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Excerpts from Sea Dust
Read excerpts from SEA DUST. Feel the characters' fluctuating emotions reflected in the turbulent moods of the sea.
Hear how Francois likens the sea to a woman
"How beautiful she is," he said gazing at the water. "La mer. So like a woman." His body tensed. "Look," he said. "How soft and flat she lies in the night. Smooth, like silk. Black. Beguiling." His tongue touched his lips, "I can taste her salt. And listen," he said, his voice barely a whisper. "Listen. Hear her breathe. Softly. Slowly. She sleeps."
Read Charles Witton's explanation of 'sea dust'
"There," she said pointing down to the waves curling from the ship's bow. "I am watching the stars in the sea. See them," she said. "They sparkle like tiny diamonds. So many of them. They seem to dance in the foam. I think they are attracted to the ship as I cannot see them where the water is calm."
"You are observant, Emma," said Charles as he leaned against the rail beside her. "Those diamonds, as you call them, have puzzled men for centuries. Long ago, men thought they were the sun's rays which had dived into the sea. At night, they said the fiery spirits would try to escape the water, to fly back to the heavens. Some said the troubled sea created sparks like those emitted when a flint strikes a stone. Some said they were small fish or insects which could glow like firefly. Some say that sometimes they can come alive and swirl together in a shining mist of colour which floats across the sea turning like a spinning top. Some say it is an aurora. Some say an illusion."
"And what do you say?"
"I say the sparkling in the sea is a wonder. I say we have so much to learn and so little time to do it." He sighed to the twinkling water cascading along the hull. "Each flash of light," he said, "is from an animalcule, a minute organism. It only glows when turbulence disturbs it. The Morning Star is causing it to shine." He looked at her but her eyes were not distracted from the sea. "Your tiny stars are no illusion, Emma. They are real. Millions upon millions of them. And perhaps as you suggest they lie in wait for ships to pass to come to life and dance together in the foam."
Witness dawn as the ship nears Madeira
To the south west the fading night melded in a haze of mauve and blue. On the horizon a faint grey outline hovered like a long thin cloud above the sea. As the ship sailed closer, the image changed, transforming slowly into a line of purple mountains rising from the seabed.
"Is one of those islands, Madeira?" Emma asked one of the seamen.
"Sure is, Missus."
She turned and looked back. With the sunrise, the whole expanse of the eastern sky burned with an orange fire born of the Sahara. And like the shiny trail left by the early garden slug, the ship's wake glistened on the face of the sea. The breeze blowing in from the south east was warm. Emma dropped the shawl from her shoulders.
Charles had been watching her, studying her expressions. "It blows off the African continent," he said. "Though it is a little unusual for this time of the year."
Together they watched as the land drew closer and the ship skirted the island. To the north a line of peaks, ragged like a dragon's tail, drifted into the sea while along the coast, the cliffs, folded into giant rock waves, rose up like a petrified sea. On the hillsides, deep gorges furrowing the forests captured pockets of cloud in their crevices, while above the tree line, streams, shining like silver threads, tumbled over the polished mountain rock.
"The Morning Star will be off Funchal in a few hours," Charles said.
Listen as Emma is advised to pull anchor on her past
"Penny for them?" the sail maker said when he came up on deck.
She looked up. "It's nothing."
"You might call it nothing," he said shrugging his shoulders. "But if you'll pardon me for saying, Miss, I see a spare anchor hanging round your neck and if you're not careful it will carry you to the bottom of the sea."
He leaned against the rail beside her, puffing smoke as he sucked on his pipe.
"See out there! See that splash of white water."
Emma looked in the direction he was pointing.
"Whales!" he said. "Killer whales. Pod of them, if I'm not wrong."
"Killer whales?"
"Don't fret about the name. Docile they are. I seen a man swim beside them and not get hurt." As he spoke, in the distance, a giant black head streaked with white, broke the surface, raised itself to an enormous height then flopped heavily onto its side. A gush of spray shot high in the air.
"They be swimming from the Southern Ocean. Heading for the Arctic."
"That is a long way."
"Aye."
"But they're always on the move. If they stay in one place too long the whalers get them. But I reckon you would know that coming from Whitby. Now seals," he said, "they're different. They just stay in one place. Seems they are waiting to be killed. If the sealers don't get 'em, the great white bears do." He prodded his finger into the smoldering leaf and gazed out to sea. They watched the whales in silence until the last one sounded and disappeared.
"If you'll take my advice, Missy, you'll not let your heart stay in one place too long. Pull anchor and sail even though the sky looks black. Believe me, Lassie, there'll be fair winds waiting for you beyond the horizon."
Regardez - the feathered figurehead!
A seagull sat on the end of the bowsprit content as a duck on a clutch of eggs. It looked as much a part of the Morning Star as the brass bell engraved with the same name. Though the bell swung rhythmically to the ocean's pulse, the gull showed no inclination to change its position. It was oblivious to the sweeping motion of the bow, carried up one moment like a rising shuttlecock, then crashing back to the sea like a sack of lead shot. Perched at the tip of the ship, the seagull sat proudly like a feathered figurehead.
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