He bowed his head so that she should not see the bitterness in his face that his sacrifice and the danger he had faced had done nothing more than bring a lecher to the throne of a fool. “I am fully restored to my family estates and fortune,” he confirmed quietly. “I did not ever stoop to curry favor. What you suggest is… beneath me. I received my due. My family were ruined in his service. We have been repaid. No more and no less.”
“Then twenty-one pistoles is nothing to you,” she triumphed. “You will hardly have noticed it. But if you insist, I can repay you. Shall I send it to your land agent at your great house in Yorkshire? I don’t have it in coin right now. We don’t keep that sort of money in the house, we don’t earn that sort of money in a month; but I will borrow and reimburse you by next week.”
“I don’t want your coins. I want…”
Once again her cold gaze froze him into silence.
“Mrs. Stoney.” He cautiously used her married name and she did not contradict him. “Mrs. Stoney, I have my lands, but I have no son. My title will die with me. I am bringing this boy—you force me to speak bluntly to you, not to his mother, and not to my son, as would be my choice—I am bringing him a miracle, I will make him into a gentleman, I will make him wealthy, he is my heir. And it will be her restoration too. I said once that she would be a lady of a great house. I repeat that now. I insist that I repeat it to her in person, so that I can be sure that she knows, so that she knows exactly, the great offer I am making her. I insist that I repeat it to him, so that he knows the opportunity that lies before him. I am ready to give her my name and title. He will have a father and ancestral lands. I will acknowledge him…” He caught his breath at the enormity of the offer. “I will give him my name, my honorable name. I am proposing that I should marry her.”
He was panting as he finished speaking but there was no response, just another void of silence. He thought she must be astounded by the wealth and good fortune that had descended on them like a thunderclap. He thought she was struck dumb. But then Alys Stoney spoke:
“Oh no, she won’t see you,” she answered him casually, as if she were turning away a pedlar from the door. “And there’s no child in this house that carries your name. Nor one that has even heard of you.”
“There is a boy. I know there is a boy. Don’t lie to me. I know…”
“My son,” she said levelly. “Not yours.”
“I have a daughter?”
This threw everything into confusion. He had thought so long of his boy, growing up on the wharf, a boy who would be raised in the rough-and-tumble of the streets but who would—he was certain—have been given an education, been carefully raised. The woman he had loved could not have a boy without making a man of him. He had known her boy, Rob, she could not help but raise a good young man and teach him curiosity and hopefulness and a sense of joy. But anyway—his thoughts whirled—a girl could inherit his lands just as well, he could adopt her and give her his name, he could see that she married well and then he would have a grandson at Northside Manor. He could entail the land on her son, he could insist the new family took his name. In the next generation there would be a boy who could keep the Avery name alive, he would not be the last, he would have a posterity.
“My daughter,” she corrected him again. “Not yours.”
She had stunned him. He looked at her imploringly, so pale, she thought he might faint. But she did not offer him so much as a drop of water, though his lips were gray and he put up a hand to his neck and loosened his collar. “Should you go outside for air?” she asked him, uncaring. “Or just go?”
“You have taken my child as your own?” he whispered.
She inclined her head; but did not answer.
“You took my child? A kidnap?”
She nearly smiled. “Hardly. You were not there to steal from. You were far away. I don’t think we could even see the dust behind your grand coach.”
“Was it a boy? Or a girl?”
“Both the girl and the boy are mine.”
“But which was mine?” He was agonized.
She shrugged. “Neither of them now.”
“Alys, for pity’s sake. You will give my child back to me. To his great estate? To inherit my fortune?”
“No,” she said.
“What?”
“No, thank you,” she said insolently.
There was a long silence in the room, though outside they could hear the shouts of the men as the last grain sack was hauled off the barge, and they started to load it with goods for the return trip. They heard barrels of French wine and sugar roll along the quayside. Still he said nothing, but his hand tugged at the rich lace collar at his throat. Still she said nothing, but kept her head turned away from him, as if she had no interest in his pain.
A great clatter and rumble of wheels on the cobbles outside the window made her turn in surprise.
“Is that a carriage? Here?” he asked.
She said nothing, but stood listening, blank-faced, as a carriage rolled noisily up the cobbled quay to the warehouse and stopped outside the front door which gave on to the street.
“A gentleman’s carriage?” he asked incredulously. “Here?”
They heard the clatter of the hooves as the horses were pulled up, and then the footman jumped down from the back, opened the carriage door, and turned to hammer on the front door of the warehouse.
Swiftly, Alys went past him, across the room, and lifted the bottom of the blind so that she could peep out onto the quay. She could only see the open door of the carriage, a billowing dark silk skirt, a tiny silk shoe with a black rose pinned on the toe. Then they heard the maid, stamping up the hall to open the shabby front door and recoil at the magnificence of the footman from the carriage.
“The Nobildonna,” he announced, and Alys watched the hem of the gown sweep down the carriage steps, across the cobbles, and into the hall. Behind the rich gown came a plain hem, a maid of some sort, and Alys turned to James Avery.
“You have to go,” she said rapidly. “I was not expecting… You will have to…”
“I’m not going without an answer.”
“You have to!” She started towards him as if she would physically push him through the narrow doorway, but it was too late. The stunned housemaid had already thrown open the parlor door, there was a rustle of silk, and the veiled stranger had entered the room, paused on the threshold, taking in the wealthy gentleman and the plainly dressed woman in one swift glance. She crossed the room and took Alys in her arms and kissed her on both cheeks.
“You allow me? You forgive me? But I had nowhere else to come!” she said swiftly in a ripple of speech with an Italian accent.
James saw Alys, so furiously icy just a moment before, flush brightly, her blush staining her neck and her cheeks, saw her eyes fill with tears, as she said: “Of course you should have come! I didn’t think…”
“And this is my baby,” the lady said simply, beckoning to the maid behind her who carried a sleeping baby draped in the finest Venetian lace. “This is his son. This is your nephew. We called him Matteo.”
Alys gave a little cry and held out her arms for the baby, looking down into the perfect face, tears coming to her eyes.
“Your nephew?” James Avery said, stepping forward to see the little face framed in ribboned lace. “Then this is Rob’s boy?”
A furious glance from Alys did not prevent the lady from sweeping him a curtsey and throwing her dark veil back to show a vivacious beautiful face, her lips rosy with rouge, enhanced with a dark crescent patch beside her mouth.
“I’m honored, Lady…?”
Alys did not volunteer the lady’s name, nor did she mention his. She stood, awkward and angry, looking at them both, as if she could deny the courtesy of an introduction and ensure that they would never meet.
“I am Sir James Avery, of Northside Manor, Northallerton in Yorkshire.” James bowed over the lady’s hand.
“Nobildonna da Ricci,” she replied. And
then she turned to Alys. “That is how you say it? Da Ricci? I am right?”
“I suppose so,” Alys said. “But you must be very tired.” She glanced out of the window. “The carriage?”
“Ah, it is rented. They will unload my trunks, if you would pay them?”
Alys looked horrified. “I don’t know if I have—”
“Please allow me,” Sir James interrupted smoothly. “As a friend of the family.”
“I shall pay them!” Alys insisted. “I can find it.” She flung open the door and shouted an order to the maid and turned to the widow, who had followed every word of this exchange. “You’ll want to rest. Let me show you upstairs and I’ll get some tea.”
“Allora! It is always tea with the English!” she exclaimed, throwing up her hands. “But I am not tired, and I don’t want tea. And I am afraid I am interrupting you. Were you here on business, Sir James? Please stay! Please continue!”
“You are not interrupting, and he is going,” Alys said firmly.
“I will come back tomorrow, when you have had time to think,” Sir James said quickly. He turned to the lady: “Is Robert with you, Lady da Ricci? I should so like to see him again. He was my pupil and…”
The shocked look on both their faces told him that he had said something terrible. Alys shook her head as if she wished she had not heard the words and something in her face told James that the ostentatious mourning wear of the Italian lady was for Rob, little Rob Reekie who twenty-one years ago had been a brilliant boy of twelve and now was gone.
The widow’s mouth quivered; she dropped into a seat and covered her face with her black-mittened hands.
“I am so sorry, so sorry.” He was horrified at his blunder. He bowed to the lady. He turned to Alys. “I am sorry for your loss. I had no idea. If you had told me, I would not have been so clumsy. I am so sorry, Alys, Mrs. Stoney.”
She held the baby, the fatherless boy, in her arms. “Why should I tell you anything?” she demanded fiercely. “Just go! And don’t come back.”
But the lady, with her face hidden, blindly stretched out her hand to him, as if for comfort. He could not help but take the warm hand in the tight black lace mitten.
“But he spoke of you!” she whispered. “I remember now. I know who you are. You were his tutor and he said you taught him Latin and were patient with him when he was just a little boy. He was grateful to you for that. He told me so.”
James patted her hand. “I am so sorry for your loss,” he said. “Forgive my clumsiness.”
Mistily, she smiled up at him, blinking away tears from her dark eyes. “Forgiven,” she said. “And forgotten at once. How should you guess such a tragedy? But call on me when you come again, and you can tell me what he was like when he was a boy. You must tell me all about his childhood. Promise me that you will?”
“I will,” James said quickly before Alys could retract the invitation. “I will come tomorrow, after breakfast. And I’ll leave you now.” He bowed to both the women and nodded to the nursemaid and went quickly from the room before Alys could say another word. They heard him ask the maid for his horse and then they heard the front door slam. They sat in silence as they heard the horse coming around from the yard and stand, as he mounted up, and then clattered away.
“I thought his name was something else,” the widow remarked.
“It was then.”
“I did not know that he was a nobleman?”
“He was not, then.”
“And wealthy?”
“Now, I suppose so.”
“Ah,” the lady considered her sister-in-law. “Is it all right that I came? Roberto told me to come to you if anything ever… if anything ever… if anything ever happened to him.” Her face was tearstained and flushed. She took out a tiny handkerchief trimmed with black ribbon and put it to her eyes.
“Of course,” Alys said. “Of course. And this is your home for as long as you want to stay.”
The sleeping baby gave a gurgle and Alys shifted him from her shoulder to hold him in her arms, so she could look into the little pursed face for any sign of Rob.
“I think he is very like your brother,” the widow said quietly. “It is a great comfort to me. When I first lost my love, my dearest Roberto, I thought I would die of the pain. It was only this little—this little angel—that kept me alive at all.”
Alys put her lips to the warm head, where the pulse bumped so strongly. “He smells so sweet,” she said wonderingly.
Her ladyship nodded. “My savior. May I show him to his grandmother?”
“I shall take you to see her,” Alys said. “This has been a terrible shock for her, for us all. We only had your letter telling of his death last week, and then your letter from Greenwich three days ago. We’re not even in mourning. I am so sorry.”
The young woman looked up, her eyelashes drenched with tears. “It is nothing, it is nothing. What matters is the heart.”
“You know that she is an invalid? But she will want to welcome you here at once. I’ll just go up and tell her that you have come to us. Can I have them bring you anything? If not tea, then perhaps a drink of chocolate? Or a glass of wine?”
“Just a glass of wine and water,” the lady said. “And please tell your lady-mother that I wish to be no trouble to her. I can see her tomorrow, if she is resting now.”
“I’ll ask.” Alys gave the baby to the nursemaid and went from the room, across the hall, and up the narrow stairs.
* * *
Alinor was bent over her letter, seated at a round table set in the glazed turret, struggling to write to her brother to tell him such bad news that she could not make herself believe it. The warm breeze coming in with the tide lifted a stray lock of white hair from her frowning face. She was surrounded by the tools of her trade: herbalism, posies of herbs drying on strings over her head, stirring in the air from the window, little bottles of oils and essences were ranked on the shelves on the far side of the room, and on the floor beneath them were big corked jars of oils. She was not yet fifty, her strikingly beautiful face honed by pain and loss, her eyes a darker gray than her modest gown, a white apron around her narrow waist, a white collar at her neck.
“Was that her? So soon?”
“You saw the carriage?”
“Yes—I was writing to Ned. To tell him.”
“Ma—it’s Rob’s… it is…”
“Rob’s widow?” Alinor asked without hesitation. “I thought it must be, when I saw the nursemaid, carrying the baby. It is Rob’s baby boy?”
“Yes. He’s so tiny, to come such a long way! Shall I bring her up?”
“Has she come to stay? I saw trunks on the coach?”
“I don’t know how long…”
“I doubt this’ll be good enough for her.”
“I’ll get Sarah’s room ready for the maid and the baby, and I’ll offer her Johnnie’s room in the attic. I should have done it earlier but I never dreamed she’d get here so soon. She hired her own carriage from Greenwich.”
“Rob wrote that she was a wealthy widow. Poor child, she must feel that her old life is lost.”
“Just like us,” Alys remarked. “Homeless, and with the babies.”
“Except we didn’t have a hired carriage and a maid,” Alinor pointed out. “Who was the gentleman? I couldn’t see more than the top of his hat.”
Alys hesitated, unsure what she should say. “Nobody,” she lied. “A gentleman factor. He was selling a share in a slaver ship to the Guinea coast. Promised a hundredfold return, but the risk is too much for us.”
“Ned wouldn’t like it.” Alinor glanced down at her inadequate letter to her brother, far away in New England, escaping his country that had chosen servitude under a king. “Ned would never trade in slaves.”
“Ma…” Alys hesitated, not knowing how to speak to her mother. “You know that there can be no doubt?”
“Of my son’s death?” Alinor named the loss she could not believe.
“His widow is
here now. She can tell you herself.”
“I know. I will believe it when she tells me, I am sure.”
“D’you want to lie on your sofa when I bring her up? It’s not too much for you?”
Alinor rose to her feet and took the half-dozen steps to the sofa and then seated herself as Alys lifted her legs and tucked her gown around her ankles.
“Comfortable? Can you breathe, Ma?”
“Aye, I’m well enough. Let her come up now.”
JUNE 1670, HADLEY, NEW ENGLAND
Ned was in a land without kings, but not without authorities. A selectman from the town council of Hadley banged through the north gate from the town and clambered up the embankment of the river and down the other side to the rickety wooden pier, so he could clang the dangling old horseshoe on a rusty iron bar to summon the ferryman from wherever he was. Ned mounted the bank from the back yard of the little two-room house, wiping the earth from his hands, and paused at the summit to look down on him.
“There’s no need to raise the dead. I was in my garden.”
“Edward Ferryman?”
“Aye. As you know well enough. D’you want the ferry?”
“No, I thought you might be in the woods, so I clanged for the ferry to fetch you.”
Ned silently raised his eyebrows, as if to imply that the man might call for the ferry but not the ferryman.
The man gestured to the paper in his hand. “This is official. You’re wanted in town.”
“Well, I can’t leave the Quinnehtukqut.” Ned gestured to the slow-moving river in its summer shallows.
“What?”
“The river. That’s its name. How come you don’t know that?”
“We call it the Connecticut.”
“Same thing. It means long river, a long river with tides. I can’t leave the ferry in daylight hours without someone to man the boat. You should know that. It’s the town’s own regulation.”
“Is that French?” he asked curiously. “The Quin… whatever you called it? D’you call it by a French name?”
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