It did not matter how many times the English governor shut down troublesome taverns and houses. They popped up again like poisonous mushrooms.
The door to her classroom and infirmary closed suddenly, throwing her father and Captain Halloren into sudden illumination. They were talking low with their sides facing her. Her father gave her a direct look and then said something to the man she now knew as Captain Halloren.
When he turned and stared, Rachel’s breath caught in her throat. He was very tall and dark. His face looked as though he struggled daily with his beard and by mid-day, lost the battle. But none of that mattered. He was just another privileged white Englishman. Although he did seem a bit more human after his spirited chase of her escaped chickens that morning.
In spite of her misgivings, though, she wondered for one precarious moment what it would feel like to brush her fingers over his stubbled cheeks.
“Rachel—.”
Her father’s summons stopped her mid-thought. Now she’d have to subject herself to the inevitable curiosity in the officer’s eyes. Why would a white English missionary cleric claim a woman of mixed blood as his daughter?
Captain Christopher Hallorenwas ready to return to his ship. In his last two years of duty with the African Squadron, he’d never quite adjusted to the suffocating heat and humidity of West Africa. The torrential rains of the afternoon had been quickly replaced with the sun’s steaming heat.
He’d been lucky to be in the thick of naval action ever since his first engagement at Trafalgar as a midshipman of thirteen. However, for someone at his stage of life and considering England was no longer at war with anyone, save the slavers of countless nations, he felt he’d been damned lucky to achieve his goal of post captain by the age of twenty-eight.
The intense heat and ever looming specter of fever seemed small prices to pay for the lowly third son of a baron with little patronage to assist his rise through the ranks at the Admiralty.
He’d always had to be several steps ahead of the competition, take more chances, and work harder than anyone else to know his men and his ships like the back of his hand.
Right now, he was trying to pretend he wanted nothing more than to linger in the stench of the flimsy wood structure the missionary school used for patching up the released captives’ wounds as best they could before providing them with clothing and temporary shelter until they could be assigned their own plots of land in Freetown.
The vicar had been showing him the progress he’d made since Christopher had last delivered a shipload of liberated slaves the year before.
“The Anglican Missionary Society in England set up a subscription to pay for this temporary wood and bamboo shelter while the grand cathedral is being built. And in return, we had an artist in Freetown make sketches of life here to send to a printer back in London to make into a booklet for subscribers.”
Christopher tried to avoid peering overlong at the vicar’s daughter tending to the wounds of the latest group of former prisoners suffering from the crude shackles used to bind them together in the holds of the slave ships. The curve of her cheek and lilt of her voice had caught his regard. She seemed to be conversing with her patients, and he wondered how in the hell she could make heads or tails out of the many variations of patois they seemed to speak.
Using nothing more than the touch of her hands, she seemed able to convey the gift of healing. Many a poor patient left her ministrations looking much more optimistic than when he’d been standing in line to be treated. The English government was little help, providing only the barest of essentials to ensure the former slaves’ recovery and survival in the Freetown community. He didn’t think they even had a proper physician.
“Would you like to meet her?” The Reverend Berry was speaking to him and had apparently had to repeat himself, since Christopher was caught up in observing his daughter.
“I would hate to bother her now.” He whipped his head back to the vicar. He wondered whether he should admit he’d already informally met the young woman that morning.
“It’s no bother. She has a few more minutes before her Bible and English class. Rachel won’t mind. My daughter rarely has the chance to meet visitors from England.”
Christopher’s breath hitched. The exotic creature dispensing mercy like a placid angel was indeed the vicar’s daughter.
The older woman that morning had told the truth. He supposed the man had been preparing him the whole time he’d been talking about the work the new shelter had enabled them to do. However, he’d been distracted and had not picked up on the hints the elderly man had been feeding him.
When they approached the young woman, she stared up at him out of eyes rimmed red with fatigue. The long line of patients had taken its toll.
“Rachel, this is Captain Halloren of the African Squadron who has brought us our latest group of guests. Captain Halloren, may I have the pleasure of presenting my daughter, Miss Rachel Berry?”
She stood suddenly, her previous look of faint disapproval fleeing when she caught sight again of the sleeve pinned to the side of his uniform to accommodate the empty space where his right arm should be. He ignored her reaction and said, “The pleasure is all mine,” bending over her hand in a bow of acknowledgement.
When he straightened, he read the relief in her eyes that he hadn’t let on they’d already met under peculiar circumstances.
“I-I’m so sorry,” she said. “I have to apologize for my lack of gloves, but the work I do here…”
He knew she was trying to cover for her embarrassment, her unguarded stare at the empty space where his arm should be, but he didn’t care. He was used to the looks of pity from women at his lack of a right limb. He’d had plenty of time to adjust since that day at Trafalgar when a cannon ball had ended his life as a whole man.
“Please, Miss Berry, don’t worry. I, too, find it difficult to keep up the pretense of what stiff society back in England would expect. I’m afraid we all have to adjust to the climate and circumstances and behave accordingly.”
“Then you should join us for supper.”
“I should not,” he began, but she interrupted him mid-sentence.
“Surely you won’t deny us the opportunity to thank you for the great life-saving work you do?”
