Revenge of the Barbary Ghost (11 page)

Oh. She took in a deep, shuddering breath. That was a new knot in her tangled feelings toward the Marquess of Darkefell.

“You haven’t heard a word I’ve said,” her dancing partner complained, tweaking her cheek as they came together in the pattern of the dance.

“I beg your pardon.” The dance continued. “St. James,” she said, as they came together once more and began a walking portion of the dance, “when you marry, what shall you be looking for in a wife?”

“Oh-ho, do you mean you are considering my constant offer of marriage, my dear girl? I’m pleased beyond anything. In fact I’m walking on clouds this minute, for you embody the very essence of—”

“Don’t go on like that, St. James,” she said, crossly. “I mean exactly what I say; what are you seeking in a wife?”

“Honestly?”

“Honestly.”

“Well, I would like a wife with a sense of humor. An adequate purse, a sense of style, good manners.” He smiled down at her. “And she should
adore
me above all others, and forgive me my peccadilloes.”

“Do looks not enter into it?”

“My darling,” he said, with a soft smile, “you are much more attractive than you consider yourself. You’re far too modest.”

Irritated that she was so transparent, she said nothing as they parted in the figure of the dance. When they came together again, she changed the subject. “I’ve been transfixed by all of this turmoil over the smugglers, and the poor excise officer who was killed last night. Did you hear about it?”

“Indeed I did, poor fellow. I hope he didn’t have a young family. Still, it’s the risk any man takes in the pursuit of his duty.”

“I suppose. Women and men have their separate spheres of risk, for women have childbirth, and that is a risky business in itself.”

They parted once more in the pattern of the dance, and Anne glanced around as she lightly touched hands with all the gentlemen down the line. Many of the young women, doomed to be without partners—the dearth of young men was monumental in the face of such a large female presence—stood along the wall staring disconsolately toward the door. It was among them that she first saw the stir. Mechanically floating through her part in the country dance, as she advanced down the line toward him, she spotted Darkefell at the top of the steps that descended into the ballroom; he was stunningly handsome in dark blue silk with a froth of exquisite lace at his throat. But also, she was overjoyed to see, he was accompanied by Mr. Osei Boatin, who stood just behind him, his dark face and glinting glasses giving him away, even though he tried to stay in the shadow of his employer.

The mayor of St. Ives rushed up to the marquess and made his obeisance, then with a sweeping gesture, seemed to offer to introduce him to some of the company. As if in pantomime, Anne could see Darkefell decline, and indicate with a negligent wave someone in the offing.

It was Colonel Sir Henry Withington who finally greeted Darkefell properly, and introduced him around the room. The dance ended, and Anne, suffocating in the crowded warmth of the ballroom, was led back to Lolly by St. James, who stayed to chat with them both.

But Anne could not attend. Where was Darkefell? Would he seek her out? And why did she care so much? She searched her heart. She liked him very much, and it pleased her vanity that he seemed to like her, and had followed her all the way to Cornwall.

He was intent on marriage. There was a part of her that shrieked that she was ungrateful. To have her hand sought by such an eligible man: handsome, wealthy, titled, but beyond that, with a heart worth having, brains, and a troubled goodness that she found intriguing. How could she ever do better than that, if marriage was to be her eventual fate anyway? If she tossed him away, she would never find a suitor so perfect, in the eyes of the world. And perhaps for her own heart.

She set those thoughts away, and greeted Pamela, who, her cheeks warm from the dance, approached, followed by her partner, Captain Carleton. They chatted, the topic of their conversation the raid of the previous night, and the fact that an excise officer being killed might lead to the army being called in to aid the customs officer, Mr. Puddicombe.

“Puddicombe’s here,” Carleton said, with a gesture toward a stalwart fellow watching a young girl, who spoke with a half circle of attentive red-coated officers. “That pretty girl he’s watching is his daughter. It’s said that he’s trying to marry her off to one of the officers. Ever since his wife died a few years ago, he’s been at loose ends what to do with the chit. He even took her to London, it’s rumored. She’s
well
known among the officers, I may say,” Carleton said, with a smirk.

Pamela laughed, lightly. Her voice brittle, she said, “Where would a man like that get the price of a London Season?”

But Anne gazed at the officer in shock. It was impolite to speak thus of a girl, to say the least—his implication had been sly, but quite clear—and she had judged him more of a gentleman than that. Frostily, she said, “I think, sir, that concerning a young girl who may have only her reputation of which to be proud, you should keep such gossip and implication to yourself, if you would show the colors of a true gentleman.”

His cheeks flamed slightly, and he bowed, silent.

“Ah, you’ve been caught out, Carleton, for the dog you are,” St. James said.

“You’re one to speak, St. James,” the fellow said. “There is your little shadow, the brewer’s daughter.”

St. James glanced around, and made eye contact with a young woman who stood with an amply proportioned lady of middle years. He bowed and smiled. The richly gowned lady looked familiar to Anne, and she realized that it was the woman with whom St. James had shared a look in the market. As St. James excused himself, Anne asked Pamela, “Who are they?”

Pam glanced in the direction Anne indicated. “Ah, Miss Julia Lovell, daughter of the brewer.”

“But who is the woman with her?”

“Her aunt, the wife of a local baronet, Lady something-or-other. Lady Foakes, I think? She’s chaperoning Miss Lovell, I’ve heard.”

St. James had approached and was talking to them both, then he took Miss Lovell’s hand and led her away while the older lady watched, a look of ill-disguised longing on her face. But Anne’s attention was pulled away by the dark, furious expression on the face of another young man, who stood watching Miss Lovell and St. James as they strolled around the perimeter of the room. “And who is that?” Anne asked, about the young man, but Pamela had gone off somewhere.

Darkefell, weary already of the crush, did his duty, chatting and listening, being introduced to more people than he would ever remember as he followed his host around the room. Colonel Withington was a Yorkshire man, and they were acquainted, though not closely so. He accompanied the colonel to meet his wife and daughter, then more of the officers. But all the while he had watched Anne dance, laugh, flirt, and then saw her go pensive as she watched St. James stroll away with a pretty young girl.

Was she jealous, then, of St. James’s regard?

Never one to delve into his own emotions or examine his feelings, he
had
wondered if he was just pursuing Anne because it was a novelty to be so roundly rejected. But no, in the moment when he saw her above, on the escarpment the night before, and with bullets flying, he had felt a visceral fear that she would be hurt. Like it or not, she had a protector and knight in tarnished armor. He cared for her deeply, and jealousy ripped into his gut at the thought that she was, perhaps, in unrequited love with St. James. If she rejected him forever, he would not easily forget her. He’d never met a lady like her, and didn’t expect to again.

When he finally was able to excuse himself from the colonel’s company, he made his way around the room, hoping to find Anne unaccompanied. The assembly room was built with a gallery above, from which the smoking, card and supper rooms could be reached. The gallery overhung the ballroom, a shadowed alcove along one side, and in the darkness many a young couple would retreat for a few moments of unrestrained courtship. But it puzzled him when he saw Miss Pamela St. James in those shadows, and with Mr. Puddicombe, the local excise officer he had seen in the taproom of the Barbary Ghost Inn.

She slipped away from the fellow in that moment, but the conversation had appeared intimate, secretive. And faintly threatening. Odd. He did not like to think any friend of Anne’s was in difficulty.

He found Anne and watched her from a distance. He remembered thinking her plain when first they met, and had criticized her protruding nose, her long face, and lips too full for fashion. But he couldn’t see it now. Why? Did not appearance remain the same, no matter what your relationship was? How was it that now, when he looked at her, he saw her sparkling gray eyes, and wanted only to press his lips to hers. Fear of losing her haunted him. The desire to carry her away as his own made him restless and fervently eager. Desire that she alone could satisfy had already invaded his nocturnal brain, leading to indecent dreams, and was beginning to infect his thoughts every time she was near.

He’d gone about everything all wrong, he feared. It seemed that it was his fate, when all around him young ladies were being offered to him for his delectation, that he wanted the one woman who seemed unimpressed by his eminence, and even less by his character. Perhaps that was part of her charm, for what thinking man could bear to be adored every minute of the day? Such empty adoration must eventually give way to dissatisfaction when his faults became apparent, but clear-sighted Anne had no illusions about him. If she could love him, it would be a steadfast, lasting love, that would carry them through their lives and into dotage.

Unable to bear watching Anne from afar, he was just about to go to her when a commotion broke out under the gallery. He looked back, fearing for Miss St. James, but it was her brother who was in trouble. A young fellow had him by the collar of his smart red coat, and was threatening him.

“Stay away from my Julia if you want to live, you oily bastard!”

“John!” a girl cried, pulling at the young man’s sleeve. Her tone was agonized, her pretty face twisted in anguish. “Leave the captain alone,
please
!”

The melee was stopped very quickly, as Colonel Withington pulled the young man away from St. James and hauled him off away by the scruff of his neck.

St. James, looking huffy, straightened his jacket as his fellow officers jeered at him.

Darkefell went on and finally, at long last, greeted Anne. She wore a blue-purpley colored gown of some fine fabric, and looked, in his estimation, head and shoulders above every other woman there. She greeted him kindly, but in his reflective frame of mind, he was perhaps quieter than usual. She gave him a puzzled look.

She was already promised for the supper dance, so, rather than be on the outskirts of her circle, only able to watch her while she was escorted by another man, he went to the smoking room, though it was a habit he had never acquired. One did not smoke because one wanted to, he knew, but because it was fashionable and social. Nonetheless, he did not smoke, but merely strolled, thinking.

He lingered along the periphery of the smoky oak-paneled room, watching, listening, wondering how long he should stay in Cornwall. It struck him that his best avenue to success with Anne might be to get to know those around her, and to that end, he strolled toward St. James’s group. As little as he liked the captain, he ought to learn all he could about his rival.

Captain Marcus St. James, his fair hair brushed back from his high forehead and heavily powdered, was regaling the other officers with a humorous story about the young man who had attacked him, a certain John Netherton, who was besotted with Miss Julia Lovell, but who could not court her as long as her family hoped St. James might come up to snuff. He ridiculed the pretensions of the young man, who was a simple barrister’s apprentice, with no hope of a proper income for a few years to come. Miss Lovell, on the other hand, was the daughter of a well-to-do brewer and had a sizable dowry, which St. James was eyeing with some musing as to whether it was worth the leg-lock to be able to sell his commission and live in leisure.

Then Darkefell heard Anne’s name raised, by one of the other officers. He drifted closer.

“She’s a
very
wealthy lady,” St. James said, casually, downing a brandy.

“Long beaked, though, eh, St. James? Plain as ditchwater, compared to the lovely little heiress, Miss Lovell.”

“That she is, lad,” St. James said, expansively, easing back in his chair and puffing on a cigar. “But I think I can get Anne to marry me. Her money’s many times the Lovell dowry, and will spend quite prettily. She’s a fine woman behind the beakiness and big mouth, though she’s awfully opinionated. Plain and plain-spoken!” That garnered a laugh from the drunkest of the officers. “Y’know,” St. James continued, “as plain as she is, still, I don’t have to see her to give her a poke in the dark and get her with child.”

More uproarious laughter greeted his cruel, crude wit.

A red tide of fury surged in Darkefell’s brain, and he shoved fellows aside. In one fluid motion he pulled St. James up by the collar and punched him, hard, sending the slimmer man flying across the room onto the floor.

“Hey there!” one of the captain’s friends said. “Not right, old man, to catch him unawares!”

“He’s aware now,” Darkefell said, waiting for St. James to right himself. “Let him come at me.” He cracked his bloodstained knuckles and waited, crouched.

“You poncy bastard,” St. James roared. He wiped the blood from his nose, removed his jacket, handing it to a friend, then put up his fists. “
Now
, I dare you!”

Deep in his gut Darkefell was gratified. He’d been wanting to do violence to St. James since the moment he met him, and now he had the invitation and ample reason. He launched himself at the other man with no hesitation, feeling flesh beneath his fists.

Anne, in the supper room, frowned at the noise coming from the men’s smoking room, next door. “What on earth is that?” she asked, about the roaring voices. Lolly, enjoying a splendid cream tea, with scones, clotted cream, honey, jam and all manners of lovely provender, merely shrugged her shoulders. Captain Carleton was off getting another plate of cakes for Lolly, but Anne couldn’t wait to find out, her curiosity piqued at the shouts, the sound of tumbling and the yelling.