Nellie held up her hands to stop him. “I’ve probably been to sea more often than you, so don’t make light of this situation to me. Look at those swells. Don’t you see anything different about them?”
“Naw, they’re not threatening. Look how slow they are.”
“Exactly! Yesterday, when the weather was calm, the swells were shallow but frequent. Now they have slowed, but they’re much deeper. The wave takes longer to travel across the surface because the water is sinking low and rising high. When the swells are as much as fifteen or sixteen seconds apart, it’s a sure sign there’s a hurricane in the vicinity. Didn’t they teach you that during your training?”
The young mate wrinkled his brow in confusion, then shook his head and walked away.
Nellie turned to go back to sick bay, but hesitated when she spotted one of the ship’s officers moving toward her. “Lieutenant Blair,” she called. “Those clouds look ominous. What does your barometer show?”
“Falling like a stone, M’am,” he answered over his shoulder, nodding but unwilling to stop long enough to talk.
Nellie rushed back, eager to report to Doctor Ludington, but the words died in her throat as she saw the stricken look on his face. “Has something happened, Doctor?” she asked.
“Jasper Vliet just died.”
“Oh, how sad. I knew he hadn’t much of a chance, but I hoped he would hang on for a while longer. Whatever will we do with him in the face of the coming storm?”
“It’s really getting ready to blow, then?” he asked, his eyes narrowing in a grimace.
“Yes, Sir. The sailors still are making light of it, thinking we’re all land-lubbers, but I can spot a hurricane far off.”
“Then we don’t want to want to delay his burial at sea. If we get a strong storm, the soldiers don’t need to deal with a flying corpse. See if you can find Reverend Browne and some other help, would you?”
“Right away. Knowing his tendency toward sea-sickness, he’s probably hanging over a rail at the moment.”
While Nellie hurried off to find Reverend Browne and the commander of the Fiftieth Pennsylvania Regiment, Doctor Ludington made his preparations. Gently closing the soldier’s eyes, he straightened his clothes and then pulled a blanket around him. He used a needle and stout thread from his medical bag to whip-stitch the blanket closed. When Nellie returned, accompanied by a delegation of wide-eyed young recruits from the Fiftieth, he sent them out to find some sort of weight and a plank. Then he and Jasper’s friends lifted the body and carried it up to the main deck.
The deck was alive with activity. The sailors were pulling in every sail, stripping the masts to make them less vulnerable to the ever-increasing gusts of wind. The soldiers had gathered to watch, and a continuing banter passed between the two groups. The Roundheads who had never been out of the sight of land were amazed at the growing waves, and the sailors were taking endless amusement from their wonderment. “You think this is a storm? Just wait!”
A smaller group of passengers assembled near the guardrails to mark the passing of their companion. The soldiers of the Fiftieth looked grim, and the curious ladies of the Roundheads craned their necks to see what such a burial would really be like. Reverend Browne, green with nausea, made short work of the service.
“Jasper Vliet was twenty-three years of age, and he fully expected to return some day to his home in Spruce Grove, Pennsylvania. But God in his wisdom has destined him to end his life here on the high seas. We commend his spirit to Heaven and his body to the ever-sheltering waters.” Reverend Browne signaled with a nod of his head to the soldiers supporting the body tied to its plank. They lifted the plank, slipped it over the guard rails, tilted it up, and then let it fall into the roiling waters. Instantly it sank, leaving behind only the finality of a single splash.
The intensity of the weather steadily increased—the waves higher, the winds stronger, the sky black by late afternoon. Still the ship’s crew made light of the danger. Lieutenant Blair sought out Reverend Browne and the Roundhead ladies, inviting them to come up from their quarters and witness the power of the storm from the afterdeck. As if this were a show put on merely for their benefit, a crowd gathered on the small deck that jutted out from the stern of the ship. It was surrounded by a guardrail and rope netting that kept objects from dropping off the edge, and the curious held onto it gratefully as they leaned over to look straight down into the water.
Nellie, having finished strapping her patients into their bunks and stowing all objects that might fly around if the ship’s motion intensified, emerged again as darkness began to settle around the ship. Seeing her, Mary Pollack waved and beckoned her to join them. Somewhat reluctantly, Nellie climbed the ladder to the afterdeck. “What are you all doing out here?” she asked. “Don’t you realize how dangerous this is?”
“Oh, Nellie, must you always be a spoil-sport?” grumbled Mrs. White. “This is an exhilarating experience. Just look how the ship is lifted up by the waves, right out of the water, And then we drop until we are only a few feet above the waves. It’s breath-taking!”
“Indeed, Mrs. White—a magnificent seesaw,” Reverend Browne agreed. Then, unable to resist the opportunity to preach, he straightened up and gestured around him. “Sick as I am, I cannot resist seeing the grandeur of ocean in one of its most fearful moods. And imagine, dear friends, if we are witnessing the power of one of God’s creations, how much greater must be the power of God himself.”
Nellie looked over the stern. The Ocean Queen was towing the little whaler, Zeno’s Coffin, because it could not match the pace of the fleet. Now it was pitching wildly in the wake of the larger ship. Its hawser was still tight, so when the Ocean Queen rose high with a wave, the little whaler was lifted out of the water. And when the Ocean Queen sank into the depths, the bow of the whaler took a full dunking. Nellie could see its crew clinging to the railings as the spray dashed over them and the water flooded the decks.
“Perhaps God is warning you that you should go below,” Nellie suggested, but the others ignored her. Concerned for their safety, she looked around to appeal to one of the Roundheads’ officers. Major T. J. Hamilton shrugged off her concerns. “I consider that Providence can take care of us on the sea as well as on the land,” he told her. “If God intends to bury us in the bottom of the Atlantic, we can not help ourselves much and if not he will deliver us in his own good time and way.”
Unable to take comfort in this statement of faith, Nellie turned and started down the ladder. But just as she did so, one of the waves pounding on the port side of the ship rose higher and higher, curling over onto itself and then crashing full onto the deck of the Ocean Queen. The force of the water hurled Nellie from her precarious hold on the gangway ladder and smashed her backward onto the deck below. Her head hit the wooden deck and bounced, and for a moment, everything went black. Her mouth and nostrils filled with gritty salt water as she choked her way back to consciousness.
She struggled to sit up or turn onto hands and knees, but a second wave washed over the deck, carrying all loose objects with it. Buckets, tools, and planks of wood battered her. Then the water lifted her, too, and she found herself being carried inexorably toward the starboard railing. She was breathing more water than air, some of it salt from the sea, some fresh from the sheets of rain now lashing the ship from above. Her flailing hands failed to grasp anything to stop her slide as the ship itself rolled from side to side, even as it rose and dipped from bow to stern.
Time seemed to slow, and Nellie realized she might be about to die. She was only slightly surprised to find she was not frightened. Death had never been something she feared. It had been living she had often found unbearably difficult. She saw no visions of her past; her life was not flashing before her eyes. But in her ears echoed one sound she wished she had forgotten—the soft and meaningless splash as Private Vliet’s body had disappeared into the angry sea. How awful to disappear, leaving behind no trace of your existence, she thought. If I had known I w
as about to die, I would have tried harder to give people something to remember me by. Realizing her struggling was gaining her nothing, she tried to make herself go limp, hoping the wave would pass over her.
When strong hands encircled her upper arms and lifted her bodily from the deck, Nellie was almost beyond understanding what was happening. But she knew her precipitous slide had stopped, and she instinctively threw her arms around her rescuer, clinging to him as her last hope. She buried her face in the reassuring shelter of his shoulder and felt the tears start to come. In a moment she was coughing and gasping for air. The terror was late to arrive, but none the less real. Her body trembled and sobs emerged from someplace deep inside, a combination of gratitude for her rescue and grief from a past she had forced herself to forget.
Nellie had still not opened her eyes, as if she feared to look around her. But slowly, her other senses took over. The coat in which she had buried her nose gave off unmistakable odors of wet wool and masculine sweat, accompanied by a touch of bay rum and sweet cherry tobacco smoke. A gruff but gentle voice urged her to “get hold of yourself.” And the rough brush of whiskery sideburns scratched her forehead. Suddenly she lifted her head and opened her eyes. “Colonel Leasure!” she gasped.
Embarrassed, she tried to jerk away, but the colonel gently held her and pulled her back into the comforting shelter of his embrace. “It’s all right, Nellie. You’ve had a terrible scare, and you have a nasty bump on your head, but you’re safe now. I’ll not let you go. When you’re feeling a bit calmer, we’ll get you safely below deck and have the doctor take a look at your injuries.”
She nodded mutely and allowed herself to relax again against that proffered shoulder. She did indeed feel calmer. She had not felt so protected since she was a child and her father had rescued her from a fall in the barn that landed her in the stall of an irritable horse. She remembered her father picking her up and carrying her to safety in a pile of hay. Then inexplicably her memory went black. Only the smell of masculine sweat and tobacco remained, along with a paralyzing fear.
A harsher voice broke through her terror, and another hand gripped her arm and pulled her away. “Here, Daniel, you have more important responsibilities than dealing with a silly female who let herself fall off a ladder. She’s not that badly hurt. I’ll see to it she gets back to sick bay and her duties there.” Reverend Browne tugged again at her arm, urging her toward the gangway to a lower deck.
“Thank you for your help, Robert,” the colonel said. “I’ll check on you later, Nellie.”
“Humph! I’ll just bet he will, the poor fool!” Browne grumbled as he shoved Nellie toward the ladder. “Get down there with you and quit throwing yourself at the colonel. He’s a married man, in case you hadn’t noticed, and he has no need for a foolish hussy making passes at him.”
Nellie’s mouth came open, but she was speechless with fear and indignation. She was also feeling dizzy and disoriented as she tried to stand on her own, and the chaplain’s voice was fading in and out. Did I misunderstand him? she wondered. Surely he couldn’t think. . . .
“Here! What’s happened?” cried the doctor as they reached the sick bay door. “Nellie, are you hurt?”
“No, she’s just being dramatic,” Browne responded for her. “Or maybe she has the vapors. Had a little bump, that’s all.”
“There’s a good deal of blood on the back of your head. More than a ‘little bump,’ I’d say. Sit down here and let me take a closer look.” Ludington parted her hair and gingerly prodded the still-swelling lump. He felt her forehead and cheeks, and then held up two fingers. “What do you see, Nellie?”
“Two fingers? Or three? Things are a little blurry. I’ve got salt water in my eyes.”
“More like a concussion, I’d say, and you’re in shock, too. Your skin’s abnormally cold. Reverend Browne, please give me a hand here. You need to get her out of these wet clothes and wrapped in some warm blankets, while I get some sticking plasters for her open wounds. Sir?”
But Reverend Browne was backing away, shaking his head and looking almost as pale as Nellie. “No, no, I can’t undress a lady. It wouldn’t be proper,” he mumbled as he turned and dashed out the door, staggering with the roll of the ship.
Mary Pollock observed his departure as she came down the passageway. “Reverend Browne must be sea-sick again,” she commented as she entered the sick bay. “He’s outside the door on his knees, coughing up his innards. How’s Nellie?”
Nellie herself was the first to answer, albeit a bit weakly. “I think he’s just sick of me. And I’m all right, Mary. Don’t worry about me.”
“No. She isn’t all right,” Doctor Ludington said as he came back carrying his medical bag. “Can you help her get undressed, Mary? There’s a flannel night shirt here, and some wool blankets. We need to warm her up quickly.”
“I can do it,” Nellie protested, but her fingers fumbling at the row of neat little buttons down her bodice proved otherwise. Mary took over with her typical quiet efficiency and soon had Nellie’s soggy dress lifted off her head and her undergarments loosened beneath the flannel gown.
Doctor Ludington made quick work of patching her open cuts and then insisted on putting her to bed, wrapped in several blankets. “You need something soothing. The ship is rocking too much for us to risk boiling water for tea or broth, but this may help.” He held out a small dosing spoon of an unidentified syrup. “Swallow it quickly,” he instructed.
Nellie opened her mouth obediently and then jerked her head away in disgust. “What is that?” she demanded. “It smells like somebody’s dirty socks.”
“So it does, but it won’t taste as bad as it smells. It’s a tincture of valerian root. It will quiet you and allow you to get some rest.”
“Where’s the whiskey when a woman needs it?” Nellie glared at the doctor through tear-filled eyes but then swallowed the vile mixture, which seemed to be the only thing on offer.
“I’ll sit with you until you fall asleep,” Mary promised. “Here, wipe your eyes.”
But try as she might, the tears kept welling up. “I can’t quit crying,” she said. “I don’t hurt all that badly, and I know it’s all over. I’m not scared. But the tears won’t stop. I feel utterly lost and hopeless.”
“Did something else happen tonight, something we don’t know about?” Mary smoothed the damp hairs from Nellie’s forehead. “Maybe you just needed a good cry,” she suggested.
“The fall brought back a few memories and regrets, I guess, but most of all I’m just angry and embarrassed.”
“Why embarrassed? The fall certainly wasn’t your fault. We were watching from the afterdeck when the wave washed over you. I don’t see how you even survived.”
“Reverend Browne said . . . he accused me of . . . of staging the whole thing so I could throw myself into the colonel’s arms.”
“He didn’t!”
Nellie shook her head at Mary’s shocked denial. “He called me a foolish hussy!”
“And he’s an evil old man!” Mary said.
“No, he’s not evil, but he hates me for reasons I don’t begin to understand, and I’m tired of trying to get along with him. Maybe I just ought to give up and go home—wherever that is.” Once again the tears overwhelmed her.
Mary sat quietly, puzzling over the situation while she waited for Nellie’s sobs to subside. “Maybe he’s the one who is embarrassed,” she suggested.
“Embarrassed? Him? Embarrassed about what?”
“About you. Consider for a moment. The chaplain’s far from home. He’s expected to take the moral high ground in every situation because of his calling. And you’re an attractive, unattached woman with an engaging personality and a strong will, one who isn’t afraid to stand up to him. What if he is attracted to you?”
“Nonsense. I told you. He hates me.”
“Hasn’t anyone pointed out to you there’s a fine line between love and hatred?”
“Oh, but surely not. No, no, he can’
t be. Even if you’re right, the explanation doesn’t help anything. I can’t well cozy up to him and take a chance on fanning his ardor, any more than I can avoid being thrown into his company.”
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