“Miss Sand,” Osgood called out with relief. “Very sorry for the spectacle. Will you help me?”
“Beg your pardon,” Rebecca said to the redhead and her freckled companion with more than a little pleasure as she pushed by them. The wind draped her plain black dress around her and showed in her simple form a beauty to rival any of the other more lavishly displayed and ribboned girls lined up behind her. She gave Osgood her arm. “Mr. Osgood, how very unlucky!” she said sympathetically. “Are you hurt?”
“Luck-which they say in business is dispersed at random-played no part in this fraud, my dear young lady,” came a voice from the perimeter of the circle of onlookers. It was the English businessman, Wakefield. The tea merchant was elegantly dressed in a traditional cape and checked trousers. He stopped to nod courteously to Rebecca, then continued making his way forward. “My friend Osgood, victim!”
“Mr. Wakefield, you are mistaken. The spray from the ocean has been quite rough, you see, and I slipped in a puddle,” Osgood insisted.
“No. That is what this man would like you to think.” Wakefield turned sharply at the large man who had helped Osgood to his feet.
“Beg pardon?” Herman asked the impudent accuser, his hands resting on the cord tied around his tunic and knotted in four places.
“The spray has become quite vicious, it's very true,” Wakefield explained, “which is why I was out walking instead of feeling sick in my stateroom. It was thus that I witnessed this man pouring water from a bucket into that corner. He appeared to be watching for someone to appear before doing it.”
“Do you mean he did this on purpose? Why would he do such a horrid thing?” asked Rebecca, turning to look at Herman. As she met the accused's eyes and innocent smile, a sudden, almost magnetic repulsion forced her to take a step back. The dark, malicious eyes gave her a rush of inexplicable fear and hatred.
Wakefield glanced at Rebecca. “My little woman, you are very innocent! I am embarrassed to say we have sharpers in England who would target any good-natured gentleman. I travel frequently on this and other liners and have been robbed two times myself. I believe this man is what the police call a floorer, or a tripper.”
“What?” Osgood asked.
“Never mind!” Herman's face grew bright. He stuck a toothpick in his mouth and chewed restlessly. “I know not what this bloke means by this, and I suggest he retreats.”
“Just a moment, please, my dear Mr. Wakefield,” said Osgood, the natural diplomat. “This man did help me after my fall.”
“Let us consider why he would do that, what opportunity that might afford him,” Wakefield mused, squaring the lower part of his face by placing one finger on each curve of his dusty-colored mustache.
Herman swatted his hand at Wakefield's head, knocking his hat high into the air. The breeze took the hat right down to Rebecca, who caught it.
“Search this man,” ordered the captain, a hairy, square-shaped man who had joined in the circle. He pointed at Herman, and the stewards seized him. They pulled out a watch and a calfskin pocket-book from Herman's tunic pocket.
“Are these yours, sir?” the captain asked Osgood.
“They are,” Osgood admitted with dismay.
“I will knock your damned guts out, and yours, too!” Herman growled to Osgood and then Wakefield.
“Threats will do nothing,” said Wakefield, though his hands trembled as he straightened the pin in his cravat. He accepted his hat back from Rebecca, bowing courteously again as a means of suppressing his trembling.
Two stewards rapidly wrestled Herman into submission and secured the thief. Most of the women covered their faces with their handkerchiefs or cried out, but Rebecca, standing next to Osgood, kept watching him in a mesmerized stare. Herman looked across at Osgood. “You louse! I'll feed your legs to the sharks, mark that!”
The voice was grating and deep, a baritone that made one wish one had never heard it.
“Go to the devil, villain!” He turned to a steward standing near him. “Take him below deck! The police in London will know how to deal with him.”
THE SHIP'S SURGEON concluded that Osgood's injuries were superficial. The captain offered him a special tour of the ship, including the brig, where Osgood was surprised to see an array of strong cells befitting a battleship.
“The construction of all the major English liners are subsidized by the Royal Navy, you see. In return they are built so they can be converted into warships,” the captain explained. “Cannons, prison cells, and what-you-will.”
Herman, slouched on the floor in the corner of one cell, praying to the red-hot furnace outside the cell, glanced up at his visitors, then looked back at the furnace. To the evident satisfaction of the captain, the man appeared worn out. Yet Herman retained a slippery grin of the strangest type, as though everyone else aboard were in prison, and he was the one completely free. His feet were bound together by a chain, and his wrist chained to the wall, and rats ran back and forth over his legs. His turban had been removed and his head was shaved clean, except for coarse patches of hair at the temples. Osgood found-from fear or humility-that he could not look into the eye of his assailant.
As Osgood and the captain climbed up the stairs again, the prisoner began singing a children's rhyme.
In works of labor or of skill,
I would be busy too:
For Satan finds some mischief still
For idle hands to do.
Then there was a sound, like a rat squealing.
THE DAYS AFTER THE attack saw Osgood feted at the captain's table at supper and given a hero's greeting every time he met his fellow passengers. Coming onto the deck for a morning walk now attracted a procession of the single women. Rebecca would sit on her deck chair and watch this grudgingly from under her hat.
Her roommate, Christie, sat down next to her. “What a picture of romance Mr. Osgood is!” She smiled at Rebecca, leaning in. “He is more admired now than ever!”
Rebecca did her best to appear occupied by the book in her lap. “I find nothing to smile about. He might have been hurt,” she said.
“Well, then just what is your idea of romance? Perhaps you haven't one, miss.”
Rebecca kept her eyes on her book and tried to ignore her. But, contrary to her own determination, she spoke. “Till the judgment that yourself arise, you live in this, and dwell in lovers’ eyes.”
Christie listened to the verse from the Shakespeare sonnet, then said, “Beg pardon?”
“Romance is not an idea, Christie, but a moment. An unspoken glance when someone looks into your eyes and knows exactly who you are, what you need.”
The other girl sat up with a mischievous energy. “Well, ain't that nice! Let us get a gentleman's opinion on the same question.”
“What?” said Rebecca, taken aback.
She turned her head and saw to her horror that Osgood was standing behind the chairs. She wondered with a slight shiver how long he had been there.
“Now, Mr. Osgood,” said the loquacious Christie, “how does a real Boston gentleman like yourself define real romance?”
“Well,” Osgood said, blushing, “self-sacrifice for one's beloved, I suppose I'd say.”
“How very endearing!” replied Christie. “You mean such sentiment on behalf of the man, I guess, Mr. Osgood? Oh, it is much more charming. Don't you think, Miss Rebecca? Oh, how dreadfully you look, dear girl.”
Rebecca stood up and straightened her dress. “The ship is shaky this morning,” she said.
“I'll walk you to your cabin, Miss Sand.” Osgood offered his arm with concern.
“Thank you, but I'll find my way, Mr. Osgood. I wanted to visit the ship library.”
Rebecca left Osgood standing, while Christie continued to gaze at him, tossing her hair. “Miss didn't need to have such a conniption fit, did she, Mr. Osgood?” Osgood gave her an awkward nod before hurrying away.