Requiem Shark

November 1719 Coast of Guinea, West Africa Williams refolded his journal and pushed it deep within his coat pocket. He wore no shirt, and as he laid his head back against the deck, his belly rose to keep watch while he rested. It was an empty night, with neither wind nor stars. The ocean, solid as a sea-chest, ran level from the Success to meet the shores of Guinea, three leagues distant. Listening to the treacly drippings of tar falling from the shrouds, he thought only of the surfeit of African heat. Even the mutterings of the slaves shackled tight in pairs could not distract Williams. He ignored the dialects of the different tribes assembled beneath as they gathered in chants and faded in murmurs like pleading breezes tugging them shoreward. Williamsis eyes fluttered with sleep until his jellied middle shivered from a sharp kick. He sat upright. "Twice now," said the bosun, "youive shunned your watch." "What," asked Williams, "is the point of holding watch in calm seas and a black night where I cannot see a foot before my face?" "Below with you," answered the bosun. "Captain shall hear." Williams hoisted himself to his feet, retied the rope belt about his ducks, and, ignoring his bosun, headed below to the foicisle. The captain had forgiven him before, taken him aside, thanked him for his fine efforts pursing for the ship, and then threatened him with a whipping should he fail at his duties again. Both men knew that Williams was not a sailor, that he had been seized and pressed into service near Plymouth. Yet Williams understood the captainis leaning. A slaver does not carry passengers, and though he might purse the ship, make sense of her accounts, and entertain the crew with a fiddle, there were no kind words for poor sailors. Few on board did more than nod in his direction. Even the cabin boy, Phineas Bunch, a pock-faced child from Clerkenwell, reserved the worst of his words for Williams. His heaviness, youth, and education were marks against him and he knew that he dwelled in a liminal land between crew, slaves, and captain. Williams was valued only by himself. As always, Williams breathed through his mouth for his first minutes in the foicisle. The stink of the unwashed crew and the heavy smell of bodies seemed to have been absorbed by the planking. Even the timbers of the ship sweated in the heat, reeking of the bilge water below that gurgled and frothed in the gentlest of swells. Williams rolled his heavy frame into his canvas hammock, and though he would not be able to confide in his journal until light, he composed tomorrowis entry in his head: The captain remains upriver for the fourth day, disappeared with his cask of silks and India wipes, and shall return with Negroes. Enough, I hope, so that we may sail again. What could I do, but resign myself to this journey, pretend it a chosen adventure, when Africa lay before me? I am now within sight of her, can smell the coast, and yet no liberty is granted to those who were pressed aboard. They fear I might run, but where to? There is much I would run from, not officers, but the crew. Not the bosun, but the boys, such as Bunch. They are shameless, pushing laughter on me when most would let me be. I have five years on them, though you might suppose it reversed. They have sailed before. It is all that counts aboard the Success. Williams opened his eyes in the gloom of the foicisle and stared. The middle watch was above, just four men, yet the padding of many feet sounded through the planking. He pushed himself upright. Across from him he could see Bunch, Smith, and Wallis sitting in similar positions, all staring upward, their eyes tracing the sound of the steps. "Weire boarded," hissed Wallis. The sharp crack of metals meetingGriffin, Nicholas is the author of 'Requiem Shark' with ISBN 9780375503368 and ISBN 0375503366.