The Convict Ship, Volume 3 (of 3)

by William Clark Russell

It so befell, however, that we were not long to wait before this degrading, loathsome and maddening business of Rotch was settled for us, and this without any demand upon our own ingenuity, though the thing worked out to its issue in strict correspondence with the inhuman devil’s nature and with all that is base and wretched in this narrative. Whether the man had been a little mad at the root all through; whether he really feared that Tom would execute his threat and hang him; whether he supposed that, taking it that Tom did not hang him, he would be fearfully punished for the conspiracy and perjury which Nodder had deposed to; or whether his conscience, working like a fiend, grew too strong for him during his long, solitary hours of imprisonment, he, one day, fulfilled the prediction of the mate and went mad.

We were then in the northern verge of the south-east trade-wind, sweeping smoothly toward the Equator. I was asleep in my cabin, and was awakened by a great disturbance and shouts. The hour was some time in the afternoon. By the time I had put on my dress and run out, the cries and sounds of scuffling had ceased; but on stepping a few paces aft, I heard a strange noise of moaning and snapping yells proceeding from Rotch’s cabin. It was such a noise as might be made by a couple of dogs, who, though half dead with worrying each other, still fight on.

I ran to the wheel, where I found Will, who told me that while Bates was in Rotch’s cabin, whither he had carried some drinking water, Rotch, giving a loud shout, whipped a table knife out of his bunk; he lunged at Bates, who very nimbly tripped him up, got the knife out of his hand, and lay wrestling on the deck with Rotch, bawling for help. Tom and Collins rushed to his assistance, and amongst them dragged the villain into his berth again.

Whilst Will was telling me this, Tom and the others came out of Rotch’s cabin. And now I heard that the man had gone mad, and that to prevent him doing himself or us a mischief they had secured his legs and bound his arms to his side.

This was a very great calamity; had he jumped overboard or cut his throat all would have been well, but here now was a madman to watch. Our little ship’s company was miserably few, and the requirements of the brig totally prohibited our telling off any one of us to look after the lunatic fiend. Then again, being mad, his confession (whatever might prove the delirious gabble he chose to regale Mr. Bates with) could be of no use to Tom, who would thus be balked in his iron-hard resolve of carrying him to some part of the seas where he could hang him if he did not confess.

But it was not a thing to be mended by lamentation; whilst madness raged in the unhappy, wicked wretch, he was to be kept bound, and rendered as helpless by cords and lines as Tom in his sanity had been by leg-irons and handcuffs. Mr. Bates from time to time looked in upon him, cut up his meat, fed him, and gave him drink. I never went near the monster’s cabin nor set eyes upon him. If Tom looked in, Rotch spat at him, howled, expressed by contortions and grimaces a hundred hellish passions, and struggled with fury and with the power of a giant to liberate himself that he might get at him. The madman’s cabin-door was in various ways strengthened to provide against all possibility of his breaking out. Otherwise he lay lodged as securely as if his prison had been the sentinelled and barricaded ’tweendecks of the Childe Harold.

This was his condition for about a week, dating from the hour of his going mad; Bates then told us that the fellow was cooling down and exhibiting some return of mind; a small light of intelligence was in his eyes, and the fire of insanity was waning in them. He begged for the freedom of his limbs, and Bates gave him the use of his arms. One morning the mate came out of Rotch’s berth, and said to me, who was sitting at the cabin table:

‘A strange change has come over that miserable creature. He cries like a whipped boy, and his mind seems in a state of panic terror. He lay hold of my hand just now and wriggled as though to fall upon his knees, and implored me not to let Captain Butler come near him. “He’ll hang me,” he whimpered; “that’s what he’s keeping me here for. Why don’t he send me ashore? I’m not fit to die. I’ve got a wife and children dependent upon me.” Then he blazed out: “But he dursn’t hang me. It would be the bloodiest of all murders to swing a poor sick man like me!” And he muttered about having a house of furniture and a little money at home, all of which he’d give me if I’d smuggle a knife into his berth, and then send Captain Butler to him alone on pretence of hearing him confess.’

It was on Friday that Bates told me this. On the following Sunday we sat down to dinner as usual at one o’clock. It was a very quiet day, clear and bright; the brig was flapping leisurely along clothed to her royals before a small air of hot wind blowing almost directly over the stern. Tom put a slice of pork on a plate, and Bates cut it up to carry it with biscuit, a pannikin of rum and water, and other matters to Rotch’s berth. The mate went to the door of Rotch’s cabin, and put the tray down to turn the key and shift one of the uprights which protected the entrance. My eye was upon him; he opened the door, cried out, and sprang back, tossing his arms with a gesture of horror and consternation.

‘What is it?’ called Tom.