The Unlikely Master Genius

by Carla Kelly

  To her surprise, there wasn’t any more traffic this morning than there had been at dusk yesterday. She looked up and down the quiet street. “It’s almost as though no one even knows St. Brendan’s exists,” she marveled.

  “That may have been one of the reasons our patron, whoever he is, chose this place,” Able replied. “He apparently wanted a quiet, out-of-the-way place to prepare young men for the fleet. A place with no distractions and few temptations.” He patted her hip. “I may be the only one at St. Brendan’s with distractions.”

  “Master Six, can I not take you anywhere?”

  “I’ll behave. Perhaps. In we go, Meri.”

  She paused inside the door and sniffed the air, pleasantly surprised to smell rye bread and the tang of dried herring. They followed two older boys in uniform, who looked back at them. One of them waited for the Sixes to join him.

  “You were in Master Blake’s history class, weren’t you?” Able asked. “Your name is Daniel Renfrew.”

  The boy in question stared. “Master, how on earth did you remember my name?”

  He probably saw your name on a scrap of paper. Upside down. Written in invisible ink, Meridee thought in delight.

  “When I entered the room, your instructor had just said your name in exasperation because you did not know who won the War of the Roses,” Able reminded him. “I trust you remember it now.”

  Renfrew nodded. “You recited a quatrain, sir. How can I forget it?”

  “Easiest way to learn things. Are we headed in the right direction for breakfast?”

  “Aye, sir, and … and Mrs. Six,” the student said. “This way.”

  He opened a heavily carved door and gestured them in. Meridee took a step back, shy to see twenty-one boys staring back at her, plus servants and the man she remembered as Headmaster Thaddeus Croker.

  Able pushed her forward gently. The headmaster rose and took her by the hand. He raised his other hand for silence in an already silent room.

  “Lads, may I present Master Six, St. Brendan’s newest instructor, and his charming wife, Mrs. Six.”

  The students were of all sizes, dressed alike. Most had dark hair cut short, some with olive skin similar to her husband’s, and others with the light tones and red hair of the British Isles. I will probably come to know you all, she thought, as she inclined her head toward them.

  Croker ushered her toward the head table and indicated two chairs. “Do join us, please,” he said. “I believe there will be a cook coming your way today or tomorrow. Until then, you are most cordially welcome here.”

  Able pulled her chair out for her and she sat down. The plates and cups were of tin, with a serviette for her lap. The cleanliness of the table met with her approval, as did the little dish of reconstituted apples beside each plate and thick slices of rye bread. There were boiled eggs with the heat still rising from them, and porridge waiting to be passed.

  Headmaster Croker cleared his throat. “Now, my lads, we will pray.”

  His blessing on the food was short. “Lord of battle, Lord who calms the seas, bless this food for our use and our service to the nation, amen.”

  Meridee smiled to herself, thinking of the occasionally long-winded prayers her brother-in-law inflicted on his offspring, boys the same age as these seated before her. This was better. She was no lover of cold food.

  Meridee waited for the headmaster to pick up his spoon and begin so they could all eat, but he wasn’t through.

  “What will it be this morning?” he asked.

  Several hands went up. Croker pointed to a small fellow, who stood up at attention. “Please, sir, ‘Heart of Oak.’ ”

  “Very well. Lasenby, give us a note.”

  From another table came Lasenby’s note. The benches scraped back as twenty-one boys leaped to their feet. “First table, what say you begin this time?” Croker asked.

  The words rang to the beams above. “ ‘Come, cheer up, my lads, ’tis to glory we steer, To add something more to this wonderful year. To honor we call you as freeman not slaves, For who are so free as the sons of the waves?’ ”

  She felt her heart grow tender at the words sung by workhouse bastards, her husband among them, who must have felt more like slaves, surviving by sheer will. Able had already reduced her to tears with a few of his own memories, but these boys wanted her sympathy no more than he did, she was certain. They sang with gusto, pride on their faces.

  Everyone joined in the rousing chorus. Should I? Meridee asked herself as her husband started to sing. Certainly I should. She took her own deep breath and came in a few words later. “ ‘… Jolly tars are our men, We always are ready; steady boys, steady! We’ll fight and we’ll conquer again and again.’ ”

  Two more verses followed. Able took her hand and pressed it to his heart, the heart that had beat in rhythm pressed against hers only a few hours ago. She watched the young faces before her, feeling a sudden dread at the sharp reminder that the purpose of this school was to train them for the fleet, war, and possible death.

  Have I the courage for such a place as this? she asked herself. God alone knows. Time will tell if I have a heart of oak.

  Chapter Eleven

  He had married a game goer. Able watched as Meridee took a bite of what he told her was burgoo, and recoiled.

  “My stars, but this is sweet,” she whispered to him. “Burgoo?”

  “Porridge to you,” he said. “Cookie makes great pots of it before we sail into battle and he has to douse the fire in the galley. The sweeter the better. Have a boiled egg, dear heart.”

  Dear Heart grinned at him, looking nearly as young as the lads who ate and watched her covertly. “I crack it on the table?”

  “No frills here, Mrs. Six,” he assured her. “Headmaster, the rye bread is an unexpected touch.”

  “A baker on the next street has discovered us,” Croker said, as he applied a dab of jam. “We even had white rolls for Christmas Day. The lads were fair amazed.”

  “Over something so simple,” his wife said. Able heard the marvel in her voice.

  “You cannot fathom how such a kindness tallies into hearts like theirs,” Able replied, then amended, “like mine. I’d have given the earth for plum jam, any small sign someone knew I was in a terrible place and cared even slightly.”

  “You’ll have plum jam and more,” he thought he heard her say, but she had turned her face into his sleeve.

  “I already do,” he said. “Thank you.” He took another spoonful of burgoo, hard to swallow around the boulder in his throat.

  He gazed at the boys in their two rows perpendicular to the head table. Some of them, probably the newest arrivals, ate the way he used to eat, hunched furtively over their burgoo, packing it in as fast as possible, fearful someone might kype it. He recognized others eating slowly as they could, wanting it to last because they knew there would be nothing before evening. Able’s experience taught him it was one way or the other.

  He turned his attention to the older table. These boys took more time. As they chatted with each other, they passed the rye bread up and down the table. The jam went around too, no one snatching more than his share, because they already knew what the younger boys didn’t—there would be more.

  He watched in appreciation as one of the serving women walked down the row between the two tables, a light hand on one young boy’s shoulder when he tried to grab all the rolls, a word (he hoped) of encouragement in another lad’s ear when he just sat there, too stunned to eat. She moved on.

  Meri sat up straight. He felt the tension in her arm before she moved slightly away. Watching her face, he tensed himself, because every emotion of hers seemed to be registering in him, as well. Was this another facet of his weird mental acuity?

  She turned to face him and he saw resolution in her eyes. “I’m going to be on the employment roll soon?” she asked.

  “Two weeks or so. I believe it’s negotiable.”

  “I’m starting early.”

  Admirat
ion for his wife grew even greater as she walked to the little boy who sat there staring at his food. With a minimum of fuss, the student next to him moved over and Meridee sat beside him. With no hesitation, her hand went to his back, and then to his neck. She pulled him close and let him sob into her breast.

  In another moment Able heard her humming to him. He smiled when he realized it was the chorus to “Heart of Oak.” In no time, all the boys at the table were singing, too, this time softly and slowly, as though England’s most rousing Navy ditty had turned into a lullaby.

  When they finished, they looked at each other and laughed. Talk resumed, the bread went around again, and the little fellow picked up his spoon. Meridee sat with him until he finished his burgoo. She buttered rye bread for him, which threatened to bring on more tears. He knew from hard experience that no one ever saw butter in a workhouse, but the now-fortunate child had the kindest woman in England—no, in Newton’s clockwork universe—seated beside him. She took a bite, and he took a bite. And another. His smile could have lit up the room.

  “Master Able?”

  “Yes, Headmaster?”

  “I thought only you were going to be St. Brendan’s summum bonum.”

  “An honest mistake, sir.”

  Headmaster and master smiled at each other in perfect charity.

  When breakfast finished, the lad on Meri’s other side helped the boy take his dishes to the rolling table where the matron stood. Meridee watched a moment more, then rejoined him at the head table.

  The headmaster took her hand. “Mrs. Six, you have a fine instinct.”

  “I like children,” she said simply.

  Croker gestured toward the door. “The boys have their assignments for the morning. We’re doing some general tidying around the place. An institution as old at St. Brendan’s never lacks for corners, sills, and closets where grime lurks. Come with me, both of you.”

  Able pulled his wife close in the hall and kissed her cheek, to the amusement of two boys already poking at lurking grime.

  “Master Six, you’re supposed to set a sterling example for the lads at St. Brendan’s,” Meri told him. “Kissing me can’t be approved in any contract devised by the hand of man.”

  “I contend we two are the best example anyone could ask for, Mrs. Six,” he replied, completely unrepentant.

  “You’re hopeless of remedy, you know,” she said as they went into the headmaster office.

  “Alas,” was the best he could summon on short notice. He could explain tonight that workhouse boys needed to know how real people behaved, and not the frail women who abandoned them, the ogres who ruined them, or the sanctimonious who judged them. He reconsidered; Meri needed no explanation. She knew.

  They sat in high-backed chairs in front of the headmaster’s desk. He spread out four sheets of paper and picked up the first one. “David Ten, whom I believe you have already met,” Croker said. “He’s one of our numbered boys, Master Six, as you have obviously divined.”

  “He paid us a visit. He worries about being beaten if he cannot furnish a right answer,” Meridee said.

  Croker steepled his fingers together. “I cannot guarantee that in other classes.”

  “Master Blake has another stick to replace the one I broke?” Able asked.

  “He seems to think no one will learn without it.”

  “Is he a good teacher, otherwise?” Able asked.

  “I thought he was, until I watched you teach,” Croker said. “Now I have my doubts.”

  Able knew it was not his prerogative to criticize the instructors. “How did you choose the students?”

  “The teacher at St. Pancras Workhouse told me David is relentlessly curious, and he wasn’t pleased.”

  “Curiosity can drive an uncreative instructor mad, when he has thirty lads crammed into one room,” Able said. “Let’s put David’s skill to good use.”

  “Mrs. Six, to answer your question, I sent out inquiries to workhouses in England and Scotland, requesting them to let us know of intelligent, curious, imaginative, resilient lads for a special school.” The headmaster made a face. “I heard from few. Are you surprised, Master Six?”

  “Not at all,” Able said. “For the most part, workhouse teachers have no imagination of their own. The resentment is high in such places, and it creates bullies. Where it does not create bullies, you will find men of moral superiority who think infants are responsible for their parents’ sins. I confess to being surprised you found any teachers willing to help you.”

  “They’re rare,” Croker admitted. He eyed Able shrewdly. “You are a man of firm opinion.”

  “I am an observer by nature,” Able replied. “My observations propelled me off to sea at nine. If I wanted to survive, I had no choice.”

  “How did you find your pupils?” Meridee asked.

  Able smiled inside. Trust Meri to persist with her original line of reasoning until she was satisfied. She was not a woman easily distracted.

  “I started asking workhouse teachers about restless pupils, argumentative, endless questioners—students they would happily discharge.”

  “You had to sort through a lot of chaff, I suspect,” Able commented, thinking of the criminals-in-the-making in Dumfries Workhouse.

  “Indeed. Some were rascals I wouldn’t have taken if the king himself had recommended them. That’s how I found the jewels in the midden.” He sat back in triumph. “I have assembled leaders, scholars, seekers, number-lovers, all with a goodly dose of rascality and shrewdness.”

  “They are survivors,” Able said. “I recognize them.”

  Croker held up another paper and slid it toward them. “I see that Mrs. Six wishes me to get to the point.”

  “Sir, I—”

  “Quite all right, my dear. I tend to wander from the subject. Nick. My dear, he’s the lad you so kindly tended during breakfast. He is new to us. He showed up at a workhouse in Northumberland, the one name pinned to his shirt. Poor lad, he was shivering so much I thought he would overset himself.”

  “He is here because—”

  “He loves to read.” He shook his head. “He also does not trust a single living soul on the planet. Who would, with parents who abandoned him?”

  Another paper came across the desk. “Stephen Hoyt, the son of two thieves transported to New South Wales. He’s a runner.”

  “How are we to keep him here?” Meridee asked.

  “Plain and simple: you will earn your one pound a month, my dear. I cannot answer your question.”

  “I will make the Six home so pleasant that no one wants to bolt,” she said.

  I wouldn’t bolt, Able thought. As it is, I must be pried from bed with a lever.

  “Last and most certainly not least, I give you John Mark, a son of a girl who, as far as we know, was snatched and passed around a fo’c’s’le for nine horrible months, then dumped on Gunwharf to die. None of those barbarians let on they had her on board, and she was used terribly. The teacher in his workhouse called John Mark tenacious, and if I may, durable.” He sighed. “Those animals had even ….” He stopped. “No more.”

  Able heard a small sound, and took Meri’s hand. “Life is no picnic on the docks and in the belly of ships.”

  “Were those men punished?” she asked, her voice small.

  Croker ran his hand across his eyes. “Not enough. I believe they were lashed and separated to other ships, at least.”

  “I hope they all died miserably,” she said, her voice trembling with anger.

  “I, too.” Croker spread his hands on his desk. “There you have it—four boys with no advantages except that now they are in a safe place where they will be trained, and in your home, cared for.”

  “I’ll do my best,” Meri said.

  “I do not doubt that for a minute, Mrs. Six,” Croker said as he stood up. “When you go across the street, you will find my own housemaid waiting for you. Put her to work today. You’ll have some household assistance of a more permanent nature soon
. Not much gets done in the week between Christmas and New Year’s.”

  A great deal got done in our case, Able thought. I’ve never been happier.

  “See your lady home and return to me. I’ll spell out your own duties, and see how hard we can work you, short of mutiny.”

  Chapter Twelve

  “I have lived a cloistered existence,” was Meri’s comment as she let go of his arm, once they crossed the street, and nodded to the maid waiting at their door.

  “Please never resent me for dragging you into this life,” he said, voicing his only fear. “I never used to fear anything. Now I fear that.”

  Bless her sweet heart, Meri kissed him, evidently forgetting the maid only a few steps behind her. His hand on her lovely throat, he kissed her back.

  Another quick kiss and she turned around to see the maid. Meri’s laugh was so contagious that the maid smiled. “I am so discreet! You are Headmaster Croker’s maid?”

  Meri dipped a playful curtsey to her lord and master, unlocked the door, and ushered the maid inside. Able went back to the school, pleased that his wife of recent tenure hadn’t run back to Devonshire. A man could count his blessings.

  A smile on his own face, Theodore Croker had apparently watched the whole trip across the street, the kiss, and the laughter. Able wondered if he should apologize for his bold behavior, but decided against it. After all, Portsmouth wasn’t a city known for its rectitude or the quality of its citizens.

  “She’s a charming lady,” the headmaster said, admiration evident in his voice.

  He pointed toward the hall with classrooms. “We’ll begin this new term on January second. Third door on the right, Master Able.”

  His corner classroom overlooked the Solent, with its anchored warships and the distant line of prison hulks. There was a desk, battered but serviceable, a filled bookcase, and twelve desks and chairs. A globe tilting at an angle on its base and a chalkboard completed the room’s entire furnishing.

  “We’re a bare-bones academic institution,” Croker said. “Our patrons are sincere in their determination to help our wharf rats and misbegotten urchins, but not everyone looks with favor on the poor, deserving or otherwise.”