Curse Of The Blue Tattoo Part 28

When we go round the school and arrive at the kitchen entrance, most get into amorous embraces till Amy coughs, "Ahem," and the lovers part. Paul and his brother go off down the hill and I go and get between Davy and Annie, which ain't easy. With a final squeeze of his hand, she turns and gives him a wave and then she joins the other girls, who all go in the kitchen door, opened by Peg in her nightgown, clucking over her girls like any mother hen. Sylvie, I'm sure, would go into the hayloft right off with Henry but good sense prevails, and after a long good-night kiss, she, too, disappears through the kitchen door, and Peg's strong arm reaches out and pulls the door shut. There is the sound of a latch being thrown.

Henry, in a daze, wanders back to his bed after what has to be the finest night of his young life. Ezra and Davy escort us around to our rung ladder and look at our rope trick and Davy says something like, "Can't keep that one down, for sure." Ezra takes Amy's hand and bows over it and kisses it. Amy lets him do it and then turns and goes to the rope. When Amy goes up, s.h.i.+nnying up like I taught her, Ezra looks away like a gentleman. Davy don't, and I 'spect he won't look away when I go up, neither. I can't wait to get that little weasel alone for a while, but it ain't gonna happen now, I know.

"I gotta talk to you, Davy," I whispers.

"I know, Jacky, I know," says he, "but I got the duty tomorrow and they won't let you on the s.h.i.+p, not to talk to the likes o' me, they won't. But it will all keep. I'll see you on Monday. I'll come here."

I bet you will, thinks I. I've got to get that Annie aside and tell her some of the facts of life. And of sailors.

I go up the ladder, and Ezra and Davy walk back downtown together, seaman and lawyer, brothers at least for this night.

Chapter 32.

"But I like him," says Annie.

I had gotten up close to her on Monday morning, when we're in the kitchen scrubbing up the breakfast pots.

"You don't know the little weasel like I do. You'll catch something from him. Or he'll give you a baby and run away to sea."

"I can't believe that," she softly says.

"What's he promised?"

"That he'd think of nothing but me when he's out on the sea."

"That's prolly true," I admits, "but that don't mean much. Will you give him any token?"

"A lock of my hair, braided and tied up in one of my ribbons."

"Aye, and it's lovely I'm sure, Annie, and he'll show that to all his mates so they'll think he's a mighty lover what's broken many a young girl's heart, yours included, you can be sure of that, too."

"But what's the harm in that? I know that I'll probably never see him again after tomorrow, but it's nice to dream on things, sometimes."

"Harrumph," I grumps. It occurs to me that I'm prolly acting a lot like Mistress right now.

"He said he'd swing in his hammock at night with the lock clutched in his hand and next to his heart and all fear banished from his mind, knowing I was safe and warm back on land, no matter what cruel fate awaited his poor self."

"Oh, please, that's what they all say. Davy does have a gift of gab, I'll own, if nothing else," I say, thinkin' back to when he talked himself aboard the Dolphin when there was plenty more boys bigger and stronger than him. Then again, I done the same thing. But he's prolly not lyin' about lying there in the dark with the token to his breast, for it does get cold and lonely out there. "All right. Just you be careful is all. The Davy I remember don't think with his head, that's for sure. What's the rascal got planned for today?"

"Just a walk in the Common. Then a bite to eat, and then I got to go home at my usual time, you know that, or else my father would kill me."

"Well, you mind the tall gra.s.s in the Common, Annie."

"I know how to be careful, Jacky. You're the one what needs to be more careful, from what I've heard."

I ain't got nothin' to say to that.

Davy comes up the hill at about eleven in the morning and I'm layin' for him. I've been about jumpin' out of my skin all yesterday and today, I'm so keen to talk to him.

I head him off at the kitchen door. "Come with me," I say, and we go around to the side and then we're up in my room.

"Keep your voice down and if anyone tries that door, you dive out the window, you hear?" I had put a small wooden wedge under the door to keep us from being surprised.

"Pretty nice kip," says Davy. "How come you're separate from the others?"

"I got busted down from lady to serving girl," I say, makin' myself not hang my head.

"Sounds like something you'd do." He tests the bed. "Why don't you call down for Annie to pop up here for a bit?"

"She's a good girl and a nice girl and a good friend to me and I don't want the likes of you to hurt her-"

"Ah, Jacky Faber, the Mother Superior, lookin' out for her little flock, ain't that sweet..."

"I mean it, Davy..."

"Still the bossy one, ain't you, Jacky? Now boys, dress up in these pretty little uniforms I made for ye! Now boys, stand up all straight in a line here! Now boys, wear the cute little caps! Now boys...." He looks at me all serious. "Look, Jacky, she's the first real girl I've met since I got on the Dolphin- you don't meet many of 'em in my line of work, you might recall-and, h.e.l.l, I've only been ash.o.r.e about a week and a half total since I signed on to this jolly seafarin' life."

"Still..."

He sneers and pokes me on the breastbone with a stiff finger. "No real girls, 'cept for you, of course, but you never did me much good in that way, savin' it all for Jaimy like you was ... and is, I reckon. Aww ... is that your Jaimy up there on your wall now?"

Davy and I are back in our old stance-nose to nose, eyes narrowed, lower lips jutting out, fingers pointing, each at the other, and snarling.

"You don't know what it's like to be me, Davy, then or now."

"Maybe I don't care what it's like to be a bossy, pigheaded little c.o.c.kney chambermaid what thought she was gonna be a lady."

That hurts me and I jerk like I've been hit. I got nothin' to say to that. He knows he hit home 'cause he looks a little ashamed and he don't follow it up with any more jibes.

I make an effort to settle down. Fighting with Davy over female virtue ain't exactly what I had planned for this morning. "I'm sorry. I just don't want you to hurt her is all."

"I'm not going to hurt her, Jacky." He says this gently and I half believe him.

"All right," I say, calm now. I sit down in my chair and fold my hands in my lap. "Please, now tell me what's up with jaimy."

Davy goes over and flops down on my bed. He has gotten longer and leaner, for sure. He is turning into a fine-looking man and it is easy to see why Annie is taken with him. "All right, jack, I'll tell you." He picks up my pillow and sniffs it and then crams it back under his head. I'm glad to see there is no tar in his hair.

"On the way back to England, he was Mr. Mids.h.i.+pman and Tink and me and w.i.l.l.y was Ordinary Seamen, so our paths didn't cross much anymore, but I will say that Jaimy never lorded it over us but always found a way, like if he had to give us an order, to do it in a way that didn't make us feel like dirt. And, sometimes, if we was some of us on watch in the middle of the night, we'd sit and talk and joke like in the old days. Then we rounded Margate and were taken into the docks on the Thames and little men with notebooks swarmed over the Dolphin and declared she was not fit for sea, her knees having been weakened by the blast of the pirate's fires.h.i.+p that day," says Davy. "You got something to drink here?"

I had sat on the edge of the bed to listen and I got up and got him a gla.s.s of cider from the jug I had put up here for just such a purpose. It is a little bit hard, and I figure, shamelessly, that it might loosen his tongue a bit.

"Ummm," he says. "Good."

He puts the gla.s.s down on my bedside table and taps it with his finger. I fill it up again. "I like you as a servin' girl, Jacky," he says. I give him a low growl. He goes on.

"Anyway, we're back and the Dolphin's crew is bein' broke up and Tink and w.i.l.l.y and me volunteer to go on the Raleigh, and bein' seasoned man-o-war's men we are taken on, and we're happy that at least some of the Brotherhood is still together, but then some bra.s.s hat from the Endeavor comes aboard and he outranks our Captain and he takes a bunch of men, includin' Tink, to his s.h.i.+p, and then two days later another bleedin' Captain comes up and takes w.i.l.l.y and some others for the Temeraire. p.i.s.sed us off, it did, but what could we do?

"But anyway, the Raleigh is layin' next to the Ess.e.x, which Jaimy is posted to, and he comes over and says to come to his house and where's Tink and w.i.l.l.y, but I says they're gone to sea, it's just him and me now, so we go off together, brothers again as soon as we're out of sight of the Royal Navy and we gets in a coach and I'm feelin' like a proper n.o.b, I am, and we're laughin' and rememberin' old times, but then we get to his house, which is a pretty fine place, I can tell you, and we go in and I meet his mother, and that dragon takes one look at me and I'm off to the servants' quarters for a meager bite with cold tea and then I'm out the back door by myself. I ain't seen Jaimy since then as the Raleigh made sail the next day and I was gone."

"He didn't try to find you after his mother sent you off downstairs?"

"He was going upstairs to change clothes and I'll wager when he come back down his dear mother had some sort of story for him. Like I ran off after a scullery maid, or got sick or something." Davy draws a long breath. "It was like she didn't want Jaimy to have anything to do with his past life or anybody who was in it. Which is funny considerin' the money that put her family back on its feet come from the likes of us."

I thinks on this and says, "Life ain't fair sometimes, Davy."

"For sure, Jacky."

"What about Liam?" I ask, avoiding the big question for a bit.

"His plan was to take his prize money and light out for his farm in Ireland where his wife and kids were. Whether or not he made it past the press-gangs, I don't know. Saw Snag in a tavern a little later and he seems to think that Liam made it."

Good for you, Liam. I wish you the joy of your farm and your family.

"Jaimy. Did he say anything about me?" I prepare myself for the blow.

"He talked about nothin' but you and I know he checked with every s.h.i.+p that come in from the States to see if you had sent him a letter, but he never got one. There was the Plymouth and the Juno and the Shannon..."

"The Shannon?" I cries, and jumps up. "I sent a letter on the Shannon and the mids.h.i.+pman who took it from me knew where Jaimy lived and swore that he would deliver it to the house and I believed him!"

"And I'll bet he was as good as his word, Jacky," says Davy quietly and shuts up, letting me figure it out on my own. Which I do.

I sit back down on the edge of the bed. "His mum prolly wants him to marry a fine lady. Which I ain't. And which is why she ain't lettin' my letters get through to him. And now he ain't got no letters from me and prolly thinks I've gone off with someone else."

"That's the way I'd cipher it out, Jacko," says Davy. "And the story of you running around in the riggin' of the Excalibur and takin' a dip in your drawers didn't help none, neither."

"You heard of that?"

"Everybody's heard of that," he says, and then mimics my voice. "'Ain't no sailor alive what can catch Jacky Faber in the riggin'!' Oh, you're famous, you are! Famous in legend and song, just like you always wanted!" He rocks back and forth with glee.

"Hush now, you!" I hisses at him. "Someone will hear!"

"Captain Morgan of the Excalibur has let it be known that he will run his sword through you at next meeting, and if he has to hang for it, so be it!" he crows. "And I hope to G.o.d I'm there as witness!"

"All right. Enough," I says. "I will have a letter for you on the day after tomorrow, when next you have liberty, to deliver to Jaimy. Be good to Annie or I'll find a sword to run through you. Now get out. We've got to get ready to serve dinner."

Davy gets up and says, "Gladly, as I got someone to meet." With a wink, he is out the window.

Chapter 33.

Jacky Faber

In care of Miss Amy Trevelyne

Dovecote Farm

Quincy, Ma.s.sachusetts, United States

November 8, 1803

Mr. James Fletcher, Mids.h.i.+pman

On Board the Ess.e.x, on Station

Dear Jaimy, If you are reading this letter, you will know that I met Davy in Boston when his s.h.i.+p made port here. It was a great joy to see him and it was an even greater joy to hear from him that you were well the last time he saw you.