**Author's Note: Several things.  First and foremost, I apologize for the shorter-than-usual chapter; I have started a new job, so bear with me as I juggle my schedule.  Secondly, a reader or two was flummoxed by the Johnny/Jack reference.  Jack was a nickname for John, even in and before the 18th century, so it's completely feasible that Jack would have been a John to begin with, and would have been more likely a "Johnny" if his father were also John.  Hope this clears up any misunderstandings.  Thank you all so much for the reviews, and please please please keep them coming.**

            Had he given thought to the matter before meeting Amelia, Jack would have thought it quite impossible for a woman to make herself nigh to invisible on a pirate ship.  Night was drawing near, however, and he'd not seen so much as a petticoat of her since she'd left the wardroom below decks.

            "Perhaps you were a bit too harsh, mate," he told himself, bracing a hand on the wheel of the ship.  But it had been harsh for him as well, thinking of his father, thinking of his boyhood, innocence long past. 

            "Been mighty quiet lately," Gibbs said, sidling up to the captain's side.  Since the missy had boarded the Pearl, there'd been nary a whiff of misbehavior.  It fair broke Gibbs's heart, it did.  "One of the men spotted a merchant ship, sailing north northwest ahead of us.  Slow, she is, likely heavy."

            Jack looked sidelong at Gibbs and let the familiar, wicked grin trail over his face.  It had been far too long since he'd taken a shot at the moneyed class he'd come to mistrust.  Perhaps it was time to remind them that Captain Jack Sparrow was still on the seas.  'Twouldn't do for every idiot with a floating craft to be thinkin' they were safe.

            "Well, then, Gibbs, what's a merchant without someone to partake of his merchandise?  It's really quite considerate for them to take their wares to the water, else we poor men of the sea would starve to death."  Taking his hat from his head and clapping it to his chest, he sighed mightily.  "Gibbs?  Let us do our part to… make waves in the local trade."  Winking, he began calling orders out to various parts of the ship.

            It was, Amelia thought, much like being rudely awakened from a pleasant doze.  The ship had started to quiet after sundown, and she had watched from the stern of the ship as the men began moving slower, insulting each other less, and taking frequent pauses to yawn. 

            Then Jack—Captain ­­Jack, she corrected herself—had started calling out orders as casually as a woman might call for her hat.  All the while, he hummed under his breath between commands, tapping his fingers merrily on the wheel in front of him.

            It was the same man who'd poured his misery out to her, she didn't doubt that for a moment, but this was a man who'd forced himself past all that.  This was a happy man, and though Amelia had found herself moved by his past, she found herself fascinated by his present.

            If such a man could move on, then surely so could she. 

            He saw her finally, amidst the commotion, the running men, the nearly savage lust that ran through them, not for gold but for adventure, for change. 

            He walked across the ship to her, his swagger back in full force, betraying his vanity by smoothing at the already perfect arch of mustache.  "Well, love, I suspect it's nearly time we broke the monotony of the Pearl and did something useful with our checkered pasts and grievous misdeeds." 

            "And I?"  She looked up at him, golden-brown eyes expectant.  "Am I to sit back and watch, or am I contracted to also break the monotony?  If it's required, I can't think 'twould be difficult for me to fabricate a checkered past." 

            He'd expected her to act differently, anticipated it and was ready to despise her for it.  When he saw her jerk her chin into the air and cross her arms over her chest, however, he knew she wasn't about to start treating him like a milksop.  "Though I'm sorely tempted to ask you to man a gun or carry a sword, I seem to recall somewhere in the corner of my brain that those things wouldn't be appropriate."  He wound a finger around the side of his head as though trying to search for something, then flipped his hand in the air in an "Oh, well" gesture. 

            "Because propriety is your forte," Amelia said, distracted by the swarms of action on deck.  Edging to his left to better see what they were approaching, she stretched to her toes and flapped a hand at him as though to tell him to be quiet.

            Jack raised an eyebrow, stepping back into her line of sight.  "I beg your pardon, love, I hate to be the one to trod upon your fun, but I've something to give ye, and then your pretty little head will be deposited in my cabin, whereupon you will stay on threat of death."

            That brought her eyes back to him, and in a hurry.  "Threat of death?  From who?"

            Feeling gleeful, he slung an arm around her shoulders and began to lead her below.  "First of all, love, I'm shocked at you.  From whom.  Surely you meant to say 'whom.'  And furthermore, on threat of death from me."

            She didn't know which was more humiliating, that he'd corrected her grammar or that he'd threatened to kill her.  "You'd not kill me even if given proper opportunity," she said, but she didn't shrug off his arm. 

            He said nothing but guided her below deck and squared her in front of the wardrooms, his hands on her shoulders.  When she started to speak, he put a finger to his lips and rolled his eyes upward.  "Aye, listen to them up there, carrying on like a pack of the wildest animals."  He lowered his gleaming eyes back to hers and winked.  "Music to my ears, love."  He grabbed something off a stack of crates and tossed it to her.  "There y'are, love, something other than that dress to sleep in.  Now back up ye go, tuck yourself nice and snug into that bed of yours, and don't come out, no matter what you hear." 

            "'Tisn't appropriate for you to give me a dressing gown," she stated flatly, draping it over her arm and putting a hand to her hip.  She wanted to see what was going on, and it was going to take no small amount of coercion to get her to do otherwise. 

            Sighing dramatically, Jack threw his hands in the air.  "Love, let us get a little somethin' perfectly clear.  Pirate equals not appropriate, savvy?  In fact, I'd rather be appropriately inappropriate than inappropriately appropriate, which is what so many people do, or worse still, appropriately appropriate, which is not only frightfully boring but also a pain in my hindquarters.  Now, if you will, take your propriety and apply it to traipsing back up to my cabin, I'd greatly appreciate it."

            She muttered under her breath all the way to the door of the cabin, where she flung it open and stepped just inside, ready to throw down the gown and march right back out.  The industrious captain, however, stood right in her path.

            "One more thing, love.  For a woman so concerned with propriety, I feel moved—nay, obligated—to point out to you that it was hardly appropriate for you to show up on my ship, soaked in rum and wearing a dress thin enough to count freckles through.  I think I made it to thirty-two."

            She was still standing just inside the door, jaw completely agape, when he shut the door gently… and barred it from the outside.