Judith E French (18 page)

Anne laughed. “‘From his tongue flowed speech sweeter than honey,’” she quoted from Homer’s
Iliad
.

Leah nodded, answering with another line from the same source. “And for me, ‘Words like winter snowflakes.’ We are like stones grinding against each other, Anne. He does nay speak to me in the manner he does to ye.”

The maid turned her face discreetly toward the street. Anne had brought her along on their excursion two days earlier, and she’d explained to Leah that the girl was new to England and spoke only French. “This way she can’t repeat anything we say,” Anne had said. Leah had approved. The constant presence of servants during every waking hour of the day was an English custom she found oppressive—it was hard to find the privacy to speak with Brandon alone, or to perform the most basic bodily functions without a servant rushing forward to offer aid.

Anne squeezed Leah’s hand. “It will get better between you and Brandon,” she said. “He loves you.”

“So he says.”

“He does.” Anne made a dainty moue and leaned back. For an instant, her gray eyes clouded. “I know he does, Leah. He—oh, look, there’s Burlington House.”

Leah gazed in the direction Anne was pointing.

“See that carriage, the one with the white horses? That’s the Duchess of . . .”

Leah pretended to listen, and as the coach rolled on through the wide streets she found herself forgetting her bitter argument with Brandon and enjoying Anne’s lively description of the landmarks and the people.

“And there . . .” Anne motioned toward another mansion surrounded by an iron fence. The coachman slowed the horses to allow another coach to cross the intersection, and Leah stared at the high gates with a Scottish thistle worked into the iron. “There,” Anne continued, “is the home of my mother’s friend, the Earl of Dunnkell.”

Peacocks strolled across the lawn, and two large greyhounds were being led on a leash by a dark-skinned man in a turban and wide trousers gathered at the ankles. Two very tall blackamoors in red and white livery stood before the gate. Each man was taller than Brandon by a head, and each held a great unsheathed sword in his hand.

“The earl must be very rich,” Leah said.

“Not him, his wife. She’s much older than he is. But Lord Dunnkell’s very handsome. All the women at court are mad for him. Barbara—she’s my mother—included.” Anne lowered her voice. “It’s rumored they shared a torrid romance many years ago.” She laughed. “Of course, Barbara is linked with all handsome courtiers at one time or another.”

“And you, are you
mad
for him too?”

Anne shook her head. “No, not in that way. He has always gone out of his way to be kind to me. I’ve known him since I was a child. He gave me the strangest present once. It was—Oh, Leah, look there. In that coach coming toward us. Don’t let them see you looking. It’s Lady Dunnkell. She’s wearing a wig, of course, but they say her real hair is as white as wool—what there is of it.”

The other coach stopped before the iron gates, and Leah saw a thin, plain woman in an elegant gown descend the steps. One of the blackamoors threw open the gate, but Leah and Anne’s carriage turned another corner before Leah could get a better view of Lady Dunnkell.

They’d gone a short distance more when the coachman halted the horses again. “Sorry, Lady Brandon,” he called. “There’s an accident ahead. We’ll have to wait until the way’s cleared.”

A crowd gathered as wagons and coaches stopped, and tempers flared. Passersby began to jostle one another and Leah heard a woman cry out. “Thief! Stop that boy!”

A dirty-faced urchin dodged through the knot of people and ducked under a wagon. Leah saw him roll out the far side and dart into a side street. The woman continued to shout that she’d been robbed, but no one seemed to be paying much attention.

A gentleman on horseback passed by on the left. He nodded in Anne’s direction and reined in his mount. “Lady Scarbrough,” he called. “Bit of trouble?”

Anne smiled. “No trouble.” She glanced at Leah. “This is Lord Dunnkell. Lord Dunnkell, may I introduce my friend, Lady Brandon.”

He bowed slightly from the saddle, and for a heartbeat he studied Leah’s face keenly. Then he smiled, the heart-tugging smile of a man who genuinely liked women. “Lady Brandon, it is my pleasure.” His cultured voice was deep and burred with the echoes of Scotland.

Leah’s tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth. Her breath caught in her throat, and she could only nod and mumble something unintelligible. The hair is wrong, she thought, and his face is older, but . . . His eyes were as she remembered them.

What was Anne saying?

“. . . not seen you in the city for many months.”

“Aye, Lady Dunnkell has been in Italy for the winter, and I’ve been living rough in the Highlands. She vowed she’d cut off my allowance if I didn’t make it back in time for the season. I understand—”

“Pardon me, Lady Brandon,” the coachman called, “but the way’s open. We must move or hold up—”

“Drive on,” Leah ordered.

“I’ll see you at Barbara’s on Friday next, Lord Dunnkell,” Anne said as they pulled away. “Good day.”

Leah stared down at her hands and tried to keep from crying. That man, the one who called himself the Earl of Dunnkell, was her father, Cameron Stewart!

Leah’s afternoon was a torment of confused emotions. She saw nothing of the Theatre Royal on Drury Lane, comprehended little that Anne said to her. The bookshop full of volumes Leah had only dreamed of was a blur. Leah had picked up the first book she’d come to without looking at the title and allowed Brandan’s serving man to pay for it.

If Anne noted Leah’s withdrawal, she tactfully did not mention it. They continued on to a popular coffee house where the two women took refreshment in late afternoon, and then Anne ordered the coachman to drive her home.

“Thank you,” Leah said when they left Anne at her door. Anne nodded thoughtfully and said her good-byes.

Leah waited until Anne and her maid had entered the big house before giving a command to the coachman. “Take me back to the house of the Earl of Dunnkell,” she said.

“M’lady,” he protested. “I have my orders from Lord Brandon. I must—”

“Your orders were to protect me, nay to keep me from going where I wish,” she replied haughtily. “Lord Dunnkell’s house, at once.”

The coachman obeyed, and soon they were in front of the earl’s gate. Trembling, Leah clung to the inside of the door. She wanted to get out and go to the gate—to demand that the blackamoors with the swords open the way for her. She wanted to go to her father and tell him who she was, but her courage failed her.

Waves of nausea made her head spin. If she had recognized him, why hadn’t he known her? “Oh, Father,” she whispered. “Why?” Was it that he couldn’t acknowledge a copper-skinned daughter here among the
Englishmanake?

“Lady Brandon?” A footman stood by the window. “Did you wish to call upon Lord and Lady Dunnkell?”

“No,” she answered hoarsely. “No.”

“Are we to go home, then, m’lady?”

“Aye,” she conceded. “Home.”

When she was safely in her bedchamber at Wescott House, Leah dismissed the maids. She took a quill and ink and began to write.

The ink trailed across the page as the pen dropped from her numb fingers and teardrops fell to smear the words she had written. Weeping, she tore the letter into bits and burned them by candle flame.

 

At a tavern near Blackfriars Stairs, Charles took his leave of two men. “You failed me before,” he said sternly. “If you do so again, it will be the worse for you.”

“We’ll earn our silver,” the taller of the two answered. “Ye’ve no cause to complain about the way we did in the cook, do ye?”

His companion, a stocky man with bushy black eyebrows, nodded vigorously.

“No,” Charles admitted, “that was clean enough. The servants’ side door will be left open. Wear the livery I’ve provided, and make certain you’re not seen. And I want no one to find her body. I don’t care what you do with it—I just don’t want it recovered. Do I make myself clear?”

“I know my way around the ’ouse,” the spokesman replied. “’Ave ye forgot I worked there four months? Now where’s our coin?”

“You get nothing until the job’s finished.” Charles leaned close to the tall cloaked figure, trying to ignore his unwashed stench. “And remember, Giles, you’re to tell her that her husband hired you.”

“’Cause ’e didn’t want no red bastards.” Giles laughed, a sound like the rattle of dried beans. He stuck out a dirty hand. “’Alf now and ’alf when the deed’s done.”

Charles shook his head. “Nothing until she’s dead.”

The silent man gave a rumbling grunt and slid his hand to the hilt of a knife.

“Naw,” Giles said. “None of that, now, Ben. We know Sir Charles will be good fer it. We can trust ’is lordship to be fair and square with the likes of us.”

“Of course,” Charles replied smoothly. “A Wescott always pays his debts.”

He hurried from the noisy public room and got into a hired coach waiting by the door. Now he would go home and have a private discussion with his aunt. It was time she knew the truth about Brandon’s wife—at least his version of the truth. He settled back onto the hard seat and rapped on the roof to signal the driver.

A pity Leah wouldn’t know who had really ordered her death, he thought. But then, one couldn’t have everything. It was enough to pay the bitch back for the insult she’d offered him and to deprive Brandon of his heir in one blow.

Charles took a silver flask from the coach seat and unscrewed the cap. The liquor was sharp on his tongue, and he wiped his mouth with his ruffled sleeve. Giles and Ben would take their pleasure with the red-skinned slut before they slit her throat—he’d bet twenty crowns on it. He smiled and took another sip. Leah deserved whatever she got. He only regretted that his dear cousin Brandon couldn’t witness his wife’s butchering firsthand.

L
ater that evening, Charles escorted Brandon’s mother into the same coach Leah had used in the afternoon. He got into the seat beside Lady Kathryn and waited until the coach was moving before speaking. “I’m glad you accepted my invitation to the theater tonight. You’ve been shut up in Westover with Uncle Raymond for far too long. I fear for your own health, Aunt Kathryn.”

“It’s not been easy for me.” The Countess of Kentington was elegantly attired in a flowered wine Chinese silk over a paler wine silk hooped petticoat. Her open skirt bore lace at the edges, and over her shoulders she’d draped a silk-lined velvet cloak of deep navy. She sighed and fanned herself. “It’s so hot for May, dear, don’t you think?”

The carriage picked up speed as the coachman cracked his whip over the lead animal and the team broke into a stylish trot.

“They say the play is dreadful,” Lady Kathryn continued. “That awful actor . . .” She folded her ivory fan and tapped Charles’s arm with it. “What’s his name? The one with the pot belly? He’s far too old to be playing dashing young—”

Charles clasped her wrist impatiently. “There’s something of importance I must tell you.”

“Not Raymond?” she began in alarm. “You haven’t received—” Her fan tumbled to the floor.

“No, there’s no news from Westover. If there was, it would come for you, Aunt Kathryn.” Gritting his teeth, he retrieved her fan and forced himself to speak in a manner that sounded sincere. “I know I’ve not always lived up to your expectations, but—”

“Nonsense, Charles. You’ve been a second son to us. God knows Brandon hasn’t always been a prize. Running off to the wilderness and coming home with—What were you about to say?”

“Brandon told me that she is carrying his heir.”

Lady Kathryn sniffed. “Yes. He told me, too—this afternoon. I know I should be delighted, but . . .”

“She’s not fit to be Lady Brandon, or to take your place, aunt.”

“My feelings exactly, but Brandon will hear none of it. You know how he is. Nothing his father or I can say will persuade him to—”

Charles cut her off smoothly. “I’ve held my tongue to prevent a scandal, but when I heard Brandon proclaiming his excitement at her—” He cleared his throat loudly and drew himself up. “I’ve taken matters into my own hands, Aunt Kathryn. The truth is so sordid that I wanted to shelter you from—”

“I think you’d better tell me everything.” Her voice lost its fluttery tone and took on an edge of steel.

“I’ve given Leah money from my own accounts and booked passage for her on a ship bound for the Colonies sailing this very evening. It’s the reason I wanted you out of the house and why I took the liberty of giving most of the servants the night off.”

“Charles! Brandon will—”

“Once she’s gone, he’ll be able to think sensibly. The woman’s been . . .” He paused delicately. “To put it in common terms, she’s nothing more than a slut. She’s been cuckolding Brandon.”

Lady Kathryn gasped. “Who is the man?”

Charles laughed wryly. “Rather ask who hasn’t she shamed us with? I caught her with one of the grooms myself. I discharged him, naturally.”

Lady Kathryn gave a choked sound. “A groom? A servant? My son’s wife?”

“I’m afraid so.” He patted his aunt’s hand. “It’s in her nature, I’m sure. After all, she’s a red savage. Everyone knows they’re totally without morals. She made indecent advances to me once when we were riding, and when I rejected her coarse suggestions, she threatened to tell my cousin that I had accosted
her
.”

“I had no idea.”

“How could you? It’s Brandon I pity. But when I learned she was carrying a child, I knew I had to do something. She’s been well paid. She can take her groom’s bastard back to America.”

“She was willing to go?”

“I gave her the choice between leaving with a full purse or exposing her adultery to her husband. You know how servants gossip. How long could she expect to keep such behavior quiet?” He gave a long sigh. “I arranged to keep Brandon away from the house tonight. He and that accountant rode to Moorland House this afternoon. I’ve made certain they’re delayed there until tomorrow.” Charles took a snuffbox from the inner pocket of his coat and leaned back against the seat. “An annulment can be arranged, and Kentington’s heir can marry someone suitable such as Lady Anne.”

“Oh, dear,” Lady Kathryn worried. “Brandon will throw such a tantrum.”

Charles sneezed delicately. “He will, won’t he? It might be easier if we didn’t tell him about our part in this affair. She’s been whining ever since she arrived. He’ll simply believe she left on her own.”

“I think that’s wise, dear,” Lady Kathryn replied. “The less said about it, the better. With Raymond’s health . . .”

“There is no sense in dragging the Wescott name through the pigsty, is there?” Charles caught his aunt’s eye and smiled. “You have always been a woman of the greatest sense, aunt. It’s what I admire most about you.” He took a deep breath. “When Brandon demands to know where she’s gone, you should be the one to tell him that she’s left to return to the Colonies.”

“I?”

“Who else?” He chuckled. “It’s for his own good. In time, he’d thank us—if he knew the truth.”

His aunt began to fan herself again. “I suppose you’re right, Charles. It would kill Raymond. He’s wanted a grandson so badly—to secure the title. Nothing against you, my boy, but you do understand.”

“I’ve never envied Brandon’s position as heir,” Charles lied softly. “I wanted to protect you from this, but I simply couldn’t stand by and see the by-blow of a groom assume the title.”

“You did right,” she assured him. “Naturally, I shall see that you are reimbursed for your expense. It’s only fair that the estate bear the burden of getting rid of her.”

“As you see fit,” Charles agreed. “Now, let’s not let this ruin your evening at the theater. Mistress Leah will be properly taken care of, and in a few months . . .” He shrugged. “It will be as if she never existed.”

 

Leah stirred from her light sleep as the chamber door squeaked. “Brandon?” she asked drowsily. She’d remained in her rooms and eaten a light supper alone when Brandon hadn’t returned. She would have preferred to go hungry rather than face the cool disapproval of Lady Kathryn or Charles’s feigned friendship without Brandon at her side for support at the formal dining table.

“Nancy?” Leah sat up and rubbed her eyes. The scent of human perspiration came to her nostrils. It was dark in the room, but she thought she could make out two figures. “Who is it?”

“’Tis Giles the footman, Lady Brandon. Ye must come down at once. There’s been an accident.”

“Oh. Is it Brandon? Has he been hurt?” She scrambled out of bed and hurried toward the footman, wearing only a linen shift. She’d covered half the distance when suspicion set in. “Why haven’t you brought a candle?” she demanded. “Where’s my maid?”

The man lunged toward the spot where she’d been standing, but Leah twisted away. “Get ’er, Ben!” The second figure charged at her.

Leah rolled under the high bed and came up on the far side. She fumbled in the darkness for the letter opener that had lain there earlier. Her fingers closed around a silver candlestick, and she threw it at Giles. He cried out with pain.

“She’s there, ye fool!”

The silent man came across the bed toward her. Leah found the brass letter opener and backed away toward the darkest corner of the room. Someone tumbled over a chair and cursed. Both men closed in on her. She waited, counting their steps; then dodged left. A man’s hand caught the neckline of her shift. For an instant, Leah was caught, then she heard the sound of fabric tearing. Her head snapped back, and she gasped as her neckchain dug into her skin. She whirled and struck out with the letter opener.

Her assailant groaned, and Leah’s neckchain broke as she pulled free. She dashed toward the door, unable to catch her amulet as it slid between her bare breasts and fell to the floor. She wrenched open the door and began to scream.

A heavy object struck the back of her head. Leah staggered to her knees as one of the men grabbed a handful of her hair and clamped a dirty hand over her mouth. She tried to defend herself with the letter opener, but her attacker seized her wrist and twisted it until the weapon fell from her numb fingers. Leah bit down as hard as she could on his palm, but he hit her again, a stunning blow to the side of her face. He clamped down on her nose, and she struggled for breath.

“Another sound and yer fishbait,” the footman hissed in her ear.

Leah felt cold metal at her throat.

“Don’t move, bitch,” he threatened. “Kill ye now or later, it means nothin’ to me.” He pinned her to the floor facedown with his knee in the center of her back.

Heart pounding with fear, she lay still. When he took his hand away, she sucked in precious air in deep gulps. Seconds later, he twisted a rag across her mouth and bound her wrists tightly behind her.

“Ye’ve yer lord to thank for this. Dead ’e wants ye, as dead as them what dangles from Tyburn gallows. Ye and yer red bastard with ye.”

Leah thrashed her head from side to side and cried out against the gag. No! No! Not Brandon! It was a lie! He wouldn’t. No matter how much he wanted to be rid of her and her child, she thought frantically, he’d never have her murdered. She bit the gag in frustration as her attacker tied her ankles and rolled her into a blanket.

The pain in Leah’s head washed over her in waves, each higher than the one before. It was hard to breathe in the confines of the heavy wool, and the gag cut into her mouth. She felt herself being lifted and slung over a man’s shoulder. Then the blackness won, and she knew nothing more.

 

Leah was shocked back to consciousness as she hit the cold mud. She moaned against the gag and raised her face from the stinking ooze. It was still very dark. The moon was hidden by heavy clouds and the layers of coal smoke that smothered the city in black dust. She couldn’t see clearly more than a few feet, but she could smell the river and hear the rushing current.

“Awake, are ye?” the footman asked. “Better for ye, bitch, if ye’d slept awhile longer.

His companion grunted, and it registered in Leah’s mind that she’d not heard him utter a word. Was he mute?

The air reeked of rotting garbage and human waste. Leah caught the scent of decaying meat and heard the rustle of small night creatures just beyond her line of vision. A wall or a building stood a few feet to her left, and in front of her she thought she saw a tumbled-down dock.

It was quiet for the city. Far off she could hear the rumble of carts and an occasional curse. The noises of the river were louder than human ones. The tide was running out, carrying the filth and refuse of London with it. And Leah knew with cold certainty that these men meant to murder her here on this muddy bank and throw her body into the Thames.

I have come so far to die here, she thought, in a death I would not give an Iroquois. She could not even cry out for help, and these two who had treated her so cruelly would be without pity. She wondered if they meant to rape her before they ended her life.

The fear she had felt so sharply in her bedchamber had melted away. She was exhausted and drained of will, her thoughts confused. Even her magic necklace was lost to her. I waited too long to use its power, she thought, and now the Eye of Mist is gone.

Her Shawnee instincts rose thick within her mind, urging her to sing her death chant and submit to the inevitable. Was death, after all, not the crossing of a river into the dream world? On the far side, she would find her mother and her dear grandmother waiting. Beyond this black, tumbling water would be gentle hands and soft voices. Dying would be like going home. There would be no more pain, or fear, or doubt.

She shut her eyes and tried to rid her mind of Brandon’s face. If the man she loved had done this to her, she didn’t want to go on living.

But her canny Scottish intellect surfaced, bringing with it a surge of icy rage. Would the daughter of Cameron Stewart surrender to death in a stinking mud puddle? The child of a man who had run an Iroquois gauntlet naked and spit in the face of a Huron sachem?

She twisted her head to stare at the two men and tried to talk. Her voice was muffled by the gag, but her tone was unmistakable.

“What do ye want?” Giles demanded. “’Tis no use to beg. Yer lord has paid us fer yer dead body. Ye’re no use to us alive.” He rubbed his midsection. “Besides, I owe ye for tryin’ to rip out me bowels with that dagger.”

The second man, the mute, knelt beside her and cut the gag away with a knife. He caught hold of her hair and pulled her head back, then made a nasty sound and brought the knife to her throat.

“If it’s money you wish, I be worth more alive,” she said urgently.

The mute made a sound of derision and leaned closer, tensing his arm for the killing stroke.

“Wait,” his companion ordered. “How so, slut?”

“I can get you money. I have a wealthy friend.”

“Kill ’er.”

“No,” Leah cried. “Wait . . .” Her weary mind scrambled for the right words.

“Ye’ve nothin’ to offer,” the footman lashed back. “My mate ’ere, ’e don’t fancy women—if ye take my meaning. I’d give ye a good tumble if it weren’t for this ’ole in me side ye give me. It ’urts bad, and I’m for me bed and a mug of strong rum to ease the pain.”

“We’re at the river,” she said. “There must be ships bound for the Colonies. They take indentured servants to sell in America. If ye roll me down this bank into the river, I’m worthless, but ye could add to your purse if ye sell me as a bound woman.”

The mute growled. It was plain to Leah that he wanted to finish her and be off as quickly as possible.

Giles laughed. “Smart, ain’t ye, missy? We’re to take ye to a captain, and ye’ll scream ye be a bleedin’ lady—the Viscountess Brandon. Ye mean to see us ’ang, is what. Do ye take us for fools, Ben and me?”