L. Meyer - Bloody Jack - Being an Account of the Curious Adventures of Mary Jacky Faber, Ship's Boy

"Put that stuff away and stop with all this twaddle. It's perfectly safe. Look, the end of the rope is tied to that tree. You're going out over the water so you'll have a soft landing if anything happens. But what could happen? In you go, now."

They're strappin' me in tight, one strap across me chest and another across me hips and a strap around each thigh and up over me crotch to connect up with the hip one, when the crowd parts and the Captain and First Mate walk up. Captain Locke says all hearty, "Well, Faber, all your good work hanging about the rigging on the ship has certainly paid off as you are certainly not afraid of heights. We saw that amply displayed yesterday, didn't we, Mr. Haywood."

"That we did, Sir. Faber has shown himself to be most brave in all our encounters with the enemy and with nature."

Even in the fog of my despair, I am amazed at this. Mr. Haywood sayin' that about me?

"This will hold you in good stead now, I reckon," says the Captain, looking at the fiendish kite with approval.

A spyglass has been fitted with a strap and it's hung around my neck. Hands are placed on the rope.

"And, Faber," continues the Captain, all beaming in his countenance, "when next you touch the ground, it shall be as Midshipman Jack Faber."

My feet leave the ground.

The group onshore gets smaller and smaller as I am lifted up. The ship itself becomes toylike down there in the blue-green lagoon with all the palm trees around. All I see of Jaimy is his uplifted face gettin' smaller and smaller, and I make that image stay in my mind cause that might be the last time I ever see it.

I know I was bad and careless and cheeky with Davy, but the swiftness of the punishment leaves me astounded. One minute I'm planning a bit of a frolic with Jaimy and the next I'm aloft with only the regret of my free and wanton ways for company.

They seem to have gotten to the end of the rope. I peer down and see that the ants below seem to be relaxing, not even holding on. I guess they trust the tree to which the rope is tied. I hope they are right.

Well, since I'm up here and not yet dead, I should do my duty. I lift up the glass and scan the horizon. I can only see three quarters of it 'cause I can't see behind me and there ain't nothin' on the horizon in the part I can see.

I wiggle around and try to see out to the west but the straps cut most cruelly and I can't ... quite ... get around.

I do manage a bit more but not enough. I bring up the glass and ... maybe there's something there? I yell out, "Hey!" but all of a sudden the kite lurches up in a strong gust of wind. It scares me but I figure it'll give me a few more feet of height so I look again but, no, nothing.

Another gust and this time it gives a real jerk and I gasp and train the glass down on the beach. All the men are back on the line again and there seems to be a certain unsettlin' panic to their movements. I lift the glass a little higher and see that the rope is pulling the tree out by its roots and the roots come out all white and ghostly and the sand falls quickly off them. Another great gust. That's it, then, I say to myself, as I watch the tree pull free and the men are dragged toward the shore, falling off, one by one.

Then the tree itself is lifted in the air. It doesn't even touch the water. I'd like to think that Jaimy is the last one to let go.

That's it for me, then. There will be no boat to come get me when at last I settle into the sea.

That's it for me.

Chapter 37

So farewell light

And sunshine bright

And all beneath the sky...

Strange that I should think of that lyric from a song about a man who's going to be hanged, which is what I always feared the most and was sure was going to happen to me, and now I'm to be drowned instead. I remember back to when I first skipped on board, thinking as how a girl what's meant for hangin' ain't likely to be drowned. Well, here I am. It looks like a deep swallow of the salt rather than the jerk of the hemp for me. Cold comfort. Same throat what gets it, seawater or rope.

I think I must have passed out for a while when the kite was climbing ever higher and higher in the sky. I look down now between my dangling toes and see the rope hanging almost straight down with that traitorous tree at the end of it, still high above the water. The island is far away now, just a smudge like when I first spotted it from the mainmast. Only yesterday, was it? The wind is lessening now, as it almost always does in the late afternoon, and the kite is starting to settle. Now the island ain't even a smudge. Now it's gone.

The kite's swooping back and forth as it settles and the rope snakes back and forth, back and forth like a long tail, and I know it's 'cause the wind can't get running smooth across the top of the kite 'cause the kite ain't held steady like a sail is held steady and soon all will drop into the ocean and that will be it for both the kite and me.

I don't rant or cry or anything like that. I don't even pray, hardly. I've prayed for deliverance before and I get delivered and then someone else dies and that someone could be Jaimy this time and I don't want that, but I do hope that he sheds a few tears for me. No, no I don't want that, either. I want him to become a fine officer and marry a fine lady, which I am not and never will be now, but I do hope he remembers me fondly, I do.

The water draws closer. Soon the tree will touch and at least the water will be warm. I look at its blue hugeness and I say, I will ask one thing please, God, please no sharks, no sharks. I just want to be let down softly and then go to sleep 'neath the curl of a smooth little wave, gentlelike. A nice little warm wave. That's all.

I imagine Liam and the rest will be waking me tonight, too. The thought gives me some comfort. I hope he asks Jaimy to come to the wake, too, even though it's Catholic stuff and Deacon Dunne would say no, but all the cryin' and hollerin' and keenin' and such is good for a grieving soul. I've never held back my tears, that's for sure.

Closer yet. I've got to get myself ready in my mind and so I think about how far I got from London and how Muck never got me and how I'll not be put up in jars and I've seen a lot of stuff and how I gave it a good run and got farther than Charlie, who I might be seeing real soon, and how I got to love a fine boy and I think he might love me and I am goin' to cry now but I think that's all right, I never was very brave....

I see the tree hit the water and I'm thinking I'll cut myself out of the harness when me and the kite comes all the way down cause I wants to float free and go down when I'm ready. I figure that the best thing to do when I finally slips under is to hold me breath till I get down a ways and then suck in a chestful of water all sharp and fast so's to get it over with quick with not much choking. I hope not much choking. I don't even know if I can swim 'cause I ain't never tried.

At least it's a plan and I feel a little better for it.

The kite steadies down. It don't swoop no more and I'm wonderin' why, and I look down and see that the tree is half under the water and leavin' a wake. I don't pay it no mind and get back to puttin' my final thoughts in order. I look down again in another minute and the tree is still half under water. No change ... but wait a minute ... I should have dropped down closer and I didn't, I...

Leavin' a wake! I shakes the cobwebs out of me mind and ciphers it out. The tree is draggin' like a sea anchor, just as if a bunch of men was hanging on to the rope so Bernoulli can get back on the job, and the kite stays up and steady! I ain't goin' down no more.

I dare not hope, but I can't help it. No, no, this can't be true, I must be dreamin' or be out of me mind, but it seems too real. It IS 5 real! I have me own ship and I'm under way with way on! As long as the wind holds, I could fly all the way to Mexico!