Free The Navigator by Eoin McNamee Page A

the table, beside Wesley and Silkie. Every plate was full but no one moved to touch them. It wasn’t until Wesley pulled his plate toward him that the children grabbed their own and began to eat hungrily. Owen was starving as well. There was fish and fried potatoes. He tried them and thought they tasted like fish and chips. The noise in the room died to a murmur as everyone concentrated on the food in front of them, eating rapidly with both hands.
    Within minutes, every plate was empty. While theyounger children carried out the crude wooden plates, Wesley, Silkie, and Owen moved over to sit on the rough stone of the fireplace. As they did so, others sat on the floor in front of them or gathered on the ladders and windowsills. The sun shone through the windows and dust motes floated in the beams. Owen felt warm and full and surprisingly contented. He saw that the children were watching Wesley expectantly.
    “We near lost Boat today,” said Wesley. “Planemen near got her.” No one in the crowd spoke but Owen could feel the wave of dismay and concern that ran through them, almost like a shiver.
    “Silkie done well and brung her home,” Wesley said. Once again Owen could feel the emotion of the silent children, but this time there was relief and gratitude to Silkie. She smiled and went pink with pride under her freckles. Owen realized that the children could make their feelings be known to each other without saying anything, almost like a crowd at a football match.
    “I think we need to arm Boat,” Wesley went on, “for if she is sunk, we are all sunk.”
    This time the feelings of the children were confused. Some seemed angry, others resigned, others seemed to feel a deep, deep sadness. Wesley held up his hand.
    “I know that it is against us and the Code of Boat to use weapons, but we done so before and now we need it more than ever. All our crew could’ve died out there today. This is what I thinks. I thinks we give magno bowsto Uel and Mervyn, and them two boys go out every time with Boat. We can trust them, though it is a hard enough task for them two boys.”
    Children moved away from two tall, solemn boys standing in their midst. Owen felt that the crowd was questioning them with love and concern, asking them if they wanted to do this thing. “Brothers,” Silkie whispered in his ear. “There used to be three, but one of them got killed in fighting with Johnston. They don’t like fighting. That's why Wesley is asking them. He knows they’ll only fire if they have to.”
    The two brothers looked at each other before nodding slowly. Owen could feel the relief and approval in the room. The children round the two boys touched them on the shoulders and took their hands, and they smiled shyly back. Wesley removed a wooden box from an alcove in the fireplace. He unlocked the ancient lock on it with a key that hung from a chain round his neck. Owen saw that the box was full of small bows, like crossbows. Wesley removed two and carefully locked the box again. He brought it back to the alcove, then returned with a smaller box, which he unlocked with the same key. As he did so, Owen examined the crossbows. They looked very old and deadly, made of age-darkened wood with a brass-colored metal spring, the wood engraved here and there with silver writing too small to read. Wesley had meanwhile removed handfuls of crossbow bolts from the other box. The bolts were brass arrows, aboutthe length of Owen's forearm, and instead of a point, they had a small glass vial filled with a tiny amount of the blue substance that Owen had seen everywhere in the Workhouse. Owen decided that he would ask about it later.
    Wesley called Uel and Mervyn forward and gave them each a bow and a handful of bolts. The boys seemed reluctant to touch them, but when Wesley told them to make sure that the crossbows were working properly, they handled them in a way that left no doubt that they knew what they were doing.
    The children started to drift