Gordon shook his head. “Even if I locate the lady and persuade her to return to England, it will take time to pack up her life. A day or two at the least.”
“If your widow has the sense God gave a sparrow, she’ll have left Washington by now,” Hawkins said pessimistically. “If that has happened, you’ll never find her.”
“True, but since I’m this close, I need to try, if only to justify all the money this mission is costing her family.”
“I can’t complain when I’m getting a good share of that money.” Hawkins raised the spyglass to survey the horizon. His voice changed. “There’s a boat in trouble up ahead. Looks like it hit a shoal or snag.”
Even without the spyglass, Gordon could see that the small boat was in serious trouble. It was dead in the water, and as he watched, it tipped over on its side, sails flapping. Most of the passengers grabbed hold of the hull, but one small figure tumbled into the water and was seized by the current.
As the child was swept downstream toward theZephyr, female screams slashed through the heavy air. “Lizzie!Lizzie!”
Gordon swore as he calculated the odds. It didn’t look as if any of the child’s family knew how to swim, and the speed of the current would take her past theZephyrbefore a dinghy could be launched. No other boats were close enough to help.
He wrenched off his boots and tossed his hat behind him, then vaulted up onto the railing. “I’d take it kindly if you’d send a small boat after us.”
“You swim well enough to do this?” Hawkins asked tersely.
“Yes.” Gordon spent a moment marking the child’s path because once he was in the water, he’d have trouble seeing her. Then he kicked off from the railing in a long, flat dive that carried him away from the ship and toward little Lizzie.
The water was pleasantly cool as he cleaved into it and set off with powerful strokes toward the child. He’d always loved swimming, and he and Callie had learned together in a Lancashire river. In later years, he’d swum in rougher seas, and once he’d swum for his life. He should be able to save one pocket-sized little girl.
The river looked very wide and dangerous now that he was in it, and the odds were about even whether or not he could reach Lizzie before her saturated clothing dragged her under forever. When he judged he was close to where the current would have brought her, he paused and kicked himself upward as hard as he could to get a better view. Where the devil was she?
There.Twenty feet or so to his right a pale, half-submerged face was on the verge of being swept past. The flailing child managed to raise her head enough to gulp air before she slipped below the surface again.
“Hold on!” he shouted, hoping a chance of rescue would encourage her to keep struggling. He threw himself through the water, knowing that if he couldn’t reach her now, she was lost.
The small head surfaced a couple of yards away and great blue eyes stared at him blindly before she sank again. Kicking furiously, he jackknifed under the surface and lunged as far forward as he could.
The water was swift and murky, so it was pure chance that his stretching fingers touched fabric. He grabbed and managed to latch on to a solid handful of her floating skirts. Then he kicked upward.
They emerged into the sunshine and Lizzie clutched Gordon, coughing up water as she locked her arms around his neck in a stranglehold. He barely managed to keep both their heads above the surface.
He scissor-kicked and paddled sideways as he secured her against his right side. She was five or six, he estimated. Old enough to know the danger she’d been in. “Don’t worry, Lizzie, you’re safe now,” he said soothingly. “Try not to choke me.”
She began to cry but had the wit to loosen her grip. As she calmed down, Gordon scanned their surroundings. TheZephyrhad come about and a dinghy was heading toward them. Another of the ship’s rowboats had reached the sailboat and was taking passengers from the damaged vessel.
Hawkins himself was in the dinghy that pulled up alongside Gordon. He leaned down, arms outstretched. “Pass her to me!”
Gordon obeyed, and Lizzie was whisked out of the water, coughing and squeaking. Hawkins wrapped her in a large towel and handed her to a sailor behind him. Then he reached down and grabbed Gordon’s hand, half lifting him from the water. “Well done,” Hawkins said tersely as he hauled Gordon over the stern.
“It was a near thing.” Gordon accepted a towel and used it to blot water from his dripping hair. Looking upriver, he added, “You’re taking the sailboat in tow?”
“It might be repairable, and it goes against a sailor’s grain to let any boat die,” Hawkins explained. “Now to find out what news the passengers have of the war.”
News would be a very good thing, Gordon silently agreed as he pulled off his shirt, wrung water out of it, and dragged it on again. In this heat, it would dry quickly.
The journey back to theZephyrwas slower because they were moving against the current. As they pulled up alongside the schooner, a boy of around twelve looked over the side of the railing and shouted, “Mama, Lizzie’s all right!”
Hawkins effortlessly climbed a rope ladder to the main deck with the little girl tucked under his arm. Gordon followed and reached the deck in time to see Lizzie and her dark-haired mother reunited in a fierce hug.
The water-soaked party from the small sailboat included a grandmotherly female, a capable black woman who behaved like a nursemaid looking after her chicks, and a boy and a girl in age between Lizzie and her big brother. They were a weary and vulnerable collection of refugees.
After assuring herself that her daughter was well, the woman handed Lizzie off to the nursemaid and turned to Gordon. “I’m Abigail Green. This is my mother-in-law, Alice Green and”—she waved at the others—“the rest of the family. I’m told that you’re Mr. Gordon. God bless and keep you for what you’ve done!”
“I’m just glad we were close enough to help,” he said. “Were you fleeing British troops? We need any news of the war you can give us.”
Mrs. Green hesitated. “You and your captain are English, aren’t you?”
