Nobody's Slave (9 page)

John Hawkins was on deck now, with a fine orange and black doublet thrown on, unbuttoned, over his light silk shirt and grey trunk hose and stockings. He stood by the rail, watching the approach of the canoe fleet calmly, a quizzical smile on his face.

The canoes seemed to have no notion of the power of the ships they were approaching. At first they headed for the
Minion
, which was the nearest ship inshore; but then, like a cloud of midges on the evening breeze, they hesitated, circling their centre for a second, then headed towards the
Jesus
, the largest vessel of the fleet. They came closer, bobbing gently in the long, lazy swells, while the sailors stared over the
Jesus'
bulwarks to watch them come.

Each of the men in the smaller canoes had his bow slung over his shoulder, and as they came within range those in the bows unslung them and fitted an arrow, watching the Europeans warily. But they did not fire; and as the King's canoe approached he snapped out an order, and the others took up a position just within bow-shot, circling the ship, waiting. There was another order, and the steady tap of the little skin drum on the King's canoe, beating out the time to the paddlers, ceased. They could see the King on his raised, leopardskin seat, shading his eyes against the afternoon sun as he stared up at the high fore- and stern-castles of the Queen's flagship.

‘’Tidn't no sort of attack, this,’ muttered Andrew Baines, still keeping his swivel-gun trained on the largest canoe. ‘Perhaps they've come to trade - buy a ship for elephants’ teeth, maybe, or sell us their rowers.’

A smaller canoe darted away from the King's side, heading straight for the Jesus. As it came closer, the man in the bows yelled at them, holding his empty hands palm up in a gesture of peace, and then up and down, in the motion of climbing.

‘They want to come aboard. Let down some handropes from the maindeck, bosun, and bring them aft. No harm to them, now.’ The Admiral drew back from the rail to receive his guests, and to his surprise, Tom saw he was fastening the points of his doublet. Surely he was not going to talk to these men, try to impress them?

‘Train the swivel round here, Andrew,’ Tom hissed. ‘Come on - they might attack the Admiral!’

But Hawkins heard him, and waved the gun away, frowning. ‘Keep that gun pointing outboard, there! I don't want to be blasted to bits by your nerves.’ He turned to receive the two tall Africans. They climbed the ladder to the quarter-deck with a strange, hesitant dignity, controlling their curiosity, but not certain which way to look. One almost bowed to Robert Barrett, but then Hawkins stepped forward in his bright, embroidered doublet. The two Africans fell to their knees before him, knocking their foreheads against the deck.

John Hawkins signed to them to stand up, scowling round angrily to check the laughter that had broken out. Then he gave a slight, courteous bow in his turn, which appeared to astound the Africans. There was an awkward pause.

‘How's he going to talk to them?’ whispered Tom. ‘’Tis sure he don’t know their speech.’

‘Blest if I know,’ muttered the gunner. ‘Don’t need no words to grab ’em and chain ’em in the hold, do ’ee?’

One of the Africans began to speak, hesitantly, in a heavy, moaning accent like a chant. He pointed to himself, then Hawkins and the African king in the canoe alongside. Hawkins shook his head, and looked at Master Barrett enquiringly.

‘’Tis Portuguese, sir, - though strangely jumbled with some inventions of his own. It seems that his master, the King - the fellow in that boat there - is lord of …’ Barrett broke off, to ask the African another question, which was answered at extraordinary length. ‘…of a great many parts hereabout, sir, of the Sumba tribe, and having seen your vessels arrive in his harbour, he, er…’

Barrett choked a little over the next part, mumbling into his beard in an attempt to maintain his gravity.

‘... he orders you to bring your men to his aid against his enemy, in a town called Conga, which is basely resisting his authority.’

Hawkins smiled, but it was the ironical smile of the diplomat, not the derisive guffaw that Tom was trying to hold down.

‘I see. Perhaps you would inform him that we are here to trade, not to fight, and that these ships are not his to command, but sail under the flag of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth of England, a monarch whose power and dignity is ... in every respect at least equal to his own.’ Barrett translated, pointing to the flag of golden lilies and leopards flying from the masthead, while Tom and the other sailors looked on, their faces wooden with self-control.

The two Africans conferred, and then the first one spoke again, his strange drone going on and on as he struggled with the foreign words.

‘He says he has not heard of Queen Elizabeth, but that he has traded with merchants from King Alonso of Portugal. They helped him against his enemies and found themselves richly rewarded for it. He says that if you will come on shore to meet his master, he will be able to explain the matter more clearly to you.’

‘Ask what kind of reward he is offering.’

Again the drone, the misunderstandings. At last: ‘He is not offering any kind of reward, sir, that is for his king to do, not him. But he knows what kind of trade we are involved in, and he thinks his master will be able to satisfy us, if we help him defeat his enemies. If we capture this town all his enemies will become slaves. He ...’

At this point there was a shout from the royal canoe, answered from the one moored by the
Jesus
, and the two Africans glanced overboard nervously. ‘He stresses that his master is a generous man, but very impatient, and asks me to advise you to go ashore with him as soon as possible.’

‘Indeed?’ Hawkins raised his eyebrows. ‘If their master is in such a hurry, he would be welcome aboard this ship.’

This suggestion, however, met with no enthusiasm from the envoys, who appeared concerned that the Admiral was not agreeing to their proposals as quickly as they would have liked. They looked even more concerned at the quiet laughter that greeted a suggestion from one of the other gentlemen, the languid George Fitzwilliam, that a cannonball through the bottom of his canoe would bring him aboard soon enough, and well-washed into the bargain. Tom thought he saw the Admiral smile too, but then still the laughter with a frown. He looked straight at the two Africans to deliver his message, in that decisive, unruffled way he had which put the matter beyond further question.

‘It is now already well into the afternoon, and I too have many matters to attend to. You may tell your master that I will be pleased to visit him tomorrow morning early, if he will send a canoe at first light to escort me to him.’

While the message was translated Hawkins turned casually away, strolling to the great cabin. The Africans left, and Tom watched as the little canoe sped its way over the waves to the royal barge. There was a short, animated conference before, at a word from their leader, the whole flotilla turned and paddled its way back, past the
Minion
, towards the estuary, shrinking in size as it went until it appeared like nothing so much as a swarm of water-beetles busily scurrying home.

‘A
RE YOU awake, Maduka?’

For a moment Madu did not answer. For a long time he had been sitting quietly in the dark outside the hut, resting his back against the doorpost and watching the heads of the guards at the top of the wall, their black silhouettes indistinguishable from the deep grey of the night sky beyond. The guards made hardly any sound, and Madu made none; it would have been easy to pretend to Ezinma that he had fallen asleep.

‘Yes, mother, I am awake.’

She crept quietly outside to join him. Her hands found his shoulder and knee in the darkness as she crawled past him to sit with her back against the wall of the hut a little further from the door. She sighed and wrapped her blanket loosely around her.

‘What are you thinking?’

It was the one question he knew she would ask, and which he least wanted to answer. Once - indeed for most of his life - he had been very close to his mother, more so than most boys. He had told her everything that passed through his mind - easily, without thinking - and she had shared most of her thoughts with him. Because Ezinma was a slave-girl, taken from her people by the men who had killed her husband, she often felt lonely and sad. She needed a friend, someone to talk to and love, and Madu fulfilled that need. Yet she had been a good mother, not restrictive or possessive, as she could so easily have been. She loved Madu for himself as well as for what she needed from him.

So now he felt guilty when he avoided her. But he could not help it. He was fourteen - too old to be passing time with his mother; and anyway, she reminded him, every time he saw her, of the reason why she, alone of the women in the tribe, had filed, pointed teeth, and beautiful swirling tattoos on her body. Because she, like he, was by birth a Sumba, a member of the enemy tribe they were now fighting.

It was of this that Madu had been thinking earlier; but for a long time now his mind had been empty, at peace with the night, so his answer was not entirely a lie.

‘I am thinking of nothing, mother; only watching the guards and waiting for dawn.’

For a long time then she said nothing, and he almost forgot she was there. A hyena barked far away in the forest; and the grey of the sky became a shade lighter.

‘They say that the Sumba attack before dawn; but when the Mani came to my village, they came in the middle of the day, so that you could not see the flames that burnt the huts.’

Madu bit his lip and said nothing. He had heard this story many times before, and he did not want to talk of it now. He heard his mother catch her breath, and reach out her hand for his.

‘There! Didn't you hear something?’

But whatever it had been did not come again, and the guards on the wall did not move. Madu thought one of the guards was Ikezue. Ezimna's hand stayed on his.

‘If they come, Maduka, they'll recognise me as one of their own, won't they? But not you - they'll see you as a Mani boy.’

‘I
am
a Mani, mother. Soon I shall be a warrior.’

It was definitely getting lighter now. Somewhere behind them in the town, a baby cried, and Madu could distinguish the silhouette of Ikezue's face quite clearly.

‘Maduka, I'm sorry. You would rather not be my son, wouldn't you? Especially now.’

He glanced sideways to see her face, but could still distinguish nothing against the dark wall of the hut. He could only feel the soft, oppressive warmth of her body near his. Someone turned over in the hut behind them and he wondered if Nwoye's other wives were awake and listening.

‘I would rather be a Mani, mother. I
am
a Mani, or I will be, if ...’

‘If Nwoye accepts you at the Festival. I think he will, Maduka - he is a fair-minded man, you know, and you are doing well at the Boys' House. You have killed your leopard.’

‘If only I had not hurt my foot! Now, when I should fight for the tribe, I am a burden ...’

‘Ssssssssh!’ Ikezue, on the wall, hissed down at them to be quiet, and then immediately broke his own order with a strangled, gurgling yell as he plucked at an arrow in his cheek. The sun was coming up now, suddenly, a ball of fire in the east, and as it did so screams and shouts erupted all along the wall, and a hail of arrows hissed over it. Madu snatched up his bow and quiver from the ground beside him. As he notched an arrow onto the string, the tops of a dozen ladders appeared along the edge of the wall, and a wave of warriors erupted over it, snarling with their filed teeth like ferocious cats. People were running everywhere, shouting; warriors hurrying to their allotted posts, women and children tumbling into the huts, the penned goats bleating wildly. Madu lifted his bow, and fired, again and again, whenever a Sumba warrior stood clear for a moment on the wall.

Most of the fighting was taking place on the wall; the Mani trying to heave the Sumba down from the ladders, the Sumba trying to shield a space at the top of each ladder so that others could climb up. It was into one of these groups that Madu was firing. Most of his shots got caught in the enemy’s shields but one pierced a man's stomach, sending him groaning to his knees.

As he fell, another Sumba warrior looked down, to see where the arrow had come from. The man saw Madu and leapt from the wall, falling on his knees in a cloud of dust. He was up again before Madu could fire, and caught Madu's arrow in the wood of his shield. Then he raised his spear and rushed towards him. Madu fumbled at his quiver but he knew it was no good; he would never be ready in time. Nevertheless he fitted the arrow to the string, looked up, and ... the Sumba warrior crashed on his face before him. The man's mouth opened and shut with horror, as he clutched at the arrow that had pierced him under the armpit when he raised his spear to strike.

And then the attack was over, as quickly as it had begun. The Sumba were leaping down from the walls, fleeing, leaving a few wounded or unlucky prisoners struggling in the arms of those of the Mani who were not, like Nwoye, laughing and firing their short bows again and again over the wall at the retreating enemy, like hunters at a flock of birds.

Madu limped forward to the dead man, dazed. He looked at the short, black-feathered arrow which bore a mark almost, but not quite, the same as his. He felt a familiar hand on his back.

‘You see, you didn't have to tell me that time,’ said Temba, bursting with pride. ‘Not a bad shot really, when you think how fast he was moving.’

‘No.’ Madu felt suddenly weak in the knees, sick, as he had done by the leopard. This was a man at his feet, dead; there were dead and wounded men everywhere. He saw the bleeding Ikezue being treated by Mganza, and put his arm on Temba's shoulder, to thank him and to feel support. ‘Nwoye was right about the spear arm. If you shoot under it when the arm is raised, there is no defence.’

‘He was right about the walls, too.’ Temba laughed as he remembered Nwoye's instructive lecture to all the boys last night, about how they would defeat the Sumba because only they, the Mani, built such strong fortifications. ‘What it is to belong to a superior civilisation!’