Moon Rising (12 page)

Furious, I pushed my hands up close to her face. ‘Look – see what a mess they are! You think I'd put myself through this kind of agony if I was getting paid for selling my body? Or don't you think my body's worth more than a few shillings a week?'

~~~

Somehow we survived. We knew the worst quarter of the year was behind us when activity in the harbour intensified and ships began to leave. Every day a few more moved out under tow, and I began to watch for Jonathan Markway's ship, the
Lillian
, wondering whither they were bound. I suppose I should have been glad he was going away; after all, he was still a reminder, and an uncomfortable one at that, of different and arguably better times. Instead, I scanned the harbour each morning with an increasing sense of anxiety, wondering whether I'd see him again before he left. And then, when I did see him, when he stopped by the stall to speak to me, I found I could barely answer for the pulse beating hard at my throat.

It was one of those crisp, bright mornings that lift everyone's spirits. The sun was just above the cliff, dazzling off the water and making a picture of ships in the upper harbour. A train pulled in at the station, so Dock End and New Quay were suddenly alive with carts and carriages, the bustle prompting people to stop and buy. Bella and I were busily serving one customer after another, barely noticing individuals until the moment of speech. Then, in a sudden lull, Jonathan was there before me in his cap and reefer jacket, looking uncertain and apprehensive, and indefinably different. Taller perhaps, and a little thinner in the face; certainly paler than the last time we'd spoken, when he was so recently returned from sea.

After an exchange of civilities we were both tongue-tied. Bella asked whether he'd had a good leave, and he said not as good as he'd hoped; he was glad to be going back. At that I found my voice, and asked when and where he was going next.

‘We'll be away in the next few days – Baltic most like, then the Mediterranean.'

‘Very nice,' I managed inanely. ‘Is that where you went last time?'

He nodded. ‘There and the Black Sea. We had bad weather coming back, across the Bay of Biscay, that's why we were so late coming home. Had to put into St Nazaire for repairs. We were lucky, though,' he said with a deprecating grin, ‘there were times when I thought we weren't going to make it at all!'

If he thought to impress me, it was the worst thing he could have said. I gritted my teeth and looked down, trying not to show the alarm I felt at the thought of wrecks and drownings. ‘Oh, I see, so that was it. I did wonder. Well, if you will go to sea for a living,' I remarked, ‘what else can you expect?'

With that the conversation stopped dead, and we were both at a loss. I bent to my basket and added some more fish to the stall, busily rearranging the display while Bella served another customer.

‘It's my life,' he said at last, enigmatically; and whatever interpretation he wanted me to put on that, I had to respect it. If he'd challenged me, I might have said the same. But I managed to say I was sorry, didn't mean it, and at that he unbent a little, volunteering something else: he was hoping to sit for his Mate's ticket next time home.

‘So it won't be long before I'm free.'

‘From what? The sea?'

‘From my apprenticeship,' he said slowly, shaking his head as though he couldn't believe such animosity from one who, once upon a time, had seemed to understand. And to tell the truth, nor could I. ‘I'll have my own wages,' he went on, ‘I'll be my own man. Free to choose what I do next, and where I go.'
And who I see
, was implied but not said.

For a moment longer I held his gaze. ‘Well, best of luck,' I said challengingly. ‘Who knows where I'll be by then?'

He looked up and down the quay, at all the women wrapped like bundles in layers of skirts and shawls against the cold. I thought I knew what he was thinking, but when he turned back to me, all he said was: ‘Somewhere a bit warmer, I hope.'

‘Oh, I'm sure,' I said, forcing a laugh and waving a mittened hand. ‘This is only temporary, you know – next year it could be the Bay of Naples!'

We all laughed at that, even Bella, but there was something burning and serious in Jonathan's dark eyes. ‘In that case, I shall have to keep looking for you, won't I?'

Something in me was burning too, but before I could answer Bella nudged me and a customer intervened. While I was serving her Jonathan backed away. ‘Look – I've got to go – work to do. I'll see you later, perhaps?'

I said yes, no doubt; but he didn't come back that day, even though I hung around for a while and made a point of being at the stall early the next morning. I watched the activity aboard the remaining ships: an intensity of hammering and banging, a raising and lowering of new sails, of berths and moorings being changed while stores were loaded for the coming voyages. At flood of the tide the steam tugs were as active as water rats, and it was difficult to see through the smoke exactly which ships were moving where. I was afraid of losing sight of the
Lillian,
and every time the bridge opened I was on tenterhooks in case Jonathan was leaving without saying goodbye.

Between times I hovered near the bridge, hoping I might identify him aboard the brigantine, or he might notice me and remember. Bella could mock all she liked, but now that we'd spoken again I felt a need to make things right between us. I wanted him to think well of me, to carry with him a memory of friendship rather than disappointment and misunderstanding.

Just before sunset, as the last stalls were packing up and I was about to go home, he called out to me from the bridge. ‘At last,' he said breathlessly as he hurried to my side, ‘I'm glad you're still here! There's been no chance to get away, and I haven't got long now, worst luck. The owners finally made a decision, and we're sailing tonight with the tide.'

He stopped for breath, relief and anxiety in his smile, while I was conscious of pleasure at seeing him, coupled with disappointment at his news. ‘Oh, I see. Well, it was good of you to come, but never mind. If you've got to get back...?'

‘Not just yet – a little while, half an hour or so.'

It was more than we might have had, and, since it didn't seem to matter where we went, we walked along the railway as far as the old ford at Bog Hall, keeping the brigantine in sight as the tide came up. There was so much to say, yet it seemed we were both too aware of each other to speak; and when we did, it was only to blurt out simultaneous apologies. But in the end we got his mother and my Uncle Thaddeus out of the way, and managed to put aside any lingering sense of injury.

With the old Esk Inn behind us we stood on the stone quay and looked up and down the river, glassy now in the evening light, saying nothing of any moment, except for both of us wishing he might stay. I wanted to catch hold of time, stop the ship from sailing, keep Jonathan by my side, but the river was rising with the tide, masts above the muddy expanse of the Bell Shoal coming upright, and it was time for him to go.

He turned to me then in mute appeal, and I felt the breath catch in my throat as he removed his cap and leaned towards me. Cold lips touched mine, melting to warmth as one kiss became another and we clung together in dizzying, tremulous joy. As my shawl fell back he laid his smooth cool cheek against mine, wrapping his arms around me as though he would never let me go.

‘It's been almost a year,' he whispered, ‘and I've thought about you so much. I really hoped -'

Overwhelmed by a conflict of emotions, I stopped his lips with my fingers. ‘No, Jonathan, you mustn't. I don't want you to think about me at all. It's not worth it.'

He protested at once, crushing my hand in his as he held it to his chest. ‘My mother was wrong in what she said and did – it wasn't your fault, none of it was.'

‘No, but the rest of it is,' I insisted, stepping back. ‘Where I'm living, what I'm doing – it's all been a mistake, you don't understand.'

‘Then put it right – move out. You don't have to stay there.'

‘It's not so easy, believe me. I want to leave, but I can't, not yet.' Even as I longed to seize the moment I feared the very things Jonathan represented: risk, loneliness, pain. I didn't want him or anyone else to have that kind of hold over me – or to expect devotion until death in return.

I felt these things, yet without the words to express them I could only gaze at him intently while he struggled to read my meaning. Voices hailed us then, jocular and teasing, as a couple of railwaymen crossed the inn yard. The moment was broken. Aware of time pressing as dusk fell, we turned to retrace our steps with a sense of chilled urgency that had not been present before.

When we reached the bridge I felt a tug of emotion quite unlike any that had preceded it. Jonathan didn't kiss me in that public place, but took my hand before we parted, gazing at me with such longing, I had to look away. ‘It's going to be a long time. Will you write to me, Damsy?'

But that was too close to commitment, and besides, I couldn't bear the idea of waiting for words from him, words that might never come. ‘No,' I said awkwardly, aware that I was hurting him. ‘Don't ask me that.'

He took a deep breath. ‘Will I see you then, when I get back?'

‘If I'm still here,' I said, struggling for lightness, ‘I'm sure you will.'

He looked downcast, and I hated myself for it. ‘Well,' he sighed, squeezing my fingers hard. ‘Whatever you do – wherever you go – leave word for me with someone. Bella or that photographer fellow you work for. Promise?'

So I promised, and he left me then. I watched him disappear into the dusk, hurrying home to collect his things before going aboard the
Lillian.
They would be heading north to the Tyne first, for a cargo of coal, and from there, most like, across to Sweden for timber. He'd assured me of the ship's good qualities, of the fact that she was a fine seaboat even in a storm, and her master an excellent seaman. I was glad of that. I needed to believe he would be safe.

Two hours later, without a word to anyone else, I slipped out of the house and went back to St Ann's Staith to await the opening of the bridge. Several ships were due to leave, and the brigantine was already under tow. She came through first, her figurehead gleaming, eager to be over the bar with sails unfurled, catching the offshore wind and away.

There were men on deck and in the rigging, but in the darkness it was hard to identify them. The mast light and red, port-side lantern cast little more than a glow as the ship swept silently past in the wake of her noisy, thrashing tug. I kept moving too, around and between the groups of people, trying to keep my eyes on individuals just a few yards away. I'd reached the pier before I spotted Jonathan coiling mooring-ropes on the stern. He looked up to scan the onlookers and for a moment his face was sharply illumined, deep-shadowed, intense, so close I could see the line between his brows and the grim set of his mouth. I stopped to call out to him, but he was unaware and the ship sailed on.

I had to run to catch up. I ran the length of the pier and was almost at the lighthouse before he saw me and his face lifted suddenly in a delighted grin. He raised his hand and I waved frantically, wishing him God speed, safe voyage, good trip, all the things women have been saying down the centuries to their departing menfolk. I watched and waved until the tug dropped her tow and the night wind filled the unfurling sails.

When she'd slipped away like a ghost into the night, I turned back towards town, wondering what was the matter with me, why on earth I was breaking my heart over a man going off to sea.

Whenever I talked of leaving Whitby, of finding employment that would provide a more secure existence, Bella carried on alarmingly, accusing me of everything from snobbery to ingratitude. She even brought Jonathan into it, claiming I'd changed since seeing him again. I denied it, but being with him that afternoon had stirred up more than one kind of longing. I was restless and dissatisfied, and whether it was Jonathan or just spring fever, his words about moving on had struck a resounding note. It was echoed shortly afterwards, and more directly, by Jack Louvain.

As I posed for him one fine evening after Easter, he remarked quietly: ‘It must be nearly a year, Damaris, since I took those first photographs of you...' Lightly, he adjusted my shoulder to the position he wanted, and turned my chin towards him, scrutinising me with those bright eyes of his. Frowning, he ran his fingers over the skin at my temple, then felt behind my ears and under my jaw.

‘You've lost a lot of weight,' he said reproachfully. As I struggled for a reply he simply shook his head, ducking once more under the black cloth. ‘No, it's just that you look haunted – all eyes and cheekbones – like tragedy personified.' He paused to gaze through the big, fish-eye lens of the camera, then announced with muffled triumph, ‘But in fact it's rather wonderful, we should have some excellent pictures...'

Not quite sure what to make of that, I knew better than to speak while he was busy. In flattering evening light, and framed by an open cottage doorway, I had hoped for something rather more appealing than tragedy; as perhaps had Jack, to begin with. After much thought and several changes of position, he exposed a couple more plates and then called a halt. ‘Tomorrow,' he said, ‘at daybreak on the west side, we'll try again. The light will be more searching, and with any luck we'll catch the boats going out. I've a fancy,' he added with a dry smile, ‘to portray you as the beautiful girl recently bereaved of her fisherman lover.'

With a hoot of derision I turned to face him. ‘Fisherman lover? For heaven's sake, don't tell anybody who knows me, will you? They might take it seriously!'

I thought he would laugh, but instead he pursed his lips and remarked that I was starting to sound like Bella. Then, as we made our way back to the studio, he said: ‘You know, when you first sat for me, last year, you said staying with the Firths was only temporary – and again, when you started working for me, you said it was just for a while, until you found a proper job. Why haven't you done anything? Why are you still here?'