Anna's Crossing: An Amish Beginnings Novel by Suzanne Woods Fisher Page B

quieted. Felix had overheard Josef Gerber say that his father could control the church with one glance. That’s what it seemed as if the captain was doing right now—controlling the entire ship with his glance.
    Through the speaking trumpet, the captain barked out orders in a deep baritone voice that was surprising in a man so short, and he used it to good effect, bellowing out commands with absolute authority. He shouted quite a lot, that captain, and sailors quivered at his command. Felix would like to have that kind of respect from others one day.
    When he saw the captain head toward the forecastle deck, Felix scurried down to the opposite end of the ship to the Great Cabin and waited until the helmsman was distracted before he slipped inside.
    The captain’s quarters was a small bowed room, with a built-in bunk on one side and a table fastened to one wall. Itwas the only private space Felix had found on this ship. He peered out through the small windows at the channel. It was a different view from the stern and Felix squinted, the way he’d seen seamen squint against the sun or at the churned-up frothy water left in the ship’s wake, as if it was telling them something. He was thinking that maybe he was becoming as savvy about a seaman’s life as any sailor ever was.
    Felix turned from the window and noticed a shelf of books built into the bulkhead and held in place by a wooden bar. One book caught his attention and he opened it to see if there were illustrations. He wondered if the captain would notice if he borrowed a book for Anna now and then. She liked to read, like Johann did, though that got him into trouble in the end. Terrible trouble.
    If Felix did borrow a book from the captain, and if Anna asked him where he’d found it, he would have to make his lie short and simple, to keep her from worrying. Johann often pointed out that Felix always got caught in lies when he tried to spin too much straw on them.
    Suddenly, the ship’s bell sounded and he realized he’d lost track of time and the Great Cabin was no place to tarry. He hadn’t thought this through. He hadn’t thought at all. Heavy footsteps drew near and he whirled around, desperate for a place to hide in this tiny room. He threw himself onto the captain’s tiny bunk and pulled the curtain, letting out a shaky breath. Pure panic, and not a good place to be. He held no illusions that the captain wouldn’t accept a boy from the lower deck in his private space, or let him borrow a book without asking permission. Just like the Baron of Ixheim.
    The door to the Great Cabin opened and footsteps crossed the coaming. Then Felix heard the scrape of a wooden chairagainst the floor and a squeak of a hinge. Through a crack in the curtain, he peeked through and let out a shaky breath, relieved to see that the man who was in the Great Cabin wasn’t the captain but that tall officer. He wasn’t dressed sloppy like the other seamen, and he wasn’t barefoot like they were. He wore long, shiny black boots, up to his knees. The officer opened the wooden box that sat on the captain’s table and pulled out some funny-looking tools. He started working with the tools, then, absorbed, he sat down on the chair.
    Felix wondered what those tools were used for. His father had all kinds of tools but nothing like those.
    Thinking of his father caused his thoughts to drift back to his brother Johann and a sweeping sadness rushed over him. Anna said that Johann was in a better place and they shouldn’t wish him back, but Felix was fairly sure that Johann would rather be here, with them right now, than be taken away from them. He wondered what his father would have to say when he heard about Johann, once they reached Port Philadelphia.
    Would his father hate the baron as much as Felix hated him? The baron was the reason his father left for the colonies so abruptly last year. The baron was the reason Johann was dead. He remembered the conversations his parents had that night