Please send my warmest regards to your daughter, Sidrah, my great friend and kind solace in my time of need, and to Master Kwai Chang. Assure him that I continue to heed his wise words as I make my way through this life.
Your humble servant,
Cheung Tong
Chapter 12
“I sure hope that boy been seein’ to waterin’ my garden,” says Jemimah. “If’n he ain’t, he’s gonna get his tail tanned a few shades darker than it already is.”
We’re at dinner, a few days out of New Orleans, having made the turn around the Florida Keys, and heading northwest.
“Don’t worry, Jemimah,” I say. “Ravi’s a good kid and he won’t fail.”
Old habits die hard. One of the first things Jemimah did upon setting up residence in Boston was to plant a vegetable garden behind the Pig. “Plenty of good dirt, plenty of good manure, be a shame to let it lie fallow. An insult to the Lord who gives us the good earth to till.”
I took that advice to heart and set up a little patch of my own—about four-foot square, well spread with horse manure, with a little fence all around. Yes, I dropped some beet seeds in, but mainly what I did was cut up my last Spanish purple mushroom cap, soak the pieces in warm water, and then bury them a few inches under the topsoil. Who knows? At least I’ll get some nice beets.
Mrs. Bodeen’s girls have been fed, and now I’m seated at the head of the table with my crew about me for the second serving, except for the two on watch above. Joannie and Daniel have passed the plates around and poured the drinks and Jemimah now sits to my left, while Clarissa sits to my right. To her credit, she has reconciled herself to sitting at the same table with a black person.
Ravi, of course, wanted to come on this voyage, but I couldn’t let that happen. He was not along on the Santa Magdalena salvage expedition and must not know about it. He is a bright, inquisitive little fellow and would quickly figure out what I would be doing down there below the salt. I told him he was needed at the Pig to tend the garden and to hand out the wooden nickels. I assured him I would take him along on the next voyage, so he took it all in good grace.
In spite of my precautions in that regard, however, it did turn out that there was another onboard who had also not been on that trip, and therein lies a problem—how to get rid of my unexpected guest when the time comes.
I cut my eyes to Clarissa and come to a decision.
“Clarissa,” I say, “are you up for a bit of fun?”
She eyes me suspiciously, a breaded pink shrimp poised between her perfect lips. “Knowing you, I can only suppose it will entail some indignity to my person,” she says before the perfect, small white teeth descend to crush the shrimp and slide it down her slim white neck.
“Not at all, Sister mine,” I say, smiling at the thought of various indignities I could impose upon her before banishing them from my mind as idle and unworthy speculation. “But have you ever been to New Orleans?”
“No,” she answers, eyebrows raised in question.
“Well, Clarissa, it is a wonderful place, a city so full of life and charm that it will take your breath away. We will be there in a few days to deliver Mrs. Bodeen’s girls to the House of the Rising Sun. We will have to give Mrs. Babineau a week to prepare the next batch of girls for the voyage north, and during that time, I plan to take the Nancy B. down to Key West to gather sponges for sale back in Boston.” Groans from my crew on that pronouncement. I send a severe glare down the table . . . Come on, you sods, you know there will be at least several days’ liberty in New Orleans, so put a sock in it.
“Sounds wondrous exciting,” grumbles Clarissa, lifting wineglass to lips and taking a great gulp.
“It is not exciting at all,” I say, “but a ship of the Blue Anchor Line does not travel with an empty hold.” It is the practical tradesman in me and I will not deny it.
“So what?”
“So I know someone at the House of the Rising Sun who might delight in showing you the wonders of New Orleans. In return for your having done your duty on the Nancy, I shall introduce you to her.”
I see a flicker of interest in this.
“Yes?”
“We’ll leave you there in good hands, go down to dive for the sponges, and then pick you up on the way back. How does that sound?”
“Sounds better than watchin’ you pull up dirty ole sponges.”
“Good. But you gotta remember to be careful—New Orleans is not Boston, nor is it Richmond, not by a long shot.
“All right,” she says in her long, slow drawl, her eyes hooded, her mouth in a slight smile of anticipation.
And so all is set . . . and I hope I am right in this . . .
Actually, I must admit that soon, against all odds, Clarissa had gotten herself into the life of the ship. When I pull out my fiddle and we have music and dancing of an evening, as we often do, she joins right in. I have even heard her laugh a few times. Early on, she gave me a poke with her elbow as we stood watching the girls capering about the upper deck, laughing and telling rude jokes . . . “Just who are these women and where are they going?”
“They are Mrs. Bodeen’s girls and they are going to a gaming and sporting house in New Orleans. You may gather from their conduct and dress that the House of the Rising Sun is not a convent.”
“Ah,” she says, taking my meaning, but saying no more.
And the life of the Nancy B. was not the only thing Clarissa got into . . . she also got into my bed.
On our second night out, Joannie and I were abed and about to slip off into sweet slumber when we heard a knock on the door.
“Come in,” I said drowsily, expecting either Davy or Jim or some other sailor to come in and report on the condition of the ship, approaching weather or whatnot. But it was not any of them, no, it was Clarissa Worthington Howe, in nightshirt, looking rather small and scared.
“I . . . I . . . don’t like sleeping down there,” she said in a whispery voice. “It’s dark and I don’t like the dark . . . I want to sleep up here . . . with you.”
“Well, Clarissa, it’s pretty dark in here, too,” I observed, up on one elbow, looking about in the gloom, but I do notice some moonlight coming through the small windows that encircle the rear of my cabin, and I guess it does lend some cheer. “But, all right, you can stay. It’ll be a little crowded, but climb in.”
“Won’t be crowded at all!” exulted Joannie, popping out of the bed and heading for the door. “I’ll go sleep with Danny! Hooray!”
“No you won’t!” I shouted, grabbing for the tail of her nightshirt. “You—”
But I miss and she is out of the cabin and gone.
Oh, well, there’s not much trouble they can get into in a small tight hammock, I figure. Besides, she’s a smart kid and she knows the score . . . and I ain’t her mother.
I felt Clarissa put her knee to my bed and crawl in.
“Here, Clarissa, climb over me and get on the other side. I may have to get up quickly in case something comes up. Watch your head on that.”
“Ouch! What is it?” she asked, as she climbed over and struck her head on the brass apparatus that pokes down through the ceiling and hangs overhead. My cabin is well-appointed, but space is limited—after all, lovely as she is, the Nancy B. Alsop is but a sixty-five-foot Gloucester schooner.
“It’s the Speaking Tube,” I replied, as she settled in. “Watch this.”
“Ahoy the quarterdeck,” I said, with my mouth to the tube. “What’s the word?”
“All clear, Missy, Course 295 degrees,” replied Jim Tanner, his voice coming soft out of the brass, as I take my mouth away. “Sea’s two to four feet, wind from the north, ten knots, sky filled with stars.”
“Thanks, Jim. G’night.”
“G’night, Skipper.”
From her side of the bed, Clarissa said, “You really do run things here, don’t you?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I said, mystified. “Of course I run things. I own this barky, after all. Ain’t that enough?”
“No,” she whispered in the darkness, “it’s more than that and you know it.”
I did not know what she meant by that, so I just said, “Go to sleep, Clarissa. You stay on your side of the bed and I’ll stay on mine.”
She grunted in agreement and rolled over, facing the wall. I turned on my right side, gave her feet a kick to keep them on her side, folded my hands under my face, and went to sleep.
However, in the deep of night, when things turned cool and damp and the roll of the ship tended to bring things together, we ended up entwined and bundled up tight when we awakened in the morning.
Chapter 13
We managed to get the Nancy B. up the mouth of the Mississippi River and into her berth on the New Orleans levee, but it took some doing since the Big Muddy takes some devious curves before Old Man River finally surrenders himself and his waters to the sea. But, with the help of a fair wind and some muscle on the oars, we did it. Dock fees were paid, coaches hired, and we hauled our cargo up to the front door of the House of the Rising Sun.
“Mademoiselle Tondalayo!” exclaims the doorman upon seeing me, calling me by the name I had used when last I was here. “So good to have you among us again! We have not seen such excitement since the day you last left!”
“A pleasure to see you, too, Herbert,” I say, bouncing up the stairs to plant one on his cheek. When I was last here, the day involved guns, swords, the Brothers Lafitte, the vile Flashby, Mike Fink, and liberal sprays of rock salt from the cannons of the Belle of the Golden West, but we need not go into that. Suffice to say, I wish to meet none of those gentlemen again—at least not now. I wear my mantilla closer to my face than usual in case I need to quickly draw it across my face. “But, now, my good Herbert, if you would show us in to Mrs. Babineau.”
We are swiftly brought into the main foyer of the House of the Rising Sun, Clarissa and I in the lead, the newly arrived girls from Mrs. Bodeen’s of Boston close behind. There are squeals of recognition as our recent cargo renew old acquaintances with their sisters in the trade, and I advance to Mrs. Babineau’s office to present my Bill of Lading.
She sits at her desk, as tight and trim as her sister, Mrs. Bodeen. She nods as she reaches out and takes the papers from my hand.
“You again,” she says, scanning the manifest.
“Yes, Madame,” I say, with a medium curtsy. “Passage for ten women, ten women delivered, as promised.”
“Very well. And you are contracted to ferry ten more back to Boston, aren’t you?”
“Oui, madame,” I reply, slipping into French.
“Bien. They shall be ready in a week. Who is this?” she asks, looking over at Clarissa. “Is she a working girl?”
“Non, madame. Just a friend come to visit your fine city.”
Mrs. Babineau’s eyes glance over Clarissa’s face and form. “A pity, that. She could make some serious money.”
Clarissa had, of course, gone through my closet and picked out my best dress, a white Empire style, and decked out in it, with white bonnet up top, she looks absolutely smashing. The dress is light, which is good, because New Orleans is hot in the summer, and the riding outfit she had worn when coming onboard just wouldn’t do. Her blond hair is up, her face powdered and lightly rouged from my cosmetic kit, and she is ready and eager to go. I am similarly attired, but not nearly as elegantly, but so it goes. When it comes to beauty, I shall ever be in her shadow.