Page 27 of Unlikely Heroes
Able couldn’t help laughing. Perhaps he had drunk more rum than the law required, but itwasfunny. He held out his hand to Angus Ogilvie. “Good night to you, sir.”
“And to you.” He didn’t leave. “Able, may I accompany you to the blockade?”
“We’ll be crowded. TheMercuryonly has six berths.”
“No matter,” Ogilvie said, brushing aside any obstacles. “You’ll be on hot racks anyway, with your small crew.”
“True enough. I’ll be acquainting my seafaring pupils with the joys of watch and watch about, so there should always be empty berths. Why now, sir, if I may ask?”
“If the occasion arises, you can set me ashore in Spain. I suspect Admiral Calder will order you to join his squadron for a while.”
“Dangerous work,” Able said, wondering how Headmaster Croker would appreciate the students of St. Brendan’s heading into deeper trouble than mere messaging. “I’ll remind you that my oldest crewmember is fourteen.”
“If you can believe him. Smitty looks older.”
“You were at the reading of Sir B’s will. His brother Edward’s by-blow would be fourteen. Why wereyouthere at the reading?”
It sounded presumptuous to a man whose ears buzzed a little from overmuch rum. Even Euclid was silent, perhaps already sleeping off the rum. Still, Ogilvie’s answer surprised him.
“I like Grace St. Anthony. Good night to you. You sail on the tide?”
And that was that. Able hoped Meri wasn’t asleep. She wasn’t. When he came into their chamber, she rose from bed, took his hand and walked him toward Ben’s room. “Our son has turned into a bit of a martinet. He thought to order me about in French. I told him what I thought about that and he sobered up considerably.”
Able watched their sleeping son, admiring such a complex creation from two people who loved each other. He would never tell Meri in a million years, but he stored up in his heart those wonderful moments when he had tapped on his sleeping wife’s swollen belly and felt answering taps. They had developed a little code that he tried out, once Ben was born – two taps, answered by three taps, then so on through a lengthy sequence. He had sired a mathematician.
Meri didn’t need to know that. “He’ll always keep you on your toes,” Able said.
“We’ll manage. Come now, Able. We’re wasting time and I know you sail on the tide.”
She loved him thoroughly, and then again before anyone was awake. He hated partings as well as the next navy man. At least she was kind enough to brush the tears from his eyes.
“I don’t like to be wept on,” she whispered. “I do want another baby, however. You know, just a normal child this time. It might be a novelty.”
How did she do it? Make him chuckle, and tear up, and go through the ecstasy of mad, slow love in an ordinary bed? He looked closer and saw her tears this time. “I did not know you when I sailed to war before,” he said. “At the dock, I had watched other partings of my mates from their wives, and resolved never to do that to a woman.”
“Thank goodness you changed your mind,” she said, settling in, comfortable. “I trust I am strong enough for these farewells.”
It remained unspoken between them, the thought that any farewell could be the final one.
The household woke at first light to the fragrance of ham, eggs, applesauce, cinnamon toast and beans from Mrs. Perry’s kitchen. Avon joined them from across the street and they all tucked into a monstrous breakfast. No Rat complained. They, their master included, never forgot workhouse lessons of eating when the food was there, against a time when it was not.
After breakfast, Meri made her Rats open their duffels. She advised all of them to take more socks and smallclothes and waited until they obeyed.
“I put in enough socks and smallclothes,” Able whispered in her ear. He whispered something else and she gasped.
He had never seen her blush so much. She thought a moment, this wife of his. “I could sprinkle more lilac talcum on whichever shimmy you stole.”
“Not this time,” he said. “It’s a short voyage. I’ll use it for my pillowcase and go to sleep a happy man.”
Funny how the whole school decided to walk with them by the Gunwharf where theMercurybobbed on the receding tide. Sailing Master Durable Six felt the wind precisely right against his cheek. Ideal. Over shorter heads, he smiled at Headmaster Croker, who shrugged and came closer.
“It was rank insubordination, but my instructors said the Gunwharf Rats walked out of class, so here we are.” Thaddeus Croker appeared not even slightly unhappy about this minor mutiny.
What did surprise him about Headmaster Croker was the cane he leaned upon. “Sir, is this an old injury?” he asked, as he slowed his pace to accommodate the man.
“Something that flares up now and then,” Thaddeus said. He changed the subject beyond redemption, but Able wondered.
It touched Able’s heart to see others. The entire St. Brendan’s kitchen staff, and look, Portsmouth’s constables, headed by Walter Cornwall and his wife Betsy, were there, too, along with Royal Marines. He didn’t see Captain Ogilvie, but suspected the man was already below.
