Mystic Memories by Gillian Doyle, Susan Leslie Liepitz

Keoni was a fine-looking Kanaka , a few years older than Blake. He was also a man from a culture that enjoyed the pursuit of physical pleasure between the genders without the guilt and restrictions of civilized countries.
    Blake felt a nudge beneath his hand and looked down to see Bud gazing up at him. At least someone had noticed he was still around. He stroked the top of his dog’s massive head, then spoke to Mr. Bellows. “Did the Valiant fare well?”
    “Beautifully, sir.” The first mate gestured toward the cliffs. “Would that be the Mystic, then?”
    “Aye, it is. We will need to check for any survivors aboard her.”
    “McGinty and I will take care of it, sir.”
    “Good. I’ll have Lopaka help me. Keoni—” Blake turned to his friend. “There is an injured sailor in need of your attention.”
    Mrs. Edwards spoke up. “Please, may I ask a favor of the men going to the Mystic, Captain Masters? Could they look for my leather backpack?”
    “Your leather what?”
    “Back—um . . . baggage. Bag, that is. My leather bag. I had it with me on the ship.”
    “I doubt they will find it aboard the Mystic, but I will have them look for it.”

    By midafternoon, the bodies had been buried in the clay soil on a low hill overlooking the sea. Blake and Lopaka were walking back from their unpleasant duty when the search party of two returned to give their report of the shipwrecked Mystic .
    “Sir, she was washed clean of most everything that wasn’t nailed down,” answered Mr. Bellows. “She’s busted up real good. The tide’s taken quite a toll through the hole in her starboard quarter. Here’s the captain’s papers, though.”
    Blake had already learned from a conversation with Captain Johnson that the Mystic had arrived from Boston only four months earlier with dry goods to trade with the cattle owners on the ranchos. Unlike the Valiant , which was nearing the end of its two years on the California coast, the small brig had a long way to go to fill its hold with hides before it could return to the East.
    “Thank you, Mr. Bellows. Did you find the leather bag?”
    “No, sir. Sorry, sir.”
    He noticed the way the sailors eyed the widow Edwards, sitting at a small fire Keoni had built to warm her and the two other survivors.
    “That will be all,” he stated firmly, dismissing the men to make ready for the return trip to the ship. They had finished their work here in San Pedro on the previous evening, so no hides would be collected today. Had it not been for the storm, they would already have been halfway to San Diego by now.
    He clutched the scrolled papers in his left hand, lightly tapping them against his thigh. Turning toward the driftwood fire, he approached Mrs. Edwards, who sat with her back to him, still huddled in the woolen blanket. Her head hung forward between her shoulders with the posture of someone who was exhausted.
    In the bright afternoon sun, he saw the color of her short hair was not black, as he had assumed during the storm, but actually a rich, deep brown. So were her eyes, he recalled. She appeared to be close to his own age of thirty, perhaps a bit younger, but no woman of his acquaintance had ever looked quite so physically strong and as able as any young sailor. Yet she certainly did not possess any other masculine qualities.
    He felt a resurgence of his own wanton desire for her.
     
     
     

 
    Chapter 4
    B lake quelled his lascivious thoughts and addressed Mrs. Edwards. “May I speak with you privately, ma’am?”
    The widow woman brought her bowed head up suddenly, as if startled. “Wha—? Where—?”
    She craned her neck around, squinting up at him through sleepy eyes that made him think of waking up next to her in the early morning. What insanity to think such things! He dismissed the wild notion and held out his palm to help her to her feet.
    “I would like to talk to you for a moment.”
    Taking his hand, she struggled to stand but faltered, her knees buckling.