Little Jane Silver
Page 20
So why are you writing out your sodding life story like you mean Little Jane to read it when you’re dead? he thought. Suddenly, for not the first time in his life, he felt vaguely ridiculous.
He placed the little book on his lap, hands positioned like a man swearing in court upon a bible. He knew it looked odd, but in the dark there was no one there to see. And so he pledged his promise to the book upon that very spot.
“I will read you to Little Jane in person some day,” he recited, and some of the tightness that had taken up residence in his stomach on that awful night the Pieces went down eased a bit.
Though his knee still pained him, though his shoulder still throbbed, though he remained chained fast in the brig with his future uncertain, his head and heart at last floated free upon the sea.
Only then, for the first time since he’d been aboard the Panacea, Long John slept. He dreamed strange dreams, and in those dreams he came upon the means for their escape.
Far away, on Smuggler’s Bay, Little Jane was also preparing for sleep. Alone in the bedroom at the Spyglass, she lay down on her little bed, next to her parents’ big, empty one and clutched Seurat to her chest. The china dogs by the fireplace looked on approvingly as she made her solemn vow to her Mama and Papa.
“Hold fast,” she whispered in the darkness. “I promise, I’m coming.”
Copyright © Adira Rotstein, 2011
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise (except for brief passages for purposes of review) without the prior permission of Dundurn Press. Permission to photocopy should be requested from Access Copyright.
Editor: Allison Hirst
Design: Jesse Hooper
Cataloguing data available from Library and Archives Canada
We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program. We also acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund and Livres Canada Books, and the Government of Ontario through the Ontario Book Publishing Tax Credit and the Ontario Media Development Corporation.
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Table of Contents
Cover
Dedication
Title
Prologue
1 - What's in a Name
2 - The Comment
3 - Dinner Conversation
4 - How to Be a Good Pirate
5 - Melvin
6 - A Night in Habana
7 - Doc Lewiston
8 - The Knot That Was Not
9 - The Story of the Newton
10 - The Powder Room
11 - Under Attack!
12 - Panacea Triumphant
13 - The Pieces of Eight Aflame
14 - Out of the Frying Pan
15 - In the Big
16 - Dropping Anchor
17 - Long John's Story
18 - Tale of a Tub
19 - Back in the Brig
Copyright
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