8th June; On-the-Job Training

Terry's eyes went round. "Show's how t'do this here again?" he said, holding up the spun-yarn. "An' what's it called?"

It was no use. He couldn't hold the serious expression for long, especially not at the sight of the quizzical frown on Dyer's face and the unsuccessfully hidden grins from the other sailors.

"Here," said Chase with a smirk of his own. "It's a carrick bend, it is. Bit of a trick to get right, 'cause of there bein' more'n one way to get it wrong. Watchin'?"

He was going through each step of the knot in slow-time so Button could see.

"Uh-huh," Button said, watching intently and trying to memorise each turn as Chase made it. "That's awful complicated, like," he said as the finished knot appeared before his eyes. "I never seed so many turns in a bit o' cordage afore."

"Just wait. There's a few," Chase told him and held the spun-yarn out again. "Have another go."

There were more knots as complicated as this one? Terry was never going to learn all of them in a hundred years, he was sure of that.

"How's this'n?" he said, after a moment. He wasn't sure it looked quite right, but didn't know where he'd gone wrong, if anywhere.

"The lee'ard end goes over the loop then back under itself, 'fore you pull both ends tight," Chase told him. "Other'n that, s'a fine job."

"The lee'ard end goes... where?" Terry said, trying figure it out. "Over the loop then under it?"

Couldn't he stick with the bowline? He knew the bowline, after all.

Dyer beat him to the guiding of Button's fingers through the correction, much to Chase's annoyance. "Like this, green head," the round-faced seaman said cheerfully. "An' there you've got it!"

"Oh." That made a bit more sense, though Terry couldn't see for the life of him where he'd gone wrong. "Looks kinda like a reef knot with a coupla twists in it afore you capsize it an' confused me," he said, looking at it.

"Aye, so mebbe it does," Dyer agreed.

"Whyn't you show him somethin' simpler, then, you're so keen to teach him," said Chase.

Dyer smirked. "Mebbe I will!" He winked at Button and added, "Right. Double o'erhand stopper, mate."

Terry fumbled the carrick bend undone before forming a loop in the yarn and twisting the working end through the loop, once, twice, and then pulled it tight.

"Izzat right?" he said, looking up. There was something going on between the two sailors that he didn't quite understand.

Dyer was all but beaming. "Aye, dead right. He's a clinker, he is! I'll wager he's been practisin'. Sheet bend now, cully."

"Um..." He shrugged, untied the stopper and borrowed the end of the neatly coiled larboard fore t'gallant brace, forming a loop as the basis for the sheet bend. It was a bit like a bowline, only round a thicker rope instead of round itself, which was how he remembered it - only he had to remember where to put the end of the yarn with this one because it wasn't quite the same as the bowline.

The sly beggar had been teaching Button too, Chase realised, and shook his head. He should have guessed. It was not a competition as such but he couldn't help sensing that it was a challenge being laid down.

"That's a proper job," Chase said, nodding. "Long's you been 'memberin' your bowlines, too."

Terry nodded, a slightly shy grin touching his lips. "Waddaya wanna see, then?" he said, untying the sheet bend and making sure to leave the brace neatly looped up once he was done with it.

"You ain't.. ain't cross, are ya?" he asked suddenly, anxious in case somehow he'd done wrong in letting Chicken teach him something behind Chase's back.

"One-handed bowline," was Chase's prompt reply. He glanced dismissively at Dyer and added, "Teasy? Not with you, anyway. Just with Feathers-head there. He's nought but a vellan!"

At that, Dyer looked unrepentantly smug.

"A... a..." He'd practised that, of course he had, but it didn't want to go right any more than about half the times he tried it. "Um."

A loop round the wrist and then something like... "Shit."

Not like that. Of course.

"Talks like he's a foremast Jack, he does," Dyer observed mildly.

The watching seamen, still standing around, grinned. Tommy Edwin said, "Go it in slow-time, nipper, it'll be easier."

Easy for him to say... slow time indeed. He wasn't the one being scrutinised by a bunch of sailors when he was far more used to be ignored by folks older than him.

Slow time, then. Like... that.

"Waddaya know!"

"Good'un, mate," said Chase. "Practise works, sure. 'Specially fer that one. Why, I knowed a lad - "

"Here, you loafers!" Mister Colburn snapped, appearing behind the little group like a vengeful wraith, his starter swinging menacingly. "Back to work! This's no idlers' paradise!"

Terry guiltily stuffed the spun-yarn into a pocket and nearly dived headlong for the companionway down, but didn't. It wasn't as though he was needed anywhere in particular, after all. He had no intention of risking getting a swipe from that starter - those hurt! - but he wanted to stick with Chase and Dyer if he could.

Just as keen as the others to avoid a taste of the boatswain's mate's starter, Chase escaped to the waist, with Dyer and Hobbs following close behind.

"C'mon, cully," Chase called over his shoulder.

Terry didn't need telling twice. He didn't need telling once, even - he was right behind Hobbs, though being younger and smaller, he couldn't run as fast as the men could.

"Nearly properly one of us, now," Dyer teased, turning back to swipe playfully at Button's hat.

Chase made a noise that sounded disapproving. "Not yet, he ain't. Not till he gets to be taller'n me."

Terry pulled a face. "That ain't gonna 'appen, not never," he said. He was shorter than the other boys aboard who were about his age, all apart from Fingers, who was probably younger than him anyway.