Joining the streaming throng, Kydd found himself in the familiar area of the quarterdeck between the ship’s wheel and the mainmast. He had been jostled to the front of the assembled company so his view of the proceedings would be immediate.
The marines were formed up across the poop, but the officers were in a group before the break of the poop facing the men. A clear area existed between them.
The Master-at-Arms and his corporals flanked two seamen, one of whom Kydd recognized as one of the fighters of the previous evening. He had bloodshot eyes but carried himself watchful and erect. The other he did not recognize, a slight gray vole of a man whose darting eyes were his only concession to fear.
Kydd searched about, looking for Bowyer, but could not see him. With the oppressive tension draining his newly won reserves of confidence, he needed some other to share his disquiet. The only one he knew was next to the ship’s side, arms folded and with an impregnable air of detachment. Renzi.
Transferring his attention back to the little group near the wheel, he was in time to see Tyrell appear from the cabin spaces. The officer stumped to the center of the clear area, looking sharply about him. “Rig the gratings,” he growled.
A brace of carpenter’s mates pushed through the crowd of seamen behind Kydd, dragging two of the main hatch gratings aft. One was placed upright against the poop railings and lashed tightly. The other served as a scaffold for the victim to stand upon.
A boatswain’s mate touched his forehead to Tyrell. “Gratings rigged, sir”.
Tyrell glared around at the men and without referring to his paper snapped, “Caleb Larkin, cooper’s mate.”
The gray man shuffled forward. He blinked and looked sideways at Tyrell, but said nothing.
Tyrell nodded at the Master-at-Arms.
“Was found drunk and incapable, sir; did piss in the waist under cover of dark, sir.” The piggy eyes looked at the man without particular expression.
There was a ripple of movements, a few murmurs. The tall boatswain’s mate at the side of the gratings stroked his long red bag.
Larkin seemed resigned, and continued his odd sideways stare at Tyrell.
“An unspeakable act, you ill-looking dog! Have you anything to say?”
The man thought for a moment, then mutely shook his head.
Tyrell let the moment hang. “One week’s stoppage of grog, Master-at-Arms’ black list one month.”
Larkin’s head rose in astonishment. His shoulders twitched as if throwing off the evil threat of the lash, and dared a triumphant look forward at his friends. Astonished looks showed that his incredible escape was not lost on anyone.
The murmuring died away as Tyrell consulted his paper. “Patrick Donnelly, quarter gunner.” He looked up and waited for absolute silence before nodding crisply at the Master-at-Arms.
“Fighting when off watch, sir.”
There were louder mutters this time. The going tariff for fighting would be a spell in the bilboes or a lengthy mastheading in this cold weather. The tall boatswain’s mate would be disappointed of his prey.
“How long have you been quarter gunner, Donnelly?” Tyrell began mildly.
Unsure how to play it, Donnelly muttered something.
“Speak up, man!” Tyrell snapped.
“Two year, near enough,” Donnelly repeated. He had the unfortunate quirk of appearing surly when being questioned in public.
“Two years – a petty officer for two years, so you know well enough that a petty officer does not engage in brawling. Disrated. You’re turned before the mast and will shift your hammock tonight.”
Donnelly’s dogged look created a wave of barely concealed muttering. This was hard. The reason for the aimless flaring and fisticuffs was well known: Donnelly had a sweetheart in Portsmouth.
Tyrell watched the men. His hard face gave no quarter. “Collaby!”
His clerk hurried over with a thin black leatherbound book. Tyrell took it.
“Articles of War!” he thundered.
“Off hats!” the Master-at-Arms bellowed. In a flurry of movement the entire assembly removed their headgear – the officers’ cocked hats, the round hats of the petty officers and the amazing variety of the seamen’s head coverings, ranging from shapeless raw woolen articles to the stout traditional tarpaulin hats.
In grim stillness all stood to hear the strict law of the Service. The sea breeze plucked the hair on hundreds of bare heads.
The words were flung out savagely. “‘Article twenty-three. If any person in the Fleet shall quarrel or fight with any other person in the Fleet, or use reproachful or provoking speech or gestures’ and so on and so forth, as well you know, ‘shall suffer such punishment as the offense shall deserve, and a court-martial shall impose.’ ”
He slammed the book shut.
“On hats!”
“You shall have a court-martial, should you wish it. Have you anything to say?”
Donnelly looked stupefied. This was no choice at all – a court-martial could lead anywhere, from admonishment to a noose at the yardarm.
“No? Then it’s half a dozen for fighting.”
A fleeting smile appeared on the boatswain’s mate’s face, and he lifted his bag.
A wave of unrest went through the mass of men like wind through a cornfield. This was ferocious justice.
Tyrell waited, with a terrible patience. “And another dozen for the utter disgrace you have brought on your position, you damned rogue!”
Donnelly’s head whipped round – apart from the fact that eighteen lashes was far above the usual, his “offense” had no standing in law, however useless it would be to argue.
“Strip!” There was a chilling finality in the order.
Donnelly stared at Tyrell, his eyes wild. He stripped to the waist in deliberate, fierce movements, throwing the garments to the deck, stalked over to the gratings and spreadeagled himself against the upright one, his face pressed to the wooden checkerboard.
“Seize him up!”
The quartermasters tied his hands to the grating with lengths of spun yarn and retired. The boatswain’s mate advanced, taking the cat-o’-nine-tails from the bag. He took position a full eight feet away to one side and drew the long deadly lashes through his fingers, experimentally sweeping it back to ensure that there was enough clear space to swing it.
Kydd stared across the few yards of empty deck to the man’s pale, helpless body. His eyes strayed over to Renzi, who still stood impassive and with his arms folded. His anger rose at the man’s lack of simple compassion and when he looked back at Donnelly he tried despairingly to communicate the sympathy he felt.
“Do your duty!”
Kydd was startled by the sudden furious beating of a marine drum on the poop. It volleyed and rattled frantically as the boatswain’s mate drew back the cat in a full arm sweep. At the instant it flew downward the drum beat stopped, so the sickening smack of the blow came loud and clear.
Donnelly did not cry out, but his gasp was high and choked. The nine tails had not only left long bruised weals where they landed, but at every point where the tail ended, blood began to seep.
“One!” called the Master-at-Arms.
The drum began its fierce noise again; Donnelly turned his head to the side and fixed Tyrell with a look of such hatred that several of the officers started.
Again the whipping blow swept down. It brought a grunt that seemed to Kydd to have been dragged from the very depths of the man’s being.
“Two!”
Even two blows was sufficient to make the man’s back a raw striping of bloody welts, the animal force of the blows visibly as violent as a kick from a horse, slamming the body against the grating.
“Three!”
Donnelly did not shift his gaze or his expression from Tyrell’s face. Blood appeared at his mouth where he had bitten his lip in agony, trickling slowly down in two thin streams.
“Four!”