Noble Duty

10. Diversions

I selected a map from the portfolio and laid it on the chart table. "For instance, here in Delaware Bay, older guides show many shipyards, but recent reports note that the greater lucre from the production of tobacco has all but supplanted other endeavours. Now only Greenwich, Salem and New Castle have shipyards."

"Shipyards. Hmmm!" Gillian examined the map for a long while; then, she looked up at me. "I cannot find Manhattan marked on this. Do you know where it is?"

"I am not familiar with it. Why do you ask?"

"I have a cousin who has a shipyard there." She shrugged. "It might save entering ports along the coast and finding none."

"A cousin?"

"My grandfather, the fourteenth Baron Cavendish – his brother's daughter married a sea captain, and they settled ashore on Manhattan Island." A broad smile filled her face, and she sighed. "They visited us a few years ago, and I still delight in memories of the stories they told."

"Did they describe where it is?"

"Close to New York." She tapped the map. "I see that here, but I cannot find Manhattan."

"We need a larger scale map." I reopened the portfolio and rifled through the contents, pulled out a chart and laid it atop the other. "There. Manhattan is the island on which the town sits."

"Ooh! Can we go there? I would love to see them again."

"Yes, certainly. With its thriving trade, the area likely offers a better choice of yards than the Delaware, and if theirs is not suitable, they can direct us to one that is."

Flipping back to the previous sheet, I measured the distance from my estimate of our position. "Two hundred and sixty miles from here to the harbour entrance. With the current assisting, we should arrive mid-afternoon on the morrow."

I opened another drawer, located the sheath of papers I wanted and took it out. "This is the list of settlements along the coast from the Carolinas northward, describing them, their approaches, anchorages and what is found ashore."

"Did you compile this?"

"Nay, far too much for that. Each of our ships amends and adds to it from their observations, and we print a new version twice each year." I leafed through the pages to find the New York ones and skimmed the entries, turning more pages until I found the part I wanted. "Here, shipyards. Latham Brothers, John Dallys, Betheson and Sons, Elvers ..."

"Betheson! That is them."

I scanned the location description, then read aloud their services, "Wharves, warehouses, careening, drying dock, repairs, refits, nautical chandlery, victualling ... Oh, my! Had I not known the relationship, I would have chosen them."

Gillian frowned and shook her head. "Why does it matter that you know?"

"How do you mean?"

"Causing you to not choose them."

"Hunh?" I reviewed what I had said, then laughed. "Nay, I meant that they are the natural choice, whether or not we know them."

She chuckled. "Same words but opposite meanings possible."

"Indeed! Thus, all orders need to be repeated back to the one issuing them. Confirm not only receipt but also understanding."

"But they do it with different words."

"Aye, we require this to show comprehension."

"Yes, of course."

I laid a protractor on the chart, adjusted it and said, "Steering a course of north-northeast half north will clear the New Jersey coast."

Gillian pointed to it. "You have it askew, Jarvis."

"Indeed, and intentionally so."

"Hunh? Why?"

"You tell me."

She examined the chart for a while before her head began bobbing. "Of course. For the magnetic variation."

"Exactly. And not making the correction has brought grief to many ships. Applying it to the wrong side is even worse. To easily remember, we have a ditty: Variation east, magnetic least. Variation west, magnetic best."

"And you take the variation from Halley's chart."

"Only when we have not had a suitable sunrise or sunset. By routine, we check the bearing of these, and with tables, determine the precise compass variation. The position of the magnetic pole slowly migrates, and Doctor Halley's chart is now only an approximation."

"So many layers of complexity to navigation."

"Aye, and that is its attraction."

She snuggled into me. "As your complexity increasingly attracts me."

"Ummm." I pointed to the chart. "I must reconfirm this."

"I sense a tightness, Jarvis. A distraction."

I blew a deep breath and nodded. "Thoughts of what I had done to them. Disturbing."

"Done to whom?"

"The pirates. To disable their swivels, some of them were hit by our shot."

"But had you not done this, they would have fired at us. Then what?"

"True. But it still leaves ..."

"Whoa, Jarvis! Whoa, whoa, whoa. You did what was right. Absolutely right. It is they who were wrong to attack us."

I sighed and nodded. "But ..."

She took my hand. "Come! Let us go sit and examine this. You did nothing wrong. In fact, what you did was noble. You could have so easily destroyed them all."

"But I did destroy them – their futures. They are condemned to enduring their remaining months or years in horrid conditions."

"As we would have been had we been captured. Enslaved, you had said."

When I shuddered at the thought of how they would treat her, she wrapped her arms around me and laid her cheek on my chest. "You need to calm, Jarvis. Come, let us lie together and do things to divert your mind."