The apparition smiled a sad smile. “She was my sister.”
Rachel was confused. “Then why are you here? But you’re not really here either, are you?”
The woman stared for a long time and suddenly stretched out a hand toward her.
For a moment, Rachel hesitated, afraid of what the apparition’s skin might feel like. Or maybe she’d drag her off to some kind of nightmare from which she’d be unable to return. And then the undulating shape came closer, and the hand she extended to clasp hers was warm.
16
Chris had sent the Vicar Berry to bed and he’d taken over Rachel’s care. Dr Peregrine was sleeping on the settee in the parlor, and Tenneh would step in the next morning when Chris would have to return to his ship.
Rachel’s body glistened with sweat, and at one point the day before, her fever had risen so high, they’d had to remove all her linens so that she could be bathed with cool water throughout the day and night.
There had been a tacit agreement amongst them never to reveal to the outside world what had transpired that night when the four of them had fought to keep her anchored in the world.
At one point, when Dr Peregrine and the vicar had debated the wisdom of whether or not to bleed her, Chris had intervened. “When my men are in the grips of a fever like this, bleeding never helps. It seems to weaken them more. Let’s wait until she’s awake and feeling better.
Rachel seemed so small and vulnerable in the wide bed surrounded by netting, like a helpless child. At that moment, he’d never loved another human being as much as he did this woman. No matter what the future held, she was his family now.
Off and on during the night, she’d seemed to be having hallucinations in her sleep and had talked to someone who wasn’t there.
When she started whispering again, Chris leaned close.
“Why? Who? Don’t leave—.” She suddenly sat up and gripped his hand hard before falling back into a deep, silent sleep.
“I’m not going anywhere,” he murmured into her ear, and placed a kiss on her forehead before shouting out to wake Dr Peregrine in the parlor next to the bed chamber. Something had changed, but for all he knew, perhaps not for the better.
When Rachel graspedher aunt’s hand, the other woman did not feel like a wraith or ghost. She felt like a flesh-and-blood woman.
How could this be? They were in the orchard behind the mission school. She knew if reached out to pluck one of the ugly oranges Chris so loved, the bumpy fruit would feel real in her fingers.
“Listen,” her aunt said. “We don’t have much time left. I have to tell you something. You must beware of your father and grandfather. They’re not to be trusted.”
Rachel was so absorbed in taking in the details of her face, it took a few minutes for the significance of what she was saying to sink in. “I know my father’s a slaver, but why should I fear my grandfather?”
The other woman turned back into a hazy, shifting wraith and then suddenly disappeared.
“No—.” Rachel reached out into the smoky haze, but her aunt was gone.
Chris pacedwhile Dr Peregrine set Rachel upright with pillows behind her head and back. When he proceeded to call her name over and over in a loud voice near her ear, Chris wanted to slam him against a wall to make him stop. He knew the man was doing the best he could, but Chris was frustrated by the knowledge there was precious little any of them could do.
They took turns after that talking to her and reading out loud from the Bible. Her eyelids would flutter now and then, but her eyes remained shut tight.
“She’s through the worst of the fever.” Dr Peregrine tried once again to get a glass of water down her throat. She choked a little and most of the liquid spilled down onto her nightdress.
Tenneh came in with a bath sheet and blotted up the excess liquid from Rachel’s nightdress and bed linen.
The apothecary was undaunted. “We’ll just keep trying, Miss Berry, until you won’t have any choice but to take in some water to dilute this poison.”
Chris’s eyes had closed several times while reading to her from a book of poetry he’d found in the vicar’s library. He woke with a start and the book fell to the floor when he heard the voice of Captain Bellingham at the front door. He lurched to his feet and tried to get his bearings.
“Chris, how is she?”
His friend’s voice brought him back to where he was and the enormity of the aftermath of the poisoning. “I’m afraid we all have to leave. There’s been a string of slaving vessels from all different countries cruising in the vicinity of Sherbro Island. We have orders. Commodore Mends wants all of the squadron to proceed there at once.” He shoved his hair back from his forehead. “I thought we had the traffic down there stopped for a while. Damn.”
Chris stole a guilty look back at Rachel peacefully asleep before heading down the vicarage hallway to search for the vicar and Dr Peregrine. There was nothing he could do. Orders were orders. He didn’t even want to contemplate the day’s sail distance from Freetown to Sherbro. He had to go. She was getting the best of care from people who loved her.
Rachel awoke suddenlytwo days after Christopher left to join the rest of the squadron. She awakened fully restored with none of the dizziness and nausea she’d experienced when she’d collapsed at Mrs Chelly’s cottage.
