Текст книги "An echo in the bone"
Автор книги: Diana Gabaldon
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Текущая страница: 30 (всего у книги 75 страниц)
I could barely breathe and was bathed in cold sweat, but my heart began to beat more reasonably.
Jamie, now clothed, took my arm.
“My wife and nephew are coming with me,” he called, and without waiting for assent from the sloop, seized me by the waist and lifted me to stand on the Pitt’s rail, from where I could grab the rope ladder that the sloop’s crew had thrown down. He was taking no chances on being separated from either me or Ian again.
The ship was rolling in the swell, and I had to cling tightly to the ladder with my eyes closed for a moment, as dizziness swept over me. I felt nauseated as well as dizzy, but surely that was only a reaction to shock. With my eyes closed, my stomach settled a little, and I was able to set my foot on the next rung.
“Sail, ho!”
Tilting my head far back, I could just see the waving arm of the man above. I turned to look, the ladder twisting under me, and saw the sail approaching. On the deck above, the nasal voice was shouting orders, and bare feet drummed on the wood as the crew ran for their stations.
Jamie was on the rail of the Pitt, gripping me by the waist to save me falling.
“Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ,” he said, in tones of utter astonishment, and I looked over my shoulder to see him turned to watch the oncoming ship. “It’s the bloody Teal.”
A TALL, VERY THIN man with gray hair, a prominent Adam’s apple, and piercing ice-blue eyes met us at the top of the ladder.
“Captain Asa Hickman,” he barked at me, and then instantly switched his attention to Jamie. “What’s that ship? And where’s Stebbings?”
Ian scrambled over the rail behind me, looking anxiously back over his shoulder.
“I’d pull that ladder up if I were you,” he said briefly to one of the sailors.
I glanced down at the deck of the Pitt, where a milling confusion of men was swarming toward the rail, pushing and shoving. There was a good deal of arm-waving and shouting, the naval seamen and the pressed men trying to put their cases, but Captain Hickman wasn’t in the mood.
“Pull it up,” he said to the sailor, and, “Come with me,” to Jamie. He stalked off along the deck, not waiting for an answer and not turning to see whether he was followed. Jamie gave the sailors surrounding us a narrow look but apparently decided they were safe enough, and, with a terse “Look after your auntie” to Ian, went off after Hickman.
Ian was not paying attention to anything save the oncoming Teal.
“Jesus,” he whispered, eyes fixed on the sail. “D’ye think he’s all right?”
“Rollo? I certainly hope so.” My face was cold; colder than just from the ocean spray; my lips had gone numb. And there were small flashing lights at the edges of my sight. “Ian,” I said, as calmly as possible. “I think I’m going to faint.”
The pressure in my chest seemed to rise, choking me. I forced a cough and felt a momentary easing. Dear God, was I having a heart attack? Pain in left arm? No. Pain in jaw? Yes, but I was clenching my teeth, no wonder…. I didn’t feel myself fall, but felt the pressure of hands as someone caught and lowered me to the deck. My eyes were open, I thought, but I couldn’t see anything. Dimly, it occurred to me that I might be dying, but I rejected that notion out of hand. No, I bloody wasn’t. I couldn’t. But there was an odd sort of gray swirling mist approaching me.
“Ian,” I said—or thought I said. I felt very calm. “Ian, just in case—tell Jamie that I love him.” Everything did not go black, rather to my surprise, but the mist reached me, and I felt gently enveloped in a peaceful gray cloud. All the pressure, the choking, the pain had eased. I could have floated, happily mindless, in the gray mist, save that I could not be sure I’d really spoken, and the need to convey the message niggled like a cocklebur in the sole of a foot.
“Tell Jamie,” I kept saying to a misty Ian. “Tell Jamie that I love him.”
“Open your eyes and tell me yourself, Sassenach,” said a deep, urgent voice somewhere close.
I tried opening my eyes and found that I could. Apparently I had not died after all. I essayed a cautious breath and found that my chest moved easily. My hair was damp, and I was lying on something hard, covered by a blanket. Jamie’s face swam above me, then steadied as I blinked.
“Tell me,” he repeated, smiling a little, though anxiety creased the skin beside his eyes.
“Tell you… oh! I love you. Where… ?” Memory of recent events flooded in upon me, and I sat up abruptly. “The Teal? What—”
“I havena got the slightest idea. When did ye last have anything to eat, Sassenach?”
“I don’t remember. Last night. What do you mean, you haven’t the slightest idea? Is it still there?”
“Oh, aye,” he said, with a certain grimness. “It is. It fired two shots at us a few minutes gone—though I suppose ye couldna hear them.”
“It fired shots at—” I rubbed a hand over my face, pleased to find that I could now feel my lips, and that normal warmth had returned to my skin. “Do I look gray and sweaty?” I asked Jamie. “Are my lips blue?”
He looked startled at that, but bent to peer closely at my mouth.
“No,” he said positively, straightening up after a thorough inspection. Then he bent and quickly kissed them, putting a seal on my state of pinkness. “I love ye, too,” he whispered. “I’m glad ye’re no dead. Yet,” he added in a normal tone of voice, straightening up as an unmistakable cannon shot came from somewhere at a distance.
“I assume Captain Stebbings has taken over the Teal?” I asked. “Captain Roberts wouldn’t be going around taking potshots at strange ships, I don’t think. But why is Stebbings firing at us, I wonder? Why isn’t he trying to board the Pitt and take her back? It’s his for the taking now.”
My symptoms had all but disappeared by now, and I felt quite clearheaded. Sitting up, I discovered that I had been laid out on a pair of large, flat-topped chests in what appeared to be a small hold; there was a latticed hatch cover overhead, through which I caught the fluttering shadows of moving sails, and the walls were stacked with a miscellaneous assortment of barrels, bundles, and boxes. The air was thick with the smells of tar, copper, cloth, gunpowder, and… coffee? I sniffed more deeply, feeling stronger by the moment. Yes, coffee!
The sound of another muffled cannon-shot came through the walls, muffled by distance, and a small visceral quiver ran through me. The notion of being trapped in the hold of a ship that might at any moment be sunk was enough to overcome even the smell of coffee.
Jamie had turned in response to the shot, too, half rising. Before I could stand and suggest that we go above, and quickly, there was a shift in the light, and a round, bristly head poked through the hatchway.
“Is the lady summat recovered?” a young boy asked politely. “Cap’n says if she’s dead, you’re no longer needed here, and he desires you to come above and speak to him prompt, sir.”
“And if I’m not dead?” I inquired, trying to straighten out my petticoats, which were wet round the hems, damp through, and hopelessly rumpled. Drat. Now I had left my gold-weighted skirt and pocket aboard the Pitt. At this rate, I’d be lucky to arrive on dry land in my chemise and stays.
The boy—at second glance, he was likely twelve or so, though he looked much younger—smiled at this.
“In that case, he offered to come and drop you overboard himself, ma’am, in hopes of concentrating your husband’s mind. Cap’n Hickman’s a bit hasty in his speech,” he added, with an apologetic grimace. “He doesn’t mean much by it. Usually.”
“I’ll come with you.” I stood up without losing my balance, but did accept Jamie’s arm. We made our way through the ship, led by our new acquaintance, who helpfully informed me that his name was Abram Zenn (“My pa being a reading man, and much taken by Mr. Johnson’s Dictionary, he was tickled by the thought of me being A through Zed, you see”), that he was the ship’s boy (the ship’s name was in fact Asp, which pleased me), and that the reason for Captain Hickman’s present agitation was a longstanding grievance against the navy’s Captain Stebbings: “which there’s been more than one run-in betwixt the two, and Cap’n Hickman’s sworn that there won’t be but one more.”
“I gather Captain Stebbings is of like mind?” Jamie asked dryly, to which Abram nodded vigorous assent.
“Fellow in a tavern in Roanoke told me Cap’n Stebbings was drinking there and said to the assembled as how he meant to hang Cap’n Hickman from his own yardarm, and leave him for the gulls to peck his eyes. They would, too,” he added darkly, with a glance at the seabirds wheeling over the ocean nearby. “They’re wicked buggers, gulls.”
Further interesting tidbits were curtailed by our arrival in Captain Hickman’s inner sanctum, a cramped stern cabin, as crammed with cargo as the hold had been. Ian was there, doing his impression of a captured Mohawk about to be burned at the stake, from which I deduced that he hadn’t taken to Captain Hickman. The feeling seemed to be mutual, judging from the hectic patches of color burning in the latter’s rawboned cheeks.
“Ah,” Hickman said shortly, seeing us. “Glad to see you’ve not departed this life yet, ma’am. Be a sad loss to your husband, such a devoted woman.” There was a sarcastic intonation to this last that made me wonder uncomfortably just how many times I’d told Ian to relay my love to Jamie and just how many people had heard me doing it, but Jamie simply ignored the comment, showing me to a seat on the captain’s unmade bed before turning to deal with the man himself.
“I’m told that the Teal is firing at us,” he observed mildly. “Does this occasion ye no concern, sir?”
“Not yet it doesn’t.” Hickman spared a negligent glance at his stern windows, half of them covered with deadlights, presumably because of broken glass; a good many of the panes were shattered. “He’s just firing in hopes of a lucky shot. We’ve got the weather gauge on him, and will likely keep it for the next couple of hours.”
“I see,” said Jamie, with a convincing attitude of knowing what this meant.
“Captain Hickman is debating in his mind whether to engage the Teal in action, Uncle,” Ian put in tactfully, “or whether to run. Having the weather gauge is a matter of maneuverability, and thus gives him somewhat more latitude in the matter than the Teal has presently, I think.”
“Heard the one about He who fights and runs away, lives to fight another day?” Hickman said, giving Ian a glare. “If I can sink him, I will. If I can shoot him on his own quarterdeck and take the ship, I’ll like that better, but I’ll settle for sending him to the bottom if I have to. But I won’t let him sink me, not today.”
“Why not today?” I asked. “Rather than any other day, I mean?”
Hickman looked surprised; he had obviously assumed I was purely ornamental.
“Because I have an important cargo to deliver, ma’am. One that I daren’t risk. Not unless I could get my hands on that rat Stebbings without taking any great chances,” he added broodingly.
“I gather that your assumption that Captain Stebbings was aboard accounts for your most determined attempt to sink the Pitt?” Jamie asked. The ceiling of the cabin was so low that he, Ian, and Hickman were all obliged to converse in a crouching position, like a convention of chimpanzees. There was really nowhere to sit other than the bed, and kneeling on the floor would of course lack the requisite dignity for a meeting of gentlemen.
“It was, sir, and I’m obliged to you for stopping me in time. Perhaps we may share a jar, when there’s more leisure, and you can tell me what happened to your back.”
“Perhaps not,” Jamie said politely. “I gather further that we are under sail. Where is the Pitt presently?”
“Adrift, about two miles off the larboard quarter. If I can deal with Stebbings,” and Hickman’s eyes fairly glowed red at the prospect, “I’ll come back and take her, too.”
“If there’s anyone left alive on board to sail her,” Ian said. “There was a fair-sized riot on her deck, when last I saw it. What might predispose ye to take on the Teal, sir?” he asked, raising his voice. “My uncle and I can give ye information regarding her guns and crew—and even if Stebbings has taken the ship, I doubt but he’ll have a job to fight her. He’s got no more than ten men of his own, and Captain Roberts and his crew will want nay part of an engagement, I’m sure.”
Jamie gave Ian a narrow look.
“Ye ken they’ve likely killed him already.”
Ian didn’t resemble Jamie at all, but the look of implacable stubbornness on his face was one I knew intimately.
“Aye, maybe. Would ye leave me behind, if ye only thought I might be dead?”
I could see Jamie open his mouth to say, “He’s a dog.” But he didn’t. He closed his eyes and sighed, obviously contemplating the prospect of instigating a sea battle—and incidentally risking all of our lives six ways from Sunday, to say nothing of the lives of the men aboard the Teal—for the sake of an aging dog, who might be already dead, if not devoured by a shark. Then he opened them and nodded.
“Aye, all right.” He straightened, as much as was possible in the cramped cabin, and turned to Hickman. “My nephew’s particular friend is aboard the Teal and likely in danger. I ken that’s no concern of yours, but it explains our own interest. As for yours… in addition to Captain Stebbings, there is a cargo aboard the Teal in which ye may have an interest, as well—six cases of rifles.”
Ian and I both gasped. Hickman straightened up abruptly, cracking his head on a timber.
“Ow! Holy Moses. You’re sure of that?”
“I am. And I imagine the Continental army might make use of them?”
I thought that was treading on dangerous ground; after all, the fact that Hickman had a strong animus toward Captain Stebbings didn’t necessarily mean he was an American patriot. From the little I’d seen of him, Captain Stebbings looked entirely capable of inspiring purely personal animus, quite separate from any political considerations.
But Hickman made no denial; in fact, he’d barely noticed Jamie’s remark, inflamed by mention of the rifles. Was it true? I wondered. But Jamie had spoken with complete certainty. I cast my mind back over the contents of the Teal’s hold, looking for anything…
“Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ,” I said. “The boxes bound for New Haven?” I barely kept myself from blurting out Hannah Arnold’s name, realizing just in time that if Hickman was indeed a patriot—for it did occur to me that he might merely be a businessman, as willing to sell to either side—he might well recognize the name and realize that these rifles were almost certainly already intended to reach the Continentals via Colonel Arnold.
Jamie nodded, watching Hickman, who was gazing at a small barometer on the wall as though it were a crystal ball. Whatever it told him seemed to be favorable, for Hickman nodded once, then dashed out of the cabin as though his breeches were on fire.
“Where’s he gone?” Ian demanded, staring after him.
“To check the wind, I imagine,” I said, proud of knowing something. “To make certain he still has the weather gauge.”
Jamie was rifling Hickman’s desk, and emerged at this point with a rather wizened apple, which he tossed into my lap. “Eat that, Sassenach. What the devil is a weather gauge?”
“Ah. Well, there you have me,” I admitted. “But it has to do with wind, and it seems to be important.” I sniffed the apple; it had plainly seen better days, but still held a faint, sweet smell that suddenly raised the ghost of my vanished appetite. I took a cautious bite and felt saliva flood my mouth. I ate it in two more bites, ravenous.
Captain Hickman’s high nasal voice came piercingly from the deck. I couldn’t hear what he said, but the response was immediate; feet thumped to and fro on deck, and the ship shifted suddenly, turning as her sails were adjusted. The chime and grunt of shot being lifted and the rumble of gun carriages echoed through the ship. Apparently, the weather gauge was still ours.
I could see a fierce excitement light Ian’s face and rejoiced to see it, but couldn’t help voicing a qualm or two.
“You haven’t any hesitation about this?” I said to Jamie. “I mean—after all, he is a dog.”
He gave me an eye and a moody shrug.
“Aye, well. I’ve known battles fought for worse reasons. And since this time yesterday, I’ve committed piracy, mutiny, and murder. I may as well add treason and make a day of it.”
“Besides, Auntie,” Ian said reprovingly, “he’s a good dog.”
WEATHER GAUGE OR NO, it took an endless time of cautious maneuvering before the ships drew within what seemed a dangerous distance of each other. The sun was no more than a handsbreadth above the horizon by now, the sails were beginning to glow a baleful red, and my chastely pristine dawn looked like ending in a wallowing sea of blood.
The Teal was cruising gently, no more than half her canvas set, less than half a mile away. Captain Hickman stood on the Asp’s deck, hands clenched on the rail as though it were Stebbings’s throat, wearing the look of a greyhound just before the rabbit is released.
“Time you went below, ma’am,” Hickman said, not looking at me. “Matters will be hotting up directly here.” His hands flexed once in anticipation.
I didn’t argue. The tension on deck was so thick I could smell it, testosterone spiced with brimstone and black powder. Men being the remarkable creatures that they are, everyone seemed cheerful.
I paused to kiss Jamie—a gesture he returned with a gusto that left my lower lip throbbing slightly—resolutely ignoring the possibility that the next time I saw him, it might be in separate pieces. I’d faced that possibility a number of times before, and while it didn’t get less daunting with practice, I had got better at ignoring it.
Or at least I thought I had. Sitting in the main hold in near-total darkness, smelling the low-tide reek of the bilges and listening to what I was sure were rats rustling in the chains, I had a harder time ignoring the sounds from above: the rumbling of gun carriages. The Asp had only four guns to a side, but they were twelve-pounders: heavy armament for a coastal schooner. The Teal, equipped as an oceangoing merchantman who might have to fight off all manner of menace, fought eight to a side, sixteen-pounders, with two carronades on the upper deck, plus two bow chasers and a stern gun.
“She’d run from a man-o’-war,” Abram explained to me, he having asked me to describe the Teal’s armament. “And she wouldn’t be likely to try to seize or sink another vessel, so she wouldn’t ship tremendous hardware, even was she built for it, and I doubt she is. Now, I doubt as well that Captain Stebbings can man even a whole side to good effect, though, so we mustn’t be downhearted.” He spoke with great confidence, which I found amusing and also oddly reassuring. He seemed to realize this, for he leaned forward and patted my hand gently.
“Now, you needn’t fret, ma’am,” he said. “Mr. Fraser said to me I must be sure to let no harm come to you, and I shall not—be sure of that.”
“Thank you,” I said gravely. Not wanting either to laugh or to cry, I cleared my throat instead and asked, “Do you know what caused the trouble between Captain Hickman and Captain Stebbings?”
“Oh, yes, ma’am,” he replied promptly. “Captain Stebbings has been a plague on the district for some years, stopping ships what he hasn’t any right to search, taking off legal goods what he says are contraband—and we take leave to doubt that any of it ever sees the inside of a Customs warehouse!” he added, obviously quoting something he’d heard more than once. “But it was what happened with the Annabelle, really.”
The Annabelle was a large ketch, owned by Captain Hickman’s brother. The Pitt had stopped her and attempted to press men from her crew. Theo Hickman had protested, resistance had broken out, and Stebbings had ordered his men to fire into the Annabelle, killing three crewmen—Theo Hickman among them.
There had been considerable public outcry over this, and an effort was made to bring Captain Stebbings to justice for his deeds. The captain had insisted that no local court had the right to try him for anything, though; if anyone wished to bring an action against him, it must be done in an English court. And the local justices had agreed with this.
“Was this before war was declared last year?” I asked curiously. “For if after—”
“Well before,” young Zenn admitted. “Still,” he added with righteous indignation, “they are cowardly dogs and ought be tarred and feathered, the lot of them, and Stebbings, too!”
“No doubt,” I said. “Do you think—”
But I had no opportunity to explore his opinions further, for at this point the ship gave a violent lurch, throwing us both onto the damp floorboards, and the sound of a violent and prolonged explosion shattered the air around us.
I couldn’t at first tell which ship had fired—but an instant later, the Asp’s guns spoke overhead, and I knew the first broadside had been from the Teal.
The Asp’s reply was ragged, the guns along her starboard side going off at more or less random intervals overhead, punctuated by the flat bangs of small-arms fire.
I resisted Abram’s gallant attempts to throw his meager body protectively on top of mine and, rolling over, got up onto my hands and knees, listening intently. There was a lot of shouting, none of it comprehensible, though the shooting had stopped. We appeared not to be leaking water, so far as I could tell, so presumably we had not been struck below the waterline.
“They can’t have given up, surely?” Abram said, scrambling to his feet. He sounded disappointed.
“I doubt it.” I got to my own feet, bracing a hand against a large barrel. The main hold was quite as crowded as the forward one, though with bulkier items; there was barely room for Abram and me to worm our way between the netted bulk of crates and tiers of casks—some of which smelled strongly of beer. The ship was heeling to one side now. We must be coming about—probably to try again. The wheels of the gun carriages ground on the deck above; yes, they were reloading. Had anyone yet been hurt? I wondered. And what the devil was I going to do about it if they had?
The sound of a single cannon-shot came from overhead.
“The dog must be fleeing,” Abram whispered. “We’re chasing him down.”
There was a long period of relative silence, during which I thought the ship was tacking but couldn’t really tell. Maybe Hickman was pursuing the Teal.
Sudden yelling from overhead, with a sound of surprised alarm, and the ship heaved violently, flinging us to the floor once again. This time I landed on top. I delicately removed my knee from Abram’s stomach and helped him to sit up, gasping like a landed fish.
“What—” he wheezed, but got no further. There was a hideous jolt that knocked us both flat again, followed at once by a grinding, rending noise of squealing timbers. It sounded as though the ship was coming apart around us, and I had no doubt that it was.
Shrieking like banshees and the thunder of feet on deck.
“We’re being boarded!” I could hear Abram swallow, and my hand went to the slit in my petticoat, touching my knife for courage. If—
“No,” I whispered, straining my eyes up into darkness as though that would help me hear better. “No. We’re boarding them.” For the pounding feet above had vanished.
THE YELLING HADN’T; EVEN muffled by distance, I could hear the note of insanity in it, the clear joy of the berserker. I thought I could make out Jamie’s Highland screech, but that was likely imagination; they all sounded equally demented.
“Our Father, who art in heaven … Our Father, who art in heaven …” Abram was whispering to himself in the dark, but had stuck on the first line.
I clenched my fists and closed my eyes in reflex, screwing up my face as though by sheer force of will I could help.
Neither of us could.
It was an age of muffled noises, occasional shots, thuds and bangs, grunting and shouting. And then silence.
I could just see Abram’s head turn toward me, questioning. I squeezed his hand.
And then a ship’s gun went off with a crash that echoed across the deck above, and a shock wave thrummed through the air of the hold, hard enough that my ears popped. Another followed, I felt rather than heard a thunk, and then the floor heaved and tilted, and the ship’s timbers reverberated with an odd, deep bwong. I shook my head hard, swallowing, trying to force air through my Eustachian tubes. They popped again, finally, and I heard feet on the side of the ship. More than one pair. Moving slowly.
I leapt to my feet, grabbed Abram, and hauled him bodily up, propelling him toward the ladder. I could hear water. Not racing along the ship’s sides; a gushing noise, as of water gurgling into the hold.
The hatchway had been closed overhead but not battened down, and I knocked it loose with a desperate bang of both hands, nearly losing my balance and plunging into darkness but luckily sustained by Abram Zenn, who planted a small but solid shoulder under my buttocks by way of support.
“Thank you, Mr. Zenn,” I said, and, reaching behind me, pulled him up the ladder into the light.
There was blood on the deck; that was the first thing I saw. Wounded men, too—but not Jamie. He was the second thing I saw, leaning heavily over the remains of a shattered rail with several other men. I hurried to see what they were looking at, and saw the Teal a few hundred yards away.
Her sails were fluttering wildly, and her masts seemed oddly tilted. Then I realized that the ship herself was tilted, the bow raised half out of the water.
“Rot me,” said Abram, in tones of amazement. “She’s run onto rocks.”
“So have we, son, but not so bad,” said Hickman, glancing aside at the cabin boy’s voice. “Is there water in the hold, Abram?”
“There is,” I replied before Abram, lost in contemplation of the wounded Teal, could gather his wits to answer. “Have you any medical instruments aboard, Captain Hickman?”
“Have I what?” he blinked at me, distracted. “This is no time for—why?”
“I’m a surgeon, sir,” I said, “and you need me.”
WITHIN A QUARTER HOUR, I found myself back in the small forward cargo hold where I had roused from my fainting spell a few hours earlier, this being now designated as the sick bay.
The Asp did not travel with a surgeon, but had a small store of medicinals: a half-full bottle of laudanum, a fleam and bleeding bowl, a large pair of tweezers, a jar of dead and desiccated leeches, two rusty amputation saws, a broken tenaculum, a bag of lint for packing wounds, and a huge jar of camphorated grease.
I was strongly tempted to drink the laudanum myself, but duty called. I tied back my hair and began poking about among the cargo, in search of anything useful. Mr. Smith and Ian had rowed across to the Teal in hopes of retrieving my own kit, but given the amount of damage I could see in the area where our cabin had been, I didn’t have much hope. A lucky shot from the Asp had holed the Teal below the waterline; had she not run aground, she would likely have sunk sooner or later.
I’d done a rapid triage on deck; one man killed outright, several minor injuries, three serious but not instantly life-threatening. There were likely more on the Teal; from what the men said, the ships had exchanged broadsides at a distance of no more than a few yards. A quick and bloody little action.
A few minutes after the conclusion, the Pitt had limped into sight, her contentiously mixed crew having evidently come to a sufficient accommodation as to allow her to sail, and she was now occupied in ferrying the wounded. I heard the faint shout of her bosun’s hail over the whine of the wind above.
“Incoming,” I murmured, and, picking up the smaller of the amputation saws, prepared for my own quick and bloody action.
“YOU HAVE GUNS,” I pointed out to Abram Zenn, who was rigging a couple of hanging lanterns for me, the sun having now almost set. “Presumably this means that Captain Hickman was prepared to use them. Didn’t he think there might be a possibility of casualties?”
Abram shrugged apologetically.
“It’s our first voyage as a letter of marque, ma’am. We’ll do better next time, I’m sure.”
“Your first? What sort of—how long has Captain Hickman been sailing?” I demanded. I was ruthlessly rummaging the cargo by now, and was pleased to find a chest that held lengths of printed calico.
Abram frowned at the wick he was trimming, thinking.
“Well,” he said slowly, “he had a fishing boat for some time, out of Marblehead. Him—he, I mean—and his brother owned it together. But after his brother ran afoul of Captain Stebbings, he went to work for Emmanuel Bailey, as first mate on one of his—Mr. Bailey’s, I mean—ships. Mr. Bailey’s a Jew,” he explained, seeing my raised eyebrow. “Owns a bank in Philadelphia and three ships as sail regularly to the West Indies. He owns this ship, too, and it’s him who got the letter of marque from the Congress for Captain Hickman, when the war was announced.”
“I see,” I said, more than slightly taken aback. “But this is Captain Hickman’s first cruise as captain of a sloop?”
“Yes, ma’am. But privateers don’t usually have a supercargo, do you see,” he said earnestly. “It would be the supercargo’s job to provision the ship and see to such things as the medical supplies.”
“And you know this because—how long have you been sailing?” I asked curiously, liberating a bottle of what looked like very expensive brandy, to use as antiseptic.
“Oh, since I was eight years old, ma’am,” he said. He stood a-tiptoe to hang the lantern, which cast a warm, reassuring glow over my impromptu operating theater. “I’ve six elder brothers, and the oldest runs the farm, with his sons. The others… well, one’s a shipwright in Newport News, and he got to talking with a captain one day and mentioned me, and next thing I know, I’m one of the cabin boys on the Antioch, her being an Indiaman. I went back with the captain to London, and we sailed to Calcutta the very day after.” He came down onto his heels and smiled at me. “I’ve been a-sea ever since, ma’am. I find it suits me.”
“That’s very good,” I said. “Your parents—are they still alive?”
