by J. L. Jarvis
19
A Wind from the North
Hours after darkness had fallen, the Crown approached the tip of Deer Sound in Orkney as the waves pounded the deck. The wind, usually from the west, now came from the arctic north, and with it the snow—not falling, but blowing in icy shards, coating every surface with slick slush that the men’s frozen hands could barely hold onto. Duncan held tight to the rigging as he worked his way to the hatch to go below the main deck.
Countless times since they’d left nearly a fortnight ago, he had not been able to make sense of the captain’s choice of a northerly route in the midst of December. Why had they not headed south along England? The North Sea was rough even in milder months. In fair weather, the choppy water would have slowed their progress. Their provisions looked as though they might last for two months, for a journey that could take twice that in bad weather. An experienced captain would have known better than to come so ill-prepared. But to chart such a course through the rough seas of winter, when bad weather loomed, was unforgivable folly.
Hours before, Duncan had cautioned the captain to take shelter while they were still able. Waves pounded the ship and heaved the prisoners about. The blizzard winds wailed and the waves were relentless, pounding and tossing the ship toward shore. The prisoners had begged and the sailors complained, but the captain heard none of it. On he pressed. It was not until the ship nearly capsized and seemed almost to groan in protest that the captain finally sought shelter.
He ran the ship into Deer Sound and drew close to the shore. Duncan and the other sailors struggled to furl the sails and prepare to wait out the storm. As they dropped anchor, lightning flashed to reveal jagged rocks jutting out from the land. Icy waves shot up like mighty arms from the watery mass to wield power over the ship, whipping it to and fro in its foam. The freezing salt mist blinded Duncan as he made his way back to the hatch.
Once below deck he knelt down and leaned over the chained and locked hatch to the hold of the ship.
“Callum!” he yelled, but his only answers were despairing cries from below, nearly lost in the din of the storm. He knew, packed as they were, with no room even to lie down for sleep, these rough waters could hurl them about to their deaths. Duncan muttered a curse to the captain as he searched the darkness below.
A violent lurch threw the ship with a deafening crack. Duncan climbed to the main deck.
“The anchor chain snapped,” cried a sailor.
The captain ordered his men to cut down the mainmast. They were going to use it as a bridge to the shore. The prisoners were in a death trap. Callum would die. In that instant, Duncan thought about Mari. And then the thought crept out from some dark part of his soul.
Callum’s death would free Mari to love someone else.
* * *
“Give me the key!” hollered Duncan over the din of the storm.
The captain glanced toward Duncan, but then pivoted back to the work at hand. Duncan grabbed hold of his shoulders. “The key! Give me the key to the hold!”
“Why?”
“Those men will die if we leave them there!”
“I’ll be paid for my costs if they die. If they escape, I get nothing.” The captain looked away. Just as Duncan was swinging a punch, one of his mates caught his arm and pulled him away. “Do you want to find yourself down there in irons? You’re no good to anyone there.”
The mainmast was coming down. Every hand on deck guided it as well as they could until its weight brought it crashing to the rocky shore. As the men began crawling along the length of the icy mast toward the shore, Duncan picked up a discarded axe and went down to the hold as the crack in the ship widened. He heaved the axe on the chains and the lock until they broke, then opened the hatch and began pulling men out. He yelled down to Callum as he grasped one man after the other.
“Duncan, is that you?”
“Callum!”
“Aye!” Below, Callum was hoisting the prisoners up to Duncan. Someone found the ladder that had been thrown across the hold. It was missing some rungs, but it sped up their progress.
Above deck, the prisoners tried to cross the mast to the shore, but the captain and his crew kicked them from the mast and pushed them back down the rocks while they themselves scrambled up the steep cliff. The lucky ones fell back to the sea, while the others fell to their death on the jagged shoreline below.
Callum and Duncan helped dozens of men from the hold before the ship groaned and cracked. Duncan grasped Callum’s arm and pulled him up out of the hold as the sea hurled the Crown to the rocks.
* * *
Mari walked along the high street with a full basket of food from the market. Fresh snow dusted the cobblestone street and the buildings, making everything look nearly clean. She took a deep breath. It was brisk, but she warmed herself with thoughts of a cup of hot tea at home before starting to cook. The lads would be home soon for supper. After Callum’s ship sailed, one of them had been with her each moment for a week, until she finally sent them away for the day. She smiled now to think of how much of a family they had become. With Callum gone, they made sure that she lacked for nothing. In turn, she gave them the things she knew best to provide: a home to come to with good food to eat. She tamped down her longing for Callum. With Callum’s passage paid, he could leave the ship and catch another returning for Ireland or Holland. He might return to her within a year. But that year was so far away.
Her thoughts were drawn back to the present as the droning sounds of a piper and drummer drew a crowd to the Mercat Cross. Mari joined the outskirts of the crowd to hear the town crier call out the news.
“The Crown of London sank off the coast of Deerness, Orkney.”
What had the man said? One week ago?
“Over two hundred of the Covenanter passengers dead.”
Callum dead? She pressed forward into the crowd, but the crier was already telling others that a few may have survived, but they have not been able to determine the number of dead. Bodies continue to wash onto the shore.
Mari walked numbly into St. Giles Cathedral. Was this her punishment for leaving the church of her childhood? Was it not enough to lose her family, her home—her wee bairn? But that had been Thomas’s fault. She could not blame God for that. But why must she pay and not Thomas? And now Callum may well have paid with his life. It was not fair, and yet how perfect a judgment, Mari thought. What worse torment could there be? In exchange for leaving her church and her family, all she held dear was gone. Nothing could have hurt her more. She leaned against a stone column and looked up at the tall arches that seemed as though they could go on forever. So would her despair.
She walked out of the church. A soft snow fell. Had it grown colder in the moments since she had learned of the news? And yet how much colder was it for Callum as the ship sank and the freezing water overtook him? But Duncan was there. He would not have let Callum perish. Mari stopped. Unless he perished, too. Only then did she realize that she had lost Duncan as well.
Mari walked into the apartment and set down her basket. This was her home with Callum. She went to the chair where Callum used to sit. She leaned back and tried to feel him there with her.
It was dark when the pounding woke her. She had fallen asleep in Callum’s chair, hoping to dream of him. Now she remembered. Her Callum was gone.
Mari opened the door to find Alex, his chest heaving from running.
With one look at her, he said, “You’ve heard.”
She looked absently at him and said, “Aye.”
Mari started to turn to go back to Callum’s chair, but Alex grasped her shoulders. “Mari.” He looked deeply into her eyes, and she seemed to awaken. “I’m sorry.”
Mari looked at the tears welling in Alex’s eyes. “No, we dinnae ken it for certain. He might have survived.”
“He’s gone, lass. They’re both gone.”
“No.” The word stuck in her throat. Alex pulled her into his arms and held her to his chest.
For t
he first time, she wept.
20
The Shadowy Wynd
The funeral service was simple. With no burial, they had only to go to the kirkyard where Callum had spent his last days. When they arrived at the gate of Greyfriars, Mari stopped outside. As a woman, this was as far as she would be permitted to go. But no women were there to wait with her. There were only soldiers. They filed through the gate—dozens of them. In her short time in Edinburgh, Mari’s life had been caught up in Callum’s. She had no women friends to stand with her or go back to prepare food for the dredgy, when the men would come back to feast and drink and remember. She longed for her childhood friend, Ellen. But she was gone, too. As the men filed in, a hand slipped into hers. Hughie stood beside Mari and listened with her as the pipes played for Callum and Duncan. Alex and Charlie spoke briefly, then the piper played one last tune. As the last tune neared its end, the piper walked away playing, and with him the music faded away.
At home, the dredgy was lively with drinking and dancing. Mari found herself comforted by the presence of so many of Callum’s friends. They told stories and laughed, and she felt closer to him for it. It was a boisterous affair until, many hours later, the door closed and sudden quiet draped itself over them. Mari could not give into the stillness, for pain would soon follow. She busied herself cleaning up.
“Och, we’ve left the old milk and butter in here, and the onions!” she said as she gathered them all. “Tis no good to keep them in the house.”
“Why?” asked Hughie.
“The spirit might enter and never find rest.” But as she echoed the words she had heard as a child, she now wondered if Callum’s spirit might find its way to her from so far away, and she started to hope that it would. She set down the onions and gave in to the thought.
“Mari.”
She whirled around toward the voice from the door.
Duncan stood quietly watching as Mari stared, numb for a moment. “Is it you?” She drew closer and touched a tentative hand to his chest, making sure he was real.
Her words drew a worried expression from Duncan. “Are you not well, Mari?” He then looked about at the stunned expressions. “What is it?”
“Well, Duncan,” said Charlie, as he grasped Duncan’s shoulder, “we’ve just had your funeral.” He laughed, only now absorbing the truth that Duncan was alive.
“An’ you did not invite me?” He gave Charlie a smirk.
Mari gripped Duncan’s arms. “Where is Callum? Please, Duncan. Tell me. Where’s Callum?”
He exchanged glances with Charlie, then Alex, whose grave looks confirmed his fears. “I was hoping that he might be here.”
Mari’s eyes drifted down, unaware that her hands fell to her sides. She could not speak, for the only words that would form in her mind she would never say. Why was it not Callum who had lived?
Duncan seemed almost to know her thoughts as he said, “I’m sorry.”
Alex interjected, “Come in. I’ll get you a glass so you can drink to yourself.”
* * *
Later they sat staring into the fire as Duncan took another in a series of drinks. “I had him in my grasp. We held onto each other with all the might we possessed, but the ship tore apart, and the waves were too wild.”
“But did you look for him? He might have washed up alive and needed help.” Without meaning to, Mari’s tone accused, and Duncan had had too much to drink to ignore it.
“Aye, I looked. I looked all over the whole bloody island. I bloody walked, and I bloody looked everywhere for your bloody Callum!”
Charlie cleared his throat. “Em, Duncan, you’re not talking to sailors. It’s Mari.”
Duncan shot a glare at Charlie that chilled him to silence. “I ken that it’s Mari. It’s always been Mari. I combed every inch of that shoreline for Mari.”
“For Callum,” Alex quietly corrected.
Mari sat still, watching Duncan with wide-open eyes.
“Aye, for Callum. Who else would I look for?” Duncan poured another and drank it down. “I knocked on doors, asked around at the docks of Stromness to see if he might have escaped on a ship. You see, I wasnae the only one looking. They wanted their prisoners back.” Duncan’s eyes grew glassy with tears, but he closed his eyes and willed them away with clenched jaw. He set down his glass with a resonant whack, and then picked up a bottle and took a long drink. He wiped his sleeve across his mouth and said, “Bodies washed up for days and for miles. And I looked at each bloated, drowned carcass.” He leaned back with a hollow-eyed stare. “The sea just swallowed him up.”
As if Mari had spoken to him, Duncan looked at her with bitter sorrow. “I ken what you think—that you wish it were me—and I’m sorry. For to come back to see you looking like that at me now—I’d liefer be under the water getting smashed to the rocks than for Callum to—”
Mari got up and left the room. Hughie rushed after her.
“I’m sure that was a comfort,” Charlie told Duncan dryly. Before Duncan could react, Alex leapt up and led Duncan outside with a promise of pubs and loose women.
Charlie considered for a moment and, with the tilt of his head and a shrug, rose up to follow. He stopped to give Mari a kiss on the forehead. “I’m away, dearie. I’ll be back in the morning.” He gave a Hughie a questioning look, which Hughie answered with a nod. He would stay there with Mari.
* * *
Alex was first to awaken that morning. He lifted a woman’s arm from his chest and set it down gently so as not to wake her. Donning his plaid and brogues, he went across the hall and gave the door a light knock. “Charlie,” he said in a loud, raspy whisper. After some jostling about on the other side, he heard a quiet, “Aye, dearie,” from Charlie. After a cajoling whine and a woman’s soft laugh, Charlie emerged with a lingering trace of a grin.
Next was Duncan. The two rapped on the door, and were answered with curses. Alex burst through the door and hoisted Duncan up by the shoulders. “Come on, lad. We’re away to see Mari and tell her you’re sorry.”
Duncan cursed and leaned over the basin to splash water on his face. A woman rolled over in bed, then went back to sleep, snoring. He looked up and said, “Sorry?”
“Do you not remember last night?”
Duncan buckled the belt about his plaid, and frowned as he thought for a moment and shrugged. “No.”
Charlie said, “It’s probably best that you not, until your head ceases pounding.” Then he looked closer at Duncan. “It is pounding, is it not?”
“Och, aye, it is that,” he said in a gravelly voice.
“Good,” said Alex. “You deserve it.”
Duncan gripped his forehead. “Bloody hell.”
“That’s what you said to Mari last night.”
Duncan’s eyes lifted painfully to meet Alex’s direct look.
“Aye.”
Still groggy, Duncan said, “I cursed her?”
“Och, no. You didnae curse her,” Alex said.
Duncan relaxed.
Alex went on. “You just cursed at her.”
Duncan shut his eyes and moaned, and then looked up. “Why?”
Charlie chimed in. “We stopped asking that about you long ago.”
Alex clapped a heavy hand onto Duncan’s shoulder. “Come. We’ll go have some breakfast while you sober up.”
Duncan squinted in pain as they stepped out into the bright morning sunlight.
Charlie said, “I can just taste some porridge with cream and some fresh brown bread slathered with butter.”
“And salmon!” said Alex with mounting enthusiasm. “And oatcakes.”
“And cold sheep’s head,” added Charlie.
“Excuse me, lads,” said Duncan, as he ducked into a close and heaved the contents of his stomach.
* * *
Mari answered the door and eyed Duncan with quiet reserve. She stepped aside to allow them to enter. Alex and Charlie let Duncan go first, while exchanging a look upon seeing Duncan’s humble expression and
bonnet in hand. Few others ever saw this side of Duncan.
Mari took a step toward the sitting room. “Come in and sit down.”
“Mari, forgive me,” blurted Duncan.
She stopped, but did not turn to look at him.
He went on. “I dinnae recall very much. But I ken I was—”
Mari interrupted. “Drunk. Vulgar. Rude.”
“Aye. All that and more.” He absorbed all of her hurt and resentment, for he knew he deserved it. In a deep, quiet voice, he said, “I’m sorry, Mari.”
“I am too, Duncan.” She stunned all of them by turning to rest a softened expression on Duncan. “I practically accused you of not caring enough to look for him. I ken that you did.” She laid her tender hand upon Duncan’s. “Last night I was overwhelmed by the grief of it all. I’m fearing I let you feel as though I was not happy to see you alive. And for that, I am truly sorry.”
Duncan swallowed and put a hand over hers. “There’s no need.”
Tears fell as she looked up at him. “Duncan, I am so glad to see you.” With that, she put her arms about him, and he held her there.
Charlie eyed them with growing amusement. “I’m glad to see you too, Duncan. Gie us a hug.” He held his arms out, grinning broadly. He was repaid with a quick fist to his gut, which he dodged, but just barely. He doubled over, but from laughter.
Mari looked from one to the other. “You’re a troublesome lot, but I’m glad that you’re here.”
The late afternoon darkness of winter was falling on Edinburgh, casting the closes and wynds in deep shadows. Across the street, a shadow clung to the wall of the wynd. Its kilted silhouette caught Alex’s attention.
“What is it?” asked Mari.
“Em, nothing.” Alex turned around, forcing a grin.
“Is there a fair lassie out there that you fancy?” asked Charlie.
Alex’s face brightened. “Aye, that was it. But not so pretty as the lassie right here.” He gave Mari a wink. He turned his attention to Charlie. “Come help me pour some ale.”