The Kingdom on the Waves Page 29

  “General Washington,” said Charles, “he hear we take Virginia, he come back down, defend his house, his land, his all these thing.”

  Slant was back, but there was vomit upon his shirt. His hands were sticky with it and his eyes expressive of guilt.

  “You reckon we can draw Chesapeake Bay and the Kingdom of Accomac?” Bono asked me, squatting beside me. “Together?”

  Seeing Slant was in some distress, I rose and I replied that I was gratified they had applied to me, but begged them continue without the imperfections of my cartography. Slant protested that I should stay, bidding Pomp and I good night. I inquired if all was well; he replied he had vomited, and believed he had a fever.

  Pomp and I led him back to our tent. At the mere suggestion we could take him to the quarantine camp, he demurred in the most plangent tones, saying, “This ain’t the smallpox. I ha —, ha —, han’t had the — . . . smallpox. You don’t take me there. You don’t take me — they all has the smallpox there. This ain’t no smallpox.”

  Pomp and I watch by him while he sleeps.

  June 4th, 1776

  The King’s birthday. Great cannonades and twenty-one-gun salutes from all the ships of the line, and a flourish of detonations from Fort Hamond. From the Fowey, we hear distantly a choir of seamen singing a Jubilate in harmony.

  Today, all those who have not had the smallpox were removed for inoculation and sequestration in the hospital. Slant was detected in his illness; though he protested, none know what his fever might be; and so they removed him with them.

  June 5th, 1776

  This evening, I attended Slant in the hospital to quiet his distress. There are soldiers by the camp of the sick who question closely as to whether we have previously suffered the smallpox. I showed the mark upon my arm and was admitted. I spake comfortably to him and fetched water both for him and for those around him, who had not received succor all day. I asked Slant whether our officers visit the dying, which is their duty; but he said that none will enter the Negro pest-house. I watched by his side until a regimental doctor — sent from the 14th, as we have none of our own — came by with febrifuge.

  The ravages of the sick are become inhuman. Among those fully afflicted, the skin boils and runs with yellow matter. Trains of sores encircle the eyes and gather at the lips. Some are distempered out of all reason and nature, and grasp at all who go by with hands emaciated by the deprivations of fever. Some of the sick lie without motion, suffering an entire stagnation of the fluids. Equally pitiable are those such as Slant who display the fever, but who have not yet come into pocking — for they wait there on pallets amid the stench and disfiguration of their brethren — eyeing each minute the tears in the flesh, the dissolution of form and distemper of mind which may soon be theirs.

  The women and children are not exempt, and the heart cannot be moved to greater pity than to see a child, stubby of leg, working his way along an aisle of mattresses, his lips aswarm with sores, as the infant Plato is said to have drawn bees to his mouth by the sweetness of his breath. Now that I am returned to my own tent, the mind relucts to recall the wailing anguish of these children, the manner in which they bat at their mothers and their own irruptions.

  Many, of course, have escaped, the fever having run its course. The scabs harden and, at length, fall off; and gradually, the mind reasserts balance and health.

  Others succumb, and in squalor see their last vision of Time.

  Slant and I had spoken but twenty minutes when, hard by us, a youth who had held still for too many days suddenly burst forth with a scream of fury, half stood, and began scratching at his whole body with his fingernails, raking open the pocks, his entire frame shaking, yelling in ire at his own disordered flesh. His blood ran out copiously, and he sought to worry himself — thirsty for damage — even as we tugged on his arms.

  We quieted him; I washed him with water as he wept. Slant, lain back down beside him, was in an excess of horror, but I was not at liberty to remain longer, and so, with anxious blessings, I made my exit.

  I returned to my tent to find Miss Nsia sitting with Bono. He endeavored, while they conversed, to tie her hand to her foot with twine as a jest. She spied his design and pulled away her wrist.

  I fear there are some who, themselves immune to terrors, are too deficient in compassion to —

  Even now, they laugh.

  It becomes us to forget the seductions of Venus when Hygeia weeps for want.

  June 7th, 1776

  I wished to go again tonight to view this evening’s funeral games for the dead, to observe again the dancing and grinning; but when Bono and I requested leave to do so, we were denied. Thus we spent the evening by our cook-fire in idleness.

  Shortly after the cannon marked the evening, Captain Mackay sent his aide, requesting we go forth and pull Serjeant Clippinger from his amusements. We sought the Serjeant out; and Bono and I came across him sitting with white privates of the 14th, singing bawdry which I shall not repeat. We lifted him to remove him from their presence, and he protested that we were too monstrous ungentle — boys, boys, look ye — boys — the brave lads of the 14th was going to chivvy me out a woman for a little kissing comfort.

  We delivered him to the Captain. Bono and Miss Nsia spent the remainder of the evening in making lips with their fists and puppet-courting as Clippinger and mistress. Bono pressed his hand to the dirt, that his fist might be pimpled and scarred.

  I fear we none of us have much respect for our commander.

  [Anonymous song]

  How pleasant to join the King’s Army!

  How brave, sir, to march on our way!

  When we limp from the plain

  In most grievous pain

  And our legs are both broke

  And they’re spattered with brain —

  Thank the Lord, sir, for eight pence a day!

  How pleasant to join the King’s Army!

  How brave, sir, to march on parade!

  With the pox and the flux

  And the year’s only fucks

  Are straight up the rear

  From a Welsh fusilier

  ’Tis no wonder we listed and stayed.

  How pleasant to join the King’s Army!

  How brave, sir, to do as you’re bade!

  To freeze and to fry

  And to fall and to die

  While the author of war

  Is home thrumming his whore

  And prinking his hair with pomade.

  How pleasant to join the King’s Army!

  How brave, sir, to march on parade!

  June 8th, 1776

  Some startling news this day.

  I visiting Slant at the noon hour with Pro Bono, we came upon Miss Nsia, who was carrying water to the ailing. “A ministering angel,” said Bono, and pressed her free hand to his lips.

  “Ha!” she scolded with a laugh. “You shut you devil mouth.” She pulled away and flicked his cheek with her fingers.

  “We has news,” Bono announced to me, and the unwonted shyness of his manner conveyed his news faster than word.

  Miss Nsia said, “I am the greatest fool that ever walk on mud.”

  “We is getting married.”

  My thoughts were in a ferment; I barely knew what to say.

  I wished them hearty congratulations, and enlarged upon the importance, at moments of great strife, of the forging of those bonds which unify human variance and align individuals in amity, providing safe haven so that the tenderer of sentiments might once again bud and flourish despite the incursions of violence.

  “You give him some water and a rasher of bacon,” said Bono, “he’d go on for some time in this vein.”

  Their delight was too great to note that their announcement may have occasioned any uneasiness in me, though I stammered, and imagine I blushed. Confronting their joy, once I have settled my wits, I am sure I shall feel joy in sympathy; Bono would do so for me.

  I pray to remember the pleasure in other’s triumphs.
We must endeavor to smile not just with the face upon the sweet felicities of others, but with the heart.

  This afternoon, we were returned to our details. I spent hours neck-deep in a hole.

  June 10th, 1776

  Today — I can scarce write it for ire — today as we shoveled dirt into barrels, to erect a mortar emplacement, I happened to look down the shore of the island, and there I perceived a body of Negroes engaged at digging an artificial harbor. I believed my senses deceived me — for one was Slant.

  We being released for our dinner, I ran to the place where they dug.

  Slant, hands red and wet with sores, stood shirtless in the pond, great masses of insects swarming about him.

  I fear I swore — I choked back horror — I asked him why he toiled there, when he should rest.

  Said he, “Lord Dunmore ordered it.”

  “The sick?” said I. “To dig?”

  He shrugged and said, “Most of them ain’t sick yet. The . . . inoculated. They’re waiting. To be poorly. They ain’t sick yet. Most of them.” In such meandering repetitions did he speak. The mosquito-flies delighted in the corruption of his flesh. Its smell was overpowering in the heat. He swatted too slowly for insect eye at the swarms around us. His arm was sluggish. He did not complain.

  I reeled at these revelations — and let it here be recorded: By Lord Dunmore’s order, that work is undertaken by a force assembled from all those who have smallpox and who can wield a shovel — and by the slaves of Loyalists, which force His Lordship has pledged to leave in bondage — for he promised freedom only to the slaves of rebels.

  Slant could not close his mouth. His head twitched nearly to his shoulder with the bites. He stood, socked in grime, without a shirt upon him, in his wet pit.

  “Slant,” said I, “feign collapse.”

  He looked upon me with confusion, and I demanded again that he fall and wait to be led away as unproductive. “Once I am gone,” said I, “I will protest this in a letter to the Regimental commanders.”

  He did not respond but with a nod, signifying no steady purpose nor comprehension. With this, I quit him and returned to my detail, where I made complaint about the circumstances.

  I have spent the remainder of the day, when unengaged, in complaint, each officer chiding me and sending me away. Corporal Craigie revealed a humane disgust at the practice, but said I should speak to the Serjeant. As might be expected, Serjeant Clippinger had no interest in the case, and enjoined me to cease my prim bickering. I wrote a letter to Captain Mackay, to which I received no reply. I wrote a letter to Major Byrd, which was returned to me by his aide-de-camp, who regretted that the Major was accepting no letters from that vile, pox-ridden band of Negroes that was not first dipped in vinegar. I have no vinegar. I wrote a letter to Lord Dunmore, which I saw read by its messenger and ripped in eight before my eyes.

  I have run from end of the isle to end. When I returned to our fly, evening having fallen, I found Dr. Trefusis applying cold tea to his sunburns.

  Unable to contain my anger, I recalled the encounter which had transpired by the officers’ pavilions.

  “Lord Dunmore,” said I, “cares not a whit for us, does he?”

  Dr. Trefusis regarded me with care, then replied, “I fear generosity toward thy benighted race is not, perhaps, first among —”

  “Tell me.”

  He admitted, “Not a groat.”

  “We cannot look to him for safety.”

  “You can, so long as your safety is a strategic necessity.”

  “We have hazarded our lives for his cause.”

  “I fear, Octavian, you often do not account for self-interest. ’Tis only self-love and self-interest which actuates animals.”

  “Which animals?”

  “Mammals with titles, par exemple. The wrist-chafer.”

  “Do not speak to me of his wrists. He was our hope.”

  “A pity,” said Dr. Trefusis. “We do not need a hope, but a hero.”

  June 11th, 1776

  This evening, in our fly, word that the rebels bruit abroad that they shall proclaim the independency of the Colonies. I feel in my soul only a weariness at the continual braying of their vanity, their outrage at small sufferings when greater are to hand.

  Tonight, I observe the fires of the rebels upon the shore. We all call their camp Cricket Hill, because they swarm so many. As I watch them, I think of a tale taught me by Dr. Trefusis in those days following my first whipping, when he tutored me upon antique slavery and its discontents.

  When the pirate-king Sextus Pompeius led a force like ours, of slaves who had thrown off their shackles of bondage, his raids were productive of such terror that the very rulers of Rome sought to treat with him; but he would not walk upon the land to meet with them, for fear that his people should be taken and returned to slavery. The water and the shifting waves, that element most known for its mutability and treachery, was to him the sturdiest and most familiar field of operation; the land, immutable, was the site of betrayal and uncertainty.

  And so when the rulers of Rome sought to parley with Sextus Pompeius, he demanded they do so thus: each party situated upon a floating platform, shouting to each other across the waves.

  I think upon this when I view the activity of our enemy, so close across the bay that we might hail them with barely a raising of the voice.

  I watch their fires, the sound of them upon the hillside like locusts; I look out at the Dunmore, the seat of our Governor, floating serenely amidst its city of ships, and I think of the pirate-king and the rulers of Rome upon their buoyant platforms. Is it not ever thus, the attempts to parley between master and slave, and perhaps between all men — is it not always words shouted across the shifting flood, torn away by wind? Each hath his element; each is wary of brigandage; and a gulf roils between us all.

  June 12th, 1776

  Everywhere, the depredations of sickness; nowhere, even within our skulls, is there ease. The Regiment does not rest upon this island.

  This hour I have gone to the east side of the island with Charles and Bono to watch the celebration of the funeral games; three were to be buried. Tonight, however, there was a mood of danger there. We found men guarding the dance jealously. Private Morris debarred our passage with his arm.

  Isaac the Joiner stood watching the group of them. “They are raising demons,” he said.

  We stood by him and observed. The crowd was small and selected of the greatest enthusiasts among the Regiment; they played upon cookware.

  Then I heard great cries, and I saw that two danced and shuddered in the midst of them, throwing out their limbs, calling, and hissing; one of these rapt individuals was Better Joe, in a mask he had fashioned out of cloth, crying as if the god were upon him.

  “They made a drink,” said Isaac. “Some recipe out of blood and dirt dug from the graves. They’re swallowing it.” He put his hand over his elbow and said, “It’s the sport of idolatry. A new covenant with their damnable gods. To reverse the crippling enchantments of Europe with their deviltry. To defeat the magical power of the white man.” He looked down. “And I can’t blame them,” he said. “I cannot blame them.”

  I watched Better Joe’s gyrations in the mask, while all around him stood back and watched his hissing. I saw potency there, and eternity.

  Isaac closed his eyes and muttered, “By the power that is within me, in the name of the Lord Jesus, I ask, Lord, I ask that this wicked spirit be cast out, that Satan’s work be confounded, that this unfortunate Africk energumen be freed from the shackles of diabolatry as he was of slavery.”

  Better Joe looked out into the night — with a great commanding croak, pointed at Charles, and through the crush of devotees, bid him approach. He waved with his old arms and spake in the language of the Ibo.

  Charles frowned and turned away; he walked back along the path we came upon. Bono and I rushed to follow.

  Bono said, “If these incantations move them to fight better against the rebel, I ca
n welcome it. But if they take up arms against our own officers, I am telling you true, there will be a sure work of cruelty, for we ain’t no equals to the regulars, and they won’t recognize no distinction between us if there’s a revolt.”

  Charles did not speak to him in return.

  Near the farms, some piles were burning.

  June 13th, 1776

  “What is a ma —, a man worth?” Slant asked me today, his lips enjoying but slight mobility.

  Before I had thought sufficiently upon his question, I answered gently that I did not know, but reckoned it at forty or fifty pound; there being no natural price for a man, as it fluctuated according to the tobacco crop, rice, coastal storms, and other several factors; that there is no security in such tallies, all prices hanging upon other prices in a complicated rigging.

  Having proceeded this far, I ceased, and saw the unenlightened look in his eye.

  I began again. “There is no price for a man,” I answered passionately this time.

  He did not heed my foolish reply. “I thought we was going to . . . fight,” he said, his ravaged face twitching. “I thought that’s war. You fight.”