Flint and Silver. John Drake

Bayonets and ball cartridge!”

      Dawson yelled and hollered and a company of marines doubled up and formed on the quarterdeck with steel gleaming at the tips of their musket barrels.

      “Mr Bones!” cried Springer. “Muster all hands!”

      “Aye-aye, sir!” said Mr Bones, and after a deal of cursing, kicks and blows, and a rushing of bare feet, Springer’s eight-score seamen poured up from below, and down from the rigging, to fill the waist. There they stood, squinting up at the quarterdeck in the sun, on the hot deck, in the mottled shade of the towering canvas high above their heads.

      So, with his officers and marines behind him, Captain Springer reminded his crew of their duty under his orders from Commodore Sir John Phillips, which orders were to occupy, fortify and hold the island of São Bartolomeo. He reminded them of the strategic importance attached to the island by Sir John. He further reminded them of the dreadful penalties provided for disobedience under the Articles of War.

      The crew stared sideways at one another, for they knew all this already. They also knew all about Flint’s “secret” plans for privateering. They knew because Lieutenant Flint had made it his business that they should know, and thereby they knew that Springer’s speech was not for themselves but for himself and Lieutenant Flint. Springer no longer trusted either, and was parading the power of the King’s Law to deliver the two of them from temptation. And for a while, the stratagem worked.

      So His Majesty’s ship Elizabeth sailed steadily southward from the Caribbean, heading for a certain latitude and longitude that Commodore Phillips had got from the last survivor of a Portuguese barque wrecked on the coast of Jamaica. Elizabeth was a big ship, of near eight hundred tons, mounting twenty brass guns. She was old fashioned, with a lateen sail on the mizzen, a spritsail under the bow, and steered with a whipstaff. But she was well found and comfortable and, with so few men aboard, and fair weather and no war actively in progress, Elizabeth should have been a happy ship. But she was not.

      As far as the foremast hands were concerned, Elizabeth was becoming a hell-ship. This was thanks to Mr Flint, who, having failed to bend Captain Springer to his will, was taking out his spite on those beneath him. As first officer, he had unbounded opportunity for this, together with a natural aptitude for the work.

      Naturally he flogged the last man down off the yards at sail drill. Naturally he flogged the last man up with his hammock in the morning. Any vicious brute would think of that. But it took Joe Flint to punish a mess by making them serve their grog to another mess and stand by while it was drunk. And it took Flint to set the larboard watch tarring the decks for the starboard watch to clean – and vice versa.

      His repertoire was endless and creative. A man who prized his three-foot pigtail was made to cut an inch off it, for the crime of sulking. Flint contrived to detect a repetition of this crime each day until the pigtail was entirely gone. Likewise, a man caught sleeping on watch was made to throw his savings overboard, and another who doted on a particularly fine parrot was obliged to give it up to Flint, though in this case a quirk of Flint’s character drove him to take the bird – for its own good, he said – in order to save it from the filthy words the lower deck were teaching it.

      This he believed to be a cruelty, which he despised. For, whatever his attitude towards men, Flint could stand no cruelty to animals, and undoubtedly the bird flourished under his care as never before. Soon, he and it were friends, and he went about with it riding on his shoulder, which was a great wonder to the crew.

      But mostly Flint’s tricks were cruel, and a particular favourite of his was to offer escape from flogging to any man who would play “Flint’s game” instead.

      “Mr Merry!” said Flint, the first time this offer was made. “I see you’ve been spitting tobacco juice upon my clean decks. There’s two dozen awaiting you for that. Is not that so, Mr Bones?”

      “Aye-aye, Mr Flint!” said Billy Bones, who followed Flint like a shadow. “Shall I order the gratings rigged, sir?”

      George Merry stood trembling in fear of the cat, while his mates bent to their work and looked down, for it was unwise to catch Mr Flint’s eye when he was in a flogging mood.

      “No,” said Flint. “Here’s Mr Merry that would escape a striped back, if he could, and I’m resolved to give him that chance.”

      Billy Bones stared in amazement, and George Merry’s face lit up with hope.

      “Will you play ‘Flint’s game’ instead, Mr Merry?” said Flint, tickling the green feathers of his parrot.

      “Aye-aye, sir!” grinned Merry.

      “Good,” said Flint. “Fetch a small cask and a belaying pin, Mr Bones, and put it down here.”

      Flint had George Merry sit to one side of the cask, cross-legged, while he sat on the other, and the heavy oak pin was placed on the cask between them.

      “Gather round, you good fellows,” cried Flint at the furtive men watching from afar, and soon a crowd surrounded the cask. “Now then, Merry,” said Flint, smiling, “here’s the game: I shall put my hands in my pockets, while you shall put your hands on the rim of the cask.”

      Merry did as he was told and an expectant silence fell.

      “Now,” said Flint, “choose your moment, Merry, and pick up the pin. If you pick it up, you go free.” Merry leered confidently at his messmates. “But,” said Flint, “if you fail, the game continues until you choose to take two dozen as originally promised.”

      Merry considered this. He looked at Flint. He looked at the belaying pin, only inches from his fingers. He stuck his tongue out of the side of his mouth to help himself think … and reached for the pin.

      Crunch! The pin beat down on Merry’s fingertips, drawing blood from a broken fingernail. Flint had moved faster than thought. A roar of laughter came from the onlookers, Merry howled in pain, and the parrot on Flint’s shoulder screeched and struggled and flapped its wings in disapproval of the proceedings. It stamped and cursed and nipped Flint’s ear.

      “Ouch!” said Flint. “What’s the matter with you?” And he shook the bird off to fly free and nestle in the maintop, chattering and muttering to itself. Meanwhile Flint smiled and replaced the pin and stuck his hands in his pockets.

      “Play on, George Merry,” he said, “or take the alternative.”

      Merry instantly snatched at the pin … and thud! It smashed blood out of his thumb, to more laughter from all sides. And so it went on, until Merry could stand it no more and begged for a flogging, which Flint graciously allowed.

      As for the parrot, in time it came back to Flint, since no man beneath him dared feed it, and Captain Springer – drunk or sober – did not care to. It even seemed to be begging his forgiveness, for it began preening him, taking a lock of Flint’s long, black hair and gently pulling its formidable hooked bill down the length of the strand.

      Ever afterwards it took flight whenever men were flogged or abused. Eventually it developed a frightening prescience of Flint’s moods, for it had grown to know him very well, such that even before Flint grinned and gave the word, it flew off because it could not abide the cruelty. The bird was innocent, but the foremast hands saw things differently. They hated the parrot. They called it Cap’n Flint, and on those fell occasions when it flew from its master’s shoulder, and no man knew what might follow, they groaned and whispered:

      “Watch out, mates … the bird’s in the maintop!”

      And yet there was still worse to come from Flint and all hands soon had warning of it.

      The formalities of the service had to be observed before George Merry could be flogged, since only the captain could order it, and Merry was clapped in irons awaiting his captain’s judgement – which was indeed a formality but took time.

      Thus Merry had to wait for his punishment, which took place during the forenoon watch of the day after he’d played Flint’s game, when