Caution to the Wind (4 page)

By her estimation, it had been a little more than two weeks since the
Amanda
weighed anchor and sailed far enough out to sea to lose sight of Maryland’s sylvan coast.

In answer to her queries, one of her shipmates explained they were no more than a day’s sail from shore. Amanda squinted her eyes against the unyielding sun and tried to spot even a hint of coastline. Perhaps he had been mistaken.

The ship rolled on a wave, and she placed a palm flat against her stomach to quell the nausea. According to Bull, the small bouts of sickness she suffered were less severe than those that afflicted most new recruits. She had to ask him to repeat his small piece of wisdom because her head had been in a bucket at the time.

He suggested spending time in the open air of the main deck and attending to her duties. She took a recuperating breath and admitted his self-serving advice worked. That and the fair weather for which her more seasoned shipmates assured her she should be grateful.

Nausea past, Amanda looked about, letting her senses steep in the beauty of her surroundings. At sea, the sky looked bluer, the ocean a deep aquamarine, and the snow-white clouds close enough to touch. She raised a slender hand to the sky so that it overlaid an ephemeral ball of fluff. She curled her fingers, one by one, into a fist, and imagined capturing the cool, cottony mist in the palm of her hand.

Amanda closed her eyes and drew a breath between parted lips. She savored the air drifting over her tongue and filling her lungs. It was salty, almost sweet. To her, it tasted like freedom. Turning her face skyward once more, she let her skin drink in the sun’s heated caress. Most women her age went to extreme measures: parasols, creams, bonnets, anything to avoid the sun’s rays. That thought brought a momentary twinge of guilt. Although she hadn’t seen herself in a mirror for days, she did not doubt the number of freckles spattered across her nose and cheeks had grown. Her face probably resembled a speckled hen.

What did the captain think of her freckles?
The question popped into her mind, unbidden, and it startled her. He wouldn’t notice her freckles anymore than he would notice those that made the face of Jimmy, another one of her young shipmates, look like a mass of polka dots. He wouldn’t notice because the captain still saw her for what she pretended to be. For reasons she couldn’t fathom, or didn’t want to, that she could so easily deceive the captain bothered her. Was she so plain that a man who could sight a sail two miles out to sea against a backdrop of white clouds couldn’t see what was right in front of him?

“Oh, who cares!” She returned her focus to the deck, scrubbing with renewed vigor and watching the water-darkened boards dry to the color of old bones.

She loved the sea. It didn’t demand she be beautiful, or for that matter, even pretty. At sea, she had more freedom to be herself than she had ever had in her entire life. The irony of it made her lips curl. For the past two weeks, she had pretended to be something she was most definitely not.

Perhaps her love for life on the ocean was what had surprised her most. Despite the short bouts of seasickness, she hadn’t expected to look forward to each new day with such anticipation, such joy. Every morning, when Bull called “out or down” in his most menacing voice, she was among the first to have her hammock rolled and stowed and be on deck ready for whatever tasks awaited her. She enjoyed working side by side with her shipmates, all of whom were exceedingly polite men, despite their rough edges.

But more than anything, she loved watching the captain go about his duties. Not that he did much. In fact, most of the time, he wasn’t even on deck. When he did emerge from his quarters, it was usually to walk amongst the men, inspect their work, say a few words to Buck or Bull, then take a position at the rear of his ship and stare out at the ocean. In that position, she could let her gaze linger on him as long as she liked.

Though she scrubbed at the deck, the memory of him filled her vision. He stood with feet planted shoulder width apart. Beneath his tight fitting breeches, his muscles danced as he adjusted to the swell of the ocean. His golden eyes scanned the horizon. She liked it best when he left his hat behind because she could watch the wind play with his dark curls as though it were trying to untie the leather thong that held back his hair. Silently, she cheered the wind on.

Every now and then, he tipped his chin as though catching the scent of a distant enemy on the breeze before turning his sharp eyes back to the horizon. He reminded her of a wild animal, patiently stalking his prey, waiting for the right opportunity to pounce.

A faint odor tickled her nostrils, and the image faded. Face tilted, nose twitching, she searched for the wisp of a scent lingering in the air. It smelled vaguely familiar, like a hearth in the morning before the lighting of a new fire, musty and thick.

She squinted toward the horizon. Had they sailed closer to land, even if she couldn’t sight it yet? Baltimore’s chimneys were choking enough when one walked through the town. The sharp odor could have drifted out over the open ocean.

Amanda set the holystone in her bucket to let the seawater seep into the brittle sandstone. She pulled it out, water dripping from its pores, and set to work on a dark, stubborn stain. She hadn’t expected sailors to be as fussy as old nurse-maids about the tidiness of their ship, but the
Amanda
was their home, and they insisted everything be—what was it they called it—
shipshape
.

The odor, stronger now, pricked Amanda’s senses. She covered her nose and mouth with her grimy sleeve and scanned the open deck. Sailors were busy at their tasks, unperturbed by the foreign scent hanging in the air. One man, perched high above her on a platform, scanned the horizon like a bird of prey searching for its next victim. Two more coiled a rope the thickness of her forearm. A third group cleaned the guns even though they had seen only limited use in training exercises.

The captain and Buck Smythe stood amidships, their heads bent together in consultation over a map. The captain’s cocked hat was nowhere to be seen, and sunlight streaked his dark hair with golden highlights. He looked up and his gaze captured hers. Amanda’s breath caught in her throat, and she twisted her face away.

The sound of a familiar ditty drifting on the breeze caught her attention. Bull leaned against the bulwark, whittling, whistling and keeping an eye on his charges. Amanda shrugged and dipped her stone in the bucket again. If Bull and the captain weren’t concerned about the smell, she supposed she had no cause to be.

She scrubbed the deck and watched the seawater evaporate, appreciating the way her efforts reawakened the sun-bleached oak, giving the dull, lifeless planks an ivory glow that sparkled in the sunlight. She didn’t mind hard work. Her assigned duties absorbed her every moment, from sunup to sundown, and sometimes longer if Bull decided something needed done. In the evening, she crawled into her hammock, muscles aching and so tired that even the thunderous snoring of the men didn’t keep her awake.

Life at sea and a constant stream of duties kept Neil out of trouble as well. At first, he and Amanda had been assigned the same tasks, but Neil’s sharpness of mind and interest in sailing soon earned him the right to learn at the side of any man with the patience to withstand the endless questions of an intelligent, inquisitive boy.

Amanda overheard him ask the navigator how he could navigate when the skies were cloudy and one couldn’t see the stars. He asked the bosun the names of each of the different types of sails and when they were used. He asked Buck about the differences between nNaval ships and privateers. And Neil, not having the sense to give the captain a wide berth, trailed him as if he had the captain at the end of a line. Whenever Captain Stoakes got too far away, Neil pulled him back, asking questions about the business of privateering, how Letters of Marque were issued, what ships they were allowed to attack and what happened at the prize courts.

Much to her surprise, the captain didn’t seem to mind being Neil’s captive. With the passing of the days, he and Neil spent more time together than apart.

Buck Smythe returned to other duties, and Captain Stoakes joined Neil at the bulwark. Neil spoke, the snapping of the sails in the crisp breeze drowning out his words, but the left corner of his mouth turned up in a half-smile, the way it always did when he was up to something. She held her breath when Neil balanced against the bulwark, hands gripping the gunwale, and leaned forward until his toes just skirted the deck. The captain grasped the back of Neil’s breeches with one hand when the weight of her brother’s shoulders threatened to topple him overboard.

Amanda sat back, resting her backside on her bare heels. What could he be doing?

The captain yanked Neil back aboard ship, but instead of giving him the scolding she expected, he took his turn at the bulwark. To the delight of the grinning boy, the captain let lose a straight stream of spittle aimed at something out of sight in the water.

Amanda’s jaw dropped. Neil had challenged the captain to a spitting contest and he had complied!

A wave of malodorous fumes washed over the deck, yet the captain and Neil remained bent over the bulwark, seemingly oblivious to the odor. Nose burning and eyes stinging, she peered over their posteriors at the horizon, half-expecting to see another ship aflame on the open sea. Nothing but blue sky and shimmering water.

She twisted about to look behind her. What was wrong with the captain and this crew? Could she be the only one who smelled it? She tossed her stone into her bucket with a sigh. Placing damp, red hands on her knees, she pushed herself up and strode to where Bull leaned against a railing, whittling wood chips onto the spotless deck.

“Excuse me, Bull, but it smells like something is burning.”

“Sure is,” Bull replied without missing a beat with his knife.

Amanda watched him whittle and wondered if he planned to make a toothpick. With each stroke of his blade, he tore away great chunks of the narrow strip of wood.

“Well, isn’t that a bit of a problem on a boat?”

“Ship,” Bull scowled at the abused wood in his hands, turned it over and started anew on the other side.

“Excuse me?”

“This here’s a ship. That there’s a boat.” He jabbed his knife at one of the small, tarpaulin-shrouded shapes hanging suspended at the rail.

Amanda set her hands on her hips. She learned that lesson her second day aboard ship when she called the
Amanda
a boat in front of the captain. An eerie silence fell over the deck in the few moments before the captain threatened to toss her overboard if she ever insulted “his
Amanda
” again.

“As I was saying, isn’t that a problem on a
ship
?” She cringed, realizing how petulant she sounded. She had seen ship’s boys have their ears cuffed for far less.

To her relief, Bull chuckled. “Not unless you’re the captain.”

Amanda pursed her lips. What kind of insane logic was that? Only the captain should be worried about whether the ship was aflame? She waited for him to add more, but Bull continued his assault on the wood.

Amanda looked about. Bull may not be worried about a fire on the ship, but her gut told her something was amiss. She hurried back to her bucket, pulled out the holystone and dropped it with a dull thud onto the deck. Then she raised her chin and sniffed the air.

A long-forgotten memory of Neil making his own breakfast surfaced.
Burnt eggs
.

She picked up her bucket and headed toward the hatch leading below deck. Struggling to maintain her balance, water sloshing, Amanda felt her way down the narrow steps with bare feet. Once her feet met the solid planks of the floor below, she breathed a sigh of relief and looked about, her eyes adjusting to the relative darkness.

The sharp smell surrounded her now, filling her nose and burning the back of her throat. Somewhere in the dark, a man cursed. At least she believed it to be a curse. She couldn’t make out the words, but they were reminiscent of the Gaelic she sometimes heard the Irish immigrants use on market day. Still, a curse sounded like a curse in any tongue. She didn’t need to understand the words to recognize an oath.

Amanda shuffled toward the galley, gripping the heavy bucket with both hands. Tendrils of gray smoke snaked about the edges of the open galley door. A man wrapped in an apron that might have been white at one time, waved a towel toward the galley as though he meant to extinguish the fire with the breeze. Amanda shoved him aside, bringing more strangled oaths, this time directed at her. She ignored them and squinted into the smoke-filled room. Coughing, she covered her mouth with the back of her hand to keep the soot out of her lungs.

A small flame licked around the sides of a blackened pan set on the edge of the stove. The contents within emitted a steady stream of noxious fumes. Amanda marched forward, heaved her bucket of seawater over the stove and emptied it into the pan.

“Now what in the hell do you think you’re doin’, laddie!” The cook grabbed her shoulder and shoved her away from his stove.

The force of his shove spun Amanda toward the door, and she stumbled. She reached out through the smoke, grasping for something, anything, to steady herself. Her fingers found stiff wool laid over a unyielding frame. She grabbed a fistful in both hands.

Blinking to clear her vision, she stared at the fabric she held. Blue wool. A man’s coat?

“Ahem.”

The sound of someone clearing his throat came from in front of her, right in front of her. She had felt the rumble beneath her balled hands. Eyes burning and tears blurring her vision, she raised her chin to find a hard face just inches from her own. Amanda dropped the wool as though it burned.

“That’s just what I want to know.” The captain’s golden eyes demanded an explanation.

Her heart beat like a caged bird while she searched for the words to clarify the situation. Even if he hadn’t seen her dump water on the fire to save his ship, surely he could smell the smoke. Did he think she had caused the fire?