The Trouble With Misbehaving

by Victoria Hanlen

  Gathering information on Captain Tollier hadn’t been all that difficult. Revealing one or two items wouldn’t hurt, would it? “Very well. When I got my mother’s letter I asked a friend of my aunt’s how I might quickly and safely get to North Carolina. He suggested I talk with his friend who had a mill that made blankets.”

  “Blankets?”

  “That’s what I said. What do blankets have to do with getting to North Carolina? As it turned out, this man has made a fortune selling blankets to the Confederacy. After talking to this one and that one, I finally found a man who dealt with agents in Nassau. That man suggested I make arrangements with a captain and a ship before I arrived in the Bahamas.”

  Captain Tollier folded his arms over his chest. “How did you find out about me?”

  “I’m getting to that.” She needed to give enough details to make this sound good. “So this man suggested several captains. He said one of the names you were known by was Tollier—my cousin’s husband’s name. He told me about your experience running the blockade and that he’d seen you at a London coffee house that very morning.”

  “And who was this fount of information?”

  “I told him I’d keep it a secret.”

  He cocked his head to the side. “I guess you and your family will need to find better lodgings around here.”

  She sighed, pulling the quilt tighter. “Oh, all right. It was Captain Dansley.”

  “Dansley!” Beau kicked the ground hard, sending a shower of gravel out in front of him. “I should have killed him when I had the chance.”

  “Oh, no, you can’t kill him. I was afraid you’d react like this. He was only trying to do me a favor so my aunt would invite him to her parties.”

  “Invite him to her parties?”

  “Well, his wife. His wife desperately wants to move up the social ladder and since my cousin married your brother, my aunt has risen a few notches in society.”

  “I’m standing in the midst of a conflagration crawling with murderers, thieves and hostile militia, wondering if this night might be my last because some frivolous woman wanted to go to parties?”

  C.C. bit her lip and tried to blink innocently.

  His expression grew even darker. “Why does Commander Rives want me dead?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “Oh, I think you do. You said his name quite plainly when you were delirious. It may be a secret you planned to take to your grave, but I don’t plan to take it to mine.”

  “I barely know the man. I haven’t seen him in ten years. Perhaps you injured someone he knew or was close to.”

  “Not good enough, my dear. I had eight months in a wretched, filthy cell to think it through.”

  “He obviously takes war seriously. Killing enemies is his job. All I can say is the young man I knew years ago was an overbearing, twisted snob. Now that he’s a commander, no doubt he feels empowered and justified to do away with not only you, but anyone who doesn’t support his cause.”

  “Doesn’t sound like you like the man.”

  “Are you saying I should?”

  “Your feverish ramblings in Nassau suggested you and he had been somewhat closer than friends.”

  “Our parents were friends. That was a long time ago. We had to go where our parents went. People mistakenly thought it our choice. You’ve never been in a situation where you’ve had to deal with persons you’d prefer not to know?”

  Jesse ran toward them on the gravel path, gasping. “Help! Auntie is coughing real bad!”

  ***

  C.C. picked up her skirts and ran. Beau followed close on her heels. When they entered the cabin, the dim lantern light revealed Delia’s mottled, ashen color. Her coughing now came in grating heaves.

  “Mama, what can I do for you?” C.C. cried.

  “Water,” Delia finally managed.

  As C.C. dashed into the other room for water Beau called after her, “Another dose of the medicine might help too.”

  With C.C. out of earshot, Beau slid onto the stool next to the cot. “Mrs. Collins,” he said softly, “I must ask you a difficult question. Your daughter has asked that I take you and your nephews back to England. I’ll not lie to you, it could be exhausting and dangerous. Do you feel up to such a journey?”

  Delia’s hands shook as she wiped her mouth. “No,” she wheezed.

  “I’m not a doctor, but I do have some knowledge of consumption. You’re coughing up quantities of blood. The disease has claimed much of your flesh. I can see how…tenuous life is for you.”

  “I know,” she whispered. “I’m done with this life. Bury me here with my parents.”

  “Could you do me a great favor?” he continued quietly. “Your daughter loves you with such intensity she’s moved heaven and earth to be at your side. Yellow fever nearly claimed her in Nassau. She risked life and limb running the blockade and spent a fortune to help and be with you. Make your peace with her tonight. No one knows what tomorrow will bring.”

  “What do you know of it?” Delia rasped, scornfully.

  He looked down and smoothed the blanket. “I know that death is final. I know the passing of a loved one can leave a dark void, especially when matters of importance are unsettled.”

  “What matters of importance have you left unsettled?”

  After briefly considering how much to reveal, he decided he’d say whatever he had to. “My father and I never got the chance to resolve our differences. At the end, I was on the other side of the world. I wasn’t there for Millie and…Fr—” His throat closed with emotion. “My little boy,” he finally managed.

  “So you’re married?” Delia’s lips curved down sourly.

  “No. I’ve never married.”

  “Of course,” she said acidly. “Your type leaves bastards all over the countryside.”

  That was unfair and inaccurate, but he didn’t rise to the barb. “Your daughter is truly exceptional. Maybe she has not fulfilled your goals for her, but she is one of the most admirable women I’ve ever met. She’s intelligent, resourceful, strong and exceedingly generous to those in need. I’ve known few men with as much courage.”

  Delia raised one side of her lips in a smirk. “You’re in love with my Calista, aren’t you?”

  Heat shot to his face.

  “As I thought. You’re a fool.”

  Her unreasonable contempt for him somehow made him smile. “I’ve been called worse. But why have you taken such a dislike to me?”

  Her features twisted scornfully, as if he were a dunce. “You know very well you have nothing to offer my daughter. You are not titled and have little hope of gaining one. You’re a captain for hire. My husband used to employ men like you for his ships. Maybe you have a comfortable income, but you are a long way from well off.”

  She wiped her mouth with the rag. “Tell me if I’m correct? You’ve never married. Not because you can’t attract women. I’m sure you never needed to do more than crook a finger. But no woman of quality would have you. And the son of an aristocrat would only marry quality. It is easy to see the dangerous, unsteady life you lead. If my daughter is as strong, resourceful and intelligent as you say, she would never saddle herself with an unreliable, undependable man she could not count on.”

  Beau massaged his jaw. She’d delivered the verbal equivalent of a knuckle punch. Unreliable and undependable pretty much covered it. This brittle, disease-ridden reed of woman may be fever-addled, but she’d managed to divine his greatest flaw and low self-regard with a sharpshooter’s precision.

  “Calista was born and bred to be a leader in society. She knows what she must do.” Delia spoke with acerbic authority. “If you truly cared for her you’d stay out of her way and let her fulfill her purpose.”

  Perhaps he was going at this all wrong. He tried a different approach. “When I said good-bye to my loved ones, I didn’t know it would be the last time. If I’d known, I would have told them how much I loved them and always will.” Sentiment forced his voice lower. �
��Let bygones be bygones. If these were your last moments with your daughter, wouldn’t you want her to remember the warmth of your abiding love?”

  Her lips twisted. “Such melodrama. Who else is there to remind her of the high standards for which she was raised—” A severe bout of hacking cut off her words.

  C.C. rushed into the room with medicine and almost spilled the bucket she was carrying. She quickly ladled out water.

  Beau carefully raised Delia and held her so she could drink.

  “Mama, here, swallow this,” C.C. pleaded as she put a vial of medicine to her lips.

  Tremors began to rack Delia’s body. She weakly pushed Beau away. “Leave us be. Let me talk with my daughter.”

  ***

  Her mother waited until the captain stepped into the next room. “Your little cousins have no one else.” Her rheumy eyes glimmered beseechingly at C.C. in the dim light. “They cannot survive on their own, and I can do no more. Promise me you will raise Jesse and Nate and keep them safe.”

  “I promise, Mama. I will love them as if they were my own children.”

  Delia pointed underneath her cot. “Reach down and drag out that alligator-skin case.”

  C.C. grasped the handle and placed it on the side of the bed. “What’s in here, Mama?”

  “All the documents and legal papers I could find after the fire. My eyesight’s not so good. There might be something in there you and the boys may need.”

  Her mother switched to an all-too-familiar tone. “Now, something else. You must apply yourself, Calista Caroline. It is still possible to redeem yourself. When a woman marries well, New York society forgets.”

  C.C.’s stomach knotted as it always had when that certain note crept into her mother’s voice. It amazed her how in ten years she’d matured in so many ways, yet in a few short words, she was right back to where she’d been a decade before, rebellious yet still craving her mother’s love and acceptance.

  C.C. tried to smile. Delia may never speak to her as she’d hoped, but perhaps she could imagine the inevitable lecture to be a bittersweet acknowledgement that she cared.

  “Have you even talked with a titled gentleman in the past year?”

  “Of course, Mama.” She took her mother’s gnarled hand and gently rubbed the top.

  “With whom have you talked other than your cousin’s husband?”

  C.C. enclosed her mother’s hand in both of hers. “Let me see. There was Lord Sutterland and Lord Falgate.”

  “Pray tell, why haven’t you extracted a proposal from either of them?”

  “Lord Sutterland has actually been a good friend since I moved to England.”

  “Well then?”

  “He’s confined to a wheelchair.”

  Her mother glared at her. “And Lord Falgate?”

  “He was my dearest friend’s husband.”

  “There is nothing wrong with marrying a widower, provided you both observe the proper mourning period.”

  “All the evidence points to him being her murderer.”

  Her mother’s eyes sparked and she snatched her hand away. “Don’t be impertinent, girl! You may be heading toward middle age, but you should still respect your elders.” She slumped back against her pillow and pinched her lips together irritably. “You don’t know how easy you have it. I didn’t have the options you do. My home and family were here in North Carolina. The world for me was no larger than this plantation, yet I married up. Did I tell you I nearly married a local boy?”

  “No,” C.C. said, astounded.

  “Your Captain Tollier rather reminds me of him.”

  C.C. noted how carefully her mother watched her as she said the words. This was one of her old tricks. She’d say something startling and then read her response.

  The fire went out of her mother’s eyes when C. C. didn’t react to the bait. She coughed again and her next words came out a gurgle. “I loved your father beyond reason. He took my heart when he died.”

  C.C. fiddled with the blankets on her mother’s cot. Nagging questions had bothered her for a decade. Revisiting such a painful time in her life felt like reopening a mortal wound. But her mother was so ill, if she didn’t ask now, she might never have another opportunity.

  She took a deep breath. “Something disturbing happened recently, Mama. A horrible man threatened me in Nassau and tried to extort money. He said Papa owed him for debts he’d incurred ten years ago.”

  Her mother’s brows lowered, and she let her eyes drift to the back wall. “Your dear father told me not to concern myself with his business. I never had a head for numbers anyway. It was a man’s sphere, he’d say. All successful marriages are managed that way.”

  “Mama, that awful man claimed he knew unflattering details about our family.”

  Delia’s gaze cleared somewhat as she trained it back on C.C. “If you recall, so did much of New York City. The newspapers nearly ran out of ink.”

  “Those were lies. I didn’t do what the papers said, Mama. I know you never believed me, but that is the truth.”

  Her mother’s voice rose in rebuttal. “Several men confessed to hearing you negotiate a price with assassins for that little strumpet’s kidnap and murder. Then they murdered the wrong woman before they abducted Captain Sterling’s baggage.”

  C.C. cut a quick glance to Captain Tollier in the other room. Had he heard her mother’s strident accusation? Jesse and Nate stood on either side of his chair engrossed in his demonstration for tying sailing knots. She pressed her palm to her temple. Lord, please let him not hear her mother’s ravings. When she looked up, her mother was studying her with a speculative glint.

  She couldn’t think about Delia’s games now. If she was going to discover anything else, now may be her last chance. “Anyway, this man in Nassau talked about other things, things I never knew. He said Sterling wanted to destroy Papa’s business because of something that happened in China. Is that another lie?”

  “Your father and Captain Sterling were arch rivals, the two wealthiest men in the city. Everyone knew that. Marriage to him made sense at the time. We thought he wanted to marry you to gain access to business he couldn’t easily develop. When you set your cap for that devil, your father invited him into our home. He only wanted you to be happy.”

  “I understood that even then, Mama. We would have made a splendid match if it hadn’t been for that other woman’s conniving.”

  “Are you still so naïve? He wanted that little artist’s baggage, not you. He only used you to get close to your father so he could drive him out of business.”

  Her mother’s words cut deep. So Sterling had been the source of her father’s business reversals? His ruthlessness had brought about her father’s heart attack and her mother’s estrangement. She’d loved and trusted that handsome demon. Suddenly she was furious at all the time she’d wasted pining over him. What a stupid, gullible girl she’d been. Now all she wanted to do was drive a stiletto through his heart.

  She pressed a fisted hand against her roiling stomach. This new revelation about her scandal made her want to retch. Yet, her mother’s answer didn’t entirely explain things.

  “Mama, if what that horrible man said is true, by the time I met Captain Sterling, he’d already destroyed Papa’s and this extorter’s business venture in China. I don’t understand this. Our family only shipped cotton to New England, England and the continent. Papa never did business in China.”

  “What did you say was the name of the man who threatened you?”

  “He called himself Captain Shamus Hargreaves.”

  A grating cough suddenly overwhelmed her mother. It went on and on. C.C. was afraid her mother might choke to death. She poured more water and medicine and helped her drink. Her mother finally regained control, though her chest rattled ominously with each breath.

  “Mama, did you ever meet Captain Hargreaves? Was he one of the men who attacked Clarkston a week ago?”

  Delia’s eyes glazed over. A thin smile drew at her li
ps. “Did I tell you we have an appointment with the dressmaker for the Mayday ball?” She took several labored breaths. “Your father bought a beautiful new barouche with a matched team. It will be a splendid party. Everyone who is anyone in New York City will be there.”

  This reunion had not been at all what C.C. had envisioned. She barely recognized her mother. In her place lay a skeleton whose mind drifted between bleak reality and her youthful triumphs and dreams.

  Over the next few hours C.C. could only sit by her bedside and watch her grow worse. The medicine stopped working. Pneumonia set in. Delia’s back arched and her chin jutted toward the ceiling. Her mouth gaped as she gasped for air.

  After midnight, her mother regained a few moments of lucidity, casting her fevered eyes about. “Read those papers in the alligator case, Calista. Some were your father’s. Maybe there’s something in them about Hargreaves.” Her rasping voice took on a bitter edge. “I waited a lifetime for your father. Always away or busy. If God will grant me one prayer, we’ll finally be together in the sweet yonder.”

  With surprising strength, Delia suddenly sat up and gripped C.C.’s coat lapels. “Promise me, Calista Caroline. Don’t marry that handsome scoundrel. If you let yourself love him, it will be like…like trying to hold a river in your hands.”

  “I’m sorry, Mama, who should I not marry?”

  “Tollier. Your fath—I’ve known men like him—full of dash and charm,” she gasped.

  Loosening her mother’s hands, C.C. gentled her back against the pillows. “I have no plans to marry anyone, Mama.”

  “You can do better. Don’t give up, girl,” Delia wheezed. “With a little more pride in yourself and a good cleanup… You used to look so pretty in violet.” She dragged in a gurgling breath. A euphoric smile slowly drew at her lips, “Still plenty of gentlemen out there with titles…even at your advanced age.”

  Chapter 22

  C.C. shivered as a biting flurry wrung her skirts about her legs. The rolling pasture next to the graveyard quivered under a cold lash of wind. She’d never envisioned such an ending to this journey: so much effort for so little return. They’d arrived too late to help her uncle and mother. And if that wasn’t enough torment, dread now dragged in tendrils of culpability.