The Randolph Legacy (49 page)

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Authors: Eileen Charbonneau

BOOK: The Randolph Legacy
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Judith opened her eyes to a billowing sail in the starlit sky. Ethan, without coat or vest, was helping the sailors raise the sail … . They were the familiar, lively young crew of the
Opal,
though this fleet river vessel wasn’t the
Opal.
Ethan fit splendidly into their company.
He approached, knelt, the smell of the salt wind vanquishing the
courtroom’s polished woods, the whiskey and tobacco of the judge’s chambers. The scent of blood remained, as did the dark exhaustion circled under his eyes. When Judith tried to sit up, he placed his hand at her shoulder.
“Rest.”
“Captain Atwater—”
“Below.” He looked away.
“The judge changed his mind? Oh, Ethan, that’s splendid, a release! I must—”
“Stay here. Sleep. Please, Judith.”
“But I cannot. You look so tired, darling boy. Allow me to tend Captain Atwater’s needs now.”
“He has no needs.”
“N-no needs?”
He looked over her shoulder, at the stars. “I did the best I could, Judith. I’m sorry.”
“What are you saying? He is not dead.”
“The veins, at the wrist—”
“What have you done to him?”
His face darkened. “Done,
madame?”
The nervous twitching, again, beside his eye. Who was this man? Judith heard her own voice make a screeching, foreign sound.
“Look here,”
she charged,
“in my eyes, Ethan Randolph. You will not tell me he is dead!”
Ethan took her arms, shook her. “Stop! This is unseemly, such grief for a man you barely know. Unseemly from my wife. Enough!”
She pulled back, breaking his hold, and slapped him hard across his face. “How dare you?” she charged.
Judith became aware of the silent stares of the seamen, black and white, surrounding them. She’d never lifted her hand to a living creature in her life. How had they come to this? Her cheeks burned with indignation. She was Judith Mercer. How dare this man she’d given up so much for treat her like an unchaste wife? How dare he shut her out of the judge’s chambers? How dare he allow that good man to die?
His soft white shirt billowed up around his shoulders, transforming him, suddenly, into a misshapen monster.
He stepped back, returned to his sails. This was all he wanted, this spoiled, rich planter’s son, her blue devils told her: to be captain of the mizzenmast.
“I would be in Richmond with Mrs. Atwater at this terrible time,
husband,” Judith said with quiet insistence.
“That will not be necessary.” His gaze did not shift from their destination, Windover’s great house. Nor did his step falter.
“We must not send him home to her alone, Ethan!”
“Ease your mind on that account.”
“The ship waits,” she said, confused.
“For me.”
Judith stopped at the steps. She saw his brothers, their wives, standing at the opened windows. “I would be home in Richmond,” she beseeched quietly.
“Climb with me,
madame.”
She fisted his waistcoat, but could not lock his eyes to hers. “What are you doing? What are you doing without me?”
“Judith,” he breathed.
“Don’t leave me here, please.”
“It cannot be helped.”
Panic shook her frame. “I’m going back to the ship. I don’t belong here.” She turned to the glowing lantern path. “I need to see Captain—
”
“Have you not humiliated me enough?” he shouted at her back.
The night air rang in silence. He caught her arm, turned her around. When she resisted, he clamped a hold on her wrist. His eyes dared her to test his strength. He lifted her high and carried her inside the house.
He ignored all of his family’s entreaties until he reached his mother, standing on the stairs’ first landing.
“Ethan, what are you doing?” Anne Randolph demanded.
“Placing my wife in your care until my return,
madame.
Somewhat against her will.”
“And how are we to keep her?”
“In chains, if you must.”
His mother stood aside. “Oh, very well,” she said with a sigh.
He kicked open the door of the room before placing Judith on the bed. She looked down at her hand. Blood, where he’d held her wrist. But it didn’t hurt, she told her racing heart. He’d held, not hurt her. He’d never hurt her. It was not her blood, but his.
“Ethan.” She could almost feel him bristle before turning. How could those warm brown eyes she knew transform so completely? The veils, again. Almost transparent, seldom-used veils.
“How much more am I supposed to endure?” he demanded.
“More?”
“Of their laughter, their taunts, about you playing me for a fool in your pursuits? About them making a game out of guessing …” He faltered here, and Judith saw his bad leg betray him and threaten to take him down. Tears shone in his eyes, back behind the veils. “Guessing who has fathered the child you carry.”
“Ethan,” she said quietly, “thy mind is poisoned.”
“Do not you turn high and mighty Quaker priestess on me now, Judith Mercer,” he railed, “with your
‘thys,’
your kind euphemisms! Poisoned? I am not poisoned, mad, an imbecile, an idiot, except perhaps in my pursuit of women, yes? Well, what’s done can be undone!
Maintenant …”
He faltered, blinking. “What is it?” he stormed. “The English?”
“Now,” she whispered.
“Now, yes, for now, the time being, madman or not, I am a Randolph and you are my wife. You will obey me. You will remain in this house until I decide what to do with you!”
 
 
E
than leaned against the closed door between them. Judith was weeping. What had he done? Was it all unraveling, all turning to madness? He ran his hand through his hair, heard the whistle from the ship. Stand fast—finish. His mother approached. He felt her scent. Roses, wild roses from their dancing time. He rested his hand at her neck, dropped a kiss on her cheek.
“Were you attempting to inform only Windover of your displeasure with your wife, or three counties around?” she asked tartly.
“Windover will suffice.”
“You’ve succeeded.”
“Aye,
madame,
But will that keep her until I return?”
She lowered her voice. “And hold your brothers’ mechanizations at bay?”
Ethan sighed. “I see I come by this loathsome ability honestly. Send for Sally, will you?”
She nodded. “If you will meet with Jordan, accept his help.”
“Mother. I cannot ask—”
She touched his face. “You will not have to ask. Ethan, promise me you’ll meet him.”
“I suppose I can hardly avoid it,” he grumbled. The whistle, again. “Mama? Take care of her.”
“We will. Don’t be long, darling.”
 
 
J
udith pleaded for the beautiful woman’s understanding. “These things he claims … I have given him no cause. And, Mother, I have endured much more for his sake in Richmond.”
“Oh?”
“Whispers, taunts. That I must be some eccentric adventuress to have captured such a young, handsome man as my husband. That his beautiful eyes seduce all the women he meets, that he charms them, treating all like treasures.”
“But he does see most of us that way, poor boy. That was one reason I was glad he found you so soon in his manhood, Judith. Before his heart became as scarred as his back. You know his way with women is innocent. Well, innocent mostly. What man is innocent? His devotion to all manner of females is, I think, misconstrued by others, because he is … well, as you say, a striking man, and unaware of it. This way of his, it is his appreciation of us, that’s all. I rather like it.”
“I do too! But certain people always assumed—”
“That is their concern, is it not? Not yours.”
“Yes. But should he not afford me the same grace now? Especially after I defended him against the very man—”
“Judith. Did Captain Atwater defame my son?”
“He … Oh, Mother, I didn’t understand—”
“That he had feelings for you? While you were engaged in your exciting, beneficial undertaking together? Feelings fed by the Richmond rumors of Ethan’s own unfaithfulnesses? I warned Sally that would come to no good! Don’t look so astonished, Judith. I have been a participant in this play myself.”
“When?”
“When I was almost exactly your age. Don’t worry. I think my son is secure in your love. It stems more from his protection, this intemperate growling of his.”
“Growling?” Judith almost laughed. “Granting me no measure of grief for my friend? Then doubting my child is his? Threatening to put me away? This is growling?”
“Were you listening carefully to his words?”
Judith stared at her mother-in-law, astonished.
Anne Randolph laughed. “I know, every member of this household could hardly avoid hearing your … altercation. But perhaps that was as purposeful as the words he chose.”
“The words he chose! My only hope is that he barely chose them in the heat of the moment. He was so angry he lost command of his English!”
“Judith, Judith. He does not forget his first language when he’s angry, but when he’s afraid.”
“You’re right,” Judith realized suddenly.
“Of course I’m right, I’m his mother.”
“But, why?”
Anne Randolph held up a long, graceful finger. “His mother, not his God. Ethan’s ways might even perplex the All-knowing. He always had peculiar notions, that child. And he’s found a kindred spirit. He will not so easily put you away; he is not a stupid man, a fact he seems strongly adamant about himself, does he not? It must have been born at sea, this sensitivity about his intellect. He was always too clever by half for his brothers’ liking here.”
She shrugged her graceful shoulders in the same way Ethan did when something was beyond his understanding. “Well,” she continued, “neither of us knows what my wayward son is out and about doing now. But when he comes home, all will be set to right.
“Now, don’t let the rest of this family know that, Judith,” she said in a low, conspiratorial tone. “They are so enjoying feeling superior in your downfall. And they are meant to believe they have succeeded in casting doubt in his heart, I think. They may even show signs they pity you, about to be cast aside. Let’s enjoy that together, shall we?”
“Enjoy?”
The mistress of Windover giggled behind her hand. “Do you think me the source of my son’s peculiar nature for harboring such a notion?”
Judith smiled at her mother-in-law.
“There. Much better!” Anne Randolph approved. “No more weeping, it’s not good for the baby.” She held out her hand. Judith took it. “I’ve determined this time we’ll have together is my son’s gift. You must warn me when I’m being insufferable. Come, let’s invite Sally and the children to keep you company. Then let’s wash out a few
things I’ve saved of Ethan’s. I have the most charming array of baby caps!”
 
 
E
than soaked his hand in the basin of salt water the sailor had brought. Climbing the rigging must have reopened the wound. But it was not swollen or hot to the touch. He dressed it quickly. Then he turned to the man in the berth that barely held him, checked the eyes’ dilation nervously. They blinked. He thought the combination of mandrake and henbane would keep him down for another hour at least. He was a big man, her captain, a good thirty pounds heavier than himself. Perhaps that’s why the dose was off. He’d make a note of it. But for now, he must be a good doctor. He smiled, stroked his patient’s cool forehead. “How do you feel?”
“Like I’ve slept the sleep of the dead.”
“You have.”
“We’re on the water.”
“Aye.”
“Not my ship.”
“No, but a worthy one. Hired out.” Ethan stared wistfully through the porthole at the lights along the shore.
“But … Dr. Blair. I was sentenced.”
“Yes, well. Corpses stink up prisons something dreadful.”
“Is that what I am? A corpse?”
“Officially, yes.”
He moved, winced. “In the courtroom. Your knife. You cut me!”
Ethan frowned. “I did not. ‘Do no harm.’ How far would I get in my training if I ignored my profession’s basic precept so soon?”
“But—the blood?”
“Mine.”
“You cut yourself?”
“I was improvising. Had I more time to plan, I would have avoided it, believe me.”
“Judith?”
“Was determined you remain out of prison.”
“Does she know?”
“Not yet. You will go home to your mother, submit yourself to a decent burial, then disappear, if you please. North. Where will your kind help you in this?”
“Philadelphia.”
Ethan winced. “How did I know all you lawbreakers come south
from Philadelphia? We will bring you there, then. But not before writing my wife a letter. To help me win back her affections.”
“You care very little for your wife’s affections, Doctor.”
“Of that you know nothing, sir.”
“I have eyes, Dr. Blair! I saw—Wait. Not Blair. You are a Randolph.” He gave a sudden, short snort of laughter.
“This amuses you?”
“So is she!”
“Who?”
“The woman—the one you meet in the park, take by the hand. Mrs. Gibson, the surveyor’s wife. She is a Randolph. She is your sister!”
“You should remain on the water, instead of spying on people in parks.”
He laughed. “The children who call you ‘Uncle.’ You
are
their uncle!”
“You are too loud for a dead man. And I am out of henbane.”
“I didn’t pay heed to any of the whisperings until I saw you and Mrs. Gibson that day. How you made her laugh and kissed her hand and … I am overfond of your exceptional wife, I confess, and that might have tainted my judgment.”
Ethan frowned. “Maine is a very fine state, I hear, Captain Atwater, with a good, long coastline. Perhaps your kindred slave stealers might resettle you there? You and your mother and her chickens might do very well for yourselves in Maine.”
“And it is as far north as I can get from your beautiful Judith.”
“Exactly.”
“Bring on your ink, paper. Sharpen me a quill with that deadly weapon of yours, Dr. Blair. I’d best write a left-handed letter, before we are boarded and both hurled into prison.”
 
 
F
inally, with Jordan and Mrs. Atwater below to take over her son’s care, Ethan sat in the ship’s stern and let his head drop into his hands. He saw himself loving Judith, on the lightkeeper’s beach. She was laughing, her whitened petticoats spread out like a lacy fan beneath them as he worked toward their mutual delight. He leaned over, kissed that sweet, salty spot below her ear. Was that all he had left of her? Memories? He felt a hand at his shoulder.

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