The Voyage of Lucy P. Simmons (16 page)

Sensing the tension in the room, Annie stopped cavorting, and suddenly the attention she craved seemed too much for her. “I'm going to my room,” she said, lifting the cumbersome silvery cloak and marching toward the stairs.

“Wait.” Prudence took Annie gently by the shoulders. “This clearly doesn't belong to you. Where did you get it?”

Annie's bottom lip trembled but she stubbornly stuck out her chin. “I didn't
steal
it,” she said. “I found it. I was hiding in Marni's big trunk and it felt soft like a kitty. I just borrowed it. You'll let me, won't you, Marni?” She looked desperately at Marni, who still seemed stricken. Marni lowered herself into a chair, looked away for a second, and sighed deeply.

“I wish I could let you wear it,” she said. “But I cannot do that. Please, as Prudence said, return it to my chest.”

Annie hoisted the length of sealskin into her arms, her face red with embarrassment, and stomped up the stairs. No one moved until the sound of her steps disappeared, the air in the room charged with questions. Grady pulled one side of his mouth into a grimace and avoided Marni's eyes. “Always knew there was somethin' funny goin' on,” he grumbled.

“I know the siren stories,” Old Peader said, eyeing Marni suspiciously. “Ye could be one of 'em, if I didn't know better.”

“What in God's name is she doin' with that cloak?” Grady demanded, as if Marni was not present.

“Fer her t' know and you to find out!” Oonagh teased.

Marni rose, her eyes fixed on the stairway where Annie had disappeared, and without a word, she followed her up the stairs.

Grady rubbed his chin as if doing so might produce the answers he sought. “Just come back from town,” he said. “Down at the pier.” He removed his cap, smoothed his hair, and replaced it on his head. “And if it ain't strange enough t' have a lass in a siren's cloak, there's this: way out in the harbor, right on the horizon, I seen two ships.” He looked at me and Pru. Nodded. “Yep—the specter ship, and, impossible as it seems, the black ship right behind her.”

23

T
he day of the wedding dawned sunny, the earth green and sparkling with dew. The little wren that lived in the tree outside the cottage warbled a glorious song announcing the festivities. There was a sense of magic in the air, everyone's spirits soaring. I pushed away the sense of foreboding that had plagued me since Grady's announcement about the ship sightings. Had Slash made it back aboard the black ship, sharing what he'd discovered on the
Lucy P
.? Grady, Pru, Marni, Walter, the capt'n, and I'd checked repeatedly with the harbormaster, perused the piers and shoreline, with no sign of either ship. I'd even gone so far as to board the
Lucy P
., scale the mainmast, and, from the crow's nest, check the seas and shore as far as the eye could see with Father's trusted spyglass.

Nothing.

Grady continued to swear by what he saw, and I wondered if perhaps he had inherited the mental confusion that sometimes afflicted his mother. Sensing my mistrust, he became surlier than usual, but this was easy to ignore.

My dress, of dusty-rose satin, trimmed in delicate lace with beading on the bodice, had been laid across my bed and matching hair combs set out on my bureau. With Pru stationed outside the bathroom door I'd risked a bath, thankfully without incident. Still smelling faintly of lavender and rose water, I slipped into my robe and sat on the edge of my bed, gazing out the window. A sense of unreasonable sadness seized me—while Addie's life was moving along, Prudence and I were still mired in the wretched family curse. Despite our best efforts we still didn't have the answers we needed. We were no closer to finding the treasure. No closer to returning to Maine, to Simmons Point. Perhaps we never would, and, like Marni, spend our days searching for something always just out of reach.

As if my disloyal thoughts had conjured her up, there was a soft knock on the door, and Marni entered. She smiled gently, immediately sensing my mood, sat beside me, and laid a hand on my arm. “We have to remember that today belongs to Addie alone,” she said, fingering her locket. “And continue to believe that our day—yours, and mine—will come.”

I turned toward her. “What if they don't? Suppose you never find your son? And I don't find the treasure?” I felt dangerously close to tears.

She sighed. “Then we graciously accept the unexpected gifts. Imagine if I was blind to the blessings handed me—you, Walter, Georgie, and Annie. Addie and Pru. The opportunity to see the world. If I'd been focused solely on my need, look at all I might have missed.”

“Yes, but—”

“No buts.”

“Marni . . . ”

She waited.

“The cloak . . .”

“The cloak.” She smiled wryly. “You're worrying about what it means.”

“Every time you disappear into the sea I think it may be the last! It's as though the ocean is your calling. I felt it from the first time I laid eyes on you, out there in the harbor in Maine. Then at sea. On Clare Island. There were rumors. Grady still thinks—”

“That I'm a siren. A merrow.” She chuckled. “I'm not. If I had been, and I'd reclaimed my cloak, wouldn't I have returned to the sea long ago?”

“But—”

“My mother, Mary Maude Lee—”

“The pirate—”

“Yes. True, my mother was a pirate. Ruthless. Cold. There was a reason she was fearless at sea.
She
was a siren. My father—your great-grandfather—saw her sunning on the rocks at Clare Island. He captured her and stole her cloak.”

I gasped. “How awful.”

“All she wanted was to return to the sea. That being impossible, she took to ships, and pirating. She was aloof and cunning, and had a streak of cruelty commensurate with the loss of her freedom beneath the depths.”

My heart sank. What a terrible thing for my great-grandfather to do. I thought of a caged bird, a chained dog. “How mean! To keep her prisoner on land just because he wanted her!”

Marni nodded. “Once she had a chance to return to the sea. She'd discovered the cloak hidden in the thatch of Edward's cottage.”

“So why didn't she?” I imagined this beautiful pirate queen, throwing the silvery cloak around her shoulders and diving into the ocean, her legs dimpling with scales as the water rushed over her, feet giving way to a wide, fanned tail.

Marni looked wounded by my indignation. She sighed again. “Because her twelve-year-old daughter found the cloak and moved it where she knew her mother'd never find it.”

“Oh!” In an instant I understood. Marni blamed herself.

“She resented me for the rest of her life.”

“Marni, I'm so sorry. . . .”

“I'd often wondered if the disappearance of my son was, in some way, my recompense. A rather useless thought.”

“You loved her. . . .”

“I needed her. And I kept waiting for her to love me.” She stood. “If we don't hurry, we won't be ready in time. Your aunt is already looking like a vision from London, or Paris. . . .”

I looked at my friend, framed in the doorway, her eyes the color of the sea. Half siren, half pirate, but with a heart so much bigger than both of her parents combined. “Marni . . .”

“Yes?”

“
I
love you.”

“I love you too.”

I stared at the door for a moment after she left, still taking in her story. Then I pulled on my petticoat and dress, buttoned and tied, tugged and primped. Pru arrived and twisted my hair into ringlets, pinning them up in a swirl of graceful swells, securing the coif with the elegant beaded combs.

“Dazzling,” she said. “I might need to borrow one of the capt'n's walking sticks to fight off the young men once they get a glimpse.”

“Hmph,” I said, thinking of Brigit and Seamus. But then I remembered what Marni had said—that the day belonged to Addie. I picked up my skirts and followed my gorgeous aunt out the door.

Downstairs everything was astir! Old Peader stood before a mirror admiring the cut of his clothes—the tall, wiry scarecrow of a man transformed into a gentleman in a vest, a charcoal-colored topcoat with satin lapels, and a black bowtie. Walter, in similar garb, had his dark straight hair slicked back, making him appear years older—and almost a stranger to me. I hadn't remembered his eyes being so dark, his brows so intense. Patsy, making her way through the chaos, giving orders left and right, was gussied up in a many-layered dress with a frilly lace bodice, giving her the look of a determined, pink, ruffled tugboat. Even Miss Oonagh looked lavish, a kimono-style silk print dress hanging on her wiry frame, her head topped with a wide-brimmed hat covered in brilliant iridescent peacock plumes. “One old bird deserves another,” Old Peader quipped. “One under the hat, another nestin' on yer head!”

“Shut yer yapper, old man,” Oonagh teased, gripping her pipe between her teeth.

Outside, the pasture had been transformed, a cordoned-off area bedecked in garlands of tulle, ivy, and roses. Father Lynch in white and green vestments waved us all into formation, Annie in front with a basket of fragrant rose petals, Georgie behind her in his suit, squirming and yanking at his bowtie, Pugsley and Rosie alongside him. And there was Brigit, a vision in her dress so like mine. But there was a lightness to her, an ease I felt was absent in me. I forced myself to smile, and in a moment forgot it was an effort.

Walter, Seamus, and Grady ushered guests to their seats, while off to the side a bagpiper prepared his strident instrument in a series of droning hee-haws, causing Pugsley and Rosie to whine. The capt'n, in full regalia, stepped up beside Father Lynch, and all eyes turned toward the back door of the house.

The piper began and Annie sashayed forward, scattering handfuls of pale pink rose petals along the path. Georgie tiptoed behind her, back straight as an arrow, balancing a pillow on which sat two rings. Brigit was next, head held high, Walter and I, arms linked, behind her. I ignored Seamus, sitting to my right, despite the fact that he whispered as I passed, “Ye look like me princess, ye do.” I raised my chin and marched on. And then there was Addie! Patsy, weeping great tears of joy, had her sister by the arm, but even beneath the yards of delicate veil I could see Addie was smiling, her face alight with joy.

Father Lynch, beaming, wasted not a moment. He nodded for Patsy to lift the veil from Addie's face, the capt'n extended his hand, and Addie laid hers in his and they stepped before the priest.

“Obediah Adams, do you take this woman to be your lawful wedded wife, to have and to hold; for better, for worse; for richer, for poorer; in sickness and in health; to love and to honor from this day forward until death do you part?”

“I do.”

Father Lynch turned to Addie. “Addie Clancy, do you take this man—”

Miss Oonagh cleared her throat. “Addie,” she whispered loudly. “Ferget the part 'bout ‘poorer'! Just skip on past it!” The entire group tittered uncomfortably.

“Shhhhh!” Old Peader scolded, his face aghast.

Father Lynch continued and Addie proclaimed, “I
do
!”

They exchanged the rings and Father Lynch nodded. “I now pronounce you husband and wife!”

Capt'n swept Addie into his arms and tilted her back in a long, passionate kiss. The bagpiper sealed the kiss with joyful strains, and the guests flew to their feet, applauding. Addie and the capt'n turned, beaming, hand in hand, and led us from our outdoor chapel to the tent where the celebration would ensue.

A moment later, the fiddlers rosined up their bows, the libations flowed, and the party began in earnest.

24

“C
ome on, then, Lucy—stop bein' cross with me!”

I whirled around to find myself face to face with Seamus. He took my hand. “At least save me a dance, then, cross or not!”

A smile slipped away from me before I could catch it. “Maybe later,” I said, disappearing into the crowd of regalers dancing and talking at once. The music was wild and repetitive, one young man playing a handheld drum with a small mallet, two more playing fiddles, another a guitar. Men and women gathered in sets of four couples doing some sort of Irish square dancing. As I walked past, Brigit grabbed my arm and dragged me into the dance. “Ye can do it,” she shouted over the din, “jest do as I do!” In an instant I was swung around, my elbow hooked with some lad's. Side by side he ushered me briskly around the square before handing me off to another young man. No one seemed to care that I didn't know the steps. The men circled counterclockwise and the women skipped the opposite way, always ending with a new partner. Forward and back we went, bowing and stomping our feet, the circle closing and expanding. As the tempo increased I lost any sense of hesitancy, and threw myself full into it. On and on we went, my heart pounding, tendrils of hair escaping my fancy do, sweat streaming down my back.

A moment later, the set ground to a finish, the guests erupting in applause, crowding around the band. There was Brigit, a fiddle tucked under her chin, tuning up the strings. Seamus was suddenly beside me. “Hear ye play the flute like nobody's seen,” he said. “Whyn't ye go and give Brigit a run fer her money?”

I was about to say no when Walter stepped between us. “You never heard anyone play like Lucy,” he said. “Look what I have,” he whispered, pulling my flute out of his pocket and winking at me. “Brought it just in case. Go on, show 'em.” Before I knew it, Addie and Pru were urging me as well, then Annie and Georgie. Old Peader clapped his hands in anticipation of the tune he imagined me playing.

“Give the people what they want!” Miss Oonagh crowed.

Even Marni, supervising her crew of eight recently polished and freshly garbed young helpers, joined in the chorus. Dressed in white aprons, they passed plates of food, helping themselves when they thought no one was looking. “Show us what ye got,” Rory hollered. Meg, Paddy, and the other five set down their platters, and wiggled their way to the edge of the dance floor.

I heard a buzz near my ear.
Let'sseeifyou'reanygood!
There was Nessa, flitting back to Annie's shoulder. Leave it to her to show up for the party.

“A reel, key of G'd be grand,” Brigit said, her bow at the ready.

The leader counted off, stamping his foot. “One, two, three . . .” The music tumbled forth, and though I didn't know the tune, I placed the flute to my lips, my fingers drawn to the holes. It was as though the spirit of the day flowed from my heart into the instrument, creating a melody that soared over the top of the rollicking ensemble. Brigit and the others provided the rhythm, and together we drove everyone to the dance floor, even Old Peader and Miss Oonagh. As the reel escalated into a frenzy, a puff of colorful glitter gushed from the flute and wafted like a magical cloud among the dancers, only increasing the sense of wild abandon. Finally Walter grabbed me by the hand and pulled me into the dance, spinning and spinning me around until the world became a dizzying kaleidoscope of sound and color.

Suddenly the crowd split in two, and a group of six men burst through the middle. They wore tall, pointy hats of straw that covered not only their heads, but their entire faces, and over their trousers they wore skimpy straw skirts. They danced even more senselessly than the rest, and engaged in general buffoonery. One stood on a chair, flapping his arms like a chicken; another hopped across the table leapfrog style. Addie and the capt'n bowed and curtsied, then joined them in the merrymaking, to the delight of the crowd. Patsy plied the Straw Boys with food and drink, and Grady grinned his approval. Only Miss Oonagh and Pugsley seemed out of sorts with them—Oonagh peering out from under her peacock feathers like an ornery old eagle, and Pugsley taking off after one of the straw-bedecked carousers, snapping at his heels.

“Come on,” Walter said, taking me by the hand. Wiping my sweaty forehead with my forearm, I followed him around the back toward the barn, away from the crowd. The sun was beginning to set, the crescent moon rocking lazily against a navy-blue sky. Stars twinkled and crickets chirped. “I was so proud of you up there,” Walter said, pulling me in front of him, staring at me as though he'd never seen me before. I felt myself blush and both hands flew to my cheeks. He reached over and pushed a tendril of hair out of my eyes. “Lovely,” he said. “I thought so the very first time I saw you.”

“Walter . . .” It was almost a question. He leaned forward, his face just inches from mine. Breathless, I closed my eyes.

There was a thud, a groan, a death grip on my wrist. I opened my eyes and screamed.

Walter lay on the ground beside a Straw Boy who held a club in one hand, digging his fingers into my arm, yanking me alongside him. I kicked and writhed but it was no use. He half dragged me, the hem of my frock catching and tearing on the edge of the barn. “Walter,” I shouted. But he didn't stir. A thin stream of blood trickled down his forehead. “Help!” I shrieked. “Help!”

“Ain't no one gonna hear ya,” came the muffled voice from under the straw hat. I could smell the spirits on his foul breath.

My heart sank as I thought of Miss Oonagh's warning. I'd know that voice anywhere.

It was Quaide.