Harriet made her way forward to examine the rose bushes up close. She had to climb onto the hatch to get past Bessie and Daisy, who were playfully butting heads and blocking the deck. This late in the year, two rose bushes had been pruned to just leaves and stems but the third still had several hardy blooms valiantly hanging on. “I’ve never seen a tri-color rose such as this.”
“It’s from Singhapura.”
Harriet had only seen the exotic place on a map, but Sheffield had been there. How sheltered her life had been. She must have visited many parts of the world when she and her mother sailed with Father on his ninety-eight-gun triple decker. But Mother had gone ashore for good when Gabriel was old enough to start crawling, and the little family had hardly ventured from Brixham since.
This trip she was on could prove disastrous, in many ways. And yet she couldn’t turn back. Even if it was possible, even if she could still attain her goals by doing so, she wouldn’t turn back.
The woman she’d been just two weeks ago had been too timid to even try on a pair of breeches, yet here she was, kitted out like a common tar and lending a hand on a sailing vessel. Sailing, if not halfway around the world, at least to another continent. She’d summoned strength she didn’t know she had to hold on to that rope when she’d been dragged into the stormy sea, her skirt caught on the cannon’s carriage axle. Strength she wouldn’t have believed possible two weeks ago. She wondered if Amber Barrow-Smith could have held on.
Harriet would still marry Percy. Still be the epitome of proper deportment for an English lady and be a jewel in her husband’s crown. But she wanted this adventure first. Just as Sheffield had accused that day at Gunter’s in London.
How had he seen through her, known her better than she knew herself?
Her hand stilled just above the top-most blossom. What else had he seen?
She tipped her head to the side, close to Sheffield who had bent to breathe in the sweet fragrance of the petals, a sparkle in his sky-blue eyes.
If she didn’t know better, she’d think he’d been privy to her thoughts just then.
She straightened. How silly. Her wily pirate thought she yearned for adventure because he yearned for adventure. He had no great insight into her thoughts, her character.
“Back off, Bessie,” Sheffield suddenly growled.
The goats had apparently completed their exercise and were now hungry for a snack. Smitty waved his kerchief, shooing away Daisy, and Sheffield pushed back Bessie. While both men were occupied—Norton laughing instead of helping—Dusty snuck in and nibbled a low trio of leaves.
“Norton, why didn’t you leave the bushes in your cabin until the goats were below?”
“We’re heading south.” The surgeon folded his arms over his chest, his chin set at the same stubborn angle as Sheffield’s.
In Norton’s cabin? How had she not seen the roses when she’d borrowed books the other night? They must have been behind the partition, which she thought hid the infirmary portion of his cabin. Of course the roses would be next to the window, the only source of natural light below decks other than Sheffield’s cabin, since the two cabins were side by side at the stern. And heading south, they would only get weak northern light, which even she knew was not sufficient to sustain healthy rose bushes for long.
Big Jim climbed out of the center hatch, setting a small manger stuffed with hay on top of the cover. “Din-din!” he called.
The goats knocked into each other in their hurry to leave the roses for the feast in the manger.
Norton and Big Jim soon went below, Sheffield went to consult with Jonesy at the tiller, and Harriet was left to her own devices to think over all she’d learned so far.
The afternoon proved just as educational as the morning, if not as exciting, since there was no more cannon practice. Luigi extolled the virtues of having dwarf goats at sea—their milk production was much higher per pound of animal than any other goat or cow—because the luxury of milk for their tea boosted the crew’s morale. Tucker showed her more sail repair techniques. Chang showed how he kept gunpowder charges, matches, and other supplies separate in the pockets of his apron.
Harriet sat on the starboard step to the quarterdeck, observing the scene after Jonesy had allowed her to ring the watch bell. Bessie, Dusty, and Daisy were resting on the mid-deck hatch cover, basking in the late afternoon sun and chewing their cud. As the larboard watch came above deck, they each gave the goats an affectionate pat before going to their station. Oscar sunned himself on the coiled anchor rope near the rose bushes at the bow, lazily flipping his tail now and then.
How bucolic. She could get used to this.
She went below to eat with the larboard watch. Jack had promised to teach her how to play a new card game. Gambling was not allowed on board, so they played just for fun. So the men said.
The days melded one into another as the weather held fair and the ship made good progress. Harriet spent her days learning everything she could, even how to milk Bessie and Daisy into the pewter mug without spilling anything for Oscar to clean up. Jack and Flynn showed her how to properly belay the ropes after changing the set of the mains’l. She began to notice the subtle shifts in wind and anticipate the commands to adjust the sails accordingly.
One day, she spelled Dieter for an hour on bow watch, perched on the newly replaced jib boom out in front of the bow. Letting her bare feet dangle above the water whooshing past below, she was splashed by waves and quickly dried by the breeze that ruffled her hair. Dolphins swam alongside the ship for a while, their grey heads breaking the surface now and then. One jumped up, bumping her bare foot with his smooth, cool back. She was startled at first, and then laughed when the creature did it again. Holding on to the jib with both hands so she wouldn’t lose her balance, she stretched her leg to stroke her toes along its sleek back.
Another day, they sailed past a pod of whales frolicking near the surface. She watched in awe as the majestic creatures, bodies almost as long as the Wind Dancer, surged half out of the water, turned, and splashed on re-entry. Others dove down and slapped the surface with their gigantic flukes. Jack, Chang, and Winston, high in the rigging, whooped and hollered, egging on the whales with big arm gestures. Harriet whooped and held on tight to the railing as the whales seemed to oblige, coming so close the ship rolled several degrees when they leaped out of the water and flopped on their backs, creating waves and drenching the deck with spray. One rolled to its side, so near she could almost touch it, its enormous fin flapping as though waving to them.
“Come watch ‘em from up ‘ere!” Jack called to her.
She tilted her head back to see where he perched, looking as at ease straddling the main tops’l yardarm as he did sitting at the table in the fo’c’sle. Her stomach lurched, and she could only give him a tight shake of her head.
Sometimes she sat on the windlass cover, drowsing in the sun, Oscar the orange tabby purring in her lap, one or more of the goats resting against her like lapdogs, a length of canvas nearby that she would work on when she was fully awake again. She and Tucker had nearly finished replacing the storm-damaged sail.
Jonesy let her throw out the log line and bring it back in, checking their speed and direction and noting it in the logbook. Chang taught her how to fire the three-pound port gun, incorporating her in his place in the intricate dance with Dieter and Winston.
