The Captain (5 page)

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Authors: Lynn Collum

BOOK: The Captain
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A strangled cry surged from him. He'd heard the stories from old pressed sailors who'd survived their ordeal. They were only too willing to spin tales of the harsh life at sea: years of imprisonment on a ship, bad food, and the lash. Gilbert wouldn't let that happen to his friend. There was only one thing he could do. After a cautious look about, he slipped along in the shadows another twenty yards west before he recognized the Wapping New Stairs. In his fear he'd run directly toward the Rendezvous. His flight had also brought him closer to home. The stairs would return him to the docks. He climbed cautiously, listening for any sound that would alert him. He made it to the top unmolested, then looked left and right.
The River Thames Police office was on the corner, but all seemed to be quiet. He raced across the wharf and disappeared into a narrow alley that would take him to Ratcliffe Highway and to Jack.
Jacinda pulled the handle of the ink press across the paper, then lifted the handbill and looked at the image. The words announcing the hiring of a crew for the
India Princess
had printed without a smudge. “There's the last one, Mr. Skirven.”
The printer peered over the top of his glasses from his desk at the rear of the dimly lit print shop. He was a thin man with hollowed cheeks and a fringe of brown hair just above his ears. The oil lamp on the desk cast a ghostly white glow to his face, making him look quite terrifying, but in truth he was a kind old man who'd given Jacinda a job with few questions about how a “lad” from the slums was so well read. “You're certain. Did you double check the count? I don't want the first mate of the
Princess
to come in here and try to wriggle out of payin'. A hundred exact.”
“Exactly, sir. There's not a smudged page in the lot either.” Jacinda's arms ached from pulling the press lever all day long, but she knew Mr. Skirven needed the business and she had stayed the two hours extra that it had taken.
The clock over the fire grate showed it was half past ten. She prayed that Ben hadn't been worried, or worse, gone out to roam the streets after finishing his work at Bixley's Warehouse, where he fed and watered the horses that pulled wagon loads of goods away from the wharves. Wapping was a major shipping area where the London Docks had been recently rebuilt, greatly increasing the number of ships. Sailors were a rough lot and were generally the only people on the streets after dark.
The old printer stood up, pushed the glassed up on his nose and smiled, “Then you best be headin' home, lad. It's late. I won't be needin' you for the next few weeks. I'm goin' to the country to visit my mother.”
Jacinda's heart plummeted. Their funds were low. She would have to look for work elsewhere. She picked up the canvas bag she'd brought with her meal and hung the strap over her shoulder. She bid her employer goodnight, then stepped into the alley near Shadwell.
Despite her male attire, Jacinda knew that danger lurked on those dark streets. She hurried toward Ratcliffe Highway. The June heat had driven many residents out onto the streets that evening. Many of the shops had remained open late. Business had been good since the Treaty of Toulouse. Ships from the continent were again frequenting the harbor.
Tall for a female, Jacinda had no difficulty passing as a young man once she bound her bosom with muslin. She appeared to the world as a thin lad in her coarse spun green waistcoat, tan breeches, and nankeen jacket. Her sandy blond hair, cut short about her ears, was curly. She often kept it covered with a wide-brimmed hat that cast her face in shadows even on a sunny day. Tonight, she kept her head down to avoid eye contact with the sailors, watermen, and rat-catchers still going about their business in the streets. In truth, there was little about her to attract undue attention, but on the rough streets of Wapping, her slender frame would intimate no one.
Her willowy build was deceiving. Jacinda had grown strong with the various jobs she'd performed over the years. She'd insisted that she do her part to help earn money after the funds from her father's jewelry had been spent. It was strange, but in all the years she'd been in London, she'd never gone hungry or been without a roof over her head. Those few items Trudy had taken that night had gone a long way to keeping them fed the first few years. Johnny Trudeau had made up the difference when their money had run low. That is, when he had been in Town. Despite Trudy's objection, he'd continued to ride the Pike to supplement their income. Unfortunately he'd ridden off two years ago and never returned. It was a subject that she and Ben had avoided discussing, but Jacinda, deep in her heart, suspected that the highwayman had met with a musket ball on some lonely road in the north. It was doubtful they would ever know for sure.
In the eight long years since she'd left home, the only time Jacinda had ever considered returning to Chettwood was the winter Trudy had died of the ague. Only fifteen and uncertain about continuing to live apart from her family without Nurse, Jacinda had packed her bags and thought to go to her Uncle Matthew's house in Soho. But Johnny begged her to stay. By then, his wife had left him with their son, Ben, and he needed her to help him raise the boy. She'd agreed to stay, knowing that it still wasn't safe for her to return since her father's murderer had never been brought to justice.
She dutifully wrote a letter a year to her father's solicitor, but had never told him her whereabouts for fear that he would supercede her father's wishes and force her to return to Chettwood. Unfortunately, this secrecy meant he had no way to send her funds, even had he agreed to do so, which she doubted he would.
After Trudy's death, Johnny never cosseted Jacinda. For the first time she had had a chance to see something of how the lower classes live. Working odd jobs wasn't easy, but she much preferred the experience to the life she would have led had she remained in Millicent Markham's care. Her cousin had treated her like a fragile piece of china, and she had been cloistered in her room much of the time. Still, there was a part of her that was curious about those she'd left behind. What had it been like at the manor without her or her father? There was little doubt Millie would run things efficiently, thinking it her duty. At present Jacinda felt no real desire to go back, knowing someone there wished to do her harm. But one day she would return to be mistress of her own life and Chettwood Manor. For now, however, Ben needed her.
As she drew near the tenement house where she and Ben kept rooms, she could see the front door was open. Lili Le Beau, their neighbor, was seated on a small barrel on the stoop, fanning herself and talking with passersby, mostly the sailors. The buxom woman spotted Jacinda, and waved. “You're late, Jack, my boy.”
A smile tipped Jacinda's mouth. Lili was a former actress without a company. The large woman well knew that “Jack” was, in fact, female. She had befriended Ben and Jacinda, taking them under her wing within a month of their arrival at the rooming house ... and a rather large wing it was. Big boned and tall, Lili had a decided fondness for sweets and gin, a rather odd combination in Jacinda's opinion, but the only thing that would make the former thespian pass on a glass of spirits was marzipan, macaroons, or sticky buns. It was a weakness that had led to the ruination of her once neat figure. Despite that, she might have kept a position in one of the touring companies, but when she drank, she became a handful. Too often she got into fights with the other performers while in her cups. The sad truth was that she was as handy with her fives as some of the bear garden bruisers, and on a bad night she could leave many a black-eyed actor or actress in her wake. Her pugilistic prowess and not her ample proportions had ended her career of treading the boards.
At five-and-thirty, with her still-pretty face, she'd settled into a room off Brett Street in Wapping and did laundry and darning for sailors, shipbuilders, stevedores, and watermen. And when the occasional seafarer stayed overnight, none of the neighbors complained to the church warden, for Lili was as generous as she was large. Many a night she had a simple meal prepared when Jacinda came home late from one of her jobs, and Ben would be already fed and in bed.
Jacinda stopped to answer the woman's query about her late return. “There was extra work and I couldn't leave. Is Ben upstairs?” She put one foot on the stoop and waited while Lili called a greeting to the old watchman, George Olney, as he made his rounds and called the hour. Jacinda thought she detected the scent of gin on the wind and eyed Lili closely, but clearly the woman wasn't into her cups just yet, for there was no hint of the demon that would appear after a full bottle.
“Nay, the lad's off with Gilbert Sprat. I warned him how it would be when you got home and found him gone. But there's no talkin' to a cheeky pup like our Benny when he's wantin' to have a lark.”
Jacinda didn't voice her concerns. It wasn't as if Lili could stop the lad when he wanted to have his way. Jacinda had begun to think that returning to Westbury would be the best thing for Ben, who was like a brother to her now. There she could see that he had proper schooling and provide a safe haven from the cutthroats and ne'er-do-wells of this world. Who would have thought they would not have found her father's killer by now? She bid Lili goodnight, then climbed the stairs to the small room where she and Ben lived.
Warm, stale air greeted her. She lit the rush lamp on the rickety table covered with a faded blue gingham cloth. The light illuminated their few belongings: sleeping pallets they'd purchased cheaply at one of the local stores where the sailors shopped, an ancient cabinet filled with their bits of crockery, and a tattered old painted screen behind which Jacinda dressed.
She pulled one of the table's three chairs to the window, which looked out over Ratcliffe Highway. She lifted the latch and pushed opened the shutter, releasing the heat before she settled into the chair to await Ben's return. The long cobblestone road below disappeared into the darkness. She watched the throng of sailors, both foreign and English, come and go from the taverns, which wouldn't close until midnight. A slight breeze came out of the west. With it came the smell of tar and newly milled timber from the nearby shipyards, but at least it helped to cool the room.
What could Ben be doing so late? She worried about him because he, like many of the Wapping lads, always had some get-rich-quick scheme in the works. He knew the truth about her legacy, but to him it was only a story. Over the years it seemed that he had come to doubt she was in danger and that she would one day be wealthy. Her lips curled upward when she thought about what Ben's reaction would be when he saw Chettwood for the first time.
Then the smile disappeared.
If
she ever returned home again. The thought of going back to Cousin Millie's iron rule was not the least bit enticing. Jacinda lived her life much as she wanted, and she wasn't certain she wished the rigid structure of a young lady's world again, to be idle and bored out of her wits day in and day out.
The thumping of footsteps on the stairs made her turn around with anticipation. But to her dismay the door burst open and only Gilbert Sprat entered. His hat was missing, his face was flushed beneath muddy streaks. It was an obvious sign he'd been down at the docks, where she'd expressly forbidden Ben to go. The lad could barely catch his breath as he coughed. “They've ... taken 'im.”
Jacinda rose even as her heart sank. There could be no doubt about the “ 'im” to whom the boy referred. “Who has taken him?”
“The Impress is out. Tryin' to refill the ships what took such a thrashin' from the Yanks.” Even a lad like Gilbert was aware of the American victories in the recent naval war. “They took 'im to St. Katherine's Rendezvous.”
Jacinda's knees grew weak and she sank back into the chair. What could she do? She hadn't the money to bribe the Gangers to release the boy. And once they put the men on the barge it was almost impossible for them to get free unless the navy deemed them unseaworthy, which wasn't likely to happen to a healthy lad like Ben. A sob escaped Jacinda and she put her head down in her hands. She couldn't think of Ben forever lost to her.
“Lud, child, yer filthy,” Lili called from the doorway. “Ye dashed past like a banshee was after ye. Where's Ben?”
“He's been pressed, Miss Lili,” Gilbert cried.
Jacinda lifted her head, tears still streaming down her face. “What can we do, Lil?”

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