Anna's Crossing: An Amish Beginnings Novel (10 page)

But the seamen all stepped away from Anna.

July 8th, 1737

Bairn held the funeral for Decker at sunset when shadows grew dusky instead of sharp, on the leeward side, as was the ship’s custom. Gulls scolded from a sky streaked with red and gold as the sailors pressed in a wide, deep circle around the body. Decker was laid out in an old sailcloth with a heavy stone placed at his feet, then the cloth was wrapped snug around him, secured by ropes tied around his neck, his body, his ankles. Someone had thought to put his pair of boots with silver buckles on his feet. Decker had been proud of those boots.

Anna and Felix stood in the back with other passengers who had come to attend the service. Bairn caught sight of her over the heads of the sailors, and he noticed the eyes of several sailors drift toward her. The rumor that she was a witch had quickly traveled through the ship. Superstitions were part of the seaman’s life and they were eager to see the witch from the lower deck with the golden hair and fine figure, an uncommonly beautiful woman.

As the highest ranking officer on board, Bairn led the
service, his first funeral. He had considered sending a message to the captain in hopes he would return, but that could take days. Having a dead body aboard ship was considered bad luck. Decker had created enough mischief when he was alive. Bairn didn’t want to allow rumblings of bad luck on the
Charming Nancy
to fester and risk losing more deckhands. He imitated what he had seen the captain do on many occasions: he stood in the traditional pose of funeral respect—feet straddled, the palm of one hand clasping the back of the other resting at his lower abdomen. He read Psalm 23 from the Bible and rolled richly over the
r
’s as Captain Stedman did. There was a moment of silence—broken only by a tapping sound that came across the scrubbed deck, drawing near. Decker’s dog came to pay his respects. He skulked toward the body, sniffed, then worked his way through the crowd until he found Felix, and sat down beside him. The laddie pretended not to notice. Then Bairn gave a nod and a sailor sewed the shroud around Decker’s body, with the last stitch put through Decker’s nose—a seafaring custom to ensure that the dead was truly dead. Then a handful of seamen picked up the shroud and tossed it overboard to a watery grave.

Felix ran to the railing and Anna reached out a hand to grab his shirt collar and pull him back.

“Let him see, girlie,” Cook said, rubbing his jaw. Doomishly, he added, “Will be the first of many to be cast into the black deep before this journey is over.”

Anna looked at him, shocked. “God’s will is for no one to perish.”

Cook only shrugged. “Who’s to know what is behind the inscrutable will of God?”

“Cook, that’s enough.” Bairn’s tone was brusque. When
Anna turned to him, he said, “Why would you come to watch this?” He motioned to the line of Germans, funneling down the companionway to the lower deck. “Why would any of you come?”

She looked up at him as if the answer was obvious. “We prayed for God to have mercy on his soul.”

He felt a sudden sinking in his chest. “That’s nae what I thought you’d say.”

“What did you expect me to say?”

“Something pious, I expect.”

“Pious? Like what?”

He cast about for a way to explain. “Something smug like the spirit of God is more powerful than the spirit of wickedness.” His voice was quiet as he dipped his head toward her. He didn’t even know where that thought had come from. “Why would you show respect to a man who cursed you and mocked you?”

“I wished him no ill will. I forgave Decker for his insults.” She lifted an upturned palm in the direction of the Germans. “We all did.” She called to Felix, leaning over the railing, and the two of them followed the rest of the passengers back down the stairs.

A knot of pride shifted in his throat and he gulped it down whole, suddenly ashamed of his naïveté. He gazed at her receding back with quiet amazement.

Later that evening, Bairn stood at the ship’s bow, bracing the rails as he leaned over to look at the dark channel waters. The moon was but a thumbnail, the stars a mere smattering, the night was now truly dark except for yellow lanterns from vessels that bobbed in the channel. Crew members were gathered around the deck in clusters of three or four, playing
cards or rolling dice. Johnny Reed curled up in the bowsprit to read a book by the glow of the lantern.

The ship would soon be shipshape for the sea crossing. Everything was in order, everything except the churning in Bairn’s gut. He simmered in silence, still raw over Decker’s untimely death. Accidents happened, he knew that. It wasn’t Bairn’s first funeral at sea and it surely wouldn’t be the last. But he wondered if it could have been avoided, if he had provoked the belligerent seaman to such anger that he acted carelessly while climbing the ratlines.

Provoked. Decker was the one who provoked.

And then there was Anna. She had her own way of provoking a man. What would she think of Decker’s death? Could it have been avoided? More likely, she would say that Decker’s time had come. She would believe that the Almighty played a role in those decisions.

Belief. He knew better.

Why, then, did Anna tell him she didn’t believe his unbelief? Her comment disquieted him and he didn’t know why.

Yes he
did.

No he didn’t.

The old weight of anxiety and self-doubt settled on Bairn again. After all he had been through, he still remained utterly vulnerable, bereft, even in the one place he had started to feel more or less at home.

He raised his fist toward heaven.
When will You leave me alone? What have I ever
done to You?

He dropped his fist. It was pointless. There was no use arguing with Someone who wouldn’t argue back. He’d never gotten much satisfaction from a God who didn’t seem to speak or see or hear. Or feel.

Then it occurred to him that he was talking to God and he had just told Anna he didn’t believe in God. He sighed and leaned his forearms on the railing.

Why should he feel so drawn, so curious about her? He didn’t know why he bothered to think of her at all. He didn’t need a woman telling him what to do or what to believe. He didn’t need a woman looking him straight in the eyes or telling him he was wrong about nearly everything.

He did not need a woman. And he definitely didn’t want one like pious Anna. So innocent to the ways of the world, pathetically innocent. Like all the Peculiars. In this world but not of it. Bound by faith that appeared gentle and yet was so severe.

He tried to put away all thoughts of Anna and went to his quarters. But he couldn’t put away the sadness that overcame him, the unnamed longings. He had another vivid dream . . .

His mother was in the front room, sitting in the bentwood rocker his father had made when they were first married. The room had not changed; the basket of mending was by the window where the afternoon light was best. The rocker was near the fireplace for warmth, a child was curled up by his mother’s feet, napping. The curtains on the window were as crisp and white as if they had been washed and ironed and starched that morning.

Bairn was not lost, his father was not dead.

When he startled awake from the deep dream, heart pounding, his face was wet with tears.

July 9th, 1737

The whole sky was on fire. Felix hid in the bowsprit to watch the sun dip lower and lower in the west, filling the sky with
flames of red and orange and gold. Squinty-Eye’s awful dog had found him and had settled somewhere near his feet. He ruffled its ears to keep the awful dog quiet.

His father would appreciate this sunset. On most summer nights in Ixheim, he and his father would watch the sun set behind the hills. “Going, going, gone,” his father would say as the last bit of sun slipped away. Felix wondered what a sunset would look like in Penn’s Woods. The very sound of the place made it seem like nothing but trees.

Tonight, on the bow of the
Charming Nancy
, Felix watched Johnny Reed sprinkle salt on a fishing net—salted in, he’d heard sailors call it, to bring good luck—and toss it over the side. The net caught a fish that was so big and bulky that it took three sailors to reel it in. Felix popped his head up to watch them wrestle the thrashing fish up onto the deck. They wouldn’t have seen him even if he’d been sending up flares—not with their keen interest in Johnny Reed’s catch. All the sailors gathered round the fish—as big as a man. Cook even came out of the galley with a butcher knife, with his cat following behind him.

“’Tis a shark,” Bairn said.

“Shark stew for dinner,” Cook said, sounding pleased. He handed Johnny Reed the knife to do the honors of butchering the fish.

Johnny took that knife and opened it up, then screamed like a girl and dropped the knife so that it speared its point into the deck. “Don’t look!” he shrieked, covering his eyes.

The seamen looked at once, curious, peering inside the fish’s belly, then something terrible overcame them and they staggered backward.

“What’s inside?” Cook asked. “What is it?”

“Not a what but a . . .” Bairn bit the end off his sentence and seemed to gulp it down. Then he tried again. “It’s a man. Swallowed whole like Jonah’s whale.”

Cook stretched the opening of the fish. “You’re right. He still has his boots on.” He looked up at Bairn. “Silver buckles on the boots.”

“Oh no,” Johnny squealed. “Don’t say it.”

“Aye. ’Tis Decker,” Cook said, matter of factly.

Johnny leapt up like he’d sat on an anthill. He bolted to the railing to vomit over the side of the ship. Oh my, he was sick. It went on forever.

“That sight,” Bairn said, peering into the fish, “’tis beyond anything I’ve ever seen.”

“It’s a sign!” Johnny Reed said in his high-pitched voice. “There’s a witch aboard. Doncha see? Decker’s tryin’ t’warn us. From the hereafter!”

The dog jumped up and barked. Felix ducked his head down.

“The only sign is that even a fish couldn’t stomach Decker,” Bairn said, disgusted.

“Aye,” Cook said, humor in his voice. “No more vomiting, gentlemen. ’Tis a grave matter.” He cackled in laughter, until Bairn silenced him with a look.

“Johnny, go get another sailcloth and two rocks.” Bairn put a hand to the back of his neck. “We’ll try to bury Decker again.”

Felix was curious to see Decker’s body inside the fish, but seamen kept running to the side to throw up over the rail and he was worried that if he moved, he’d be spotted. The bowsprit was the best hiding spot of all. The stupid cat found him, though, and jumped up to the bowsprit to poke around, which made the awful dog start to bark. Fortunately, no one was paying any attention to the cat or the dog or the bowsprit.

If only Johann were here, Felix thought for the hundred and first time. Anna would squirm and his mother would faint and his father would frown that he took delight in the tale, but Johann would’ve appreciated such a gruesome story about the squinty-eyed sailor swallowed whole like Jonah in the whale. Maybe he’d wait for the right time and use it to shock Catrina silent.

After Decker’s body splashed into the water and sunk, the other sailors milled about on the upper deck, talking about witches and fishes. Bairn stood alone at the bow of the ship, looking west to the dying sun. The moon was coming up full over the harbor. Felix considered making his presence known, but decided against it after observing the somber look on Bairn’s face. Just as he was about to make a run for the companionway stairs, he thought he heard Bairn quietly say, “Going, gone.”