Kydd by Julian Stockwin Page A

was almost completely dark now, but somehow it fitted the mood. Light from the decks below came through the gratings, gently patterning Bowyer’s face in alternating squares of light and dark, a slight breeze whiffling his thinning hair.
    “You’re bred t’ the sea, Joe. I just know . . . how to make wigs.”
    “Don’t you pay no mind to that!” Bowyer said warmly. “A sailor has it inside, just a-waitin’ to have it woken up in him — I could tell, first time I clapped peepers on yer, Tom, you has the makin’s.” He gave a slow smile. “Like it’s said, ‘Begotten in the galley and born under a gun. Every hair a rope yarn, every finger a fishhook and ’is blood right good Stockholm tar!’   ”
    Kydd laughed.
    “Yeah — you’re quick on your feet, got a good headpiece on yer, ’n’ you keep your eyes open. And you’ve the build for it,” Bowyer said. “
An’
you have an eddication — means a lot these modern days. I’d be gunner’s mate be now if I could figure them books.”
    Kydd sat back. There was some truth in Bowyer’s words. Clearly, if he was to be imprisoned aboard for some indefinite time it made sense to avoid staying at the bottom of the heap. But he was rated on board as the lowest form of life, a landman. Without an academy for sailoring how could he qualify upward?
    Bowyer seemed to sense his thoughts. “You make your own chances,cuffin. You show willin’, you’ll get yer start.” He smiled broadly. “Like this. Tomorrow forenoon, when it’s part-of-ship for priddying down, we goes together to the maintop — up there, Tom! First step is leavin’ the deck to the land toggies, and go where a sailor goes — aloft!”
    Kydd glanced up at the arrogant thrust of the great black masts and spars against the cold dusk clouds and his heart quailed.
    “
Haaands
turn to, part-of-ship! All the hands!”
    The afterguard part-of-ship in the form of Elkins was waiting for them the next morning, and under the eye of the boatswain and Lieutenant Tewsley he lost no time in dispatching the men in parties to their respective tasks.
    “Bowyer, brace pendants with Pinto,” he ordered.
    Glancing at Kydd, Bowyer said to Elkins mildly, “Be a chance to get Kydd aloft, learn some ropes — can I have him up there?”
    “No,” said Elkins shortly, “you’ve got Pinto. Kydd stays on the holystones.”
    Bowyer paused. “Then, Mr. Elkins, I’d be obliged if you’d allow me to join him.”
    Elkins looked at him, astonished. His jaw hardened. “You’re a clinking fool, Joe, always were, so get down on yer hunkers and get scrubbin’ with ’im, then.”
    Kydd looked up from rolling up his duck trousers to see Bowyer do the same next to him. “I thought . . .”
    “This life, you can’t always get what yer want — but you can learn to take it. Move over, mate.”
    Captain Caldwell had made it quite plain that he regarded efficiency and smartness to be equivalents. As First Lieutenant, Tyrell would be judged on appearances, and this would mean at the very least continual hard labor for all. The gunner’s party toiled at their pieces; each cannon would receive close attention from canvas and brickdust, then be blackened with a shining mixture of lampblack, beeswax and turpentine. This left little time for vital work on vent and bore, or even chipping roundshot.
    And, of course, there was the appearance of the decks. While the sea-men were aloft, the unskilled laborers of the sea rolled up their trousers, and with decks well a-swim from the wash-deck hose, and with sand liberally scattered over the planking, they began the soul-grinding misery of holystoning the decks. In a line the men moved from forward, on hands and knees and pushing a book-shaped piece of sandstone. Thomas Kydd was one of them. Twenty yards of the quarterdeck on, his knees were red and sore with the gritty sand and little splinters, but his chief suffering was the bitter pain from the icy water that pulsed relentlessly