The Ghosts of Aquinnah Read online

  “And what’s our patient’s name, Stella?” Mrs. Mayhew asked as she ladled steaming clam chowder into a large bowl.

  “Christopher Casey. He’s an Irishman.”

  “Would be with a name like that.”

  “He’d been living in Boston and planned to go to Savannah on the ship.”

  “Plans sure can change, can’t they?”

  Stella thought of all the plans she’d had for her life when she was a child. Yes, plans certainly can, and do, change.

  “He’s in terrible pain from the arm,” Stella said. “I gave him some more laudanum.”

  “All you can do for him, poor child.”

  Mrs. Mayhew set the bowl of chowder on a tray and pulled her freshly baked bread from the oven. She noticed Stella staring at the bread with anticipation.

  “Would you like a slice for yourself?”

  “Yes I would, please.”

  “I could see your tongue hanging out for it. I’ll cut you both two slices. You could use some more meat on those bones of yours, child.”

  “Thank you, Mrs. Mayhew.”

  “Let me get you some coffee now. I know that bedroom has to be cold with this breeze kicking up.”

  The woman put the chowder, bread, coffee, and condiments on a serving tray and handed it to Stella.

  “There you go, girl. Best get back to your patient.”

  Stella thanked her again and slowly walked out of the kitchen, focusing on keeping her tray steady.

  As she walked along the hallway, she smiled at the thought of Mrs. Mayhew. She was nothing like her mother had been, but she felt like a mother all the same. Stella enjoyed being in her company. It had been too long since she’d had a woman to talk to. Or anyone to talk to, for that matter.

  She carefully opened the door and broadened her smile for Christopher, who had managed to sit himself up in the bed. It crossed her mind that she wasn't sorry the snow had delayed Josiah's return to Gay Head. She didn’t miss her husband at all.

  ****

  “We need to mend your clothes,” Stella said as Christopher struggled to sit up in bed to greet her the following morning when she entered his room. “All that thrashing around on the boat tore them to shreds.”

  Christopher looked down at his shirt and pants and grimaced.

  “I don’t have any other clothes to put on,” he said. “And I don’t have a coat either. I lost it on the boat.” He glanced out the window and shivered. “Looks like a blizzard out there.”

  “It’s not a blizzard,” Stella said. “Quite a breeze, sure, but it’s just a storm.”

  Christopher stared out at the snow still falling and swirling through the air and shook his head. “As you say, Mrs. Winslow.”

  “I brought some of Mr. Mayhew’s clothes for you to wear while I do the mending.” She looked Christopher up and down. “You’re not far off his size. And he has a coat you can wear as well.”

  “I don’t know how I’m going to pay back Mr. and Mrs. Mayhew.”

  “I wouldn’t worry about that. They’re good people who want to help you is all.”

  Christopher winced with pain as he sat up and swung his legs over the side of the bed.

  “I know you need more laudanum,” Stella said. “I want to give you your dose before I change that sling.”

  “What?” Christopher asked. He didn’t like the idea of changing anything about his arm.

  “I need to change your bandage and your sling. Josiah told me I’d need to change it if he got delayed getting back up here. You need a clean bandage for that gash on your hand.”

  “It can wait, yeah? The pain…”

  “It cannot wait, no.” Stella busied herself with measuring out Christopher’s laudanum. She stuck the vial in his mouth without a word.

  While Stella waited for the medicine to take effect, she poured a pitcher of hot water into a large bowl and dipped in a bar of soap and a cloth.

  “Once that medicine eases your pain I’ll help you get cleaned up. You can’t be dirty when you’re fighting an infection. And believe me, that gash in your hand looked right wicked before we bandaged it.”

  She glanced at Christopher’s matted curls and the mixture of sand and seaweed that was caked to his ear and head. “And besides, look at you. You’re a mess, aren’t you?”

  Christopher chuckled. “I’ve no doubt I am.”

  He watched as Stella expertly folded out a new sling from a clean piece of cloth and set out an array of bandages.

  “Are you a nurse for your husband then?” he asked.

  “Not officially,” Stella said. “But I’ve learned how to help. I like doing it.”

  “You ought to make yourself an official nurse.”

  “Like Clara Barton, you mean?”

  Word of the American nurse’s role in caring for soldiers in the Civil War and involvement in the Franco-Prussian war had spread all the way to Ireland, and from what Christopher had heard, the woman was an angel. He looked at Stella and found himself thinking the same about her.

  “Maybe so.”

  “I don’t think Dr. Winslow would go along with that. He'd surely say he doesn't need a nurse.”

  She sat down next to Christopher on the bed and washed his face and neck before starting to unbutton his tattered shirt. “I think the medicine should be working enough now. I’ll try my best not to hurt you though.”

  “I can take it off myself,” Christopher said, suddenly embarrassed. He used his good hand to undo the rest of the buttons at the top of his shirt and remove his suspenders from his shoulders. He pulled his good arm free of the sleeve and, biting his lip from the pain, grimaced and pulled the shirt over his head.

  “I need to take that sling off for you now,” Stella said.

  Christopher cringed as she untied the sling and held the weight of his fractured arm in her hands. He moved as quickly as he could to pull the shirt off his arm.

  He shivered from both cold and embarrassment as he sat on the bed wearing nothing but his trousers.

  “I know you’re cold,” Stella said, “but there’s no need to be embarrassed.”

  Christopher wondered if Stella could read minds in addition to being a nurse. “How’d you know I was embarrassed?” he asked.

  “Because your cheeks are as red as the sun coming up over the horizon in the morning,” she said, smiling as Christopher’s cheeks turned an even deeper shade of crimson.

  Stella rubbed the soap onto the wet cloth and gently washed Christopher’s shoulders and chest. She struggled to keep from turning red herself as she ran the cloth over his pectoral muscles and her hand brushed the curly brown hair that ran in a line down the middle of his chest to his abdomen.

  She rinsed the cloth in the bowl of hot water and soaped it up again, this time focusing on cleaning Christopher’s unbroken right arm. She felt his eyes on her and glanced up into his face, blushing again as his chocolate brown eyes seemed to bore into her.

  Stella cleared her throat. “I have to wash your broken arm now. I’ll be gentle.”

  Christopher wanted to say he had no doubt of that, but he didn’t trust his voice to speak. He cringed and let out a soft moan as Stella straightened his arm to run her cloth around his elbow.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I know it hurts.”

  Within seconds, she finished and bent Christopher’s arm back into its set position. He clutched it to his chest as she used a towel to dry him off.

  Stella got up from the bed and pulled a clean shirt from the pile of clothes Mr. Mayhew had given her for Christopher. She held up the white wool shirt in front of her.

  “This looks like it should fit you, don’t you think?”

  Christopher nodded.

  Stella returned to the bed and pulled the shirt over Christopher’s head. He braced himself for another shot of pain as Stella pulled his broken arm through the sleeve, and then quickly finished putting the shirt on himself, using his good hand to fasten the small row of buttons at the collar.
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br />   “I still need to clean that wound on your hand,” Stella said.

  She got up from the bed, took a fresh cloth from the dresser, and poured hot steaming water into a new bowl. Sitting down again, she took Christopher’s wrapped hand in her own and gently removed the bandage her husband had used to cover the wound.

  “Do you remember how you got this wound?” she asked.

  “I think it was from hanging on the rigging. I remember the cords cutting into my hand.”

  The gash was deep and oozing pus, and the skin around the wound was red and hot to the touch. Stella washed the wound and cleaned Christopher’s hand, then reached for a small bottle of iodine on the dresser.

  “This will sting,” she said as she put the orange liquid on the gaping wound.

  “I don’t mind,” Christopher said. “Compared to the arm, it’s nothing.”

  Stella smiled and placed the medicine bottle back on the table. “Let me bandage this up again now.”

  She expertly wrapped the clean bandages around the wound and patted Christopher’s hand when she had finished. She glanced back up at him and blushed again from the intensity of his stare.

  “You’re staring at me, Mr. Casey,” she said.

  Now it was Christopher’s turn to blush. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m just grateful to you is all. For helping me.”

  She smiled again and got up from the bed. “Just one more thing to do.” She picked up the fresh sling and folded it into a triangle.

  “We need to keep that arm tight to your chest.” She placed the sling around Christopher’s arm and tied it around his neck. “How’s that feel?”

  “Much better,” Christopher said. “Thank you.”

  Stella glanced down at the tattered trousers Christopher still wore. “I can help you wash…”

  Christopher cleared his throat. “No, no, I can do it, thank you.” He raised his right arm. “I’ve still got one arm and hand to use.”

  Stella nodded and stood up from the bed. “I’ll give you your privacy then. Once you’re finished, you should try to get some more rest. Mrs. Mayhew or I will bring you your lunch later. And I’ll get to the mending too.”

  “Thank you.”

  Christopher watched Stella leave the room and could feel his cheeks burning as he remembered her running the warm cloth over his chest. He couldn’t deny that he hoped Mrs. Mayhew would not be the one to bring him his lunch.

  ****

  “The snow looks to be done now,” Mrs. Mayhew said as she set a plate of fish and a bowl of bread on the table. “Josiah should be able to get back up here soon I imagine.”

  “I hope so,” Stella said, plastering a smile on her face that she hoped didn’t betray her real feelings. She was grateful for every hour that passed before her husband made his inevitable return.

  “Where’s Mr. Mayhew today, ma’am?” Christopher asked as he took a slice of hot bread from the bowl. With Stella’s help, he’d managed to come to the kitchen for lunch. It was a thrill to finally be out of bed and moving again. And it was a relief to be wearing his own clothes again since Stella had finished mending them that morning.

  “He’s over at the lighthouse cleaning the windows. No point having such a powerful lens if the windows are dirty.” Mrs. Mayhew sat down next to Stella and took a piece of fish for herself. “How’s your arm feeling, boy?”

  “Much better, thank you.” Christopher smiled across the table at Stella. “Although I’d hate to think how it would feel without Mrs. Winslow’s laudanum.”

  Stella blushed and focused her attention on the food in front of her. “You’ll have to thank my husband for that.”

  “Thank your husband for what?”

  Stella jumped at the sound of Josiah’s voice and looked up to see him standing in the doorway of the Mayhew kitchen. She got up from her chair and quickly walked towards him.

  “Josiah! We didn’t hear you come in.”

  Mrs. Mayhew also got up from the table. “I didn’t know if you’d be able to make it up yet, Josiah.”

  “Of course I could. The snow stopped a good 24 hours ago.”

  Christopher stood up next to his chair.

  “It’s good to see you, Dr. Winslow.”

  “You look a grand sight better than the last time I saw you, boy.”

  “Yes sir. Your wife is a very good nurse.”

  Josiah nodded. “That she is. What’s your name then?”

  “Christopher Casey, sir.”

  Christopher thought he saw a sneer on Josiah’s face as he said his Irish surname. But surely he would have noticed his brogue beforehand. His nationality couldn’t be a surprise.

  “An immigrant, then.”

  “Yes sir.”

  Christopher was certain now of the sneer.

  “Josiah, you must be hungry after coming all that way in the cold,” Mrs. Mayhew said. “Sit yourself down and I’ll get you a plate.”

  “That’s kind of you, Mrs. Mayhew.”

  Christopher watched as Josiah sat down in the seat recently vacated by their host. Stella did not return to her chair beside him. Instead, she walked to the stove and poured a cup of coffee, which she then set down in front of Josiah. He drank the hot beverage without looking at her.

  “I’ll want to take a look at that arm and hand of yours once we’ve finished eating, Casey,” Josiah said. “Make sure my wife really has been a good nurse.”

  “Sit down, Christopher,” Mrs. Mayhew said. “You only just got out of bed, and we don’t want to send you back to it. You need to eat to get your strength back.”

  Christopher returned to his seat and felt Josiah’s eyes watching him as he sat down. It was hard to believe he was still in the same kitchen he had been in before Josiah's entrance. What had been a warm and comfortable atmosphere just minutes ago was now filled with a tension so thick it was suffocating.

  “What about you, Mrs. Winslow?” Christopher said. “Don’t you want to finish your lunch?”

  “Don’t you worry about my wife,” Josiah said. “She’ll eat when she’s finished fixing my plate.”

  Stella had returned to the stove, where she was filling a plate with the fish and bread Mrs. Mayhew had removed from the oven. She took the utensils Mrs. Mayhew offered her and walked back to the table, where she set the food down in front of her husband.

  “Here you are, Josiah,” she said.

  Stella took her husband’s now empty coffee cup and returned to the stove, where she poured him a fresh cup. She gave him the coffee and sat back down in her chair. Christopher watched as she pushed the now cold food around her plate and kept her eyes downcast.

  Noises from the entrance to the home interrupted the tension of the kitchen. Mrs. Mayhew wiped her hands on her apron and looked towards the doorway.

  “Sounds like William is back,” she said. “But I wasn’t expecting him to bring company.”

  Before she could leave the room, her husband appeared with a young man in tow.

  “Abigail, do we have lunch for one more?”

  “I’m afraid not just now, William. But I’ll get something prepared.”

  The newcomer held up his hand. “Don’t trouble yourself, ma’am,” he said. “I’ve just come to talk to you all about the Columbus.”

  Christopher froze at the mention of the ship that had nearly taken his life. “You want to talk about the shipwreck?” he said.

  “That he does,” Mr. Mayhew said. “This is Arthur Chesham from the Boston Globe. He’s been on the island and over in New Bedford learning about the wreck, but he hadn’t been able to get up here to us until now.”

  Josiah got to his feet and strode towards the reporter. “Good to meet you, Mr. Chesham,” he said, extending his hand. “I’m Dr. Josiah Winslow.”

  “Good to meet you as well, Doctor. I assume you helped treat the survivors?”

  “You assume right, but it was just this one boy here,” Josiah said, pointing at Christopher, who rose from his chair. “We didn’t get anyone
else.”

  “There were other survivors?” Christopher asked.

  The reporter nodded. “The cutter Dexter picked them up and took them to New Bedford. And one of the lifeboats from the Columbus came ashore on the beach in Lobsterville. Three of the crew members were on it and they’re staying with some folks there. But as far as I know you’re the only survivor here in Gay Head.”

  “There was someone else in the boat with me. When I was rescued.”

  “That man died in the boat, Christopher,” Mr. Mayhew said. “He was dead when we pulled you out.”

  Christopher lowered his head. “God help him.”

  “More than 100 dead is what we’re hearing,” Chesham said. “Bodies are still washing up and many have already been taken to the meeting house so their families can claim ‘em.” He glanced at Christopher. “You’re a lucky one, sir.”

  “His name’s Casey,” Josiah said. “Christopher Casey.”

  Chesham nodded. “Then you’re a lucky one, Mr. Casey.” The reporter cleared his throat. “Let me explain why I’m here. I met with the Gay Headers who manned the boat and took some photographs of them. I’d like to do the same with you folks.”

  “A picture of us?” Stella asked. “Why?”

  Chesham bowed slightly. “Pleased to make your acquaintance, ma’am. And you are?”

  “She’s my wife, Stella. And I’d like to know the answer to her question, too.”

  “Of course,” Chesham said. “I’m writing a story about the attempts to rescue survivors when the Columbus went down. I’d like to include your care of Mr. Casey here. Frankly, I think you all deserve to be recognized. My readers will want to know about your efforts.”

  Stella pushed a wayward strand of hair behind her ears. “I’ve never had a photograph taken,” she said. “I think it sounds like fun. What do you think, Josiah?”

  “I don’t see any harm in it.”

  Chesham smiled. “Great. I’ll need you all to come outside. I know it’s cold but I’d like to have the lighthouse as our background.”

  “I’ll stay here and make you all some fresh coffee for when you get done,” Mrs. Mayhew said.