by Julia Quinn
Poppy chuckled to herself. What a thing to think about. If she were home, she’d say as much to her mother, if only to hear her shriek. Anne Bridgerton did have a sense of humor, but it did not extend to bodily fluids. Poppy, on the other hand, had been far too influenced by her brothers to be so fussy.
Roger had been the worst. And of course, the best. He was her fiercest protector, but he’d had far too much mischief and humor to ever be stern. He was clever too, as clever as she was, but he was the oldest, and his extra years of experience and education made it impossible for the others to keep up. For example, he would never just leave a toad in his brother’s bed. That would have been far too pedestrian.
No, when Roger turned to amphibians, he made sure they fell from the sky. Or at least from the ceiling, and onto Richard’s head. Poppy still wasn’t sure how he’d managed that with such accuracy.
Then there was what he called his crown jewel. He spent six months secretly tutoring Poppy in false vocabulary, and she dutifully complied, writing such things in her primer as:
tinton, noun. The delicious crust made by burnt sugar on a pudding.
and
fimple, adverb. Almost, nearly.
He declared his life complete the day she approached their mother and asked, “Is the apple cream fimple out of the blackbox? You know how much I chime when it gets a tinton.”
Her mother had fainted on the spot. Her father, upon learning the extent of Roger’s preparation, mused that he was not sure he could bring himself to mete punishment for such a well-thought-out plan. He’d even opined that perhaps such diligence ought to be rewarded. Indeed, Roger might have received that new épée he’d been coveting had not Mrs. Bridgerton overheard. With strength no one knew she possessed, she smacked her husband on the back of his head and demanded, “Have you heard your daughter? She’s talking to the maids about plumwort and farfar!”
“She’s especially fond of plumwort,” Roger said with a smirk.
Mr. Bridgerton turned to him with a sigh-crossed groan. “You realize now that I have to punish you?”
Poppy was never quite certain just what punishment her father had chosen, but she did recall that Roger smelled remarkably like the chicken coop for several weeks, and, proving that punishment occasionally did fit its crime, her mother had required him to write, “I will not farfar my sister,” one thousand times in his primer.
But he’d only had to do so nine hundred times. Poppy had sneaked in to help him, taking the quill and doing a hundred lines for him.
He was her favorite brother. She would have done anything for him.
She wished she still could. Even now, after five years, it was so hard to believe he was gone.
With a sigh, and then another and another, she wandered aimlessly around the cabin. Captain James had not told her what time he normally took his dinner, but after the clock struck seven, then eight, then nine, she decided there was no point in saving the pudding. Poppy took the larger of the two slices of pie, then pulled a chair up close to the window so she could gaze out as she ate.
“My compliments to the chef,” she murmured, casting an eye back to where the other piece of pie sat on the table. “If he’s not back by . . .”
Ten, she decided. If the captain didn’t return by ten, she’d eat his pie. It was only fair.
In the meantime, she’d take very small bites. She might be able to make it last until—
She looked down at her empty plate. Never mind. She’d never been able to make her sweets last. Richard had been just the opposite, savoring each bite until the very end, at which point he moaned with pleasure, not because the pudding was especially delicious (although it was; their cook had had a particular talent for baking), but rather to torture his less patient siblings. Poppy had swiped one of his biscuits once, as much out of irritation as hunger, and when he’d noticed he’d walloped her.
Then her father had walloped him.
It had been worth it. Even when her mother had taken her aside for a lecture on ladylike behavior, it had been worth it. The only thing that would have made it better was if Poppy had got to do some walloping herself.
“Wallop,” she said aloud. She liked that word. It sounded rather like its meaning. Onomatopoeia. Another word she liked.
Strangely, it didn’t sound like its meaning. An onomatopoeia ought to be one of those crawly things with fuzzy legs, not a literary device.
She looked down at the dish in her hand. “Plate,” she said. No, it didn’t sound anything like what it was. “Bowl?”
Dear God, she was talking to crockery.
Had she ever been so bored?
She was on a ship, for heaven’s sake. Heading to exotic climes. She ought not to feel as if her brain was desiccating. She ought to feel—
Well, what she ought to feel was terror, but she’d already done that, so didn’t she now deserve a little excitement? Surely she’d earned it.
“Yes, I have,” she said firmly.
“Have you?” came the amused voice of Captain James.
Poppy shrieked with surprise and jumped nearly a foot in the air. It was a wonder she didn’t drop her dessert plate. “How did you enter so quietly?” she demanded.
Although honestly, it did sound more like an accusation.
The captain just shrugged. “Have you eaten?” he asked.
“Yes,” Poppy said, still waiting for her pulse to return to normal. She waved her hand to the table. “I saved some for you. I don’t know if it will still be warm.”
“Likely not,” he said, heading straight for the table. He didn’t sound concerned. “Ah . . .” He sighed appreciatively. “Chicken in brown sauce. My favorite.”
Poppy’s head whipped around.
He gave her a queer look. “Is something amiss?”
“Chicken in brown sauce? That’s what you actually call it?”
“What else would you call it?”
Poppy’s mouth opened, and it hung that way for about two seconds too long. Finally she made a steadying motion with her hands and said, “Never mind.”
The captain shrugged, indifferent to the meanderings of her conversation, and he dug into his food with the speed of a man who had put in a hard day of work.
“Chicken in brown sauce,” Poppy said to herself. “Who could have known?”
The captain paused with his fork halfway between plate and mouth. “Do you have a problem with the food?”
“No,” she said. “No. It’s—” She shook her head. “It’s nothing. I have been talking to myself all day.”
He took a bite and nodded. “As opposed to all those people you’ll never have occasion to meet?”
She pressed her lips together, trying—and probably failing—to look stern. “Now you’re just taking all my fun away.”
He grinned unrepentantly.
“I can see you are troubled by the thought.”
“Miss Bridgerton, you always trouble me.”
She allowed herself a lofty tip of her chin. “Then I can count this a good day’s work.”
The captain took a long sip of his wine, then covered up a belch with his hand. “You do that.”
Poppy tapped her hand against her thigh, trying not to look as if she had nothing to do but watch him eat (when of course they both knew she had nothing to do but watch him eat). She felt ridiculously awkward, so she turned back to the window and pretended to look out. She supposed she actually was looking out, but the vista hadn’t changed for the last two hours, so really, it was more of a staring at the glass sort of thing. “You’re quite late,” she finally said.
His voice came from behind her, warm, rich, and terribly provoking. “Did you miss me?”
“Of course not.” She turned around, trying to maintain a disinterested air. “But I was curious.”
He smiled, and it was a devastating thing. Poppy could easily imagine dozens of ladies swooning in its wake. “You’re always curious, aren’t you?” he murmured.
She was in
stantly suspicious. “You’re not saying that as if it were an insult.”
“It’s not an insult,” he said plainly. “If more people were curious, we’d be far more advanced as a species.”
She took a step toward him without realizing it. “What do you mean?”
His head tipped thoughtfully to the side. “Hard to say. But I like to think we’d be traveling the world in flying machines by now.”
Well, that was the most ridiculous thing she’d ever heard. So she plunked herself right down across from him and said, “That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.”
He chuckled. “Clearly you’re not curious enough.”
“I’ll have you know—” Poppy frowned as a contraption with wings, wheels, and maybe some fire shot through her imagination. It was enough to distract her from her initial response, which had been to defend herself.
She’d grown up with four brothers. Defending herself was always her initial response.
“Do you think it’s possible?” she asked. She leaned forward, arms crossed on the table in front of her. “Flying machines?”
“I don’t see why not. Birds do it.”
“Birds have wings.”
He shrugged. “We can build wings.”
“Then why haven’t we done so?”
“Men have tried.”
She blinked. “They have?”
He nodded.
People had built wings and tried to fly and she didn’t know? The injustice was astounding. “No one tells me anything,” she grumbled.
He barked out a laugh. “I have difficulty believing that to be true.”
Her eyes narrowed for what had to have been the tenth time in their conversation. “Why?”
“Your aforementioned curiosity.”
“Just because I ask doesn’t mean people tell me things.”
He cocked his head to the side. “Did you ask anyone about men building wings?”
“Of course not.”
“Then you can’t complain.”
“Because I didn’t know to ask,” she protested, jumping right in over his words. “One needs a certain base of knowledge before one can ask sensible questions.”
“True,” Captain James murmured.
“And it goes without saying,” Poppy continued, only somewhat mollified by his easy agreement, “that I have not been given the opportunity to study physics.”
“Do you want to?”
“Study physics?”
He made a courtly gesture with his hand.
“That’s not the point,” she said.
“Well, it is, actually, as pertains to aerodynamics.”
“My point exactly!” She jabbed her finger toward him with enough suddenness that he blinked. “I didn’t even know that was a word.”
“It’s self-explanatory,” he said. “One doesn’t need—”
“That’s not the point.”
“Again with the points,” he said, sounding almost impressed.
She scowled. “I can deduce the meaning once you say it. That’s not the—” She bit her tongue.
“Point?” he offered helpfully.
She gave him a look. “Women ought to be allowed an equal education,” she said primly. “For those who want it.”
“You’ll get no objection from me,” the captain said, reaching for his pie. “Awfully small piece,” he muttered.
“It’s very good, though,” she told him.
“It always is.” He took a bite. “Your slice was larger?”
“Of course.”
He gave her a vaguely approving nod, as if he’d expected no less, and Poppy sat quietly as he finished his pie.
“Do you always dine so late?” she asked, once he had sat back in his chair.
He glanced up, almost as if he’d forgotten her presence. “Not always.”
“What were you doing?”
He seemed slightly amused by the question. “Other than captaining the ship?”
“I was hoping you might tell me what captaining a ship entails.”
“I will,” he surprised her by saying. “Just not tonight.” He yawned and stretched, and there was something astonishingly intimate about the motion. No gentleman of her acquaintance would ever have done such a thing in her presence—aside from her family, of course.
“Forgive me,” he murmured, blinking as if he’d only just remembered that he no longer had sole free rein of his quarters.
She swallowed. “I think I’ll get ready for bed.”
He nodded. He suddenly looked exhausted, and Poppy was struck by the most inconvenient burst of compassion. “Was it a particularly tiring day?” she heard herself ask.
“A bit.”
“Was it because of me?”
He cracked a wry smile. “I’m afraid I can’t blame everything on you, Miss Bridgerton.”
“Much as you would like to?”
“If you can conspire a way to take responsibility for a torn topgallant sail, a vexing wind, and three cases of putrid stomach, I would be much obliged.”
Almost apologetically, she said, “I’m afraid the wind requires a supernatural talent I do not possess.”
“As opposed to the torn sail and the putrid stomachs?”
“I could manage those, given a bit of time to plan.” She made a vaguely sarcastic motion with her hand. “And access to the deck.”
“Alas, I am too cruel.”
She leaned her elbow on the table, her chin resting thoughtfully in her hand. “And yet I don’t think it is your nature.”
“To be cruel?”
She nodded.
He smiled, but just a little, as if he were too tired to make a proper go of it. “It has been but a day, and yet you already know me too well, Miss Bridgerton.”
“Somehow I think I have barely scratched the surface.”
He regarded her curiously. “You almost sound as if you wish to.”
Their voices had softened, the hard edges of the conversation worn down by fatigue. And maybe respect.
Poppy stood, unsettled by the thought. She did not respect Captain James. She could not. And she certainly shouldn’t like him, no matter how likeable he could be.
She was tired. Her defenses were low. “It’s late,” she said.
“Indeed,” he replied, and she heard him rise from his chair as she made her way over to the basin of water Billy had brought sometime between her entrée and dessert. She needed to clean her face and teeth, and brush her hair. She did so every night, and she was determined to maintain her routine at sea, no matter how odd it felt to be performing her ablutions in front of a man.
And yet it was strangely less odd than it should have been.
Needs must, she told herself as she retrieved the tooth powder. That was all. If she was getting used to his presence, it was because she had to. She was a practical woman, not given to hysterics. She prided herself on that. If she had to brush her teeth in front of a man she’d only just met, she certainly wasn’t going to cry over it.
She glanced over her shoulder, sure that the captain somehow knew she was thinking about him, but he seemed to be immersed in his own tasks, riffling through some papers on his desk.
With a resigned exhale, Poppy looked down at her finger and sprinkled some of the minty powder on it. She wondered if she should switch hands with each brushing. All this tooth powder might irritate her skin.
She took care of her teeth, splashed some water on her face, and, after making sure the captain was not watching, pulled the pins from her hair and ran her fingers through it, doing her best approximation of the boar bristle hairbrush she used at home. Once she’d fashioned a sleeping plait, there was nothing left to do except get into bed.
She turned, taking a step toward the bunk, but then there he was, somehow much closer than she’d expected.
“Oh!” she yelped. “I’m sorry, I—”
“No, it’s my fault entirely. I didn’t think you were going to turn and—”
&nbs
p; She stepped left.
He stepped right.
They both made awkward noises.
“Sorry,” he grunted.
He stepped left.
She stepped right.
“Shall we dance?” he joked, and she would have made a similar riposte, but the ship swept up and then down on a wave, sending her stumbling to the side, saved only by two warm hands at her waist.
“Now we really are—” She looked up, and it was such a mistake. “Dancing,” she whispered.
They did not move, did not even speak. Poppy was not sure if they even breathed. His eyes held hers, and they were so bright, so astonishingly blue, that Poppy felt herself being drawn forward, pulled in. She didn’t move, not an inch, but still, she felt it, the pull.
“Do you like to dance?” he asked.
She nodded. “When there is music.”
“You don’t hear it?”
“I can’t hear it.” She wondered if he knew that she really meant she must not. Because it was there, and she felt it on her skin—the soft music of the wind and the waves. If she were anyone else—no, if he were anyone else—this would be a moment made of romance and breathless anticipation.
In another lifetime, another world, he might lean down.
She might look up.
They might kiss.
It would be daring. Scandalous. How funny to think that if she were back in London, she could be ruined by a single kiss. It seemed so trivial now, compared with, oh, being kidnapped by pirates.
And yet as she stared into the captain’s eyes, it didn’t seem trivial at all.
She lurched back, aghast at the direction of her thoughts, but his hands were still there, large and warm on her hips, holding her, if not in place, then at least steady.
Safe.
“The water,” he said in a rough voice. “It’s choppy tonight.”
It wasn’t, but she appreciated the lie.