Ma’am! I do not want to be ‘putated!”
“No one is going to amputate your arm, Kisty.” Tiola reassured the girl. “It is merely a broken bone, a splint and firm bandaging, several weeks rest, and it should be as good as new.”
“There you are then,” Bella exclaimed, gesturing Amber-Rose and Crystal indoors and then, helping a shaking Kisty to her feet, remarked to Tiola, “If you do not have the medications you require, as we have arranged, I shall obtain them.”
Can I do this? Tiola thought. She glanced at Jenna, hanging the last dripping sheet on the line. The older woman merely shrugged.
“There was little your grandmother could not do,” Jenna said pragmatically. “And what she could do, so can you.”
Tiola took hold of Kisty’s uninjured hand. “Do you want me to tend you, dear-heart?” The black girl nodded, her face grave, her front teeth biting into her lip.
“It will hurt.”
“More than having my arm ‘putated?”
Tiola smiled. “No, not as much as that.”
“If you are a good girl and are very brave,” Bella coaxed, “When it is all over I will buy you some sugar cane to suck.”
Kisty’s eyes widened. Any discomfort was worth enduring for such a rare treat.
Restless, Tethys wandered her vast domain of the oceans of the world, ill at ease. The winds, stirring and growling on the surface of the sea always agitated her. And when they billowed into the fury of a hurricane storm her rage was also whipped into a savage ferocity.
In her churning discomfort she sought payment for the pain searing through her – and the vengeance of Tethys was never mild.
Always, she demanded the taking of a ship and the claiming of life as compensation.
Kisty was feverish. She at last slept, helped along by the few drops of laudanum Tiola had administered. The tiny room at the rear of Bella’s apartment was no more than the size of a large cupboard, but Kisty loved it because it was hers. She had brightened the cramped space by covering the cot with a quilt made from sewing scraps of material together, and on the wall, two pictures Bella had not wanted. One was of flowers. Round, yellow sunflowers and brilliant red poppies. The other was a ship. A Spanish Galleon, cleaving her way through a wild sea.
In between tending the injured girl Tiola had sat staring at the picture, seeing in her mind not a mediocre painting but a real ship. His ship. She felt the dip and rise of the deck, heard his voice calling frantic orders above the howl of the rising wind.
“ Clew it up! For God’s sake, get it clewed up! ”
It was months since he had sailed away on the Mermaid . Had she really been here in Cape Town all this while? At times it felt as though she had lived here forever, at others as if she had arrived but yesterday. Tiola had stopped feeling homesick for the wild freedom of the moors, stopped grieving for her mother and brothers. Bella’s was home now: the clack of her tongue when she shrilled about something amiss downstairs, the chatter of the girls; all had become familiar, worn-in and comfortable. Yes, this was home; these were people she had learnt to love.
What had Jesamiah been doing all the while, she wondered? Up to no good, probably. How could a pirate be anything different? She barely knew him and yet, inside, she felt she had known him forever; every nuance of his tanned face was stamped indelibly on her brain. She thought about him every day recalling each subtlety: the way the white scar crinkled at the side of his eye when he laughed, the way he habitually fiddled with that gold earring or his ribbons. His voice, his smell. His cock-sure confidence. Only occasionally, when she was busy supervising a difficult birthing or doing something that required concentration, did he become nothing more than a passing thought, his face darting across her mind like the quick come-and-gone shadow of a bird in flight. But he was always there, lingering somewhere in her consciousness.
He
“No one is going to amputate your arm, Kisty.” Tiola reassured the girl. “It is merely a broken bone, a splint and firm bandaging, several weeks rest, and it should be as good as new.”
“There you are then,” Bella exclaimed, gesturing Amber-Rose and Crystal indoors and then, helping a shaking Kisty to her feet, remarked to Tiola, “If you do not have the medications you require, as we have arranged, I shall obtain them.”
Can I do this? Tiola thought. She glanced at Jenna, hanging the last dripping sheet on the line. The older woman merely shrugged.
“There was little your grandmother could not do,” Jenna said pragmatically. “And what she could do, so can you.”
Tiola took hold of Kisty’s uninjured hand. “Do you want me to tend you, dear-heart?” The black girl nodded, her face grave, her front teeth biting into her lip.
“It will hurt.”
“More than having my arm ‘putated?”
Tiola smiled. “No, not as much as that.”
“If you are a good girl and are very brave,” Bella coaxed, “When it is all over I will buy you some sugar cane to suck.”
Kisty’s eyes widened. Any discomfort was worth enduring for such a rare treat.
Restless, Tethys wandered her vast domain of the oceans of the world, ill at ease. The winds, stirring and growling on the surface of the sea always agitated her. And when they billowed into the fury of a hurricane storm her rage was also whipped into a savage ferocity.
In her churning discomfort she sought payment for the pain searing through her – and the vengeance of Tethys was never mild.
Always, she demanded the taking of a ship and the claiming of life as compensation.
Kisty was feverish. She at last slept, helped along by the few drops of laudanum Tiola had administered. The tiny room at the rear of Bella’s apartment was no more than the size of a large cupboard, but Kisty loved it because it was hers. She had brightened the cramped space by covering the cot with a quilt made from sewing scraps of material together, and on the wall, two pictures Bella had not wanted. One was of flowers. Round, yellow sunflowers and brilliant red poppies. The other was a ship. A Spanish Galleon, cleaving her way through a wild sea.
In between tending the injured girl Tiola had sat staring at the picture, seeing in her mind not a mediocre painting but a real ship. His ship. She felt the dip and rise of the deck, heard his voice calling frantic orders above the howl of the rising wind.
“ Clew it up! For God’s sake, get it clewed up! ”
It was months since he had sailed away on the Mermaid . Had she really been here in Cape Town all this while? At times it felt as though she had lived here forever, at others as if she had arrived but yesterday. Tiola had stopped feeling homesick for the wild freedom of the moors, stopped grieving for her mother and brothers. Bella’s was home now: the clack of her tongue when she shrilled about something amiss downstairs, the chatter of the girls; all had become familiar, worn-in and comfortable. Yes, this was home; these were people she had learnt to love.
What had Jesamiah been doing all the while, she wondered? Up to no good, probably. How could a pirate be anything different? She barely knew him and yet, inside, she felt she had known him forever; every nuance of his tanned face was stamped indelibly on her brain. She thought about him every day recalling each subtlety: the way the white scar crinkled at the side of his eye when he laughed, the way he habitually fiddled with that gold earring or his ribbons. His voice, his smell. His cock-sure confidence. Only occasionally, when she was busy supervising a difficult birthing or doing something that required concentration, did he become nothing more than a passing thought, his face darting across her mind like the quick come-and-gone shadow of a bird in flight. But he was always there, lingering somewhere in her consciousness.
He
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