Ingenious pain, Andrew Miller [little red riding hood ebook .txt] 📗

drinks and stagger out. It is dark now. Gummer dances, very freely, then, propped on the boy's shoulder, shouts: 'This is what you'll never know,' waving his arm to introduce the night. 'I pity you. Pity you. Christ!' He crashes on to his knees. Grace hauls him up, works him on to her back, clasps his arms about her neck, his head drooped on her shoulder, toecaps dragging on the ground behind. James looks around for the sailor, thinks he sees him in the shadow of a boarded chandler's shop; he and another.

Homeward now, James at the tail. Gummer sleeps serenely on the woman's back. The moon peeps out, gives the streets a black shine. Somewhere to the rear of them, the men are following. At the door of the house James glances back but the street is empty. Grace says: 'Help me with him.'

James takes the feet. The stairs are very narrow, very dark. Grace lights a candle at the fifth attempt. Gummer is on the bed, mouth slack, a peep of white between his lids. Grace pinches his cheek. He wakes, sits up and sings: 'Bring forth in Sabine jar the wine four

winters old, O Tally-arkus . . .' Then falls back, smiling, deeply asleep. To James, Grace says: 'Bolt the door.'

James goes down. There is still a little of the fire left. He finds a stub of candle on the shelf, lights it from the embers. He opens the front door, two inches, and goes upstairs to pack his bag. The orrery he wraps in his velvet coat, buries it deep in the bag, then carries the bag down to wait by the fire. It is a short enough wait. There is a noise, soft, like the nosing of a dog in garbage. He goes to the door. The man is standing there grinning, a cosh in his hand. He puts a finger to his lips. James points upward.

To one behind him, a huge Chinese, the sailor says: 'Stay here, Ling-ling. Look after our new shipmate. Warren, Kinnear. With me.'

As they go on the stairs James sees that their feet are bare. The Chinaman puts things in his pocket. It does not look like stealing. James, who gave only three of Canning's snuff-boxes to Gummer, gives the fourth to Ling-ling. The Chinaman takes it, strokes the top with his finger. He says: 'They call me Ling-ling, like bell. My name Easter Smith. My old name Li Chian Wu.'

From the ceiling, a mighty thud, as if someone has picked up the bed and flung it down. One of the seamen, Warren or Kinnear, staggers down the stairs, spitting teeth. From above, Grace Boylan screams: 'Murder! Murder!' Ling-ling goes up. Thuds, oaths, the sound of something large and empty smashing. A sudden hush, then Ling-ling with Gummer in his arms and behind Ling-ling the other sailors and then Grace Boylan, descending on hands and knees.

'Oh mercy,' she cries, gulping a great sob out of her heart. 'He's sick, can't you see? Sick. Some awful catching sickness. Green shit. You'll all be dead by Monday.'

Says the sailor with tattoos: 'I know his sickness, Mother. Good sea air will set him up. Cast off, lads!'

She rears; he whacks her with the jack, once, and once for luck.

Then they stream out into the night. Passers-by shrink back from them; an old woman shakes her fist. Left, left again; Gummer, still in Ling-ling's arms, limps as a doll, murmurs but does not struggle. They emerge on to the docks. Beside a bollard, a man in a blue coat, a hanger at his side, watches them come. He calls: 'Anything likely, Hubbard?'

'Couple o' landsmen, sir. The young 'un come willing.'

The officer peers into James's face. 'You volunteer?'

'Yes.'

The officer takes a coin from his pocket and gives it to James. 'Welcome to King George's Navy. Ship them aboard the tender. Tell Mr Tedder to enter this one in the books as volunteer. Sharply now!'

They set out over the water. The oars creak in the rowlocks; the men talk lingo. They are hailed from other ships:

'What are you there!'

'Aquilons!'

How tall the wooden walls of ships are! Some of the men-of-war have their guns run out and from the gun-ports comes light, music, a hubbub of voices. Gummer, curled tight, shivers in the bottom of the boat. James rests his feet on him, hugs his bag to his chest, tastes the salt breeze. A lantern shows from a ship dead ahead, a voice rings out - 'Ahoy there!' — and Ling-ling, Easter Smith, Li Chian Wu, pulling at his oar, whispers: 'This home now.'

Kingswear, 10 January 1773 Rev Dvd Fisher to Rev Jls Lestrade Sir,

Mr Buller at the Admiralty informs me that you are desirous of knowing something of the sea career of James Dyer whom I understand to have been your particular friend. Knowing that I sailed upon the Aquilon as Chaplain throughout much of the '50s Mr Buller suggests I might furnish you with some recollections which — craving your indulgence for the distortions of memory occasioned by the passing of some twenty years — I shall now endeavour to do. It may also be in my power to provide you with the names of other former 'Aquilons in particular Mr Munro, for whom I believe I have an old address in Bath which may yet find him.

In order that I may situate myself in this narrative, let me say only that I came aboard the Aquilon in the spring of '53 having finished at the University — I was a New College man - the previous year. I had had hopes of a living at Mere but this falling to another I did not care to take some poor curacy and so petitioned an Uncle, then Captain of the Furious, to obtain a posting for me.

I knew then as little of the sea and of life upon a Man of War as any Englishman may, and had I known of the hardships,