Penn’s Landing was bustling with people as we alighted from our hired carriage. Neither Pedro nor I had much luggage to encumber us. My most prized possession, Sasakwa, a Creek Indian pony, had been entrusted to Frank to transport home. I felt she would be happier running free on the green pastures of his family’s estate, Boxton, than confined in the livery stable in the poky backstreets of Philadelphia. I certainly couldn’t take her to the Caribbean, so England it would have to be until we could be reunited. My farewell with her had been easy: a rub on the nose and an extra carrot. I did not think I would escape as lightly from the rest of my friends.
‘Look after each other,’ Lizzie said, holding baby Catherine up for a kiss. ‘Write soon.’
Johnny ruffled my hair and shook Pedro’s hand. ‘Mind you don’t get split up! I’m only happy knowing you’re watching out for each other.’
Frank gave me a hug, then pushed me away as if embarrassed he had let it last so long. ‘I expect you to visit me in Cambridge, Cat, so we can go rattle the dons together. My life will be far too staid without you around. Pedro, keep an eye on her, will you?’
‘Two eyes,’ promised Pedro.
Syd didn’t say anything but there was no need: we both knew what the other was thinking. He folded me in a bear hug, crushing my head against his chest. His heart was beating fast.
‘Goodbye, Syd. You will see me again.’ There, I’d made my promise.
‘I’d better, or there’ll be trouble.’ He cleared his throat and nodded to Pedro. ‘You know what I expect from you, Prince.’
‘Yes, Syd. I’ll look after her or you’ll punch me.’
Syd gave a grim smile. ‘That’s right. Glad you understand. Now get along with you, Cat Royal. Go impress the ’ell out of your punters.’
I wiped the tears from my eyes. ‘I’ll try.’
‘And you’ll succeed, Kitten. I ’ave faith in you.’ He brushed my cheeks with his thumbs where the salt trail had crinkled them. ‘They’ll love you. Everyone does.’
‘It’s no good,’ I moaned two weeks into the voyage, ‘I’m going to have to kill Mrs Peabody. I can see no other option.’
I had slipped away after Sunday prayers and found Pedro enjoying the fine morning on the main deck of the Running Sally, a trading sloop on which we had secured passage for Jamaica. Pedro was waxing his bow with rosin and chatting to some of the gentlemen in the ensemble. All of them looked relaxed and happy. How different from the cabin where we women were packed together like sardines in a barrel. The very managing Mrs Peabody had absurdly strict notions of propriety and had refused me permission to wander the deck.
‘We may be actresses, Miss Royal, but that does not mean we need not worry about our reputations,’ she had snapped when I’d begged leave to get some fresh air.
I was prepared for her to run the ensemble, but I drew the line at her organizing my life too.
The women’s quarters were unbearable for more reasons than close confinement. Mrs Peabody had brought along her empty-headed daughter, Hetty, expecting me to be company for her. We had nothing in common except the desire to throttle each other after an hour spent in the same room. A blue-eyed, golden-curled girl of my age, she infuriated me by making sheep’s eyes at every man. As a ginger-haired green-eyed runt of the litter, I’m afraid, Reader, I envied her luscious beauty. Perhaps her mother was right to be concerned for her with the sailors, but I couldn’t understand why I had to suffer because Hetty did not know how to behave. Besides, I had sailed across the Atlantic dressed as a boy for heaven’s sake; I rather thought it too late for me to worry about such petty social rules, particularly if it meant being separated from my only remaining friend.
My death threat against our employer produced only a patient sigh as Pedro prepared to hear yet more of my complaints. But if I couldn’t moan to him, to whom could I speak on this interminable voyage?
I let out my main grievance. ‘And she’s cast Hetty – Hetty of all people! – as Rosalind. The girl can’t act, barely can speak the verse. It’s going to be a disaster.’
‘And you?’ asked Pedro, looking amused as he squinted up at me in the bright light. I spun my parasol to shade him. I knew better than to venture on deck without protection; my freckles were already rioting across my nose at the merest hint of Caribbean sunshine. A breeze kept the heat comfortable out here, unlike the cabin.
‘I’m to be Phoebe, the brainless shepherdess.’ It was a humiliation, a complete waste of my talents. I’d never rated myself all that highly, but surely even I scored better in this company than that! ‘Actually, I’ve changed my mind. I’m going to rip up the script and make Mrs Peabody and her daughter eat As You Like It page by page. They do not deserve to be entrusted with Shakespeare.’
‘Let me get this straight, Cat,’ said Pedro. He ran his fingers lovingly over his bow. ‘Are you going to feed these items to Mrs Peabody before or after you’ve done her in?’
‘Does it matter?’
‘Of course it does. Before would be a little easier, I would say.’
I waved my hand. ‘Details, details. I think you understand the sentiment.’
‘Completely. Can’t say I particularly like the woman myself, but she’s the master and we all have to dance to her tune.’
I slumped next to Pedro on his coil of rope and scanned the rigging with a professional eye.
‘Seems to me we could pack on a little more sail in this breeze,’ I commented, watching the men up on the yardarm. ‘I never thought I’d miss being a sailor, but anything is better than being a lady on Mrs Peabody’s terms.’
‘Can’t you team up with her daughter?’ suggested Pedro. ‘Though unable to act, Miss Peabody seems a pleasant enough girl. If you both appealed for a little more freedom, perhaps she would listen.’
I gazed out at the unbroken blue of the horizon. ‘Pleasant fiddlesticks! Don’t tell me she’s been making eyes at you too? All the men in the ensemble think she’s an angel when in fact she’s a shallow creature far too used to getting her own way. She treats poor Miss Atkins like dirt.’
‘I like Miss Atkins,’ Pedro said, a little off-subject in my estimation. ‘She loves music.’
‘Yes, she’s a sweet mouse but now she’s got to be Celia to Hetty’s Rosalind. Her life is going to be hell: all those scenes together with Hetty upstaging her by simpering at the audience.’
‘Miss Royal!’ The strident tones of Mrs Peabody floated down from the stern.
‘Hide me!’ I said desperately, ducking behind Pedro.
‘Cat, I think she can see you,’ Pedro said calmly. ‘You’d best go at once.’
‘Come here directly, Miss Royal.’ Mrs Peabody strode forward, hooked my arm and towed me back into the cabin. Hetty and Miss Atkins looked up from their prayer books to stare. ‘I told you not to wander off on your own. Your behaviour is a disappointment. You of all people should know that as an actress one hint of impropriety and people will quickly assume you are ruined. Mr Garrick never allowed his actresses to conduct themselves in such a scandalous manner.’
I doubted that very much. According to my theatre friends who had had the privilege of working with the famous actor-manager at Drury Lane, David Garrick had not interested himself in the private lives of his actresses, only in their public talent. I was steadily growing more and more suspicious that Dorothea Featherstone had never trod the boards there.
‘My apologies, Mrs Peabody. But surely you do not require me for a rehearsal on the Sabbath, our day of rest?’ I said sweetly, taking a stool next to Miss Atkins.
Our theatrical manageress gave me a sour smile. ‘No, Miss Royal, but you remind me of my duties. I do think we should prepare some appropriate entertainment suitable for Sundays. The pious folk of Jamaica may well require it of us. As you seem at a loose end, you, young miss, will spend the rest of the day memorizing Psalm One Hundred and Nineteen, all one hundred and seventy-six verses.’
Our eyes locked.
‘It is your job to entertain, is it not, Miss Royal?’
‘Very well. Psalm One Hundred and Nineteen it is.’
The other women left the cabin to take a turn on deck. Flinging a few unsabbath-like words at Mrs Peabody’s back, I settled down to the challenge. I had only reached verse thirty when Miss Atkins returned.
‘How far have you got with the psalm?’ she asked, patting her honey-blonde hair in place after the dishevelment of the sea breeze. When unbound it sprang into tight cork-screw curls. I had noticed that she kept herself to herself when the Peabodys were present. I imagined she found that life was easier if she did not attract attention; perhaps this was a lesson I should learn.
I reeled off the first segment of the psalm word-perfect.
‘Excellent.’ Her cheeks dimpled as she smiled, making her even prettier. ‘I admire your memory, Miss Royal.’
‘Please call me Cat when she’s not around. Everyone else does.’
Miss Atkins nodded. ‘I’d like that. Still, I’d also like to know your secret of learning so fast. Celia’s part is quite daunting.’
‘I learned the trick from Mr Kemble and Mrs Siddons,’ I said, naming the brother and sister acting duet at Drury Lane, well known to you, Reader, I am sure. ‘It’s like exercising a muscle: once your brain is warmed up, it’s surprising how much you can retain with the right kind of concentration.’
‘What else do you know?’
‘Oh, bits and bobs. Speeches from plays, poetry, English, French and Latin.’
She laughed. ‘I can see your talents are wasted on a small part like Phoebe.’
I gave her a cheeky grin. ‘And I also know lots of sea-shanties, not all of them decent.’
‘Perhaps you should teach me some.’ She leaned forward with a wicked smile. ‘But not on a Sunday.’
I sat back and fluttered my hand in a missish gesture often employed by Hetty. ‘You shock me, Miss Atkins.’
‘Georgina, or Georgie, please. When she’s not around.’
I gave a conspiratorial nod. ‘Georgie it is, then.’
Feeling the ice had been well and truly broken, I yawned and threw the Bible aside. No need to pretend with her.
‘Tell me about yourself, Georgie. How did you come to be part of Mrs Peabody’s hen-pecked ensemble?’
The actress shrugged and took a place on the narrow bunk beside me. ‘She’s not so bad. I’ve known worse. As for me, there’s not much to tell. My quiet life in Antigua ended when my father died.’
‘Antigua?’
‘It’s one of the islands in the West Indies – we might be going there later on the tour.’
‘Do you have family living there still?’
She shook her head. ‘My mother passed away years before, taken by the yellow fever. Father was in charge of supplies for the Naval Dockyard but left me with little – too honest for his own good when everyone else was lining their pockets. I was thrown upon my own resources, and being an actress was one of the more desirable options.’
‘What about marriage?’ I couldn’t believe that a pretty woman like her would have been without offers from the officers who passed through the island.
Georgie tweaked her hair. ‘Did you not realize, Cat? I’m a mulatto. No man of decent family is going to offer for me, and the other sort of men I prefer to keep at a distance.’
‘A mulatto? Doesn’t that mean you have mixed blood?’
She nodded.
‘But you look white.’
‘The memories of many people out here are very long. My grandmother was a slave – that makes me a quadroon.’
‘A what?’
‘A quarter African but, to many people, that’s the part that matters.’
‘That’s absurd.’ Not to say insulting: as if one kind of blood was better or worse than another!
She smiled bitterly. ‘Isn’t it? You would not believe the minute categories they dream up on the islands to account for blood. You have to reach octoroon before you’re automatically free.’
I gasped. ‘You’re not a slave, are you?’
‘No, no. My grandfather freed my grandmother and married her. But the taint remains, acceptable for an actress but not for a wife of a European planter or an officer.’
‘Does Mrs Peabody know?’
‘Of course. I would never hide such a thing from my employer. She hired me last year when the troop came to Antigua and I’ve been with the Peabodys ever since. They’re not bad sorts: infuriating but not cruel. So here I am.’ She spread her hands wide. ‘One very boring life. This voyage is the most exciting thing that has ever happened to me and even I recognize that it has been pretty uneventful. Nothing by your standards, I’m sure.’
‘My standards?’ I asked, puzzled.
‘Pedro’s been telling me stories at dinner while you’ve been discussing the finer points of sailing with the bosun.’
I laughed. It was true: I had been milking the crew for information about the ship at every opportunity.
Georgie kicked off her shoes. ‘I must say it is very odd to be cabin-mate with a girl who, though younger than me, has seen far more of life.’
My smile faded. I wondered if she meant that as a veiled insult. In our society, girls were not supposed to be worldly; we were supposed to be sweet innocents without an original thought in our head. But as her face glowed with genuine interest, I decided she had not meant to censure me.
‘Everything that’s happened to me has always been a bit by accident,’ I confessed. ‘My friends think I attract trouble.’
Georgie clasped her hands to her chest. ‘How wonderful!’
‘Not always. Sometimes it can be terrifying.’
‘But still, you’re really living, not drifting as so many of us do. How I would like to live an adventure, not just act in one!’
I laughed. Miss Georgina Atkins was quite a surprise.
‘In that case, I think we should make a pact against the forces of dullness and decorum,’ I suggested, nodding towards Mrs Peabody’s chair. ‘Though we outwardly conform – or at least you do,’ I amended, ‘inside we will know that we are free; we’ll grab our adventures before they pass us by!’ I spat on the palm of my hand in a true Covent Garden gesture of deal-making. ‘Agreed?’
Georgie hesitated for a fraction then spat delicately before shaking my hand. ‘Agreed.’
Sailing with the Turk and Caicos Islands to the east, two hundred and fifty miles north of Jamaica, the Running Sally continued to make good progress. When not required for rehearsal, I often stood watching the slow unfurling of the wake behind the ship and once was rewarded with the glimpse of the stately wave of a whale’s tail before it slapped down on to the waters and disappeared. Inside the reef protecting the islands, the sea glowed turquoise; out in the channel where we were sailing it was a deeper blue. The sun shone in a sky smudged by only a few puffs of cloud like powder marks on an azure gown. Revelling in this chance to travel, I fell in love with the boundless horizons and sense of freedom you can only find on the ocean.
Our first port of call was approaching. The captain hailed a passing trading vessel and the two ships drew in canvas for an exchange of news. Our route to Jamaica would be taking us to the troubled French colony of San Domingo and he did not want any unpleasant surprises when we called in to off-load some cargo. Whatever the other captain told him was clearly a matter of great concern.
‘Apparently the whole island of San Domingo is in uproar.’ Pedro filled me in on the details during a lull in our morning rehearsal. ‘The mulattos are fighting for their rights, the slaves are demanding their freedom; it’s revolution, Cat, and the French masters can hardly complain because the people are only following the example set in Paris.’ Pedro grinned. ‘I can’t tell you how proud it makes me to hear that some of my people have finally done what we all wanted. They’ve taken their freedom rather than waiting for it to be handed to them.’
I bit my lip, watching Mrs Peabody going through Hetty’s part with her for the hundredth time. The girl had a brain in which no words would stick. ‘I don’t know, Pedro. What if the masters get back in control? Their revenge will be terrible.’
‘Then the slaves must not lose.’
‘I hate to sound pessimistic, but when have you ever heard of a successful slave revolt?’
‘There always has to be a first.’ Pedro’s tone was brittle. He was taking my doubt personally. ‘The main point is that Le Cap where our captain had thought to make port is too dangerous with all these different groups running wild. He’s making for the Ile de la Tortue.’
‘Where?’
‘Tortoise Island – you might have heard it called Tortuga. It lies to the north, just off the mainland of San Domingo, so he thinks it will probably have escaped most of the turmoil. He’s dropping off some cargo there and then will take the Windward Passage to Jamaica.’
Tortuga I had heard of, yes. It sounded a most intriguing destination. From what the old tars on board had told me, the island had been the centre of piracy in the early days of our century. That was the heyday of buccaneers: a time when you might’ve met Blackbeard and William Kidd drinking at a local Tortugan tavern. Since then, the French and British Navies had imposed some order on the Caribbean, but there were still plenty of disreputable privateers ready to walk on the wrong side of the law when no one was looking; and I had heard that Tortuga was still a notoriously lawless place. I very much doubted that Mrs Peabody would let us girls go ashore.
After weeks of travel, the temptation to put foot on dry land was strong. I hadn’t come on this voyage to spend my time staring at the walls of my cabin. As we drew into the main port on the island, I squinted into the shafts of evening sunshine. Cayonne was a ramshackle place in the shelter of the turtle-backed mountain, a jumble of taverns and shops serving the sea-going vessels, but to me it didn’t look very threatening – no worse than the places I’d visited on Bermuda on my voyage out from England. I sighed. No point getting myself thrown out of the company for disobeying Mrs Peabody without good reason.
When Pedro returned from shore-leave at dawn, he was a good deal richer but I sensed that the visit to Tortuga had disturbed him profoundly. Lucky, then, that the Running Sally was not lingering; cargo unloaded, the captain was already making preparations to sail.
Pedro stood at the ship’s side, drumming his fingers on the rail.
‘What was it like?’ I asked curiously, tugging him out of the way of a sailor busy with the task of casting off.
My friend drew his hand over his brow. ‘The usual collection of dirty inns and drunks.’
‘So why the long face?’
‘I just feel as though I should . . .’ He paused, searching for the right words. ‘Everyone’s talking about this rebellion on San Domingo; I think . . . no, I know that it’s a cause I would give my life for and I can’t say that about anything else, except perhaps for my friends.’ He squeezed my hand then let it drop. ‘Just think: if they succeed here it could mean the end of slavery across the West Indies as rebellion spreads from island to island.’
I was taken aback by his vehemence. I’d never seen Pedro in this mood before. ‘What happened, Pedro? Who did you meet?’
‘Am I so easy to read?’ Pedro gave me a fond smile.
‘Only to me.’
‘Well.’ He slumped down with his back to a barrel, rubbing his head with both hands, elbows on knees. I sat down next to him. ‘There was a man in the second inn we went to – an escaped slave. I got talking to him about San Domingo. He told me that people of my colour were gathering around a leader called Toussaint. He’s hiding out in the interior; he’s training up an army of slaves.’
I whistled. ‘A risky venture.’
Pedro shrugged. ‘Of course. The slaves won’t get freedom without sacrifice.’
‘That might be true, but it sounds as if there’s going to be a lot of blood spilt.’
‘What about the blood being spilt already – every day on the slave plantations?’
I didn’t have an answer to that.
‘I think this Toussaint is right,’ continued Pedro, fists clenching. ‘We have to grab freedom rather than wait for white men to grant it to us. The masters will squeeze work out of the slaves until they no longer have use for them. Only then will they think about giving us our freedom – too late.’
‘But you are free, Pedro.’ I took his hand in mine, smoothing out his fist and feeling the calluses on the pads of his fingers from his violin-playing.
‘Yes, Cat, but don’t you want to do something to help?’
‘Maybe. But what could I do?’ I caught his eye, guessing what he was thinking. ‘And what use would you be to a soldier?’
‘I don’t know.’ He looked longingly at the San Domingo mainland just a few miles off our bow. ‘I don’t know. As you said, I’m free but I feel I’ve got to use my freedom well. I owe it to my people. It seems wrong not to try.’
‘What about your promise to stay with me?’ I said lightly.
He bent his head. ‘You’re right. It’s just a mad dream of mine – a way to slay the dragons of my past.’
‘I thought you’d slain them when you won your freedom?’
‘So did I, Cat. So did I.’