Polaris

by Michael Northrop

  “You sounded like a girl,” said Henry.

  As fast as a hawk in flight, Manny turned and took two quick steps toward Henry. Henry immediately stumbled backward, holding the lantern in front of himself for protection.

  “Another word, and I’ll leave you down here!” spat Manny.

  “But—” Henry began.

  “Unconscious!”

  The two stared at each other in the dim light. Henry’s eyes were confused and unfocused, but Manny’s blazed with intensity.

  “All right, fine,” said Henry, looking down. “Cripes.”

  “Here,” said Manny, suddenly eager to change the subject. “Take this tin of sea bread, that jar of molasses, and anything else that looks halfway edible. This barrel of meat is less than half full—must be pork, since that’s what we’ve been having the last few days. Anyway, I can carry it myself.”

  They loaded up and turned back toward the door. Daffodil waited at their feet, her tail flicking back and forth, nose pressed to the edge of the door.

  “Why are we taking so much stuff?” asked Henry, the lantern balanced atop a fat packet of beef jerky that was itself stacked on top of two tins of the hard, flat biscuits known as sea bread. The jar of molasses was pinned under his arm.

  Manny looked at him like he was an idiot. “Do you want to come back down here again anytime soon?”

  “Oh, right,” said Henry. He opened his mouth again, but for a long moment, nothing came out. Manny knew instantly that he was considering another stupid question.

  “You know this ship better than I do,” he said. “Do you think that noise—those noises—could have been Daffodil? Maybe she knocked something over?”

  Manny stared at him again, thinking, That would be quite a trick, considering that she was asleep behind this barrel I’m holding. But then a second thought: What if she hadn’t been sleeping? What if she’d been hiding?

  But Henry was scared enough, and Manny was sick of questions.

  “Es posible,” said Manny with a shrug. It’s possible.

  True or not, the words were enough to prompt Henry to open the door and head back into the murky passage. Daffodil darted between his feet, nearly upending him.

  The air that had been so stale and foul before they entered the galley was now laced with the faintest hint of sweetness. The two exchanged looks and sped up, barely looking down as they hustled through the darkness. Manny kicked a fallen hat across the crew berth without consequence only to painfully stub a toe on a misplaced sea trunk. They reached the hatch in record time, just as Daffodil’s tail disappeared up the last rung of the angled ladder and out onto the deck. They replaced the fallen lantern and headed up after her. But Henry went first and his progress was painfully slow. He had the lighter load and even one hand partially free, but he lacked the Spaniard’s talent for climbing.

  “Hurry up!” hissed Manny.

  If there was another noise behind them—so much as the scritch-scratch of a rat along the wall—Manny vowed to climb right over this bookish boy’s back. But there was only silence as they made their agonizingly slow ascent. Silence and the vague, unnerving, and all-too-familiar sense of being watched.

  With a heavy thud, Manny dropped the barrel of salted meat onto the deck and then breathed in the fresh sea air, blinking into the blinding sunlight. The scene on deck slowly came into view. Aaron was standing at the helm behind them, taking his turn at the big wooden wheel, steering the ship. As usual, Manny sought out Mario—and instantly recoiled in horror. “Mario! What are you doing?”

  Mario looked over and continued slowly unwrapping the black headscarf. “I’m sick of this thing.”

  “But—but—” Manny stammered.

  “But nothing. My brains are boiling.”

  “But you must leave it!” Manny’s eyes were wild, staring at Mario and then casting quick, worried glances around at the others. “You know it’s the Spanish style!”

  Mario snorted out a laugh. “That’s not even a real thing. And even if it were, you know that’s not why we wear these.”

  The others had all turned to look, and the headscarf was almost off now, the sweat-soaked black cloth drooping heavily as it came free. Manny panicked and switched to Spanish. “Sí, lo sé, pero los otros no saben.” Yes, I know, but the others don’t.

  Mario looked around at all the gawking eyes and shrugged. “¿A quién le importa?” Who cares? Then, in English: “It’s just us now: no officers, no old salts. Just us children, so what does it matter what kind?”

  Manny forced a small laugh, as if not understanding. “En español, por favor.”

  “No,” said Mario.

  Manny glared. “Don’t you dare!”

  “Too late!” said Mario, unwrapping the final layer and exposing the thick, damp black hair underneath.

  Manny stepped deftly around the barrel and rushed toward Mario, who darted back with all the grace and ceremony of a Spanish bullfighter. With a flourish, Mario tugged the damp headscarf up and away from Manny’s grasping hands. The others howled and hooted with delight.

  Panic and anger flooded Manny’s mind. “Maria, no!”

  The deck fell silent.

  For a few moments, the only sounds were the wind whistling through the sails and the waves slapping against the hull. Henry broke the silence: “Did he say Maria?”

  Manny made another lunge at the cloth, this time with a threat: “I’ll wrap it around your stupid neck!”

  But the other “Spanish brother” spun aside once more, long, wavy black hair twirling out and then falling heavily down. And even the face that hair now framed looked different, no longer tightly cropped by austere black cloth, with a few weeks’ worth of grime having washed off in the storm the night before.

  All around the pair, the others stood and stared in silent disbelief. What a difference a blurted name and an unwrapped headscarf made. The truth had been hiding in plain sight all along.

  Maria broke the silence. “Don’t you see? We don’t have to pretend anymore, Emma.”

  Emma, short for Emmanuelle, groaned: “Do I see? Everyone sees now.”

  She looked down at her own sunburned feet, not yet daring to meet the eyes of the others, and retraced the steps that had led here. This whole thing had been her idea: a simple disguise in exchange for a steady job and a ticket to a new life. That was the idea, anyway. Emma looked sheepishly up at her sister. And now, after more than a year of hard labor, serious secrets, and uncomfortable camouflage, Maria couldn’t resist a little payback. She batted her eyelashes at Emma—playfully, girlishly, and just for fun.

  Owen closed his eyes tightly, but when he opened them, the view still hadn’t changed at all. Had Mario’s eyelashes always been that long? he asked himself. Wait, I mean, Maria’s?

  “So let me get this straight,” said Thacher. “Let me see if I have it figured …”

  “It appears,” said Henry, cutting in with a schoolmaster’s tone that annoyed Owen, “that two of the ship’s boys are actually—”

  “Ship’s girls,” said Owen, who could cut in with the best of them.

  Aaron called up from the wheel, demanding to know what was going on.

  “It’s still your trick at the helm!” Owen called back. Then he turned to the Spanish sisters and lowered his voice: “He’s not the only one awaiting an explanation.”

  “Yes, fine,” said Emma with an exasperated sigh. “I’ll explain if you all stop staring.” She waited a moment, but the eyes stayed on her. Another sigh, and then: “We had no life back in Spain: no parents, no money. Other orphans made their way to Barcelona and found work on the ships, but they would not hire girls, or even women. It is stupid, of course. Most people don’t think things through—and most people don’t look too closely at the things right in front of them. And so I came up with a plan …”

  “It’s bad luck!” blurted Owen. “Women on board a ship: Everyone knows it’s bad luck!”

  “It is a silly superstition,” said Maria fl
atly.

  Owen felt his sunburned face getting hotter still. He refused to be lectured by these girls! “That’s probably why all of this has happened!” The words came out in a rush, the thought suddenly occurring to him. “The mutiny, the—the—”

  “The what?” said Emma, her expression turning scornful. “The ghost?”

  Owen looked down, suddenly embarrassed by what he’d been about to say, and Emma continued on. “There is something down there,” she said, pointing straight down at the deck. “We all know that.” She gestured at Henry. “And we heard it. But it is no ghost. It is alive, and as solid as any of us. And as for the mutiny, well …”

  She let the thought hang there as she slowly looked around at the others, knowing no one would cut her off this time. “Well, I think maybe they knew something about it that we do not.”

  “But how?” said Owen. “What?”

  “No sé,” said Emma with a shrug. “I don’t know. But I have heard talk of many bloody mutinies. I have heard of the losing side being set adrift in longboats. But never, ever have I heard of men taking control of a ship only to abandon it.”

  Owen nodded. It had been bothering him too. “And trying to blow it up behind them,” he added.

  “Exactly,” said Emma. “So maybe it wasn’t the ship they were trying to get away from.”

  “And perhaps it wasn’t the ship they were trying to blow up,” added Henry.

  The crew fell silent again. The gears ground slowly in Owen’s head, and once again he wished he were more clever. He briefly wished that he were more like Henry, but a quick glance at the other boy’s scrawny frame and slumped posture brought him back to himself. Not too much like Henry.

  “I think they were overcome with guilt for what they’d done,” said Maria, breaking the spell. “They knew they’d be hanged when they reached port.”

  Thacher nodded. “Yes, could be they planned to sink the ship and then claim to have survived a shipwreck. As for what lurks below deck, a ghost is much more likely.”

  “Well then,” said Emma, pointing back toward the aft hatch. “I invite you to go down there and find out for yourself.”

  Owen turned to see where she was pointing, but his eyes never reached the hatch. They locked onto the barrel of salted meat directly in front of it. Then he saw the food Henry had dropped beside it. His stomach rumbled.

  “I have a better idea,” he said.

  In the past, with the full crew divided up into four-hour watches and then divided up again into two-hour dogwatches, they ate in shifts at the little table in the galley. Cutlery, cups, maybe even a rag for a napkin. Now the new crew ate with their hands in the bright openness of the sunlit deck.

  Aaron had been a friend and occasional assistant to the ship’s cook, and he’d had no trouble boiling the salt pork in a little kettle they’d found stowed in the former goat house. The kettle was meant more for heating tar than boiling food, but with meat of this quality, there wasn’t a huge difference. Not that any of them complained. Each crew member received a slab of the stuff, salted to near oblivion in order to prevent it from spoiling during the trip. To go with it, they each got a dry, flat biscuit. And to wash down this dry, salty feast: a few gulps of water from the scuttlebutt.

  Most of them took their time. Meals were often the only true breaks in a sailor’s day. They savored the chance to rest, if not the meal. A few of them ate quickly, though, too hungry from a long day with no food. Owen had always had a big appetite, but looking around he saw that Thacher had him beat. The hold rat had already gobbled down his hunk of salted meat and was licking his lips for any scraps. Ravenous as a wolf, he thought.

  As Thacher rubbed his hands on his grimy pants, he raised his eyes and caught Owen sizing him up. Owen wasn’t the sort to look away quickly, to pretend it hadn’t happened, and so for a moment they held each other’s gaze. Thacher lifted his chin toward the spot where the barrel of salt pork was resting near the mainmast. Owen shook his head: No. They might eat like savages, sprawled out on the deck, but there would be no seconds. Thacher gave him a sour smirk and looked away.

  Owen made a mental note to stow the food away after they finished. He glanced up at the raised forecastle. In larger ships, the fo’c’sle was where the crew slept, but it was far too low for that on the Polaris. Instead, it served as a convenient place to store ropes and sailcloth and anything else they might need quickly. It would keep the food out of the sun, and out of sight.

  “You better save some of that for me!” Aaron called up from the wheel.

  Owen looked back at him and then right back at Thacher.

  “You were on the same dogwatch as Aaron, were you not?”

  Thacher looked up and gave the smallest of nods.

  “Then go relieve him,” said Owen. “It’s your trick.”

  “But I haven’t finished yet,” said Thacher, holding up a small scrap of sea bread as proof.

  “And he hasn’t started,” Owen shot back.

  Thacher made a show of getting up, moving in a slow, pained way. As he did, he leaned over and muttered something to Henry. The gusty wind died down once more, and Owen heard the words clearly.

  “Who died and made him captain?”

  The words hit Owen in the gut, stirring up a swirl of anger and sorrow. He shot them both a look. Henry looked down immediately, but this time it was Thacher who refused to look away. He smiled back. “What?” he said, his voice dripping with fake innocence.

  Owen played out the exchange in his head. He wants me to repeat it, to say what I heard. He glared back at Thacher. I won’t do it; I won’t defame my captain’s memory. “Watch yourself, hold rat,” he said.

  Thacher’s smile fell away and his expression darkened. “I think we should all watch ourselves now,” he said, his tone ice cold despite the burning sun.

  “Is that a threat?” said Owen.

  “It’s a fact,” said Thacher as he turned on his heel and headed for the wheel.

  Owen looked around at the others as if to say, You all heard that, right? But no one said anything until Aaron flopped down on the deck with his food a few moments later. Henry turned to him immediately and pointed over at Emma and Maria. “They’re girls!” he said.

  Aaron’s mouth fell open, and a little spray of sea bread crumbs rained down onto his lap. His surprise was so immediate and genuine that everyone except Owen laughed.

  “I’m Maria.”

  “And I’m Emma,” they said, introducing themselves to their old friend for the first time.

  Emma’s hair was down now too, and Owen saw it fly out behind her in a quick gust of wind.

  As it did, the ship rose up abruptly and slammed down with a heavy crash. Owen looked up toward the bow and saw white spray clear the railing on both sides. He shouted back over his shoulder, “Ease her as she pitches, Thacher! The wind is picking up, and the waves with it!”

  As the others chattered about the sisters’ secret and laughed at “the Spanish style” and their own gullibility, Owen fell back into his own thoughts. Henry claimed to have known all along and was roundly hooted down. Owen ignored the noise and looked up into the sails.

  The wind is definitely stronger now, he thought. It had been no more than a steady breeze that morning, and they’d set every sail they had to catch every puff of it. But now the wind was no longer in such short supply, and the gusts were driving them forward hard. He tried to tune out the chatter all around him and listen. Another gust and he heard the wood of the mainmast groan from somewhere up high. He squinted skyward into the topsail, but before he could find the source of the sound, another groan from the foremast drew his attention.

  As he looked up, he relied on his other senses as well. He sat heavily on his haunches, feeling the ship rushing forward beneath him, smashing down the waves as it went. Small, he thought, but growing. He gazed up toward the bow and waited for the Polaris to crest a larger wave. He didn’t have to wait long. As the big boat crashed down, he felt the impact
shoot up his spine and ring his skull like a bell.

  He gulped down his last dirt-dry mouthful of sea bread and looked around.

  This time it was Emma who met his gaze. “Think we should reef some of the sails?” she said.

  It was exactly what he’d been wondering. Shortening some of the sail would reduce the amount of wind they hauled and be easier on the ship. It was the prudent thing to do. The others hated the idea immediately.

  “Are you joking?” said Henry. “This wind is wonderful. The faster we get to port, the better.”

  Owen ignored his words utterly—he was no sailor.

  “Nothing more than some afternoon gusts,” said Maria with a shrug.

  Owen tried to ignore that too. What did she know of the weather?

  “The ship has been through much worse,” said Aaron evenly.

  “Yes, much worse,” agreed Owen. “But not at full sail.”

  Aaron glanced up nervously.

  “A few gusts, nothing more,” repeated Maria before pushing further. “And we’re lucky to have them.” She paused. “We are still near the equator, no?”

  “Yes,” admitted Owen. He knew where she was going with this and decided to get there first. “And still prone to the doldrums.”

  The hot, windless stretches known as the doldrums had plagued them on the voyage out, leaving them drifting helplessly for days at a time. Owen remembered the frustration etched on the faces of captain and crew, a speedy trip ruined, the sea seeming to turn to syrup beneath them.

  He paused too long in the memory, and the others redoubled their protests.

  “We have a good wind at our backs,” said Henry. “The most logical approach is to take advantage of it.”

  Owen didn’t care for the boy’s seamanship, but if he was being completely honest, he was somewhat intimidated by Henry’s scientific education. Logical. He nodded.

  “I wish to get to port as soon as possible,” said Aaron. “Even a few puffs earlier would be welcome.”

  Emma looked around at the others. “We all want to reach port,” she said. “This ship is an awful place now. But sailing it alone will not be easy, and we have to be smart—and maybe cautious too.” She turned to face Owen. “Tell us what you think we should do, and I’ll abide by it.”