Page 48 of Unlikely Heroes
Nick sat by himself in the dining room. Since Master Ferrier had requested he keep detailed notes of each class, Nick had accumulated a tidy pile of paper, which he had tabbed and separated into folders. Meridee watched him from the door of the dining room, mindful that his earlier chaotic years in the Dartmouth workhouse compelled order in his brain.
She knew that some of the other Rats had needed bits of food to squirrel away in their bedchambers against the nightly fear of hunger. With Nick, the need had been a hunger for the order found in books, paper and pencil. She wondered if he could manage the chaos of the HMSVictoryin battle.
“Nick, there is someone here who has news for you,” she said. “Do make yourself known to Reverend Scott. Sir? This is Nick Bonfort.” Her heart breaking, she smiled at them both and ushered Lord Nelson’s secretary forward. “He has wonderful news for you.”
She turned away, blinded already by tears, and bumped into Able behind her. He tried to hold her there but she wrenched herself out of his grasp and hurried up the stairs, desperate to shut her bedroom door on them all. She stood against the door and gulped back her tears, listening. Silence, silence, and then a whoop from Nick.
Meridee covered her face with her hands and sobbed. Oddly, her ordinary mind took her on a journey of its own back to an afternoon when she had committed some childhood infraction and been sentenced to read several improving chapters in the book of…which one was it?
She went to her side of the bed and sat down, reaching for the Bible. Impatient with herself, wishing she had a brain like her traitor husband’s, she stared at blurry pages. She didn’t hear the door open, but Able sat beside her next, his arm around her.
She was no fool. She could have leaned away. She could have pushed him away. Instead, she burrowed closer. “Where does it say… someone mourning for her children? I have to know.”
“The Jeremiah version or the St. Matthew one?” he asked sharply.
“Don’t, Able, please don’t.”
“I’m sorry.”
She knew he didn’t need the Bible; he had memorized it on one voyage or another, but she wanted more. “Tell me in your own words,” she demanded.
“What?” he asked in mock astonishment, which lightened her heart. “You prefer me to the Lord?”
“At times,” she replied. “I know you know all verses by heart because your brain has no choice. Tell your brain I wantyou, not some dusty prophet.”
She watched his face, hoping she hadn’t offended his weird genius. When he smiled, she knew better. “Rachel won’t let herself be comforted, because her children are gone.”
“I’m going to miss Nick,” she managed. “I miss them all, but Nick… You understand.”
“I do, lady of my heart. Imagine leading them into danger, as I do.”
She took a deep breath, amazed that she hadn’t considered his view. “Shame on me for whining,” she said softly.
She let herself be gathered in his arms. He gently pulled her down beside him until she rested her cheek against his uniform buttons. He gave her his handkerchief and she tucked it under her cheek. This was his best uniform; he didn’t need tearstains on it.
“No shame there, Meri. You love your Gunwharf Rats, too. Remember the next verse?” he asked. He put the damp handkerchief over her nose. “Blow.”
She did as he demanded and felt slightly better. Maybe she should lighten this dark moment she had brought on them both. “I know it doesn’t say ‘blow.’”
He chuckled. “Meri, what a mother you are. This is what Jeremiah wrote in the next verse.”
“Your words, please.”
“They’ll return from enemy lands. For the sake of argument, let us add seas. Most people never think of that verse, but I do. It keeps me going. Will it keep you going?”
Would it? She kissed his cheek. “I believe it will.”
“I know it will, because you are Meridee Six, mother of many, wife of one, and my heart of oak.”
Chapter Twenty-one
TheMercurysailed two days later in early September with the tide and the wind from the right quarter, blowing them toward Spain. Meri and Ben saw them off from the Gunwharf, Nick standing beside the woman he called Mum, looking not even slightly sad, because he had his own sea duty ahead in mere weeks.
Even Smitty had been properly impressed when informed that Nick’s duty would see him aboard the HMSVictory, the flagship of Lord Nelson himself. “Good God, Nick!” he had exclaimed in his inimitable Smitty way, “Who do youknow?” That made all the Gunwharf Rats laugh, Able included. They knew they didn’t know anybody.
“Smitty, sometimes you just get lucky,” Able told hisMercurysailing master later that evening. “It so happens that the admiral’s secretary is drowning in paperwork and needs an organizer to stack, file and collate.”
“That would be Nick,” Smitty agreed. And still being Smitty, he had given Able a long look. “We Rats don’t get lucky often, though. Master Six, didyouget lucky?”
