HABS, SAM AND eighteen other Block Four inmates from the work party had been put in the rapidly cleared cockloft. Joe had to be admitted, too. There hadn’t been any discussion about it, just an acknowledgement of the obvious: you couldn’t quarantine the whole of Seven’s cockloft just for one man. Joe sat cross-legged against the stage, his hands on his knees, palms up.
‘Suddenly, we’re equal,’ said Habs, slumping against the stage. ‘Sick white men allowed. Healthy white men: keep out.’
They were just twenty-one sailors, after all, terrified of dying. Four oil lamps on the stage drew each man in turn to examine their hands, each blister-free verdict greeted with a grim nod or relieved sigh. Food, grog, tobacco and pipes were left at the doors; the yarning took a predictable turn.
‘We was docked in Madrid few years back,’ said one, clouds billowing from his freshly lit pipe. ‘On the Matchmaker outta Boston. Soon as we got ashore, we all smelled somethin’ like rotten flesh, and this crazy woman come runnin’ at us, half naked, covered in red spots and the like. She was screamin’ somethin’ we didn’t recognize, but we turned right round and ran back to the ship. Whatever it was killed thousands, and we shouldn’ta even been in the harbour. We unloaded and got the hell outta there. We got lucky.’
A few of the men whistled their agreement.
‘Damn right!’ called a man shrouded in a tarp. ‘I survived the influenza two winters ago, off Nova Scotia. It took some o’ the younger boys, mind, worst fevers I ever saw.’
There was some silence then, followed by a hawking cough and an extravagant spit.
‘I got syphilis in Lisbon back in ’10,’ said the coughing man.
‘Uh-huh. Me, too,’ said another voice. ‘Mine was in San Domingo. We all got the pox in San Domingo.’
‘That pox don’t count,’ said Habs. ‘You have to go lookin’ for that one. This pox finds you where you are. And maybe it’ll find us here still.’
In between the yarning, they heard the suffering. Magrath had ordered all the illegal stoves in all the blocks to be extinguished and the windows unblocked, decreeing that the uncirculated air was in large part to blame for the spread of the disease. As a result, the hundred yards between Block One and Block Four melted away and the agonies of their neighbours cut through the thoughts of the men in Four and animated their fear.
‘Ev’ry time I hear that sound,’ said Sam, pointing through the window towards One, ‘that caterwaulin’, I look around here. I look at all o’ you. And none o’ you is sick. Not like that sailor – may God have mercy on his soul – is sick. So maybe we’ll survive, after all.’
‘Sometimes,’ said a white-haired sailor, shivering in the new draughts that had been encouraged into all the buildings, ‘sometimes, it sounds like the whole o’ One is dyin’. If I end up at the gates o’ Hell, it ain’t gonna sound no worse than that.’
Another inmate stepped up to a window and leaned out. ‘We hear you!’ he shouted. ‘God bless you all!’
Within seconds, others took up the cry and from every prison block came shouts of sympathy and encouragement.
‘Any singers here?’ asked Joe, looking around. ‘Anyone in your choir?’ The man who’d told the influenza story, a round-faced man with a thin covering of grey hair, raised his hand.
‘Me,’ he said. ‘Just me. Joshua.’
‘Do you know any songs for the sick, Joshua?’
‘Sure I do. We all do. They might not be in the choir, but they all know the songs.’
‘Of course,’ said Joe. ‘Pardon my ignorance. Can you sing loud?’
Joshua laughed. ‘You kiddin’ me?’
Joe nodded. ‘Loud enough to reach One?’
Joshua slowly got to his feet. ‘Well, now,’ he said, ‘seein’ as we ain’t too sick ourselves, let’s see if we can administer to the needy and sufferin’.’ He stood by the first window. ‘Wind’s a nor’easter. Blow the song straight to ’em.’
Joshua started a marching beat, both feet stomping the floor in turn. All the men scrambled for the windows, clapping and stomping as they went. Joshua, leaning through the window, turned his head to the rooftops.
‘Ain’t gonna let nobody turn me around,’ he sang, his full baritone loud enough to fill the cockloft and bounce off the roof of Block Three.
‘Turn me around,’ sang the men.
‘Ain’t gonna let nobody,’ led Joshua.
‘Turn me around, turn me around,’ repeated the men. Habs nodded at Joe, who was learning fast. He’d never heard the song before, but he understood a work song when he heard it.
Joshua was finding his range now. Still stomping, he coughed and cleared his throat. From somewhere, he found more volume.
‘I say I’m gonna hold out,’ he sang.
‘Hold out, hold out,’ repeated his chorus.
‘I say I’m gonna hold out.’
Then they sang together: ‘Until my change comes.’
They carried on stamping their feet, but before the third verse the crunching sound of boots on timber grew. Puzzlement was replaced by wonder. The extra feet were from downstairs. Suddenly, there were hundreds of boots hitting the floor – the noise was astonishing.
Habs and Joe leaned out of a window, only to see faces staring right back up at them.
‘Joshua! They’re waiting for you. You lead!’ shouted Joe, still clapping.
Joshua nodded and leaned out further.
‘I promise the Lord that I would …’
And what sounded like the whole of Four sang. A broadside of benediction.
Later that night, with most of the cockloft asleep, Habs and Joe lay on a mattress, listening again to the sounds of men in torment.
‘D’you think they heard the singin’?’ whispered Habs.
‘Must have,’ said Joe. ‘Couldn’t have missed it. And the clapping after. Went on and on.’
‘Reckon the whole damn place was joinin’ in,’ said Habs.
They lay silent again.
‘But they’re still dying,’ said Joe.
‘Sure sounds like it. You feel all right?’
Joe propped himself up with an elbow. ‘I ask myself that every second,’ he said. ‘I inspect my hands every second. We look at each other’s faces every second. All the time. I know every inch of your forehead – everyone’s forehead – mapped every spot that we don’t need to be scared about. Worst thing about the night is that we can’t see what’s happening.’
‘Or not happenin’.’
‘Agreed.’
‘You inspectin’ me now, Mr Hill?’
In the near-darkness, Joe studied his friend. Rough blankets pulled high, only his head exposed to the frosty night air, Habs’s eyes were closed and deep lines were etched into his forehead. Maybe he was frowning, maybe he had just aged. Joe couldn’t tell. He counted the days since they had met. It was just twelve. Not even two weeks had passed since he’d marched under that hideous arch and announced the end of the war. What cheer remained in him came, still, from that proclamation and, he realized, the man lying next to him.
‘I said, you inspectin’ me?’
Joe leaned closer.
‘Not officially,’ he said.
‘Do I pass?’
Joe lay back down alongside his friend, their wrapped bodies close enough to feel each other’s warmth.
‘You’ll probably do,’ he said.