by Susan Wiggs
“Can I take your wrap?” Mary asked awkwardly.
Annabelle touched her fur storm collar with a gloved hand. “No, thank you. I’m quite comfortable.”
Mary settled Davy in his cradle. She’d fed him at Palina’s, not wanting to make him wait, and now he was sated and groggy, ready for his morning nap. “I’ll put water on for tea and then get dressed.” After stoking the kitchen stove, she started up the stairs.
“How is Davy?” Annabelle asked, bending over the cradle.
Mary had no idea why she had such a cold reaction to Annabelle. “Fit as a fiddle. He’s a good little lad.” She hastened up to the bedroom, frowning. Every moment she kept the truth from Annabelle, the tension heightened. She hoped Jesse would return soon.
She brushed out the skirts of her warmest dress—a tea gown of sapphire cashmere from Emily’s storage chest. Jesse had given it to her recently, and the darkness had not come over him as it usually did when something reminded him of Emily. She combed and braided her hair, then hurried downstairs.
Annabelle sat at the table. Her cape of fine seal plush glistened in the morning light. Mary wouldn’t let herself get exasperated. Annabelle was born and raised a lady; she wouldn’t know the first thing about brewing a pot of tea or adding a log to the fire.
“There now,” Mary said cheerily, fixing the tea herself and bringing it to the table. “This will keep us warm.”
Annabelle lifted her teacup. Mary was amazed to see her hand trembling almost uncontrollably, sloshing hot tea down the front of her cape.
“Are you all right, dear?” Mary asked, hurrying to the sideboard for a towel. She leaned down to dab at the wet spot.
Annabelle gasped as if Mary’s touch hurt her.
Mary jumped back. “I’m sorry. Did it scald you?”
“No.” Annabelle’s normally light, girlish-sounding voice had a razor’s edge. “I have a bruise there, that’s all. An old bruise.” Like a child suddenly reminded of her manners, she smiled cordially and took a dainty sip of her tea. Yet there was nothing childlike in the icy depths of her eyes when she said, “I had to be punished. I kept making a muddle of things.”
“Annabelle, dear, I don’t understand. Punished? By whom? And for what? You didn’t make a muddle of anything,” Mary assured her. Hurry home, Jesse. “Nothing that’s happened is your fault—”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Annabelle said, “I’m always at fault.” Moving mechanically, without seeming to realize what she was doing, Annabelle began to spoon sugar into her tea. One, two, three spoonfuls. “But I always learn my lesson. How foolish of me to run away from Portland.” Three more spoonfuls. The tea would be undrinkable. “My place is at home. My place is with Granger.”
“But you said he was cheating the company. That he’d absconded with a stolen fortune. Of course you had to turn to your brother.” Mary took the teacup from Annabelle and set it aside.
Annabelle stared at the cup. Then at the bowl of sugar. Then at Mary, with cold, dead eyes. “Granger told me what you did,” she said. “He told me you had his baby. He was going to give it to me. He was going to let it be mine.”
Mary’s blood chilled even as tears heated in her eyes. “Oh, Annabelle,” she whispered. “I’m so very, very sorry. Jesse and I wanted to tell you together—”
“The baby is supposed to be mine,” Annabelle said flatly. Though her voice lacked all expression, Mary knew it concealed a world of longing and pain.
“I know how desperately you must want a child,” she said. “But Davy is mine. He belongs to me. And to Jesse.”
“You had Granger’s baby. It was supposed to be mine,” Annabelle said stubbornly.
“Please listen. What I did with Gra—with your husband—was wrong. Very, very wrong. The fact that I didn’t know he was married is no excuse. I should have been strong instead of giving in to loneliness, to a weakness of the flesh. But the baby belongs to those who brought him into the world, those who love him best,” she said, trying to stay calm. “Davy is my son. Mine and Jesse’s.”
“That’s where you’re wrong,” said a deep male voice.
Mary stood so abruptly that her chair fell backward, hitting the floor with a loud crack. She saw him, saw Granger, handsome and ruddy and strong-looking. Saw the determination in his eyes. Saw the adoring desperation in Annabelle’s face as Granger crossed the room and stood behind his wife, resting his hands on her shoulders.
The gesture might have been solicitous, but Mary saw his fingers bite hard. And suddenly she understood everything. All the things she had observed in Annabelle earlier came back to her—the slyness, the flinching, the shifts in mood from giddiness to despair.
Granger mistreated her. Mary understood that clearly now. Perhaps he wasn’t as obvious about it as Ollie Haglund had been, getting drunk and belting his wife, but it was just as severe.
Annabelle lifted a shaking, gloved hand and covered Granger’s. She was still his creature.
Oh, God in heaven, where was Jesse? Mary managed to remain calm as the question swirled through her. But perhaps, she thought hurriedly, it was best Jesse wasn’t here. When he learned of Annabelle’s suffering, what he had done to Ollie Haglund was mild compared to what he would do to Granger Clapp.
“Where is he?” Granger demanded. “Where is my son?”
Mary rushed over to the cradle and picked up the sleeping baby, blankets and all. “He’s not your son,” she said, feeling a surge of fierce defiance. She took a surreptitious step backward, into the keeping room. She had to get to the door. She had to ring the fog bell, signaling an emergency.
“You have no right to him,” she spoke calmly. “I never belonged to you. My son will never belong to you.”
“There is no point in arguing,” he said. “I always get my way.”
She remembered how she used to look forward to his visits. How she used to crave his kisses and, when he spoke, hang on his every word. Now she felt sick. Why hadn’t she seen what he was?
“We’ll sort everything out once we’re away,” Granger continued.
“Away,” Mary whispered. “Where—”
“I didn’t tell her,” Annabelle said, her voice a high squeak.
Granger didn’t appear to be listening. With long, purposeful strides, he crossed the room. “Come then, ladies. Time to go.”
Mary panicked. She seized the closest weapon at hand—the perfect glass globe on the mantel. In a flash, she remembered the day Jesse had given it to her. He had been gruff, ungracious, yet oddly endearing in his quest to bring her something the sea hadn’t damaged.
I’m sorry, Jesse.
She hurled the glass float at Granger’s head. It hit him a glancing blow, making a sickeningly loud sound. Shattering glass exploded in the air. He sank to the floor, a rivulet of blood snaking down his temple.
Annabelle sobbed. “Oh, my God! You’ve killed him!”
Mary headed for the door. The bell. She had to reach the bell.
Just as she rushed across the porch, a shadow overcame her and blocked her way. It was Granger, bleeding and furious. He lifted his fist. “Now. It’s time we got under way, ladies.”
* * *
Jesse sat in the cockpit of the pilot boat, scowling at the letter from the lighthouse commission. The annual inspection was almost upon him, and he’d been busy all day. He had finished the caulking and rerigged the sails. He’d oiled the pulleys that let the boat out into the estuary, repacked the bearings of the tiller and checked the fuel in the pilot lights.
He knew why he’d been driven to do this today. All morning, he’d wrestled with his conscience, finally bringing himself to a decision. Things had to be done. Had to be said.
I love you, Mary.
Four words. How stupid he’d been to resist saying them for so long.
; Knowing Mary, she had already guessed that she’d stolen his heart. The moment she had awakened in his house, flinging a pitcher at his head, she had captivated him. No, before that. Before she had even opened her eyes. It was just as Palina had said all those months ago. She was his destiny. Who was he to argue with a force as powerful as the sea itself?
He loved Davy, too, with a fierceness he hadn’t been prepared for. Mary had taught him that being a father wasn’t a matter of blood, but one of love.
Jesse glanced at the sky and swore when he realized the sun was about to set. The days of winter were short, the sun sinking before four o’clock. He’d let the entire day slip by, and it was his turn at watch tonight. He hastened up the hill and fired up the beacon for the night, gave the gears a turn and clattered back downstairs.
There was just enough time to go to the house and tell Mary what he’d been too thickheaded to say before. Maybe she’d come with him to the lighthouse again. Just remembering what they’d done last night heated his blood.
He climbed the bluff to the house, surprised to find himself running. He did that a lot lately. He was always in a hurry to see Mary and the baby.
The moment the house came into view, he felt a subtle but undeniable difference in the atmosphere. A heaviness, reminiscent of the lull before a storm, hung in the air. Something was wrong. No smoke wafted from the chimney. No cooking smells spiced the air. No lamp shone in the window.
Puzzled, he wondered if she might have stayed at the Jonssons’. She must be more angry than he’d feared.
All I can ever do is hurt you. He couldn’t believe he’d said that—was it only this morning?
He’d make it up to her. He would tell her he loved her. He would say that he always had, always would. Together they’d go to Annabelle and tell her about the baby. And then they’d go on from there.
He stepped inside the house just to check. The scent of gardenia hung in the air. Had Annabelle been here? Something crunched beneath his boots. Frowning, he looked down. Broken glass. Aqua-colored. The glass fishing float.
Maybe he’d finally pushed Mary too hard. Maybe she’d left him at last. Did she hate him so much, then? Hate him enough to destroy the only gift he’d ever given her?
Heartsick, he hurried to the barn, mounted D’Artagnan bareback, and raced down the hill to the Jonssons’. His lantern made crazy streaks of light in the night woods. A freshening wind tore at the treetops. The storm was coming in earnest now.
While he waited in the Jonssons’ yard, Palina came out on the porch. “Jesse?” She raised her voice over the howl of the wind. “Is something wrong? Where is Mary?”
A strange, unpleasant buzzing started in Jesse’s ears, sounding like a swarm of angry bees. “I thought she was here with you.”
“She came for the baby in the morning, but no one’s seen her since.”
The buzzing sound crescendoed. He thought of the broken glass. Annabelle’s perfume. Something was wrong. Something was terribly, terribly wrong.
A drumbeat of hooves sounded. Jesse turned to see a lamp bobbing swiftly through the darkness. Digging in his heels, he urged the gelding across the yard to see who was coming.
It was Judson Espy, the harbormaster. By the time Jesse reached him, the rain had started. It slashed through the sky, riding the high wind, cutting like knives. Judson was shouting something; Jesse only heard the last of it.
“...didn’t authorize the tug to take him out, but he went anyway. Must’ve bribed the tugboat skipper. He should be crossing the bar any time now.”
“Who?” Jesse demanded.
“Some fancy city fellow.”
The past was happening all over again. Once again, Jesse had failed someone he loved. He should have foreseen that Granger would come. He should have protected Mary.
Dread rolled over him as Judson pushed a scrawled letter into his hands. Granger and Annabelle had gone to sea with Mary and Davy.
Only Granger didn’t call him Davy. He called him “my son.”
A hole opened in Jesse, and everything drained out of him. Everything except the rage. The hate must have showed on his face, for Judson looked worried. “Now, we’ll just make a plan here, and find a way to stop—”
Jesse didn’t wait to hear the rest. Slamming his heels into D’Artagnan’s sides, he drove the horse through the rain, up to the top of the bluff where the lighthouse stood.
The gelding was excited; all the horses grew agitated during storms. They weren’t fearful. Jesse had trained the fear out of them. Rather, they welcomed the sense of danger pumping through them. He used to feel the same way. But that was before Mary. Before he had learned to care.
Taking the stairs three at a time, he entered the beacon house. Grabbing his spyglass and shoving open the iron-and-glass door, he went out to the pulpit. The wind screamed through the iron pilings and the grillwork of the catwalk. The surf boomed so hard that Jesse tasted salt spray on his lips. Rain lashed at him, slanting sideways.
Cupping his hand over the end of the glass, he lifted it to his eye. He spied Granger’s ship. It was the schooner Trident, appropriated from the Shoalwater Bay Company. The boat was only a quarter mile out, but it might as well have been in another world. He could see the Trident, but there was no way to get to it.
Unless...
Unless he went after her. Jesse recoiled from the thought. But God! Mary. He had to save her. The pilot boat was down at the bottom of the bluff. In this wind, it could make good progress.
The paralyzing fear spread over him. He couldn’t do it, couldn’t sail into the churning waters, couldn’t let himself be swallowed by the storm.... Yet in the wake of the terror came the knowledge that he had to face that fear, do battle with it, take away its power over him.
Common sense jabbed at him. The schooner had too much of a head start. Even at its fastest, the pilot boat couldn’t overtake it.
Unless...
The outrageous idea streaked like a lightning bolt through Jesse. He stood on the catwalk in the rain, hearing the thump of the rotating lens and the roar of the storm, and deep in his gut, he knew what he had to do.
He was the lightkeeper of Cape Disappointment. He controlled the light, which in turn controlled the heading of the ship. According to his signals, the ship would be guided through the channel and safely out to sea.
Unless the schooner lost its way. Just as Emily’s ship had lost its way....
“We’re so sorry, Mr. Morgan,” the old lightkeeper had said. “My assistant was in charge that night. He got to drinking with some Portland swell and he let the light go out. Just let it go out.”
Jesse felt a sick echo of his rage that night so long ago. The echo grew until it became a scream inside his head. Because now he realized who that Portland swell was—Granger Clapp.
That fury had propelled Jesse to have the lightkeeper dismissed. He’d never discovered the identity of the Portland man—until tonight. He had made a promise never to let the light go out. No ship in sight of his beacon would ever suffer the fate Emily’s had, running aground and breaking up because the lightkeeper had been careless.
It wasn’t with carelessness that Jesse made his decision. It was with cold calculation.
He knew what he was risking. But he also knew what he was capable of. He knew what the past years had taught him. Years of watching ships go in and out, years of knowing precisely how the crossing was made. He knew where the shoals were and where the channel let out.
He had to do it. He had to.
For a moment, he stood in the lashing rain and the howling wind, stunned by the magnitude of his decision.
He went inside and looked at the rotating lens, the layers and layers of crystal that had held him prisoner for so long, just as they held the glowing lamp inside their cold facets. Then, with his hand as steady as solid
rock, he reached in and extinguished the light.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
In a stateroom of the schooner Trident, Mary and Annabelle clasped each other tightly while merciless swells heaved the ship up and down. Davy alone took the adventure in stride, asleep on a bunk in his swaddle of blankets.
“I’m sorry,” Annabelle kept saying. “I’m sorry.”
“Hush,” Mary commanded her. “I know what Granger is capable of making a woman do. I don’t blame you, and neither will Jesse.”
But as the storm tore at the schooner, she wondered if they would ever see him again. The four-man crew did their best as the Trident bucked through the waves, but their shouts up and down the decks had grown ragged with desperation.
“I was mad to listen to him.” Annabelle grimaced as the boat listed. The brass fixtures in the stateroom rattled. “He made it sound so perfectly reasonable. He said we would claim the child because he is the father. That we’d bring you along until the baby’s weaned, and then just send you away.”
Or more likely do away with me, Mary thought, but she didn’t say it aloud.
“I wanted a baby so badly that I didn’t think about what it would mean to rip an infant from his mother’s arms.”
“And his father’s,” Mary said. “Jesse—and no one else—is Davy’s father.”
A wave rammed into the ship, upending a small table and a wooden chest. Mary looked at the baby, but he slept on, lulled by the motion of the ship. Annabelle cried out and clutched at Mary as the contents of the chest spilled across the stateroom. Bundles of paper money littered the floor. Something metallic and shiny skittered along the deck.
Annabelle picked it up. “A gun.”
Mary recognized the Smith and Wesson with its pearl stock. She had felt the deadly chill of the revolver’s blued barrel held to her temple the night Granger had told her she could never leave him.
Somewhere outside, emergency bells started to clang. Fearing a fire or worse, Mary struggled to the door. On the midships deck, the skipper was screaming at Granger.