The Devil's Own

by Christopher Nicole

  Slowly Kit straightened. 'You are a fool, Edward Chester,' he said. 'Better to have called him out, man to man.'

  'He fired into us.' Chester's voice was hoarse.

  'He was entitled to do so.' Kit took the letter from his pocket. 'He is Governor of this land, and will remain so until dismissed by Her Majesty.'

  'But ... he was recalled ...'

  'To answer your charges,' Kit said. 'Not to be dismissed, unless he failed to satisfy his peers. You had best read it.'

  The shouts had already died, and feet were shuffling. Kit stepped away from the dead Governor, held out the letter. Chester took it; his hand trembled. Hastily he perused the words, then handed it to Harding.

  His action accomplished more than a regiment of cavalry would have done. Already men from the back of the mob were drifting down the hill. Now even those from the front shrank back, and the men who a moment before had been shouting for Kit's blood now would not meet his eyes as they slunk across the trampled lawn.

  'By God,' Harding said. 'We have committed treason.'

  'It was your idea as much as mine,' Chester said.

  Harding glanced at him, and then at Kit. 'What do you propose?'

  "That you disband that rabble and return them to their proper occupation.' 'And then?'

  Kit sheathed his sword. 'The Governor is dead. There is no man of your force can escape the guilt of it, but I doubt there is a man will identify himself as the one who struck the fatal blow. It will lie with the Queen.'

  'We are the ringleaders,' Chester muttered. 'And he deserved to die. By God he did. Mary is pregnant. Did you know that, Kit? She carries his bastard in her belly.'

  'And for that you should have called him out. This is murder.'

  Harding looked past him, at the Negroes gathered on the verandah, at the soldiers slowly returning now the sound of battle had died. 'And you will have us hanged?'

  Kit sighed. For all their enmity, he realized, the three of them, standing here on a bloodstained lawn, were all the hope of survival Antigua possessed. 'There was provocation.'

  'What?' Chester's head came up. 'You will testify to that?'

  'Aye,' Kit said. 'For an end to strife, for an understanding of where your, our duty lies, to the Queen and to our country, I will testify to that.'

  'By God, sir,' Harding said. 'There is nothing small in your nature. I'll say that to God Himself.'

  Chester squared his shoulders. His right hand started to move, then he checked it. 'You'll have my support, Kit, in whatever you elect to do.' He turned away, and stopped, and looked down at the Governor for the last time. 'But he deserved to die.'

  They buried Daniel Parke, together with his victims, that same morning, in the cemetery outside St John's. Six soldiers from the garrison carried the coffin, and a firing squad of their comrades delivered a volley over the grave. Captain Smith stood behind the remainder, armed and looking very stern. He was anxious to quash any suggestion that he had deliberately delayed turning out his men to avoid taking sides. The planters stood in a group, with their wives, and the townspeople gathered in a huge mass beyond. None of them bore arms this day.

  Kit Hilton stood by the graveside, next to the Reverend Spalding. Lilian, with Jonathan the butler, and Abigail, were a little distance away. Dag and Astrid Christianssen were also by themselves.

  There was no oration by the priest, and Kit did not feel that he could utter one. The first clods of earth fell upon the wood and he turned away, to meet Lilian's gaze. For the moment the island was his. In a most remarkable fashion, he realized, Parke's death was his triumph. He had stood always for moderation and good sense, and for that had been rejected and pilloried. But now at last had the plantocracy gone too far. But only for the moment. Daniel Parke had been his support, and now all opposition was crushed by the enormity of his death. But they would recover soon enough.

  He walked round the grave, approached the planters. 'I am in possession of Mr Parke's will,' he said. 'Which you may copy, if you wish, Edward.'

  'I?' Chester demanded. 'What have I to do with Mr Parke's will?'

  'It is simply that he leaves all his possessions to the child of your wife, Mary, whenever it is born.' 'By God,' Chester said.

  'Aye. It will be of some service to you, I have no doubt, in proving their liaison. To my mind, it will also serve to prove that his was no mere lust, but a genuine affection. I hope you will do him, and Mary, the honour to believe that.'

  'By God,' Chester said again. 'What a remarkable fellow he was, to be sure.'

  Kit rejoined Lilian, and escorted her through the crowd, which parted before them.

  'Kit.'

  He stopped, and turned, and felt Lilian's fingers bite into his arm.

  Dag Christianssen's cheeks were red. 'I'd have you know that I honour your defence of the Governor, both for the way you stood by a friend, and for the way you protected a principle.'

  'I thank you, Dag.' Kit thrust out his hand. 'It would be my great happiness could we be friends, once more.'

  Dag hesitated, then took the proffered fingers. 'Perhaps, after all, there was some sense in what you claimed, and what you did. Perhaps indeed a wrong such as you did Lilian could only be set right by a public flaunting. I wish things could have been different. But I'll bear a grudge no longer.'

  'Kit.' Astrid kissed him on the cheek. 'You'll come to our house for luncheon.'

  'Indeed, I doubt that we properly belong at Government House in the absence of a governor, Astrid.'

  'Well then,' she smiled. 'You must move back in with us. Oh, we will make room for you, be sure of that.'

  'Then we shall be happy to accept,' Kit said. 'And perhaps Dag will help me with my deposition, for I must set down everything that has happened here for the perusal of Her Majesty, and I think the sooner it is done the better.'

  'And will that not bring even worse misfortunes upon this unhappy island?' Dag asked.

  'I hope not,' Kit said. 'I have promised Chester to be fair to him as well as to Daniel. There was provocation, and misunderstanding, and misfortune. And in any event, it is to Her Majesty's advantage that sugar is grown here, and successfully, and that the planters have some say in the management of their own affairs. I imagine her best course would be to regard the appointment of Daniel to this governorship, however much of a blessing it proved to me, to have been a mistake.'

  'If you can even attempt to persuade her of that, Kit, then shall I be your scribe with pleasure. I will prepare my pens.'

  He hurried ahead of them down the street, his wife at his elbow. Kit and Lilian followed more slowly. She had said nothing all day, that he remembered.

  'Can you not find it in your heart to be happy, at least about the reconciliation with your family?' he asked. 'One would suppose that in Daniel Parke you had lost your closest friend. But as I remember you thought little of him.'

  'I feared him,' she said. 'If that is what you mean. Perhaps I even foresaw that he must come to a violent end, and feared that he would involve you in his own catastrophe. As he did.'

  'Yet do I stand here at your side, now, unharmed.'

  'And for that I am eternally grateful. Yet it is also but what I expected, Kit. You are too straight a man to be brought down by rogues, except through an unhappy chance.'

  'Well, then ..."

  'I fear you are also too straight a man to live a lie, for all of your life.'

  He frowned at her. 'Could you but forget the fact that I am married, I have no doubt at all that I also could manage it.'

  'I doubt that, Kit. I doubt that very much. No doubt, knowing that this day of disaster was overhanging us, you slept restlessly, last night. And cried out in your sleep.'

  He stopped, and turned to face her. 'Her name?'

  'Meg. Time and again. Meg. But you have done this before.'

  'By God,' he said. 'That I should have inflicted such a misfortune upon you. It shall not happen again, Lilian.'

  'What will you do?' she asked. 'Spend the
rest of your life in wakefulness?'

  'If I could make you understand. She is a part of my life. A great part. Like Daniel, she helped to make me what I am.'

  'And you love her still,' Lilian said quietly. 'So after all, she is the victor between us, and I must remain a trespasser.'

  He stared at her, his mind desperately searching for the words which would have set her mind at rest, and finding none.

  'Kit.' Astrid came running out of her front doorway.

  'What is it, Astrid? Some more catastrophe?'

  'Miss Johnson, Kit. She is here to see you. But Kit ...'

  Kit went inside, to pause in amazement. Could this be the prim middle-aged lady he had known for so long? Elizabeth Johnson was hatless; her hair was loosed and tumbled. Her gown was torn and mud-stained, and there were shadows beneath her eyes. She looked as if she had not eaten in days.

  Dag held a glass of water to her lips, and she sipped, and panted. 'He'll not find me here, Mr Christianssen. Say he'll not find me here.'

  Dag raised his head, to look at Kit.

  'Who'll not find you here, Elizabeth?'

  'Captain Hilton.' Elizabeth Johnson half fell out of the chair to seize his hands. 'Oh, thank God. He came into town, you see, to join with Mr Chester and Mr Harding, and most of the overseers came with him. So I managed to escape. I walked all night, Captain, crawled through the canefields to get here.'

  He held her shoulders and raised her up. Certainly there was no doubting the evidence of her journey.

  'You had to escape from Green Grove?'

  'I have been locked in my room these last three weeks, fed when they wished. When he wished. I thought he would murder me, but ...'

  'He? Who is this he?'

  'Hodge. He manages the place now, Captain. He has since ... since the day of the duel. Since he ..." she burst into tears.

  Gently Kit forced her into the chair and knelt beside her. 'He has imprisoned Marguerite as well? Is she also locked in a room at Green Grove?'

  She shook her head. Her hair scattered to and fro. 'Oh, no, Captain. He would not risk that. He feared her, as we all feared her, until that day.'

  Kit frowned at her. 'You mean they rebelled against her because she had not killed Lilian?'

  Again the violent shake of her head. 'No one knew,' she said. 'No one, save I, and I was sworn to secrecy. And she was careful, always careful, Captain. She would not go abroad unless veiled, and only I was ever allowed into her bedchamber.'

  Kit stared at her, a terrible lump seeming to swell in his belly. He glanced at Dag; the Quaker's face was rigid.

  'But that morning,' Elizabeth said, 'she was in despair. She had gone to die. She thought Lilian would kill her. She expected to die, Captain. And then, when Lilian fired into the air, she knew that she could not. She was in such despair,

  Captain, she took off her hat and veil in the carriage. And Hodge caught up with her before she regained the house. He saw her, Captain.'

  'Oh, Christ,' Kit muttered. 'What did he see, Elizabeth?'

  But he did not have to ask, because suddenly he knew.

  'Oh, God, Captain,' she moaned. 'He saw.'

  Kit felt Dag's hand on his shoulder.

  'How long had she been ill?' the Quaker asked.

  'More than a year,' Elizabeth said. 'It began with a cold which would not dry.'

  'My God,' Kit muttered. He remembered Marguerite on board the Euryalus, and in the courtroom in Bridgetown, dabbing at her mouth with the scented handkerchief. And he remembered too Martha Louise, and others, whose ailment had begun with a dribbling nose. But neither of them had thought for a moment such a fate could be Meg's. 'You knew of this?'

  Elizabeth's head bobbed up and down. 'Soon after she returned from the trial. After that night, when you came out to Green Grove, and were arrested. She fled upstairs when you were gone, and I went in to her, and saw her lying on the bed, in tears. I asked if I could help, and she raised her head, and looked at me ... oh, God, Captain Hilton, that look I will carry to my grave.'

  'There were marks on her face?'

  'Not then. On her body.'

  'She showed you?' Astrid whispered.

  'Aye. She was so alone, in her misery. She knew not what to do. It was I begged her to do nothing. Perhaps it was just a skin disease, I said. Perhaps the yaws.'

  'But they spread,' Kit said.

  'Yes,' Elizabeth said. 'They spread. And became worse.'

  'And would you not send for the surgeon?'

  'She would not, Captain. And she swore me to secrecy. Oh, God have mercy on me, Captain. What could I do? What can anyone do, with a woman like Mrs Hilton?'

  'But ... the children?'

  'Were not exposed, Captain. I swear it. From that moment she never touched them. She kept herself isolated. No one was allowed near her, except me, and I was to wear gloves whenever I assisted her, and then to burn the gloves.'

  'You stayed with her for a year, knowing she was a leper?' Lilian asked. 'Miss Johnson, you put us all to shame.'

  'But the children,' Kit said again, his brain a whirl of despair.

  'Are safe, Captain. I swear it. I tried to persuade her to send them away, immediately. But she would not. She loved them too dearly, Captain. But when she realized there was no hope for her, then she sent them to her stepmother.'

  'Safe?' Kit cried. 'And their mother a leper?'

  Dag's fingers still rested on his shoulder. Now they tightened. 'The disease is not hereditary, Kit. All authorities are agreed on that. If they were not exposed, then they are, truly, safe.'

  'Oh, God,' Kit muttered. Marguerite, all that beauty, all that strength ... 'Is that what you would have told me the night I went out there?' he asked. 'But once again you obeyed her.'

  'What could I do, Captain?' she asked again. 'By then I loved her as if she were my own sister. God knows, I feared and hated her when first she summoned me to Green Grove. But such courage cannot help but be loved.'

  'And she would have had me kill her,' Lilian said half to herself. 'I failed her, in that. But I will put flowers on her grave. Now and always.'

  'She is not yet dead,' Elizabeth muttered.

  Kit's head jerked. 'Not dead? But ..."

  'Hodge discovered her secret, yes. He was terrified. He summoned two other of the overseers, Lowan and Marks, and they took her to her room. They knew not what to do. With either of us. They wanted to kill her, but they feared her, even then. But then they realized the power that could be theirs, that was already theirs, if no one discovered the truth. Yet they still feared to murder her, to murder a planter, to murder a Warner, to murder Kit Hilton's wife. So at dead of that night they ferried her to the island.'

  Kit stared at her, his jaw slowly dropping. 'They took Marguerite to the island?'

  'She fought them,' Elizabeth said. 'She fought them and would have screamed for help, but they bound her and gagged her and threw her into the boat, and took her across, and left her on the beach.' 'And you?'

  'They threatened to take me with her, Captain.' Tears welled into her eyes. 'I could not. I wept and begged.' She glanced at Lilian. 'You think I am brave, and strong, as she? I stayed because I feared to leave. But when they would have taken us both, I lay on the floor and kissed their boots and begged them. And so they locked me up, at last. I think even then they were afraid of what might happen. They were waiting to hear about the Governor, because everyone knew that Chester had written to England asking for Colonel Parke's recall, and it was felt that if the Governor went you would have to go too, Captain Hilton.'

  'Hodge, by God,' Kit said.

  'So last night they rode into town to take part in the fight, and I escaped.' She flushed. 'I climbed down the drain pipe.'

  'And walked to St John's from Green Grove?' Astrid cried.

  Kit stood up. 'You'll get me a horse, Dag. I'll take the trap up to Government House for my weapons.'

  'You'll go after Hodge? Can there not be an end to hatred and bloodshed, Kit?'

&n
bsp; 'Hodge? By God, I'll settle with Hodge, Dag, when the time comes. But I must go for Meg.'

  'But ..."

  'She is a leper? Would you have me stay away for that? Yet is that not the true horror of it. Hodge set her ashore on the island where every inhabitant is a victim of her own peculiar method of dealing with the disease. Can you imagine how they must hate her? And now ... for three weeks, by God, she has been in their power.'

  'Oh, God,' Lilian muttered. 'Oh, God.'

  'Aye,' Dag said. 'He does pose us some problems, to be sure. You fetch your weapons, Kit. I'll procure two horses.'

  'Two?' Kit demanded.

  'This day I'll ride by your side. And be happy to do so.'

  The sun was still high in the sky when they topped the hill above the plantation. From here all looked as peacefully prosperous as ever in the past. Except that the fields were empty.

  Kit, dragging on his rein to give his mount a respite, and drawing his sleeve across his face to dry the sweat, stared at the empty acres of waving green in amazement.

  'The overseers must all have marched with Chester,' Dag said.

  'Then may we well discover a massacre.' Kit kicked his horse and cantered down the slope. He had not seen Hodge since immediately before the Governor's death. But then, Hodge, would hardly have dared show his face.

  The house stood empty, the front door open. But now he could see the activity at the overseers' village. There were wagons waiting, and women standing around giving their menfolk instructions, while the children shouted and played hide-and-seek around their mothers' skirts.

  He turned his horse and rode for them, and at the sound of his hooves men, women and children insensibly moved into a huddle. He reined at the gateway, scanned the terrified faces. 'Where is Hodge?'