Edith Layton (17 page)

“I was a convict once. I’ll not chance putting my neck in a chain again unless I see no way to avoid it. And forget about asking; a female
never
sets foot on a ship unless she’s got a ticket of passage, is looking for bed work, or a pirate’s dragged her there. The manifest should give us a good idea who’s on board, even if they’ve given false names. A few coins to the officer in charge of the manifest will give us a better idea. Come along.”

But though the stolid clerk who checked the list of passengers for the
Mother’s Love
pocketed his coins fast enough, the only suspects he could offer were an elderly couple bound to see their son in the New World.

“I’ve seen them, sir,” he told Daffyd. “And if they’re not nearly a hundred years old apiece, I’m a blind man. The others are regular passengers. Sorry I can’t be of more help. Have you tried the
Sea Swallow
? She was set to leave yesterday, but the captain had a bellyache.”

The
Sea Swallow
had a pair of newlyweds aboard, but they were the captain’s own son and daughter-in-law, and it was the captain’s head, not his belly that had ached too much after a night of celebration for him to leave on time. There was a lone female, but she was a middle-aged governess, off to New York to work for a noble family.

Trips to the offices of the
Doris
and the
Black Jack
line produced no results either. No redheaded young men, no young lovers, no woman with a lisp had sailed on the last two tides.

The ship’s offices weren’t close to each other, so Meg and Daffyd had a lot of walking and talking to do. By the time the sun moved westward into afternoon, Meg was footsore and dispirited. Any chance of catching the eloping couple seemed a fantasy.

“Maybe they went to Portsmouth,” she said sadly as she watched the
Wild Rose
out of the harbor, and saw the ship unfurl sails so she could fly away from England’s shores. “Or Penzance. I was so sure it was Plymouth. But maybe it was another port that began with a P. Maybe I was wrong again.”

“Or perhaps, ‘Poland’?” Daffyd asked quizzically. “No. Don‘t doubt yourself about that now. Plymouth it was. My cousins aren’t often wrong. And
my noble brother almost never is, though please don’t tell him I said that. Maybe we’ll catch them tomorrow. Three ships leave at first light, two more on the next tide. Let’s go to the inn, have a good dinner and a long night’s rest, and start again at dawn.”

“The inn?” Meg asked dully.

“The same one I’ve been telling all the pursers about if they want to get word to me. And it’s also where my family can find me if need be. I don’t just disappear into the ether, Meg; I always leave a trail for those who may have to follow. I’m a lone wolf, but a wise one. No man can ever be completely on his own. We’re stopping at the
Old Bucket
, which, in spite of its name, is said to be tolerable. They have fresh linens, soft beds, and serve the best fish pie in England. Come along,” he said, offering her his arm.

She looked up at him, the afternoon sun showing her eyes to be as clear as they were bleak. “It’s my last day.”

“On earth? I doubt it. Here in Plymouth?” His dark brows drew down in a frown. “Yes, I’d forgot. No matter, I’ve made arrangements. You’ll be on a carriage at first light, off to your governess’s cottage. Whatever happens, you’ll be safe. When I find them, I’ll get word to you.”

She shook her head. “No. I’ve decided. I won’t go. What’s the point?”

“The point,” he said patiently, “is your reputation.”

“My reputation,” she said hollowly, “is no longer
the point, or a point at all. Rosie’s been gone too long. I was supposed to watch over her. The baron and his wife won’t forgive me for their anxiety during these past weeks, my job was to prevent such things from happening. They’ll never give me a recommendation now, and I can’t find a decent position if my last employer won’t vouch for me. Even if you do find her, I’ll have overstayed my leave of absence.

“I won’t go back without her,” she said firmly, holding up her chin. “So I’ll stay and see it through. At any rate, after all this time, it would be too painful not knowing for even more days and nights.”

“You’ll go, because something may be salvaged from this yet.”

“No,” she said. “I won’t.”

“Good,” he said. “We’ll have nice lively conversation at dinner tonight. And then, you’re going,” he added, as he offered his arm again.

“No,” she said and stood, stubbornly staring at him. “The aunts will take me in no matter what, and so it doesn’t matter if I go to them a few days later.”

“Look,” he said in exasperation, but didn’t get a chance to say more.

“Mister? Mister Daffyd?” a young voice asked.

They looked down to see an earnest young boy, cap in hand, staring up at Daffyd.

“Aye,” Daffyd said.

“Well, sir, my father, Mr. Greaves, of the
Black Jack
shipping line? Where you was earlier today, and
I saw you? After you left, I said something and my father had a thought, and he asked some questions. He said I’d find you and the lady here on the dock by the
Wild Rose
, and he gave me this note for you. He said he’d be glad to discuss it with you tomorrow, but as his office is closed now and his dinner’s a-waiting, he sent this to you now.”

Daffyd took a coin from his pocket and gave it to the boy, who bowed, handed over the note, and smiling, raced away.

Daffyd read the note, and his dark brows slammed down. “Damn, damn, damn,” he muttered when he was done.

Meg’s hands grew cold. “What?” she asked, not really wanting to hear. She was afraid of whatever had upset him.

He handed her the note:

My dear Sir,
it said, on elegant embossed Black Jack Shipping Lines letterhead.

Meg put the note down. Her eyes were dry, and they hurt. She was too upset for tears, and too numbed to speak. She could only stare out to the wide sea and watch the fading ripples of the wake the last ship left behind, and feel her heart grow cold.

“Damn, damn, damn,” she whispered.

T
he
Old Bucket
was a clean, nicely furnished, and well-run inn. It was close to the sea, but far enough away for the pervasive sounds and smells of the docks to be muted. Meg only nodded when asked if her large, airy room suited. She looked at it, dull-eyed, and then went silently in to wash and change for dinner.

The private dining room she joined Daffyd in was snug and cheery. He rose to greet her. He’d changed his clothing, and now wore sober evening dress. His hair was damp and freshly brushed, he’d patted spicy scented toilet water on his freshly shaven face. He looked the perfect gentleman of means.

Meg took her seat quietly. She was gowned in lilac
and wore a lilac ribbon in her soft curls. Her whole demeanor was tragic and funereal. Daffyd ordered dinner, hoping the fare at the
Old Bucket
would lift her spirits. Food, he’d discovered, usually did.

The fish pie was excellent, but he realized it wasn’t to everyone’s taste, and understood when she left it untouched. The claret was full bodied, the canary wine light as springtime, the ale was fresh and clean tasting. She only wet her lips with wine, and stared down at her plate.

The soup was thick and delicious. The beef was tender and the fowl fragrant. The ham was juicy and the meat pie savory. The lobster was buttery and the tiny prawns were sauced delicately. Meg didn’t eat anything; she only tasted, and that only at Daffyd’s repeated insistence.

When she didn’t so much as touch a spoon to the plum tart at dessert, even after Daffyd made a show of pouring fresh cream over it, taking a bite and sighing with bliss, he became genuinely alarmed.

“Are you sickening?” he asked.

“I just don’t feel like eating,” she said.

He drummed his fingers on the table. “So they’ve done it,” he said. “Don’t think that doesn’t stick in my craw, too. Still, done’s done, and they got away with it. It’s over. We’re not swimming after them. The baron will have a fit when he finds out. But when he calms down he’ll realize that at least she’s with the man he picked to be her husband. His wife, and the lad’s parents, will rail and grouse and blame each
other. Then they’ll have time to think on it. A lot of time. Absence and worry about the pairs’ welfare will make their hearts grow fonder.

“I’d bet they’ll even congratulate the couple on their cleverness—in time,” he added, “and with a grandchild or two. Maybe the runaways will make a success in the New World. Maybe they’ll come home with their tails tucked under. Either way, they’ll be forgiven, depend on it.”

At last, Meg raised her gaze from her plate. Her eyes were bleak. “Yes, of course, after all,” she added bitterly, “there’s Rosie’s splendidly informative note to absolve me, isn’t there?

“‘Dear Meg,’”
she read, taking the crumpled note from her pocket.

She crumpled the note in her fist again. “I thought I’d taught her to restrain herself with those exclamation points,” she murmured. “Her note makes me seem like an accomplice, but yes, if she ever writes
more, the baron and his wife may forgive me, in time. I don’t have that time. I’m going back to my aunts’ tomorrow,” she said briskly. “It makes no sense for me to hide at my dear old governess’s cottage now. I never was comfortable making her party to a lie, and there’s no reason for it now.”

She gave him a wobbly little smile that never reached her eyes. “And as you say, in time I might get my recommendation from the baron, and who knows? I may find an excellent position again.”

He leaned forward, his expression serious. “Bedamned to that! No ‘in time’ about it, your time is now. You’ll come with me tomorrow. We’ll go to my friend and benefactor, the earl of Egremont’s, in London. He was a convict, too, but he was never guilty. That’s been proved. He’s got money and position, and is the most decent man I ever knew. He has decent friends now, too. I know his son Christian does. For that matter, so does my adopted brother Amyas. They’ll be sympathetic. We’ll get you placed in a good position with good people, so there’s no need for you to throw yourself on your aunts’ charity.”

Now he could see how her eyes glittered as her head came up. He never realized such a piquant face could look so murderous. “And there’s no need to throw myself on your charity either!” she said through clenched teeth. “You seem to have forgotten: I traveled the length of England with you, alone. It’s not just you—the point is that I traveled alone, with a male, for days and nights on end. I’ll not get a
good thought from any decent person, and it would be wrong of you to ask the earl for a recommendation saying I’m responsible and moral,
especially
if he’s a good man.

“Why,
I
wouldn’t believe I was in any way innocent if I didn’t know me,” she said angrily. “Because even if I did end with my honor intact, there’s not a sane person who’d believe it. I scarcely do myself! And what’s ‘honor’? It’s only that I emerged…intact,” she said, her cheeks growing red as the untouched claret in the glass in front of her. “And only we know it. Besides, that wouldn’t be my idea of honor, I can tell you!”

She sat back, bitterly triumphant.

“That kind of honor works for most men,” Daffyd said dryly. “It always has, so don’t belittle it. Proof of virginity goes for lot on the open market, in marriage…or otherwise. I won’t go into that. But let me tell you it cost me enough to keep you that way, and that’s no lie.

“Now,” he said as she gaped at him, “if you don’t want to apply to the earl, and I’ll bet you will after you meet him, we can ask my brothers. If you don’t think they can do enough, I could…” He hesitated. “…apply to my mother. I failed her by not stopping the runaways. It should please her to do me a favor, even so.”

He frowned. “Whatever her reasons, she can do it. She’ll find someone highly placed to give you a recommendation. She has no reputation, but it don’t matter,” he said, his accent becoming rough. “She’s
got enough money and social standing to ask favors of the Pope. I’ll bet she could blackmail anyone in England. But first, we go to London, and the earl.”

“No. I’m going home.”

“Afraid I’ll be proved right? Poor spirited of you,” Daffyd said with a nasty smile. “I thought you had more bottom.”

She paused, thinking of what to retort.

Daffyd took the opportunity to taunt her again. “Easy to hop on a coach and hie back to your aunts. Nothing simpler: ‘I sinned, take me in,’” he mimicked in a high voice, putting his hands together prayerfully. “‘Poor me, doomed for eternity.’ Ha!” he went on in his usual tones. “Easy. Harder to face the unknown, ain’t it? After all, if you dared try something new you might find new insult. Or you could find a solution. That might be worse for you. Then you won’t be able to wallow in self-pity.” He leaned forward and stared at her, his eyes dark and angry. “I tell you, if I’d had your attitude I’d be a heap of moldering old bones in Newgate’s cellars now.”

She frowned.

He waited.

She put her spoon into her serving of plum tart, lifted it to her lips, chewed and swallowed. “It is good,” she said coolly. “Is there any of that meat pie left? It smelled wonderful.”

“It was, and there is,” he said.

She ate her dinner. He watched her, and sipped
wine. They never spoke about the next day. They didn’t have to. Daffyd had many faults, but they both knew he never gloated.

Daffyd couldn’t sleep, and that irked him. He was proud of his ability to sleep anywhere. He’d slept in places people were afraid to die in, he often bragged. But here, in a snug inn, in a wide, clean bed, with nothing but the soft, distant sound of the sea in his ears, he couldn’t even doze. He turned over. Again.

Sleep eluded him. Of course, he was annoyed because he’d failed, when he’d been so sure of success. He’d intended to present his mother with her runaway goddaughter, refuse all thanks or reward, then bowing, silently slip away. It would have been a delicious sour victory. He, who had been nothing to her but an inconvenience she’d gladly rid herself of, would have appeared from nowhere to help her, even though she’d never done anything but hurt him. There would have been a reverse sort of joy in it, the only joy he’d ever known from her. Yesterday’s outgoing tide had snatched that away.

If it were only that he’d have slept. He was used to disappointment. It wasn’t his mother’s reaction that kept him from finding a comfortable position in his bed. It was the look on Meg’s face that haunted him. She’d looked crushed. That little flower face of hers had been a portrait of sorrow. He’d seen females suffer, of course; both physically and mentally, and had
often been unable to help. He’d thought himself impervious to that sort of hurt. He wasn’t. That surprised him, and kept him wakeful.
Damn
, he thought, and turned over again.

He was trying to think of all the bad places he’d slept, trying to feel luxurious and grateful for where he was, when he heard a sound at his door. He sat up and reached beneath his pillow for the knife he always kept nearby. His pistol was on the table near the bed, and he was calculating how fast he could get to that, when he saw his door slowly opening. He hadn’t thought to bolt it! He silently cursed himself for his unusual lack of foresight. He’d been lulled into carelessness because the adventure was over, he’d had a bit of wine at dinner, too, and the inn had looked so safe. He damned himself for a fool, and tensed.

The door opened further.

“Daffyd?” a small scared voice whispered.

He jumped to his feet, strode to the door, and threw it wide.

Meg stood there in a long white nightshift, looking like a sleepwalking child suddenly wakened. She stared at him, wide-eyed.

“What is it?” he demanded in a rough whisper. “Someone in your room?”

She shook her head in denial, and kept staring. He noticed she was looking at the knife he held, and lowered his arm.

“So what is it?” he asked.

“Well,” she said. “I couldn’t sleep.”

He stared at her.

She looked down at her bare toes.

“You couldn’t sleep?” he asked in confusion. Did she want to sit and talk with him?

“Well, no, I couldn’t sleep at all,” she said. He saw the white fabric at her bosom rise as she took a deep breath, and blurted, “I couldn’t because it occurred to me that this is the last time we’ll ever be alone together, and as I have no reputation left, and am not likely to have much of a life left, at least not in the sense of free will and adventure, that I’d like to make love with you, if you’re still interested.”

He kept staring.

“I wouldn’t ask if you hadn’t always asked,” she said in a smaller voice. “I mean, I wouldn’t want to be presumptuous. How rude, after all, to ask someone to do something as intimate as that if they really didn’t care to, after all.”

“Come in,” he said.

She stepped inside and stood upright, looking about as seductive, he thought, as the carved wooden figurehead on the prow of a ship. No, he decided, he was wrong. At least the figureheads were usually half draped, and smiling. “Sit down,” he said.

She looked around for a chair.

“On the bed,” he said. “Saves time. I mean, why start at one end of a room if you intend to end up on the other?” He tried not to smile. But he hadn’t been so amused in a long time. He couldn’t read her expression clearly in the faint moonlight that came
through his window. But he could guess at it from how rigidly she held her shoulders, and then, how slowly she proceeded to his bed.

She climbed the short bed stair and settled herself on the edge of the bed, her legs and feet pressed as close together as a schoolgirl’s on a stage.

He closed the door, bolted it, and came to sit beside her. “May I ask if attraction to me plays any part of this?”

“Of course. I wouldn’t be here otherwise.”

“That’s a relief. So, you’ve decided that you’ll never marry?”

“I didn’t say that,” she said. “Though it’s unlikely.”

“I see. And if you do, what do you plan to tell your future husband, if there is one, on your wedding night?”

“Well, he won’t believe that I’m not experienced after I traipsed halfway through England with you, will he?” she flashed back at him, showing sudden spirit. “And I expect anyone who knew me will have heard about that. He’d have to be an understanding sort if he married me, wouldn’t he?”

“You know,” Daffyd said quietly, as he just as slowly and quietly placed his arm around her shoulder, “you’re making more of this than need be.”

She flinched when he touched her, and then quickly recovered, relaxing, with effort.

“You’re not a titled lady or a famous courtesan,” he said in the same lazy, easy way. He brushed his hand across her flushed cheek. “Your name, if it’s
bruited at all, will be forgotten. If you stay away from your aunts and the village they live in, I doubt anyone will even remember it in a year or two. Did you ever consider that?

“Not that I’m trying to dissuade you, of course,” he added conscientiously. “I like your decision. Very flattering to be told you’re desired because you’re someone’s last chance at having sex on this earth. But I’ve been told that before,” he added thoughtfully. “And I’ve obliged just for that reason, too. So I’m used to it,” he said, frowning as he remembered how true that was.

“Then you understand, I thought you would,” she said sadly. “Maybe you’re right, maybe they won’t remember me and what I did.” She turned her head to look him in the eyes and told him the absolute truth that had driven her from her bed to this place. “But I’ll remember. And I want to remember you.”

That took his breath away. All amusement fled, all sad memories, too. “I see,” was all he could say as he looked into her eyes. They were wide, and serious.

He’d been playing with her. He’d intended to send her back to her room after a kiss. It was late and she’d been crushed, and she wasn’t used to adventure or failure. But lovemaking wasn’t the answer for her, at least, not for the moral and upright Miss Shaw. He knew the consequences of lovemaking, even if she didn’t. But he was after all, only human. He reacted. He lowered his head to hers, and kissed her.