Chapter 16
Captain Crabbe laughed as they ran. ‘You certainly stabbed that man where it hurt – and what was that you stabbed him with?’
‘A knitting needle,’ she replied tersely, feeling nowhere near as amused as he obviously was. ‘I pretended to fall back at the house. I fell onto my companion’s knitting bag and grabbed a needle. It was easy to hide.’
He threw his head back and laughed loud enough to send the crows fleeing from their roosts.
‘What about Mrs Mackintosh?’
‘Who is Mrs Mackintosh?’ He barely broke step. He was on a mission, one that would reward him very well indeed.
‘My companion. She’s back there at the house where they held me. It was her knitting needle.’
‘You want to return her knitting needle?’
‘No! Of course not! I want you to rescue her.’
Captain Crabbe shook his head. ‘Can’t be done.’
‘Why not?’
He stopped so abruptly that his band of cut-throats ganged up behind him, forming a semicircle around his back.
‘Look,’ he said, pointing to where a pall of flame and smoke rose into the night sky.
‘Fire caused by cannonballs. OK, the British are being met by American soldiers and they’re all hell-bent on killing each other.
’ He shook his head and frowned at her. ‘Personally, I have no intention of getting in between them. If they want to kill each other, it’s no business of mine. ’
Her protest was instant. ‘I’m not asking you to pick a side. I’m asking you to rescue my companion.’
‘Is she married?’
The question was asked by one of Crabbe’s men, a big man with a black beard and bushy eyebrows. He looked quite serious.
‘No. She’s called Mrs Mackintosh, but only because it suits the people who employ her.’
‘Does she have a first name?’
He looked oddly interested.
‘Moira. Her name’s Moira. Now can we rescue her?’
She looked pleadingly at Captain Crabbe, who rolled his eyes in disbelief.
‘You just can’t get brutish men nowadays,’ he said, throwing the man with the beard a woeful look.
And so they found themselves heading back to the house where she had been held captive and where Moira Mackintosh was still held.
Captain Crabbe looked at the door, the sheer facade rising to three storeys.
An ornate balcony. He looked thoughtful standing there with his hands on his hips and a jaunty tilt to his head.
His cravat was undone, and he’d tucked his pistol into the open neck of his shirt.
It was obvious he felt better with everything hanging loose on his frame.
‘OK. This is the way I see it,’ he said after considering the house and situation most carefully. He turned to the man with the black bushy beard. ‘Bent. If you want her, you have my blessing. Pick your men.’
At first, Lochranza had no idea what he meant. Only when the whole motley crew followed him across the road did she understand.
The door caved in to repeated blows from the man’s big fists. Like a herd of buffalo, the men crashed through the opening.
‘Wait,’ said Captain Crabbe when Lochranza made a move to follow. ‘No point getting in their way. My men are unused to pretty houses and nice manners.’
From within the house came the sound of china being smashed, the squawking of parrots, the screaming of monkeys.
Each man came out having pilfered anything he fancied. All of them had picked a cage containing a parrot or a monkey. The man with the black beard came out with a parrot on one shoulder and Mrs Mackintosh over the other.
Captain Crabbe slapped Lochranza on the back. ‘Mission accomplished!’
It was quite a slap. He caught her as she fell forward, her legs still not quite as positive as they should be.
‘Sorry, Lady Kildare. I get rather exuberant when things go well.’
‘I would hate to be around when things go wrong,’ she grumbled.
They were reliably informed that Moira had been drugged but unharmed.
Captain Crabbe gave the order. ‘Move! Fast!’
Like a herd of bulls, they crashed through crowds where they needed to, heading for the Mississippi River. Lochranza observed that it was a wide river. The widest she had ever seen.
‘We have a boat,’ said Captain Crabbe.
Every muscle in her body sighed with relief when she finally clapped eyes on a gold, blue and red paddle steamer.
Crabbe and his men ran towards it – then ran straight past.
In the absolute darkness, the men clambered aboard a vessel as indistinct as they were, no paintwork to make it shine in the darkness, and not a single lantern lighting even a patch of its dismal form.
Sight of the vessel made her wonder if it were fit to get take them away from the carnage of battle. The night was wet and miserable, typical for the time of year in another state, but somehow she’d expected better here.
The weather suited her, the dampness making her shiver away her lethargy, the cool air invigorating.
Because of the darkness it was difficult to see much to like about their vessel. She asked Crabbe if it had a name.
‘Does it matter? Look, your ladyship, can we continue this conversation at a later date? In the meantime, climb aboard and we’ll be out of here.’
Two strong hands planted on her rear heaved her up over the gunwale and onto the deck, cluttered with bits of wood.
‘Old Sam never finished it,’ said Crabbe when she asked why it was unpainted.
‘A good thing for us. Bright colours stand out on the river, even at this time of night.’ His men clattered aboard, their voices raucous and edging on vulgar.
‘Keep the noise down. We have ladies present – plus two opposing armies and I’m not sure which of them I fear the most,’ he added a little ruefully.
* * *
Moira Mackintosh’s dress was torn, her cap askew and her head was aching fit to burst.
‘We were drugged,’ Lochranza explained as she fished out some nightgowns from the luggage Captain Crabbe’s men had rescued.
Whilst dressing, Moira looked around her, decided she didn’t like river boats any more than seagoing vessels and wrinkled her nose.
‘This boat smells.’ She sighed in consternation before a sudden thought brought a frown to her face.
Lochranza had an inkling of the question she was likely to ask. ‘No, Moira. Your body was not taken advantage of – as far as I know. I think you were alone in the house with Eugenie.’
‘Thank goodness,’ said Moira, flapping her hand over her heart.
‘And before you ask, I too escaped being ravished. Nobody harmed me.’
‘Oh thank goodness for that. These people – Americans, French, Dutch and all those black folks – they’ve no social graces whatsoever. And terrible habits… Where did they take you?’
‘I was about to be sold into a dangerous situation.’
Moira’s eyes nearly popped out of her head and for a moment it looked possible she might faint clean away. ‘Sold? You mean the Marquis is a white slaver?’
‘Yes.’
‘Oh my word!’ Moira flapped her hand at her meagre breast, which was now clothed in a frilly nightgown with lots of pink bows and bits of lace hanging everywhere. It was one Lochranza hated; all fuss and pink and so voluminous it could cover a horse.
She chose for herself a fine muslin nightdress sporting a minimum of frills and bows, cool to the touch and no more than a sheath of fabric covering her body.
As Moira brushed her hair, her mind went back to the auction. Although only vaguely aware of what was happening to her, there remained an impression that she’d been bought by a Frenchman – not a roué – but a man who looked purposeful and had the dour dress and plain expression of a civil servant.
Could a civil servant afford her? And why would he want her – unless…
She headed for the door.
Moira asked her where she was going.
‘I need to speak to Captain Crabbe!’
Moria was aghast. ‘He’s a brigand! He looks like a brigand, so must be a brigand.’
Lochranza had to agree, but it was a case of beggars not being choosers. ‘At this moment in time, he’s all I have. You stay here.’
The night air was fresher up on deck than down below. The scent of early blossoms vied with the smell of river mud and rank vegetation lining the bank, the smell of gunpowder drifting up from downriver.
Crickets, grasshoppers and night birds competed with the croaking of frogs to fill the night air with a cacophony of sound.
It was very dark, but Lochranza could just about make out Captain Crabbe’s athletic figure standing at the prow of the riverboat. He was speaking to one of his men who was on his knees, holding a lantern which was reflected off the river.
Lighting within the boat was kept to a minimum for fear of attracting attention from the riverbank. As yet, nobody knew who had won the battle and what the outcome was likely to be. Captain Crabbe had already expressed his opinion of patriotism; he was loyal only to himself.
On hearing her approach, he turned to face her, a dark figure cloaked in darkness. Unable to see her in the dense darkness, Crabbe’s voice rang out with the order for her to identify herself.
She did as he’d asked. ‘It’s me. Lady Kildare. I need to speak to you.’
He muttered something to the man holding the lantern before facing her. The smart clothes of a wealthy man had been replaced by a leather jerkin; plain trousers tucked into knee-length leather boots. The handles of two pistols stuck up from the sash around his waist.
‘I haven’t had the chance to thank you before for rescuing me, Captain Crabbe. I’m indebted to you.’
‘Always happy to help a damsel in distress. Now, do you mind? We’re trying to find our way upstream without attracting attention. So keep your voice down.’
She considered he might be mocking her, but then discounted the notion when he said, ‘Your ladyship, I have to confess that I was paid to rescue you, so no debt is owed. However, I will add that when I saw you there, drugged and looking very… well… helpless, I would have made the attempt anyway, with or without being paid.’
‘Well. That’s very chivalrous. So where is he? Where is my fiancé-to-be?’
‘Your fiancé?’
She sensed the surprise in his voice, the hesitation before he said, ‘Arrangements have been made to meet your rescuer upriver. He never gave me his name. Never said anything much about you except for describing your hair, your eyes and… other attributes. When I saw you… well… I could see why he would pay me enough money to fund the slave labour of a cotton plantation.’
‘It was not a nice experience,’ she said bitterly. ‘To have others in charge of your body…’ She shivered.
‘You’re cold. Come on, your ladyship. Let’s get you back inside.’
The glow from a pale lantern flame in an alcove threw light on the fragile garment she wore. In her haste to speak to him, she’d not thought to cover herself in something less diaphanous.
Occupied with the hope that Ethan was waiting for her, she barely noticed how ill-dressed she was – not until she became aware of the look on Captain Crabbe’s face.
Placing her hands over her breasts, she felt her nipples pressing into her palms and blushed. Divert his thoughts and he might not notice the sheen of her flesh glowing beneath the flimsy nightgown.
‘I’m so glad my fiancé did this for me. He’s a very great man, you know, both here and in England.
A lord, in fact,’ she added, her nervousness causing the words to keep tumbling out of her mouth until at last she said, ‘I wonder who it was who arranged for me to be kidnapped in the first place. I was indeed supposed to board a Dutch ship to take me north, but it was not supposed to arrive for a few days. I was surprised when I was told it was ready to take us.’
‘Do you have any enemies?’
‘France. My uncle is a thorn in their side.’
He nodded as though that was no surprise at all. ‘They have a habit of getting themselves disliked. But apart from a nation your country happens to be at war with, who else?’
She shook her head, reluctant to admit that her uncle received secret visitors at all hours of the day and night and that he was involved in espionage.
‘When will I see my fiancé?’
‘Three days upriver. If that’s the man who instructed me. I understand he’s arranged onward passage from there.’
She breathed a sigh of relief. ‘That’s good.’
Although she’d spent little time with Ethan back in England, she had been looking forward to seeing him again. She had wondered before leaving England exactly what she was letting herself in for. She was now beginning to find out.
Amongst her dresses was a dark blue one with pockets well hidden within its seams. Both her written note and her pictorial report should still be in there, ready to be left at a township upriver, or better still with somebody with access to the wide open sea.
She became aware that Captain Crabbe had eyes that reminded her of chocolate.
‘I like your eyes,’ she said suddenly, taking Captain Crabbe off guard. ‘They remind me of chocolate.’
His teeth flashed white in his dark brown face. He placed his hands on his slim hips and said, ‘Chocolate melts if you get it too hot – if you put it too close to the fire.’
She suspected he’d wanted to say more, to tell her that with her fiery red hair, she was the one he might melt for. Instead, he explained that he’d been paid to rescue her by a man they were meeting at a prearranged spot further upriver.
‘Ethan MacKinnon,’ she exclaimed.
Captain Crabbe shrugged his shoulders. ‘I wouldn’t know. My orders came from someone closer at hand.’ He frowned. ‘It’s not the first time this organisation’s employed me.’ He shrugged again. ‘That’s all that I can say.’