o-o Widow's Walk o-o

At dawn on the first of February, Harry gave him up for lost.

February first. More than twelve weeks after the Black Pearl had been expected to return to St. Claire for the Christmas holidays.

There had been no word. None at all. After Christmas Day came and went with no sign of the Pearl and her beloved crew and treasured Captain, they had sent boats out, to neighboring islands, and then beyond, far beyond. Nothing. The last of the searchers had returned two days before. Nothing. Not a sign.

As though the sea had swallowed them up.

Harry lay, blinking at the shadowed ceiling of their bedroom. In the bed that was empty now, and ever would be, save for ghosts.

o-o-o

Tom was still asleep. Her darling, her bright morning star, lighting that new horizon. She knelt beside him, and placed a kiss on his brow.

"Mama?" he murmured, and his dark eyes opened. He began to struggle up.

"Hush!" she said. "You don't need to rise just yet, love."

"But I want to. Where's Rachel? Are you going riding?" He plucked at her linen shirt, compliment to the breeches she wore.

She smiled. Her morning star, indeed! Or something less romantic, and far more dear. "Yes, I'm going riding, and if you are determined to rise we had best find Rachel, hadn't we?"

"Aye. I want some breakfast. But can't I go? Please?"

"Not this time."

"But I want to!"

"Tom," began his mother, between laughter and exasperation, but they were interrupted.

"Go where?" Rachel asked as she entered, tying the sash on her dressing gown.

"Mama's going riding. I want to go, too," said Tom.

Harry stood to face the housekeeper, and tried to smile though it did not reach her eyes. "Will you watch him, Rachel? I need to go alone, this time."

Rachel frowned. "The Captain… it ain't safe to go by yourself. That new mare's young and too flighty for her own good. Or yours."

"She'll be fine, Rachel," said Harry, firmly, her smile fading. "I'm going alone, this once. I'll return by nightfall. Please take care of Tom." She bent and swiftly hugged the little boy, who hugged back, but squirmed, too.

"I want to go! Mama, please!"

"Not this time, love. Be a good boy, and mind Rachel." With a final speaking glance at the housekeeper, Harry turned and strode from the room.

o-o-o

"Mama!" wailed Tom, tears of frustration in his eyes.

Rachel went to him and picked him up. "Shh… quiet now. What would your da say to this carryin' on?"

"He'd want to go with her!" averred Tom.

Rachel chuckled. "He would at that, for all 'e don't like horses."

Tom buried his face against Rachel's neck and squealed and kicked a bit. Presently, however, he stopped and pushed away, frowning stormily. "Da would make mama behave!"

"Now is that any way to speak of your mother?" Rachel scolded, but then added, "Not that he wouldn't. And keep her safe."

"Wh-where is da, Rachel?"

Rachel sighed, and brushed the hair from the little boy's forehead. "That's what we'd all like to know, laddie. Come now. Let's get you dressed so you can have your breakfast."

o-o-o

Mounted on the young mare, Harry wandered far and wide on the island that day, though she avoided contact with any of the island's people. This was easy enough to do, for her destinations were the various spots she and Jack had made their own over the years. Hidden glades where they'd talked for hours at a time; pools of crystal water where they'd bathed, and played, cooling themselves… warming themselves; secluded nooks where they'd spread blankets and a pillow or two and made love for whole afternoons, often entirely forgetting the picnic lunches that were so carefully planned and packed to tempt them. Their hunger had been for another sort of repast, more sustaining in nature, yet impossible to long assuage.

And now it seemed she was destined to starve.

She must face it though, as so many sailors' wives had throughout history. She wondered if it would have been easier to know what his end had been. Maybe… but maybe not. This way she could picture him standing proud at the helm of his beloved ship as Neptune's forces had taken back one of their very own.

He hadn't feared drowning – he'd told her that, once. Beautiful, laughing, courageous… he had lived a dangerous life, by his own set of rules, trusting in wit and skill and luck. Lady Luck. She was ever a fickle jade.

How she hoped… prayed… that he had not been afraid at the end.

o-o-o

In mid-afternoon, the mare took fright at an explosion of birds and Harry took a toss into a bush. She was unhurt, save for some scratches and bruised pride. The mare lit out for home as though a pack of devils was after her. Caught miles from Island House, Harry swore colorfully, then gave a rueful laugh. Rachel – and all of them – would be in dreadful state by the time she returned. She'd never escape unescorted again!

So she'd best make the most of it.

There was one more place, Sparrow Point – or so she and Jack had named it soon after their marriage. It was on the Northeast side of the island, only a few miles from the settlement where dwelt the Lightfoots, and Harry and Jack both thought of it as the place of Tom's conception. Not that it couldn't have been any one of half a dozen other places; but the afternoon they'd happened on Sparrow Point had been particularly memorable.

o-o-o

It was different now, of course, without him.

The isolation of the place had somehow made it dearer when they had been there together. It was all their own, the scooped out place in the cliff that provided some shelter from occasional rain, the big trees that marched within yards of the ledge, high above the sea. Ferns and mosses, and grass covered the area, forming a soothing carpet for tired feet, and a soft bed on which to take one's ease, or one's pleasure.

Here, among all the places she had visited that day, she felt the loss of his presence most keenly. Here she finally heard the sad whisper of the wind, the empty murmur of the waves – he is gone – and knew it for something real, a sword through her heart, pinning her to the cold earth.

Oh, she should not be here, she thought. She had loved the place, but had always been fearful of that ledge, of that sheer drop into the waves far below. Jack had laughed at her, and had drawn her close to see, his arm tight around her, and they'd looked out over the wide ocean, sparkling in the sun. But now that same sheer drop drew her, almost palpably.

Slowly she approached, and did not stop until her feet were at the edge. The breeze was blowing, gusting around her. How easy it would be. She might float away, to a place without pain and loneliness.

Without fond memory. Without her Tom.

That last thought was the one that brought tears to her eyes. She could not leave her boy – their child, begotten of love if any child ever had been! St. Claire would be his, of course, but at not quite four he was little more than a baby. He needed her, even in spite of all the people on the island – and elsewhere! – who loved him. He needed her protection, and instruction, and the memories that no one else in the wide world could give him.

No. It was not her time.

A sudden burst of wind chilled the tears on her cheeks and pushed her slightly off balance. Her foot slipped, just over the edge, and she backed away, startled…

"No!" The shout was followed by rough hands gripping her arms. She froze in electrified confusion, and then began to scream and struggle as she was turned about and shaken.

Jack!

"What the devil're you doing?" he raged at her, and dragged her roughly from the edge.

Her screaming did not abate, though the emotion prompting it went through a swift and horrid metamorphosis that ended, to her surprise, with fury. "What are you doing? Where have you been!" she shrieked right back at him, her fists punctuating the words against his chest. She shoved away from him (and the cliff), and he let her go, and the fear, hurt, and anger in those black eyes somehow goaded her afresh. "How dare you do that to me!"

He could only give a sad laugh at that.

He opened his arms, and with a sob she went to him, and hard words and fierce kisses told the truth of the tale.

o-o-o

"The Pearl dismasted!"

"Aye, in the middle of nowhere." They sat close, Jack frowning out at the veil of rain that had driven them into the shelter of the overhang, and his arm tightened about Harry's shoulders. "You wouldn't believe what we went through to get her home."

"You must tell me everything – me, and all of us. Everyone will want to hear. We've been mad with worry!"

"Hmmph. Some more'n others, I collect." He rubbed at his chest, where she'd hit him, and eyed her accusingly.

"I'm sorry. But it was your own fault." She lifted her chin, pugnaciously.

He laughed, but then slid his hand along the side of her face and his voice was solemn when he asked, "You wouldn't have done it?"

She knew what he meant. And there had been a moment… but, "No. Tom has need of me yet." And her lip quivered, eyes filling with tears again.

"Harry!" he said, his voice broken.

o-o-o

She ended up in his lap, somehow, snuffling. "Th-there is nothing for it, Jack Sparrow. You must never, ever leave me."

Jack cleared his throat. "You're right. I never will, love. My word on't."

She sighed, extremely pleased with this lie. "How happy that makes me."

He picked up her hand, and pressed his lips to each finger. But he said, "Enjoy it while you may, Mrs. Sparrow. They'll all be fit to be tied by the time we get home. That mare of yours bolted into the yard five minutes after Gibbs and I walked in."

"Oh, dear. I suppose they were—"

"Mad with worry?" Jack nodded. "I can protect you from the wrath of Tom, but Rachel has a longer memory. Best resign yourself to the company of a groom, henceforth."

"Only if he's named Captain Jack Sparrow," she asserted, and kissed him.

He returned the favor, but said wryly, "Your servant, as ever, ma'am, but don't that entail riding a bloody horse?"

"It does," Harry nodded, gravely. "But I assure you, I'll make the task well worth your while." And she bent close to whisper into his ear, outlining the prospective arrangement in detail vivid enough to make her sailor blush.

o-o-o-o-o