Sacred Hunger - Barry Unsworth [185]
Thereafter she was driven by heavy squalls that struck at her repeatedly, with scarcely a pause. For six days the slaves could not be brought on deck. Their meals were served below in lulls between the squalls. Because of the rough seas and heavy rain, the air ports set along the sides of the ship between decks had to be closed, and tarpaulins thrown over the gratings, thus effectively cutting off all the means by which air could be admitted.
The sufferings of the negroes, already weakened by their privations and many of them with dysentery, were of the most appalling kind. Their rooms soon became insufferably hot. The confined air grew stifling through lack of oxygen and noxious with the breathing and sweating and excreting of so many bodies so close together. There was little more than two feet of headroom and the boards they lay on were of unplaned plank so that as they rolled helplessly in the hot, suffocating darkness, the rough surface of the wood took the skin from their backs and sides. In lapses of the wind Paris heard calls for help come from them and wild, demented cries. Sometimes he saw steam rise through the gratings.
Several times, when conditions permitted, he went down among them, accompanied always by three men, one to hold a lamp, the others carrying loaded sticks to prevent the slaves from biting at their legs and ankles. To Paris the place seemed like some infernal slaughterhouse. The floor of the rooms was slippery with the blood and mucus that had resulted from the dysentery, making the footing hazardous.
He brought bread soaked in water to refresh the slaves and tried to discover any who had fainted so that they might be brought up and revived. He always pulled off his shirt before going down, but he could never stand the heat for very long. On the last occasion he was already feeling sick and feverish before descending. After no more than ten minutes he was so overcome with the heat and stench and foul air that his senses swam and he would have fallen had it not been for the assistance of the men with him.
This heralded a bout of the fever which had visited him earlier in the voyage. For a day and a night he lay in his cabin, sweating, shivering, sleeping in troubled snatches, while the squalls slowly grew less violent and the weather began to settle again.
It was while he lay thus that Thurso had his idea. It was a simple idea, but Thurso was a simple man, being an incarnation, really, of the profit motive, than which there can be few things simpler. His idea was based on certain undeniable facts. Deaths among the negroes during the six days of bad weather had amounted to eighteen – ten men, five women and three boys. The ship had been blown considerably off course and a good number more were likely to die before Jamaica was reached. Those that survived would not look attractive to the planters that came to bid for them. Cargo dying aboard ship of so-called natural causes was quite worthless, whereas cargo cast overboard for good and sufficient reason could be classed as lawful jetsam and thirty per cent of the market value could then be claimed from the insurers … There was also the fact that Paris, who might otherwise have given