In The Belly Of The Bloodhound (44 page)

“Nothin’,” he says, coming back out from under the Stage.

Sin-Kay crouches down and steps under for a look. He comes back out and as he does, a hanging petticoat brushes by his face. He looks startled. He takes the garment and holds it to his nose.

Uh-oh…

“Soap. This rag has been washed with soap,” he says, glaring down at me. “Who gave you the soap? You know that was forbidden.”

I think fast. There must be an answer other than that we’ve been getting it from the storeroom on our own. There is…

“Nettles got it for us,” I say. “He said if I showed myself to him in the altogether, he’d get us some soap. I did it, and he got it for us.”

“That’s a lie!” shouts Nettles. “That’s what she’s been doin’ to get—”

But the back of the Captain’s hand catches Nettles across the mouth and he don’t say nothin’ after that, he just falls back and whimpers, his hands over his sore and now quite bloody mouth.

“Go back to my cabin, Sammy,” says the Captain. “I don’t want you messin’ around down here anymore. Sin-Kay, I don’t want him down here again. These vile vessels are a corrupting influence on the boy. Get along with just the Dummy. If need be, I’ll assign another sailor to the duty. Now I’m going up to talk to the crew. About them seein’ things and such.” He heaves a heavy sigh, and I know he wishes this voyage were over. “Everyone’s accounted for. There ain’t no ghost. Let’s all get back to sleep. That’s what I’ll say. Let’s all get back to sleep.”

With that, he turns and leaves, with Chubbuck and Sin-Kay following him.

There is still light from their lamp as they go out, and I see many curious faces hanging down over the edges of the Stage and Balcony, looking at Clarissa and me lying there still, one on top of the other.

“You can get up now,” I say, and then add huskily, “if you want to.” At that, Clarissa leaps to her feet and makes a big show of spitting and retching and wiping off her mouth for the benefit of our audience. Then she stalks off and the total darkness falls upon us once again.

But I do not act as she does. I slowly put my shirt back on and I lie back in sweet relief at how things turned out for the best this night, and I say to myself,[_ Hey, I’ve been kissed by worse._]

“We could be gone tomorrow, if the weather holds,”

I say, in conference with Clarissa and Dolley.

“Good,” says Clarissa. “The sooner the better. The summer social season is about to begin and I do not want to miss it.”

“I’m sure they will cancel the entire season if Miss Clarissa Worthington Howe is not able to grace the proceedings with her divine presence,” I say.

That gets me a glare and a low growl from Miss Howe, who is still smarting over the teasing she’s been getting concerning our little embrace of the other night. In fact, Rebecca had to be saved from physical harm when Clarissa went after her this morning because of that whole thing. Rebecca was performing that bit of pantomime everybody knows: She turned away from the audience and wrapped her arms about herself and ran her hands slowly up and down her back so it looked like someone else’s hands were doing the caressing. Well, Rebecca was very good at it and she did it standing up on the Balcony while all the rest of us were down on the Stage, waiting for breakfast. All eyes were upon her as she did the bit, all the while moaning “Oh,

Jacky…Oh, Clarissa…” Clarissa almost got to her before cooler heads intervened.

“I don’t know, though,” I say thoughtfully, back on the subject of the weather. We’re sitting on the Balcony looking out at the sky. “See that big area of clouds there, the ones with the little bumps on it that look like scales on a fish? They’re called ‘mackerel skies: And see those high, long wispy ones? They’re called ‘mares’ tails:”

“So?” says Dolley.

“So sailors got a saying: ‘Mackerel skies and mares’ tails make tall ships carry low sails: It means we’re in for a blow and it’s almost always right,” I say. “But we’ll see. If the weather holds, I go out tonight and disable the rudder on the other lifeboat and we’ll go with the Plan in the morning. All agreed? Good.”

But the damned weather doesn’t hold. By noon we have whitecaps and by the time the flaps come down, the wind has whipped up into a full gale. We ain’t goin’ nowhere tomorrow. I sigh, resigned to yet another day in the belly of the[_ Bloodhound._] Ah, well, think about the story you will tell tonight, I say to myself. That’ll keep you occupied, and the tale will keep them occupied, as well. They know we are going soon and they are about to jump out of their skins and we can’t have that.

I reached into the trash pile and picked up the baby. I expected him to start screamin’ but he don’t…

He just looks at me and gurgles. Spit runs down his chin and onto the little dress he’s wearin. It’s got a little J on it in blue thread.[_ Must be his initial,
] I’m thinkin’.[
Wonder why Muck let him keep the dress?_] He’s got a nappy on, too, and it ain’t very wet yet, so he must not have been in the rubbish for very long.

I hold him to my chest and put my right forearm under his bum and he nestles his little face into my neck and…

“All right, Clarissa, if it makes you sick, don’t listen then.”
p. And he puts his thumb in his mouth, and I head back to the kip.

Judy and Nancy are in the kip when I get there and they look up in wonder at what I’m carrying.

“Coo,” says Judy. “Look at that. Mary’s got ‘erself[_ a_] baby. Whatcha gonna do with it, Mary?”

“It ain’t an[_ it,
] it’s a[
he.
] His name is Jesse, ‘cause of the[
J there_] on his chest, see?” I say, then sit down on the edge of the stone platform that serves as the gang’s bed at night. “I’m gonna keep him, is what I’m gonna do with him.”

I set him on my knee and bounce him a bit. “Look at what a good baby he is, no crying at all, and him just a simple orphan like the rest of us. I can tell you, when I was in his place and first brought into this kip, I was crying like any ten babies.”

“Any twenty,” says Judy, who was there at the time.

“Well, he’ll be cryin’ soon enough, when he gets hungry,” says Nancy. “I had a little brother…once.” So she knows, and she don’t have to say it.

Sure enough, the little bugger starts rummaging around on my chest. I pull down my shift and he fixes his mouth on what there is of me, which is nothin’ and he gets nothin’.

“Here. Let’s try ‘im on Nancy,” I say, and pass him over to her. She’s started to come out a bit on top, you know how we swells up a bit in the beginning.

She pulls down the top of her shift and Jesse clamps on but all we get is an “Ouch!” from poor Nancy, and all he gets is nothin:

Just then Charlie, Hughie, and Polly come back in for the night.

“Good God, what the hell is that?” says Charlie upon seein’ Jesse. “And what are you doin’ with it?”

“Tryin’ to feed ‘im, is what,” I says. “And ‘is name is Jesse and he’s the newest member of our merry band.”

“Were dumber twits than you two ever born?” says Charlie, all incredulous at seein’ what we been up to. “You’ve got to[_ have_] a baby before them milk things start up, don’cha know that? Don’cha know anything?”

“I have a baby. He’s right here.” I pull Jesse off of Nancy and hold him up to prove my point.

“No, no, you stupid twit. The baby’s got to grow in your own belly and come out of that same belly for that to happen,” says Charlie, steamed. “And I’ll tell you another thing—I says who’s gonna be a new member of the gang, and not you.”

“Oh,” I reply. I wasn’t too clear on how all that stuff happened then, so I let the feeding bit go, but…

“Rebecca, please, if you want to find out all about that stuff I’ll tell you tomorrow, not now. All right? Good. Now, hush.”

But I don’t let it go completely. “He could be a help to us, Charlie, like in the beggin’—a big-eyed, beautiful boy like him next to our Polly? Who could resist?”

Hughie kneels down by him and lets Jesse grab his big fingers in his tiny hands. “I like ‘im,” says Hughie, grinning hugely. Everything Hughie did was huge.

“Christ, Mary, what next?” says Charlie. “Last year it was them three kittens…”

“Right, and I raised them up proper, with no cost to the gang, and now all three are off leading good cat lives. And they gave us all a bit o’ joy when they was here. I remember you playing with ‘em, too, Rooster Charlie, and don’t say you didn’t.”

“But you don’t know nothin’ ‘bout raisin’ babies, Mary, you don’t. You think you know everything, and don’t deny that, but you don’t know how to raise babies,” says Charlie, his mouth a grim line of certitude.

But I am stubborn. “What should I do? Put ‘im back to die so’s Muck can cart ‘im off to Dr. Graves’s Fine Exhibition of Guts in a Jar? Should I do that, Charlie Brewster? Should I?”

“We could leave ‘im on a doorstep,” says Charlie. “See if someone takes ‘im in.”

“They won’t do that, Charlie,” I says. “They’ll think that he has diseases, since he comes from the likes of us. Nobody’s gonna take ‘im in ‘cept us, and that’s the truth.”

“Damn!” Charlie groans. “We ain’t got trouble enough…”

“But Jesse ain’t got no diseases, do you, baby?” says I, taking him back from Nancy and holding him tight.

“No, you don’t. You’re just the best baby that is, and don’t you pay that Charlie no mind. You’re staying here with me, or”—and here I lean into it—”the two of us will go off alone, together.”

Charlie rounds on me. “A threat, is it, Mary? Well, let me tell you this: You’re a valuable member of this gang, but you ain’t all that rare a thing, and if that brat don’t pull ‘is weight, and if you slack off in any o’ your duties, then you can go, and to hell with both of you!”

“Fine, Charlie,” I say. “Has anybody got any food?”

Charlie grumbles but opens his sack and pulls out two-day-old meat pies, a bit of sausage, and half a loaf of hard, stale bread.[_ Quite a haul,_] I thinks to myself, and it could not come at a better time.

Charlie divides up the stuff in the usual way—carving everything into as equal portions as can be made, then turning around and calling out names as someone else points at one portion or another.

“Polly,” he says, and Polly goes and gets hers. “Mary,” he says, and I lean forward and gather up my share.

While the other names are being called and their portions taken, I take a piece of the meat-pie crust and hold it up to Jesse’s lips. He don’t do nothin’, he just shakes his head and turns away.

“Ain’t been weaned yet,” says Charlie, observing all this. “You’ll see…It ain’t gonna be easy.”

We have a broken bit of a crockery jug that we keep water in, water we get from the horse trough up on Creed Street. I reach for it, lift it, take a sip, hold it, and then take a bite of the meat pie. I chew it up until it’s a pasty glop in my mouth, and then I hold Jesse’s lips up to mine and push the chewed-up mess out with my tongue. His lips worm around mine and he takes the food in. When we’re done with that, I chew up another batch.

As I’m giving it to him, I see that Charlie is watching me doing it. I know as leader of the gang he’s got to be hard sometimes and he knows it, too. But now he heaves a great sigh and his face softens, and as night falls and Jesse is full and burps his contentment and we get ready to go to sleep, Charlie says, “Mary, Mary, quite contrary, what are we gonna do with you? You’re just too softhearted for this life we lead, is what it is.” He says that and he puts his arm around my shoulder. “Here, let’s put him between us as we go to sleep. Then we’ll see what tomorrow brings. No promises, now, but we’ll see.”

As I lie there in the darkness under the bridge with Jesse sleepin’ peacefully by me in the crook of my arm and Charlie near on the other side, and Hughie’s broad back up against me on my right, the rags and straw pulled over all of us, I think about the way of things and the feel of Jesse’s lips as he took the food from my mouth, and I think about how you can get real close to someone when you do that and you…you…you…sleep…

It is morning and Rebecca will not be put off. “I want to know about those things and I want you to tell me,” she announces firmly.

We’re being tossed around ferociously by the storm, but only a few of us are stretched out sick. The girls have been told that they are going soon, and now this storm comes to delay things. Still, it’s better that they lie here listening to my stories than be out there in a small boat. Had we left earlier, we surely would have been lost.

There will be no Dance class this morning, so I might as well grant Rebecca her wish.

“Very well,” I say, “Mother Faber will now conduct a class in The Nature of Things.” I’m seated cross-legged on the edge of the Stage, having just finished my bowl of cold gruel. I pat the deck next to me. “Come, Daughter, and sit.” She plops down next to me and waits, wide-eyed in anticipation. I look at the child and think,[_ Oh, sweet Rebecca, you ain’t gonna like a lot of what you’re about to hear._]

I clear my throat and begin. “In the mature male of our species—”

“Speak up down there,” I hear someone on the Balcony say, and I hear someone else say, “Yeah. We certainly don’t want to miss any of[_ this.”_]

Hmmm…I
realize from the silence in the Hold that all of them are listening, and I bet a good half of them are just as ignorant as Rebecca about how a baby gets made and how it enters this world. All right, then. I raise my voice to be heard over the howl of the wind outside and begin again.

“Very well.[_ Ahem.
] Things Your Own Mother Should Have Told You But Plainly Did Not, part one.[
Ahem._] In the adult male of our species, there is…”

I don’t have a blackboard or a drawing pad, so I make do with my left hand’s thumb and forefinger making a circle and my right hand’s forefinger going in and out of that circle again and again—just like Mrs. Roundtree instructed my younger and very worried self a few years back, when I didn’t know anything about this stuff, either.

I cover the basics first, about how the baby gets in there in the first place and what happens after that, and then I tell about the other games that people play when they’re of a mind to be a bit naughty, and for that I hear[_ “Eeeeeeeuuuwww!”
] and[
“I would never do that!”
] and[
“That’s disgusting!”
] and[
“I think you’re making all this up!”_]