Island of the Swans (51 page)

The door to Arabella’s brother’s bedchamber stood open a few inches. Its bareness assured Thomas that Beven O’Brien had apparently sobered up long enough to volunteer for the Maryland militia. He paused at Arabella’s door, listening intently. He could hear nothing. Carefully, he lifted the latch, but, despite his efforts to open the door noiselessly, it creaked loudly on its rusty hinges.

“Mehitabel? What is it?” Arabella’s husky voice cried out. “Don’t tell me that mare’s come up with the colic
again
!”

“Why no,
Mrs.
Boyd,” Thomas said into the darkness. “’Tis merely His Majesty’s troops, come to pay a call.”

There was enough moonlight flooding the room for him to see Arabella sit bolt upright in her high, four-poster bed.

“Not
again
!” she moaned. “Who goes there?” she said boldly, though Thomas detected a slight tremor in her voice. “How dare you enter my boudoir!”

The silvery light pouring through the window glinted off the barrel of an unwieldy pistol Arabella had snatched from beneath her pillow and held in her shaking hand.

“’Tisn’t it just what you always
wanted
of me, Mrs. Boyd?” Thomas said sardonically, advancing toward the bed. “Free access to your boudoir?”

“Who
are
you?” Arabella demanded, shrinking to the far side of the bed. “Get out at once or I’ll pull the trigger!”

“Now, is that any way to treat a former guest at Antrim Hall?” he said softly, resting his boot on the mahogany bed frame and leaning an elbow on his knee. “Perhaps I should reintroduce myself. Former Lieutenant—now Captain—Thomas Fraser of Struy, Scotland, mum, come to pay my humble respects.”

“Thomas Fra—? What are
you
doing here?” Arabella shrieked, plainly shocked by his sudden reappearance. She relaxed her hunched shoulders, and the bedlinen slipped to her waist, revealing ample breasts outlined beneath her cambric nightdress.

“I’m here to renew an old acquaintance,” Thomas said pleasantly, “and to request a favor.”

“Thomas, stop talking in riddles,” Arabella said nervously, lowering the pistol onto the pillow by her side. “I certainly never thought to see
you
again, after what happened.”

Her sheepish words trailed off and she stared at him uncertainly. Embarrassed, she fumbled for a flint to light the candle standing in a pewter holder beside her bed.

As she reached toward the bedside table, Thomas grabbed her hand and held it in a viselike grip. Her face was illuminated by a shaft of moonlight and a flicker of fear flared in the blue depths of her eyes. After a long moment, he released her arm, taking the flint from her fingers and the gun from its perch on her pillow. He tucked the pistol into his belt.

Arabella shifted uncomfortably under Thomas’s steady gaze as he ignited the candle. Her former guest sat down casually on the mattress. His eyes wandered leisurely over her form clad in the filmy nightdress while she stared at him from a mountain of linen-covered pillows cushioning her back. The silence hung heavily between them.

“Just as comely as ever,” he commented, as if to himself. “Marriage to the Colonel seems to agree with you, even if it hasn’t brought you the prosperity you’d desired.”

In the ten years since he had stormed out of Antrim Hall, Arabella had aged in the way of women blessed with high cheekbones and trim figures: her face had held its striking contours, and her body had become only slightly fuller, hinting at a voluptuousness she might achieve in her early thirties. Her jet black hair was as glossy as ever, pulled back from her face and secured by a length of white satin ribbon, salvaged from better days. Although tiny lines fanned out from the corner of her distinctive eyes, their arresting gaze was still framed by long dark eyelashes that cast shadows on her cheeks in the mellow candlelight.

“Antrim Hall was
finally
starting to show a profit when this blasted war broke out,” she complained. Her voice was full of bravado, but her eyes watched him warily. “Mr. Boyd sold his own farm and the money was put to good use—under
my
management, I must say—after my dear brother Beven ran off with his Annapolis cronies to play soldier. But then Boyd, that old goat,
volunteered.
General Washington had to go and make him a Colonel, which cost us a pretty penny, I can tell you! Now, there’s no one but the oldest slaves left to pick the crops, and no way to get them to market safely, thanks to
you
lot.” She lifted her chin and flashed him an angry look. “You English are running all over the countryside, raiding our storehouses, killing whomever you please. No farmer’s safe from the Limeys
or
the Colonials! ’Tis disgusting!”

“I’m
not
English!” Thomas interrupted.

“English… Scottish… Continentals… what’s the difference?” she demanded petulantly. “You men merely
take
what pleases you and cloak your actions in fine sentiment and flowery words about liberty and sovereignty. I find the entire situation absurd!’

“Did you express your opinions to your dear husband, the Colonel, during his visit here last week?” Thomas asked calmly, nodding in the direction of a small porcelain miniature standing beside the candlestick.

It portrayed a slightly balding, heavyset man of middle years whose nose was too large for his face. Studying it, Thomas found himself discomfited by Arabella’s cynical assessment of the reasons why some thirty thousand men had fought and died in places such as Brandywine, Pennsylvania. Less than two weeks previously, on a dark September night, Thomas, personally, had supervised a military detail that had buried some five hundred bodies in Colonial soil. Those good men had gone to their graves without regard to their red or blue uniforms, soldiers from both armies forever entombed beneath the bloodstained battlefield near Chadd’s Ford.

“I told Colonel Boyd
exactly
how I felt about being left here, virtually unprotected, only a stone’s throw from the Baltimore-Philadelphia road!” Arabella said, bristling. Then she looked at Thomas sharply. “How, pray tell, did
you
know my husband came to Antrim Hall five days ago?” she demanded.

“’Tis part of my job to keep track of the movements of our enemy’s spies.”

“
Spies?
” Arabella sniffed. “Colonel Boyd, a
spy
? Don’t talk nonsense!”

“How well do you know your dear husband, Mrs. Boyd?” Thomas asked with mock politeness.

“Stop calling me Mrs. Boyd,” Arabella said irritably. “Then I shall have to call you Lieutenant… or Captain or whatever you said you were now,” she retorted with matching sarcasm.

“A mere Captain,” he replied, inclining his head with a derisive smile. “A Colonel’s Commission is beyond my means, I’m afraid.”

“Ah… so the baronet’s daughter is a bit stingy with the purse strings, is she?” Arabella said with a flash of malice. When Thomas remained silent, she continued with a brittle smile. “Actually, the Colonel and I hadn’t conversed much when we decided upon… rather… ah… hasty nuptials. War had just been declared when I discovered I was… how shall I put it delicately? I was, as they say,
breeding.
”

She shot him a challenging look, veiled by something in her eyes he couldn’t quite discern.

“Ah… so you are a mother now, as well…” he said.

“No, I lost the baby,” she replied shortly. “The entire exercise snared me a reluctant husband. Of course, he’s more than delighted to be called the Laird of Antrim Hall and strut around behind General Washington, dealing in tittle-tattle, just as you do! Meanwhile, I’ve been trying to keep this place afloat—and I was doing just
that
—that is, until the damned
British
headed south!”

She glanced over at a small, round table near the window on which rested a square cut-glass decanter and several glasses.

“Would you like a whiskey?” she said abruptly. “I’m thirsty.”

Without waiting for his reply, she slid out of her four-poster and quickly donned a dressing gown that lay on one of two chairs positioned next to her private liquor supply.

“You don’t approve of the war, I take it?” Thomas asked. The kernel of a plan began to unfold in his mind as he watched her pour out the amber-colored spirits.

“I don’t approve of anything that makes my job harder!” she retorted, handing him a glass and indicating he should be seated in one of the two chairs facing each other across the Chippendale table. “I think your fat English king should mind his own business, and I think those hotheads in Philadelphia should mind theirs!”

“You
are
a cynic,” he commented, sipping his drink. “And a very beautiful one, at that.”

He stared boldly at the top of her nightdress where a button had become dislodged, revealing a patch of her lovely rounded bosom. Feeling his eyes on her, Arabella set down her glass on the table with a clunk.

“I think you should leave now,” she said in a low voice. “I’m sure by now your men have stolen every last rasher of bacon and every bushel of grain I have, so you might as well go.”

“I will see that they leave us enough for breakfast, my dear Arabella,” he said softly, relishing the prospect of capturing such prey. “And enough for supper, and dinner and breakfast again.”

“W-what are you talking about?” she stammered, glancing nervously out the window, which faced the rose garden below.

“You see before you a man as weary of war as yourself,” he replied, his eyes boring into hers. “I merely long for a brief respite, enjoying the civilized company of an old friend.”

“
Friend!
” she countered sharply. “You don’t regard
me
as a friend. I was bold enough to ask you to marry me, once, and to share Antrim Hall, but that wasn’t good enough for you!” She waited for Thomas to respond. Goaded by his continuing silence, Arabella lowered her eyes and added, “You’ll always hate me because I didn’t send your letter to your precious Jane Maxwell! Do you still hold her in such high regard after ten years of close proximity?”

Thomas felt his gorge rise, but he fought to keep his temper.

“We never married,” he replied evenly, draining the rest of his whiskey in one gulp.

“Ah…” Arabella said with a note of rancor. “The great love of your life didn’t have the grace to wait for you?”

“That’s right,” he said shortly, setting his glass next to the near-empty decanter. “She didn’t. She married a duke instead. That’s why I’m back in service to His Royal Majesty… and why I’m mighty sick of the entire business.” He reached across the table to grasp her hand and lifted it quickly to his lips before she could withdraw it. “So soft…” he murmured against the back of her fingers. He was surprised, despite his calculated gesture, to feel himself genuinely aroused by her proximity and the faint scent of jasmine rising to his nostrils.

It had been more than a year since he had lain with anyone but whores. What’s more, the plan that was slowly evolving in his mind had increasing appeal: dish out to Arabella a sample of what she’d served up to him a decade earlier and, in the process, perhaps gain some important intelligence as to when General Washington would move on Philadelphia.

“My dear Arabella,” he said, ignoring her puzzled frown as he released her hand, “I’ve disturbed your sleep long enough. I must excuse myself. I want to be sure that my men do not strip your stores of more than they need to spur them on their journey back to Germantown.”

Her startled look told him his strategic retreat was precisely the correct maneuver to bend her to his will.

“And… you?” she inquired uncertainly, like a wallflower whose favors remain unclaimed at a ball.

“I shall avail myself of the bed in my old sickroom, if I may,” he said lightly, “and look forward to joining you on the morrow for some of that bacon. I haven’t had a bite of anything decent to eat in a month. And I relish the thought of a hot bath and a day’s holiday.” He picked up the candlestick and held it above his head until Arabella slid back into bed. Then he blew it out. “Good night, Arabella,” he said into the semidarkness.

“G-good night, Thomas,” she replied hesitantly.

He was nearly to the door when she spoke again.

“Thomas?”

“What?”

“’Twas very bad of me not to post your letters as I promised. You left so quickly that day… I couldn’t tell you how ashamed I was to have done such a thing.

Thomas stared at the shaft of moonlight pouring through her bedchamber’s window.

“’Twas a long time ago,” he managed to say, perplexed by an onslaught of contrary emotions.

“I pray such childish actions played no role in your not marrying—”

“Don’t speak of it!” he interrupted harshly. “’Tis in the past!”

“Thomas…” she said softly. “I’m truly, truly sorry for what I did.”

Her abject apology sounded so unlike the tough little piece of baggage he’d always taken her for. Such meek words from the strong-willed plantation owner made him wonder. What was she up to? And who was about to set a trap for whom?

Two horses, one gray and one black, walked together across the little creek that flowed toward Antrim Hall.