If I Wait For You (7 page)

“
Tell me, sir, what does a
split open head look like?” she said, knowing such a question was
the last thing this man would expect from her.

He stared at her a long moment, one
bushy eyebrow disappearing beneath his loosely-fitted black knit
cap. Then he let out a sharp bark of laughter.

“
Ain’t pretty.”

“
I imagine not,” she said,
turning serious. “
Does
it happen every trip?”

“
Nah,” he said with obvious
reluctance. “Not with Mr. Mitchell it don’t. He trains ‘em well, he
does. Men’ll die. Always do. But Mr. Mitchell don’t tolerate it
well. Won’t have it on his ship. I’m Mr. Mason, by the way. First
mate.”

“
An honor, Mr. Mason,” Sara
said, knowing full well she didn’t need to introduce
herself.

Sara’s gaze went from the gnarly Mr.
Mason to West, who was again urging the men to furl the large sail.
She could hear him shouting words of encouragement and instruction
to the men and felt a fierce sense of pride, then immediately felt
foolish. She forced herself to look away, ignored that strange
feeling that bloomed in her breast, and found herself looking into
the hard little eyes of Mr. Mason. Those eyes seemed not to miss a
thing, though she prayed he would not see the blush on her
cheeks.

“
Beg pardon, Mrs. Mitchell.
Got work.” With that, the man moved away barking out orders to men
who stood idle.

Sara stayed on deck only a few more
minutes, fearing her presence was too much of a distraction to the
men. Telling herself she would become used to the men, and they
used to her, Sara escaped to the aftercabin, sat on the long sofa
and waited for the first wave of nausea to hit. Closing her eyes,
she could hear the shouts of the men, the hull creaking, the waves
rushing by sounding almost like a hard October wind rustling the
leaves. She felt the ship roll beneath her and smiled. The captain
had been right; her seasickness was nearly gone. It was a wonderful
thing, to finally feel well after days and days of sickness.
Perhaps she would be a hearty sailor, after all.

Feeling better than she had since
stepping aboard ship, Sara gazed about the room, which to her eyes
was in complete disarray. The steward, whose job it was to maintain
order in the captain’s rooms, had apparently not done his job at
all. Goodness, it was ramshackle, that’s what it was. Finally, she
would have something to do, something to make herself useful. To
make the captain look at her as more than a burden.

Feeling wonderful, she set about
straightening books and organizing charts that seemed to be piled
haphazardly with absolutely no thought to order. Rolling up her
sleeves and tying her wayward hair back with a rag, she set to work
putting the room to rights. In one corner she found a pad filled
with sketches showing life aboard the whaler. They were a
remarkable depiction of life at sea, and Sara was stunned when she
realized the drawings had been done by Mr. Mitchell. She quickly
recognized Mr. Mason, a pipe jutting from his bearded mouth, his
expression devilish. Other drawings were of men she hadn’t met yet,
men who perhaps were not on board ship any longer. Feeling as if
she were somehow invading the man’s privacy, she left the drawings
where she found them and concentrated her efforts on other parts of
the room. When she was finished, she stood back and surveyed the
room, inordinately pleased with the order she saw.

“
Miss Dawes.”

“
Mr. Mitchell. I was on
deck earlier today.”

“
Yes, I saw you. I take it
you’re feeling better?” he asked, his eyes moving over her face. “I
don’t detect a green cast to your skin.”

“
Much better. Thank you.
And how is that young man who fell?”

His mouth quirked in a quick smile.
“He’s fine. I should have left him dangling a bit longer, though.
Still, I think he learned his lesson.”

He stared at her a long moment, then
said. “Your hair.”

Sara’s hand immediately went to her
head, acutely aware she must look a fright. The rag was doing an
inadequate job of keeping it from her face, and she felt her face
heat with embarrassment. She self-consciously tucked a stray strand
behind her ear.

“
I’ve something for you,
for your hair, that is. In my top drawer. Hair combs. For your
hair. I like to carve from the bone, you see.”

He had a look of expectation on his
face, so Sara looked back in the drawer and saw, tucked in one
corner, the combs of which he spoke. Pulling them out, she looked
at them with wonder. Daffodils, her favorite flower, made up the
top of the combs. She loved the bright yellow flowers for they were
one of the first flowers to thrust through the cold earth and
proclaim that spring was here. Sara had planted a thick row of
bulbs along the edge of the kitchen garden and would smile when she
saw them, a burst of yellow in a still-gray world. Her fingers idly
tracing the fine carving, Sara stood and gave West a curious
look.

“
Daffodils. They are my
favorite flowers.”

“
Are they?”

She stared at him to see if there was
anything in his gaze to tell her whether he’d somehow known they
were her favorites, but his eyes held nothing but bored
disinterest. She narrowed her eyes.

“
When did you carve
these?”

“
Shortly after departing,”
he said, and Sara thought she detected the tiniest upward quirk of
one side of his mouth.

“
You made these for
me.”

West felt ridiculously pleased by her
obvious delight. She smiled at the combs as if they were the finest
of treasures, and for that moment, West was completely
mesmerized.

“
You looked like you had
hair that would fly all about,” he said gruffly.

One of the locks of hair she’d tucked
behind her ear had already fallen down and was brushing against her
cheek. Without thinking, he lifted his hand to touch it, to rub
that silky lock between his roughened fingertips. It looked so
soft, impossibly so, resting on his work-rough hand. He dropped his
hand, his knuckles brushing her soft cheek, before his hand turned
to a fist by his side.

That’s when he noticed the rest of the
room.

“
You have been
cleaning.”

Sara, who had been willing herself not
to lean her cheek into his hand, gave him a sharp look. He did not
sound pleased. Perhaps he was concerned about her health, Sara
thought. She smiled to reassure him, and couldn't help thinking
that he was far more considerate than she’d thought.

“
Yes, but I assure you, Mr.
Mitchell, I am perfectly well. My neck pains me not at all and I am
happy to report that all seasickness appears to have
fled.”

“
I was not asking after
your health, though I’m pleased you are doing better.”

Sara felt a small tingle of foreboding
and her smile faltering slightly.

“
I do not recall giving you
leave to clean.” He said the word “clean” as if it were an evil
act.

“
I thought you would be
pleased,” Sara said, dismay clearly etched on her face. She might
have imagined that wonderful moment when he gently touched her
hair, but she had the combs digging into her palm to remind
her.

“
Tell me what you’ve done,”
he said with strained patience.

The room, which she’d looked at with
such pleasure, now held an atmosphere of gloom. He stood behind his
desk looking about as if completely baffled by what he saw. And
angry. It was clear, though he was trying valiantly to hide the
fact, that he was quite angry.

She had thought he would be pleased
and told him so, hating the slight quiver she heard in her voice.
She was a child again, presented before her mother wearing what she
thought was a lovely little dress only to have her mother say, with
a dismissive flick of her hand, “My God, Sara, what are you
wearing? Take it off immediately.”

“
I thought I was clear when
I told you it was the steward’s duty to clean the stateroom and
this room.”

“
Yes, you were quite
clear,” Sara said, lifting her chin. “However, it was also quite
clear that this room was filthy and in disarray.”

He stared at her, those blue eyes of
his darkening as his gaze narrowed. “The room was as I like
it.”

“
But it was dusty. And
disorganized.” She walked over to the bookshelf, trailing the back
of one hand along the spines of the books. “See? The books are now
organized by author.”

“
And if I don’t know the
author’s name and only the title?”

She chewed on her bottom lip, and
West’s eye immediately fastened there. “I suppose it will take a
bit of time finding your book, then,” Sara said with some
reluctance.

“
And my charts?” West shot
a look over to the charts, now neatly tucked behind a railing that
was installed for just that purpose. “How have you organized
them?”

“
That was more difficult.
But I thought the most logical way was to arrange them by
size.”

“
By size.”

“
It makes perfect sense,”
she said, walking over to the charts as briskly as she could given
the movement of the ship. “They were in a terrible jumble. I
couldn’t begin to see any sort of reason to it. Now it is orderly.
Neat.”

“
But now I cannot find a
damned…” he stopped and swallowed heavily before continuing. “I
will not be able to find my charts, Miss Dawes.”

“
You mean you don’t know
them by size?”

He looked heavenward in a beseeching
manner. “Grant me strength,” he muttered.

Sara stiffened. “I thought only to
help.”

“
I realize that, Miss
Dawes. But you have not helped. You have made it impossible to find
anything in my own cabin. I am willing to share this space with
you, but only if you keep things as they are. Do not touch my
things. Do not rearrange my books or my charts. Or my
clothes.”

Sara blushed, realizing he’d noticed
that she’d refolded all his clothing neatly in his
drawers.

“
But what am I to do all
day?”

“
As you have discovered, I
have plenty of books in my library.”

Sara’s eyes swept over the three
shelves of books with more dread than anticipation. She didn’t mind
the thought of reading in her spare time, but to have reading as
her only way to pass time was exceedingly depressing.

“
Surely there is something
I can do. Perhaps help you in some way. I could help spot whales
or…”

“
Miss Dawes, we have gone
over this before. I believe your presence aboard this ship will be
less intrusive if you keep to yourself and to these
rooms.”

“
I shall feel like a
prisoner.”

“
Better this prison than a
real one.”

Sara gasped at his heartlessness. “I
would have been better off in New Bedford,” she said rashly,
feeling a rare bit of temper begin to grow.

“
I can arrange
that.”

“
My brother said you were a
kind man. He was sorely mistaken.”

He bowed mockingly, but his jaw
tensed, as if her remark had somehow bothered him. “If it is a
cruelty to save you from certain prison, I am guilty.”

Sara felt the alien sensation of the
prickling heat of anger. “If my presence is so unwanted, then why
did you agree to allow me to sail? If you planned to be so
disagreeable, you would have been better to deny my brother’s
request. Indeed, I wish you had.”

“
When I made the agreement
with your brother, I did not realize that you would be so damned…”
He stopped abruptly, clamping his mouth shut and fisting his hands
by his sides. He was not a man to show his temper, even if it raged
beneath the surface. West realized with sudden perception that he
was angry not over her cleaning, but because he’d been so weak to
want to touch her, even if it was only a few strands of hair and
the softness of her cheek.

Heat suffused Sara’s face. Never in
her life had she felt more unwanted than at that moment. He could
not have made himself more clear how noxious was her presence on
board this ship. She felt an even bigger fool for having him the
center of her dreams, for having wanted him to touch her. He was so
unlike that imagined man, so much harder and disagreeable. She
decided then and there that she did not like West Mitchell. Not at
all. He was boorish and…mean. Yes, mean. As indifferent as her
mother had been to her, Sara was certain she’d never purposefully
hurt her. But this man seemed to be going out of his way to make
her angry. She looked at him, at his gloriously thick brown hair,
at the curls that so rakishly teased his strong forehead, at the
blue eyes that had so mesmerized her, and saw nothing but a
disagreeable man. Well, perhaps a completely compelling
disagreeable man. A completely compelling disagreeable man who had
painstakingly carved daffodils into her hair combs. Sara crushed
her teeth together for allowing herself to soften so
quickly.

“
I understand,” she said as
calmly as she could manage. And she did understand. All those silly
girlish fantasies were cut free and West Mitchell became simply
another man who had no need of Sara Dawes. That mind-numbing
nervousness she felt each time she was near him fled.