Dewey Lambdin - Troubled Waters

"God, no!" Lewrie hooted. "The shoreline swings in a great arc in Portland Bight," he continued, taking a welcome chair himself. "To the West of Kingston, is roughly East-to-West, then begins to jut South down to Portland Point. The Beauman plantation, and Cashman's, are on the coast, quite near the Point. Uhm, have you a pen and paper I may borrow? I'll draw you a rough sketch, though a proper chart of the-"

"A chart}" MacDougall cried of a sudden. "But, of course! You still have the chart you used that night? "

"Aye," Lewrie told him, puzzled by his attorney's enthusiasm; wouldn't that chart, still with his pencilled markings, prove that he had premeditated the crime, after all? And, he had to wonder why Mr. Andrew MacDougall, Esq., burbled with laughter, rocked on his chair, and kicked his thick legs in seeming joy. To Lewrie, MacDougall looked about to pop like a haggis, all swollen with steam, and a poke with a sharp-tined fork would do him in!

"One never throws away an accurate chart," Lewrie said, hoping that MacDougall's glee was a good sign. "They're rather rare, d'ye see. Certainly, my Sailing Master, Mister Winwood, has his, as well. Never throws anything away, even pencil stubs, he doesn't. He was my Sailing Master in Proteus, and turned-over into Savage. While he may not need charts of the West Indies for now, I'm sure his charts are still aboard."

"You must send it me, yours and his, at once, sir!" MacDougall urged, swiping hair from his eyes again, and about ready to leap from his chair and start that infernal pacing once more. "We must have him, this Winwood fellow, too! He was there that night? Oh, capital!"

"Well, in fact 'twas Mister Winwood who took the most interest in the former slaves' welfare, and their spiritual improvement. None had more than a smattering of knowledge of Christianity, before comin' aboard," Lewrie related, made more at ease by MacDougall's elation.

"Denied the Good News of Christ?" MacDougall scowled. "Why? By omission, or calculated commission, one wonders. If told they're equal in the Lord's sight, might slaves begin to think, and wonder why they are slaves, and whether their own humanity is the equal of a master's, perhaps? Is that common, d'ye think, Captain Lewrie? As a means for their continued oppression?"

"It may vary from master to master, sir," Lewrie said, digging round the top of MacDougall's desk to find a spare lead pencil, paper, and enough space in which to begin to draw. "Some, I'm told, don't go much beyond one of Saint Paul 's letters, the one about 'slaves, obey your masters,' hey? Mister Winwood 'twas the one who helped them take new, freemen's names for ship's books, even used the usual hosing-off under the wash-deck pump that new-come hands get as a sort of baptism.

"He's Low Church," Lewrie had to caution. "Halfway to 'Leaping Methodist,' mind."

"Such a character witness, though," Mr. MacDougall mused, with his arms about his chest, rocking once again as if in transports of a heavenly rapture at a Welsh revival meeting. "Oh, capital! Capital! I shall swoon with joy, swear I will, to have him in the box! What a scandal 'gainst the Beaumans I could make!"

MacDougall stopped rocking, turned grave, and peered anxiously at Lewrie. "Charts. Maps. Where does one get them, from Admiralty?"

"They don't print their own," Lewrie told him, happily drawing. "But there are plenty of printers who do. Sayer and Bennett in Fleet Street are very good, very up-to-date, if they're still in business."

"How large are they. Captain Lewrie?" MacDougall pressed.

"Oh, 'bout three foot square, most of 'em, though it depends," Lewrie said, intent on his depiction of the reef and beach. "Harbour charts and their approaches might not be more than eighteen inches by eighteen, some even smaller."

"We must have one much larger," MacDougall petulantly declared. "A gigantic reproduction for all in the courtroom to be able to take in… judge, jury, and, most especially, the audience, ha ha! They, ah… ever make charts that large?"

"Doubt it," Lewrie replied, looking up from his sketch. "It'd be dear." And, he wondered; will you be billing me for that?

"Hang the cost!" MacDougall exclaimed, leaping to his feet at last, unable to contain his urgency; which outburst made Lewrie wince. "The Reverend Wilberforce will surely see the necessity. Cost is no object, compared to true justice… for you, the former slaves, and the cause of ultimate Empire-wide Abolition.

"Yes, Captain Lewrie, I, too, support the cause of Abolition," MacDougall quite proudly stated, looking as if he was posing for an heroic portrait. "In this ' one instance, I may not be quite the dry and objective lawyer who presents the most compelling argument in his client's best interests. I am enthusiastic in court, others tell me. Though, not to my detriment, nor to the interests of those who engage me. And I have found that visual evidence is more compelling than dull, yawn-inducing blather, d'ye see?"

"The 'picture's worth a thousand words,' d'ye mean, sir?" Lewrie supposed aloud.

"Exactly, my dear Captain Lewrie," MacDougall replied, guffawing with great pleasure, abandoning his stiff "noble" pose as quickly as a poster could be ripped from a tavern wall. "If the printers cannot reproduce your charts large enough, perhaps a canvas, as big as a bedsheet, may serve, and a journeyman artist or sign painter could draw it all in broad strokes. Something on which the jury may gaze as any false evidence is reiterated. Do the Beaumans not bring their witnesses with them, and depend upon a dry reading of their testimony from the Jamaican transcript, well… there's confrontation standing mutely in the centre of the courtroom. Do they fetch 'em along, and testify anew, I'll present your officers, and that Mister Winwood, in stark rebuttal."

"Or, tear them to pieces when you put your question to 'em?"

"Beg pardon, Captain Lewrie?"

"When you question them yourself," Lewrie re-stated.

"Oh, heavens no, sir!" MacDougall pooh-poohed. "The prosecuting attorney puts questions to his witnesses to form a case, then I, as a defence attorney, put our witnesses in the box to refute. Prosecutors under English Common Law cannot examine my witnesses or attestors, nor may I examine his!"

"What?"

"I fear you've had little exposure to the law, and courts, Captain Lewrie," MacDougall said, with one of those simpering little "how ignorant of you" laughs.

"Not 'til now, no," Lewrie sarcastically replied. And, why that is, God only knows, the things I've got up to! he thought a tick later. "Well, at least I'll have no fear of scathing questions from whoever it is the Beaumans hire as prosecutor," he concluded with a resigned sigh.

"Uhm… beg pardon again, Captain Lewrie, but…," MacDougall said, looking a bit sorry for his new client. "The accused only speaks upon his own behalf after the verdict is announced… most usually in King's Bench cases to plead for mercy… transportation to Australia, 'stead of the New Market gallows."

"What?" Lewrie gawped in alarm. "I just sit in the dock, while everybody else gets t'lie their arses off? Stay mum as a tailor's dummy, while…?"

"That, ah… is the custom, Captain Lewrie," MacDougall sadly informed him. "Ah, look at the time!" he cried as a mantel clock atop the fireplace chimed the hours. "I thought I was beginning to feel a tad peckish. Oh, there's an hundred, a thousand, more matters which I must ask of you in the short time allotted us, but I do believe we may repair to the most excellent chop-house… quite nearby… and take our mid-day meal. I took the liberty of reserving private rooms where we, and Mister Sadler, who shall prove to be instrumental to the preparation of our presentation, good fellow, may dine. I swear, all you have related to me, and what stir such has caused in my wits, has made me famished. Shall we adjourn for the nonce, Captain Lewrie?"