Gypsies, Tramps, and Thieves(91)

“Lucky us!” But that was not entirely how she was feeling

You lose some hands, you win some. She would be losing Duke.

§ § §

For the second time in a week, Romy was back at the Rotterdam ferry terminal and looking and feeling much worse for the wear.

On the other hand, Duke looked, as ever, capable and in charge. His fisherman’s red ribbed sweater, also the worse for the wear, stretched taut across his broad chest, giving him the appearance of rugged endurance and self-sufficiency. A man who needed no one.

Of course, neither he nor she would ever be the same. Her foolish heart was inextricably bound to him. And he was foolish that he didn’t see the obvious – that she was not the runt of the litter but the pick of it. The best woman for him.

If only she could purge her love for him with some Gypsy spell, nonexistent though they were – although her irreverent, deceased mum would have vehemently proclaimed otherwise.

Romy recalled something Duke had once read to her, by a man named Whit or White or Whitson, something like that.



“For everything created, in the bounds of earth and sky,

Has such longin' to be mated, it must couple or must die.”

Well, die she would not of a broken heart. But living on without Duke McClellan. Aye, that would be punishment indeed for her sins.

Yet, did not Ireland offer redemption, at last – and gratitude, too – at the holy summit of Croagh Patrick?

As the morning’s flotsam lapped the ferry’s barnacled hull, Duke and she stood at its railing. A colony of seagulls circled overhead, their shrieks a chorus of Bon Voyage. A miserably cold wind off the choppy Chanel bit through both Duke’s jacket, the lab coat, and her floral dress, its ratty hem whipping around her bare calves.

She wanted to lean into his warmth and strength, to be close to him, only this man and always this man. But her own self-worth prevented her from making a move, a gesture, a word that could be construed as needy.

For the crossing that took hours, neither of them left the railing. And more hours of travel ahead lay for Duke to reach the English Air Force Base at Kent. And for her, yet another ferry crossing into Ireland.

There was so much left to say. Things of importance. And yet those were not of what they spoke.

“Do you remember when I mowed down your barbed wire gate – trying to drive yuir bloody pickup?”

“You’re much better at steering a paddleboat, Sunshine.”

Once again, they both went silent, with thoughts of Gideon crowding in on them. Gideon, whose sacrifice, in the face of self-interest, deserved so much more than merely a final breath.

Leaning forward, Duke braced crossed arms on the railing and stared out into the hazy distance. “Had Gideon lived, would you have – ”

“No.”

He looked askance at her.

She tugged from her lips wisps of her wind-tossed hair. “I cared deeply for Gideon, but he was not what I wanted.”

“Then it has been Ireland all along, hasn’t it?” His voice rumbled with a rougher than usual edge. His gaze switched back to the fog blurred horizon.

“Nay, not always.” She cast a sidewise glance at his craggy profile, then quickly looked away. “There is the S&S . . . old Ulysses . . . and the guys there. Family, ye know?”

He didn’t want her as his bride, only his cook – and, aye, as a rather goodly place to bury his flute – but, Goddamnitohell, no matter how he made her body come gloriously alive, she wouldn’t settle. Never again would she settle for less than being cherished – cherished enough that a man would want to bind her to him legally.

She stared fixedly at the undulating gray waves.

“Jock, Bud, Micah – the ranch hands miss you something mightily.”

“As I shall miss them.” She swallowed the words she wanted to add.

The ferry horn blasted its approach to the Port of Harwich terminus, and, the fog lifted, as if cleared by the sonorous sound. The briny smell of the sea mingled with the port’s aroma of rich vegetation.

Duke’s High Seas, not within any country’s jurisdiction, and her lush Eire, where Irish Travellers still roamed freely . . . if only those two could mingle, as well.

The docking slip came into sight. Deck hands scrambled to prepare for the ramp lowering. Only minutes remained for her eyes to feast on the rugged magnificence that was her cinema poster longing.

Duke straightened to his full height. His fingers, braced on the teak wood railing, white knuckled. Passengers surged past, their baggage jostling her. At once, his hand at her elbow steadied her,

This then was it. THE END. As all fairy tales did.

She gave him her ever ready smile. “May ye be lucky, Duke McClellan.”

He cleared his throat. “You know, Sunshine, just when I reckon I have everything about ship-shape in my life, you come along like a Texas twister and, afterwards, I get to swearing, but, well, I get to thinking, too. Thinking about you. And I realize ship-shape is second best.” He paused, mayhap hoping for a response from her.

Her teeth clamped restrictively on her lower lip.

“Have you ever thought you might find your lucky four-leaf clover in Texas?” he seemed to venture idly.

Her voice was a dungeon door’s rusty hinge. “Are ye telling me ye still want me to come back to Texas with yuirself?”