St. Margaret - Chapters 00-02

00 ~
- Let's call her Margaret! - A man with tousled blonde hair blinks confused looking at a tight bundle of foolish flower diapers. His daughter was born half an hour ago.
- What kind of nonsense are you speaking? - protests the mother, still pale and clutching the bundle to the chest. In her green lively eyes hides protest. As always. - Why not call it Lysanne? Selena? Isabella by the way?
She pouts, looking at her husband. He has totally disarming smile slender fingers and soft eyes. Starting artist Aram Tilly gently pates her on the cheek.
- I thought it should fit her, Pele.
- Margaret, - the woman sighs, tucking a lock of brown hair behind her ear - just like some kind of saint ...
And laughs as always contagious and suddenly, causing her husband  that was nervous the last couple of days almost to jump on the chair.
- Well, to hell with it - a young mother decides – it will be Margaret then, number of letter is still the same.
A girl named Margaret was a few hours old, and could not argue.

01 ~ Perfect octave

- Margaret!
- Pele, be quiet!
- Another two minutes, please-e-e...
Loud cries rock a small cottage to its foundations. Here, as always - the morning begins with waking up. It's the time for the child to be in school. When mom comes in a little attic room, she founds room a bunch of tangled blankets, a piece of blond hair sticking out, and barely audible snapping and swarming. Skinny girl barely has time to put out from under the blanket her big green eyes to see her mother with a frying pan in hand and manage to hide the clock, she just repaired.
Pele Tilly has always been hard at hand. Among housewives of Agrema, comfortable area of a small island, she has long been a central subject of discussion, as well as the whole family of hers. When it became known that a boy from a good family, Aram, the love interest of more than just one girl, contacted the girl from the vulgar area, but still not someone, but Drago El Pele, the parents raised a terrible scandal. And it was one of the few occasions when the boy with delicate wrists and stained with oil paint managed to defend his opinions. The poor artist and tavern's owner daughter got married a month later. And six months, to a strong displeasure of the father's parents Margaret was born. 
And now seven years old girl rushed like a hurricane to the bathroom, splashing on the floor with her bare foots. At the first floor her breakfast cooled down. She and father always ate cold food, because Aram Tilly always sat at the easel.
"My father is an artist" on the first day of school was the subject of jokes of the whole class. Margaret was hurt for a long time, but what if dad could not get through during these seven years? Yeah, no one's fault. Girl habitually stuffed cooling omelet in her mouth and grabbing the bag ran to the school never minding the loud lamentations of her mother.

The journey to school takes exactly fifteen minutes and twenty eight seconds faster running though cut path. Passing the playground with mammies, along the wide, cobbled streets and symmetrically planted pear trees. After the fifth rotation carved steeples of the academy will emerge from the usual green, and after another five minutes, you can catch your breath before the grand staircase. 
Other children are brought by parents; some come by themselves, in ironed skirts and pants, with neat leather backpack. The girl in red t-shirt and shorts only will correct the old backpack, from her father's time  and thank heaven for what they do not have school uniforms.<
- Now tell me, what perfect octave is!
Birds outside the window look much more attractive. And now the sky is particularly high in the afternoon. It seems, she gained her love of landscapes from her father. When she first came to his studio, she really liked it. Paints, palettes, brushes of all sizes and large canvases on the walls. The smell of paint and solvent for it tickles the nose. And Aram colors something intently standing beside the easel. Perhaps he would be an artist, if not the mother's love for music and strange men.
"She will be pianist!" - Pele said, and that exactly happened because dad was not able to insist on his own decision. Therefore, it was not possible to get out from the desk till 4 p.m.
- Margaret Tilly!
She reluctantly turns away from the window and manages to close the drawings in her music book with hands. The teacher always has such a triumphant expression on his face, which is immediately picked up by other students.
They just naively believe that she would not listen.
- Perfect octave - the interval in eight steps and six tones, simple ratio between the two sounds of different heights, whose oscillation frequency is as two to one that is the upper sound has twice the frequency of vibration than the lower sound.
She completes under the disappointed sigh of peer and turns away. Parents are concerned about the lack of friends of their little Daisy. Mom as usual is worried more than anyone else.

- It's you again? - The old man strokes his luxurious, curly whiskers and scratches his bald head. He is already eighty years old, but he still watches over the store. Before him stands a girl of seven years, with repaired watches and an old tattered book.
- Yeah. I have them repaired, the regulator was broken.
Year and a half ago, this girl was in this dusty shop for the first time. She passed, ran her finger along the dusty clock, sneezed and asked to take it home. An old useless clock. And yet picked up a book about and read it.
A week passed, and then another one, the owner almost forgot about it when she opened the door wide and chattered lively.
- They go, do you hear? - She excitedly cried. So it became a tradition. Gradually, a girl named Margaret came in more often, to repair everything that has not yet been repaired. These were the last.
The girl with green eyes had a magical hands and very tenacious mind.
- Honey, there are no more broken clocks - he said softly, laying his hand on her shoulder. Carefully trying not to offend. Little girls need to spend time outdoors with friends, but not in a dusty clock shop. 
What would her mother say, knowing that the girl from Argema runs in vulgar areas?
- I know, grandpa, - she answered quietly and laughing - but now I have a clear conscience!
A girl named Margaret shakes his hand and waves her goodbye. The old shop owner forgets to ask her when she would come again.

Today is a special day. 
She will come home when the mother's lover already leaved, and new pencils and paper, in exchange for her silence already are waiting on the table.
For the first time in a few months  the whole family will gather at the table and discuss plans for this summer. And parents will not yell at her even from the fact that she did not sit down at the piano.
They'll go to bed early. And after four hours the girl would collect all the needing things in a backpack from her father's time, and climb out from the window of the little attic room, rushing through the garden, ornate gate, go through the dark cobbled streets, trying not to drag with her sandals. 
She would go to the pier and make her way along the familiar route to the old boat with a sail fastened on a makeshift mast, throw down her backpack and look at the sky. 
And with a sigh, would alienate the boat from the dock into the obscurity, black as night expanse of the ocean.

02 ~ Hold to the wind and don't get scared, greenhorn! <

She couldn't breathe. Peaceful quiet and familiar world suddenly was shaken its foundation, like someone splashed out a huge blue blot on the bright colors of the day. Whirlpool twisted so much that it is impossible to understand where the top and bottom is.  And her huge backpack pulls her down to the bottom, and little girl, rapidly going down under the water, barely has time to untangle the straps while she still can. She has air only left for a moment, if no less and the water around is muddy and greenish, with no light at all.
Lungs are burning under pressure of the water mass, and she chokes with the remnants of oxygen. 
It's scary when her boat caught a storm on the third day of her travel. When it gets dark, and the ocean, what was peaceful a second ago, shakes like in a crazy amusement park.  And when the waves rise it seems to the sky and without looking swallow the smallish boat and her mistress.
If she could just swim to the surface, grab some slivers and let it shake, it would be better there, but not here in the depth, scary to the death, as if she'll never be again at the surface.
She was washed away by the first wave.

- Hey, hey, come to you!
She has to force herself opening her eyes, and instead of a clear answer - disgustingly coughs spitting the water, which collected in the lungs during this time. Cough almost ad nauseam, with the difference that there is nothing to spill out. The body shakes, as if ten elephants past it and she still does not quite understand where she is and why.
It seems that it's a deck. It seems it is even saved. A girl named Margaret weakly believed in miracles.
Frigate "Sciacca", which name a boy of fifteen told her, was a merchant ship on the way to Nimanpurru.
- What's your name? Where are you from?
Sailors around are laughing and looking at a small thin girl with short tousled hair. She had never felt so embarrassed, but this nasty sense, as all other inventions does disappear when she proudly lifts her chin, just like mom.
- My name is Peggy.
Lying is easy,  no one will notice that the girl is shaking, and if they do, they will think that's because of shock. Green eyes are trustingly open, and words of gratitude climb on her the tongue, but she is offended silent, scowling at the ship's captain, who is  gloomily inspecting her.
- Well, let's keep her?
A tall man vaguely snorts, under the indignant roar of the crowd.
- What can you do, girl?
The words stuck in her throat.

- Those damn pirates again!
There are shouting, noise and thunder of canons directly on the ears on the upper deck. That's right; she shouldn't hide right behind them after all.
This is so damn stupid, but she is only seven and there are injured ones, groaning, with bloody limbs, and the guy over there in the shirt red from blood that gave her second helping, he has no hand now. Beside her is another man, tall and strong, smoking and looking at his comrades. Shipwrights are not supposed to fight.
4 months ago the captain of the frigate frowned a while and after hearing that she knows how to fix things said, that there will be a plenty of business for her. 
That's where she met the ship's carpenter – Fannar, who was more than twice bigger that she was, had the steel muscles and a lot of scars on his hands. And he smoked. Smoked like a steam engine, for which he always caught it hot. When they were introduced to each other, he immediately gasped a stream of smoke into "Peggy's" face. Spat. Coughed. Turned away.
With this ship's carpenter she had to speak. Forced herself through a "I don't want," and asked. Because how is she supposed to do something if she doesn't know how. Fannar had one wonderful habit - he never told something twice.
- Look, - he forces her to remove her hands from the blubbered face, because she has to look at. He always thought that the girl is still too much of a greenhorn.
"Greenhorn" - he made up this nickname for her, because she didn't know a thing. Yeah, stupid inexperienced sailor, she looks like a little boy, and is tanned and terribly proud.
"Ksossan" - she calls him that because anyone is an "uncle" for her. And the eyes are watery from the smoke, hands are scratchy from the work and knees full of bruises. And he loved cursing, especially her. Especially if she did something good.
- Look, damn you! - Fannar pushes her weeping from behind the cannon, which she tries to be close to – it has ended up already.
They say that South Blue has the fiercest pirates.


The night is quiet, calm, their ship is somewhere in the middle of the ocean.  The rest of the crew now sleeps deep in the hold, and their first mate Willie snores loudly.
A girl named Margaret sits in a boat, hugging her knees and looking at the round moon, hanging directly above them and the scattering stars on a black sky. 
Around the ocean roars, as usual, but the girl is angry. She has a habit, to come here at night, remembering the ill-fated day and a small boat crushed by the waves. Too weak. Too small.  Greenhorn, who didn't know a thing.
- You'll pierce a hole - smoke of strong cigars clogs right in her nose, "Peggy" sneezes and realizes that she is exposed. 
All is good, but a backpack of food betrays her.
- How long have you been here? - She is trying to frown and make herself look more firm, but it does not work. 
Fannar climbs into the boat without an invitation and inhales with pleasure.
- Some time - it lets light smoke rings into the dark - about four months. He sits and smokes and she looks at his shoes. 
The noise of the sea is still heard.
- You're a fool Peggy, - he pronounces finally, sighed. 
The girl immediately flares up like a barrel of gunpowder and is outraged why «Ksossan» suddenly is full of such statements.
- The ocean will not submit to you - calmly utters the shipwright, getting out of the boat.
The moon shines in his face, and she thinks, that he looks older than usual - you're just going to be fish's food, that's all.
While she tries to understand why, the late understanding comes. The boat is untied, and it is ready to go.
- Hold to the wind and don't get scared, greenhorn! Let's see what will become of you!
"Ksossan" never had words of praise for her. But the girl still cried all the way, choking on tears, and harder leaning on the oars.