Chapter 8
Chains, the kind used in Mauritius to strip slaves of dignity and rob them of freedom, bound his hands and feet, rattling cruelly, preventing resistance.
Chris blinked dirt out of his eyes and clenched his teeth, frustrated by his predicament and ghastly aware that he hadn’t made good his escape.
His plan had been foolproof. At least that was what he’d thought.
Bollocks! He’d practiced his schemes repeatedly in his mind, trying to reckon anything that would foil them.
If it hadn’t been for that cantankerous horse—
He grimaced with each breath and licked dry blood off his swollen mouth, gently testing an injury to his cheek, before glancing around his cell.
The six-by-six-foot iron box provided enough room to stand, but little else.
The cool, freshly churned earth underfoot offered relief from the harsh French heat, and the sun filtered in through a poorly constructed roof.
Light shimmered down through the marginal openings in the rotting timber, a curious spectrum of stripes angling across his body and face, teasing him with the freedom he’d failed to find.
Aye, he was good and surely trapped once more in a French prison camp. Subject to retaliation. But where? Who had found him?
Even if there was a way to shed his chains, the steel bars closing him in were spaced too close to aid another escape. He shifted his legs, numb and thick from disuse, grunting in pain with the effort as he stood.
He had been transported from one prison camp to another since boarding the ninety-eight-gun HMS London at Spithead and fighting the French at Santo Domingo and off Ile d’Aix.
Officers usually assumed house arrest, but the courtesies shown those of the upper ranks had been withdrawn when Chris attempted to escape at every turn.
Thoughts of home, his parents, Noel, and Emma plagued his mind, making him wonder what they’d been told about his whereabouts.
Did they think him alive or dead? Blood and gall!
What if Emma believed he was dead? Either case brought misfortune and sorrow, denying those who loved him finality and the ability to move on.
What would Emma do if she thought he was dead?
Almost seven years had passed since he’d asked Emma to marry him. Her letters had once been frequent, but he hadn’t received one in five years. He could only speculate what she felt about him now as his letters had never seemed to reach her.
Surely, she understood how desperately he fought to earn his freedom. That he hadn’t written because there was a reason. That he loved her, that he was not dead.
He raised his hands before his face, angrily desiring to jerk off his chains no matter the pain the action caused.
He knew what awaited him. Resisting was futile.
His ribs felt as if he’d been dropped from the yardarm to a pitching deck.
His right leg refused to comply. He stomped his foot to awaken the limb.
“That won’t help.” He snapped his head around and found himself staring at his old friend, Lieutenant Daniel Barrett, held in a nearby cage.
Bound by friendship and duty for the past six years, they had been at the mercy of the French since the Battle of the Basque Roads. “How long have I been out?”
“Two days,” Daniel said. A rat scurried by underfoot. He kicked it, knocking it unconscious. “You have two broken ribs. Your shoulder was dislocated, and you took a bullet in your right leg. I was able to get the bleeding to stop, but you’ve lost a lot of blood. I’m astonished that you can stand.”
Chris tested his arm, feeling residual pain collide in his shoulder socket. “Where would I be without you?”
“You’d be dead. And so would I.”
He got defensive. “Not if I can help it.”
“You have answered your own question. I am here because of you. And you are still here because of me. But unless you abort your schemes, even I won’t be able to keep you alive much longer.”
He nodded, understanding. He wasn’t the same man he’d been when he left Emma and his family for Spithead.
He’d taken so many hits to the head that his thinking was impaired.
A brawl with a guard had cut open his cheek, high on the bone.
The scar was a stark reminder never to trust the enemy.
His body was riddled with rat bite marks, the hungry rodents a constant source of unrest.
“Rest,” Daniel said. “You need to regain your strength. We’re set to march out in the morning.”
“Aye,” he replied laying once more on the straw covered earth, wincing and holding his side. He heard a rustling sound, shot a glare to the corner, and fixed his eyes on a rat burrowing out of the straw. “I need strength.”
The surf crashed into the bay, pummeling the outcrop of rocks stretching majestically and magically out to sea with a magnificent demonstration of power.
Emma watched the chaotic scene, anticipation churning in her stomach.
A storm brewed on the horizon, dark and oppressive in the half-light like the one shadowing her heart, a massive curtain of energy looking for a fight.
Nearer to shore, a galley built for speed and stealth advanced.
In it, a group of stalwart men—pirates and smugglers—operated the oars, defiantly mastering the waves, rowing against the tide with brute force.
She shot a look at what was left of the Two Sisters, twin towers of the old, ruined St. Mary’s, the site’s location dating back to a seventh century Saxon church, and perched precariously above the sea.
Legend had it that you could hear a baby crying on the grounds.
No one knew why, unless it had to do with the numerous infant corpses found there that dated back to Roman times.
There, high in a window, a lighted candle appeared within the maritime landmark, moving left and right, assuring them the coast was clear. Only one thing occupied her mind—finishing her business transaction with Ansell before revenue officers could thwart it.
What was more, she wondered if her cousin had news of the man who’d once pledged his love to her at a festive ball—Sir Christmas, the one she’d waited for over six years to return home.
A pressing weight restricted her breath, each dip and pull of the oarsmen’s backs amplifying her anxiety as she waved the vessel in, hoping to unload it before their activities were curtailed.
She turned back, waving to the men who waited at Reculver’s sandstone base.
Sprinting forward, she closed the distance between the bluffs and the shingled shore.
Speed and organization were factors in a smuggler’s success. If one wasn’t quick, one couldn’t expect to be in trade long. Somehow, she’d managed to weather time, her operation boasting a triumphant four years of gain.
Reorientating herself, she turned back to the sea, searching the surf for the galley.
When she caught sight of it, she counted six men dressed as regular anglers, no one more conspicuous than the other.
Except she could not help but recognize her cousin.
She’d know Ansell Ransome anywhere. His jet-black hair and commanding stature were distinctive features.
Ansell was her mother’s beloved brother’s son, a good, competent, reliable man devoting his life to smuggling goods in from France, which included British prisoners-of-war who languished in French citadels with no hope of escape.
Ansell was more than a pirate, however. He was a messenger of hope, a seafaring maestro, a man who made the impossible possible when direct commerce was banned between the two countries.
And with his help they had delivered fugitive Frenchmen from Hoy Public House in Whitstable to Dunkirk and Gravelines, and transported British countrymen home in a peaceful exchange.
But enough was enough. England and France had known hundreds of years of war.
As if on cue, Ansell lifted his hat and waved it in the air. At his signal, she darted into action, meeting him halfway.
“Heva!” His hasty hail was nearly swallowed up by the sound of waves crashing and the undertow pulling against the foreshore.
Driven by an eagerness to know what Ansell had found, she shouted back. “Heva!”
Tall and broad and brawn, there was no mistaking that Ansell had inherited his father’s good looks, with enough charm to talk his way back from the gates of hell—a habit that had helped him escape plenty of dangerous circumstances in his lifetime.
By crock, Ansell had experienced enough death and despair to write a book, or two or three, regaling the public with all he’d seen and heard.
She, on the other hand, took after her mother, fair-skinned, blonde, petite, and hardy enough to survive three years without her parents’ affections.
She was an orphan, but she couldn’t take credit for living this long.
That honor belonged to Lord Astley-Milne’s wardship.
The oars cut through the breakers, speeding the boat in with the tide.
Clouds loomed overhead, a storm advancing toward Kent.
She fought the urge to close the distance, to swim out to the galley, the pull of curiosity difficult to resist. Ansell spied her; his features taut.
Her heart sank into her belly like an anvil.
Not again. Dear God, not another fruitless foray into danger.
Oars clanked hollowly against their oarlocks.
The wind shared muffled conversation she couldn’t discern.
Bodies moved as one. Apprehension flooded her.
Something was wrong but she couldn’t put her finger on what warred within her most—the fear that Ansell had not found Sir Christmas or that he had, and the news wasn’t good.
She waded into the surf, icy cold sinking into the bones in her lower legs. Ansell stood then hurdled himself over the gunwale like a lithe fish and waded toward her, his expression one-part jubilant, and two-parts grit.