'Not a bit of it,' Alan replied, grinning widely. 'Let there be perfect freedom between us, Mistress Chiswick.'
'Then please call me Caroline.'
'Caroline, I shall. Could you wait here for a moment, though? I really must see to the helm and the ship for a moment.'
'Show me what you must see, I pray.'
At her injunction he led her down the deck from the weather rail to the binnacle box before the wheel to speak to the quartermaster.
'Evening, Tate.'
'Ev'nin', sir. Ev'nin,' miss,' the helmsman said, almost swallowing his quid of tobacco at the miraculous appearance of a pretty young lady on the deck. His assisting quartermaster's mate, Weems as bosun of the watch, and one of the ship's boys drifted closer to ogle her, the boy gazing up in snot-nosed wonder, earning a smoothing of his unruly hair from her gloved hand that turned him into an adoring worshiper.
'How's her head?' Alan inquired.
'Sou'-sou'-west, 'alf south, sir,' Tate answered.
Three bells chimed from up forward.
'Mister Weems, I'd admire another cast of the log,' Alan ordered. 'Turn the glass, boy.'
'Aye, zur,' the boy replied, fumbling with the half-hour glass on the binnacle, never tearing his eyes away from the pretty lady in the faint light from the compass box lanterns.
'How's the helm, Tate? Any problem with those bronze guns aft, or do we need to shift some stores to lighten the bows?'
'Ah, seems harright, Mister Lewrie.' Tate turned to spit into the kid, and flushed with embarrassment. 'Sorry, miss.'
'We grew tobacco in the Carolinas, Mister Tate.' She smiled. 'In the backcountry where I was a girl, even the women wouldn't turn their nose up to a chew now and then. My granny smoked a pipe,' she coyly confided.
'An' me own, too, miss.' Tate, marveling at himself for daring to even open his mouth in the presence of an officer of the watch, grinned foolishly.
Alan looked up to check the set of the sails that shone like pale blue ghosts in the moonlight. There was nothing to complain of in their angle to the winds, and the commissioning pendant stood out in a lazy whip like a black worm on the sky, pointing perfectly abeam towards shore. The yard braces seemed taut enough to leave alone as well.
'So this is how you steer the ship,' Caroline said.
'Yes, with this wheel. Though it's not always this easy. Sometimes it takes four or more men to manage the wheel when the sea and the wind kick up. When you want to go left, you put the helm to starboard.'
'That sounds backwards,' she said, shaking her head in confusion.
'Turning the wheel left turns the rudder so that its leading edge faces right, so it is backwards, in a way. You'd say helm alee to make her head up more into the wind.'
'You sailors are a contrary lot.' She laughed gently. 'And you have to keep adjusting it as Tate is doing?'
'Yuss, miss,' Tate said, playing a spoke or two to either side as he spoke. 'Back an' forth, hever sa gentle like.'
'A wave will push her bows off course,' Alan explained. 'You watch the compass bowl, the wind pendants, and the luff of the sails and the way the wind strikes them, the way the sea is coming at you and, on a clear night such as this, a star or constellation, as well.'
'It seems so complicated.'
'Try it,' Alan urged. Before she could demur she was behind the wheel to the weather side, hands on two spokes, with Tate off to the lee side to lend his strength just in case and Alan at her side with his hands atop hers.
'It is harder to turn than I thought,' she said after a few minutes of effort, as Alan bubbled happily on about what a proper luff looked like. They let her steer by herself, letting her get the feel of it. A bow wave thudded gently and creamed down their larboard side, and the helm fell off, but she corrected, almost grunting with the effort to add a spoke or two to windward. She gave Alan a puff and a smile, but her hazel eyes were gleaming like golden nuggets in the binnacle lights.
'Gentlemen, I thank you for sparing the time for such a weakling to learn a thing or two, but you'd best take your ship back before I run it on the rocks or something,' she finally said, and suffered to be led away from the wheel to the nettings over the waist up forward.
'Did you enjoy that?' Alan asked, standing by her.
'Aye, I did, thank you.' She smiled. 'Much more than the lecture I received today from Captain Treghues. What a strange man your captain is, so enamored of his own voice at one moment and so somber the next.'
'He has his moods,' Alan replied cryptically, noting that was perhaps the five hundredth time he had heard that said in
'After months of this at a stretch, I can imagine that it could grow wearisome, but being at sea can be fun, too, can't it, Alan?' she enthused, leaning forward over the waist and the gun deck. 'The ocean is beautiful tonight with the moon on it. Like a blanket made of jewels.'
'Yes, it is pretty tonight,' Alan admitted as he half froze next to her. 'There are many pretty days, and it can be exciting and fun, sometimes. But the sea's a chimera. She can seem peaceful one minute and try to kill you the next. You always have to be on your guard.'
'The sea sounds much like life itself in that regard.'
'Such sagacity from one so young,' he chided her. 'And such a cynical outlook. Chary as a burned child. Where will it end, tsk tsk?'
'Had I grown up in London with nothing more distressing in my life than balls and the theatre, it might seem so,' she replied, stiffening. He turned to study her face in the moonlight, and saw that the serious mien was upon her once more.
'I am sorry to have raised such a frown from you in the middle of your enjoyment, Caroline,' he said. 'I've spoiled it for you; if I have, I regret it.'
'You've spoiled nothing, Alan,' she said, patting the back of his hand that rested on the railing. 'You gave me back my brothers, got us aboard a ship and away from retribution of our Rebels, brought joy to my parents, and have provided me with a few precious moments of diversion. God knows I have needed some. You are pleasant company.'
'And so are you, Caroline. Very easy to be with,' he told her, realizing that it was so. There was no formality with her, as there was with many young women, no call for stilted triteness that passed for decent conversation. 'I shall be sorry to reach Charleston tomorrow.'
'And you shall go back to the Indies from there?' she said in a softer voice.
'Yes. This Admiral de Grasse still has a French fleet of nearly thirty sail. He'll not rest on his laurels until we've met him once more and beaten him.'
'I shall pray God for your safety every moment,' she promised. 'But I expect there are more than a few young ladies who are already doing the same thing, eh?'
'Your prayers for me would be most welcome, Caroline,' Alan said, looking at her and seeing the hesitant nature of her smile. That's not teasing, that's fishing for information, by God, he thought.
'This seafaring life leaves little room for young ladies, much to my regret,' he added quickly. 'There is no one back in England. Even if there had been, I've not been back in nearly two years.'
'But there is the admiral's relation, is there not? Surely, she is kindly disposed towards you, and you her, or you would not have fought to defend her honor.' She almost stammered this out, trying to appear nonchalant and only slightly interested.
'No one in her family could ever be enthused about the prospects of a two-a-penny midshipman.' He shrugged. 'I believe she is in Jamaica now, back with her family. We exchange letters now and then, but…'
'I only ask because of the sisterly affection I feel towards you, and the gratitude for saving Gov and Burge at Yorktown,' she insisted, also shrugging most eloquently. 'You'll be off across the ocean soon, and we shall never see each other again. Is that not the way of life, that people meet and part so quickly? I and my family shall always hold you in our memories, but…'
