Astonished to be alive, Jamie found himself gasping in the stern. At the limit of his strength he groped for the door and fell into the cabin.
Skye was still in his corner retching, half-conscious, Hoag lying on his stomach, unconscious, Angelique curled up on a bench where he had left her, hanging on grimly, moaning and sobbing slightly, her eyes tightly closed. Shivering, he slumped beside her, chest heaving, mindless, knowing only that he was still alive and they were still safe.
After a while his eyes cleared. He saw land a mile or so away, and noticed that the rain had lessened and so had the sea. Now only the occasional wave came aboard. In a locker below the seat he found blankets and wrapped one around himself the other around Angelique.
"I'm so cold, Jamie, where have you been?" she sobbed like a frightened child, only half aware.
"I'm so cold, so lonely, and feel awful but so glad we did it, so glad, oh Jamie, I'm so cold..."
When they came alongside the Struan jetty a few misted stars were out. It was still early, at the edge of nightfall. The sky had cleared and promised a good day tomorrow. Merchantmen and the fleet lay safe at anchor, quiet, riding lights on--only the mail ship still being worked under a multitude of oil lamps like so many fireflies.
Nimbly the stoker jumped onto the wharf with a hawser and tied the craft, then helped the others.
Angelique first, then Skye and Hoag.
Jamie climbed the steps easily, still wrapped in his blanket, chilled but not badly. Skye and the doctor were pasty grey, their stomachs and heads ill at ease, legs weak. Now Angelique was much better. Her headache had gone. She had not been sick nor felt seasick. Once again she had cried herself out. The last half hour she had been on deck, away from the sick tainted air below, and had joined Jamie on the poop.
There she faced the salt-sweet wind and let it wash her brain clean again.
Behind her Hoag coughed up a wad of phlegm and spat it into the water lapping the pilings.
"Sorry," he muttered, needing a drink badly. Then he noticed the mess on the prow, some timbers crushed, the fore hatch stove in, bowsprit vanished, halliards gone, most of the gunnel. "What the hell happened?"
"Some flotsam was washed aboard, looked like a crate. Gave me a fright for a moment," Jamie said.
"Thought I heard a crash... I... think I'll, think I'll vis't the Club before turning in."
"I'll join you," Skye said, needing more than one drink to settle his stomach. "Jamie?
More'ss Angelique?"
She shook her head and Jamie said, "Off you go, nothing more to do tonight. Don't forget the plan."
They had agreed nothing was to be said other than, if asked, they had conducted a symbolic sea burial, nothing more.
Fortunately none of the others had seen the coffin come aboard or his struggle with it--except Tinker. As soon as he could, he had gone aloft to the wheelhouse. "Bosun, about the coffin, the others below saw nothing, so on your head, by God, you saw nothing and you say nothing either. It's our secret."
"Whatever you say, sorr." Tinker handed him the flask and touched his forelock, "Thanks.
Weren't for you we'd be below, all of us--along with him."
There was barely a swallow left but it helped.
"I thought I'd never make it. We forget it. Your oath, eh?"' "Whatever you say sorr, but afore we forget it, when the box sank an' broke up an' he come out it, he didn't half give me a turn, by God. I thort he were trying to bloody come back aboard."
"Jesus Christ," Jamie had gasped.
"You're imagining it, I saw nothing--you're imagining it."
"Oh no I weren't, sorr, my eye line's higher an' yors, right? An' I saw the bugger, begging your pardon, I saw him come out and flail for the surface afore he were sucked down."
"You're imagining things, for Christ's sake.
What an awful thing to say!"
"It's the God's Truth, sorr, so help me! 'Course it were only for a moment and sea spume were all around him but I seed him right enough!" Tinker had spat to leeward, touched wood, and made the sign against the Evil Eye and the Devil, and pulled the lobe of his ear to make his point. "God's truth, sorr an' strike me down if I lie, made my balls jump to Kingdom come. Struck out for the surface he did afore Davy Jones sucked him down, naked as a babe."
"A lot of bloody cobblers!
Nonsense!" Jamie remembered how he had shivered and touched wood himself just in case.
"You're imagining it, Bosun, though I swear to God that bloody coffin seemed to have a mind of its own, an evil one at that."
"My whole point, sorr, it were possessed by Old Nick hisself." Again Tinker spat to leeward, sweating. "Flailed for the surface he did, different like, eyes open and all, and I thort he was coming at us for good."
"For Christ's sake, give over!
Malcolm wouldn't do anything bad to us," he had said ill at ease. "It was a trick of your mind."
"My eye line, sorr, was high--"' "Forget your bloody eye line. Have you any rum left?"' Tinker coughed and reached into a hidden locker and pulled out another flask. It was half empty.
Jamie took a large swallow, choked, and took another.
"There'll be ten cases of rum in our warehouse for you to draw against, Tinker, with my thanks. You did a fine job, so did the stoker--four cases for him." Tinker thanked him effusively. The grand rum heat in his stomach had swamped all his chill. He looked at the old weathered face and shrewd blue eyes. "I was never so bloody scared, never, in my whole life. I thought I was a goner three or four times."
"Not me, sorr," the Bosun said with a grin.
"Not with you aboard, but I was right happy when the bugger and his box were overboard and him sucked down cursing us all the way..."
Though safe ashore, again Jamie shivered, thinking of it. Angelique said, "You should get out of those wet clothes."
Hoag said, "Well, I'm off."
She put her arms around him and kissed his cheek closing her nostrils to the smell of vomit.
"Thank you so much, see you tomorrow." She did the same to Skye. The two men went off unsteadily. "Will they be all right?"
Jamie said, "Nothing that a few whiskies and a night's sleep won't cure."
"They're not in shape to discuss anything, are they?"
"No. What do you want to discuss?"
She took his arm in hers and hugged it. "Just to decide about tomorrow."
"We can talk as we go." They said good night to Tinker and the stoker, both men again thanking McFay for the rum. Then they walked off arm in arm. "Angelique--before you say anything, I'm glad we did it."
"Oh so am I, dear Jamie, you are a dear and I truly am so glad and so happy nothing went wrong, no one was hurt." A wan smile.
"Just a little sick."
"Nothing to worry about. Tomorrow?"
"I've decided not to go with the mail ship, no, please don't say anything, I've decided.
I'm safer here. Until I hear from Tess formally. Really, Jamie, I am, I'm safer here. And I'm sure Hoag and George would agree that medically it would be wise. I don't think you should go either."
"It's my job to tell Mrs. Struan, Mrs. Tess Struan."
"You can call me Angelique, you always have and I, well, I've only been Mrs. Struan for a moment." She sighed, continued walking towards the Struan Building. "It's better I stay. She'll have to declare herself, better by letter here. Malcolm's buried and that's all that I wanted. Do you have to go?"