Sea Change (10 page)

"My father was the doctor for our town and the surrounding area. When my mother died it was just easier for him to dress me as a boy and take me with him. As I grew, he discovered I had an interest and aptitude for healing. I think...I think he tried to forget I was Charlotte, and I became 'Charley' in all but reality. He wanted an apprentice, and he had one."

"Didn't your family say anything?"

"My parents were estranged from my mother's family because they wanted her to marry better than a country doctor. And my father was an orphan. So it was just the two of us, and the housekeeper and her husband, and it suited us fine. Until my father died."

"I cannot imagine being without family," Henry said. "They are always there for you--whether you like it or not. David had most of the raising of me, first with our father at sea, and then after his death when David took over the business."

"It was a mixed blessing," Charley confessed, "being raised as a boy. I never experienced what other young ladies do, and yet I had an education that was unique. I would sit at table when my father's medical friends would come to visit, and the knowledge I picked up was invaluable, especially when combined with my father's teaching."

"But it is not a natural life for you."

Charley leaned against the bulkhead and crossed her arms over her chest, a deliberately masculine stance.

"On the contrary," she said, "for me it is the most natural life. To try and change now into something I am not, something I have no skill at... No, I would rather be Charley Alcott than Charlotte."

"Except that Charley cannot experience what Charlotte could," Henry said softly. "A home and a family of her own."

Charley shrugged. "Do you have a dream, Mr. Fletcher?"

He looked down at his bandaged stump, then back up at her. His face was drawn and tired in the lamplight, and she imagined she looked much the same. She could hear men outside sick bay, one watch heading to its meal while the other went about its business, but her eyes were all on the man in front of her.

In another setting, she could see herself attracted to someone like Henry Fletcher. He was intelligent and handsome enough, and a gentle man despite his service aboard this privateering vessel.

But he did not make the air sharper when he entered a room, he did not make her senses come alive. With Henry Fletcher, she felt safe. When Black Davy Fletcher was about, she felt anything but safe. And yet if she had to choose this minute between the men, she knew which one she would choose.

Now Henry sighed as he considered her question. "My dream is to command a ship of my own. This voyage...David was grooming me for my own ship. See, Dr. Alcott, when David marries Miss Dixon, she will bring enough wealth into the family that we can expand our holdings, increase our ships. I, too, want to be a captain, but of a merchantman, not a privateer."

"Ah. Those must be the marriage plans Captain Fletcher mentioned."

"Yes, it has been discussed for some time. Her father is one of the wealthiest ship owners in Baltimore. With Sarah's dowry the Fletcher family will be able to expand its own business as never before." There was something in his voice when he spoke of his brother's intended that caused Charley to look at him more closely, but he said nothing more.

"Why do you think you cannot achieve your dream?" she asked.

"What?" he looked up at her.

"Why can you no longer be a ship's captain?"

"With only one hand? I am a cripple!"

"Oh for heaven's sake, Mr. Fletcher, Lord Nelson defeated Napoleon's navy with one arm and one eye! Are you telling me you cannot command a single vessel because you are short a hand?"

"Well, it is necessary to have sufficient hands to man the ship," Fletcher said expressionlessly.

Charley stared at him and then burst out laughing, and couldn't stop. She knew she was on the edge of hysteria, but the tension of the day magnified by the conversation of the last ten minutes brought her to the point where her laughter morphed into something much deeper from her soul.

"Here. This looks clean."

Henry Fletcher handed her a piece of unused bandage and sat there looking uncomfortable. She waited until she could get her sobbing under control and her eyes to stop streaming, then blew her nose vigorously.

"Thank you, Mr. Fletcher. That was good medicine for the doctor."

"And I imagine that was your dream, Dr. Alcott. To become a physician."

It cheered her no end that he was still calling her "Dr. Alcott," unlike Dr. Murray's insistence on addressing her as "Miss Alcott."

"Yes, Mr. Fletcher, my dream is to heal the ill and keep the healthy patients healthy. Before he died my father said he did me a disservice by training me in his ways, but I cannot accept that. I am happiest when I am working, mending those who are broken. Each day is different and exciting to me because I do not know what I will encounter, what I will learn."

"You saved my life, and you have mended many aboard this ship who were broken, Dr. Alcott. I would say that even if your dream may seem an impossible one, you are right not to forsake it."

"Now you have made me cry again," she scolded him.

He sat there patiently, a much more restful presence than his brother. She could see Mr. Fletcher as a ship's captain, one who would lead his men through difficult situations by infusing their spirits with his own calm and grace, rather than by rousing them with his passions.

She blew her nose again. "What gave me away?"

"You have examined my arm every day, which gives me a chance to examine you. Your hands are too small for a man, your wrists too slender even for a boy."

Charley sighed. "One cannot practice medicine while wearing gloves. I can only hope that others aboard this vessel are not as observant as you are."

"Since most of them seem to be bending over or staring at the deck above when you are ministering to them, I wouldn't worry about it overmuch," Henry said dryly, getting up from the chair.

"Dr. Alcott," he hesitated at the door, "I meant what I said. If you need a friend aboard the
Fancy
, you can count on me. Because I must warn you--you think you have seen David in a temper. You have not, not yet, and I fear for you if he finds out you are hoodwinking him."

"Then I will do my best to make sure he doesn't find out. I hope Captain Fletcher will soon drop me in Jamaica, where this will no longer be an issue."

He frowned and seemed about to say something, then shrugged. "David Fletcher will do what David Fletcher wants. He always does."

"So I am learning," Charley said grimly. "Good night, Mr. Fletcher."

"Good night, Dr. Alcott."

Charley busied herself straightening sick bay, wondering if she would get any sleep at all that night. She had been complacent, fully into her identity as "Dr. Alcott." Was there anything she could have done differently to disguise her sex?

Probably not. As Mr. Fletcher said, he was in a position to observe her more than the others were. Even Miller, the sailor who helped keep the sick bay neat, did his work and left--his lack of literacy would keep him from moving up to the position of assistant surgeon and he made it clear he was happy to be rated an able seaman and was not desirous of further responsibility. That left Captain Fletcher as the only other person aboard ship who saw her on a regular basis.

There was a knock at the sick bay door.

"Come in, Captain Fletcher."

"How did you know it was me?"

"No one else has that commanding knock."

"Of course not."

He walked around sick bay and the small space felt more cramped than ever with his larger-than-life presence. The captain was wearing a shirt, unbuttoned and loose over his trousers, and she could see the dark dusting of hair on his chest.

She saw a lot of hairy chests in the course of a day. Why this one should catch her notice was something to chastise herself over later. When he wasn't standing so close to her, and smelling fresh and clean, and male. She stopped herself from leaning in to take a deep breath

"What brings you here so late, Captain? Is your wound bothering you?"

He snickered. "I would hardly call that scratch a wound, Doctor. And no, it isn't bothering me, other than my annoyance that I was not fast enough to evade that Spaniard's knife."

"Well, then?"

"Well then wh--oh, why am I here? I couldn't sleep, Doctor, and wanted to ask if you would join me in my cabin for a drink. Everyone else is busy or asleep, and we hardly see each other."

That was a good thing, because the more time she spent with handsome Black Davy Fletcher, the more she found herself drawn to him. Despite his keeping her on his schooner against her will, despite her disguise, despite everything her practical and ordered mind told her about the danger of spending time with this man, she was drawn to him.

She was no different from any of the other
lepidoptera
, even if she was more moth than butterfly.

"Yes, thank you, Captain, I would be pleased to join you. Give me a few minutes and I will meet you at your cabin."

"Excellent! I have a Jamaican rum that I would be happy to prescribe to you, Doctor, as a sovereign remedy. It will put hair on your chest, I guarantee."

He winked at Charley and left, and she chewed her lip, wondering if she had just made a colossal mistake, Henry Fletcher's warning words still fresh in her mind.
In for a penny, in for a pound
, she thought, and put away journals and locked the medicine chest.

As she closed the door to the privy that the sailors called the head, Charley again thanked Providence and whomever had added this enhancement to the
Fancy.
It wasn't easy maintaining her disguise, but it would have been nearly impossible without this additional privacy. There'd been an enclosed stool aboard the
Lady Jane
, but it was a larger vessel, and there the head was reserved for the officers and passengers.

She was still thinking about it as she knocked and entered Captain Fletcher's cabin.

"I have to tell you, Captain, that one of the amenities aboard your ship that makes my workload easier is the ship's roundhouse being available to all the crew. Aboard the
Lady Jane
it was an ongoing problem for the men, being costive and sore from having to hang over the bow on the lifelines. Not surprisingly, they would hesitate to go in rough weather, and the results brought them to sick bay more than it should have."

Captain Fletcher looked at her like this was an odd conversation to be having, and poured her a drink of rum. She took it from him and sniffed it cautiously before taking a small sip.

He poured himself a more substantial serving and said, "My mother traveled with my father on his voyages, and she insisted he add this amenity before she would set foot aboard the
Fancy.
Of course, Doctor, being American and full of egalitarian values regarding sailors' rights, how could I deny the crew the opportunity to sit at ease like gentlemen?"

The last was said with such fervor that she smiled. "Joke if you must, Captain Fletcher, but sometimes it is the little things like a dry place to sleep and a quiet place to...mmmm...contemplate the workings of one's bowels that make the difference between a well man and a sick one."

"Your appreciation is noted, Doctor."

"Your father was a ship's captain?"

Captain Fletcher stretched himself out on his bunk, leaning up against the bulkhead, and gestured to the chair at the desk. "Sit, Doctor, and relax a spell. It is not often we have a chance at the end of a long day to appreciate some of the other amenities in life, such as a good rum."

He took some into his mouth and she could tell he was rolling it across his tongue, savoring the taste and the bite, and his eyes closed briefly in sensual enjoyment of the moment.

Charley swallowed, her mouth gone dry, but resisted the impulse to gulp down her rum. She knew the last thing she needed was to drink to the point where she was foolish, and the sight of Black Davy Fletcher stretched out in all his piratical glory, combined with rum, could lead her to act foolishly.

Even fatally foolishly.

"Yes, this was my father's vessel. He named it after my mother--Frances-- but her friends call her Fanny. Father thought it inappropriate to name a ship Fanny, so he settled on Fancy. Mother said she preferred that name anyway."

"Where is your mother now?"

"She still lives in Baltimore." A shadow crossed his face. "I do not know how she will take the sight of Henry without his hand."

"If you bring Henry home to her alive, she will be grateful. And if she has any understanding of life aboard ship, as you say she does, then she will understand." Charley looked him in the eye. "I am sure your mother is a woman of great sense and will not hold anyone else responsible for Henry's mishap."

Some of the tension eased from Captain Fletcher's broad shoulders. "Aye, you are right, Doctor." He looked over at her. "For such a young man you have a great understanding of human nature."

"Practicing medicine with my father showed me the best and worst of human nature, Captain. I saw frail women who were brave beyond all understanding when it came to helping their loved ones, and I saw grown men faint at the idea of being vaccinated against smallpox."

"I can understand that, Doctor. I am fine in the face of fire and shot, but bring a scalpel near me and I might faint at your feet."

"Ideally, we will never have to test that, Captain."

They sat in silence for a few moments, and Charley studied him surreptitiously. The more time she spent with him, the more she was struck by the sheer physical beauty of this man. She could not imagine a life where one was so attractive heads would turn as you walked into a room and admiring glances would follow you. Mr. Lewis told her in Baltimore they'd called him "Handsome Davy" from the time he started wearing long pants, and he accepted it as his due. Everything about him bespoke confidence and assurance. She was certain those qualities were necessary for a privateer, and Davy Fletcher had it in spades.