Chapter 60
Harper sat at the desk, her hands and head buzzing. There was a reference number at the bottom of the page she’d been reading from in the historical account. She turned to the file box and matched it with a crumbling letter encased in a plastic sheath.
Most Honourable Sirs of the Court
It is with a heavy soul that I write in the matter of the most ungodly death of Mistress Meg MacGruer and the young seaman Liam Kelly.
Master Kelly had sailed with The Mary Clarence on many occasions, serving as a most able mariner and fisherman.
His temperament was gentle and his nature quiet.
He never took of the drink nor was idle with the cards and dice play of his fellow sailors.
I knew him to be a godly man, and his passing lays heavy on my soul.
I write as a precursor to my testimony in your good court so that I may clear his good name of all misdeed.
I was like to anger and outrage as I listened to the most foul beast Ewin Taine as he testified that young Master Kelly had attacked him and his assault upon his person had been in a manner of self-defense.
I pray to your honourable Sirs that he is as the D—lies.
This is a trickery of a most black and foul nature.
On the night of 7 September, shortly before midnight, as we kept watch over Taine as he forced Meg MacGruer to pray and recite scripture, I ordered my men to stand down and not interfere.
It was my most flawed belief that it would be best for all if we were to not anger Taine further, and refer the matter to the Dock Marshal upon our entry to Boston Harbour.
He had brandished a blade and threatened the safety of my men, and I felt that left to his prayers and torment, Taine would tire and sleep on his own accord before the sun rose.
This would prove to be a flawed judgement on my part, and I carry young Master Kelly’s blood on my hands in this life and Heaven beyond, if our Lord grants me entry after my most foul deeds.
It was in this time before midnight, as young Meg was in a most grievous state, that my men became restless and pleaded with me to allow them to intervene.
I denied their request and told them to stand down, that justice would be done by the proper authorities.
Liam Kelly, his face full of fire and dignity, charged past me and in his rage confronted Ewin Taine, pulling the man away from Meg and the other women.
It was in this way that Liam was cut by Taine’s blade as he demanded Meg’s release from her torment.
The wound ran deep, and even my most learned crewman could not stem the bleeding as it struck deep inside Master Kelly, severing his mortal life.
Taine’s women cried and huddled together in fear.
Meg, stalwart and brave, held Master Kelly’s head in her lap and sang a tune that I knew from my own childhood in Glasgow.
It was a sight that would break the most hardened heart, and I do believe our Lord wept for the loss.
For his part, Taine watched as Master Kelly perished, and seemed stunned at his own violence. It was in this manner that the next horror on The Mary Clarence was known to happen, on which I will write further so that justice may be done in our good courts and our Lord’s kingdom.
Thank you for considering my humble words.
Your Most Dedicated Servant Captain Cedric Caseling
Harper felt a lump in her throat and a cold weight in her gut.
Liam had died trying to save Meg. He had saved her from jumping to her death from the ship, and had inadvertently brought the charge of Lechery to her on the part of Taine.
The guilt he must have carried, the weight of knowing that he could not save her from Taine no matter how he tried to intervene.
Harper wiped a single tear from her cheek.
It wasn’t Liam Kelly who had brought trouble to Meg.
The charges of “wickednesse” and “witchery” were invented by Taine as revenge for Meg’s parents’ petition to the Laird and the actions of the Glasgow courts.
Kelly had nothing to do with that, but he would never have known.
He must have had immense guilt, and could not stand to sit by while he watched her being tortured.
Harper slowly returned the letter to the file box and opened Meg’s journal.
The moments before and after my green-eyed Liam lay in my arms on the deck of the ship, his eyes already set on our Lord’s Kingdom, are of a ramfeezled manner, blurred as though they were a dream and not my waking eyes.
I sang him a song that my goodly mother had sung to me, and I had sung to my Rory.
Baloo, balilli, baloo balilli
Baloo, balilli, baloo ba
Gae awa peerie fairies
Fae oor peerie bairn
Gae awa peerie fairies
Fae oor bairn noo
He was with our Lord and I closed his apple-green eyes as his soul fled his empty form.
It was in this way that I felt all fear and the weight of my torment leave my body.
I heard the song of the sea creatures envelop me.
I heard my Rory in their midst, and I knew that he awaited me.
I saw my sister Constance and knew her heart to be true.
The others quaked with fear, but Constance met my gaze.
I knew her soul to be pure, and not poisoned by Father Taine.
I felt as though my body was a world entire apart from soul, as though my skin had lifted from my form as a shield against my tormenter.
I saw my goodly mother’s and father’s dear faces.
I felt Liam Kelly’s gentle hand on my shoulder as he guided me away from my attempt to harm myself.
I held Rory’s small hand in mine, his fingers intertwining my own.
I was taken entire by the song of the creatures that had followed me on this journey.
They beckoned me forth, their mín arms more cumailèite than flesh awaited me below.
I gently stood, leaving Liam Kelly where he fell, and faced Father Taine as more beast than woman, no longer afraid of his anger or his fists.
Harper strained to read the faded print of the journal. Her heart pounding, she took a deep breath; she pulled the historian’s account close and continued reading.
The official charges facing Ewin Taine upon his arrival in Boston were the murders of both Liam Kelly and Meg MacGruer, as well as assault on several crewmen of The Mary Clarence.
Kelly’s body was delivered to the local coroner, who also served as undertaker and sheriff of Town-House Square.
Meg’s body was not recovered, though there was little doubt she had perished.
Captain Caseling writes in his private journal that he witnessed Meg stand before Taine.
He could not hear the words spoken, but he witnessed Taine rush the girl, who held up a single hand that stopped Taine in his tracks.
It was in this moment of pause that a group of sailors intervened and ran to restrain Taine.
He again brandished the dagger and cut several of the men as they tried to pull him to the ground.
The men of The Mary Clarence were unarmed.
It was a shipping and fishing vessel, and there were no muskets or fowlers present.
The only weapons available in this matter were boning knives, which the men ran to retrieve when it became apparent that Taine could not be contained.
It was in this moment that Captain Caseling witnesses an event that was the subject of much scrutiny and debate in the Boston courts and among historians alike.
Harper stopped reading and closed her eyes.
She had lived this before, she had dreamt it.
She felt the frigid North Atlantic water like ice knives in her skin.
She felt the terror of the weightless fall from the bow of the ship.
She heard the sea creatures calling her from below.
But as she closed her eyes and her skin lifted from her form as a shield, she also felt the silk-soft embrace of the water, the creatures whose tentacles wrapped around her form, embracing her; she felt a small hand in hers, and smelled the little-boy scent of Rory’s hair overwhelming her, surrounding her.
Her body struggled for air, but her soul was already at peace.
Above her, the shadow of the ship faded as she sank deeper and deeper into the heart of the moonless night.
And then she was rushed along through the waves, being pulled by translucent beings with eyes that contained the universe. They regarded her as she held her Rory tight in her arms. He clung to her and whispered in her ear:
Beannachd leat andrásta
Na gabh dragh orm
Goodbye for now, do not worry for me. The words were clear in Harper’s head and she heard the little boy’s voice ring in her head.
Then, the shock of arms lifting her into a rowboat, where an angel, a woman with a black braid and matching eyes, wrapped her in a thick shawl, pulled her close and held her as she shook with cold.
Two men in black cloaks rowed rhythmically toward land barely visible in the blackness.
Harper could see the outline of the ship in the distance and knew it was over. Father Taine, her torture, all she had suffered was over. She looked to the woman with wonder, this woman who was both familiar and strange, known and unknown.
“Where are we?” she whispered.
“Beyond the Graves, where no one will hurt you again,” the woman replied, her eyes fixed on hers.
And in that moonless night where a perfect blackness cloaked her and an angel held her in their arms, Harper’s spirit was sent awash in a wave of understanding that she had come home.