Flint and Silver: A Prequel to Treasure Island

Chapter 3

John Silver and Captain Nathan England walked the quarterdeck side by side, with every other man deferring and keeping clear of their private conversation. The weather was hot and good. The ship sailed easily, the guns were secured, and most of the men idling.

"Articles, John! Articles is what makes us what we are."

"Which is pirates," said Silver.

"No!" said England. "If I'm a pirate, then Drake was a pirate, and Hawkins and Raleigh too, and all the rest of 'em that did what I do. And didn't they come home to knighthoods and estates?"

"But the law — King George's law — will hang us if they catch us."

"Which they won't."

"But they would."

"God bless your soul, John! And wouldn't Queen Bess've hanged Drake, if she'd caught him at the wrong time? She'd've done it to please the King of Spain! She did what she had to, and so do I."

"But…" said Silver.

"JOHN!" yelled England, loud enough to shake the t'gallant masts, and all hands turned to look. England's face reddened with anger. "Avast, you swabs!" he cried. "Look to your duties!" And every man turned away and found something to be busy with. They did as they were told, without resentment and of their own free will.

"There!" said England. "D'you see that? Was that pirates, or free companions?" He waved a hand at the crew. "That's real discipline, John. The discipline of free men. That's articles."

"Bah!" said Silver.

"God damn you, you ignorant bugger!" said England, biting down on his temper. Then, "Ah!" he said, as an idea struck him. "Come along o' me, John Silver, and I'll show you something, by God I will!"

England stamped off, slid down a companionway, and led the way below decks to the great cabin, right at the stern of the ship. Unlike some, England used his cabin not for display but as a place of work, where he could bring together his officers when he needed to make plans. There was a big table and some chairs, and a profusion of cupboards and drawers and pigeonholes for the storage of charts and other papers.

"Secure that hatchway!" said England, pointing at the door. "Not that I don't trust the hands, but some things are best kept out of temptation's way." Then he fumbled for a key, unlocked a cupboard and pointed to the big, black ledger that lay inside.

"Book of Articles!" he said with reverence. "The very same in which you signed your name. And here beside it is the flag beneath which we buries the dead." He laid a hand on the black cloth. "And then there's this!" He took out a snuff box. It was nothing special. It wasn't gilt or enamelled. Not the sort of thing that would have graced a gentleman's waistcoat. It was a large, plain box, neatly carpentered from some hard, black, African wood.

"Now you just look at this, my boy, and you tell me if that was the work of bloody pirates!" He held out the box. Silver took it.

"Well?" said Silver.

"Well, open the bugger!" said England. Silver fumbled for the catch, and sprung the box open. He looked inside and saw nothing… just two round pieces of paper, each about an inch across, each faintly dirtied with charcoal that had long since rubbed off.

"Aye!" said England, seeing Silver's expression. "Not much to look at now, are they? But each one of them got rid of a captain. By one of 'em Davies was removed by Latour, and by the other Latour was removed by myself." Silver took out one of the papers. He turned it over. The single word Deposed was written on the fresh side. The same word was on the other paper.

"What are these?" said Silver.

"The black spot, my son," said England. "This is the means whereby the lower deck gets rid of a captain it doesn't like."

"The black spot?" Silver said, grinning. "Sounds like boys at play!"

"Huh!" said England. "You just hope you never see one handed to you! For it's a summons from the crew to stand before them and be judged. No man may harm one who gives him the black spot, nor stand in his way as he seeks to deliver it. No man may even lay a hand on one who is found in the act of making a black spot. And as for him to whom they deliver it — why, he must stand judgement by vote of the whole crew, be he even the captain himself."

England reached out and took the papers. He held them up one at a time before Silver's eyes.

"This one was for Captain Danny Davies who had greedy fingers for other men's shares. Him they hanged from the yardarm. And this one was for Captain Frenchy Latour, that brought bad luck upon us one time too many! Him we stripped bollock-naked and heaved over the side to see if he could swim to Jamaica from ten miles offshore."

"Aye," said Silver, "but what does it mean?"

"It means, my son, that we sail under the rule of law on board of this ship. We sail under the rule of law every inch and ounce as much as if we were on board of a ship of King George of England, or King Louis of France, or King Philip of Spain! Their laws is all different, ain't they? And ours is too, but it is law! It is articles! And that's why we ain't pirates!"

He spoke with such passion and such obvious sincerity that Silver nodded. He'd now heard these same arguments repeated so many times that he was losing the will to fight them; and in any case, nobody likes to think the worst of himself, so even the cleverest man will accept a weak case if it suits his self-esteem to do so.

"Now then," said England, "no more o' this, for it ain't why I sent for you." He stared at Silver thoughtfully. "You're a good man, John Silver, and the crew like you. You know what they call you?"

Silver grinned. "Aye!" he said.

"Well?" said England. "Out with it!"

"Long John," said Silver.

"Aye! Long John Silver, 'cos you're the tallest man among us, and one o' the best. You're a seaman to the bone, and there's not a man here that would dare to fight you. You're a man that others will follow." Silver shrugged, England laughed. "It's true," said England. "So here's the case, Long John Silver. I have it in mind to make an officer of you on board of this ship. You have the natural gift of command, and more than that you know your letters and your numbers, which is as rare among seamen as balls on a eunuch! I shall rate you as third mate and start your education this very day." He clapped Silver on the shoulder. "What say you, Long John?"

"Thank you, Cap'n," said Silver, beaming with pleasure and raising a hand to his hat in salute.

"Good!" said England. "So what do you know already? Can you steer a course?"

"Aye!" said Silver, confidently.

"Then show me," said England. "We'll go this instant to the ship's wheel!" He smiled and led the way.

"Cap'n!" said the first mate, who was standing by the helmsman.

"Cap'n!" said the helmsman.

"Let Mr Silver take a turn," said England. "The course is north by northwest, Mr Silver, and keep her as close to the wind as she'll bear."

The helmsman waited till Silver had taken a firm hold on the other side of the big wheel with its out-jutting handles, and when Silver nodded, he stood back and left the ship to Silver's hand, with England and the first mate looking on.

It was easy. Silver had done this a hundred times before on other ships. He was a fine steersman, keeping careful watch on the sails, and holding the ship true to her course with minimal pressure on the wheel. The task is harder than it seems and few men could have done it better. England grinned. The mate grinned, and word ran round the ship that Long John was at the helm.

"Would you change the set of her sails, Mr Silver?" asked England, nudging the mate.

"I'd shake a reef out of the fore topsail, Cap'n," said Silver. "She'll bear it, and she'll steer all the easier." And when this was done, and Victory did indeed answer the helm more sweetly, there was an actual cheer from the crew, now eagerly looking on.

"Well enough," said England. "Stand down, Mr Silver, and we'll look at the transit board, and you shall tell me its purpose aboard ship and how it is kept." Again, Silver smiled. He waited till the helmsman had control of the wheel, then stepped forward to the binnacle housing the compass, and picked up a wooden board hanging on a hook. It had a series of holes drilled in it, radiating out from the centre in the form of a compass rose. There were a number of pegs to go in the holes, each peg attached to the board by a thin line.

"Well, Cap'n," said Silver, "every quarter-hour by the sandglass, the log is hove at the stern to find the speed of her through the water."

"Aye," said England. "Let's say the log's been heaved, and her speed is five knots…"

"So," said Silver, "that's five knots for a quarter-hour, north by northwest." And he set a peg in the board accordingly, and looked at England. "For that is the purpose of the board, Cap'n: to keep a reckoning of her course and speed, every quarter-hour, throughout the watch."

"Splendid!" said England. "And what happens at the end of the watch?"

"Why," said Silver, "the officer of the watch — " he instinctively touched his hat to the mate — "he takes the board and marks out how she's run — her course and speed — during the watch." He paused for he was now entering unknown waters. "He marks it out on the chart, Cap'n…" Silver blinked. "Which is all I knows o' the matter." His smile faded a little.

"We'll come to that!" said England confidently. "But first, here's the end of the forenoon watch about to be struck…"

Clang-clang! Clang-clang! Clang-clang! Clang-clang! The bell sounded from its little temple at the break of the fo'c'sle.

"Eight bells! Change the watch!" yelled the boatswain, and there was a rumble of bare feet on the boards as the hands of the starboard watch ran to relieve the larboard watch, who were now standing down. They doubled to it like men-o'-warsmen because Captain England would have it no other way. At the same time England's servant came up from below with a big triangular wooden case. He opened it and presented it to England.

"Cap'n," he said respectfully, and England took out a complex ebony instrument with brass scales, a miniature telescope, and lenses, filters and other mysterious appendages besides.

"This is a quadrant, Long John," said England. "For this first time, I shall instruct you in its use, but afterwards, the second mate shall be your teacher."

He nodded at the second mate, who touched his hat respectfully before taking his own quadrant out of its case and standing beside the first mate, who already had his quadrant ready.

"'Tis noon," said England. "The ship's day begins at noon, each day, and at that time we…" England paused. "Long John?" he said. "What is it?"

Silver was looking at the quadrant. It unsettled him. It worried him. He'd seen officers using quadrants and the like ever since he first went to sea. But he'd never before been asked to use one, and he stared in morbid dread at the unfathomable complexity of the thing. Some men are disturbed by heights, some by spiders or snakes. Some cannot bear to be enclosed in a small space. Long John was weighed down by the thought of having to swallow such an appalling meal of abstract thinking, which was so different from the simple, physical seamanship that he'd learned by hard labour.

"No matter, Cap'n," he said. "Show me the workings of her." Long John was no coward. So he took the quadrant when England offered it, and he paid his best attention to the explanations, so carefully given, and he did his best to ask questions.

But it was no good. The worry turned to fear: fear of being exposed as an incompetent before England and the crew. Later, in England's cabin, when the captain tried to explain latitude and longitude and how a ship might find its way across the empty oceans, it was even worse. Long John tried to the very utmost of his ability, but the bearings and degrees and minutes had no meaning to him. Instead, his head felt thick and hot, a band of pain clamped round his brow, and his eyes watered like a blubbering child's. Finally, as England waved a pair of elegant brass dividers with blue-steel needle-points, trying to explain dead reckoning, Long John Silver swayed and stumbled with nausea, and had to be helped into a chair by a dumbfounded Nathan England.

"What is it, John?" he said. "Have you got the ague? Is it some damned fever? What is it, shipmate?"

"Can't do it, Cap'n," said Silver. "Show me any other task. Let me dive for gold on the sea bed. Let me lead boarders into a three-decker's broadside. Anything."

"What d'you mean, lad?" said England, more concerned than he'd realised. England had no son. He had no family at all. He'd taken powerfully to John Silver and it had become England's hope and pleasure to see the younger man advanced in his profession.

"Can't do it, Cap'n," Silver repeated. "Not with charts an' all. Please don't ask me."

"Nonsense!" said England. "Everyone thinks they can't do it at first. We shall persevere."

And so they did. Neither man was one to give up easily. They persevered for weeks. Sometimes Long John even thought he was getting a grasp on the thing. But the best he ever achieved was like the performance of a clumsy musician who sounds one plodding note after another, to the dismay of those around him, and to his own despair, recognising his failure.

"How can it be, John?" said England at last. "I've seen you calculate the value of a ship's cargo down to the penny — and that done in your head without pencil and paper. How can you manage that, yet not master this piece of glass and wood?" He held up a quadrant.

"Cargoes is things I can touch," said Silver. "But that bloody thing…" he stared hopelessly at the instrument "… that's black magic!"

England sighed. "It's no good, is it, shipmate?"

"No," said Long John. "And happy will I be to try this no more!"

"So be it," said England. "I shall rate you as an officer, nonetheless: whether it be coxswain, master-at-arms or something of my own invention, for I still say that men follow where you lead. But the fact of it is, John Silver, that only a gentleman and a navigator may command a ship, and I fear you will never be one."