Michael Jecks: The Death Ship of Dartmouth

The watchman was sympathetic. ‘Nothing you can do about it. The Coroner’s been sent for. If you’re lucky, he’ll be only a couple of days.’

‘Even if he is, he’ll need a day to arrange his inquest,’ Alred grumbled. ‘I’ve seen them in Exeter. Bloody fools take a good time over their inquests, and all the while poor workers suffer.’

‘We don’t take so long here,’ the watchman said with a chuckle. ‘This isn’t some borough in the middle of a city where they can bugger about for days. We’ve got work to be getting on with down here. You wait and see.’

Alred nodded bitterly. A man of middle height, with grizzled hair and beard, his eyes were more used to laughter, but today there was nothing to laugh about. He glanced down at the corpse, shaking his head. This fellow must have been a lover, a son, a father, perhaps … and now all he had become was sport for others to gawp at.

There were plenty who kept coming to take a look. Two youngsters, a boy and girl of ten or so, were standing up at the edge of the hole even now, their mother or nurse with them, all three peering down, wide-eyed, at the dead man. Well, it was best that everyone who could might see him, so that someone could identify him when the Coroner arrived.

Turning, he made his way to the Porpoise further down Higher Street. It was a small alehouse of the sort he would normally avoid in Exeter, but here … where else would a body go? Blasted place was hopeless. In Exeter, there were attractions all the time: you could watch the baiting, see a duel, or go and watch the jugglers and fools at the market square. Ah, how he missed Exeter.

The alehouse did have one advantage, though: it was cheap. He walked in, stooping under the low lintel, and looked about him for the others.

‘That bloke said the Coroner should be here in two days, and he may be quick to come to a conclusion,’ he said when he had joined them.

Bill and Law were his helpers. Bill was a taller man, his eyes a pale blue, his features wrinkled from laughter and sunburned in a round face. Law was darker, with steady brown eyes set in a narrow face, and he was much shorter. Only sixteen, he had been apprenticed to Alred for two years now, and was bright and quick, if not strong enough yet to do much of the heavier work.

‘Two days? What do we do now, then?’ Law asked.

‘Wait until we hear, I suppose. We can’t go and do anything until we’re allowed. Oh, God’s ballocks! What a mess! Why did we ever come here to this miserable midden?’

Law shrugged. His real name was Lawrence, but Bill and Alred had agreed early on that the shortarse didn’t justify so long a name. Now he leaned forward eagerly. ‘See that girl over there? She’s been making eyes at me for the last while. Reckon she fancies me!’

‘Law, she’d be more likely to fancy a hog,’ Alred sighed. ‘Your face looks like you’ve been rolled in a bed of nettles.’

‘It’s not that bad!’ Law protested, a hand going to his volcanic chin.

‘Don’t be too hard on the lad,’ Bill said. ‘It might just be that she’s got lousy eyesight.’ He burst out laughing.

‘There are many eye me up, I’ll have you know,’ Law said sulkily.

‘They’re desperate in a town like this,’ Alred chuckled, then sighed. ‘What are we going to do for money if we get held up? Christ’s pain! what made me take this job in the first place?’

Bill smiled, showing his uneven teeth. ‘Because you said we’d clean up in a little place like this. You said we’d charge them through the nose for everything they needed done and we’d live the high life when we got home again. You said the locals down here never saw anyone from the real world and had less sense than a peasant from-’

‘Yes, yes! All right!’ Alred said hastily, aware of all the eyes in the place going to him and his friends. Bill’s voice was penetrating. ‘But in the meantime we’re losing money. That road has to be repaved, and I agreed a fixed price for the job. If we’re held up, we won’t make a penny profit.’

‘You agreed a price for the job?’ Law burst out. ‘You always taught me that a fixed price was daft, that you’d never know if something was going to go wrong, and that you always need to be flexible in case of problems.’

‘Yes, well — this proves I was right, doesn’t it?’ Alred snapped, adding nastily, ‘And it was you supposed to put up the barriers, wasn’t it?’

‘I did! You know I did!’

‘They weren’t there this morning, were they? How do I know you put them up right? If it was that easy for some thieving scrote to nick them, you can’t have fixed them in place all that well, can you?’ He sank his face in his cup of ale.

‘It’s not my fault all this happened, as you well know!’

Alred grimaced, then: ‘No, it isn’t.’

Law grinned. ‘Come on, Alred. What are we?’

‘Don’t. Just don’t say it.’

‘What are we, eh, Bill?’

‘We’re paviours, Law. We keep people moving.’

‘What are we, Alred?’

‘Yes, yes, yes. We’re bleeding paviours. But that isn’t going to help us when …’

‘Hey! Is the paver in here?’ It was Stephen, the clerk.

Alred closed his eyes and screwed up his face. ‘See?’ he hissed. ‘And now I’m going to go and get stuffed for finding a stiff. I hope you’re pleased with your work, lad! Yes — I’m here.’

‘Come with me. The Port Reeve wants a word with you.’

Hamo the cooper was at his bench outside when he heard the boat returning to the shore. It scraped along the piles of empty clam and oyster shells that shingled the beach, and the men inside jumped out, hauling her up the slope to lie out of the water. Hamo watched idly as Jankin took the great stone anchor and thrust the rope from the boat through the hole bored in it, and then Hamo returned to his work, shaving a stave to fit a broken barrel. Much of his work involved mending damaged vessels. He didn’t know what he’d do if sailors were more careful!

‘Come on, Henry, let’s be getting you out of there,’ a man called.

Hamo noticed that Henry Pyket was still seated on the thwart, his face in his hands.

‘Come on, Dad, eh?’

Jankin was a steady fellow, sound and as hard as oak in a fight, and Hamo was oddly affected to see how he went to the older man and placed an arm about his neck comfortingly.

‘Hey, Jankin, you want some help there, boy?’ he shouted.

‘We’re fine, I think, Master Hamo,’ Jankin responded, but he didn’t sound it.

‘Let’s help him out of there, eh?’ Hamo went over and said gently, ‘Henry, have you hurt yourself, man? Hit your head on a beam?’

‘We’ve all seen them, haven’t we,’ Henry said dully. ‘You’ve seen your share of dead men, I daresay, Hamo?’

‘We all have, aye. There isn’t the year we don’t see enough washed up on the beaches.’

‘But have you ever been touched by one?’ Henry gave a shudder of horror. ‘He was in there, he was, poor Danny, and a-wavin’ like he was asking me to join him. It turned my stomach, it did!’

‘Danny? What was he doing in there?’ Hamo asked, bewildered.

‘He’s dead, Hamo. Murdered, like all the others.’

‘God’s teeth, you mean that’s the Saint John ?’

‘There’s no one on board, I swear. Only Danny down in the hold, and he’s dead. All the other men have gone,’ Henry said with another shiver. ‘The ship’s cursed, Hamo. It must be. Sweet Jesus! It’s like the devil came up and took ’em all. Took ’em all down into the sea with him.’

Simon was sitting in his favourite chair when John Hawley entered. ‘Master Hawley, good day. You have a rich prize, I see.’