Langley's Choice

by Kate Dolan

  After another pause, she looked up at him in alarm. “Did you call me ‘miss?’” Caroline realized she could add, “My name is Jimmy and I’m a boy,” but what would be the use? It was obviously not true—so obvious, in fact, that she had been surprised her secret had lasted so long. She thought of silk skirts again, and of dancing with Captain Talbot. Her limbs and head felt heavy. A chill passed over her and she closed her eyes.

  “I must explain,” she said, but at the same time, she lay her head down on her undamaged arm.

  Hardey took up her injured arm to inspect the burn. Blisters ran the length of it, but none looked too serious. Had the ship been full of illness or under attack, her wound would have received no attention at all from a ship’s surgeon. Today, there was time to apply a little salve and bandages.

  Her arm felt hot. Gingerly, he touched her forehead and found it cold and clammy. Her eyes, only halfway open, stared ahead without focus, as though she had fallen into a trance. The girl would need to rest.

  With great care, he picked her up and carried her to her hammock. He returned to his cabin to fetch a small blanket, rather moth-eaten but not too dirty. This he draped over the girl, taking pains to tuck the blanket without touching her body.

  He would need to go talk to the captain, but given their recent confrontation, he wondered if it was the right time. Talbot wasn’t going to like this.

  “How are you feeling, Miss Dyer? May I get you some water?”

  Caroline awoke to find herself in a small, lumpy bed in a part of the ship she had never seen. The captain stood by her side, ready to wait on her as if he had been her servant.

  “Captain, I’m sorry.” Her throat felt tight and dry; it was hard to speak. “I don’t know how I came to be here, and…” Wait. He had called her “Miss.” The captain knew she was a woman. And with sudden certainty, she knew she was lying in his bed. She tried to get up.

  “Please, Miss Dyer, do not try to move just yet. You’re not well.”

  “But, Captain, I must…”

  Must what? She stopped trying to get up. What would happen now? Here she was, an unprotected woman on a ship full of men, lying in the captain’s very bed.

  His face showed one, perhaps two-days’ growth of beard, and his collar hung loose at the top. He smiled and drew a chair up next to her. Warmth spread through her like a bolt of lightning. He was going to take her hand, and her fingers tingled in anticipation.

  “Miss Dyer, I am very sorry we have brought you into these circumstances.”

  “Captain Talbot, I should first tell you that my name is not Dyer. I am Miss Caroline Carter of Hill Crest.” She glanced at her hands, which remained available and waiting so near to where he sat. She wanted to add “and I’m not sorry you brought me into these circumstances,” but she kept silent, still hoping he would take her hands in his.

  “A gentlewoman of property. This, then, has been an even greater affront than I had feared.”

  “You could not have known, Captain.” Caroline apologized as if she had enticed the captain into taking her and the others from the inn. “You found me dressed as a boy, in a tavern filled with men.”

  “Well, Miss Carter, and now you’re dressed as a boy on a ship filled with men. And that is why we will have to put you ashore as soon as we reach a suitable settlement.”

  Put her ashore? She gaped at him in surprise. Then she turned away, twisting her fingers in the hem of the gray blanket that covered her.

  She must go back? Now? To Georgiana and Mary? To Mr. Throckmorton? She must return to her small, uncultured life of trees and scattered ugly houses with no chance to see the great world that lay beyond? This ship, this crew, Captain Talbot himself had given her the opportunity to experience more—and now he was going to take it all away.

  “Are you ill, Miss Carter?”

  “No.” But she couldn’t bring herself to turn back and look into those beautiful dark eyes.

  A door creaked open.

  “I believe the young lady is asleep, Captain.”

  Caroline realized she must be awake to have heard the words, but she lay still. With her face turned toward the bulkhead, the speakers would not know.

  “If she’s asleep then she won’t be disturbed if I collect my charts. I need to determine where to set her ashore.” The irritation in the captain’s voice made Caroline cringe beneath her blanket.

  “No, Captain, of course not.” Hardey’s words were loaded with deference.

  “A damned nuisance having her aboard.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “How are the men taking this?”

  Hardey paused for some time before replying. “As well as can be expected, sir.”

  “Which means?”

  “It’s bad luck, or the men believe it’s bad luck, to have a woman aboard when we’re out at sea.”

  Caroline nearly snorted aloud with derision. She was not bad luck. Nothing bad had happened! And they’d had excellent weather. She had brought good luck, if any at all.

  “Well, she won’t be aboard much longer. I, for one, will be grateful to have my cabin back. But I can’t very well put her in with the men again.”

  Caroline felt tears filling her eyes again.

  “No, sir.”

  “It is odd that none of us noticed, is it not, Hardey?”

  “Indeed, Captain, though such things have happened before. She kept the ruse going for quite some time. A hard worker. Strange, with her being a lady and all.”

  “There are no true ladies in the Americas, Hardey. They all toil like slaves. Even so, look at her. She’s tiny. Can you imagine her grinding corn or butchering a hog or whatever these colonials do on their crude plantations?”

  No ladies in the Americas? Butchering a hog? The very idea! Captain Talbot obviously had not much contact with decent society in the colonies.

  Caroline prepared to sit up and give him a very elegant speech concerning the superiority of society in the colonies—but stopped herself. An angry tirade would only reinforce the captain’s misguided beliefs. She would instead show him a how a colonial lady behaved.

  She lay still and pretended to sleep until she heard the door close. Then she got up and started trying to make herself look a little less like a ship’s boy.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Josiah sighed with relief as he pulled himself to the top of the rope ladder and swung his leg over the side and onto the deck of the weather-beaten sloop. It had been difficult to even grasp the ladder; the small boat in which he had stood pitched wildly in waves that seemed close to, yet moving in entirely different directions from, the waves controlling the larger vessel he was attempting to board. But he had managed, and even dared hope he had not looked too ridiculous in the process.

  Tiny drops of water wet his eyelashes, drawing his attention to the darkening rain clouds in the sky. A distant-sounding splash made him look back down quickly—Charles had apparently not been as fortunate in his ascent up the side. This was surprising. Charles had always struck Josiah as the very paragon of frontier hardiness and athletic ability. He watched as two men on the boat plucked Charles from the water by the back of his coat and hoisted him up to the nearest rung of the rope ladder. He climbed the rest of the way slowly but without incident and grinned when he was at last planted firmly on the deck and caught Josiah’s eye.

  “Well, there’s my bath for the season over with, anyway.”

  “And your clothes washed in the bargain.”

  “Yes, so they are.” Charles held his arm over the side and tried to wring out his sleeve. “My compliments, Mr. Throckmorton. You made the feat appear simple.”

  Josiah smiled uneasily, uncertain whether Charles had really paid him a compliment. Had the climb seemed easy to Charles merely because the young man figured that if Josiah could do it, anyone could?

  He brushed this thought aside. Raindrops fell heavier now, and his energies would be better served finding shelter and sending someone to alert the captain of t
heir arrival.

  The captain would not be expecting them, but he apparently welcomed men of trade to come aboard unannounced as standard practice. So they had been informed, anyway. Two men at the Boar’s Head in Norfolk had, in two independent conversations, suggested that they “go see Spittel on the Sea Lily.” The captain kept his small sloop at anchor in the channel and sent crewmen into town to do business for him. Word had it that the captain’s superstitions kept him from setting foot on dry land, at least in the vicinity of Norfolk.

  “Didn’t expect someone from the Canary.”

  Josiah and Charles turned to find that the man they sought had silently materialized behind them.

  “Most of my business comes from out in the open waters. I don’t get many callers from up the bay.”

  Charles looked at Josiah uncertainly. Should they apologize for appearing when he hadn’t expected them?

  The captain gave them no time. Squinting at the sky, he waved them toward the hatch. “Ugh. Come along below, then, mates. M’ tobacco won’t light in the rain.”

  Josiah had thought the Canary was cramped and smelly, but it seemed a perfumed garden compared with the Sea Lily. Darkness prevented him from seeing clearly where they were headed, but the clutter of unknown objects on either side kept him from going in any direction other than that taken by the captain. He realized they’d reached their destination only when he ran smack into the captain’s back, and a moment later felt Charles’s hands probing his hair.

  “It’s me, Mr. Carter. We’ve stopped.”

  “Sorry, Mr. Throckmorton.”

  They could hear the captain fumble with a latch of some sort, then a door squeaked and Josiah noticed the man had moved forward.

  “Do you suppose their eyes get used to this?” Charles asked in a whisper. Obviously, Josiah wasn’t the only one who found the interior of the sloop extremely dark.

  “Sirs, ye can enter now.”

  They could hear him, hear the click of his pipe against his teeth and even smell his sour breath. But as Josiah and Charles inched forward in the dark, they could not see the captain.

  “I’ll send for a candle, will I?” Without waiting for a response, he bellowed, “Martin, bring a candle!” in a voice so powerful Josiah could have sworn he felt the deck quiver a bit at his feet. “Sit down, if ye please, sirs.”

  By this time, Josiah had discovered the table. He felt his way around to a chair. It was missing at least one spindle, but the seat seemed steady enough. When he tried to pull it away from the table, though, it moved only about three inches before the rear legs struck something behind. Pushing the table forward slightly and sucking in his breath, he could just squeeze into his seat.

  He realized his eyes must have adjusted to the darkness somewhat because he could now see Captain Spittel’s face across the black expanse of table. To his left, Charles had managed to find a chair but seemed hesitant to sit down.

  “Hrriow,” said the chair.

  “That’s just old Barnaby, don’t let him be in your way.” The captain slid down and kicked at Charles’s chair. “Get along there, you!”

  Small patches of white on a black mass of fur flashed across the table, landing on the topmost of several wooden crates piled at the corner to the right of Josiah. At that moment, a skinny seaman stepped through the doorway and stopped. Light from the battered lantern in his hand illuminated his long, yellow teeth.

  “Captain?” He held out the lantern.

  “Thank’ee, Martin. Close the door, will ye, on the way.”

  “Aye-aye.”

  “You have business, I believe, sirs?” The pipe clicked on the captain’s widely spaced teeth. “Ye be looking for passage? For yourselves? A cargo?”

  “Yes,” Josiah said quickly. Passage—that didn’t sound too risky. “We are seeking passage for ourselves to…ports south.”

  “And return,” Charles added. “We will have one additional passenger with us. Perhaps more, if you’ve room?”

  “Aye, we can accommodate several men, if ye’ve no great cargo. What’ll ye be carrying?”

  “I have a sizeable trunk.” Josiah wanted to make sure the crew wouldn’t balk this time when he presented his luggage.

  “And I’ve a few small chests,” said Charles.

  “Just your personal effects, sirs? Should be fine, fine. Ye can see we’ve plenty of room here.”

  They could, in fact, see very little, but what they did see indicated the captain would have been hard-pressed to find room for the personal effects of a field mouse. Nevertheless, they both nodded.

  “What ports south, sirs? And with whom will ye be meeting, if I may be so bold?” The captain smiled, showing more open space between his teeth than either Josiah or Charles had seen anywhere since they arrived on board.

  Neither man answered; neither had any idea where they were really headed. Josiah knew they would have to stop frequently along the coast, but the quest could take them halfway around the world. If they weren’t going to be honest with the captain about the type of ship they were following, they at least needed to give him some idea of how far they would ask him to travel.

  “Charles Town,” Charles finally said.

  Josiah nodded. Charles Town, South Carolina, was the only sizeable port between Norfolk and the Caribbean; it would be a logical destination. “Perhaps Nassau,” he added, as offhandedly as possible. The island of New Providence was administered by the governor of South Carolina, so he hoped it wouldn’t sound too distant.

  “Nassau?” The captain shifted his pipe. “What business do ye have in Nassau?”

  “Ah, well, Mr. Carter’s sister is…ah, visiting friends in Charles Town, and they had some plans to visit the family’s estates on New Providence.” Yes, this sounded plausible. Josiah’s story gathered momentum as he continued to devise it. “Mr. Carter and I have come on a sad errand. We must cut short the young lady’s visit to return her to her mother, who has taken quite ill and is not expected to recover.” Josiah glanced quickly at Charles, willing him to look sad at the prospect of his mother’s demise. “So, you see, we do not know whether we will find Miss Carter in Charles Town or on New Providence and therefore cannot say for certain what our final destination will be. And…” Would this be too much? “…there is some chance that the family, the uh, Pierreponts, will have themselves started up the coast on a journey. So, we had hoped to stop in a handful of ports along the route to see whether their vessel had been sighted.”

  That should cover everything. Would the captain believe that last part? Josiah wished he’d quit while he was ahead. The last segment of his story really seemed quite improbable.

  The captain clicked his pipe again, then took it out and tapped it in his hand. His chair creaked a few times.

  “Passage to Charles Town and Nassau will cost ye fifty pounds in gold. Each, mind you.”

  “And passage home for Miss Carter?” Charles asked eagerly.

  “We’ll discuss that when we see where we find Miss Carter.” Another smile from the captain. “Are we agreed, sirs?”

  “Done.” Charles’s expression showed relief. Josiah wished the two of them had discussed the matter first before agreeing. He wasn’t at all certain about the Sea Lily’s ability to handle the chase, but he supposed they would find it all but impossible to find another captain so gullible as to accept their story about Miss Carter visiting friends in Nassau or Charles Town.

  “We will make arrangements with our agent to have the gold ready for our return to Norfolk,” Josiah said finally.

  The captain stopped filling his pipe with tobacco and set it firmly on the table. “Oh, no, sirs. You’ll pay me now.”

  “Now?” Charles seemed taken aback.

  “If we pay you in advance, what guarantee have we that you will carry us to Nassau and back, as agreed upon?” Josiah asked.

  “Ye have no guarantee, ’cept my word. Ye can ask in No’fo’k. My word is good.”

  Ha! Nobody in Norfolk had even s
et eyes on the man these ten years. How could they trust his word? But Josiah did not want to insult him. “It would not be prudent business practice for us to pay you before receiving your services.”

  The captain stopped smiling. “And it would not be, how did you say, prudent business practice for me, sirs, to go without the money. I guarantee I’ll take you wherever you need to go. But ye can’t guarantee ye’ll be alive to pay me when I return to No’fo’k.”

  Charles eyes widened with surprise at the captain’s blunt words, and Josiah had to clench his hands to keep them from trembling. They said nothing, however.

  The captain looked at each of them in turn then finished filling his pipe. “There’s accidents at sea, of course. And diseases. ’Specially in the islands.”

  He said no more. For a moment, Josiah feared he knew the true danger of their mission. But he was apparently only weighing the risks of an ordinary sea voyage.

  As much as he disliked the idea of paying for services up front, Josiah could not argue with the captain’s logic, especially when he knew that something more than accidents or illness might prevent them from paying on return. They would have to trust him. He saw this same resignation in Charles’ eyes when he turned toward him.

  “We agree,” he said at last.

  “Tomorrow we will make the arrangements with my agent,” Charles finished. “When can we leave?”

  Hardey reached a hand down to Caroline as she climbed to the deck. Two men smiled at her, but many more scowled or turned away.

  She gazed out to sea. The South Carolina coast looked essentially the same as that of North Carolina, with a few more trees and slightly fewer sandbars. A small wisp of smoke drifted up in the distance. She could see no buildings. Were they just going to strand her on the beach?

  “No, I want to stay here,” she whispered, squeezing her eyes to hold back tears.

  “Ah, miss, we won’t leave you here alone. We will find you a settlement. You’ll be among good people.”

  “Mr. Hardey.” Caroline felt suddenly mad with desperation. “May I not stay on the ship and earn my way? You know I can work.”