Silk and Shadows (56 page)

But he would never be truly one of them, no matter how long he stayed.

There were friends scattered in other places, men of many races. There were also women whom he remembered with great fondness; in one or two cases, perhaps with a little love. He would also be welcomed by those who were still in the business of pleasing men who could afford them.

None of them would be
his
woman. They were wary creatures, survivors like himself, who would never give more than they could afford to lose. None would be brave and foolish enough to deliberately put their hearts in the hands of a man whom they knew would break them.

Now he understood why Sara had been terrified on their wedding day. She had not feared physical pain, but the anguish of inevitable loss. Yet still, with desperate, loving courage, she had given herself to him.

Abruptly he set the horse moving again. What had happened to him since he came to England? For twenty-five years he had been filled with absolute purpose. Every action had been measured against his ultimate goal.

But now, for the first time in his life, he was torn by internal conflict. He had found Sulgrave, the home of his heart. And Sara, ah, God, Sara. In a few short weeks she had sunk into his soul, filling cracks and pores so thoroughly that her loss made his spirit feel as if it had been stripped naked and thrown to the winds.

Summer was giving way to autumn, and the ominous rasp of dry leaves whispered along the wind. When he reached the spot where Ross had been shot, he dismounted and tethered his horse. There was a blotchy patch on the trail, easy to overlook if one did not know what it was. He went down on one knee by the dark stain of his friend's blood.
I
owed you… a life for a life
.

Peregrine had done little to earn that loyalty. The first time he had seen Ross Carlisle, the Englishman had been a bruised and battered prisoner. He must have known that his captors were planning some particularly ugly death, but he sat calmly with his hands tied behind his back and his clothes in rags, looking as if he didn't give a damn what happened next.

His expression of cool English detachment had been unpleasantly reminiscent of Charles Weldon, and Peregrine had almost let Ross go to his fate. But he knew that a highborn Englishman might be useful in the future, so he had intervened and offered to gamble for the captive's life. There had been little risk for him; winning the game would give him the captive, while losing would cost only a handful of gold. But Peregrine had won the game, and when he took the captive home, he discovered that he had also won a friend; a friend whose mind and humor matched his own more closely than any man he had ever known.

There had been that other occasion, during an Afghan raid. Outnumbered and out of ammunition, Ross could have been killed, though his own righting skill might have been enough to save him. Peregrine had intervened, again with little risk to himself, but at least that time he had helped from friendship rather than a cold calculation of possible usefulness.

He lifted a pinch of dry, blood-saturated soil and crumbled it between his fingertips.
I
owed you… a life for a life
.

Ross had welcomed Peregrine, introduced him to his own friends and family, sponsored him in society, defended him in the presence of the queen. Most valuable of all, Ross had given trust, allowing Peregrine the benefit of the doubt about the justice of his mission against Weldon. And yesterday, Ross had taken the bullet intended for Peregrine. If not for him, Peregrine would be the one lying dead now, not Kane.

It had been purely a matter of luck that the bullet had not struck his friend's heart. He smiled mirthlessly as he remembered his own half-mocking comment that he did not believe in guilt, for it was an unproductive emotion. If Ross had died, no power of earth, heaven, or hell could have assuaged Peregrine's guilt.

No man could ask for a better friend than Ross. In return, Peregrine had compromised and seduced his friend's beloved cousin. Even then, Ross had tried to understand and had ultimately forgiven.

The anger and pride that had sustained Peregrine collapsed in the face of a grief more devastating than anything he had ever known. When Sara had left, he had flailed out in rage and pain, but now he was beyond that. He sank down on his knees and bowed over, his face buried in his hands and his lungs heaving with raw, anguished gasps. He did not weep, for he had not shed a tear since his mother's death; not for himself, not even for Jamie McFarland. But he rocked back and forth, shaking with violent bone-deep chills, as if racked by tropical fever.

Sara was right. He had filled his life with hate, worshipped the dark god of vengeance. And when his mission was done, what would be left inside of him? Nothing. He would be as empty as a wind-scoured ravine, a hollow core in dead stone.

He had never planned what would come after revenge; that was why the thought of dying to accomplish his mission had been unalarming. But lately he had begun to sense that there could be a life beyond hatred, beyond vengeance: a life with friends, a home, and love. Most of all, with love.

"Sara," he whispered brokenly, feeling that he had been torn in half. "Oh, God, Sara." He had thought Charles Weldon had sent him to hell, but he was wrong. Hell was not pain; it was not even hatred. Hell was to have known love, then to lose it.

The thought made Peregrine smile bitterly. He had not lost love; he had thrown it away, which was infinitely worse.

He did not need Sara to survive. But without her, he did not much care whether he did or not.

Her note had said
I
wish one of us were different. May God keep you and grant you peace. Love, Sara
. His wife had loved him fully, with tenderness, passion, and acceptance. The only peace he had ever known had been with Sara.

He had not missed love and peace when they were only words. But having experienced both, how could he live without them?

For the first time he wondered if he should, or could, abandon the mission that had been the center of his life. What could he do to bring Sara back to him?

It would be easy enough to get Mrs. Kent's evil virgin house closed; it was almost time for that anyhow. Nor would it be difficult to save the railway and its unlucky investors.

Those things were simple. The heart of the problem was Weldon. Peregrine had sworn to kill him with his own hands, but if he was to win Sara back, he would have to forgo that pleasure.

Weldon versus Sara. Death versus life. To a disinterested person, it might sound like an easy choice, but it was not. The thought of retribution was all that had sustained young Michael Connery when Charles Weldon was flaying the flesh from his back. To block out Weldon's violations, Michael had imagined a thousand slow, excruciating ways to kill his tormentor.

Over the years, the dream of vengeance had sustained Peregrine through every kind of danger; deserts that baked the marrow from the bones, hunger and disease, savage attacks, and thirst so tormenting it was madness. No matter how dark his situation, he had never despaired, for he knew he could not die before he had fulfilled his mission.

Peregrine had come to realize that, while he could kill a man in hot blood, he was not capable of deliberate, cold-blooded torture, not even of Weldon. At least, he could not perform physical torture. Thus had been born the idea of mental torture, of stripping away everything Weldon valued. It was a more sophisticated revenge than the bloody dreams of young Michael Connery, and it had been deeply satisfying to plan how to ruin Weldon's life before the final reckoning.

Only now, when his mission was half-completed, could he see the limitations of vengeance.

With a shuddering breath, he lifted his head from his hands and sat back on his heels. Scooping up another handful of earth, he crumbled it in his fist, then let the dry soil drift through his fingers. Vengeance was like dust in the wind, ultimately worthless, for the past could never be changed.

Admittedly there had been great pleasure in his campaign against Weldon. He had enjoyed taking away Sara, and the barony, and his enemy's fortune, and he had certainly delighted in Weldon's confusion and rage. But nothing that Weldon suffered in the present would save the child Michael from the savagery he had endured, and Peregrine would never be able to hurt Weldon as much as he himself had been hurt. Now that he looked at his mission a new way, he saw that vengeance could never be fully satisfying.

Even Weldon's death would not heal the wounds of the past. Scars of the body would be with him until he died, and the only balm that might heal his spirit was Sara's love.

Wearily he stood and brushed the dust from his fingers. He still craved the feel of his enemy's blood on his hands, and he wondered if it would be possible to kill Weldon without Sara learning that her husband was responsible. After a moment's consideration, he shook his head. He would never be able to deceive the woman who had seen so much of his soul, and he doubted that it would be possible for them to build a future on a lie.

With stark regret he accepted that the pleasure of killing Weldon would come at too high a price if it meant losing Sara. He must put Weldon's fate in the uncertain hands of the law.

He could no more change what he had done since coming to England than he could change the months in Tripoli that had shattered his life. But he could change the present and the future, and perhaps Sara would give him credit for the positive things he had done. Granted, he had injured strangers as Sara had charged, but he had also helped some people as a consequence of his mission. Jenny Miller and Sara herself had benefited.

As he swung up on his horse, he prayed that his actions would persuade Sara to give him another chance. Otherwise the future stretched bleak and barren before him.

Back at Sulgrave, Peregrine immediately sought out Benjamin Slade, who was working in the room he had turned into an office. Without preliminaries, he said, "Benjamin, I want you to collect all the evidence we have on Charles Weldon and prepare to present it to a magistrate."

Startled, Slade pushed his chair back from his desk. "You are actually going to trust the law to punish him?"

"Yes," Peregrine said without elaboration. "I also want you to drop the lawsuits against the L & S Railway. Is it possible that Weldon will soon be in so much legal trouble that he will have to step out of the company?"

"I think that is a safe assumption." Slade leaned back in his chair, his eyes narrowing with thought. "What do you intend to do with the company? With some more capital and good management, it will be very successful. As the largest single shareholder, you can run it yourself if you want to."

Peregrine grimaced. "No thanks. Start thinking about who might have the skill and experience to run the company. I'm sure you can find someone worthy."

Slade gave a beatific smile, "You can't imagine how happy I am to help you make money rather than waste it."

Ignoring the comment, Peregrine said, "Tomorrow morning, I'm going to the London house for a few days. I think you should stay there, too, at least until Weldon is arrested."

"Fine," Slade said, starting to gather his papers. "Country peace and quiet are beginning to wear. But what about Lord Ross—will you just leave him here alone?"

"Ross will be well taken care of," Peregrine said. "And when he learns why I'm going to London, he'll wish me Godspeed."

It was pure luck that Weldon happened to see Sara's return to London. His usual route between home and office ran by Haddonfield House, and he was traveling to work when his eye was caught by a carriage pulled up in front of the duke's mansion. He leaned forward in his seat and peered out the window.

Lady Sara stood on the pavement, and the pieces of luggage beside her implied that she had come to stay with her father for a few days. Perhaps the two lovebirds had had a quarrel? Weldon sincerely hoped so. He was about to drop the curtain and lean back in his seat when another small figure climbed out of the carriage. He sucked his breath in with shock, then leaned forward again. Yes, by God, the second female was Jenny Miller, and she was acting as a lady's maid.

Then his carriage moved past the newcomers, and he could see no more. Weldon sat back and crossed his legs, thinking hard about what he had seen. Damnation, the little trollop had disappeared from Mrs. Kent's within a day or two of Peregrine's visit to the girl. Weldon hadn't made the connection before, but now he was willing to bet that the bastard had helped Jenny escape. He must have made the girl his mistress, then installed her as his own wife's maid after the marriage.

It was an impressive display of gall, the sort of thing Weldon had always enjoyed. He wondered if Sara knew her husband kept a mistress under her very nose. Probably not; she was too prudish to approve, much less join the other two in a bed.

Weldon began drumming his fingers on his knee. He couldn't touch Sara without running the risk of retribution against Eliza, but Jenny Miller was fair game. He had sworn that if he ever found the little slut again, he'd make her pay for running away. And now fate had given him a perfect chance to avenge himself on Jenny and strike a blow against Peregrine at the same time.

Instead of proceeding to his office, he gave orders to return home. There he summoned Jimmons, whom he had selected as a replacement for Kane. Unfortunately, while Jimmons was the best of the brothel guards, he was to Kane what a plow horse was to a thoroughbred. Still, he was strong and he obeyed orders.