Captain of My Heart (33 page)

“Looks like one’s a cutter, sir, with two
ship-rigged tubs in her lee!”

“Probably a Brit with her prizes,” Liam
commented, eagerly rubbing his hands together.

Brendan grinned and pulled out his spyglass.
“Or a Tory shepherd guarding his flock from wolves like us.” He
strode to the weather shrouds, the glass under his arm. “Either
way, they’re ours, and so is she!”

The shrouds were stiff with ice and frozen
spray, but he climbed dauntlessly, his boots slipping here and
there, his hands numb and red with cold before he’d even reached
the level of the foresail’s throat. There, he paused and looked up.
The fore topmast drove skyward above him, its sail fading into the
gray mist. Mr. Starr was nowhere to be seen. Looping an elbow
through the shrouds, Brendan briskly rubbed his hands together to
restore their warmth, blew on them, and continued his climb.

He found the lad near the topgallant yard,
felt hat clamped down over his eyes, and face turned toward the
distant ships. His hair, dull with mist, was braided in a seaman’s
queue, the tip of it wafting in the breeze. Brendan tried not to
think of the eighty some-odd feet between the end of that braid and
the deck below.

“Brits, sir,” the boy mumbled, yanking the
hat even lower until Brendan wondered how he could see at all.

“You’re absolutely right,” he agreed, seeing
the ships quite clearly up here above the mist and fog. He decided
to test the lad. “But tell me how you know that, Mr. Starr. They’re
not flying any colors.”

“That cutter’s lighter built than a Frenchie
or one of our’n.”

“Very good, Mr. Starr.” He steadied himself
against the slick topgallant yard, the dizzying sway of the mast
below him. “Also, an American would have more deadrise, more
rounded curves, more rake to her bow, and a bit less depth and
freeboard than that one yonder.”

“Ayuh.”

As usual, Mr. Starr was not a man of many
words. Brendan grinned and said, “I feel the wind starting to
freshen. What d’you say to shaking out the topsail and going after
them, laddie?”

The boy, wearing strange little spectacles
with bottle-green lenses, kept his face averted, although his
captain’s mood was as light, his grin as infectious, as ever. But
no matter how friendly Brendan tried to be, Mr. Starr never met his
gaze and avoided him as much as possible. Obviously he was
terrified of his captain, and probably had a complex about his
sensitive skin as well—yet Brendan didn’t press him about it. No
doubt the lad got harassed enough about it below deck, despite the
popularity he seemed to enjoy with his shipmates.

Still squinting off toward the distant ships,
Mr. Starr mumbled, “Maybe we oughta set the t’gallant and fly the
studders, too. Might get a couple more knots outta her, at least,
’specially if we get the wind dead abaft.”

Brendan stared. For Mr. Starr, that had been
a speech. He lifted a brow. “Think so?” he asked, testing him once
again.

“Ayuh. Oughta be able t’ run ’em down before
dusk.”

“Very well then, Mr. Starr. Provided you can
stand the cold, you may remain here until we come up on them, at
which time I’d like you to come down and renew your acquaintance
with
Freedom.”
He tucked his glass into his pocket. “Carry
on, then.”

Back on deck, Liam stood at the tiller, his
brows knit in concentration as he peered at the compass. The fog
was starting to lift, and watery sunlight managed to put enough
glare on the water to throw a few diamonds back in his eyes. A seal
bobbed just off the starboard bows, watched them for a while, then
dived beneath the waves. The splash it made was loud, almost eerie
in the heavy stillness. Brendan stamped his feet, trying to restore
the circulation to his frozen toes.

Dalby, bless his heart, had read his mind,
and hustled toward him with coffee steaming in a dented pewter mug.
Gratefully accepting it, Brendan wrapped his hands around the mug,
letting the heat thaw his fingers and scald a path all the way to
his stomach. “Ah, Dalby . . . you’re ever the thoughtful one,
aren’t you?”

“Just thought you might appreciate something
hot and bracing, sir.” But Dalby himself was shivering.

Brendan frowned. “And how are you feeling
today, Dalby?”

The moment the words were out of his mouth,
he could’ve shot himself.

“Oh, not so good today, sir, not so good. I
got up with a runny nose, and my head’s all stuffed up.” He pressed
gnarled fingers to either side of his nose. “Right here, way down
deep. Getting a cold, I think. Throat’s scratchy, too. And I
suspect I’ve got a fever.” He held out one wizened hand. “See? I’ve
got the shivers already—”

“That’s ’cause it’s cold, ye bonehead,” Liam
joked.

“Cold? I’ve a knit shirt, a waistcoat, a
greatcoat, and a cloak on! Don’t tell me I’m cold! I’m coming down
with something, and that’s all there is to it!”

From several feet away, Fergus McDermott,
ex-atheist, ex-Christian, and now emphatic embracer of some Eastern
religion Brendan had never heard of, nodded sagely. “I told ye,
Dalb. It’s
reincarnation.”

Liam snorted. “Reincarnation, me arse! Ye’ve
been listenin’ to that bloody furriner too much!” He threw a sharp
glance forward, where a cloaked figure stood in the bows with a
lead line in his hand. They’d picked him up out of one of
Kestrel
’s first prizes, and Liam rued the day they had. The
man was an Easterner, with crystals hanging from his neck, the moon
in his eyes, and strange ideas of where people came from. Real
strange. The British were probably well rid of him, Liam thought.
Anyone who went around proclaiming that Brendan had been a fox in
his past life—past
life!
he snorted—deserved to have his
head examined. It had been bad enough when Fergus had seen the
light. But this reincarnation stuff? God Almighty. . . .

Brendan went back to his sketch, hiding a
grin.

“Well, he’s right,” Dalby sniffed. “Why else
would I be sick all the time? Rama says it’s because I’m paying for
my sins in a past life. That my poor health is the price for the
bad things I’ve done before.”

“God Almighty, we’re all a-payin’ the price,
havin’ to listen to such bloody nonsense! Get up there an’ make
sure that dingbat calls out the fathoms correctly!”

Dalby looked crushed, but he went anyway.

“Now, Liam, don’t you think that was rather
harsh?” Brendan said reprovingly, but with a faint grin.

“I’ve never heard such a crock o’ nonsense in
me life! Next he’ll be a-sayin’ that
Kestrel
was a bird in
her
former life!”

“Is that so?” Brendan allowed himself to look
serious for once. “Why, I’d have thought she spent it as a pine in
the forests of Maine.”

They both laughed.

“Deck there!”

“Report, Mr. Starr!”

“Another sail, fine on the larboard beam! A
brig—nay, it's a snow, sir, with the Union Jack at her
masthead!”

“Faith, this
is
getting interesting!”
Brendan said, mirth dancing in his eyes. “Four to two.
Wonderrrful
odds, eh, Liam?”

“Aye, but we ’ave
Kestrel.
They
don’t.”

“Nor will they.” Brendan picked up his
speaking trumpet. The metal was cold against his lips. “Hands to
the sheets! Topmen aloft! Shake out the t’gallant and up with jib
fores’l! Lively now, laddies!”

Whooping and hollering, men flew to halyards
and sheets. Grommets rattled, canvas thundered, swayed, and rose.
Kestrel
quivered in eagerness, swinging her bowsprit around,
her sleek sides following. Beneath her the sea whispered and began
to cream as she heeled over and found speed. Wallowing clumsily,
Proud Mistress
followed suit, her crew scampering up the
shrouds to set her topsails. Brendan pulled out his spyglass and
trained it on her quarterdeck. Sure enough, there was Matt, his red
hair standing out in all directions beneath his floppy hat, his
coat half-unbuttoned, his canvas breeches ragged and stained. He
looked up, caught sight of Brendan, and touched his temple in a
disgusted salute.

“Bet Ashton’s steamin’ about us seein’ the
prizes first!” Liam cried, rubbing his giant hands together in
glee, for prize sighting had become a friendly contest between the
two captains.

Brendan adjusted his sketchbook over his arm.
“Think so?”

“Don’t you?”

“Well, I should think he’s steaming more over
the fact that
Kestrel
’s showing her heels to that
ridiculously caked-up figurehead of his.” He tipped his head back
and yelled, “Mr. Starr! Come on down and prepare your gun for
battle! We’ll be upon them by eight bells!”

“Aye, Cap’n!”

High above, the topgallant snapped to
attention, swelled mightily, and strained against its yards.
Kestrel
lifted her nose and pulled herself up in the water,
higher and higher and higher. Beneath her sharp bows, the sea began
to roar and fall away in great snowy blankets of white.

Brendan grinned.

“Tack on studding sails!”

Spray was driving over the rail now, freezing
on shrouds and deck alike.

One of the Newburyporters muttered, “Jesus!
There ain’t even any wind and she’s movin’ like the hounds of hell
are on her tail!”

“Aye, and I’d like to know how the blazes
she’s doing it! Gawd, we must be makin’ six knots!”

“Seven when those studders go on!”

“But there ain’t no wind!”

But Brendan, staring forward, paid no heed to
the reverent looks the Newburyporters were throwing his way. The
cutter was now speared on
Kestrel’s
bowsprit, the two
merchantmen fleeing like sheep. . . .

And then the studding sails were on. Like the
swift raptor she was,
Kestrel
folded her wings, dove through
the mists, and swooped in for the kill.

###

A bucket of sand by her leg and a slow match
in her hand, Mira stood beside
Freedom,
her heart racing,
her mouth dry, and her chest tight with that strange, nervous
anticipation she always felt before battle. Just aft, Brendan clung
to the shrouds, looking resplendent and handsome in his fine blue
coat with its rows of gold buttons. His waistcoat was as red as a
cardinal’s breast, his boots gleamed in the gray light, and his
tricorne was perched jauntily atop his chestnut curls. From his
wrist dangled his speaking trumpet, which he was swinging with
uncontained excitement—and in his hand was his sketchbook.

She forced herself to look away.

The wind had backed, and
Kestrel,
close-hauled, was catching it over her starboard bows. Her lofty
bowsprit rose up, down, up, down, in perfect rhythm, each downward
plunge smashing the waves and sending big, hissing blankets of
snowy foam out and away from either beam. The cutter, a Royal Mail
packet with one tall mast stepped well forward, was dead ahead now.
Sporting a straight-running bowsprit and carrying a cloud of sail,
she would be a fast sailer and armed to the teeth. She would also
be carrying the king’s messages and cash, probably to the British
troops in New York. Mira imagined the guffaws from her decks at the
audacity of the Yankee schooner sweeping down on them out of the
fog.

Soon they wouldn’t be laughing.

“Mr. Wilbur! Ease the fore and main and
prepare to tack!”

Nope, they wouldn’t be laughing at all. She
smiled smugly and blew on her slow match, her eyes still on the
cutter.

“Sheet in fore stays’l, fore and main!”

“Stand by the heads’ls!”

“Cast off the preventer on the fore!”

“Hard alee!” Brendan’s pencil was flying over
the page. “And
let fly!”
The schooner paced herself,
gathered her wings, and swung her bows neatly through the wind. The
great boom of the mainsail passed over their heads. Sails filled on
the opposite tack, and the deck heeled over.

“Pass jib and foresail!”

“Close haul for larboard tack!”

Up until that last moment, the cutter never
expected the schooner to attack. Surprise was with them, and taking
full advantage of it, Brendan sent
Kestrel
swooping around
the cutter’s stern, and a broadside slamming through her windows
that cut down everything in its path. Before
Kestrel
was
even to windward of her, the cutter had lost her topmast, and with
it, a good deal of her speed and agility.

Brendan wasted no time. “Run out your guns,
laddies! Again!”

Cupping the match with her hand, Mira lowered
it to
Freedom
’s vent and quickly stepped aside. A puff of
flame, a thunderous roar, and the cannon flung itself inboard
against the breeching, its sharp bark lost beneath the angry,
sporadic roar of the cutter’s guns, which, in her crew’s confusion,
seemed to be hitting everything but her target. Or perhaps it was
just that
Kestrel
was blessed with an Irishman’s luck, for
she moved like a dancer, teasing and flirtatious in one moment,
flitting away on her heel the next.

And now Brendan was sending her right across
the cutter’s bows.

A voice, sharp with indignation and rage,
roared out from her deck, sounding tinny and artificial through a
speaking trumpet. “Damn you for an impudent dog! This is a king’s
ship! How dare you fire on us? Show your colors or I’ll sink you
where you stand!”

Brendan leaned out from the shrouds that
supported
Kestrel
’s foremast, lifted his own speaking
trumpet to his lips, and called back, “I invite you to try it!”

Those who had telescopes to their eyes saw
the British commander go an angry red beneath his carefully
powdered hair. “By God, what ship are you?!” he demanded.

For answer,
Kestrel
ran her huge,
thirteen-striped flag up the halyard and poured a broadside of
chain shot into the cutter’s rigging. The crew sent up a mighty
cheer.