Chapter One #2
He bowed again. “Excuse me. I have overstepped.” Then he pivoted and strode toward the gangplank. Halfway up it, he looked over his shoulder at her. And tripped, plunging face first into the water.
Elspeth screeched, stepping toward the edge of the dock.
Sir Gordon, calling his cousin’s name, rushed down the gangplank, dropping down on it, lying flat as he reached for the flailing Lord Timothy.
Together with another sailor, they hauled him out of the water, helping him to his feet.
Water dripped from his hair and clothes as Gordon looked him over.
Lord Timothy spit water and held up his hand, fending off any more help.
With a single glimpse in her direction, he trudged up the rest of the gangplank and onto the boat.
Elspeth watched him until he disappeared below deck. “What a peculiar young man.” She felt Sinclair move in beside her.
“Most men are odd at nineteen.”
Elspeth cut a glance at her maid. “Speaking from personal experience?”
“Do you know how many nineteen-year-old hall boys and footmen your father employs?
Elspeth returned her gaze to the mail packet, which was now a flurry of activity as the gangplank was lifted and the mooring ropes released. “Pesky creatures, are they?”
“Like a clowder of alley cats.”
“Ah. Well, he does look a bit like a dowsed tom.”
“Most likely behaves like one as well.”
Elspeth coughed a laugh. “Ah, what stellar views of men you have, Sinclair.”
“And nary a one undeserved.”
As the ship shrank into the distance, Elspeth sighed. “Well, that is one gentleman I will not have to worry about stepping on my toes. He will be out of sight for rather a long time. But I may not forget those eyes.”
“You probably should, since you will never see them again. Sinclair’s fingers grazed her arm. “Time to go home, my lady.”
Monday, 5 September 1814
Aboard the HMP Swiftsure
Departing Falmouth, England
It was not supposed to be like this. Adventuring across the planet was supposed to be exciting. Enthralling. Gallant. An echo of heroes past and present. James Cook. Alexander MacKenzie. Henry Hudson.
This is disgusting. Lord Timothy Rydell, youngest brother of the Duke of Embleton, leaned over the rail of the mail packet headed for America and delivered every morsel of his recently consumed breakfast to the churning sea below.
His head spun, and he clung to the rail and one rope of the rigging in a desperate attempt to stay upright.
Not even the brisk air and the salty spray peppering his face helped ease the roiling in his gut.
His dark curls, still plastered to his scalp by his mortifying dunk off the gangplank, dripped down his neck and beneath his collar, chilling him.
He had changed into dry clothes, his soaking garb now draped over the end of his bunk in his miniscule stateroom below, but his hair held onto the water, smelling distinctly like fish oil and tar.
They would laugh, if they saw me now. His mother, who had been dismayed by what she had termed his relentless braggadocio.
His brothers—especially the ones who had served with Wellington—who had teased him about having to give up his many women when he became a vicar, which had seemed his only option for a stable future until Gordon came along.
They saw their youngest brother as little more than a dandy.
A pink. Definitely not strong or brave enough to follow their own military service, and they had refused to help him purchase a commission.
And all those women, who had been mere dalliances for him, would find his current weakness most amusing.
As would the young woman he had just met on the dock.
Lady Elspeth? She of the remarkably thick red hair and eyes a lustrous emerald green.
Her simple straw bonnet barely contained thick tresses that must have taken a multitude of pins to hold it in place.
A lush figure a man could plunder for days and never tire of exploring.
And she wanted to travel!
So, of course, he would meet her only on the day he left England for many years to come.
And make a complete fool of himself, not only in his attempt to talk with her but in his abrupt plummet into the ocean.
He had not been that awkward around a woman ever.
So why would he pick this day and that woman to behave like such a buffoon?
A sudden clap on his back almost dislodged his grip, and Timothy staggered, sucking in air.
“It will pass in a few days. At least it does for most people.”
Timothy twisted to look at his cousin, the man responsible for him being on the mail packet boat headed across the North Atlantic. “A few days?” He spit over the rail. “I will never survive that long.”
Sir Gordon Rydell chuckled, his brown eyes sparkling with humor. “You will. Just stay on deck as much as possible and never cast your accounts into the wind. Nearer the stern is your best bet, leeward side.”
Timothy groaned, trying to remember what leeward meant in sailing parlance.
“I will try to keep that in mind.” He looked toward the bow where Gordon’s new wife, Ella, seemed to relish the wind created by the fast-moving ship.
She laughed often, shaking her head as her long, raven tresses bounced about freely.
As the ship rose and fell with the waves, Ella shifted her body, adjusting to the constant movement of the deck.
Her bright-blue gown stood out starkly against the dampened wood of the ship. “Ella seems to have adapted well.”
If only I could have found a woman like that.
Timothy looked back toward shore, his mind recalling the beauty on the dock. Would she be so carefree, adapt as easily to travel?
Gordon leaned closer to be heard over the wind, his broad shoulders and six-foot-two height towering over Timothy’s shorter, leaner frame.
Unlike Ella’s mane of curls, Gordon’s blond locks lay close to his head, firmly anchored by a queue bound near the nape of his neck.
He had cut his hair into a proper English style upon his arrival in the spring but had let it grow again after his wedding a few months ago in order to adopt this style still popular on the other side of the pond.
And, obviously, more practical on a wind-blown ship.
“We sailed through the Mediterranean on our honeymoon. She got used to it then but was queasy for the first couple of days.”
“The Mediterranean could not have been this rough.” Timothy looked out over the tossing gray-black water of the North Atlantic and the froth stirred by waves and the progress of the boat. His stomach flipped again, and he coughed.
Gordon grinned. “No, few passages are as rough as the North Atlantic in autumn. Except possibly the North Atlantic in winter.”
“No wonder you only come home every ten years.”
Gordon leaned against the rail. “My extended stay in America had little to do with the nature of ocean travel.” He glanced at Ella.
Timothy remembered his mother’s hurried explanation of Gordon’s return to claim his new baronetcy and title, deal with his new estate, and renew his relationship with the beautiful Ella, which had been forbidden to him by his father ten years before.
While Timothy’s mother made it sound like the love match for the ages, his brothers had been more practical.
Gordon, at two and forty, was the sole remaining male in his lineage.
He needed an heir, and he had been lucky that his beloved Ella had remained single and was willing to travel with him to America, where most of his businesses and investments were based.
Then, again, Timothy’s brothers were a cynical lot. For them, love always took second place to practicality.
Not that Timothy blamed them. He had just spent an eye-opening season maneuvering through a plethora of marriage-minded misses and their mothers, at the behest of his own mother, Phyllida, the widowed Duchess of Embleton.
This past January, she had been frustrated that none of her eight sons had married, despite all having reached their majority, and she was determined to change that.
Her pressure-wrought campaign had led to two marriages during the season, with the promise of more to come.
Timothy, however, had no desire to be among them. His goal had long been to dally with less acceptable women whenever he could but to travel and explore instead of marrying. Nothing—and no one—he had seen during the past season had changed his mind.
Until this morning. The lady redhead would have been worth a second dance. But where would she be in five years? Ten? Married to some dolt who could not see the longing in her eyes for the horizon?
Gordon nudged him. “Do not think about her too much. It will make you insane. She is not Ella. She will not be around when you return. Focus on why you are leaving. Why you chose this.”
That was wisdom. He could not afford to look backward for any reason, and he remained grateful for Gordon’s guidance and the offered solution to both of Timothy’s major problems. So he and Gordon had struck a deal.
By traveling with his cousin to America, Timothy removed himself from his mother’s aims and provided an avenue for his own path forward.
Because his American businesses had proved to be exceptionally lucrative, Gordon Rydell was an exceedingly wealthy man on both sides of the Atlantic.
Timothy would work with him for one year, after which Gordon would help him with whatever Timothy wanted to do next.
Overall, Gordon’s return to England, however brief, had been an unexpected but welcome blessing to several people.
“But you know your reprieve is temporary.”
Timothy swallowed hard, then glanced at Gordon before looking ahead again. His queasiness lessened when he faced the bow. “I am not sure what you mean.”
Gordon chuckled. “Your mother. When I arrived back in the spring, Phyllida confronted me on the subject of marriage before I was barely off the boat. Her relentless pursuit of Matthew on the subject sent him fleeing to a matchmaker. She will not abandon her campaign to see all her sons wed, even with you three thousand miles away.”
“She should be focused for a while on my brothers. There are five of them before me.”
“Not as long as you might believe. Phyllida Rydell can face a battle on more than one front at a time. She will not give up on you. You are family. And that is more important to her than you can imagine.”
Timothy gazed out over the waves, remembering a few of the times when his mother had discussed the importance of family at their daily meals, encouraging them to support and care for each other.
He understood and appreciated that, but he simply did not believe he would ever have one of his own.
Women were too . . . homebound . . . and his aims in life had wandered too far afield from polite Society.
His gaze lingered on Ella, her joy at traveling with her husband sparking a touch of hope in Timothy’s chest. A hope that had nowhere to land. “Unfortunately, there are not many women like Ella. At least none that I have met.”
Gordon paused, glancing back at the disappearing Falmouth shoreline. “No. There are not many women like Ella. And I waited a long time for her. Possibly her friend, Elspeth, but that lady will be long married before you return. Perhaps this time abroad will allow you to find such a woman.”
Timothy shook his head. “Even I did, she would not want a soft dandy who tosses his accounts at the first wave. Or cannot walk a gangplank without diving overboard.”
“Perhaps. But you will not be a soft dandy much longer. You may count on that. Exploration brings rewards far beyond wealth.” Gordon grinned. “And if not, there is always Mrs. Bessie Dove-Lyon.”
Timothy scowled. “Who?”
Gordon looked past Timothy to his wife. “Matthew’s matchmaker. Which is a story for another time, cousin. When the seas are calmer and our heads are clearer.”
The bow of the Swiftsure rose suddenly as the ship split a large wave, slamming down on the other side with a force that almost knocked Timothy off his feet.
Even Gordon gripped the rail tighter, but at the very front of the ship, Ella laughed riotously as she finally grabbed a handhold, her hair billowing about her.
The small crew of the vessel, only nine and twenty men, barely took notice as they rambled over the deck and scrambled about in the rigging.
Timothy gagged and leaned over the rail, but nothing remained in his stomach.
As the ship settled, he straightened and turned his gaze forward again.
Behind them, the port of Falmouth had slowly slipped below the horizon, the light of the sun a white glow behind the scattering clouds.
Before them lay only what appeared to be an endless ocean, the vast distance seeming unconquerable to him, even though he knew the mail packet boats, with their light draft and sparse crew, usually reached America in about forty days.
Some considered them the fastest ships on the main.
Which is why Gordon had laid out the money for the expensive if miniscule passenger cabins.
Mail packets were not intended for passengers or their comfort.
Only five cabins had been set aside for them.
The deck pitched again, and Timothy swallowed the remaining bile in his throat. “I will never eat again.”
Gordon turned to face the sea as well. “You will. Stick to the water crackers for a few days. They are just water, salt, and flour, so they should not bother you too much if they come back up.”
“Encouraging.”
“This is what you want, is it not?”
Was it? Have I not long dreamed of following the men I admire to new worlds and discoveries? He had, although he had never imagined it would mean barely eating and casting his accounts over the side of a boat every day. Still . . .
“It is.”
Gordon nodded. “Good. Then once you have recovered, we have a great deal to talk about. Now, I need to retrieve Ella before one of these waves launches her over to the mermaids.” He turned and headed toward the bow, his steps sure, if not straight, on the rolling deck.
Timothy took a deep breath and turned his face to the wind. I can do this.
Two weeks later, Timothy noted his twentieth birthday in his journal, along with recognition that the water crackers had worked.
Then on the seventeenth of October, he entered his thoughts about his first sight of the New World, undulating and impossibly green fields juxtaposed with the sprawling new cities, new buildings everywhere.
This was the adventure Timothy had sought. Now he just had to embrace it. And leave all other thoughts behind.