“I am surprised,” said Richard to John Power as they watched colored sparks and tendrils float down from a skyrocket, “that ye’ve not tried to escape, Johnny.”
Power looked wry. “Here? Not speaking Portuguese? I would be snabbled in a day. Apart from Portuguese slavers and cargo snows, the only ship in port is an English whaler having her bottom scraped. And she is to take a party of naval invalids from Sirius and Supply home with her.” He changed the subject, obviously too painful. “I see that Esmeralda is neglecting his ship as usual. He never makes any attempt to scrape her.”
“Didn’t Mr. Bones tell ye? Alexander is copper sheathed.” Richard flicked his chest, sticky with orange juice. “I am going over the side to wash.”
“I did not know ye could swim.”
“I cannot. But I dunk myself in the water and hang on to the ladder. In the hope that sooner or later I will be able to do without the ladder. Yesterday I let go and actually kept afloat for two seconds. Then I panicked. Today I might not panic.”
“I can swim, but dare not,” said Power ruefully. Slack discipline or no, Power had his own guard.
Richard was in the water one day when Stephen Donovan returned in a hired boat. He had not succeeded in swimming; as soon as he let go of the ladder he began to sink. With a boat coming in he had to get out, and was ready to when he saw who stood in its bow.
“Richard, ye idiot, there are sharks in this harbor!” said Donovan, gaining the deck. “I would not continue were I you.”
“I very much doubt that any shark would fancy my stringy frame in the midst of the bounty Rio harbor offers,” grinned Richard. “I am trying to learn to swim, but so far I am a dismal failure.”
Donovan’s eyes twinkled. “So that if Alexander goes down in an ocean gale ye can swim for Africa? Fear not, Alexander has a good tumblehome hull and she’s shipshape in spite of her age. Ye could lay her right over on her beam until her spars went under or poop her in a following sea, and she’d not sink.”
“No, so that when we get to Botany Bay and perhaps buckets are in short supply, I can at least bathe in sea-water without needing to worry about being over my head in a hole. There may be lakes and rivers there, but Sir Joseph Banks does not mention them. In fact, he indicates that fresh water is exceeding scant—just a very few small brooks.”
“I understand. Look at yon dog Wallace.” He pointed to where Lieutenant Shairp’s Scotch terrier was striking out for the ship alongside a hired boat, encouraged by a laughing Shairp.
“What about Wallace?”
“Watch him swim. Next time ye go down the ladder to brave the sharks, pretend that ye’ve got four legs, not two. Tip yourself onto your belly, stick your head up out of the water and move all four of your limbs like a duck’s paddles. Then,” said Donovan, bestowing a silver sixpence upon a beaming black man after he put a heap of parcels on the deck, “ye’ll swim, Richard. From Wallace and four legs ye’ll go easily to treading water, floating, all the tricks and treats of swimming.”
“Johnny Power swims, yet he is still with us.”
“I wonder would he have come so tamely in Teneriffe if he had known what I found out today?”
Alerted, Richard put his head to one side. “Tell me.”
“This fleet sailed from Portsmouth with what cartridges the marines had in their pouches and not a grain of powder or a single shot more.”
“Ye’re joking!”
“Nay, I am not.” Donovan began to chuckle, shaking his head. “That is how well organized this expedition is! They forgot to supply any ammunition.”
“Christ!”
“I only found out because His Excellency Governor Phillip has managed to purchase ten thousand cartridges here in Rio.”
“So they could not have contained a serious mutiny on any one of these ships—I have seen how our Alexander marines care for their pieces and ammunition—there would not be one cartridge worth a man’s spit.”
Mr. Donovan glanced at Richard sharply, opened his mouth to say something, changed his mind and squatted down near the parcels. “Here are some of your things. I will pick up more tomorrow. I also heard talk of sailing.” He piled the bundles into Richard’s arms. “Oil of tar, some ointment from a crone so hagged and ugly that she cannot help but know her craft, plus some powdered bark she swears cures fevers. And a bottle of laudanum in case aqua Rio spreads the dysentery—the surgeons are suspicious of it, Lieutenant King sanguine. Lots of good rags and a couple of fine cotton shirts I could not resist—got a few for myself and thought of you. For coolness and comfort in hot weather, cotton has no equal. Malt is proving elusive—the surgeons got to the warehouses first, damn their eyes and cods. But dry some of your orange and lemon peels in the sun and chew them. ’Tis common sailor talk that citrus prevents the scurvy.”
Richard’s eyes dwelled upon Donovan’s face with affection and gratitude, but Donovan was too wise to interpret what they held as more than it actually was. Friendship. Which was to die for with this man, who must surely have loved, but was not willing to do so again. Whom had he lost? How had he lost? Not the woman who had opened the gates of sexual heaven. That, from the expression on his face, had revolted him. Not any woman. Nor yet any man. One day, Richard Morgan, he vowed, I will hear all of your story.
As he went to leave the ship the next morning, he found Richard waiting for him by the ladder.
“Another favor?” he asked, looking eager to do it.
“No, this I must pay for.” Richard pointed to the deck and bent down as if something of interest lay there. Donovan hunkered down too; nobody saw the seven gold coins change hands.
“What is it ye want? Ye could buy a topaz the size of a lime for this, or an amethyst not much smaller.”
“I need as much emery powder and very strong fish-glue as it will buy,” said Richard.
Mouth slightly open, Donovan looked at him. “Emery powder? Fish-glue? What on earth for?”
“It would probably be possible to buy them at the Cape of Good Hope, but I believe the prices there are shocking. Rio de Janeiro seems a much less expensive place,” Richard hedged.
“That does not answer my question. Ye’re a man of mystery, my friend. Tell me, else I’ll not buy for ye.”
“You will, you know,” said Richard with a broad smile, “but I do not mind telling you.” He looked out across the bay toward the northern hills, smothered in jungle. “I have spent a great deal of time during this interminable voyage wondering what I should do when finally we reach Botany Bay. There are hardly any skilled men among the convicts—we all hear the marine officers talking, especially since arriving in Rio, what with all the visiting goes on. Little Lieutenant Ralph Clark never shuts up. But sometimes our ears glean a useful item between his whines about the drunken antics on Friendship’s quarterdeck and his fond moans about his wife and son.” Richard drew a breath. “But do not let me start on marine second lieutenants! Back to what I began to say, that there are hardly any skilled men among us convicts. I do have some skills, one of which I will certainly be able to use, as I imagine there will be much tree felling and sawing of timber. I can sharpen saws. More importantly, I can set the teeth on saws, a rarer art by far. It may be that my cousin James managed to get my box of tools somewhere aboard these ships, but he may not have. In which case, I cannot do without emery powder and glue. Files I imagine the fleet must have, but if it has been as sketchily provided with tools as it has been poorly victualled, no one will have thought of emery powder or fish-glue. Hearing the news about musket cartridges has not exactly cheered me either. What did they expect us to do if the Indians of New South Wales are as fierce as Mohawks and besiege us?”
“A good question,” said Stephen Donovan solemnly. “What d’ye do with emery powder and fish-glue, Richard?”
