A Different Sort of Perfect

by Vivian Roycroft

"I certainly can't claim any such credit for my own pitiful attempts at keeping a journal," Mr. Abbot said. "The captains passed me for lieutenant in spite of those efforts, certainly not because of them."

  "Not one midshipman in a dozen could claim credit for his journal." Captain Fleming leaned back in his chair and held his glass up toward the lantern's light, as if admiring the brilliant garnet color. "Gentlemen and Lady Clara, I promise you will never hear me discussing mine."

  Another ripple of laughter encircled the table, missing the far end, where the gunner, purser, and carpenter had buried themselves in a sotto voce conversation. Clara sipped again, then set her glass aside. She'd been silly to suspect Chandler of ulterior motives or a mean spirit. The entertainment was going splendidly, although the conversation could not be called scintillating, and everyone seemed determined to be pleased and cheerful. She should relax her own shoulders, where her short stays' sleeves were behaving themselves perfectly, and enjoy her evening.

  She glanced down and across the table. Chandler still stared at her, as he'd done all evening, his refilled glass already empty, and another frisson shivered through her. His scowl hadn't shifted since she'd entered the wardroom; it looked no worse than normal, but out of place considering everyone else's efforts. Still, she should give him the benefit of the doubt, rather than let him worry her evening to shreds. Clara gave Chandler her best smile.

  His eyes narrowed. Deliberately he tapped his fingers on the tablecloth, and Clara's shudder intensified. His hand didn't shake and his eyes weren't bleary; alcohol hadn't taken its toll. But without doubt it had emboldened him. What had Mr. Abbot been thinking, offering spirits to two inexperienced lads?

  "Lady Clara, is it true you're seeking a French captain you met during the peace and that you intend to marry him?"

  The room froze. From Captain Fleming and Mr. Abbot, down through Mayne and the other common sailors, nobody moved, nobody breathed. Heat flushed through her, settled in her face then drained away, leaving her cold and dizzy. Chandler curled one lip, hiked one eyebrow. His stare didn't waver, the little monster.

  Mr. Abbot cleared his throat. "You know, marriage is such a personal subject, it shouldn't be attempted at table." He riveted Chandler with a glare, and whatever he read there sent the midshipman back into his chair and wiped the smirk from his face. Clara's next breath came more easily.

  One of the sailors carried in dessert, an impossibly long jam roly-poly smothered with custard, another behind with an armload of clean plates. A small bustle ensued, slicing, spooning, serving, little commentaries flowing with the portions. No one, not even Chandler, specifically looked at her, and by the time Mayne, thin-lipped, set her plate in front of her, the dizziness had subsided.

  When everyone was settled, Mr. Abbot corked the decanter and handed it over his shoulder to one of his footmen. "I think we're ready for coffee now. And you know, Mr. Chandler's comment does remind me of several French captains I've met, during the peace and after battles. I must say, taken as a group they're a remarkably handsome, well-mannered group of men, and not anyone I'd be ashamed to know."

  "Indeed yes," Captain Fleming said, plying his spoon. "Gallant and courageous, too, often to a fault. Both the ones I met during the peace—" he swallowed a bite. "—and the ones I've defeated."

  The officers guffawed and Lieutenant Pym flashed her a gleaming smile. But Lieutenant Rosslyn still did not lift his gaze. Staunton's flush hadn't cleared, and he hacked at his pudding with short, hard strokes. The moment had passed, but it hadn't cleared the air.

  Where oh where had Chandler heard that little detail? She'd mentioned it to Captain Fleming when she'd first come aboard, but only Hennessy had been present during that tête-à-tête and she couldn't imagine that good-natured man passing on such a compromising detail. More importantly, with common sailors acting as footmen, what could stop it from spreading all over the ship?

  * * * *

  At the door to her cabin, Clara turned and smiled. "Good night, Captain Fleming. Thank you for your part in such a delightful evening."

  His eyes gleamed, perhaps with affection or gratitude, and he bowed. "It was most enjoyable, wasn't it? Good night, Lady Clara."

  To his credit, he said the words without a trace of satire in his voice or mien. Instead, the gleam in his eyes turned knowing, amused…

  …conspiratorial. As if they shared a secret from the rest of the ship and crew, something they'd never tell another living soul.

  Which was perfectly ridiculous. But still it was difficult, breaking their mutual stare and retiring to her cabin.

  She closed the cabin door behind her and leaned against it. The lantern had been lit, and the little flame's light swayed halfway up the starboard bulkhead as she waited, holding her breath and listening with her ear to the door. The light's climb slowed near the rafters, paused, reversed, and as it swept with the ship's roll back over her feet, outside the door light footsteps trotted up the aft ladder. Captain Fleming had gone on deck, not to his cabin.

  She grabbed her old grey silk wrap and swept it on, then slid the lantern from its hook and tugged open the cabin door. In front of the captain's cabin, Morrow jerked upright from where he'd been leaning against the bulkhead, eyes fixed in a guilty stare. A quick touch of her finger to her lips, then Clara ran past the aft ladder, twisted between the capstan and the pump's railing, and doubled down the midships ladder.

  The curtain still hung across the wardroom entrance. Light leaked beneath it, onto the deckboards at her feet, and silhouetted two forms leaning toward each other over the table. Glass clinked, then Mr. Abbot's voice laughed and Lieutenant Pym's began muttering. Difficult to be certain, but neither seemed aware of her presence.

  On the berth deck before the mast, the crowded hammocks swayed with the ship like fat synchronized worms strung from the rafters, ropes creaking with the timbers. Nobody raised a head; no one peered about. Heart pounding as if guilty, Clara shielded the lantern with her body, slipped past the curtain, and doubled down another level.

  Stygian blackness swallowed her and the lantern's light before she'd reached the little rounded landing. As Topaze rolled, the landing's padlocked doors loomed and faded away: they led to storerooms, the steward's room, the slops room. Another ladder, set at right angles to the one where she stood, led down into the hold proper, the industrial bowels of the ship. Something rustled in those depths, skittered, then fell silent as her heart pounded. She really should return to her cabin. But then a voice rose in a singsong snarl.

  "She's not a member of the crew."

  Chandler. One guess who received that belittling tone. As she'd suspected, they'd taken the fight both seemed to want to the part of the ship where they'd least likely suffer interruption. And she had to stop them. Clara grabbed her skirts and raised them safely away as she ran down the final ladder.

  Past the shot lockers, the well, and the mainmast's railing. Beyond their uneven wall, another lantern burned, adding its feeble bit of light to hers. Within that wavering circle, Chandler and Staunton stood toe to toe.

  "It's never going to be your place to say," Staunton said, thrusting himself up into Chandler's face. "You'll never be a ship's captain, you don't have what it takes—"

  Chandler's face twisted. He wrapped a fist in Staunton's dress shirt and lifted.

  She'd arrived in the nick of time.

  Clara opened the lantern, throwing a wash of light across them. "Gentlemen."

  They broke apart. Chandler raised his arm, shielding his eyes. The shadow fell like a solid bar across his grimace.

  "Thank you for your concern and able defense, Mr. Staunton." She set the lantern atop the for'ard shot locker and stepped between the boys. "But I am perfectly capable of defending myself."

  And with all her strength, she shoved Chandler in the chest.

  He stumbled back, into a row of barrels, and sprawled atop them, arms flailing. A lock of hair fell across his disbelieving eyes. Without standing, he brushed it
aside and stared at her.

  If he had stood, she'd have shoved him over again. Astonishing, how good that felt.

  "How dare you, Mr. Chandler?" She leaned over him, fists clenched. Of course she'd experienced anger before, spats with Harmony and Diana, helpless misery aimed at Uncle David; but never before had she felt such a towering flame of rage. "How dare you? My personal affairs are not your concern and should never have been discussed at an open table. Now they'll be discussed by gossips from stem to stern, and it's your fault."

  His mouth twisted and he pushed up onto his elbow. "You're disloyal. You deserve to be shamed—"

  She stepped closer and he froze.

  "That's not the point and you know it. If you truly want to be an officer, one formed in the stamp of Mr. Abbot, Lieutenant Rosslyn, Captain Fleming, then you need to become a gentleman, as well."

  His chin tucked back into his chest. On either side, his neck rippled as he swallowed.

  "And a real gentleman would never discuss a lady's personal affairs in public."

  The lantern light flickered a reflection in his eyes, gleaming red as if the yearning within him blazed more brightly. Oh, these were wretched tactics, a blackmailing tug at desires he'd tried to conceal. But what else could she say that might penetrate his brittle defenses? And the shot hit home; of that she was certain. In his eyes, one could measure the depth of Chandler's yearning to be the best, to follow in the footsteps of real officers, men everyone respected and admired — anything but the role Fate had assigned him.

  Roiling, all-too-obvious emotions played across his face — his initial fury and frustration sinking slowly beneath ambition, calculation, dismay. She waited until he reached regret.

  "Mr. Chandler, I ask you, as a lady to a gentleman, to help quell the rumors that must surely follow this contretemps. We cannot stuff the genie back into his bottle. But with your help, perhaps we can hold a complete disaster at bay."

  For a moment, it seemed as if his suspicion would defeat her yet. But then he swallowed. Chandler pushed himself upright and rubbed at his elbow.

  "I suppose. I mean, for a lady, it's the least I can do." Reluctance edged his gruff voice, and he hadn't apologized nor admitted he was in the wrong.

  Yet she'd count it a success. She'd at least established a relationship with Chandler, something they could work on and develop in the future, despite the ugliness of their mutual situation. Of course, she could have requested assistance from the captain at any time. Captain Fleming's natural air of command would have cleared the tempest with a few words. But as she'd implied earlier to Staunton, she didn't want Captain Fleming embroiled in the disagreement.

  She didn't wish to tattle to authority. That was it. And especially not that authority. The role of simpering, helpless female wouldn't earn anyone's respect, much less Captain Fleming's, and wouldn't sustain the relationship she wanted with him: that of a capable, contributing member of his crew. Of course that was what she wanted.

  That she wanted a lasting, continuing relationship with him, and why, was not a subject she was prepared to consider. Not in the hold while standing between two aggressive midshipmen, at least.

  Clara strode past Staunton, who seemed frozen in place. The light reflected in the whites of his wide eyes like twin candles, and his eyebrows arched halfway up his forehead. She'd gotten his attention as well. Good; she valued his friendship, their laughter and fun, but she'd need his help to contain the rumors, as well. She closed the lantern, swept it off the shot locker, and retreated back up the three ladders.

  But her feet dragged along the decks. For the first time since she'd come aboard, Topaze did not feel like her village.

  Her home.

  Chapter Seventeen

  The wind diminished, diminished further as Topaze arrowed south. A few degrees north of the Line it vanished entirely. The sails lost their purchase, the frigate rolled her guts out, and sailors Fleming had never suspected of having weak stomachs began turning green about the gills.

  Rosslyn, of course, collapsed in the infirmary, but that was to be expected. Chandler looked awful, depressed and morose — even more so than usual — and Fleming himself couldn't entirely ignore the uncontrolled, swooping motion. Only a few of the hands didn't look glum as the west-bound current carried them along the equator toward North America, helpless as a squirrel in a hound's jaws.

  Of those few, Lady Clara stood out by her disgusting chipperness.

  Infuriating. Did nothing disturb the woman? Granted, he'd upset her emotions upon occasion, but her stomach had to be cast iron, like the new water tanks some of the more flash modern ships carried. Nobody had that right, when practically everyone else wallowed in misery.

  But whatever materials comprised her anatomy, she never complained.

  Day after day she sat beneath a rigged awning on the poop, claiming she preferred to be with the crew rather than huddle in the overheated shade below deck. Reading Staunton's journal, writing when a task was assigned to her, doing that odd needlework she pretended to enjoy — Fleming had to hand her his respect and grudging admiration. Sweat moistened her face, slicked her hair, stuck her sailor dress immodestly to her skin until he was forced to look away on multiple occasions each day. Even in the afternoons, when the sun gained another impossible degree of intensity, when the horizon wavered and the pitch melted and Topaze spewed her oakum from every seam, Lady Clara merely leaned back in her chair, throwing her head back and lolling in the heat as if soaking it in.

  About a week into the doldrums, Chandler swayed on the foremast yard and had to be carried down the ratlines, slung like a sack of meal over David Mayne's shoulder. That day, Fleming issued the order for the officers to forego their woolen broadcloth in favor of tropical-weight cotton slops, as the more sensible crew had done weeks ago. During earlier cruises, of course, he'd seen Chandler, Staunton, the Marine Lieutenant Pym — all of them, dressed like common sailors in blue-and-white checked shirts and duck trousers. But he never got used to it, and their straighter stance, squared shoulders, alert and competent air, made them stand out among the crew no matter how they dressed.

  As usual Abbot, while not precisely refusing to obey, managed to circumvent the order. He did leave off that ridiculous woolen coat — or he'd have drawn his captain's attention and ire — and the first time he appeared on the quarterdeck, wearing a cambric frilled shirt that spilled open to his ribcage, fitted buff breeches, and Hessian boots — well, Lady Clara's popped eyes and open stare had been a sight. And her ears hadn't been the only ones turning pink. Fleming had done his best to study the slate, displaying their nonexistent course and speed, but surely Abbot had noticed the poorly hidden grin before he'd stomped off for'ard.

  One of those priceless moments Fleming vowed to treasure forever. As he stood there in his own frilled shirt, breeches, and Hessians. He'd never claimed his first lieutenant wasn't predictable.

  "Captain Fleming?"

  "Yes, my lady?"

  She slipped the ribbon into Staunton's journal, closed it, and set it aside. "If I'm reading this correctly, during a previous voyage last year, Topaze was becalmed ten degrees north of the equator." She glanced up, her dark eyes languid and heavy-lidded, and something very like fire scorched through his veins.

  He cleared his throat. "I sense an unvoiced question in there."

  That opened her eyes a bit. With annoyance.

  "When I fair-copied your notes into the log, you said the doldrums began at three degrees north."

  Ah. "And like any intelligent first-voyager, you're wondering why the blasted things didn't stay where we left them. The doldrums are part of the weather, Lady Clara, and that tends to change when no one's watching."

  He expected her to huff and reach again for the journal — why, why did he have to needle her? Why couldn't he permit them to carry on a dry, factual conversation that didn't do intolerable things to his inner workings? — but she surprised him with a thoughtful contemplation that slid over his skin
like a cool compress. Was she actually peering at his chest?

  No. Of course not. Mrs. Fleming's little boy needed to rein in his self-consciousness. Or he'd be walking the quarterdeck all night.

  "We've had a lucky cruise so far," he said, as seriously as he could manage. "We've avoided both friendly and enemy ships, as we were instructed to do. We haven't been hit with a storm or a fever, our supplies are holding up well, and the raw landmen are shaping up into handy crewmen. If we continue to be lucky, the doldrums will have narrowed rather than shifted south, and we'll drift out of them soon."

  "I see."

  Her unfocused gaze drifted across his torso, presumably without actually seeing him. Surprising, the degree to which his skin seemed to physically feel it. As if she stroked him with one of those crow quill pens. Beneath his shirt.

  Not smart, Mrs. Fleming's little boy. Not smart at all.

  "And what's this ceremony undertaken at the equator? Mr. Staunton barely touches on it in his journal. Is it similar to a muster or Sunday divisions?"

  Crossing the Line.

  Crossing the Line.

  When a handful of experienced crewmen dressed up as arrogant Neptune, Davy Jones, Badger-Bag, lewd Amphitrite, and the other obscene Triton members of the sea king's court. When they bullied the new hands with rough, ribald humor, forcing them to either pay a fine or be shaved with a barrel hoop and rancid grease before they received permission to continue into Neptune's territory. When the laughter and ribbing flowed unchecked and the humor was blue.

  To say the least.

  Any last, lingering, imagined crow-quillish delight skewed into pure emotional agony.

  They had to cross the Line.

  They didn't have to slow down for Neptune and his court to come aboard. The hands would be upset, but he simply could not permit such carrying-on, not with a gentlewoman under his protection aboard the ship.

  Something appeared to be stuck in his throat. And he knew in advance that no amount of coughing would clear it.