Free The Corvette by Richard Woodman Page B

ducks flapping wetly about his legs, his knuckle respectfully at his forehead as he crossed the hallowed planking of the quarterdeck.
    ‘What’s your name?’
    ‘Mullack, sir.’
    ‘That was well done, Mullack, I’ll not forget it. Who was the victim?’
    ‘Jim Leek, sir, foretopman.’
    ‘A messmate of yours?’ Mullack nodded. ‘Did you see what happened?’ The seaman met Drinkwater’s eyes then studied the deck again. ‘No, sir.’ He was lying, Drinkwater knew, but that was nothing to hold against him in the circumstances.
    ‘Very well, Mullack, cut along now.’ Drinkwater watched for a second as Melusine paid off to steady on her course again.
    ‘Begging your pardon, sir,’ offered Lord Walmsley, stepping forward, ‘but the man was only skylarking, sir. Leek was dancing on the yardarm when he missed his footing.’
    ‘Thank you, Mr Walmsley. He is in your division ain’t he?’
    ‘Yes, sir.’
    ‘Kindly inform the midshipmen that they will be put over a gunbreech every time they permit a man in their division to fool about aloft
    and Mr Rispin! Set the main t’gallant again, we are three miles astern of our station.’
     
    The smell of tobacco smoke filled the dimly lit cockpit which housed the midshipmen. For a second Drinkwater was a ‘young gentleman’ again, transported back to an afternoon in Gibraltar Bay when he had caught a messmate in the throes of sodomy. As he paused to allow his eyes to adjust he took in the scene before him.
    Leek’s body was thrown over a chest, his buttocks bared while a loblolly boy held his abdomen face downwards. Behind him Surgeon Macpherson stood with a bellows inserted into Leek’s anus. The clack-hole was connected to a small box in which tobacco was burning and, in addition to the aroma of the plug and the stink of bilge, the smell of rum was heavy in the foetid air.
    ‘He’s ejecting water,’ said the loblolly boy. Drinkwater felt himself pushed aside in the darkness and looked round sharply as Singleton elbowed his way into the cockpit.
    ‘What diabolical nonsense is this?’ he snapped with uncommon force, opening a black bag. Macpherson looked up and his eyes narrowed, gleaming wetly in the flickering light of the two lanterns.
    ‘The Cullenian cure,’ he sneered, ‘by the acrimony of the tobacco the intestines will be stimulated and the action of the moving fibres thus restored
    ‘
    ‘Get that thing out of his arse!’ Macpherson and the loblolly boys stared at Singleton in astonishment as the missionary completed his preparations and pushed the drunken surgeon to one side.
    Drinkwater had recovered from his shock. He was remembering something in Singleton’s letter of introduction; the two letters ‘M.D.’.
    ‘Do as he says, Macpherson!’ The voice of the captain cut through the gloom and Macpherson stepped back, his rum-sodden brain uncomprehending.
    ‘By my oath
    here, on his back and quickly now or we’ll have lost him
    ‘
    Singleton waved two onlookers, Midshipmen Glencross and Gorton, to assist. Leek was laid face up on the deck and Singleton knelt at his head and shoved a short brass tube into his mouth. Pinching Leek’s nose Singleton began to blow into the tube. After a while he looked at Gorton.
    ‘Sit astride him and push down hard on his chest when I take my mouth away’
    They continued thus for some ten minutes, alternately blowing and punching down while the watchers waited in silence. About them Melusine creaked and groaned, her bilge slopping beneath them, but in the cockpit a diminishing hiatus of hope suspended them. Even Macpherson watched, befuddled and bewildered by what he was seeing.
    Suddenly there was a contraction in Leek’s throat. Singleton leapt up and pushed Gorton to one side, rolling Leek roughly over and slapping him hard between the shoulder blades. There was a massive eructation and Leek’s chest heaved and continued to heave of its own accord. A quantity of viscid fluid ran from his