Little Lion Page 5

  “It looked like you were just a bookkeeper or something,” Maisie said.

  Alexander’s violet eyes flared angrily. “I’m back to my old job as a clerk,” he said. “But not for long. Just watch me.”

  By this time they had reached the wharf again, and the smell of fish and sweat was even stronger in the afternoon sun and heat.

  “Which ship did you arrive on?” Alexander asked them.

  Maisie and Felix exchanged a glance.

  “It’s gone already,” Maisie said.

  Alexander looked out at the ships crowding the harbor.

  “How odd to arrive and depart so quickly,” he said. “It was a bark?”

  When they didn’t answer, he said, “A schooner?”

  Felix laughed nervously. “I’m not sure.”

  Alexander pointed to a large ship that looked very much like one of the tall ships that had sailed through New York Harbor.

  “That ship there is a schooner. The square rigged one beside it is a bark. Barks have three or more masts.”

  Felix tried to look interested, but all he wanted was that fish they’d been promised. When Alexander kept talking, Felix groaned. This guy might never shut up.

  “They say that when the first one was launched in the colony of Massachusetts half a century ago, someone watching said, ‘Oh, how she scoons!’” Alexander said. “In Scottish, scoons means to skip or skim over water. Well, the builder of that ship, Captain Andrew Robinson, replied, ‘A schooner let her be then!’”

  Maisie thought she could listen to this Alexander Hamilton talk forever. He was a show-off and full of himself, but he was charming just the same.

  “What’s that one?” she asked him just to keep him talking. Maisie pointed to a smaller ship.

  Felix glared at his sister.

  “The small one?” Alexander asked. “That’s a sloop.”

  “Wow!” Felix said. “Great! Is that fish you were telling us about around here somewhere?”

  “This way,” Alexander said, leading them past the people hawking food and wares.

  He stopped at the small stand of a woman who was dropping fish dusted with flour into bubbling oil.

  “Alexander,” she said, smiling at him. “How is Mr. Cruger treating you?”

  “Just fine, Miss Liza,” he said. “My new friends here need to try the best fish in Christiansted.”

  Miss Liza blushed. “Go on with you,” she said.

  She lifted several pieces of fish from the oil with a small wire basket and placed them in cones made from newspaper.

  “One for yourself, too, I imagine?”

  Alexander laughed his hearty laugh. “You know I cannot resist your fish,” he said.

  Miss Liza made a third cone and added fish to it.

  As he took a few coins from his pocket, Maisie got a good look at them. No wonder the conch lady had looked so suspicious. These coins were smaller and lighter, nothing like the silver dollar she now had nestled in the front pocket of her jeans.

  Alexander handed a cone of fish to Maisie and then one to Felix. The third cone he lifted up, pretending to read the newspaper.

  “This one doesn’t have my poem in it, I trust,” he joked. “I hope it’s not meant to hold fish. Even fish as good as yours.”

  Miss Liza grinned at him. “That poem, Alexander, made me blush. And I understand you lied about your age to the Gazette.”

  “Only by a year,” Alexander said.

  Miss Liza shook her head. “Alexander!” she pretended to scold.

  After good-byes and thank-yous, Alexander brought Maisie and Felix to a dock where they could sit away from the crowds, facing the ocean.

  “She puts sugar in the batter,” Alexander said as he took a bite of fish. “That’s what makes it so delicious.”

  It was delicious. Crunchy and sweet, the white fish inside flaky and fresh.

  “Would you like to hear my poem?” Alexander asked them. “The one that ran in the Gazette?”

  “I have a feeling you’re going to recite it no matter what we say,” Felix said.

  Alexander cleared his throat, then began in a deep, strong voice, “In yonder mead my love I found . . .”

  As he recited the poem, Felix pretended to listen. But the poem wasn’t to his liking. It was overly romantic, something about a shepherd boy falling in love.

  When Alexander finished, Maisie applauded enthusiastically. “I love your rhymes,” she said.

  Felix snorted. Maisie didn’t care about rhymes or poetry. Why was she acting like this?

  “Yes,” Alexander said, “they are good in that one. My second published poem was a bit more ribald.”

  “Ribald?” Maisie said, disappointed she didn’t know the word.

  “Randy,” Felix said.

  “My essay, ‘Rules for the Statesman,’ which was published more recently, is a bit more serious,” Alexander said, talking to Maisie as if Felix weren’t even there. “In it, I advocate for the British system of a prime minister with cabinet members as the best way to govern. What do you think about that system?”

  “Yes, Maisie,” Felix said, stifling a laugh, “what do you think about that system?” He wondered what in the world Alexander even meant.

  “Well, it sure looks like it works, doesn’t it?” she said, hoping she sounded like she knew what she was talking about.

  Alexander’s face brightened. “Exactly!” he said.

  Felix rolled his eyes.

  “I suppose you know about the hurricane that hit here in August?” Alexander asked Maisie.

  She nodded solemnly, causing Felix to roll his eyes again.

  “It was the worst hurricane to ever hit our little island,” Alexander said softly. “The winds blew relentlessly for at least six hours. Ships were blown out of the water and were lying right there and there,” he said, indicating with his head. “The tides rose fourteen feet higher than usual, and crops from the hills were uprooted and blown into the streets here.”

  “How terrible,” Maisie said.

  “I’ve written an account of it,” Alexander boasted. “I sent it to my father on Saint Kitts, but Reverend Knox also read it, and he thinks the Gazette might run it.”

  “So you’re a real writer?” Maisie said.

  Felix shuddered at the way his sister was fawning over this show-off.

  “Yes,” Alexander said, grinning. “But I think I’ll become a physician some day, like Neddy. If I can ever get to New York.”

  Maisie sighed. “I understand the frustration there,” she said.

  Alexander stood and brushed off his trousers.

  “I need to get back to work now,” he said. “We’ve talked about poetry and ships, but I still know nothing more about New York.” He pointed his finger at Maisie. “When we meet again, you will give me details, won’t you?”

  Maisie blushed. She was grateful the opportunity hadn’t come up to talk about New York. How could she explain subways and Times Square and how pretty the Empire State Building looked all lit up at night? No matter how hard she tried, she could not think of anything to tell Alexander here in 1772 that would make any sense to him.

  “I will,” Maisie said. “Lots of details.”

  Alexander smiled. “It’s been very nice to meet you both.”

  He bowed, taking Maisie’s hand and kissing it. Maisie gasped, and when he released her hand, she stared at it as if it didn’t belong to her.

  Alexander shook Felix’s hand. Then, without another word, he turned and walked away.

  Maisie and Felix watched him go, until he got swallowed up in the crowd.

  Felix turned to his sister.

  “Well, Maisie,” he said. “If he’s the guy we’re supposed to give that silver dollar to,
he just disappeared.”

  Slave Auction

  Maisie and Felix looked at each other.

  “Now what are we supposed to do?” Felix said.

  “I have no idea,” Maisie said. She could not believe what had just happened to them. Alexander Hamilton had walked away, leaving them alone on the island of Saint Croix in 1772.

  “Maybe he’s not the one we’re here to meet,” Felix offered.

  Maisie considered this possibility. If it wasn’t him, then who was it? And how were they supposed to find that person?

  “Let’s look at the coin,” Felix said. “Maybe there’s a clue on it.”

  Maisie dug into the pocket of her jeans, where she’d tucked the shard and the coin for safety as soon as she’d landed in the water.

  “It’s just a silver dollar,” she said, holding it out in her palm.

  Felix took it from her, surprised by how heavy it felt. It was actually beautiful. One side had a picture of a woman with flowing hair and the word LIBERTY on it. The other side had a graceful bald eagle surrounded by a wreath of leaves. The words HUNDRED CENTS ONE DOLLAR OR UNIT were printed on the edge of it.

  “1794,” Felix said, studying it.

  “So?” Maisie said, frustrated. “Big deal.”

  Felix sighed. “Do you think Alexander Hamilton had anything to do with money?”

  “How am I supposed to know?” Maisie said. “Anyway, that coin is a US coin, and we’re here in the Caribbean. That doesn’t make any sense.”

  “But it’s dated twenty-two years from now. Anything could happen in twenty-two years,” Felix said.

  “I feel like he’s the person we’re supposed to give it to,” Maisie said. “If we wander too far from him, he might not be able to find us.”

  “Maybe we should just find a place to wait and see what happens,” Felix said, relieved. He wasn’t eager to venture into the island without knowing anything about it.

  He looked at the crowded wharf and across the street where the town’s businesses stood, and then finally up the hills at the plantations. None of it seemed very appealing to him.

  “The beach?” Maisie offered.

  “Okay,” Felix said. He wasn’t thrilled at the idea of spending the night there, either. But what choice did they have?

  They walked back along the wharf. Maisie liked looking out at the ships and knowing which one was a schooner and which was a bark. The schooners were the biggest and probably the ones that went across the ocean, to Holland and England and . . . “Wait a minute!” Maisie said, grabbing her brother’s arm. “Maybe one of those schooners is sailing to New York.”

  “Oh no,” Felix said. “I’m not getting on a ship and sailing across the Atlantic Ocean.”

  “But we wanted to get back to New York, right? Somehow things got mixed up and we landed here, but that’s our way back,” she said, pointing at the biggest ship of all. “Right there.”

  Before Felix could protest more, Maisie ran down the dock and stopped a sailor there.

  “Do any of these ships sail to New York?” she asked him.

  The tall, blond man didn’t even pause as he answered. “You just missed one. Next one’s in two days.”

  Excited, Maisie ran back to Felix, who stood at the end of the dock waiting for her.

  “I heard him,” Felix said. The last thing he wanted was to get on one of these ships. They didn’t have any navigation system except the stars. And weren’t there pirates out there? And storms? Maybe even hurricanes?

  “So we just need to find a place to spend the next couple of days, and then we are headed to New York. Who needs Alexander Hamilton, anyway?”

  “That doesn’t make sense, Maisie,” Felix insisted. “I thought we needed him. If he’s supposed to have the coin, we won’t be able to get home unless we give it to him.”

  “Fine,” she said. “When we see him, we’ll give him the dumb coin, and then we’ll get on that ship to New York.”

  “And then how do we get back to the present? To Mom?”

  Maisie didn’t answer him. Instead, she began to walk purposefully toward the beach. Felix followed her. He had one thought in his mind: How could he figure out a way back before his sister made him get on that ship?

  $ $ $ $ $

  Maisie had watched enough reality television to know they needed to build a shelter of some kind and try to find some food and water. Knowing that they would be headed for New York in a couple of days made the idea of sleeping on the beach almost fun.

  “What an adventure, huh?” she said to Felix, who looked about as miserable as she’d ever seen him. “Stop sulking,” she told him. “It’s warm and dry, and we always wanted Mom and Dad to take us on a cruise or something, didn’t we? So here we are, on a Caribbean island.”

  “We have no food, no bed, and no money,” Felix said, counting off on his fingers as he spoke.

  “We have the coin,” Maisie reminded him.

  “Right. Somebody’s going to take a coin that doesn’t even go into circulation for over twenty years.”

  “Come on,” Maisie said, elbowing him playfully. “This is probably the only Caribbean vacation we’ll ever get.”

  “This is not a vacation!” Felix said.

  But Maisie had run ahead of him, onto the sugar-white sand and straight into the turquoise water.

  He had no choice but to dive in after her. For now, anyway, they were stuck here until he figured out a way home. He took off his glasses and held them tightly in his hand.

  The water was even warmer than before. Felix dived down and opened his eyes. Schools of colorful fish swam around him. Here, bright yellow and white striped ones. Over there, electric-blue ones. In the distance, he could make out a coral reef stretching toward him.

  Slowly, he made his way to the surface, watching the air bubbles rise with him. He came up right beside his sister, who was treading water and squinting into the distance.

  “Look,” she said.

  Felix squinted, too, in the direction where Maisie was looking. There, on the horizon, he could just make out the silhouettes of dolphins leaping into the air. Beneath the water, Maisie’s hand found his and held it, squeezing tight.

  $ $ $ $ $

  On television shows, the contestants found twigs and things to build shelters. They caught fish with their hands and made fire by rubbing two stones together. Maisie and Felix were not so clever. They could find only palm trees and coconuts and lots of seashells.

  “I guess we’ll just have to sleep out in the open,” Maisie said, trying to still sound optimistic.

  After swimming for a long time, they had dried off on the beach, then set off to find all the things they would need to get them through the next couple of days. But now the sky was turning red and violet, and they sat leaning against one of the fallen palm trees, preparing for a night without any food or shelter.

  “Do you think there are wild animals out here?” Felix whispered.

  Maisie had no idea. But she said, “No, not on the beach.”

  He picked up a coconut.

  “If we could get this open, we’d have something to eat.”

  Actually, Felix hated coconut. He didn’t like macaroons or Almond Joys or the coconut shrimp his father used to make. But he was hungry enough to eat almost anything. It seemed like a million years since he’d eaten that fried fish, and his stomach was grumbling loudly again now.

  “Pound it against the tree trunk,” Maisie suggested.

  Felix lifted the coconut and slammed it down as hard as he could against the tree.

  Nothing.

  He tried again, but the hard shell didn’t even crack a little.

  “Let me try,” Maisie said.

  She didn’t have any luck, either.

  Fe
lix put his hands over hers, and the two of them used all the force they could muster to crash that coconut down. This time it got away from them and skittered onto the sand.

  “Hopeless.” Felix groaned.

  “You don’t even like coconut,” Maisie said, which made them both laugh.

  Dusk had fallen, and a light buzzing filled the air.

  “What the—” Maisie began, but the sharp sting of a mosquito on her neck cut her short.

  “Mosquitoes!” Felix said, jumping up and swatting his legs.

  A small, angry cloud of mosquitoes descended on them, stinging their arms and legs and necks.

  Felix slapped at them, but it was no use. When he blinked, he felt mosquitoes on his eyelids.

  “Aaaaaarrrrggghhh!” he screamed.

  “Run!” Maisie said, batting her arms as if she could knock the mosquitoes out of the air.

  The two of them took off, fast, down the beach and back toward the lights of Christiansted.

  $ $ $ $ $

  Standing in front of the locked door of Beekman and Cruger, Maisie and Felix tried to figure out how they could find Alexander Hamilton again. King’s Street had emptied out now, the horses and carriages long gone. Candles flickered in some windows in the houses up the street adjacent to it, but even as they stood wondering what to do, the lights that had led them back here were slowly extinguished. Felix was thinking about the mosquito bites that ringed his ankles and climbed up his calves. Wasn’t Saint Croix in the tropics? And didn’t the mosquitoes in the tropics carry diseases like malaria or yellow fever or worse? Maybe even the plague?

  Despite himself, he whined, “What if we get yellow fever?”

  “Yellow fever!” Maisie said. “Let’s concentrate on our real problems. Like having nowhere to sleep on this dark, creepy island.”

  Felix swallowed hard. Did he have a sore throat? Was that a sign of some deadly tropical disease?

  “I think I have a sore throat,” he said.

  “No, you don’t,” Maisie said. She caught sight of a man leaving the building next door to Beekman and Cruger, locking the door, and walking slowly up King’s Street.