Free The Voyage of Promise by Kay Marshall Strom Page A

otherwise, justice is well served.”
    Grace couldn’t trust herself to look at Doctor Wills. Instead, she gazed up at the North Star. If it was in Mama Muco’s power, Grace knew she would be looking at that very same star and praying to God that it would guide Grace home. And Cabeto—where was he this night? Was it possible for him to look up and see the guiding star?
    Everything that had happened to Grace, all of it circled around Jasper Hathaway. He would have been her husband had her parents had their way, despite his most disagreeable nature. A snake at your feet. That’s how her mother, Lingongo, had described him, even as she was arranging for her daughter to marry him. Keep a stick in your hand, Grace , Lingongo had warned, you will need it . It was the thought of marrying Jasper Hathaway that had forced Grace to escape from the London house, and it was the fear of his taking her back that had pushed her to Cabeto. And although everything that had happened had come about because of evil intent, she was grateful for the happy years in the village—her life with Cabeto, baby Kwate, and Mama Muco.
    From bad comes good.
    And then Jasper Hathaway had forced his way back into her life and destroyed everything all over again.
    From the worst comes the best.
    How could that be so? All Grace knew for certain was that she did not want to see the man. Certainly not in the presence of Captain Ross and Doctor Wills. What she would have to say to Mister Hathaway, she had no wish for the two of them to hear. They were kind men, but what did they know of straddling two worlds—both foreign, both hostile, both treacherous?
    And yet, the thought of leaving the solitude of her cabin for the busy-ness of the main deck did hold its share of attraction. For in truth, Grace was terribly bored. From her cabin,she could hear singing and dancing on the deck, and sometimes raucous laughter and wild cheers. She longed to watch the fun. Not to take part in it, of course; just to stand in the shadows and watch. The captain had forbidden her to do so— “unseemly,” he insisted, “not to mention needlessly dangerous.” But Grace was no child. She could take care of herself.
    If I make my way back at twilight … she thought. If I am careful to stay hidden in the shadows …
    And now, after Doctor Wills’s words, were the captain to discover her where she was not supposed to be—well, she could simply plead a responsibility to look in on Jasper Hathaway.
    The very next evening, when Mister Brandt came along the deck at sunset to light the lanterns, Grace opened the door of her cabin the same as she usually did, and she reached out her candlestick to him to light the wick of the candle. But this evening, strains of a strangely sweet music wafted through her open cabin door on the evening breeze.
    “What is it that makes such music, Mister Brandt?” Grace asked.
    “A fiddle,” Jonas Brandt answered. “Jake Martin plays it rather well for a thief who was almost hanged at the gallows and only just escaped from Newgate Prison, do you not agree?”
    Grace did indeed. And as soon as Mister Brandt was out of sight, and her candlestick was safely settled on the table, she slipped out the door. She stole past the officers’ berths and, following the music, made her way toward the main deck. In the waning light, under the shadows of the deck lanterns, she spied a cluster of seamen hunkered down and crowded together. Jake’s fiddle almost drowned out their voices, but Grace was well acquainted with the sound of men calling out wagers. Still, no one in the group looked to be throwing dice.Odd, that. Nor could she see any playing cards. Odder still. What were the gamblers doing?
    Grace inched forward just a bit, then a bit more, taking care to stay hidden behind a stack of barrels. What she saw was a circle scratched onto the floor. In it was a huge cockroach, along with several smaller ones.
    “ ’As ye a favored one?”
    Grace jumped