Infernal Devices - KW Jeter [88]
"You sonsabitches," said Miss McThane. For a moment, I thought I saw her lower lip tremble; then she stepped forward and kicked the lieutenant in the shin. One of the men guarding us interposed himself; before he could lay hand on her, she had flounced back between Scape and myself.
"Um… begging your pardon, Lieutenant." As much as I had expected his pronouncement, the words had still brought my heart surging into my throat. "Is it possible… do you think perhaps – you're being a bit… well, harsh?"
He nodded once, gravely. "Only upon the erring flesh, Mr Dower; upon the transient envelope of your immortal spirit. And upon that we confer a great boon: it will be a considerable period of time before we reach Groughay, and our fervent prayers for your souls will assist you in commending yourselves to your Maker."
"Thanks a bunch." Scape grimaced at the lieutenant's back as he and his men marched away. For a few moments he was silent, his head lowered in his brooding. Then he glanced over his shoulder at me, the corner of his smile flicking below the dark spectacles. "Well… that's the breaks."
Miss McThane leaned back against the ship's rail, looked up at the grey-clouded sky, then back to the two of us. "Now what the hell are we supposed to do? Play shuffleboard?"
I picked Abel up into my arms and stroked his head. The London streets down which he had come running after me, now seemed far away. "As the lieutenant said," I murmured, "perhaps we should make those certain preparations."
After the fury of my recent adventures, the life on board the Virtuous Persistence was not altogether disagreeable. Unlike poor Creff, betrayed by a poorly moored digestive system, I found myself to be one of those fortunates who find the sway and roll of a seagoing vessel to be comparatively relaxing. Even in the few bouts we had of blustery gale, I experienced little discomfort; so at ease was I that it occasioned some regret, not having discovered my mariner's ability until so late a date.
The prisoners were given the freedom of the ship, there being possibly no more effective gaol than the billowing waves on all sides, and too few of us to pose any threat of commandeering the vessel by force. Food was coarse, but ample; the Godly Army-men, in their roles as sailors and captors, treated us with some measure of respect, due perhaps to the enormity of the crimes that had brought this justice upon us. An inquiry on my part, as to the fate of the dog, evoked a considerable debate among the crew, some arguing as to the poor beast's innocence, others (the more primitive in their beliefs) maintaining that it might be a witch's familiar and thus liable to the same sentence as its master.
In such conditions of enforced leisure, and once a philosophical attitude towards one's imminent death had been adopted – that being the only possible attitude to take under the circumstances – I found the opportunity to reflect upon the singular experiences I had undergone. As a drowning man's life is said to flash before his eyes, so did the events since Creff announced an Ethiope in the shop pass, rather more slowly, through my thoughts.
My fellow passenger Scape came across me as I was deep in just such a reflective mood. I sat against the frame of an open hatchway, idly scratching behind the ears of Abel, panting from his labours of chasing gulls from the deck. "Yo, Dower," Scape greeted me, before sitting down. He rested his arms on his raised knees, studying the smoke from a cigarette he had cobbled together from tobacco cadged from one of the Godly Army, rolled in a Bible page from the same source.
"That's what you get," he said, nodding towards a group of the men engaged in some close-order military drill, "when you give people Bibles and guns. You should give 'em either one or