The Light in the Darkness (3 page)

“She’s been trouble, I grant ye,” he said at last, choosing his words carefully, “but the girl’s like a daughter to me, sir. I promised my sister I’d take care of the child and I ’ave. I couldn’t let ’er just leave with a stranger, sir.”

A sudden grin broke over Grey’s impassive features. It was a disconcerting expression on his solemn face, reminding the innkeeper of a wolf. A ravenous wolf. “How much?”

“ ’Ow—much, sir?”

“I’m taking the girl with me,” Grey said. The grin
disappeared as suddenly as it had come, replaced by implacable determination. I know you’re not so attached to her as you pretend. What do you want in exchange?”

“I’d be losing a good pair of ’ands, sir. ‘Twould take a good sum of money to console me for the loss, if ye follow my meaning.” Blatant avarice gleamed in his eyes as he added, “What’re ye offering?”

Grey frowned. Few men, no matter how wealthy, carried more than a few coins with them, for money was scarce in Virginia. The true currency was tobacco. Transactions involving tobacco, however, necessarily took place on paper, due to the sheer impossibility of lugging thousand-pound hogsheads of tobacco around. Because Grey had left the O’Neills’ house expecting to do little more than quaff a few ales, he did not have a tobacco warehouse receipt or much else of value on his person to offer in exchange for the girl. Then his expression lightened. “Come outside,” he commanded.

The shorter man followed him into the darkness. He came to an abrupt halt when Grey put his hand on the arched neck of a magnificent black stallion. “The horse for the girl,” Grey said simply.

The man stared at the horse for a few minutes, speechless. The stallion was beautiful, a shade over sixteen hands, long legged and deep chested. It was a horse such as few men could afford. And, if it were to be sold, it would bring an incredible amount of money.

“Done,” he agreed.

Thus it was that Edward Greyson obtained a new wife for the price of one thoroughbred stallion. Had he been completely sober, he would have laughed at the idea of trading his best horse for a ragged girl. And later, in his sober moments, he would wish repeatedly that he could reverse the trade.

He was to find out that women cause far more trouble than do horses.

•  •  •

“You’re going to what?”

Grey’s expression was carefully neutral. “I’m going to be married” he repeated, adding with complete honesty, “I’ve finally found the perfect woman.”

His friend regarded him through narrowed yellow eyes. Few people knew Edward Greyson as well as did Kayne O’Neill. The two men had known each other for a decade. Kayne knew better than anyone, save perhaps Catherine Greyson, how Grey despised the thought of marriage.

Now, studying the younger man intently, Kayne was certain that he saw a gleam of amusement in Grey’s otherwise perfectly solemn eyes. Suspiciously, he asked, “Are you in love with her?”

The gleam vanished instantly, replaced first by indignation and then by a hard, shuttered expression. “Of course not,” Grey snapped.

Kayne nodded, watching the play of emotions on his friend’s face. Kayne was some twenty years older than Grey, yet he seemed younger. Peace and joy had left their marks on his face, just as grief and dissipation had marked Grey. Next to Grey, he was considered one of the most attractive men in the colony by the ladies of the upper class. It had long been a source of great despair among such ladies that Kayne was married—and worse yet, happily married.

The two men were seated in the study in Kayne’s house, Windward Plantation. It was a red brick dwelling in the Dutch style that had been popular some years before, gambrel roofed and with its brick laid in the sturdy and attractive Flemish bond pattern. It was not half so large and grand as Greyhaven, nor was Kayne’s land as extensive. Here along the Lynnhaven River in the southernmost part of Virginia, the colonists had settled early and relatively thickly. Tobacco, of course, was the lifeblood of the colony, but tobacco was a greedy master, destroying the soil rapidly and always demanding more. The planters along the James had on the whole more land, and were consequently more wealthy.

But what Windward Plantation lacked in elegance, it more than made up for in a comfortable atmosphere and a reputation for hospitality. Grey knew there were few people who would have been willing to put up with his surly presence for more than a week. Kayne had cheerfully tolerated him for three. All the O’Neills had been friendly, except the eldest son, Carey. Carey made it clear by his words and actions that he despised Grey and tolerated him only because he was a guest in their home. The two men had clashed for the first time seven years before, and over the years Grey had grown inured to the younger man’s dislike. He thought Carey an idiotic young pup and decidedly preferred Kayne’s company to his son’s.

Just now, however, Kayne was determined to find out what lay at the bottom of Grey’s unexpected declaration. “If you feel nothing for the lady,” he inquired, “then what is ‘perfect’ about her?”

“Everything.”

“Is she of good family? Is she beautiful?”

“She’s a tavern wench,” Grey said bluntly, delighting in the stunned expression that descended onto Kayne’s features, “and she’s louse ridden. And she is as far from beautiful as it is possible for a woman to be.”

At this astounding answer Kayne could find no words. For a long moment his mouth hung open, then he closed it with a snap. “A tavern wench? Have you lost your mind?”

“You’ve been wed so long you’ve forgotten what it’s like to be a wealthy unattached man,” Grey said. “You can’t recall, can you, how young ladies—girls, really—throw themselves at you, and try to trap you into compromising situations. Have you forgotten how mothers capture you in a corner and force you to listen to how clever their empty-headed little dears are, how talented they are—at playing the harpsichord, or useless needlework, or painting garish watercolors?” Grey scowled in a way that would have terrified most of the young maids he was describing in such uncomplimentary terms. “It wouldn’t be so bad if I truly believed they were intrigued by my charming
personality—but of course we both know I haven’t one. It doesn’t improve my opinion of women, I can tell you.”

“I grieve for you,” Kayne said dryly. He could almost have laughed at the disgusted expression on his friend’s face, had he not been so concerned by his actions. “I suppose that this young, er, lady you have pledged your hand to is not so superficial and vapid as the ladies of our own class?”

Grey shrugged. “I don’t doubt she would have been, had she been brought up properly. As it is, she knows nothing of money or luxuries. In fact, she knows little of anything. I have never seen a face so devoid of personality or self-respect.”

“Then why—”

“If I marry this pathetic little creature,” Grey explained, “I’ll never again have to deal with women weeping on my shoulder and begging me to marry them. True, they’ll still clamor for the privilege of being my mistress—but that nuisance can be borne.”

Kayne almost smiled at the younger man’s blatant misogyny, but he managed to keep his composure. He well knew how irritated Grey had been by the parade of simpering, eligible young women visiting Windward these past three weeks. But simple irritation was no reason for Grey to act so recklessly. It would surely ruin his life—and the girl’s as well. “Damn it, Grey,” he said, adopting the stern tone he used when his children were wayward, “that’s hardly fair to the girl. Do you think she’ll want to be shackled to a man who despises her for the rest of her life?”

Grey shrugged. “She’ll be better off. Her uncle beats her—every day, from the looks of it. And an ordinary is hardly a wholesome environment. No doubt she’s a doxy as well as a serving wench. She’ll be happier at Greyhaven.”

Kayne pushed a lock of silver-streaked red hair out of his eyes. He was becoming annoyed by the young man’s callousness, even though he had grown to expect such an attitude from his friend these last years. Furthermore, he was certain that there was more to this situation than Grey
was telling him. Possibly there was more to the situation than Grey was willing to admit, even to himself. “I don’t doubt you’ll get the French pox,” he said sharply. “And it will be no less than you deserve.”

“Good Lord, man, I have no intention of sharing a bed with her. Do you think I want a bedraggled, vermin-infested urchin cluttering up my bed?”

“Surely she is not so filthy that the dirt has become ingrained. At any rate, if you intend to marry her, bedding her is the accepted custom. But, Grey,” Kayne added, “think what you are committing yourself to. What if you ever fall in love with another woman? You’ll be trapped in this farce of a marriage.”

“I will never fall in love,” Grey stated flatly. There was a hard edge to his voice that said that this conversation was over, but Kayne ignored it.

“You can’t know that,” he persisted. “After all, you are only thirty—hardly in your dotage. Perhaps someday—”

“
Never,
” Grey said with absolute finality.

Inwardly, Grey knew Kayne was genuinely trying to help him see reason. Awakening this morning with a splitting headache, and contemplating his impossibly rash actions of the night before in the clear light that streamed in through the window, he had wondered if perhaps he had not gone entirely mad. He recalled the pitiful creature he had betrothed himself to, her thick lower-class accent, her greasy, stringy hair, her tattered, outgrown gown, and he had to suppress a shudder. His excesses had led him, not for the first time, into folly.

And yet he refused to go back on his word, for a number of reasons. The first was that his honor was at stake. He had already committed himself. No doubt the girl’s uncle would be willing to forget the bargain as long as Grey permitted him to keep the stallion, but his word was his word. Once given, he could not go back on it. The second reason was the amusing thought of how outraged Catherine would be. That timid, filthy, uneducated child would be the mistress of Greyhaven. It would be worth the cost of
his stallion just to see Catherine’s fury. After all, she had goaded him into this.

He recalled the expression of fear, buried far beneath the surface, he had seen in the wench’s eyes, but he suppressed the fleeting memory easily. He was certain that he was not motivated by pity. There was no room in his dark soul for such an emotion.

Annoyed by his friend’s criticisms, as well as by his own self-doubt, he caught up the cut-glass decanter of apple brandy sitting on the open mahogany desk and poured himself another glass. Kayne eyed him with open distaste. “That’s always your answer, isn’t it?”

Grey lifted a questioning black eyebrow in a characteristic gesture and gulped a mouthful of the brandy. “My answer to what?”

“To everything. Whenever you want to forget, you drink.” A moderate man by nature, Kayne could not approve of his friend’s excesses. “And you want to forget every minute of every day.”

Grey drank the rest of the brandy in a gulp and fixed the older man with an angry, almost savage look. “I can never forget,” he growled. “I don’t want to forget. Every minute of every day, I
remember—
”

He turned his head away and stared blindly at the wall. Kayne said gently, “Don’t you think it’s unfair to marry, feeling as you do? Perhaps it’s true that she’s unhappy in her current situation. But mightn’t she be just as unhappy, married to a man who despises her because she can’t be what he wants her to be?”

“Who I want her to be, you mean.”

“Perhaps,” Kayne agreed softly.

There was a silence in the room. Then Grey turned his head away from the wall and smiled at his friend. It was a genuinely warm smile, quite unlike his usual sardonic snarl, and it transformed his chiseled features to an astonishing degree. For a moment he looked like the contented young man Kayne had met ten years before, rather than the sullenly temperamental man he had become.

“I appreciate your concern,” he said quietly. “Truly I do. But I’ve already made the arrangements. I imagine the girl’s uncle has sold Tempest already.”

Kayne blinked. “Am I to understand that you traded your horse for the girl? Good Lord, Grey, your callousness astounds even me. I cannot believe—”

“Furthermore,” Grey went on calmly, ignoring his friend’s outburst, “the banns have already been posted. The matter is settled. I will be married in three weeks.”

At that moment the door to the study opened and a stunningly beautiful, ebony-haired woman entered. She crossed the chamber with quick, confident steps and stopped beside Kayne, placing a hand on his shoulder. He raised his hand to hers and squeezed it as though for support.

“Pray, gentlemen, do continue,” she said merrily. “I believe I must be hearing things, for I could swear that I just heard Grey state that he was going to be married.”

“You heard correctly,” Kayne said through clenched teeth.

“Good heavens. Judgment Day must be at hand.”

Grey grinned despite himself. Sapphira Carey O’Neill was still a beautiful woman, though she was over forty and had borne four children. Her midnight black hair was piled atop her head in a fashionable style, and the deep blue gown she wore showed clearly that her figure was still lovely. “It must be,” he agreed. “Good morning, Sapphira.”

“Practically afternoon,” she corrected. “But no matter. Tell me how you came to propose to some fortunate young lady—if indeed you are not jesting with me.” She smiled in his direction but her gorgeous blue eyes did not quite find him, for Sapphira was blind.

“I am not jesting. But I am not certain I want to explain the entire story again. Perhaps your husband will tell you about it.” Grey placed his glass back on the desk and stood up, bowing in her direction even though he knew she could not see him. There was something about Sapphira that impelled him to be gentlemanly in her presence. “If you will excuse me, I believe I will go for a ride.”

He strode from the room. Sapphira waited until the front door could be heard closing behind him, then squeezed her husband’s hand. “Kayne, is he really going to be wed?”

Kayne looked across the room at the fire, blazing to drive away the January cold. “Yes. In a manner of speaking.”