Captain of My Heart (6 page)

Motion stopped. The back of his head lurched
against someone’s chest, slamming his teeth down hard upon his
swollen tongue. He choked back the flood of nausea and let his head
roll, until Ashton’s face appeared within the circle of his
spinning, darkening vision. The Yankee still looked dubious,
unsure, his kind brown eyes confused behind the thick lenses of his
spectacles. And then he looked down and saw the sodden ball of pulp
that dripped, in pieces, from Brendan’s fingers.

Brendan shut his eyes as Ashton reached out
and took what remained of the sad lump, hearing his own voice
coming from further and further away. “The drafts . . . for the
schooner . . . your father was to have . . . built . . . for . . .
me. . . .”

And then that freckled face faded, the
darkness swept in, and the nightmares that had been his for three
years now came surging back.
Halcyon’s
sunny deck. Crichton
firing, the burst of agony in his chest. And Eveleen, oh God,
Eveleen . . .

He struggled, knowing it was a dream,
fighting to wake up but unable to.

The drafts.

Please God, no—

The drafts! For God’s sake, Ashton, don’t
let Crichton get his hands on the drafts!

Panicking, he went wild, clawing desperately
toward consciousness—
wake up, wake up, WAKE UP! —
and then
his own screams jolted him rudely awake.

Wild-eyed, he threw off the dream and bolted
upright in the bed.

Chapter 3

Dazed, it took him a moment to realize he was
not on a ship, not in the sea, and certainly not drowning, but
lying on a handsome Hepplewhite field bed whose tall posts rose
majestically above him and supported a graceful canopy that looked
like bleached fishnet.

He shut his eyes, his heart still
pounding.

Opened them again.

The first thing he saw was a telescope
pointing out an open window through which bars of bright sunlight
streamed. A mild breeze, heavy with the scent of summer flowers and
newly cut grass, stirred the gauzy curtains. As they wafted in and
out, he saw trees, buildings, and in the hazy distance, marshes and
glimpses of a silvery, mast-clogged river. An hourglass, a
half-spent candle, and a fine model of a brigantine stood on a
bedside table, and from its lofty perch atop a carved mantel, a
shelf clock spoke steadily in a rhythmic
tick, tock, tick.
Brendan shut his eyes, his pounding heart beginning to return to
its normal rhythm. Just outside, a songbird trilled from a nearby
tree, and he heard carriages passing on a street below. He sank
back in a thick stack of pillows, let the breeze cool his brow, his
cheeks, his damp and naked chest—

“Nightmare?”

—and bolted upright in the bed.

Just beyond his toes a young lad stood, his
baggy trousers belted with a piece of frayed rope, his stockings
caked with mud, and his shirt, probably borrowed from his father,
hanging off him like a slack sail. A scruffy orange cat was tucked
in the crook of his arm, and both were staring at him intently, the
cat’s eyes baleful and annoyed, the lad’s the color and coolness of
fresh celery. Dirt smudged the hollow beneath one pale cheek, and
above the questioning arch of fine dark brows, a floppy hat, also
too big, covered his hair and cast most of his face in shadow.

The breeze bumped the door open and shut.
Without taking that unnerving stare off him, the lad kicked it
closed, let the latch fall into place, and casually tossed the cat
to the foot of the bed, the movement of his arm stirring the thick,
sultry air and sending a variety of scents wafting across the room.
Horse sweat. Mud. And the harsher, cleaner one of lye soap and
roses.

Roses?

“You could at least
answer
me,” the
boy complained, the pitch of his voice that of a lad not yet into
manhood, which, combined with his scanty height, told Brendan he
couldn’t be more than twelve, maybe thirteen at the most. “Pretty
rude of you to just lay there gaping, don’t you think?”

“I beg your pardon?” But Brendan, confused,
was staring at the cat, now creeping, panther-like, toward his
face, its yellow gaze fastened on his and its paws pressing against
his legs, his thighs, his bare stomach. Tensing, he groped for the
sheet, yanked it up, and spilled the animal from the bed and onto
the floor. Flicking its tail in pique, the cat leapt to the window
seat and sat glaring at him.

“I asked you if you were having a nightmare.
By the way, who’s Eveleen? Your wife? Mistress?” The lad grinned
slyly and cocked his head. “Lover?”

“What?”

“Eveleen. She your lover?”

“My
lover?
”

“Aye. You were hollering for her.”

“My lov— Oh, dear . ..” Brendan glanced about
the room. It was a masculine chamber, with a chair rail running
along its perimeter, and the woodwork beneath painted a deep,
strong red the color of oxblood. The windows were recessed, and
framed with small, hinged panels that were folded back, exposing
window seats topped with embroidered cushions.

He had no idea where he was and no idea what
had happened to him except that it had been something bad,
something
very
bad. And as the young stablehand came forward
and idly picked up the brigantine model, it suddenly all came
flooding back to him.

Crichton.
Annabel,
trying desperately
to make the river. Cannon fire and smoke, and Newburyport, where he
was to meet the shipbuilder to discuss—

The drafts.

He bolted upright, terror draining the color
from his face.

“The drafts!” he gasped.

The lad put the ship model down. “Huh?”

“The drafts!”

“Want me to close the window?”

“The win—? No, I don’t want you to close the
window, I want to know where the drafts are!”

“Why, coming in through the window,” the lad
said, jerking his thumb toward the sunny panes. “Can’t see how
you’re cold, though, it being summertime and all.”

“
Drafts,
not drafts!
Ship’s
drafts. Plans!”

The lad stared at him for a long moment; then
his eyes gleamed, a sly smile curved his mouth, and little wrinkles
appeared on either side of his impudent nose, fanning out like the
whiskers of a cat. “Oh . . .
those
kind.” Chuckling, he
tipped his hat back with a grimy finger. “So Matt and I are right
after all.”

“What?”

“About you being the client. Father doesn’t
believe him, because the client was supposed to have drowned last
night during that scuffle with the Brit ship. That’s what they’re
arguing about. Father hates being lied to.”

As though punctuating his words, something
broke somewhere with a horrible crash, and a chorus of shouting and
yelling rose up from downstairs. But the lad seemed oblivious to
the commotion, and wiping his grubby little hand on his trousers,
held it out in greeting. “Fine job you did, tricking that British
frigate onto the sunken piers last night. Whole town’s talking
about it. In fact, they’ve got its crew down in the jail now.” The
hand was still there; Brendan slowly reached out and took it. It
was tiny, even for a lad’s, the bones fragile and the skin as
supple and smooth as a child’s. “By the way, my name’s Mira.
Welcome to Newburyport, Captain.”

Brendan shook his head, trying to clear it.
“I’m sorry . . . I didn’t catch that.”

Downstairs the shouting grew louder, angrier.
Something else broke.

“Mira,” the lad repeated, and then added
proudly, “Spelled like the star in the constellation Cetus but
pronounced
Myra
.”

“Oh.
Mira
.”

It came out
Moyrrra,
with a pleasant,
lilting roll on the
r
’s that most would’ve recognized as an
Irish brogue; but either the lad didn’t know his geography,
disliked Irishmen, or found something in the way he said it that
bothered him, for he frowned and regarded Brendan with the same
baleful stare that the cat was still bestowing upon him. “Aye,
Mira.
You got a problem with my name,
Brit?”

The shouting was getting louder, closer.
Brendan pressed his fingers to his temples. He had dim memories of
yesterday—or was it this morning? last week?—of floating, of being
fished out of the sea and lying helpless on a sunny deck while a
red-haired man bent over him.
Ashton.

Faith, he hoped he hadn’t said or done
anything stupid. His memory was terribly foggy where all that was
concerned.

“No, I’ve no problem with it,” he heard
himself saying. “What I seem to be having a problem with is
remembering the events of my life during the past several hours, or
perhaps
days,
for all I know.”

“Oh,” the boy said, relaxing. “The way you
said it, I thought you were picking on my name. You weren’t, were
you?”

“Weren’t what?”

“Picking on my name.”

“No, I was not picking on your name—”

“What’s yours?”

“Brendan,” he said tiredly.

“Sounds Irish to me. You Irish, then?”

“Well, partly—”

“You a bloody king’s officer?”

“What?”

“I said, you a king’s officer? Father thinks
you are. That’s what all that damned hollering’s about out there.
You talk like you’re Irish but I could be wrong. And Matt didn’t
say anything about the client being a Brit, which is making me
wonder if maybe you aren’t the client after all, but someone off
that bleedin’ frigate, trying to spy on us so you can go back to
your countrymen and tell ’em all you know. Like how to get past
those barriers in the river. And don’t tell me you ain’t a Brit,
’cause I know a Brit when I see one, and I’ve seen plenty.”

“Look,” said Brendan, sitting up and trying
in vain to untangle the sheets from his legs, “I don’t know where
you get your ideas from, young man, but I’ll have you know I am a
privateer in the service of America, and have been for the better
part of three years!”

A pounding started on the door. “Mira! Mira,
you in there? So help me God, you open this door this instant!”

The orange cat shot from the window seat and
dove under the bed. The sea breeze fled back through the open
window, taking the lower half of the curtains with it. And the lad
drew himself up to his full, scanty height and shouted, “Bugger
off, Matt! I’m having a conversation with this damned Brit you
brought home, and I don’t care to be interrupted!”

“You open this door right now!”

“I will not!”

“Open it
now!
”

“I said go to hell, Matt! Your arse can fry
there till the cows come home as far as I’m concerned!”

“Yours is going to fry when I get this damned
door open!”

Bang. Bang.
Bang.
The door couldn’t
take much more—and neither could Brendan. His damp breeches pasted
to him like a second skin, he finally untangled himself from the
sheets, swung his legs out of the bed, and clutching one of its
tall, carved posts for support, rose above the bristling lad.

“I am
not,”
he said archly, “going to
stand here and suffer the insults of a stablehand who stinks of
horse dung and field mud! That’s Captain Ashton out there, and I
demand to see him now!”

Uncowed, the boy turned on him and stabbed a
finger into Brendan’s chest. “You’ll see him in good time, Brit,
and not a moment before. Ye think ye can give orders around here
just ’cause you’re a guest? Now sit down and cover yourself! I can
see everything ye own through those breeches, and that ain’t no way
to appear before the lady of the house!”

“When the lady of this house arrives, I’ll
thank her to bring me the rest of my clothes so I can greet her
with proper
British
courtesy!”

“You’ll greet her with proper courtesy
now,
’cause I
am
the lady of the house, and I ain’t
going to stand here and suffer your rudeness!”

“Like hell you are!”

“Like hell I
am!
”

And then, incredibly, the lad reached up and
in one angry, fluid motion, swiped the hat from his head and flung
it to the floor, releasing a glorious mane of rich, glossy brown
hair that tumbled down and down and down in an impossibly thick
fall all the way to that tiny, rope-cinched waist. Staggering back,
Brendan grabbed the bedpost for support and sat down hard on the
damp counterpane.

“Great God,” he murmured, taken aback.
“Tá
tú go hálainn
....”

Yes, she
was
beautiful, but since he’d
unconsciously reverted to his native tongue to say so, the strange
words meant nothing to her and only made her more irate. She stood
glaring at him, her pixie face all but obscured by that fall of
hair through which her impudent nose poked and eyes as green as the
underside of a winter wave now glittered. Hooking a finger beneath
it, she shoved it behind her ear and revealed the curve of a pale,
mud-stained cheek. Beneath the mud there were freckles and a spot
of high color.

“Satisfied? The next time ye speak to me,
Brit
, ’twill be with the respect I deserve!”

Numbly he reached down and drew the sheet up
over his lap, heat flooding his face. She was right. The damp
breeches revealed every curve and ridge he owned. He swallowed hard
and looked at the ticking clock. “Will you please go away?”

“I will not. This is my father’s house and
I’m staying right here. And if you don’t like it,
you
can
leave.”

“Mira!” The pounding began anew. “So help me
God, if you don’t open this door
now,
I’m going—”

“To what?” the girl hollered. “Sneak off
without me again? You’re a real louse, Matt, you know that? A real
louse! You just wait! One of these days I’m going to best you at
your own game, and we’ll see who comes out laughing!”

“Damn you, Mira, I didn’t sneak off, and if
you’d been on the ship instead of with those damned horses, I
would’ve waited.”