In that moment, the door to their cabin burst open, pushed wide by two small, determined girls, followed close behind by Willa holding a very angry infant.
Willa braced the red-faced baby over her shoulder and continued bouncing him. She turned her unrelenting gray gaze on Cullen. “Thank heaven you’re better and managing without your cane. You have to help me. Come along.” With that, she turned and headed back out the door, beckoning him to follow in their wake. “I’m going to find Nanny. Mary, you go back to the surgery with Dr. MacCloud and bring a pan and a clean flannel before you join me.”
“Nanny?” Cullen gave Willa a vacant look.
“The livestock pens - the goats.” Willa stabbed a finger in the air in the general direction of where the ship’s livestock was kept and kept moving with the younger girl trotting close behind her.
Cullen was pleased to note even the angry baby had stilled at the tone of command in his wife’s voice. He chuckled and motioned for the older girl to follow him. His earlier visions vanished of a romantic evening spent with Willa in his arms.
When he and Mary, who had introduced herself, joined Willa and young Anna, the nanny goat had been tied conveniently by one of the crew near the livestock holding pen. Once he arrived with the pan and flannel, Willa set to rhythmically milking the nanny’s teats into the pan. After several frustrating attempts, the Baker baby, who seemed fascinated by the goat, finally gave in and sucked some of the liquid from the twisted flannel Willa kept dipping into the milk.
Cullen marveled at his wife cajoling the angry infant, while at the same time calming the boy’s anxious sisters. This was not the same woman who kept careful journals of her courses, wanted to get her marital duties “over with,” and was terrified of bringing a child into the world. He could imagine her bouncing their own bairns on her lap and easing them into doing her bidding.
Cullen stared into the darkness above his lonely, swinging cot and listened to his wife’s soft snores across the cabin. They’d apparently switched habits for the night. He was usually the one who fell asleep mid-argument. After filling the pan with goat’s milk, Willa had taken the baby back to the Baker cabin.
He’d brought up the rear with Mary and Anna. Mary had carried the pan of milk since his steadiness without the cane seemed to come and go.
Getting the angry baby settled and back to sleep took all of their mutual resources. He suspected the healthy boy was a ravenous eater who had become accustomed to his mother’s bounty and resented mightily having to work harder for Nanny’s milk. He’d checked on Mrs. Baker and felt confident some extra hours of uninterrupted sleep would allow her to return to her feeding duties by morning.
0º Latitude
TheArethusaCrosses the Equator
Willa awoke with trepidation. Even with carefully engineered ventilation below decks, the air was thick with heat. Today was the day they’d cross the equator at zero degrees latitude. A rowdy contingent of sailors calling themselves “bears” and members of Neptune’s Court had caroused throughout the decks the night before.
She knew Cullen had crossed the equator several times during his tours of duty with the African Squadron, but this would be her first crossing. She also knew the ship’s officers played the part of the Shellbacks who would haze the Pollywog first-timers. She had no doubt Mr. Dalton would use the hazing as an excuse to impose himself on her again, if he could find her on one of the decks. Mr. Parker had been helping Cullen with sick call at the main mast each morning, so she’d be on her own, alone and vulnerable.
They’d been in the doldrums for the last week with hardly a breath of a breeze, accompanied by oppressive heat and humidity. All of theArethusa’ssailors were ready for something to relieve the tedium. In fact, she suspected that down through the centuries, the navies of the world had adopted the elaborate “crossing” ceremony for that very reason. The area of the sea north and south of the equator was usually bereft of wind, and without the wind, a Royal Navy ship could be a boring place indeed. Sailors this long out of port needed to be kept busy.
She had a vague feeling of unease, knowing First Lieutenant Dalton would be in the thick of the hazing tricks. She determined to make herself scarce until the sailors’ hijinks rose to a crescendo before fading into the aftermath of the drunken celebrations that evening. For a moment, she considered asking Captain Still to intervene, but decided against bringing up all that unpleasantness again. Other than stealing looks at her when both of them happened to be on deck at the same time, First Lieutenant Dalton had left her alone ever since Cullen had recovered most of his strength and moved back into their cabin from the sick bay.
At a tap at the cabin door, Willa nearly jumped out of her skin. “One minute, please,” she called out and quickly pulled on her plain gray muslin work dress before cracking the door to see who the early morning visitor might be.
“Mrs. MacCloud, it’s only me.” Her young knight errant, Charles, stood outside the cabin, peering over his shoulder in the dim orlop deck light reflected from a covered lantern near the hatchway steps.
Willa opened the door wide, looked in both directions, and then snatched the boy inside. Once she closed the door behind him, his eyes widened. “I’m afraid,” he admitted and buried his head against her waist.
“Lieutenant Dalton is dressed like some awful creature from the deep, and he keeps passing through the sick bay, as if he’s looking for someone. He’s asked me where you are twice.”
“What did you tell him?”
“What you told me to say…you’re sick and don’t want to be disturbed.”
Willa sighed and squeezed her eyes shut for a moment. “Is there no end to the torture by this plague of a man?”
Young Charles grabbed her hand. “I won’t let him hurt you. I swear. I’ll stay right here until Dr. MacCloud and Mr. Parker come back down to the sick bay.”
She pushed him back and leaned down to his level. “I can’t let you get into trouble on my account. If you’re missing from sick bay for too long, you could be punished for shirking your duty.”
“Then what should we do?”
Willa gazed up at the ship rafters for a few moments. “I have an idea.”
An hour later, Willa had talked Poppy into finding her one of the “bear” costumes some of the men were wearing around the ship to bully “pollywogs.” They pulled the hot, furry costume from a storage chest in a dark corner of the orlop deck. When he handed her the heavy costume in silence, she took the bundle toward her cabin, and he headed back to the galley.
Aside from the rank smell inside the costume from too many sweaty bodies over the years, she didn’t have any trouble fitting the bulky costume to her body. Thank God, she was tall enough to support the long, furry leg coverings.
The heat and humidity hit her like the blast from wandering too close to a bonfire in the middle of a jungle. She ventured into the sick bay and young Charles immediately recognized her. “Just keep making up stories about where I am,” she whispered, before leaving again.
