Captured for the Captain's Pleasure

by Ann Lethbridge

  He filled his own glass with red wine and attacked his pie with obvious relish. She did the same with hers. Sandford might eat little, but he had an excellent chef.

  ‘What did your cousin mean when he said it wouldn’t do any good to wish us well? He doesn’t like me, does he?’

  Michael put down his knife and fork and picked up his glass. ‘I apologise for Jaimie. He thinks I’m making a mistake.’

  That hurt. More than she liked to admit. She hoped her expression didn’t show her feelings. ‘Why?’

  He shrugged. ‘He is not always easy to understand. It could be fear I’ll spend less time with him. It could be the smoke.’

  Jealousy. It did strange things to people. ‘Surely smoking that…stuff isn’t good for him?’

  He took a deep swallow of wine, then stared into what remained in his glass. ‘Probably not.’

  ‘Then shouldn’t you try to stop him?’

  ‘It is not always possible to repair things, Alice. He’s happy.’ His mouth tightened. ‘Or he says he is. I’m sorry if you don’t approve. He is the only family I have left. Eat up, for we must be on our way.’

  The deliberate change of topic made her feel like an unwelcome intrusion in his life. It stopped her from questioning him further.

  ‘I am ready to leave whenever you are,’ she said.

  The bleakness in his gaze disappeared. He smiled and she felt her breath catch at the sheer glory of the sight. ‘Excellent,’ he said. ‘I want to be there by nightfall.’

  ‘Where is there?’

  ‘You’ll see.’

  His eyes held a promise and she felt hot and breathless, as if the room had grown over-warm.

  Nightfall seemed far too far away.

  Chapter Sixteen

  The rain had stopped while they were at lunch and the sun still lingered well above the horizon when the carriage halted in front of a small stone cottage located behind the break in an ivy-covered granite wall. A gatehouse from all appearances, without any gates. An avenue of beech trees led away from the opening, but wild grasses covered any sign of the drive.

  The carriage rocked, signalling Simpson’s descent. He pulled open the door with a grin and a wink.

  ‘Where are we, Simpson?’ she asked as he let down the step.

  ‘Not sure, my lady. I’ve been following the Cap’n.’ He jerked his thumb towards Michael tying his horse to a post near the front door of the small stone house. Simpson handed her down and went to his horses’ heads.

  Alice forged through the damp grass to join her husband, who was jerking his crop through his gloved hand.

  She quickened her steps. ‘What is this place?’

  His brows lowered, his eyes full of shadows and not quite meeting her gaze. Yet he held out his hand. ‘I want you to see something.’

  Wherever this was, it was not a happy place for him. When she took his hand, he drew her close to his side and she felt stronger, ready to face what lay ahead.

  Side by side they walked through knee-deep grasses that rippled like a troubled ocean with each puff of breeze. Her skirt hem quickly became sodden. The beech trees linked above their heads and splattered rain on their shoulders. The scent of clover and damp vegetation filled the air.

  If it wasn’t for the tension she felt radiating from Michael, she would have felt thoroughly content with her hand tucked beneath her husband’s arm.

  ‘Are you going to tell me what this place is?’ she asked.

  ‘In a moment.’ The rough quality of his voice forestalled her questions yet again. She bit back a sharp retort. Time. They both needed time to become used to the married state.

  They rounded the curve of the avenue. A crumbling relic of what had once been a grand house overlooking a magnificent sweep of countryside came into view.

  Time and nature had softened the outline of broken walls rising two storeys in some places and completely gone in others. A chimneystack emerged from the ruins, pointing skywards like an accusing finger.

  ‘Oh, my,’ she whispered.

  ‘Hawkhurst Place,’ he said with soft reverence, one hand shading his eyes against the dying sun.

  ‘Your family house?’

  ‘Yes. It burned down.’ His voice lowered to a murmur. ‘This is the first time I’ve been here since…’

  Shadows carved deep hollows beneath the high, stark planes of his cheekbones. Mouth etched into a hard painful line, he stared at the ruin. Bleakness hung about him like a cloak, isolating and cold.

  Awkward and sad, Alice waited quietly at his side. To break in on his reverie felt invasive.

  He took a deep breath, straightened his shoulders and set off towards the house. His long stride ate up the ground, leaving her to follow in his wake.

  The longing to comfort was an empty place in her chest and an ache in her arms. He did not seem to want her sympathy. She tramped in his trail of bent and broken stalks.

  In the dying light, with grasses bending before him, she had an image of a lonely rock jutting from unfriendly seas. He halted and as she reached his side, he waved an arm to encompass the whole. ‘Not much left.’

  The carefully matter-of-fact tone sounded painful to her ears, but she took a deep breath and responded in kind. ‘It must have been lovely.’

  How shallow the words sounded in the face of such devastation.

  He pointed with his riding crop to the shield engraved on the arch above what once would have been the entrance. Lichen marred the weathered crest. ‘The Gryphon,’ he said softly. ‘The family crest.’

  ‘Hence the name of your ship.’ And the symbol of the ring he had tossed at her so casually. She fingered the ribbon at her throat, wondering whether to ask him about it, but he caught her hand. She curled her fingers around his and realised they trembled. For all his stoicism, he was in the grip of strong emotion.

  Without understanding what had happened, all she could offer was silent support.

  Together, they mounted the shallow steps. Inside the walls, the air seemed to hold its mouldy breath. Shadows threw up barriers after the bright daylight outside. Cold and damp and dark prowled in the corners. It was like entering a cathedral, or a crypt. She shivered.

  Slowly, her eyes became accustomed to the gloom. Ivy-strangled beams lay at crazed angles. Moss smothered charred yellow brick. Creepers and nettles carpeted uneven flagstones. If it wasn’t impossible, she could have sworn the faint smell of smoke invaded her lungs.

  He led her over fallen rubble, past brambles whose thorns snagged her skirts. A pigeon up among the jagged chimney pots softly cooed a warning.

  At last he stopped before the remains of a blackened hearth. ‘This was the library,’ he murmured. ‘My father had a wonderful collection of books and manuscripts. I think I remember learning to play chess in this room.’ His voice was raw with pain. She wanted to say something, but he was already moving on, turning to help her over a beam before peering into a room with a magnificent view of the park. Great oaks cast shadows over unkempt lawns and overgrown gardens. ‘The drawing room. My mother took afternoon tea there, according to Jaimie.’

  His gaze followed the column of lone chimney up into the deepening blue. ‘Up there was the nursery where Meg slept.’ His tone remained horrifyingly conversational, his body tightly controlled, so rigid, Alice feared that at any moment he might snap in two.

  He vaulted a beam and, putting his hands around her waist, lifted her over. ‘This was the ballroom. The fire started here. The house was full of people.’

  ‘How awful,’ she whispered.

  He stared out between piers of brick, which once must have supported a bank of windows leading out to a veranda, from the looks of the stone balustrade. A shudder shook his frame. ‘I should never have come here.’

  He turned away, headed for the front door, leaving her to follow as best she could. She clambered over the bricks and the beams, all the while wishing she had comfort to offer instead of platitudes.

  At the front step he seemed
to remember her presence and stopped, staring off into the distance. He looked so alone.

  She touched his arm. ‘I’m so sorry, Michael.’ She slipped an arm around his waist.

  His eyes when he looked at her were fractured, glittering, his expression full of loneliness. ‘I didn’t think coming back would be so hard. Not after all this time.’

  She could only imagine how such a tragic loss would feel. ‘Sit for a while,’ she said. ‘Catch your breath.’

  He sank on to the step. Elbows on his thighs, he clutched his hair in raking fingers as if fighting the images in his head.

  With nothing but her presence to offer, she remained silent. When he spoke his voice was low and raw. ‘Meg was in bed.’ He gulped a breath, staring at the tufts of grass between his feet. ‘I should have saved her.’

  She laid a hand flat on his back. ‘You were just a boy.’

  He turned his head and gazed at her with anguish. ‘I was out on the veranda peeping in through the window, when I should have been upstairs asleep.’

  He covered his eyes with a shaking hand, but not before she saw the sheen of threatening tears.

  ‘I saw flames and ran inside, looking for my parents. I remember the screams. And the heat. I remember…’ His mouth twisted. He shook his head as if to shake the sights from his mind.

  She slipped an arm around his back, pulled his head down, pillowed it against her shoulder. Patted his back. ‘Hush.’

  He buried his face in the crook of her neck, breathing hard, a painful, raw sound. After a moment or two he started speaking again. ‘Somehow I ended up outside. On the lawn.’ He swallowed. ‘Meggie called from a window. Someone behind her broke the glass. The next second she was falling. Screaming. Her nightdress in flames. I looked away.’ He pinched the bridge of his nose, squeezed his eyes closed. ‘For years I saw her in my dreams not knowing who she was. Always running to catch her, but my feet won’t move. I want to catch her, but I can’t. I let her fall to her death.’

  ‘It was not your fault.’

  He raised his head, staring at her, his eyes dry and empty. ‘If I’d been where I was supposed to be, I would have saved Meg. My parents would not have tried to go up there to find us.’ He groaned. A deep awful sound from low in his chest. ‘Father told me to remain in my room. I disobeyed.’

  ‘Perhaps you would have died too. Do you think they would have wanted that?’

  He exhaled a short breath, closed his eyes, lifted his face to the heavens, anguished. He swallowed. ‘It’s odd. Sometimes I see them out of the corner of my eye, but when I turn to look, there’s no one there.’ His voice cracked. ‘I’m alone.’

  A chord twisted in her heart. Tears for his pain clogged her throat. ‘Not alone, Michael. You have me,’ she whispered. ‘And Jaimie.’

  Lost too deep in his memories, he didn’t seem to hear. ‘I’ve seen portraits of them. It is like looking at strangers. No matter how hard I try, I can’t recall their faces as part of my life.’

  ‘Perhaps if you don’t try so hard…’

  ‘God, if only it was possible.’ He swiped at his face with the heel of his hand and drew in a shuddering breath. ‘I was ten. Meg was five. My parents were in the prime of life. They didn’t deserve such a fate.’ Anger coloured the grief.

  ‘Michael, it was a terrible accident. No one was to blame, least of all a small boy.’

  His face hardened, the furrow in his brow deepening. ‘The fire was deliberately set.’

  Her stomach gave a sickening lurch. ‘Who would do such an awful thing?’

  ‘An evil man.’

  ‘Do the authorities know?’

  ‘The magistrate? The local constable?’ He barked a short hard laugh, full of bitterness. His fingers clenched convulsively on her shoulders, biting into her flesh. ‘They refused to do anything.’

  Something about the way he was looking at her caused her heart to jolt. Her stomach clenched with a sudden surge of fear she couldn’t explain. She drew in a rasping breath of realisation. ‘You know who it is, but you don’t have proof.’

  ‘I have all the proof I need.’ His gaze darkened, fixed on her face intently. ‘What would you do if it was your family? Wouldn’t you do all in your power to seek justice?’

  The weight of the question pressed against her chest. The intensity with which he awaited her answer burned in his gaze. She thought about her father, her brother, how she would feel if someone hurt them so cruelly. ‘It would be hard to forgive such a terrible act.’

  He let go a long breath, as if she’d lifted a great burden from his shoulders.

  The hairs on the back of her neck rose in warning. ‘Michael. Don’t set yourself above the law. Nothing good can come of it.’

  Had he even heard? He looked to be in a whole other world, his expression cold and hard.

  ‘Michael?’

  He came back to her with a blink and heartbreaking sadness in his smile. He bent his head and touched his lips to hers. ‘Thank you,’ he whispered.

  She caught his nape, pressed her mouth to his, as if she could somehow absorb his pain, make it less hard to bear. He relaxed in her arms. She rocked her body against his, kissing, stroking, until he slowly pulled away and tucked her head beneath his chin.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said softly. ‘I should not have burdened you so.’

  ‘I’m glad you did.’ He’d shared such an important part of himself. She felt closer to him than ever before. They sat in companionable silence watching the shadows grow.

  ‘How were you pressed into the navy?’ she asked.

  His chest rose and fell on a deep inhale. ‘I don’t know. I must have taken a blow to the head.’ He rubbed his hand over his chin. ‘My first memory for years was coming to my senses on board a frigate bound for the West Indies. I had no idea who I was or where I had come from.’

  Her chest squeezed in fear for the ten-year-old boy he’d been. ‘Oh, no.’

  He stroked her cheek with his thumb. ‘The navy thought I was a slow top. They told me they were doing me a favour by giving me a trade and a home.’

  ‘Dear Lord,’ she whispered. She’d seen patients in St Thomas’s Hospital who had lost all recollection, confused, anxious and often angry. A child would be terrified. ‘But your memories eventually returned?’

  He gave a soft little chuckle. ‘Came as quite a shock, let me tell you. I’d just left the navy and purchased the Gryphon. I’d named it after the design on the only thing I owned when I came to. The Hawkhurst heir’s ring, though I didn’t know it at the time. We were in port. A runaway block clouted me on the head and shook some memories loose. After that, I looked up the insignia in a library, wrote to people in England, found Jaimie and learned the whole story.’

  It ought to be a happy ending, yet he sounded strangely sad. ‘Jaimie must have been glad to see you?’

  He smiled down at her. ‘That he was. And I was glad to see him.’ He raised her hand to his lips, pressed a gentle kiss to her wrist. She felt the scrape of his stubble across the tender skin. ‘Thank you for listening.’

  She kissed his cheek. ‘Thank you for sharing your memories.’

  A shadow passed across his face, leaving her feeling there were things he had not revealed. Darker things. The connection between them dissipated on the cool evening breeze. She shivered.

  ‘Come,’ he said. ‘You are cold. We must return, before it is too dark to see our way. There are plans we must make.’ His voice had a determined ring, as if he had news she might not like. Whatever it was, the future could not be as bad as his past. She let him haul her to her feet and arm in arm they set off for the gatehouse.

  ‘Do you think you could bear to live here again?’ she asked after a moment or two. ‘Rebuild the house?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ He turned to look at her, his cheekbones as stark as axe blades in the dying light, his eyes deep in shadow. ‘Hawkhursts have lived on this land for centuries.’ He circled her waist with his arm. ‘Jaimie says my father would
want that. He remembers him better than I do.’ There was an ocean of emptiness in the soft spoken words. ‘I’m not sure.’

  He’d lost so much. His family. A good part of his childhood. ‘Is it your head injury that causes your headaches?’

  ‘The doctors aren’t sure. They were worse before my memory returned. During bad spells, the bo’sun would lock me in irons, I was so wild. Jaimie says it was the memories trying to get out. Dark and quiet helps. Simpson knows what to do.’

  ‘Is that what happened that first night on board the Gryphon? And last night?’

  ‘It was.’

  They were almost at the gatehouse. Alice stared at the carriage in surprise. Simpson was nowhere in sight, but he had unloaded the luggage from the carriage’s boot and must have taken it into the house. ‘We are staying here?’

  ‘This is your new home,’ Michael said.

  At first she didn’t quite take in his meaning. ‘You mean us to live here?’

  He nodded. ‘For now.’

  The remoteness in his gaze caused her a moment of panic. ‘Why here? Why not go to Oxfordshire?’

  Simpson emerged from the cottage. ‘Goodnight, my lord, my lady.’ He headed for the waiting carriage and swung up on to the box.

  ‘Where is he going?’ Alice asked.

  ‘The carriage is Jaimie’s. I borrowed it before I came to London. There is nowhere here to keep it.’ He grasped her shoulders, looking down into her face. ‘Go inside, while I stable my horse. See what you can find for supper.’

  Dismay twisted her stomach in a knot. What was the matter with her? It didn’t matter where they lived provided they were together.

  She pushed open the little house’s front door and immediately stepped into a parlour. Small, clean, furnished with a sofa and a chair, a faded but serviceable rug covering the flagstone floor. A table and two chairs sat in front of the diamond-paned, leaded window looking out over the stone gateposts. Whoever lived here would have had a good view of visitors coming or going to the great house beyond.

  Opposite the front door a low passageway led past a winding set of stairs. Wondering what she might find, she wandered through to a tiny kitchen, with a scrubbed pine wood table and a dresser against one wall. Beyond the small window, a walled garden, long overgrown, contained an apple tree and a small wooden shed nestled against the stone wall.