Come Looking for Me. Cheryl Cooper
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Kettle rolled her eyes and planted her puffy hands on her wide hips. “It ain’t in me duties to be undressin’ young ladies for yer examination.”
“Since you are the only other woman on this ship, I have no other alternative.”
Mrs. Kettle yanked the canvas shut behind her. “Off with yer clothes. The doctor needs to be lookin’ at ya.” She pulled at Emily’s blue velvet spencer-jacket, causing her to cry out in pain.
“Careful, Mrs. Kettle, please. She is grievously injured,” Leander called out, wishing he had given more thought to the wisdom in summoning the laundress in the first place.
“I wonder if she’s that gentle with the men in her cot,” whispered Fly.
Leander looked disapprovingly at his friend over his spectacles.
“Right then, Doctor, she’s ready fer ya,” said Mrs. Kettle, coming from behind the canvas curtain.
“Thank you for sharing your invaluable time.”
“S’pose I didn’t ’ave a choice now, did I?” She opened the door. “Make sure ya check her female parts.”
Dr. Braden raised his eyebrows.
“If she’s been roamin’ thee seas with Yankee sailors she’s likely with child. And if she hurled herself overboard, she likely didn’t fancy thee father.”
9:30 p.m.
(First Watch, Three Bells)
OCTAVIUS LINDSAY took his place at the mess table in the wardroom. “Biscuit, it’s terribly late and I’m starving. What have you cooked up for us tonight?”
“Lobscouse, sir.” Biscuit plunked down a pot of unsavoury-looking stew in the middle of the table. “Ya’ll be lucky to get anythin’ tonight, Lord Lindsay. Think of yer buddies we gave up to thee sea this afternoon.”
“It’s all part of the service,” Octavius retorted. “I wouldn’t be surprised we throw your old bones overboard before this war ends.”
“And what would ya do without yer old cook to boil yer porridge for ya and serve up yer rations of grog, eh?”
“Aye, you have a good point there, Biscuit,” said Fly Austen. His eyes were bright and his cheeks flushed as a result of his previous partaking of spirits in the captain’s cabin. “Do try to stay clear of enemy fire.”
“If they come after old Biscuit, I’ll cut ’em up with me cutlass.”
“That’s if you can see them coming,” snorted Mr. Spooner, the stout purser.
“I’ll have me one eye lookin’ at ’im and me other lookin’ for ’im,” said Biscuit, dishing up the mixture of salted meat, potatoes, biscuit bits, onions, and pepper.
The men laughed, then rushed to guzzle a glass of wine before having to taste Biscuit’s supper.
James mentally counted his dinner guests. There were only six seated around the mess table; normally there were eight who dined together. “I know our sailing master, Mr. Harding, having lost his foot, is recuperating in the hospital, but where is our doctor? Still at work?”
“Operating on our lady’s shoulder in your cabin, sir,” said Fly, passing the wine to Mr. Spooner.
“You gentlemen begin without me.” James pushed back his chair and stood up. “Biscuit, while I’m gone, replenish the decanters.”
He walked up one deck to his quarters, now a makeshift operating room, and quietly stepped inside. Osmund Brockley, whose large tongue hung out of his mouth as he beheld Emily’s bare shoulders, was pinning her arms to her sides. Leander swabbed the gaping hole in her right shoulder and picked up a large prong-like instrument.
“James, would you mind giving Emily the rope?”
“Have you given her anything to dull the pain, Lee?” James whispered, feeling very warm all of a sudden.
“Laudanum and rum.”
Emily readily accepted the piece of rope from James and bit down on it as hard as she could. Tears of agony streamed from her dark eyes as the doctor entered her wound in search of the lead. Her body tensed as she endured the pain. Osmund grunted as he tightened his hold on her.
“There now, I’ve got it,” Leander said, triumphantly holding up the offending ball. “We’ll just clean and bandage you up and let you get back to sleep.”
Emily smiled wanly before closing her eyes.
James waited until Leander was done before motioning him into a corner of the room.
“Now that you’ve looked her over, what’s the word?”
“She has a broken left ankle, and severe cuts on both hands. She’s dehydrated and half starved. Her bullet wound, however, should heal up nicely.”
James pursed his lips as he listened. “Well, dinner is on the table in the wardroom. It looks quite unpalatable, but you should take time for some refreshment.”
“I don’t dare leave her alone with Osmund. He’s been making very strange sounds. There’s no telling what that man might do.”
“Yes, quite. I don’t like the look of him.” James scratched his head. “Should we ask Mrs. Kettle to sit with her?
“Heavens, no,” said Leander. “Given the chance, she’d toss our guest overboard.”
“In that case, would you allow me to call up Gus Walby?”
“By all means! Young Walby’s a most trustworthy fellow.”
James hesitated a moment, then gave Leander a sheepish grin. “But first, let us have her removed at once to your hospital. I’m afraid I would not be setting a good example to the men if she were to stay alone with me in my cabin.”
10:15 p.m.
(First Watch)
ON THE LOWER DECK, Bailey Beck and the two cook’s mates, the Jamaican brothers Maggot and Weevil, gathered the few belongings of the sailors who had lost their lives earlier in the day. Their clothing and possessions would be sold off at the mast on the following day to the highest bidder, and the raised money sent home to England to benefit their dependents. The men worked by lantern-light, humming sea shanties, and fortifying themselves with the extra ration of grog Captain Moreland had ordered for them to ease the burden of their unpleasant task.
Above deck, despite the sadness of the day and the repair work that had to be done, James allowed those hands who hadn’t rushed to their beds in exhaustion to gather as usual for a bit of entertainment. Biscuit played his fiddle and the young sail maker, Magpie, his flute. The men clapped and cheered as Morgan Evans hopped up on an overturned crate to lead them in singing an ode to grog:
While up the shrouds the sailor goes,
Or ventures on the yard,
The landsman, who no better knows
Believes his lot is hard,
But Jack with smiles each danger meets,
Casts anchor, heaves the log,
Trims all the sails, belays the sheets,
And drinks his can of grog.
* * *
THE DIN ON THE WEATHER DECKS awakened Emily. For a few bewildering moments, she glanced about her tiny room – illumined by a lantern, which swung gently on a wooden peg by her feet – trying to remember how she came to be in this new place … on this new ship. Someone had placed her in a cot next to a sealed gunport, and closed off her corner with the aid of two lengths of canvas suspended over a rope affixed to the ceiling timbers. Despite the noise overhead, she could hear moaning and weeping beyond the canvas. One or two people were moving quietly about, speaking words of reassurance to those