Free The Captain's Daughter by Minnie Simpson Page B

a
baby. Do they have any meaning to you?”
    Her mother seemed uneasy as they
were displayed to her.
    “Oh dear. They don’t mean anything.
I don’t think they have anything to do with you. The old sailor must have left
them at the wrong place.”
    Emma was watching her mother with
curiosity but said nothing.
    “But the pouch has my name on it,”
Amy pointed out to her mother, holding the pouch so her mother could see. Lady
Sibbridge tried to avoid looking at it.
    “Obviously, the old sailor asked
someone in the village if they knew where an Amaryllis lived and they told him
to go to our house. The old man was probably drunk and got off the coach at the
wrong town.”
    It seemed as if all of a sudden
Lady Sibbridge found her chair uncomfortable. She set down her embroidery.
    “Look at this,” said Amy, “does it
have any meaning to you. Does the city of Bristol have any meaning?”
    “No dear, I don’t see why it
would.”
    “What about this letter?”
    Mildred Sibbridge glanced at the
letter and made excuses not to read it, so Amy read it to her.
    “What about this locket. Have you
ever seen it before?”
    Lady Sibbridge, struggled out of
her chair, picked up her embroidery, and complained, “Oh dear, that chair has
become uncomfortable. They do that at times when you sit too long in the one
place. I have to go to my room and lie down. I...I feel a little faint.”
    “Mother...” Amy stopped appealing
to her mother. It obviously wasn’t going to be productive.
    Emma just watched everything.
    “Well what do you think, Emma? To
me Mother acted a little queer.”
    “A little queer? These items
definitely mean something to her.”
    “You think she has seen them in the
past?”
    “I don’t know about that, but they
do mean something to her. The question I have is what do they mean? Mother is
always nervous, so that makes it difficult to decide if they have any serious
meaning. But they do mean something, and that is what we have to find out. I am
now convinced more than ever that the old sailor brought the pouch to the right
place and it was given into the right hands. You are Amaryllis, but I do not
know what your secret is.”
    As Amy was returning the three
items to the pouch, Emma asked to look at the locket again. When she opened it
she looked intently at the miniature. It was a tiny painting of a baby who
appeared about one year old. Tiny as the painting was it was well detailed. The
baby was not smiling and yet there could be seen a sparkle in her little blue
eyes beneath a tiny swath of bright orange hair.
    Emma looked up at Amy, her eyes
wide and her mouth slightly open.
    “This baby is you, Amy Sibbridge.”
    “That’s ridiculous, it can’t be.”
    “Then come with me.”
    Emma dragged her to Mr.
Gainsborough’s painting of their family.
    “Look at the painting. Look at you
when you were eleven years old. Now look at the baby in the locket. The same
expression. The same slight curl of the lips. It is you.”
    “You cannot compare a baby with an
older person. All babies look the same. They all have blue eyes and blonde or
orange hair.”
    Emma looked at her with disdain.
    “All babies do not look the same.
That is you whether you accept the fact or not. Now I have a telescope to work
on, although I find your mystery worthwhile thinking about. I’ll have to develop
a theory about it. Draw out the meaning to the items in your pouch. I’m
beginning to think it must have something to do with pirates, or estranged
lovers, or a hidden romance, or maybe all three.”
    Emma stomped off with a frown on
her face. It was not a frown of disapproval, but rather of a serious scholar
challenged by an inscrutable mystery. Amy watched her sister leave and smiled.
If anyone could solve her mystery it was sister Emma. Then she turned her
attention back to the locket. She looked at the painting and then back at the
baby in the miniature. It cannot be me .
    Once again she did not rest easy
that