Chapter Four #2
“Just so,” the lieutenant says again. “It’s intolerable to watch these criminals have free rein of the land. That’s why I don’t wait for them to be acquitted at trial. I ensure justice takes place. You see this, surely?”
“But of course.”
“I do wish you’d accept my offer of protection, Mrs. Henley. They’re cutthroats, the lot of them. I can’t bear to think what they would do to a woman of such refined qualities as yourself.”
As on his previous visit, he looks as if he not only can bear to think of it easily, but rather enjoys the image.
A trail of red spots creeps up his neck and into his face until he is blushing, his eyes grown dark, his mouth half open.
She doesn’t mean to take a step back; isn’t even aware she has done it until she feels the rough planks of the door against her shoulder blades.
“I entirely agree,” she says. At the sound of a light thud, she jumps; Lieutenant Sowerby has heard it, too. He’s listening carefully, but there’s no other noise.
“A bird, I suppose,” he says. “Slamming into the window there, perhaps, the poor, useless creature. If you permit my saying, I noticed your reaction of fear just now. It’s clear to me you are ill at ease and you are right to feel so, living in this godforsaken place all alone.
I could protect you, madam, if you would but let me.
” He pats the hilt of the sword at his side.
When she doesn’t say anything, he adds, “I hope I may have the pleasure of your company again soon, at the dinner organized by my most particular friend the deputy lord lieutenant of Cornwall, at Weatherston Hall.”
“Dinner?”
“Oh dear, we do seem to have a knack for misunderstanding one another this morning. Has Lady Harriet Darby not come to see you?”
“She has not.”
Lieutenant Sowerby says, “I hope you’ll forgive me, but I made mention of your circumstances to Lady Darby, in case it might influence her desire to make your acquaintance.
However, she assured me it did not. I believe she said—in her own words, which tend to be quite remarkable—she should not care a jot however much you were reduced in circumstance, for she was in dire need of decent company. ”
The thread comes loose from her sleeve and she rolls it between her fingers. “Perhaps something has prevented her coming.” She doesn’t really believe this. Most probably, Lady Darby took one look at the old pilchard shed and fled back to Weatherston Hall.
“Perhaps, indeed.” He purses his lips again, which would make him look comical if it wasn’t for the odd, lingering blush in his cheeks.
He raises his hand to his brow, wiping. Two days ago, that same hand put a noose around a man’s neck.
“Well, an invitation may yet be forthcoming,” he says.
“The dinner is not for another fortnight. I shall look forward to your presence, if it may be procured.”
“So shall I,” she says. “To your presence.”
“Much as I should like to linger, I’d best go. There are smugglers to catch, after all.”
His eyes fasten on her chest and he steps closer until, as before, she’s trapped between his hulking body and the door. The sweat on him is pungent, sour smelling. Leaning in so closely his breath grazes her cheek, he murmurs, “You are an extraordinary woman, Mrs. Henley.”
Her heart nearly beats its way through her skin. With the back of his hand, he moves as if to caress the left side of her face, but before he can touch her, she drops low and dodges his arm. Spinning around to face him, she says, “I wish you Godspeed, sir.”
Lieutenant Sowerby stands very still, breathing hard. He’s still red in the face when he says, “Do let me know if you find yourself in need of aid at any time, Mrs. Henley. Upon my honor, it vexes me that you should choose to live here like this.”
It’s hardly a choice, she thinks, but she doesn’t say it.
“I shall, sir.” Go! Please go! The wish is so strong she worries he’ll see it on her face, so she looks down at his boots as he opens the door and crosses the doorstep.
The boots are knee-length and made of brown leather.
They’re too clean for patrolling the coastal path. He must have them shined often.
The rushing of the waves reaches her over the lieutenant’s steps.
She draws strength from the sound as one might from a draft of water when thirsty.
Would that leaving a fish for the sea spirit the Cornish people believe in gained one protection not from inclement weather but from noxious men.
She’d buy a fish just for the purpose every day in that case.
If she weren’t so deeply shaken, this thought would’ve made her smile.
She watches the boots make their way up the gravel path, watches the lieutenant mount his horse, then lifts her eyes to catch him raising his hand. “Good day, Mrs. Henley!”
Then he’s gone. At once, she starts to tremble as badly as she did when Jack and his men entered her bedroom.
She waits behind the door; she doesn’t dare go up yet.
Upstairs, all is quiet. After what feels like years, she opens the front door a crack and looks out.
What she can see of the coastal path is empty.
It has stopped raining, but the air still smells of rain, a wet, leafy scent more suited to autumn than to early spring.
The river is swollen with the tide. She pushes the door open wider and takes a step outside, wanting to dip her fingers into the water and watch the waves move over them, but Jack waits upstairs.
Deep breaths, then, tasting the sea air—the next-best thing for allaying her fears.
“Isabel,” Jack calls under his breath as she trembles her way up the stairs. He lowers the pistol when she steps into the room. “Who was it?”
“Lieutenant Sowerby.” She sinks down onto the bed, her head in her hands. “Oh dear God.”
“What? What did you say to him?”
“Nothing! That’s the problem. He’s an officer of the Revenue Service and I lied to his face.” It wasn’t just what she didn’t say to him; it was the way he looked at her.
Jack says, “I’m terribly grateful.”
“Oh, do hold your tongue,” she says. “You knew I’d never say anything.” A sob rises in her throat. “He hanged a man two days ago.”
“Jed Ferries from Penzance. I heard.” Jack pushes himself up before she can tell him not to and reaches for her hand. “Your hand is very cold.”
“It’s often so.”
He wraps his own around it and says gently, “I didn’t know that you wouldn’t say anything. I hoped you wouldn’t—” He stops himself and, letting go of her hand, says, “I shall leave at the earliest opportunity. Rowell will be back tomorrow. I’m feeling better already.”
He does look a little better. There is some color in his cheeks. “I’m glad,” she says.
“You’re still determined not to accept any money for your hospitality? You’re taking a considerable risk hiding a fugitive.”
“Don’t remind me. And yes, I’m determined.”
“Then would you consider a business proposition instead?”
“What sort of business proposition?”
“We’ve used the shed—your shed—in the past for the storing of goods, until they could be moved farther inland. A couple of days at most. It’s a convenient spot, out of the way, down the inlet.”
That explains the padlock, she thinks. Jack says, “I should like the use of it in the future, if you’ll allow me.”
“No. Absolutely not.”
“It would only be a few times a year. You’d never see us—we’d come in with the new moon and leave before you even realize there’s contraband stored on your property. I would pay you as well as any of our accomplices. Better, when we have some good runs of it with the new ship.”
She’s going to say no again but the word has gotten stuck on her tongue. She remembers the farmer Mrs. Dowling told her about, who was shot by revenue men for storing contraband on his property. It’d be madness to say yes.
Jack says, “It would be a way to augment your income. And it wouldn’t be charity. You’d be doing us a service.”
She will say it now. No. Simple, short, and why in Heaven’s name is it so difficult to get the word out? “I shall think about it,” she says.
“Please do.”
“How will I get word to you when I’ve made my decision?”
“Speak to Tom Holder, the keeper of the Shipwrights Arms. Tell him you’ve got news for his friend from the cove—say it exactly like that, not ‘my friend’ or ‘a friend,’ but ‘your friend from the cove.’ Then tell him your news; in this case a simple yes or no will suffice.”
“Very well.” She feels stupidly pleased.
She worried that once Jack left she wouldn’t see him again.
The feeling annoys her. She should not see him again.
He’s a smuggler. She has done her Christian duty, helping him, and that’s enough.
She cannot get involved with smuggling. “How much?” she says, feeling more foolish still.
“The compensation? Two percent of the profits. On a good run that can easily amount to”—he taps his fingers, thinking—“ten pounds.”
“Ten pounds?” Her widow’s pension is two shillings a day. Her mind whirls with the numbers. Ten pounds, that’d be a hundred days’ worth of income. For a couple of nights’ work. No, not even work—she wouldn’t have to do anything but turn a blind eye to the cargo being stored in the shed.
Jack says, “Does that change things?”
“I have to think about it.”
“Let me know when you’ve decided. I could use another friend along the river.”
“I shall.” She looks at his hand on the bed. She wishes it was still wrapped around hers. He was awfully forward taking her hand in his, but she cannot deny she liked the feeling. “Shall I see you again after you leave?”
The smile appears as it did the day before when she first saw him. He’s quick to smile. He seems glad even though he’s laid up here with a gunshot wound in his side and a riding officer knocked on the door not thirty minutes ago. “Should you wish to?”
“Yes. No. Maybe.”
The smile widens. “Well, which is it?”
“I shall have to think about that, too.”