A Rose in Splendor (52 page)

“Leave go!” Enan cried, shoving her away and scrambling onto the bank. Only then did he remember that she could not swim and had sunk beneath the surface again.

Wading back into the waist-high water, he reached in and grabbed the wrist of the figure floating just below the surface. “’Tis the last time I’m sav—!”

Fey suddenly broke water near the riverbank a few yards away, spewing water and curses in equal portions.

Enan’s rosy complexion turned ashen as he looked down at what he had drawn toward him. He almost released his unwanted catch, but a part of him told him he should not. When he looked up again, Fey had gained a slippery footing on the bank. “Get me Da!” he cried. “Hurry!”

Fey turned back, annoyed to be shouted at when she had already nearly drowned. “Get him yourself, ye fu—! Oh God!”

*

Deirdre turned about in surprise at the pelting footsteps on the stairwell. An instant later, Fey appeared on the second floor, streaming water from every part. “Ye must come! There’s a woman! A woman drowned! Enan’s fishing her out! Come!”

Deirdre hurried after Fey, a prickling of fear along her spine. Killian was not yet two hours gone and already there was trouble. What should she do? What was expected of her? She had not thought of the responsibilities Killian’s absence had placed on her, only the loneliness his going had brought her

When they reached the bridge, others were there before them. Colin stood in the reeds with Enan while his wife and companions stood behind. “What’s happened?” she called from the bridge.

“A poor bedeviled soul is drowned,” Colin called back.

“Do you know her?”

Colin shook his shaggy head. “Nae! And there’s not a man among us would forget if we had.”

A cold salt-tinged wind, blown miles inland from the shore, enveloped Deirdre. “I’m coming down.”

“Nae, m’lady. Ye won’t want to do that, I’m thinking,” Colin’s wife answered, and a murmur of assent from the others echoed her words.

Deirdre paused at the edge of the bridge. In truth, she did not want to look upon a drowned stranger, but it seemed the appropriate thing to do, the thing her father or Killian would do. What if the woman was known locally and inquiries were made about her? She should have a description of the hapless soul.

“Ye shouldn’t want a look, m’lady,” Colin cautioned when Deirdre stood beside him.

The upper half of the body was covered by Colin’s coat and Deirdre smiled at him in thanks. “I appreciate your concern, Colin, but as my husband is not here, it is my duty.”

Colin shook his head and reluctantly bent down. “One quick look and I pray ye’ll nae regret it,” he said and lifted the coat.

Deirdre did not scream. She could not. It was the face of her phantom. In a few short hours the water had bloated the face until it was nearly featureless. Yet, the ravages of disease clearly remained. A huge tumor had swollen one side of the woman’s head and begun eating away at her cheek, lips, and chin.

Deirdre whirled away, a hand to her mouth. The phantom had been real. “Send for the priest.”

“What priest would that be?” Colin’s wife asked cautiously.

“Do not play ignorant with me,” Deirdre snapped, her heart beginning to slow. She turned to Colin’s wife. “I
know there’s a priest about. He’s related to O’Donovan. He came to see me my first day here. Send someone for him immediately.”

“He won’t bury her,” Colin’s wife stated flatly.

“Why not?” Deirdre questioned.

“Because she’s drowned.”

“What possible difference could that make?”

“I saw her when they dragged her out. A lass like that, what man would have her?”

Deirdre understood. “You think she took her life?”

The woman nodded once. “’Tis a mortal sin, that.”

“But none of us know that,” Deirdre answered. “She might have slipped in the grass in the dark of night with none to see and none to hear her.”

“I slipped in just now,” Fey offered glumly, but when Deirdre turned to offer her a smile of thanks for her support, Fey looked away.

“Send for the priest. We will let him decide. Until then, wrap her in what you can find and have a man dig a grave in the old cemetery.”

“’Twas the French pox done that to her,” Deirdre heard Colin’s wife whisper to her son. “Ye want to be shy o’ that sort.”

Deirdre bit her lip to keep from shouting at the woman. The victim’s face had been distorted by a tumor. Her brothers had been fond of relating all the details of their visits to foreign places, both the beautiful and the gruesome. In Spain, they had seen whole communities where people with disfigurements of the body, tumors and diseases of every sort, gathered in hopes of miracle cures. The woman had been dying of such a disease.

She came to Liscarrol seeking my help
,
Deirdre thought with a shiver.
Why my help?

Had she killed herself when she was refused, or had she simply drowned because her legs were crippled and—

“The bairn!” Deirdre swung about suddenly. “Did you find the bairn?”

“What bairn, m’lady?”

“The woman had a child with her, a babe in arms.”

“How would ye be knowing that, m’lady?” Colin questioned in amazement.

“Because I saw her,” Deirdre blurted out before she could think better of it. The men exchanged glances and Colin’s wife moved back a step, crossing herself.

“Begging yer pardon for asking it, m’lady, but when would that have been?” Colin asked.

Stung by his open skepticism, Deirdre was about to reply when she realized how her answer might sound. The woman had drowned during the night. If Deirdre was the last to have seen her, she might become suspect or accused of mischief. Killian had told her she could not be too cautious or too careful. She might be a noble lady, but she was also Irish and Catholic. There were those who would use any excuse to get rid of her, she was certain.

“There was a bairn. I know it. Look down stream, half a mile if you must, but search. The bairn might have been saved.” She turned quickly and started up the slope to the bridge and no one said anything more.

Before she had crossed the bridge, a cry went up from one of the men and Deirdre turned to see a man in the reeds along the bank holding aloft a dirty ragged bundle.

“’Tis a bairn right enough!” he cried. “A lad it is! And alive!”

Deirdre retraced her steps hurriedly until she was staring at the pinched, ill-fed face of a fair-haired baby boy. She took him from the man, who was glad to be released of his burden. “I knew it!” she whispered, cradling the babe gently. “Poor wee lamb. You’ve come close to losing all this morning.” She turned to hold the child out for the others to see but they backed away from her, their faces averted. Deirdre turned angrily to Colin. “What is wrong? ’Tis only a babe.”

“’Tis a miracle,” Colin’s wife murmured and crossed herself, and many of the others followed suit.

Colin looked at the young woman with eyes as wide as a child’s. “How did ye know about the bairn?”

Deirdre looked into his bemused face. “Is it not enough that I did?”

He reddened and nodded. “Ah well, the lad thinks so! We’ll be sending for the priest then.”

Fey ran after Deirdre, too intrigued to keep up her resentment of MacShane’s wife. “How did you know?” she asked breathlessly.

Deirdre glanced at the girl and decided the truth was best. “I saw the woman last night in the stable yard. I thought she was a ghost. She was terribly disfigured. I wish now I had told Killian the truth. He might have found her and saved her life.”

Fey’s mouth went askew. “’Tis nae so good as the tale Enan’s ma will tell.” She smiled at Deirdre. “They think ye’ve the gift of the Sight, and ’twas that that saved the bairn.”

Deirdre shook her head. The very thought of it made her feel cold. “Foolish talk.”

“Is it?” Fey kicked at rock. “Brigid would nae say so.” She had Deirdre’s full attention now. “Ye did nae think of me listening that night Brigid fell down in a fit. Ye were too concerned with old pisspot to think of me in me bed sitting and watching. Brigid said ye had the Sight and the mark proved it. And here ye’ve found a bairn what should have drowned by all rights. Ye’ll nae be changing their minds.” She jerked her head back toward the river bank. “Only I’m nae so gullible as the rest.” With that, she turned away.

*

Pausing in his labor, Killian wiped the sweat from his brow. It was chill on the sea, the dusk painted with cold shades of purple and gray, yet perspiration squeezed from every pore with his exertions. He and O’Donovan would be working under cover of night, emptying the hold of the French smuggler into the numerous fishing smacks that were tied up alongside it like piglets suckling a sow.

“Ye must work for yer supper here, laddie!” O’Donovan called down jovially from his position on deck.

“Getting too old for it, are you?” Killian called back.

“I’ve done me share over the years, done me share,” O’Donovan answered. “Why do ye nae chuck yer shirt, MacShane? ’Twould be cooler.”

Killian looked up with a grin. “And have you steal it?”

As O’Donovan roared with laughter, Killian relaxed and went back to work. He bore certain scars that he showed to no man. Once he had been afraid of Deirdre’s reaction to the lash marks he bore. The first time they made love, in Nantes, it had been too dark for her to see him properly. But, the night they loved again in Paris, she had put him at ease.

“You’re a proud man,” she had said. “I’m not so surprised you bear scars as a result. ’Tis no shame in them, but I own I would kill those who did this to you.”

Killian smiled as he lifted another hogshead. Her kisses had seared his skin as surely as the lash had, and with them, he had felt absolved, freed, of the stigma of having been sold to the galleys.

“What’s got ye grinning like a man in his cups?” O’Donovan called down once more.

“The thought of all this lovely wine in my cellar,” Killian answered.

Four hours later, he sat at the captain’s table and surveyed his companions. Ventura, the captain, was not known to him. He looked past Ventura to the first mate and steward. His gaze moved on to O’Donovan, who had drunk enough brandy to float this tub, and then to Cuan O’Dineen, who watched them all in stony silence.

“There you are. Your cargo in trade for mine,” Ventura said as he handed the slate of inventory past Killian to O’Dineen. As Cuan reached for it, Killian clamped a hand over his wrist.

O’Donovan gave him a startled look from beneath his bushy red brows. “’Tis always Cuan who reads the cargo list.”

As O’Donovan’s eyes narrowed, Killian realized that the man was not nearly as drunk as he had appeared. Perhaps it was his way of watching without being watched. He released Cuan’s arm. “Let him read it, by all means.” He looked at Cuan. “Read it aloud.”

Cuan frowned over the slate a moment, then thrust it at
Killian. “Ye read it aloud. I’ve nae finished me brandy. And be sharp, MacShane. Ventura’s a man who loves money nae less than we.”

Killian glanced at the captain, expecting a smile of agreement, but the captain’s face was blank, as if he had been surprised by Cuan’s gesture. “With your permission?” Killian said, and Ventura nodded slowly.

Killian glanced at the list. It contained what he might have expected. Rum and molasses, bottles of brandy and French wines, silks and velvets were listed on the duchesse’s portion of the tablet. Irish butter, hides, wool, flannel homespun, and
slaucan
were listed on the Irish side. He read it again, to confirm that he had missed nothing, and then looked up. “It seems in order, but isn’t something missing?”

O’Donovan and the captain exchanged glances. “What, lad?” O’Donovan questioned through a huge yawn.

“We unloaded at least twice as many crates as there are listed here. And why aren’t the kegs of butter and hides we loaded listed?”

O’Donovan shrugged. “Prices vary from month to month so we added a bit to make up the difference. Ventura owed us a bit from his last cargo. Now we’re even again.”

Killian dropped the slate back on the table. Smuggling was too risky a business for even the most honest of men to be granted credit against goods owed. Ventura might sink, be caught, or give up the trade before he could deliver. Cash and barter were the only methods of payment.

He turned to gaze at the swarthy captain. “Does the duchesse know that you accept credit in her behalf?”

“Base-born bastard!” Ventura swore and stood up.

Killian accepted with equanimity the man’s baleful stare. He was much more interested in the sleight-of-hand going on between the first mate and the steward. He cocked his pistol under the table. “I would not do that,” he said softly, his gaze hard on the first mate’s face. “I will kill you and have a shot left over for your captain.”

O’Donovan wheeled about, glaring at the pistol the first mate had pulled. “Have ye completely run mad?” he roared. He tore free his sword from its scabbard and
brought the flat of the blade down across the man’s wrist. The man yelped in pain and the pistol fell to the floor where Cuan quickly scooped it up. “Get him out! Out afore I kill him!” O’Donovan roared. “Cuan, take the captain and crew up on deck till I’ve finished me meal.”

Shoving the captain and first mate before him, Cuan led the men out of the cabin.