on both men, but gave up. He snorted, halted by a sudden thought. Had he not been an officer and therefore above such punishment, how many lashes would Bligh have chosen for him?
He went slowly along the creaking ship to the quarter-deck, to relieve William Peckover. The gunner didn’t like him, suspected Christian. Once it had worried him.
‘Hot night, Mr Christian,’ greeted Peckover. He was a large, shambling man, always ready at grog time. But a good seaman.
Christian nodded.
‘How’s it below?’
‘Bad,’ said Christian.
‘Then maybe I’ll stay on deck.’
Christian didn’t reply.
Peckover nodded towards the stern.
‘Norman has found a new friend,’ he said, amused.
‘What?’
‘A shark,’ said Peckover. ‘Very big. Norman is talking to it, idiot that he is.’
The gunner moved away, humming softly to himself.
A following shark would be on him the moment he hit the water, Christian knew. No matter how quickly he followed the raft, it would take at least five minutes to swim to it and sprawl aboard. So he’d have no chance. Which meant that the carefully made raft was useless. And that he remained trapped.
Still the professional seaman, Christian looked around for the rest of his watch, then shrugged. John Hallett and Thomas Hayward would both be still asleep, he guessed, careless as always of their duties. He would let them stay. There was little they could do and he liked neither of them. The last thing he wanted was forced conversation with two youngsters whose prattling irritated him. If Bligh discovered he’d done nothing to rouse them, there’d be trouble, Christian knew. It didn’t matter. Very little seemed to matter, any more.
Christian was surprised to see Edward Young coming towards him. Young was his friend, almost as close as Stewart. Too hot to sleep, Christian guessed. It would get worse, after sunrise.
Young was a direct, rough seaman who drank too much. He was quite ugly, thought Christian, his nose broken from some forgotten brawl and nearly all his teeth rotting blackly in his mouth. The Tahitian girls hadn’t liked him, Christian remembered. Before they’d agree to his making love to them, they’d made him eat pineapple and drink coconut milk, to sweeten his breath.
‘What’s it to be then, sir?’ opened Young, with his customary directness.
Christian moved his shoulders, uncertainly. It wasn’t just Bligh any more, he thought, feeling the emotion rise in his throat. Everyone kept on to him, prodding and demanding. He tried to control the irritation. Edward Young was his friend, the man to whom the previous night he’d given some of the belongings he most treasured. The man’s concern was genuine, he knew, not the prying of someone trying to confirm a half-heard rumour.
‘Mr Stewart thinks we should seize you, to prevent your killing yourself. He thinks you’re mad,’ added Young.
‘And what account would you give the captain?’
‘That’s the only thing preventing us.’
‘I’ll get away, somehow,’ said Christian, lamely. The knowledge that there was no escape was settling insidiously in his mind.
‘You’ve got friends aboard,’ said Young.
He was speaking very quietly, Christian realised, his head only inches away. The Tahitian women had been justified: his breath smelt very badly.
‘… friends who would follow any lead you might make …’ added the other midshipman, pointedly.
The same prompting as George Stewart, reflected Christian. Why did they need him to lead?
‘There’ll never be another opportunity like this,’ said Young, urgently. ‘Look at your watch …’
Christian stared around him at the men under his command, then answered his own question. The officers wanted him to lead because they knew he commanded the respect and leadership of the men on the lower deck. He wished Young would stand away a little.
‘What do you mean, Mr Young?’
The midshipman shifted, annoyed at Christian’s refusal to acknowledge the facts.
‘Every man of them with reason to hate Bligh, almost as much as yourself,’ insisted Young, hurriedly. ‘Sound them out … they’ll be behind you, just like we will …’
‘You can be hanged for inciting a mutiny, sir, just the same as mounting one,’ warned Christian.
‘Nothing will go wrong, once it starts,’ argued Young. ‘Every man who might oppose you is below now, asleep.’
Christian shook his head, unwilling to make the commitment.
‘What’s the alternative?’ demanded Young. ‘It’ll take months to get home, months when you’ll be the whipping boy for that madman Bligh. He’ll turn you mad, Mr Christian. Mad, like he is.’
‘He’s already come close to it,’ mused Christian, softly.
‘We could put them in the cutter,’ enlarged Young. ‘And give them provisions. That way they’d get to an island …’