Shadows of Love

by Gail MacMillan

  “No,” I faltered.

  “And I have another reason for choosing this kind of dress,” he said, going to squat native-like near his bed to pick up a piece of fruit from the pile we’d gathered the previous day. “We must save our civilized clothes for the day we’re rescued.”

  “But what can I wear?” I asked, looking down at my dress. “Even though I’m not a prudish Caucasian, I can hardly adopt your style of garment.”

  “There is a length of sheeting among the supplies left us,” he said, then paused to bite into a ripe, juicy fruit in his hand. “”Bring it to me and I’ll show you how to fashion a sarong such as the native women wear.”

  I obeyed. He laid aside his breakfast and, with a few deft slashes of his knife, cut the cloth into several lengths.

  “Take off your dress,” he said, rising to stand before me, cloth in hand. “I’ll show you how to wrap this about yourself securely for comfort and ease of movement.”

  “No!”

  “Starr, you have to trust me.” Exasperation accented his words. “I slept only a few feet away from you last night. I could have come to you. You were exhausted and hurting and vulnerable. Sleeping with you would have been easy…if that was all I wanted. Now take off your gown and let me teach you to be a native.”

  Slowly I unbuttoned my dress and let it slip to the ground. I wore no underclothing. It had gone to become bandages for Colin. As I stood naked before Barret, he paused, his gray eyes filled with repressed desire as he stood staring at me.

  Then he reached out and swept a length of cloth about me. Several deft wraps and a couple of strategic tucks later, I stood bare-shouldered in a white garment that ended just above my knees and fastened beneath my armpit. Feeling suddenly free and uninhibited, I unpinned my hair and let it fall down my back in a tangle of waves and curls.

  “You’re very beautiful…too beautiful.” He backed away from me and looked me up and down, rubbing his palms on his thighs. I sensed the gesture was an unconscious attempt to keep from reaching out and touching me. My heartbeat, already much faster than normal, raced away like a wild horse before a violent gale.

  This isn’t right. We should be mourning Colin with all our souls, not lusting after each other.

  He broke the spell by drawing a deep breath and rubbing a hand over his stubbled chin.

  “You’re going to have to get used to living with a bearded man. A razor wasn’t among Andrew’s bounty.”

  “You don’t sound much concerned that he is responsible for our predicament,” I said. His return to normal conversation had made it possible for me to get myself under control…with an effort.

  He shrugged. “In his position, I might have been tempted to do the same thing. Taking a man’s command from him can make him bitter and vengeful. Now, enough of the past. Eat your breakfast.” He tossed me a piece of fruit. “This is delicious. Later I’ll teach you to fish in the lagoon.”

  ****

  For a week we retained a chaste, brother-sister relationship, but the atmosphere between us was as acutely charged as black clouds bearing an intense lightning storm. At night I often lay awake well into the hours of darkness, longing to go to him, longing to feel the comfort of his embrace, longing to satisfy my curiosity about the joys of shared lovemaking with the man I loved, who had declared himself in love with me.

  I’d hear him move on his bed of palms fronds and knew that he, too, lay sleepless, probably struggling to keep those same powerful desires at bay.

  Eight days after we’d arrived on the island, Barret brought matters to a head. Arms laden with a great bouquet of wild orchids, he returned from the jungle late that afternoon and laid them in front of me.

  “What’s this?” I asked, looking up in surprise. I’d been sitting in front of our hut, preparing fruit for our evening meal.

  “I’ve come a-courting,” he said, dropping on one knee.

  “What?”

  “I should like to be granted the privilege of courting you.” He spoke earnestly. “I’ve never courted a woman before, and I’m not sure how to proceed. My previous relationships have always been born out of pure sexual need.”

  When I stared him, stunned to silence, he continued, “I had to wait until my face and wrists healed, to prevent my being physically repulsive. Then I remembered gentlemen I’ve known have asked permission to court a lady. I thought a gift might render that permission more readily granted. Am I correct so far?”

  A ghost of a grin twitched his lips, but he was rubbing his hands together, and I could sense his discomfort.

  “Permission granted.” I smiled. “The flowers are beautiful. Thank you.” I picked one from the pile and fastened it in my hair.

  “My pleasure.” With his relief obvious in his face, he reached forward, took up a bit of fruit, and began to help me with supper preparations. “After our meal, will you walk with me on the beach? Since there are no soirees or balls to which I may escort you, I think it might be the next appropriate step in our relationship.”

  ****

  For the next three evenings, Barret took me walking on the moonlit beach. On the fourth evening, as we paused before re-entering the hut, he put his hands on my shoulders and asked, “May I kiss you?”

  I nodded. His mouth, warm and strong, gently covered mine. Cautiously he enfolded me into his arms, against his hard, scantily clad body. The sensuous tenderness of the moment flashed through me. I couldn’t remain detached and ladylike one moment longer.

  “Starr, no! It’s too sudden.” He pulled away and held me at arm’s length.

  “I love you!” I cried. “I have for so long. Don’t keep me in this limbo any longer.”

  “You mean we can be together…now? But I’ve been told respectable women need months of courting…weeks of…”

  “For a man of the world, you know remarkably little about so-called respectable women. We’re flesh and blood, too. We have needs and desires…”

  “Sweet Jesus!”

  He scooped me up in his arms and carried me into the hut. There he laid me on his mat, among his blankets, then straightened and for a moment stood looking down at me.

  “I love you,” he said, gray eyes smoldering with desire. “I’ve never known any feeling like it. It fills up my senses, my soul. But I have to know…was Colin ever able to make himself your lover?”

  “Barret…”

  “Please, Starr. I have to know!”

  “No, never,” I breathed, my heart pounding impatiently against my ribs and wondering why he’d chosen this moment to question me about my relationship with my husband with such obvious vehemence. “He tried…in the meadow where you came upon us, and then aboard the Linnet…as you saw. But he never…could.”

  “Hush.” He lay down beside me, gathering me to him and stroking my hair. “The past is past, and I despise myself for asking. But I had to know. I had to be certain.”

  “Barret,” I whispered as I slowly released my sarong’s fastening, “there will always be only you.”

  “Yes,” he muttered. “There will be only me from this day forward. And I vow there’ll be no others for myself. No matter what has gone before, this will be the first true lovemaking of both our lives…the first time we’ve been in love and made love.”

  He opened my sarong and let his gaze move over me. The gesture in the twilighted shelter was as sensuous as if he’d been touching me with his hands. My breath caught in my throat.

  “Barret…” I whispered. He took my hand in his and placed it on his loincloth.

  “Take it off,” he said, his voice deep with emotion, when I tried to flinch away. “Take it off and see if you’re still willing to make love with me.”

  When I hesitated, his hand went to cup my chin, to raise my lips to his in a kiss that was at first tender and gentle, then probing and forceful. As I became lost in its passion, his hand went to my breast. My senses whirled out of control, and my hand on the scrap of cloth that was his only garment pulled it free.
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br />   His patience that night was amazing. I felt no fear, no panic, no revulsion. Only ecstasy as he made love to me—at first gently, then, as I responded, with a seductive passion I could never have imagined. Simon and his brutality slid from my mind.

  A skillful lover, well schooled in the art of satisfying a woman, he rejoiced in my inexperience, in my delight of all he had to offer and teach me, and in what I gave so uninhibitedly to him.

  I was a child, a neophyte in the art of lovemaking, and in the days and nights that followed Barret proved an enthusiastic and talented teacher. Together we blended innocence and experience, honesty and desire, body and soul, to achieve total fulfillment.

  I was happy as never before, and Barret told me he felt the same. Free at last to live a life together, we swam naked by moonlight in the lagoon and foraged for food and building materials during the day. I grew tanned as a native, my unbound hair a tangle of curls about my shoulders and down my back. Barret became bearded and bronzed by the sun. We were Adam and Eve, he jested, and so we named our island Eden. Freed of pasts of which we did not speak, uninhibited in love, and living in a veritable paradise, we were that first couple.

  ****

  We had been on the island about five weeks when I awoke one morning to find Barret gone from his place beside me. It wasn’t unusual. Often he arose early to swim or fish or search out fresh treats for our breakfast.

  I stretched lazily and smiled. I was happier than I’d ever been, happier than I’d ever dreamed of being. I understood what had been missing in my marriage to Colin. I also knew that all the wealth and mansions in the world could not replace what I now possessed.

  I sighed contentedly. Barret and I had it all…food, shelter, and most importantly, freedom and love. There was only one more wish we could cherish and perhaps some day bring to reality, the product of our love, our very own child.

  I knew Barret envied family ties, although he never admitted it. His reference to his employer’s sons as brothers, his closeness to Marie and her family because of his French blood, and his own lack of relatives, all painted a picture of a man longing for roots.

  A baby! Barret’s baby. I put a hand to my flat belly and suddenly realized that I had, by two weeks, missed my cycle. Was it possible? I sat up and re-calculated the days. Yes, I was definitely, undeniably late. And only yesterday I had experienced an unusual revulsion against breakfast.

  I smiled and lay back slowly, my hand still on my stomach. I was pregnant! How wonderful! I tried to picture the joy on Barret’s face when I told him. Our very own baby, conceived in love and born on this glorious island. We would teach him to read and write, and sing, and speak his father’s mother tongue. He would grow up strong and wise and brave and gentle like his father.

  I could not wait any longer to tell Barret. I got up, slung my sarong about me, and hurried down to the beach, where I found him weaving a basket in which to carry fruit. His broad, tanned shoulders were toward me as I went quietly up behind him and knelt to slip my arms about them.

  “Ah,” he grinned, leaning easily back against me. “My love. Did you sleep well?”

  “Of course.” I stroked his hair and kissed his temple. “Barret…”

  I let my gaze wander out to sea. And it was then I saw the sails of the ship that would rescue us.

  I did not have a chance to speak further, for at that moment he saw them, too, and leaped to his feet to wave his arms.

  ****

  Soon a long boat was rowing in toward us. We’d dressed hastily in the clothing we’d saved for the occasion, and now we stood on the beach as respectable-looking as possible with Barret’s heavy beard and my wildly unkempt hair. I knew I must tell him about the baby before our rescuers arrived.

  “Barret,” I said, looking up at him. He stood, legs apart, a hand shielding his eyes as he watched the approaching craft.

  “Barret,” I repeated, when he failed to respond. “We’re going to have a child.”

  “What did you say?” He swung to face me..

  “I’m pregnant,” I said, smiling. “We’ve made a baby with our love. Isn’t it wonderful?”

  “Wonderful!” His face registered outrage. “You let me lay with you while you knew you carried another man’s child? My brother’s child? And now you try to convince me it’s my baby in your belly? And Colin encouraged you in this deception! Sweet Jesus, betrayed by the two people I cared for most in this world!”

  “Barret, it is your baby! You have to believe me. Colin and I never…”

  “Liar!” he snarled. “Your child can’t possibly be mine. I’m sterile—have been for years.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Within an hour we were aboard the Atlantic Lady, our rescue ship. Already carrying a full cargo of guano from neighboring islands, she’d been on her way up the American coast scouting out new prospects for future voyages. Her captain decided to forego further exploration and deposit Barret and me on a nearby island, one settled by the English, before proceeding farther north.

  “A woman aboard a cargo ship has always been bad luck for me,” the burly, gray-haired master declared. “The sooner we land you safely, ma’am, Abe Douglas’s daughter-in-law though you declare yourself to be, the better I’ll feel.”

  “I agree, Captain,” Barret said caustically.

  He turned and strode away, leaving another thorn in my already aching heart. But then, I should have expected nothing more. As soon as we’d boarded the Atlantic Lady, he’d alienated himself from me, ignoring me or calling me “Mrs. Douglas, ma’am” whenever he was forced to acknowledge my presence. He avoided being alone with me, keeping himself in the presence of one or more of the seamen, allowing me no opportunity to speak privately with him.

  This estrangement did not stop the mariners from drawing what to them seemed the obvious conclusion concerning our days on Eden. They nudged each other and pointed at us with leering grins.

  I tried to accept the situation with grace and dignity. By the time we reached the island to which the Atlantic Lady was taking us, Barret would have realized he’d been wrong about his physical condition. He would find a clergyman, and we would be married. Or so I struggled to reassure myself.

  When we docked at Del Ray Island, the English family of a wealthy plantation owner, on learning I was daughter-in-law to powerful Abraham Douglas, took me in. In the flurry that followed our arrival, I lost track of Barret. When I was settled in the plantation mansion, I inquired after him.

  He’d vanished, I was told. He’d disembarked from the Atlantic Lady and disappeared into the dockside crowd. No one had seen him since that time.

  Alone and pregnant, ill with despair and morning sickness, I didn’t know how I’d survive. Please, God, I begged, don’t let him go on believing I deceived him, that this is not his child I carry.

  ****

  Within a month the Maris Stella, under command of Jared Fletcher, arrived at Del Ray to fetch me. The pirates had released him and his crew on an uninhabited stretch of Florida coast, he explained, then scuttled the Linnet. After several days of struggling through the swamps, he and his men had managed to reach a settlement. When there had been no news of Colin, Barret, or me after they’d managed to return to Pine, Abraham had given Jared command of the Douglas fleet.

  When Jared asked about Barret and Colin, I could only tell bits of the truth. Colin was dead and Barret had vanished. I could not bring myself to confide in him regarding my condition.

  ****

  Back in the Douglas household, I became overwhelmed with an ever-increasing panic. Widowed and now deserted by my lover, I didn’t know what was to become of me if the truth about my pregnancy became known. Ill with apprehension, I watched the days slide by, hoping for a miracle that would somehow extricate me from the situation.

  Then one morning, as I came down to breakfast, a wave of giddiness overwhelmed me. The last conscious memory I had was of toppling down the remaining three steps and crying out in pain.

 
; ****

  When I returned to consciousness, I lay in the big featherbed I had once shared with Colin. The room was darkened and those around me spoke in whispers.

  As I became able to focus on faces, I saw Randall bending over me. Behind him stood Abe, Gram, and Caroline.

  “Hello, little sister,” my brother-in-law said. “How do you feel?”

  “Weak and sore,” I said becoming aware of pain in my back and left shoulder.

  “You took a nasty fall,” he said. “But you’re going to be fine. After a few days’ bed rest, both you and that baby you’re carrying will be right as rain.” He patted my hand reassuringly. Then he and Abraham left the room.

  When the men had gone, Gram sat down on the edge of the bed.

  “So you’re to have my great-grandchild,” she said, taking my hand between her wrinkled palms. “That’s wonderful news.”

  “Is it really?” Caroline came to stand by the bed, arms akimbo. “She was alone on that island for weeks with Barret Madison. And we all know his reputation with women.”

  “That will do!” Eyes snapping, Gram arose and faced the woman. “Starr is not to be harassed.”

  Abraham returned.

  “Leave us, ladies,” he instructed. “I wish to speak to my daughter alone.”

  They obeyed, Gram casting me a reassuring, conspiratorial wink, Caroline’s expression one of utter contempt.

  When they’d gone, Abraham seated himself on the edge of my bed and looked at me with penetrating gray eyes. Did he suspect the truth?

  “So you’re to present me with Colin’s child.” He startled me by beaming. “Thank you, young lady. Bear a healthy lad with none of his father’s weaknesses, and I’ll see to it you and your boy rule this valley when I’m gone.” He took my hand. “I always knew the right woman could make Colin act like a man.”

  He stood and began to pace, rubbing his hands together. “Now that I’m to have a grandchild, I must plan accordingly. I must expand my enterprises immediately. This autumn I will go to England and secure more credit to advance my endeavors.”

  “Mr. Douglas…” I began. I knew I should tell him the truth. It was wrong to allow him to believe the child was his son’s.