"Find a whore?" Julius suggested with a grin.
"Tried that." Gavin slapped the table with his palm. "First time since I was fourteen I couldn't get my pecker up!" He sighed dismally. "I'm telling you, she's ruined me, Jules. I've got saltpeter on the brain. I don't want anyone else but Ellen. Don't know that I ever will again." He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "I've got to have her."
At about that time, the serving girl came sashaying by. "What you need, gen'lemen?"
She stopped directly behind Julius, who rocked back in his chair to nestle his balding head between her sagging breasts. "A little tit, mayhap?"
She took a quick step back and he lost his balance, nearly falling to the floor. She chuckled good-naturedly. '"Sides that, boyos?"
"Sack." Gavin demanded, hitting the table with his fist for emphasis. "Two bottles each. You're so damnable slow, we'll drink 'em waiting for you to find us again."
The girl smirked and walked away. "Be right back."
Gavin watched in slight awe when she took a sudden running step and kicked a rat with the toe of her worn slipper. The animal squealed as it skittered across the floor and disappeared under another table. The tar-tailed sailors sitting there let out a few hoots and a round of applause.
Gavin felt his stomach toss as he looked back at Julius. He knew he shouldn't be here. He wasn't a drinking man anymore. Now he was hallucinating. "That blessed rat was as big as a dog!"
Julius smirked. "What do you think that meat was you had for sup?" He smacked his lips, rubbing his washboard stomach. "Damned tasty, I vow!"
Gavin's sea-green eyes narrowed doubtfully as he stared across the table at his friend. The worst thing was that the man was probably right. They probably had eaten rat meat! "You're a sick man, Julius. I don't know why I'd let you take my ship out of the harbor, much less to Maryland."
Julius opened his arms in a grandioso gesture. "Because I'm wise . . . wiser than you!"
"Oh, you are, are you?" Gavin leaned on the table and propped his cheek on the heel of his hand. "So tell me, wise man of the sea, what would you do with Ellen Scarlet if you were me?"
"I told you. Get a whore. An expensive one . . . one of them acrobats from the Orient."
"After the whore, Jules. I mean, if the whore didn't work. If you still weren't over the jade."
The older man broke into a grin. "I guess I'd kidnap her."
"Kidnap her?"
Julius drew his chair closer. "Look, you say the problem is you can't get to her to talk to her. You say if you could just explain, you know she'd see to your way of thinking and the hull would be patched, right?"
"If she's reasonable, yes."
Julius shrugged. "So there you go. Tie 'er to your main m'st and she have no choice but to listen to you."
The serving girl came back with four dusty green bottles of sack. Gavin snatched them from her hand before she had a chance to set them on the table. "That's insane!"
"Look, I told you the whore was your best wager." Julius took the other sack bottles from the girl and dropped a couple of farthings down her bodice. "The kidnapping is only my second idea. After that" —he wiped the neck of a bottle with his sleeve, then took a long pull—"I'm fresh out of ideas."
"Kidnap her." Gavin took another sip of the sack but it tasted sour in his mouth. He set down the bottle. "She'd hate me."
"Sounds like she hates you now."
"Chambray'd lose his mind if she disappeared," Gavin mused aloud. "I'd have to leave him a note to let him know she was all right and that I'd bring her back safely."
"I don't know why you're so light-footed about stealing another man's female. This certainly wouldn't be the first time you've done it. What about that little mademoiselle in Paris back in '57? You remember the little thing with the dark eyes and the mountainous—"
"Chambray's a good man, Julius. Ellen doesn't want him hurt."
"You sail off to the savages for a few years and suddenly you get a conscience, friend." He took another drink. "I'm bloody disappointed."
Gavin leaned forward to keep the conversation private, though who would be listening, he didn't know. He and Julius were by far the most sober men in the tavern, and probably the only two that had any wit to begin with. "You think it could work? You see, I thought what I could do is take her somewhere . . . somewhere out of the city where we could relax and talk. If we just had some time together alone, I'm certain I could convince her that my intentions were never to be deceitful."
Julius twisted the point of his short-cropped grey grizzled beard. "You'd need a partner. You can't pull off something like this alone—not a gentleman like you. It's not in your blood. No, you need someone who's got the gall to go in and get her out of the theater or her apartment whether she's willing or nay."
"You?"
"I once kidnapped a princess in the Caribbean Islands. Worth her weight in gold to her father, she was, literally." He winked. "Made me a rich man . . . at least for the year or two it took me to piss it away."
"I don't want Ellen hurt in a struggle. You hurt her and I'll kill you, I swear by the virgin I will, Jules."
"No, no, no. You just leave this to me, old boy. A man like me gets ahold of her and she'll be as timid as a mouse."
Gavin lifted an eyebrow. His mind was still a little cloudy from the sack, but he was thinking more clearly. Yes, he'd take Ellen into the country, where they could be alone to enjoy each other's company. There he could make her understand why he'd lied. He could make her understand that he truly did love her. "Ellen's not the timid mouse sort, I'm afraid. She's a redhead with a temper to match."
"Not with me, old boy. I guarantee I'll bring her to you packaged like a docile little lamb." He took a knife from his belt. "Now, you say she lives on the second story." He drew a sputtering oil lamp closer and scratched a square in the table. "Tell me what street she's on and what surrounds the building . . ."
Ellen watched through the window as Richard jumped into the hackney beside two friends and the vehicle rolled away into the darkness of the London night. Morosely, she let the drapery fall from her fingertips.
Richard had wanted her to come tonight to sup and play cards with friends, but she just wasn't up to it. It seemed that in the last two weeks she wasn't up to anything. She had to drag herself out of bed in the morning to make it to rehearsal on time, and once at the theater, she felt a keen lack of interest in the performance. She found herself argumentative with Richard and so restless that she was beginning to think she had been too hasty in making her decision concerning Gavin.
Ellen wandered over to the table where she and Richard had left chess pieces set on a board. They had ended the game only halfway through because she'd been unable to concentrate long enough to make her moves. She lifted a rook and rolled it in her fingertips.
She missed Gavin so much. She kept going over and over in her head that last night when they'd made love. She recalled every caress, every kiss, every word of passion exchanged. It all seemed like a dream now, even Gavin's words of love, but just the same, she kept conjuring them up again and again.
Now that time had passed and Hunt had not showed up at her door, she began to think that perhaps she really was safe. Perhaps he'd realized that the wisest way to protect himself and the men on the list was to simply leave her alone.
Ellen dropped the chess piece back on the board and wandered back toward her bedchamber, toying with the tie of her Chinese silk dressing robe. The maid had filled her bath half an hour ago. If she didn't get into the tub soon, the water would be too cool. Perhaps a bath and a little reading, Ellen thought as she went down the dark hallway, clopping in her silk mules.
She was just unwrapping a bar of French soap when she heard a noise in the front antechamber. Thinking for certain Richard had dismissed the maid before he left, she called out.
"Rose? Richard? Is someone there?"
"Rose!" Squawk! "Richard!" Sir Gavin chanted from his bird cage.
"O
h, shut up, or I'm going to send you to the cook house to be made into stew!" Ellen threw a towel at the bird cage, and the parrot screeched and leaped, fluttering its wings.
"Oh, shut up! Made into stew. Shut up!" Squawk!
Ellen shook her head. Now she knew why Gavin had given her the blasted bird. It was to drive her insane after he was gone.
Standing at her doorway, she listened for another moment, but when she heard no other noise, she went back to her dressing table to find her brush and comb. Richard was making her as jumpy as he was, with all of his watching for hackneys following them and fearing there were eavesdroppers in every tavern.
Ellen had tossed the bar of soap into the copper bathtub and had begun to remove her robe, when she heard another noise, this time the distinct squeak of the kitchen door.
She tightened the tie of her robe and peeked around the corner into the hallway. In the semidarkness she saw nothing but the familiar shadows of doorways and furniture.
When she heard the floorboard near the kitchen door groan, she was certain there was an intruder in the apartment. Without thinking, without taking time to be frightened, she went to her dressing table and pulled a loaded pistol from a hatbox. It had seemed rather silly at the time when Richard had hidden it there, but now she was thankful.
If it was thieves in the house, they could have what they wanted, but if it was Hunt or if it was someone sent by him to harm her, she'd blow their head off. She'd decided that two weeks ago when she'd seen Hunt. She'd decided she wouldn't be afraid to walk on the street or stay home alone. She wouldn't live with that kind of paralyzing fear of a man, not ever again.
With her fingers tight around the handle of the pistol and shaking only slightly, Ellen crept down the dark hallway. She knew she had the advantage over the intruder, as she knew her way around the apartment in the dark while he—she heard a thud as he struck a piece of furniture—must feel his way through the rooms.
At the end of the hallway Ellen stood stock-still, staring at the shadows of the hulking furniture and fireplace, looking for something that appeared to be out of place.
She saw nothing.
But she could feel someone's presence. She could smell the salt tang that clung to his clothing. She could almost hear his breathing as he watched her from somewhere in the room.
Ellen pulled back the hammer of the pistol, the sound loud in her ears, and took a step into the front room. Still she saw nothing. She took another step, her bare foot making a slight slap on the hardwood floor. It was not until she took the third step that she realized the intruder was behind her, and then she only felt him rather than heard him.
Ellen reeled around, swinging the pistol. She immediately caught sight of a figure in a wool cap with a sack thrown over his back. Thieves. "I'll give you to the count of three before I shoot," she warned in a voice that sounded strangely sincere in her own ears. "There'll be no thieving here this night."
There was a chuckle in the darkness. "Christ's bones," he said in a raspy voice, "You do have a spine, wench. Wasn't kidding, was he? Now put down the weapon afore you shoot yourself in the foot!"
Ellen's eyes narrowed as she tried to make out the figure. "He? Who's he? If it's Hunt who sent you, tell him he'd best come for me himself."
The intruder made a cautious step forward. "He only wishes to speak with ye. Now lay aside the pistol like I said!"
She straightened her elbows. "I'll shoot you. It's no jest."
He swore. "I'll give you but one more chance, wench, and then—"
"Then what?" Ellen was surprised by her own boldness. Here was one of Hunt's men come to kidnap her and she was standing her ground with little fear, with even a measure of aggression. What a long way she'd come since that night at Havering House.
"I'll—"
Ellen saw his intention to move and squeezed her eyes shut as she pulled the trigger. There was a blast of sound and a streak of white light. Ellen felt herself being struck in the middle and hurled backward as the acrid smell of gunpowder curled in her nostrils.
She went tumbling to the floor, with the man gripping her waist. The pistol flew from her hands as the back of her head struck the ground.
The intruder groaned as he wrestled her backward. "You could have killed me, you little bedlamite!"
"Let go of me! Let go of me!" Ellen screamed. Her hands found his face and she sank a finger into his eye socket.
"Son of a poxed whore! Ouch!" In the struggle that ensued, the man somehow managed to catch both of her arms at the wrists and pin them to the floor with his hands.
"Get off me!" Get off!" Ellen screamed, bucking beneath him, trying to get a leg up to kick him.
"If you don't shut your mouth, madame, I'll be forced to knock you in the teeth! Now calm yourself!"
She struggled, though the weight and size of him was obviously too much for her to fight against. "Who are you? What do you want? Tell the filthy pink-eyed bastard to come himself if he wants me!"
"Saint Satan! You've got a mouth!" He let go of one of her hands just long enough to pull a handkerchief from his coat. "The name's Julius. I know no pink-eyed bastard. A friend sent me and he'll be sore displeased if you get hurt, so cease your struggling, wench!"
"I'll not go! I'll not go anywhere with you! Now let me go, else I'll—" Ellen was cut off by the handkerchief he stuffed into her mouth. When she tried to scream again, no sound came out and she almost gagged on the silk.
He let go of her hands and sat back a little, the pressure of his body still holding her down on the floor. "Now will ye be more reasonable?"
She balled her hand and struck him with her fist so hard that he swayed.
Julius swore again as he yanked another piece of cloth from his coat. "As I was saying," he went on as he caught her hands and rolled her over to tie them behind her back. "You could walk out of here sensibly, or I could carry you."
Ellen could only grumble through the gag.
"Well enough! Suit yourself." Julius stood and lifted her up.
The minute Ellen was on her feet, she kicked him as hard as she could in the groin.
Julius doubled over with a growl and came up swearing as he whipped out another length of cloth. "Docile as a lamb, I say. Quiet as a cathedral mouse. As sweet as a dairymaid on May Day," he went on, muttering to himself as he caught her ankles in an iron grip and tied them together.
He straightened up to see Ellen glaring fiercely at him through the darkness.
Julius flashed her a grin. "Can you stay put long enough for me to fetch ye a bit of clothing?" He winked. "Not that you're not rather fetching as you are."
Unable to make a sound or move, for fear of toppling herself over, Ellen could only glower at him as he turned and went down the hallway.
She figured she was in no immediate danger. It was obvious this wharf rat had been sent to bring her to Hunt and that his instructions had been not to harm her. But what would happen when he turned her over to Hunt? She squeezed her eyes against the tears that threatened to spill forth. She'd get out of this. She didn't know how, but she'd not be bested this easily.
Julius returned from the bedchamber a minute later with his sack filled and thrown over his back, nursing his finger. "Damned bird bit me!" he complained, sucking the offended finger. He looked at Ellen. "Dangerous, that parrot is. Were he mine, I'd bake 'im in a eel pie." He stopped in front of her. "Ready, sweet?"
She muttered at him through the silk cloth. He laughed as he lifted her and flung her over his shoulder.
With her hair brushing the floor, he carried Ellen out of the apartment, through the back entrance, and into the black starless night.
She shivered with cold in her thin dressing gown, which blew in the wind. She was dizzy from being held upside down but was determined to keep her thoughts clear. If she was going to escape, she had to know where he was taking her.
Julius walked half a block down the street and stopped at the wheels of a covered coach. She heard the door swing
open. Then her kidnapper lifted her gingerly off his shoulder and through the door of the coach.
"By the king's cod, what have you done to her?" a familiar voice said. "You swore you wouldn't hurt her."
"She put up a hell of a struggle, friend," Julius declared as he took a running step and leaped on to the sideboard as the coach rolled off. "I'm lucky I came away without having my private parts blown off!"
As Ellen hit the seat, she lifted her chin to meet Gavin's gaze. Unable to speak, she could only stare at him in fury.
He reached across the narrow space and pulled the handkerchief from her mouth. "Ellen, I apologize—"
"Black-hearted whoreson!" she spat as she raised her feet, still tied at the ankles, and struck Gavin hard in the shins.
Julius's laughter echoed in the deserted street as he swung through the door, closing it behind him, and the coach careened around the corner in its getaway.
Chapter Fourteen
"Ouch! Hell and fury, Ellen!" Gavin massaged his wounded shin.
''Son of a poxed whore! What are you doing sending someone to kidnap me? You scared the life out of me! I thought it was H—" She turned her head, ashamed of the tears that burned beneath her eyelids.
Gavin slid across the coach to sit beside her. He reached out to stroke her cheek, but she jerked back. He sighed. "I don't know who it is you're avoiding other than me, but if he's had half the trouble catching up with you as I have, I imagine you're blessedly safe."
Julius rapped his knuckles on the ceiling. "I'd love to stay and see how this all turns out, but this is where I take my leave, friend." He swept his knit sailor's cap off his head and half stood, stooping beneath the low ceiling. The sway of the coach made him clutch for something solid. "Your servant, madame."
Ellen glared at him, her green eyes snapping in fury.
Julius gave a laugh and, with a shrug of his shoulders, opened the coach door. Without a moment's hesitation or thought about the fact that the coach was still moving, he leapt out into the darkness.
Sweet Deception (Hidden Identity) Page 16