When they went back up on the upper deck, Colonel Fitzwilliam was there to greet them. “Hallo, Captain! Mrs. Wentworth!” he called. “Glad to see you’ve made it!”
“Thank you, but where is Caroline?” Anne asked. “I hope she isn’t feeling poorly.”
“Well, she is a little, but I hope it’ll pass soon. She’s determined to accompany me, come hell or high water—oh, excuse the expression!—merely she is very determined, and I’m a little afraid she’ll regret it.”
“Oh, I hope not. Shall I go down to her? Would she want company?”
“If you don’t mind, please do.”
When Anne knockedat the door, Caroline called for her to enter. “I am so glad you are come,” Caroline said. “The thought of your company has been supporting me.”
“Poor dear, are you very unwell?”
“My stomach has been uncertain, but not fully riotous.” Caroline realized the basin was still on the bed, and she set it back under the edge. “I did not need the bowl after all.”
“That is a good sign.”
“I hope so. Although we are still at thedocks,not even out of Falmouth, and I have already shown weakness. I hope the high seas will not quite undo me.”
“It’s not weakness to be ill! But would you like to come up?” Anne asked. “I believe they will cast anchor soon.”
Together they wended their way up the ladder and across the deck around coiled ropes, crates, and pigs. “Ugh, the smell,” Caroline said.
“We’ll be glad enough of pork in a few weeks.”
“Of course.” Caroline rebuked herself for her failure to achieve the uncomplaining elegance she now sought. “I was only startled.”
They approached the gentlemen, and they also were discussing the smell of the animals, which made Caroline feel marginally better.
“We will no doubt take on more livestock in Lisbon,” Wentworth said, “but the captain is going to skip most of his normal stops. He will swing wide to the west to lessen our risk of crossing any of Napoleon’s ships. After Lisbon, it’s directly through the Strait of Gibraltar and on toward Italy.”
Caroline shivered. She could bandy about exotic names likeGibraltarandCasa Blancaeasily in drawing rooms, but the process of actuallygoingthere felt far more perilous.
Numerous sailors seemed to be engaged with hauling sails up the masts, but the passengers found a place along the stern that was not busy. The sails were connected to circular wooden rings that encompassed the masts. By hauling ropes, the men could pull the sails upward and the rings slid up the mast.
They all fell silent as two sailors turned the great wheel to haul anchor. Others pulled the ropes to haul the sails up; the triangular sails caught, and the booms shifted.
The wharf slid away behind them. The front, or bow, of the ship faced down the river Fal toward the Bay of Biscay, and thestern faced back toward Falmouth. “It’s done,” Caroline said. “We’re on our way.”
She wasn’t sure whether to be relieved that the choice was now out of her hands—the need for resolve over!—or terrified at the fortitude now required of her for the next months.
The ship flowed with surprising smoothness down the river, at least to Caroline’s untrained perceptions, and apparently she was not the only one to notice.
Captain Wentworth looked appreciatively at the rigging. “A very nice schooner, this! We’re going well with the wind, but I bet she can sail pretty close to a headwind in a pinch. Well in shallows, as well, and with such a small crew!”
“This is a small crew?” Caroline repeated. It seemed like many men to her.
“Well—on my first sloop, theAsp, we had fifty sailors—and that had only one mast, you see. Here there are three, and only—perhaps twenty men? I shall ask the captain.”
Richard raised his brows. “How do they get away with it? Ought we be worried?”
“No, it’s the ingenuity of the rigging. See those rings sliding up and down the mainmast? The pulleys at the top for the sheets? In fine weather, you might get away with two men for each.”
This devolved into a more complicated discussion of topsails, foremasts, and parallel vs. perpendicular rigging. Anne seemed to know everything about it all, and Caroline could only marvel. She knew enough to speak languidly of the campaign in Spain or Nelson’s liberties, but not this detail. It was another deficit, she realized; an accomplished lady was well-informed.
Mrs. Scott joined them and Caroline turned to her. “How do you do? You have missed our departure, but you can still just make out land if you squint.”
Mrs. Scott looked back, and it was true that the low, blue outline of Cornwall on the horizon was still visible against the cloudy gray sky. She had an indefinable expression on her face, something of resignation, but also determination.
