Jamrach's Menagerie - Carol Birch [36]
He scanned us with his pale, questioning, blue eyes as if searching for dissent.
“Utmost severity,” he repeated thoughtfully.
Mr. Rainey stepped forward from the small line-up of him and Comeragh and Cash. Why Cash? Standing there with his cool half smile, as if he was a mate already.
“If I might comment,” Mr. Rainey said.
“Most certainly, Mr. Rainey,” replied Captain Proctor pleasantly.
“It occurs to me that Copper might be a wiser choice than Hannah, sir. Copper has a smattering of the native tongue. Hannah, I believe, has none.”
There was an odd moment. Captain Proctor’s hand stopped fondling his dog. Cash gave a slight nod, and Comeragh looked away. The captain’s eyes flickered, he adjusted his hat. “Thank you, Mr. Rainey,” he said smoothly, “a good suggestion. Copper, Flower—fair dealing.”
It was a good choice. John Copper knew what he was about. He told me later he’d worked on his aunt’s fish stall in Hull since he was about six years old. John measured fairly with quart pot and pint cup, a frown of concentration pleating the skin between his eyes. It was funny to hear him switch between his native Yorkshire and pig Portuguese as he haggled gamely with the noisy women. “Três, senhora, três so! Bastante! Obrigado, obrigado, depois por favor.”
The rest of us who’d gone ashore were free to roam around the town, and a sweet little town it was, full of narrow cobbled lanes and donkeys and flowers and small white houses with patterned tiles upon the walls. Some of the buildings were grand, with fine balconies that overhung the road, flowers cascading, but mostly the houses were poor, and the children who peeped out of their doorways were barefoot and raggy, with bright, dark eyes. The men were shabby. The women carried pots on their heads and wore long cloaks with stiff hoods in spite of the warmth of the day. But there was nothing in the shops we wanted, and anyway we had no money. So after a while me and Tim strolled out of town along a narrow climbing lane hedged with great clumps of pink and purple flowers, and we saw a wooden plough drawn by two oxen, and a couple of men digging in the fields. High bamboo hedges divided the land. Here and there were cottages with scabby, thatched roofs.
We climbed till the land became woody. Big rocks poured water down into the gulleys at the sides of the track.
“To think there’s this,” I said. “All the time.” It seemed to me for one moment that unhappiness was a nonsense. I thought of my mother gutting fish in Limehouse and Ishbel coming off Quashies’ stage.
“I know exactly what you mean,” Tim said.
It was a funny thing with me and Tim. I don’t think we ever really had any proper conversations, not what you’d really call a conversation, not like I’ve had with others. Skip, for example. Now me and Skip we could rattle on all day and night. Me and Tim now, we never talked. But we did know what the other meant.
We saw a figure dark upon the skyline, sitting on a high, flat rock completely still and engrossed in what may have been a book upon his knee. Skip. Something seemed strange about him, and it took me a moment or two to realise it was the stillness. I’d never seen him still before. Skip was a jiggler. When he stood he swayed, when he sat he banged his knees together.
“What you up to, Skip?” yelled Tim.
Skip jerked.
Tim scaled the rock, grinning.
“Fuck you.” Skip said it like he said everything, quiet and controlled. “Creeping around like that! Why don’t you say you’re there? Creeping up on a fellow like that.”
“Who’s creeping?”