6

FRENCH HENRY,
WHO ISN’T FRENCH

I was standing over the body of a rich boy. A rich boy I’d killed.

His face was pale as a seagull’s chest. His hair was fanned out like a mermaid’s curls.

I didn’t know what to do.

Then the body started to shake. The eyes crinkled at their edges. The shoulders started to jump up and down and then a massive snort, like to that of a pig, burst out of his nose.

His eyes opened. Very blue. He sat up and started picking grass out of his hair.

‘Fooled you! Ah! Revenge! So sweet!’

Did I tell you that I do not like to be made fun of? Well, I do not. Not at all. I was minded to hit him again. Really hard this time. He saw the fury on my face and smiled, holding out his white hand.

‘Henry De la Beche, at your service, ma’am. Go on! Shake!’

‘I’ll never shake a Frenchie’s hand,’ said I, and no more I would. Everyone had heard the tales from the war with old Boney Bonaparte who called himself Emperor and was about three feet high and we were all reminded nearly every day to keep a lookout for spies who sneaked onto our shores in the dead of night, pretending to be fisherfolk or our own sailors.

He got up and dusted himself down. ‘I’m as English as you are. My family goes back generations in England.’

‘Sounds French to me! And you sneak! You sneak around and hide yourself. You hide yourself and then you run away. You are a spy! A coward and a spy!’

‘Neither, I assure you.’

‘Then why are you always following me? Sneaking and peeking and running away? Watching what I’m doing? Sounds just like spying to me!’

He shrugged his shoulders. ‘I’m sorry. I’m a bit shy. And you are always so busy... digging or dealing.’

‘So you admit that you were watching me sell my ram’s horn to that lady! No doubt you thought to steal my findings or my money!’

‘No! No. I am just very interested in what you are doing. Fascinated, really, and . . .’

‘And what?’ I tried to sound as fierce as I could.

He pushed his hair out of his eyes and looked straight at me. ‘I hoped you might let me help you. Come with you. Obviously, I’d have a lot to learn from you. You are so clearly an expert in this field. I am just an ignorant boy.’

‘Well, you’ve got that bit right. You are certainly ignorant,’ I said stoutly; but I had to admit that it was quite pleasing to be asked for help by one so much older and grander. ‘I learned all I know from my father. Why can’t your father teach you?’

A strange look passed over his face. He seemed like to cry. Still a cowardly baby, then!

‘My father is dead.’

‘How?’

He looked at me sharply, almost angrily. ‘You should not ask such things.’

‘But why? I want to know, and only you can tell me.’

He sighed and sat down on the edge of a grave and then leaped off it as it if had burned his backside. I really thought he would cry then.

‘We don’t speak of it. My mother and I. We never speak of it.’ He was crying, his face becoming red and blotchy.

Again, I found myself not knowing what to do. A boy should not be crying. Joseph would never cry.

He wiped his face with a large handkerchief. I was still waiting for his explanation and maybe he could see that I was getting a little impatient for he muttered, between sniffs, ‘You aren’t a very agreeable person, are you? For a girl, especially.’

‘And you aren’t a very brave person, are you? For a boy, especially,’ I retorted, quick as you like. ‘Besides, who says girls have to be agreeable?’

He gave an almighty sniff and rubbed his eyes furiously before saying, ‘And who says boys must always be brave? I hope, for your sake, that you never have to lose your father.’

‘Well, that is quite the silliest thing anyone could say! My father will not live for ever. Nothing does. Crying won’t bring your father back. Mother cries over the dead babies for days but none of them ever come back. Dead is dead. Nothing to be done but get on with living.’

‘You’re a hard creature. Hard as your “treasures”.’

I let this pass. ‘So how did he die?’ I asked.

Father said I was like a dog with a bone sometimes and at that moment I did not feel at all inclined to let this bone drop. Persistent is what I am and always will be.

Henry’s face was reddened with anger now, not tears.

‘If you must know, he died of fever. In Jamaica. Our first visit to our plantation. He fell ill and then he died. He died a horrible death, wracked by pain. He spewed his guts up. He writhed in agony in his bed. He burned up with a fever. And then he died! Happy now? Oh, and it might also entertain you to know that my mother and I were shipwrecked and nearly drowned on our voyage back to England. There! Is that enough tragedy for you?’

I was impressed. His father’s death sounded very normal to me, but to be in a shipwreck and live to tell the tale was a very interesting thing indeed! I had to know more! Henry, it seemed, could read minds, because he started to speak again.

‘I see that has got your attention, you fiend. Maybe you would also care to imagine how it feels to be robbed of your father, to see your mother spend her days crying, not eating, growing thinner and paler and then to have to leave your father behind in his grave and set sail and then—’ He stopped to blow his nose again. ‘Then to be caught in the most terrifying of storms, tossed about on waves as high as a cliff and then dashed on a coral reef with five other ships. The sea was full of bodies, bodies cut to ribbons by the coral, and we and the other poor souls who survived left clinging to the rocks, watching as sharks feasted on the dead and dying.’

This was quite the most exciting story I had heard since Noah’s Flood and that was not so very interesting as there were no accounts of sharks eating the wicked who did not have a place on the Ark. Henry could see the gleam of excitement in my eye for he continued, and I fancied he was beginning to forget to be sad for there was a light in his own red-rimmed eyes.

‘Your blood would have frozen in your veins if you had heard the cries of the men as they tried to defend themselves against the mighty sharks with their great teeth and thrashing tails. The sea was red as any sunset. Red with blood. I saw heads and hands and limbs washed up by the tide. I saw great seabirds peck out the eyes and gorge upon the flesh. I saw sailors retch their innards up or soil their nether garments from terror at the sight. I saw—’

‘Enough!’ I had begun to feel ever so slightly sick myself. ‘How came you to be rescued, then? Or is this tale a web of lies?’

He blushed a little. ‘Well, maybe there weren’t so many sharks, but men really were cut to ribbons on the coral; and this I swear is true: the sailors would have eaten me and a little girl also saved, if it wasn’t for the Commodore hearing of our plight and sending a ship to rescue us.’

‘Eat you!’ I exclaimed.

‘Yes! Eat us! They were like ravenous wolves. They eyed us up like pies on a shelf. One of them pinched my arm to see how much meat was on it. My mother flew at him and he backed away but we were this far’ – he held up his finger and thumb just a hair’s breadth apart – ‘from having our throats slit and our bodies roasted over hot stones!’

‘Ugh! Disgusting!’

‘Ha! Not so brave now, are you?’ he crowed triumphantly.

‘Oh, I am not scared by your tale. I just think you would have tasted disgusting.’

In truth, I was rather horrified. I could imagine hunger well enough. I had felt it often. But a hunger that would drive you to eat another person? I shuddered to think of it.

Henry De la Beche was watching me closely, as if waiting for me to say more.

‘Well, that’s a fine story and perhaps we have something in common, for I am myself the survivor of a storm,’ I said, ‘and it does explain why you cannot learn from your father, him being dead.’ I saw him wince a bit at these words but the truth is the truth. ‘But how am I to profit from teaching you is what I should like to know?’

He reached into his pocket and brought out a small notebook. ‘Here.’ He offered it to me and I undid the ribbon that was keeping its pages tight closed.

It was full of drawings. Drawings of plants, of birds, of dogs and cats and, of more interest to me, stones. They were good. Faithful reproductions of the subjects. They looked alive or real. He had a skill I did not possess, that was clear.

I could feel him watching me, waiting for a reaction. I handed him back his book and hid my delight behind a stern countenance, not unlike my mother’s when she feigns displeasure but she is secretly pleased with me.

‘Very well. You could be useful, but all the drawings you make for me shall have their own book, is that understood? I won’t have the treasures muddled up with cats and flowers.’

He grinned at me and raised his hand to his head in salute. ‘Understood. At your command, Captain... Captain?’

‘Miss Anning will suffice. Good day to you, Frenchie. We will commence work tomorrow.’

And with that, I left him where he stood, smiling fit to burst.