“We can’t risk lives to defend Indian against Indian,” Thomas protested, “and it’s best to remain neutral in their indigenous squabbles.” He pulled his cloak closer, muttering something about it being spring, not winter.
Matthew hemmed: in this, he had to concede Thomas had the right of it. Besides, there was very little a white militia could do to support the Piscataway.
“I saw Philip Burley yesterday.” Thomas gave Matthew a quick look.
“Aye, so did I.” Matthew spat to the side. By the time he’d called out the constables to arrest the bastard, he’d been gone.
“Took to the water,” Thomas said when Matthew recounted this. “Swims like a fish, that one.” He shook his head, making his long, greasy hair bounce. “Fool to come here! There’s a price on his head, and yet he has the effrontery to stroll down Main Street.”
“He didn’t know that until he got here,” Matthew said. “I dare say he’ll blame me for having been outlawed.”
“Probably.” Thomas frowned. “About time, if you ask me. Those brothers should have hanged years ago!”
“As I hear it, Walter Burley remains in custody,” Robert Chisholm put in. “Why they haven’t hanged him yet is something of a mystery.”
“Mystery?” Thomas snorted. “The Burleys are well connected in Virginia. Besides, the girl has changed her story. Now, she no longer recalls who it was that raped her, saying that she fears she may have identified the wrong man.”
“Has she, do you think?” Robert asked.
“No,” Matthew said. “But Walter Burley has very persuasive brothers, doesn’t he?”
“Poor wench.” Thomas sighed.
“What do you think of the new minister?” Matthew asked to change the subject. He looked back to ensure Betty and Agnes were keeping up, and nodded at his new field hand, John Mason. He bit back a smile at the thought of Agnes: meant to stay behind in Providence now that her contract had expired, she had been afflicted by a bout of panic and decided she preferred to return with the master to Graham’s Garden – helped along, Matthew suspected, by John Mason’s golden locks.
“Somewhat dour,” Thomas replied.
Robert chuckled. “All your ministers are dour. Your churches are dour, your rites and sermons are dour.”
Thomas’ face acquired a bright red hue. “Papistry is nothing but—”
Matthew placed an arm on his sleeve and shook his head. “Nay, Thomas, leave him be. Robert is but teasing. I liked the man and I didn’t find him dour, rather the reverse.”
Minister Allerton reminded him of Sandy Peden, his dear friend and minister, with dark grey eyes and a thinning head of what must once have been reddish hair. Not when he spoke, because Minister Allerton had never set foot outside his native Boston until this new assignment had been given him, and he spoke with an accent quite different from anything Matthew had ever heard before. But he had enjoyed the sermon on the Good Samaritan, and he had liked it when the minister congratulated him on his fine son, Daniel.
“You know my lad?” Matthew had asked.
“Oh, I’ve had the pleasure of teaching him for well over a year, and that is one very bright boy. Most devout as well,” Allerton continued, smiling in a way that made his eyes twinkle. “Not always the most well behaved, and he has a disturbing effect on the younger female population – which he well knows.”
“He’s almost fifteen,” Matthew had said, “and lads like lasses.”
“Oh yes. And your son, I think, very much likes a certain Miss Temperance Allerton.”
“Ah. Your lass?”
Minister Allerton had beamed proudly. “Yes, my eldest.”
*
“He’s never even mentioned a Temperance in his letters,” Alex laughed when Matthew told her all this a couple of days later. “Temperance…poor child!” She slipped her arms round his waist and scrubbed her cheek against his shirt. He held her to his heart for a couple of seconds before going back to his unpacking.
“He’s a lad,” Matthew said in a teasing tone. “We don’t tell you everything. And if the daughter is anything like the father, I would say he has chosen wisely.” He kept his back to her while he fiddled with his leather satchels.
“Chosen? As you said, he’s a lad. Besides, you just told me Minister Allerton has almost no hair and resembles Sandy. Poor girl, I tell you, poor, poor girl.”
Matthew chuckled. “When have you ever seen a lass with no hair?”
“It happens, and what is it you’re hiding?”
In response, Matthew brought out nine coloured glass panes: six red and three green.
“Oh!” Alex knelt and picked up one of the red panes. “They’re beautiful!” She twisted it this way and that, sending coloured light to dance on the whitewashed walls of their bedroom.
“For our room,” he said, delighted by her reaction. “I thought it would make a nice pattern on the floor and the sheets.”
Any further inspection of her gift was precluded by Ruth, who fell into the room, followed by an equally excited Sarah.
“Jenny…” Ruth gasped.
“…and Patrick!” Sarah filled in, her eyes round with amazement.
“Here?” Alex got to her feet.
From outside came Ian’s voice, raised in anger, curses flowing from his mouth in a surprising and uncharacteristic flow that had Matthew raising his brows.
“Here apparently,” he said and rushed down the stairs.
*
“Ian! No!” Da’s voice cut through the red curtain of rage that had invaded Ian’s brain. Strong arms took hold of him, and he was pulled back, with Mama and Betty standing themselves between him and Patrick, who was getting to his feet helped by Jenny who had dismounted.
“You could have injured him!” she snapped at Ian.
“Do you expect me to care?” Ian snarled. He shook himself loose from Da’s restraining hold, and crossed his arms to stop himself from shoving Mama aside to hit Patrick again, or was it Jenny he really wanted to hurt?
“Why are you here?” Ian demanded. “And why did you bring your fancy man along?”
“My wife and I…” Patrick began.
“Wife?” Ian looked from Jenny to Patrick. “You’re married?”
Jenny nodded in confirmation, her eyes on the ground while she fidgeted with her cap.
“Once a whore always a whore,” Mark said, giving Patrick a belligerent look. “But seeing as she comes reasonably well dowered, I don’t think you particularly care.”
Jenny flushed a painful red, and, to his irritation, Ian felt sorry for her.
“Mark!” Mama frowned and indicated the very interested group of children who were following the conversation. “Now, assuming we’re all done with the pleasantries, why are you here?”
“I want to see my children.” Jenny looked directly at Ian and cleared her throat. “Please?”
Ian was very tempted to say no, but on his nape rested Da’s eyes, and, even more, Malcolm was pressed tight against his side, craning his head back to look at him. Ian drew a thumb down his son’s nose. “Go on, lad,” he said.
Malcolm shifted from foot to foot, but remained where he was.
Ian couldn’t help it. He raised his chin to meet Jenny’s eyes in triumph. See, he taunted, he’s already lost to you. But the apparent pain in her face shamed him, and he crouched down, smiling at Malcolm.
“It’s alright, son. She’s your mother, aye?”
Malcolm took a hesitant step in Jenny’s direction, he took two, he took three, and then he was in her arms and she was crying in his hair.
“Any particular reason for this impromptu visit?” Da asked.
Patrick threw him a cautious look. “We’re here to make our farewells. We leave for Carolina within the month.”
“Carolina?” Ian asked.
“To the south,” Patrick said.
“I know where it is,” Ian snapped, “and it’s very far away from here.”
“Far enough.” Patrick nodded
with obvious relief, eyes straying to the assembled children.
Ian’s face tightened to the point of being painful as he watched Patrick study Maggie, who was standing to the side, fingers sunk in Viggo’s shaggy coat. Ostentatiously, he walked over to his lass and swung her up to sit on his arm. Maggie made a series of warbling sounds, gripped his shirt, and hid her face against him.
“May I?” Jenny held out her hands. Ian nodded and handed Maggie over. His wee Maggie did not much like to be carried in the first place, not now that she could stand and take the odd step, and even less to be held by someone she didn’t know. She stiffened in Jenny’s arms, brows pulled together in a ferocious frown. When Jenny attempted to kiss her, she opened her mouth and bawled. Quickly, Jenny returned her to Ian, retaining a hold on one small, bare foot.
“She looks very healthy.” She stroked the soft skin.
“She is, somewhat of a temper on her, but very healthy.” Now that Ian understood this was a final visit, he was feeling more generous, and so he smiled and caught Jenny’s eye. “Like her mother.”
“And her grandmother,” Jenny whispered back. She studied Maggie’s little face, eyes darting back and forth between Ian and Patrick.
“Much like me in other things,” Ian said with a clear warning in his tone.
“Yes.” Jenny let go of the squirming foot.
*
Betty waited until she was certain Ian had settled his children for the night before sneaking down to his cabin on soundless feet. The evening was warm enough that a shawl was excessive over her shift, but she tugged it tighter round her shoulders and swallowed so loudly it almost made her giggle. She had seen the way Ian’s gaze had locked on Jenny’s waist when she sat up on her horse, and, after some scrutinising of her own, had understood that Jenny was with child – again.
All the way up the lane, Ian had followed his former wife and her new husband with his eyes, and Betty had seen him afflicted by doubts and uncertainties when he looked from Patrick to Maggie and back. It would have been easy to laugh it all off. Little Maggie had no doubts as to who was her father, and with her dark hair and light eyes she looked very much a Graham. Except that her hair grew in a widow’s peak – just like Patrick’s – and her lower lip jutted out – just like Patrick’s.
Betty decided not to knock. The well-oiled latch lifted easily, and Betty slipped inside a room that was dark after the lingering dusk outside. She had never been here this time of the night: Ian’s and her love trysts had mostly happened in the hayloft or out in the woods. She could hear her own pulse; loud and red it swished through her head. Her stomach was a mass of writhing things, her knees were beginning to wobble, and her mouth… She opened it and breathed in short, audible gulps. This was unseemly. A woman should not come like this to a man.
She groped behind her back for the latch, and for a moment considered escaping back outside, before something happened that was irreversible, but she knew she wouldn’t, not now that she had worked up the courage to come. Besides, he needed her, she sensed that, especially tonight after seeing his ex-wife ride away with the man that had put horns on him. She felt a forceful cramp in her privates, and blushed in the dark. If he needed her, she wanted him, her body yearning for his touch.
“Betty?” Ian sat up in bed. “Is that you, lass?”
She closed the door fully, and now all she could make out was the white of the bed linen, a blob of light in the dusk. She dropped her shawl to the floor, tugged her shift over her head, and before her nerve failed her, she walked towards the bed.
“What…?” He didn’t get to say more. She kissed him, and his arms came up around her, so warm against her goose-fleshed skin.
“Betty…” he groaned when her hands slid in under his shirt. “We mustn’t. I’ve promised Da.”
“I don’t care,” she told him, and soon he wouldn’t either, of that she was quite sure, her fingers caressing the soft heaviness of his balls. “I’m no longer married,” she said between kissing him, “and so I come to you…” She raised herself on her arms to look at him, a dark shape no more. “If you want me,” she said uncertainly.
“Oh, I do, very much I do.” He rolled them over, bent his head to nuzzle her throat, and Betty’s toes curled together. Betty inhaled loudly when his cock nudged at her. Go on, she told him with her hands, please go on. She wriggled even closer, and finally he was there, where she wanted him to be. She laughed out loud.
*
“I must talk to your father,” Ian said next morning. They were alone in the stable, each of them sitting by a cow.
“Not yet.” Betty walked around with a sensation of disembodiment, her legs extraordinarily heavy while the rest of her was a weightless blur. She sniffed and blushed. She could smell him on her, everywhere on her, and she liked it so much she hadn’t washed properly this morning. A slight shift on the milking stool relieved the heat that flared between her legs…wanton, she chided herself. Betty Hancock, you’re wanton.
“Now,” Ian insisted, smacking the cow out of the way to see her.
“No.” She intended to take no risks, and if that meant forcing her father’s hand then so be it. “We wait.” They had until her eighteenth birthday, and she fervently prayed that she might conceive before then.
Chapter 35
Jacob rounded the corner of Watling Street and Bread Street in such a hurry that he crashed into the couple coming the other way. Only by his quick reactions did he save them all from landing sprawled in the unappetising gutter.
“My apologies,” he stuttered. “I’m so sorry, sir, mistress.” He helped the woman straighten up and was surprised to find himself face to face with Helen – Mistress Cooke.
“Inconsiderate fool!” the man huffed, rubbing at a smudge on his breeches.
“I’m that sorry,” Jacob repeated, “but my master has sent me with a hasty delivery to one of the seafaring ships.” With his head, he gestured towards the waterfront. After yet another quick bow, Jacob took off, and not one word had he said to Helen.
He had placed an arm around her waist to stop her from tumbling to the ground, and he frowned, trying to grasp what it was that was bothering him. It struck him just as he reached the Customs House, half out of breath after his run. Her belly… Jacob swallowed rapidly and shook his head. Fat, he tried, dear Helen had gained weight. A lot of fat to be in one place, a cynical corner of his brain laughed.
On his way back, Jacob counted. Helen had been married since late September, and for her to be heavy with child in May was in no way surprising – if it hadn’t been for those reassurances of hers that she didn’t want a child with her elderly husband. Jacob licked his lips. It had been a very long and intense night back in September, and…nay, of course not! He increased his pace, in a hurry to get back to Master Castain. His head buzzed with all the information he was presently revising for his examination the coming month.
Jacob had scarcely slept of late, working far into the light evenings, and spending a further few hours studying with Master Castain, who seemed as nervous as Jacob was. He stopped for a moment and gazed up at the May sky. These long evenings were something very special, purple round the edges with all the shades of blue one could imagine. Well, when it didn’t rain, of course, which it had done quite a lot the last few weeks. Fortunately, Jacob smiled, thinking back to a most agreeable hour a week or so ago, spent in the protection of one of the arches of St Saviour’s in Southwark with Charlotte on his lap.
He adjusted his breeches over his privates. Charlotte had a very competent hand, and when Jacob was in one of his darker moods, he couldn’t help but reflect over where she had learnt such skills. Maybe he should ask her, he mused; he could do that tomorrow. A smile spread over his face at the thought of tomorrow – he hoped she would like the ribbon he had bought her.
*
“Where have you been?” Richard cornered Charlotte with his bulk.
“Out,” she said.
The slap left her reeling. “Whe
re?” The three apprentices in the workroom kept their eyes on the work at hand.
“In church.”
The next slap threw her back against the wall.
“Try again,” he said, “and the truth might be a better option.”
Charlotte’s throat dried up. Richard gripped her by the arm and she was half carried, half dragged up the stairs to the private quarters.
“That country lad needs a lesson,” Richard said once he had beaten the truth out of Charlotte. Every single meeting she had listed, from that first time she smiled at him in St Mary-le-Bow to this latest evening stroll beyond the Tower. The red ribbon had been torn to pieces, and Richard prowled the room, glaring alternately at her, alternately at the stained glass panes in the long low window that faced the street.
Charlotte sidled away from him. No one had ever hit her before, not like this, and she didn’t like the way Richard was looking at her. He blocked her way out of the room and invited her to sit, smirking at her obvious discomfort.
“The contracts, it’s time you sign them.”
Her hands were shaking where they lay in her lap. “The contracts?” She attempted an innocent gaze.
Richard gave her an amused look. “No, no, little Charlotte. That may work with a callow youth not yet eighteen, but it won’t work with me – not this time. So, the contracts, you’ll sign them tonight.”
“Tonight?” Charlotte swallowed. “But I’m not yet sixteen.”
“Ah, but I’m thirty-eight, and I can’t wait to bed my beautiful, blooming bride.” His fingers traced a patch of reddened skin on her face. “It’s difficult, isn’t it? To believe you have the upper hand and suddenly realise you don’t.” He leaned forward and wound a tendril of her hair round one of his fingers. “I chose to wait, Charlotte. But now I choose to wait no longer.”
Charlotte wet her lips. “I’ll sign them.”
“Oh, but of course you will.” He toyed some more with her hair, dragged a finger down her cheek, smiling when she flinched. “Tonight, before witnesses.” He took her by the arm and propelled her to her room. “I’ll be back in some hours, and I expect to find you radiant.” He kissed her cheek and all of her trembled. “Wear the brocade bodice,” he said as he closed the door behind her. To her surprise, she heard a bolt grate into place on the outside, and when she turned to angrily draw her own bolts, she found them gone. Charlotte Foster felt very frightened and very alone.
Serpents in the Garden (The Graham Saga) Page 31