Island of the Swans (29 page)

“I loved you from the first, but I didn’t realize it, you see…” she murmured brokenly, as if explaining her deceitful conduct to herself. “You were my only hope of saving this place from Beven’s dissipation, but after a while, ’twas more than just the plantation… I wanted you here, with me, Thomas…
you
! I had fallen in love with you, damn you! I wanted to give you everything I had…”

Arabella faltered, silenced by the murderous look in Thomas’s eyes.

“I don’t believe anything you say… anything you’ve
ever
said…
Mistress Delaney
!” he raged.

Arabella took a step toward him and raised her hand beseechingly. Thomas stiffened.

“Stay where you are, or I swear by St. Giles, I’ll
kill
you!” he said between clenched teeth. He rummaged in one of the drawers and drew out a pouch of gold coins. “I’m taking the wages due me as overseer to buy my passage home,” he growled. “I’ll send back your steed when I get to Philadelphia, and I’ll post you whatever additional monies I may owe you from Scotland!”

He stormed up the stairs to the guest bedchamber, still clutching his letter to Jane. Within minutes, Arabella heard Thomas’s booted feet pound past the morning room and out to the front portico. The door slammed behind him. Soon the crunching sounds of his hurried strides faded on the gravel path leading around to the horse stalls at the rear of the mansion. In the dwindling light of the humid afternoon, a gray stallion bearing Thomas Fraser streaked past the windows at the side of the house and thundered down the rows of stately trees leading away from Antrim Hall.

“Your regiment sailed for Ireland, not Scotland, lad,” the grizzled dock master informed his visitor. The young lieutenant with the thin scar slashed across his cheek scanned the line of square-rigged ships tied up along the quay at Philadelphia’s waterfront.

“Seems the Paddies are givin’ old King Georgie worse problems than we are!” the dock master chortled. “You’re lucky, lad. In two days time, on August tenth, there’s a ship bound for Cork.” He stared curiously at the soldier’s woolen kilt, which, even allowing for the breezes wafting up the backside, looked deuced hot in the muggy weather. “Shouldn’t be too hard for you to get to Dublin from there. You should catch up to the other lads in due time.”

Thomas Fraser swore softly under his breath.

“Can you also do me the favor of telling me when the next ship bound for Leith or London would be leaving?” he inquired. “I have a letter to post.”

“The
Valiant’s
your best bet. She leaves for London on the noontide. You’ll have to hire someone to row you out, but you still have time to make it, if you hurry.”

Jane darted past the four central pillars supporting the canopied vaults of St. Giles Cathedral, pausing to catch her breath as she approached a small stone chapel on the far side of the enormous granite edifice. It, in turn, had been built on an earlier Roman church erected on the site. She glanced cursorily at the stone pulpit where Protestant reformer John Knox had railed at his flock some two hundred years earlier, urging all the ornate architectural evidence of Catholicism to be stripped from the church, leaving in its place a stark stone monument to Presbyterianism.

Dwindling shafts of amber sunlight filtered through the cobalt-colored stained glass, casting an azure sheen on the stone paving below. It almost gave the mammoth sanctuary the appearance of being underwater. Jane hurriedly entered the minuscule chapel and stood at the spot where ancient emblems picturing Protestant evangelists were carved in the floor.

“Good afternoon,” said a calm voice from the shadows. “I came as soon as the caddie brought your message. I must say, Jane dear, ’tis a rather strange spot for a secret assignation.”

Jane squinted in the murky light of the chilly October afternoon, trying to catch sight of the man all Edinburgh expected her to marry in seven days.

“Alexander?” she said uncertainly.

In response to her voice, the figure of the duke emerged from the dark corner of the chapel.

“Aye… and what might it be that occasions a rendezvous in such a dank place as this?” he teased, languidly approaching Jane, who stood rigidly near the arched stone entrance to the tiny chamber. “A romantic nook, to be sure, but hardly very comfortable.”

Jane remained rooted at the arched entrance, fidgeting with the lace handkerchief she always carried to hide her injured finger. Alexander kissed her gently on the cheek and then allowed his lips to stray casually to her ear.

“Odds fish, but you Presbyterians can be a gloomy lot,” he murmured. His breath felt warm against her skin, in contrast to the chill in the small room. “Hard benches, instead of the cushioned pews, as in the Anglican churches of my acquaintance. I should have liked to see this pile before John Knox ordered its renovation. The good Reverend would be thundering from that pulpit out there if he knew my unclean thoughts right now.”

Jane pulled away from Alexander’s embrace and continued to twist the lace handkerchief in her hands.

“I needed to talk to you privately and I could think of no other suitable place where we could be alone.”

“How unlike you to be so unimaginative,” Alexander replied, putting a palm under each of her elbows and drawing her close to him again. “I could think of one place in particular,” he added with a raffish grin. “’Tis about a mile down the High Street, near the castle walls. My coach is just outside and could whisk us there in a trice,” he teased, obviously referring to his own elegant lodgings. Without further words, he seized her shoulders and returned his lips to the sensitive spot he’d discovered, over recent weeks, just below her ear. “I admit I was startled to receive your request for a clandestine meeting,” he whispered, “but, now that I’m here, I find such an eager bride much to my liking…”

Jane was aware of Alexander’s rising ardor as he pressed her body tightly to his. She struggled to tilt her head back to look at him.

“Please, Alex,” she pleaded, pushing in vain against his chest. “I wanted to meet you here because I have something… something very difficult to tell you.”

The duke did not reply, but held her close to him for a moment before releasing her.

“What is it?” he asked quietly.

Jane avoided his piercing gaze and crossed the small chamber to the spot where Alexander had been lounging earlier. She turned around and faced him.

“There is no pleasant way to say this,” she began with effort. She raised her eyes and met his quizzical gaze. “I can’t marry you next week.”

“No? May I ask why?” Alexander said evenly, but Jane could tell he was reining in his temper and the welcoming smile had vanished from his lips.

“I was awake all last night trying to sort it out,” she said, pacing back and forth on her side of the tiny chapel. “I kept asking myself, what can I say? How can I explain…”

Jane’s voice faltered. She watched the duke’s lips harden into a straight line. A muscle in his cheek quivered with tension.

“Explain what?” he asked coolly.

Jane walked toward him and gazed earnestly into his face.

“’Tis too soon,” she said simply. “There is no other way I can express this feeling that’s been twisting my heart. I should never have let you… and Mama… and
everyone
, really, persuade me to do something I know could be disastrous for us all.”

Alexander quickly looked away from her and stared, blankly, unseeing, at the stained glass window above their heads. Jane seized his hand, pressing it urgently between hers.

“If we marry now, when those cords binding us to… others… have not been truly broken, neither of us will be happy,” she implored. The duke remained silent, and his gaze was fixed on the jewel-like window. “I’ve grown to care deeply for you, Alexander. ’Tis difficult to explain…” she continued apologetically. “’Tis just a sense I have that we’re proceeding too hastily, considering what we’ve each endured. We’ve only really
begun
to know each other, Alex. If we wait a while longer… say, another half a year or so… and you still wish to wed, then we would come together with a free heart, certain of our own happiness as husband and wife.”

“I want you as my wife
now,’’
Alexander said in a low voice. “It appears to me, Jane, that you are merely suffering from a common case of bridal vapors.” His tone had become clipped and formal, and Jane felt a chill run down her back as she listened. “I think you would have to admit that I have been more than patient with you on this subject. Thomas Fraser has been dead for more than a year now. You’ve had your time of mourning, though you weren’t even officially betrothed.” Alexander gave Jane a side-wise glance and continued to speak, his voice cracking with intensity. “Six weeks ago you agreed to become my wife. My family and yours are assembling from near and far, not for one, but
two
weddings in a week’s time, at your sister’s country manse and a repetition of our vows here in Edinburgh. I think ’tis time, Jane, you attended to the feelings of others as well as yourself,” he added stiffly.

“I am thinking of your feelings,” Jane interrupted, trying to keep the choking frustration out of her voice. “I’m thinking of us
both…
and of our families. What of the years of unhappiness that lie ahead for everyone if we marry merely to fill a void left by the people we loved and lost? ’Tis no good, Alex, unless we purge the ghosts that still torment us.”

“That’s not the way it is for me!” he retorted fiercely, his fists clenched by his side. “I’ve made my peace with Bathia’s death. ’Tis
you
who still longs for a ghost. Do you suppose I haven’t known ’tis
his
arms you think of when we embrace? That ’tis
his
lips you remember when I kiss you?”

Alex stepped a pace closer, boring in on her with his burning eyes. Jane met his glare with her own.

“That is
precisely
the reason I feel we should not be wed next Friday, Alex,” Jane replied.

Angrily, he grasped her shoulders, his voice low and slightly menacing, disguising his hurt.

“I warrant you shall soon recognize the difference between your ghost and your husband, lass!”

Savagely he covered her mouth with his, forcing open her lips to accept his tongue, which spoke with silent but frightening intensity. Jane stiffened, wanting to push him away, longing to retreat to the safety of Hyndford Close, wishing fervently she’d written him instead of daring to meet him here to tell him of her doubts. Finally, he released her mouth, only to press his lips to the hollow at the base of her throat. Jane felt the grip on her self-control starting to snap as Alexander probed her lips once again. Her mind had gone blank. Shudders began to pulse through her body in response to his skillful caress.

“Don’t
do
this!” she cried, shocked at her own unbidden reaction to his passionate embrace. “Don’t use my body to have your way. It’s so hard to keep it straight in my mind when you—”

“I love you, Jane!” he whispered fiercely. “I want you as my wife, though God knows every Gordon from here to John O’Groats has hinted I could aim higher. But
this
is my choice and no one—not even you—is going to prevent this marriage!” Alexander caught hold of Jane’s wrist and held it in a viselike grip. She stared at him, shocked at the ravaged look radiating from his hazel eyes. “I don’t think we shall wait a week to exorcise this ghost,” he said resolutely.

Before she could protest further, he was pulling her down the length of Preston Aisle and out through a side door of the immense cathedral. Jane struggled to break away, crying out as he squeezed her arm even tighter. He propelled the two of them out into the October air.

“Coachman! Over here!” Alexander barked as soon as they emerged.

Instantly, the driver snapped his reins, bringing the black enameled carriage with the stag’s head crest to the spot where Jane stood rigidly pressed against Alex’s side, his iron grasp holding her close. Without preamble, he thrust her inside the carriage and pulled the curtains closed. The two rode opposite each other without speaking as the coach rolled down the High Street. Jane was frightened by the way Alexander was now staring at her—coolly, as if deciding which of several methods he would employ to brand her as his property.