The Horsemaster's Daughter by Susan Wiggs

father.

    “It’s been so long since I’ve seen my dear sister,” Lily said. “Rose is the widow of a Brazilian planter. She lives in a magnificent villa high in the forested hills overlooking Guanabara Bay. I’ve promised her for years that I’d visit.” She lifted her cup to her lips and took and unhurried sip. “Isadora would be such an asset to the voyage. Ryan needs her expertise as a translator, but if she spoke not a word other than English, I would beg to have her along as my guest and my companion.”

    “Did I say I needed her?” Ryan asked with a laconic half grin. “I don’t recall that.”

    “Mother, I simply must go,” Isadora said in a rush, deciding not to dignify his insolent remark with a reply. “I know how deeply I would grieve were I deprived of my own dear sisters’ company.” She managed to say this with a sincere expression.

    “Mr. Peabody,” Sophia said, addressing her husband formally, “what say you?” She framed it as a question, though Isadora knew she had already made up her mind.

    “Well, most certainly I approve,” Papa assured her. “You know how I feel about broadening our daughters’ experiences.”

    “Does Miss Isadora need broadening?” Ryan Calhoun asked, the very picture of innocence. He stared at her, daring her to crumple before his insults. “Where?”

    “Perhaps I need to learn to pity those with feeble minds,” she snapped, surprised to feel anger rather than humiliation, and further surprised that the anger felt…rather good.

    “Sailing a ship is an unusual vocation for a Harvard man,” Mr. Peabody observed, ignoring the heated exchange. “Particularly for such a young man. Don’t most sailors spend years working their way up to skipper?”

    “Indeed they do, sir. I was fortunate to win my first command early.” He savored a sip of his coffee. “I grew up on Mockjack Bay, with a view straight out to the Atlantic. I’d sit for hours on the end of our dock, watching the ships come and go, stowing away on the short runs to neighboring farms.”

    “I couldn’t get him to do a blessed thing,” Lily said with fond exasperation. “He and Journey even built a lookout in the top of a tree by the water. After I discovered he’d been stowing away on the local barges, I decided to let him follow his heart. He learned seamanship from Captain Hastings himself of the frigate Carlota. ”

    “When I discovered Mr. Easterbrook was looking for a skipper, I decided it was Providence itself drawing me back to the sea,” Ryan said. “None of my schooling could take that desire from me.”

    Isadora felt her anger melting into something else as she studied him. He looked so romantic in his colorful, finely cut clothes that fit his trim form so well. He had one arm draped over the back of a chair, a thick lock of hair adorning his brow. He might have been a poet, though he lacked the pallor and thinness of a man of letters. No, Ryan Calhoun was too vigorous and too vibrant to toil in private with paper and pen.

    A sea captain. Isadora realized that she was looking at a man who had become what he was born to be.

    What a gift that was. Few people ever achieved that.

    She refused even to contemplate what she was born to be. Maiden daughter, keeping her elderly parents company. When her beautiful nieces and nephews were old enough, she might serve as their tutor or chaperon.

    The very thought made her shudder.

    She lifted her chin. She was going on a sea voyage. Like it or not, Ryan Calhoun was going to save her from a fate of obscure mediocrity.

    But as he looked across the room at her, there was nothing but mocking laughter in his eyes as he said, “And as for your schooling, Miss Peabody, I pray you are prepared for its hard lessons.”

Part Two

The Bird of Passage

    “You don’t understand me,” said the duckling. “I think I’d better go out into the wide world.”

    “Do you think this is the whole world?” the mother duck asked.