We finished dessert and Graves called Tansy to whisk away the plates and the detritus of our meal. When she left, I was alone with Graves and knew that I was out of distractions. The moment I had been dreading since I first saw the Jezebel at anchor that morning had arrived and I could do nothing to postpone it any longer.
I sat at the table, waiting Graves's command while I stared down at my hands. I could feel his attention, could feel his whole being intensely concentrated upon me from just a foot or so away. It made me itchy all over, and my heart pounded in my chest. The tension in my shoulders was building to painful levels and I know he could tell that I was out of sorts. He was clearly showing me that he was in control of the situation, that I was there merely to amuse him, to serve him, that I had no say whatsoever in what happened to me. I dare say he enjoyed my discomfort.
“Has Ben been treating you well?” he asked, his voice causing me to jump in fright. I darted a look at his face and found him staring at me levelly as he sipped his wine.
“Yes, sir. Gideon,” I corrected. “He's been very kind.”
“Good. And Madame and the other girls? Not too much resentment from them?”
“No. They've been kind, too.” Was he happy that everyone was treating me well? Did he want them to treat me badly? I was confused by his solicitous questions and concerns. It did not fit the picture I had formed of him.
“And Tansy? How is she working out as your maid?”
“Tansy is wonderful.” I paused and darted another look at him. His face as an emotionless mask and nothing was in his eyes—no anger, no happiness, no curiosity. Nothing. They were as empty as the place in his chest where his heart should be.
A sudden thought struck me. Perhaps he merely wanted to talk with me tonight. Perhaps he missed the company of a woman, the idle chitchat of partners, like that which my parents had shared. I remembered listening to them discuss all sorts of things—their daily activities, politics, music, books, my brothers and I. Maybe that was what Graves desired. If he hadn't spent time with his wife in two years, it seemed possible that it was what he wanted from me tonight.
He nodded at length, satisfied with my answer, and stood up from the table. I watched him, dread filling my breast. He held his hand out to me and I took it gingerly, feeling the strength in his fingers as he drew me to my feet and into an allemande spin. He gathered me in against his body, holding me tightly, and lowered his mouth to mine. He tasted of the wine we'd had during dinner as he kissed me, delicately tracing my lips with the tip of his tongue before thrusting it into my mouth to twine with my own.
He broke the kiss, and whispered, “Take your hair down,” before releasing me and going to close the shutters over the windows. I obeyed, carefully pulling the flowers and baubles out of my braid and setting them down on the table. Once the braid was loose, I combed my fingers through it and let it hang over my shoulders. He came back to stand in front of me and took a tendril of my hair between his fingers, just as he had the night we met. He pulled me in close again and smoothed his hand down the back of my head, raking his fingers gently through my hair and seeming to savor the texture and the color in the firelight.
He let me go and stepped back, his eyes moving over me hungrily. “Undress. Slowly.”
I drew a deep breath, steeling myself, and then began peeling away the layers of my clothing. Luckily he would not have to destroy the lacing on my stays; the one I was wearing tonight laced up the front. I was impatient and more than a little embarrassed by his demands to go slowly. I wanted to get this whole affair over with as quickly as possible. I wanted him to go about his business and then leave immediately afterward. I wanted him out of my bedroom.
As soon as I was standing naked in front of him, he moved closer to me, standing within arm's reach and began touching me with both hands. He began at my hairline and traced the curve of my face and along my jaw to my chin and then down my throat. His fingers stroked out along the wings of my collarbones and down my arms to my fingers, where he interlaced our hands together for a moment and drew me against him to kiss me. I stood still and compliant, allowing him to do anything he wanted to me but not reacting to his touches or his kisses.
His hands let go of mine and slid back up my arms, over my chest, and down between my breasts. He took them into his hands and massaged them gently, his fingers tweaking my nipples, rolling them delicately. His mouth closed over one even as his hand kept busy with the other. I drew in a sharp breath and arched my back, pushing my breasts more firmly against him. A shock wave of pleasure coursed down my spine and I reached up to plunge my fingers into his hair and pull him even harder against me.
“Careful, girl,” Graves's voice intoned and my eyes sprang open. His voice—harsh and too deep—had broken through the haze in my mind and I was horrified to find that I was drawing pleasure from this devil.
I pulled away and Graves straightened, grabbed a fistful of my hair at the back of my head and turned me around. He shoved me forward, bending me over the table, squashing my face and my breasts against the rough grain of the wood. I felt his fingers poking and prodding at me, opening my delicate folds and thrusting rudely inside me.
I squealed and tried to fight him off, but he merely used his grip on my hair to hold me fast. I heard the thud of his boots being kicked off and the sound of his breeches coming down. Then something cold dripped down the crack of my bottom and over the very center of me. It was the wine; I could smell it, sweet and astringent. He used his fingers again, rubbing and stroking and spreading the wine all over me.
His fingers were replaced by his manhood, which he shoved into me with a mighty thrust. He leaned forward, covering me with his upper body, and nuzzled the side of my face with his unshaven cheek. His whiskers were rough and burned me, just as the table was scraping my breasts and stomach as he thrust in and out of me.
The room was filled with the sound of his body slapping against mine, his panting and grunting, the table scraping across the floor with each of his thrusts. I tried to turn my face away from his, tried to bury it in my hands, but his grip on my hair was too tight; I was pinned beneath him, a butterfly on a card.
Hot tears leaked from my eyes and I prayed for it to be over soon, but he showed no sign of flagging. If anything, his pace quickened and his hips slammed into me over and over. Finally, with a loud groan that I felt vibrating through my back, he buried himself into me and stilled, except for tiny twitches and jerks of his hips. He lay atop me, his breathing slowing, his free hand stroking up and down my side, from my armpit over the swell of my hip to my flank and back. It was a gentle touch and I hated it; I hated it even more than his roughness, his humiliation and degradations.
He pulled himself out of me and let go of my hair. “Clean yourself up and get into bed,” he growled in my ear before getting off me. I carefully stood up, keeping my back to him as I went to the ewer and poured out some of the water into the basin and used the cloth there to clean between my legs. There was no blood this time, only the wine and something thick and viscous that smelled of the sea.
When I finally had to turn around and face him, I found him in my bed, lying atop the quilt, naked and staring at me. Each muscle in his body was clearly defined and looked as hard as marble, like the sculptures I'd seen in Italy when I was younger. His expression was as warm and welcoming as those aloof stone creations, too.
I gingerly crawled between the sheets and laid down on my side, facing away from him. I wished he had left the windows open. It was stuffy in the room and the air stank of his sweat. I could feel him moving around behind me. His arm snaked around my waist and drew me backwards, my back against his chest, his breath hot in my ear, his arm like a steel bar holding me. I closed my eyes and held myself stiffly, not wanting to relax into him.
“It doesn't have to be like that all the time,” he said. “I can be gentle, Loreley. I can give you pleasure. You just have to let me.” The only response I had to that was a very adamant negative, but I
didn't think that was the answer he was looking for, so I kept quiet. “I know you hate me,” he continued after a moment or two. “I understand that feeling. But you belong to me, and I will have you whenever I want, however I want. You would be best served by accepting that fact. I can make you feel good, or I can hurt you. It's your choice.”
I had absolutely no answer to that statement that wouldn't get me beaten or perhaps worse. So I remained silent and still, my eyes open and fixed on the shutters over the window. I would not fall asleep in this man's arms, like some happy lover. I would do what I could to endure his abuse and perhaps mitigate it, but I would never, ever enjoy it.
He fell silent soon after, his breathing evening out into the cadence of sleep. His grip on me loosened and I carefully pulled away from him to slip out of the bed. I found a clean shift and a robe and went to lie down in Ben's bed. There was no way on Earth that I would sleep in the same bed with that devil man.
I curled up under Ben's linens. They smelled of him and I felt somewhat safer, though I knew it was just an illusion. Ben was elsewhere, probably sharing Tansy's bed tonight, if she let him. But the truth of the situation was if Graves wanted to hurt me, Ben could not help me, even if he was here. No one could help me. Tears slipped down my cheeks and I curled up even tighter, a miserable ball in the tiny bed. I prayed for deliverance that night and in the darkest depths, I didn't care in what form it came.
When I woke the next morning, Graves was gone, but there was a small stack of books on the table where we had dined the night before. I rose, stiff from sleeping in Ben's uncomfortable bed, and my head ached something fierce. There was a note atop the books, written in the same lovely hand as the first note. It contained essentially the same message as the previous note, too. I set it aside and looked through the stack. There were three volumes of something called Les Mille et une nuits, contes arabes traduits en français. “One thousand and one nights,” I said as I opened the first book. “Arab stories translated into French.” The book was beautiful, richly illustrated and filled with many tales of far-away, romantic Arabia. If Graves was trying to buy my affections and not just my attention, then these books were a good attempt.
Ben and Tansy returned, bringing with them breakfast and tea, to find me curled up in a chair I'd drug over in front of the open windows, consumed by the first volume. They exchanged a look that I barely saw and did not care to interpret before setting out the food and things. Ben poured a cup of tea and set it on the floor next to me before they left.
* * *
I spent most of Christmas day reading the first volume of the Arab stories, losing myself in daydreams of far-off exotic places, where genies gave wishes to simple merchants and parrots told only the truth to their owners. I tried not to think of my life in London just the year before. We had attended services at St James-in-the-Fields, and after a lavish meal and gift giving, we went to the Frost Fair on the Thames. Father gave Mattie, Gunnar, and I some spending money and we treated ourselves to small trinkets. I bought a small, gold-foil cross from a peddler who claimed he brought it all the way from Constantinople. I'd been wearing it when the Resolution sunk. I supposed that it was at the bottom of the sea now.
I did, however, bestir myself to attend Christmas Mass at Christ Church. I donned my best gown and sat in the congregation, listening to the story of the birth of Our Savior. It was my favorite of all the stories in the Bible. It filled me with hope and I prayed fervently for salvation, for rescue from my plight. I also lit candles for my father, mother, and Mattie and Gunnar.
That night, I went down to the tavern, expecting to see Graves and the rest of his crew there. I was surprised to find Mr. MacIsaac sitting alone at the hearth, nursing a flagon of ale. After accepting a small glass of port wine from the girl behind the bar—port was something I'd come to relish in the brief time I'd been imprisoned in Nassau—I joined the quartermaster at the fire.
He stood as I seated myself and bowed over my hand. “My lady Weymouth,” he said before retaking his seat. “How have you been spending your Christmas Day?”
“Reading the lovely books the Captain left behind,” I answered. “And you?”
Mr. MacIsaac grunted and looked away, a frown marring his brow. “Drinking, mostly.” He raised his flagon to his lips and took a deep draught. “Acting as nursemaid to a bunch of drunkards, paying off angry tavern owners when those self-same daft drunkards destroy tables and stools in fits of churlish anger.” He bit off the rest of what he was going to say and sighed angrily. His Scotch accent had broadened, due mostly likely to the ale or his mood.
“I'm sorry,” I said awkwardly and shifted uncomfortably in my seat. I would stay long enough to finish my port and then extricate myself as politely as possible. I'd never been at ease in the face of anger. It was a foreign thing to my upbringing. Raised voices and corporal punishment were unheard of in my house. My parents rarely fought or argued and beyond a few childhood altercations—which never came to blows—neither had my brothers or I.
Mr. MacIsaac looked up at me and gave me an apologetic smile. “Your pardon, my lady. Bad news has soured my wame.”
“Bad news? Of what sort?”
“It isn't anything to worry your pretty head over, my lady. And I certainly don't want to be guilty of ruining your Christmas celebrations with something so boring as politics.”
I bristled. My father had never spoken down to me like that, nor had my brothers. I was just as educated in matters of war, politics, and strategy as they were, and MacIsaac's patronizing me set my teeth on edge. “There is a mind inside this pretty head, I assure you, Mr. MacIsaac,” I said in my coldest tone. “I find great fascination in British politics and probably understand more of it than does the rest of your crew, including, I dare say, their captain.”
One side of his full mouth drew up in a smirk and he dipped his head in acknowledgment of my jab. “My apologies, my lady.” He studied me minutely for a moment. “On what side did your family fall during the Revolution?” I assumed he was referring to the Glorious Revolution, when William of Orange and his wife, Mary, deposed Mary's father, the Scotch James VII, to unite England beneath a Protestant banner and force the Catholic Stuart into exile in France.
“Why, on the side of William III, of course. Though I hardly see how that...” I broke off and raised my brows in shock. “Oh. You're Scottish,” I said dumbly. “And Catholic?”
He nodded curtly. “Aye, that I am. There's been a rising, though I'm sure by now it's been put down.”
“I see,” I said lamely. I didn't dare express my happiness or relief that any sort of rebellion against the rightful king had been put down, if indeed it had, as Mr. MacIsaac feared. I finished my port and held it awkwardly between my hands, mind reaching for a polite way to leave the tavern and retreat to my room.
Thankfully, Mr. MacIsaac sensed my discomfort and stood. “Again, I must apologize, my lady. I have made you uncomfortable. I'll take my leave.” He bowed and left the hearth, moving to the bar and sitting down heavily on a tall stool there. I left shortly thereafter, going up to my room and thinking about the quartermaster. Despite his politics—and his religion—I rather enjoyed his company. He was well-educated, possessed gentlemanly manners, and was kind to me. I fell asleep soon after, my last thoughts dedicated to wondering how fast my father was spinning in his watery grave because I was entertaining kind thoughts about a Scotchman, and an admitted rebel to compound things.
VIII
House of Earthly Delights, Nassau, New Providence Island
January, 1716
The Jezebel spent a week at anchor and I saw Graves every night. He didn't speak to me again as he had during the Christmas Eve; instead we ate in silence and he went about his attempted seductions, which I rebuffed. Though I knew he was angry with me, he never raised his hand to me. Instead he took what he wanted and then slept all night in my bed. After seven nights of sleeping in Ben's cot, I promised myself I would get him a new mattress, if only to
save my back and neck from the morning stiffness.
On two occasions, Graves took me downstairs to the tavern to drink with his men. I supposed that he was showing off his prize, letting the sailors see him with me but not allowing them to speak with me. He did, however, allow Mr. MacIsaac to sit at the table and my impression of the man remained unchanged, despite our Christmas Night talk.
“How are you enjoying the books?” Mr. MacIsaac asked me while the captain was playing at cards with some of his crew and other residents of Nassau.
“They are wonderful,” I replied, smiling at him. His face lit up with pleasure at my words and I knew in that instant that it was the quartermaster who had made gifts of the only means of escape I had. It endeared him to me even more. “You'll have to thank the captain for me again.”
One corner of his mouth quirked up in a smile and he gave me a secretive nod. “I'll be sure to pass on your compliments to Captain Graves,” he said loudly, as if to cover the conspiratorial expression. I felt a small warmth bloom in my belly at Mr. MacIsaac's smile.
“Have you read them?” I asked.
He nodded. “I have. I especially enjoyed Perrault's stories. I found the tale of the talking cat the best.”
“Le chat botté,” I said and nodded. “The story of Puss in Boots. I'm not entirely sure the boy deserved such a devoted servant. It seems to me the cat's reward was less generous than it should have been, considering what his service did for his master.”
Mr. MacIsaac looked at me sharply. He shrugged after a beat and said, “At least he was rewarded for his service. Ofttimes, a servant's exertions on behalf of his master—or mistress—go unacknowledged, let alone unrewarded.”
The Jezebel's Daughter Page 7