The Scot Corsair by Fiona Monroe

Author:Fiona Monroe
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
ISBN: 9781682592885
Publisher: Fiona Monroe
Published: 2016-01-16T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eleven

Elspeth watched the coast of Venezuela recede until it was a tiny wavering line of green against the horizon, which vanished in an instant as if a magical land in a fairytale. She was alone again on her wide, wide ocean, and free.

Her heart sang within her. She had been alarmed when Captain Scot had come to her cabin and whisked her out of it, his hand in hers, as if her life depended on it. He had taken her from the pirate ship back to the sadly empty and silent Heron, and locked her in her old cabin there—actually turned the key on her—telling her to keep quiet and stay hidden.

She was left there quite alone for what felt like a long time, though she had no way of measuring time as her malfunctioning watch was with her other possessions on board the Chieftain. Her cabin on the Heron was much larger than her borrowed quarters on the pirate ship, being second in splendour only to the poor slain Captain's, but she now felt it had a desolate air.

Outside the ship, indeed directly below her porthole, there was for a time a lot of noise; shouting to and fro in a rough foreign tongue, clattering of heavy objects and slapping of oars on water. Then everything went quiet for a while, and Elspeth was seized by the fear that she had been trapped alone on a haunted ship. She bit down rising unease, her imagination running relentlessly in all directions. Had she been hidden here because the authorities were going to board the Chieftain, and the pirates did not want her discovered? Did Venezuela even have authorities?

When she felt the unmistakeable sensation of the whole ship lurching free from its anchor and setting into motion as the wind caught its sails, she began to panic.

She knew Mr Coleridge's The Ancient Mariner. She remembered her mother reading passages of it to her in the temple, as they had called the folly on the west lawn, on one of the golden evenings of their last summer. It had scarcely been suitable material for a ten year old, Elspeth thought years later when she picked up the volume for herself; but the idea of a lost ship, mystically powered and manned by the decaying corpses of its dead crew, had haunted her imagination as a child. Her mother had had a talent for reading, imbuing even the most trifling prose with drama and atmosphere As the Heron moved away from the port as if by itself, so silently, the chill of her words on a warm summer's day came back over her like a fever.

"Captain!" she screamed, banging at the door. It rattled and creaked against the lock, but remained fastened. "Captain Scot! Is there anyone there? Help! Let me out!"

Almost immediately, she heard the clatter of footsteps and the door was flung open.

Half-expecting an animated corpse by this time, at the sight of Captain Scot Elspeth threw herself impulsively into his arms.

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