The Lost Daughter

by Iris Cole

  She lifted her gaze to his. “Why are you doing all this for me?”

  “Because I know what it’s like to not have family. All mine are dead, and if I could get ‘em back, just for a day, I’d do whatever it took,” he replied, his voice hitching. “My da passed when I was a wain, my brother passed a few years ago, and my ma passed a year back. Not a day goes by that I don’t wish I could see her again. You deserve this chance.

  Clary’s expression softened, and Bill held her eyes with his own. “Even if you don’t find aught, at least you can say you tried, and you can rest easy, knowing you did everything you could to find the folks who gave you life. I can’t imagine what it’s like to never know, and just to have a coin as a memory, so that’s why I’m doing this for you.”

  “Your ma raised you well, Bill.”

  “Aye, she did.” He smiled sadly, and went to one of the ramshackle shelves, sending a couple of rats skittering away into the hole they had gnawed into the wood. Plucking up candles and a box of matches, he lit the wicks and set the candles out around the room, casting a glow across the makeshift surgery.

  Clary took a breath and rolled up her shirt sleeves. “I suppose I’d best get started on the cleaning. Right now, those sailors are more likely to catch something in here than be healed.”

  “I’ll come back and help you in a little while,” Bill promised. “I’ve to help up on deck first, but as soon as we’re out at sea, I’ll be back.” He pointed to one of the barrels. “Just throw all that rotting mulch in there, and anything else you find, and I’ll toss it overboard later.”

  Clary smiled at him. “Thank you, Bill.”

  “What are you thanking me for?” A grin spread across his face. “It’s you who’s going to have to sift through all this mess.”

  She chuckled despite the horror of it all. “You know why.”

  “Aye, I do.” He came up to her and took hold of her hand, squeezing it gently. “And I hope there’s someone out there waiting for you, who’s as eager to find you as you are to find them.”

  As he disappeared out of the store room, Clary’s heart deflated. She knew Bill had not meant to sadden her with his words. Indeed, she believed he had intended the opposite, but he did not realise that he had reignited one of her biggest fears: what if she went through all of this searching, only to find someone who had no desire to know her? What if she discovered where she came from, only to discover that she had truly been abandoned, and nobody had ever meant to come back for her?

  Chapter Nine

  For the entirety of that day and well into the next, Clary did not see so much as a glimpse of the outside world. Every time she contemplated walking through the cramped, stinking passageways to reach the top deck, where she longed to draw in a gasp of glorious, fresh air, another sailor came to her door.

  And they came with ailments she had never even seen in the medical tomes she had pored over in secret, during her time at the Foundling Hospital.

  If I never see any part of the male anatomy again, it will be too soon.

  She folded her arms on the stained, splintered table that had been turned into a desk of sorts, and rested her head on her hands. Her eyelids were heavy after the previous night’s futile attempt at sleep.

  Every time she had drifted off, the rock of the boat on the wintry waters had tossed her awake again.

  A knock came at the door, disturbing what might have unfurled into a nap. Bill poked his head around and immediately looked apologetic.

  “Ah, you were resting. I’m sorry.”

  Clary lifted her heavy head. “It’s all right. This is the price of my passage to Manchester.” She had repeated the sentiment in her mind, every time she had been faced with another pus-filled blister, or a weeping wound, or a rash infested by tiny black creatures that scuttled around areas of a man she had never desired to witness.

  “I thought you might be hungry.” He produced a plate of bread and cheese from behind his back and came to sit opposite Clary. “You’re not looking too well. Are you seasick?”

  Clary smiled thinly. “Amongst other things.” She had lost count of the times she had been forced to run to the tin bucket in the corner of her surgery, in order to eject the meagre contents that remained in her stomach. Sometimes, the motion of the ship caused it. Sometimes, the smell of these men, and the festering fluids that covered them, were the cause.

  “The lads are all singing your praises,” Bill went on encouragingly. “The one with the cut on his thigh is calling you a godsend after you fixed him up. Poor lad thought he was going to lose his leg and have to get off the ship before we set sail for America. He’s a wife and wains waiting for him at home, so they’ll be glad of what you’ve done for him.”

  Clary sighed. “If he doesn’t bathe the wound in vinegar, like I told him to, he might still have to face the surgeon’s table.”

  “Why vinegar?” Bill tilted his head to one side.

  She shrugged. “Dolly always used to use it on cuts, and it tended to make it heal better. She had the real knowledge, not me. I’m seeing all these men, and looking at their ailments, and realising I have no true notion of what I’m doing.”

  “They seem happy,” he assured. “And you’ve saved ‘em coin they can’t afford to spend on a physician.”

  Clary’s shoulders sagged. “How much longer until we reach Manchester?”

  “The captain says we should dock tomorrow morning, just after dawn.” Bill pushed the plate closer to her. “You should eat something. Me ma always said that food is the best cure for most things.”

  Clary shook her head. “It won’t stay down.”

  They sat in silence for a moment, as the ship swayed nauseatingly from side to side, cutting through the waves of a sea that Clary had not been given the chance to look upon.

  “Are you worried about what’ll happen when we get to Manchester?” Bill finally broke the silence.

  Clary met his gaze. “Petrified.” She drew in a shallow breath. “What if my father is dead? What if he died out at sea, and that’s why my mother gave me up? What if I learn nothing from this Captain Dunbar? It was a long time ago—he might not even remember my father. Worse still, what if I find my father and my mother, and they wish I’d never come looking for them?”

  “They wouldn’t have left you with a token if they didn’t want to see you again,” Bill said softly. “I’m sure there’s a reason for all of this. It might not be a nice one, but at least then you’ll know everything what happened.”

  Clary gave a small nod. “The truth is, I’m starting to feel like this was a terrible idea.”

  “What do you mean?” Bill leaned further over the desk.

  “Well… I had an offer of employment at an orphanage.

  “They seemed like pleasant people, and they were eager to have me as part of their staff. I was to begin that work in two weeks’ time,” she explained, voicing the fears that had been slowly rising to a swell within her. “Perhaps, I should have remained in London until I could begin there. Perhaps, I have disregarded an opportunity for safety and security in favour of… a wild goose chase that may not lead anywhere. I have a mother in Dolly. I’ve had a good life thus far, and I was about to make that life better when I boarded this ship instead. And now I’m dressed like a man, feeling so sick I can’t stand, tending to sailors who have no qualms about exposing themselves to me.”

  Bill reached out and took hold of her hand. “Clary, you can still do all of that. If you don’t find anything in Manchester, then you go back to London and you take that position at the orphanage. You have plenty of time, and I can give you some coin so you can buy your passage back to London.”

  Tears pricked her eyes as she held his comforting gaze. “Why would you give me coin out of your own pocket? You don’t even know me.”

  “I know enough,” he replied. “I urged you to do this, so it’s only fair that I give you the money to get yourself out of it, if and when you decided that you don’t want to keep l
ooking.

  Exhaustion, and physical discomfort were railing at Clary’s defences and Clary felt the emotion stinging behind her eyes and bit it back hoping Bill would not see it. Bill’s voice was kind.

  “Anyway, I’ll have naught else to spend it on. I haven’t got a wife, or wains, or family to give it to, so it might as well be used for something good.”

  She brushed a tear from her cheek as it fell. “And you really think I still have time to go back to London, if I don’t succeed?”

  “I do, Clary,” he insisted. “And whether you’re in London or Manchester, I’m going to come and find you when I return, and I’m going to ask you all about it. I want to hear of every adventure you’ve been on, and I want to tell you all of mine.”

  He took the copper coin from around his neck and pushed it into Clary’s palm. “That’s me promise that I’ll come back for you, no matter where you are. If I don’t come back for it, then you’ll know I’m buried out at sea somewhere, and you can say a prayer for the sailor you met once, who wanted to help you because that’s how he was raised.”

  Clary stared at the copper disc. “I can’t take this!” She tried to give it back, but Bill put up his hands.

  “I want you to have it. That’s my token to you.” He smiled. “Think of it as a lend if you like, and when we see each other again, I’ll put it back around me neck.”

  Is that what my father did? T

  he thought came to Clary suddenly, as she took Bill’s chain and put it over her head, letting it lie beside the token she had carried since she was a baby.

  Did he give this token to you, Mother, as Bill has given me his? Did you lose him, Mother? Is that why you couldn’t bear to keep me, because I was a reminder of him? Or was it that you couldn’t keep me, because he died and left you with nothing?

  She was about to ask Bill more about the meaning of these tokens, when the door burst open and Captain Wilks strode in. He marched directly to Clary and seized her by her collar, pulling her out of her chair and almost lifting her off her feet.

  “Is it true?” the captain hissed, his eyes glinting with rage.

  Clary struggled for breath; the collar closing around her throat. “Is… what true?”

  “Are you a lass?” His grip tightened. “And don’t even think about lying to me!”

  Clary’s eyes widened. “Who t-told you… that?”

  “It doesn’t matter who told me. Is it true?” the captain spat, before turning his furious gaze upon Bill. “Did you know about this? Were you part of it? I like to think you’ve got more sense than that, to bring a woman on board a ship and curse us all, but I know what lasses can do to men’s minds. Warps ‘em and twists ‘em up ‘til they don’t know which way is up.”

  Clary immediately realised that if she did not tell the truth, the captain would find out for himself. Her disguise was flimsy and could be ripped away at any moment. However, she also realised the trouble Bill was in.

  If he admitted to being privy to this ruse, he would lose his place aboard the ship, and his livelihood with it. After all he had done for her, she could not allow him to suffer like that.

  “He didn’t know,” she rasped, clawing at the captain’s hands to get him to let go. “I lied to him, as I lied to you, Captain. He thought me a young man in need of help, and I sweetened the lie by telling him I could heal the sailors on-board—that part wasn’t a lie. He wanted to help them, Captain, and his heart was too big to refuse. That’s his only crime. He didn’t know what I am.”

  The captain shoved Clary away roughly, sending her crashing into the back wall of the small room. Her shoulders collided with a shelf, breaking through the rotten wood and sending up a chorus of frantic squeaks from the rats that had been hiding there. The spiders and woodlice scurried away too, evidently fearing the turn this confession might take.

  Bill looked like he was about to say something, likely in Clary’s defence, but she shot him a hard look and gave a subtle shake of her head, as if to say: “Let me do this for you. Let me do this one thing for you.”

  “What’s the use in healing me men if you’ve doomed us all?” Captain Wilks ran an anxious hand across his stubble, the sound reminding Clary of the scratch of rats creeping around the ship. “Do you know nothing of seafaring folk?”

  Clary swallowed uneasily. “I don’t, Captain. I’m sorry.”

  “If you bring a woman aboard, you might as well set fire to the whole vessel!” the captain growled. “It’s bad luck, is what it is, and you’ve just put that evil on us with your lies.”

  It seemed he was content to believe that Bill had had no part in any of this, which gave Clary a sliver of comfort amidst the maelstrom of terror that swirled within her.

  What would the captain do with her? Would he throw her overboard, in the hopes it might appease whatever sea gods he believed in? Or would he at least allow her to disembark at Manchester?

  Clary bowed her head. “I didn’t know that, Captain. I didn’t mean to put you all in danger. I just… wanted to get to Manchester, and I didn’t know how else to do it. I couldn’t afford passage on any of the other ships. This was my only chance, and I took it, and… I’m sorry.”

  Bill fidgeted awkwardly. She could tell he wanted to come to her aid, and make sure she was not bruised or injured. And she could tell he wanted to tell the real truth, but she prayed he would not. For his sake. This pursuit of her family was not worth him losing his employment.

  The captain sighed and narrowed his eyes at Clary. “Let’s hope you’ve only cast your wickedness on this leg of the voyage. As soon as we dock in Manchester, you’re to leave without a word. Say nothing to anyone. If the lads find out about this, they’ll get off and they’ll not come back.” He paused. “And you’re to stay in this room until we get to Manchester. I’m going to lock you in, and there’ll be no food, no water, no nothing, except what you’ve already got in here. Do you understand me?”

  Clary nodded, knowing her sentence could have been far worse. “Yes, Captain.”

  “What will you tell the lads?” Bill spoke up, casting an anxious glance at Clary.

  Captain Wilks scowled. “I’ll have to tell ‘em this “healer” got sick and can’t see no more patients.” He grabbed Bill by the front of his shirt. “And if you say aught, I’ll throw you into the water so fast you won’t even know you’re wet ‘til you start sinking.”

  Please agree with him, Bill. Do whatever he says. My plight is not worth your pain.

  “I won’t utter a word, Captain,” Bill promised, allowing Clary to take a relieved breath.

  The captain wrenched open the store room door and pushed Bill through it, denying Clary the opportunity to say farewell.

  A moment later, Captain Wilks followed him out into the walkway beyond, before the door slammed and Clary heard the sound of a key turning in the lock.

  Stumbling back to the chair, Clary sat down and held her head in her hands as her breath came in short, panting gasps.

  Her gaze lifted for a moment and settled upon the five flickering candles that cast their glow upon the room, chasing away the shadows and the rats, and the other creatures that hid away in the holes and nooks and crannies of the ship. Without that light, there would be nothing but darkness, and she did not know how long they would hold out.

  In desperation, she got up and blew out three of them, before returning to her position at the desk, where two candles remained. Pulling them closer together, where they created a halo of light around her, she prayed it would be enough to keep the rats at bay. For if those oily, foul creatures became too bold, she knew she might be the one dousing herself in vinegar when they arrived at the dock.

  “A rat bite will kill ye slow as anythin’,” Dolly had always warned. “Puts bad humours in the blood. There’s poison in them nippin’ teeth, let me tell ye.”

  Please, last until morning… Please.

  Though she feared the plunging, impenetrable darkness just as much as she feared what hid withi
n it.

  Chapter Ten

  By the time dawn came, Clary had a single nub of wax to keep the dark away. The flame swayed precariously with every breath she exhaled, and more than once she had been forced to push the candle gently out of the way of swollen beads of saltwater that dripped from the beams above her head.

  If the wick got wet, she would be swamped in shadow, unable to light the candle again.

  As for the food that Bill had left; she had managed to swallow it down, if only to stop the smell of the cheese and bread from bringing the rats out of their hideaways. The meal continued to sit heavily in her stomach, and she did not know if she would see it again, should the ship decide to rock violently.

  Will I be allowed to say goodbye to Bill? She touched the twin coins around her neck, but they would not warm in her icy palm. Have I really put him in danger by being aboard this ship?

  She had never known that seafarers had so many superstitions, and Bill had never mentioned there might be risks if she came on-board. That calmed her somewhat, for a superstition only had power if it a person gave it power.

  If Bill did not believe it would bring about a curse, or bad tidings, or something of that ilk, then perhaps the Dawn Voyager would be all right. She certainly hoped so.

  True, she had not known Bill for very long, but she could not bear the idea of any harm befalling him, especially not because of her.

  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

  With the flame of her last candle almost gone, Clary lifted her weary head as she heard unusual sounds coming from outside, filtering in through the warped wood: the clatter and clang of activity. Shouts followed, though she could not quite hear what was being said. Still, it was enough to let her know that they had docked at their destination, when combined with the fact that the ship had stopped moving.

  Her eyes darted to the store room door as the rasp of a turning key cut through the outside noise. Her heart fluttered for a moment, hoping to see Bill’s familiar face. Instead, she saw the gruff, disapproving visage of Captain Wilks.