The Spirit is Willing (An Ophelia Wylde Paranormal Mystery) by Max McCoy Read Free Book Online Page B

troops during the war to carry their ammunition.
    I stood and, turning my back, quickly buttoned my shirt.
    “Pardon,” he said. “Didn’t know you were doing your business.”
    “You may have caught me at a disadvantage,” I said. “But I was doing no business of any kind. I thank you to move on.”
    “Why don’t you piss up a . . .” The man lost his thought and stared intently at my torso, and then up to my face. “. . . rope. By God, you’re a woman.”
    “Of course I am.”
    “Forgive me, I just caught a glimpse of you and thought, naturally, because of your clothing, that you were a gentleman.” His voice was soft and strongly British.
    “That is something we must share.”
    “Pardon?”
    “Being mistaken for the opposite gender,” I said. “Your hair goes below your shoulder blades. From the back, you must often be mistaken for a woman.”
    I was immediately sorry I had said it, because in truth I am attracted to well-groomed long hair in men, but I had wanted to hurt him. He gave no sign that he was at all sensitive about the matter, however.
    “Pardon, but are you all right?”
    “I’m sure it’s no concern of yours,” I said, both appalled and a little frightened by his rudeness. “Additionally, that isn’t the kind of question one expects from a gentleman.”
    “Meant no offense,” he said, brushing the hair out of his eyes. “But neither of us is the type of gentleman anybody would be expecting.”
    He reached casually down and retrieved my collar from where I had dropped it, offering it to me with a smile. I plucked it from his hand and shoved it into my pocket.
    “Thank you,” I said, meaning the opposite.
    He reached into the satchel, and I must have flinched or otherwise telegraphed my concern, because he paused.
    “I am disarmed,” he said.
    “Unarmed, you mean.”
    “No,” he said. “I am disarmed by your beauty.”
    “Distracted, perhaps,” I said. “Disarmed? Surely not.”
    From his satchel he removed a briar pipe with a straight stem and a pocket tin of Turkish tobacco. As he carefully filled the bowl of the pipe and tamped it with his thumb, he looked out over the water and squinted. His blue eyes reflected the dawn.
    “I grew up on the bank of a river,” he said. “Now I find comfort in walking a riverbank in the still of the mornings, even along rivers as small as this. It seems strange to me now, because when I was a boy I couldn’t wait to leave the river behind.”
    He struck a wooden match on his belt buckle and fired the pipe. He sucked vigorously for a moment, then released a great cloud of smoke.
    “Let’s start over, shall we?”
    I was silent for a few moments.
    “What river?” I asked.
    “The Thames,” he said. “A neighborhood called Millwall, on the west side of the Isle of Dogs. Not an island, really, but a peninsula the river loops around. Home to builders of ships and barges and ironworks of great import.”
    “Were you a shipbuilder, or a sailor?”
    “Good heavens, no,” he said, the stem of the pipe clicking against his teeth. “I was a mudlark, as was my father before me. Ah, I see by your expression you don’t know the term, but then I wouldn’t expect anyone outside of England to recognize it. Mudlarks claw a living from the banks of the river, scavenging whatever has fallen from the great ships that pass: chunks of coal, iron rivets and washers, bits of rope and canvas. Working in the filth and muck from first light until full dark. On a good day you might earn a few pence. Other days, only a farthing.”
    He shook his head.
    “I forget myself,” he said. “I have disturbed your morning meditation with melancholy ramblings about a time long ago and dead. It is inappropriate for a man of common stock to share intimate conversation with a gentlewoman to whom he has not been properly introduced.”
    I told him I didn’t mind strangers sharing stories, as long as they proved interesting. He said if I would share my name,