“Barnacles,” said a soft Irish voice from the mist behind him. Despite himself, Roger jumped, and a low chuckle materialized into Bonnet’s shadowed bulk. The Captain held a cheroot between his teeth, a spill from the galley fire illumining the lines and planes of his face, dissolute in red light. The rasping shudder came again through the boards.
“They scratch themselves to rid their skins of parasites,” Bonnet said casually. “We are no more to them than a floating stone.” He drew heavily to start the flame, blew fragrant smoke, and tossed the burning paper overboard. It vanished in the mist like a falling star.
Roger let out a breath only slightly less noisy than the whales’. How close had Bonnet been? Had the Captain seen him coming out of the hold?
“They will not damage the ship, then?” he said, matching the Captain’s casual tone.
Bonnet smoked for a moment in silence, concentrating on the draw of his cigar. Without the illumination of the open flame, he was once more a shadow, marked only by the glowing coal of the tip.
“Who knows?” he said at last, small spurts of smoke puffing out between his teeth as he spoke. “Any one of the beasts might sink us, should he have a mind in him for mischief. I saw a ship once—or what was left of it—battered to pieces by an angry whale. Three feet of board, and a bit of spar left floating—sunk with all hands, two hundred souls.”
“You don’t seem troubled by the possibility.”
There was a long sound of exhalation, a faint echo of the whales’ sighing, as Bonnet blew smoke between pursed lips.
“ ’Twould be a waste of strength to worry myself. A wise man leaves those things beyond his power to the gods—and prays that Danu will be with him.” The edge of the Captain’s hat turned toward him. “Ye’ll know of Danu, will ye, MacKenzie?”
“Danu?” Roger said stupidly, and then the penny dropped, an old chant coming back to him from the mists of childhood—something Mrs. Graham had taught him to say. “Come to me, Danu, change my luck. Make me bold. Give me wealth—and love to hold.”
There was an amused grunt behind the coal.
“Ah, and you not even an Irishman. But sure I knew you from the first for a man of learning, MacKenzie.”
“I know Danu the Luck-Giver,” Roger said, hoping against hope that that particular Celtic goddess was both a good sailor and on his side. He took a step backward, meaning to go, but a hand descended on his wrist, holding tight.
“A man of learning,” Bonnet repeated softly, all levity gone from his voice, “but no wisdom. And are you a praying man at all, MacKenzie?”
He tensed, but felt the force of Bonnet’s grip and did not pull away. Strength gathered in his limbs, his body knowing before he did that the fight had come.
“I said a wise man does not trouble himself with things beyond his power—but on this ship, MacKenzie, everything is in my power.” The grip on his wrist tightened. “And everyone.”
Roger jerked his wrist sideways, breaking the grip. He stood alone, knowing there was neither help nor escape. There was no world beyond the ship, and within it, Bonnet was right—all were in the Captain’s power. If he died, it would not help Morag—but that choice was made already.
“Why?” said Bonnet, sounding only mildly interested. “The woman’s no looker, sure. And a man of such learning, too; would you risk my ship and my venture, then, only for the sake of a warm body?”
“No risk.” The words came out hoarse, forced through a tight throat. Come at me, he thought, and his hands curled at his sides. Come at me, and give me a chance to take you with me. “The child doesn’t have pox—a harmless rash.”
“You will forgive my putting my ignorant opinion above your own, Mr. MacKenzie, but I am Captain here.” The voice was still soft, but the venom was clear.
“It is a child, for God’s sake!”
“It is—and of no value.”
“No value to you, perhaps!”
There was a moment’s silence, broken only by a distant whoosh in the empty white.
“And what value to you?” the voice asked, implacable. “Why?”
For the sake of a warm body. Yes, for that. For the touch of humanity, the memory of tenderness, for the feeling of life stubborn in the face of death.
“For pity,” he said. “She is poor; there was no one to help her.”
The rich perfume of tobacco reached him, narcotic, enchanting. He breathed it in, taking strength from it.
Bonnet moved, and he moved, too, settling himself in preparation. But there was no blow forthcoming; the shadow dug in a pocket, held out a ghostly hand in which he caught a magpie glitter from the diffuse lantern light—coins and bits of rubbish and what might have been a jewel’s quick gleam. Then the Captain plucked out a silver shilling, and thrust the rest back into his pocket.
“Ah, pity,” he said. “And did yez say you were a gambling man at all, MacKenzie?”
He held out the shilling, dropped it. Roger caught it, only by reflex.
“For the suckling’s life, then,” Bonnet said, and the tone of light amusement was back. “A gentleman’s wager, shall we call it? Heads it lives, and tails it dies.”
The coin was warm and solid in his palm, an alien thing in this world of drifting chill. His hands were slick with sweat, and yet his mind had gone cold and sharp, focused to an ice pick’s point.
Heads he lives, and tails he dies, he thought quite calmly, and did not mean the child below. He marked throat and crotch on the other man; grip and lunge, a blow and heave—the rail was no more than a foot away, the empty realm of the whales beyond.
There was no room beyond his calculations for any sense of fear. He saw the coin spin up as though it were thrown by another hand, then fall to the deck. His muscles bunched themselves, slowly.
“It seems Danu is with ye the night, sir.” Bonnet’s soft Irish voice seemed to come to him from a great way off, as the Captain bent and picked up the coin.
Realization was only beginning to bloom in his chest, when the Captain gripped his shoulder, turning him down the deck.
“You’ll walk with me awhile, MacKenzie.”
Something had happened to his knees; he felt as though he would sink down with every step, and yet somehow stayed upright, keeping pace with the shadow. The ship was silent, the deck under his feet a mile away; but the sea beyond was a live thing, breathing. He felt the breath in his own lungs rise and fall with the shifting deck, and felt as though there were no boundaries to his body. It might have been wood under his feet, or water, for all he could feel.
It was some time before he made sense of Bonnet’s words, and realized, with a vague sense of amazement, that the man seemed to be recounting the story of his life, in a quiet, matter-of-fact sort of way.
Orphaned in Sligo at an early age, he had learned quickly to fend for himself, he said, working as a cabin boy aboard trading ships. But one winter, with ships scarce, he had found work ashore in Inverness, digging the foundation for a grand house that was building near the town.
“I was just seventeen,” he said. “The youngest of the crew of workmen. I could not say why it was they hated me. Mayhap it was my manner, for that was rough enough—or jealousy for my size and strength; they were an unchancy, whey-faced lot. Or maybe that the lasses smiled on me. Or maybe ’twas only that I was a stranger.