Epilogue

Homeward Bound, October 3, 1699

 

Vice-Admiral Hudgeson looked sharply from one smiling passenger to the other, as he listened to their story. To be sure, ’twas a most shocking and unusual tale.

Most peculiar and offensive to his sensibilities was the idea that this seemingly proper young woman not only cradled a young infant in her arms, but had just calmly confessed to being three months pregnant—and still debating her marital status!

“But you just told me you are Mrs. Watermann,” Hudgeson interrupted. “Naturally I assume this man, whom I know to be Grant Watermann, is your lawful husband?”

She smiled most agreeably and paused to hand her little daughter Katerina, whose gray eyes had a decidedly Oriental cast to them, to the handsome young sea captain at her side. “As I said, Admiral Hudgeson, I am the widow of Captain Watermann.”

He looked puzzled. “How can you be Captain Watermann’s widow when he’s standing before me in the very picture of health?”

Hudgeson next scowled at Grant. Obviously this pair meant to hoodwink him. But little did they suspect with whom they were dealing! Aye, he’d seen enough of this wicked world to see through their little game. The situation smacked of scandal, plain and simple.

Grant shrugged nonchalantly and grinned at his alluring consort. “Admiral, she is my father’s widow, but ’tis my babe she carries in her belly. Three months ago we exchanged impromptu vows in a barn near the headwaters of the Volkhov River. And while I consider those vows binding, for the sake of our children we wish to make sure our marriage receives the official sanction of our fellow countrymen.”

The Vice-Admiral pursed his lips. “Most irregular! What made you think you could exchange ‘impromptu vows’ without benefit of clergy?”

“Being a sea captain, I felt I was vested with sufficient powers to officiate at my own wedding.” Out of the corner of his eye, Grant caught the censuring look in Rosalyn’s blue eyes.

“What are you saying?” she gasped. It was a subject upon which they still locked horns.

“My love, I mean only that a proper Puritan lass like yourself would ne’er consent to our union without benefit of marriage. Is that not so, my love?” He gave her a nautical wink. “That’s why I made certain you promised to love me for as long as we both shall live.”

“But all that was said in the heat of the moment! I thought we had only seconds to live,” she gasped, her eyes round with dismay. “What a devious man you are, Grant Watermann!”

“Guilty as charged, my love. But my intentions were—and still are—strictly honorable. Remember, in the sight of God, we already qualify as man and wife.”

Blushing, she lowered her gaze in seeming modesty. “How can I ever forget?”

Grant turned to the Vice-Admiral. “I should explain that we were prisoners, about to die in a peasant’s barn. My love for Mrs. Watermann inspired me to consummate our vows only minutes before the place was set ablaze.”

The ship’s commander cleared his throat. He had no difficulty believing that the sparkle in Mrs. Watermann’s deep blue eyes had been put there by this young sea captain, as sure as his seed was now growing in her belly. Indeed, the virile rogue must have had no difficulty at all in leading this poor, love-struck young woman astray. Why, even now the rogue was flashing his dimples at her shamelessly! And his tawny hazel eyes, like two mesmerizing orbs, never left her glowing countenance.

Aye, the Vice-Admiral saw his duty, all right. The young woman had succumbed to temptation, and it was his sworn duty to set her feet firmly upon the path of righteousness again.

“Fortunately,” Grant went on with his tale, “I had discovered a trap door in the floor, beside some bales of hay. It led us through a tunnel to a root cellar where the peasants were in the habit of hiding foodstuffs and fodder from invading enemies of Tsar Peter. We remained in the root cellar until after the Swedish army left the area.”

“That is the God’s honest truth, Admiral Hudgeson.” Rosalyn nodded earnestly. “Captain Watermann and I returned briefly to the boat we had sailed downriver the night before. We found a cow nearby, got more milk for little Katie, and then we set out for Riga on foot.”

“I also salvaged my blueprints for the ships we plan to build in Boston,” Grant added.

“’Tis a remarkable tale,” Hudgeson had to admit.

“Two days later we were rescued by a group of Russian merchants, who helped us complete our journey to Riga,” Rosalyn explained. “From there, it was a simple matter to book passage for London on an English merchant ship.”

“Our own ship, the Fair Winds, had left Riga months before, and even now awaits our return in Boston Harbor,” Grant added.

Rosalyn beamed happily. “So here we are, about to set sail for home on your fine ship!”

“Hm.” The Vice-Admiral nodded toward Katerina. “And how do you explain this other child, madam? Whose is she?”

Her face lit up with love for her dear friend’s child. “She is our adopted daughter, the love-child of my friend, Mercy Wallins, and a Russian Cossack. They died soon after little Katie was born.”

Remembering how shockable Rosalyn used to be, Grant chuckled at her artless explanation of how Katerina came to be in their care. “The baby’s father died in the opening skirmishes of a bitter conflict between Russia and Sweden,” he explained.

Hudgeson cleared his throat. “So the baby is the product of English and Russian passions?”

Grant nodded, trying to keep a straight face. “Aye, sir, most definitely.”

“Katerina’s mother and I share a great love of freedom, and her Russian father was a freedom fighter,” Rosalyn said earnestly. “The last promise I made to my friend before she died was that I would raise her little daughter in the New World. Hopefully Katie will flourish and enjoy freedom from all that oppresses the human spirit—including narrow mindedness.” Rosalyn raised her chin defiantly and returned the Vice-Admiral’s penetrating stare.

A faint smile played around the older man’s lips. The years might be bearing down on him a bit heavily of late, but he wasn’t so old that he'd forgotten what it felt like to be in love.

“Aye, well, we need large families to make the King’s colonies prosper, and you seem to be off to an excellent start, Captain and Mrs. Watermann,” he boomed, at long last bringing his service book out from under his uniformed arm. “Now let’s try to make everything about this alliance entirely proper—and legal, shall we?”

“My sentiments exactly, Admiral,” Grant said, taking his bride’s slender hand. “What say you, my love?”

“Have I not said so already?” Blushing, Rosalyn shifted little Katie to her other hip. “After being in business together these past two years, we might as well make our partnership permanent.”

“And we’ll seal it with a kiss,” Grant insisted, feeling quite romantically inclined, despite his mate’s prim response.

“Of course,” she said with as much dignity as she could muster, considering her delicate condition. “I believe our affection for each other—”

“Oh, cut line, Rosalyn!” Grinning, he gave her an impatient hug. “Let’s just get on with it, shall we, Admiral?”

“Certainly.” His lips twitching with amusement, Hudgeson skipped the flowery language of his usual wedding service and got right down to the nitty-gritty. “Do you, Captain and Mrs. Watermann, hereby promise in the sight of God and these witnesses—” he nodded toward several sailors loitering nearby, “—that you will love and be faithful to each other for as long as you both shall live?”

“I do!” said Rosalyn with tears in her eyes.

“Aye. That is, I do!” said Grant, a little misty-eyed himself.

“And do you wish to bestow a ring upon your bride, as a token of your love?” the Admiral asked.

Almost as an afterthought, Grant frisked his pockets and came up with the ring his father had presented to this same young woman two years before. “Rosalyn,” he said, placing it on her finger with a flourish. “With this ring I thee wed!”

“We’ll keep it in the family always,” she promised, admiring it with a wistful smile.

“I sense the Old Man is smiling down at us right now,” he confided. “He certainly knew how to pick a beautiful bride.”

And as the young captain and his bride sealed their vows with a kiss, suddenly, high in the topsails of His Majesty’s warship, the New Enterprise, a chantyman began to bellow out a bold new song to the sailors pulling cable below:

 

“There was a saucy baggage, a vixen of fame;

Hailed from Boston-town, this beauty none could tame

Till she met this handsome Cap’n, whose passion was the sea.

He wooed her—aye!—he won her, an’ he set her free!

‘Way haul away, we’ll haul for finer weather,

‘Way haul away, we’ll haul away together!

 

Now me story’s ended, an’ me tale she is told.

Forgive me, ole shipmates, if ye think me over bold!

For this song was inspir’ed while the couple was below,

Bound away to the New World, on fair winds we do go!”