Pirate's Wraith, The (20 page)

She crawled out of her crude shelter and plopped down on the sand beside Harlan. “I can’t sleep.”

“Are you hungry?”

“I’d like a nice fat juicy steak, smothered in onions and mushrooms, with a big fat potato on the side slathered with sour cream and sprinkled with chives.”

“Tomorrow we will search for more food.”

“Like what?”

“Perhaps some small rodents.”

“Rats!”

“They are edible.”

“Blech. I’ll stick with the mussels.” She could tell he struggled not to smile and she relaxed a bit. Nice to know the guy had a sense of humor, despite his piratical ways. Yes, at first he had accused her of stabbing Moody but she supposed they must have been good buddies before she came along and discovered the first mate was a creep.

“You know—I
’ve given some thought to this thing about Moody’s murder. Isn’t it possible that someone wanted to steal his identity? It’s got to be an easy thing to do in your century. No social security cards to worry about, no driver’s license. So whoever killed him is now claiming to be him. He’ll get himself a ship, design his flag, and three centuries from now nobody will be the wiser.”

“Do not speak of the future.”

“Sorry.” She frowned. No, she was not sorry. How could she deny a lifetime spent elsewhere? He would have to accept her at some point. They came from very different backgrounds, but they were here together—alone.

His silence annoyed her. She glanced up at the twinkling stars in the heavens. “There are so many stars here, more than I ever noticed back home. I suppose I never saw them because the streetlights are too bright. Do you know where we are?”

He continued to stare into the fire. “Without my sextant I cannot be accurate.”

“Do you have any idea at all?”

“We are above the equator.” He placed another piece of wood on the fire.

“So we’re really, really lost.” It’s not like she hadn’t guessed as much, but knowing it for sure made everything worse. “Why don’t we set up some sort of signal flag so a passing ship will know we’re here?”

“Our enemies ply these waters, too. We must watch and wait.”

“What are the odds that we’ll get picked up?”

“I cannot guess.”

“That’s depressing.”

“We are alive.”

She could not be sure of that. She might be in some sort of fugue state. However, when she lifted up her hand it throbbed. If she was unconscious, it shouldn’t hurt—unless she now resided in a very strange portion of hell, but then she supposed she would be suffering a great deal more pain.

She resolved not to contemplate her impossible situation. While Harlan did not rate as the greatest conversationalist in the world, he provided her only companionship at the moment so she decided to take another stab at getting to know him.

“Were you born in Lyme?” she asked.

“No, I was born in England, but my parents came to the colonies when I was very young.”

“Do you remember the trip?”

“No, I was but a babe.”

“What is your first memory as a child?”

The corner of his mouth tilted upward in a wry grin. “A horse stepped on my foot.”

“Was it broken?”

“No, but badly bruised.”

“Ouch.”

His forehead furrowed. “What is that ‘ouch’?”

“It is an expression people use when something hurts.”

He lifted her still-bandaged hand. His touch sent a swirl of excitement through her along with that ever-present hum of awareness. “Ouch?”

“Yes, that’s a big ouch.”

“I am sorry.” He gently placed her hand back on her thigh. 

“It’s okay. You got the splinter out.”

Again his brow creased. “What is that ‘okay’?”

“Okay means all right or good.”

He rubbed his eyes. “I am weary of your strange tongue.”

“It is English—but a dialect. You seem to understand most of the common words I speak.”

He nodded. Then his soft blue eyes bored into hers and her pulse began to race. “What is your first memory as a child?”

She smiled with delight. Yes
! He intended to make a sincere effort. They could have a real conversation. “I remember going to the airport—”

She stopped and winced.

“What is that ‘airport’?”

“In the future there are flying machines—airplanes. They are faster than ships.”

“No.” He stood up. “Birds fly. Man cannot build a machine that flies like a bird.”

Lesley sighed. “The first airplane was flown in North Carolina by the Wright brothers sometime around the beginning of the nineteen hundreds.” She was not sure of the date, but she knew it had to be before the first World War because there were airplanes used in that conflict. 

“Bibble-babble.” He turned his back to her.

“Think of it as a story.” She entreated. “Don’t you like stories?”

“I like poetry.”

“Can you recite any poems?”

“Indeed. I have memorized some of
Paradise Lost.”

She suppressed a groan. Epic poems bored her. Still, she asked him to sit and recite the poem.

Hearing his voice—steady and low—and watching the fire—lulled her into a relaxed state. Her eyes grew heavy and at one point, she realized she had nodded off while leaning against him. She woke up because there was a slight, but incessant hum in her head. Unlike one of her migraines, it did not hurt but she was conscious of it.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to lean on you.” She yawned. “I guess I’m ready to go to sleep now.” She turned to crawl into her makeshift shelter when she noticed the phosphorescent glow emanating from the pocket of Harlan’s long coat.

He frowned, followed her gaze, and swore.

When she reached out toward the soft luminosity, thin fingers of light leaped out at her. Her fingers tingled and she drew away.

“You are her.” His hoarse voice chilled her. “You are Elsbeth, come back from death.”

Fear chilled her. “I am Lesley—from Belford, New Jersey, in 2011.”

He put his hand in his pocket and drew out the glowing object. “I carved this for Josiah and you took it.”

Lesley stared in horror at the small wooden horse. “No
, I found it in a cradle I bought in an antique store in Delaware.”

“You lie
! I have remembered what I did with it after Josiah died. I threw it into the fire.”

“That’s ... that’s ... not possible ... unless it is a different horse. Or maybe someone saved it before it burned.” Shoving her fear aside, she reached out and grabbed the horse in his hands. That was like sticking her finger in an electric socket. Hot energy flowed through her and she could not let go.

The connection was severed only because her fingers shook so badly they could not hold on any longer. She dropped it and so did Harlan.

As the glowing toy lay on the sand, a vaporous cloud billowed into a swirling plume of shimmering particles. Lesley didn’t breathe. Frozen in terror, she watched as the gleaming bits of effervescence shifted and coalesced into an amorphous form.

Harlan jumped up. “’Tis a ghost.”

Lesley’s insides turned to ice water. Until now, she had never believed in ghosts, but there in front of her was a thing that had a lot more substance than smoke or fog. Two appendages appeared and reached out toward her.

Harlan slashed at the thing with his dagger. It reacted by emitting a high note.

“Stop
!” Lesley screamed. “You’re hurting her!”

Chapter
Thirteen

Harlan
’s heart thundered in fright but he lowered his dagger and stumbled backward. The swirling cloud dissipated while the high-pitched cry slid into lower range until it became so faint it faded away. In a moment, the spirit vanished without a trace.

He had fought in countless battles, but he had never trembled with such abject terror. Every part of him quivered as if his body had no more substance than the telltales lifted by the wind on the sails. His mouth had not a drop of moisture in it. His tongue could not move. It lay like a dead stick of wood in his mouth.

His glanced downward at the wooden pony on the sand. No light emanated from it. No sparks reached out to stab him with fire. He had fashioned it with his own hands from an ordinary block of wood. Elsbeth must have enchanted it. He had thrown it into the fire once and it had not burned. Perhaps he should throw it into the sea.

He reached for it, but Lesley snatched it away and held it to her breast.

“You shouldn’t have done that. I don’t think she meant to hurt us. She wanted to talk to us.” She slid her fingers along the pony’s back as if it were a live pet. “This little horse has come a long way with me. It’s all I have left of my other life.”

In the moonlight, he saw the lone tear course down her cheek. He had a sudden urge to taste it, but he fought against his inclination.

“I suffered for months with the most unendurable migraines but I would reach out to this little horse and dream ... and somehow it comforted me.” She held the toy as tenderly as one held an infant.

He grabbed the bottle of wine, uncorked it and proceeded to quaff most of it down. His tongue loosened. “I have gone mad.”

“There are other explanations. We could have suffered a hallucination brought on by the trauma of all we went through. Or maybe the mussels have some fungi in them, which causes a kind of delirium. I read about a fungus on rye bread that caused people to have delusions in the middle ages. It was the original LSD.”

“I do not understand your words
.” Living on an uninhabited island with a strange woman who talked of the future and caused him to see things that could not be surely would cause his death. 

“LSD is a hallucinogenic drug. You must have opiates in this century. Right? LSD is worse than opium. I think. I’ve never tried it, of course. A glass of wine is my drug of choice.”

Harlan handed her the bottle. “Drink.”

“I thought we were supposed to conserve it, but .... bottoms up.” She lifted the bottle to her lips, but held onto the wooden pony with a death grip that showed in her white knuckles.

He sat on the sand beside her and watched as the tear coursed down her cheek and dribbled away, leaving only a pale trail. His fingers itched to wipe the light stain from her skin, even though the horrible discoloration from the bruise still marred her beauty. For one so delicate, she had endured much, and she had borne her sufferings with little complaint.

He had seen men with far less fortitude. Was her bravery a product of her courage, or did she possess the power of the devil? Had she even now woven a spell about hi
m? Why should he care for her? Yet, he had to admit to himself he did.

She lowered the jug. “Feels good going down—despite the slight tinge of vinegar. At home I have a very classy wine rack. I keep it well stocked with my favorite
Pinot Grigio.” A hint of emotion sounded in her voice. Would another tear follow in the wake of the first? 

“Wine is a woman’s drink.” He craved a glass of whiskey. It would eliminate his foolish thoughts. Unfortunately, he could be on this island for many months before a friendly ship came along. It might be a long time before he tasted whiskey again. The firelight played on Lesley’
s hair, making it appear not black but same tawny hue as his favorite drink.

“You are a damned chauvinist.” She glowered at him as if he were the lowest of vermin.

As usual, he had no idea what her strange word meant, but he could guess. “Women cannot handle whiskey.”

“Ha
! If I weighed as much as you, I could drink the same amount.”

He laughed. “The last time you had my whiskey, you could not keep your eyes open.”

“That doesn’t count. That was a horrific day. In fact, I’ve had nothing but drama since I arrived in this miserable century. If we get back to civilization—such as it is—I will prove to you that I can hold my liquor as well as you can. Though we have to base consumption on body weight. Do you know anything about percentages? Here, I can show you in the sand—” She used her finger to draw a mathematical formula.

He did not listen to her words, though the soft lilt of her voice had a calming effect. Warmth lingered in the night. The wine had dulled his panic and he began to doubt what he had seen. It could have been smoke from the fire, a wisp of evening fog, or some film floating across his eye.

The cry he thought he heard could have come from a seabird. His senses could have tricked him. He needed rest and more substantial food. Tomorrow he would go hunting and set traps.

In the brief walk he had taken, he found indications that the
island contained an abundant source of fresh water, which made it far more likely that a ship would drop anchor at some point. There should be clues about the island of former shipwrecked sailors. He had not seen anything yet, but he intended to search for broken barrels, pieces of pottery, or other signs of previous visitors. While he knew he had never laid eyes on this scrap of land until now, that did not mean that no one else had.