Mrs Bargus answered the door, flustered and apprehensive. "Oh, Mr Renzi! I'm s' glad you're here! It's the captain—he's in such a state! All those things he's saying, it's not right, Mr Renzi . . ."
Kydd was slumped in the same chair in his shirtsleeves, gazing fixedly into the fire, the brandy bottle nearly empty beside him. He jerked round when Renzi entered. "Ahoy there, ol' shipmate!" he called bitterly. "Bring y'r arse t' anchor an' let y'r logic tell me why—why scrovy bastards like Lockwood still strut abou' while my Rosalynd . . . while she's . . ." His face crumpled.
Renzi went to him and touched his arm. "I'm going to the apothecary, my friend. He'll have much more efficacious medicines for your pain." It was chilling to witness: never in all their years together had he seen Kydd in such a condition—save, perhaps, in the early days in the old Duke William.
"No!" Kydd's hoarse cry pierced him. "St-stay wi' me, Nicholas."
"Of course, brother." Renzi stoked the fire and drew up his chair. With a forced laugh he went on, "You should have no care for Teazer, old fellow. There's half the ship's company rollicking ashore and Kit Standish believing you gravely concerned with the stowage of the hold."
Kydd took no notice. Instead he turned to Renzi and said hollowly, "It's—it's that I can't face it, Nicholas—life wi'out her." His hands writhed. "I saw all m' days in the future wi' her, plans an' course all set fair, an' now—there's . . . no point."
Carefully, Renzi replied, "Not at all! I see a fine officer who is captain of a ship that needs him, one with the most illustrious of sea careers to come."
Kydd grabbed his arm and leered at him. "Don't y' see, Nicholas," he slurred, "it's th' sea right enough. It's taken m' Rosalynd as it can't abide a rival!"
"What? Such nonsense."
Kydd slumped in his chair. "I knew ye'd not unnerstan' it," he said, almost inaudibly, and closed his eyes before Renzi could continue. "No point," he mumbled, "no point a-tall."
"Tom, I have to slip out for a space," Renzi said. "I'll be back directly."
For a long minute Kydd said nothing. Then, with his eyes still closed, he said, with intense weariness, "As y' have to, m' frien'."
"Why, Nicholas! What a surprise!" Sensing the gravity of the visit, Cecilia added hastily, "Do come in. Mrs Mullins is engaged at the moment—the drawing room will be available to us, I believe."
Renzi followed Kydd's sister into the home of her old friend, whom she was visiting. She turned to face him. "It's Thomas, isn't it?"
"Yes . . ." Renzi hesitated. "I'm truly sorry to have to say that Rosalynd . . . has been taken from us. She was drowned when a packet boat overset on the way to Plymouth."
Cecilia gasped. "No! It can't be! And—and poor Thomas. He— he must be feeling . . ."
"I rather believe it is worse than that. His intellects are perturbed. He's not seeing the point of life without Rosalynd and I fear for his future."
"Then I must go to him this instant, poor lamb. Pray wait for me, sir, I shall accompany you presently."
"No! That is to say, it might not be suitable, Miss Cecilia. You see, he is at this moment, er, disguised in drink and he—"
"He might be, um, flustered, Nicholas, but he needs us. I shall go to him," she said, with unanswerable determination.
The night was cool as they hurried through the streets, but when they reached number eighteen they were met outside by a distraught Mrs Bargus and a wide-eyed Becky clutching her from behind. "I didn't know what t' do, Mr Renzi! All of a sudden I hears this great roar fr'm upstairs—fair set m' heart a-flutter, it did. I goes up t' see, an' then down comes th' captain in a pelt. He pushes past me an' out on the street. An' he just in his shirtsleeves an' all."
It was past enduring: the shock of the news had given way to the spreading desolation of grief, then the firming certainty that he wanted no part of a world that did not include Rosalynd. Whichever way Kydd faced there was pain and mockery, heartbreak and futility. Blind hopelessness had demanded release, and exploded into an overwhelming compulsion to escape the prison of his hurt.
He stumbled on into the night; some instinct had made him snatch up his sea-worn grego as he left, which kept him warm and anonymous over his shirtsleeves. Setting his path away from the sea, his thoughts tumbled on, a tiny thread of reason struggling against the maudlin embrace of the liquor.
Suddenly he had a theory: every mortal had a measure of happiness allotted to them and his had just run out. Did this mean he should resign himself to dreariness for what remained of his days? Was this something to do with the Fates? Renzi always set his face against them, something to do with . . . with 'terminism—deter . . . something . . . Damn it! Who cared about Renzi and his high ideas? Tears stung and no answers came.
A gentleman of age saw him and frostily made much of crossing the street to avoid him. Kydd glared drunkenly at him: how he'd suffered at the hands of so-called gentle society. In the hard days as a newly promoted officer from before the mast he had been ignored until he had learned their fancy ways. There had been ill-disguised scorn for his origins even in far Nova Scotia until he had earned admiration in a social coup when he had unwittingly invited the mistress of Prince Edward to a ball. It had been seen as a cunning move for advancement in high society, and here in England they had been ready enough to see him court one of their own but could not accept that his heart had finally been taken . . . by another.
Bitterness welled. Now when he so needed those who cared and understood to rally to his support there was no one. Not a soul. Cecilia could not be seen with him for the social stigma and Renzi, well, he had been so disapproving about Rosalynd in the past . . . Be damned to it—be damned to all of them! When he had been a common foremast jack it had never been like this—he remembered the comradely understanding, the rough kindnesses . . . Then there had been no judgements, and all was plain speaking, square playing. The memories flooded his brain fuzzily, the drink in him only intensifying his loneliness. He yearned to exchange his hard-won status for the careless warmth of the fo'c'sle. But never again would he—
A sudden thought came—seductive, challenging and glorious. He had lost everything, was alone in the world now and nobody cared. What if he left Commander Thomas Kydd to his misery and became once more Tom Kydd, carefree mariner, shipping out on a deep-sea voyage to the other side of the world? There were ocean-going merchantmen a-plenty in Plymouth, taking on last stores and cargo—they would snap up a prime hand.
Such a voyage would give him time to heal, find a new self. He gulped at the thought. After all these years, would he be able to hand a staysail, tuck a long-splice, stomach the burgoo and hard tack? He knew the answer instantly.
Yes.
He tried to focus on the details, muzzily aware that he was in no fit state to walk the mile or two back to Plymouth. He drew himself up with drunken dignity and hailed an approaching public diligence. The only other occupant stared in astonishment at his worn, tar-smelling grego over the lace-trimmed shirt and stylish breeches, then averted his head.
He was deposited outside the King's Arms in Old Town Street, on the heights above Sutton Cove and well clear of the insalubrious sailors' haunts—but that was where he was headed, down the narrow streets, alleys and passageways into the jumble of rickety buildings around the waterfront. He knew that Cockside on the opposite side of the Pool was most favoured by the merchant seamen so he made his way there, spurred on by the roars of jollity from a nearby taphouse.
A memory—a reflex from a life long ago—came back: he removed one shoe gravely, placed a few coins in it, then put it on again. This old sailor's trick would ensure that whatever condition he was in later he would not be a burden to his shipmates in returning to his ship. Whichever it would be . . .