The Pirate and the Pagan (16 page)

She gave him a tiny kiss. “This week?” She gave him another tiny kiss. “Next week?” She kissed him again. “Sometime?” And again. “Never?”

“I swear I’ll run mad if you keep teasing me. Next week will be even busier than this one. Charles’s mother and sister are coming from France for a visit. They’ll be sailing into Portsmouth in a fortnight, so next week Charles and a lot of the court are coming first to Plymouth while he inspects his navy firsthand.”

“Will he go to war against Holland?” she asked.

He kissed her nose. “You ask too many questions. I’ll be away tonight. Will you come tomorrow night?”

She clung to him in the dimly lit privacy of the loose box, trying to control the restless devils inside her who fought and struggled for release. She wondered if all women in love were torn between two impulses. She longed to throw modesty to the winds and urge him to make love to her, and yet the thought kept intruding to be cool, aloof, utterly detached. Perhaps she should die rather than be the first to admit a thing so personal and intimate as love. “I don’t know if I will come or not,” she said with brutal honesty. “I know I should not, but if I cannot keep away from you, than I shall come.”

“Summer, by letting me set the pace, you are forcing me to act honorably toward you.” He ran a possessive hand down her back. “God’s flesh, ’tis the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do.”

“Act honorably?” she murmured, full of devilry.

He laughed. “Oh God, I want to be so dishonorable with you.”

“Mmmm,” she said, licking her lips over the thought. Her restless horse, tired of waiting, walked out of the stall without her and she pulled out of Ruark’s arms to follow him.

He whispered huskily, “I’ll come home early tomorrow night, and I’ll try my best not to act dishonorably.”

She wrinkled her nose. “Then perhaps I won’t come after all,” she teased unmercifully.

A
fter her morning ride Summer kept Ebony to crop the lawns and was thankful she wouldn’t need to water the vegetables today because the heavy morning fog had taken care of that chore.

Spider fashioned three wooden crates which looked as if they might hold paintings while Summer wrote a letter about the Brussels lace to Auntie Lil. She packed the lace lovingly, making good use of the oilskins, and Spider nailed the crates closed.

By eight o’clock he was on his way to Falmouth in the ponycart and Summer reckoned the lace should add another couple of thousand pounds to their savings. She carried water from the well and set it to boil for the washing, then as she scrubbed the linen her mind never left Ruark Helford.

All her time was running out and she knew he must make her his mistress soon if she was to obligate him with her debts. Once they had become intimate, she hoped he would be loving and generous enough to forgive her deceptions. She would have to choose very carefully the perfect moment when she would confess all.

He was going away again next week and heaven only knew when he would return once he was reunited with the King and court. So she decided she must make it happen. Tomorrow night he must make love to her!

When Spider returned, he had brought food from Falmouth. He unhitched the cart and set his pony to crop the lawns with Ebony. Over lunch he told her how smoothly it had gone when he carried the crates aboard himself and stowed them in the cargo hold. Lord Helford instructed Mr. Cully to deliver them to Lady Richwood when the ship docked in London and then, Spider said, the magistrate had ridden off to Plymouth, no doubt to condemn the poor bastards from Brittany who were imprisoned there, awaiting their sentence.

Later in the afternoon when Spider saddled the bay, she asked him where he was going. “When I checked the lobster traps this morning, they were empty, so I thought I’d ride up the Helford River and do a spot of fishing.”

She sighed with relief, for he was getting to an age where he wasn’t going to listen to a woman’s admonitions to be careful, not even his sister’s. When he hadn’t returned by dusk, she felt uneasy, then when it turned full dark, she could not dispel a nagging worry. When a knock came upon the front door, her heart plummeted. A shabby urchin handed her a scrap of paper. “Spider’s been taken,” he said breathlessly.

“You mean arrested?” she cried.

He nodded. “Excise men.”

She felt the blood drain from her face. She closed her eyes and grasped hold of the lintel. “Where have they taken him?”

The boy shook his head, so she looked at the paper on which were scrawled two words, “Falmouth jail.” “Aren’t you the Penrose boy from the tavern in Helston?”

He nodded, “They got my da’ an’ my brother, too,” he gasped.

She thanked him and gave him some coppers. “Run home to your mother, she’ll need a strong lad like you.”

She wondered if she might be able to bribe Spider’s way out and ran upstairs to get money from the cash box. Should she get dressed up, sweep in telling them she was Lady Summer St. Catherine, and demand his release? No, if she knew Spider, they hadn’t the faintest idea who he was, so it would be best to dress shabbily this first time and hope she could learn something.

She put on her gardening skirt and wrapped a shawl about her, then she rode the pony to Falmouth. She put the shawl over her head and had no trouble gaining access to the prison. She wasn’t the only woman hastening to the jail this night. All those who had been arrested for unlawful importation were housed in a common
cell and not a few of them stood at the bars talking to their anxious womenfolk. Her brother motioned her over quickly. “Don’t worry about me, Cat, I’m fine. The short, thickset man over there is Bulldog Brown … they’ve got me down as Spider Brown. We don’t come up before Helford for three weeks, so for Christ’s sake promise me you won’t let this spoil things for you. Don’t dare tell him or he’ll never wed you!”

“You can’t stay here for three weeks,” she protested.

“’Course I can. We’ll just sit here and eat our heads off.”

Penrose grinned at her. “I’m going to offer our jailers some cider from the pub to keep us in good stead.”

“You see?” demanded Spider. “A deep draft of local cider will have us lying in the gutter every night with our toes in the air, so stop worrying about me and get on with more important business.”

She nodded. She wouldn’t tell him she’d brought money as a bribe. She didn’t want to give him false hopes if it didn’t work. She turned to seek out an officer, but before she could leave, Spider had her firmly by the wrist. “Promise me you’ll pretend all is well when you see him.”

She bit her lip and whispered, “I promise.”

“Good girl. Now I have a really lousy job for you, Cat, but you’ve got to do it.” He looked at her anxiously. “That bastard Oswald who caught us shot the bay out from under me. I don’t think the swine killed him—he just left him there on the beach. You’ll have to go and finish him off, Cat.”

Her heart flooded with anguish. What sort of swine would leave a horse to die a slow agonizing death as its lifeblood seeped away? She felt for her money and hurried to the ward room. Fate was laughing at her this night. Sergeant Oswald sneered, saying, “Well, well, if it isn’t Helford’s whore. There’s no denying it this time. I caught them with the barrels. Which one are you connected with?”

“I came on behalf of Mrs. Penrose at the tavern. You have both her husband and her son,” she said quietly.

He leered down at her, his red face sweating. “I don’t think spreading your legs will do you any good this time.”

She couldn’t get away from him fast enough. She urged the pony into a fast trot, wishing Spider had ridden this surefooted little beast who knew the cliff paths so well and probably wouldn’t have been spotted in the dark.

Back home at Roseland she carefully loaded one of the pistols, put some fresh water into a bucket, and climbed down the cliff
path to the beach. Halfway down she spotted the bay lying on the shingle, his maimed body making a grotesque mound in the moonlight.

Summer prayed he was dead, but before she even got close she could hear him heaving. She knew he would be unable to eat— that’s why she hadn’t brought an apple or oats—but she knew with his lifeblood trickling from him, he would have an unbearable thirst.

She dug the bucket of water down into the sand beside his muzzle and with soft soothing words lifted his head to help him drink. He drained the bucket, his great sides heaving and quivering with the effort. “Good boy,” she whispered as she put the pistol behind his velvet ear and pulled the trigger.

It flashed and kicked in her hand, and if she hadn’t been kneeling, it would probably have knocked her off her feet. She sat quietly a long time to make sure he was dead, then when the eternal tide crept up to wash about his hooves, she arose and let the sea have him.

That night she didn’t sleep, of course. Her feelings were so intense she felt like screaming. If she could scream loudly enough, she felt that some of her tension might dissolve. She agonized over her brother, but at least she knew the Falmouth prison was no hellhole like the larger one in Plymouth. Finally she realized that Spider was right. The best way she could help him was to carry through her plans to secure her position with Ruark Helford and she had no more days or nights to waste.

Now that the moment had arrived, she was suddenly reluctant. She realized with dismay she was battling her conscience. Until now she hadn’t realized she had a conscience. What sort of person could deliberately and dishonestly use someone they cared about for financial gain? She lay quietly, weighing the alternatives. If she were the only one involved, she would have abandoned her dishonest plans. If she lost Roseland as a result, then so be it; but now that Spider was in such serious trouble, she knew she would have to carry on with the deception. She would use Ruark to help her brother, but she promised herself fervently that she would never cheat him. She would be faithful and generous and give back in full measure whatever he did for her.

    The warm fog the day before had been a prelude to the subtropical weather the gulf stream had brought this heavenly summer
day. In the afternoon Summer took a long bath and washed her hair, letting the sun dry it until it was a dark mass of silken curls. Then she opened her wardrobe and went over its contents.

She had only one gown left which Ruark hadn’t yet seen. It was a white, silk organdy with puffed sleeves, a low, heart-shaped neckline, and a skirt billowing with yards and yards of delicious organdy from the tiniest waist.

She put on lacy stockings and shift, blushing as she did so, for she knew before the night was over his eyes would see everything beneath the gown. Its waist was so nipped in, she found it difficult to breathe, or was it the thought of what was yet to come which made her so breathless?

By early evening none of the heat had left the day, so she didn’t bother with a cloak. She made sure the house was safely locked up, and since she hadn’t returned Ebony to the Helford stables the day before, she rode him back now, very slowly, so that she wouldn’t be disheveled when she arrived.

At the stables there were a half-dozen grooms and stableboys ready to help her dismount and care for Ebony. She smiled her thanks and walked slowly up to the hall. Mr. Burke met her at the front door and led her to the south wing, through tall French doors, out onto a terrace where a profusion of bougainvillea and other tropical blooms had turned it into a sheltered paradise.

Ruark had been sitting on the edge of a fountain until he saw her, then he arose and came forward eagerly. “Sweetheart, I was afraid you wouldn’t come.”

“I don’t believe you’ve ever been afraid in your life,” she said prettily, laughing up into his eyes.

He took both her hands, holding her at arm’s length to drink in her beauty, then he enfolded her in his arms for a moment of delicious possession. ’Ods blood, she
would
wear white tonight. It was like a symbol of her purity. He pushed away the thought with determination, for his mind was made up. He would wait no longer.

He stooped to pick an exotic, flame-colored hibiscus and offered it to her. She gazed up at him with unfathomable eyes. She knew tonight would be different. Before, he had always given her cream-colored roses. She reached out for the flaming hibiscus and Ruark knew that tonight she would come to him fully.

He was instantly conscious of the blood flowing hot and thick in his veins and of the heavy, unbearable ache which suddenly
flooded his loins. Keeping hold of her hand, he drew her to the fountain. Its centerpiece was a small dolphin carved from jade with the water spouting high from its mouth, then falling into a three-tiered waterfall. The pool was lined with jade green tile where the orange and black carp made a startling contrast.

“It’s like paradise,” she murmured, her eyes sweeping the flowering trees which enclosed the terrace. Yellow laburnum dangled its blossoms next to the mauve blooms of a glorious magnolia. Small flowering almond were backed by large masses of fuchsia-colored rhododendrons.

“I had it copied from an Ottoman palace in Algiers on the Mediterranean.”

Summer’s eyes widened. “There are so many things I don’t know about you.”