The Silver Lotus by Thomas Steinbeck Page A

to his senses he appeared well enough, but soon discovered he could no longer keep his balance to walk or even sit up for any length of time without suffering from severe vertigo.
    The winds had taken a toll on the rigging, and Captain Hammond supposed that even if they should survive the storm, it would take two or three days floating around the swells to effect repairs sufficient to loft sails safely again. It surprised him to discover that the ship’s drift rate, as it was driven back before the winds, was almost eight knots. And though the course of the storm was moving generally west-northwest, the cyclonic winds were driving the ship east-southeast, with the eye of the monsoon moving somewhere off to the west.
    When the gales at last cast his ship free of the vortex, The Silver Lotus had survived three days and nights of near-death torment. Her decks looked like they’d been raked with gunfire, and what was left of the storm sails hung in rags like a beggar’s laundry. The crewmen were almost too spent to move. They hadn’t had a hot meal or any worthwhile nourishment, and the cooks were no better off than the rest of the crew.
    Captain Hammond had been on deck for eighteen hours when the storm broke free and moved on. He was so tired that he collapsed
on the bunk locker in the pilothouse and slept for three hours. In fact, nobody aboard could do much of anything for the ship for eight hours, and even when they managed to rouse themselves, they moved around the ship like the walking wounded, grateful to be alive to be sure, but maimed all the same.
    When Captain Hammond awoke, he went on a tour of inspection and made a list of repair priorities. He next looked to the crew and their needs and lit the galley fires himself. He told the cook to brew up a rich beef soup with whatever vegetables he could find. He was told that Lady Yee had braved the elements to come to the aid of the injured sailors. With the help of Billy Starkey she set their bones, bound their wounds, spoke soothing words, and then dosed their pain with enough laudanum to put a bull elephant to sleep. It was the best she could do until professional help could be found.
    Hearing this, Captain Hammond suddenly realized that he hadn’t seen Lady Yee for quite some time. Something dark twitched in his brain, and he suddenly went off to his cabin. The moment he entered that dark thing twitched again. Lady Yee lay on her berth with eyes closed. Li-Lee stood over her mistress cooling her face and forehead with damp compresses, and Billy Starkey stood nearby almost in tears. There was no sign of response from Lady Yee. The captain rushed to his wife’s side and looked down to notice a long, bleeding bruise on the left side of her beautiful face and a large blue-green lump above her left temple. Her left wrist had also been bandaged. When the captain demanded to know why he hadn’t been called when his wife was injured, Li-Lee told him that Lady Yee insisted he not be bothered with trivialities. When he asked how the accident had happened, Billy Starkey wiped the tears from the side of his nose and said, “Sir, Lady Yee was thrown off her feet by the pitching of the ship. She and I were returning from the crew’s quarters, and while coming down the companionway she fell headfirst to the deck below. She was unconscious at
first, but somehow I managed to get her back in her berth, and her maid here and I managed to lash her back in place. Her left wrist appears sprained and swollen, but her maid signed there was no serious damage beyond that.” In the simplest Chinese, Li-Lee confirmed that Lady Yee was sleeping comfortably now, under the influence of willow bark tea laced with Chinese brandy.
    Captain Hammond dismissed Billy Starkey to his other duties with a firm handshake and sincere sentiments of profound gratitude. Then he turned to Li-Lee, nodded, and smiled to reassure the maid that he wasn’t angry. Then he asked to