Chapter 5

 

 

Philippe takes Andres and me by the arm and pushes us into the captain’s quarters, located at the very back of the ship. His large room smells of pipe smoke and cologne. He has a trunk, a chair, a small desk, and a low bed. He sits in his chair and thumps his boots on the footstool.

He points at Andres. “Remove my boots, boy.”

Andres pulls off the boots that are so tight, a sweaty suction sound can be heard when they’re coming off.

He wriggles his toes in his woolen stockings. “Now fetch the powder and rub my feet.”

Andres sneers at the command, begrudgingly reaches for the powder, and begins peeling of the sweat-dampened stocking. By the way he pushes himself back and scrunches up his nose, I know it must be fragrant.

He turns to me and points. “My back.”

Happy to have the top end, I put down Bella, who goes to the captain’s side and reaches up for a biscuit he’s offering her. He starts talking to her in strange high-pitched sounds. “Oh, nice, oh, good girl, so nice.” A very different captain than what I’d just seen on the deck. After we’re rubbing for more than thirty minutes and our hands are beginning to ache, he says, “Now help me get ready to retire.”

I panic at the thought he wants assistance getting undressed, but he points for Andres to turn down his bed and gives me his clothes to hang up. As he takes his linen undershirt off, I noticed the scar running down from his wrist down to his elbow. Thankfully, he leaves his hose on but removes the codpiece and gets in bed, motioning us to turn the candle off.

As I pick Bella up, he says, “No, leave the dog. There’s a rat problem on the ship.”

We walk out on the deck and see Pepe still cleaning, with Alvaro watching over him.

Alvaro says to us, “I think your boyfriend’s about done. Dump your bucket overboard and go find a hole to sleep in.”

He walks away, and Andres and I exchange glances, wondering where that would be.

Pepe returns, and Andres says, “Good one, Pepe, now we’re stuck on this ship, and they just expect us to take care of ourselves.”

“I didn’t tell you guys you had to come. They probably would’ve treated me better if I came alone.”

Andres and I look at each other, disgusted with Pepe turning this on us. I start to try to find a way belowdecks as Andres follows behind me. There’s a hatch open, and we venture down. We’re met with a rancid, musty smell of bad food and sweat. The hold is filled with men lying in hammocks or sitting on the floor on filthy blankets in a circle playing a game of some sort. Some stare at us, and we look away, trying to find a spot we can disappear into. I see there’s a spot right under the stairs that has some old rope coiled up, and I quickly go to it. When I turn around, Andres is there like my shadow. I curl myself up in one coil of rope, and Andres finds the other. When I wake up in the night from the chill I felt from not having a blanket, I see Pepe’s in the coil next to us. He’s sleeping soundly, and I smile, thinking he must’ve searched all over the ship for us. I try to pull some of the coils up around me for warmth and fall back asleep.

Something hits me in the forehead, and I open my eyes to see Alvaro throwing trash at our heads.

“Wake up, little kittens! Captain wants everyone on deck.” He gets up and sticks his head through the ladder steps. “Follow me, and don’t get in my way.”

As I get up I feel the assault sleeping on ropes did to my body and rub the sore spots. Andres and Pepe start climbing up on deck.

The captain bellows, “Take all the salt pork, cheese, and fish and throw them overboard!”

Sailors walk past me down into the hold and come back, arms full, and the same terrible smell down below wafts past me.

“That was the food?” Andres puts his hand over his nose.

Alvaro says to the captain, busy swinging back and forth something hanging from a red silk ribbon with his nose pinched, “The wood’s too green. Old wood’s the only kind you can use. The new wood has too much moisture, rots all the food.”

The captain nods. “Well, the king thinks we’ll be scavenging in England in a few days’ time, so he feels ninety days of biscuits is more than enough.” The captain seemed weary, though, as he looks at the grey sky and churning sea. “Let’s hope he’s right.”

He hands me the thing on the silk ribbon, and a strong smell of spices comes from it, sweetening the air.

BOOM-BOOM!

Andres, Pepe, and I all jump and duck at a cannon firing from one of the ships nearby.

The captain grins. “You heard them, my boys of the San Pedro! Weigh anchor!”

The deck’s a fury of men running to different positions all over the ship. I stare out to a line of ships gathering to leave the bay. A good wind’s blowing, and it looks like we’re leaving the only home I’d ever known. Men call to each other, sails flap and catch the wind, as Andres’ and Pepe’s excited voices fall silent as the rocky peninsula drifts away. The church and the graveyard I know so well disappear—and I know somehow I will never see this bay again.