‘You must never go on to the poop deck where the officers are without an express invitation,’ Clemence warned Eliza. ‘And we must do our best to stay well clear of the men working and not wander about the ship.’

‘Don’t see how we’re going to get any fresh air, then,’ the maid grumbled, clambering up the companionway. ‘This thing goes up and down a lot.’

‘It will be worse when we are at sea, so you must grow accustomed. But we can certainly take exercise; I’ll ask the captain at dinner where we may place chairs and where we may promenade,’ Clemence said soothingly, hoping that Eliza would prove immune to seasickness. A reproachful bark sent her back to untie One-Eye’s leash. ‘And as for you, behave yourself!’

She had seen the island so often from on board a ship that she had not expected it to be any different this time. But somehow the vista of hills and mountains, the buildings on shore, the jumble of shipping in the harbour seemed like a painting, something unreal and distant. This was no longer home.

Clemence stood, one hand gripping the rail, one tight on the hound’s leash, and stared, trying to fix the scene in her memory along with the smells that the soft off-shore breeze brought across the water. A hand removed the leash from her hand and replaced it with a large handkerchief before she was even aware that silent tears were rolling down her checks.

‘You will come back one day,’ Nathan said, looking not at her but at the island.

‘I know.’ Clemence dried her eyes, but held on to the white linen. ‘It is just that I cannot imagine what I am going to or what my new family is like or what they will think of me.’

‘They are good people, the ones I know,’ he said. ‘People with a strong sense of family who will love you because you are theirs and then, once they know you, because you are you.’

‘Oh!’ Charmed out of all self-consciousness, Clemence turned to face him. ‘Oh, thank you.’ She smiled and for a moment the blue eyes that smiled back into hers held the expression she had surprised in them sometimes aboard the Sea Scorpion, the look that had lingered on her face as they hung together in the cool waters of the pool. And then the shutters came down and it was the polite smile of a gentleman who had offered a minor compliment to a lady.

‘It is merely the truth,’ Nathan said, handed back One-Eye and walked abruptly away towards the poop.

By the time Clemence’s eyes were focusing properly again, the ship was sailing east along the coast and Nathan was nowhere to be seen.

After two weeks out at sea life had settled into a routine. To Clemence it sometimes felt as though this was real life and everything else was a dream. She and Eliza had made themselves as comfortable as they could in their cabin and Eliza, at least, now knew the ship from stem to stern thanks to Street and his excuses of either needing to take One-Eye for a walk, or asking advice on his mending or cajoling the maid into joining him and the ship’s cook in the galley.

‘I hope he intends to make an honest woman of you,’ Clemence said severely one morning after Eliza had come back to the cabin in the small hours.

‘He will, if I’ll take him,’ Eliza had chuckled, her fingers busy whipping a hem.

The awning that the men had rigged over the chairs, table and hammocks that had colonised the ‘ladies’ corner’ of the main deck flapped idly in the light breeze. Clemence fanned herself and rocked in her hammock, too idle to sew or read one of the books she had borrowed from the officers.

The Straits of Florida were proving hot and humid and they were experiencing an uncomfortable combination of heavy squalls interspersed with virtual calms and the officers, Nathan included, appeared to be able to think of nothing other than navigation.

They all made polite conversation at dinner, of course, scrupulously avoiding matters relating to the running of the ship, but Clemence never lingered, certain they greeted the sight of her retreating back with relief so they could relax and get back to talking of naval matters.

She adjusted her pillow now and tipped her straw hat over her nose, secure in the knowledge that she could peep through the gaps in the coarse weave and scrutinise the comings and goings on the poop deck unseen.

Nathan was up there now, in deep conversation with the officers on watch as usual. He was so scrupulously polite and reserved in her company that anyone who did not know would assume he had never met her until she had boarded the Orion. She had hoped, for the first week, that he would think better of his attitude towards marriage, but the respectful way she was treated by his fellow officers only confirmed what he had said—as a Ravenhurst, it would take more than an adventure on a pirate ship to ruin her standing.

And the more she thought about his late wife, the more convinced she became that he still loved her. There was more behind his refusal to wed her than the fear of being thought a fortune hunter, Clemence was certain. She was certain, too, that if she could only get close to him again he might come to realise that, precious though his lost love was, there was another waiting for him, one that was alive and warm and wanted him.

But a frontal approach was not going to work, he was armoured against that, she told herself, lying awake at night and hearing him moving around in his cabin. But what would happen if she waited until all was still and then

slipped next door and into his bed? One night she had got as far as putting one foot out from under the sheet and then had snatched it back with the thought of just how humiliating it would be when he rejected her again.

As she thought about it the bo’sun appeared, the two youngest midshipmen at his heels. ‘Sir, I’ve got Mr Markham and Mr Stills for their navigation lesson, like you said, sir. I’ll be more than grateful if you can get these two sorted, they’re beyond my powers.’

Nathan came down the steps. ‘I gather that you two are finding your mathematical studies a challenge.’ There was an exchange of sheepish looks and two nods. ‘Right, well, take your notebooks and the theodolites over there and we’ll see if we can keep this vessel off the Grand Bahama.’

The bo’sun knuckled his forehead and took himself off, the boys ran to do as they were bid. And Clemence, still watching furtively, saw Nathan stretch his shoulders and flex his back with a grimace that spoke of more than stiffness. His back must be healed by now, surely, but the skin must be taut and tender.

Concerned, Clemence swung her legs out of the hammock and stood up. The hound opened his eye and looked hopeful. ‘Oh, come on, then. I’ll just take a stroll along the deck,’ she said, waving Eliza back to her sewing. ‘Where’s Street?’

‘In the galley, I dare say, that’s where he usually is.’ Eliza bit off her thread and folded the petticoat. ‘I’ll just have all these finished by the time we get to England,’ she grumbled. ‘And then you’ll be wearing them three at once on account of the snow.’

‘Not in early September, surely?’ Clemence queried, watching Nathan’s progress along the deck to the waiting boys. No, he wasn’t moving as well as he had before the flogging.

By the time she drew level with the hatch cover that Nathan was using as his makeshift classroom, one midshipman was being put through his paces with the theodolite while the other stared glumly at a page covered in figures.

‘Difficult?’ Clemence queried softly, peering over the boy’s shoulder while One-Eye sat down panting beside them.

Tags: Louise Allen Historical
Source: readsnovelonline.net