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"Captain …" Penelope pulled the boarding pass from her pocket to double-check the name. "Captain Cook, where is he?"
Her urgency was growing. The first orange rays of dawn were beginning to touch the horizon behind her. The sounds of cheering and merriment came from the docks far below them, and the shipwright suddenly jumped up from his bucket as though he had been stung by a bee.
The man who stepped onto the ship's gangway wore navy and his jacket was decorated with medallions. The men following him all looked a little worse for wear, and as they drew closer, Penelope could smell the rank scent of ale on them.
Oh, brilliant, just what I need,Penelope thought, struggling not to roll her eyes. It looked as though half the crew of theWhite Rosehad been on land drinking half the night.
"Captain Cook, sir!" The shipwright Penelope had been talking to straightened up and saluted, not daring to take his hand down until the captain acknowledged it.
"Any trouble, Harry?" Captain Cook asked the young man as he turned a curious eye upon Penelope. She struggled to stop herself from shivering as his eyes travelled the length of her. Captain Cook looked to be a man in his forties. Though quite plain, he was oddly handsome with a scar on his right cheekbone. His eyes were almost the same colour as his navy uniform.
"No trouble, sir," Harry responded quickly, his backbone so straight that he might topple at any moment.
"Then what's this?" Captain Cook demanded, looking at Penelope still. "We aren't set to sail until noon."
Noon! That's only a few hours away!Penelope realised. It was as if the gut feeling she'd experienced in the Comte's study had been warning her that she was running out of time.
"Nobody should be aboard my ship but me and my men," Captain Cook continued when Harry looked utterly dumbfounded.
"Forgive me, good sir," Penelope put in quickly before Harry could come up with anything to say. "But I am due to board your beautiful ship next week, only I have an emergency and must leave early."
Heart hammering, Penelope didn't dare to take her eyes away from the captain's, fearing that he might see it as weakness or, worse, admitting to some kind of wrongdoing.
"You have a boarding pass then, I presume, Miss?" The captain asked, eyebrow still raised, a curious glint in his dark blue eyes.
In a flash, Penelope remembered how Clara had once reacted upon being misaddressed. Hoping that if she acted the lady, she might just pass for one, Penelope quickly straightened up and forced an indignant expression onto her face.
"I am a lady, sir. I would kindly ask that you address me as such," she said firmly, allowing her tone to be a little snappy but not entirely rude and entitled as the real Clara might have been.
"Ahh, Lady, forgive me." Captain Cook quickly removed his hat and bowed his head, crossing his arm over his abdomen as he did so. "We have not been formally introduced. I am Captain Robert Cook, and you are?"
Penelope sucked in a breath through her nose and prepared herself quickly. Only hoping she would not fall at this final hurdle, she responded, "I am Lady Clara St Clair. It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Captain."
As she had seen Clara do so many times before, she offered the captain her hand. He took it eagerly and kissed her gloved knuckles before asking again, "Lady St Clair, may I see your boarding pass?"
Quickly digging into her cloak pocket, she produced the boarding pass, relieved to find it and her coin purse still safely where she had put them. Trying to stop the trembling of her hand, she passed the papers to the captain, holding her breath to await his response.
"And why do you need to board early?" the captain asked once he had given the papers the once over. A part of Penelope wished he was an uneducated fool who would simply see the gold inlay of the boarding pass and automatically assume that it was real.
Yet she could tell from his uniform, his ship, and the way he spoke that he was definitely an educated man. Penelope was certain that Comte St Clair would have hired nobody less to carry Lady Cecily and Lady Clara to England.
"Do you not have a travelling companion?"
The captain's dark eyebrow seemed to be rising further by the minute. In contrast, Penelope's heart was sinking further and further. The longer this conversation continued, the surer she was that she would mess up and the captain would refuse.
In the heat of the moment, Penelope found it all too easy to blurt, "We were supposed to visit my grandmother in England in a few weeks’ time, but we have had word that she has grown ill, and so I am hoping to board early to get there before anything terrible should happen."
It wasn't entirely difficult to make the story believable. Her anxiety was causing her to hold back tears, and seeing the way the captain's expression softened when he saw them, she finally allowed one to roll down her cheek, adding a good sniffle for good measure.
"It would be greatly appreciated if you might consider allowing me to board on an earlier voyage, Captain."
Lowering her gaze, Penelope bowed her head and held her breath to await the captain's decision. Heart hammering in her chest, she was almost certain that both the captain and his shipwright could hear it if they just listened close enough.
Her only saving grace was a couple of rowdy crew members who were beginning to scrub the deck, clearly still jolly after their time on land. From the way they wobbled to and fro, Penelope wasn’t at all sure they would be any help when it came to sailing the ship, and she only hoped there were plenty more members to make up for it.Maybe it's just the swaying of the ship,she hoped, yet one of them was hiccupping and clearly still well in his cups.
"Don't you worry, Lady St Clair, we will have you in England in no time," Captain Cook announced, handing her the boarding pass back and following her gaze to the two crew members. He smiled and added with assurance, "Try not to worry, My Lady. My crew are far more responsible than they look."
Penelope barely managed to stop herself from blurting,does this mean you will take me to England?
