Rough Passage to London(75)
At this point, he was having a hard time restraining his laughter at the vision of the three sodden suitors on deck.
“Each of your gentlemen friends has his respective merits, but, as I seriously ponder your dilemma, I think, if you truly want a sensible husband, why I think I would pick the dry one.”
His normally deadpan face broke out in a hopeful but playful smile. Eliza stared at him in surprise, puzzled at first by this reference to the “dry one,” but as his words slowly sunk in she realized the portent of what he was saying. Her frown disappeared and she smiled coquettishly.
“Why, Captain Morgan,” she replied, “may I be so bold to ask if the dry one might be the master of the packet ship Philadelphia?”
His face became flushed at this direct question. Even in the black stillness that surrounded them, she seemed to sense his vulnerability. Whether by instinct or guesswork, she seemed to have the answer she had hoped for, and she edged closer to him.
“Well then, I think I will take the dry one,” she said with a beaming smile. “I’ve always wanted a sensible husband.”
She was now close enough that he could hear her breathing and smell the lavender in her hair. She seemed more desirable than ever before, a creature so determined and headstrong, yet so delicate and small. He looked down at this tiny powerhouse of a young woman with her finely shaped nose and high cheekbones. In the darkness of the night, he couldn’t see well, but he could sense her smile. All caution seemed to abandon him. He placed his fingers on her still-wet hair, gently stroking it, and allowed his hand to fall down the back of her neck to her shoulders. Their faces grew closer and Morgan’s hands moved lower down to her back as he pulled her to him. His eyes locked with hers. She moved her head upward and closed her eyes as Morgan pressed his lips against hers. She reciprocated, wrapping her arms around his neck and pulling him closer to her.
PART VII
The institution exists, perhaps, in its least repulsive and most mitigated form in such a town as this; but it is slavery; and though I was, with respect to it, an innocent man, its presence filled me with a sense of shame and self-reproach.
—Charles Dickens (commenting about slavery in Baltimore, Maryland), American Notes
17
Morgan turned away from the ship’s busy deck where the crew was securing lines and looked down at the faces lined up on the South Street docks below him. The ship had just arrived after more than four weeks at sea. There was a phalanx of horse-drawn cabbies and hotel brokers lined up, a crush of porters and newsmen eager for business and information from the packet’s passengers. The hum of voices, laughter, shouting, and yelling drifted up to the ship’s deck. A blend of sausage, onions, and spices wafted up from one of the food vendors on the wharf assaulting Morgan’s nose and whetting his appetite for shore leave. The baggage wagons drawn by mules were already being loaded. A newsboy was hawking the latest sensationalist headlines about the second day of rioting underway in New York. “Read all about it! Mobs target homes of abolitionists!”
The riots were supposedly triggered by an anti-American remark from an Englishman by the name of George Farren, the stage manager of the Bowery Theater. He was known to be an outspoken abolitionist and had no love for Americans. Farren was quoted as publicly saying that Americans were “a damn set of jackasses and fit to be gulled.” Mobs were angered by that remark, and turned their rage on many of the nearby antislavery churches. They were dunking white abolitionists in hogsheads of black ink and targeting anyone of color. They’d stormed the Bowery Theater and demanded an apology from Farren.
Morgan handed the newspaper to Lowery and said to his steward, “Better stay aboard, Mr. Lowery. With this thuggery going on you’re a good deal safer in the London docklands than you are here in New York.”
Lowery excitedly showed the newspaper to Scuttles and another colored sailor, Ben Sheets, who had recently signed on board as a foredeck sailor. Morgan watched Lowery run off clutching the newspaper tightly in his hand. In London, he’d seen his steward dressed in a fancy suit with a good-looking English woman holding on to his arm, his head held high. This wasn’t possible in New York. If he tried to do that here, he would have been beaten by a mob.
As the passengers lined up at the gangway ready to disembark, Morgan stood ready to shake their hands. Lord Nanvers was dressed in a long-skirted coat with an eye-catching red vest. He escorted the swaying Lady Nanvers to the gangway, where he thanked Morgan for the safe voyage, assuring him that they would travel aboard the Philadelphia again. They were off to Baltimore, he said, to attend to some business and see some of the fine, fast clippers being built there. When the time came for Eliza and her mother to leave the ship, Morgan knew all was not well. He and Eliza had been discreet by staying apart from each other during the last few days of the voyage, exchanging warm glances but little else. Eliza had kept her suitors at arm’s length by spending more time with her mother on deck and in their cabin. He’d assumed she’d told her mother about their romance and that Mrs. Robinson would approve. After all, he was a packet ship captain with a London liner and Eliza’s mother had seemed to enjoy his company.