Julian Stockwin - Artemis

Millais stared back at Kydd. 'I - I can't—' he began, swayed, and then, before Kydd's disgusted eyes, vomited helplessly. Sick drunk at this hour? Millais crumpled to his knees and looked up piteously. 'I don' feel s' well, mate,' he croaked. The words were not slurred. Kydd felt a creeping fear and bent to help the man to his feet. Even at that distance he felt a raging heat radiating out from his body.

'Get aloft, you infernal rascals!' came Rowley's irritable bellow from the quarterdeck.

Kydd hurried aft and confronted Rowley. 'Sir, that man's got a fever.' He watched Rowley stiffen. It was the worst possible news. Kydd sensed a scurrying down the main hatch and guessed that the news was being spread even as they spoke.

'Sling his hammock in the gundeck forward and put him in it,' Rowley snapped. It was the only thing possible. Frigates did not have even the rudimentary sick berths of a larger ship. 'And tell the surgeon,' he added.

Kydd touched his hat and rattled down the ladderway. The sooner the surgeon could take strong measures the better for all. The musty gloom was tinged with apprehension: Kydd had never had occasion to visit the surgeon professionally, and like most healthy men, felt uneasy there.

He took off his hat and crossed the wardroom to the louvred door of the surgeon's cabin, knocking firmly. He was about to knock again when the door flew open, nearly hitting him. 'You?' said the surgeon, puzzled. Kydd stepped back in surprise: the surgeon was in his usual rumpled black, but it was stained and there was a rank, unpleasant odour about him.

Kydd collected himself, and reported, 'Sir, respects from Mr Rowley, an' he wishes you t' come - he thinks we have fever aboard.'

The surgeon looked at him and frowned. 'Pray inform milady, Jenkins, that she must persist in the measures or I will not hold myself responsible for the outcome.'

Blinking, Kydd said carefully, 'Sir, my name is not Jenkins. Could y' come now? Mr Rowley is very concerned.'

'No. You will tell Lady Bassett that I have done all I can. All! There is no hope - none. I grieve for you all. Goodnight.' The door slammed. Taken aback, Kydd hesitated.

Across the wardroom Party emerged from his cabin, wiping his face with a towel. 'What is it, Kydd?' he asked.

'Could be fever aboard, sir,' Kydd said respectfully. He felt ill at ease in officers' private territory.

Parry paused. 'You have seen this?'

'Aye, sir.'

Striding past Kydd, Parry hammered at the door. 'Doctor, we have a crisis, sir. Please be so good as to come on deck at once.' There was no reply. 'There is a fever on board, damn your blood!'

The door remained closed, but from within Kydd heard a desolate, 'No hope! None!' and a quiet sobbing.

Parry slapped the towel at his side in frustration. 'We'll get nothing from that useless ninny. I'll be on deck shortly.'

Fever! It was feared more than any number of enemy cannon, and with reason: in a ship there was nowhere to hide, nowhere to escape to; every man aboard must face risking his life in the unknown miasma that brought the fever.

Supper was a silent meal. Kydd slowly spooned his pease pudding. Across the table eyes followed his movements; he glared back. Haynes coughed — every eye swivelled to watch, then dropped at his savage expression. Mul-lion seemed sunk in misery, pushing away his wooden plate.

'A pox on it!' snarled Haynes. A twisted smile acknowledged his unfortunate turn of phrase, but he went on forcefully, 'Don't sound like any ship-fever I know - an' it ain't scurvy. Could be nuthin' a-tall.'

Renzi raised his head. 'Or it could be deadly . . .' The table glowered at him collectively. He lapsed into silence. Kydd watched him narrowly — there was a half-smile that he could only remember seeing before battle.

Haynes tugged at his neckerchief. 'Port Royal, now that's th' place fer a fever. See them soldiers arrive, chirpin' merry an' all in their lobsterback rig. A week later an' they're sweatin' and writhin' with the yeller jack, only a coupla days afore they tops their boom.' He brooded. 'Must be thousan's left their bones there.'

'Must be a spankin'-size graveyard!' said Kydd, hoping to joke away the pall.

It was Stirk who replied. 'No, mate, very small. See, they buries 'em the same day at the Palisades, spit o' sand away from the town. Come night, all these 'ere land crabs pops out 'n' digs 'em up fer a feast. Rousin' good eatin', should you get yerself a dish o' them crabs.'

Kydd interrupted him. 'What's this, cuffin?' He had noticed how Mullion held his head in his hands, obviously in distress.

'Me head, mate, aches somethin' cruel.' Looks were exchanged around the table.

Haynes stood up. 'Gotta get aloft — that scurvy crew in the foretop not done yet, I'll 'ave their liver.' Crow rose, mumbled something, and they both left.

Stirk turned his gaze to Kydd. 'An' you?' he said.

Kydd stared him down, then stood. 'Bear a fist, then, y' hen-hearted lubbers!' Mullion was difficult to handle as he staggered haphazardly. They tumbled him into his hammock forward on the gundeck where he lay, biting off moans. Kydd saw that there were slung numbers of hammocks now, each bearing its burden of suffering.

The warm, pleasant airs on the open deck were a relief, but there was a sense of dread: the ship had turned into a prison that was confining its inmates to permit an unknown death to overwhelm them.

Kydd turned to Renzi. The half-smile was still there. 'What chance . . .'

'My dear fellow, my education does not include physick. I cannot say.'

They glanced aft. With a pugnacious stride and jutting chin, Powlett was now pacing the quarterdeck as if he had never left it. 'I do wish, however, that the surgeon had retained but a modicum of his intellects,' said Renzi, still watching the Captain. 'It was churlish of him to take leave of them at this time.'

The loblolly boy held a bowl of thin gruel over Mullion, trying to spoon it in, but Mullion twisted away his head. 'Fer Chrissakes!' the lad muttered. This was no time for games, there were too many others to attend to.

'Take it, Jeb, y' needs the strength,' Kydd urged.

Mullion focused his dull eyes on him. 'No, mate, give it ter the others,' he whispered. 'This is me punishment, I knows it. 'Cos I didn't hold on ter him — I let 'im go ter his doom. He'd be aboard now an' alongside us if I'd've held on.' He looked away in despair.

Not knowing what to do, Kydd took the gruel from the loblolly, who pulled aside Mullion's shirt. Kydd recoiled: the torso was suffused by a pink rash and it glistened with sweat. 'That's yer sign,' the loblolly said, and took back the gruel to limp over to the next man.

Suddenly gripped by an urgent desire for the open air, Kydd hurried on deck. He saw Haynes by the boat-space: he was motionless, staring out to sea, his grip on a rope bringing white to his knuckles. Kydd sensed the man's fear. 'Comin' for y'r grog?' he said, in as friendly a manner as he could.

Slowly Haynes turned his stare on him. In horrible fascination Kydd saw a betraying pinkness above the line of his open-necked shirt. 'I got it, ain't I?' Haynes mouthed.

There was no point in denying it. 'Y' may have it, but it's a fever only, nobody died.'

'You a sawbones, then?' Haynes came back, but with little spirit. He resumed his stare out to sea.

At barely six bells it was not yet time for Kydd to go on watch at the helm, but he was not ready to go below, and swung forward. Abreast the fore-hatch was an anxious group in troubled conversation; Kydd saw Petit's lined features and nodded to him. Petit came over and touched Kydd's arm. 'I'd be beholden were yer mate Renzi ter help us,' he said in subdued tones.

'Nicholas says as how he's no physician.'

His forehead creased with worry, Petit appealed, 'Yair, but 'e's book-learned, he is, knows a mort more'n he says. Say that it would be kind in 'im jus' ter step down an' clap peepers on Billy Cundall - he's very bad.'