The Book of Shadows (60 page)

I did receive, in return, the brig's most comfortable quarters: a room twice as long as it was wide, wide enough for a single berth; it has a starboard porthole, this table and chair, which I am eager to surrender, a bank of glass-enclosed bookshelves that I have sampled (reading all I ever care to read of adventures in the South Seas, of mythic sea beasts and islands where the women go about bare-breasted in skirts of grass), and a sort of pantry, which was, when I boarded, rather generously stocked with jugs of fresh water, a keg of sea biscuit, several Bologna sausages, a bowl of citrus, a ham, roast mutton, and bottles of assorted cordials and liqueurs, none of which I've failed to taste. All that was left for me to procure was a store of candles, some phosphorous matches, ink, and pens. This I had time enough to do in Marseilles that evening, before letting a room in a quayside inn, the common room of which I was afraid of entering, as it seemed home to the fearful sailor and the even more fearful woman who keeps his company…. I was wrong to think one might actually
sleep
in such a place. Having secured a map of America, I retired with it to my room, against the door of which I propped the only chair. On the bed, with torn cloth stuffed in my ears against the ceaseless singing from belowstairs, I studied the map. Hungry, I fell asleep. Hungrier still, I woke at first light. Famished, I was the first to board the
Ceremaju
…. So fast did I tear into that larder that I failed to bid
adieu
to the fading coast of France.

Happily, I can record here that our crossing was without incident, and that we—that is, the captain, a mate, a cook, four seamen, myself, and one Mr. Hunt, who is returning to Richmond in the company of a Negro girl whom he quite preposterously says he
owns,
and whom he has named Melody, for she sings beautifully—indeed much of what I've written above has been set down to her accompaniment….
Enfin,
we are all about to arrive in Richmond infine shape. To be accurate, I should say that I've a sore left shoulder owing to the swollen seas of three nights back which tossed me from my bunk not once, but twice; and sure there's been a bit of
le mal de mer,
but I'm told that is to be expected. A bit of
le mal du pays,
too; also to be expected, for who sails from their homeland without some measure of sadness?

So it's here, in sight of the seaboard—and I'm thrilled to see it, and to
smell
it too, for it is not the open sea that smells but rather the sea's edge—it is here that this tale ends. For now. Certainly, there's much more to come, all of it still a mystery to me. Perhaps I'll sail on. (I have enjoyed the sailing.) The captain has invited me to do so, and has told me of the brig's itinerary: more tobacco to be loaded on at Richmond, then it's off to the far tip of the Floridas for salt, which he'll carry to La Havane, Cuba, there loading up with coffee and hemp, which he'll relay to
La Nouvelle Orléans
…There, at least the language would be familiar….
Alors, qui sait?

From the scratchings and goings-on above deck one would think some wild animals had been loosed to run about. The mate is shouting this and that, none of which I understand—a new language, this, the
spoken
English of America. Melody, I notice, has stopped singing. I have written on and on, but now I must put this pen down, indeed pack it and all else I own into the
nécessair
…. Ah yes, the
nécessair
. That trunk with which I left Ravndal, that trunk I eventually emptied of Sebastiana's
musée des modes,
emptied of all but the black velvet bag, which I shoved this way and that as I repacked the trunk with new clothes and books, et cetera, never once thinking to open it and examine its contents.

In that black velvet bag, you see, I made a discovery. Two nights ago, when first it occurred to me that I ought to begin organizing my things and readying to disembark. Only then did I come across that sack Sebastiana had given me, pressed upon me at Ravndal. Only then did I open it, long after tossing it into the trunk without a thought. And what I found was enough to…

No, I cannot go on. There
simply
isn't time! The mate has knocked three times on my door. And there is confusion above deck, an excitement I am eager to join.

…So instead I will insert here those few words, those pages I scribbled that very night, two nights ago, seated topside with the deed already done, an inkwell steady in my left hand, a sharpened quill in my right. The sea was wonderfully steady. I wrote what follows by the high and bright light of the moon, of course.

Read on.

T
HIS SEA
-
NIGHT
is sublime—wind enough to fill the sails, not enough to roil the black water.

Two, maybe three days from landfall, they say. I am ready.

I am a ship sailing out of my life. To a new life.

I am ready.

Topside now.

Had to move carefully, step lightly: winches like the hands of the greedy, pinching pulleys, sudden-swinging booms, and ropes coiled to strike like snakes…This brig is a thing alive, that much I've learned. And it sings—sings constantly—mimics the sea—the sucking wind, the high whine of the wind, the whisper of the waves…Dances too, dances its sea dance day and night.

 

I left the Books to come topside. To do what I had to do. To the accompaniment of these songs: the ship's, the sea's.

I came with hands full—the basket, the bag—to this, my spot, in a corner of the stern. (Men about, but none notice me. Some are asleep, swinging in hammocks.)

I have it all with me. No—I
had
it all with me.

I've already done what I had to do. Done it, yes.

 

Bone by bone from the soft basket went Madeleine into the sea.

 

The bag…Sebastiana's full black bag, full, full…

Forgotten till this night.

Packing that trunk—with books, new books—I saw again the soft black bag, curled like a cat in the canvas-lined corner. I touched it, to move it just so and…And I knew. Knew as soon as I touched it. Knew too what I would do.

I opened it. There, there like loot risen from the sea—belched up from the bloated belly of a long-gone galleon—there it all lay.

I spread the bag wide. Rolled its lips down. Both hands dipping, diving down birdlike, lifting the loot to let it rain back into the bag, again and again. My smile as bright as the silver and the gold and the gemstones.

Yes, there it all was:

Skavronsky's diamond heavy as an egg in my fist.

Rings from the Italian witches—Renata, Giuliana—rings of sea-green jasper and pale quirin.

The sapphire-set, golden ankh given by Luchina—it was Luchina, no? who gave the Egyptian gift of life to Sebastiana at the Greek Supper, sealing it with a kiss…

Bangles—one of them—of hammered gold—a cuff to cover the whole forearm. Rings to weight the witches' hand. Ropes of pearl—black, white, and gray—all entwined. Clusters of jeweled and filigreed silver and wrought gold and….

 

The black bag full of jewels. The soft basket full of bones.

 

To decide. What to keep of all we are given, all we receive, all we seek out and take. To decide.

Too, the bracelet from the Prince of Nassau.
Ornez celle qui orne son siècle
. Adorn she who adorns her century.

That and that alone I have kept. I wear it pushed high up onto my left forearm, as high as it will go, beneath a full sleeve.

Ornez celle
. Adorn she.

All the rest of it into the sea, stone by stone into the sea, into the moonlit opaline churning of the sea, broken by the on-sailing brig.

 

Stones and bones. Jewels. All of it into the shadowed sea. The sea.

 

What I see—the deed done—is a chain: jewel to bone to jewel to bone…trailing this brig…sinking down, down into the Deep…. A necklace…. A bridge.

Yes, a bridge of jewels and bones.

…
Adorn she
.

 

My way must be my own, no? I will
make
my way my own. As you must make yours.

 

We all of us travel alone over bridges made of jewels and bones.

Thank you to my family for allowing me an avocation; and to my agent, Suzanne Gluck, and my editor, Trish Grader, for providing me with a profession. Thanks also to Ben Short for his genorosity, and to the late Joe Jenner for his abiding guidance.

JAMES REESE was born in New York and presently lives in South Florida.

This is his first novel.

 

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