A Bound Heart

by Laura Frantz

  He smiled politely, even stiffly, as if they’d simply exchanged pleasantries.

  “How delightful!” Mrs. Ravenhill exclaimed at their unintelligible exchange. “Your native language must be quite a boon to you, especially when you chance upon a fellow Scot.”

  “Indeed,” Magnus said. He uttered a few final words in Gaelic, meant for Lark alone. “Play coy, aye? For yer own protection. And as the evening progresses, act as if yer besotted with me though we’ve just met.”

  At this, her wide-eyed surprise gave way to an amused, agreeable smile, and she took her place between Magnus and Surgeon Blackburn at table.

  Lark placed her serviette in her lap, awaiting the first course as the captain told a story of once being marooned in the Caribbean. Whatever these men of the sea were made of, they were not dull.

  Her joy and relief at sitting to Magnus’s right cast a golden glow over the evening. Any fretting over Larkin was pushed to the back of her mind, at least briefly.

  Play coy . . . act besotted.

  So he wanted her to pretend? Why? She dared not ask him outright, not even in Gaelic. Something more was afoot, truly. And that was why Magnus’s quiet words came cloaked in a veiled warning. The long glittering table with its polished candelabra and china did seem a lure, all the convict women playing dress-up, herself included. But to what end?

  In English, Magnus said offhandedly, “Tell me about yer bairn. I’m unused to seeing ye without him.”

  She smiled around a sip from her goblet. “Larkin’s a wee braw lad who has completely won my heart. He’s not above six months, his aunt said, God rest her.”

  “An orphan but for you,” Blackburn said, leaning in.

  She looked down at the steam rising from a bowl of consommé set before her. “Sadly so.”

  “Nay, happily,” Magnus returned, his gaze intense in the shimmering haze of candlelight. “Yer a born mother. He seems very content.”

  “’Tis a God-made circumstance,” she said with conviction. “Mayhap a baby is less trouble than a husband.”

  Both men chuckled and returned to their supper, allowing her a look at the women interwoven with the officers about the finely laid table.

  Something was afoot. Something more than dinner and dancing. She hardly needed Magnus to tell her so. Beyond the finely lacquered ceiling of the dining room came the trill of a fiddle on the quarterdeck above.

  “D’ye dance, yer lairdship?” She nearly smiled at the silly question when she well knew the answer.

  “Betimes,” Magnus said. “And ye, Miss MacDougall? I’ve heard it said Quakers disdain such amusements.”

  “Some do. But a jig and a reel are hard to resist.” She looked to her right. “And ye, Surgeon Blackburn?”

  “Depending on the partner, aye. I’ll be glad to lead out with you. After the captain and his lady, of course.”

  The pairing was no surprise. Of all the women on board, Mrs. Ravenhill was first lady of the ship, every bit as much as James Moodie was its captain. In their short acquaintance, Mrs. Ravenhill had not missed a step, polished as the paste gems winking on her flawless bosom. Despite her whispered-about reputation, she was amiable. Interesting. As lovely as she was shrewd. Lark tried to look past the fact that the woman’s silks and laces might be stolen or that her renowned brother was a highwayman who’d escaped when she’d been caught.

  “Yer gown reminds me of midsummer,” Magnus told her between courses, eyes down. “Scotia’s bluebells.”

  “Oh aye,” she murmured. Could he hear the lament in her voice? “Where I once lived, there was a wee loch rimmed with them like blue lace.”

  “Yer a Highland lass then?”

  “Nay, the western isles.” Fearful of steering too near the truth, she changed course. “Where are ye bound for, sir?”

  “The West Indies.”

  “Not Virginia Colony?”

  “Nay.” Magnus toyed with his meat, looking as dangerously close to despair as she felt. And then he righted himself, stabbing a bite of beef and chewing resolutely.

  She stifled her own dismay, lowering her eyes with a sweep of her lashes in the surgeon’s direction. “And ye, Surgeon Blackburn? Where are ye bound for next?”

  “I’m unsure. I may well shun the sea. Try my hand at farming in the colonies.”

  “Oh? Surely the plant cabin is a fine start.” She set down her fork and took a bracing sip of wine. Its sourness nearly made her sputter.

  The ship’s surgeon leaned in, so close the lace of her upraised sleeve draped across his own coat sleeve. “Are you all right, Miss MacDougall?”

  “Not to worry.” She smiled. “The fare is bountiful. Delicious. I’m simply unused to such rich food after . . .” She hated to even mention the tolbooth as it stirred so many dark memories.

  “I’m glad to hear you’re not indisposed. Though I’d be happy to attend you should the need arise . . . no matter the hour.”

  Lark sensed Magnus’s resistance at the surgeon’s words. She knew him too well to miss such. It lay about him like a winter cloak, cold and forbidding. Could Surgeon Blackburn sense it too?

  Magnus forked a last bite of beef, as aggravated by Lark as the lieutenant. Did she have to be so charming? So attentive? Surgeon Blackburn was thoroughly besotted. Did she not see how he kept looking at her? He was ignoring the woman to his right, who seemed not to mind, absorbed as she was in the clutches of another fawning officer. As for the attentive doctor, his Lowland Scots aggravated like a burr.

  By meal’s end, the captain had consumed such a quantity of spirits Magnus doubted he could stand without listing, much less climb the ladder to the quarterdeck, where music now wafted on a warm southwest wind.

  But up they all went.

  Newly bereaved widowers did not dance, did they?

  Aye, they did, if only to prevent any ill-trickit doings on board. Yet Surgeon Blackburn soon claimed Lark for a reel while Magnus was left to look on, standing with the two fiddlers on the small platform in front of the foremast, where the halyard and ropes were secured.

  The open sea was so vast. His gaze swept skyward where stars winked like angelic candles overhead, breaking up the blackness, moonlight falling to the deck’s sand-scattered surface.

  Did the surgeon have to be so able a dancer? So attentive? Magnus was cast back to the tenants’ ball when Lark had danced in Isla’s stead, her surefootedness and grace winning admiring glances both then and now. Once he’d been her laird but no longer. His responsibility for her, his protective reach, had ended. Though indentured, she was perhaps freer than she’d ever been, now well beyond his and Kerrera’s keeping.

  He looked to his shoe buckles, grappling with their new standing. What if she was fond of Blackburn? She could do worse. Yet a lonesome life in some coastal town with a husband at sea who was free to take a female mate whenever he pleased . . . Lark deserved better. For all they knew, Blackburn already had a wife. But what sort of future awaited her with Larkin? She was now tied to the bairn in inexplicable ways. How would she fulfill her indenture chasing after a lad not her own?

  “Are ye not going to dance?” Scarlet-cheeked, Lark stood to his right, her Gaelic coming in winded, indignant bursts as a jig was stepped.

  He fisted his hands behind his back. “In truth, I have no heart for dancing.”

  “How can I act the besotted miss if ye willna play along?” Her high spirits fell away. “Yer in mourning. Missing Kerrera. As I am.”

  “Dinna look so aflocht. We’ve only just met.”

  She sighed and forced a smile at the same time, eyes on the circling dancers. “Is it true what ye said? About the West Indies?”

  “I’m now a prisoner of the Crown, ye ken. Not even Osbourne could change that. I go where I’m told, at least two years hence.”

  “But my laird ye’ll always be,” she answered softly but firmly. “No matter where we are, nor how much time passes. Nor what the Crown says.”

  His voice gentled. “And ye’ll alwa
ys be my Lark.”

  Her poignant expression told him she’d heard his Gaelic despite the rousing music, despite her not looking at him. He said no more, facing into the wind as the night wore on and she partnered with every officer present, including the captain.

  Should he warn her? Tell her the officers’ intent?

  Indecision warred inside him. He was not used to asking questions but providing answers. And though he knew Lark, he did not know where her heart would lead her in the face of their ever-shifting circumstances.

  20

  The devil’s boots don’t creak.

  Scottish proverb

  When half a dozen women spilled onto the quarterdeck from the officers’ quarters instead of through the usual hatch at daybreak, Lark’s suspicions were confirmed. She’d come the usual way, the warm weight of Larkin in his sling testing her balance as the ship heaved, emerging into a world of mist where white-capped waves sprayed salty water at every turn. Little stayed dry on such a day.

  She breakfasted, feeding Larkin first. Milk drunk he was, gulping the fresh offering from a bottle fashioned from a cow’s horn with an occasional appreciative burp.

  “And how’s yer wee charge this morn?” asked the ship’s carpenter with a gap-toothed grin.

  “Bonny and bright-eyed,” she answered, as proud as a new mother. Never had there been eyes so hugely blue or a grin so wide and heart-stopping. Her smile slipped as she took in Larkin’s every roll and dimple. His fair skin was splotched pink from the glare of sun on water, despite his linen bonnet with its short brim.

  “I’ve made a play-pretty for ’im,” the aged man said, dangling a shell rattle from a leather loop with a piece of teething coral attached. Larkin lunged for it as the sailor added, “It ain’t gold nor silver, but it’ll do. Fitted with a whistle too.”

  Though it would take time for the babe to discover the whistle, the orange coral end had already found his open mouth with its sole tiny tooth.

  “Gnawin’ on it like a baby beaver, he is. ’Tis a hard bit o’ coral that won’t break. I’ll make a toy soldier next, mayhap a pony.” He went away whistling to Lark’s high praise and Larkin’s chewing.

  She kissed the babe’s damp brow, thankful, wishing they could sit in the shade of a sail to escape the strengthening sun. She left the yawning women behind as she walked to the fenced quarterdeck and plant cabin. Surgeon Blackburn stood, back to her, reminding her of their reel last night.

  She’d excused herself from the after-supper frolic shortly after Magnus did, ready to return to Larkin. She found him sleeping, his caretaker dozing too.

  Would a second summons to dine be forthcoming? Their shipboard supper remained a riddle, though her fellow convicts held a clue—the select few who had emerged from the officers’ quarters, Mrs. Ravenhill leading. Was this what Surgeon Blackburn expected of her? A night in his hammock? Heat burned her face and neck like a saltwater rash when he swung round to face her.

  “Miss MacDougall.” His politeness was intact despite any disappointment over the previous eve.

  “Good morning, sir. A fair day, aye?”

  “Indeed.” He looked beyond the green square of plants to the purling blue sea. “Cat’s paws.”

  No cat was in sight. She studied the water, puzzling out his meaning.

  “Light, variable winds on calm waters, producing small waves resembling—”

  “Cat’s paws,” she finished. “The waves do look like them.”

  “The sea has a language all its own.” He came closer, examining the rattle Larkin fisted. “Orange coral. Not quite so comely as the beads you wore last night at supper.”

  “Larkin doesna seem to mind.”

  He chuckled, surprising her by lifting the babe from his sling so that the fabric lay limp about her. “He’s becoming something of a barnacle, attached so.”

  It was her turn to smile. In the surgeon’s strong arms, Larkin stiffened before bringing the rattle down on the man’s broad chest with a musical clatter of shells. “You’re a Highland Scot, surely, striking a Lowlander so.” His gaze met Lark’s. “Try tending the plants unencumbered for one morn, at least.”

  Not wasting time, she turned away and began to do just that. Blackburn was not far behind, no doubt for Larkin’s sake.

  The tea trees seemed slightly wilted, being wind-whipped, while the parsley and mint were flourishing. An ominous brown edged the rosemary while the marigolds were a colorful riot. She stroked the lamb’s ears, the velvety leaves soft as Larkin’s skin. The bees buzzed contentedly, one of the most reassuring sounds she knew.

  Casting a glance over her shoulder, she felt a tendril of pleasure. The babe, clad in his white bonnet and gown, looked like spilled milk against the surgeon’s dark blue uniform. Besotted with his rattle, Larkin chewed fiercely, eyes fixed on Lark nevertheless.

  “Surgeon Blackburn, sir. Yer needed in the infirmary. A jack is down with a fever.”

  Handing Larkin over, he disappeared below deck. Lark resumed her work, if it could be called that. Other than watering and watching, staking and pruning, what more could be done? ’Twas a chancy endeavor and not all the plants would survive. And if there came a gale . . .

  The sails snapped as the wind stiffened. She looked aloft to where she’d spied Rory MacPherson. In sailor’s trews and cap and even pigtailed, he in no way resembled the captain of the Merry Lass. But he was somewhere on this great ship, though their chance of doing more than exchanging a fleeting glance was slim.

  The laird was nowhere on deck that she could see. But with so large a crew and so many nooks and crannies, he might be right beneath her very nose.

  The morning glare was fierce, and she blinked into its brightness. Day three at sea. Why did it seem weeks already? ’Twould be September when they made landfall, Lord willing. Already Scotland seemed faded, a tattered dream. No longer could she recall the exact hue of the bluebell-rimmed loch she’d mentioned to Magnus, nor the musky smell of the peat fire or the hearty taste of oatcakes. Too many new sights and sounds had elbowed their way in, lapping over her heartfelt memories like cat’s-paw waves, erasing what had come before.

  Here there was just wind and wood, salt spray and sail. Larkin was her world, and she his. With her hands and heart full, her sorrow was halved. For now.

  Lark returned to the captain’s table a second time. And a third. Magnus was always there, seated to one side of her at supper since the arrangement did not alter. Surgeon Blackburn was on her right.

  It slowly dawned on her that she was now one of the select few while the rest of the convict women were left on the orlop deck, in the hold at night and picking oakum by day. In close quarters, it didn’t take her long to sense their distress.

  “We must help them,” she told Surgeon Blackburn. “Make a salve.”

  His brow arched. “What have you in mind?”

  “Dried comfrey. Yarrow and rosemary. Oil.”

  “Come down to my makeshift apothecary. I believe I have what’s required.” He shrugged. “But does it truly matter when they must continue oakum picking?”

  She had no answer. If the women continued their brutal task, their hands would not heal, nor even scar. “Might ye speak with the captain? Have them do something else, at least for a time?”

  Silent, he studied her in the sun’s harsh light. The squint lines about his eyes were pronounced, his eyes intense. At night, her own eyes burned from the water’s glare, but it seemed of no consequence compared to torn and bleeding hands.

  They went below. Though his cabin was not as grand as the captain’s, hers was a mouse hole in comparison. The surgeon’s included not only a sleeping berth where his hammock was suspended but a second chamber lined with shelves containing jar after jar of herbs and simples, many that she recognized. A seaworthy apothecary.

  The fragrance alone made her close her eyes and take a deep, delighted breath when his back was turned, yet he clearly sensed her mood straightaway.

  “This place makes y
ou smile. Why is that?”

  She traced the design on a green glass bottle. “’Tis the stillroom’s fragrance.”

  “Your castle stillroom.”

  Her smile faded. Any thought of the stillroom was now tainted. Gone was that joyous feeling, that sense of place, of belonging. Her banishment had seen to that.

  “I apologize.” He cleared his throat. “I shouldn’t have mentioned it. Something happened there, I take it, that explains why you are here.”

  She nodded, shifting a sleeping Larkin to ease the knot of the sling digging into her shoulder. “’Twas unexpected, terrible—”

  “Think no more of it. Nothing matters but here and now.” Reaching out, he stilled the words on her lips, his fingers cool and smelling of camphor. “Let the past go, Lark.”

  He was so near. Never had he called her by her given name. She didn’t even know his, other than Blackburn. Yet she knew his particular scent, that pleasurable melding of soap and sandalwood. In the closed space of his quarters it was like a lure. She returned her attention to the assortment of jars and vials and bottles, cleverly arranged behind a shelf made secure in stormy seas. She leaned past him, reaching for what she thought was comfrey, only to find it was foxglove instead, she was so aflocht.

  “I could talk to the captain. Ask a reprieve for the women.” He reached for a mortar and pestle and set it on a table. “No doubt his response will be that the ship must be watertight and the work continue. Still, I will ask . . . for you.”

  The last two words were said with such intent there was no mistaking the underlying meaning. He wanted something in return. From her.

  “Thank ye, sir,” she murmured.

  “Alick, if you will.”

  Alick . . . Blackburn. Knowing it made him seem less a stranger, not simply a surgeon.

  He ground the herbs she’d selected with a practiced ease. “I’ve been wanting to consult you about a particularly stubborn fever suffered by the master’s mate.”

  She kept perusing jars for something more that might benefit the salve, listening as he described the mate’s ailment.