Theodore nodded. “There is a well-respected woman in town, and Mistress Theodore is well by all accounts.”
“That is good to hear,” Gaston sighed.
“So, you sail within the fortnight?” Theodore asked.
“So I am told. We plan to visit the plantation. I will write my father. Is there ought else I should do?”
“Well, there are the matters we discussed in October, and… the matter we did not.”
I frowned. He sighed and went to the shelves lining the wall to pull two leather satchels and place them on the desk. One was marked “Williams/Sable”, and the other, “Marsdale”.
Theodore spoke as he opened the Williams/Sable packet and withdrew documents. “I saw to all of the legal matters. Gaston is now a citizen and you both…”
“What?” Gaston asked.
He looked from one to the other of us and I realized something quite important.
“I forgot… to tell you, these last few days,” I said. “Theodore came in October and we parsed the French documents and…
Gaston seemed to be struggling to remember what I was talking about.
“As you were not considered a competent Frenchman,” Theodore said smoothly. “I thought it best you become a new Englishman.” He handed Gaston a document. “Mister Gaston Sable. Blame your matelot for the name if you dislike it.”
Gaston studied the page and touched his new legal name in a curious fashion. Then the tension left his shoulders and at last he nodded.
“It is acceptable,” he told us. “I did not wish to be English and not French, but I suppose it is as it must be.”
Theodore smiled. “Gaston, no one has told the French you are no longer French. It is simply wiser if you do not go near them.”
“Ah.” Gaston nodded, and then his gaze was on me alone. “Thank you for remembering my surname,” he said quietly in French.
“I am relieved you are pleased.”
He thought on it and nodded. “Oui, I am.”
Theodore was pulling more pages from the satchel. A crude map was among them.
“What else have you wrought?” Gaston asked me quietly.
“I believe we own land,” I said.
“Aye, generous grants. Both of you and several of your associates will soon own that coast you dwelled upon. There is one grant that still needs a complete name. The governor has assured me he will grant all that we ask, but I still require signatures before the formal request is filed. I need a surname for Pete, but they have not delivered one.”
“We will see to it,” I assured him, and perused the map. We would indeed own all of the point, beach, morass, and even the semicircular bay to the north. The map had rough squares drawn in and names jotted within them: Striker, Pete, Cudro, Liam, Otter, the Bard, Davey, Julio, Gaston and myself all owned adjoining lots of land, which varied in apparent size from thirty or so acres to several hundred. Striker and I had the largest, with him owning the bay to the north and me owning the point itself.
“All of the dwellings are now on land I will supposedly own,” I noted.
“I could do little for that,” Theodore sighed. “I am hoping you can work out some arrangement amongst one another.”
“I am sure we can.”
Gaston touched the block with the name Sable. It was smaller than mine and lay east of the point proper.
“Damn you, Will,” he whispered in French. “You have made me a man of consequence.”
“I am sincerely sorry for that,” I replied, and gave him a hopeful smile.
I was relieved that his answering smile was warm and amused.
We signed our grant requests. Gaston paused for a time before signing Gaston Sable in his neat script. Once relieved of the pen, I slipped my hand under the desk to caress his thigh reassuringly; and once he set the pen down, his hand came to cover mine. A small smile graced his lips as he passed the papers back to Theodore.
“What else is there?” Gaston asked.
“I have taken the liberty of writing a last will and testament for each of you,” Theodore said, and produced two more documents for us to sign. “These name the other as the sole inheritor of all of your possessions. If you are to die together…” he spread his hands wide to indicate it would then be up to God.
“We will have to consider what is to become of the land and house if we should perish mutually,” I agreed.
Gaston shrugged. “Decide as you will,” he said to me in French. “I will not outlive you. If I should die, you know where the gold is buried.”
I made no attempt to gainsay him; and as he had been quite disimpassioned about the utterance, I was left to decide whether it was romantic or tragic. I could make no such determination. It made my heart ache either way.
“We will think on it, together,” I said.
He shrugged again.
“And now,” Theodore sighed, “we must discuss the things that you said you would leave to my discretion in October.”
I remembered that of which he spoke, or rather his mention of it. I looked to Gaston again. “Theodore said there were things that need be dealt with but not immediately, things of which I might not wish to hear regarding my father and the plantation. I told him that I trusted his judgment as to whether they could wait until we returned here or not.”
Gaston nodded amicably, and Theodore opened the other satchel.
“First, I was able to purchase a number of Negroes for the plantation,” Theodore said.
“I suppose we will see them when we visit,” I sighed. “And we had discussed the need for them before I left.”
“They are even more necessary now,” he said with a sad shrug. “A number of the bondsmen have died.”
“That is sad to hear,” I said.
I thought of all the men with whom I sailed to Jamaica and wondered what I would find when I visited Ithaca.
“Is the why of it known?” I asked.
Theodore shrugged. “They seasoned poorly. I know you knew them such that their names might have meaning. I will leave Fletcher to the telling of it.”
I nodded resolutely. At least good Fletcher was still alive.
“And then there are the letters from England,” Theodore said. “They arrived in September. I do not feel concern that you will fault me on withholding your father’s; but in hindsight, I feel some guilt that I did not deliver the others to you in October, because you might have wished for them. As for your father’s, I have not read his missive to you, but I know what he wrote me, and… well, I thought we would have more time to address the matter prior to your sailing again. As it is…” He sighed heavily and pushed the satchel to me across the desk.
I regarded the satchel with trepidation. I knew I truly did not want to know what Theodore thought it wise to withhold from me.
“As always,” I said, “I am sure you had my best interests at heart.”
He stood and rounded the desk to pat my shoulder. “I hope you will continue to feel so. I will leave you with it then, and inquire as to our meal.”
He withdrew through the back door, closing it after him. Gaston and I regarded one another. I pushed the satchel toward him. He opened it as if it might contain snakes he would have to kill. There were four letters. I recognized my father’s script on the first, and so did he, as he set it aside. The next had very fine and pretty writing that looked to be female in origin. The third was from Master Rucker. The fourth much-battered packet, to my utter amazement, was from Alonso, and addressed to me at my father’s estate. I was pleased it had been forwarded.
“What is wrong?” Gaston asked as I continued to stare at it.
“This is Alonso’s hand.”
Gaston glared at the packet.
“The Spaniard?” he spat.
I sighed and snatched it from him to break the seal. “It is dated the day after I left Florence.” I handed it to Gaston. “You read it and tell me what it says.”
He handed it back. “My Castilian is not proficient to th
at degree.”
I glanced at the last page, which contained many crossed-out words and blots of ink. “Even I will have a hard time reading it; he appears to be quite drunk by the end.”
“Read it,” he said.
“I do not know if I wish to.”
“Why?” he asked.
“Well, you throwing a jealous fit for one.”
He rolled his eyes and slumped in his chair. “I am sorry.”
“And for another,” I said, “I truly do not wish to read it yet. I can guess its contents, as it was written after he woke to find me gone. I do not imagine it to be pleasant.”
“He did not know you were leaving?” Gaston asked with sincere curiosity.
“Non. He wished for me to accompany him to Spain and then Panama. I did not wish to spend the rest of my life posing as his manservant.”
“Why would he even ask such a thing?” Gaston snapped.
“Non, non.” I smiled at him. “I am ill using his intent. In the end, he offered to go elsewhere with me. But for us to remain together, one or the other would have had to sacrifice a great deal. And as I have explained several times over, I did not love him as I love you.”
He took the letter and smoothed it flat and slid it back before me.
“Please,” he said solemnly. “Now I am curious.”
I could refuse him nothing. I read Alonso’s letter.
It started angry. He had woken to find me gone, without even a note. He had been incensed that I would leave him in such a way. Then he had either let time pass or indulged in a bottle. The sweep of his handwriting relaxed and yet became tidier. He admitted he had been corresponding with his family for some time, and that he had broken the trust between us first. Then he began to list all of the things he wished he had said to me. Some were simple, such as “I love you,” which I realized he had never truly said. Others invoked shared memories, such as complementing me on insulting a don who had given us a bit of trouble. This was interesting, in that I remembered Alonso being furious at the time. In this letter, he admitted that he had actually admired my courage, or stupidity, in the face of insurmountable odds. He wrote of his fondness for our lovemaking, and how he honored that I had trusted him after all that had happened to me. That was something he had never told me, either. Toward the end of the letter, it was obvious, as I had noted when glancing at it, that he was deep in the wine. His script became quite difficult to read. He went on in detail about how he did not know if the letter would ever reach me, or if it would be read by others, and how he did not care even though he had said things that one man should never commit to paper concerning another. He even said that he realized now, that if he had been willing to take those risks, if I had been more important than his family honor, then perhaps I would have stayed with him.
It was not what I expected. It led me to hidden veins of emotion I had long since thought banished or dissipated. I finished the letter in tears. Thankfully, Gaston did not question me as I buried my face in the side of his neck and cried. I was grateful for his comforting arms, as I thought again of all the things I would miss of Alonso.
I mourned him as if he were dead, because he was dead to me now. I would never see him again, and I doubted I could ever get a letter to him, even though I knew his family name and estate just as he had known mine. I was sure a letter from England would be questioned, and if his life had followed the course he had described to me, then he would already be in the New World. And knowing what I did now of political matters here, I would never be able to go to Panama. So he was dead, and I had received this last letter from a ghost.
When most of the emotion had passed, the cynical portion of my spirit roused itself, and I wondered how hard Alonso had tried to retrieve this letter after he posted it.
I wiped my eyes.
Gaston regarded me with concern and curiosity. “Was it hateful?”
“Non, on the contrary.”
He frowned.
“Let me read it to you,” I said.
“You do not have to,” he sighed
“I want to, because I want you to understand. You wanted me to read it, now you have to listen.”
“Is that how it is?” he asked. “So what am I to understand, how much he loved you?” His tone was light but his eyes were hard.
“Not… precisely. Your Horse truly fears all others, does it not?”
He snorted. “This is not a thing of my Horse.” He sighed. “Not entirely. And it is not fear,” he added with vehemence. Then he shook his head and rubbed his temples. “I do not want to argue. Not tonight.”
“I am sorry.”
“Will,” he sighed. “I think of this man touching you and it fills me with frustration. You shared things with this man. He was with you before me. I have been with no one except…” He shook his head. “Every time you touch me, it is new to me. When I touch you, I want you to feel the same. I realize that is selfish. I wish to possess you… even in the past.”
“You do. My love, you overshadow all that has ever occurred in my life. I can think of no other I have known without comparing them to you. They do not exist to me now except in your shadow.”
His smile was slow in coming, but it finally lit his eyes. He handed me Alonso’s letter again. “Read it to me.”
So I did, explaining my observations as I went, and ending with my thought that he probably tried very hard to retrieve the letter once he was sober. When I finished, Gaston took the pages from me and folded them neatly, compressing the creases until the poor battered papers were flatter than they had been.
“I wish to meet him,” he said as he set it aside.
“And what? Kill him?”
“Non,” he grinned. “Make him jealous. He lost you.” He handed me another letter. “He is a fool. And you are correct; he is no one to be jealous of.”
“Thank you.” I chuckled at his change of heart and mood. I regarded the feminine script and broke the nondescript seal with a shrug. I flipped to the last page to read the signature. “Sarah.”
“Your sister, oui?”
I nodded and read. She had been delighted by the letter I sent her. I calculated, based on the date, and realized this was in response to the first short note I had written her, and not the massive volume I wrote on our return voyage from Île de la Tortue. I would not receive a response to that until the ships began to arrive in January.
She apologized that hers was short, as it had to go on a ship soon. She wished to come here someday and see it all for herself. She asked several questions of matters and details she wished clarification on. She mentioned that she had made the acquaintance of Master Rucker, and he had taken to providing her with a steady supply of political and historical tracts on the subject of the West Indies, and she was quite fascinated by them and by his company. I was greatly pleased to hear it.
She joked that she was going to tell me to give greeting to Gaston, but realized I would let him read this, so she addressed a paragraph directly to him. She thanked him for making me happy, and wished us both well. Gaston was pleased and amused by this. I was pleased she had given such credence to my mention of him; despite the rapport I had established with her, it was not a thing I would have expected.
Then her letter took a more serious tone. Shane had been furious at his plans being thwarted. Our father had decided it was best to keep them apart, and she had only seen Shane briefly at our mother’s funeral and our sister’s wedding. At which point, she changed her tack, and spoke of our mother’s passing. Sarah had felt a great and unexpected sorrow over this: but not of the loss, rather guilt and sadness that she did not feel any great need to mourn. So she postulated that perhaps she was truly mourning not having a mother, rather than feeling the loss of the woman who had filled the post in name only. I decided that I truly adored my little sister, and that at least I could say I had one family member in the world.
“I wish to meet her as well,” Gaston said as he finished.
“And make he
r jealous?” I teased.
He smacked my arm painfully, and toyed with Rucker’s and my father’s letters.
“This first.” He handed me Rucker’s letter.
It was much as I expected from the man, and I reminded myself that when he wrote it he had not yet received the letter I wrote him that would answer many if not all of the questions he listed in this one. I put it aside after explaining this to Gaston.
He shrugged and handed me my father’s letter. “Then we must read this now.”
I grimaced and nodded. It did not match the dour tone I had expected. My father mentioned Elizabeth’s wedding and my mother’s passing in a few brief sentences, as if it were a perfunctory duty that must be gotten out of the way so that serious things could be discussed. He seemed pleased I was enjoying myself and had found something to do with my time, as he had not expected planting to suit me. In actuality, I supposed, he was relieved I was out making war on the Spaniards, and not gambling and whoring with his good name all over Port Royal. To my dismay, he appeared to have a very specific agenda for the rest of the missive.
He suggested that, since I was engaged in dangerous enterprises, perhaps it would behoove me to produce a legal heir. He said he would be very pleased with me when I married. He assured me that marriage need not be a thing of love. It was a thing of duty, and any sensible young woman would understand that and turn a blind eye to my philandering with whomever I chose, as long as I practiced a modicum of decorum. He went on to offer the proceeds of the plantation as a means of support for my starting a family.
It was extortion. Thankfully, I did not need his money.
Then he put the noose around my neck. He said that, as incentive for producing an heir, he would give me the plantation upon the birth of my first son. To that end, since he was sure there were few young ladies of sufficient breeding available, he was arranging a marriage for me and would send a bride as soon as one could be procured.
Gaston and I regarded one another in shared horror.
“I am going to kill your father,” Gaston said.
“May I hold him down?”
“Will it be necessary?” he asked.
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