Never Land the First Fish

Chapter Nineteen, Part 2

They sailed with the dawn. Maddox had warned Emily about Julia's mal de mer. Sure enough, before they had been at sea an hour, while they were still on deck watching the coast of the United States sink into the distance, she turned an alarming shade of green and staggered to the leeward balustrade to feed the fish. Emily put an arm around her shoulders until she finished heaving. "I'll take her below," she said.

Gills looked as if he would lodge an objection, but thought better of it. "I'll fetch hot water and some ginger tea," he offered. He must have it bad, poor sod, if he missed the nursing he'd done on the outward voyage, when Julia had been as vicious as a feral cat.

Maddox caught Stocke grinning at him. "Looks like you'll be at a loose end this afternoon, little brother. Game of cards, then?"

The afternoon wore into the evening. The captain joined the game for a time, but refused more than a single drink. Maddox was careful, too. If, by some miracle, Julia was recovered enough to be on her own tonight, Maddox had plans for the bed in his stateroom.

Not that he hadn't enjoyed the bed in Emily's apartment, but they hadn't been able to spend nearly enough time in it. Thanks to the newspaper interest and her family's attention, he'd been careful to arrive after dark and leave before dawn. On his ship, he swore, it would be different.

When he went to fetch Emily for dinner, though, she asked him to go ahead without her, and she'd have something later. And even after dinner, when she permitted Gills to take over from her for a brief thirty minutes while she ate in another room, away from the smell of Julia's affliction, she insisted that she couldn't leave Julia to Gills, that the woman couldn't be left alone overnight, and no, Maddox couldn't help her.

"Julia doesn't want Gills seeing her like this, Maddox. Surely you understand. And she certainly doesn't want to appear weak in front of you."

Maddox thought of arguing that Gills had nursed her in every intimate way on the journey to New York, but he'd already figured out that it wasn't going to convince Emily, and he didn't want to whine like an abandoned baby. Even if he felt a little like one.

Gills was just as disgruntled to be turned out of Julia's room as soon as Emily had eaten and refreshed herself. The pair of them joined Stocke for another round of cards, but neither of them could settle, and in the end Stocke told them he was off to bed so that he didn't have to look at their Friday faces for another moment. Maddox sloped off to bed, too, and what Gills did, he neither knew nor cared.

***

The following morning, Emily reported that Julia had had a bad night. She then whisked back into Julia's cabin, leaving Maddox to go to breakfast alone, where Stocke teased him mercilessly about not enjoying the journey he had hoped for.

Maddox declared he had work to do, and shut himself in his stateroom to review the notes he'd made on his New York trip. The distraction worked to such good purpose that he didn't emerge until lunchtime, leaving neatly clipped stacks of notes behind on his desk, ready to work up into lectures or articles when he had time.

Which would be this afternoon, apparently. Julia was still heaving, though the sailor assigned to fetch and carry for Miss Kilbrierry reported that Mrs Marloughe had managed to keep down some ginger tea and dry biscuits, which he was continuing to supply in quantity.

Maddox asked to be informed if either woman emerged from the cabin, and went back to his work.

When Stocke came to collect him for dinner, he was quite pleased with what he'd accomplished. He was catching up on what he'd left undone because of his pursuit of Emily, his efforts on behalf of Julia. He usually wrote up his notes every evening, and pulled an article or two a week out of them. Last time he'd failed in that routine, he'd been courting Sally Wellbridge on the Pacific island where her father was representing the Queen.