by Carla Kelly
What a dear woman she was, this wife of his. Once inside the house, she set the bones on the hall table and put her hands on each new boy’s shoulder. “You’ll get used to us, I promise,” she said. “Master Six will show you to your room, while I dry off. Lead on, husband. Mrs. Perry will be unhappy if supper gets cold. Doesn’t it smell divine?”
He led Stephen and John upstairs and into their room directly across from the chamber he shared with Meri. She slogged behind him and stood in the hall as he ushered them in.
“It’s a trifle cozy,” she said, apologetic, the perfect hostess even as she dripped on the carpet. “I know the mattresses are comfortable and there are plenty of blankets.”
With a wave of her hand, she went into their chamber and shut the door. Able watched the boys turn toward the closed door like flowers following the sun.
“You’re in good hands, lads,” he said quietly. “This is what it feels like when Dame Fortune smiles.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Dinner was an unalloyed pleasure: meat pie with steam rising out of a hole in the top crust, potatoes boiled in their jackets and mashed with a great dollop of butter that had Nick’s full attention, crusty bread, stewed dried apples, and rice pudding with sultanas moist and plump.
To Able’s eternal delight, Meridee—hair damp, eyes lively—presided with all the panache of a woman who took in strays every day and fed them almost to the point of pain.
At first they had not known what to do when Mrs. Perry set the empty plates on the table and left them there. At St. Brendan’s, they were used to being served filled plates, with a bowl or two going around once. The idea of dishes allowed to roam free on the table seemed to frighten them. Stephen shrank back when Meridee passed him the mashed potatoes.
“You can put as much as you like on your plate,” she told him. “Take what you know you will eat. There is more in the kitchen.”
Able could tell Stephen didn’t believe her. He excused himself, went to the kitchen, and asked Mrs. Perry to bring out the entire pot of potatoes. “They need to see there is more in here,” he told her.
He sat down again, and Mrs. Perry carried in the pot, tipping it to make sure they could see that more remained. Only then did the anxious look leave Stephen’s eyes. When Meridee handed him the bowl again, he served himself a tentative spoonful, then another.
“What you do now is hand the bowl to Nick,” Meridee said.
Nick took his turn, then handed it on to John Mark. Touched, Able watched how Stephen’s eyes followed the bowl all around the table, until his wife set it in front of him again.
“We do that with each dish,” she explained. “If you want more of something and it is out of your reach, you ask, ‘Please pass the whatever-it-is.’ ”
“Suppose he won’t pass it?” Stephen asked.
“I can think of a time, becalmed in the doldrums and hungry, when I didn’t want to pass the food,” Able said. He ducked when Meridee took a swing at his head. Stephen even smiled.
“That is precisely what my sailing master was ready to do to me,” Able said. He looked at each boy in turn, seeing years of hardship ahead for them, but also a certain camaraderie he doubted his wife would understand. “I wish I could tell you that life at sea is all grog and pasties, but it isn’t. You’ll be hungry, frightened, and uncertain, at times.”
“It’s still sounds better than St. Pancras,” Davey said, ever-hopeful David Ten.
“Aye, lad. Nothing is quite as lovely as seeing the Southern Cross in the night sky near the tip of South America. By the time you join the fleet, you will each possess skills the Navy needs. You will have useful work to do, in this time of national emergency.” He looked down at Mrs. Perry’s wonderful meat pie and his own mound of potatoes. “Eat and talk, lads, but don’t talk with your mouth full or Mrs. Six will probably give you her evil stare.”
To his delight, Meri opened her mouth to protest, then shut it and glared at him. “It looks mostly like that,” she said serenely.
He blessed his wife again and again through that first meal with their young lodgers, as she kept up a steady, mundane conversation, asking him about his day, telling him the tailor had delivered those two promised shirts, and reminding him that a haircut wouldn’t be a bad idea. It was married-couple conversation, in its own way gently reassuring the boys that their lives were different now.
When the meal ended, Meridee asked the boys to help her carry the dishes to the kitchen. “We don’t have a maid of all work yet, so you’ll be helping Mrs. Perry with the dishes,” she said. “Pass me your plates and follow me with the bowls.”
Without a word, they did as she said. Able smiled to see Nick pocket one of the remaining meat pies, which gave Stephen silent permission to do the same. Studiously unmindful, Meridee led her gaggle of lodgers into the kitchen while Able went into the sitting room and stood by the window, wondering how he had become the luckiest man in the realm.
Meridee joined him at the window, putting her arms around him and resting her head against his back. “Mrs. Perry is ordering them about and they are doing exactly as she demands,” she said. “We must recommend some house rules to them.”
“First one, Meri: no one bothers us once lights are doused,” he said.
“Unless I hear them crying,” his wife amended. “No one cries in the Six home without attention.”
Only last night, he would have carried her up the stairs after dinner and plopped her on their bed. Now they had a houseful of boys to consider. “What are our rules?” he teased, taking her by the hand. “You know, general merriment and all that.”
“We might have to become more creative,” his practical wife told him. “Earlier rising, perhaps? Middle of the night frivolity?”
“We already do that,” he reminded her.
“Then we’ll continue.”
He looked toward the open door. “Dishes done, lads? Kitchen clean?”
“Aye, sir,” Nick told him.
They stood close together at the door, uncertain, wondering what was next. He gestured them inside. “Find a chair or sit on the deck, if you’d rather. We don’t stand on much ceremony in the Six household.”
The floor suited them, so it suited him too, as he sat on the carpet with them and leaned his head against Meridee’s knees. “We need rules,” he began, “same as on a ship.” He looked up at his wife. “What say you, Meri? Should we make the rules? It’s our house.”
“I think John, Stephen, Nick, and Davey should,” she said. “I might have one or two rules, but no more.”
“Let’s start with yours.”
Able stood up and took a sheet of paper and a pencil from the desk. “Who of you has the best hand?” he asked.
“I’ll do it, Master Six,” Nick said, reaching up.
“Good. Meri?”
He sat cross-legged again and her hand went to his head this time. “Clean up after yourselves,” she said. “Yes, write that, Nick.”
The boy did as she asked, then looked at her.
“Do as Mrs. Perry asks,” she said, then patted the boy closest to her, which turned out to be Stephen. In fact, he was almost, but not quite, leaning against her other knee. “I know she is intimidating, but Mrs. Perry has your best interests at heart.” She laughed. “Don’t look so doubtful! She watches out for me, too. That’s all the rules I have.”
Able didn’t know if the boys would say anything. He knew no one in the Dumfries Workhouse had ever wanted his opinion on any subject. “Your turn, lads,” he said gently. “You’ll be abiding by the rules, so you should set them.”
“We shouldn’t fight,” Davey said finally. “Aye, that’s it. No fighting.”
“How will you solve your difficulties, if you do not fight?” Able asked, remembering desperate struggles over food in his dormitory, twenty-five boys tussling over scraps.
“Maybe we could talk about it with you, and let you decide?” John suggested.
Able nearly answered, then h
e realized John was looking at Meridee. “Meri?” he asked.
“I would listen to both sides, but I would expect the warring parties to solve it themselves,” she said. She turned her attention to Nick, who had sprawled on his stomach now, pencil poised. “How should we say that?”
“ ‘Come to Mrs. Six and discuss hard feelings,’ ” John said. He looked over Nick’s shoulder. “There’s one more E in feelings.”
Nick wrote as directed, then looked at his fellow lodgers. “How about ‘Obey all orders?’ ”
The others nodded, so he wrote it. “That’s four.’”
Able regarded Stephen, the fellow Headmaster Croker said was a runner. “I have one,” he said. “No running away.”
Stephen lowered his eyes and traced the carpet pattern with one finger.
Meri watched him too, and put her hand gently on Stephen’s head. “Mrs. Perry tells me Portsmouth isn’t a safe town. I doubt she would let me go in search of a runaway, because she would worry about me, too. I daren’t cross Mrs. Perry.”
Nick wrote, No running away on the paper, his expression troubled. “I wanted to run away in Northumberland,” he said. “I hated it.” He sat up. “Master Six, did you ever run away?”
“You have me,” Able said, knowing better than to lie to these boys. “I ran away three times, was brought back and beaten soundly. Ask Mrs. Six. She has seen the marks on my back.”
His dear one nodded, and sniffed back tears.
“The fourth time I ran away, I crossed the Scottish border in a wagonload of potatoes,” he said, looking at Stephen, whose face wore an old man’s expression. “I ate those potatoes all the way to Plymouth, dirt and all. I hid under bushes at night and hopped on the wagon before it started to roll at dawn. I snuck aboard a captain’s barge under a pile of canvas. When it tied up to a frigate in the harbor, I climbed the chains and said I wanted to join the Navy.”
“How old were you?” Davey asked.
“Nine. They took me into the service and I rose in the ranks the usual way.” No need to tell them that he read every book he could find, learned to tie knots by one observation, had no fear of climbing the sheets and furling sails, and learned to use a sextant by watching the sailing master teach the midshipmen while he was supposed to be scrubbing the deck.
“Couldn’t we do that, too?” Stephen asked, his voice soft. “Work up the usual way?”
“No need. The purpose of St. Brendan’s is to provide you with nautical training,” Able said. “You’ll know enough to be a rated seaman, and not a lubber with nothing to recommend him. No running away,” he repeated.
There were a few more rules, but the point was made, at least he hoped it was. Who knew? Stephen’s expression was unreadable, not unusual in a workhouse lad. “Nick, make another copy and we’ll hang one in each of your rooms,” he said.
He looked up to see Mrs. Perry standing in the doorway, filling it as only she could. “Aye, Mrs. Perry? You look like a woman with a question.”
“I want to know what to do with the rat bones in my kitchen.”
Able couldn’t help laughing at the guilty expressions Davey and Nick exchanged with his wife.
“Davey? You’re the one who seems to like the bones the most,” Meridee prompted. “Stand up.”
Davey did as she said. To Able’s gratification, Nick did too. Bravo, lad. Stand by your mate, Able thought. You never know when you might be required to keep each other alive.
“We cleaned them pretty well, Mrs. Perry,” Davey said. “If we can boil them one last time in clean water tomorrow, we can dry them off and … and ….”
“Yes?” she prompted, looking none too pleased.
“Uh, maybe find someone who knows wood to make us a proper plaque to hang them on,” Davey finished in a rush. “If we knew someone like that.”
Mrs. Perry shook her finger at the boys, but he could tell her heart wasn’t in it. She took her time looking at each child rendered old by hardship. “We will see,” she said. “No promises, mind.”
“No one promises us anything,” Davey piped up cheerfully.
Mrs. Perry muttered something and left the room. Able saw her shoulders shaking. Whether he knew it or not, Davey had conquered.
“Time for bed,” Meridee said. “You’ll breakfast at eight o’clock and—”
“How many bells is that, John Mark?” Able interrupted.
“Eight, Master Six,” he sang out, as though he already inhabited a quarterdeck. “Eight bells and all’s well!”
It was the traditional call at the end of each watch. Oddly enough, all was well; he felt it in his bones. He stood up. “To bed, lads, and handsomely now.”
He stood by while Meridee supervised them below deck in the washroom, acquainting them with the wash basin, soap, and towels, and the need to use the necessary, and not just let fly in the yard, even though it was dark out. He went to his room first and stood in his open door as they followed her upstairs like goslings after mama goose.
“Get into your nightshirts and I will come back and tuck you in.”
He had to hide his smile when that statement, which might have originated on Mars, left them frowning and puzzled.
“Beg pardon, miss?” Nick asked.
“You know, wish you goodnight,” Meridee said. “Don’t you … perhaps not.”
He had to give his woman credit. She squared her shoulders when he knew she wanted to weep.
“Make that another rule, Nick,” Able said. “Every night Mrs. Six will wish you goodnight, because she wants to.”
“Five minutes! You had better be in bed,” she told them.
He gathered her close in their room. “At one pound a month, St. Brendan’s isn’t paying you enough,” he said.
“Silly husband,” she whispered back. “I would do it for nothing.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
In the morning Meridee saw her little charges off. They trooped along beside her husband, who looked back from the other side of the street and blew her a kiss. To her amusement, Davey did the same, and then Nick.
“They’re already behaving like sailors,” Mrs. Perry said. “Cheeky boys.”
Better express contrition now. “Mrs. Perry, I apologize for the bones.”
“If that is the worst thing that happens, we will be numbered among the fortunate,” her cook told her. “The bones are simmering. I will say no more.”
“What have we gotten ourselves into?” Meridee asked.
“You should have thought of that before you married a crazy man,” Mrs. Perry said. She looked down at Meridee from her great height. “Take a nap! Don’t you two sleep?”
Not really, Meridee thought, as she went upstairs to make her bed, not sleep in it, because she had work to do. To be honest, she had wakened him out of a sound sleep once. Then they both lay awake, listening to someone cry across the hall.
Able got up and wrapped his robe around him. She lay in the warm spot he left, as he opened one door across the hall, stood there listening, closed it, then opened the other and went inside.
Her eyes were closing when he came back to bed and nudged her out of his spot. Pulling her close, he said, “Of all people, it was Nick. He seems so assured. He said he was sorry but sometimes he can’t help himself.”
“We can take turns,” she told Able. “Is he the one found with just one name pinned to his shirt?”
“Aye. Maybe it’s better to have no memory of a family at all. How can you miss a family if you never had one?”
So much for her resolution to get a great deal done that morning. When she woke up near noon, weak sunlight had wrestled its way through the gloom of Portsmouth’s winter sky. Rubbing sleep from her eyes, she went to the window and looked across the street to St. Brendan’s. Two floors up and two windows over, she saw her husband gesturing. She watched in appreciation as he threw back his head and laughed.
Gadfreys, but the man was in his element in the classroom.
“And he married you, Mrs
. Six,” she told the mirror’s reflection as she brushed her hair and wound it into a bun low on the nape of her neck. “All that brilliance and amazing good looks married you. Heavens.”
Probably long since back from the baker’s, considering that the sun was overhead now, Mrs. Perry stirred a pot in her kitchen, accompanying herself with a tuneless whistle. Meridee gasped when the cook took a sip using the long-handled spoon. The small sound made Mrs. Perry turn around, start in surprise, then laugh.
“Mrs. Six, this is not rat bone broth!” she said, pointing to the dry sink. “Of course, you might not wish to ever use that strainer again. I think the bones are clean enough to satisfy any barbarian, for such are little boys.”
Meridee looked into the wire strainer, dreading the sight of the bones, then struck again by how small they actually were. She poked them this way and that, thinking how much they would please Davey Ten.
“Davey wants to adhere them to a plaque,” she said and tested the waters. “Who might have a really fine piece of wood on which to mount this … this specimen?”
“I have one,” Mrs. Perry said. “I spirited away Mr. Perry’s carpenter satchel before the Navy thought they needed it more than I did.”
In for a penny, in for a pound, Meridee thought. “We’ll need glue. I wonder ….”
Mrs. Perry saw right through her. “I have that, too.”
Meridee knew when to stop fishing. “Mrs. Perry, are you the best thing that ever happened to Able and me?”
Mrs. Perry’s African dignity was impressive in its depth. “Let us say we are all fortunate. Care to try a rout cake?”
“I thought you would never offer,” Meridee said simply. “I would love a rout cake.”
Meridee spent a lengthy time deciding which petite cake she wanted. “This one has more sugar on the sides,” the cook suggested.
“I want more icing,” Meridee declared. Mrs. Perry finally handed her two.
Meridee closed her eyes in bliss as the more sugar-sided morsel dissolved in her mouth. She followed it up with the tang of lemon icing on the other rout cake, and shook her head over another of the moist offerings. “I daren’t,” she said, but reluctantly. “Master Six might not care for rotundity in a wife.”
