Bravely we go, we go.”
He held up the rope, and sure enough, the knots he’d formed looked like a frothy ocean bed. Then once again he lowered it and began reworking the thing as he spoke.
“With hind, the dry land reaping,
With townsman, shelter keeping,
With lord, on soft down sleeping,
Change we our lot? O no!
O no! O no! O no!
Change we our lot? O no!”
This time when he held it up, the knots had squared into what looked like a bed with a ropy man sleeping atop it. Amelia leaned forward in her seat, as did Colin. How on earth had the doctor managed to create such a thing?
Before she could ask, Mr. Lambert’s deep voice continued.
“On stormy main careering,
Each sea-mate, sea-mate cheering,
With dauntless helms-man steering,
Our forthward course we hold,
We hold, we hold, we hold,
Our forthward course we hold, we hold.”
A knotty sailor dangled from his fingers, and Amelia could imagine a brawny seafarer shouting into the wind of a tempest as the captain held the brig on a straightforward course.
The doctor’s hands once again flew to work.
“Their sails with sunbeams whitened,
Themselves with glory brightened,
From care their bosoms lightened,
Who shall return?—the bold;
The bold, the bold, the bold;
Only the bold! the bold!”
A series of knots formed a ship’s hull, and while he shook the fabric, he held up the two ends as if they were sails billowing in the breeze. Amelia clapped a hand to her chest, astounded at the man’s skill. As a surgeon, of course he must be dexterous, but this? Absolutely amazing!
He pulled the two ends, and just like that, the whole thing came apart. Once again he held nothing but a limp cravat in his hands.
“Bravo, Mr. Lambert!” Amelia clapped, her applause matched by Colin’s beside her. “Bravo!”
“Well done, Doctor,” her brother rumbled. “You are quite…quite the…”
“Mr. Balfour!”The doctor’s neckcloth plummeted to the floor as he sprinted forward.
Amelia jerked her gaze aside, horrified to see Colin slumped in his chair. Only this time he wasn’t convulsing. His eyes were not rolled back. He was still.
