by Kim Wilkins
Chapter 18
Three hours out of Nagakodi, the area began to look familiar to Alexandre, and he was lost in thought as he tried to remember if he had been there before. He held the wheel as the pearler bounced along the choppy waters. The sun dazzled on the sails. Constance was as useful and strong as any crewman, but that was no surprise if her father was a sailor. Even if he’d never taught her a thing, that kind of sea-courage was passed along in the blood.
“You’re very quiet,” she said, leaning on the railing opposite him.
“I’m trying to remember. I think I’ve been here before. With de Locke. When I was just a lad.”
“Really? So do you think you’ve seen Ranumaran before too?”
“I’m not sure. De Locke never told me where we were going; we just went.” His eyes caught on a rocky outcrop in the distance, almost like the face of an ape. “Yes, I’m certain I’ve sailed up here before. We’ve hunted for pearls all through the Gulf.”
“Tell me about de Locke,” she asked, turning so that her back was against the railing.
Alexandre shook his head. “I don’t even know how to start.”
“Why did you choose to work with him?”
“There was no choice. He acquired my services in France when I was only a boy. He was good to me, I suppose. Even gentle. As long as I did as he said, we had no conflict. He taught me to read and brought me books and drawing paper. He never paid me, but I ate well enough and always had a safe place to sleep.”
“Were you like a son to him? A protégé?”
Alexandre laughed bitterly. “I never made the mistake of thinking he had any fond feelings for me.” But her words provoked the memory: de Locke shaking with rage, the pistol at Alexandre’s temple. Alexandre, how could you? De Locke had been angry about more than the theft of the pearl; he had been angry that Alexandre had betrayed him.
“And for your part? Did you have any fond feelings towards him?”
“I did at the start,” Alexandre conceded. “But we do not stay forever children, Constance. Knowledge comes with age, although it’s not always welcome.”
“Do you think knowledge really comes with age? Then that would make my father a very knowledgeable man.”
“He is.”
She tilted her head, irritation crossing her brow. “And yet, he’d rather I married Victor Kloppman than you.”
“We are all constrained by our circumstances.”
“You are so forgiving of my father.”
“He was forgiving of me.”
“Not in the end.”
“He was forgiving of me as far as he could be. I understand.” He paused, watching her a moment. “Constance, if you find your mother, what do you think will happen next?”
Her eyes went to the horizon. “I don’t know. I have this fantasy: we rescue her and take her back to Father. He forgives everything, even us. But as to what will really happen . . .” She paused here. “I think it would satisfy me just to look on her face,” she said softly. “I have waited so long.”
As they rounded a curve in the land, the vertical summit of Sun Peak came into view. “God willing, your wait will soon be over. I believe we are scarce two miles from our goal.” For a reason he couldn’t articulate, he began to feel tense. Perhaps it was because he suspected Constance would be disappointed. Either they wouldn’t find Faith Blackchurch at all, or they would find her and she would not be as Constance hoped. He had heard enough of the people of Nagakodi complain about a sharp-tongued, cruel-tempered woman. Or perhaps the tension was simply because he knew today would be the last hours they spent together.
But neither of those explanations seemed right, so he bent his mind back again to his childhood, to the time when he and de Locke had been here before. He peered into the distance, looking for landmarks. A shimmer of white ahead on the water caught his eye.
And he remembered.
“Get down!” he shouted to Constance. “I’m going to have to gybe.” He remembered how he and de Locke had only just missed it, a jagged ridge of rock perfectly visible at low tide, but cruelly lying in wait when the tide was high. And, once more, La Reine des Perles was headed directly for it at speed. “There’s a reef ahead. It will tear us in two.”
Constance flattened herself on the deck, and Alexandre hauled the wheel as hard as he could. There was no time to sheet in. The ship shuddered underneath him; he felt huge resistance. Normally, he was very cool in a crisis, but the instinct to protect Constance was overwhelming. As they turned, the sails crashed around—first the headsail, then the foremast sail, with a huge crack. Splinters flew off the mast. All the booms swung fast and sudden, sweeping savagely across the deck, skidding above Constance’s head. His heart thundered. The pearler, grinding against its trajectory, came around. She was out of control now, and the main sheets were a tangle, hooked around the boom crutch.
“Constance,” he called, wrestling with the ropes, “can you release the jib sheet?”
She leapt to her feet and loosened the rope, and the pearler began to settle. The shallow breaking waves over the rocks skidded past to starboard. He held his breath against the possibility that some deeper submerged rocks might catch them, then released it again as they sailed into the clear.
Constance collapsed to her knees with relief. “I thought we were done for.”
“Of course we’re not done for,” he said with a wry smile. “We are the King and Queen of Today.” He examined the damage to the main mast, feeling a pang of guilt for Captain Blackchurch. It wouldn’t take much to repair, and it certainly wouldn’t stop them sailing home. A lucky escape.
And now, a little village came into view. A collection of thatch huts huddled between coconut palms. Dotting the shallows were men on fishing stilts, their lines cast into the water. In the distance, three small vessels bobbed in the water at anchor.
Constance looked around. “That’s it, isn’t it? That’s Ranumaran.”
“I think so.”
She pointed back behind them, towards the coastline. “I saw a cave near the reef. I think it’s the hidden temple.”
“I will check Nissanka’s map, but I think you are right.”
“Can we anchor here?” she said. “I’ve waited sixteen years; I can’t wait another moment.”
Henry took his breakfast in the library, trying to save time in the day. He had some correspondence to write for Howlett before the buyer arrived to look over the pearler. Birds twittered in the garden, and the sea breeze gently troubled his papers on the desk. He put a paperweight on them and turned to the morning’s mail. Usually, it was only business and general correspondence for Howlett, but today he saw immediately the one addressed to him. He slit it open, expecting another letter full of disappointments. He’d had more than a dozen that began, Dear Sir, I regret that I do not have any information to add. . . . It seemed he had chased Faith as far as he could, and he was already preparing himself for the trip home.
But this letter expressed no regrets, and Henry found his blood jumped when he read the first few lines.
Dear Sir,
Thank you for your correspondence concerning the disposal of furniture against debts in Nagakodi, September 1789. I appreciate that you have spent some time in the hunt for these details, and it is only through coincidence that I am able to write to you with some information that may help you. As the office of the debt register no doubt told you, many records were lost in the flood of 1793. However, I was, in fact, one of the debtors owed and had dealings with Mrs. Blackchurch, or Faith Wicks as she was known to me.
Henry paused here, his mind spinning. Faith Wicks? She had adopted that name? The insult was too great to bear. He took a breath and continued.
I lent her money on her arrival in Nagakodi, directly before I moved to another post at Mannar in 1785. I had a good deal of correspondence with Mrs. Wicks over the repayment of the debt, a debt that she was either unwilling or unable to honor. The last I heard of Mrs. Wicks, she had plans to com
e to Mannar. She offered to repay me in full, in person, if I would assist her in finding a place to live and a post in service where she might be able to earn a small income for herself. I have enclosed that letter for your information. I have retained all the correspondence, should you desire to possess it, but it is certainly only of a business nature.
Again, Henry had to pause. The idea of Faith in service to anyone . . . it was unimaginable. She had too much pride, surely. Things must have gone very badly for her. He didn’t know what to feel. Pity? Anger? He returned to the letter.
Mrs. Wicks told me she would be arriving within one week. She was to take the journey north on a ship called the Monkey King. That ship never arrived, and I did not hear from her again until her furniture was sold and I was forwarded a small amount of money, less than a fifth of what she owed me.
I am very sorry that this is all the information I have for you. As there are barely sixty miles of coast between Nagakodi and Mannar, it is not unthinkable that a local might have heard of her, or of the Monkey King. I cannot say, however, whether you should be satisfied in your search if your goal is to bring your wife home to England with you. You will forgive me for speaking frankly.
Yours,
Ernest Carver Esq.
Henry turned to the letter from Faith. It detailed only what Carver had said; there was no hidden meaning to squeeze from the words. But he stared at it a long time nonetheless. It was in her handwriting, the only thing he possessed that she had touched after her disappearance from his life.
Faith Wicks. He knew now why she had disappeared. It was as his sister Violet had suspected and, although she had warned him, the dashing of his hopes was spectacularly painful.
He hadn’t long to nurse his feelings though, as the door opened quietly and Chandrika stood there, an anxious expression on her brow.
“Yes?” he said, clearing his throat, folding up the letter neatly.
“Captain Blackchurch, Miss Constance and Miss Orlanda both failed to come down to breakfast. I checked their rooms, and they are both empty.”
“Empty?” He pushed back his chair but didn’t rise. “Well, they must be somewhere together, concocting some nonsense. What do Mr. and Mrs. Howlett say?”
“They told me to come and ask if you knew anything.”
A prickle of unease. Orlanda was wild, but surely she couldn’t have compelled Constance to do anything too foolish. “I know nothing.”
“Thank you, sir. I shall report back to you if I hear any news.”
Henry stood and began to pace. He moved to the French doors and gazed into the garden. Constance was cross with him, that was for certain. But she was a reasonable young woman.
Wasn’t she?
The door to the library burst open behind him, this time without an accompanying knock. He turned and saw Maitland standing there, flushed and shoeless.
“Captain, the Queen of Pearls is gone!”
“Gone? How can it be gone? You were aboard it.” He noticed that sand clung to Maitland’s coat and trousers, and groaned. “A bad night for sleeping on the beach, Maitland. I have a buyer coming today, all the way from Colombo. He hoped to sail her back this afternoon.”
“I’m sorry, sir.”
“The question is, how on earth are those two ninnies sailing it? Constance knows her way around the ropes, but Orlanda doesn’t strike me as—”
“Orlanda?” he said. “Orlanda’s here. She’s been . . .” He lowered his voice. “She’s been with me.”
“Then how . . . ? Constance couldn’t sail the pearler single-handed. . . .” Dawning realization. His heart fell all the way to his feet, and he pressed his hand against his forehead in the hopes it would still his thoughts. “Alexandre, of course,” he muttered. He was paralyzed, afraid to move or breathe. It was happening again: the woman he loved, disappearing into the dawn.
Maitland grew uncomfortable with the long silence. “Sir? What do you want me to do?”
“Ready Good Bess for immediate departure. We have about an hour before the tide dips too low.”
“But where will we go? We don’t even know which direction they’ve gone in. South, north, across to India?”
Henry’s voice grew strident with rage. “Yes, yes, they could be anywhere in the world. I am well aware of this, Maitland, as I am well aware that you were anywhere when you should have been somewhere, and that was aboard that damn pearler. Find Orlanda; she might know something. And send Chandrika to search Constance’s room.” He slammed his fists on the writing desk, making the inkpot jump. “We have to find my daughter.”
The beach at Ranumaran was not as pleasant as the one at Nagakodi. A thin strip, gravelly rather than fine sand. With Nissanka’s map in her hand, Constance and Alexandre found their way back towards the reef that had almost claimed La Reine des Perles, to find the cave.
Already, she was preparing herself for disappointment. In her imagination, the hidden temple had been a roomy system of underground tunnels. Habitable, of course, even cozy, with the warm ocean roaring just beyond its front door. But the opening of the cave she had seen was small and dark. Alexandre led the way, leading her up on rocks. She was careful not to cut her feet, using her toes to cling to the hard surface. Then they were there.
Dank. Poky. No tunnels leading off to hidden places. Simply a cave that smelled of dead fish and old seaweed, around five feet high at the entrance, just tall enough to stand within, though not for Alexandre, who had to duck. The let-down was acute, almost taking her breath away.
Alexandre picked up a stick of driftwood and moved around the cave, poking at the walls. “I can’t see any tunnels,” he said.
“That’s because there are no tunnels,” she sighed. “This is it. The hidden temple of Ranumaran. A stinking little cave in the cliff face.” She sank down to sit on a flat rock near the cave entrance. Half a beam of sunlight fell into her lap. “I’ve brought you all this way, caused all of this trouble, for nothing.”
Alexandre sat next to her, and together they watched the sea break over the reef for a few minutes. “I’m sorry that you are disappointed, Constance,” he said. “But I am not sorry I came with you.”
She turned to him and admired his profile. Then he turned, smiled at her, and leaned in to kiss her. “Dear Constance,” he murmured against her hair.
“What now, Alexandre?” She pulled her knees up and grasped them.
“Remind me again what Nissanka said.”
Constance screwed her eyes shut, turning the memory over in her mind. “He said an Englishman came here every day for years; he would stay for an hour and then go again. Though who he was, I’ve no idea. I had thought he was visiting Mother. That perhaps he had constrained her somehow, or . . . perhaps she knew him. He was taking care of her. I don’t know. But Mother wasn’t here. Nobody could live here.”
“So why did he come?”
“To meet her? Perhaps she came from somewhere else?”
“But why here? Why would anybody come here to meet? There are many other, nicer places. Safer, without rocks everywhere. There must be something about this place particularly.”
“Nissanka said the locals thought he was praying. They said it was his temple, because he told them he went there for faith. For Faith.”
Alexandre mused, watching the water. Constance couldn’t think straight, reality rushing in on her. She would have to go back, explain herself to her father, and say goodbye to Alexandre forever. All for nothing.
“Constance?” he said, at length, in a very gentle voice that made her frightened, because why would he speak so gently unless he feared hurting her?
“Yes?”
“Look out from the cave. What do you see?”
She turned her eyes out. “The sea.”
“You can see the sea from anywhere along the coast. What can you see from right here?”
She looked again. “The reef.”
He turned his sad gaze to her, and realization began to dawn on her. Tears pri
cked her eyes.
“I’m so sorry, Constance,” he said. “But I think I know what happened to your mother.”
“No, Alexandre,” she said, because she didn’t know what else to say.
“That reef is barely visible until you’re on top of it. It would be so easy for a ship to sail right into it. In bad weather, or at night, getting out of the water and onto land would be near impossible. Perhaps possible for a man, a strong swimmer. But for an English woman with little experience of the sea . . .” He took her hand in his. “The strong swimmer would never forgive himself, especially if he loved her. He would return, again and again, to the place he lost her. To pray, in a way. To be near her.”
Tears began to fall. “But there must be a chance—she couldn’t have been dead all this time.”
“I’m sorry, Constance.” He put his arms around her and she clung to him, sobbing. Years of dreams dissolved around her, leaving her with the harsh, brutal possibility.
She sat back, palming tears from her eyes. “But we don’t know for certain, do we?” she said again. “We’re only guessing.”
“I can find out for certain if you like,” he said. “I can swim out there and dive for the wreckage.”
Her heart was at once torn: it sounded like a dangerous endeavour, but she wanted badly to know for certain. If her mother was dead, then so be it. She could tell Father, and they could abandon their search. But if there was even the shred of a possibility . . .
“Is it risky?” she asked quietly.
“Not for me. I’m a strong swimmer; I can hold my breath for nearly six minutes.” He stroked her fingers. “I should like to do you one last favor, to repay you for everything you’ve done for me.”