Master of Paradise (4 page)

But it was Hastings who turned Gabrielle’s
life into a living hell. He came to the foundlings’ home where she
was staying temporarily and, pretending to befriend her, took her
by the hand through the streets of London and forced her to witness
her mother’s execution. As the life was choked from her mother at
the hangman’s noose, Hastings leaned over and whispered, “That’s
what we do to bad girls in England. We hang them.” When she’d
looked up, terrified, into his black eyes, he’d added, “Don’t make
me angry, or we might do the same to you.”

He held it over her head for years. At every
infraction of her father’s rules, she’d been terrified that he’d
have her hanged as he had her mother. To this day, she had
nightmares of being hanged while Hastings watched, laughing, from
the safety of his table at the Magpie and Pint. It was the only
thing she’d ever been afraid of in her life.

Hastings looked up to find her still in
costume. “Good lord, you look foolish,” he rebuked her.

She remained still before him, chin raised at
a fighting angle.

“Did you summon me here to criticize?” she
asked in her best haughty tone—one she’d learned from him at an
early age.

“You would do well not to bait us, young
lady, after all you’ve put us through,” admonished the duke.

She met her father’s gaze and felt the same
sadness she always did when in his presence. Sometimes she thought
she could feel some of the love he’d felt for Caprice. Though he’d
never voiced such emotions, she sensed that he, too, suffered
because of her death. There was a time when she’d thought he might
feel something for Caprice’s foundered children. Until Hastings had
poisoned his mind against them. Until he’d seen to it they didn’t
have a chance.

“My name,
Your Grace
, is Gabrielle.
You might try using it once in a while.” She called him “Your
Grace” in the way he demanded, but always with a tinge of sarcasm
in her tone.

“Your name,” he countered, “is not Cross,
although you insist on using it to shame a noble family.”

“If my name
isn’t
Cross, it’s only
because you deny me the use of it. By now, everyone in London knows
I’m your daughter. What good does it do you to deny it?”

“Everyone knows because of your blatant
flaunting of it. Not only do you use the name without my leave, you
disgrace it by teaming it with that of your mother’s and using it
to publicize that outrage you call a play!”

“You didn’t seem to mind
what
my
mother’s name was when you took her to your bed without benefit of
matrimony.”

“I shan’t allow you to speak so to me!” he
raged.

“Contrary to your opinion,
Your Grace,
you hold no sway over what I say or do. You think to deny me my
name and birthright, yet retain the privilege to criticize my every
move. What a hypocrite you are!”

“You call me
hypocrite
because I
deplore the outrages you perpetuate? Because you defile yourself by
executing this perversion on the stage? Because you choose to
glorify
that ungrateful pup?”

“I never set out to glorify Rodrigo. Only to
humiliate you.”

“You’re a callous girl.”

“I wonder where I got it?”

Suddenly, Hastings laughed. “Ah, Gabby. I’d
imagined in my absence that you’d changed. Perhaps become the soft
woman your appearance seems to promise. Before you open your lovely
mouth and show your fangs.”

How she hated him! She turned toward the
door, ready to leave. “I can’t abide this. I’d thought you summoned
me here to say you’ve decided to give me what I want. If you’ve
called me here to demoralize me—”

“The trouble is, Gabby dear, we can’t quite
get it straight what you
do
want. You’re a complicated
woman. And you seem to want so very much.”

She turned on Hastings, her eyes flashing.
“You know very well what I want. The same thing I’ve wanted since
the day I was thrust into that prison you call a home. I want my
freedom from this society that rejects me, not because of who I am,
but because of the mishap of my birth. You wouldn’t understand
that. You take for granted your place in this world. You don’t know
what it’s like to feel an outsider in your own country, your own
home. To feel shame because you happened to be born on the wrong
side of the sheets.”

“You’re right,” Hastings drawled, studying
his nails. “I wouldn’t.”

“I want to leave England and take Cullen with
me. I want my independence from the two of you. And I want what’s
rightfully mine—Beau Vallon. The land you, Your Grace, stole from
my mother and held over her head. The land you gave to this
precious son of yours on his twenty-first birthday, though it
wasn’t yours to give. The same land he’s been holding to keep me
chained to him, just as you did to my mother. You owe me that, for
all you’ve put me through. I shall settle for nothing less.”

Hastings turned to Douglas. “You see, Father,
she wants us to favor her, yet she retains the right to spew forth
her venom at every turn. A little gratitude might be in order,
Gabby. Say what you will, you still seek to embarrass us above all
else.”

“Once Cullen and I leave, I shall have no
further need of embarrassing you. In fact, we shall both be happy
to relinquish the Cross name. Frankly, we’re ashamed to be one of
you.”

“
You’re
ashamed. The Delilah of the
London stage and her spineless pup of a brother. I should think you
would
be ashamed, at that.”

“Hastings, you’re pathetic. Governor of the
Seychelles, what a sorry jest. You’re still the same cruel little
bully who’s jealous because we all have a bond with paradise and
you don’t. So you want to own it.”

“That’s enough,” Douglas countered. “I’ve
brought you here to say you’ve won.”

She stilled, suddenly alert. “Won?”

“You may have what you desire. Hastings has
generously agreed to hand over his possession of the plantation on
Mahé. You’re welcome to it.”

She eyed him suspiciously. “In exchange for
what?”

“In exchange for your leaving the country
forthwith. I’m fed up with this nonsense. You’re to relinquish use
of the Cross name. And you’re to give up your career. No more
acting. No more perpetuating this farce you call a play. You’re to
deny permission for it to be performed ever again. Those are my
terms. Take them or leave them. I shall have your answer now.”

“I’ll take them,” she said. Finally, after
all these years of struggle, she’d been afforded what she really
wanted. Finally, she could make her mother’s dream come true.
Caprice would not have died in vain.

“I want the deed signed over to me by a
solicitor of my choice,” she insisted. “Not that I don’t trust
you,” she added, looking sarcastically at Hastings. He gave her a
smirk like a falcon who’d just devoured its prey.

“It will be done,” the duke agreed. “You’re
to leave in a fortnight. Hastings will precede you on an earlier
ship, and arrange for your arrival. Use the time to get your
affairs in order and bring a halt to that atrocity of a play.”

On her way out, she paused with her back to
the room. It was silent as a vault. She could feel their eyes on
her, waiting to see what she might do. She turned and looked her
father in his watery eyes. “It’s a pity about us,” she said softly.
“We might have found a way to bridge the gap between us, if not for
Hastings.”

Then, she turned and looked at her loathed
half brother. She’d hoped to see some defeat on his face. But if
he’d lost anything in this meeting, there was no hint of it in the
calculating gleam of his predator eyes.

Dockland was a nasty neighborhood, but
Gabrielle walked through it unafraid, with the reckless freedom of
someone so accustomed to her environment that she no longer sees
its dangers. She’d always loved the area along the river where, as
a child, she and her mother liked to come and watch the great East
Indiamen set out for the Indian Ocean. In those days, the East
India Company—known to its vast family of employees as John
Company—was king of the seas. The most prestigious and powerful
syndicate of merchants the world had ever known, it worked around
the clock to keep up with the imports of spices, cottons,
saltpeter, porcelain, and tea. Now, the Company was in serious
decline. There was even talk of retiring the grand old ships in
favor of steamers that would reach India in half the time—another
sign of a rapidly changing world. In an effort to hang on to her
memories of her mother, Gabrielle still chose to live close to the
docks Caprice had so loved.

Tonight, in the predawn fog, the East India
Dock was quiet as a tomb, its cracked stone walkways empty of all
but the night watchmen who walked their beat.

She crossed the Isle of Dogs, where many of
the newer docks resided, with the smell of the winding Thames in
her nostrils. Here, other sounds and smells mingled to create an
aura of cosmopolitan chaos and decay. On the way she passed by
Chinatown, where the aroma of pork and ginger reminded her she’d
forgotten her post-performance meal. She wandered through
communities of Irish and Indian lascars, playing native music for
dancers long into the night. She saw several families of Africans
who’d been slaves and had been freed by the antislavery society.
England had been riding a wave of reform in the last few years
since the death of George IV. This very month, after a near
revolution in the rural north, a sweeping reform bill had finally
passed the House of Lords, enfranchising large portions of the
middle and working classes and threatening to change the entire
makeup of Parliament.

Tonight, though, she gave no thought to
politics, for her mind was focused on the news she had to tell her
brother. How happy she’d be to get him away from London and all its
perils for a boy like Cullen. She adored him, but knew better than
anyone that he was helpless and weak. It was the curse of the
Ashton men. Her uncle and grandfather had been this way, taken care
of by their women. She could still hear her mother’s voice ringing
in her ears.
You must always protect Cullen, Gabrielle. He’s
weak. He has the Ashton blood. A man’s fate is written in stone,
and none more so than the Ashton men.

Through the fog, she spotted the lantern
swinging before the Duelist Public House. It wasn’t difficult to
guess that she’d find Cullen there—a crush on the tavern keeper’s
daughter, Hallie, sent him worshiping at her altar whenever he was
out of Gabrielle’s sight. It had been an old dueling tavern in the
days when midshipmen from Haileybury used to battle each other for
honor, and the favors of young maidens. For some time now, it had
been more of a museum, with crossed swords lining the walls
alongside portraits of some of the more illustrious patrons of days
gone by. Long abandoned by the Company’s officers and gentlemen, it
was now mostly frequented by dockers, coopers, stevedores, and
other working men responsible for the loading and unloading of the
tall ships. It had fallen into disrepair, and was now a spot where
the sideslip son of a duke could moon after his lady love with some
measure of anonymity.

As she was drawing close, Gabrielle heard a
commotion inside—raised voices and the scraping of tables along old
wooden floors. Curious, she pushed the door open and was assaulted
by a wave of smoke and the odor of beer, tobacco, and male sweat.
She heard angry voices before she could see what was happening.

“Hold him, lads,” cried a coarse East End
voice. “We’ll tar and feather the bugger before this night’s
through.”

As her vision cleared, Gabrielle spotted a
group of men holding another pinned to a long table. She recognized
them at once as the Rotherhithe crowd—two brothers and their three
smarmy friends who regularly popped across the river to make
trouble. They were a cruel, burly lot, accustomed to long hours
spent unloading cargo and swabbing decks. As they twisted the arm
of their victim until he screamed, their faces were contorted with
barbarous sneers. At just that moment, their victim turned his head
and Gabrielle was not surprised to see that the agonized face
belonged to Cullen. Every time she looked away, he was in trouble
of some kind or another.

He spied her at the same instant and croaked
out a plea. “The cat, Gabby. They were torturing Hallie’s cat.”

One of the bullies raised a frizzled orange
cat high above his head. “This the cat you mean, little man? Yer so
sweet on the creature, how’d you like him for supper? He’s a
fetching little bugger at that. Be more fetching still with his
hair in flames.”

Swinging the cat toward the roaring blaze,
the bully cackled his glee as one of his mates yanked Cullen’s arm
back again and made him cry out in pain.

Gabrielle stepped toward the thug holding the
spitting animal, reached over, and took the cat in one quick swipe,
surprising the tough so he didn’t have time to react. The cat
screeched, obviously hurt.

“What the hell, lads?” said the bully with a
philosophical shrug. “We’ll torture this little nancy boy
instead.”

As he moved toward Cullen, the others jerked
him up. One grabbed his hair and yanked his head back while another
punched him in the gut.

Setting the cat gently aside, Gabrielle moved
toward them. “How many times have I told you,” she addressed her
brother. “If you’re going to get on in the world, you have to learn
to deal with ruffians like these.”

The door opened again and a man came in,
bowed over a bucket of molten tar. “Here’s the tar, lads. Let’s
have done with it.”

The bucket was brought closer, the biting
stench of tar overwhelming the place. Gabrielle, feeling the first
flash of anger at his torturers and not at her brother, drew her
sword.