The Delfe Treasure

37. Calm in the Storm

Aldrick's passion triggered another trembling peak for Elizabeth, and they lay entwined in a tight embrace as involuntary movements coursed through their bodies. When she had regained composure, Elizabeth said, "I have not before seen you so moved from release." She giggled. "Nor heard you so loud."

"Nor had I before felt it with such intensity." He trembled again. "I know not whether its cause was the enhanced sensations of remaining inside, or if it was from my thoughts."

"What were your thoughts?"

"About implanting a new life within you. Starting a family. Creating an heir."

She held him tighter and hummed a sigh. "I love that. Though I should have given you warning, not surprised you with it."

"But we have discussed it, and you said you would let me know when."

"True." She shifted her hips. "And the increased sensations?"

"So much more intense. And even more so when you began contracting and pulsating around me. This was my first time releasing inside."

"Into me, yes. But with others?"

"Not with any of them. I did not want to leave a collection of bastards, contrary to the common habit, it seems."

"Have you dallied with many?"

"While I was young, more careless and less wise."

"You are still young. When did your wisdom arrive?"

"When I increasingly found their spirits and minds wanting."

"And their bodies?"

"None can compete with the magnificence of yours. But a body is simply a vessel for the person, for their being, their spirit. It's beauty attracts, but if there is little inside, the attraction fades."

"And do I fade?"

"To the contrary. You increasingly intrigue and attract me." He tilted her face up and kissed her. "When will we know if you are with child?"

"If I do not bleed when expected."

"And when do you expect the next visit of them?" 

"They come every twenty-nine or thirty days with the new moon." She paused to think. "They last began when we raised Madeira. That seems so long ago now with all that has happened."

Aldrick nodded at the memory of the mice; then he was quiet as he ran the ship's log and the lunar tables through his mind. "That was the seventeenth of August, and today is the first of September, a full moon, though we will not see it tonight with this storm. We should know in a fortnight, at the next new moon." 

"But there is no need to stop while we wait." She sighed and shifted her hips. "You can continue planting seeds. The more, the better the chance."

He expanded at the thought, and she encouraged the renewed stiffening with a deep moan and increased movement.

Wednesday, 2nd September 1733

The howling in the rigging grew louder and of higher frequency through the night, and Elizabeth's movements to her anchors increased. As the first light of dawn came through the windows in the night cabin, Aldrick slipped out of bed, donned his dressing robe, went to the chart table and blew the whistle on the voice tube. When the cover was removed on the quarterdeck, a loud roar came down with Charles shouting above the wind, "Officer of the Watch, Sir."

"How are we riding?" Aldrick shouted back up.

"Still stable, Sir. Anchors remain five points spread. Rain heavier but the swell from the south seems to have peaked." 

"That is a good sign. Also, the mercury glass has stopped its rapid plunge, so we may be through the worse of it." 

"How low did it fall?"

"I noted twenty-seven point five in the log at the beginning of your watch, and it is still near the same level. It had fallen only three points from midnight."

"Lower than last week's storm."

"And it had a more rapid fall. Down more than an inch and a half in twelve hours." Aldrick looked aft through the stern windows at the glum of the dawn. "Add visual reports of the conditions in your log, Mister Charles. We need to analyse the nature of storms such as this."

"Aye, Sir."

Aldrick covered the tube's horn, then after he had checked the mercury glass again and recorded its level in the log, he returned to the night cabin, doffed his dressing robe and climbed into bed.

Elizabeth snuggled up to him and asked, "Is all well?"

"It is, and the pressure is no longer dropping."

"So, the storm is almost over?"

"No. It is no longer building, so it may remain like this for a long while before it begins to pass."

"Linger as more clouds and their rain pour into the deep hole."

"Deep hole? I do not follow."

"While you were away, I lay here thinking. Looking for explanations from what you have described."

"And?"

"Think of the air as a layer above us, as high as the highest clouds or more, swirling while the Earth spins on its axis. Thicker in some places, thinner in others, thus the difference in pressure. The thinner areas would attract more air, as do low spots on land attract a flow of water. The steeper the slope, the faster the flow, both with water and with air. The deeper the hole, the lower the pressure and greater the flow. The greater the flow, the faster the wind."

Aldrick nodded. "And with the flow come the clouds of moisture, and as they descend, they condense into rain."

"This is what I had thought. And when there is higher pressure, the air and any of its clouds flow away as does water off a hilltop, leaving us with a clear and blue sky overhead."

"This explains the faster the fall of the mercury, the higher the winds."

"This also explains the differing pressure Pascal had found. The higher the mercury glass was carried up the mountain, the lower the pressure fell. Think of Newton's theory of gravitas and that the air is not a void, but rather it is composed of tiny particles, so small as to be invisible. Though each has a weight, it is far too low to measure. But taken in a layer a few miles thick, its cumulative weight depresses the mercury in the instrument." Elizabeth shrugged. "Only some rambling thoughts."

"And were you a man, rambling thoughts such as these would gain you a position at Cambridge or at the Royal Observatory." 

"But as a woman in years past, and still now among some, gained me accusations of lying abed with Satan and of engaging in witchcraft. Men are allowed to think, but women are not."

"Am I Satan? Or I should check you for signs of being a witch? Among the tests was stripping the woman naked to search every place for the Devil's mark." Aldrick chuckled as he rose to sit beside her hips. "I can begin with a thorough examination here."

"Another test the witch hunters employed was pricking, and you may also do that, if you wish." Elizabeth giggled. "Though I would prefer you to choose a tool thicker than a needle or a bodkin."