Smiling, he slid a gentle hand down her legs, feeling the soft skin of her inner thighs. “Sleep well,” he sighed. “For any more of you and I’d ne’er make it to the mill—I’d sleep long after cock crow!”
With her body still glowing from their last fiery contact, Georgiana lay on her elbow and watched him go, a tall form dark against the moon’s pale light. His dark hair was gilded for a moment as he passed through the door into the adjoining room.
“Leave the door open,” she called.
“No, I’ll not let Wouter, when he comes to wake me, see you sleeping.” Firmly he closed the door.
At least, she told herself, giving her pillow a blow with her fist, he had not latched it!
Wakeful now, she waited, pouting, annoyed that he had left her side. Perhaps he would come back!
When he did not, she got up and put on her night rail. Silently she padded over the soft carpet to the door that separated them. She opened it without a sound and glided to Brett’s bed and stood looking down at him. He had not even thrown back the covers, but lay atop them fast asleep.
For a long time she stood there, a bride with a guilty secret and a desperate need for love, staring down at the man who had thrown himself down upon the coverlet and now lay there sleeping heavily.
He is tired and must be up early, she thought fondly, giving that strong determined face a tender glance. A doubting glance too, for in spite of all his playful lovemaking and disturbing passion, she felt she would never be sure of him. Suppose some other girl had been heiress to Windgate? Who would then be lying in his arms?
Suppose, suppose...
After a while Georgiana tiptoed away and cautiously shut the door behind her. She stood looking around her in the moonlight at the lovely room her mother had decorated so long ago.
Suddenly she knew what she wanted to do. She wanted to go downstairs and study in absolute privacy, without the feeling that Brett or the servants might wander in, the features of the woman who had smiled back at her from a gold-leaf framed portrait on a thick plastered wall—a woman of light and air, breathtakingly lovely, and young as Georgiana was young—her mother.
Soundlessly, and with that sense of urgency still upon her, Georgiana stole downstairs, down that broad stairway lit by moonlight from the high Gothic window overhead. She made her way by moonlight into the long dining room where Verhulst’s and Imogene’s portraits were hung. Tall Gothic windows spilled a moonpath straight across the room and gave Imogene’s portrait a sudden ethereal life.
Swiftly Georgiana padded across the long room and stood motionless in her white night rail staring up at the portrait. So young her mother looked! Imogene must have been about Georgiana’s age when this was painted. So young and so—carefree.
Reluctantly she turned from the painting and her brooding gaze scanned this handsome room where Imogene’s jealous husband had grasped his wife by her long fair hair and reached for a carving knife on the dining room table. Murder had almost been done here, she realized with a shiver. All the terrible misfortunes she had learned from Imogene’s journal spilled over Georgiana in a wave, and a sob caught in her throat as she turned again to her contemplation of the warm, lovely woman in the portrait. This was the mother she had never known, whose love she had missed all these long years, a woman whose personal tragedy had marked her daughter as well as herself.
And suddenly all of her being seemed to converge in one great long inner wail. "Oh, Mother,” she whispered to Imogene's painted likeness, ‘'why couldn't it all have been different? Why couldn’t you be here to advise me?”
Part Two
The Carolina Lady
The shadowy wings of the future
That flit o’er the present’s pain
And remind one at last of all that is past. ..
Will it ever return again?
Longview Plantation,
The Carolinas,
1673
Chapter 8
In a frowning mansion on the Hudson, Georgiana whispered what was in her heart to a portrait, called to that painted likeness on the wall.
And far away in the Carolinas, the woman who had sat for that portrait—-Imogene herself, a woman the world thought dead, roused with a sudden start from her sleep and threw back her embroidered coverlet. She cast a swift look at the long lean body of the sleeping man beside her, but he did not stir. She threw one long lovely leg over the side of the bed and got up in a froth of expensive Venetian lace. With a light toss of her head she threw back the tumbled gold hair that cascaded over her white shoulders—she had meant to braid it neatly but in the torrential heat of their lovemaking before they went to sleep she had quite forgot and as usual it had covered her pillow like a shining golden shower, making it difficult to comb in the morning.
But it was not morning.... A cold white moon shone through the windows of her bedchamber, brilliant against the black velvet night.
She shook her head as if to clear it.
“I thought—I thought someone called my name,’' she murmured to herself in confusion.
So strong was her conviction that she moved to the windows, her bare feet silently crossing the thick red Turkey carpet, the only sound in the room the steady breathing of the dark-haired man on the bed and the slight rustle of her silken night rail.
She stood there brooding, looking out, listening.
Before her was spread out the whole panorama of the front lawns of Longview Plantation, sloping down to the wide silvery expanse of the Cooper River, winding its way majestically to the sea.
Something must have disturbed her—but what?
I was dreaming we were back in Tortuga, she thought, puzzled. That I was in my bedchamber and there was a noise in the courtyard below and Arne was speaking to someone and—I thought someone called my name.
She looked about, half expecting to see below her a figure waving and gesturing, trying to attract her attention.
But of course that was ridiculous. Newly arrived guests at Longview would not be shouting from the yard, they would be banging the big brass knocker designed like a ship in full sail—and would be let in by sleepy-eyed servants.
She looked up sharply as a flight of birds obscured the moon, flying south down the Great Eastern Flyway to winter in summer islands basking in the sun.
She herself was a daughter of the summer isles—but hers were far away now and far back in her memory. Her own summer islands had been the Scillies at England’s southern tip, and she had been born Imogene Wells, loveliest daughter of those “fortunate isles” and destined for a turbulent life of shattering passion and wild remorse and now—-at last—happiness.
She glanced north whence the birds had come. Here in the Carolinas the weather was still fine and fair, but along the wild banks of the Hudson River it would be snowing soon—and she was suddenly reminded that she had once been Imogene van Rappard, wife of the young patroon of Wey Gat.
And it was at Wey Gat that she had borne Georgiana, her beautiful baby—only to lose her to the guns of a Spanish man-of-war somewhere off the Great Bahama Bank.
She shivered and a pain seemed to pierce her heart. So many tears she had shed for Georgiana—-and waked screaming from so many nightmares in which Verhulst van Rappard’s dogs chased her over the ice. Georgiana . . . again a spasm shook her delicate frame. And then she straightened. All that was behind her now, lost somewhere in her past.
She had another life now, another last name.
Her gaze flew to the man whose gleaming dark hair was spread out on the pillow of the bed she had so recently quitted—van Ryker, the wild buccaneer who had snatched her back from death, made her live again and filled her days with splendor and joy. There were wings of gray along his temples now and in the wash of moonlight they shone like the silver flash of his ever-dangerous sword. Her delft blue gaze traced that calm sardonic visage looking so young and so relaxed in sleep, caressed his mighty wingspread of shoulder and his broad chest that moved rhythmically with his st
eady even breathing.
She smiled at him tenderly. It was a comfort for her to see him so, to know that he would be there when she waked—for there had been other, more desperate days when she had watched his tall ship sail away, uncertain that he would ever return.
Without him, she felt she had been like a rudderless ship, that with him she had cast anchor and in his arms found her safe harbor.
She turned back to the garden again, for surely she had heard something, some sound that had waked her. But around her the sleeping house was silent and the stubborn thought stayed with her that the sound must have come from outside.
The white moon still drifted over the low-hanging clouds, and shadows came and went over the gardens she herself had planted, reclaiming them from the palmettri clumps and luxuriant undergrowth native to the Carolinas. For a moment her lovely face with its frame of thick luxuriant fair hair studied those gardens intently, the big live oak trees, the boxwood hedges, the shrubs imported from half a dozen countries. All of it lay spread out before her in beauty, but in the silent moonlight nothing moved.
Imogene leaned dreamily on the sill, remembering the old days, the wild rebellious days when the man asleep on the bed had been the notorious and feared Captain Ruprecht van Ryker and she his buccaneer bride. For buccaneer he had been—never a pirate. Indeed he had fought only the ships of Spain and had been always chivalrous and helpful to the ships of other countries. A privateer was what they should have called him, she thought idly, but in the wild West Indies men like van Ryker were called buccaneers....
She sighed. They had changed of course.
Gone were the days when van Ryker had stormed through the Caribbean on his great ship, the Sea Rover, striking fear into the hearts of the Spaniards, seizing the Spanish treasure fleet entire. Gone were the hot nights in buccaneer Tortuga when, in the bedchamber of a white-plastered house overlooking blue Cayona Bay, that same van Ryker had claimed his golden bride, the lustrous Imogene. Gone—but not forgotten.
Now Imogene climbed into the window seat and sat with her chin on her knees, her arms clasped about her slender white legs, letting her light silk night rail cascade down to pile up like foam on the thick boards of the random-width cypress flooring. She looked thoughtfully out at those lovely gardens the planting of which she herself had supervised.
None of their Carolina neighbors knew of their wild past. Van Ryker, pardoned by the king, was using his real name of Branch Ryder at last and her own turbulent past was well cloaked. She was no longer the English bride of a Dutch buccaneer, but an aristocratic lady of colonial America, the elegant wife of the distinguished landgrave of Longview Plantation, whose forty-eight thousand acres stretched along the broad banks of the Cooper River and whose gracious white-pillared home rose majestically to be reflected along with the magnolias and live oaks on the river’s shining surface.
In the great double drawing rooms of the floor below, where graceful French doors opened to the cooling breezes from the sea, she entertained colonial governors and burgesses and their ladies. Distinguished visitors made a point of stopping by, for not only were the food and hospitality at Longview renowned but the landgrave was a man to be reckoned with and his charming, golden-haired wife was famous for her beauty. Invitations were eagerly sought for the balls Imogene gave—and not only by the far-flung gentry of the Carolinas. People came from as far away as Virginia and Philadelphia to attend these balls and came away singing the praises of their host and hostess. England’s loss was America’s gain, they said—and went away never dreaming that the gracious host at whose carved walnut table they had just dined had once been the terror of the Caribbean, or that the elegant lady who had just shown them her rose garden and beaten them at whist had once been the toast of lawless Tortuga.
It was vaguely understood that the landgrave had inherited his family home back in England and that the Ryders sometimes went back there for short periods. And even more vaguely understood that he had some holdings in the West Indies—but that was not too unusual, many of the Carolina planters had come here from Barbados and some still had holdings there.
But the guests who strolled the handsome halls of Longview and trod a measure to the tinkle of the rosewood harpsichord in the elegant ballroom would have been startled to learn that some of these trips home to England were made roundabout by way of Amsterdam, where van Ryker had a fortune in gold earning interest in Dutch banks. And astonished to discover that Branch Ryder had indeed reclaimed his family home of Ryderwood—but only by dint of repurchasing it when it was almost a ruin, that he and Imogene seldom went there and that he had restored the hall to its former elegance only out of sentiment. Stunned they would have been to learn that a handsome townhouse on one of the best streets in London awaited this Carolina landgrave’s pleasure, completely staffed and ready even to fine satin gowns and jewels for the landgrave’s lady—although it too was for the most part vacant, for the former buccaneer favored life in the New World to life in the Old, and fretted when he was too long away from the Carolinas.
But most of all they would have been amazed to learn that the landgrave’s handsome vessel, the Victorious, which rode at anchor at the mouth of the Cooper River, had once been the notorious Sea Rover and still voyaged every year or so to cast anchor in an unnamed Jamaica bay. In Jamaica the striking couple who appeared out of nowhere to occupy Gale Force plantation for brief periods were reputed to be from Devonshire, where it was rumored they had some great estate. It was said this particular gentleman, whose first name nobody knew at all, had inherited the Jamaica plantation from a brother who had passed on. Nobody ever saw them at balls, for they stayed to themselves at beautiful Gale Force, coming into Spanish Town only to call on the governor, who was reputed to be an old crony of theirs, supposedly from his London days. Their name was vaguely known in Spanish Town to be Ryder, and weren’t they some relation to the Carolina Ryders? Different coloring of course, for the Carolina landgrave was known to be tall and dark and his lady, a great beauty, was a dazzling blond, and these Devonshire folk were just the opposite—the lady dark, the gentleman fair. Which was true enough, for when the former Captain van Ryker and his lustrous Imogene rode into Spanish Town—and most especially when they rode into Port Royal, which was still largely a buccaneer stronghold and where they might well be recognized—they wore enormously fashionable enveloping wigs, the lady’s black as a raven’s wing, the gentleman’s of a sandy hue. At those times the master of Gale Force sported a foppish, almost French elegance of dress and a tall silver-handled cane adorned with a ribboned rosette that always seemed to come loose and demand his attention, causing him to bend over whenever someone he might once have known came too close. In similar fashion, his lady affected both a large silk parasol and an intricately carved ivory fan, which—at the right moments—effectively obscured her beautiful features. At all these foibles, the governor of Jamaica, who had known them in the old days and enjoyed keeping their secret, cocked a knowing eye.
“Your lady’s as ravishing a brunette as she is a blonde, van Ryker,” he was wont to say when they were alone, toying with gem-studded goblets of wine on the wide balcony overlooking his tropical garden. “And to think,” he had once added softly in an aside to Imogene, “you could have been the consort of a governor and you chose instead to be wife to this great hulk of a Carolinian!”
“Your tongue is as blandishing as ever, Darnwell,” Imogene had responded with a swiftly caught breath. Her delft blue eyes challenged the handsome governor. “Why do you not take a wife, Darnwell, and fill the empty rooms of this ‘governor’s palace’ with children?”
Van Ryker, who knew that just before their arrival the governor must have cleared out the three mistresses who kept these rooms from being empty, gave Lord Marr, the governor of Jamaica, an innocent smile over Imogene’s raven-wigged head. “Yes, why don’t you, Darnwell?” he asked softly.
The governor cleared his throat. “It might become—overcrowded here,” he maintai
ned. “After all, this governor’s residence—‘palace’ as you politely call it—is none so large.” He hoped sincerely that none of his “women” would come sauntering in half-dressed, for he did not wish the elegant Imogene to know that he kept a disreputabe household; he preferred her to think he still pined away for her—as indeed he still did at times.
“Overcrowding. Yes, there is that to consider,” agreed van Ryker gravely.
Lord Marr gave him an irritable look. This damned buccaneer was poking fun at him! His gaze fell on the jeweled goblets, gift of this same “damned buccaneer,” and philosophically he took a pinch of snuff from a gold snuffbox. “If I have children, I think I’d prefer launching them in some English hall,” he told van Ryker frankly “Rather than marry here and send my offspring on a dangerous voyage back to England—” He had been about to add “to be educated” but he stopped abruptly and looked stricken, for he had belatedly remembered that Imogene had lost a daughter to a “dangerous voyage.”
In the awkward pause that followed, before van Ryker swiftly led the conversation down another track, Imogene winced. For her old suitor, the governor of Jamaica, had recalled to her the memory of Georgiana, the daughter she had lost. Van Ryker, noting that wince, plunged abruptly into a discussion of life in the Carolinas, which kept the governor attentive as he sipped his port.
“How is it you’re never recognized, van Ryker?” he asked cheerfully. “I know you’re supposed to be dead, I’ve heard the stories, but surely someone should recognize you.”
“We are different people there, Darnwell,” Imogene assured him demurely. “So respectable.” She made herself laugh to brush the shadows away. “None there think to associate us with our old life.” Now as she looked down into her Carolina garden, all those years away from that conversation in the governor’s palace in Spanish Town, she thought how true that was. Nothing of the old buccaneering life remained—except taciturn Arne, who had one day unexpectedly joined them, arriving unannounced to assume his old duties of keeper of the door just as he had at their house on Tortuga. Arne had exchanged his leathern buccaneer breeches for a suit of handsome broadcloth in deference to his new position, but he still sported his worn cutlass and his ways had not changed—he still beat the servants out of their wages at cards and dice, although Imogene did her best to restrain him. And Arne could be counted on never to speak of the past to anyone; he was close-mouthed, stomping about purposefully on his silver-studded wooden leg. When visitors sometimes remarked in his hearing that he looked like an old pirate, Arne would spit disgustedly and stomp away—and they took this to mean that he scorned pirates, as indeed he did, for buccaneers were a cut above. They were not pirates at all, actually, but unlicensed privateers, some of them even going so far as to carry letters of marque from the French governor of Tortuga. Van Ryker had never bothered with that, believing rightly that if the Spaniards ever caught him they would hang him high with the letters of marque hung derisively around his neck as a lesson to others.
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