In The Belly Of The Bloodhound (21 page)

Silence.

Then another, smaller voice comes out of the dark. “I know you said we’d get out of this, Jacky. But what if we don’t? What will happen if they get us to Africa?”

Ah, the night dreads. During the day you are able to be strong, face things a little more bravely, but then comes the night…
p. “Well, I imagine we’ll be taken ashore, cleaned up, examined as to the state of our virtue, and then one by one, or maybe in small groups sometimes, we’ll be put up on the auction block, which is rather like a small stage, and sold to the highest bidder.” I decide to be frank in this matter, to strengthen their resolve to escape that fate. “I’ve heard that you are stripped naked when you are on the block, but I don’t know for sure…” There are gasps of shock from all around me. “Let’s ask Clarissa. Clarissa, was it like that when you bought Angelique?”

“I don’t know. I wasn’t there!” hisses Clarissa through teeth I know to be clenched in a snarl. “She was bought[_ for_] me, not[_ by_] me.”

“Ah. So that makes it all right, then.”

“Shut up, you.”

“Be quiet, both of you,” warns wise Dolley, trying to keep order among the so-called officers. She’s right, of course. I shouldn’t have said that.

“But I don’t want to be sold to anyone!” This is a wail from Elspeth, next to me.

“I’m sure that many who sailed in the opposite direction had[_ exactly_] the same wish, dear,” I say, patting her shoulder. “But they are being so[_ cruel_] to us! So cruel!”

I think for a bit before replying.

“You know, I have sailed with seamen who had signed on to slavers before and they described to me the horrors of those voyages—how over five hundred men, women, and children would be packed into a hold like this, the men held by these neck chains here behind us, stretched out fourteen inches apart so they could not even turn over, packed together on all these shelves, on every inch of space. If a person on the upper shelf was sick, then his sickness would rain down on the ones below. If there’s dysentery, then that goes down, too. Sometimes as many as half of them would die on the way over. Other times, if they were spotted by a British patrol, in order to avoid getting seized as a slaver, they threw everyone overboard to drown. Men, women, and children.”

I pause to let them think on this, then I go on. “Is it any wonder that when women were sometimes allowed on deck for an airing, they would throw their babies overboard and jump in after them, to drown rather than remain with these incomprehensibly cruel fiends who subjected them to such horror? Remember, these people were taken from their villages in the interior of Africa. Since they didn’t speak any of the languages spoken in the slave pens on the coast, they had no idea what was going to happen to them, or where these monsters with their big strange boat were taking them. At least[_ we_] know what they plan for us. Us being treated badly? Nay, my sisters, we are being treated like queens compared to that!”

Another long silence. There is the sound of weeping again. Perhaps I shouldn’t have…

“Jacky.” I recognize Dolley’s voice again. “You must know that we’ve all read Amy’s book about your early life. Will you tell us about what happened to you after you left the school the night it burned? Amy said she had received a letter, soon after that, saying you had signed on to a whaler. It sounds wondrously exciting. Will you tell us about it?”

Good Dolley, she’s always right there when she’s needed to be, to soothe tempers, to calm fears, or, in this case, to change the subject.

“Sure, I will,” I say, and I’m about to give them a quick account of my doings since I left the Lawson Peabody the first time, when I reconsider. Why not stretch it out over several days, maybe even a week? I am a natural show-off, after all, and these evenings are long, and it might cheer them. I decide to do it and then lift my voice:

“‘Ishmael!’ I called out as I skipped down the gangplank of the
Pequod,[_ my seabag on my shoulder ‘Good sailing to you!”_]

“And to thee, Jacky…”

In a short while, I’ve crawled off the Balcony and felt my way to the center of the Stage, and I continue with the story, complete with embellishments and gestures, to my invisible audience listening in the dark.

“‘Thee are sure thee will not marry me?”

Later, much later, after I had finished my story for the night and all about me breathed deep and regular in sleep, I again leave my kip and go down to the Stage. I feel my way along the wall till my hands touch the bars of the doorway, the doorway behind which sleeps the snoring Dummy.

“Hughie!”
I hiss.[_ “Wake up!”_]

He snorts in his sleep and then awakens. “Huh? What you want? You leave me be now, gonna tell Mister…”

“No, no, Hughie, don’t tell Mister. Just listen…,” I say urgently. I don’t want him flying off for Sin-Kay. “It’s me, Hughie, it’s me, Little Mary from Rooster Charlie’s gang. Don’t you remember?”_ Come on, Hughie, remember, please remember…_

It is not so much of a coincidence that Hugh the Grand should end up here. Taken by a press gang, as the girl Joannie said he was, he would surely have proved too stupid to be a seaman on a warship, or even a merchantman, and would naturally have drifted to a slaver, which’d take just about anyone who lacks a conscience. Not that Hughie lacks one; it’s just that he doesn’t know, he being simple and all. Of course, I recognized him the instant I laid eyes on him, and rejoiced. There’s lots that girls can do, but there’s some things they just can’t, and I know that—like have the strength to lower a lifeboat into the water when it has to go down.

“We was mates, Hughie, you and me,” I say, hoping that slipping back into my old way of talking would give his memory a jog. I sense him in there shaking his great big head in confusion. “Remember how we all lived under Blackfriars Bridge, you and me and Polly and Nan and Judy and Charlie? How I used to ride on your shoulders and I’d read the newspapers posted on the printers’ walls to see if we could get a penny? Remember how—”

“Charlie…loved Charlie. Charlie went away.”[_ Hallelujah!_]

“We all loved Charlie, Hughie, we did.”

“Little Mary?” he says, and seems to be wondering at the notion. “Little Mary went away, too. Toby come.”

“That’s right, Hughie, and now I’ve come back and we can be mates again.”

“Was happy then…Mary.”

“Aye, Hughie, we was a good bunch, but we got some good ones here, and we can have a new gang and you can be in it.”

“I can be in the gang?”

“Sure you can, Hughie, but just one thing,” I say, and reach in through the bars and find his hand. “Do you know how to keep a secret, Hughie? Like when you don’t tell about somethin’?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Well, you can’t tell anyone that you know me and that you’re in our gang now. Don’t tell Nettles. Don’t tell Mister.”

“Hate Sammy. Hate Mister. Won’t tell.”

“Good, Hughie, that’s real good.” I give his hand a squeeze. “I’ve got to go back to my kip now. I’ll see you in the morning and I’ll wink at you so’s you’ll know which one I am, ‘cause I’ve changed some since last we was mates. And remember,[_ mum’s_] the word, Hughie, all right?”

“Mum.”

“Good night, Hughie. You was always just the best boy.”

“Here he comes,” reports Wilhelmina Johnson up on starboard-aft lookout. “Got Nettles with him.”

Earlier, when the flaps went up, I had gone to the hatchway and winked broadly at Hughie. He blushed and grinned his big foolish grin, and I put my finger to my lips and whispered,[_ “Shush now,”_] and he nodded and kept on smiling, his big head lolling back and forth in joy.

Again there’s the sound of the upper locks being opened, and Sin-Kay comes down the stairs. Hughie, his smile now gone, presses himself against the bulkhead to let his master pass. The bottom door is opened, and Sin-Kay enters the Hold, with Nettles following, being his usual awful, smirking self. With them also is Chubbuck, the Bo’sun, who takes a position next to the doorway and leans against the bulkhead in a posture of complete brutish indifference to the proceedings. I take note that his club swings on a lanyard by his side and that he wears a cutlass in a leather sheath on his other side.

“Good morning, ladies,” says our jailer, “I trust you slept well? No? Ah, well, soon you’ll be reclining on silk sheets, eating pomegranates, and awaiting the arrival of your Sheik of Araby. Some of you, anyway.” It appears our Mister Sin-Kay is in a fine mood.

He opens his notebook and calls out, “Rebecca Adams.”

“Here.”

“Good. Go stand over there, girl.” He gestures to the port side. “We are going to line you up alphabetically. Ruth Alden.”

Ruth goes over to stand next to Rebecca.

“Sally Anderson, then Hermione Applegate. Once we get all this done, I want you to remember the person to the right and left of you so you can re-form this line every time I enter. You will do that without being told. Is that clear?”

He waits for some reply, but he gets none. “All right…Bailey…Baxter…Byrnes…”

And so on till we’re all lined up proper, to his way of thinking at least. I have Katy Deere on my right and Dolley Frazier on my left.

“Very well, we will now have inspection,” says Sin-Kay, and he goes to the end of the line and confronts Julia Winslow, a delicate, cheerful girl, who was given much to ribbons and bows and frilly things back at the school. She is not cheerful now, as Sin-Kay says to her, “Open your mouth.”

“Wha-what?” asks Julia, taken aback by the order.

“Show me your teeth, girl. The condition of your teeth affects your salability and hence your price, so open your mouth such that I might look.”

“I…I won’t,” quavers Julia, putting her hands to her mouth.

“Bo’sun Chubbuck, if you would be so good,” says Sin-Kay, taking one step backward so that the brutish Chubbuck can come up, take the terrified girl by the neck with one hairy hand, and with the thumb and forefinger of the other, push in on her back teeth, forcing her mouth open.

“Very good, Bo’sun Chubbuck. You may step back now.”

Chubbuck releases Julia and moves back to his place by the door and resumes his former stance. Shaking, Julia stands with her mouth open.

Sin-Kay peers in her mouth and then says, “Bare your front teeth,” and Julia pulls back her lips in a grim parody of a smile. Tears of shame trickle from her eyes.

“Good,” he says. He makes a note in his book and then moves on to Frances Wallace. He has no more trouble with the rest of the girls obeying his order. Better to do it than to be touched by the awful Chubbuck.

When he reaches Clarissa, four girls down from me, her baring of teeth is not some gruesome parody of a smile, oh no. It is the snarl of an animal that would like nothing better than to lunge forward and rip out Sin-Kay’s throat.

A minute later he is up to me. “Ah, we meet again our little Miss English Smart-mouth from yesterday. I trust you passed a pleasant night, Your Highness?”

“Another delightful evening at the elegant Hotel Bloodhound, to be sure. The staff has been ever so attentive to our needs,” I say, without expression. I case my eyes and look over his shoulder.

That gets a short bark of a laugh from our innkeeper. He then orders me to open up and I do it without question. I grimace, he checks my tusks, and then moves on down the line.

In a while he is done with this exercise in humiliation and orders Hughie and Nettles to start the feeding, then prepares to leave.

“Your pardon, Sir,” pipes up Judy Leavitt, as she has been coached. “Some of us girls had needle and thread in our purses that were taken from us. Combs, too. If we could have them—”

“The answer is no,” says Sin-Kay, simply.

We had picked three girls to do the asking today, so Clarissa, Dolley, and I don’t get to be seen as the leaders. If there’s any trouble—and I[_ do_] plan for there to be much trouble—all they would need to do is merely separate us from the others, and all would be lost. Frances Wallace is next.

“I beg your pardon, Sir,” she says, “but why cannot the shutters stay up till dark? We know there are a good four hours of daylight after you have them put down. It makes the night so very long and our spirits are suffering.”

“Again, no.”

Then Sally Anderson, who is near the head of the line, asks, “If…if we could have some water with which to wash ourselves…even salt water would help. Please, Sir, we are ladies, you know.”

“The answer to that is, also,[_ no,”_] says Sin-Kay. His face is without expression, his voice level, but I think he is becoming impatient.

“Please, Sir, the salt water is nothing to you,” says Martha, who stands next to Clarissa. “There’s a whole ocean of it out there—”

“I told you the answer is[_ no!”_] shouts Sin-Kay, advancing on Martha. She shrinks back in fear.

“Don’t worry, Martha, honey. He won’t touch you,” purrs Clarissa. “You saw how he had to get that ape Upchuck, or whatevah the hell his name is, to assault dear Julia that way and pry open her poor jaws. And you know why?”

She pauses, then charges on. “‘Cause for all his fancy clothes and fine mannahs, he is nothin’ but a low-down dirty field nigra who don’t know his place, and he knows that if he so much as lays a finger on you, his so-called ass-so-ci-ates would get a rope and string his black ass up faster than you can sing ‘nigra in the woodpile, do-si-do; business partners or not!”

Sin-Kay nods and smiles, as if savoring a private joke, turns, then goes over to stand before Clarissa. He puts his hands behind his back and regards her.

“Did you know, Miss Howe,” he finally says, “that I made arrangements for my[_ ass-so-ci-ate_] Colonel Bartholomew Simon to purchase your girl Angelique for me? No? But then, how could you know, for you have been my honored guest here at the Hotel Bloodhound, as your Lady Miss Faber would have it. Yes, it is true, though. Your father’s household would have no further use for her, since you are considered dead and gone, and Colonel Simon’s offer will have been most generous. The shy, demure, and most beautiful Angelique will[_ definitely_] be waiting for me upon my return.”

I’ve noticed that when Clarissa Worthington Howe is enraged beyond words, her cheeks go even more pale than they usually are and a red spot appears on each cheek. I know that, because that rage has so often been directed at me. The red spots appear now, and though shaking with rage, she says nothing.