The Traitor's Stain (wattys 2019)

Chapter Four: Wallabout Bay, Long Island

The next day was as hard, if not, harder than the day before. She found herself having to slap a smile on her face, despite the pain in her back from the brick and the ache in her heart. She just... focused on the job at hand. Because she knew full well that if she didn't keep her mind on running the store, her mind would drift to Noah in that awful prison ship, and if that happened... well, she wouldn't be able to stop crying. Again.

"I have some good news," Colonel Erikson said as Ophelia prepared his fabric. The fabric he'd been picking up when the brick came through and he got distracted with trying to find who did it. "I asked the commander in charge of the Jersey if you could visit your husband. And, he said that you could as long as I accompanied you."

Ophelia... didn't know what to say.

"I... thank you, colonel," she finally said. She could feel herself starting to shake. "Really: I-I don't know how to thank you."

"No thanks is needed," Colonel Erikson assured her. "Pack up a basket: I'm going to get this fabric to my men, and I'll take you to the Jersey to see him."

They set out to Brooklyn on Colonel Erikson's horse, riding through the countryside of Long Island. The trip took four hours, Colonel Erikson keeping the horse at a steady canter for much of the trip, slowing down for water and to keep the horse from getting too tired. They didn't talk much, and frankly, that suited Ophelia just fine. She just felt... odd about it. About wrapping her arms around the stomach of a man she hardly knew, on her way to visit her husband on a prison ship. She knew full well that nothing was going on between them, and she was fairly certain Colonel Erikson knew that, as well, but it still made her uncomfortable.

Finally, though, Wallabout Bay came into view, the huge masts rising above the landscape like fingers.

Ophelia began to grow nervous. She'd heard horrible stories about what happened on those prison ships in Wallabout Bay. Stories of corpses - ones that were practically skeletal with starvation - being tossed overboard so frequently, it was almost constant. Stories of feces ridden decks, cramped quarters where diseases spread like wildfire. And, according to the stories, none of the prison ships were nearly as horrible as the HMS Jersey.

"Don't worry, Miss Stroud," Colonel Erikson said as they approached, as if he could sense her trepidation. "We won't be going below decks: they'll bring your husband onto the top deck."

So I won't be able to see what's going on below decks.

The horrors she'd heard about was all she could seem to think about while they made their last leg of the trip. She thought about it as she stared up at the prison ships looming ominously in the bay as Colonel Erikson tied the horse up to a post, as they walked down the wooden dock where two ships were moored, one on either side. As she stared up at the ship where her husband was being held while Colonel Erikson talked to the soldier at the end of the gangplank.

He's in there, she thought to herself, gripping the basket in her hands a little tighter as she stared up at the decrepit ship before her. Noah's in there.

God help him!

Colonel Erikson gently put a hand on her arm, yanking her out of her hellish thoughts. "You've been cleared to go on deck. I'll wait down here."

Ophelia nodded, then walked up the rickety gangplank onto the deck of the HMS Jersey.

"Miss Stroud, I presume," one of the soldiers on deck said.

Ophelia nodded. She couldn't quite bring herself to speak.

"Stay here," the same soldier said. "Your husband will be up shortly."