The Choir Boats (14 page)

“Here,” the Cretched Man said. “The first time at sea is always
difficult. The sea may have birthed us all but, alas, it does not admit
us back without first exacting a penalty. Here, dear boy, drink this.
It will palliate and stimulate. Drink.”

Tom balked at the outstretched glass and the coated man laughed.
“Thomas, this is no fairy feast. One sip will not damn you. To the
contrary, I assure you. Please drink!”

Tom sniffed the liquid, drank it, and felt better almost at once.
The speed of the potion made him even more suspicious.

“Thomas,” the Cretched Man said. “You doubt me still.”

Tom found his voice. “Why not? You’ve waylaid me, kidnapped
me. Your men broke into our house. Shall I go on?”

The Cretched Man replied, “Nay, that will suffice. I know you feel
this is . . . unpleasant for you. But, if you will allow me, I can show you
that much of what you believe to be true about your situation and
that of your uncle and your house is, in fact, misguided, incomplete,
under . . . under-nourished. That’s what it is, young man, under-nourished. Which reminds me of dinner, doesn’t it you?”

The pale man continued as they ate: “You are my guest, Thomas,
my guest, do you understand?”

“Guests come of their own choosing and can leave at any time.”

“Sophistry, Thomas. Guests rarely come of their own accord but
are compelled by greed, envy, lust, all of the base emotions, when
they are not directed outright by those who ostensibly ‘invite’ them.
As for leaving, why, you are as free as any of us to leave at anytime.”

Tom opened his mouth to answer, then shook his head in
disgust.

“Let us be friends, Thomas. Truly I mean you no harm.”

“Release me then.”

“Your release is entirely in the hands of your uncle, you know
that. I would gladly have released you in London.”

“Friends have names for each other,” Tom said.

The Cretched Man smiled, like a bust from Pompeii come to life.
“Very true, Thomas, very, very true. What name shall I use with
you? I have so many.”

For the first time, Tom felt the Cretched Man was thinking
through something he had not prepared in advance. After a pause,
the Cretched Man said, “Call me by my true name, which is Jambres.
I have not been called that in a long time.”

“Jambres?” said Tom. “I know that name but cannot place it.”

“Indeed you do,” said the Cretched Man, his lips like bowstrings.
“Think of Moses, think of the trial of the rods in the court of the
Pharaoh.”

Tom’s eyes widened as he said, “Jambres was the Pharaoh’s
sorcerer. He challenged Moses . . .”

“And lost,” said Jambres. “And was punished for it.”

“No,” said Tom, half-rising. “I do not believe you. You
cannot
be
that person!”

“I wish what you say were true, young Thomas,” said the Cretched
Man.

“Do not take me for a fool,” said Tom. “None of what you
say is according to Cocker! I am a modern person, with modern
understanding, like Sir Newton and Pitt and, well, all the thinkers
Sally knows so well!”

“As may be, but there is much more to the world than you seem to
think, young sir. History for one. Living repercussions for another.
Besides, Sir Isaac suspected my existence, and the mathematics of
Mr. Cocker confirm me.”

“
Quatsch
!”

“As for your sister, she already knows the truth of me, though she
fears that knowledge at present.”

Tom was silent for a minute, shaking his head.

“What about Strix Tender Wurm?” he said. “Is that his real
name?”

For the first time, Tom thought the Cretched Man felt something
he had not expected to feel, something he wanted to keep hidden.
The blue eyes glinted, the beautiful mouth tautened the least of
fractions.

“His real name? Even I do not know that, Thomas, though I have
sought long to know it. The creature called Wurm has existed since
the beginning, or nearly so, if you can believe that. Everything you
do and could have done, everything you think and should have
thought, everything you feel and would have felt, all go into your
true name. In the end, and often long before that, you will have to
do penance for your name.”

Tom still did not understand what Jambres, the Cretched Man,
had meant, but on that first evening dining together he had caught
a note in Jambres’s voice, as a finger sliding over the most minute
hairline crack in a glass catches the imperfection. He had not been
able to tell what the note was but he knew it was there, buried, tiny
but real.

Jambres had continued: “‘Wurm’ rings well enough for this world.
It has a certain simplicity and directness about it, dispatches with
the flamboyant, the orotund, the irrelevant. If you prefer something
more historical, you might also call him Pechael or Sesuzmeniel.”

The ringing of the second dog-watch tailed out in the stillness
surrounding the ship, bringing Tom out of his memory of that first
dinner nearly two months ago.

Someone knocked on the door. Tom put down his book (Buskirk’s
play “Hero of the Hills”); his cabin held a small but well-appointed
library. Someone put a key in the lock, opened the door. Billy Sea-Hen stood there.

“Time, sir,” said Billy, who was one of the group that had seized
Tom in the Wapping alley, a group Tom had come to call his Five
Minders. Tom was certain he had seen Billy Sea-Hen before, but
could not say where. Besides Billy Sea-Hen, there was Brasser,
Old Lobster-hide, Pinch, and Tatterhead, usually called Tat’head
for short. Lean but thick-armed, with ears seemingly cocked for
a call yet to come, all but Billy were from Lancashire or Yorkshire
originally, driven to London by hunger and the want of work. Billy
was London-born, as he put it: “Twenty-four years ago, born to me
mum in the blissful bosom of Wapping.”

“No movement today,” said Tom as they walked from Tom’s fore
compartment to the captain’s cabin.

“No,” said Billy. “But we’ll move soon.”

Tom wondered at Billy’s certainty. The sails hung limp. Hanging
down from the topmast was the ship’s long pennant, a white banner
with a red orb trailing streaks and smears of red. Some held that it
was a red-rimmed moon dripping blood, others an eye streaming
fire and sparks. As they passed the cabhouse, they heard a muffled
bumping sound below deck, a noise that would have gone unremarked
when sailing but which could not be ignored in the quiet.

“His pet,” said Billy. “Restless today.” Tom looked at the deck,
ears straining to hear the sound of a great head rearing up beneath
his feet, the head falling back again as he passed. Billy left Tom at
the door to the Cretched Man’s cabin.

“English justice?” said Jambres, as the white, white man opened
the door.

Every evening they picked up their debate from the evening
before. Tom was ready. “Yes. English justice and fair play. That’s why
we have the Empire, why we will beat Napoleon.”

“Justice?” said the Cretched Man as they sat down at table. He
smoothed back a cuff. Tom had never seen him without his coat
on. No matter how hot it became — and it was terribly hot as they
languished in the tropics — Jambres always wore his coat.

“Yes,” said Tom, helping himself to pudding. “We are bringing law
and justice to the world, to those unfortunates trapped by tyranny
and choked by the chains of unequal custom.” He had practised that
sentence all day. He thought it sounded pretty much like Hume, or
maybe Burke, impressive in either case.

The Cretched Man smiled, while finely dissecting a cutlet,
and asked, “Was it justice when the English fleet bombarded
Copenhagen?”

“It was . . .” Tom hesitated. “Necessary. A necessary expedient in
the war on Napoleon. It could not be helped.” McDoon & Associates
had many connections in Copenhagen. Tom recalled the letters they
had received describing the three days of fire and devastation. He
was angry at the Cretched Man in his bloody coat for reminding him
of this.

“Ah,” said Jambres. “Expediency. No different then, I assume
you will concede, than your being temporarily detained to further
another just cause? I and my confederates mean the McDoons no
more harm than the English meant the Danes — our actions are
merely, as were the English fleet’s, a matter of expediency.”

Tom dug at a lump of pudding but said nothing.

“Do not be angry,” said the Cretched Man, smearing lemon-and-raisin jelly on a bit of pork. “The English are probably no worse
than others who have enjoyed your degree of power, nor even more
hypocritical. Arguments of expediency in times of war have a long
pedigree. Why, you’ve read your Thucydides, every English schoolboy
has. Think what the Athenians demanded of the Melians!”

Tom said nothing. He wished Sally were here.

“You think me your enemy still?” said Jambres. The Cretched
Man’s face seemed even whiter that evening. “Am I more a shrike
than the Duke of Marlborough or Wellesley, more than Rodney or
Nelson? I hardly think I have as much blood on my conscience as
they do.”

Tom pushed his plate aside. “They fought
for
justice, to defeat
infamy and to bring civilization to those who — ”

“Wellesley hunting down Tipu Sultan in Mysore . . . justice?”

“Necessary in time of war. Tipu Sultan was allied with the
French.”

“Just but not cruel, was it?”

“No, not cruel! The French with their guillotines are cruel. And
the Muslims, well, they’re — ”

“The English, not cruel? I wonder. Are the English a kind race
then? Do you know what takes place in your sugar colonies, your
Jamaica? There’s blood in every cup of tea you drink. Under the
minuets played at great English country-houses, your Mansfield
Parks, there is the sound of sobbing from the cane fields. Oh yes,
kind all right — as kind as Gorgon’s milk.”

Tom pushed back from the table, stood. “I won’t have it,” he said.
“I won’t stand for this from . . . from you . . . you bastard!” Tom strode
from the cabin, grabbing his hat on the way out. The Cretched Man
did not pursue him, but sat wrapped in his rudling coat, with his
long white fingers pressed together in front of his face.

Outside, Tom felt better. Billy Sea-Hen stood at the railing. Night
had come, with a sky full of stars and a bright moon such as no
Londoner ever had seen.

“Evenin’, sir,” said Billy Sea-Hen. Billy was talkative, more so than
the other Minders. As for the rest of the crew, the proper sailors, they
never spoke at all, at least not to Tom. Tom called them The Others.
There was something strange about them, the way they moved so
swiftly and silently. They appeared to be Lascars or Africans for the
most part, dark-skinned, with black hair and odd head-gear.

“It’s a sight to be sure, isn’t it?” said Billy. The moon was nearly
full. Flying fish skipped out of the sea of kelp, silvery streaks like
harpoons from mermen under the surface. “The great Sargasso
Sea. And up above us all, them stars.” Tom looked up. The starfields
were a revelation to him. He dawdled every night after dinner to see
them. He wished Sally could see them too; she would see more in an
hour here than in a month of “lunaticking” at home.

“No wind, still no wind,” Tom said. The ship’s pennant hung, the
red moon or eye with its streaks and curls of red downcast.

“True enough,” said Billy. “But it’s not wind we are waitin’ on
now. We’re needing the winter stars to steer by. See, up there now
are summer stars: the Bear-Watcher and the two Bears, with the
Pole Star and the Ploughs in ’em, and the Triangle with Jubal’s Star,
The Grail Star, and Zephiel’s Star. All very fine stars, naught can be
said against them, but we need others.”

“How long must we wait? Winter, you say?”

“Yes, sir. Early December will answer. Then we’ll have the Eye of
the Bull lined up with Ermandel’s Toe, and both lined up with the Dog
Star. That’s on the one side. On the other side, we’ll have the Mouth
of the Fish lined up with the Crossing Star at the end of Judgement’s
River, and with the Ark Star. That’s six stars, counting Ermandel’s
Toe as one, so we will miss only the seventh to make our voyage.
And there she’ll be, our seventh, the May Star. She sits among the
Sisters, on the Bull’s cheek. It’s her sweet influence we must bind.
Being careful, of course, not to call the other sisters, the Weepers, as
they seat the King in Yellow, him with the silky hands.”

Little of this made sense to Tom, who said only, “Where are we
going again, Billy?”

“You know, sir — to Yount.”

Tom, certain he had seen Billy’s face before their meeting in the
Wapping alley (there was something about the sharp nose, the cut of
the eyes), said, “Tell me again how it is that you know of Yount? You,
a Londoner like myself.”

“Well, sir, it’s like this: we are all following his Grace,” Billy
twisted his wrist, extending his thumb in the direction of the
captain’s cabin.

“But why, Billy, why?”

“For salvation.”

This was as far as they ever got. Tom could not grasp what Billy
said. Tonight he pushed further.

“Salvation? Billy, that man, the Cretched Man . . .” Tom lowered
his voice in the immensity of silence around them. “. . . that man in
there is . . . the Devil.”

Billy raised one eyebrow and said, “No, that is just precisely what
he is not, begging your pardon. You’ve gotten the wrong impression,
is all. We’re on the road to Yount, which is the road to salvation.”

Tom turned full towards Billy, who stood as easily as ever.
“That can’t be,” said Tom. “Who goes to salvation locked in a ship’s
cabin?”

“I’ll allow as that is a mite strange,” Billy said. “But then perhaps,
and meaning no offense, there’s them as need to be brought to the
truth a little against their struggling. If you know what I mean.”

Tom thought about this. Out on the flat sea, a flying fish splatted
back into the weeds.