The Guineaman

  Kite spent a month in Antigua after the capture of Guadeloupe. On their return the soldiers of the 38th Foot disembarked without Major Robertson; he had been one of eleven officers killed in the capture of the island and his widow plunged into a conspicuous and affecting mourning.

  But Kite also returned to bad news. Dorothea lay dying and when Kite went in to see her, he was appalled. The once handsome, voluptuous and apparently ageless black woman was almost beyond recognition. Dorothea had metamorphosed into a shrivelled husk whose body hardly disturbed the clean white sheet laid over her.

  Seeing her visitor, her eyes gleamed with alarm and she held out her hand for Puella. Kite regarded the two women, the one standing, the other lying inert, linked by their clasped hands. His heart filled with pity, sadness and regret.

  ‘Dorothea…’ he began, but Puella restrained his forward movement.

  ‘She does not like you, Kite,’ Puella said with a flat finality.

  ‘What is the matter with her?’ he asked, overwhelmed by a sense of desperate inadequacy.

  ‘She is dying, Kite; she stopped eating, she does not want to live any more, now that Mr Mulgrave is dead.’

  ‘But…’ Kite began, then caught himself. For all his multiple kindnesses, Mulgrave had saddled Kite with a mighty obligation in return. He saw Dororthea watching him closely, saw the gleam of febrile intelligence in her eyes and felt the conviction that Dorothea knew all about Mulgrave’s deception. How could she then so hate him, if it was Mulgrave, her trusted and much admired lover who had, in the end, deceived her?

  And then it struck Kite that, despite the protection and the advantage conferred by their association with himself and Mulgrave, these women hated their white men. He looked sharply at Puella.

  ‘And Puella,’ he asked quietly, ‘do you hate me too?’ Puella looked at Dorothea, as though for guidance, but the dying woman kept her eyes steadfastly upon Kite. It was clear Puella would offer him no comfort while Dorothea lived and he felt overwhelmed with weariness. ‘Well Puella,’ he said, ‘you are a free woman, you have a competence upon which to live. You can afford this house upon your own account and Wentworth will protect you…’

  A rasping came from Dorothea and Puella bent to her hear her dying friend. As she straightened up, Kite asked, ‘What did she say?’

  ‘She tells me that you will go away soon and that I may stay with you…’

  ‘May stay, or must stay?’

  ‘May stay, Kite.’

  ‘And when will you choose?’ He asked, his voice cracking with despair. But Puella merely shrugged.

  Kite slept aboard Spitfire and daily attended Wentworth’s premises where the two men sought to mature their plans for the future. Every evening, however, Kite returned to the house to pay his respects to Dorothea, but he exchanged no more than formal remarks with Puella, and the gulf between them grew wider.

  On several evenings, after these depressing visits, he dined with Wentworth and attended an assembly or two. In the aftermath of the acquisition of Guadeloupe and the return of the island’s soldiery, these were gay affairs, by no means confined to the white population, but embracing the better part of the wealthier townsfolk, many of whom were mulatto or quadroon. To her regret, Mrs Robertson was prevented from attending by the conventions of widowhood, but her chagrin was increased upon learning that the handsome Captain Kite had at last abandoned his ‘nigger whore’ and was making his way in polite society. Anxious to secure a new protector, Mrs Robertson fell victim to panic, becoming desperate to catch the eligible bachelor before some other schemer secured his affections. To this end she brow-beat Wentworth and contrived to be at his rooms one evening when Kite was known to be calling. She had removed her black lace lappets and her black dress had fallen from her splendid shoulders so that her ample bosom was indecorously exposed to view.

  ‘Captain Kite,’ she gushed, smiling and extending a hand to him, ‘what a pleasure.’ He bent politely over it and she seized his, drawing him down beside her, her features eager at his proximity. Despite his black servants, a sweaty and blushing Wentworth improbably pleaded a lack of limejuice to absent himself at this moment, and Mrs Robertson came swiftly to the point.

  ‘Captain Kite,’ she said, boldly placing her hand between his thighs, ‘you are a most arresting man and I am deeply affected by you…’ Her breath was hot on his face and the scent of her and the movement of her hand disturbed him. He felt the mounting flush of lust and twisted round. Relaxing, sure of her conquest, Mrs Robertson lay back, opening her legs and drawing up her skirt with a rustle of black silk, exposing petticoats and slender stockinged calves.

  ‘I will do anything for you, William, anything…’

  ‘Anything?’ he whispered, stupidly wrestling with his conscience, longing to lose himself in her willing flesh and wash away the confusion in his soul. He half heard Makepeace’s war cry as rising lust made him tug at himself.

  ‘Anything,’ she repeated with breathless ardour, exposing herself naked above her stockings and looking down at him as he disencumbered himself of his fly. ‘Oh, God…’

  She sensed him hesitate, then quickly reassured him. ‘Wentworth will not trouble us, I have seen to that…’

  Kite’s member sprung free and he frowned. ‘What? How?’

  She laughed and eased herself receptively. ‘Oh, my darling don’t trouble yourself, come to Kitty. Here…here…’ She reached down to guide him.

  ‘But how,’ he insisted and she saw a dangerous gleam in his eye.

  ‘Why, silly, like this,’ and she stroked his throbbing penis.

  He looked at her, horrified. The extent of her scheming struck him at the moment of entry and he recoiled, priapic, foolish and half spending in his excitement and disgust.

  ‘You are rejecting me?’ Kitty Roberston could scarce believe the fact.

  Kite had stood up. He was tucking his shirt tails in and settling his breeches. ‘No, I am not rejecting you,’ he temporised. ‘I am treating you like a whore…’

  ‘But you like whores!’ She was desperate in her disarrangement, but it was her mood that turned now. ‘Or are only nigger whores to your taste?’ she snarled.

  Kite swiped at her, but she evaded the blow with a grin of triumph, standing up with such a sudden motion that he fell back, still adjusting his clothing. Her skirt fell to the floor and she thrust her head forward, her expression furious.

  ‘You nigger-loving bastard!’ she hissed.

  He regretted his attempt to strike her, it cancelled out her humiliation and made her the victim, sparking her spirited riposte. ‘And to think I considered you a gentleman! You are nothing but a…’

  But Kite was provoked and a mounting anger overtook him. ‘Be silent!’ he snapped. Then recovering himself before matters flew utterly out of hand said, ‘We have both behaved foolishly and impetuously…’

  She was shaking her head. ‘Oh, no, you shall not say so! I will not have it! I will not have you make a fool of me, by God!’ She would submit to no soothing; she was wildly indignant, outraged, a singular contrast to her wanton eagerness of a moment before. Kite stilled his protest, letting her have her head. What did it matter? If she and Wentworth kept their mouths shut, he was not going to gain any capital from the unhappy and awkward incident. He suddenly turned and picked up his hat. The unexpected retrograde movement caught her unawares and she paused.

  ‘For God’s sake madam, make Wentworth happy!’ Kite said. ‘He is rich beyond your late husband’s competence and is probably sweating miserably below in an agony of disappointment that you should frig him, then offer yourself to me.’

  In the brief, calculating hiatus that followed, Kite hurried from the room and down the stairs where he ran into Wentworth. ‘Go to her, for God’s sake and take your pleasure; I love Puella and have no wish for her, she’s as eager as an alley cat.’

  The regrettable encounter with Mrs Robertson brought to an end Kite’s period of irresolution. He had been half-hearted and
uncertain in his dealings with Wentworth, unsure of his objectives as much as his motives. After he had drowned himself in what he privately considered to be wanton murder at La Gosier, this further disquieting evidence of his own weakness acted like a slamming door. When, ten days later, Dorothea died and Puella agreed to accompany him wherever he went, he realised that her submission was the only thing that encumbered his mind. There was nothing beyond the considerations of business to keep him in Antigua, and even these lessened when Wentworth let it be known that his proposal of marriage had been accepted by Mrs Kitty Robertson. For propriety’s sake, the wedding would have to be deferred until after a year’s mourning, but Mrs Robertson could not entirely hide her satisfaction: it would make her one of the richest women in the Antilles. As far as Kite was concerned, her triumph was unconcealed.

  ‘She is a very bad woman for you, Kite,’ Puella remarked one evening after they had passed her carriage when out walking along the waterfront. Kite looked at Puella. He had mooted the evening walks as a means of attempting to re-establish some contact with her, though he had not returned to sleep under her roof. He had been pleased when she accepted, for he did not want to humiliate her in front of the townsfolk of St John’s after the death of Dorothea, when the excuse that she was tending the ailing mulatto was at an end. Her comment about Mrs Robertson was the first remark she had made which showed any returning consideration for him.

  ‘Why do you say that?’ he asked.

  ‘Because she wanted you. After the major died, she thought that you could throw over your black woman and marry her.’

  ‘How did you know that?’

  Puella shrugged. ‘I know it.’

  ‘But I did not, and now she is to marry Mr Wentworth.’

  ‘He will make her rich and she will make him miserable.’

  ‘Like I make you miserable?’ he asked tenderly. Puella walked on saying nothing. ‘Tell me something, Puella,’ Kite went on, ‘Why did Dorothea so dislike me? Did she attribute Mr Mulgrave’s disappearance to me?’

  ‘Of course. She believed you had tricked him and that he had to go back to England.’

  ‘I see. That is not what happened at all. Mr Mulgrave made me tell Dorothea that he had drowned. He said something about her having foretold he would drown and that it was best that she thought so.’ Puella said nothing, so he went on. ‘You see, Mr Mulgrave had to return to England, he went home to ease his fever and he had a wife in England. Did Dorothea know that?’

  Puella shrugged again. ‘Perhaps she did, I don’t know.’

  ‘The sad and stupid thing is, Puella, Mr Mulgrave is still alive…’

  ‘No!’ Puella shook her head. ‘No, Mr Mulgrave is dead,’ she said firmly. ‘He died in the water.’

  Kite held his peace. What did it matter? Dead or alive, Puella would believe what Dorothea had told her, such had been the mulatto woman’s hold over her younger friend. He had learned to his sadness that whatever benefits of civilisation one conferred on these Africans, no matter how one sought to ameliorate their condition, no matter how much one was devoted to them, one could not make them anything other than Africans.

  ‘I tell you something important, Kite.’ Puella broke into his unconsciously arrogant musing. He felt her draw closer to him as they turned and began to walk back towards the house. It was already dark, the last rosy flush of sunset in the western sky was already fading and the air had assumed the first slight chill of the night. ‘I am pleased that you have told me what happened to Mr Mulgrave. It is sad that Dorothea had to be left behind, but now Puella has said that she will come with you if you are going to England…’

  ‘And if I go to America?’

  ‘America then, only you must take Puella.’

  ‘Do you love me, Puella?’ he asked in a low voice, leaning towards her so that a passing couple remarked on their preoccupation.

  ‘You must come to me tonight, Kite… but there is something important to tell you.’

  Kite chuckled, his heart lifting. ‘No, nothing is as important as what you have already told me.’

  ‘Yes, something is more important. You must be careful of Mrs Robertson. She will influence Mr Wentworth, especially after you have gone. She will try and ruin your business.’

  ‘You think she is that vindictive?’

  ‘I do not understand vindictive, but I know she is your enemy.’

  Puella’s warning crystallised Kite’s intentions. The following day he called upon Wentworth and announced that he wished to realise his entire capital and that he wished to leave the island before the middle of June. Wentworth could not see Kite’s logic until Kite explained there was none.

  ‘I am resolved to leave the Antilles, my dear fellow, and not to return,’ Kite explained. ‘The place has too many unhappy memories.’

  Wentworth thought of Kite doting upon his late son and agreed. ‘It will reduce my ability to give credit, but…’

  ‘Banker’s draughts will suffice, though a quantity of currency and bullion will be necessary for contingent expenses.’

  Wentworth nodded. ‘I have moidores, specie and a little bullion upon which I can readily lay my hands,’ he said.

  Kite smiled wryly. The ‘little’ bullion amused him. ‘That will do very well. The rest in draughts…’

  ‘To be drawn against Coutts in London…’

  ‘No,’ said Kite, ‘against Verhagen in New York.’

  Wentworth shook his head. ‘That is impossible. I have exhausted my credit with Cornelis until the next season’s cane is in. He shipped me three large consignments of wine, timber, flax, notions and other fashionable fol-de-rols. The freight-rates were ruinous and the under-writers’ premiums exhorbitant. I have yet to move much of the stuff out of my warehouse… I’m sorry. It must be London… Does that matter?’

  Slowly, Kite shook his head. So, this was how fate finally compromised him. It was funny how the fatal blow came from a quarter from which it was least expected. He recalled Julius Caesar and the death blow from Brutus. He looked at Wentworth, but Wentworth lacked the guilt of Brutus; Wentworth was no friend turned political assassin, merely a man of commerce, venturing capital against an anticipated market. The risk made Wentworth sweat, Kite noticed, as his friend mopped his brow.

  Kite wondered if he was seeing shadows, like Dorothea had; was it the vague umbral spectre of fate that, at that particular moment, lay behind Wentworth’s lack of credit with the Dutch banker in New York? Kite shook his head. ‘No; I was minded to go to New York, but I can as easily change my plans.’

  ‘You may have as much in moidores as you wish, William, I do not mean to discommode you.’

  ‘You don’t discommode me,’ Kite said smiling and rising to his feet. ‘Until tomorrow then. And have Garvey here with a bill of sale for my shares in Da Silva’s schooner. I shall offer them to him.’

  ‘No, let me buy her from you, you’ll get nothing from the Portugoose.’

  ‘In gold then.’

  ‘Yes,’ Wentworth nodded, ‘in gold. Sovereigns if you wish.’

  ‘As you please.’ And picking up his hat, Kite left.

  Part Four

  Wind

  Chapter Thirteen

  The Hurricane

  On the eve of his proposed departure for North America, Kite ran into Captain Makepeace and, inviting his old commander back to the rented house, agreed to embark a consignment of twenty slaves just then brought in by the Enterprize from Benin. The slaves were destined for Kingston, Jamaica, and Makepeace was not keen to delay loading molasses and rum for England, fretful that, already late in the season, he might be caught by a hurricane before he got clear of the islands.

  ‘If you’re bound for the American coast, I’d be obliged if you’d look favourably upon the task,’ Makepeace pleaded, as they sat in the small courtyard set behind a high wall separating them from the hurly-burly of the St John’s waterfront. The sun was setting and the sky was suffused with a rich peach hue. Kite was disposed to be cordi
al and laughingly agreed as the two men drank glasses of mimbo. ‘You have done well, as I predicted,’ Makepeace said, watching Puella as she settled quietly beside them. ‘And you Puella, are more beautiful than I could have imagined.’

  Puella lowered her eyes and remained silent; she was uneasy in Makepeace’s presence, unable to adjust to the alteration in his relationship with either Kite or herself. Moreover, she did not want Kite to carry slaves in the Spitfire. The schooner was already loaded with a full cargo of muscovado and rum, some of which was bound for consignees in Savannah, where Kite intended replacing the discharged commodities with cotton. His returns would be modest, but with no personal contacts in Britain he did not wish to venture a speculation on a cargo which would be difficult to sell. However, despite his misgivings, he agreed to purchase a quantity of elephant’s ivory from Makepeace.

  ‘I hear you are a man of considerable substance,’ Makepeace said as they concluded their transaction.

  ‘I doubt that I could match your own substance, Captain, but you did me a considerable service when you introduced me to Mr Mulgrave. He was most generous to me as well as to Wentworth, his main protégé. I was quite undeserving.’

  ‘I daresay you will benefit further from his munificence then,’ Makepeace remarked, helping himself to more mimbo from the jug.

  Kite frowned. ‘Oh. In what way?’

  ‘Why, have you not heard? Mulgrave is dead. I would have thought his attorney, what was his name…?’

  ‘Mr Garvey,’ put in Puella, sitting up and taking more than a casual interest.

  ‘That’s it, Garvey, I’d have thought he would have let you know. Well, no matter; Mulgrave has been dead for some time. Garvey will have the details. I’m surprised you knew nothing of it…’

  Kite looked at Puella. His expression was contrite; there was no need for words to pass between them: Dorothea had been right. ‘Do you know the manner of his death?’ Kite asked.