SIXTEEN

IT WAS THE FORENOON WHEN LOIRE SAILED INTO HAMILTON’S HARBOR and let go. There were random ships about at anchor, including Royal Navy sloops and a brig, but not much movement on the water itself. Aja had the newly patched gig lowered and the little crew pulled for government dock, where the Admiralty prize agent kept his office. Aja was understandably proud of sailing Loire to Hamilton; indeed, there had been no surprises and his small prize crew had done all they could with what they had available to make the ship presentable. There was still quite a bit of work to do but, yes, he was proud.

But, of course, life then pricked his pride. There was no prize agent in Hamilton at the moment, and might not be for some time. The word on the docks was that he had been recalled for scandalous behavior involving false appraisals and shoddy paperwork and missing funds that had ended up in the wrong pockets—his, apparently.

There was nothing for it. Obviously, Ezra Somers would have to decide what to do, for the prize partially belonged to The Somers Salt Company. The closest prize court was English Harbor, five days sail to the southeast. Aja climbed back down into his gig and, once aboard Loire, made ready to sail for St. George’s to present the ship, and the problem, to Somers.

It seemed the prize money would have to wait because, as Fallon was wont to say, nothing was certain at sea.

Barclay worked out the distance to Boston from Grand Turk as 1500 miles, give or take, and laid a course which would allow the little convoy to pick up the fast-moving current that flowed up the east coast of the U.S. from the Gulf of Mexico to Newfoundland.

“Mr. Barclay,” said Fallon, approaching the sailing master. “What can you tell me of the coastline of the U.S.? Have you been in those waters before?”

“Yes, a bit,” answered Barclay. “I sailed the Chesapeake Bay as a young man, for my parents came from Bristol to Virginia, where they began raising tobacco. My youth was spent mucking around in boats in tidewater Virginia and, when I was older, I went to sea. I knew the farming life wasn’t for me. I joined a ship trading up and down the coast as far as New York and worked my way up to second mate. I did that for a lot of years before the American Revolution. But the war put me in a quandary. I couldn’t very well fight Great Britain, and I couldn’t see fighting against the Americans, so I got a berth on a packet sailing for Bermuda to wait out the war. I’ve lived there ever since, except when I’m at sea, of course.”

It was the most Fallon had ever heard the very private sailing master say about himself, or his family, and he chastised himself for not asking sooner, for Barclay had been sailing with him for several years.

“The stream next to the coast is about five miles off and moves quickly, maybe six knots,” continued Barclay, getting back to business. “It’s sixty miles wide in places and warmer than the water around it. Very strange, it is. And dangerous when the wind comes north. Many ships have been lost around North Carolina’s cape and outer banks, in particular. We’d best beware in getting our ships around those banks.”

And then Barclay ambled off to take a sight, for it was almost noon on a clear day and a good sight might not be possible for days.

Eleuthera and Lucille were behaving themselves so far, and Fallon was feeling a bit guilty that he’d been so harsh with their captains. But his experience told him that, often as not, packet captains went their own way. As dusk approached on the first day he met with Beauty at the taffrail as she made the evening signals to the merchantmen, which they both acknowledged.

“I must say you put the fear of God in those men,” she said to Fallon. “Look how they are shortening sail and keeping station to leeward.”

“Yes, so far so good,” admitted Fallon. “But, of course, we have many miles ahead of us. We’ll see if the fear holds.”

They passed the next few minutes in companionable silence, two old friends who never felt the need to talk to fill in quiet gaps. They both instinctively looked west to catch the green flash, that mystical and magical flash of light that sometimes appeared just as the sinking sun dipped below the horizon. All sailors thought it good luck, but tonight they did not see it.

“Tell me, Nico,” said Beauty in the gathering darkness, just making conversation, “how are the wedding plans coming with Elinore? What have you decided?”

“We’ll be married in the little chapel at St. George’s, by the sea, in the late spring,” answered Fallon. “Ezra says this is our last cruise for a while, so I’ve promised Elinore I will be back to help her plan things, although I confess I am out of my depth with weddings.”

“Yes, I expect you would be no help at all,” said Beauty with a knowing smile. “You know, for as resourceful a captain as you are you are remarkably incompetent at some things.”

“What else besides wedding planning?” asked Fallon, laughing.

“Remembering birthdays,” Beauty said with a smile.

“Whose birthday did I forget, pray?”

“Mine, you dunderhead. Today is my birthday and I am terribly offended that you forgot it.” Beauty laughed aloud in spite of herself, for she clearly meant no such thing.

“Oh, you’re right, Beauty,” Fallon said. “How could I have forgotten? Oh, wait, I didn’t forget.”

And he pulled a small package from his pocket. Beauty looked at him in surprise, looked at the package, and looked at him again.

“You didn’t forget.”

“Open it.”

“You didn’t forget!”

“No, now open it.”

Beauty opened the package to find a necklace. A piece of rawhide strung through a small, hand carved wooden dog.

“Sea Dog,” he said. “I kept a piece of wood from our old ship. Not my best carving, but, like you said, I am totally incompetent at some things. Many things, truth be told.”

It was doubtful Beauty had cried many times in her life. But the memory of their old ship swelled up inside of her, that good and true ship that had battled a Spanish flotilla in a hurricane and paid the ultimate price, her bottom ripped out from coral, her shipwrecked crew using her timbers for rafts as Sea Dog looked after them at the last.

Those memories and more washed over her like the waves that had driven Sea Dog ashore, and she looked at Fallon silently for as long as she could see him through watery eyes, mouthed “Thank you” and then left to go below.