"Useful," she said in a low voice. "Is that how you evaluate people, Doctor?"
He looked at her with greater interest. Perhaps she was not as dim as he thought.
"Yes, Miss Farnham, that is how I evaluate people. In the natural world everything serves a purpose and is useful, from the animals we hunt and the plants we harvest to the maggots eating dead flesh."
"But what of young ladies, Doctor? Must they be as useful as," she swallowed, "maggots?"
He stepped closer to her, intrigued now. She smelled of lavender, and the part of his brain connected to certain anatomical functions registered this and woke up. It had been a long time since he'd relaxed in port with hired companionship. Then he remembered young ladies were not in a class of women where one could dally without consequences, even young ladies of questionable reputation.
But he was still intrigued.
"I do not deal much with young ladies, Miss Farnham. I can tell you though all the women I do know have been, in one fashion or another, useful." He thought back to a certain young woman who ran off with an American and added, "Some are extremely useful, and competent in a crisis, and yes, that is how I judge people."
Her eyelashes lowered, shading her thoughts from him. She wore something ruffled and pink, of course, and he noted that women's gowns were now so high-waisted it brought their bosoms into pronounced prominence. She had a shawl of flowered silk wrapped about her against the evening breeze and the light wind whipped strands of hair out from under the frilly and completely non-utilitarian bit of lace atop her head.
"Dr. Murray! Such a harsh assessment of the ladies! La, sir, you would find yourself shunned from the most entertaining drawing rooms for such a puritanical outlook."
"Since it has never been my desire to be a success in entertaining, I will not fret over it, Miss Farnham."
She seemed to be mulling over his words, then her face brightened.
"I do have a useful skill, Dr. Murray."
He looked at her.
"I am quite talented at picking out just the right hat or gloves to complement an ensemble."
She smiled, waiting for his praise.
"Miss Farnham, I would hardly term that a useful skill."
"Oh, but I beg to differ, sir. Knowing which accessories make an outfit complete is what makes us civilized, and attractive to look upon."
He found his mouth opening to argue this and then shut it. What was the point? But now, with her mind engaged, she was prepared to defend her claim. She came closer then and lightly laid her lilac-gloved hand on his arm.
"What is life without some color, some entertainment, Doctor? Should our days only be filled with work and useful functions? What of..." She thought for a moment, and since he suspected this was a rare event, he did not interrupt her. "Butterflies! Butterflies spend their days flitting from flower to flower, Doctor. They live to entertain."
"You are mistaken, Miss Farnham. Butterflies are useful creatures, as are other members of the Lepidoptera family. Butterflies and moths spread pollen amongst plants. Even the ugliest and plainest moth can do that job, just as a butterfly does. They also make a meal for birds."
"My dear Dr. Murray! Do you see butterflies floating through a meadow on a summer morning and only think of them as food for larger creatures?"
He would have told her how long it had been since he'd seen a summer meadow, with or without butterflies adorning it, but he was too aware of the feel of her hand on his arm. She was not applying any pressure at all, but it drew his senses. That butterfly touch, even muted by her gloves and his coat, made him aware of how alien she truly was, how soft and clean and fragrant, so different from the men with whom he spent his days and his nights.
"Miss Daphne Farnham!"
Mrs. Cowper's grating voice broke his concentration, and he looked up from the soft lips of his interlocutor to see her chaperone bearing down on them like a ship of the line. Even in the near dark he saw how pale the older woman's face was. She was also short of breath, but given her size that was to be expected. One could not haul that much weight up and down between decks without strain.
"Mrs. Cowper, are you well?"
She looked at him disdainfully.
"I am well enough, Mr. Murray! I just need to sit down and drink my cordial to feel tip-top again. As for you, miss, you should not be out here. What would your father say?"
Bertha Cowper's jowly cheeks were aquiver with indignation, and small wisps of hair that had dared to escape her tightly pulled bun were sticking to the sweat pouring down her forehead. He started to speak again, but she was still going on.
"And if I need medical attention, I will wait until we are in England and I will consult a proper physician." She punctuated this by grabbing Miss Farnham by the arm in a grip that made Alexander wince for the young woman's sake, and pulled her charge behind her, still talking.
"You should not be speaking to the likes of Mr. Murray, Miss Farnham. He's only a ship's surgeon. You are in enough trouble, young lady, you do not need to be looking for more..."
"But the sailors call him doctor, Mrs. Cowper."
"They are common, and ignorant. You are above him in station and it will not help your reputation to be seen spending time with him or with the other riff-raff aboard this vessel!"
But then an odd thing happened. Even as she was being hauled away, Miss Farnham turned. She smiled at Alexander, a smile of such surpassing sweetness he was struck dumb by the gesture. He could see all too clearly now how even a reasonable man could lose his composure over a cloth-headed young lady.
Chapter 2
Daphne stood outside the door to Dr. Murray's cabin, chewing on her lip. She did not want to knock on that door. A shiver ran down her spine as she pulled her wrapper tighter and shifted her weight from foot to foot. It was dank and dark in the narrow ship's corridor, and it was oppressive. She was tired of the smell of mildew and damp, tired of life in a boat that never stood still, tired of water that tasted like old sweat.
Most of all, she was tired of being judged. Everyone looked at her and found her wanting. The mate looked at her with speculation in his eyes, thinking her fast. The captain looked at her and saw her as a passenger likely to cause trouble. Mrs. Cowper looked at her and saw a girl who was no better than she ought to be, but whose father paid well for her to be transported home.
Dr. Murray looked at her with the most condemning visage of all. She could understand how Mr. Carr and the captain and Mrs. Cowper might judge her based on the stories that had spread like fever through Jamaica and England, but Dr. Murray found her very existence an affront.
When he looked at her with those changeable eyes of his, sometimes gold, sometimes a mossy green, it felt like he was peering deep into her soul, diagnosing her, and not liking what he found. She did not know what purges he would prescribe for her supposed moral ailments and intellectual shortcomings, but she knew the cure would not be pleasant.
He was the closest thing to a physician on this ship though, so there was nothing for it. She knocked on his cabin door, resisting the desire to knock and run.
The door opened while her hand was still half raised to knock again, and Dr. Murray peered out at her. He was in his shirtsleeves, and seeing him undressed startled her into silence. He always looked so formal, so proper. Now though he was half unbuttoned, and his silver touched hair was mussed, as if he'd been running his fingers through it. It made him look human for a change.
For a brief second, Dr. Murray looked as startled at seeing a woman in a wrapper standing outside his cabin as she was by his appearance, but then he composed himself.
"Miss Farnham?"
"It is Mrs. Cowper, Dr. Murray," Daphne said in a rush. "She went to the privy and has not returned, and when I knocked she did not answer."
He frowned at her words, but did not look surprised.
"One moment."
Daphne looked at the closed door, but before she could wonder he returned, a lantern in his hand. He
led the way to the tiny room at the front of the ship, the direction the sailors called "forward," though Daphne had never figured out why they could not say "front" like regular people.
Following behind Dr. Murray gave Daphne a view that surprised her. Given Dr. Murray's years she would expect a belly or a spreading form beneath his conservatively cut coat. Instead, what she saw was solid but not padded. Broad shoulders and back, average height, and he seemed remarkably preserved for his age. His linen shirt was mended at the collar and at the seam behind his arm, but it was clean. She'd noticed that about the surgeon. He kept himself scrupulously clean, and unlike many of the other men aboard ship--or Mrs. Cowper--smelled mostly of soap, not stale sweat.
The hair that was not silvered in back was a warm russet and it curled at the nape of his neck. From the wet air, she thought, no different from others in that regard. Somehow she thought he'd be distressed if he knew his hair was out of place, normal though it might be.
They were at the privy now--"head," he absently corrected her--and Dr. Murray rapped sharply on the door.
"Mrs. Cowper, are you ill?"
There was no answer, and he pushed on the door, but it was stuck and would only open scant inches.
"Hold the lantern over my shoulder please, Miss Farnham."
Daphne rushed forward to make herself useful, that quality Dr. Murray prized above all others. Her view inside was restricted and the odor was strong, but she held the lantern up, steadying it with one hand beneath. Mrs. Cowper appeared to be slumped over against the wall. Dr. Murray put his hand inside and rested it on the older woman's neck. He took his hand out a few minutes later.
"Mrs. Cowper is dead, Miss Farnham."
"Dead? That is not possible! Are you certain?"
He looked at her.
"There is no heartbeat. I have long observed that when there is no heartbeat, people cease living. So yes, I am quite certain, Miss Farnham, that Mrs. Cowper is dead."
Daphne knew she was blushing, and she was angry, more at him than at herself for saying such a foolish thing. Of course an experienced ship's surgeon knew when someone was dead, but this was not a normal occurrence for her!
"Return to your cabin, Miss Farnham. I will inform the ship's officers of what has happened."
"Is there...is there something I should do?"
"What do you suggest?"
What Daphne wanted to do was burst into tears. Not because of any fondness for Mrs. Cowper, who'd been her jailer more than her companion, watching her, criticizing her constantly and writing notes for her report to Daphne's father. But this was another complication in Daphne's life, a life that had had far too many complications lately to suit her.
Dr. Murray was still observing her, unfazed by being a foot away from a corpse. These things must happen to him all the time. His craggy face was lightly stubbled with the day's growth, but he looked alert and not at all as if being up in the middle of the night was an issue, or a new experience.
"I will write a letter to her family expressing my regret at Mrs. Cowper's passing," Daphne finally said. There. That was something useful she could do.
"You are the only other woman aboard ship. Did it occur to you, Miss Farnham, that you might be useful laying out Mrs. Cowper for her burial? Do not drop that lantern, it would start a fire."
He took the lantern from her nerveless fingers as Daphne stared at him.
"I could never do that, Dr. Murray! How you could even ask--"
She knew from his expression that she'd fallen even further in his esteem, if such a thing were possible.
"It was more in the nature of a suggestion, Miss Farnham. I knew better than to ask." He sighed. "Return to your cabin. I will see to it."
Daphne turned and walked blindly back to her cabin. Pompom greeted her and jumped into her lap when she sat on her bunk, staring at the empty covers of the bunk across from hers. Pompom licked her hand and Daphne put her head down next to the warm body snuggled into the crook of her arm.
"At least you love me just the way I am, Pompom," she whispered to the bichon.
* * * *
Alexander logged the time of death, then woke Captain Franklin with the news that one of his passengers was no longer among the living.
The captain was not happy.
"You are a surgeon, couldn't you have done something for her?"
"Certainly. I could have told her to stop drinking port, eat a more moderate diet and try not to have heart failure, but I doubt she would have listened to me."
Captain Franklin scowled at him, and ran his hand over his bearded face.
"Send Mr. Carr to me. And I will want to see you in the morning--later in the morning, after breakfast."
Alexander did not want to volunteer, but he felt obligated.
"Do you need me to lay her out?"
"Would Miss Farnham be willing to help? No, I thought not." Captain Franklin sighed. "Mrs. Cowper won't keep in this heat. Yes, do what needs to be done when the sun's up. The sailmaster will sew her up and we will do the burial service later today."
"Miss Farnham did say she would write to the woman's family."
Captain Franklin grunted.
"It will be logged here as well, and that should satisfy everyone. Good night, Mr. Murray."
Alexander returned to his cabin, and made some quick notes in his own journal, then dropped off to sleep, a skill perfected over years of being awakened in the middle of the night. A passing thought almost kept him awake: Miss Farnham did not have hysterics or swoon over Mrs. Cowper's death. That was the only bright spot in this evening's events.
The next morning, or later the same morning, depending on how disgruntled one was over interrupted sleep, Alexander sat at breakfast with a subdued Miss Farnham. They were the only ones left at table, the ship's officers busy at their tasks, and the steward in the galley. He observed her over the rim of his coffee cup.
"You are not eating, Miss Farnham. Starving yourself will not bring Mrs. Cowper back."
Miss Farnham's head jerked up. She did not look as neatly put together as she usually did, and it occurred to Alex that without another woman in the cabin Miss Farnham had no one to help her dress in the mornings.
"Why do you not have a maid, Miss Farnham?"
He didn't know why he asked. He really did not care.
"We had a girl hired to come with us, Dr. Murray. She became ill the day we were to sail, and Mrs. Cowper would not wait for another ship." Miss Farnham swallowed. "She said she was under strict orders to fetch me back to England on the first ship out, and she was worried she would not be paid her full amount if she delayed."
"You are not mourning Mrs. Cowper then."
Miss Farnham looked up from her plate and the ghost of a smile hovered around her mouth. She needed no cosmetics to add color to her lips or cheeks. Only someone in close contact with her might notice the slight shadows beneath her eyes. Oddly, the small flaw did not detract from her appearance, but made her seem more human and less like a china fashion doll.
"Mrs. Cowper and I were not on good terms, Dr. Murray. But she is dead now, and I lost an opportunity to become friends with her."
Alexander set down his coffee cup. It was clear to him why this chit needed a keeper. Anyone who was such a poor judge of humanity would be as easily led astray as her yappy little animal, wagging its tail and doing tricks in the hopes of a treat.
He almost said something, but stopped himself. It was not his concern. In a few weeks, maybe less if the weather held, they would be in England and he could move on with his life. Miss Farnham, now crumbling a ship's biscuit between her manicured fingers, would no doubt be whisked off to her proper social setting and he need never give her a thought again. A baseborn Scotsman who labored as a ship's surgeon was not going to cross paths with the likes of Miss Daphne Farnham.
"If you will excuse me, Miss Farnham, there is work I must do before the burial service today."
"Burial--Mrs. Cowper isn't going to be buried
in England?"
"No, Miss Farnham. There is no way to preserve Mrs. Cowper's body for burial, and in the tropics it is best to deal with these situations as quickly as possible. The heat and the humidity bring on rapid decomposi--"
He stopped. She'd gone slightly green, and while up to now Miss Farnham had proved herself a hardy sea voyager, he had no desire to put it to the test.
"There will be a burial at sea." he finished up. "Captain Franklin will ensure that all is handled properly."
"Oh!" She looked intrigued. "I will include the information about the burial in my letter to her family. It will ease their pain to know all was done in accordance with the customs of the sea."
"You do that, Miss Farnham."
Miss Farnham dipped her dainty little chin in farewell, then resumed eating her breakfast with more appetite. Alexander hesitated at the door because she looked so alone, but he had matters to attend to, the deceased Mrs. Cowper being chief among them.
Late in the morning the crew and passengers assembled as Captain Franklin read the service for burial at sea, four sailors standing by the larboard rail where the canvas-wrapped body awaited its final destination.
No one wept, though Miss Farnham sniffled a time or two and wiped her eyes. Mrs. Cowper had not endeared herself to the crew with her constant complaints about the rigors of sea voyaging. Alex studied the faces of the men. Most were bored, but some were intrigued, as a break in routine was always a welcome diversion. Some looked at Miss Farnham speculatively. He resumed listening to Captain Franklin, who was wearing his best coat for the occasion. This was the point where he'd seen things go horribly wrong in the past, so he paid attention.
"We therefore commit her body to the deep, to be turned into corruption, looking for the resurrection of the body, when the sea shall give up her dead and the life of the world to come, through our Lord Jesus Christ, who at his coming shall change our vile Body, that it may be like his glorious Body, according to the mighty working, whereby he is able to subdue all things to himself."
Castaway Dreams Page 2