Sacred Hunger - Barry Unsworth [110]
Not long after he had gone a party of men under Haines set off to shore in the yawl with water casks and a variety of cutting tools. What these last are for I do not know. There is much that is not explained to me; I do not mean kept from me – I suppose my knowledge is assumed; and it would be easy to resign myself to this, cease enquiring about this world of the present, into which I have strayed by some accident and which appears more grievous to me every day, just as I have ceased to speculate, or much to care, about what is to become of me. Perhaps that is all that would be needed: by an act of will to relinquish curiosity and so have no need to skulk away from God when he walks in the cool of the evening …
But this, as he knew, was death in life. It was in a spirit of rebellion against his own self-abnegation that he abruptly closed his journal now and made his way up on deck. The weather was oppressively heavy and hot, with a darkening skein of cloud drawing over the sky from the distant headlands to the south. The wind had abated but the waves were high over the bar across the river mouth; he saw the glitter of the spray and heard the low thunder of the breakers. This distant violence of the surf, viewed across the calm expanse of blue unbroken water, appeared to Paris like the stealthy release of some vindicative mania long nursed. A sickening fetid smell came over the water from Macdonald’s ship lying to windward of them with its full cargo of slaves.
Turning and looking down into the waist of the ship, he saw the negroes clustered under their canopy, their bodies patterned by shadows. The slight, continuous riffling of the awning made gleaming fluxions of light on the men’s chains. The women had been given a piece of calico to tie round their waists so as to cover the pudenda, and these squares of white held an intense purity in the thick light filtering down through the canvas. Johnson and Libby were standing guard, armed with pistols and whips.
Forward of him, astride on the boom, he saw Hughes working on the tackle for the stay ropes, head and shoulders outlined against the sky. On the deck below Cavana was sitting cross-legged, with various bits and pieces laid out before him.
Paris made his way forward and stood near the starboard rail. Cavana had glanced up at his approach but his eyes were back on his work now, and he showed no sign of being aware of the surgeon’s proximity. They had not spoken much together since he had treated Cavana for an inflamed condition of the eyes.
‘What work is that you are doing?’ the surgeon enquired after an interval of some moments.
‘I am putting in new pins for these blocks,’ Cavana’s voice was surprisingly soft and musical. After an appreciable pause he added, ‘They have wore loose. They were not well fitted to begin with.’
This was the longest speech that Cavana had made for some considerable time; but he felt relaxed this morning, in the sultry weather, under the slowly thickening sky, with customary aggravation absent for the moment, Thurso away on his visit, Haines ashore with the boat party, Barton below somewhere busy with stores. Besides, though he would not have gone so far as to admit to a liking, he had formed a favourable judgement of Paris over the weeks, and this though the surgeon had started out with the black mark against him of being related to the owner. In this Cavana shared the general opinion of the forecastle. It was seen that Paris spoke fairly to people and that he was no crimp for Thurso – it was remembered how he had stood out against the captain over treating Wilson’s torn back. Other things there were too. A ship is a public place and the Liverpool Merchant was little more than a hundred feet long from stem to stern. Paris would have been surprised to learn the extent to which his words and actions had been noted.
Cavana maintained silence for some moments more to see if the surgeon had more questions. He discovered in himself a reluctance to let this conversation come