May he have mercy on yours, Hayden thought.
‘I am in command,’ de Latendresse admitted. ‘I am the captain.’
‘You are no officer,’ Hayden said coldly. ‘You, sir, are nothing more than a spy. And you,’ he said to Miguel, ‘aided this man. In good faith, I offered you my help, and you chose this course instead – to become a traitor to your own nation.’
‘Better than accepting handouts from the likes of you,’ Miguel replied in Spanish.
The blood drained from his face as he said this, he wavered an instant, and then slumped slowly down on to the deck. Although he looked as though he might pass into unconsciousness, no one seemed to care or even to take notice.
‘Mr Wickham? See to their surrender. And Mr Gould?’
‘Sir?’ The midshipman stepped quickly forward.
‘Will you examine Don Miguel’s wounds? God help me, he is my brother-in-law yet.’ He turned his attention back to de Latendresse. ‘Where is Mrs Hayden? What has been done with her?’
‘She is below,’ de Latendresse said, and ordered a man to lead Hayden to her.
Marines went ahead with muskets at the ready, but there was no resistance, only wounded and dead lying on the ruined gundeck, which was slippery with blood.
Hayden was taken down to the hold, where he found all the ship’s sick and hurt, lying upon barrels, but for one cot, suspended and screened off from the others by a bit of sail.
Hayden went there, unable suddenly to breathe. And there he found his bride, shiny with sweat, her beautiful face a sickly yellow hue.
‘Do not come near,’ she whispered. ‘I have the fever.’
Hayden went immediately to her side, all but collapsing down on a short stool that stood on planks by her cot. He took up her small hand, which was inhumanly hot.
‘You are always a bit late,’ she said, her voice so thin it was not even a whisper. ‘But here you are, all the same.’
‘I will have Griffiths here of an instant,’ Hayden told her. ‘He has physic for every hurt. He—’
She put up her hand to quiet him. ‘There is no physic that will heal this hurt … The true apothecary comes for me.’ She closed her eyes and tears pressed between the lids and, though she made no sound, her shoulders shook.
‘Is Mr Smosh nearby?’ she managed after a moment.
‘He is …’
She nodded, and then with effort whispered, ‘I will be buried in the religion in which we were married.’
‘You are not going to die.’
‘Charles …’ she said softly, but very firmly. ‘That is my wish.’
Hayden found he could not speak, but nodded.
She put a hand upon his heart. ‘You will keep me there – I know. There, safe … until we are both called from our long sleep.’ Tears flowed freely then. ‘So short was our time together in this life but all of eternity awaits us.’
Thirty-four
Hayden had arrayed her in the dress in which she had been wed and then sewn her into a cocoon of sail cloth. He paused then to weep the most bitter tears of his life. She appeared so very small when they bore her up to the deck, as though whatever had made up Angelita in life had already fled.
The officers and crew gathered on the quarterdeck, where Smosh spoke in his deep, sonorous voice. His words, as kind and profound as they might have been, seemed nothing more than bits of air to Hayden. They hardly registered.
The day appeared somehow imbued with solemn beauty, the sea of tropical blue spreading out to the south, a little whisper of wind, and hardly a cloud to sully the sky. Gulls ranged about the ship, mewling sorrowfully.
What occurred seemed somehow impossible to Hayden, and he had difficulty believing that he attended the funeral of his young wife, who but a few weeks before had been vibrant to the point of overflowing with the life she had been given.
The voice of Mr Smosh penetrated Hayden’s numbed mind, and the final words registered.
‘We therefore commit her body to the deep,’ he said, ‘to be turned into corruption, looking for the resurrection of the body when the sea shall give up her dead …’
They slipped her into the endless depths, and condolences were again offered, until Hayden found himself alone on the quarterdeck. For a long time he stood at the rail, his mind in a whirl of strange emptiness. He could not give the order to make sail, to leave her there alone, sinking slowly down to the ooze and the darkness.
But he could not keep his ship on station for ever and, finally, he ordered sail to be made and their course shaped for Barbados. He went down to his cabin, then, and sat quietly by himself, listening for the sound of his own heart beating, for the tiny murmur within that he would bear with him until his heart could speak no more.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank all of my friends who read my manuscripts and offer their kind comments: Stephen Ariss, Don Deese, Greg Janes, Doug Swanson, Chuck Bates, Carol Shaben, Jack Moss, Brendan Russell and, my first and always most trusted reader, my wife Karen. I want to thank Rob Margolis, who has advised me on all of Hayden’s legal matters over the course of four books. I want to thank my friend, the intrepid small-boat sailor Gil Mercier, for lending Hayden his name when he is in France. One of my advisors passed away this year – Lyman Coleman, who was the retired senior padre of the Canadian Armed Forces. Lyman advised me on all things religious in the Hayden books and had been a friend for several decades. There is a little bit of Lyman in Mr Smosh, and he will be missed by many. I want to thank my editors, Alex Clarke and Sara Minnich, for all of their hard work and insight, as well as the teams at Penguin USA and UK. I would also like to thank my fantastic agents, Howard Morhaim and Caspian Dennis.
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PENGUIN BOOKS
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First published 2014
Copyright © Sean Thomas Russell, 2014
Jacket illustration © Larry Rostant
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ISBN: 978-0-141-96725-7
Until the Sea Shall Give Up Her Dead Page 44
