The Flood-Tide by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles Page A

be hungry.'
    ‘Yes, sir.'
    ‘Got any money?'
    ‘Yes, sir.'
    ‘Well, go out of the gates and turn to your left. You'll see a tavern along there, The Ship. Go and get yourself a fourpenny ordinary and sit by the fire until it's time to go. They'll tell you where the sally-port is. And keep your hand on your money, child, and don't show more than fourpence of it to anyone. There are sharks even in these waters, and you look more tender than the usual bait.’
    At the corner of the trestle nearest the inn's fire, with his feet safely on his box, and his jacket gently steaming, William felt a great deal more cheerful, and attacked the plateful of food in front of him with childish appetite. Boiled mutton, pease pudding, carrots and winter cabbage, and a large hunk of rather mousey-looking bread at the side to mop up the gravy, made a good fourpenn'orth, and William had proudly ordered two pennyworth of ale to go with it, and felt for the first time in control of his life. It was the first time he had ever eaten in a tavern, or indeed paid for his own food, and as the damp, pale hair dried on his forehead, he felt his spirits rising.
    ‘Make the most of it, young 'un,' the waiter had said jovially as he slapped an extra dab of pease pudding on William's plate. 'Nothing for you now but salt meat and hard bread for God knows how long - maybe for ever, if a cannonball takes your head off before you see home again. Still, your father'll be glad to know you're provided for.’
    But William was not deterred by such talk. It had been his idea from the start, ever since he had heard that Cousin Thomas was to spend a week at Morland Place before sailing for the West Indies. General Gage in Boston had asked for more troops, and the Generals Howe, Clinton and Burgoyne were to sail to join him. Ariadne was to collect one of them at Portsmouth, and then sail round to Cork to pick up and convoy one of the troopships, the Norwich. Troopships, being built for the purpose of carrying as many men as possible, were not able to carry also the firepower to defend themselves, so a convoy was necessary.
    Uncle Thomas had not been hard to persuade: to him, nothing was more natural than that a boy should want to go to sea.
    ‘I'll take him with me as a volunteer. He can be my servant, and run messages, and as soon as he learns his way around, I'll give him a warrant as midshipman,' he had said. The reaction of the family, however, was exactly as William had feared.
    ‘William go to sea? Nonsense!' Jemima had cried. 'Why, he would not last a week on a ship.'
    ‘Once we are out of harbour, it is a very healthy life, you know,' Thomas had said mildly. 'Plenty of fresh air, no infectious diseases—'
    ‘But the hardship,' Jemima cried. Allen agreed with her.
    ‘The food and accommodation, Thomas,' he protested. ‘I know you make nothing of them, but William is delicate. I doubt whether—'
    ‘And the damp, always to be damp and cold. His lungs, Thomas, consider!' Jemima broke in. 'He would die for sure.'
    ‘I do not think,' Father Ramsay said, 'that the boy has the strength or constitution for such an active life.’
    It was the beginning of a week of hard work and frustration for William, a week of arguing and persuading, and finally of passionate pleas.
    ‘You sent Edward to school instead of me! You never let me do anything. I am strong, really I am, if you'll only give me a chance. I keep up with Charlotte, in everything she does. How can I ever make anything of myself if you keep me at home here like a baby? I might as well be dead as stay here like that, to be an invalid all my life.'
    ‘William, be quiet,' Jemima said. 'No one wants you to be treated like an invalid all your life. But there are other careers open to you that do not need so much physical stamina - the Church, for instance, or the law. What sense is there in taxing yourself beyond your powers?' But in the end, it was his father who came to his rescue. ‘He really seems to