And then the damp stones of 1825 came rushing up to slam into her face and ended all further misery.
12
The long hard days were indistinguishable, one after another. Up before light, cleaning the tools he would use that day, a piece of hard tack for breakfast—and often ale or rum to wash it down—then a long day of sewing ripped sails, mending broken gunwales, strengthening ratlines and general rigging. In the first days after they left Casablanca, Rowan would return to the brig to await dinner in the dark, but they soon let him wander the decks after his work was done.
Inevitably, he found ways to lend a hand.
How many chances would he have in his life to help crew a pirate’s ship?
The further they got from land or port, the more the crew responded to him as if he were not a prisoner. They knew he couldn’t escape.
And Rowan knew they were only slightly wrong about that.
There wasn’t a day that passed he wasn’t reminded that just a few feet from where he worked or ate or slept, was his ticket back to Ella and his life in Cairo. If he could just manage to get his hands on his wedding ring or Ella’s lighter—both priceless in their emotional worth to him—he knew he could return to 1925.
It did occur to him that attempting to do so while in the middle of the North Atlantic Ocean might not turn out so well.
Ansel, the master gunner, popped his head out of the galley and waved to Rowan. “Oy, mkubwa, the boys ‘r getting together a game of Blood.”
Rowan shook his head. “I’ve nothing to wager,” he said.
Ansel had spent ten years living in Bermuda on the Dromedary, an ex-naval store ship which served as accommodations for the transported convicts working there on the dockyards. Once he’d served his sentence, the habit of visiting the Dromedary to visit old friends on his way to the Dry Tortugas was the highlight of his year.
“Offer to do their work as yer ante,” Ansel said. “If ye win, ye kin take yer booty in shells and ivory and then ye’ll have something to bet with next time.”
“It’s a plan.”
“We all started the same.”
“That is reassuring.” But Rowan managed to smile.
After the first few wretched days were behind him, Rowan found it in him to focus on the sunshine on the days that had it, and the thrill of survival when a storm cropped up that they were able to emerge from in one piece. He went to bed exhausted but his pain had more to do with the muscles he’d used that day than physical abuse. He was the only one on ship besides the captain who ate the few stores of fresh fruits they’d brought onboard in Casablanca. The rest of the food was salty and tough, and only sometimes insect free.
He found the men who crewed the Die Hard to be simple, if crude. He was surprised to find they weren’t evil. They were just trying to do the best they could with the hand they’d been dealt.
Captain Sully and Quartermaster Edward Toad, on the other hand, were a different story.
Rowan was careful to avoid Toad—not easy to do since the man was moderately obsessed with keeping a close watch on him. But Sully kept himself apart from the men. Usually he could be found in his quarters, or alone on the upper deck. The men generally considered him mercurial and gave him his space.
On the third day out to sea, Rowan was given a hammock in the corridor between decks where the rest of the crew slept. Now his nights were spent attempting to sleep through the thunderous and multiple ranges of snoring, not to mention body odor and stench from teeth that were slowing rotting.
The day the topsail schooner appeared on the horizon, Rowan had been scrubbing below decks in an attempt to eliminate the stench of accumulated bilge water that had filled from a recent tropical storm. Even from below deck, he heard the cry, “Sail ho!” and dropped his brush to join the men topside.
Sully stood on the quarterdeck, a spyglass to his eye. The ship had three masts and was an easy five miles away.
Rowan turned to Ansel. “Why doesn’t he run?” Die Hard was eight-six feet long, armed with twelve guns, and, with a huge spread of canvas, was as fast as they came.
“Yer funny, mkubwa,” Ansel said, grinning.
The scalp on Rowan’s head crept. He glanced back at Sully, who lowered the spyglass and spoke to Toad standing by his side. After a moment, Toad went to the railing of the quarterdeck and raised his hands to the crew, thirty–five strong.
“She’s a schooner with one long nine-pounder and two six-pounders,” he shouted. “Cap’n thinks we can take her easy. What say ye?”
The roar of the men made Rowan wince. If he ever thought for a moment the men on Die Hard were there because they lost a bet, he learned otherwise in that moment. They were there for the loot and the life. Pure and simple.
“Then cinch up and let’s go get ‘er!” Toad shouted and then turned to the helmsman, who was already switching tack. “Full sails!” Toad shouted over his shoulder.
Rowan couldn’t help but feel the excitement fill him as the men hurried to their stations, scampering up the ratlines and over the railings to luff the sails and make way to chase the schooner.
“Can you see what nationality it is?” Rowan asked Ansel.
The tall man shrugged. “It doesn’t matter,” he said, clapping a hard hand on Rowan’s shoulder. “Will ye fight, mkubwa?”
Rowan looked again at the schooner, closer now, although it was clear it was trying to run. He saw its colors flapping from atop its tallest mast. Spanish.
Ansel didn’t wait for an answer but grabbed a cutlass from the pile of weapons—pistols, swords, daggers and boarding axes—being dumped on the main deck by three of the crew. Out of the corner of his eye, Rowan saw the skull and crossbones go up the flagpole. It was crude and stark and sent shivers up his back just to see it.
Imagine what it’s doing to the schooner.
When they were close enough to count the people on deck, Sully gave the order to fire across the schooner’s bow. The cannon erupted in smoke with a deafening boom that made the heavens shake and prompted shrieks and screams from the other ship’s passengers. Rowan watched two women on deck hug each other in terror.
The Die Hard crew lined the railing and began banging their swords and knives against the ship’s gunwales. Their demonic howls raised the hackles on Rowan’s neck and without knowing he was doing it, he moved closer, his eyes on the gun ports in the schooner’s side. If they opened, he knew Sully would give no quarter.
Rowan’s eyes returned to the sight of the two women and then to the Spanish captain on the quarterdeck.
Give up, you bastard, he thought angrily. It’s not worth your life.
A victorious cheer went up on Die Hard as the Spanish flag was jerkily hauled down.
Within minutes, the grappling hooks pulled the schooner alongside and half the crew—outnumbering the Spanish crew by half—boarded the ship. Rowan watched from the deck of the Die Hard as his shipmates emptied the pockets and purses of every person on board. He could see Ansel asking the women for the jewelry on their hands and around their necks. He watched the Spanish crew cowering in fear and he realized that Sully’s reputation was at least as effective for the quick surrender as the demonic howling of the plunder-crazed men.
Without harming anyone or damaging the schooner, the Die Hard crew stuffed their spoils in long bags that they slung across their backs and scampered back on board their ship. Die Hard corrected its course toward the Bahamas, now newly loaded down with a sea chest full of spices, packages of lace and silk, beads, and Spanish gold.
Later that evening, as the men prepared to divide up the prize, Rowan couldn’t help but be amazed at how democratic the whole process seemed. If the men had opted not to go after the schooner, Sully couldn’t have forced them. It was an odd society with its own set of rules and codes. And while it pained him to see his friend, Ansel, stripping helpless women of their possessions, he couldn’t help but think those women likely had a lot more where that came from.
Jesus, he t
hought shaking his head. Stay on this boat much longer and you’ll be vaulting over the rail lines yourself, a cutlass clenched in your teeth.
A few weeks later, he was strolling the middle deck, mindful of a bit of weather that seemed to be kicking up on the horizon and nodding to various men who he’d become friendly with. His pocket was full of an assortment of coins, charms, buttons, spoons and beads that he’d won from the crew at their nightly games of chance and cards. At one point, he even won an ivory-handled knife that had been taken on the raid of the Spanish schooner and no one thought he shouldn’t have it.
The trinkets, although worthless in themselves, served as currency on the Die Hard and could buy him more than just entrance into a game of loo. The next time they were in port Rowan would give his winnings to Ansel, who would trade them in town for tobacco, alcohol or money.
For Rowan, that would be money.
If he could get one of his talismans back, get off this bloody bucket once he was in at least swimming distance to land, he would attempt to cross over again to 1925. Failing that, if he had to hide out in 1825 a little longer for whatever reason, a few bucks in the local currency could be the difference between life and…not.
Rowan was an ex-Eagle Scout. One thing was for sure; he was going to be prepared.
Today, as he climbed to the upper deck and nodded to Indigo, the affable young Greek who piloted the ship, he felt strangely at peace with his life. He knew that was partly because there was nothing he could do to change it, at least until they arrived somewhere.
“Storm coming up?” Rowan asked the pilot.
Indigo, who also served as navigator, belied his age and experience with his ability to direct the Die Hard on its course, using only charts and the stars above. He shrugged. “Nothing to worry about.”
Past the young man, Rowan could see the door to the captain’s cabin was open.
And it was empty.
He looked behind him to see the deck just beneath the quarterdeck held five men intent on their jobs trimming sails and swabbing the deck with salt water and lye soap.
Where is Sully?
It was highly unusual for the captain to be anywhere but in his cabin or on the quarterdeck. Rowan took a step closer to the captain’s cabin, walking behind Indigo, until he stood in the doorway of the cabin. His eyes scanned the room’s rough and simple furniture.
A simple cot served as the captain’s bed and over it was a framed photo of a map. Beyond the bed was a large desk with several drawers.
And there in the center of the desk, shining brightly as the sun hit it from the single porthole in the room, was his lighter.
Without thinking, Rowan took two steps into the room and snatched it up. The minute it touched his palm, he felt a vibration and a power that heralded its magic to him. This was a piece of Ella, a piece of his old life back in Cairo, of security and love and safety. It was his ticket—his only ticket—back to her and their child.
It hummed softly in his hand with its warmth and its promise. He turned to retrace his steps to the door, but before he could he felt the room darkening as if a shadow had fallen over it.
Rowan looked up to see Sully regarding him from the doorway.
13
“Lose your way?”
Rowan’s gut tightened at the sight of the captain filling the doorway. Before he could respond, Toad pushed past Sully and entered the cabin.
His eyes widened and then narrowed to see Rowan in the room. “Get below,” he growled to Rowan.
Had it been a trap? Had they been watching all along?
As Rowan moved out the door, Sully stopped him. “I’ll take that,” he said, holding out his hand. Rowan hesitated and then dropped the lighter in the man’s palm. As he emerged from the cabin, Toad slammed the broadside of a dredging spade into his stomach. Rowan took the blow and crumpled to his knees on the deck. Toad dropped the shovel and shouted orders to two men standing nearby.
Rowan gasped for breath and clutched his stomach. The bastard had broken at least one rib, but he knew he could expect far worse for his crime. It had been a terrible risk. The memory of the last beating—the one Jan said had just been for show—came roaring back into his mind.
“Oy! Hold ‘im over there by the water barrel,” Toad shouted. Out of the corner of his eye, Rowan could see the man was in a state of agitation. Almost joy.
Why were they positioning him by the barrel and not the lashing mast?
Two of the men held him, and refused to meet his eyes. Rowan knew they hated doing it but he also knew they had little patience for the sort of behavior that would bring down Toad’s wrath. He could expect no sympathy.
The biggest of the men, a one-eyed Tunisian named Argo, grabbed Rowan’s right arm and held it on the barrel while another man began tying it to the iron grid work that framed the barrel. Rowan tried to jerk his hand away.
Son of a bitch! They were going to…
Toad stood in front of him with the axe held down by his knee so that Rowan could see it. “Tell me when he’s secure,” he said.
In a panic, Rowan began to pull ferociously against the leather ties and to fight the men holding him. He heard the captain come out of his cabin and call out to Toad.
“I’m told he’s a good carpenter, Toad,” he said.
“Aye, Captain,” Toad said, hefting the axe for weight.
“So mind you don’t take his good hand.”
***
Sully sipped his rum and flicked the lighter open. He spun the dial and watched the blue flame shoot to life before he snuffed it by snapping the cover shut. On the back was the inscription he’d read many times already.
To my dearest Rowan on our first wedding anniversary. Always an adventure, darling. In bed and out. Ella.
Now what sort of poetess or educated slattern could write such a thing? In Sully’s experience, refined women who could write rarely mentioned bed or whatever might happen in it. And never, in his experience, had he heard of a woman referring to the delights of the bed as an adventure.
The sounds of the men’s gaming below, laughter intermixed with groans or the occasional shout, told him that regardless of today’s excitement the men had accepted it as a natural part of life on the high seas. There needed to be laws. There needed to be consequences.
They wouldn’t keep him long as their captain if there weren’t.
But the bosun was right, too. When he’d interrupted the giant’s punishment to insist they just throw him into the ocean as lop off his hand for all the good he’d be to him after that, it made too much sense to ignore.
No sense in taking part of your cargo and watching it bleed to death just to show your crew who was in charge.
No, in the end, another public lashing—and this time one that woke the bastard with a bucket of sea water every time he passed out to lash him again—was imminently more satisfying than a brief moment’s pleasure followed by a night of listening to the bastard scream in agony.
Who was this man? Why does he have a lighter—something that won’t be invented for at least another fifty years—and how does he have a wife who sounds more like a free love hippie chick from the sixties than an eighteen-twenties wench?
Sully tossed the lighter onto his nightstand and listened to the sounds of the crew as they became slowly less raucous. They’d put the giant in his hammock to mend as he would.
It was just as well. The repairs on the ship were largely done. And done well. Until another job could be found for the man, let him heal, Sully thought.
At least this way whatever job we give him, he’ll be able-bodied.
As he extinguished the lantern light on his nightstand, Sully’s eyes fell once more on the lighter.
Perhaps he had more in common with the giant than he originally thought?
***
Halima tucked the blanket ends under Ella’s legs and patted her knee.
“I’m not an invalid,” Ella said.
“No, in fact, you are st
ronger every day. You’ll come with us to the park today?”
“I was hoping to go to the Old Market.”
Ella watched Halima’s back stiffen as she turned to walk over to the couch to retrieve a magazine.
“I think that’s a good idea,” Halima said. “If you’re up to it.”
Ella had been back nearly three weeks and she still suffered from blistering migraines for the bulk of her days. When she landed back in the darkened toilet stall of the Majestic Hotel in 1925, her head hurt so bad it was midmorning before she was able to stumble out to the lobby. When she did, an ambulance was called and she spent the next two days in a clinic for Europeans on the outskirts of town. She had the doctor call Halima to tell her she had returned from her “trip” and would be back in Cairo as soon as she was well enough to travel.
The recent experience of going from 1825 back to 1925 made Ella think she might not survive another attempt. Even now, she tired easily and the throbbing pain of her worst headache was always just a breath away.
“Do you think she can tell you how to manage the pain better?” Halima asked. She handed Ella the magazine.
“I don’t know. But that’s not why I’m going. I need to ask her how I can…direct it better. I mean, what if I try again and this time I’m a year off? Or more? What if I try to come back and Tater is in college and I’ve missed his whole childhood?”
“Indeed,” Halima murmured.
“I know you worry, dear,” Ella said, yawning and feeling grateful that the urge to nap would soon usurp the beginning edges of a coming headache. “Try not to.”
“Yes. I’ll try.” Halima sat on the couch and picked up her teacup.
Ella closed her eyes. “Every day I’m better.”
“Of course you are. It’s just…” Halima cleared her throat and Ella opened her eyes.
“What is it, Halima?”
Race to World's End (Rowan and Ella Book 3) Page 12