Sweet Deception (Hidden Identity)

by Colleen French

  He came to stand beside her, his hands balanced on his hips as he stared at the portrait. "She was Waldron's wife—Thomasina."

  She tried to hide the emotion in her voice. "I see." She looked from the portrait of herself to Gavin. "Why did you keep it?"

  He studied the life-size portrait of the Countess Thomasina Waxton for a long moment and then looked back at Ellen. "I honestly don't know. I've had it under my bed since I first went to Havering House upon my arrival in London."

  All those months it's been under the bed we were making love in, Ellen thought. If I'd gone into Waldron's bedchamber, I'd have known it was missing.

  When Ellen said nothing, Gavin took her hand. "Don't be jealous, sweet. I suppose it was an infatuation of sorts. At first I hated the bitch for what she did to my brother. Then, I was only intrigued by her and her mysterious disappearance. When it came time to sell the portrait along with Waldron's other belongings," he shrugged, "I just couldn't do it." He crossed his arms over his chest, again looking at the picture. "I suppose it sounds ridiculous."

  Ellen grasped the oil painting of the Maid Marion and carefully returned it to its place, covering Thomasina's portrait. "I suppose," she echoed, tossing the oilcloth over both pieces of artwork.

  Gavin caught her around the waist and pulled her toward him. "Not angry with me, are you? Because if you are"—he toyed with a curly lock of hair that had escaped the ribbon— "I can throw her overboard. I swear, I can."

  Ellen smiled at Gavin. She knew she had to come to terms with her past and was not letting it affect her every waking moment. "Keep her if you like, sweet. I'm not a jealous woman. Especially when I know I'm the one who has you."

  She kissed him gently. Then he took the lamp and she her clothing, and they left the storage room and Thomasina Waxton in darkness.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Before the wagon wheels had ceased rolling, Ellen leaped to her feet, resting her hand on Gavin's shoulder to keep from tumbling to the ground. "Heavens, but this is the most beautiful place I think I've ever seen," she breathed, turning full circle. "More beautiful than you described. More beautiful than I could ever have imagined!"

  Standing in the wagon, she took in the panorama of the Maryland Colony wilderness that stretched as far as she could see. She breathed deeply, filling her mind as well as her lungs with the fresh, clean air surrounding the woods. Heaven's Fate was a plantation, like many, that had been carved out of the dense forest of the eastern shore of the great Chesapeake Bay. Land had been cleared acre by acre until tobacco fields stretched from the newly constructed house and barns down to the river's edges.

  The house Gavin had had built was a two-and-a-half-story rectangular-shaped structure similar to others he had pointed out to Ellen along the shore, as they had sailed out of the Chesapeake Bay down the Ptasick River to Heaven's Fate's property lines. Red brick with white shutters on its many windows, it was plain but somehow magnificent, sprouting up in a stately grandeur in the middle of what seemed to be the ends of the earth.

  Gavin had explained to Ellen that though the home may have seemed meager to her in comparison to country estates in England, Heaven's Fate and ones like her were by far the finest in the Colonies. He had explained that most of the other houses along the river had been built completely from materials shipped from mother England at exorbitant costs. Gavin had glowed with pride when he had told her that Heaven's Fate had been built from the red bricks baked in the plantation's own kiln, a new fangled idea that would most likely catch on in the Colonies.

  Gavin looped the leather reins around the hand brake of the wagon and stood up to take in the view that had left Ellen breathless. "She's even prettier than I had hoped," he sighed proudly, staring at the house that was now nearly complete. He squeezed her hand. "Christ's bones, it's good to be home again. I didn't realize how much I truly missed it until we reached the shore."

  He jumped out of the wagon and reached up to help Ellen down. "Rob, get your mistress's bags and take them inside."

  Rob vaulted out of the back of the wagon and ran to do his master's bidding.

  Ellen looped her arm through Gavin's, pulling on him anxiously. "I want you to show me everything," she exclaimed.

  "I thought you'd like to go inside first. You can take a fresh water bath . . . rest perhaps. My housekeeper, Mary, can see you're made comfortable."

  "I don't need a bath right now! Where are you going?"

  "I thought I'd ride out to the west fields and see my overseer." He pushed back his battered cocked hat he told her was his planting hat. "I've a mind to ride through the tobacco. I missed last year's crop; I don't want to miss this one, too."

  "Let me go with you." Ellen looked up into his green eyes. "I want to see the fields, too. I want you to tell me everything. I want to understand what it is you do here in the wilderness. I want to understand why you love it so much, husband."

  "All in good time, sweet. Now, I know you must be exhausted. Mary could give you a tour of the house. I won't be gone long."

  She threw up her hands. "The house can wait. I want to see this tobacco of yours."

  He grinned at her. "You're a rare woman, Ellen Scarlet Waxton. A rare woman, indeed."

  "Why? Because I want to be a part of my husband's life?"

  "Because most women concern themselves with homes, fashion, and gossip."

  She lifted up on her toes to kiss him. "This woman is different. I've grown so used to working in the theater that I've been bored with nothing to occupy my time." She shrugged. "Since there are no theaters here in the Colonies, I thought, perhaps, I'd take up a new occupation."

  He grabbed her hands and spun her around, finding her excitement contagious. "And what occupation might that be, my lady?"

  She gave him a smug grin. "Well . . . planter, of course. I'm going to grow the finest tobacco the London wharfs have ever seen!"

  Gavin's laughter filled the sunlit afternoon as he took her hand and led her toward the barns. "What makes me think life with you is always going to be full of surprises?" He was still laughing, his green eyes lit up with the pleasure of true happiness.

  She released his hand to run ahead. "At least you'll never be bored!" she called over her shoulder.

  His reply lost in the wind, Gavin could only shake his head and run to catch up with her.

  Late that night Ellen lay stretched out on the new marriage bed that Gavin's Indian friend, Azoma, had built for them. Apparently, Azoma had predicted his white friend would bring a wife home from England, despite Gavin's insistence that he needed no wife. Ellen was anxious to meet this Shawnee man, curious as to what it was about a savage that Gavin could find so much respect in.

  Ellen watched Gavin as he sat at a desk under the windows, flipping through records kept by the overseer concerning the plantation and crops. For the moment, she was content to lie on the bed and watch him, as she mulled over the day's events.

  Gavin had kept his promise and taken her out to the tobacco fields to meet the overseer. While he and the tall redheaded Scotsman had talked, Ellen had ridden the perimeter of the west field, watching in fascination as bond servants carefully hoed the tiny tobacco plants that had been planted after the danger of frost had passed. Come late summer and early fall, one of the men had explained to her, they would cut down the great leafy plants of tobacco and pack it into crates to be hauled to the drying houses down by the river.

  After Gavin had completed his immediate business with his overseer, he had taken her on a long ride, showing her just a small portion of his property. He had taken her down to the Ptasick River, where they had explored a huge drying barn that smelled of the pungent Roanoke tobacco, despite the fact that this time of year none hung in sheaths from the rafters. She had also seen the dock where men would load hogsheads of the dry product, to be shipped back to England and perhaps to France.

  By the time Gavin and Ellen had returned to the big house, it was already growing dark. They had taken a quick tour o
f the freshly papered and painted rooms, most still absent of furniture, and then they had retired to their cozy bedchamber for a hearty meal served by the red-skinned housekeeper, Mary.

  A case clock on the mantel above the cold fireplace chimed ten o'clock. "Coming to bed soon?" Ellen asked.

  Gavin looked up from his paperwork and smiled at her. "Soon, sweet."

  He returned his attention to his work and Ellen lay back on her pillow, closing her eyes as the warm May breeze blew in through the open windows off the river.

  Her hand fell to her flat stomach. She was pregnant. She was certain of it. Her woman's flow had never come and her breasts had become tender. Though her mother had certainly never discussed such matters with her, Ellen had heard enough kitchen chatter to know the symptoms of pregnancy.

  Of course, she was overjoyed at the prospect of giving Gavin a son or daughter. It was what he wanted, what they wanted. Yet something had kept her from telling him while they were still aboard the ship. And something kept her from telling him now.

  It was Waldron.

  Ellen knew Richard had said she was never to tell Gavin the truth of her past. Richard said it would serve no purpose. But Ellen felt dishonest, disloyal to Gavin for keeping such a secret. And now that she was to give birth to his child, her lies—or at least her failure to tell Gavin who she truly was—seemed an even more heinous crime.

  You should just blurt it out. Tell him you're really Thomasina Waxton, she thought. He told you himself that he had forgiven the woman who had killed his brother. He said he no longer sought vengeance. He said what was past was past. Surely he'll understand when you tell him what a monster his brother was.

  Hadn't Gavin told her he didn't care about her secrets? Didn't he say he loved her too much for whatever she had done to matter?

  She glanced up at him. As he turned to reach for a quill, his dark, shining hair fell to brush his bare shoulders in a strangely erotic way. She sighed, her heart giving a little trip.

  Heavens, but she loved him!

  So what was the right thing to do? Did she confess her sin and get it over with, absolving herself? Or did she keep silent the rest of her days and spare Gavin the pain of knowing she had killed his brother? No matter what a bastard Waldron had been, she wasn't fool enough to think that it wouldn't hurt Gavin just a little. After all, he was Gavin's brother, and Gavin had never known Waldron as she had known him.

  Tell him, a part of her nagged. Tell him and let the past truly be the past. Don't let your secret taint the child to be born.

  Ellen closed her eyes. She could hear Gavin moving about the room now, undressing as he blew out the candles to join her in their new bed. She'd tell him, she decided. She'd have to. It was just a matter of finding the right moment. . . .

  "May God commit your rotting soul to hell, Waxton!" Hunt cursed, shaking his fist as he held tightly to the ship's rail to prevent being tossed into the violent sea. The vessel rocked and pitched in the squall as the crew members rushed about the deck, swinging the yards, trying desperately to keep her from dipping down into the waves, never to rise again.

  Week after week the square-rigger Hunt had hired to carry him across the ocean to the Colonies met storm upon storm on the open seas. These unpredictable tempests forced them off course, putting them days, then weeks off schedule. At the rate they were sailing, a voyage that should have taken two or three months would take four or five.

  The journey seemed doomed at every turn.

  Sickness swept through the ship's crew only a week out of London. The fortunate men died, while others still lay in the ship's hold, gripping their bellies as their life's blood was slowly sapped from them.

  In a storm a month off the coast, the main's starboard braces snapped, causing the foredeck to submerge for a harrowing moment. In the same storm provisions that had been securely tied to the deck went overboard, severely depleting the crew's food and fresh water supplies.

  The captain swore he had never seen such ill luck in the twenty-odd years he'd been sailing. The crew was beginning to mumble about witchcraft and devil's curses. They all feared the white-skinned duke and stayed as far from him as was possible.

  With barely half a sailing crew, the captain had requested returning to port to replace the lost and sick men, but the Duke of Hunt adamantly refused. He promised the captain that he would pay him handsomely to take him safely to Maryland and then home again to England in a timely manner. If the captain failed, he would die.

  Hunt leaned over the rail, resting his forehead on the back of his hand. He let the icy rain and seawater pelt his face, hoping it would calm his heaving stomach.

  "Thomasina Waxton," he muttered maliciously as he traced the line of the raised scar that ran across his cheek. "You'll pay you, malapert slut. You'll pay dearly for the trouble you've caused me." He looked up into the noonday sky that was naught but a swirl of dark, ominous clouds as black as midnight. "You'll wish to God Almighty you had given me your maidenhead when I had asked all those years ago. You'd have been better off with me than Waldron. We could have been friends, you and I." He pulled his wet cloak up over his head and turned to stalk across the slippery deck. "Instead, you have made us mortal enemies, little Thomasina, and you will soon see just how mortal you are. . . ."

  "A good morning to you, mistress," the housekeeper, Mary, called from the window as she pushed open the draperies and let in the sparkling late June sunlight.

  Ellen yawned and stretched. The place beside her was empty and cool. She'd slept late again. Already, Gavin was dressed and gone on his horse to survey one of the many tobacco fields, or to direct the clearing of more land granted to him by King Charles.

  June, Ellen thought. More than a month has passed and I still haven't told him. Not about Thomasina. Not about the babe. She just hadn't found the right time.

  She was beginning to wonder if there was ever going to be a right time. She was now more than three months pregnant. Another month and her belly would begin to grow round with the blossoming of her child. In another month Gavin would be able to look at her and see that she was pregnant.

  But she didn't want him to find out that way. She wanted to tell him herself. She wanted to enjoy the moment with him. She wanted to celebrate the miracle of life wrapped in his loving arms.

  Mary set a tray of herbal tea and biscuits on the table beside the bed. She laid Ellen's robe beside her and turned discreetly away so that her mistress could slip out of bed and cover her nakedness.

  "And how be your belly pains this morning, mistress?" Mary inquired.

  "Fine." Ellen stood and slipped her arms into her dressing robe and tied it around her middle. She'd been plagued with nausea for weeks but was finally feeling better. "Just fine, thank you."

  "Should pass soon. A mother is not sick all the moons."

  "Mother?"

  Mary turned with a smile. She was a stout woman with skin the color of turned soil and hair as black as a crow's wing, save for the streaks of silver-grey. Her button eyes followed Ellen. "A woman who has lived as long as this woman knows when another carries her husband's child."

  Ellen poured herself a cup of tea. There was no need to lie to Mary. The Shawnee woman was one of those people a person just couldn't deceive. Ellen knew she would see through the falseness of her words in an instant. Besides, Mary was the first friend she'd made upon her arrival at Heaven's Fate. Ellen didn't want to jeopardize that, not for anything.

  "So when do you tell the master? His heart will jump for the joy only a father can know."

  Ellen reached for a biscuit. "I . . . I was waiting for the right time."

  Mary removed clean undergarments from a chest of drawers and laid them on the bed. She came back a moment later with a simple apple-green gown made of sturdy broadcloth. "Do not wait too long to tell the master, or he will have reason for suspicion. This is not a thing a woman should hide from her husband." She spread out the gown. "It is not good for the babe that grows in the womb."
r />   Today, Ellen thought. Should I tell him today?

  But she wasn't ready! She hadn't rehearsed her speech in days!

  Ellen glanced at Mary and the way the older woman looked at her. She knew. Somehow Mary knew there was more to be told than that of the babe.

  "Oh, Mary," Ellen murmured, "I have something else to tell Gavin first, but I'm afraid. Afraid he'll be angry. Afraid to hurt him. To hurt what we have."

  "The truth is often like the shaman's knife," Mary said gently. "It hurts as it goes in, cutting out the poison"—she twisted her hand as if it held a dagger—"but after the evil it cuts clean away, the knife is a healer. It makes the flesh whole and good. Stronger than before."

  Ellen ran her fingers through her thick hair. Perhaps Mary was right. Perhaps today was the day. Since she had decided to tell Gavin the truth about who she was, it had been hanging over her like a funeral pall.

  Draining her cup of tea, Ellen rose. "Do you know where my husband's gone today?"

  Mary smiled. "Happened to ask young Rob as I was coming up. The boy say he's gone to the dry house in the west fields. He fix a hole in the roof. Rain on the tobacco is not very good."

  Ellen reached for her clean shift. "I think I'll take a ride out to the drying house this morning. Could you have Rob fetch me a horse?"

  "The boy can ride with you."

  "No. I'll go alone."

  "The master, he say he does not want you alone. He is afraid of something or someone, mistress, but this woman he will not tell."

  For the first time in months, Ellen thought of Hunt. Would he? Certainly not. Even if he did figure out where she had gone and with whom, he'd never cross the ocean to retrieve the letter. She could do him no harm so far from London. There would be no sense in pursuing her across the sea.

  "I'll be fine, Mary. If a woman's not safe on her own land, where is she safe? No one on the Eastern Shore would harm me for fear of Lord Wax ton."

  Mary went to the door. "I will have the boy get the horse. Then I will come back to help you with your clothing."