Victoria and the Rogue Read Free Page B

It
    really was quite a long way down, and the ladder was, after all, made only of rope and wood. But, she
    told herself staunchly, so was the swing, and at least on the ladder she would be in command of her own
    destiny, whereas the swing would be dropped down by crew members… some of whom Victoria feared
    were not altogether as committed to their duties as one might hope.
    Accordingly, she hiked up her skirt and pelisse—causing Mrs. White to gasp, as if the glimpse of a
    woman’s ankles were quite the most offensive thing in the world. It was a good thing, Victoria thought,
    that Mrs. White had never been to Jaipur, where women and girls—including Victoria—regularly went
    about with their feet and legs bared to the knees, and she swung a leg over the ship railing. She teetered
    there for a moment while her foot sought purchase on the first rung of the rope ladder, and happened to
    glance down again….
    And realized this was a mistake. The men in the boat below looked very small indeed. It was a long,
    long way down to the water’s choppy, whitecapped surface. Such a long way down, in fact, that Victoria
    began to feel strangely hot, though the wind that was nipping at her skirts was quite brisk. Her pulse, she
    was convinced, had begun to stagger, and her mouth had gone suddenly very dry.
    Victoria froze where she was, beginning to think that the swing might not be such a very bad thing, as at
    least she could keep her eyes closed all the way down. She was trying to decide how she might broach
    this subject to the people in front of whom she had only too recently scoffed at such an idea, when she
    felt a hand, warm and reassuring, upon her gloved fingers.
    She opened her eyes to see the odious Captain Carstairs hanging above her, the corners of his lips, as
    usual, twisted into a smile… only this one was not scornful, but rather kind.
    “Don’t look down,” he advised her gently, “and you’ll be all right.”
    Victoria swallowed—a difficulty given the dryness of her throat—and nodded, not trusting her voice.
    There was nothing for it now. She had no choice but to climb down, as she had apparently lost all ability
    to speak, and could not ask for the swing.
    Down she accordingly went, carefully keeping her gaze on the side of the ship as she climbed. She could
    hear the men below shouting encouragingly to her—“Easy does it, m’lady,” and “Nice ’n’ slow
    now”—and she was quite grateful to them, since their voices made the roaring in her ears, which had
    nothing to do with the sea, seem less oppressive.
    And then finally, sooner than she might have suspected, she felt their hands on her elbows and waist, and
    she was lifted from the ladder and put down inside the longboat… which was a good thing, since her
    knees gave out completely the moment her feet touched the boat’s bottom, and she knew she would not
    have been able to walk to her seat unaided.
    There were some cries of “Hurrah!” from the ship’s deck, impossibly high above her head, and Victoria
    began to feel the blood move inside her veins once more. La, she thought. Why, that was nothing at all!
    Imagine having been afraid of a little climb like that!
    By the time poor Mrs. White—who, of course, opted to descend by the swing—joined her in the
    longboat, Victoria had forgotten all about her own fear and could not help feeling annoyed at the other
    woman’s theatrics. For, despite Mrs. White’s assertions that the swing was perfectly safe, she shrieked
    quite hysterically all the way down, before collapsing completely once she was safely inside the longboat.
    Victoria was forced to wave hartshorn beneath the lady’s nose before she became sensible—quite a
    deplorable way to behave, Victoria could not help thinking, for a ship captain’s wife. She could not see
    why Captain White bothered to let his wife come along during his voyages at all.
    Captain Carstairs, who descended by ladder a few moments after Mrs. White