Chapter Fourteen
“As your friend,” Michael said with a snort of laughter, “I have to say, this is not what I expected.”
His words were almost drowned by the hollering and screaming of the other inhabitants in the room, something he should have expected, considering the last twenty minutes.
Dear God, it was a rush to the senses. The auction house was really nothing more than a warehouse close to the docks, and when Phylis had told him to meet her there at eleven o’clock, Michael had been so intrigued, he’d arrived five minutes early.
She had already been there, arguing vociferously with a man almost twice her width.
“And if you come near my ship again, I’ll cut you into a thousand—”
“Oh, good morning, Captain Seaton,” Michael had said hastily, stepping forward and wondering whether, if it came to it, he’d be able to lift the woman bodily and carry her away from danger. “Let’s just—”
“Shove off, man, I’m doing business,” the stranger had said, turning a grin back to Phylis, who inexplicably was grinning too. “You rascal, it’s been months!”
“Because you always avoid me, you rum gagger,” Phylis said happily, much to Michael’s confusion. “But I mean it, though. If any of my crew see you anywhere near the Dreamer…”
“Yes, yes, you’ll cut me into a thousand pieces,” the man had said, waving a hand nonchalantly as though this were a typical greeting and not a vicious threat. “Give my regards to Drummond, won’t you?”
“He’ll kill you if he sees you!” Phylis had said cheerfully as the man started to walk off back along the dock. “Ah, Michael. Right on time.”
Michael had blinked. This was not the sort of light communication he had with others, and he couldn’t exactly tell whether the man who was now sauntering away from them was friend or foe.
Perhaps…both?
“What had he done to deserve that?”
“Oh, he used to be a part of my crew, until he stole from me,” Phylis had said lightly, as though this sort of thing happened all the time.
“Had to get rid of him, of course, and wasn’t able to take a finger as he left, but he was one of the best navigators I ever had.
If Drummond ever decides to leave me, I’ll have him back in a heartbeat. ”
Michael had glanced over at the man who disappeared around a corner. “A known thief? You’d have a known thief on your ship?”
Phylis had shrugged. “Better a known thief than an unknown thief. Besides, he knows I’d take his hand if he did it again. Shall we go inside?”
And that was how Michael had followed the woman into the warehouse in a daze and had stayed in that daze ever since.
It was difficult not to be dazed by such a place. The tall, expansive ceilings and the wide, spacious room had once housed some sort of packing place; Michael could guess that by the detritus left behind. What was here now appeared to be a large stage and a gaggle of men around it.
All men, save for Phylis.
“And this is…?”
“An auction house.” The woman beside him tilted her chin up, crossing her arms as her gaze darted about her. “It looks like Captain Pelham isn’t here, which is all to the good. Should mean all the goods are legitimate.”
“‘Legitimate’?”
“Not stolen. Full taxed up, imports paid,” Phylis translated as she nudged him with her shoulder. “Just don’t wave your hands about, understood?”
Michael drew himself up to his full height and tried to look more comfortable than he was in such a place. “I’ve been to auctions before, you know. Once, I bought the most elegant, little—”
“This auction,” Phylis said drolly, “is not going to be like that auction.”
She could not have been more right. Michael had expected the auctioneer to step up to the stage and wave his hands for silence, get it, and then launch into a pretty speech about what they would be seeing today, the rules of engagement, and a request that any debates were taken outside, as their conversation could disrupt the auction.
None of that happened.
“All right, you bastards!” roared a man with one eye yet somehow a glare to sink ships, pulling himself onto the stage amidst jeering. “Bid high, bid often, and if y’get outbid, no punches below the belt! Are we ready?”
“Yes!” roared the crowd and Michael was delighted to find that Phylis roared with them.
When he gave her a questioning look, she shrugged with a smirk. “It’s the best auction you’ll find.”
Perhaps it was, but Michael found it a little difficult to follow. Firstly, there did not seem to be any rhyme or reason as to the order with which auctioned items were presented. There were no categories, no catalog to review, just…crates and barrels.
Secondly, no one ever said what was in the damned things.
“Four,” someone yelled.
“Four an’a half!”
“Six!”
“But it’s just a barrel,” Michael whispered, lowering his mouth to Phylis’s ear and trying not to think about what else he could do while his lips were so close to her neck. “What’s inside it?”
She did her best not to roll her eyes, he could tell, but she did not quite manage it. “That’s the point! All this is washed up or shipwrecked or seized or once stolen. No one knows what’s in it. That’s the risk.”
Michael stared, hardly able to believe his ears. “You… You don’t even know what’s inside it? You never know?”
“Seven!”
“Not until you buy it.” Phylis bounced on her heels, the excitement of the auction giving her cheeks a flush. “That’s the risk and that’s the reward.”
It was fascinating. Michael stared, open mouthed, as a barrel about half his height went for eight shillings in the end, and a man roared with delight as he grabbed it with a friend and carried it off the stage to the side of the warehouse.
All eyes turned to him as he pulled out a crowbar, and the place went silent as he hastily levered the lid off.
Michael could smell it from here. “Oh, dear—”
“Rotten fish!” crowed Phylis with a snort of laughter, something that she was joined in by half the auction. “Eight shillings for a barrel of rotten fish!”
“It’s a terrible way to lose eight shillings,” Michael said, shaking his head in wonder.
Phylis shrugged, turning back to the stage upon which men were placing three crates. “Five shillings.”
“‘Five’?”
“He’ll clean and sell the barrel, lower his loss,” she said in a low voice as silence fell once again across the place. “Now watch—really watch, Michael. I want to know what you see.”
What I see?
What he saw was a bunch of men essentially gambling—that was all Michael could see. Each time a crate or a barrel was brought upon the stage, it was greeted as though it could have been carrying buried treasure—which he supposed it might have been, though it was long odds.
After the barrel of rotten fish, the other crates were revealed to be two crates packed with bolts of linen, a barrel of apples, a crate of silver plateware, which gained a sigh of appreciation from the group, and a trunk that had gone for over four guineas and turned out to contain absolutely nothing.
“But the trunk itself is worth a guinea, so they’ll make something back there,” Phylis muttered. “Now, what do you see?”
Michael stared helplessly, feeling more out of his depth than he had when they’d gone rowing, and that had been a mite deep.
‘See’? What was he supposed to—
The crate with silverware. It had been heavier—the men had struggled to lift it onto the platform.
And the barrel of fish—hadn’t there been some sort of residue around the top?
He looked over at Phylis, who winked.
“Now you’re know what you’re looking for,” she said lightly. “Do you want a go?”
Michael swallowed.
He knew what he wanted. He wanted her.
He wanted Phylis in his arms, in his bed—but on his arm every day. He wanted each morning to be full of her and each afternoon to be centered on her. He wanted these moments, this sort of moment where she caught his eye and grinned and his pulse skipped a beat, to be every moment.
“Do you want to bid on anything?” Phylis repeated.
The smile disappeared from his face. “Oh. Right.”
Obviously, that was what she’d meant. He was being foolish to even consider anything else.
“Perhaps,” Michael said in a murmur as the next item was lifted on the stage, a small trunk—and with great effort, he noted. “Perhaps, if I see something worth wanting.”
For a moment, their gazes met and waves of need flowed between them. Need and affection, rippling between them, soaring like a fluttering sail in the wind. Everything in the room faded, all noise and sense of place, because he was looking into the eyes of the woman he…he loved.
Phylis blinked, flushed, and turned back to look at the stage.
Had he dreamed that? Had he merely seen affection in her eyes because he wished it to be there?
Michael swallowed and turned back to the stage.
“Three!”
“Four!”
“Five!”
“Seven!” Michael found himself yelling.
Oh, hell. What did he think he was doing?
There were murmurs echoing around the warehouse now, but the one-eyed man on the stage grunted. “Any more for anymore?”
“Seven and a half,” called someone from Michael’s left.
And a need to—not prove himself, not necessarily, but to gain something, to enter into this world of Phylis’s successfully, overcame Michael and made him say the most ridiculous thing he had ever said in his life.
“A guinea!”
There were more than murmurs now; there were mutters.
Phylis grabbed his arm and hissed into his ear, “It’s a mighty small trunk.”
“It’s a mighty heavy one, and I intend to know exactly what is inside it,” Michael whispered back, his pulse racing as he looked around the room. “Any advance on a guinea?”
There were a few stares, one filthy look, and one man muttered something that sounded like an oath but in a different language.
No one advanced on a guinea.
“Sold!” cried the man on the stage with a pat on his rather round belly. “To the impressively dressed idiot at the back. Next item, this ’ere lovely barrel!”
“Go on, then,” Phylis said with whistle, shaking her head as though he’d followed a whim he perhaps should have left well alone. “Go get your prize.”