Tim Severin - Corsair

‘New recruits for you, comite,’ said the escort respectfully. ‘The commissaire says that you are to make something useful out of them.’

Gasnier looked at Hector and Dan thoughtfully. Hector had the impression of a solid, sensible man. The comite’s calm gaze took in their manacles. ‘Right then, leave them with me,’ he answered, then turned back to his duties, leaving the two prisoners standing where they were.

It was almost another hour before Gasnier paid them a second glance when, after shouting something to an underling who seemed to be his foreman, he came over to the two prisoners and announced, ‘I don’t want to know what you did to get yourselves here, only what you can do for me in the future. First let me say that if you behave yourselves, I’ll treat you fair. But if you give any trouble, you’ll discover what a hard man I can be. This is the moment for you to tell me what you think you are good at. Speak up!’

Hector stumbled over his words as he answered. ‘I was a clerk on a galley for a few weeks,’ he said. ‘And my friend here was with the musketeers.’

‘A musketeer, eh?’ The comite looked at Dan. ‘He doesn’t speak French, does he?’

‘No, sir.’

‘Well, that’s no harm. He doesn’t need to speak the language if he’s got clever hands. Can he mend guns?’

‘I believe so, sir.’

‘What about you? A clerk, you say.’

‘Yes sir. I was responsible for keeping track of stores.’

‘Any good at it?’

‘My master seemed satisfied.’

‘Well if you’re going to be a storekeeper here, you need to keep an extra sharp lookout. All sorts of things go missing. See that galley down there?’ the comite nodded towards the dry dock where the men were keeping up an incessant thumping and banging with their mallets. ‘Notice anything unusual?’

Hector stared down at the workers. The men were busily breaking down the galley, carrying away the timbers and setting them on one side in neat piles. Most of the workers were wearing what seemed to be a prison uniform of a parti-coloured jacket of dark red and brown worn over heavy canvas trousers. The legs of the trousers were also in different colours, one brown and one buff. All of the men wore bonnet-like caps, but some were dark blue and others were scarlet. He guessed that these marked a different status between the prisoners, and was about to comment when he noticed something else. The planks, frames and beams that were being stacked up were freshly cut. The workers were taking to bits a galley that had never been put to sea. He said as much to the comite.

‘That’s right,’ confirmed Gasnier. ‘That’s what they’re doing,’ but he did not explain further. He only beckoned to an assistant and instructed him to take Dan to the armoury and leave him there in charge of the chief armourer for assessment as a gunsmith. Then, addressing Hector again, he said, ‘You report to the head storekeeper. He’ll tell you what to do. You’ll find him in the main depot over by the sail loft.’

THAT EVENING Hector and Dan met when work at the Arsenal finished for the day and they were shown to their dormitory.

‘I never imagined there were so many muskets in all the world,’ Dan told his friend. ‘There are ten thousand of them stored in the Arsenal – four galleries lined with rack after rack of guns, and they all have to be checked and cleaned and repaired as necessary. I’m to be one of forty gunsmiths employed in that task.’

‘Will you be able to manage?’ Hector asked.

The Miskito nodded confidently. ‘I passed my test. The head armourer handed me a musket and used sign language to ask me what was wrong with it. I pointed to a dangerous crack in the barrel which would burst one day, and I mimed the sort of injury the explosion would do to the man who fired it. He would lose an eye or be scarred for life.’

Dan stretched luxuriously, extending his arms above his head.

‘As soon as I passed my test, an armourer removed my wrist and ankle chains and only left the ankle ring in place. He told me that I will be handling gunpowder from time to time, and the less metal I have about me, the less chance there is of a spark setting off an explosion.’

‘Wish the head storekeeper would do the same for me,’ commented Hector. ‘Wrist fetters are a real handicap when it comes to handling a pen.’

He was about to continue when a voice behind him said, ‘I told you that the commissaire would snap up the least crumb.’ Hector turned to see Jacques Bourdon standing in the doorway, a smug look on his branded face. ‘It only goes to prove the old saying that appetite comes with eating,’ the pickpocket added as he sauntered into the room.

‘You mean you managed to bribe the commissaire?’

‘It didn’t take much, just two small silver coins.’

‘And where did you get the money?’

‘And wouldn’t I have been stupid not to make a few advance arrangements when I heard I was to be taken south from Paris with the chain? I sent my lass on ahead to Marseilles with the cash from my last robbery. I couldn’t hide it on me because I knew those swine of argousins would strip and rob us on the way down here. So she was waiting at the Arsenal gate for one last embrace and it was the sweetest kiss she ever gave me. A mouthful of silver.’

The pickpocket sat down on a bench. ‘It seems I’ve also managed to get myself assigned to that missing galley of yours. What’s her name? St Gerassimus , though who was Gerassimus, or what he did to deserve his sainthood, I’ve no idea. But the rumour is that the galley’s to receive the pick of the new Turkish slaves in from Livorno, and that’s good news. Turks make the best oarsmen, as anyone in the Galley Corps will tell you, and if your fate is to be a galley oarsman there’s no better place on the bench than alongside a great big strapping Turk. Which reminds me,’ the pickpocket nodded towards Dan, ‘you said your friend here isn’t a Turk, then why’s he wearing that ring, and no chains?’

‘He’s working in the armoury,’ Hector explained. ‘It’s to avoid accidents.’

Bourdon appeared unconvinced. ‘Tell him not to get any fancy ideas about running away, now that his legs are free. He looks enough of a foreigner, with that long ugly face and brown skin, to be mistaken for a Turk.

Thinking back, Hector recalled that few of the men he had seen dismantling the galley had been wearing chains.

‘That’s how you’ll recognise the Turks among the other galley men,’ Bourdon continued, ‘Turks don’t wear leg chains or even wrist fetters when on shore.’ He leaned back against the wall, clearly pleased to be showing off his superior knowledge. ‘They only wear an ankle ring. The authorities know that the Turks will very seldom try to escape, because where would they go? They would find it very hard to get aboard any ship to take them home, and here in France who would take them in? So there’s no point in keeping them chained up, except on a galley at sea for fear they mutiny and take over the vessel. And even a mutiny is unlikely. The funny thing about the Turks is that they’ll settle down to whatever job is given them. They’ll work as hard on a Christian galley as on one of their own religion, and often you’ll get better treatment from the Turk on the galley bench beside you than from your Christian neighbour at your other elbow.’

‘Surely a Turk will try to escape if an easy opportunity presents itself,’ said Hector doubtfully.

‘If that happens, the good people of Marseilles enjoy a spot of fun,’ answered Bourdon. ‘There’s a fat reward to anyone who brings him in to the authorities, so the local folk organise search groups and pass the word to be on the lookout for a foreign-looking cove. When they locate their quarry, they chase him, just like running down a hare or stag.’