Sailing Home, page 35
As the sun began to set, Marin was beginning to worry about the length of time he had been gone and the additional time it would take for him to return to Perth Amboy. When Opaline came into the kitchen to check on Marin, he was slumped over the kitchen table with his head in his folded arms.
“Marin,” she said in a hushed voice.
He rose up and wrapped his arms around her waist. “I am so sorry,” he said.
She kissed him on top of his head, and said, “I worry about Evin. She was his whole life.”
“Something tells me he will forge on,” Marin offered.
“Yes, I believe you are right. Still...”
“I would stay for the funeral, but I need to get back to the ship.”
“There will not be a funeral. There may be a small graveside service, but ...wait ...where exactly is your ship?”
“In Perth Amboy.”
“Why is...? I am so confused.”
“I had planned to sail to Philadelphia, but the storm forced us to dock at Perth Amboy.”
“But why did you come to Philadelphia?”
“I wanted to meet your mother before...” and he stopped short, the sentence not needing finished.
Opaline bowed her head, and said with an edge of remorse, “I can still recall when I use to call her, ‘mother’. But after I found out that she was not my mother, I started calling her by her name ...to punish her, I suppose. But then of course, in truth, she is not my mother.”
“Yes,” Marin said. “Yes, she is.”
As Marin was preparing to leave, Opaline began pacing about.
“I do not understand why you feel you must complete this absurd mission,” she blurted out.
“Please, Opaline, we have been all through this.”
“Father,” she pleaded, and surrendering to the power of a word she had not used for almost twenty years, she suddenly went mute. Evin’s eyes widened to receive her, and she spoke to him again, as only a daughter would. “Father, talk to him.” She went to Evin, wrapped her arms around his waist, and came undone. “Tell him,” she cried.
Tears glistened Evin’s eyes as he looked over his daughter’s shoulder at Marin, and he whispered into his daughter’s ear, “Go and kiss your fiancé farewell.”
Opaline released her hold on her father and went to Marin. As she reached his side there came a knock at the door. At first, she ignored it, but a second rapping followed and she went to door and drew it open.
“Jaydan!” Opaline exclaimed.
Jaydan stood perfectly still, poised in the backlight of a streetlamp.
“Come in,” Opaline urged.
Jaydan stepped but a few feet inside the house as Opaline closed the door behind her. An awkward silence filled the room, and all eyes turned to Opaline.
“Jaydan, this is Mister Marin Carpenter.”
“We’ve met.” Jaydan was quick to say.
Opaline glanced back and forth between them, and inquired, “When? When did you meet?”
“This morning,” Marin said, stepping closer to Opaline. “I really should be going,” he added. He wrapped his arms around Opaline while she draped her arms at his side.
As he began to kiss her good-bye, she pulled her head back, and said, “I will see you out.” She opened the door, took Marin by the hand, and led him outside onto the small porch.
“Is there a reason you chose not to kiss me in front of Jaydan?” Marin asked.
“I prefer the privacy,” she said, adding, “I so wish you would stay.”
He took both of her hands into his, and said, “Opaline, promise me you will return to Newport.”
“And can you offer me the same promise?” she replied.
“Nothing could stop me,” he said, pulling her to him and kissing her. “Until then,” he added, with a parting step.
She grabbed him back into her arms and kissed him, releasing her lips only long enough to say, “Take care of my heart, for it goes with you.”
As their eyes opened upon one another, and their lips pulled apart again, Opaline quickly separated herself from him and returned back into the house. Marin stood for a moment without her, wondering... With heavy step, he made his way down the street to the livery.
Back inside the house, Opaline asked for Jaydan’s coat.
“I would prefer to wear it,” Jaydan said.
Evin returned to the bedroom as Opaline took Jaydan’s hand and escorted her to a seat beside the hearth.
“So,” Jaydan began, “Marin tells me he hopes to marry you.”
“Is that the way he put it?” she asked.
“That is, to the word, as he put it. Is it true?”
Opaline teetered for a moment between a droll remark and a straightforward reply. She chose to be frank. “We hope to marry one another, yes.”
“I would have thought you would be the first to inform me.”
“That was my plan upon returning to Philadelphia. I had no idea Marin was coming here.”
“Is this a sudden development?”
“Very. Two weeks ago, I could barely tolerate his presence,” Opaline said, with an air of light-hearted irony.
Jaydan was not amused. “Seems a bit impulsive.”
“Perhaps...”
“It was only a few months ago you were to marry Jonathan, and when that did not come to fruition, you wrote to me saying I was the only one who has never disappointed you. You even said you were thinking of moving back to Philadelphia, so I thought...” and she stopped midsentence, finding it too difficult to continue.
“Jaydan,” Opaline began, but Jaydan cut her off.
“No, I must go,” she said, standing up to leave. “I had hoped to see Emma yesterday, but she was asleep. Perhaps another time.”
“Mother is dead,” Opaline said, as if it were all one word.
Jaydan froze, her eyes locked onto Opaline. She wanted to reach out to her, but it was as if her arms would not move. Opaline too, stood perfectly still, as if she had turned to stone.
“I ...I am ...so very sorry,” Jaydan said, placing her open hand over her mouth, and with awkward step, she turned away and rushed out the door.
By the time Marin was an hour out of Philadelphia, a gentle but constant swirling snow accompanied him, dancing about without getting any closer to the ground. An occasional wintery sea breeze from the east would waft through the carriage, followed by a noticeably warmer gust of wind from the west. Throughout the long and dark journey, his mind kept returning back to Opaline, and time stood still as he pulled further and further away from her.
December 28, 1811
When the first rays of daybreak broke over his right shoulder, he wondered if he hadn’t been asleep the journey’s length. With a short distance to go, his hands tightened around the reins and he found himself pulling back and easing the horse’s pace.
Mister Prince watched as Mister Murel pranced back and forth from rail to rail, minding the ocean and the sky through his ‘third eye’.
“Can ya settle yerself on a single spot, mate?” Jude more demanded than asked of Dorian.
Mister Murel addressed Jude, saying, “If we are to sail, the time is now. Any further delay could invite misfortune.”
“I would like to know what it is you see through your talisman that could justify the mutinous act of sailing forth without our captain. Why don’t ya ask yer trinket, where might be our captain?”
Dorian walked up to Jude and stood but a few inches from him, locked eye to eye. “For the final time, sir, this is NOT a talisman. I do not rely on magic, clairvoyance or a sailor’s superstition. You need not heed my advice, but I offer it all the same ...to wit, if we are to sail, we should commence as soon as possible, and venture due east.”
Jude leaned in an inch closer, saying, “We will await Captain Carpenter.”
Phillipe came to Mister Prince’s side. Under his right arm was a large thick book he had brought from the Captain’s Quarters. He gained Jude’s attention by saying, “With Mister Haller gone, and Mister Armstrong infirmed, I wanted you to know, I am at your service. You need only instruct me.”
Mister Prince stared at him without affect. After a weighty moment he replied, “And what is that yer hoisting under yer arm?”
“It is a seaman’s manual I found in Marin’s library cupboard. I have been reading it. It is quite instructive.”
“Is it now?” Jude balked. “Tell me lad, do ya think if I were to read yer Bible I would come out the other side a Christian?”
Knowing full well where Jude was going with this line of reasoning, Phillipe could not help but answer as a Christian. “The Bible is a helpful guide, but I am always becoming a Christian by my actions in service to the Lord.”
“As it is with a sailor,” Jude said, turning away and looking out to the horizon. “Where in the devil is your brother?” he asked.
Within an hour, snow began to fall and the air turned colder. The possible consequences of Mister Haller’s gossip stirred thick through Jude’s mind until he felt as if he could wait no longer. He gave the order for all hands on deck, and the crew scrambled to prepare for launch. As they began to lower the Mainsail, one of the crew standing aloft on the Mainsail’s first yardarm, yelled out,
“Captain Carpenter comes yonder.”
Marin’s figure became distinct through the gathering blur of snow, as he stepped wearily toward the Magister Maris. He stopped a moment to observe the crew readying to set sail. Proceeding up the gangplank, he asked Mister Prince, “Were you bound to set sail without me?”
“Wouldn’t dream of it, Captain,” Jude said, with a sardonic smile.
“Very well. Take her out, Mister Prince,” Marin commanded, and he went directly down the steps and into his cabin.
Marin wrestled with a restless sleep until late afternoon when Phillipe came into the cabin to wake him.
“Marin, you are needed topside.” Phillipe said, shaking his brother by the shoulder.
Groggy, and somewhat disoriented from the travel and lack of sleep over the last couple of days, Marin took a moment to collect his thoughts.
Phillipe impatiently added, “Jude and Dorian are at one another’s throat, and I think it best you sort it out.”
“I will be there directly.” Marin said, adding a yawn.
“I would not dawdle,” Phillipe warned, as he left the cabin.
Once topside, Marin observed Jude and Dorian standing before the helm arguing. The two quieted their quarrel as Marin approached.
“What is all the kerfuffle?” he asked. As both began to speak, Marin interjected, “Jude, you first.”
“Mister Dorian has had us on a course due east for the past nine hours. We’re most of a sailor’s day, east of New York, and not a hundred yards north, toward Passamaquoddy. You might ask him, ‘Can you share with us what destination you have in mind, Mister Murel?’” Jude huffed, addressing Marin but looking at Dorian.
Marin turned to Dorian for a reply.
“I am taking advantage of the westerlies to take us to the southern winds blowing farther out. The more distance between us and the shoreline, the better.”
“And why is that?” Marin asked.
“Because a cold northern wind is coming down the coast line and when she meets the southern stream, we want to be as far east of the mix as possible.”
Marin took a long look at the blue-green ‘third eye’ hanging round Dorian’s neck, and asked, “And when do you suppose we are to meet up with the southern winds?”
“Cannot say for certain ...but it should be sometime tonight.”
“Tonight?” Marin and Jude said in unison, but Jude’s voice was the louder of the two.
“Captain,” Jude implored, “We’ve been runnin’ with the wind as if only the devil gives a damn where we’re goin’. It’s past time we reach a little to the north.”
Marin, knowing well he would fall short in Jude’s eyes, gave the order to his helmsman, “Steady as she goes, Mister Sheets.”
Dorian gave a ‘wise choice’ brand of nod, and returned to Mister Sheets’ side.
Jude stood stoic before the captain, lips drawn tightly together to hold back words.
“Yes, Mister Prince, you were about to say?” Marin coaxed, sliding in a sharp smile to slice the tension.
“We’ve two less sailors, sir. I’ve put Mister Haller ashore, and a Mister Armstrong is laid up below deck with a festering knife wound, courtesy of Mister Haller. I suggest we put Mister Sheets elsewhere.”
Marin drew a deep breath and said, “Very well, put him where you need him. How is Armstrong doing?”
“Sufferin’ needlessly while surrounded by medical supplies we’ve no access to.”
“Well, keep an eye on the situation then. Who is in the crow’s nest?”
“Mister Humphrey, I believe.”
“I will relieve Mister Humphrey at first watch. Locate Phillipe and have him report to Mister Sheets,” Marin said, and he set off to make his rounds.
His first stop was to visit Mister Armstrong, who lie in his hammock with a bottle of rum in one hand, and a Bible in the other.
“How are you feeling, Mister Armstrong?” Marin asked.
“I’m drunk,” he replied. “Do ya think the Lord would mind?”
“According to my brother, ‘there is a time to every purpose under heaven’.”
Armstrong strained a smile and said, “I believe that is according to Ecclesiastes, Captain.”
“A-h-h, so you are a religious man.”
“I am a man humbled by what I do not know, and so I seek relief and release wherever it is offered,” he said, holding up both the bottle and the Bible.
Marin looked down at the blood-soaked sheet wrapped around the man’s thigh, and said, “I will get someone to change your...” but stopped short of saying the word, ‘bandage’.
At eight p.m. Marin put Jude in command, and met Mister Humphrey climbing down from the crow’s nest.
“How goes it up there?” Marin asked him.
“I couldn’t swear to it, sir, but I may have spotted a ship a-followin’ us. Hard to tell though, through the murk of night and the fallin’ snow.”
“Well, if we can’t see them, they can’t see us,” Marin said, and began his climb up the rope ladder to the crow’s nest.
Being a captain, it had been years since he had made the climb. He held onto the wet cold ropes perhaps a little too tight, giving the appearance of a man afraid of the ascent. With each successive foothold, the ship’s toss widened little more from side to side, and the cold wind stiffened and grew more brazen, as if daring him to climb another step higher. As he reached the top, he nestled himself into the round basket and looked out into the dark snowy night. Fog was beginning to drop and thicken, and within a half an hour he wasn’t able to see the deck of his ship below, much less anything further out to sea. While his vision may have been limited to the extension of his arm, he could sense a changing of course, and his sense of smell and hearing were on full alert, enhanced by the darkness surrounding him. The sea breeze filled his nostrils with that briny scent that Jude had called, ‘the salty perfume of our mother, the ocean.’ Marin could hear the dolphins swimming alongside the ship. The sound of their chirping was a familiar and comforting presence. The wind’s soprano catcalling through the rigging, the tenor pitched creaking of the masts, and thundering bass notes of the sails occasionally flapping rhythmically in the wind, all served as orchestration to the main motif - that being the slapping sound of the bow breaking through the water, and the thrashing reply of the ocean’s waves breaking against the wooden hull of a ship as it forged its way forward through a capricious sea - a man-made vessel daring to challenge Poseidon. At times the sound resembled taunting laughter, other times, the gentle breathing of a sleeping giant ...but when angry, the deafening roar of a God ignored.
High above the deck of his ship, tossing in the wind, he began to feel the insignificance of his command as regards the will of the sea. Marin knew we are all sacrificial servants, serving at the pleasure of the things we covet. He always held it in the back of his mind that given enough sailing days he would, sooner or later, be swallowed by the very thing he loved.
As eight bells rang signaling the end of the first watch, he yelled down to a man preparing to relieve him, “I will be staying on through the middle watch.”
“Aye, Captain,” came the reply.
Marin attempted to read his compass, but the mixture of fog and darkness made it impossible.
“What might be our course?” Marin beckoned down to the deck.
“North by northeast,” cried someone from the helm, in a voice sounding remarkably similar to Phillipe’s.
Marin settled in for what would be another four hours in the crow’s nest. It began to hail.
December 29th, 1811
At 4 a.m. Marin climbed back down the rope ladder, and by the time he reached the icy deck he felt as if his hands were frozen in the curled position. He made his way carefully to his cabin, only to find Phillipe curled up asleep in the bed. He poured a tankard of rum, sat down at his desk, and began to make an entry into his log. He had only managed to scribble a few lines when he drifted off, slumped over the desk’s surface, pen in hand.
A few hours later, but what seemed like only moments to a weary Marin, someone pounded on the cabin door, calling out, “You’re wanted top side, Captain.”
Marin looked around and noticed that Phillipe was gone. He retrieved his heavy coat and made his way to the deck, where he was greeted by a strong frigid wind swirling about. With the sunlight over the horizon attempting to pierce the thick fog, Marin had a hard time recognizing that it was Mister Sheets back at the helm, struggling to hold the wheel steady.
“Mister Murel has commanded us to maintain a north by northeast heading,” Sheets called out to Marin through the heavy wind, “but she’s getting’ harder to hold that course, what with the winds constantly shifting about and the lack of a crew to man the yards. All the while, I am mindful of your warning about the rudder. And, Mister Prince has just ordered us to pursue a course due north. I am in need of your orders, Captain.”
