It is so satisfying to imagine this scene that I do it over and over again in my mind ... I wish you the joy of your command, Mr. Pinkham...
Men are coming on deck to commence their ship's work. Most look at me with pity, perhaps thinking of their sisters and sweethearts, while others can barely keep the leers and smirks off their faces as they pass. Well, she finally got hers, I know they are thinking, and the little busybody sure had it comin', she did.
That's the expression Muck and his crew have on their faces as they file by. Let it be, girl, I say to myself. Just wait.
Ned relieves me at eight and I tell him that if he needs anything to just rap on the Captain's cabin door and I'll be right out. He blushes and nods.
Higgins, the steward, comes up with the tray precisely at eight and I take it from him and go in the cabin. I sit down at the table and survey my breakfast. It sure beats what we've been eating, that's for sure. There's two cups of coffee—thanks, Higgins—and a plate of real fresh rolls and butter, some little fishes with sauce, slices of ham—ham! Can you believe it!—and eggs! Three of them! Where the hell has this Higgins been hiding the chickens?
Before I sit down and tuck in, I go and open the windows just a bit, but I do not pull the curtains. Then I sit back down and rattle the silverware as if two people were sitting down to breakfast.
I make the lowest rumbling in my chest, Grumble rumble ratz ... hoping it sounds a bit like the Captain's surly voice.
"Yes, Sir," I say in my meek little voice. "Holystone and sand, and then exercise the guns. Yes, Sir."
I make other small talk, back and forth, and then I set into eating. I know the ears at the windows have heard, and while they probably wanted to hear the Captain thumping the bed with me, breakfast talk is all they get.
Lord, that's good! I exult. How does he afford this on a one-swab captain's pay, I don't know, but I'll take it. Or, rather, we'll take it. After I'm done, I find some paper on a shelf and I wrap the leftover food in it. Then I take the tray and my bundle of soiled clothes and I go back out and close the door behind me. Higgins still waits there.
"That was very good, Higgins." I hand him the tray. "Will you see that my shirt is sewn back up and it and the other clothes are cleaned?"
"Oh yes, Miss," he says, seemingly overjoyed at not having to go into the cabin. I guess each of his visits there ended with a boot up his behind. Though he is a big man, he is gentle, and he seems touchingly glad to hear a kind word about his service.
"And, Higgins," I say with a warning look, "none of that stuff that Weisling pulled with my clothes..."
"Miss. Please. I was trained in service to Lord Hollingsworth before I was brought down to ... this."
"Well, all right then. Thank you."
I instruct Ned not to disturb the Captain for anything, just send for me and I'll be right up. Then I take my packet of food and go below to the berth. Tom and Georgie are sitting at the table. I go up to them and say "Open." They don't know what to think, and so I pull out one of the delicious fishes and dangle it over Tom's face. He opens his mouth and I drop it in. "Mmmm," he says.
I do the same for Georgie. "See? It ain't so bad. Now cheer up." But Georgie don't cheer up. Hmmmm ... I give them each a piece of the buttered bread and leave, heading down to the brig.
The light is dim, but I can see Robin lying on the hard bench. There is no guard, as there is no need for one. Even if he got out, where could he go?
"Robin."
He stirs and sits up. Seeing me, he puts his palms over his eyes.
"How is your head?" I ask.
"It does not throb so much in pain now as it does in shame and disgrace."
"Come, Robin, you did what you could—you even put your very life on the line for me, and I will never, ever forget that, as long as I may live."
He takes his hands from his eyes and they blaze feverishly in mine as he gets down on one knee and says, "Jacky Faber, if you will do me the honor of being my wife, I will be the happiest of men. Please say that you will before that fiend takes me out and hangs me. I do not care what he—"
"You could not have been more noble, Robin Raeburne, but we will not speak of that now. And the Captain is not going to hang you. I have already taken care of that," I say to set his mind to rest. "Come, have something to eat with me."
There is a stool in the corner and I pull it over to the bars and sit down and unwrap my package. His anguish is plain and he seems to be struggling to put something into words, but I stop him by putting my fingertips to his lips. "Just eat, Robin." I sigh, and, reluctantly, he sits down beside me to eat. The heart guides, but the belly rules.
On the way back to the quarterdeck, I meet Jared. He's got a bit of his cocky look, but not all of it.
"Sorry, Miss," he says, "but, hey..."
"'But, hey' is right" is what I say in reply. "Thanks for what you did—taking the helm like that and covering for the cannonball rollers ... and for whatever else you did." I am sure he is the one who dropped the cannonballs from the top rigging onto the cabin roof.
I pat his arm and go to the deck and check in with Ned. The turn to the next leg is due at four o'clock. On my watch. Good.
Six bells in the Morning Watch. Still no sign of Mr. Pinkham and the others returning. Even if they were taken out to the flagship itself, and they would have been, considering the grave charges against the Captain that they were carrying, they should have been back by now. Could they have been taken by a French patrol? Are they now in a French prison? Poor Mr. Pinkham, if only you will return, you will find yourself in command of a fine ship. If you don't, a year or so in a dank French dungeon, waiting to be exchanged for a French officer in similar straits, will be your lot. Either way, it'll be better than serving under the late Captain Scroggs, I'll wager.
At noon, Higgins appears with the luncheon tray. He tells me my clothes are drying and I should have them soon. I thank him and take the tray into the cabin.
"Good day, Captain," I say. "I have brought the noon meal," for the benefit of the Marine guard and Higgins, as I close the door.
The Captain doesn't say anything. His mouth has fallen open, but I'll be damned if I'm going to try to close it. Besides, it just looks like he's asleep and snoring.
"Harrummmph. Gargle snark," I say for him, as low and guttural as I can make it.
Then I eat. Once again, the food is delicious, and once again I wrap up the greater portion to take to Robin later. I had thought about letting him out of the brig—sure could use another officer on the watch rotation—but then I thought better of it: The Captain certainly would not have released Robin after what he had done. The crew would know that and be suspicious. Very suspicious. Then, too, Robin might make an attempt to kill the Captain to avenge my fallen honor. Couldn't have that. Nay, Robin, you must cool your heels a while longer.
At one o'clock I mount the quarterdeck once more, having told Higgins, and anyone listening in, that the Captain was ill again and for him not to prepare quite so much food as the Captain's digestion is upset and he has taken to his bed. This, of course, gets to Earweg, the loblolly boy, and he appears with his bottles of white stuff and his bleeding bowl. I take them from him and say that I will give the Captain his doses. Earweg looks distressed, feeling, quite rightly, that he is losing some status here. I tell him, too, that the Captain does not want to be bled just now. I put the bottles on a shelf in the cabin and wonder about what harm they might have brought to Earweg's late patient and shiver. First, do no harm ... Isn't that part of the doctor's oath?
I talk to Ned for a bit about the set of the sails and such. Being on these watches has been good for the boys. For Ned and Tom, that is. Georgie, being too little to stand watches, gets no benefit and thus is still without joy. Ned and Tom, being close in age, have each other. Georgie has no one, 'cept maybe me, and I ain't very available just now.
The Messenger of the Watch is standing at the starboard rail, just off the quarterdeck. I go to him and say, "Have the ship's boy, Tucker, lay to the quarterdeck." He knuckles his brow and heads off. Soon Tucker comes swaggering down the deck.
"Yes, Miss Faber?" he asks, grinning.
"You know Midshipman Piggott, do you not?" I say.
"Hard for me not to know him, Miss, as he's powder boy with me in your division."
Such cheek.
"Very well, then, I am going to tell you something. Mr. Piggott is going to be demoted to ship's boy. I want you and Eli and Tremendous to welcome him into your company. I do not want him given any special treatment, but I do not want you to be cruel to him, either. Do you understand, Tucker?"
He nods.
I turn again to the messenger. "Go get Mr. Piggott. He'll be in the midshipmen's berth." He's off again.
In a few minutes, he's back with a mystified Georgie.
"Georgie," I say, "take off your jacket."
He does it.
I put on the Look and say, "You are being demoted to ship's boy. You may go collect your things from the midshipmen's berth. You will string your hammock with the rest of the ship's boys and you will mess with the crew."
His jaw drops and his eyes fill with tears. "Jacky ... what..."
"That's Lieutenant Faber, Piggott. You mind your manners. This is Tucker. He will show you the way of things. Dismissed."
Tucker comes up to him and puts his arm around his shoulders and says, "C'mon, Georgie, let's get your stuff and then we'll go up to the foretop and meet Eli and Tremendous, your new mates," and they are gone. God bless ship's boys.
Ned, standing behind me with the long glass in the crook of his arm, has watched all this and now looks at me with not much love in his eyes. "That was cruel, Lieutenant Faber," he says.
I should say nothing—Never Complain, Never Explain— but I can't afford to lose the middies as my friends, so I say, "Nay, Mr. Barrows. I did not mean to be cruel. I just want him to have some time to be a boy, before he has to stand up and be a man."
An hour later, pretending again to hear the Captain's hail from the speaking tube, I again go over and place my ear upon it and pretend to listen.
"Yes, Sir," I say into it when I straighten up. I advance to the edge of the quarterdeck and say to the Bo'sun's Mate of the Watch, "Muster the gun crews for practice."
I run them hard, over and over, till every back is slippery with sweat, till every man wishes me dead a hundred times over, until, finally, each man knows his job.
As we secure from the exercise, I hear it whispered for the first time:
The Captain's whore...
I have the Midwatch that night, and as I stand there, I think, What if the officers don't come back, ever? What shall I do? The Captain ain't gonna last forever in the state he's in now, that's for sure. True, the days and nights have been cool, but three more days is the best I can hope for before he really starts in to stinkin'.
I must plan. I must turn this to my advantage, somehow. But how? Once again, I see the flashing light on the shore, and I wonder at it.
I think far into the night, and by the time I am relieved, I have a plan.
Chapter 15