The Many Daughters of Afong Moy(76)

“Sounds like a ghost story.”

Lai King shrugged. “Ghosts aren’t always bad. Sometimes they’re just our ancestors checking in on us.” A seagull landed on the deck, and they both stared at the bird, half expecting it to glow, but it just looked at them.

Alby coughed and the startled bird took flight.

Lai King watched the bird disappear behind the small sail that, she had learned, the steamer used to stiffen the ship. Then Alby turned away, trying to clear his throat. When she touched his shoulder to see if he was okay, his cheeks were reddening. He removed his kerchief and she noticed a bruise on his neck for the first time.

“I’m sorry…” He apologized as he coughed until his eyes watered.

Lai King noticed that a few passengers who were grouped on the starboard side of the ship to look for dolphins had turned around and were looking for who might be coughing. She gently rubbed Alby’s back, silently begging for him to stop as she noticed that more passengers halted what they’d been doing and were eyeing them warily.

Lai King smiled at them, hoping they couldn’t see how scared she was.

When they turned away, she touched Alby’s cheek as he caught his breath. In the cool breeze of the afternoon, she thought he felt too warm. “You should go below deck.”

Alby shook his head, suppressing a cough. “Maybe I’m just tired…”

Lai King tried to remain calm, even though she noticed that his voice had become hoarse, and inside she was shouting, crying for him to not cough again. She noticed that one of the crewmen, shirtless with leathery skin and covered in scars and tattoos, was staring at them. She put her arm around Alby and helped him up. He wasn’t coughing anymore, but his limp had become noticeably worse. She led him back to midship, where he could go down to his cabin and rest as long as needed. They were almost to the stairs when Lai King felt someone grab the back of her hair. The sailor turned her around, then squeezed her arm as he held Alby by his shirt collar.

He looked askance as he yelled, “Mr. Cappis, we may have a problem!”

Lai King felt a cool breeze and cold spray from the ocean as the chief officer shouted from the quarterdeck, “What have you, Mr. Fawcett?”

The sailor pruned his face as he regarded her, touched her neck, rolled up her sleeves, and examined her arms as though he were checking a slab of halibut to see if it was spoiled or still worth eating. He even sniffed her skin.

He did the same to Alby, who struggled, trying not to cough.

The sailor lifted his neckerchief and covered his face.

“He’s fine,” Lai King said, as she put herself between Alby and the seaman. “It’s just a stomachache. I told him not to eat the butter but he wouldn’t listen.”

“Report, Mr. Fawcett,” the chief officer shouted.

“Please,” Lai King said, “please just let me take him belowdecks. I’ll take him down to steerage. I’ll keep him there with me. If he gets worse, I’ll tell the matron.”

The sailor looked at them, spat a glob of chewing tobacco over the railing, then shook his head and grumbled, “Take him below. I’ll let Mr. Cappis decide.”

“Thank you,” Lai King said. “You won’t even know we’re there.” She ushered Alby away. He stopped coughing but looked pale and tired, though with her help, he was able to manage the ladders.

When they reached steerage, Auntie Anna removed her bonnet and apron and looked at them, one hand on her wide hip. “It was okay for a visit, my dear, but you know he can’t stay down here forever.”

“He’s not feeling well,” Lai King confided because she had no one else to turn to. “I have an empty bunk. I thought that maybe…”

“So you thought that you’d play nursemaid to that boy?” she asked, but the question was more of a statement. “Down here?”

Lai King looked at her, pleading with her eyes.

“Fine.” Auntie Anna sighed as she led Lai King down a narrow hallway. “In here.” She opened a small half-door into a storage room. “Take him inside. I’ll go grab some bedding. You know it’s not wise for him to be down here. Even worse of an idea for you to be so close to him. If he’s really sick…”

“It’s nothing. I’ll be fine.”

Auntie Anna opened her mouth as though she were about to lecture them, then softened, shaking her head. “You have my sympathies, child.”

Lai King helped Alby inside. She took the blankets and a pillow from Auntie Anna and made a bed on the floor behind barrels of salt pork and flour. She tucked Alby in, and he didn’t complain about the hard floor or the darkened closet that was probably a dungeon compared to his stateroom in second class.

“You’re going to be okay,” Lai King said, though she wondered if she was lying, and if so, whether it was to him or to herself. She touched his forehead, his cheek. “I think you have a fever. It may just be the croup. You need to sleep.”

He nodded, then whispered, “Thank you,” as he closed his eyes, shivering beneath the blankets. As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she watched over him, thinking about how she’d watched her parents sleep. How they fell ill and she didn’t.

He stirred and coughed again. “You should go.”

“Shhh…”

His teeth began chattering. “You need to leave me, Lai King.”