Carol Gregg Presents - Part Two

by TunnelsOfTheSouth

Carolyn is dubious about Daniel's idea of their writing a novel together. But times are tough and it seems the tastes of her readers have moved on. Carolyn must catch up. As requested by so many, here is the second and final part of Carol Gregg Presents. Thanks to those who asked for it, I had a great deal of fun crafting this fic. My editors are very happy with it, always a plus!

"Carol Gregg Presents…"

Part Two

A Ghost and Mrs Muir Story

By TunnelsOfTheSouth

※※※※※

"If one cannot enjoy reading a book over and over again, there is no use in reading it at all…"

Oscar Wilde

Returning to her bedroom after talking with Martha about the paperback novels, Carolyn shut the door behind her. "Captain Gregg?" she called.

The ghost of Gull Cottage materialised before her, looking well-satisfied. "You summoned me, Madam?"

"I've talked to Martha and from what she's told me, I'm willing to admit I may be having a few second thoughts about these books…" Carolyn replied slowly, holding up the paperback. "Just maybe…"

"I thought you might. There is a good deal of merit in my offer, Madam. If you're willing to see it."

"Yes, well, if I decide to write one of these…one of these, potboilers, no one, and I mean no one, is to know it's me," Carolyn insisted. "After last time…" She shook her head. "I have my Feminine View reputation to consider."

"My lips are sealed." Daniel swiped two fingers across his mouth. "I will take your secret to my grave." He grinned.

"I can't believe I'm even thinking of doing this." Carolyn shook her head. "But if it is the way the literary world is heading… You said something about my using a non-de-plume…"

"I've been giving it some thought…" Daniel stroked his beard. "And since I am to be a part of this writing duo, I was considering a name that should include both of ours."

"Fair enough." Carolyn walked over to her desk and sat down. She inserted a fresh page into the carriage of her typewriter. "What did you have in mind?"

She held up a detaining hand. "That's if I agree to this crazy plan of yours."

"Of course, you'll agree. Because you can see the merit in my idea. Even if you won't admit it, yet…" Daniel moved to stand behind her, leaning over her shoulder, to frown at the page. "As I said, I have given it quite some thought. I feel I deserve to share in some of the limelight since the basic storyline will be mine."

"Yes, I think that's only fair," Carolyn conceded reluctantly. "We will need to write what Martha said is called a historical romance."

"What else do I have but historical stories?" Daniel commented. He frowned at the blank page, thinking.

"How about Carolyn Gregg?" he finally asked, raising one eyebrow. "It combines both our names."

"Sorry, but I think it's too close to home, a little too obvious." Carolyn bit her lower lip in concentration. "I can't risk being found out."

"Fair point. Then, what would you suggest, my dear?" Daniel asked softly.

"What about Carol Gregg…?" Carolyn replied, leaning forward to type the name onto the page. She sat back to frown at it, trying to see how and where it could be wrong.

"Carol Gregg…" Daniel studied the name for a long time, before nodding. "I think you may have the right of it, Mrs Muir."

"Now all we have to do is think of a title…" Carolyn mused.

"I believe Maiden Voyage has already been taken…" Daniel teased gently.

"I think we should give that one a wide berth, for now." Carolyn quelled him with a frown.

"Very well, but it was an excellent story." Daniel picked up a nearby chair and brought it closer to the desk. He sat down, leaning back with his arms folded. "I think we're going to need something with a little more punch…"

"How much punch?" Carolyn asked warily, worrying about the dangerous trend of his thoughts.

"Oh, I don't know…" Daniel considered her closely for a long moment, before he said softly, "It must be a historical romance, you said. How about The Captain's Forbidden Love…?"

"Yes…um, I think that will do very nicely." Carolyn looked away in confusion, her cheeks warming. "It sounds very…historical…"

"All right, we have agreed on a name and a title." She drew a steadying sigh as she rolled the sheet of paper back in the typewriter, before typing in the title above the new name of the author.

They both sat and stared at it for some time. Then they looked at each other.

"I think it works…" Carolyn finally acknowledged.

"I think it will do very nicely." Daniel nodded. "I suppose we had better start at the beginning…"

"I don't think there's anywhere better," Carolyn replied, setting her fingers on the keys, waiting patiently for him to start speaking.

Daniel drew a deep reminiscent breath before expelling it slowly. "I remember that morning as being cold and dull. The sun refused to shine and it had rained heavily overnight. Everything was drenched and smelling of the filthy old Thames."

He shook his head, leaning back in his chair with his hands clasping the lapels of his jacket. "The smog of the city hung heavily in the air and the stench from the dockside taverns took your breath away…"

"Sounds positively charming…" Carolyn remarked drily. "I think we might need to lighten that part a little."

"You had to be there." Daniel shrugged. "I was far too busy with my pressing duties to take much notice. But a damnably inconvenient interruption was about to disrupt everything…" He lifted his eyes to stare up at the ceiling, warming to his theme as his story began to unfurl.

"I still have very deep reservations about this type of prose…" Carolyn remarked sometime later.

Her fingers had been flying across the keyboard, as she'd been doing her best to keep up with the captain's quickly evolving tale. Several times she'd been forced to raise one hand to stem the flow of words.

"Blast it, woman, you're ruining my concentration!" Daniel finally exploded, after the tenth such incident when Carolyn was forced to call another halt.

"Well, you're going too fast!" she accused hotly. "And using some words which shouldn't ever be seen in a novel. Even one of these paperbacks."

She waved her hand at the romance novel Martha had given to her earlier. "We have to think of our potential readership."

She sighed in frustration. "Look, perhaps this really is a bad idea, after all. Maybe we should just give up before we waste too much time on a lost cause. I still have an article I must write before its deadline. That's the way I know how to make enough money to keep us all afloat."

"Madam, I never took you for someone who could give up so easily," Daniel remarked.

"I'm simply being realistic," Carolyn countered. "I know what my readers want to read."

"Very well…" Daniel ran an apologetic hand over his beard. "I am prepared to admit that perhaps my vocabulary did become a little salty. I got carried away in my storytelling. I'll make a bargain with you. I will help you with your magazine article tomorrow. I'm sure I can recall a suitable enough tale that will not shock the delicate senses of your readers in Feminine View."

"Thank you." Carolyn recomposed herself. "Perhaps I did speak a bit hastily..." She sighed as she reached to pick up the paperback, frowning at the cover. "I truly don't know what to think…"

"Then just go with the idea for now," Daniel encouraged. "What can it hurt?"

He took the book gently from her hand and put it back on the desk. "What do you have but time?" His shoulders lifted, his expression becoming pensive. "It's all I have, time and tales that wish to be told…"

Carolyn considered him for a moment, seeing an unspoken need in his blue eyes that set her heart racing. And she also saw the deep loneliness that had drawn them together on the very first night they met.

"I understand…" she admitted slowly. "Okay, we can try again to make this work. But please, don't go so fast." She went back to her page in her typewriter. "Now where are we…?"

She read the words quickly. "We got up to the scene where the young woman asked to come aboard your ship in London. She wanted to buy passage out to her family in Boston and she'd been told you were the captain to see because you were making ready to sail on the evening tide..."

"Ah, yes…" Daniel smiled slowly. "She came upon me, quite unawares. My first mate had directed her to my location aboard ship. I was engaged with the final tallying of the cargo manifest when she accosted me."

He smoothed the line of his moustache with the side of his finger. "I'll admit she was a fetching little piece. But my motley crew well knew my rules. No woman was ever allowed aboard any ship I captained. The young woman's rather colourful sentiments detailing both my manhood and captaincy were volubly expressed as soon as I turned her request down flat."

"Yes, you've made your rule on no women aboard very clear on more than one occasion. But this is a romance and it's fictional," Carolyn reasoned. "You need to remember, it's not about you, but the fictional sea captain who has just been asked by a beautiful young woman for his help in getting her safely to Boston. For the novel to succeed, you should allow her to come aboard. Otherwise, we don't have a story and we're wasting our time with this kind of venture."

"Yes, I do understand the whole point of this exercise…" Daniel nodded. "Very well. The young woman came to me for help in securing passage out to Boston and I obliged by allowing her the exclusive use of my cabin for the voyage." He glanced at her. "Will that be acceptable?"

"Perfectly," Carolyn nodded, sighing her relief. "Now where were we?"

Daniel gazed off into the middle distance, the soft smile returning to his lips. "She made a very pretty picture. All soft white skin and a pair of beautiful sea-green eyes a man could drown in…" He cleared his throat. "If a man was looking…"

"She was all alone in the world…" Carolyn went back to her typing, talking dreamily. "Her entire family had died in a fever epidemic and she'd travelled a very long way to London to find passage to Boston, where her grandparents lived. She had barely enough money to pay for her passage, but she possessed a fine cameo that had belonged to her mother. She was prepared to barter with it if she needed to do so."

Daniel frowned. "Ah, I do believe the young lady told me she'd run away from a very bad marriage and was going out to Boston to secure service as a maid in a respectable household. She was in possession of more than sufficient funds to secure her passage having just sold her wedding ring along with a few other trinkets."

"Yes, but where's the romance in that?" Carolyn questioned. "My way is much better. Our heroine is all alone in the world and begging for a strong, young, handsome captain to help her out in her hour of need."

Daniel stared at her. "She was barely eighteen if she was a day, and this was in eighteen-sixty-four. I had just turned thirty-five."

"Again, you have to remember this is a romance," Carolyn replied patiently. "It's not about Captain Daniel Gregg, the stern master of the Mary Anne, but the fictional you. Captain Josiah Wentworth is a handsome young man of twenty-five and single."

"A mere whippersnapper!" Daniel exclaimed, getting up to pace the space between the desk and his telescope. "He'd still be wet behind the ears and just when did he earn his blasted ticket? While he was still in his blasted cradle?!"

"Poetic license…" Carolyn waved a dismissive hand. "Josiah is what he needs to be. Now please, sit down. And stop shouting. You'll wake Jonathan."

"He cannot hear me. Not unless I wish it so." Daniel returned to his chair, sitting down heavily. "Very well, I can see you and I must come to an agreement about how we are to craft these stories to suit both of us. But we must maintain at least a nodding acquaintance with the truth. A young, headstrong man like that has no business captaining a ship in those times."

"Then let's agree that Josiah is very mature for his age." Carolyn turned in her chair to face him. "Your stories will have the ring of truth about that time because you were there. We can use your knowledge to make them as authentic as possible. In return, you must allow me to craft a work of fiction that will be acceptable to the women who might read these novels. We cannot afford to shock them over their cups of tea by using too-ripe language and graphic descriptions. That would be a disaster."

She indicated the closed door of the bedroom. "Women like Martha and her circle of lady readers are our potential audience. They loved your tale about the Mary Anne. Martha told me, tonight, that her circle still reads Maiden Voyage and enjoy it immensely. She said they read stories such as these paperbacks for escapism. That I know how to write about and have."

She raised her shoulders. "I will admit that was a revelation. I was rather shocked. That's when I realised that there could possibly be a new market for the kind of fiction you propose that we write. Novels that will bring us in a good income and secure all our futures."

"Despite your reservations, you appear to have given this a deal of thought," Daniel replied slowly.

He sat back in his chair crossing his long legs at the ankle. "Very well, you are the professional writer. Therefore, I must bow to your experience." He inclined his head.

"Thank you. I think I know what sells." Carolyn nodded. "I will admit of being ignorant of the possible potential of books such as these…"

She picked up the paperback from the desk. "But Martha swears they are the coming thing. It certainly would seem so, given the monthly orders Lorrie Hammond down at the General Store is being asked to fulfil. It's a case of moving with the times or being left behind."

She began to thumb through the book, reading passages and considering the various scenes and character portrayals with keen attention. She skipped to the ending, reading that before returning to the beginning and closing the book.

She deliberated on the front cover once more. "It's rather a lurid tale."

"It's light fiction," Daniel said, watching her. "It is certainly not Shakespeare or Dickens. But it will serve us well, once we catch the flavour of it. The one drawback is their sad lack of sound naval knowledge. In that, we have a distinct advantage."

"Then let's get back to where we were. The young woman – oh, we still have to name her – was standing on the deck, begging the handsome young sea captain to allow her to take passage aboard his ship."

She reset her fingers to the typewriter keys. "What was the ship's name, by the way? She also has a part in this story."

"The Rebecca…" Daniel said with great fondness. "One of the finest schooners I ever had the pleasure to sail in as captain. She was so responsive to even the lightest of touches upon the wheel I could have sailed her with one finger…"

"Rebecca…" Carolyn typed it in. "She sounds wonderful."

"She was..." Daniel's gaze went dreamy again. "Everything about her was beautiful. Her lines, her shape, her whole presence was graceful and lovely, very pleasing to the eye…"

"Are we talking now about a woman or a ship?" Carolyn queried, pausing in her typing.

"The ship, of course." Daniel looked at her pityingly. "Women come and go, but a ship of her quality…"

He shook his head. "I had rarely seen her like…" He paused, his blue eyes considering her closely. "Until that first night when I first saw you, Mrs Muir…"

"Now you're comparing me to a ship…?" Carolyn questioned lightly, flushing a little even as she smiled at him.

"In my lost world, my dear, there could be no greater compliment," he said softly. "Something lovely, feminine and graceful. A comparison to you who is all those things and more. The moment I first saw you, my dusty, old heart began to sing once more…"

"Thank you, Captain…" Carolyn whispered as she dropped her eyes to her typewriter.

Silence filled the room as they both considered his words. Carolyn would have welcomed his embrace then, knowing at the same time it was impossible.

Over the years they had become close in every way but the one that truly mattered. There seemed to be no way out of their mutual dilemma, except in the magical dreams Daniel had sometimes crafted for them...

Carolyn closed her eyes momentarily, remembering some of those dreams. She sighed. "Um, tell me, what was the young woman's name?"

Also lost in reflection, Daniel blinked. "Who? Oh, she never told me her name. As soon as I refused her passage, she flounced off down the gangplank and along the dock in high dudgeon."

"That was rather uncharitable of you to send her away," Carolyn observed. A frown creased her forehead. "Then we shall have to invent a name."

She thought for a moment. "What about Annabelle Winters? I think it's safe enough. I've used the name before, in one of my early articles and no one objected."

"It makes not a jot of difference to me." Daniel shrugged. "It is your story to craft as you wish. I am simply providing the bones of it."

"I still can't believe you refused the young woman passage aboard your ship in her hour of need."

"I thought we'd settled that fact and that this is to be a work of fiction?" Daniel observed. "I made the hard and fast ruling for the safety of my ship and her crew. No women aboard, no matter the circumstances. The crew were all rough and ready scoundrels, eager for any mischief they could devise. I needed them to focus on their duties for the voyage ahead. It was dangerous enough under normal circumstances in the season of sudden squalls and rogue waves without the added distraction of a pretty female."

"Then, I'm just glad Captain Josiah Wentworth has a totally different opinion of the fairer sex." Carolyn read what she'd just written and nodded. "Very well, the fair Annabelle threw herself on the mercy of the handsome captain of the Rebecca. He consented to save her from destitution and ruin, because if he didn't give her safe passage, then she would be forced to find employment in one of the quayside taverns."

"What?" Daniel stared at her in frowning disbelief. "I can assure you, Madam, that the young woman was most determined. I heard later that she'd walked the quay until she found another captain willing to give her passage. That was the last I ever heard of her."

"Ah, but you see, the Rebecca was the last ship of the season sailing home to Boston…" Carolyn's fingers flew across the keys. "There wouldn't be another before the spring. Until that morning, Annabelle had been unable to secure her passage. She was becoming desperate…"

She warmed to her theme. "What else could she do if she was abandoned on the dockside?"

"Yours is quite the fertile imagination," Daniel marvelled. "Very well, Madam, continue. What happens next in this fanciful tale of yours?"

"Well, as you rightly said before. What was the good captain of the Rebecca to do, but offer the young lady safe passage to Boston and the sole use of his cabin for the length of the voyage?"

"Forcing him to spend the entire voyage standing guard at her door, with weapons to hand, because of the nature of his gallows-bait crew." Daniel shook his head. "Meanwhile, who would be captaining the ship? My ship?"

"But, what else would a gentleman do?" Carolyn smiled as her fingers continued to type. "We shall come back to that later. Of course, one night, the good ship Rebecca was caught by a violent storm and Captain Wentworth's attention became divided between the safety of the young lady in his cabin and keeping his ship from sinking."

"Ah, now you have the right of it," Daniel approved. "That night on the Mary Anne, when I'd forced the entire crew below decks and locked them in the brig! All because of that confounded female stowaway!"

He stood up, stalking around the room as if he was once more, walking the heaving deck of a storm-ravaged ship. "For forty-seven hours I piloted that ship single-handed! It was the stuff of legend!"

"Yes, but in our story, it was Captain Wentworth who commanded and saved them all that night…" Carolyn continued to type furiously. "But, all the while he was wrestling with the storm that threatened to take his ship, his mind was also on the young woman locked in his cabin, waiting for him to go below and save her from danger. A young woman to whom he'd sworn an oath to protect with his very life and limb."

"The Captain's Forbidden Love…" Daniel mused, coming back to settle in his chair beside her. "I can see there is a lot of you in your Annabelle, Madam…" he mused softly. "For you, I would have willingly broken my golden rule about no women aboard…"

"I…I like to identify with the characters I write about," Carolyn allowed softly.

Daniel leaned closer. "Would you have stayed meekly in the cabin, waiting for your captain to return to you?"

Carolyn considered him thoughtfully. "I wouldn't have risked both his life and mine, let alone the safety of the ship, by doing something foolish…"

"Somehow I doubt that…" Daniel shook his head in disbelief at her statement. "But then the storm finally blew out and the ocean turned to glass…" he continued. "Finally, the gallant Captain Wentworth could release his iron grip on the ship's wheel and go below…"

Carolyn nodded. "Before the storm struck, he'd given Annabelle the key to the cabin, ordering her to lock herself in and to answer it to no other knock, but his..."

"A fine point. The captain was exhausted, all he wanted to do was fall onto his bunk and sleep the clock around…"

"Annabelle was so grateful to see him still alive…" Carolyn voiced her thoughts as she typed. "They'd both been saved from a watery fate by the captain's bravery."

Daniel leaned closer, his shoulder almost touching hers. "How could she reward his heroism…?"

"By helping him take off his boots?" Carolyn quipped lightly, her fingers stilling on the keys.

"Ah, you remembered that line from Maiden Voyage…" Daniel studied her quickly averted face. "I thought you might…"

"I think we should call a halt here, now. Writing stories such as this is new to me," Carolyn admitted. "I was caught up in the telling of it."

She leaned over to pick up the paperback. "I have some research to do." She opened the book to the inside front page. "The first thing is to familiarise ourselves with the submission guidelines. The address for the Hanover publisher is here, so tomorrow morning I will write a letter, asking for them."

"With your writing talent and my store of adventures, we'll make a better team than Shakespeare…"

"I told you once before, Shakespeare was only one person."

"And I told you not to quibble, Madam, but to take full advantage of a genuine ghost writer."

"I guess you could call one woman and a ghost, one person." Carolyn smiled. "This is still a writing style I need to get used to. It is a great deal outside my usual way of working."

"Then we will help each other…" Daniel conceded softly. "But for now, you need to go to bed. The Middle Watch is already upon us…" He pointed with his chin toward the bed on the other side of the room. "Go on now, and don't argue."

"Aye, aye, Captain…" Carolyn saluted him before she rose from her chair, stretching out the aches in her spine.

She leaned down to pick up the paperback. "Good night…"

"Good night, Mrs Muir…" Daniel nodded, as he gathered the closely-typed pages of their novel into order. "I will read these and make my notations while you sleep."

"Very well…" Carolyn nodded as she walked away to put the book down on the bedside table.

Then she went to the closet to retrieve her nightwear. By unspoken accord Daniel remained at the desk, reading, as she left the room to go down the hall to the bathroom to change.

She returned to the bedroom to find he'd turned out the lights before lighting a branch of candles on the desktop.

"Candlelight is different to electric. It helps me to remember…" he replied to her questioning look. "Go to bed…"

Carolyn didn't need telling again. She was tired from the newness of their collaboration and the unusualness of their venture. She still harboured doubts they could successfully pull it off. She hoped she could do justice to the story they were trying to craft.

She picked up the book from the bedside table, settling between the sheets and began to read…

※※※※※

Daniel sat in the chair beside Carolyn's desk, reading and making notations on the neatly typed manuscript by the flickering light of the candles that were steadily burning low. Behind him, the dawn was slowly breaking, streaks of orange and blue riding high in the sky.

No longer plagued by the need for sleep, the captain continued to edit the pages of his tale they'd written together.

"Not bad…not bad at all…" he mused. "I'd almost forgotten how it happened that night…"

He had to admit that Carolyn's typing was much faster than his and far neater. But he frowned over her use of words and phrases that had not been in what he'd dictated. He could see there would be conflict ahead before they came to some agreement on how the novel should turn out.

He looked up from his reading to study his co-author, sleeping in the bed across the room. The paperback had fallen from her fingers and now lay open on the covers.

He put the pages down and got up from his chair. Crossing the room to Carolyn's bedside he picked up the paperback that had started them down this collaborative path.

He stood gazing down at her, sleeping so peacefully. It had become a secret addiction through the years that now and then he would materialise in the room, simply to be with her.

He remembered the urge he experienced on the very first night Carolyn had slept in his bed. In a fleeting moment of weakness, he'd wished he could join her, holding her close in the darkness, and keeping her safe for all eternity. He would have made her his own, even as he'd tried to fathom the strength of the strange appeal she held for him.

"Such is the stuff of dreams.." He sighed as he turned away, returning to the desk, carrying the novel.

He sat down to study the front cover picture of the half-dressed young woman, swooning into the brawny arms of a bare-chested man dressed in the garb of a nineteenth-century sea captain. He frowned at the background of a fully-rigged sailing ship, heeling over before a raging storm.

"'Taming Her Pirate's Heart…'" he repeated the title of the book even as he shook his head. "The fools haven't even set the sails correctly for such a storm. They would've been torn to shreds in the next blast, and all hands lost at sea. All while the blasted fool dallies with a temptress hiding behind the thin disguise of a female stowaway. And no dastardly pirate I ever had the misfortune to cross paths with, ever possessed such a fine-looking ship…"

His lips curved with wry humour as he lowered the book. "Unless he pirated it in the first place, from its legitimate master…"

Reassembling the pages of the manuscript, the captain placed them beside the typewriter before standing up. He went to stare out the windows at the brightening sky before opening the window quietly and stepping out to put his hand to the ship's wheel on the balcony beyond…

※※※※※

Five weeks later, Martha opened the front door of Gull Cottage and hurried into the foyer. On the way back from town she'd collected the mail from the mailbox at the beginning of the road.

"Mrs Muir, I've brought the mail home," she called up the stairs in an excited tone.

Carolyn appeared at the top of the stairs and started down. "Has it finally arrived?" she asked anxiously.

"I think so…" Martha sorted through the collection, choosing a large manilla envelope before dropping the rest onto the telephone table beside the stairs.

She held it out. "It's their return address, right enough."

Reaching the bottom step, Carolyn took it from her, keenly scanning the front of the envelope. Then she turned it over to look at the reverse.

"Well, go on then, open it," Martha encouraged. "I'm so excited."

"It's only their guidelines that I wrote away for last month…" Carolyn ran a fingernail beneath the seal. "And you can't tell anyone about my attempting to write one of their romances. Besides, at the rate we're going it might never see the light of day."

"Yes, I know. You told me." Martha nodded quickly. "But you and the Captain have been spending a lot of time up in your room. Surely you've thrashed something out by now. When am I going to get to read it?"

"You may be our only fan." Carolyn grimaced as she took the papers from the envelope and gave them a quick look. "We've reached a stalemate, for now, trying to make the content work for both of us. I never knew working with a ghost writer could be so frustrating. He can be so stubborn."

"Compromise," Martha advised her. "You can do it. I have faith in you two. Don't forget, when you need a third opinion, I'm your woman. I'll go and get lunch started. Jonathan will be home from the library soon. And don't worry, it'll all work out." She bustled away into the kitchen.

"Thank you…" Carolyn turned back to the stairs, climbing up to her bedroom.

When she entered the room, she found she was alone. Where Daniel had gone she had no idea. They'd been working on ironing out some of the thornier points they disagreed on in the manuscript when Martha had called. Daniel had been refusing to budge on a couple of pivotal points and had finally lost patience with the discussion.

"There's no point in running away, you know…" Carolyn sighed as she sat at her desk.

She read through the submission guidelines quickly. They detailed the usual things she was used to dealing with. She was grateful there were no unwelcome surprises. It was all straightforward enough. She could wish the stymied evolution of their troublesome novel was as easy.

"Captain Gregg?" she called tentatively, looking up.

"I am here, Madam…" He appeared beside her, looking less than pleased. "I had retired to my Wheelhouse to think. Did Martha bring us any news?"

"I have the submission forms." Carolyn held them up. "We can fill them out today and return them as soon as we've finalised the first three chapters of the manuscript."

"That is all they require for their approval?" Daniel raised his eyebrows.

Carolyn consulted the guidelines again. "All they ask for is a synopsis of the novel and the first three chapters, along with a covering letter about any experience we've had. If they wish to read the rest of our story, then they ask us to mail them the entire manuscript. After that, we cross our fingers and wait for their final approval." She grimaced. "Or their disapproval…"

"Maybe I should accompany our submission and scare them into their submission," Daniel offered grimly. His hard expression softened. "I'm…sorry we had words this morning. Sometimes I forget this is a collaboration."

"We can do this…we really can," Carolyn insisted softly. "We have ironed out most of the issues with the first three chapters. If you will allow me to make the changes we discussed this morning, then we can go ahead, retype a final copy and post it away." She put out a hand to him, pleadingly.

"The Captain's Forbidden Love…" Daniel stared down at her hand, conflicting emotions tumbling through him.

His own hands flexed at his sides. How he longed to be able to take hers within his grasp and carry her fingers to his lips as he once would have done almost without thought. It was both a simple gesture and a forlorn dream, but one he clung to tenaciously.

He shook his head. "We started this venture as a collaboration, my dear. Collaboration is the action of working with someone to produce something." He gestured toward the typewriter. "I think we've produced something worthwhile for the world to see. I willingly concede on all your points."

"Thank you…" Carolyn sat in her chair, looking up at him. "But only if you're really sure."

"I'm sure. As sure as I can be." Daniel sat in his chair beside her. "Together, we will bring a solid ring of authenticity to this novel. That pleases me very much, knowing the true source of the tale. Through these novels, Mrs Muir, your readers will come to understand my lost world in a way few ever could."

"You are most welcome, Captain," Carolyn acknowledged, well aware of the cherished ground he was willing to concede for the success of their venture. "Let me know when you're ready to begin."

She readied herself, fingers poised over the keys as she waited for him to find his place and begin the dictation from the first page of their rough draft.

Her heart beat a little faster, and she felt suddenly light-headed with anticipation. She prayed this was all going to work out as they both hoped. So much rested on them achieving a successful debut.

"Very well..." Daniel cleared his throat. He settled back in his chair, crossing his legs at the ankle before he began to read…

"The dull and foggy London morning held no promise of sunshine. It had rained heavily overnight. Everything was drenched and heavy with the smell of sea brine.

As he walked out of his cabin and went up on deck, Captain Josiah Wentworth cast a jaundiced eye at the sky, trying to gauge the mood of the changeable weather. He needed to be on alert to catch the best of the tide in order to sail downriver and out into the English Channel. That time would arrive soon enough.

"It's a foul day to be setting sail…" Josiah shook his head as he walked along the deck to his more immediate duties, as he'd done countless times before.

On his last return voyage of the season, he was captaining the good ship, Rebecca. She was being readied for sailing home to Boston with a full cargo of textiles and good chinaware, and the tides of the Thames did not make any allowances for those who did not respect her power.

As he walked along the slippery planking, his critical eyes studied all aspects of his ship. His rough crew were hard at work, making sure everything was in order and well-stowed. Josiah acknowledged their grudging nods of respect as they made way for him to pass. He was fully aware that his crewmen held his youthful age of twenty-five years against him, and they constantly watched for the smallest of errors in judgement or any signs of weakness.

They were mostly scoundrels and brigands, men pressed to the sea rather than face the gallows. Their grudging allegiance to their captain was hard-won and by no means guaranteed in the lonely vastness of the Atlantic Ocean. The slightest spark could result in a full-scale mutiny and the ever-present danger of loss of life.

"God grant me fair seas, a following wind and a safe passage home…" Josiah sighed as he halted beside the last stacked pile of cargo on the deck.

He picked up the ship's manifest, tallying and rechecking the totals one final time. He never left anything to chance or another man's less careful eye.

"Ah, excuse me, Captain, sir…" a familiar voice spoke from behind him, sounding more than a little agitated. "Got a knotty matter needin' your attention if ya please…"

Josiah turned to see his first mate, Nathan Golightly, crumpling his sea cap in one hand while pulling urgently at his forelock with the other. The man looked ill-at-ease and eager to be elsewhere.

"What is it, Nathan?" Josiah demanded impatiently, unwilling to be pulled from his more important duties before they sailed.

"Ah, someone want's ta see ya, Captain…" Nathan mumbled, gesturing with his jerked thumb over his shoulder toward the head of the gangplank that led down to the quayside. "Sorry, Captain. But it's not my fault. Wouldn't take no for an answer, they won't…"

"What are you babbling about, man?" Josiah demanded to know. "Who wants to talk to me?"

He couldn't see past the broad bulk of the first mate's stout body. It cut off the sight of whoever was waiting to talk to him.

"Got me own duties ta see to…" Golightly saluted smartly before turning to trot away along the rain-washed deck, cramming his cap back onto his head as he hurried out of sight with what appeared to be unseemly haste.

"What in God's name…?" Josiah looked after him, anger in his eyes.

He turned back to look toward the gangplank, preparing to give whoever was interrupting his important work a good tongue lashing for the delay before sending them on their way. But his words of censure dried in his throat the moment he saw her.

She was standing at the head of the gangplank nervously twisting her small reticule between her gloved fingers. Dressed in a black-edged, dove-grey gown and lace-trimmed bonnet to match, the young woman seemed to have brought the sunshine with her on the rain-swept, foggy morning.

Her soft, sea-green eyes met Josiah's and all the breath rushed from his lungs. He suddenly felt as if he were drowning, but he didn't care a jot as he stepped over and around the last of the cargo to reach her side.

"Good morning, Captain Wentworth," the young woman said in a gentle, breathy voice, giving him a small courtesy.

She held out one hand and Josiah reached to clasp it in his roughened palm without thinking. "I…how may I be of assistance, Miss…um, Miss…?"

"Annabelle Winters," the young woman supplied readily enough, taking back her hand. "I…I have come to ask for your help. I must secure safe passage to Boston and I am told yours is the last ship of this season. Therefore, you are my salvation."

She swallowed tightly. "You see, I am all alone in the world and I must find a way to reach the safety of my grandparents' home in America."

Josiah stared at her, confounded and at a loss. He'd never been addressed as anyone's saviour before. It sat uneasily on his mind.

He cleared his throat. "My deepest regrets, Miss Winters, but the Rebecca is not a passenger ship. We carry only cargo and we have no accommodations suitable for a lady."

He shook his head. "And we sail with the morning tide…" He stared down at her, momentarily lost in her beautiful eyes and the soft pearly whiteness of her skin. Dark smudges beneath her eyes said that she'd been crying, and recently too.

"Oh, but, sir, I have no need of the usual feminine comforts," Miss Winters replied quickly. "I am quite willing to muck in as required. I am thought a fair cook and I travel light. My boxes are few and I have them with me."

She indicated the small pile of luggage at her feet. "Your man was good enough to carry them aboard for me." She gave him a tentative smile. "He said he was sure you would grant my wish for safe passage. All I had to do was ask you nicely."

"Did he, indeed…?" Josiah looked after his vanished first mate. "The man takes on a deal more authority than he possesses, Miss Winters. He deserves nothing more than a good flogging."

"Oh, please, don't hurt the poor man! It's all my fault. And please don't say no! You can't!" Annabelle cried, tears filling her green eyes. "I have nowhere to go and no one else to turn to. I am obliged to throw myself on your good nature, sir."

"My good nature will not save you from the unwanted attentions of my crew. They are a motley lot of cut-throats and rascals," Josiah told her severely, fully aware of the many eyes fixed on their exchange. "They would take any opportunity to attack your virtue if I were to grant you passage aboard my ship. I might as well lock them all up now as allow you to sail with us."

"If you will not take me, sir, I do not know what will become of me." Annabelle turned to stare fearfully at the dockside taverns, where groups of drunkards and loose women were spilling out onto the quayside in the noisy confusion of the morning's trade. "Is such as that to be my fate, sir?"

She moved her slender shoulders. "Far better be it, that I am thrown overboard to drown at sea, than face such a humiliating end."

"You said you are alone in the world. You paint a very bleak picture. You truly have no one?" Josiah asked grudgingly, looking down at her.

She seemed so small beside him and so young. He wondered at her age, settling on perhaps sixteen or seventeen. Of course, a gentleman never asked.

In her tiny kid boots, she barely reached to the height of his shoulder. He was well aware the fate she described would soon destroy her soft gentleness and fair visage. The honey-blond curls that peeked from beneath her bonnet would fetch a high price in the London ale houses.

"You look far too young to be alone in the world..." Josiah frowned.

"I have passed my seventeenth birthday…" Annabelle sniffed as she reached into her reticule to retrieve a lace-edged lawn handkerchief.

"And I am all alone…" She dabbed at her eyes and nose. "My whole family was taken by fever these two months past. I was from home when the dreadful event occurred. I received word, too late."

She sighed. "My only hope of salvation is your consent to carry me away to Boston and my maternal grandparents. They wrote to say they have a room waiting for me and urged me to catch the next available ship."

"Your tale is indeed tragic," Josiah allowed cautiously. "But all I can offer you is my sincerest condolences and an escort ashore. Good morning, Miss Winters, and goodbye." He indicated the gangplank behind her with an outstretched hand.

"I have money…" Annabelle brightened, patting her reticule. "And my mother's best cameo brooch. I can pay for my passage. If you will consent to furnish me with a suitable cabin with a stout key lock and a bowl of water in which to wash my face, then I shall trouble you no more, this day. I promise." She raised her right hand. "And I will make every effort to keep out well of the sight of your crew."

"The only suitable cabin aboard the Rebecca that has a good door lock is mine own." Josiah grimaced. "And it is already occupied."

"Then that will suit me perfectly." Miss Winters nodded quickly. She indicated her luggage. "If you will convey these to my new cabin, Captain, I shall follow your lead below. There we can settle on my fare for the voyage and you may sail your ship for Boston and not give me another thought."

"But, I…" Josiah stared at his unwanted passenger.

"I believe we have made a contract, sir." Annabelle raised her chin, her fine green eyes filling with a determination she would not be contradicted. She seemed equally determined to stay as he was equally certain she needed to leave his ship.

Josiah was about to open his mouth to send her fleeing back ashore when he felt the ship beginning to move beneath his feet, and he knew the tide was starting to rise toward its peak. The Rebecca groaned and creaked as she tugged against her mooring ropes, seemingly as eager as he to be gone down the river and out to sea.

At that moment he knew he'd lost the argument. He had run out of time and patience.

"Very well, Miss Winters. Despite my deep reservations, you have trumped my hand," Josiah told her grudgingly. "I have no more time to waste on trying to put you ashore because I fear you will not go willingly. And I do not need a woman's hysterical scene to bring the law down upon us to delay me further."

"Thank you, Captain…" Annabelle heaved a sigh, as she picked up her skirts and made to follow him. "I will not give you cause to regret your decision."

"I already am…" Josiah snatched up her small pile of boxes.

All around he could feel the hot eyes of his crew fixed on him and his pretty companion. In the rigging and along the deck, the men stared surreptitiously at the Rebecca's unwanted passenger. They muttered and elbowed each other, getting as close as they dared, as their captain escorted the young woman toward the aft hatch.

Josiah glared at them. "Cease your confounded gawping and make ready to sail, you worthless bunch of wretches! I'll catch the tide or you'll all pay for it with stripes on your hides!" he bellowed, making every man of his crew hurry away to their stations.

First mate, Golightly reappeared to take charge of the ship's wheel. Watching his captain's actions warily, he began shouting orders for the letting go of the mooring ropes and more men hurried to obey.

Josiah thrust the hatch open and led his passenger below. Miss Winters followed meekly, seeming to have been shocked into silence by his shouted orders and the sudden, rowdy commotion needed to get a ship ready for sailing.

"God save me from the feminine wiles of all women!" Josiah muttered bleakly, as he booted open his cabin door and stood back to usher the determined young woman safely inside…"

※※※※※

"I still can't quite believe it's all real…" Carolyn commented in an awed tone. "I mean, we did it, we actually did it."

It had been a hectic six months, from their initial submission of the first three chapters of 'The Captain's Forbidden Love', leadingto Hanover's finalised acceptance and subsequent publication of Carol Gregg's first romance novel.

"In their acceptance letter, they said you brought a brilliant ring of authenticity to your debut novel..." Daniel raised his glass of champagne to her. "That pleases me very much, knowing the true source of your story."

"Yes, I couldn't have done any of it without you…" Carolyn returned his salute with her own champagne glass. "Thank you, Captain."

"I'm just glad I finally got to read it!" Martha declared happily. "I was starting to wonder if it would ever get finished…" She shook her head. "Of course, I do expect a personally signed copy from the reclusive author."

It was late at night and they were all sitting in the living room with a small pile of six paperbacks on the coffee table. Their titles were all the same. 'The Captain's Forbidden Love' authored by Carol Gregg.

"Who knew that writing with a true ghost writer could work out so well." Carolyn smiled. "Of course, we still can't tell anyone."

"I know, you said." Martha shook her head. "Sad, though. My ladies' reading group would be so proud to know they had a small part in the creation of this novel. I've ordered a dozen copies from Lorrie Hammond for them all to read when we meet for our weekly session tomorrow night. I can't wait to see their reactions."

"Maybe, some day in the future you can tell them the truth," Carolyn allowed cautiously. "When we see how well this new writing venture works out." She glanced at Daniel, seeing he was watching her with a satisfied smile.

"Oh, so we are going to write a sequel, then?" he asked pleasantly. "If so, then we shall have to think of a suitable title."

"Of course, we're going to write another one," Carolyn replied airily. "You did say you have a fund of such tales just waiting to be told. And Hanover is talking about contracting me to write more."

"So, are you finally ready to admit that my idea of writing such novels as these did have some merit?" Daniel raised an enquiring eyebrow.

"I'll have to plead the fifth on that one…" Carolyn took a long sip of her champagne, trying not to return his widening smile.

"Here's to forbidden love…" Daniel raised his glass again, as he studied the beauty of her lovely face with a look of ineffable longing that he could never act upon. Not in this life…

※※※※※

"With freedom, flowers, books, and the moon, who could not be perfectly happy?"

Oscar Wilde