JoAnn Wendt (30 page)

“Perhaps Wednesday?”

Beside herself with shock and horror, she whirled from him. She stumbled to the center of the room, drifted there without feet, with legs gone numb. The silver chandelier above her head began to spin slowly. She reached out, seeking something to hold on to. The room spun. Turquoise brocade, saffron silk, parrot green velvet, ivory fans, lace, and bondslave muslin spun round her like the streamers of a child’s Fair Day stick. Colors whirled dizzily, madly, fast, faster, closing in. The floor lurched up, crashing against her hip and an instant later, her head.

She fell into merciful darkness.

* * * *

“Your drunkenness is a disgrace! A blot on my good name,” Mr. Byng raved. “All of Chestertown will speak of it. ‘She drank herself into a swoon,’ they will say. They will laugh behind my back, saying the Reverend Byng employs a wanton, drunken chit!”

Flavia sat collapsed at the kitchen table. She’ sobbed in grief, her arms abandoned upon the table, her cheek resting upon the rough wood. Dead. Her bright-eyed darling baby was
dead.
All that sweetness gone.

“What have you to say for yourself, Jane?” Mr. Byng demanded, his boots stridently pounding the oak floor planks as he paced.

She made no response. She couldn’t. She couldn’t stop sobbing, even though the deep muscles of her stomach hurt from the endless, wrenching sobs. Dead. Dead since August. She had rejoiced on his second birthday in September, and all the while he had been dead.
Dead.

“Speak,” Mr. Byng ordered, bending over her and shaking her. She pulled away. The odor of his bad tooth flowed to her, melding with the salty taste of her tears, making her gag.

She didn’t remember how she got back to the Byngs’. Vaguely, she recalled Dennis Finny’s drawn, worried face. Vaguely, she recalled William Tate and Dennis lifting her up to Mr. Byng, upon Mr. Byng’s horse. The funereal clop of hooves. The strong equine smell. Dazed, she’d heard none of Mr. Byng’s irate lecture. She was sobbing when he’d pushed her into the house. Her sobs had upset Neddy. He’d begun to bawl, babbling, “Jane—uh, uh—Jane hurt—”

“Fool!” Mr. Byng had thundered at Neddy. “Tend to my horse. Get to the barn and stay there.” Neddy had scurried to obey.

The fire crackled on the hearth, radiating waves of warmth, but she felt no warmth. She was cold as a stone. Still ranting, Mr. Byng thrust a cup of steaming tea at her. Its fragrance made her gag. She rolled her head away, too grief-laden to lift her head.

“Go to bed,” he said in disgust,

She tried to find her feet, but could not. Irritably, he pulled her up, stripped off her cloak and pushed her toward the loft where she slept. She stumbled numbly to the loft ladder.

“You’re too drunk to climb the ladder,” he snapped. With an angry push, he shoved her toward Neddy’s sleeping pallet by the fire. She fell upon it, curling up into a ball of grief. The pallet smelled of barn. The worn sheet covering it was as cold as ice water. Water. Oh, God! She saw her baby. In her aching numbness she felt his bewildered shock as the cold Rhine River closed over his head. She saw the bright happy eyes go wild with fear. Tiny hands clawed. She felt the torture of the first lungful of water, the tormented gasp for air. His baby-fine hair swirling in the dark waters as he fought.

God. Oh, God.

She gagged at the vision, sobbing and curling into a tighter ball. The vision tormented her, freezing her to ice and then burning her with hellish, feverish heat. She twisted and turned, unable to sleep. She bit her lip to keep the vision at bay and scarcely noticed when Mr. Byng retired, casting a long last hot look at her.

She burned with thirst as a sleepless hour crept by. Dragging herself up, she stumbled to the water bucket. She drew the shaking dipper to her mouth with two hands. Her throat was too choked to swallow. Water trickled onto her crushed, ruined gown.

She shivered. She was suddenly cold again, cold as stone. Dizzy, she found her cloak and pulled it on. A door creaked open on hinges that cried for oiling. Dully, she turned toward Mr. Byng’s bedchamber and his door opened.

He stood there, still fully dressed, glowering, his face crimson with anger in the firelight.

“So. I caught you, you red-haired bitch. Not too drunk to sneak out of the house, eh? Who waits out there for you, eh? A man?”

Too grieved to understand, she could only stare at him. He thrust an accusing finger at her, wagging it at the cloak she wore.

“Brazen chit! I watched you play your charms upon young William Tate. So you planned to shame me by feigning drunkenness, did you? And then sneak out to meet him?”

She shook her head, understanding not a word. Robert. . . her sweet baby son. Like a predator, her master lowered his head and stalked toward her. Softly. His boots noiseless.

Fear knifed through her numbing fog.

“Mr. Byng,” she whispered, backing away. “Please, sir—”

Alert now, she saw what she’d been oblivious to as she rode home in his angry arms. His face was flushed, highly colored and puffed with passion. As she stared, his hooded eyes closed, snakelike.

“You shan’t wait for the whipping post,” he whispered in a thick, shaking voice. “You shall be whipped this instant. Go to my bedchamber. Prepare yourself.”

She gasped, fear exploding like musket shot. She tensed. His words were a lie. She knew it. Knew he did not intend to whip her. Knew exactly what he intended. Whirling in panic, she flew for the door. But he caught her, grabbing her wrist, twisting it, wrenching it until she fell against him. She struck out wildly and a chair clattered over, hitting the floor with a loud bang.

“Submit, Jane.”

He pawed her, trying to kiss her.
Her feet went out from under her. She struggled to get her balance, stiff with fright, trying not to breathe in the foul odor of his breath.

“No,” she cried out. “Let me go!”

But he was beyond reason. He tried to kiss her again. She tore out of his arms with a scream. He slapped her silent, a great crashing crack on the cheek. The blow sent her reeling. She fell to her knees, cradling her burning face in her palms.

Aroused by the violence, he seized both of her wrists. He dragged her to his  bedchamber. She broke free with one hand and clawed at the doorframe, trying to hold on. She felt her fingernails split to the quick as he wrenched her through the door.

She sobbed in pain and terror.

“Please—I beg—don’t—”

She managed to lunge away, reeling into the bedpost. She grabbed it, clinging to it as though to life itself.

Again he wrenched her loose. With the last breath she had, she screamed. But he’d seized her hair, he’d forced her to the quaking bed, crushing all air from her lungs. She gasped for air but drew in the stench of his mouth, the acrid stale smell of his serge coat. The smells brought her terror to a  head.

“No! You cannot!”

In a frenzy she clawed at him. He bellowed in pain as her nails raked his face. For a moment, he let go. She lunged off the bed. She tried to run, but her own skirts trapped her. They were caught under him. With a sob of desperation, she tried to jerk the skirts free. But he caught her, caught the slippery silk. She jerked again, jerked desperately until the silk wrenched free of his fist. She lunged from the bedchamber, her feet clumsy wooden things that would not, could not move.

“Jane!” he roared, chasing her.

In her terrified flight, she tripped over the extended rocker of the Philadelphia chair. She crashed to the floor, knowing she’d come to the end. She had no strength left. She curled into a ball and sobbed her despair. She did not look up as his boots slowly clumped across the floor and stopped not inches from her. She could hear his determined panting.

“You
will
submit, Jane.”

Weeping, she did not hear the kitchen door open until it banged to the wall. She looked up through her tears. Neddy swam in the doorway. She blinked, trying to see him clearly. He held something in his hands. She blinked again. What he held made no sense at all.

“Fool! What do you think you’re—”

Flavia reared up in terror, finally understanding what Neddy held.

“Neddy—oh, no!”

Neddy charged like a bull. In a single motion he thrust the lance in, lofted the flailing terrapin on his lance and flung it hard to the floor. Like the hunts at the creek, the terrapin lay belly up.

Flavia screamed as Mr. Byng’s blood spurted high on the wall. Its rich redness glistened in the firelight. She stared, as the spurting ended and a dark red pool slowly spread across the floorboards, seeping down into the cracks between the boards. The sickly sweet smell of blood crept into the air.

Unbelieving, she stumbled to her feet.

Neddy dropped the bloody lance with a cry of fright. The lance rolled away, bumping along until it hit the kitchen table leg and stopped. Neddy burst into tears, swiping at the blood on his clothes, his hands.

“Dirty,” he sobbed in distress. “Dirty—uh, uh—Miz Byng— she will whip Neddy—uh, uh—clothes dirty—”

She was dazed. Too dazed to move to the boy.

A cold draft blew through the open kitchen door and with it came the distant sound of approaching voices. Boots clomped through the mudyard, then stomped across the stoop.

She felt dizzy, as if she were floating. She turned, staring out at the sounds, staring from glazed eyes. Vaguely, she heard someone say, “Odd. The door is open.” As she stared, two men seemed to swim into the doorway.

“Jane?” Dennis Finny began, “Mr. Tate and I walked over to see if thee is feeling better — No! Oh, my God!”

“Lord Almighty,” whispered William Tate. “What’s happened here?”

Chapter 16

Mab Collins ran away.

Garth had anticipated it. He’d alerted the servants, warned Harrington and Jenkins. As a result, Mab got no farther than Dray’s Ordinary on the Hampton Road, five miles beyond Williamsburg. Jenkins tracked her. He threw the kicking, hollering chit across his saddle and trotted home with her.

Now she’d have to be dealt with, Garth fumed. He slammed a business ledger shut. Lunging from his chair, he crossed his small study in two strides, fumbled into a tin box for a cigar and, finding none, irritably slung the box away.

Damnation. Was there no end to female trouble? What next! It was enough to try a saint with Raven chewing at him every blessed moment about the Chestertown bondwoman the young fool wanted to make his mistress and with Eunice Wetherby sending urgent letters from London, demanding his presence and urging their marriage. “Demanding!” he thought blackly. Ha! And then there was Annette -- turning suddenly virtuous—-dressing up in lace collars like a sixteen-year-old virgin and tripping about town with that parrot, Lord Dunwood, although she knew damned well Garth wanted her stripped to her shift and lying in his bed upstairs. Then the business about the freckle-faced girl—what was her name?

He snapped his fingers, irritably jogging his memory.

Mary. That was the name. Mary Wooster. He’d sent her to the Widow Richards, a motherly innkeeper in Barbados. “Fine!” he sneered at himself. “Done! And a star for your crown in heaven, McNeil.” But the worry about the letter remained. Who had sent that odd letter with the girl? He hadn’t believed for a moment that a male had written it for Mary Wooster. Men did not write letters referring to “true love”.

And now he had the Collins chit to deal with. He snorted in self-disgust. In the old days, he’d walked out on domestic problems, leaving the problems to solve themselves. And he’d certainly not spent five minutes mollycoddling any of his mistresses. He’d lived by the sailor’s rule: when a woman ceases to be an amusement, sail on, brother, sail on. Even now he chafed to jump on a horse and ride to the peace and quiet of his small house in Hampton. Or better yet, escape to the
Caroline
and the inviolate sanctuary of his captain’s cabin.

But he couldn’t. And he was at a loss to say why. Was Trent the cause? Partly. Home had never before been so appealing. He was getting used to sticky, enthusiastic kisses. Getting accustomed to sinking into a chair only to find he’d squashed a remnant of a sweet bun or a toy soldier. He’d miss those homely things at sea or in Hampton, he admitted. But there was more to this curious deterioration of his old chauvinist ways, and he lay the blame on Flavia. He’d loved her with shattering intensity. She had melted into his heart, become part of him. Because of Flavia, he looked at the world with new eyes. She’d softened him, taken away the old “cutting edge.” Hell, he felt like a fish out of water.

A tap at the door broke into his musing. The tap was followed by the door pushing cautiously inward.

“Now, Cap’n? Will y’see Mab Collins now?”

Garth scowled. Harrington’s red beaky face was twisted with concern. The look he popped at Garth begged for amnesty for Mab. The tar had taken a shine to the chit. Behaved like a mother hen.

“Bring her in,” he snapped, squelching Harrington’s hopes. As he waited, he caught furtive whispers outside the door as Harrington coached.

“Remember, lass, beg his forgiveness—”

“I’ll not beg!” a saucy hiss snapped back.

“Come, lass, make it easy on y’self. The Cap’n’s not a mean man, but if ye rile him ye’ll have the devil to pay.”

McNeil heard the woman’s derisive snort. The door swung inward. Harrington tugged at Mab Collins’s soiled sleeve, mother-henning her into the study. She shrugged off his hand and threw an angry, blazing look toward Garth. Damnation! She looked about as meek and repentant as the Queen of Sheba. He’d have to get rough.

He returned her stare. Returned it with cold ruthlessness. She quailed slightly. She dropped her eyes to the floor. McNeil sauntered to his chair, casually dropped into it, propped his feet atop the writing table and indolently leaned back. He stared at her, saying nothing.

The silence was loud as thunder. He could see it made her nervous. A tie flared in her cheek. Once, then again. Good. So, silence was more effective torture for Mab than ranting and raving . . .

At last, she could take no silence. She flung her head up. Her gray eyes shot fire at him.