Stowaway on the Ship "Destiny's Dreams"

In the summer of 1898 the sleek vessel called Destiny's Dreams glided over the ocean waves off the western coast of South America.

Deep in the shadows of the cargo area there was a secret passenger.

A figure was curled up in a corner, rocking with the bobbing of the boat.

The dark form began crawling across the bottom of the ship, swaying with the hull's movement over the waves.

The stowaway began talking to herself to break up the silence and comfort herself.

“We have chosen happiness,” Isabella whispered, while she moved across the ship's ribbed hull. “There is a price we had to pay, but it is worth it.”

During the long days and nights, Isabella created new stories to pass the time and had conversations with herself.

“Love is the meaning of life. To love and to be loved. We will have happiness. We choose it.”

She took a deep breath and imagined she was speaking to her lover.

“My dearest Allesandro, my love, we will make our own life. My parents would not stop with the predetermined marriage to my father’s business partner. I am so glad we ran away together."

"Our lives will be our own, not dictated by my family's ambitions to merge the riches of two wealthy families by forcing me to marry my father's business partner."

"They were corrupt. We will choose to be different. Our lives will have goodness and caring, truth and sincerity.”

Footsteps pounded outside the door to the cargo room. Isabella shrank back into the corner and stopped breathing.

She must not be discovered. The steps passed and faded away.

The timbers creaked and she heard waves sloshing. 

For a moment Isabella wondered what would happen to her if any of the planks gave way, and the water rushed in.

“No.” She told herself. “Don’t let your imagination run away with fears. Make this a good day, even in these circumstances. Make up some new dream stories and lose your thoughts in them.”

Then her mind turned to the focus of her dreams coming true. 

“Alessandro. Alessandro, someday we will be there, in our own home, away from it all.” Isabella wished her thoughts could reach her lover now, wherever he was on the ship.

Her long dark hair was pulled back into a low bun on her neck.A few loose strands fell around her oval face, framing large brown eyes that could light up with friendliness.

She had a straight nose with a slight bulge that simply added character to it.

Her mouth could curl into a sweet smile, and then a laugh, with teeth that were slightly crooked peeking out.

It was a warm and likable face, not beautiful, but with a unique charm that enticed others with its expressions and a face that was easy to be around.

But now the eyes were thoughtful and serious. Her mouth was softly closed. 

Isabella's long, dark blue dress was covered with a heavy, knitted shawl.

She breathed in rhythm with the ship’s movement. It bobbed over the wavelets on the calm seas of the day.

“We can do this,” she said to herself.

Images flashed through her mind.

Running. Gasping for air. Through the narrow streets of stucco buildings. Darkness. Away from the forced marriage.

“No. No.” She remembered her words. “I can’t marry him. I want to marry Alessandro.”

Then the image of her childhood friend, the beloved Alessandro, who grew up with her and became her soulmate, floated into her thoughts. 

She thought of his dark eyes offered their dark pools to her, and gazed into her heart and soul when he looked at her. It was a trustworthy face with a steady strength and honesty. He was not traditionally handsome, but his face expressed his character that was both playful and thoughtful toward others.

She imagined he was there in front of her now, with his black hair, shaggy, his broad cheekbones and lips that were often smiling.

They knew each other’s gestures and expressions so well that a glance could speak by itself and their thoughts seemed to go through the air to each other’s minds.

She knew her heart and soul were safe with him, and he knew his were safe with her.

Their trust made them almost become one.

Alessandro was rejected by her father, because he lacked wealth and prestige. But the riches he had were not silver or precious goods to be traded. 

They could not be held in the hand, but they could be held in the heart.

“I’m so glad we ran away now, and we didn’t wait any longer,” Isabella thought.

“Now, I have to get through the next 5 or 6 weeks until we get to the big bay up north. As long as they don’t find out I am a stowaway and put me on shore somewhere.”

Isabella stretched her arms and legs to relieve the cramps.

“I know Allesandro will bring me water and food soon. It must be so hard for him, shoveling coal into the ship’s furnaces. But someday we’ll be together, in our own little home. We will make it. I can work too.”

She knew her sewing and cooking skills were superior and somewhere there must be people in a village who needed her work.

In another part of the ship below deck, Allesandro heaved more coal into the furnace. His pockets bulged with parcels of food and water that he saved from his last meal.

Soon the next shift of workers would arrive and he would take this to Isabella.

“I’ll be with you soon, Isabella.” He hoped somehow his thoughts could ride the air, flow through the ship and the wood planks, and reach her.

“Someday this will all be in the past. Keep focused on the dream.” In the dim engine room his thoughts were full of visions of a green wilderness, full of beaches, lakes, and streams with salmon fish.

On a hill in a forest, surrounded by birds singing their music, was a cottage for Allesandro and Isabella, called “Heart’s Content Cottage.”

The power of his love for her, and the knowledge of her love for him, gave him renewed strength. He kept shoveling coal and tried to send her loving thoughts that carried strength, hope, and faith. 

A disturbing thought arose. “What if the captain or crew member discovered her? I must keep her safe,” he thought.

Meanwhile, up in the wheelhouse the steamship captain was using the sails because the direction of the brisk wind was just right. 

He was an experienced captain who made voyages up and down the west coasts of the Americas, carrying cargo and a few passengers between South America and North America.

The Pacific Ocean and its weather, both calm times and storms, were well known to him.

It was a rough life in many ways but a life at sea was all he knew as the son of a man who was also a captain.

Now he thought about the port and docking coming up and he hoped not too many of his crew would jump ship. Once in the port, he would visit the eateries and recruit more crew members. 

He could afford to pay decent wages to attract workers. He was a fair man, but he expected them to work hard, too. 

Captain Alfonse spun the huge wood and metal wheel to change the tack of the 200 foot long Destiny’s Dreams. With sails and a brisk wind she could make better time than powered by steam but on a windless day the steam kept them traveling.

Her huge, long, heavy keel under the hull stretched along the underside of the ship and gave it stability in the ocean swells and waves.

Captain Alfonse Belanger’s whiskered, grizzled, tanned face framed his narrow, piercing grey eyes below his captain’s cap.

“Can you see the harbor pilot boat yet?” His voice was gravelly and rough from decades of calling commands on the windy seas.

“There’s a boat that could be the tender coming out of the bay, going over the river bar now.” Miguel, one of the navigators, peered through his telescopic spyglass, holding it up to one eye.

“There’s a shipwreck on the shore to the left of the river.” Miguel turned the dial on the spyglass to adjust it so he could see more clearly.

Captain Alfonse Belanger squinted and frowned. He did not like going into this tricky port. The currents and riptides with the high swells could lift, turn, and capsize a ship.

The watery walls could also slam the boat if it did not approach the swells from the right angle. Crossing rivers with underwater sandbars was treacherous.

“Let’s drop the sails now and start slowly steaming in. We’ll have more control,” said Captain Alfonse.

Miguel stepped outside the wheelhouse and gave directions to a crew member. Sailors working on the desk stepped to the three masts and began unwinding the thick ropes from the cleats. 

Then they began pulling on the halyards that connected to the sails.

The sails went limp and snapped in the wind. The white canvas was rippling and fluttering.

One of the mates below the deck cross the steerage section and went farther down into the bottom of the vessel to the engine room. Workers around the clock shoveled coal into the furnace there that powered the steam engine.

“Power up,” he said. We’ve dropped the sails but we need to keep moving forward so we can steer the ship.”

Without momentum the Destiny's Dreams would drift with the waves, out of control.

The engine room was like a cave, lit by the furnace fires. Workers shoveled coal into the furnace and it was hot, stuffy and noisy there.

“When we get into port, I’m going to enjoy my time outside,” said one of the workers.

“I like the pay for this work, but I can’t wait to get to the big bay up north and get out of here,” said another.

“Ever think of jumping ship while we’re in port?”

“I want my pay, first. When we get to the big bay up north I’ll collect it. Then I’m going north to sign up for a homestead and set up a farm on the Mystic Coast. Maybe work in the logging and fishing there. Might set up a dairy farm.”

“Alessandro, how do you know so much about all this?”

“I saw a poster and some pamphlets. They’re seeking homesteaders and workers for logging and fishing, sawmills, salmon fishing, things like that.”

The first worker scanned Alessandro’s face with admiration.

“Tell me more,” he said.

While they shoveled coal they talked and began dreaming of a life in the green forests and abundance of the Mystical Coast.

Their jobs shoveling coal took on new meaning. This work would supply them with funds to start new lives.

Up in the wheelhouse, Captain Alfonse and Miquel watched the river on the coast get closer. The Destiny's Dreams vibrated and the steam engine began drumming with a pulsing beat.

“Tell them to slow down now.” Captain Alfonse’s message was relayed to the engine room.

In a smaller boat, called a tender, the harbor pilot, Antonio, watched the long, slender shape of the Destiny’s Dreams gliding over the day’s calm seas.

“What do you think?” The skipper of the tender liked to get the harbor pilot’s specialized comments.

Antonio, the harbor pilot, said, “She’s well designed to dance over the waves and I see there’s a substantial keel across the bottom for stability.”

“I’m going to bring the tender up to the starboard side. I see they’ve put a rope ladder down. We will put our bumpers out over the side so the ship’s don’t scrape.”

“Good. I’ll climb up the rope ladder. Even in these calm seas they’ll need me to pilot them around the underwater river sandbar. It shifts all the time so the maps are not much help. I have to watch the surface to see the currents and guess where the sandbar is now.

I don’t know how many ships we’ve lost at that river bar.”

The harbor pilot analyzed the swells and waves of the day’s currents. He hoped he was right. He decided on a plan to get Captain Alfonse’s ship safely into the river and all the way to the dock in the port.

The tender came alongside the Destiny’s Dreams and the two ships bobbed on the waves. Antonio held the railing of the tender, braced himself, and when the tender bobbed up, he let go of the railing. Then he grabbed the rope ladder hanging from the side of the Destiny’s Dreams. 

Next, he pulled himself upward and put each foot onto a rope step while the ship continued to rise and fall with the ocean swells.

It was dangerous work to make these transfers and the ocean would be cold if he fell. He wore a flotation device just in case and the tender would need to pick him out of the ocean if this happened. It was not easy in the rolling seas to do it.

Antonio and Captain Alfonse nodded, and introduced themselves, then walked to the wheelhouse, where Antonio began giving directions.

Alesandro, down in the engine room, and Isabella in the cargo area, felt the ship lean and turn.

The swells became larger because they were approaching the crossing of the underwater sandbar. The Destiny's Dreams rose and fell more dramatically, timbers creaking and waves sloshing against it.

On one swell they felt the vessel rise almost on its stern, and it pitched upward on a towering swell.

Then with a rush of speed, the Destiny's Dreams fell quickly down the swell into the hollow. But something was wrong.

Alessandro fell sideways against the wall in the engine room.

Isabella slid across the floor and slammed into the other side of the vessel.

Up on the deck, the water poured over the side and the ship began to be swamped. The more water that weighed it down on one side the more it tipped into the sea.

Alessandro grasped the wall. “Isabella,” he thought. He staggered across the tilting floor, and stumbled along the corridor to the cargo room.

Flinging the door open he saw her hanging onto the wooden ribs of the hull.

“We need to get out. I think we’ve wrecked,” he hollered.

She scrambled over to him, they grasped hands, and fought their way along the hall and up the steps, into the waters flooding the deck.

Miraculously, the Destiny's Dreams righted itself and floated into smooth waters. The sandbar swells almost sank them, but they made it through.

Captain Alfonse looked out of the wheelhouse at the two people standing on the watery deck. 

Who was this? He had not seen that woman board the ship. Had she sneaked onto his boat, a stowaway? Wasn’t that the new man he hired to shovel coal?

Antonio continued to guide the ship into the wide river and toward the harbor’s docks. Captain Alfonse and his first mate went down to the deck.

“Identify yourselves.” His voice was stern.

“Isabella.”

“Alessandro. I work shoveling coal here.”

“And why are you here?” Captain Alfonse’s mouth formed a thin line. He raised his eyebrows, and narrowed his eyes.

“She’s with me,” Alessandro spoke.

Slowly the whole story came out. Captain Alfonse was not without feelings. Forcing women to marry was against his beliefs.

He understood.

“So we are heading to the Mystical Coast to get married and start a homestead farm,” Alessandro finished the story.

“Come with me.” Captain Alfonse Belanger’s voice was commanding.

They followed him through a passage and into a room with a desk, bed, and items that appeared to be the captain’s belongings.

He picked up a thick book. Then he picked through a box and picked up something small.

“Stand here.” He barked the command.

Alesandro and Isabella looked at each other. What was happening?

“Put this on her finger.” The captain held out a tarnished silver ring with hammered designs on it. 

“I am the captain of this ship and I have the power and authority to do what I am about to do.”

The couple looked at each other.

The captain’s voice carried on, but the couple only partly heard what he said.

“By the power vested in me, I now pronounce you man and wife.”

It was done.

They were married.

Then followed a discussion with the captain. He got out a piece of paper and wrote a marriage certificate for them to carry.

Isabella and Alessandro could not believe it.

Then the captain spoke. “Alessandro, you can continue your work shoveling coal, but I will also train you as a deckhand."

"Isabella, you can work in the ship’s galley, preparing our meals. You will be paid for your work."

"When we get to San Francisco, you will need to find travel arrangements to go north to the Mystical Coast.”

The two lovers gazed open-mouthed at each other in shock. Now no one could separate them.

They were husband and wife.

“You may kiss the bride.” The captain’s voice was still rough, but held a note of kindness.

Alessandro and Isabella fell into each other’s arms, holding so tightly they could not breathe, and the Destiny’s Dreams floated over the smooth blue water of the river.