An Officer but No Gentleman(87)
“If he is offering to marry you after he slept with you, you should marry him, Charlie.”
Charlie’s soft snort of derision went without notice. “Why? Surely, if I ever were to fall in love again and want to marry, my future husband would forgive me for an indiscretion if he loved me.”
“Some men might,” Morty said, “but not all. Considering the life you live, how will a man know you only had one moment of weakness not a lifetime?”
“If he would not believe me, why would I want to marry him?”
Morty looked at her directly in the eye and sighed. He did not want to be the man encouraging her to marry another man, but Charlie truly had no inkling of the way society worked. How could she? She had never lived among it.
“Fallen women, and you are truly fallen become mistresses not wives. Your children would be bastards—you do not want that for them. I’ve seen the way children at school treat by-blows. There was a little girl in my school—she was just a little mousy thing—she never did nothin’ to nobody. The girls shunned her and some of the boys would spit on her. The last time I saw her, she had become a tavern wench with all that that implies.”
“Why didn’t you help her?”
“I was the dullard from the poorest family in town; my standing was barely above hers. I was fighting my own battles and didn’t think to take on hers. If I had not gone to sea, she would have been one of the only girls in our town who would have improved her lot by marrying me.”
Charlie thought about that. It was also foreign to her to hear how people judged each other based on money or one’s parents’ mistakes. Aboard ship, it only mattered that you were a hard worker and had a modest temperament.
“Do you think it’s true that a man, even a wealthy man, who has broken off two engagements, the second one involving the tarnishment of the maiden’s reputation, will never get married nor will his sister?”
“It wouldn’t surprise me,” Morty said.
Charlie sealed her lips and nodded as she wondered if it was better to be unhappy alone or unhappy with someone else. It certainly wasn’t fair for Jayne.
“I don’t have a choice, do I?”
“No. As my mother would have said, ‘You made your bed, now you shall have to mess it up to sleep.’”
Charlie playfully punched Morty. “That’s not the way that goes and you know it.”
“No, but I made you smile.”
“It’s just not fair that I have to live by land rules when I’m a seafarer.”
A crooked smile crossed Morty’s lips. “You sound like a girl.”
Charlie’s eyes narrowed at him. “You want to see if I fight like one?”
Morty laughed, shrinking back. “No!”
Charlie tried to tell herself it didn’t matter if Jaxon didn’t love her. She loved him and she was going to marry him which, she had to admit, she wanted to be with him. Would Jaxon change? Could he grow to love her?
On deck, Charlie put the crew to work. She was beginning to recognize the old girl again.
“Miss Sinclair?” Benjy stood at her elbow. “I-I’m getting to be a little old to be a cabin boy,” he said, nervously.
Charlie smiled at him. “I was thinking the same thing myself. You think you’re ready to do a man’s work?”
“Yes, miss.”
“Have you been practicing your knots?”
“Yes, miss.”
“I have just the job for you,” Charlie said leading him into the boatswain’s locker. “How do you feel about oakum?”
Charlie saw his shoulders sagged. Picking oakum, hemp fibers coated in tar, out of old rope was a tedious job that often times was a task given to prisoners, workhouse children, and the crew when there was no other work to be done. After it was picked out of the old ropes, it was rolled into a cord and used as caulking to seal the ship.
Charlie grabbed four coils of rope and threw two over Benjy’s shoulder and put the other two over hers.
“All of this?”
Charlie laughed at his plaintive tone. “I thought I’d show you what to do with it after it’s picked.”
Benjy’s expression brightened up.
Charlie put the corded oakum and tools they’d need in a bucket. “Now remember if you don’t do this right the ship will sink.” She laughed at his stricken look.
It was strange how making her decision to marry Jaxon had lightened her mood. She was still smiling when she and Benjy emerged. Her eyes were drawn immediately to Jaxon coming up the gangway carrying Jimmy’s sweater and a book.
“Permission to come aboard,” he called out.
Charlie granted him permission.