Anyhow, froze up as I was, I somehow managed to haul myself into the skiff. We got the life-ring aboard, and then Whittle commenced to row us for the yacht.
I sat in the bow, hunched over and shaking apart. Trudy, she was on the other side of Whittle, lying on the bottom, curled and hugging her knees.
“You gave us an awful scare,” he told Trudy, but he sounded more like she’d given him a jolly show. “This is rather inclement weather for a swimming party. Did you enjoy it?”
She didn’t answer.
Her rump was in easy reach of his foot. He fetched it a smart kick that made her flinch. But she still didn’t say anything.
He kicked her again. Then he laughed, and laid off conversation the rest of the way to the yacht.
Michael had reefed the sails, so the True D. Light was only moving around because of the currents and waves and such. When we came up alongside, he lowered the boarding ladder. I tossed him the bow line. He tied us up. Whittle climbed the ladder, leaving me with Trudy in the tossing skiff.
She only just laid there.
Michael stared down, all pale and hang-jawed, like Trudy was something strange and revolting.
He was no more use than a neck ache.
“Trudy,” I said, “you’ve got to get up. We’ve reached the yacht.”
She might as well have been deaf.
“Help her,” Whittle called down to me.
It was what I’d aimed to do, anyhow. I couldn’t see a way around it. So I kept low and made my way to where she lay. I crouched by her rump. “Trudy?” I asked. “Please get up.”
She didn’t stir, not even when I put a hand on her cold hip and gave it a shake.
So then I pried her top arm away from her knees and hauled it toward me. She rolled. Her knees swung up and knocked me sideways. The gunnel jammed my ribs. Next thing I knew, my feet were kicking at the sky. Then I hit the ocean head-first.
I tumbled around underwater for a spell, clawed for the surface and banged my head on the underside of the skiff, and finally got to air. I reached for the skiff, but a wave snatched it away so I missed. Before my hand slapped down empty, what do you know if Trudy didn’t reach out and catch my wrist.
It must’ve brought her senses back, knocking me overboard.
Whittle, he was up on the yacht, looking down at us and laughing like he might bust a seam.
Trudy towed me up close, till I could hook my elbows over the gunnel. Then she scooted to the other side to keep things steady. While I hung there, trying to squirm into the boat, she clutched me under the arms and hauled. She didn’t let up, but kept pulling even when my head pushed into her breast. She squished me against her and helped me turn over and eased me down.
“Are you all right?” she asked.
I nodded up at her. She frowned down at me. And right then I forgave her everything and was mighty glad I’d worked so hard at saving her.
She crouched over me for a spell, then got up and climbed the ladder all by herself. I followed her up. I had one leg over the bulwark when Michael went to hug her and she slapped him across the face.
He stood there, blinking, and Whittle laughed, and Trudy went down below.
Whittle clapped me on the shoulder. “You’ve done splendidly, Trevor,” he said. “Go down, yourself, and bundle up, before you catch your death.”
He was the cause of all our troubles, but right then I near forgot how much I hated him. I hurried myself down the companionway.
I found Trudy in the saloon, squatting down to light the heater. All a-tremble, she shook out two or three matches trying. While she worked at that, I saw that the door to the forward quarters was open.
I turned away quick, though not quick enough by a long sight. Just a glimpse was too much. Not only Patrick’s head was gone. He had no arms or legs, either. More was missing, but I don’t aim to tell about that. And what was left of him had been split open and hollowed out considerable.
It made me plain sick to see such a thing. I dropped down onto the bunk I’d used last night, and remembered all the noises that’d kept me awake—Trudy whimpering and screaming and such. Much as I felt sorry for Patrick, I felt a lot sorrier for her. He’d been dead, and shut of the business. But poor Trudy, she’d had to watch and I didn’t want to think about what Whittle must’ve done to her, or made her do.
She got the heater going, then took a couple of towels out of a cabinet and gave me one. I stripped off my wet trousers and socks. We both rubbed ourselves dry. We climbed under our covers, and didn’t it feel fine to lay in a warm bed!
I thought to ask her what had gone on last night. Kept mum, though, figuring it wouldn’t do her much good to talk about it and she more than likely wouldn’t tell, anyhow.
So we just kept quiet.
By and by, Whittle came along with Michael.
“Oh, my God!” Michael blasted when he saw what was past the door. “What did you do to him?”
“Why, I ripped him, of course.”
“Where’s the rest of him?”
“Fish food, no doubt.”
He must’ve tossed the missing parts out a porthole. If he ate any, like he did with Mary, he didn’t let on.
Michael came out with another, “My God.”
“All the less for you to deal with,” Whittle told him.
“I don’t see why I have to do it,” Michael whined.
“Would you rather I ask Trudy to clean up the leftovers?”
The way Michael didn’t answer, I reckon he would’ve preferred it that way.
“And poor Trevor’s all done in from the business of saving your bride from the ocean depths.”
“I belong at the helm,” Michael said.
“You belong where I tell you. I’m certain the boat will manage itself spendidly until you’ve finished.”
“Please. It’s not…”
Whittle, he hauled off and kicked Michael’s rump. That sent the fellow stumbling along. I bolted up to see better. At the doorway, Michael lost his feet altogether and, crying out, flopped down right on top of Patrick. He squealed like he’d been stuck, then took to blubbering.
I settled back down and turned my head away, not wanting to watch any more of this. Trudy, she’d pulled the covers over her face when the two first came in.
Pretty soon, Whittle said, “You see? He’s no trouble—hardly weighs more than a dog.”
Michael walked by me, gasping and sobbing.
When he and Whittle were gone, I looked and saw a trail of red drippings and other mess on the floor between our berths. I kept my eyes from wandering into the front cabin.
Pretty soon, along they both came again. This time, Michael carried a bucket and mop.
It was dark by the time he finished cleaning the place.
He never spoke a word to me or Trudy. But he sighed and sniffled considerable.
Whittle let me and Trudy stay warm in our beds till Michael was all done. Then he fetched us fresh sets of clothes. We got up and dressed ourselves. Trudy made supper. We all ate, and then he sent Michael and me topside to get us under way again.
Michael didn’t say one thing about any of what had happened that day. He gave me orders and instructions, and that was it.
Once we were sailing along nicely, he turned over the helm to me. He said we’d man the boat in shifts, three hours at a turn. If I should run into any trouble, I was to fetch him quick. Then he went below.
I was glad to be rid of him. I kept my eyes on the compass and sails, and kept us heading in the proper direction, more or less, until he showed up to relieve me.
Whittle and Trudy weren’t to be seen. The door to their cabin was shut. I climbed into my bunk in the saloon. Tonight, no sounds came from the other side of that door. And I knew they didn’t have Patrick in there with them any more, which was a mighty relief.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
High Seas and Low Hopes
Michael kept a ship’s log. I saw plenty of it, for he scribbled on it every day
. It didn’t say much, mostly just gave our location in degrees of latitude and longitude, which he figured out somehow by using a sextant along with various tables and charts. He tried to figure that stuff out each day at noon if the sun was showing. That wasn’t often, let me tell you. But it came out now and again, and we stayed on course.
We were making for New York Harbor, which is where Michael and Trudy and her father had set out from when they left for England, and Whittle said it suited him fine.
The trip took us thirty-six days and nights and seemed to last about ten years.
It was pretty much the same routine the whole time except when we hit storms. Michael and I took turns at the helm, though it seemed like we spent hours each day fooling with the sails, raising and lowering them because we wanted to keep as much sail flying as we could, but had to reef the mainsail whenever the wind kicked up too hard.
Trudy fixed all our meals. When she wasn’t busy with that, she came topside and stood lookout. Whittle shared the lookout duties with her. We all took our turns at it, for none of us was eager to fetch up on an iceberg. We ran into a passel of those, and steered clear of them.
We all got along the best we could, pitching in to help each other, and such.
Trudy stayed cold toward Michael for a spell, holding it against him that he hadn’t jumped in the ocean to save her instead of me doing it, I reckon. She never did warm up to me. When she wasn’t bossing me around, she acted like I wasn’t there at all. She was always civil and meek to Whittle, and didn’t once give him any lip.
Michael acted like a whipped dog around Trudy and Whittle both. If he’d had a tail, it would’ve been drooping between his knees most of the time. He sure knew how to sail the yacht, though. He’d turn into a man again when nobody was around but me and all he had to do was navigate and steer and muck about with the sails or rigging, and give me orders. The dicier it got with the weather, the better he handled himself. Why, you never would’ve guessed he had a yellow streak at all if you could’ve seen him skippering us through a gale with waves higher than mountains. Then later on you’d see how a look from Trudy or Whittle made him wither, and you just couldn’t believe it.
Whittle, he acted the whole voyage like he was having just the bulliest time ever. He paraded about like Long John Silver himself, a knife on each hip, and hardly a word ever passed his lips that wasn’t an “Aye, matey” or an “Avast, me hearties” or a “Shiver me timbers.”
Whereas pirate sorts generally sported an eyepatch, Whittle took to wearing one where his nose used to be. After he’d healed enough to stop bandaging himself, he fashioned a whole variety of patches that he tied onto his face. One day, he’d be sporting a disk of red silk. The next, he might have one made of white lace or leather or velvet or tweed. I don’t suppose Trudy had a dress or petticoat or blouse or hat or shoe that didn’t wind up with a round hole in it the size of a gold piece. She wore some of those things after Whittle’d been at them, and you could see where he’d gotten the material for this or that nosepatch.
Every so often, when he was feeling ornery or full of mischief, he’d take and pluck his patch up to his forehead and make us sick.
Taken all round, though, he behaved a sight better than I might’ve expected from the likes of him. He’d come near losing Trudy and me, that first day out of Plymouth. If we’d gone and drowned on him, it would’ve put an awful wrinkle in his plans. I figure he realized that, and chose not to push his luck. He went ahead and gave us a fair share of thumps and kicks, but he never tormented any of us much—not as I knew about, leastwise.
Each night, he took Trudy into the forward cabin and locked the door, leaving the saloon as sleeping quarters for me and Michael when we weren’t taking our turns topside. I never heard much out of her, though. When she’d come out the next day, she didn’t look like she’d been strung up or otherwise abused.
Her neck got better slowly. By and by, the scabs fell off and her skin was pink and shiny across her throat.
As for me, I behaved. Plenty of chances came along for me to bash Whittle or shove him overboard, but I always resisted. Whenever a chance showed itself, all I had to do was remember how he’d dealt with Patrick, or how he’d punished Trudy after I’d failed at garroting him. It was never a sure thing that a bash or push would’ve put an end to him, so I never dared.
When things got slow and I had time for my mind to wander, I often longed for home. But I grew curiouser, all the time, about America. I’d read a heap of books about the place. It sounded grand, and I allowed what a shame it’d be to travel so far and only just turn around, first chance, and return to home. The plan I hit on was to send off a message to Mother, letting her know I wasn’t dead, after all, and then explore around a bit.
I’d no sooner get excited about all that, however, than the glooms would set in. I judged I was bound to end up killed and never reach America. If the ocean didn’t swamp us, Whittle’d carve us down to torsos once he stopped needing a crew.
My odds were on the ocean, though.
It never let up. At the best of times, it shoved us up and down and jolted us and pitched us from side to side. At the worst of times, it gave up toying around and did its best to demolish us. While that was going on, you’d never see hide nor hair of Whittle or Trudy. They’d be hiding down below with the door shut tight while Michael and I worked like mad, tied to safety lines so as not to get swept overboard. One of us would wear out our arm on the bilge pump while the other manned the wheel, and sometimes one or the other of us had to climb in the rigging or go up the mast, and wasn’t that just the most fun?
There were times my heart near gave out from the fright of it all, when we’d be in that tiny boat at the bottom of a gorge, the waves like cliffs looming over us, and then one would avalanche down on top of us, or almost, but more often than not we’d go sliding up a slope and hang on the crest and go shooting straight down into the next chasm, diving down so steep it seemed we might flip end over end, or strike the bottom so hard the boat would fly all to flinders.
The wind, it’d be shrieking through rigging like a banshee. Water’d be smashing against us, trying to tear us loose and throw us into the seas. By the time it’d all ease off, we’d be dripping icicles off our noses and hair, and near dead.
We’d get maybe a day or two of normal roughness, and then we’d find ourselves in just such another fix and it’s a mighty wonder the True D. Light didn’t give up and call it quits and fall apart underneath us. But she held together, and so did we somehow.
It’s a plain miracle, is all I can say, that we were all still alive to look out and spot land off in the far distance on the thirty-sixth day of our voyage.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Our Last Night on the True D. Light
As Whittle wanted no truck with customs people or any other brand of officials, he decided we ought to avoid the New York harbor and pick a section of shoreline where we weren’t likely to get noticed.
So we hung well off the coast till after sundown. Then Michael steered us into a place he said was Gravesend Bay. We went in behind a jut of land for shelter from the wind and rough seas. There, a couple of hundred yards from the mouth of Coney Island Creek, Whittle had us reef the sails and drop anchor.
Safely moored on the quiet waters, we went below and ate our last meal aboard the True D. Light. I didn’t have much stomach for food. On the one hand, I was mighty glad to be shut of the ocean at last. It had done its most to kill us, but we’d gotten across alive. On the other hand, though, Whittle’d had uses for us when we were on the high seas. Now, he didn’t need a crew or cook or captive. He didn’t need us at all. That dampened my appetite considerable.
I could see that Michael and Trudy were worried, too. They fidgeted and picked at their food and didn’t say much. Nobody asked what Whittle aimed to do. None of us had the grit, I reckon. Maybe they were like me, and figured talking about it might only serve to give him ideas. Maybe if we just let it lie, he’d forg
et it was about time to kill us all.
When Whittle finished eating, he patted his lips with a napkin and sighed. He wore a flimsy silk nosepatch that I reckoned had left a good pair of Trudy’s bloomers with a hole in them. It kind of drooped in the middle and clung to his tiny nubs at both sides, but puffed out like a sail when he sighed.
“Taken all around, me hearties,” he said, “it’s been a marvelous voyage. You were fine shipmates and companions. I daresay I’ll be quite sorry to take my leave of you. However, all good things must come to an end.”
Trudy, she turned a shade of gray and caught her lower lip between her teeth.
Whittle gave her a cheery smile. “You’ve nothing to fear, Trudy. Am I so ungrateful as to harm you now that we’ve reached safe harbor? I may indeed have some mischievous ways about me, but I am not a heartless fiend. I count you as my friend. I count you all as my friends,” he added, nodding and smiling at Michael and me. “We’ve sailed the vast reaches of the sea together—we band of brothers. And sister,” he added, tipping Trudy a wink. “We honored few.”
He went on spouting such rubbish for a spell. He laid it on thick as molasses about how highly he thought of us and how grateful he was and how we were his comrades and mates and chums and how he wouldn’t even think about hurting us in any way. Well, he jabbered on about it till I lost any doubt but what he aimed to kill us all.
Finally, he yawned and said, “I’m all done in. I suggest we retire for the night. We’ll rise early, for I’m quite keen to be on my way. Just before dawn would seem the best time to set out, I should think. I’ll take the skiff ashore, and you three may carry on as you fancy. Make for the city or the warm Carib or Timbuktu, it’s all the same to me.”
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