Anne tried desperately to crawl out
of the grave she’d now dug for herself.
“But Captain!” She protested with
more than an edge of desperation in her voice, “I didn’t mean too!”
Only moments before had Anne
blundered into a game of Towers that Captain Frobisher was about to win. Now
Captain Hawkyns and Captain Drake were splitting the money that Captain
Frobisher didn’t have. Anne picked herself up from amid the blocks she had
toppled over with and scooted away from her irate employer.
“I don’t care!” Captain Frobisher
roared. Anne dashed in between the other captains, using them as a buffer. She
wondered why she had let the Captain into the wine so early in the morning,
even if it was a festival day. “Get back over here!”
Anne slowly trod towards her
captain, ready to duck and cover or run as fast as her legs could carry her.
Captain Frobisher had lifted men bigger than her clear over his head and tossed
them off the ship. “It is a festival day, Captain.” Anne said hopefully,
“Mayhap we can simply forget about this?” It was a stretch and Anne knew it.
“Certainly not.” Captain Frobisher
insisted. “I’m revoking your land privileges and you’re going to get ten
lashes.”
Anne steeled herself. She could
take a whip so long as the captain didn’t find out she was a girl.
“Administered by whom?” She couldn’t help the quaver in her voice.
Captain Frobisher looked at Anne
like it was the most idiotic question in the world. “Me!”
Flailing around for words Anne
sputtered out “But you can’t!”
“What do you mean I can’t! I’m the
captain! You’ve got to learn to take punishment like a man, I’ve been much too
lax on you.”
Anne looked to Hawkyns and Drake.
Hawkyns seemed ready to jump into action, but as always he waited to see what
Anne would do. Anne had told him in no uncertain terms that she could take care
of herself.
“But Captain!”
“What?” Captain Frobisher was
already starting to walk away from the towers. “Come on, I haven’t got all
day.”
Anne tried to find an excuse,
“It’ll ruin my shirt!” Was all that she could come up with?
“That doesn’t matter- you don’t
need it anyway, Andrew!” Captain Frobisher stared at Anne with annoyance. “Just
take it off now!”
“I can’t!”
“Why not?” Captain Frobisher pulled at Anne’s arm.
“You’re not going to get any blood on it. Act like a man, Andrew!”
“I’m a girl!” Anne blurted.
Everything seemed to stand still for a moment.
Captain Frobisher blinked. “What?”
Anne looked to Drake, who looked
astonished. Then she looked to Hawkyns, who looked a little surprised. Then she
looked back her Captain, who looked skeptical. “I’m a girl, Captain.”
“You lied to me!”
“Not technically.” Anne wheedled.
“I never said I wasn’t a girl.”
“I distinctly told you girls are
bad luck on ships!” Captain Frobisher protested.
Anne nodded, “But you never asked
if I was a girl.”
“Naturally I assumed you’d be a
boy!”
“Martin.” Hawkyns interrupted. “Do
you recall my cabin boy ‘Bob?’”
Captain Frobisher gaze Hawkyns the
same annoyed look he had given Anne moments earlier. “Of course! Rather rubbish
of you keeping a girl on board.”
“I had my reasons.”
“We all knew your reasons.” Anne
couldn’t help herself. Hawkyns gave her a cautioning glance.
“Glass houses, Anne.”
“WAIT!” Frobisher burst between the two. “Anne-Drew.” He looked at Anne in shock. “That’s a boy’s name!”
Captain Hawkyns rolled his eyes and
stepped in between the increasingly outraged Frobisher and the petrified Anne.
“Oh, come now, Martin.”
“You’re not just getting a
whipping!” Frobisher yelled. “I think a good old fashioned keelhauling is in
order.”
Hawkyns put his hand protectively
on Anne’s shoulder. “As Anne’s father, I take responsibility for her actions
and forbid you to touch her.”
Anne and Frobisher looked at
Hawkyns in disbelief. “Father?” In reality, thought Anne might have played her
cards to gain a little from each Captain by teasing how they might be her
father, she had no idea which of these famous captains her father was.
Hawkyns’ pulled a piece of paper
out of his doublet and handed it to Anne. “That is my signature, isn’t it?”
Anne glanced at the paper,
I, Father Peter of the church of
England, do provide witness to the baptismal and christening of this child,
Anne Drew, born to John Hawkyns, Captain, and Fanny Drew, a most common woman,
on the seventh day of September anno domino 1556. While this child is not of a
legitimate union, both parties do recognize parentage and accept responsibility
of this child and do claim the child to be their own.
Witnessed By
Father Peter
Fanny Drew John Hawkyns
“While your
mother might have had copies of this particular letter.” Hawkyns raised an
eyebrow at Anne, who almost blushed from embarrassment. “I do claim you as my
child, since it seems that you finally have gotten yourself into a scrape you
can’t get out of.”
“John!” Captain Frobisher
sputtered, trying to make sense of everything that he had learned in the last
three minutes. “This doesn’t make any sense!”
“What doesn’t make sense Captain?”
Anne asked exasperatedly. Hawkyns gave her a look that told her to let him do
the talking.
Frobisher looked at the ground in
an attitude of deep thought. “Wait…” He said as he put two and two together, “You’ve
been a girl this whole time.”
“Yes.”
“How many people knew?”
“Everyone but you Captain.” Anne
grumbled. It hadn’t been her plan.
“Am I really that thick?”
“Come along Anne.” John Hawkyns
held out his hand to his newly recognized daughter. “Let’s go get your things
from the ship, you need to get some women’s clothes.”
“I don’t own any.” Anne winced at
the thought of losing the freedom that trousers and a doublet had given her. “What
about the Captain?”
“He’ll work it out eventually.”
Anne looked over her shoulder at
the dumb-struck Captain Frobisher. To be honest she didn’t have much of an
understanding of what just happened either. Still, something inside of her
leapt with joy that she belonged to someone.
However, something inside her said
that her adventures had only just begun. She’d need to keep her boy clothes
around just in case.
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