Flint and Silver: A Prequel to Treasure Island

Chapter 14

"We're all going to die," said Mr Midshipman Hastings, "and that's God's truth." And he curled himself into a ball in the sternsheets of the wallowing longboat.

"Hell and damnation, George," said Mr Midshipman Povey, kneeling down and putting his hands over his friend's ear so he could whisper without being heard, "If you don't buck up soon, that's just what we shall do. Now bloody well stand up and do your duty! I can't do it, I'm too small. They won't listen to me."

"Shan't," said Hastings, "it's too much." He shoved Povey's hands away and looked up at him. "Just too much! All that on that stinking island… and now this — " He raised his head slightly, peered between the backs of the three marines sat stolidly on the aftermost thwart, as a protective screen from the hands.

Povey followed his gaze. Rough, fearful faces glared back in a mass. The men were growling and moaning. Worse still, some of them were sobbing in despair. Cast loose upon the deep without charts, compass, instruments or any hope of

salvation, they were twenty-three lost souls a tiny wooden shell, surrounded by an endless desert of ocean.

If they were lucky and the weather was foul, they might be swamped and drowned. But given fair weather… it would be a hideous lingering death by thirst: the worst of all ways for a seaman to die. Povey's heart sank.

"Oh, what's the use…" he said.

"What's goin' on!" said one of the hands, reading Povey's expression. He lurched forward, trying to see what the mids were doing, only to be grabbed by a marine and thrown back to his place.

"Fuck you, lobster!" said the seaman, and sneered. "You ain't got no bloody musket now, have you? Don't you touch me, you bloody lubber!"

"Aye!" growled the rest.

"Where's the rum?" said one.

"AYE!" they cried, and surged forward in a body to seek an answer.

The boat rocked horribly as a fierce struggle took place between seamen and marines. There were no weapons among them — they'd been plucked clean of those — but there was gouging and kicking, and heads slammed hard against the planks.

"George! George!" said Povey. "For God's sake stand up!"

The longboat was a big one — thirty-six feet long by a dozen broad at the waist. She was ponderous and heavily timbered, but with twenty-one men fighting viciously on board of her, she was rolling gunwale-under and shipping it green.

"George!" said Povey, shaking the other as hard as he could, but Mr Midshipman Hastings sat staring with his mouth hung open, head lolling from side to side with the sickening motion. "Right then," said Povey, "here's the way of it, George Hastings."

He let go of Hastings and fell back. "If you won't stand up and do your duty, as the senior of us two, then… then… I'll cut you in town, I'll tell my servants to shut my door to you… and I'll never speak to you again!"

"Oh…" said Hastings, and sat up just as a seaman threw himself clear of the fight and landed belly-down between Hastings and Povey, and got both hands lovingly round the rum cask. His feet were firm caught among the bellowing crowd forrard so he couldn't get up, but from the look on his face, he wasn't ever going to let go.

"Ah!" said Hastings, struck with inspiration. He scrambled to his feet and began kicking the seaman's hands and fingers with all his might.

"Ow! Ow! Little bastard!" yelled the tar.

"Help me!" cried Hastings.

"Aye-aye, sir!" said Povey, and laid in with the toe of his boot.

"Here!" said Hastings, grabbing the cask as the tar finally let go. "Help me lift it!"

The two mids heaved the heavy cask up and poised it on the rolling, heaving gunwale.

"NO!" wailed the horrified tar. He drew breath and gave out an ear-splitting shout, "Ahoooooy, shipmates! 'Ware astern! Look what the little sods are a-doin'!"

The instant they clapped eyes on the awful thing the mids were doing, the men gave a collective groan and magically ceased to fight.

"Now then," screeched Hastings, having been handed his audience without even having to summon it, "pay attention, you men!" Silence fell. He looked at Povey. He looked at the wobbling cask "Can you hold it?"

"Aye-aye, sir."

"Right!" said Hastings. "Now listen to me: either I shall have discipline aboard of this ship, or that cask — " the men gaped in round-eyed horror "- goes over the side!" He turned to the other mid: "Isn't that so, Mr Povey?"

"Indeed, sir!" said Povey, and wriggled the cask.

"Uh!" gasped the hands.

"Now then…" said Hastings, his hands clasped behind his back in the style of an officer. Drawing on all he'd learned in a year and a half afloat, he then behaved like an officer and divided the men into starboard and larboard watches, appointed captains of each watch, rated the man with stamped fingers as boatswain (to keep him out of mischief) and rated the eldest of the marines as acting-corporal. He then threatened stopped-grog for all future offenders, reminded them that the longboat was rigged for sail and in all respects seaworthy, and assured all present that he and Mr Povey would now confer to agree a course to the nearest port. Then — putting the larboard watch on duty — he sat down, exhausted.

This cheered the men wonderfully. Gloom vanished. Smiles returned.

"Gaw' bless-you for a young gen'man, sir!" said a voice.

"Aye!" said the rest.

"Well done, sir!" said Acting-Corporal Bennet.

"By Jove!" said Povey. "Well said, George!"

"I do hope, so," said Mr Midshipman Hastings quietly. "Just as I hope you know how to find the bloody land, because I'm damned if I do."