Burning Bright (9 page)

The carriage came to a halt, and the driver climbed down and opened the door for her. “Let me help you into the boat, miss,” he said.

Before Elinor could protest, she was handed down into a rowboat shining with fresh black paint, manned by two seamen who looked younger than she was. “
You’re
going t’
Athena
?” the nearer one said. His front teeth had a gap between them, and when he said
Athena
it came out as
Asena
. He glanced back at his partner, who shrugged.

“Just take the lady to the ship, and keep your opinions to yourself,” the driver said, handing down Elinor’s trunk. “Good luck, miss.”

Elinor twisted around in her seat to watch him drive away, and when she turned to face front again, the young seamen had begun pulling at the oars in straight, smooth strokes. They were facing the wrong way, or at least Elinor thought they ought to watch where they were going instead of where they’d been, but they didn’t seem concerned they might run into some other boat. Both seemed fascinated with her, and Elinor wished she could pull her hood over her face again, regain that anonymity.

“Goin’ t’ the
Asena
,” the sailor said. “Wotcher goin’ there for?”

“Are you one of
Athena’
s crew?” Elinor asked. The young man nodded. “Then I suppose you will learn that once we’re there, won’t you?” Captain Ramsay likely resented her for his not being allowed to forewarn his crew about her presence. Elinor ruthlessly shoved her anxieties away again—plenty of time to entertain them in private, once she…
oh, no, will I even have a private place to sleep? Don’t people on ships sleep in hammocks? I will
never
be able to sleep in a hammock. It’s fortunate I can’t swim, or I would risk the Thames and go home.
But she knew she wasn’t going back, even if it did mean sleeping in a hammock, surrounded by a hundred sailors.

They came out from among the great ships being loaded at the docks, into smooth, murky water the color of grey, smoked glass, and the young men, again without looking, steered the boat so it was pointed at a large ship anchored a short distance away. From here, she could clearly read the word ATHENA painted across the rear of the ship. It was beautiful, all sleek curving lines contrasting with the straight masts and cross-beams, its black paint and yellow trim fresh and bright, its sails bundled along the masts white in the morning sun. They were approaching the side of the ship from the rear, which gave it a foreshortened look and prevented Elinor from seeing whatever figurehead might be mounted at the front; would they have put an image of the Greek goddess there?

A bay of six glass-paned windows across the rear of the ship looked out of place, as if someone’s sitting room were trying to emerge from the ship’s curved posterior. She counted the red-lined gun ports—thirteen, so
Athena
carried twenty-six guns, and more—she couldn’t tell how many—on the deck above. The ship looked enormous to Elinor, though based on the number of guns it was actually small compared to the 74-gun ships of the line that were the pride of the Royal Navy. Lord Melville had called
Athena
one of their fastest ships, but Elinor had trouble believing anything that size could possibly be fast.
That
, however, was an opinion she planned to keep to herself. She had heard sailors were proud of their ships and didn’t like outsiders criticizing them. At least she knew better than to call it a boat.

It loomed larger as they neared it, the oarsmen not slowing down at all. Elinor gripped the rough edge of her seat and bit her lip to keep from screaming at them to stop before they crashed into the ship. Just as she was certain she would be finding out whether or not she could swim, the seamen dipped the oars, and the boat turned, slowed, and came to a neat stop next to
Athena’
s side, barely kissing the wood without leaving a mark.

Wooden cleats affixed to the ship’s side ran from the waterline to the deck, high above, like a primitive ladder. Climbing it would be impossible, even if she weren’t wearing a gown. “I can’t climb that,” she told the men, reddening with embarrassment. She was not even aboard ship and already she needed special treatment.

“Identify yourself!” A head, darkly backlit against the lightening sky, peered down at them.

The first seaman stood up, rocking the boat so Elinor had to grip the edge of her seat again. “Lady comin’ aboard! Send down the bo’sun’s chair!”

Moments later a bundle came into view, high above, and was slowly lowered toward them. It turned out to be some kind of seat that did not look stable, a tangle of canvas and rope that, once untangled, hung limp like a child’s swing. The seaman helped Elinor arrange herself in it, holding the ropes while she tried to balance in its exact center and simultaneously keep her gown from hiking up; the other young man stared at her slack-jawed and did not offer to help. The gap-toothed sailor strapped a harness around her and shouted again.

Elinor gasped as the “chair” jerked into motion. She kept a firm grip, for despite how securely she was fastened into it, she felt terribly unsafe. She carefully kept her eyes fixed straight ahead, insisting to herself she was safe, truly she was; they had handled the whole transaction so matter-of-factly they must do this all the time, and there was nothing to worry about.

The seat rotated slightly, and she gripped the rope so tightly the fibers cut into her palm as her view went from being one of the ships moored at the dock to the smooth black side of
Athena
, so close she could have touched it if she’d dared let go of what she was clinging to. The young seaman shouted something up at her, but she couldn’t make it out. A gull swept past, croaking its shrill cry; she squeaked involuntarily and cringed, then felt like a fool.
It’s only a bird. And you’re not dangling what feels like twenty feet in the air with nothing beneath you but a tiny wooden boat and who knows how many feet of filthy water.

Soon her eyes were level with the deck, then she rose above it and realized the seat was attached to a spar and its ropes were being pulled on by several men who acted as if her slight weight was almost impossible for them to manage. A couple of crewmen came forward to help her out of the chair; they both looked puzzled at her appearance, as if they hadn’t been expecting her. Which, of course, they weren’t. “I would like to speak to Captain Ramsay, please,” she said.

They looked at one another, then at her, their expressions of puzzlement deepening. “The Capt’n?” one said. “Wotcher want w’ the Capt’n?”

“That’s my business,” Elinor said in her most patrician manner, softening it slightly with a serenely smiling visage. She was barely able to understand his thick accent. Yet another problem she had not considered when embarking on the madness that was this journey. Behind her, the ropes and pulleys creaked again. She hoped it was her…dunnage, yes. It was like learning a foreign language.

“Whom have you brought on board?” A dark-haired man wearing a lieutenant’s epaulette approached her. He sounded irritated. “We are not expecting—I beg your pardon, who are you?”

“I have business with Captain Ramsay,” Elinor said in that same firm tone.

“And what business is that?” The lieutenant had bad skin and a nose that turned up at the tip, which gave him the appearance of a somewhat seedy elf.

“Private business. Can you conduct me to him, Lieutenant?”

The lieutenant looked her up and down, almost leering, as if he had a suspicion of what the captain’s private business might be.
Again I wonder if there is something about me that makes men believe I am open to the most immoral practices.
“Certainly,” he said. “Follow me.”

There was rope
everywhere
, tawny, thick strands strung like a giant child’s cat’s cradle from the masts to the sails and from there to the deck, where it was wound round pegs and an enormous spool with spokes emerging from it. Men swarmed over the deck, hauling more rope and wooden buckets and other things she did not recognize; they stepped around Elinor, glancing at her, but did not pause in their activities. They were surprisingly quiet, speaking just above a normal volume, rarely shouting out to their fellows but appearing to understand one another quite well nevertheless.

Elinor looked up at the sails and observed more men clinging to the masts and the cross-pieces—she ought to at least learn the names of the ship’s parts, if she were to be even nominally a part of Captain Ramsay’s crew. They were beginning to unfurl the white sails, and Elinor wondered if the wind would be sufficient to take them out of harbor or if they might be stranded here at Deptford for days. Days during which her father could search for her.

She closed her fists until her nails cut into her palms. Her father might think to ask the butler, who knew Elinor had hired a hackney the previous day and might have heard her instruct the driver to take her to the Admiralty. Then he might manage to find someone there who had seen her…she unclenched her fists. Lord Melville and the two admirals would say nothing. Her father would not be able to find her. And even if he did, Captain Ramsay would not allow him to drag her, screaming, off
Athena
. Probably.

The lieutenant led her past a grating over a large, square hole in the deck to a set of steep stairs—Elinor was tempted to turn around and go down them as if they were a ladder, but the lieutenant seemed quite casual about descending them, and she already disliked him enough not to want to show weakness in front of him—and into a noisy, crowded place filled with sweaty bodies and cannons larger around than she was.

Men shouted past each other and laughed at jokes she couldn’t make out, told in accents she couldn’t understand. The walls curved just the slightest bit, and the ceiling was low enough the lieutenant had to duck a little to avoid cracking his head on the beams. It was lit only by the sunlight coming through the gun ports and by brass lanterns giving off an orangeish light; she heard the noise decrease, and as her eyes adjusted to the dimness, she saw the men nearest her were staring, their silence spreading outward until Elinor felt deafened by it.

She turned and hurried to catch up to the lieutenant, who had moved without hesitation beyond the stairs to a door whose carved moldings belonged in a country house rather than on board a ship, an unexpected contrast to the flimsy wall into which it was set. Beyond that was a tiny, windowless room with another door, on which the lieutenant knocked and said, “Captain? You have a…visitor.” He looked at Elinor over his shoulder and smiled; it was, again, nearly a leer.

Elinor responded with a smile of her own, innocent friendliness concealing her irritation.
I wonder what that smile of yours will look like when you learn we are shipmates?

Half a minute later, the door opened, revealing Ramsay in the process of buttoning his jacket. “Miss Pembroke,” he said, “please come in. Thank you, Mr. Livingston, that will be all.” Elinor glanced back before the door closed and saw, for a moment, a hint of disdain touch the lieutenant’s eyes.

This room was brightly lit by the morning sun pouring through the clear glass of the windows, two of which were open to catch the brisk air and the sound of seabirds
kraaawing
across the river. With pictures adorning the walls, it had a comfortable, home-like look. Less domestic was the pair of swords mounted one above the other on the wall to her right, the longer one decorated with gilt and a tassel, the shorter one plainer with signs of use. There was another door to the left, smaller and flimsy by comparison to the others, and a couple of covered objects Elinor realized after a moment were small cannons. They were a reminder that this room, as homelike as it seemed, was still built primarily for war.

Two couches upholstered in brown leather, with a short oak cabinet resting between them, fit nicely into the space beneath the windows, though why they were attached to the walls, she could only guess—to keep them secure in bad weather, perhaps? A long table stood near the furthest left-hand window where the light would fall most brightly on its surface, with a log book open on it, and a chair was drawn up to it at an angle as if someone had just got up, for example, to answer the door.

“You’re earlier than I expected,” Ramsay said.

“This is apparently what the First Lord meant when he said he would send a carriage in the morning,” Elinor said. This was the first time she had seen the captain in full light. His face was long and interestingly bony, his nose a little crooked as if he’d broken it once and had it imperfectly set. He wore his light-brown hair cut short and swept back from his face, which again had that neutral expression she’d seen in the Admiralty, and his eyes were a startling blue against his tanned skin. Elinor had heard seamen grew weathered and prematurely aged because of their exposure to wind and wave, but despite the faint lines at the corners of his eyes, Ramsay didn’t look old, merely as if he were contemplating a puzzle he was not certain he could solve.

“Where is your companion?” he asked.

“My—?” Elinor flushed. “I have no companion.”

Ramsay’s eyebrows went up. “No companion? Miss Pembroke, do you have no care for your reputation at all?”

“I cannot expect another woman to endure what are apparently the privations of shipboard life,” Elinor retorted.
And I cannot afford to hire a duenna or abigail.

“You know what society will think if word of your…adventure…gets around.”

“I am depending on you to see it does not, Captain.”

Ramsay’s lips tightened. “That’s quite an expectation. Mr. Selkirk has the boys in charge; none of our officers have wives aboard. And duenna is not among my duties.”

“I apologize, Captain. Please believe I do not hold you responsible for the keeping of my reputation. I meant only that I know you will do your best to conceal my presence here. And I think my being an Extraordinary is some protection.”

“Protection from overt censure, possibly. I still think you should have a companion.”

“Where do you suggest I find one at this juncture?”