Beatrix patted Kite’s arm to make him lean down to her. ‘Other one name?’
‘Victory.’
Beatrix slid down to talk to George in their twins-burble. Joe could only understand a little of it, but he had a feeling they thought the ship was alive because Kite had called it she. He took a breath to explain, but then stopped. It was a good thing to believe.
He held himself just about together until they were on board. The sailors took over the children immediately; there was, incredibly, a nursery, because the women brought their children with them now. Joe stayed long enough with them to see that it was a bright, cheery room, warm and well-lit, right in the heart of the ship, next to the infirmary where no shots ever came through. There were matrons on duty, though all the children were asleep. One of them put the twins into a spare hammock. George looked like he’d never seen anything better in his life, and then fell asleep so abruptly he might have been knocked out. Beatrix sat quietly, bobbing to make the hammock swing. She giggled when the matron gave her an extra push. Joe had never seen them so happy to be put to bed. He kissed them both, and then found that he was shaking with the sense that he’d forgotten something, some danger that would still loom up and snatch them. The matron lifted her eyebrows at him.
‘Nothing worse for disturbing sleep than hovering fathers.’ She made it sound like an unfortunate medical condition.
He had to laugh, or sort of. He couldn’t help wondering if they had made it through with plenty of time to spare, or if there had only been forty seconds before one or all three of them winked out of existence, the inevitable outcome of some innocent conversation on either side of the gate, a dropped watch, a penny spun at the wrong second.
Kite touched Joe’s back, just between his shoulder blades. It stopped all those what-ifs hurling themselves around.
‘Night, Bee.’
She looked past him and smiled, and saluted at Kite, who must have just done it towards her.
The way into the stateroom was familiar. He’d walked this way before, he knew it, and when Kite opened the door, he knew the room. He knew the tilting windows, the dining table, the desk, all so powerfully that he could smell the wine and the cigarette smoke from that last night off Spain, before Trafalgar, before the shots had come in.
It was all beautifully repaired now, and on the desk was a gleaming bronze telegraph. But it was still itself, warmer and brighter than the cabin on Agamemnon, and somehow, it had soaked in all the good things that had happened far more than the bad.
Home. It was coming up through the deck.
He had to sit down, because all the strength had evaporated from his knees. When he looked up, Kite was sitting next to him, very still, not touching him. He looked anxious.
‘I know it must have been bad, leaving. But – I swear, they’re safer here than—’
‘I know,’ Joe said. He started to laugh, because when he said I, it felt different now. He knew who that was. ‘It all looks a damn sight better than the last time we were here, doesn’t it? Much nicer now it’s not on fire.’
Kite did his unbearable trick of turning to glass. ‘You remember that then?’
‘We were sitting here, with Tom and Rupert Grey.’ Joe studied the dust in the air. He could nearly see their ghosts in it, the lamps that night in the heat, the glitter of the wine glasses. ‘I think that was the happiest I’ve ever been. I’d been sick missing you, it was making me crotchety with the men, I could hardly sit still more than fifteen minutes for that last six months. And then there you were.’
When Kite cried, Joe’s whole chest hurt. Joe pulled him close, and even that didn’t feel near enough. He kissed him once, very softly, for permission, then again when Kite leaned up to him, cradling the nape of his neck where the bones were fragile. His fingertips already knew the pattern of the burn scars. And then it was all there, everything, and all of him: Jem, Joe Tournier, Joe Zhang, different and not, three winking facets of a person who he wasn’t sure had a name. Whoever he was, though, he had a surge of joy when Kite sank forward against his shoulder.
He put his head down a little. Kite smelled of cedar, from the sea chest his clothes lived in. Joe touched his arm where there was a new burn, too precise to be accidental. There were hints of cruciform shapes in it. Kite took it back and folded it close to his own chest without looking up.
‘Can I do something new on your other arm?’
Kite hesitated.
Joe caught his hands. ‘I’m not leaving again. You’re not going to get rid of me now. And the twins have adopted you.’
‘All right,’ Kite said, but not like he believed it.
Joe decided it didn’t matter. There was all the time in the world to make him believe it.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
As always, thanks to my brother Jacob for keeping me sane and telling me how to fix my stupid plots, even though he’s always busy with things that matter much more. Also to Alison and Sara Helen, my brilliant editors, who took me seriously when I insisted that the introduction of giant tortoises to nineteenth century Scotland would definitely solve everything. Huge thanks to Jenny, my agent, who stuck with this project even when everyone else thought it was ridiculous, and worked on it above and beyond the call of duty for years. Thank you to the Arts Council, who funded the 2018 project which took me aboard my first tall ship, Atyla, and thanks even more to Darwin 200, who gave me
