After a night drinking in one of the town's taverns, 15-year-old Luke wakes in the bowels of the warship Essex to find that he's been beaten and pressganged into "His Majesty's damned whore-son Navy".Īn "elver amongst pikes", haunted by the memories of the life he left behind, young Luke soon realises that life at sea is all about survival. Harwich, however, is a dangerous place for a young boy. As the closeness between the two women deepens, Louise discovers something locked away inside of her, "like treasure in a chest", that eventually throws the life they've made together into disarray. Louise is captivated and confused, and so begins a merry dance between mistress and maid that ends in an unconventional arrangement. One minute she plays the respectable young lady, the next her coarse language rivals that of the port's liveliest tars. The widowed captain's beautiful daughter, Rebecca Handley, is untutored in womanly ways, doesn't know how to manage a household, number linen, keep track of the wine cellar, or even get a stain out of fine cambric.
Louise's new mistress is like nobody she has ever met.
"Men always leave," her mother warns, "and the sea never gives them up, once she's got them."
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