Читать книгу Men Against the Sea – Book Set. The Greatest Maritime Adventure Novels: The Bounty Trilogy, Lost Island, The Hurricane, Botany Bay, The Far Lands, Tales of the South Seas… онлайн

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He turned to the lieutenant.

“Mr. Parkin, have this man sent below, and see to it that he has no communication with anyone.... Wait a moment. Ask Mr. Hayward to step in.”

My surprise at the mention of Hayward’s name must have been apparent. A moment later the door opened, and Thomas Hayward, my former messmate on the Bounty, appeared. Forgetting my shackles, I stepped forward to greet him, but he gazed at me with a look of contempt, at the same time putting his hands behind his back.

“You know this man, Mr. Hayward?”

“Yes, sir. He is Roger Byam, a former midshipman on the Bounty.”

“That will do,” said Edwards. With another cool glance at me, Hayward went out, and I was taken by the guard to the orlop deck, to a place evidently prepared for prisoners, next to the bread room. It was a foul situation, below the water line, and nauseating with the stench of the bilges. The only means of ventilation was a ladderway some distance forward. Irons were now placed on my legs as well as on my wrists, and here I was left, with two guards outside the door at either end of the compartment. About an hour later, Stewart, Coleman, and Skinner were brought down and ironed in the same manner. No one, save the guard who brought our food, was permitted to enter the place, and we were forbidden to speak to each other. There we lay the whole of that interminable day, as wretched in mind and body as men could well be.