Ruenna opened her eyes at the sound of Esmée’s soft voice. She smiled. Or was it only indigestion? Despite the odor, Esmée’s heart melted.
CHAPTER
fifty-four
29th January 1756. Cold day. Heavy NW gale toward night.
Esmée’s light was snuffed thrice as she took a tin lantern up to the waiting lamps. Back to the cottage she went to kindle it again at the hearth’s fire. Lucy and Alice, babies in arms, looked on, alarm in their eyes. The wind, steadily rising throughout the afternoon, had a particularly sharp, unfriendly feel. It moaned as it whipped round the cottage’s corners and gabled ends, pressing against the windowpanes with such force Esmée feared they might shatter.
“First fog and now this,” Lucy said before Esmée slipped back into the twilight.
Since early morn, passing ships had fired their cannons, and then the island’s fog cannon answered with a sulfurous blast. The noise woke the babies and fretted Alice and Lucy. Even Esmée wanted to cover her ears. But at least she didn’t have to man the cannon. Two of Henri’s ablest crew, kept from sailing by a recurrent malarial fever, took on the chore without complaint.
Now at dusk, another boom sounded as the wind whipped Esmée’s cape and petticoats, snatching off her hood as she made for thetower. With all her might, she slammed the door shut, preserving the lantern’s light. Up the spiraling stairs she climbed, thankful for five-foot-thick stone walls, though she still heard the wind’s wailing.
Was the wind worsening?
She hung the lantern from a hook and paused to look out on the surly Atlantic. A briny mist covered the glass, but it in no way dimmed her view of the blue-gray swells tipped a frothy white. The surf was encroaching where it had never been during her tenure as keeper, splashing over rocks and through sandy openings she’d thought impenetrable, closing in on the very foundation of the lighthouse.
Her stomach quavered as if pitched by the mounting waves. With a move so brisk it rattled her chatelaine, she began to light the lamps, praying they’d stay on, hoping they’d provide some sense of direction and bearing to any needy ship and keep them out of shoal waters. ’Twas her first storm as keeper. Would she weather it?
Where was Henri in this tempest?
She shut her eyes, caught between a prayer and a sigh. Oh, to have him by her side, capable and uncomplaining, not out on a vessel whose masts might be snapped by the wind’s force and founder.
“Captain Lennox is the same in rough weather as if the seas were standing still,” his quartermaster had once said in her hearing. “Dead calm.”
She didn’t doubt it. She wished for a mite of that composure. Her heart seemed to skip beats as she studied the waves, her breathing shallow. A motion below caught her eye, and she spied the two of Henri’s crew who’d been manning the cannon. One made his way to the lighthouse while the other stood on the rocks and faced the surf. His bald head was covered with a brown Monmouth cap, a button on top. His hoary hand clutched it to his head lest the wind snatch it like her cape hood. He faced the sea as if to stand down the storm.
Chary, she returned her attention to the waves. As she hadn’t heard any tread of steps on the stair, she started when Cosmos, one of Henri’s ablest Scotsmen, appeared.
“Pardon, Miss Shaw.” His gruff manner made his apology almost amusing. He came to stand beside her, his expression unreadable.Reaching for the brass spyglass, he grunted his dismay. “A league or so distant is a Guineaman with her foremast cut away. Likely heavy laden with Africans.”
“A slaver, then.” The very word was bitter on her tongue even as compassion rent her heart. Who knew how many men, women, and children were aboard that vessel, taken by force. She’d once seen a child’s shackles lying near the York wharves. Considered the most valuable cargo, children were stashed in a slaver’s smallest spaces.
“The lot o’ them are better off at the bottom o’ the deep than in chains,” he said. “The crew daren’t launch their longboat even to save themselves. That she’s lying bow to sea might keep ’er from breaking up.”
Shaken, Esmée turned away from the struggle. Two of the lights had gone out. She rekindled them, fighting a swelling dismay as the wind lashed the tower with renewed force. It had been constructed with a bit of sway for hurricanes. Would it hold?
In a quarter of an hour the Guineaman was lost from view, the night thick and black as tar. Cosmos was still on watch, spyglass in hand.
Esmée nearly started again when he said, “Best return to the cottage and ready for worse.”
“Worse?”
“The wind’s mounting, the waves with it. There’s nae telling what the storm’s tide will do.” His Scots burr was so thick she stumbled over his words. He raised the spyglass again. “At best, the Guineaman will run aground. At worst, she’ll founder.”
She looked out again as darkness pressed nearer. “God help them, then.”
He looked straight at her. “If the hurricane doesna abate, the surf will be o’er this part of the island, washing into the cottage and even the bottom o’ the lighthouse. Ye’ve got two bairns below, aye? Best bring them to the tower out o’ the worst o’ it.”
She nodded, wasting no time in heading for the stair. But was it wise to bring the babies into the wintry blast? Had she no choice? The fumes from the pan lamps alone were an abomination.
She fought her way to the cottage, pushed and shoved all the way. Once inside, she found Lucy and Alice huddled by the hearth’s fire, the babies swaddled and sleeping between them.
“Ye look tuckered out, Miss Shaw.” Lucy stood as if wanting to help in some way. “I feared the wind would blow ye into the water.”
“It nearly did.” Gathering her wayward hair into a knot, Esmée secured it with the few remaining pins. “I come with hard news. Cosmos believes the water will soon rise and reach the cottage. ’Tis best if we all go to the tower.”
