Sacred Hunger - Barry Unsworth [149]
Paris could not for the moment find a response to this, though it was clear one was expected – the Governor had addressed him, not Thurso, no doubt supposing the captain incapable of finer feelings. It was he, the captain, however, who saved the present silence from lengthening awkwardly. Not finding much of interest in this tale of a theft and a flogging, he had been glancing into the corners of the room for some time and now said, ‘I believe these chambers have been refurbished since the last occasion I had the honour to be here? And I noticed as we came up that the timber and the ironwork on the gates are new.’
‘Yes, you are right, Captain,’ the Governor said. ‘There have been extensive repairs. The work was begun in the days of my predecessor and has not been long completed. The Company, when it took over the fort from the Royal Africa Company, which as you know is now dissolved, finding it dilapidated and in some parts ruinous, thought fit to expend some considerable sums on its reconstruction. They were right to do so, in my view. This fort is the visible evidence of our presence here; it must be made imposing. We are judged by it, sir, not only the power and wealth of the Company but that of our whole nation. By their works shall ye know them, as the Scriptures say. Competition for trade is increasing all down the coast. We cannot rest on our laurels. The Company is very much alive to the importance of the image it presents.’
The Governor lay back in his chair, as if the energy required for this speech had exhausted him. He drew out a square of cambric from his sleeve and dabbed at his temples and the corners of his lips. A scent of lavender expanded in the still air of the room. The screaming had stopped now, but the regular sound of the lash continued.
‘They were obliged to bring craftsmen out,’ the Governor sighed after a moment. ‘All the oak for the interior panelling had to be imported. Imagine the difficulty we were under, in getting these wretched people to transport the stone. With their distaste for work of any kind, our labour here was worse than that confronting the pharaohs of old. Well, gentlemen, it grows time for me to busy myself with my syllabub. With your permission, I shall give you over to the care of one of our factors, Mr Saunders, who will take you down to see the slaves. After that you might like to take your ease for a while. Saunders will show you your quarters. I look forward to seeing you both again at supper.’
He rang a small brass handbell that had been lying on the table before him. An African in white tunic and drawers appeared instantly and was told to fetch Mr Saunders, for whom they waited some minutes in a silence made rather uneasy by Thurso’s audible breathing and the Governor’s total immobility. There was no sound at all now from the courtyard below, but it seemed to Paris that he could hear a faint but steady sound of hammering from some more distant source. The Governor kept his nose and mouth buried in his handkerchief, though he freed them once to ask the surgeon his opinion of the efficacy of watered spirits in preventing disease. ‘The Company doctor here recommended a glass of red wine with the juice of half a lemon and a little sugar as a good defence against contagion,’ he said, ‘but he died of fever a month ago, leaving me in some doubt of his remedy.’
The surgeon was seeking to reply to this when there was a knock at the door and Saunders entered. He was youngish, perhaps not more than thirty or so, but sunken-eyed and haggard. With him as their guide they returned to ground level and thence through stone-floored passages towards what Paris thought might be the rear of the fort, the side facing away from the sea. But the corridors twisted and turned and after a while he had lost all sense of direction.
As they proceeded he began to feel a sort of remote terror, the anxiety that comes sometimes in dreams of labyrinths, when each turning threatens to confront us with something intolerable and we struggle