The Sacred Shore

by T. Davis Bunn

  One of the seamen shifted his load and spoke up. The man waved him to silence and said, “Where north?”

  “To Acadia, m’sieur. The city of Halifax.”

  He closed the distance between them with such speed that Nicole was hard pressed not to bolt. He studied her face with an intensity that frightened her. But all he said was, “You are Acadian?”

  Nicole hesitated. She had been taught from an early age to value the truth more highly than silver. But she had also heard all her life how the British hated the Acadian people. So she finally answered, “French, m’sieur. We are French. From the province of Louisiana.”

  His face showed great disappointment. “And your name?”

  Again she paused, knowing full well that Acadian names were as distinct as their heritage. But the second slur of the truth came more easily. “I travel with the family of my uncle, Monsieur Guy.”

  “I see.” It was strange to interpret how the news affected him. The creases about his eyes and mouth deepened. “Well, it was too much to hope for, I suppose.”

  “M’sieur?”

  “Nothing. You say you are traveling to Acadia?”

  “Yes. We have relatives there. We wish to acquire land for farming.”

  “Land, land. Everyone is wanting land,” he muttered. “How did you come to be here?”

  “We traveled by coastal barque from New Orleans. It has taken us nearly two months to come this far.” She could not keep the entreaty from her voice. “We must arrive before the autumn storms. Please, m’sieur, can you help us?”

  The man inspected her searchingly. Then he slapped the cane on the side of his trousers. “Very well. Yes. I can offer you berths. How many are you?”

  “Seven, m’sieur.” She could scarcely believe her good fortune. She rushed on, “But three of them are very small, and we can all stay together in one cabin. Or on deck, we don’t mind at all. We will take up no space, none.”

  “Slowly. You must speak more slowly.”

  Nicole took as great a breath as her pounding heart would allow and repeated what she had said.

  The man waved her words away. “You can discuss that with the captain. He wishes to depart with the tide. How long will you be?”

  “A few minutes only!” She reached for his sleeve, stopped herself in time. “Oh, m’sieur, a thousand, thousand thanks! I will go and fetch the family.”

  “Yes, and hurry.”

  “Of course, m’sieur!” She was already racing away. “I will fly!”

  Chapter 21

  Charles paced the ship’s foredeck and tried to ignore the stifling heat. Confined to twelve paces east, twelve west, back and forth, his enclosure circumscribed by blue as far as he could see. The sun beat upon the ship and the sea like a hammer striking an anvil. The sails hung from the masts like forlorn flags. Every hour Captain Dillon sent the crew aloft to douse the canvas with water so as to catch the slightest bit of wind. Even so, the ship lay motionless, trapped in a prison of unbounded heat and sun and water.

  The captain had rigged a sail for cover amidships for the sailors and passengers. But the shade offered little comfort, for there was no breeze to disperse the sun’s fierce power. There had been none for three days. And every day the crew’s muttering had grown stronger.

  Charles was surprised the captain did not see fit to silence his men. Captain Kedrick Dillon was a taciturn fellow, as were many of his kind. He was also a strict disciplinarian, maintaining a taut and generally harmonious ship without use of the myriad of punishments available to a master at sea. He had said nothing when Charles had requested that berths be granted to the stranded French family—after all, Charles had paid well for the ship’s exclusive use. And one look at the young lady’s vibrant beauty had been enough for Captain Dillon to order a place where the family could be isolated from his men. So that morning, when the decks had been hollystoned and washed, and the crew then had gathered in tight clusters and cast dark glances about the ship, Charles had been surprised that the captain had not shouted at them to disperse and get about their business.

  Instead, Captain Dillon gathered with his officers, who also spent much time muttering among themselves. They climbed the crow’s nest and searched the endless blue expanse with telescopes. They inspected the mercury barometer, and they examined the almanacs. They cursed the vagaries of nature as the captain’s face grew ever more creased with stern worry. And with each passing hour, the heat grew more suffocating still.

  The captain approached Charles and said, “M’lord, with this heat I think we’d be better off serving our noon repast on deck. Perhaps you’d care to join my officers and myself.”

  “As you wish.” Charles watched as sweating seamen set up plank tables astride sea chests and hauled benches up from belowdecks. They served a cold meal of mutton and hardtack and cheese and small green apples in a bowl of water to keep them fresh. The mutterings did not diminish with the meal, however. As the captain approached the table, one of the seamen was pushed forward by his mates. Charles watched as he knuckled his forehead and said, “Beggin’ your pardon, sir. But we was wondering if p’rhaps we shouldn’t lower the boats.”

  “I appreciate your concern, Malthus. But there is nowhere to row.” The captain’s words halted all activity about the decks. Again, however, he did not reprimand the crew as Charles expected. Instead, he pitched his voice louder and said, “A few of you have sailed these waters with me. As you know, the coastline here is as treacherous as any around the world. Barrier islands are fronted by sandbars and shoals that shift with every storm.” His features turned hard, his voice stern. “I appreciate your concern for this ship,” he repeated, “but I will not have my orders questioned again. Is that clear?” When the men did not respond, he barked as loudly as one of his cannons, “Is that clear?”

  “Aye, aye, sir,” came the chorused response.

  “Very good. Bosun, pipe the men to their meal.”

  When the officers were seated and the meal joined, Charles ventured, “I hope you will forgive my forthrightness, but I am not certain exactly what just happened here.”

  “The men are worried about being overcome by a blow. They wanted to man the longboats and attempt to tow the ship into a safe harbor,” the captain replied tersely. “Simmons, pass the hardtack, if you please.”

  “A blow,” Charles said and pushed his plate aside. “Not again.”

  Dillon’s gaze raised from his plate. “You’ve seen an Atlantic storm?”

  “On the way from England.” Charles could barely repress a shudder at the memory. “A dozen times and more I thought I was done for.”

  “Yes, the Atlantic is a treacherous lass, full of fire and brimstone when it suits her.” Despite the grim words, Dillon ate with good appetite. “We’re early in the season for a nor’easter, but this heat is uncommon close. And three days is long enough for trouble to brew out somewhere in deeper waters.”

  One of the junior officers ventured, “Begging your pardon, sir. But if we were to row in while it’s still calm, wouldn’t that be safe?”

  “It would if we made it in time.” He addressed his lieutenant. “Simmons, how far would you say we are from the coast?”

  “I make it fifty miles, sir, give or take five for the jut of the islands, maybe even ten.”

  “You see? Between us, Simmons and I have made this journey a dozen times, more, and neither he nor I can even say for a certainty where landfall lies.” The captain gave his head a grim shake. “The worst thing we could do is try for landfall, make it halfway, and lose the sea room we have now. Believe me, sir, you do not ever want to meet a barrier island in a storm. They lie low in the water, so low you can’t make them out from the wave’s peak.”

  “Like warm-water icebergs, they are,” Lieutenant Simmons muttered. “Storms make them all but disappear. You’re on them before you know it. First warning you have is when they rip out your keel.”

  “We are safer where we are,” the captain agreed. �
�And hope—”

  All talk ceased; all movement on deck suddenly was as if turned to stone. The sail rigged for shade ballooned up, almost lazy in its motion. Charles then lifted his head with the others but could feel no wind. Even so, the sail puffed once more and this time flapped down.

  The officers rose as one man, leaping to the starboard railing. They stood tensely searching the horizon with telescopes and shaded eyes. Charles stared with them, yet saw nothing save the same relentless heat and sun and blue.

  Even so, the captain snapped, “Have the sails rigged for storm. And cut down these awnings.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  Captain Dillon turned a hawk’s eye toward Charles. “M’lord, I understand you speak a bit of the heathen tongue.”

  “Some, yes. But what—”

  “Please tell our passengers they soon had best get below.” The captain’s eye moved from his telescope to add dire warning to his quiet tone. “And tell them it might do good to pray.”

  Chapter 22

  Pray. The word echoed through the hot air like a challenge flung directly at Charles. He returned from speaking with the French family to observe the entire crew gathered along the eastward railing. A thin dark line appeared, so low it seemed to be wed to the sea and not the sky.

  “You there!” The captain’s roar spurred the men to instant action. “Batten down the hatches! Simmons!”

  “Aye, sir!”

  “Place your three best men on the wheel. With the first breath of wind in the sails, steer north by northeast. And set the storm anchors!”

  “North by northeast it is, sir!”

  That swift exchange was sufficient time for the horizon to be transformed. No longer was the storm a mere distant stain. Now thunderclouds were banked like a wave above the sea. The wall streaming toward them was a thousand hues of gray.

  “Sir Charles! If you insist upon remaining on deck, I must require you to bind yourself to the lifeline.”

  Charles raised his hands and allowed a seaman to knot a rope about his waist, and then watched as the line’s other end was attached to a longer rope attached to the center mast. He tested the rope, looked back to the horizon, and gasped aloud.

  In the space of a half dozen breaths, the menacing clouds had raced so close as to now dominate their world. Where their ship lay becalmed, all was heat and windless waiting. Yet just a few leagues away, the thunderhead was a solid wall stretching from the sea’s face to the highest heavens. Charles briefly recalled a painting he had once seen of a storm at sea. The artist had depicted approaching chariots of lightning bolts, drawn by steeds of wind and fire. He now understood the imagery.

  The clouds were hanging so low to the water that he could no longer see beneath them. Blasted by occasional flickers of lightning, the storm raced toward them with the low rumble of distant thunder.

  Charles turned and cast a glance aloft. All was furious activity now as sailors lashed the sails into tight quarter moons, just enough remaining to grant them steerage. He watched the last of the crew fly down the halyards to the deck, landing lightly as sparrows. His eye was then caught by the young Frenchwoman. She stood by the last opening below decks, watching the storm with the same sense of fearful fascination that he felt himself.

  She chose that moment to turn and look up at him. Charles found himself giving a small wave and smile in reply. He liked her spirit. There was fear in those lovely young features, most certainly. No one but a fool would not be frightened at a time like this. But the fear did not possess her, did not dominate her. She remained strong and steadfast, enough so that she could offer him her own smile in reply before vanishing belowdecks. Charles found himself regretting that the captain’s shipboard discipline had not offered opportunity for him to know her better.

  The first breath of wind caught the canvas and turned him back to sea. A mere featherweight, the swift puff lifted his coat and breathed the first measure of coolness he had known in days. He could no longer see the top of the clouds. They reached from just above the masthead to the very firmament, and they seemed close enough to touch.

  The first breath of wind was utilized to steer the ship about, heading it directly into the face of the approaching fury. Charles understood this maneuver from his Atlantic crossing. Storms of this magnitude had to be met head-on.

  Pray. The captain’s charge came back to echo through the reaches of his mind, in time to the thunder that now rolled and roared almost continuously. He felt as though his entire life could well be captured in the symbolism of this day. He had lived for years in the calmness of wealth and power and position. Then suddenly, without warning, he realized the distant dark on the horizon meant jeopardy for his future and his legacy. Now he was beset by a storm so powerful it defied his imagination. Every last vestige of control of his life was suddenly whipped from his grasp. He felt as helpless as a child. And there was only one answer, one clarion call above it all. Pray.

  Pray. The storm shrieked and wailed about them, so loud the youngest child’s squalling could not be heard. The only word that fully formed in Nicole’s mind was the Englishman’s suggestion that they turn to God—which Guy and his family did with fervor. All huddled together in one corner, bracing against one another, sheltering the littlest ones with their bodies, and bedding down as best they could. They were praying aloud, but even seated directly alongside, Nicole could not hear the words. But she could see the fervency on their faces and the fear. Of course they prayed.

  Yet she could not. It seemed such a simple gesture, to turn to the God of her father and mother and ask for help in this time of defenseless need. Was it only pride that kept her from joining the others? She could not seem to form a single complete thought, not even enough to ask the question, much less respond. All she felt was stubborn anger—at her weakness, at her fear, at her desire. Yes, she could not deny that she wanted to pray. So why not do so?

  The ship rolled and crashed against the waves with maddening violence. It rode up high peaks, then slid down and down troughs so deep Nicole felt her stomach rise in her throat. At the bottom they struck what felt like solid walls, hammering everyone about with a force made worse because it seemed to be so careless, so random. The two middle children had become copiously ill and were now groaning and crying for it all to stop. She could not hear the words, but she knew what they were saying, for it was what she wanted as well.

  A great roaring wave crashed into the boat, sending it sliding up and up and up, then pitching it down to slide again into the next trough, this one deeper and longer than the others, so deep Nicole thought she would lose control of her stomach also. Then they struck bottom with such force a great torrent of water poured in through the hatch, drenching them all. The water was so cold it made her gasp, but she also realized it at least cleaned the hold of the smell of fear and sickness.

  She was tired, she was bruised from being knocked about, and now she was wet to the bone. She found herself thinking of the rich Englishman and the way he had spoken to them. He had seemed weary with what was to come, as though he had experienced such a storm before. Nicole found that hard to believe. How could anyone survive such a tempest and return to sea again?

  Another rising peak, pushing them toward the back wall. Up and up they rose, then poised at the top, the wind shrieking so loud it seemed to tear at the wood with claws of air and rain, and the death-defying slide down the other side. Nicole gripped her little cousin beside her and tried to form the words to God. But they did not come. She was too honest for her own good, or so it seemed at that moment. She was terrified that this day might be her last, and yet there was no one to whom she might turn. No one she could believe in. Though all the arguments she had used against the existence of a God who cared enough to act on her behalf seemed to have been swept overboard in the storm, they did not leave her able to turn to the Lord. She felt an empty cavern at the center of her being. One so vacant and barren it felt as though the storm could blow directly through her, touchin
g nothing in its passage.

  Thunder boomed from all sides like a thousand voices shouting inside her terrified head and her empty heart. The storm mocked her when she could do nothing but hold to the wet and shivering bodies nearest her.

  At the storm’s height, an earsplitting crack shuddered through the vessel. The sound seemed too loud to be a mere fracturing of wood; it was as if the ship itself was splitting.

  “All hands on deck!” Those were the first words shouted above the sea’s roar since the storm had struck. Perhaps they could be heard because the shouts came from the bosun, the lieutenant, and the captain, almost within the same breath. “All hands on deck!”

  The ship’s mizzenmast had broken in the gale. The sailors and the officers grabbed hatchets and machetes and swords and hacked with all their strength at the ropes. Charles himself was tossed a bone-handled knife by a seaman whose face he never saw, and he too joined in the frantic effort to saw every rope that connected the mast to the ship. Thankfully, the mast did not give way all at once. It fractured a head’s height above the main deck and hung there, tilted at an angle. They raced to release the ropes before the mast whirled overboard in the wind, taking with it whatever was still attached.

  Charles could not say why he had remained on deck. Without conscious thought, he had grasped at the railings as the wind tore at him with such force it had literally ripped away his coat, leaving him in shirt sleeves and drenched. Twice he had been saved from being washed overboard by the line about his middle. His flesh was burned raw and aching from the salty spray and from the rope’s hold, yet still he did not go below. Every wave that rose before the ship seemed directed straight at him. Somehow he felt he had to stand and face whatever fate was sending his way.

  The mast cracked further, and the men redoubled their efforts. A single remaining line would be enough to turn the mast into an anchor, tilting the boat to leeward until the roiling sea washed in and sunk them. A third crack, a fourth, and Charles released his death’s grip of the rail to use both hands for sawing frantically at the next line. Men shouted and cursed and chopped with all the energy they had left. The mast gave a final ripping sound and careened overboard. Ropes flew like hemp snakes, lashing out as they followed the mast into the depths of the sea.