by Jane Orcutt
Someone shook my shoulder, and I awoke with a start. Moonlight illumined the room, and I could barely see. Phineas put a hand over my mouth. “You must get below. Quickly. Not a word.” He helped me from my hammock and led me toward the door. “Privateers,” he whispered in my ear. “They are boarding the ship.”
“What?”
“It is the French. You must go to the pantry with the other ladies.”
On deck I came awake with the realization that this was no joke, it was real. A ship fired on us, and the Dignity answered in kind. Smoke filled my nostrils. Overhead, a topsail took a hit, rigging splintering around us, and I screamed. Phineas made haste to get me to the ship’s pantry, all but dragging me. Julia Whipple, Mrs. Akers, and Mrs. Harrison already cowered there, the latter lady looking more awake than I had ever seen her, though she wore her bedclothes.
“You will be safe,” Phineas said to us. “Stay here, and stay away from the opening lest a stray ball find its way through.”
I grabbed his sleeve. “Where are you going?”
“I am going on deck to fight,” he said. He looked at me for a long moment, then was gone.
Mrs. Akers clung to me, sobbing hysterically. “What are we to do? I am certain we will be killed!”
“Or worse,” Mrs. Harrison said. “I’ve heard what pirates do with the ladies aboard.”
Mrs. Akers swooned.
Julia Whipple held her upright, her expression calm. “Now, now, Mrs. Akers, let us not panic. Our men are brave, are they not? I’m sure we’ll be quite safe. We have only to wait here. Look, the seaman who brought me below gave me this sword for our protection.”
“Oh my!” Mrs. Akers swooned again.
“We’ll probably drown anyway, for we are below the water line,” Mrs. Harrison said dolefully. “All they have to do is sink the ship.”
“You are a cruel liar, Miss Whipple,” Mrs. Akers cried. “That sailor gave you the sword so that we might kill ourselves, lest we be ravished!”
A sound like thunder cracked overhead. Mrs. Akers and Mrs. Harrison screamed. Julia and I reached for each other. My heart pounded, but I tried to keep a steady voice. “It is only cannon fire, ladies. I am certain that we will be well.”
“Allez! Allez!”
A voice rang out from the top of the stairs, then I had a quick view of thick black boots and faded gray-striped pants. A swarthy Frenchman brandished a cutlass as he descended the steps. A privateer!
He stopped, apparently surprised to find us instead of the ship’s treasure, then grinned. “Bon soir, mesdames et mesdemoiselles.” He bowed with a flourish, sweeping his red stocking cap from his head.
Mrs. Akers screamed. “Mercy!”
Seized with panic, my heart in my throat, I ripped the sword from Julia’s hands and brandished it. “Partez, vous chien français!”
Straightening from his bow, he smiled at me. “So you speak French? I speak a little English myself.” He stepped forward. “But my heart breaks that you think me a dog.”
I held out the sword, its tip pointed directly at his heart. “I would stand back were I you,” I said in a low voice.
Glancing at my sword, he grinned then turned and walked back to the stairs, calling up the hatch. “Mes copains! Venez ici—c’est les dames!”
“What did he say?” Julia whispered.
“He’s telling his friends there are ladies down here.”
She stepped to my side, smoothing her skirt. “Let me handle them. I’m well acquainted with desperate men.”
“No!” I pushed her back, gripping the sword while I used my free arm to shield the other ladies. Think, Isabella! What strategy should I employ?
Julia’s eyes shone with admiration, but she gripped my arm. “Would you defend us? You’ll be killed!”
“You will get us killed!” Mrs. Akers cried.
Mrs. Harrison sank to a barrel and sipped from a small brown bottle.
Three other scraggly looking privateers clomped down the stairs and joined their cohort. Their eyes lit with pleasure when they saw we four ladies. Julia stepped forward again, smiling. “I won’t fight you,” she said, lifting her chin. “Leave the other ladies alone.”
The three newcomers looked at Red Cap for translation. He rapidly repeated her words in French. One with dark curly hair and a full beard smiled and moved forward, but I held out the sword. “Arretez!”
The stocking-capped privateer laughed. “She’s feisty. That one is mine.”
The sword felt heavier in my hands than that to which I was accustomed, but I gripped it with all my strength. “I am not yours nor are any of these ladies. I order you to leave.”
“Allez!” The bearded one scowled and jerked Julia by the wrist, brandishing his sword in my direction.
Despite her previous bravado, Julia screamed. The pirate pulled her to his side and planted noisy kisses on her face. The other men laughed.
“Show your opponent no mercy,” Signor Antonio had drilled into me, and I heeded his words without hesitation. Into the gap between the pirate’s sword arm and his hold on Julia, I thrust my sword in his midsection. He released her, stared at me in amazement, then fell to the deck, writhing.
10 h
“Robert!” One of the privateers rushed to aid the wounded man, but the other two turned to me. Anger replaced their amused expressions, and they moved closer, cutlasses brandished. Julia instinctively scurried to my side, and behind the protection of my out-thrust sword we backed toward the other ladies.
“That was not wise, mademoiselle,” Red Cap said. “I must cut your pretty face in repayment.” Then he proceeded to tell me what else he would do.
I do not mind revealing that I was more frightened than I had ever been in my life. I had had the element of surprise with the distracted pirate, but I would now have to rely on skill and strategy. Could I fight two men at once? I had never done so.
More men raced down the stairs, and my heart pounded. It is over. My foolishness will get us killed.
To my surprise I saw Phineas fighting backward down the stairs. He carried no weapon, yet he used his hands and feet, punching and kicking, to first knock the sword from a pirate’s hands then to knock him down the stairs to the deck. Another combatant took the first one’s place, and Phineas prevailed over him, as well. The pirate landed in a heap beside the first.
The two privateers menacing us turned toward Phineas. He was prepared, however, kicking the swords from their hands then punching them before they could defend themselves. They lay on the ground, moaning.
He saw me, and I was about to raise the sword in triumph when he barely had time to yell before another privateer was upon him. “Isabella! Take care behind you!”
I whirled around to face the pirate who had tended the wounded man. He held his cutlass at a deadly angle, slashing through the air as though to warn me. I suddenly realized that I had never actually fought Signor Antonio with the button removed from the tip of my sword.
I parried his thrust and could tell from his slashing that he fought with a great deal of drink inside him. He leered at me, his eyes rheumy with alcohol. I could not afford to let him tire himself out as would be my normal method. Though inebriated, he would fight too long and hard and would take risks that might work to his advantage. I hastily prayed for guidance and strength, then feinted, ducked, and after he followed through, drove my blade into his sword arm.
Cursing, he dropped the weapon and sank to his knees. Phineas rushed beside me, kicked him in the head, laying my opponent flat on the deck. We had barely a moment before we were beset by another miscreant, but between us, we sent him to join his companion.
We stared at one another, breathing heavily during the respite. I could not believe a man could fight the way Phineas had. Not a weapon did he have, save for his body, yet he had defended himself—and me—quite handily.
Mrs. Akers sobbed loudly, and even Julia had given herself to loud tears.
“Listen!” Still panting, Phine
as held up his hand. “The cannons have stopped firing.” He turned to the ladies. “Are you all to rights?”
Mrs. Akers could not stop bawling. Mrs. Harrison had nodded off with her head against a stack of barrels. The pirate I had dueled lay sprawled against a spilled sack of grain, completely still.
“I’ll take care of Mrs. Akers and Mrs. Harrison,” Julia said, wiping the tears from her face. “Go above and see what has happened.”
I looked at the still pirate and felt my knees buckle. “I . . . I should stay to help.”
“Go above with Phineas,” Julia said softly. “We will be well.”
Phineas took my hand and led me up the ladder. When we reached the deck, I smelled gunpowder. I tried not to focus on the prone and bloodied men on the deck, some of whom I felt certain were dead.
Smoke clung to the air around us. I could barely discern a much smaller French ship alongside the Dignity. The corsair sat so low in the water that its masts aligned with our deck. The pirate crew must have dropped onto our ship from their top masts, for one or two men still attempted to board. One landed right in front of me, knocking Phineas and me to the deck. I held on to my sword and staggered to my feet, breathing hard. The villain grappled with me for a moment then drew back in shock. “C’est une dame!” The sight of the fairer sex wielding a sword must have frightened him, for he took another look at me and raced in the opposite direction, only to be caught by one of the Dignity seamen.
Indeed, the fighting had ceased. Our crew had rounded up the pirates and now encircled them, taunting with yells and displays of the captured swords and guns. Clutching his bloodied arm, Captain Malfort bellowed, “Throw them into the brig! And while you’re down there, someone let the ladies know all is safe.”
He caught sight of me wielding the sword, and his jaw dropped. “Good heavens! Miss Goodrich!”
Phineas glanced at me sharply. “You are bleeding,” he said, touching my elbow.
I looked down and saw a bloody gash in the sleeve of the gray dress. “Thankfully, it is nothing serious. I should survive with a minimum of care.”
“Which you shall have right now.” He took me by my undamaged arm, the one still holding the sword, and moved me across the deck, bellowing for the ship’s surgeon. “Mortimer!”
“I am all right,” I murmured, unheard as he moved us toward the bow, where Mortimer knelt over a fallen man.
“She is wounded,” Phineas said, thrusting me in front of the doctor.
Mortimer glanced up at Phineas, then me, taking in my wound with a surgeon’s practiced eye before pronouncing, “It is nothing, man. Bind it up and leave me to tend to more serious matters.” He gestured at his patient, who groaned then screamed as Mortimer adjusted the leg bent at a crooked angle.
“Mr. Gilpin!” I cried, clinging to Phineas for support.
“Take her away,” Mortimer said with a sweeping gesture, “and leave me to my work.”
Phineas steered me in the opposite direction, wrapping an arm around my shoulders. “Come away,” he said gently now. “I have some fresh cloth to bind your wound, Isabella.”
“But I must help!” I said, gesturing at the wounded men. “Mr. Gilpin . . . the others.”
“You have done more than your part. Let us go back to the cabin where I can see to your arm.”
I clung to the sword, in shock, I suppose, only releasing it when Phineas gently removed it from my hand once we were safe in our cabin. When he did, I could not help the rush of emotion that overtook me, and try as I might to prevent it, I wept fiercely. I had fought and won, but there seemed little glory. I had taken a life. A life!
Mindful of my wound, Phineas drew me into his arms. He said nothing, but pressed my face against his shoulder. When my tears dissolved into mere tremors then one undignified hiccup, he drew back, smiling. “Do you feel better?”
I did not, but I nodded, yet unable to speak.
“Sit,” he said, gesturing at the wooden crate. I was happy to leave someone in command, so I complied, numb, watching as he knelt to open the mysterious trunk. I could not see inside, for he shut it quickly, but he approached me with a white silk sash.
He knelt and bound the silk around my arm. “It is but a scratch,” he said. “When I saw you wounded, I forgot myself and thought the worst.”
He tied the cloth in place, then gently touched it. His eyes met mine, and my stomach trembled as it had in Cape Town. We looked at each other as though anew, and I felt a pull between us as thrilling but as dangerous as the currents of the ocean.
Phineas leaned forward then seemed to catch himself, rising and helping me to my feet. “Though it is past dawn, you should rest,” he said. “May I bring you some wine?”
I shook my head, suddenly weary to the bone. I made my way to my hammock and crawled in. He drew the blanket around my shoulders then turned away. “Phineas?” I murmured.
He turned back. “Yes?”
“When I awake, will you brew me some green tea? I have yet to partake of any.”
He smiled. “I shall brew you pot after pot.”
“Phineas?”
“Yes?”
“Will you show me how to fight as you did?” I said sleepily.
“A lady with your sword skills wants to fight without one?”
“I will have to return the sword to its rightful owner, and then I shall be without a weapon again.” With my eyes closed, I had no idea where he was, but I smiled anyway. “I am still waiting for my own.”
I heard him raise the canvas, but he made no response.
I did not rise until nearly dinnertime, and I am not certain I would have awakened even then except for the memory of Mr. Gilpin. I wanted to ascertain that he was in good health. I donned the brown dress, since the gray would need to be mended in the sleeve, then I headed for the cuddy. The captain’s cook was there, ordering others about to prepare for dinner. He stopped short when he saw me, clearly appalled for some reason.
“I did not mean to disturb you,” I said. “Is there any news about Mr. Gilpin?”
“He’s still breathing, if that’s your meaning. Check with the doctor, if you like.” He turned away as though he did not want to look at me.
Curious behavior! I headed for the stairs, to the surgeon’s area below deck. I wondered how many other wounded men besides Mr. Gilpin I would find there.
Mr. Calow waited outside the cabin, and he bowed when he saw me, his young eyes twinkling. “Miss Goodrich!”
“Mr. Calow.” I curtsied. “I am delighted to see that you are well.”
He nodded. “Is your arm in need of attention?”
“It was a mere scratch. Phineas should not have troubled Dr. Mortimer.”
Calow’s smile fell. “The doctor is still with Mr. Gilpin.”
“Then he lives?”
“Barely, Doctor says. His leg was broken. He was also wounded in the chest and bled quite a bit, but if he holds during the day, he may survive.”
“Perhaps I can help.” I reached for the doorknob.
Mr. Calow covered it first. “Miss Whipple has helped the doctor with Mr. Gilpin, as well as the other wounded men.”
I turned. “Miss Whipple?”
He nodded. “She has helped Dr. Mortimer all this time.”
“She must be exhausted,” I said. “Perhaps I can relieve her so that she may rest.”
“Did you rest well, Miss Goodrich? You must have been exhausted.” Mr. Calow lowered his gaze. “I have never seen a lady fight before.”
“I have not exactly fought before,” I confessed. “Not with real blades, at any rate.”
Smiling shyly at me, Mr. Calow opened the door and admitted me to the surgical area. Several men with various injuries—a bruised head, a sliced arm, a nicked shoulder— lay nursing their wounds. However, all appeared to be conscious and would no doubt be better in a few days, if not sooner.
Mr. Gilpin, lying in the corner bed, did not appear to have that luxury of time. His face was waxy, a contras
t to the white bandages bound to the wound on the right side of his chest. He breathed, but scarcely.
Miss Whipple sat on the far side of his bed, applying a wet cloth to his forehead. When she saw me, she looked startled. “Miss Goodrich!”
I took the chair opposite her. “How does he fare? Mr. Calow says that if he lives through the day, the doctor has hope.”
“Yes. The bleeding has lessened, and we can only hope that he improves with rest. There is no longer anything to be done for him, other than prayer.” She wiped his forehead again, and her shoulders drooped.
I felt great pity for her and admiration for her compassion. “You have been here all day?”
“How could I not? Dr. Mortimer admitted that he needed someone to help, and I was available.”
“What of Mrs. Akers and Mrs. Harrison?”
Julia smiled bitterly. “I believe they took to their own beds, promising not to rise until they were fully recovered from being shoved into the ships’s pantry in such an ungracious manner.”
“You should have awakened me,” I said. “I would have been glad to assist. Indeed, I would be glad to take your place now. You have been through a great deal.”
“I have survived worse than being taken below deck for my own safety. Besides, it is you who have endured a great deal. It is all the crew can speak of, how Miss Goodrich and Mr. Snowe fought off many of the frogs and saved the Dignity from certain plunder and ruin. If not for you two, we would all be lost.”
“The crew is too modest. They fought like tigers to save their ship. But what of the Frenchmen and their vessel?”
“Captain Malfort ordered one of the superior officers and some of the seamen to sail the vessel and prisoners back to Cape Town.”
“It is a relief to know they are no longer aboard. Were there many wounded . . . and dead?” I suppressed a shudder, thinking of the men I had fought hand to hand.
Julia shrugged. “I did not hear. I only know that Captain Malfort said that the frogs were gone. Some of the crew are mopping the deck, as well as making necessary repairs.”
“Would you like for me to watch Mr. Gilpin while you rest?” I offered again.