LIFE AT SEA. AT FIRST NOVEL and exciting, quickly settled into a routine. As planned, the Derry Crown met two other ships, the Star and Regent, at Cork, and the sight of their white sails moving along on either side was vastly reassuring.
The passengers soon found that the agent had exaggerated the vessel’s virtues and neglected to mention its faults. The food rations, while adequate for sustenance, often left them unsatisfied. The passengers soon learned that it was best not to expend energy unnecessarily.
After a poor start of sleepless nights, the McKays finally adjusted themselves to the unaccustomed motion of the ship and to their cramped quarters. William often slept upon deck, and Sarah was allowed the most convenient bunk, the middle one, to herself. When William slept below, Ann and Jonathan shared the bottom bunk.
The boy seemed to enjoy everything about the voyage. Despite his father’s warnings to be careful, Jonathan wandered freely about the ship, talking to everyone who would listen and asking endless questions.
The single men, including the group being transported, were quartered with the sailors, one level below the family deck. They generally used the port side of the upper deck, although no restrictions had been placed on any of the passengers.
Ann and Isabel found a sheltered spot on the starboard side of the deck, where they sometimes watched the single men as they took the air. Although Isabel had dismissed them as unlikely marriage prospects, some of the men were young and attractive.
A few days into the voyage, the man who had spoken to Jonathan the day they boarded nodded to them. Much younger than her father, he appeared to be perhaps a dozen years her senior. With his expressive gray eyes and broad brow, he was what many would call handsome, yet his air seemed unusually grave. The man was holding a book, and, as they watched, he leaned against a bulwark and began to read.
“I wonder what he did to be transported,” Isabel said. “He looks like a real gentleman, compared to the others.”
“Oh, he isn’t one of them,” Jonathan volunteered. “I think he’s a schoolmaster, because he asked me if I thought Father might allow him to give us lessons.”
“A schoolmaster!” Isabel exclaimed. “Perhaps he’ll take the boys in hand, then!”
“Aye, the children on board need something to fill their time and keep them from mischief,” agreed Ann.
“I’ll go ask him about it,” said Jonathan, and was gone before Ann could open her mouth in protest.
When Jonathan returned, he was wriggling with excitement. “I am to tell Father that Mr. Craighead is willing to teach any who wish it,” he said importantly.
At his son’s urging, William conferred with the schoolmaster that morning.
“He seems to be a good sort,” William told Sarah later as the family gathered for prayer. Subject to the captain’s approval, Caleb Craighead would commence teaching the very next day. “Perhaps Jonathan will learn some of his letters by the time we reach Philadelphia.”
“I know some of them already,” Jonathan boasted, “and I know lots of numbers and things.”
“Ye still have much to learn,” Sarah smiled fondly. “Yes, William, it is good for the children to be occupied in a useful manner. Surely the captain can have no objections.”
Captain Murdock readily agreed to the proposal, providing Mr. Craighead keep the younger children out of the sailors’ way. The next day six boys and four girls, ranging in age from seven to fourteen, assembled on the aft deck for their first session.
Ann and Isabel stationed themselves nearby, pretending to be fully absorbed with their knitting, but sharply aware of all that was going on around them. Mr. Craighead’s black box, which had caught Ann’s attention as he came on board, yielded a variety of interesting materials. In addition to textbooks of the kind used in the school Reverend Duffle kept in Coleraine, he had a Bible, a Psalter, and the Westminster catechism, which most of the older children had already learned to recite from memory.
Mr. Craighead also had a shallow sandbox, in which the young ones practiced shaping their letters, using their forefingers. The sand could be smoothed again with a shake of the box, and even the older children, using feathered quills, used it to practice their handwriting. Sometimes Mr. Craighead set sums for his students, making the numbers in the sand and letting them take turns ciphering out the answers.
The only reader was the Bible, and often Mr. Craighead read it to them himself, in a firm, resonant voice that, with its Scots burr, was quite pleasant to hear. Ann and Isabel, though several years older than the pupils, listened along with them, glad for the diversion.
The school had been underway for some two weeks when the fair weather finally broke, and squalls of wind-driven rain kept the passengers below. Mr. Craighead tried holding lessons in the cramped family dining area, but the light was poor, and as the storm grew more intense, the motion of the ship made reading impossible.
“I had thought a spring passage would be calmer than fall or winter,” William commented on the second day of their confinement.
For the first time, the movement of the ship made Ann feel ill, and she stayed in her bunk, grasping its sides as the vessel tossed and pitched. How long could the groaning timbers of the ship stand such buffeting without splitting asunder?
Twice daily a sailor came down to the family deck, carrying a bucket of water and another filled with the thin gruel the captain had ordered as their storm fare, but few of the passengers even attempted to partake of it. The sailor Jonathan called Ian brought them some hardtack on the third day of the storm, and at his urging they each broke off a piece and chewed it gingerly. “We should be out o’ this blow by dawn,” he assured them. “The wind has shifted direction, and the clouds are breakin’ up.”
Just before sunrise the next morning Ann, feeling weak and lightheaded from the combined effects of the lack of food and the rankness of their quarters, stumbled up the stairs to the deck and leaned weakly against the rail, breathing in the fresh air. Some half-dozen others had come up onto deck by the time the sun appeared, and Ann saw that the schoolmaster was among them.
“Good morning, Mistress McKay,” he greeted, walking over to stand beside her. “How has your family withstood the storm?”
Ann looked up at Caleb Craighead, suddenly overcome with shyness, in all her years, Ann had never held a conversation with a man alone. His gray eyes were quietly reassuring, and Ann yearned again for an appearance that matched her years and for the facility to converse with him as easily as he was speaking to her. It seemed a very long time before she managed to say anything.
“We have all survived, thank ye,” she finally said, “but for a time I feared I would not.” Then, afraid her remark had been too personal, she blushed.
Apparently Mr. Craighead did not notice her discomfort, for he continued. “The captain says we must expect at least one more spell of bad weather before we make port.”
“Can the ship withstand another storm?” Ann asked, alarmed at the thought of repeating their recent experience.
“It has done so many times before,” he assured her. “Tell your brother and my other pupils that lessons will resume today for all who are able to come.”
“Jonathan was the least affected of us all,” Ann said. “He will be happy to be occupied again.”
“And I shall be glad, as well. I am unaccustomed to idleness.” Mr. Craighead touched a hand to his forehead in a gesture of farewell, wished Ann a good day, and walked away.
As Ann watched him go, her head was still light, but a strange warmth filled her heart. He thinks of me as a child, she mused, knowing full well that Isabel would have known just what to say—and how. As she went below, Ann found herself hoping that he would seek her out again.
Jonathan was taking breakfast when Ann returned to their quarters, and William was attempting to persuade Sarah to eat a bowl of gruel.
“I can’t swallow a drop,” she protested, but at her husband’s encouragement, she managed a few spoonfuls.
“The sun is out, and it promises to be a beautiful day,” Ann told her mother. “Let us help ye up on deck. Ye’ll feel better for having some fresh air.”
“But she must not be chilled,” William warned. “Wait until the sun is higher, and the air warms.”
By then, the deck was crowded with all the passengers who were able to walk. Most of Caleb Craighead’s pupils were back, and he entertained them with stories of various biblical storms, while Sarah and Ann sat nearby, listening along with the children.
When he finished and had set the children to various tasks, Sarah spoke to him. “Mr. Craighead, the way ye tell those stories puts me in mind of a pastor I knew in Scotland in the old days. Have ye ever felt a call to the ministry, by any chance?”
Ann had never known a minister who looked—or sounded—like Mr. Craighead, and she was surprised when he nodded.
“I have, ma’am. In fact, after serving as a schoolmaster for some years, I have only recently been ordained to the ministry. It is my intention to preach in America, as God leads me.”
“Ah,” said Sarah. “Then perhaps ye can lead us in worship of a Sabbath on this ship?”
“If Captain Murdock has no objections, and will tell us when the Lord’s Day is,” he smiled. “I fear that I may have lost a day during the storm.”
“Please ask him,” Sarah urged. “We all need to hear the Word proclaimed, no matter where we may be.”
“I do hope Mr. Craighead will not be long-winded,” Isabel said as she and Ann waited for him to begin the first service two days later. “Our pastor always spoke at least two hours, and never said anything I could remember two minutes later.”
“Perhaps his preaching will be as interesting as his teaching.” Ann replied.
“Well, in any case we canna leave if we don’t like it. ‘Twould be a long swim back to Ireland,” Isabel proclaimed, tossing her head and smiling. Then she took a quick look about to see if any of the men were noticing.
Caleb Craighead, minister, looked no different to Ann from Caleb Craighead, schoolmaster, except for the white linen shirt replacing his usual brown one. Either he lacked a black ecclesiastical suit, or had chosen not to wear it.
Standing on the captain’s deck, Caleb looked out over his makeshift congregation. Nearly all of the passengers had gathered for the service, including most of the men who were being transported, and even a few of the sailors. His voice was firm and clear as he led in a long prayer, and then asked one of the men to line out a hymn from the Psalter. Another read from the Scriptures, then Caleb Craighead began his sermon. All listened with attention as he began to talk in quiet, almost conversational tones, of God’s grace and mercy, of His ability to protect them if they trusted Him utterly.
Reverend Duffle had never preached with such force or quiet conviction, and as Ann listened, she thought about what this unlikely young minister was saying. Did God really care about them, she wondered? Did He know, right now, this instant, that this band of people was here, on this tiny ship in the midst of a vast ocean? There could be no doubt that Caleb earnestly believed that God was with them, but it was almost too much for Ann to accept.
“Well, that didn’t take too long,” Isabel said after the benediction. “Do ye think Captain Murdock’d loan us his spyglass’? I want to see if the other ships are still with us.”
“I am sure they are,” Ann said, turning away. She did not want Isabel to see her face; she was not even sure what was written there herself, but whatever it was, she meant to keep it private. “I must see to Mother’s bedding before she comes below,” she added, and hastened away before Isabel could reply.
The next week continued mostly calm and fair, but there was often a chill in the air, and Sarah had begun to cough again, so she rarely ventured on deck. Ann spent much time with her mother, reading aloud Psalms and Scripture passages that Sarah knew from memory. Each day when his lessons were finished, Caleb Craighead came to sit at Sarah’s bedside, and Ann looked forward to his visits, although he rarely spoke directly to her. Caleb spoke of his childhood in Scotland, not far from where Sarah was born, and of going up to the university at Edinburgh. Often a fit of coughing would seize Sarah, and although she turned her head away from them, Ann could see the crimson stains in the cloth her mother held to her lips, and her heart ached. It was apparent that Sarah was worsening daily.
“Father, is there naught we can do?” Ann asked one evening after Sarah had suffered a particularly violent spell of coughing. “I feel so helpless.”
“Aye, lass,” William agreed sadly. “There’s no surgeon on board, and such physic as the captain has canna’ heal, but only ease pain.”
“She says she feels no pain, but her eyes tell a different tale. Perhaps ye could ask Captain Murdock for some laudanum.”
William nodded and went in search of the captain, but when he returned with it, Sarah would not take the draught.
“Fetch Mr. Craighead,” she asked. “I have need of his prayers tonight.”
When Caleb Craighead arrived, prayer book in hand, Sarah motioned to her family. “Leave us alone, now.”
Ann bent down and kissed her mother’s wasted cheek, her throat tight with the burden of unshed tears. Then she and William went up on deck, where Jonathan sat with the Prentisses.
“I saw Mr. Craighead go below,” Jonathan said. “Is Mother worse, then?”
William did not reply, but patted his son’s thin shoulder.
“I think we should offer prayer now, also,” Mr. Prentiss suggested, and as they bowed their heads, he hesitantly began to recite the Lord’s Prayer.
“’Thy will be done,’” Ann repeated with them, but she did not understand what that really meant. How could she pray to a God whose will could take Sarah from a family that needed her sorely, when she had ever been His servant? Yet she could not help murmuring over and over, as if the mere repetition could help, “She must live, she can’t die, she can’t…”
Ann did not know how much time passed. The Prentisses drifted away at dusk, and it was fully dark when she heard the minister’s steps on the deck. He came to them, saying nothing, and embraced William. He picked Jonathan up and held the boy, murmuring to him, then turned to Ann, still holding her brother. She could not see Caleb’s face, but the cheek he touched to hers was damp—from his tears or the others’, she could not tell.
“It is over,” he said softly, and Ann felt the deck slipping away under her feet, and a long fall into darkness.