The Least Likely Bride (22 page)

“Portia, allow me to introduce Lord Channing.” Phoebe stepped forward out of the turmoil of children. “Lord Chan-ning, Lady Decatur, Countess of Rothbury.”

Portia gave him a cold nod, her hand still on the dog’s head.

Godfrey’s bow was sketchy. He’d never seen a woman like this one. He knew, of course, of Rufus Decatur, Earl of Rothbury. A man with a checkered past. But he was still an aristocrat. What was he doing with such a travesty of a wife?

He turned to Phoebe. “I should make my farewells, Lady Granville, and leave you to your guests.”

“Oh, do you have to go so soon?” Phoebe murmured politely even as she gave him her hand.

“I have overstayed my welcome,” he responded, kissing her hand before bowing to Olivia. “Lady Olivia, I trust I may call upon you again?”

Olivia curtsied but made no reply. She could think of nothing to say that would prevent his return. Unless or until he made her a formal offer, she had no choice but to receive him.

Godfrey waited for her to answer him, and he waited in vain. He realized he was looking foolish, standing with his hand on the doorknob, and with a short nod he left the parlor.

“W
HAT AN UNPLEASANT MAN,
” Portia observed.

“Yes, isn’t he?” Olivia agreed readily. “He gives me the shivers.”

“He seems harmless enough,” Phoebe said, adding, “for a popinjay.”

“My father thinks he wants to pay court to me,” Olivia told Portia.

Portia went into a peal of laughter. “Then I can only commend his enterprise. He doesn’t know, of course, that you’re sworn to celibacy.”

Celibacy but not chastity!
The pirate’s lightly teasing words rang in Olivia’s mind, and idiotically she felt herself blush. She glanced at Phoebe, who wore her air of unwonted gravity again.

Portia caught the glance and her eyes narrowed. “I detect secrets.”

“Olivia has been adventuring,” Phoebe said in an undertone, mindful of the children.

“Oh, sounds interesting.” Portia examined Lady Granville’s rounded, serious countenance with a quizzically raised eyebrow. “You look as if you don’t approve, duckie.”

She cast an eye over at Olivia and saw her confusion and distress. “I think I’ve arrived just in time,” she observed, and turned to the children. “Luke, Toby, take Alex and Eve into the garden and give Juno a run.”

The two elder boys obliged cheerfully, and the three women were left in relative peace.

“Now …” Portia sat on the arm of a chair. “Let’s hear it.”

R
UFUS
D
ECATUR AND
C
ATO
were walking the length of the terrace, deep in conversation. The children, Juno, and the two Granville hounds exploded through the glass
doors from the parlor. Rufus paused to watch with a paternal eye as they chased across the terrace and into the trees.

“Luke … Toby … don’t leave the garden,” he called after them. “And don’t let Eve get into any trouble.” He got a wave in response and laughed slightly. “She’s a real tearaway, that one. Always hip deep in trouble. It seems to seek her out.”

“Takes after her mother,” Cato observed.

“You may have a point.”

The two men glanced through the open door into the parlor. The three women were sitting in a circle, heads together, so intent on their conversation they were oblivious of their audience.

“I wonder what they’re talking about,” Rufus murmured.

“Oh, domestic matters probably … teething babies, difficulties with servants, complicated embroidery stitches,” said Cato with a chuckle.

Rufus laughed at this absurdity. “The soldier, the poet, and the scholar. What a trio.”

“An inseparable trio,” Cato commented before resuming their earlier discussion. “So, there’s talk off the island as well as on it about a renewed attempt to get the king away.”

“Aye, the army’s full of rumor, but this one seems to have some teeth.”

“But no one has a name for whoever’s behind it.”

Rufus shook his head. “I hear only that he’s well respected, well connected, and something of a brigand. He’s talked about with the kind of awe people reserve for folk heroes. William Tell or Robin Hood.” He shrugged. There had been a time when he too had had such a reputation.

“But he’s on the island?”

“Some say yes, some say no. He’s a mystery.”

Cato nodded. “A mystery who can defeat even Giles Crampton’s network of informants. Well, we’ll just have to watch and wait. And keep the king under even closer observation. I’ve set a spy in place, Hammond’s equerry … Godfrey Channing. Have you met him?”

Rufus shook his head. “I know the name.”

“He seems to have a knack for keeping his eyes and ears open. And he’s good at interpreting the king’s moods. You know how His Majesty’s moods reflect what’s going on. When he’s cheerful and optimistic it tends to mean he’s got some plan a-brewing.”

“Aye,” Rufus agreed. “It’s not that he’s stupid, just that he considers it beneath his dignity to pretend. Is he still negotiating with the Scots, d’you think?”

“I’m certain of it. And Channing said that the king knew when the Scots crossed the Border, so information’s getting to him somehow. And there’s money coming from somewhere too. These damned pockets of rebellion across the country are being funded from somewhere … soldiers are being paid.”

“Paid soldiers fight with a damn sight more enthusiasm, and they don’t much care who the paymaster is or even what they’re fighting for,” Rufus observed. “While Parliament’s armies go unpaid and mutinous, the king’s supporters are fighting with full bellies and heavy pockets.”

Cato nodded. “Every time I think the end is in sight, it drifts away again.”

“We’ve a long way to go yet,” Rufus said wearily. “You’d think seven years of bloodshed would be enough, wouldn’t you?”

It was a rhetorical question.

A
NTHONY SURVEYED THE BOOTY
from the cave, piled high in
Wind Dancer
’s hold. “What do you think Ellen would like, Adam?”

“Lace.”

“If I give her lace, she’ll only use it to make me more nightshirts.”

“They ’ave their uses. The lass looked right pretty in ’em,” Adam commented slyly.

“That’s as may be,” Anthony responded. “But to return to Ellen …”

“The silk’s too rich fer ’er tastes. She’d like a nice bolt of kersey or some such. She’s not one for folderols … O’ course, she’s not agin’ a drop o’ cognac or a nice flagon o’ that there madeira.”

“Well, that’s easily supplied. And a couple of bottles of burgundy too. Maybe she’d like one of the cashmere shawls. Keep the drafts out in winter.”

“Aye, mebbe so. You goin’ to visit now?”

“You’re coming too, I’m assuming.”

Adam looked pleased. “Wasn’t sure I was asked.”

“Oh, for God’s sake, man! When would I visit Ellen without you?”

Adam merely shrugged, gathered up the gifts for Ellen, and followed Anthony out of
Wind Dancer
’s hold.

The dinghy with two sailors at the oars knocked gently against the side of the ship. Anthony jumped down into the boat, reaching up to take Adam’s burdens. Adam followed with rather less agility.

The oarsmen pulled strongly towards the mouth of the chine. Beyond its mouth they hoisted the sail and kept close in to shore until they turned in to a shallow cove, running the boat up on a tiny sandy beach. The cliffs rose steeply on three sides, almost overhanging the beach so that it would be invisible from the clifftop.

Anthony picked up the gifts and stepped onto the beach, reaching forward to give Adam his hand as the older man hauled himself over the side of the boat and stepped gingerly over the rivulets onto dry land.

“We’ll be back ’ere tonight, master.” The sailors prepared to push the dinghy back into the water.

“Aye. But don’t look for us until well after nightfall.”

Adam huffed and puffed up the nearly invisible trail to the clifftop. They passed a watchman sitting, knees drawn up, gazing out to sea. Like his fellows stationed along the undercliff path, he carried a pipe that would give warning to
Wind Dancer
of any untoward visitors from land or sea.

“Morning, Ben.”

“Mornin’, sir.” The watchman offered a half salute. “Mike’s at the top wi’ the ponies.”

Anthony nodded and continued the climb. They would ride across the island to Yarmouth and from there sail across the Solent, past Hurst Castle on its spit of sand, and up the Keyhaven River. Ellen’s cottage was in the tiny hamlet of Keyhaven, and it was there that Anthony had grown up, tumbling in and out of boats almost as soon as he could walk, absorbing the seaman’s craft whenever Ellen released him from the learning that she insisted a gentleman’s son, even an illegitimate gentleman’s son, should acquire.

Smuggling was an active trade along the Hampshire coast as well as on the Isle of Wight, and Anthony had taken to the business as naturally as a duck to water. Within a year he had made enough money to buy his own small craft, and soon after, the men who had plied the trade for themselves in small and inefficient ways had joined forces with him, accepting his leadership. The acquisition of
Wind Dancer
had followed quickly, and the pirate had taken to the high seas in search of richer game.

As far as his father’s family were concerned, he did not exist. His mother’s family had never known of his birth. Anthony Caxton went his own way and took care of his own. Those who earned his friendship counted themselves
fortunate indeed. And by the same token, those who earned his enmity learned to regret it.

They reached the small harbor town of Yarmouth after an hour’s ride. The castle stood sentinel at the head of the River Yar facing Hurst Castle on the mainland spit, both fortified edifices guarding the entrance to the Solent. It was at the tip of Hurst spit where Anthony at the height of his smuggling operations had followed local custom and landed his contraband.

They left the ponies at the King Charles tavern and went down to the quay.

A grizzled fisherman was waiting for them in a small sailing dinghy moored at the quay. He jumped up as they approached. “Y’are in good time, sir.”

“I’d not keep you waiting, Jeb, if I can help.” Anthony smiled at the man who had first taught him to understand the tides and the dangers of the races for a sailor navigating the frequently treacherous waters of the Solent.

He stepped into the dinghy, shaking Jeb’s hand as the other climbed out onto the quay. Adam followed Anthony and took his place on the thwart. Jeb cast them off as Anthony hauled up the two sails, then took the tiller and turned the dinghy to catch the wind as she set sail for Hurst Castle and the Keyhaven River.

E
LLEN
L
EYLAND WAS WORKING
in her vegetable garden. She straightened from the asparagus bed she was weeding and mopped her damp brow just as the two men strolled into view around the bend in the narrow lane.

“Why, Anthony … Adam … what a lovely surprise.” She hurried down the path to open the gate. “I wasn’t expecting you. Do you have news, Anthony?”

“You think I only visit you when I have news?” he chided, bending to kiss her sun-browned cheek. “Am I so undutiful?”

“Oh, get along with you,” she said, giving him a little slap. “Adam, my dear, how goes it with you?”

“Well, I thankee, Ellen.” Adam beamed at her. Once, many years ago, they had shared a bed, when Adam had shared with her the parenting of Edward Caxton’s son.

Ellen had no time for the distinctions of social class, and in youth and robust middle age had taken both friends and lovers where she found them. But her interest in the hurly-burly of lovemaking had died in recent years, as her passion for the king’s cause had absorbed all her energies, both emotional and intellectual.

“Come in,” she said now, hurrying ahead of them up
the path. “I’ve just taken a batch of bannocks out of the oven. And there’s a fine chicken pie.”

“And cognac, madeira, and a good burgundy to go with it,” Anthony said, setting his leather flagons on the scrubbed pine table. He looked fondly around the small kitchen that had been the scene of so many of his childhood joys and troubles. As usual, it was spotless, the china plates arrayed on the Welsh dresser, the copper pots glowing on their hooks.

“I expect Adam will prefer ale. Fetch a jug from the back, will you, Anthony?”

Anthony took a jug from the dresser and went into the back scullery, where Ellen did her brewing.

Ellen busied herself putting food on the table. “Sit ye down, Adam.”

Adam pulled out the bench at the table and sat down with a little sigh of relief. It had been a long sail. The wind had been against them and they’d had to tack across the Solent.

“Here you are, old man.” Anthony grinned as he set the jug of ale in front of Adam. “You’re getting right creaky these days.”

“Now, you watch your tongue, young Anthony,” Ellen scolded. “And open that burgundy.”

Anthony laughed and did as he was told. They ate and drank with the companionable ease of people who had sat at table together over many years. On board
Wind Dancer,
Adam would not have considered it appropriate to eat with the master, but in this kitchen there were no social distinctions.

Ellen waited until they’d finished before broaching the subject uppermost in her mind. “So, Anthony, have you seen the king?”

“Aye, last even.” He rested his forearms on the now cleared table, tapping his fingers lightly on the surface. “I
managed to slip him the nitric acid so that he can cut through the window bars.”

Ellen nodded. The second time the king had tried to escape, no one had thought to check whether he could squeeze through the bars on his window. The bungled attempt had been a mortifying failure. On his third attempt, he had been given nitric acid to cut the bars, but so many people were part of the plan that all its details had inevitably come to the ears of Colonel Hammond.

This fourth attempt was being organized by a master. Anthony left nothing to chance. At Ellen’s behest he had been serving the king’s cause since the beginning of the war. He did what he did for Ellen and not for the king, for whom he had little regard. But Ellen’s loyalty to King Charles was all consuming, so for the last six years most of Anthony’s profits had gone to funding the Royalist armies, and now all the formidable skills he had acquired in planning his piracy and smuggling ventures were devoted to organizing the king’s escape to France.