Shark Island Read Online Free Page A

nodded. “If he asks me questions about seamanship, I’ll answer them. But,” he warned, “I can’t promise any more than that.”
    *   *   *
    On the Vincennes, Midshipman Keith was in a state of abject grief. His friend, Jack Dicken, had tears running down his red cheeks, too, and kept on sobbing, “But ’tis a signal honor,” to which Keith replied, “I know, I know.” Every time he looked about the luxurious berth he was leaving behind, though, more tears would fall.
    The two of them had set up this room together, spending a great deal of money—not that that had been a huge sacrifice, as both hailed from rich families. Now Constant Keith, like all his friends, considered the room both beautiful and in the very best of taste; as he had written home to his family, it was the admiration of all. The bulkheads were hung with crimson-striped drapes, and decorated with a large mirror on one wall and an even larger display of weapons on another. A Brussels carpet covered the floor, and the porcelain bowl of the washstand was sprinkled with designs of green clover. Silver candelabra perched on tables, and Chinese urns full of painted feather flowers stood about in corners. The two divans where Keith and Dicken slept were upholstered in blue damask.
    Still worse, Keith had invested six hundred dollars in a private store of wine and food—only staples like flour being provided by the ship—and all of this would have to be left behind, too. He was just seventeen and naturally hungry, and his spirit quailed at the thought of what the rations were apt to be like on the Swallow.
    â€œBut ’tis such an honor,” Dicken repeated. “You should be fit to bust with joy.”
    â€œAnd I am, I am!” Keith cried. When Captain Wilkes had sent for him he had shuffled along reluctantly, with memories of past sins lining up in his guilty mind, and he had fully expected to be reprimanded, or even punished. Too, he’d been stricken with the nasty notion that Captain Wilkes had somehow deduced that the midshipmen didn’t hero-worship him any more, not the way they had at the beginning. Where they had once revered their commodore unquestioningly, considering him a genius of the stature of Captain Cook, they now felt uneasy about many of his decisions, especially his ominous habit of changing the officers of the various ships on a whim. Not only did it make a chap wonder who he’d be taking orders from next, but it overturned the comfortable arrangements of the squadron.
    Accordingly, it had taken Keith an embarrassingly long time to realize that he was being promoted to the station of first officer on the brig Swallow —and on such a wonderful exciting mission, too! He must have seemed sadly addleheaded, he feared. But then—probably just in time to prevent Captain Wilkes from arbitrarily changing his mind—his heart had leaped with understanding, and he had exclaimed out loud with joy. Captain Wilkes had even smiled briefly as he had dismissed him, and for a moment Keith had regarded him with something like his old admiration and awe.
    â€œCaptain Rochester will be your commanding officer,” Dicken said enviously. George Rochester was the unquestioned hero of the midshipmen’s mess—not only was he the paragon who had topped the class in the last set of examinations, but, because he had been given the command of one of the expedition’s ships, he was living proof that mere midshipmen could aspire to wonderful things. All the junior midshipmen had mourned when George Rochester had been abruptly demoted, and all of them were exceeding glad to hear that he’d been restored to the quarterdeck of the Swallow.
    Then Dicken lowered his voice. “One of your shipmates will be Wiki Coffin.”
    The two young men gazed at each other. Mr. Coffin had been a guest at one of the midshipmen’s weekly feasts, and though he