For Her Love (12 page)

“Poor sot,” Giles said with a grin, “dazzled, no doubt, by the sight of you.” Then he made a point of gazing at her with a thoroughly smitten air and tripping lightly over an imaginary impediment. She laughed softly and had to admit to herself that she rather liked being outrageously flattered.

She looked back down at the crew. “They are all white,” Grace commented.

“Pardon?” Giles asked.

“Your men, they are all white. And there are so few. I saw many more than this when you were loading my father’s goods, and he pointed out your Negroes. Where are they?”

Giles shook his head. “This was but a short pleasure trip. I’ve no need of a full crew. Doubtless the rest are carousing the streets of Port Royal, spending their wages on vice and sin.”

“The Blacks, too?”

“Aye, them, too.”

“Do they not fear that they will be sold as slaves while you are gone?”

“A free Black is not uncommon in Port Royal. Neither are slaves.”

“I cannot imagine it.”

“I doubt me you can. One has to see Port Royal to believe it.” So it was on to more serious matters. “I’ve an apartment above my office. If you come back with me, I’ll look for a house outside of town. Mayhap I can find something near Geoff and Faith.”

Grace looked up at him, and some of the mistrust that seemed ever a part of her clouded her gaze. “Your business partner and his wife?”

“You’ll love Faith,” he assured her. “I’m sure you’ll be fast friends.”

All her life, she had lived as a white woman, but Grace had never had a white friend. She’d had Matu, and Matu was all. She and Iolanthe had socialized with the wives and daughters of other planters, but she had never become close to any of them. Iolanthe had friends in Saint-Domingue to whom she wrote, and she often visited with the wife of their closest neighbor. They compared embroidery stitches and designs for gowns, exchanged beauty secrets, and complained about their husbands and servants. Grace felt a little sick. She did not want to become Iolanthe.

“If I go back with you,” Grace said. “If I marry you.”

“Would you like to take the wheel awhile?” Giles asked.

They had things to talk about, but the prospect of steering the huge ship was too tempting. She smiled at him and said, “Oh, aye! But what if I make some error?”

“We’re not far out, and the trip is short. At this point, you can’t make a mistake of any consequence.”

There was substantial wisdom in that statement. She grasped the wheel firmly and followed Giles’s instructions, steering the ship this way and that for no reason but the fun of making it go where she wished. He stood close beside her, and she found that she didn’t mind it at all. In fact, she found his presence reassuring, and she rather enjoyed the tingle she felt when his arm accidentally brushed against her shoulder or he leaned down to murmur a suggested course in her ear. The sun was warm and the breeze refreshing. Water glided under them in shades of sapphire and turquoise. The sky was a brilliant azure, though dark clouds gathered in the mountains above the plantation. In time, they would sweep to the sea.

After awhile, Giles suggested that they let one of the men take the helm while he showed her the rest of the ship. They toured the galley, and he showed her the passengers’ quarters. The lower deck was dark and the chambers cramped, every bit of space used with greatest efficiency.

“Our other ship,
Destiny
, was never meant to take passengers, so it has no cabins but those for the first and second in command. Since we’ve started our business, we’ve taken a few travelers, but it meant the first mate must give up his quarters to females.
Reliance
has no such problem.”

“Then why did you buy it?”

Giles furrowed his brow. “
Reliance
?”

“Nay,
Destiny
. I should think you would want a vessel that was versatile and could be used for goods or passengers.”

“Ah—we did not buy
Destiny
. At least, not until after we had commanded her. Back then, she belonged to the whole crew, more or less.”

Grace frowned. “The ship had to belong to someone.”

“She changed hands a few times. You see, Geoff and I and our old shipmates—we took her. Then the two of us bought her from the rest.”

“Took her? From whom? Why?”

“From another captain and crew. I haven’t always been a merchant sailor, Grace. Geoff and I were privateers.”

Grace’s delicately curved jaw dropped and her eyes widened. “Privateers? Like pirates?”

“Nay! We didn’t prey upon ships willy-nilly. We took Spanish ships for the king. And as for
Destiny
, the Spaniards we took her from had stolen her first from an English crew.”

“But you didn’t return her to her English captain?”

“He was dead, killed by the Spaniards.”

“And what became of the Spanish captain?”

“We killed him.”

Grace stared at him, thunderstruck. Then, to his astonishment, she burst into laughter. “Oh, Giles! For a moment I actually believed you!”

“And now you don’t?”

“Oh, please!” she shook her head vigorously. “You could never kill anyone.”

A tiny muscle in his jaw ticked. “As you have oft pointed out, Grace, we do not know one another well at all.” Turning away from her and retreating down a tight passageway, he called back, “There’s not much to see in the hold, for ‘tis empty, and ‘twould not be proper to show you my quarters. Shall we go above again?”

Grace didn’t move. She watched his retreating back and realized that he walked differently on a ship. Though the rocking should have sent him off balance, as it did her, he only moved more gracefully, rolling with the vessel. He paused at the hatch, looking back at her. In the shaft of illumination from the deck above, she saw him in a different light. Shadows were cast downward over his face, and his gray eyes that had always struck her as being soft now seemed hard as steel.

Is no one ever what they first appear?
she wondered.

Wordlessly, she joined him at the ladder, and he motioned her up first, following behind her. Once again, they stood at the deck’s rail, this time watching the shore grow closer and closer. Grace knew that she was going to have to be the one to patch the strained rift that had come between them.

“You still have not told me when you decided to marry me,” she prompted.

He scanned the horizon and replied tersely, “Does it matter?”

“Aye, it does.”

He looked down at her, and now she fancied his eyes more like the sea in a storm.

“Would you even consider marriage to a man with my past? A ‘pirate’?”

She cocked her head coyly. “Nay, not a pirate, but mayhap a privateer. And I’ll tell you something else, Giles Courtney. I do know you. You may have killed men, but every one weighs upon your conscience. I can see it in your face.” She set her hand on the deep blue velvet of his sleeve. “We all do what we must to survive in this world. We see things and do things that we pay for a thousand times over.”

“The Spanish are no more merciful to the English, I assure you,” he said laconically.

“I believe you.”

He breathed deeply and spread his hands to encompass the horizon. “There was so much freedom. I’d served under captains I’d no love for, for so long. At least with privateering came wealth. Geoff and I could swagger into Port Royal as men of means with all the liberty that entails.”

“And yet you became merchants.”

Giles grinned, and Grace breathed a sigh of relief. “Well, that was sort of Geoff’s fault. ‘Twas one of the conditions of a pardon he obtained when he was captured by the Spanish. Still, I was ready to settle down.” He carelessly brushed a wispy ringlet away from her face where the wind had blown it. Such a harmless, intimate gesture that Grace forgot to breathe. “You’re right. I’m not a man to whom killing comes easily.

“And now, as for when I decided to marry you, ‘twas in that hut, with that little girl.” Both of their faces sobered at the memory. “That weighs heavily on
your
conscience. You don’t see yourself as any different from them, and you suffer when they suffer.”

She watched the shore, unwilling to look into his eyes. “And that is what you have always desired in a wife, a woman who thinks herself no better than a slave?”

“Good God, did it sound so to you? Heavens, no. I just feel ready. I’ve a ship of my own and a prosperous business, but a man wants more. There comes a time for a family.”

“For heirs, you mean. Someone to inherit your business.”

“Mayhap, if I’ve sons with any desire for it. But nay, that is not what I mean. I want children, not heirs. I want a wife, not a slave.”

Oh, the words were all so right! Grace squeezed her eyes shut, then opened them into the dazzling sunlight.
Keep your eyes wide open, you foolish girl
, she scolded herself. “And you chose me because I am beautiful, intelligent, and honest.”

“And modest,” Giles teased. He took her chin in his hand, forcing her to look at him, and in her eyes was all of the bitter cynicism he had come to expect. “You
are
all of those. But they were only the reasons I chose to call upon you. I asked your father for your hand because you deserve better than this. How old are you, Grace?”

“Twenty-two.”

“Twenty-two. I am thirty. I live in a city of sin and villainy, have served on crews peopled by common criminals, and killed more men than I care to count, and yet I see more pain in your eyes than ever I have seen in my own mirror.”

“And so you pity me?”

“We two, Grace, are in need of a balm. What say you? Together, might we make a corner of the world just as we wish it?”

Her heart ached with the beauty of the thought. Children, not heirs, not poppets, not dolls to be dressed prettily and then alternately coddled or abused, never knowing which or why. A wife, not a slave. She thought of her father and stepmother. Had Father ever wooed Iolanthe with such pretty words, or had they snapped and sniped at one another from the very beginning, each maneuvering for power?

And what if he did not say cruel and frightening things to her before he took her? Aye, in truth, Jacques’s words were the true source of her terror. Giles was not a man to hurt people. He must hurt her, of course, to make the children that he wanted, but surely he would be as quick as possible and soothe her if she wept. And she was bigger now. She could bear a man’s weight without suffocating, and would probably not tear so badly. In her mind, a silky French voice whispered, “
It is a shame that the breaking can only be done once
.” Only once, and the worst of it would be over.

“Grace? I’m sorry. Have I said something to upset you?”

Giles’s face, not Jacques’s. Kind concern, not malicious delight. “N-nay. I’m fine. I think that we might make such a corner.”

“Then you’re saying…”

“Nay! I am not saying anything. Not yet. Only that I will think on it.”

In all honesty, it was a relief to Giles that she had not said aye. On the deck of his ship, it felt like they were rushing, going too fast. Here, they had all the time in the world to get to know one another and to proceed carefully. But by the time they reached the plantation’s bay, the clouds had begun to roll in, and he had to row swiftly to get them to shore and shelter ere the rain was upon them.

Edmund was mercifully absent from luncheon, and true to form, Iolanthe took her meal in her room. Grace and Giles ate and conversed loudly over the sound of the heavy, soaking cloudburst that hammered the roof of the house. There was little wind, so rain fell straight to the ground and the windows could be left open, letting in soft, gray light and cool air that smelled of wetness and plant life.

Giles told her about his business and explained about how his partner took his wife with him on long journeys so that they were not separated long. She learned that Giles would seldom travel beyond the New World, for voyages to Europe were most profitable if one stopped in Africa for slaves. This route made for a trade triangle that comprised most of the shipping in the region. She had to admire Giles and Geoff greatly that they were willing to sacrifice profits for principles.

“I judged you harshly,” she admitted. “I condemned you for profiting from slavery, but as you said, it is unavoidable, and you surely do what you can.”

Giles pushed away his plate and leaned back in his chair. A young serving girl whisked the plate away, and he watched her go out the back door to the kitchen. “Before I came here, it seemed like enough. I thought of how much my freedom means to me, and I thought that was the greatest suffering to slaves. You know, the idea that they could never be free. Until yesterday, I’d had no idea.”

“I’m sure you didn’t.”

He leaned forward again, resting his elbows on the table and his head on his folded hands. “Nay, that is a lie. I knew. Somewhat, I knew. I have seen slave ships unloaded. But I wasn’t a slaver, so it had nothing to do with me. And yet, I see now that it has very much to do with me. I have watched and done nothing, and so it has everything to do with me.”

“What can you do? What can I do?” Grace closed her eyes and drew in a deep breath of damp, clean air. They
could
make their own corner of the world. “I could sail with you?”

“I could teach you navigation. Faith navigates from time to time.”

Faith. The woman she was supposed to make her friend. How would Grace ever fit into Giles Courtney’s world? Mayhap she’d not have to. Mayhap they could sail all of the time. She had enjoyed herself on his ship. “I’d like that, I think, learning about the stars and the sea.”

“And you might like to visit New England. ‘Tis very different from here. I could take you in the fall.” She watched his face light with enthusiasm and felt herself getting swept up with him. His voice eager, he continued, “You’ve never seen such color as the trees of New England in autumn. And we could go again in May, when the lilacs are blooming.”

Grace smiled at him, and her heart began to beat a little faster. She thought of the wide, blue sky and the wind in her hair. She tried to imagine the trees he spoke of, then asked, “Might we see snow? I’d love to see snow.”