Beyond this gunroom sea fog wreathes the hull when James Morrison arrives to read lay scripture. John Millward, Plymouth-born, much lashed, literate, a suffering voyager come to port, softly sings while his mates cling to worn jokes: Three blind mice, see how they run, they all took off for the island life. Morrison, who has faced down his share of troubles, knows this morning his humanity shall be tested.
A predictable end considering soaring wheat prices, increased taxation, and persistent rumors of Parisian grotesquerie, their macabre justice system run riot. Quelle horreure! Indeed. So, give ’em a show, reinforce proof of wave-ruling. Pageantry creates optimism. After that courts martial codswallop the final scene – it should be famous but isn’t – begins at Spithead where this shambles began.
The doomed trio greet Morrison in Tahitian, their long night over too soon. James’ eyes focus in the gloom, his gaze forcing the foul marshal’s sneer to waver, notes Tom Burkitt’s earnest scrimshaw as memento mori. Ogled by ghoulish spectators he smiles at runty Tom Ellison, a boy, but long since a tough little nut, recollection lingering on Ellison’s flawed charm, his perky cheek when stranded on a sand island off New South Wales’ coast.
The chief witness, progenitor of high drama that hovers today, has embarked elsewhere, perhaps seeking hiatus from troublemaking. No lawyer questioned him, but then, he scorned language’s rituals. Portsmouth’s taverns shall fill later, thousands of sightseers on the harbor, the Brunswick girdled by wherries, although disgusted respectable folk vacate town in protest. Fog clearing. An eerie absence of seagulls. Whispered conversations, stifled coughs.
Morrison, who is clever, was pardoned, patiently indulges Ellison’s account of a smart mongrel dog from early boyhood before the four kneel, forming a circle, backs, necks, exposed, hearts beating strongly. Then the three barefoot sailor lads, memories of unspoiled Otaheiti their inheritance, jog to the catheads in sacrificial white, toeing the line, jaunty for scapegoats. They accept their Janus-faced verdicts like ignorant schoolboys blamed for some jape. Toes gripping for balance, Millward delivers a strong speech in defense of their prosecutors, rope caressing his feather tattoo. Do the others think of Bounty now? The great gun fires. See their used bodies twirl. Seagulls resume crying, sounding not righteous, but mournful on the wind that has picked up.
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-- Ian C Smith’s work has been published in Across the Margin, BBC Radio 4 Sounds,The Dalhousie Review, Gargoyle, Griffith Review, Southword, Stand, & The Stony Thursday Book. His seventh book is wonder sadness madness joy, Ginninderra (Port Adelaide). He writes in the Gippsland Lakes area of Victoria, and on Flinders Island.