“Well, I hope it doesn’t take him as long to return this time,” Corisande murmured, and Rebecca nodded in agreement.
“Ais, I told him if that shipment wasn’t there to come back straightaway, an’ he promised me, Corie. No ifs or an’s about it! An’ my Oliver holds to his word. So ‘ee can look for the signal tomorrow night, an’ if it doesn’t come, you’ll know there was none of that good brandy to be found.” Rebecca’s hand moved to the door. “Now, can I give ‘ee a nice hot drink before ‘ee must be on your way? A piece of buttermilk cake?”
Corisande shook her head as she stepped outside the room, though buttermilk cake, especially Rebecca’s, which she always served with a dollop of sweet cream, did sound inviting. By now Charlotte was probably quite overcome by dreaded fish odors, so she’d best hurry. She gave Rebecca a hug and then drew her cloak more snugly around her.
“Ais, a good idea, wrap yourself tight. A gale’s brewing, I fear, a nor’westerly, so my Oliver should be well clear of it, but I’ll be praying hard tonight, all the same.”
“I’ll say a prayer too.”
“‘Ee do that, Corie dear. A vicar’s daughter’s prayer is surely worth two of mine!”
Corisande smiled, turning to the door only to be bumped suddenly out of the way as three men who’d just gotten up from their chairs shouldered past her without even an apology.
“Ais, those dockhands!” Rebecca snorted with exasperation as the door slammed behind them. “Rude as can be and not getting any better! Been here almost two weeks now an’ haven’t left an extra pence for me cleaning their rooms an’ cooking them meals, an’ nary a thank you either. Pah! Foreigners! Oh, dear, no slight upon your dear mother, though. But these fellows—come here to find work when there’s barely enough for our own? Pah!”
Corisande shrugged. “Everyone has a right to earn bread, Rebecca. It’s no matter.”
She gave the still-grumbling woman another hug and then stepped outside. The whistling wind had picked up tremendously in the few moments since she’d entered the inn, so strong now that her skirt whipped around her legs. Obviously Charlotte had noticed, too, the duchess waving to her frantically to hurry.
“Oh, dear, oh, dear, we’re going to be blown into the sea! We’ll never make it back to the house, I know it! We’ll tip over, the horses will stumble in the mud, we’ll drown!”
“Drown in what? The heath?” Corisande muttered to herself as she ducked her head to the wind and went to the carriage, a footman waiting to assist her. She waved him away, saying to an incredulous Charlotte, “I was hoping we might stop first to meet my family but—”
“Oh, no, we must get back to the house!” the frenzied duchess interrupted before Corisande could finish. “Climb into the carriage before you’re blown away!”
“I’m not going to be blown away and I’m not getting into the carriage,” she shouted, beyond all patience now. “You go ahead, I’ll get home somehow later. Either that, or have Donovan come for me. I’ll be at my father’s house—I haven’t seen him and my three sisters for several days. Are you sure you wouldn’t like to come with me and—”
Again Corisande didn’t get to finish as a powerful gust of wind suddenly tore the carriage door away from the footman and slammed it shut with a bang, while Charlotte shrieked in terror for the coachman to drive on at once. Corisande barely had time to step out of the way as the black ducal coach jerked into motion. The hapless footman had to run after to swing himself up onto the back platform.
“Yes, hurry, you don’t want to be blown into the sea,” Corisande said with a wryness that would have matched Donovan’s if he’d just seen this ridiculous little episode.
Oh, Lord, Donovan.
She began to walk quickly toward the parsonage, trying not to think of how angry he might be once he discovered she’d stayed behind in Porthleven. Of course, she had no intention at all of journeying across the heath alone; if the storm proved too bad and Donovan couldn’t come for her, she would just spend the night in her own bed, her narrow single bed, not anything like the huge bed she’d shared those two nights with Donovan…
Corisande shivered, not wanting to think of that either. Nor how he’d stared at her so strangely all through supper last night, looking at her almost as if he’d never really seen her before.
Of course, it could have been because her hair was mussed and her dress askew; she’d pulled on her clothing in the dark after all. And certainly she didn’t want to think about how vastly disappointed he must be to have to wait longer for his inheritance—Oh, for heaven’s sake! Why think of Donovan at all?
So she tried not to, wondering instead when she was going to be able to write down all the figures of Tuesday’s landing in the ledger she kept hidden in the church. She supposed after she visited her family she might have some time, that is, if the gale grew worse and there was no chance of Donovan coming to fetch her—
“Donovan again, always Donovan,” she said aloud with resignation, grateful that the parsonage was only another few houses away. A blast of wind, laced now with cold rain, hit her with tremendous force and so suddenly that she half spun, looking back down the darkening street as she braced herself against a cottage wall.
Villagers were rushing outside to close banging shutters and shoo their children indoors while dogs barked at the low, heavy clouds scudding across the sky. The harbor was alive with activity as boats were lashed to the docks, a few larger vessels anchored farther out bobbing upon the angry, steely-looking waves, their masts dipping and swaying. Other than that, the streets were nearly empty where she stood, well, except for those three men huddled as if talking among themselves down the hill.
Corisande turned and kept walking, then slowed down.
Three men? Strange. She glanced over her shoulder to see that they were no longer huddled but coming up the street at her pace, their capped heads lowered against the wind and shoulders hunched. She’d scarcely thought twice about it at the inn, but could they be the same ones who’d bumped into…?
Corisande began to walk faster, glancing behind her to see that the men were now walking faster, too, which made her heart jump. Then she immediately told herself she was being silly. It was growing dark, but there was still enough light to see quite well, and she was in the very center of the village. Surely she had nothing to fear. So why, then, was she suddenly so nervous?
She didn’t want to, but she hazarded a quick glance behind her to find to her immense relief that the three men were gone.
Where, she could not say, but she didn’t waste time wondering. She flew into the parsonage, where the comforting warmth of the place and the smell of Frances’s leek and potato pie greeted her like an old friend.
“Hello? Anyone here?”
At once a clatter arose from the kitchen as wooden chairs scraped against the floor and Luther began to yip, and her sisters came spilling down the narrow hallway at a run.
“Oh, Corie, is she here? Is she here?” That from Marguerite, who embraced Corisande excitedly while glancing past her into the parlor.
“The duchess, Corie! Where’s the duchess?” piped Estelle as Luther spun and pranced and yapped at her feet.
“Oh, so you heard Donovan and I have important visitors?” Not surprised that the news must have flown like tonight’s gale through Porthleven, Corisande bent down to give her youngest sister a hug. Then she moved on to Linette, who flung her slender arms around her neck.
“I don’t care about any silly duchess, Corie. I’m glad just to see you.”
“I’m very glad to see you too,” Corisande murmured, giving Linette a good squeeze before releasing her. “I’m sorry to say the duchess decided to go home. Charlotte doesn’t much like storms. Doesn’t like much of anything, for that matter.”
“Did she take her shiny black coach with her?” Her voice very small, Estelle looked crestfallen. “Johnnie Morton saw you riding in a huge, shiny black coach—with men in fancy clothes sitting on a funny little seat. He c
ame hollering back into the school to tell us.”
“Yes, it was quite big with a crest and silver mountings and footmen in fancy clothes, and I’m afraid they all went home with the duchess. But I’m here, and something smells very good in the kitchen. Do you think Frances made enough for me too? Where is Frances?”
Suddenly there was an uncomfortable silence as all three girls looked at each other, none of them looking at her.
“She’s not in the kitchen? Marguerite?”
“She’s out trying to get Papa to come in for supper, Corie. She told us to stay inside—the storm coming and all—and she knew, too, that you might be stopping by—”
“What do you mean, trying to get Papa to come in?”
Again the silence, Estelle looking up with very big eyes at Marguerite while Linette chewed her lower lip.
“Well, is somebody going to answer me?”
“He doesn’t want to come inside, we don’t know why,” Marguerite said in an uncertain voice. “He’s too busy digging holes.”
“Holes?”
A chorus of nods greeted her incredulous query; Corisande stared at them in confusion. “Where? Why?”
“I told you we don’t know.” Tears filled Marguerite’s eyes. “He’s been outside in the garden—”
“Well, of course, that explains it, then,” Corisande broke in as she moved down the hall. “You know how he loves to spend time out there tending the flowers.”
“But all day long, Corie, and into the night?” Marguerite called after her while Linette and Estelle followed closely at Corisande’s heels, and Luther skittered ahead into the kitchen. “I don’t think he’s slept at all for two days.”
Growing concerned now, Corisande said as reassuringly as she could, “Go on, all of you, sit down and eat your supper. It smells wonderful. I’ll go see if I can help Frances, all right?”
They didn’t sit down, instead following Corisande to the kitchen door until she spun and said in her sternest voice, “I said to go finish your supper. Everything will be fine, you’ll see.”
They silently obliged with long faces, their chairs scraping dully, not at all the boisterous girls who had greeted her only moments ago. It was as if seeing her had given vent to unspoken fears, but Corisande couldn’t worry about them now as she went outside into the garden, astonished at how dark it had grown. A thick rain was falling, too, scratches of lightning cutting across the pitch-black sky. And the wind, the wind had become a wild thing that tore at her clothes, her hair, whistling shrilly as it whipped across the heath.
“Frances! Papa!”
She ran deeper into the garden, but she didn’t see them anywhere, a great sense of unease swamping her.
“Frances?”
“Here, Corie! Here!”
She whirled, relief overwhelming her as she spied Frances and her father just outside the garden wall. She ran and pushed open the metal gate, barely dodging a yawning hole some two feet across illumined by a great flash of lightning.
“Be careful, they’re all around!” Frances warned, waving her back inside the garden. “The good parson’s fine, Corie, never ‘ee fear! Go back now! I’ll have him into the house quick as a wink!”
Corisande doubted it would be quick as a wink since her father walked more slowly and more stooped than she’d ever seen him, his snow white hair plastered to his head, his clothes drenched. She made a move to come and help, nearly slipping into another hole just inside the wall. Good Lord, how many holes—
“Oh, God!”
Corisande’s hand flew to her throat as two cannon explosions in close succession rocked the earth, rumbling over the village as loud as any thunder. As lightning flashed brilliantly around them, she could see Frances’s stricken face that must have surely matched her own.
“Lord help us, Corie, that alarm hasn’t sounded in over a year! ‘Tes a ship! They’ve sighted a ship in trouble!”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Corisande gasped as a third cannon blast shattered the night—which meant only one thing: the ship must have already struck the shore, with who knew how many lives at stake.
“Get Papa inside—see to him, Frances!”
Corisande ducked her head against the slashing rain and ran back through the garden to the house, taking care to watch for any treacherous holes. Her three sisters scattered away from the door as she burst inside the kitchen, their faces pale and their eyes wide.
“Papa’s fine. Frances is bringing him back to the house,” she explained hastily, wiping the moisture from her eyes. “See that he eats, and drinks some hot tea. A ship’s in trouble, and they may need him to…”
Corisande didn’t finish but raced down the hall, her sisters well understanding that their father might be needed to perform a burial service if anyone drowned—though she prayed that help would arrive in time for those poor desperate souls. To her relief, she saw as she stepped outside that the village was alive with commotion, men and their wives, too, tugging on cloaks and caps and coats as they rushed from their houses and jumped onto pony-drawn wagons already rumbling down to the harbor.
She ran to a passing cart; villagers outstretched their arms to give her a lift up, and she clambered aboard, breathlessly murmuring her thanks as she joined the flight to help strangers in trouble. It seemed in only moments they’d reached the water and there everyone set off on foot, running north along the beach. Some men had huge twists of rope thrown over their shoulders while still others half dragged, half carried rowboats across the sand. A tar barrel stood lit and burning brightly atop a nearby cliff to show them the way.
It only took a brilliant flash of lightning to spot the distressed ship fifty yards from shore being buffeted by a tremendous sea, her eerily white sails split and tattered. It looked to be a fishing vessel, and Corisande’s heart pounded hard for a moment when she thought it might have been the Fair Betty returned home because of the fierce gale. At once a hue and cry went up to man the boats, while a host of villagers suddenly dashed into the boiling surf to drag a limp survivor to shore.
Corisande was stunned to see another exhausted swimmer struggling through the breakers to reach the safety of the beach, and she rushed with four others to help. The water was bitterly cold and dragged heavily at her skirt, while the sand shifted dangerously beneath her feet with the powerful undertow. She managed to grab onto the man’s collar while the others grabbed his arms and legs and hauled him to dry land.
“There’s seven hands…seven hands still aboard without Hodge an’ me,” the man gasped, coughing up water as he looked to where the other sailor was surrounded by villagers farther up the beach. “An’ Captain Briggs an’ his young son…we were bound with a load of mackerel for Falmouth…tried to run the storm…we’re the only ones who know how to swim…”
As the man fell into a fit of violent hacking, Corisande sank to her knees and did her best to lift his shoulders so he wouldn’t choke.
“I’ll stay with him. Tell the others there are still nine people on board!” she shouted above the roaring wind to the villagers who had helped her drag the sailor to shore, waving them away to alert the men climbing into the rowboats. Already several boats had headed into the crashing waves, only to be tossed about like bits of cork and overturned, spilling their occupants into the sea.
At once people forged into the heavy surf to save their own. Corisande’s heart sank as another streak of lightning lit the sky and she saw that the ship now listed ominously.
God help those poor people, there wasn’t much more time—
“Hell and damnation, woman, must you forever place yourself in harm’s way?”
Corisande gasped as she was hauled to her feet, barely able to see Donovan’s expression in the darkness although she could hear the scowl in his voice. She could tell, too, from how tightly his hands were gripping her shoulders that he must be furious she’d not returned in the carriage with Charlotte, but there was no time to think of that now.
“Donovan, thi
s man swam from the ship, but there are still nine on board including a little boy! They’ve already tried to launch some boats…”
Corisande’s words were drowned out as a great anguished cry went up along the beach when another rowboat was cast back onto shore by the churning sea. She saw then that several men with ropes tied around their waists were plunging into the water in a valiant attempt to reach the ship before it foundered. Donovan must have seen them, too, for he turned back to her and shook her hard, his voice brooking no argument.
“Stay here, Corie, where I’ll know to find you. Don’t move an inch!”
She didn’t have a chance to reply as he left her and ran to the water’s edge, where a cluster of villagers gathered round him to tie a lifeline about his waist as well. Then Donovan was gone, disappearing into the waves while Corisande’s heart flew to her throat.
That’s what she had meant to ask him—if there might be some way he could help. Now that he was swimming out to the ship as the storm was shrieking and thundering and blowing all around them, she had never felt more frightened.
The water was so cold, the waves like mountains. Oh, Lord, oh, Lord…
Corisande dropped again to her knees as another fierce fit of coughing seized the sailor, but to her surprise he waved her away as if sensing her unease.
“I’m all right…go on if ‘ee want to join the others.”
Corisande shook her head, but then three women came rushing over with blankets, one of them saying that he should come with them to the overhang of a cliff where a bonfire had been lit. She was only too relieved to help them lift the man to his feet and see him led away.
She knew Donovan had told her to stay put, but she hurried down the beach anyway. She wanted to make sure that the villagers holding his lifeline were ready to haul him in as soon as they saw him swimming back to shore—and not to pull too hard either. Last year a rescuer had been swallowed up by the sea when his rope had snapped…
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