Cassie gazed up into the cloudless blue sky and decided that making love with Edward in the middle of the day would be a delicious experience. Her sail suddenly luffed wildly, and she pushed quickly at the tiller, chiding herself for her inattention, before she promptly fell back into pleasant fantasy.
She was disturbed again by waves slapping sharply against the bow, and looked up to see a large sailing vessel in the distance. She drew in her empty line, dropped the fishing pole into the boat, and shaded her eyes, trying to make out the lines of the ship.
She gave a crow of delight when she realized that it was the yacht she and Edward had seen the afternoon before. It rode high in the water, its many square-rigged sails tautly full as it held its northeasterly course close into the wind. She saw the gun mounts on the starboard side and several sailors perched high up the mast, unfurling the royals and topgallants.
Cassie wanted to see the yacht more closely before it passed her by, and she jerked on the tiller, bringing her boat high into the wind. She eased in the sheets, and the mainsail bulged tautly as it took more wind.
As she drew closer, she could make out sailors standing on the quarterdeck. She fancied she could see the captain of the yacht shouting commands to the sailors swarming over the rigging, and to the helmsman as he steered the ship past the dangerous shallow inlets. She was suddenly able to see the name of the yacht, painted in bright yellow letters on the starboard bow. She stared with growing confusion at The Cassandra.
The yacht was overtaking her, and she was perplexed to see that its course had shifted more northerly. In a few minutes, if she was not careful, it would cut in front of her small boat. Grim visions of the huge vessel ramming her, blind to her presence, sent her speeding into action. She jerked the tiller sharply, and tacked to starboard and landward. In her haste, she backwinded her sail, and for a few frantic seconds, her sloop lay dead in the water, bobbing up and down in the crest of waves from the approaching yacht. She let the sheets fly free, and ducked as the boom swung with a grating thud to starboard. She pulled at the tiller to put the wind to her back, and her small sail took the wind with agonizing slowness. Cassie fought off her growing panic, secured the tiller between her thighs, grabbed her paddle, and rowed furiously toward shore.
She heard a man’s shout, and slewed her head about for a moment to see the yacht bearing down on her, its graceful, full bow slicing cleanly through the water.
The huge shadow of the yacht blotted out the sun, and Cassie moaned low in her throat as the specter of death rose before her.
A man’s voice commanded sharply, “Veer off! Hook the ropes and haul her in!”
Cassie gazed dumbfounded at several sailors hanging precariously from rope ladders over the side, each of them holding in his free hand a thick looped rope. By God, they are pirates, white slavers, she thought. She saw herself tied in irons, bound for servitude on the Barbary Coast, and pulled frantically with her paddle.
She heard a whirling sound over her head and was suddenly thrown backward against the teller as looped ropes encircled the mast and the outjutting bow. She shook off the pain in her back from the sharp-edged tiller and scrambled forward. She tugged at the thick hemp rope about the mast, but it was pulled taut.
She looked up when one sailor shouted upward to a man who stood at the railing. “All secure, captain!”
“Pull her close in! Steady now!”
There was something oddly familiar about the commanding deep voice, but her mind was so clogged with fear that she did not heed it. She saw that fumbling with the thick rope about her mast would gain her naught, and quickly stumbled to the stern of her wildly lurching boat. She measured her distance to shore and groaned with frustration, for in her heavy skirt and petticoats she would drown long before she reached shallow water. She was thrown to her knees as her boat heeled sharply, drawn closer to the yacht by the ropes. She watched numbly as the captain gingerly stepped over the side and began his descent down a rope ladder. He was a powerfully built man, dressed in a full-sleeved white shirt, and tight-fitting knit breeches above his black boots.