrying five boats in high davits with three more stowed in her hold. Her decks were a mass of lines and breakers as her crew attended the final preparations for fishing and the filling of her water casks. The men worked steadily, with little noise and no attention paid to their commander and his guest as they picked their way round the cluttered deck.

Sawyers pointed aloft. 'First, Captain, the rig; it must be weatherly but easily handled. Barque rig with courses, top and t'gallant sails. Thou doubtless noticed the curious narrow-footed cut to our courses, well this clears the davits and allows me to rig the foot to a 'thwartships boom. The boom is secured amidships to those eye-bolts on the deck and thus tacks and sheets are done away with. As thou see'st with course and topsail braces led thus, through that system of euphroes I can handle this ship, of three hundred and fifty tons burthen, with five men.'

'Ingenious.'

'Aye, 'tis indeed, and indispensable when working after my boats in pursuit of fish running into the ice. Now come…' Sawyers clambered up onto the rail and leaned his elbows on the gunwhale of one of the carvel-built whale-boats. Drinkwater admired the lovely sheer and sharp ends of the boat and at his remark a man straightened up from the work of coiling a thin, white hemp line into a series of tubs beneath the thwarts.

'Whale line,' explained Sawyers, 'six tubs per boat, totalling seven hundred and twenty fathoms. The inner end accessible to the boat steerer, so that the lines of another boat may be secured and thus extend the line. This is done in the event of a fish sounding deep or running under ice. The outer end at the bow is secured to the foreganger, a short line attaching it to the harpoon which is kept to hand here, on this rest.' The instrument itself was not in place and Sawyers added, 'This is Elijah Pucill, Captain, speksioneer and chief harpooner; a mighty hunter of mysticetus.' The man grinned and Sawyers pointed to various items in the boat.

'Five oars and a sixth for steering. We prefer the oar for steering as it doth not retard the speed of a boat like a rudder. By it the boat may be turned even when stopped. By sculling, a stealthy approach may be made to a fish caught sleeping or resting upon the surface of the ocean. Of course a whale-boat may, by the same method, be propelled through a narrow ice-lead where, by the lateral extension of her oars, she would otherwise be unable to go.'

Drinkwater nodded. 'The oars,' Sawyer tapped an ash loom, 'are secured by rope grommets to a single thole pin and may thus be trailed without loss, clearing the boat of obstruction and allowing a man two hands to attend to any other task.'