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cabin’s slide bolt lock confirmed to her there would be no escaping this nightmare.
    Her breath stuck in her throat as she stood frozen against the wall just inside the door arch, daring not to make a move. She could not fit yet one more single breath of air into her lungs as each inhalation was shorter than the one before it. The pain from her breast bindings cut into her chest like a knife. She was beginning to feel faint from the lack of air and feared she would lose consciousness.
                  After several endless agonizing seconds she heard the slow scrape of match stick striking carbon and then smelled the pungent odor of sulfur. The haunting glow of candlelight produced the sinister image of the quarter master, Kilern.
    "Well now, lad, is it?” His whisper echoed throughout the sparsely furnished cabin. “I've been watchin' ya for over a week now and I've been noticin’ some things about ya.”
    Maura’s chest continued to heave with each rapid shallow breath as she struggled to remain conscious, despite the growing numbness of her body. 
    “That's right. I've been lookin' at ya going through the mess line. I've seen many a scrawny lad, but you be a bit too feminine, shall I say? Wasn't exactly sure if I heard right, on the last day in port, when ya was talkin' to Godsey in the Cap’n’s archway. So I waited and observed ya for a while. But I feel I now know ya little secret, lass."
    Maura's eyes grew wide as saucers and full of terror.
    "Yes that's right lass, you've been found out. But I've told no one and don't plan to, unless , that is, ya give me reason ta tell. Ya see I know our Cap'n. He can be a mean one, he can. One thing he can't abide is trickery and lyin'." Kilern was now just inches from Maura’s face. She could smell his brandied breath in her nostrils and she was almost going to be sick.
    He reached up to cup her face with one grimy calloused hand and traced the outline of her cheek and chin with his rough thumb. He ran his finger the length of her neck to the first button of her flannel shirt.
    Her heart pounded hard with fear.
    "Am I wrong, then? Are ya a lass or a lad? I guess I'll have ta find out for myself, now, won't I?" I n one fluid movement he ripped open her shirt to find the bindings that wrapped about her midsection. Paralyzed with fear Maura could not scream nor move.
    "So this be how ya kept your identity secret. First I thought ya just a school girl, but now I can see you're more than that."
    He ran his tongue across his dry cracked bottom lip, and then ran a shirtsleeve across his brow as he was sweating from the excitement of his find and what awaited his eyes beneath those bindings. He took his blade and slowly, meticulously sliced away at the thin cloth from above her breast line to below her waist, being careful not to nick the skin.
    Her chest heaved at a painful rate. Terror gripped her mind, not knowing what he planned to do to her. Maura’s eyes shifted to the blade he held at eye level to assure her he meant to do harm if not gotten his way. His muscular forearm pressed against her throat, holding her inplace against the cabin wall, while his free hand peeled away at the bindings.
    "Oh, Lass, you're a beauty, ya are." His mouth went dry with excitement. He reached his large calloused hand inside the crumpled bands of cloth to cup her soft, firm breast.
    Maura let out a muffled scream and startled him into losing his grip on her.
    She scrambled beneath his arm and ran to the opposite side of a table in the center of the room. When she bent to escape him her cap fell to the floor and her long black tresses fell freely to just beyond her shoulders.
    He crossed the room in a flash and had a hold of her in one fell swoop.
    "Awe don't you worry ya pretty head none, lass. I ain't gonna take ya here and now. No, I got plans for ya when we get ta port in New England. All I want 'tis but a little taste of ya now and then." He covered her mouth with his, in one