I turned to him. “So what were the pirates after? Why did they pursue your father again? I presume it was years later, wasn’t it? Did he still have the map?”
He looked at me blankly for a moment, as though he’d forgotten what we were talking about. Then, shaking his head, he said, “No. Marshall Looper took the map. They somehow had the impression that my father had a key to the map … a legend. I’m unsure how. At the time of the mutiny, Fredrick arrived and informed my father of what the men were doing and my father absent-mindedly shoved some papers in his jacket pocket before hurrying out the door. So perhaps, when Marshall found out, he assumed they were pertinent.”
“Fredrick?”
“One of the loyal members of his crew.”
“And were the papers pertinent?”
The captain shook his head.
“Do you still have them?”
Again, he shook his head. “They were burned long ago.”
He sat down on the edge of the small bed.
There were still more questions to ask. But instinctively I didn’t ask them. It seemed the captain was through talking about it.
“The delve into our histories, though entertaining, is irrelevant. I still don’t know what to do with you once we get to port.”
I sighed and leaned back in my chair, Two years of my life’s work, my drive and ambition and purpose … and for what? Was there no greater reason behind it all? Was it just cruelly arbitrary? Had I simply proven a hypothesis? And now I’m stuck here, vulnerable and alone? I couldn’t bear it if that was true.
The path before me was bleak and uncertain. I still needed food, shelter and clothing. I needed to make a living, some kind of life. And how was I to do that, displaced and disoriented as I was here, away from my home, my people, my world and my work? I couldn’t live off the captain’s kindness forever.
I stood up and went to him and sat down beside him on the bed.
“What are your plans, Captain?” I asked, watching him closely. “How long will you be ashore?”
He sighed, running his hand down his hardened, weathered face. “Not long. I have to see my backers, take inventory and get paid and, in turn, pay my men. A few weeks are usually all it takes for a new assignment.” Seeing the look on my face, he hurried to say, “I won’t leave you until you’re situated.”
“I know,” I said quietly.
“Are you trained at all? Could you work? I hate to ask it, but ….”
“I suppose I could teach, couldn’t I?”
“A woman?”
“Surely with my credentials they would overlook my gender.”
“What are your credentials?”
“I have doctorate and post doctorate degrees …” I began.
“From where?”
I told him.
“It is unfamiliar to me.”
“Surely it is obvious I’m educated.”
“Yes. But one needs documentation.”
We both sighed, sitting there side by side. I shook my head and clenched my fist. “I will find a way. There has to be a way. There has to be meaning in all of this.”
“You need a husband.”
I looked up to find him watching me. His face, which I have described as unexceptional, suddenly seemed extraordinary to me, the shape of his dark, melancholy eyes and the way his springy hair fell on his brow, suddenly poignant. I wondered how it had eluded my attention for so long. If I had been an artist, I would have wanted to sketch it.
“I used to scorn statements like that,” I murmured. “Strange. I have no inclination to do so now.”
“The sea is all I know. If I led a different life then ….” He made a helpless gesture with his hands as his voice trailed off.
I looked at him thoughtfully, taking my time, gazing at his weathered face with leisure. His eyes were a deep brown, his skin tan. His lips were pale and slightly parted, his teeth a steady row of white. I saw that scar again, peeking up at me over his collar and it seemed to beckon to me.
I felt something deep inside me budding, taking new shape and life, something novel and strange. I didn’t try to analyze it, instinct warning me that dissecting it would surely destroy it, and I couldn’t bear to do that.
All I know is, I felt alive. And I knew … I knew that I had never been alive before in all my life, my rigid, academic, unfeeling life.
I leaned closer to him, answering the call.
After a moment of hesitation, he, too, leaned forward, bringing us very close together.
My thoughts ceased to exist. There was no time, no earth, or sun, or moon or stars. Suddenly, and against all laws of logic, the universe collapsed, leaving just him and me together. I will never understand it.
He whispered my name, and just as I was about to close my eyes and surrender to this strange, tangible atmosphere, something flashed below me. I looked at it, my eyes focusing on it in an instant.
“Captain!” I cried, stooping to look at his belt buckle. “It’s impossible.”
“What?” he exclaimed, alarmed.
“Those markings … that’s shorthand. Modern shorthand.”
*** *** ***
“Why is it I’ve never seen this buckle before today?” I asked breathlessly.
By now I had the buckle in my hands. I hadn’t asked him to take off his belt, but when I stooped to get a good look at it, the captain pushed me away and tore off the belt, nearly tossing it at me.
“Obviously because I hadn’t worn it until today,” the captain answered, his voice something between irritation and resignation. He lay on the bed, a hand to his head.
“But why not, sir? If I’d seen it earlier, it would have saved me much anxiety.”
“I only wear it with … particular clothing,” he said.
“Particular clothing? And what are those?”
He didn’t answer me. He seemed very surly and cantankerous all of a sudden, when only moments ago I thought him inordinately gentle. I looked at him lying there on the bed. And for the first time, I noted that he wore a jacket of rich, soft red, the cuffs slightly frayed, and pants … breeches, they were called, that were very dark. His stockings were white and his shoes shone.
“Did your father give you this buckle?” I asked after a moment, holding it out to him.
He looked at me in surprise. “How did you know?”
I went to him and dropped to my knees by the bed. I could feel the glow radiating off my face when I whispered, “Captain, don’t you see? This is it! This is the answer. We needn’t worry anymore.”
“What on earth are you saying? What’s the answer?”
“This,” I said, holding it out to him. “You know what these markings are? It’s shorthand.”
He took the buckle from me and looked at the strange markings engraved on it. “This isn’t shorthand,” he scoffed.
“It’s American shorthand,” I said.
“What are you talking about? There’s no such thing as American shorthand.”
“There is. You just don’t know it.”
I took the belt back, and rubbed it almost affectionately with my fingers. This was it: my calling. This was why I was here. Incredibly … somehow, someway, writings from the future had found their way into the past. Present day, American shorthand wouldn’t be invented for at least another 150 years. And yet, here it was, in my hands, taken from ancient documents that were thousands of years old. The Maharahi Pharaohs reigned well before 2000BC. How could this have happened? How was it possible?
But it was possible. I was living proof that it was possible. And my mission was clear: I had to unearth this priceless treasure and present it to the world.
“Oh, Captain! We needn’t worry about anything anymore. Don’t you see? This is the answer. This solves all our problems.”
“Would you stop saying that?” he exclaimed angrily. “What madness has affected you now?”
“It isn’t madness, Captain. Don’t you see what we must do? We will find the treasure, you an
d me. And never worry about the future again.”
“Find the treasure? You are mad.”
“I’m not! The answers are all here.” I gestured to the buckle. “They’ve been here all the time, just waiting for someone to unlock them.”
His brows came down and he looked at me sternly. “What nonsense.”
“It isn’t nonsense,” I exclaimed. “You said the map didn’t have a legend, that it was illegible. But this is the legend. You’ve been wearing it around your middle all your life.”
He abruptly rose and walked away from me. “I told you, the treasure is a myth. It doesn’t exist.”
“Your father didn’t even know it for what it was. Perhaps he suspected, I don’t know. But he had the images on those scraps of paper engraved on his belt and burned the papers, knowing that the safest place to hide something was in plain sight.”
The captain turned and looked at me.
“It’s why I was sent to you, don’t you see?”
“Sent to me?”
“Yes. It’s why I’m here. My calling. My mission. This is what I’ve been looking for since I arrived.”
He looked at me. “What are you saying?” he asked, intrigued despite himself.
I stood and went to him again. But when I did, he backed away from me and put the desk between us as if he were afraid of me.
“We retrieve the map. We search for the treasure. We bring it to land and present it to the world. Our reputations will provide us with opportunities until the end of our days.”
He looked at me in horror. “You really are mad, aren’t you? Just how do you suggest we do all this?”
I blinked. “You know where the map is, don’t you?”
“I most certainly do not.”
I looked at him sternly, and he had the grace to look away. “Do you want to know what I think, Captain?” Without waiting for him to answer, I continued, “I think your father’s friends, the pirates who sided with him during the mutiny, continued in their piracy after your father retired from it. Fredrick, didn’t you say his name was? It was he and his men who arrived in time to save you when you were a child, and it was he and his men who raised you. And that’s why you can pilot these waters without being molested. Because you have allies in these waters. But you also have enemies, don’t you, Captain?”
He stared at me in surprise, but he did not dispute me.
“I could tell by the look on Finley’s face he was afraid when he heard the word pirate, yet a look at that pirate ship and he was at ease again. It’s the only explanation. And you know Marshall Looper still has that map, and that he is still searching. It’s the truth, isn’t it?”
The captain came around the table and seized my arm. “Keep your voice down,” he bit between his teeth.
“Don’t you see, Captain? We can do this. We must.”
“What can we do? Are you seriously suggesting I take you out on the open ocean yet again? That we attack a pirate ship, steal a map that may or may not still exist, and go treasure hunting?”
“Yes,” I cried happily.
He released my arm, throwing me from him. “It’s out of the question,” he said succinctly, and then turned away and tore off the pretty jacket with no regard for its delicate material. “And what’s more, I don’t want you breathing a hint of this to anyone. Do you understand?”
I looked down at the buckle, carefully reading it. “It is very cryptic,” I said. “I can know very little until I see the map itself. It gives the direction of North, possible markings for landscape.”
“The fact you claim you can read the legend puts you in more danger than ever before,” he said more to himself than to me, nearly tearing his hair out with his hands. He turned to me suddenly. “Not anyone, not the crew, not anyone ashore, not even Finley, can know about it. You understand?”
I scoffed, still reading the buckle. “It also gives a date and time. Interesting.”
There was a noise at the door, and the captain looked up in consternation while I turned the buckle over in my hand and looked on the back. “Oh, darn. It’s empty,” I said.
Suddenly it was ripped from my hands and tossed to the floor where it clinked on the hard wood in protest.
“Enough. I demand you forget this madness. Swear never to bring it up again, not with me, not with anybody. We are going ashore, and you are going to stay there. Forever. If I have to bind and gag you to ensure it, I will.”
I smiled, exhilarated and revived, feeling more affection for him than ever before. “I’m so happy!” In my exuberance, I flung my arms around him. “And I know you well enough to see that your ostensible anger is only unconscious concern for my safety, Captain, and I think it’s sweet.”
I drew away and looked up at him, my hands gripping his upper arms. I continued gently, apologetically, “But you will change your mind. You will be convinced. No one can stop this. Not even you, O Captain my Captain, Mallory Tucker.”
I twirled in a circle before falling onto the bed, my arms outstretched, my eyes on the ceiling, a smile on my face.
There was a soft knock at the door, and I turned to see Finley enter. In his subdued, unassuming way, he asked the captain for his orders, thanked him, and quietly left.
But something on his face made me wonder if he perhaps overheard some of our conversation, in the way he glanced at me out of the corner of his eye, and at the captain not at all. I chided myself for being suspicious. And surely it wouldn’t even matter if he had overheard us. But I couldn’t help an odd shiver run down my spine.
Chapter Seven
Notes: First contact with aristocracy: a Duke Charles Dubois. Would make interesting case study. Manner and dress exceedingly pleasing. Cursory study reveals subject’s affable yet complex personality inordinately engaging to researcher. Witness similar reaction in general population.
Captain only exception. Disputes hypothesis. Explanation not forthcoming.
** Researcher experienced inordinate pleasure in title and hierarchy despite democratic upbringing. Intriguing. Customs and atmosphere affecting despite efforts at indifference: the standard protocol for researcher/subject relationship.
I leaned over the bow of the ship, watching the land slowly approach as we bobbed up and down on the waves. It seemed we were going tremendously fast all of a sudden with something like the shore as a marker.
England.
I turned to my notes that I held in my grip, and struggled against the wind as it attempted to take them from me. As I scribbled on the paper, my hair repeatedly blew into my face, blocking my vision, and I had to continually brush it away.
“I shall learn to fashion my hair according to the mode of the day, Captain. It will not do for me to …,” I looked up and found that he had moved down the deck, and was speaking to Finley. I went to him, notes and all, writing along the way.
I stood behind him, finishing a sentence, and when he turned, he bumped into me.
He cursed, then quickly asked if I was hurt.
“You always ask that,” I said complacently, “and I always say ‘no.’”
“If I’m always trampling you, it’s because you are always underfoot.”
I looked up, frowning. “You told me to stay close, didn’t you? I’m only obeying orders.”
“I am incredibly busy and simply don’t have time for your nonsense today.” He turned to leave.
“Nonsense?” I followed after him. “What is your problem? You’ve been snapping my head off since breakfast.”
He exhaled a long breath and shook his head. “I apologize.”
“Captain, I sense anxiety. Is there a reason for this?”
“I’m not anxious,” he told me, but he still avoided my gaze.
“Of course you are. Look at you, you’re in knots. What is causing so much apprehension? It started when ….” I looked around and saw his eyes on the distant shore. “It started when land came into view.” My eyes narrowed when he swung on me. “It is the approach of land, isn�
�t it? What is the problem, Captain? Don’t you like shore?”
“You’re mistaken Rachel, as usual.”
“I’m pretty sure I’m right, Captain. You should have seen the look on your face when I said it. You looked startled and a little afraid. I think I’m right, yet I don’t know what you should be apprehensive about. I should think you’d be relieved to be finished after a long journey, to finally return home and be able to rest. You certainly don’t act like the ship is your favorite place. So why should you be unhappy to find it come to an end.”
He looked out to sea, ignoring me now. But I wasn’t fooled. His ears were perked, his posture defensive.
I thought about it. “It can’t be because you’ll miss your crew. You aren’t exactly on the best terms with them. And Finley is definitely a permanent fixture in your life, so it can’t be that. You’ve no family on the other side of the ocean. And you’re home here. You are clearly English. If you’ll allow me, a psychological evaluation would — ”
He suddenly turned. “Would you stop talking like that,” he demanded.
I blinked in surprise.
“There you go again. You’re unintelligible. You speak as though you’re not even human, like you’re just studying us from afar. You changed for a while, and I thought … I hoped ….” He stopped momentarily and then shook his head. “But here you are once more, worse than ever.”
I opened my mouth but the words came with difficulty. “I-I was merely … that is, I was simply trying to understand ….” I shook my head.
The captain’s eyes widened, and I knew he regretted his outburst. His hands rose as though he were attempting to ward off an unpredictable beast. “Forget I said it, Rachel,” he begged. “Speak however you wish. For heaven’s sake, just don’t cry.”
I laughed. “Captain, I wasn’t going to cry.”
He lowered his hands and leaned back. “Of course not. I don’t know why I said it.”
“Why do you say it like that?”
“Like what?”
“Like it’s humorous.”
The Dreamer (The Fall Series) Page 6
