A Castaway in Cornwall Page 3

  Mary nodded. “Could be much worse, as I’ve seen.”

  “Then thank heaven for small mercies.” He frowned at the deep wound in the victim’s side. “We had better stitch this up. I am no surgeon, mind, but I learned to do a bit of everything at Guy’s.”

  He laid a hand over the man’s brow. “He’s very cold. Better build up the fire too.”

  Laura hurried to do so, but Jago was there before her, bending to the hearth. Seeing Newlyn hovering in the doorway, Laura said, “Please ask Wenna to send up a warming pan.”

  “Yes, miss.” Newlyn hurried away, likely glad for a chance to distance herself from Jago as well as the stranger.

  Perry gathered supplies from his bag. When he hesitated to pierce the skin, Miss Chegwin took the needle from him and began doing the stitching herself. “Women are better with needles, I find. We’ve had more practice.”

  Perry nodded in relief. “It’s a mercy for him that he has yet to regain his senses. Though if he doesn’t soon, he may not at all. He might have gone without air too long.”

  Laura drew a deep breath. Please, God, no.

  Old Mary’s fingers were bent and frail, but they worked deftly. After a few minutes, she snipped the thread.

  Perry studied her work. “Well done, Miss Chegwin. If I decide to stay and practice here, I would be honored to have you as my chamber nurse.”

  “Dr. Dawe says I’m too old.”

  “Then Dr. Dawe is a fool.”

  Mary grinned at that but neither agreed with nor refuted the claim.

  The young man straightened. “I have to go. My parents will be worried. But I shall return in the morning to see how he fares.”

  Laura walked him to the door. “Thank you, Mr. Kent.”

  “Perry, please. Mr. Kent is my father. You make me feel ancient.”

  “After tonight, I should call you Dr. Kent.”

  He looked up at her humbly from beneath a fall of dark hair. “Then you would be the first—other than in jest, at any rate.”

  Laura smiled. “Very well. Dr. Kent. You deserve the title.”

  “Thank you.” He looked back toward the patient. “Keep him warm, and if he survives the night, well, we’ll see.”

  Miss Chegwin watched him go, and when the door closed behind him, she tsked and shook her head. “That lad is worth two of his brother, but sadly ain’t half as handsome.”

  “There are more important things,” Laura replied.

  “I agree but am surprised a young lady would. Well, you heard the doctor. Let’s keep this poor soul warm.”

  Laura fetched a nightshirt from her uncle’s dressing chest, and with Jago’s help, the three of them managed to get it over his head, laced his hands through the sleeves, and worked it down over his body. Laura stepped back when Mary lowered the sheet, seeing only a flash of muscled, hairy legs before they were covered once again. Then Jago took his leave.

  Mary shook her head. “Goodness, how he shivers. Where is that girl with the warming pan?”

  They layered heavy wool blankets and a counterpane over the sheet. Even so, the man’s shivering mounted to tremors.

  “We could warm the bed the old-fashioned way,” Laura said. “Did not servants once lie in their masters’ beds to warm them?”

  “Oh, iss, it were the way of things. And only a few years back, a poor widow took in a half-dead sea captain after a wreck. She tried to revive him with brandy, and when that failed, warmed him in her own bed. Her country medicine worked. After he recovered, he credited her with saving his life and rewarded her handsomely. Twenty gold guineas! But you ought not do so, Miss Callaway. Yer a lady. And worse, damp through.”

  Yes, the rain and surf had soddened her skirts. She was near to shivering herself.

  Thankfully, Newlyn came in with a warming pan—a closed container that held heated stones, sand, or embers from the fire.

  “Good, you’re here. Wrap this flannel around that and slide it under the bedclothes near his feet—but be careful not to scald him.”

  Newlyn did so, and after a few minutes, the man’s tremors subsided.

  Uncle Matthew and Mrs. Bray appeared in the doorway, still dressed in their coats and hats from their evening out. Eseld hovered in the background, trying to peek over their shoulders, but her mother shooed her away. “Go to your room, Eseld. This isn’t a sight for you.”

  Eseld sighed dramatically but acquiesced.

  “We learned of the wreck while at Roserrow and left as soon as we could,” her uncle said. “Wenna tells us you brought a survivor here.”

  “Yes. I hope I did right.”

  “Right?” Mrs. Bray echoed. “I am not happy to find a stranger installed in my home, without so much as a by-your-leave. Did you not think to ask us first?”

  Laura was not surprised Mrs. Bray was reluctant to have a stranger in her home. To be fair, the woman had welcomed her when she first married Matthew Bray, but that welcome had worn thin over the years, especially as Laura grew into womanhood and attracted the notice of Treeve Kent.

  “You were away,” Laura defended. “And the man needed help immediately.”

  Her uncle soothed, “It’s only right the poor soul should find shelter in a clergyman’s home.” When Uncle Matthew moved from Truro to North Cornwall to marry Lamorna Mably and become vicar of the local parish, the bishop allowed him to live in his new wife’s larger, brighter house instead of the damp old vicarage in St. Minver.

  “We know nothing about him,” Mrs. Bray insisted. “He might carry some foreign disease or be a criminal.”

  “Now, my dear, no need to jump to conclusions. I must leave to help with the dead, but this poor man poses no risk in his current state.”

  “Well.” She huffed. “I hope you and Miss Chegwin can manage it yourselves, Laura, for I am going to bed. And I don’t want Eseld in here either. Don’t enlist her aid in nursing a strange man. Understood?”

  Mrs. Bray turned to go but tossed over her shoulder, “For all we know he might be dangerous.”

  Seeing there was nothing else they could do for the man presently, Laura sent Miss Chegwin home to sleep, and asked Newlyn to sit with the patient while she helped her uncle lay out the bodies for burial. She promised to relieve the girl in a few hours’ time.

  Newlyn reluctantly agreed but moved the chair near the fire and far from the man, eyeing him warily, as though at any moment he might leap up and grab her by the throat.

  Upon reaching the beach, her uncle paid the sexton and a few local men to carry the bodies to his cart and deliver the morbid load to St. Enodoc.

  The small chapel was one of three churches in the parish and the nearest to the wreck site. It had become partially buried by sand dunes over the years and was no longer regularly used for divine services. Burials, however, continued. To enter the churchyard, one passed through a roof-covered lych-gate with its solitary slab or “coffin rest,” used to lay out a single body before burial. But in cases like a shipwreck, with many sailors to be buried, they carried the bodies to the sexton’s shed beyond the west hedge instead.

  Reaching the shed, they hung a lantern high on a hook to illuminate the space and aid them in their work, and then laid the poor souls on the floor. Some of the victims had been badly battered by the rocks, while others looked as though they were simply asleep. Several had lost their shoes and coats or had them taken by wreckers.

  Years ago, when she’d first seen a woman pulling boots from a drowned man, she’d been shocked and offended. Her uncle had calmed her, saying, “He won’t need them where he’s going. And she has six growing sons and not enough money to keep one well shod, let alone a half dozen.”

  But Uncle Matthew had been the one surprised when Laura offered to help after a wreck. Overworked as he always was, he’d agreed. She found the experience sad but not devastating. Perhaps it was because she was a physician’s daughter who had seen the injured and dead on many occasions in her childhood, or possibly because she felt she could be of servi
ce to her uncle and, in a small way, to the recently departed.

  Even though she knew anything of value had probably already been taken from them, she always looked for any identifying possession or mark that might remain. If there were survivors who could identify the dead, she recorded their names—her uncle was a horrid speller. And if there were no survivors, she wrote down brief descriptions of each victim, in case some loved one came to inquire after the bodies had been buried.

  On naval ships, officers could often be identified by their uniforms. Even on a merchantman, the captain might wear a distinctive coat with epaulets. But the mates, carpenters, and ordinary seamen were far more difficult to classify.

  Now she knelt beside each man, once again looking inside garments and pockets and writing descriptions:

  Man aged 40–45. Grey hair. Green eyes. Rotund. Still wearing apron. The cook?

  Man aged 25–30. Black hair. Brown eyes. Strawberry birthmark on his left brow. Initials T.O. inside his waistband and the collar of his shirt.

  Laura paused. T.O.? The letters struck a chord. Were they his initials or something else? The answer tickled at the back of her mind. Surely it didn’t signify what she thought it might. She tucked the suspicion away for later and moved on.

  Boy aged 13–15. Red hair. Blue eyes. Freckles.

  Tears blurred her vision as she wrote the words. So young. Thinking of his mother, wherever she was, Laura’s heart ached, and she tenderly closed the boy’s eyes.

  When she had finished the list, Laura rose and handed it to her uncle.

  “Thank you, my dear.” He prayed over the men, asking God to have mercy on their souls, and then they spread a cloth over each body. They kept the cloths in the sexton’s shed for just this purpose and, sadly, had used them several times.

  “Eight men and one boy.” Two less than she’d seen on the ship, though she might have miscounted.

  He nodded. “The shroud maker shall be busy tomorrow.”

  He locked the shed behind them, to protect the bodies from further harassment, and the two started home together.

  Driving away from St. Enodoc, Laura thought back to her first Sunday in the parish. She recalled her amazement at seeing her uncle lowered through the roof of the partially buried church, and her disapproval of the boisterous behavior of those gathered on the nearby mound. It had certainly not been the reverent atmosphere of a divine service she had come to expect. Mrs. Bray had accused her of looking as if she’d eaten a sour Italian lemon and cautioned her against criticizing traditions she knew nothing about. Eseld, however, had taken her hand and gently defended the strange custom, explaining that the vicar was required to conduct a service there at least once a year to maintain tithing rights and consecration.

  Now, as they traveled back in the cart, Laura felt a little embarrassed to think of how naïve, and yes, judgmental, she had been as a sheltered youth. She still struggled to understand her Cornish neighbors, but she had grown rather fond of many of them. Even though her uncle had been new to the parish of St. Minver too, he had been born and raised in Cornwall, and so was not seen as an incomer. He had endured the strange new experiences with his usual patient stoicism. Dear Uncle Matthew. Always so kind and patient with her as well. At the thought, a wave of affection washed over Laura, and she laid her head on his shoulder for the rest of the journey.

  When they reached Fern Haven, a vaguely familiar man came riding up the road. “You go in, Laura,” her uncle said. “I’ll just have a quick word with Mr. Hicks first.”

  Laura nodded, too tired to argue.

  Returning to her room physically and emotionally exhausted, she stripped off her damp pelisse, unpinned her front-fastening gown, and wriggled it off her hips. Then she loosened and stepped from her damp petticoat, removed her half boots, and yanked off her sodden stockings. Finally, dressed in her mostly dry shift and stays, she washed her hands, wrapped her dressing gown around herself, and tiptoed to the guest room to ask Newlyn to unlace her stays, and to see how their patient fared.

  Quietly opening the door, she found Newlyn asleep, slumped in the chair, and the fire burned to embers. The man, she quickly saw, was shivering again, his lips blue by candlelight.

  She pulled the cold warming pan from under the bedclothes and carried it to the fire, quickly filling it with smoldering embers. She wrapped it in the flannel and slipped it between sheet and blankets, safely away from the man’s legs. Then she bent to add more fuel to the fire, poking it back to life.

  “Newlyn,” she whispered, gently shaking the girl’s shoulder.

  The maid mumbled something and went on sleeping.

  Laura gave up. She watched the man for a few minutes, but his shivering continued. Remembering the story Miss Chegwin had told her about the poor widow who saved a sea captain, Laura pulled back a corner of the bedclothes and carefully climbed in beside him.

  She had never been in bed with anyone before. What did one do to warm a cold body? Was proximity sufficient, or was physical contact required?

  She edged closer, until her shoulder touched his arm and her hip his leg. She was covered, she reminded herself, and so was he—well, except for their legs. And he was insensible, so really, she bolstered herself, there was nothing scandalous in her actions.

  His convulsive shivering lessened but did not stop altogether.

  She rolled to her side, her face near his shoulder. Reaching out hesitantly, she put her arm over his torso, relieved to find his chest rising and falling with regularity. She felt the hard muscle of his arms beneath the nightshirt, and the leanness of his belly. Her own body flushed, embarrassed by the intimate position. Hopefully, her nearness would have a similarly warming effect on him.

  As if vaguely aware of a presence, the man turned his head toward her and murmured something into her hair. A name, perhaps. Honora? Three syllables murmured too softly and too quickly for her to gather any impression of his speech. Then he slackened again and said no more.

  Being so warm and tired, Laura felt her eyelids grow heavy. She decided she would close them, just for a few minutes.

  Sometime later, she heard a gasp and jolted awake. Morning light shone through the shutters.

  Newlyn stood nearby, staring at her, brows high and eyes round as O’s. “Miss, what’ee doing? What would yer uncle say?”

  What would Mrs. Bray say, is the more frightening question, Laura thought. She whispered back, “He was shivering again. The doctor said we had to keep him warm.”

  Deciding to refill the warming pan, Laura folded back the blankets and swung her legs from bed.

  Just as the door opened.

  Her uncle and Mrs. Bray stood framed in the open doorway and drew up short to see Laura sitting on the edge of the man’s bed. Eseld’s wide eyes appeared over her mother’s shoulder.

  “What is going on here?” Mrs. Bray demanded.

  Laura stood, thanking heaven they had not entered a few minutes earlier.

  Her uncle’s brow puckered. “Is he wearing my nightshirt?”

  “Sorry, Uncle,” Laura said sheepishly as she retrieved the pan. “We were following doctor’s orders to keep him warm. Newlyn, please refill this.” Laura turned her burning face away, tucking the blankets more securely around their patient.

  “Doctor? I thought Dr. Dawe was still away?”

  “He is. I meant Perran Kent.”

  “Ah . . . A boy delivered a message about the wreck last night, and Perry dashed out without a word of explanation.”

  “A boy? Did not Treeve Kent deliver the message?”

  “Treeve?” Mrs. Bray frowned. “Why should it be Treeve? He left the house earlier, some important meeting of the parish council, he said. Rather ruined our evening, first Treeve, then Perry leaving. A sorry party for Eseld.”

  Important meeting? Laura doubted it.

  “You saw Treeve?” Eseld asked, expression anxious.

  Laura didn’t want to hurt her feelings or raise her jealousy, so she said, “Only in pass
ing. He . . . must have left his important meeting when the ship fired its guns. People came running from all directions.”

  “Including you.”

  “Yes.”

  Mrs. Bray’s disapproving gaze moved from the still man to Laura. “Well. It isn’t seemly for you to be alone in here in your dressing gown.”

  Laura gestured to the tongue-tied maid, cowering in the corner. “Newlyn was with me all the while.”

  Her uncle stepped nearer the bed. “No sign of regaining his senses?”

  Laura shook her head. “He murmured something in his sleep, but that is all.”

  Mrs. Bray lifted a warning hand to Eseld and then followed her husband farther into the room, staring down at the stranger. “I don’t like the look of him. Like a pirate. Or a foreigner. He might be a spy, for all we know.”

  “I don’t think so, my dear,” Uncle Matthew said. “The captain’s chest washed ashore, and by it the ship has been identified as an English merchantman called the Kittiwake. I talked to Mr. Hicks, the agent, after you were in bed. He will determine what to do with the cargo his men are able to salvage.”

  Laura said, “Precious little, I imagine, after Tom Parsons and his lot were through with it.”

  Mrs. Bray narrowed her eyes. “Remember, it’s not your place to judge, Laura. You’re not Cornish and don’t understand our ways.”

  No, Laura did not, but she wisely held her tongue.

  Bodies washed ashore were not allowed Christian burial until 1808, when a Cornishman, Davies Gilbert, succeeded in getting an Act of Parliament passed for their burial in churchyards.

  —A. K. HAMILTON JENKIN, CORNISH SEAFARERS

  Chapter 3

  Later that morning, Uncle Matthew returned to the churchyard to select a grave site, and the sexton began digging. Until five years ago, bodies washed ashore were not legally permitted burial in consecrated ground. The usual practice had been to bury shipwreck victims anywhere and anyhow, often in a common grave near the site of the wreck—on the cliffs or the grassy verge of beaches. Thankfully, a local MP had worked for a change in the law, and that practice had been abolished.