The White Gull

by Laura Strickland

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Praise for Laura Strickland

  The White Gull

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  ONE MORE SECOND CHANCE

  THE WIDOWS’ GALLERY

  SOMEDAY MY PRINTS WILL COME

  A word about the author of The White Gull…

  Thank you for purchasing this publication of The Wild Rose Press, Inc.

  Lightning flashed once more, flooding her eyes with brightness. In the doorway of the bedroom stood a figure wearing dripping oilskins, only the matching sou’wester missing from his bare head.

  Declan.

  In the sudden darkness that followed the lightning, she moaned his name and then shouted it.

  “Declan? Declan, Declan!”

  She heard movement, the scrape of a boot on the floorboards, the flap of his coat as he turned and left the doorway.

  With a sob, she followed. Hands stretched before her like a blind woman, she felt for him, stubbed her bare toe on the leg of the bedstead, and faltered. She blundered from the room in his wake.

  The cottage boasted but three rooms: this bedroom they had shared, another smaller bedroom she’d dreamed of someday using as a nursery for her children, and the main room which combined parlor and kitchen. The darkness of the main room enfolded Lisbeth like black velvet. She had but a glimpse of paler darkness as the front door opened and closed again.

  “Declan!”

  She followed after him, her heart torn between gladness and pain. He was here! But if he truly were here, returned by some miracle from the same sea that had stolen him, why would he go from her?

  She reached the door, tore it open, and stared out into the storm. Waves and salt spray poured over the stones in front of the cottage. Static filled the air, and lightning arced overhead, the thunder competing for dominance with the crash of the rain.

  Praise for Laura Strickland

  “The world building is phenomenal.”

  ~Daysie W. at My Book Addiction and More

  ~*~

  “Laura Strickland creates a world that not only draws you in, but she incorporates it…seamlessly. …the kind of book that keeps you awake well into the wee hours, and sighing with satisfaction when you've finished the very last page.”

  ~Nicole McCaffrey, author

  ~*~

  “As I read I became so involved with the story, I found it difficult to put down the book. …Definitely …an author to watch.”

  ~Dandelion at Long & Short Reviews

  Books by Laura Strickland

  available from The Wild Rose Press, Inc.

  Dead Handsome: A Buffalo Steampunk Adventure

  Off Kilter: A Buffalo Steampunk Adventure

  Devil Black

  His Wicked Highland Ways

  Daughter of Sherwood

  Champion of Sherwood

  Lord of Sherwood

  ~*~

  Christmas Stories:

  Mrs. Claus and the Viking Ship

  The Tenth Suitor

  The White Gull

  by

  Laura Strickland

  The Lobster Cove Series

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales, is entirely coincidental.

  The White Gull

  COPYRIGHT © 2015 by Laura Strickland

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author or The Wild Rose Press, Inc. except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  Contact Information: info@thewildrosepress.com

  Cover Art by Diana Carlile

  The Wild Rose Press, Inc.

  PO Box 708

  Adams Basin, NY 14410-0708

  Visit us at www.thewildrosepress.com

  Publishing History

  First American Rose Edition, 2015

  Print ISBN 978-1-5092-0294-2

  Digital ISBN 978-1-5092-0295-9

  The Lobster Cove Series

  Published in the United States of America

  Dedication

  In memory of my ancestors,

  whose hearts were anchored to the bay.

  And to my editor, Nan Swanson,

  for her wisdom, patience,

  and the gift of her friendship.

  Chapter One

  Frenchman Bay, Maine, September 1851

  Lisbeth O’Shea awakened from the depths of sleep abruptly, as if someone had called her name, and opened her eyes. She lay for a moment searching the intense darkness of the room with all her senses.

  Outside a storm raged; she could hear wild, ragged waves clawing at the strip of shingle that fronted the cottage, and rain struck the windows intermittently as if someone threw handfuls of gravel at them.

  Surely the storm had wakened her, nothing more.

  She drew a breath, struggling for it, and tried to calm her racing heart. Was she alone?

  Overhead the rafters creaked like the planks of an old ship. The cottage had belonged to the O’Sheas, parents of her late husband, Declan. He had grown up here, the son of a lobster fisherman. How many times had he lain in this very bed with her and teased: Feels like I’m out in me Da’s old scow when I’m rowing you in me arms, Lisbeth, darlin’.

  Lisbeth squeezed her eyes shut on a surge of grief and pain. It had been a storm like this that brought his father’s old scow, the White Gull, ashore in pieces on the rocks down past Lobster Cove, and broke Lisbeth’s heart with it. Declan had not been aboard and was nowhere to be found, plucked away clean as the jetsam such storms scrubbed from the shore.

  A year ago, that had been. Every time Lisbeth awoke with his voice in her ears, she told herself she had to stop hoping. But she couldn’t, not quite.

  Lightning flashed, sharp and violent, and seared her eyes.

  Lisbeth flinched and clutched the blanket. The men of Lobster Cove—old salts and mariners, many of them—had examined the wreckage of the White Gull and speculated she’d been hit by lightning while at sea. No man, they said, could have ridden out such a storm.

  “Not even a strong swimmer like Declan,” Lisbeth said aloud, now.

  The words hung in the dark air of the room, burning Lisbeth’s heart the way the bright flash seared her eyes. She did not want to believe them.

  She must.

  Outside the wind rose, threatening a gale, and screamed around the stones of the cottage. Surely that had awakened her. Not his voice.

  Lisbeth.

  There—she heard it again, a mere whisper of sound riding the tail end of the thunder. Just so had his voice rumbled in her ear when he made love to her, warm and so very Irish.

  Suddenly she could lie in the bed n
o longer. She fought her way free of the blankets and swung her bare feet down to the icy floor. Fumbling, she reached for the candle on the table beside the bed and in her haste knocked it over. She heard it roll away across the planks.

  No light, then. She waited for the next flash of lightning to illuminate the tiny room. She had not wed Declan for his wealth or possessions but for the charm he wore like a second skin, and the devilry in his eyes. She had married him because he was all she’d imagined wanting since the age of eleven.

  She stumbled to the window and strained to see through the rain that streaked the glass. The next flash showed her the rocks in front of the cottage and the sea heaving itself up like the back of a monster to top them. The storm must be right over her. And remembering—remembering made her tremble.

  She recalled the first time she’d seen Declan O’Shea. She, her sister Ellie, and her parents had just moved to Lobster Cove from St. John’s, Newfoundland when Lisbeth and Ellie showed up for their first day of school at the one-room schoolhouse on First Street. Ellie, older than Lisbeth and more outgoing, took things such as the first day of school in her stride. Even before they entered the building, she struck up conversations with two girls her age and made friends.

  Lisbeth, feeling shy, stood on her own, eyeing the other students—all ten of them. Some looked young enough to be just starting to learn their letters. One girl, near Lisbeth’s age, wore a fine frock and button-up shoes, and stood with her nose in the air.

  Three lads also appeared to be near Lisbeth’s age. One stood as quietly as she, an awkward-looking boy with no meat on his bones, a pinched face, and hair black as coal. The other two had to be brothers, they looked so alike—both with flaming red hair, faces full of freckles, and eyes wild as those of foxes. The brothers fussed and pushed each other until the teacher called them all inside. Then one of them held the door for Lisbeth and gave her a smile that lit the morning—and her heart. Not until the teacher called roll did Lisbeth learn his name: Declan O’Shea.

  She believed she had loved him from that very day.

  Another flash and again her thoughts flew back in time. It had rained on the day of their wedding—bad luck, some folks said. Lisbeth hadn’t cared about the weather because Declan had become hers forevermore.

  But the bad luck had followed. Almost a year to the day from her wedding had come the storm, so like this one, that had snatched Declan from her life.

  She turned from the window blindly, not wanting another glimpse of the raging sea lest she begin raving at it in return, screaming and demanding what it owed her. She told herself she should bury her head under the bedclothes, burrow there, and pray for morning. How many more of these endless nights could she endure?

  Lightning flashed once more, flooding her eyes with brightness. In the doorway of the bedroom stood a figure wearing dripping oilskins, only the matching sou’wester missing from his bare head.

  Declan.

  In the sudden darkness that followed the lightning, she moaned his name and then shouted it.

  “Declan? Declan, Declan!”

  She heard movement, the scrape of a boot on the floorboards, the flap of his coat as he turned and left the doorway.

  With a sob, she followed. Hands stretched before her like a blind woman, she felt for him, stubbed her bare toe on the leg of the bedstead, and faltered. She blundered from the room in his wake.

  The cottage boasted but three rooms: this bedroom they had shared, another smaller bedroom she’d dreamed of someday using as a nursery for her children, and the main room which combined parlor and kitchen. The darkness of the main room enfolded Lisbeth like black velvet. She had but a glimpse of paler darkness as the front door opened and closed again.

  “Declan!”

  She followed after him, her heart torn between gladness and pain. He was here! But if he truly were here, returned by some miracle from the same sea that had stolen him, why would he go from her?

  She reached the door, tore it open, and stared out into the storm. Waves and salt spray poured over the stones in front of the cottage. Static filled the air, and lightning arced overhead, the thunder competing for dominance with the crash of the rain.

  Wearing only her nightgown, Lisbeth was immediately soaked to the skin. The wind tore at her hair, and she strained to catch sight of the figure she had glimpsed in the doorway.

  From the cottage, as well she knew, a path led either north to a narrow strip of shingle or south toward Lobster Cove. Which way might he have gone? She could see nothing but storm, the raging elements that matched the furor now in her heart. Would he head down to the sea? Most of this coast consisted of sheer rock, but the O’Sheas possessed that stony beach where they had hauled up their boats and readied their lobster traps.

  The boats were all gone; the White Gull lay in pieces. Why would Declan go there? Having come home to her, why would he leave at all?

  She walked barefoot to a break in the rocks where the sea poured in like a gray beast, alive and wild. No one but a madman would be down on that strip of shingle now.

  She turned her head toward the track but saw nothing. The thought came to her: Maybe I imagined it. But she had heard the scrape of his boots on the floor. She had seen his hair ruffled by the force of the storm.

  A dream, then. She’d had them before, yes, but never, never so real. She returned to the cottage, where she shut the door and hurried to the fireplace. With clumsy hands, she searched for matches and the stub of a candle. Her fingers shook so violently it took her three attempts to put flame to the wick.

  The light took hold slowly and seemed pitifully inadequate. Thrusting it aloft, Lisbeth retraced her steps to the door of her room, careful to keep the hem of her now-sodden garment swept back, her eyes on the floor.

  A trail of wet led its way to the bedroom door and culminated on the threshold.

  The very place where he had stood.

  The candle tumbled from her suddenly numb fingers, and the flame went out.

  Chapter Two

  The storm pulled off before dawn and moved away up the coast toward Nova Scotia. Lisbeth, who slept no more that night, dressed herself and, before going outside, mopped up the wet floor by the dim light that seeped over the windowsills.

  The wind still blew aloft, raking the sky and stretching the clouds into long streamers. But areas of blue showed between, and far out the sea took on a deep cobalt hue. Inshore, the waves remained tumultuous. They tossed themselves over the break wall, sending an occasional spurt of spray half way up her walk.

  She stood wrapped tight in her shawl, her hair flapping and her skirts pressed against her legs. Her gaze plundered the shore the way the storm had. She did not want to admit to herself she looked for signs—for proof—of what she had seen last night, some tangible evidence beyond the water on the floor saying she hadn’t dreamed the figure in the doorway. In the hours before dawn she’d been over and over it, and doubt had crept in. She might well have dreamed it.

  She must have dreamed it.

  Just as she must have dropped that water on the floor herself, shed it before she caught herself, when she came in.

  She must have shed it.

  Because, desire it as she would, Declan couldn’t come back to her. He lay dead somewhere at the bottom of that wild ocean.

  Could the heart produce such an illusion through sheer desire?

  Unable to keep still an instant longer, she walked down the path to the shingle, going carefully and marking the items that littered the stones. Such storms as the one last night swept the shore clean of flotsam and deposited new things in exchange: driftwood, broken floats, even a lobster pot lying dashed and broken.

  Was it one of Declan’s? After he died, the men had hauled in his pots and given her the money from his last catch. This broken cage, then, must represent someone else’s misfortune.

  The sea clawed at the shingle, slow to calm. Almost at once, Lisbeth’s feet became soaked and cold, but she walked on. If he’d
come in a skiff, he would have put in here; it was the only place.

  Yet she saw no signs on the stones and, anyway, what skiff could weather such a storm?

  She turned and walked the other way, back toward the path that led to town. The wind blew her hair into her eyes, and she pawed it out of the way. She had the mad idea she might find his sou’wester lying in a sodden patch of bright yellow where it had blown from his head.

  Mad idea.

  She passed her cottage, climbed the rise where the path angled up along the cliff toward Lobster Cove, and saw him.

  A man walking toward her.

  Not the man she sought.

  This one had no beacon of flaming red hair declaring his Irish blood. And a dog walked at his side. The man’s hair and the dog’s coat matched in hue—black, with the deep gleam of a crow’s wing. Lisbeth knew him by the dog and his hair, and she tried to deny the way her heart fell.

  “Good morning, Rab,” she called when he drew near enough. “What brings you way up here so early?”

  “Came to make sure you survived that blow last night.”

  He and the dog kept walking toward her. A big man, and the blacksmith in town, Rab Sinclair could not be called handsome—not as Declan had been.

  Handsome as the Devil, am I not? Declan had often joked, with that note of cocky confidence in his voice.

  But Rabbie Sinclair had a pleasant face, broad and strong like the rest of him, and that glossy black hair worn over-long, and those deep blue eyes the same color the sea had now turned, far out. Lisbeth wondered again why he had never married; a sheer waste of a good man.

  For Rabbie Sinclair was above all else a good man. Lisbeth had known him from that first day at school—the thin, dark boy straight off a ship from Scotland, orphaned and with his keep to earn in the world.

  How that pale, scrawny boy had grown!

  She turned her attention to the dog, a male Newfoundland. Rab had accepted him in trade three years ago for a job he’d done for some fishermen from off the Grand Banks. The dog had been a mere pup then, a ball of black fur and paws that Lisbeth had helped name. Like the man, the dog had grown magnificently.

  The three of them met on the path, and Lisbeth reached to pat the dog’s head. “Good morning, Kelpie.” She added, addressing the dog rather than his master, “Surely you did not walk all the way out here from concern for me?”