Flames of Desire

by Vanessa Royall

  “You say McGrover indicated that he knew where Royce was hiding? Well, it is possible. God, how did he find out, though?”

  “Where is Royce hiding?”

  “Forgive me, but I’d prefer not to say. But it’s not far from here. He’s in a small, false room in a residential house. We often conceal naval officers there, when they are here for consultations, or to receive orders. John Paul Jones was there last week, in fact. But I thought it was absolutely safe…”

  His voice trailed off, and his brow furrowed as he calculated.

  “Where is the…the ship?”

  “Don’t be modest.” He grinned. “The Selena is in harbor at Port Washington, on the North Shore of Long Island, being provisioned for the next assignment. Did you know she sank seventeen freighters last year, and once took on five British men-of-war and sent them to the bottom in the space of an afternoon?”

  Selena was thrilled and proud, but there was in Dick’s tale the parlous whisper of strange violence, the mysterious flicker she had seen in Royce, the call of the wild that echoed down the trackless Highlands, the sign of the wolf. She recalled the wild white cumulus, driven by wind across the diamond skies of India, and how the strange wolfheaded shape of the clouds jittered the Sherpa guards.

  But that wild Royce had to be saved, too, along with the gentle one who had loved her. Along with the chief naval defender of the colonies. They all occupied the same body. No way to separate them.

  Dick explained that his “purchasing network” was in operation and working beautifully. The Selena was being fitted and provisioned with goods and produce his agents had purchased from Long Island farmers. Many other ships had been similarly fitted, and the British had not yet discovered either location or tactic.

  “He’s supposed to be out there by tomorrow morning. If a British patrol rakes Long Island Sound, it’s sure to spot a ship as big as the Selena. And, you can bet, if they know Royce is in New York, they know his ship can’t be far away. McGrover is acting because he’s remembered who the hangman was…is. The British Admiralty has put a price of fifty thousand pounds on Royce’s head, dead or alive. And there’s another one hundred thousand pounds waiting for the captain of the ship that sends the Selena to the bottom.”

  “No one will ever do that!” she snapped. “I guess not,” Dick laughed. “Not with that kind of spirit as his weapon. Now, here’s what I think. If McGrover knows where Royce is hiding, then he knows our most secret location. Thus, we can’t transfer Royce to another location, those being equally vulnerable. All we have to do is to conceal him until a bit after midnight, when he’ll leave for Long Island on horseback. What we ought to do—and if I could think of such a stroke I most certainly would—is to make a bold move. To do something even McGrover wouldn’t expect. We need a hiding place that is not a hiding place at all, something right under the guns, so to speak.”

  Selena was thinking hard. There was La Marinda, but…

  “What about here at your house?” Dick Weddington suggested.

  He wasn’t jesting.

  “Look, I know there was something between you and Royce, and I know you’re married. I also know Sean doesn’t want you involved in any of these political machinations. But it’s more than that now. This may be the matter of a man’s life. You’ve told me about McGrover and his threats. You know only too well what he’d do if he took Royce Campbell into custody.”

  “But it’s still daylight. How can you transfer him now? And here? Where…?”

  “I noticed you have a back entrance, other than the one I came in.”

  “The cellar?”

  “Good as any. You won’t even have to see him. We’ll get to him before McGrover, if we can…”

  “What if McGrover’s bluffing, and using you now to lead the way to Royce?”

  “I’ve thought of that, but we can’t take the chance that he is. We’re always aware the other side may know everything we’re going to do. The trick is to execute our plans so fast that they haven’t time to react. We have passageways and a system of messengers. We can get Royce out, and do a number of feints and ruses in the streets for a couple of hours. The problem is: where can he find shelter until early morning?”

  He waited.

  “My household must not know,” Selena said. “They cannot know.”

  So he knew that she had already decided.

  I won’t be able to see him, she thought. I will have to pretend it isn’t happening.

  Can you do that? asked the tiny, nagging voice of her conscience.

  She did not answer it. Instead, she told Dick of a danger she could not prevent.

  “There are fourteen people on the service staff here. There is nothing I can do to guarantee that no one will see him, and give the alarm.”

  “In which case you know nothing. Neither how he got there, nor why.” He paused a moment. “So it would be best if you did not find an excuse to go into the cellar yourself. Pretend nothing is happening.”

  Then he was gone, on foot, through a system of alleyways constructed by the Dutch founders of New Amsterdam. Constructed not for passage, however, but for the drainage of refuse and rainwater. Selena felt confident about his route of escape, until she suffered an ugly insight: with the possible exception of a sewer, there was no place on earth in which a piece of breathing offal like McGrover would rather lurk.

  “Be careful, Dick,” she breathed, praying.

  Sean and Davina came home from their ride, happy and laughing, touched by the sun, and the aroma of dinner on the stove—dough balls stuffed with chopped lamb, rice and spices, gravy—drifted in from the kitchen. Outside, the sun was going down. Men walked homeward on the streets; cabs and horses came and went. Royce. Twilight came early, it being May. They played cards for a while in the drawing room; a servant entered unobtrusively, lighting the lamps against the falling sun. Was that a noise at the back of the house?

  “Where’s Traudl?” Sean inquired casually. The nursemaid usually joined them in a game or conversation as they awaited dinner.

  Selena, who had been doing quite a good job of concealing her tension, started unduly. Sean, watching Davina at play with blocks, did not seem to notice.

  “Perhaps she’s busy,” Selena hoped. The last thing she needed was jittery Traudl revealing, by her manner, the events of the day. Properly primed, the Dutch girl could be counted on not to speak of that which was forbidden to her. But expecting her to maintain a pose of equanimity was simply too much to ask.

  “Where Traudl?” Davina asked, as they sat down at table.

  Traudl customarily ate with them as well: Sean believed it created more of a family feeling for the little girl, to offset the intimidating size of the house and the impersonality of all the servants.

  “I’ll get her!” Selena blurted. She had tried to sound eager, but she knew she sounded harassed instead.

  “Send someone,” Sean said.

  “No, that’s all right…” And before he could protest further, she was on her way out of the dining room.

  Traudl’s room was not in the big attic, beneath the eaves, with the rest of the staff, but rather, due to her position, on the second floor. It was a small bedroom in the back of he house, modest but comfortable, and the nursemaid was as proud of it as a general might be of his first star. The door was ajar. Selena pushed it open a bit more. And peeked in.

  Traudl, galvanized, stood at the rear window—the one overlooking the alley—her chubby body stiff as a tree, her hands doing something at her mouth, twisting there as if she were trying to tear a cry from her very throat. Selena did not even have to guess what it was. Later, she could not even remember crossing the room, to stand beside Traudl at the window. Dick Weddington peered from the corner of the neighboring house, hard by one of the drainage conduits. And, emerging from behind him, leaping across the distance in swift, leopardlike strides, Royce Campbell made his way to the back of the Bloodwell house. Selena herself had made certain the cellar door was unlocke
d. Barely a sound, and then nothing. Dick Weddington was gone. Royce Campbell was inside her own domain, their hearts beating beneath the same roof.

  “Oh, ma’am!” Traudl moaned. “Must be a thief. We must tell Mister Sean at once.”

  “We’ll do nothing of the kind,” Selena told her.

  Hastily, with as much confidence as she could muster, Selena attempted to explain. The evil man at the door today was looking for the man who’d just gone into the cellar. No one must know. Traudl had to help Selena. Traudl had to be brave. No harm would come to her.

  The nursemaid, almost gasping for breath—she was that upset—did not quite seem to hear. Or, if she did, was not quite sure she ought to believe. Sensing this, Selena made it a command.

  “This is an important matter and none of your affair. You saw nothing. We’re most pleased with your work, and we want to keep you here, but…”

  Traudl began to sob. Now she understood. Selena thought so, anyway.

  “I’ll say you’ve a touch of spring cold, and have a kitchen servant bring up your dinner on a tray.”

  Nerved by necessity—or was it Royce Campbell’s proximity?—Selena made it through dinner, chatting quietly, and half-mad with tension. Sean had seen some excellent property on the drive, far to the north on Manhattan Island. He thought it well worth looking into.

  Selena agreed to inspect the property, rather too enthusiastically, but Sean’s mind was already on his planned work for the evening and he didn’t notice. He kissed both of his girls and retreated to the study. The rest of the evening was uneventful. It was already Davina’s bedtime, and, with Traudl “indisposed,” Selena wiped errant bits of food from the little girl’s face, took her upstairs, gave her a quick bath, and put her into her nightie for bed.

  “Traudl sick?” Davina wanted to know.

  “Not very. She’ll be fine tomorrow. Want to say your prayers now?”

  Davina got down on her knees next to her little bed. The soft rag doll and the big pink bunny rabbit waited for her.

  “God bless Daddy, God bless ’Ena, God bless Traudl. God bless Coldstream Castle…” She didn’t know what it was, but she liked the idea of a castle. “…and God remember Mommy.”

  Selena waited, uncertain of her own emotions, for the day Davina would reason that “’Ena” and “Mommy” were somehow not one and the same.

  “That’s a fine girl.” She tucked Davina into the bed and turned down the wick of the lamp. “Good night.”

  Traudl was in the hall, waiting. She looked positively ill. “I’ve got to talk to ye, ma’am.”

  Something was wrong. “Of course.”

  They went back into the nursemaid’s room.

  “I hate to have to say this, ma’am…”

  “Just calm down, Traudl. Go ahead. Tell me what it is.”

  “You know, ma’am? What I told you this afternoon? About how I was raised not to have truck with wrongdoing?”

  Selena nodded. Not this again.

  “Ma’am, I mean no offense, but I’m beginning to think I’m amidst somethin’ that’s not right.”

  “Traudl, I assured you it was none of your concern.”

  But the dauntless nursemaid had made up her mind. She had to have it out. It took a lot of courage, and there were tears of trepidation in her eyes, but she shivered and made her proclamation.

  “Ma’am, I won’t be able to tolerate anything illegal or immoral. I got my soul to think of, an’…” She broke into tears. Once more, Selena comforted her.

  “I’ll do the worrying for both of us, all right? Sometimes there are things…” She broke off. What was the use? Traudl’s understanding of events was entirely different from her own.

  She went to her own study, across the hall from Sean’s, and tried to refine some sketches she had in mind for next year. But not even the excitement of her success with La Marinda could drive from her mind the knowledge of Royce, close enough to speak to, close enough to touch…

  It had been easier at dinner, when she was forced to think of other things.

  Once, at about ten-thirty, Sean stuck his head in the door and asked if she would like to share a measure of port with him. She barely noticed. “I’m going to bed,” he said, sometime later. She registered that information, but indistinctly. Eleven-fifteen. At two in the morning, perhaps two-thirty, Royce would be gone, to Long Island, to the Selena, bound for the high seas that, more than anyplace else since the Highlands, were his home.

  Let it go, she thought. Don’t be a fool. She had a glass of wine to make her sleepy, and went to bed just before midnight. Sean was already asleep. Traudl peered out of her doorway to see who it was on the stairs, but quickly retreated into darkness. Selena undressed, put on her nightgown, and slid into bed beside her husband.

  Sometime during the evening, it had begun to rain lightly. With a steady, gentle rattle, it fell upon the slate shingles of the great house, and down upon the cobbled streets. It ought to have been soothing, but it was not. Rain and night, life waiting in shelters, life held in abeyance. She got up and walked to the window. Bowling Green was dark and flat as the rain fell upon it, and the gray river rippled white where the raindrops fell. Royce. All the times in her life that gentle rain had fallen in the spring. Twenty years. Royce. Sean was sleeping, and the world; gray skies folded the soft spring earth in the promise of summer and sustenance and warmth. Rain upon the blooming fields of May. Raindrops heavy in the newborn heather. Rain upon the battlements of Coldstream Castle, that reached the sky itself, and in the castle where hearth fires crackled, Selena dreaming into sleep. Royce. Time was so short, and life so sweet and dear. Rain forever, soothing and forgetful, upon all the graves of ancient earth, upon the seven seas that held the bones of sailors in the rolling deep. Oh, Royce!

  Suddenly she was flying down the upstairs hall, possessed of another mind, or possessed of no mind at all. She floated down the stairs as if in a dream, not so much driven by a force as drawn to one. His life was constant danger. She could not bear it, not to have said good-bye. If something should happen…

  But how could she explain it, being found in the cellar with a man? With Royce?

  Her thoughts were disjointed. She would go down. It would all be over quickly. It doesn’t matter! I have to…

  Traudl,distraught with anxiety, watched Selena from her slightly open door, watched her mistress’s billowing white gown against the darkness as Selena flew down the stairs.

  It was one-thirty. Perhaps too late already…

  Selena went through the downstairs rooms, and into the kitchen, walked to the door that led down to the cellar. Wait. It would be dark. She took a length of candle from a box on the kitchen counter, and lit it on the flickering flame of an oil lamp that was kept burning by night on the iron stove. Then she opened the door and started down into the cellar.

  The candle flame wavered, flared, and wavered again in the damp, drafty air of the cellar. Selena thought she heard a movement, but she was not sure. Down the stairs, slowly. Too soon, yet, to call out. Halfway down, she stopped and stretched out the candle. Boxes of supplies. The sturdy pillars on which the house was founded. Discarded furniture. Other junk the servants had cast down here, awaiting the rubbish scavenger. No more sound.

  She would speak his name when she reached the bottom of the stairs. By now, he must have seen her.

  Selena reached the bottom of the stairs. “R…”

  From behind her, a hand grasped the flame of the candle and extinguished it. Darkness. A rough arm enveloped her.

  “Quiet, lady, and you won’t get hurt.”

  Tensing to struggle, the voice struck fever. Royce! But his hand was over her mouth now, and, coming at her from beneath the cellar stairs, he had not seen…

  He did not know who she was! He did not know whose house he was in! Dick Weddington had done what he could to minimize the danger.

  Now she felt something hard and sharp at the base of her spine.

  “You’ll come to no h
arm,” Royce was saying. His voice was gentler now. “Don’t scream. I’ll take my hand away from your mouth if you don’t scream.”

  She nodded, a difficult task against the pressure of his hand.

  Slowly, his grip loosened, and the hand went away. But not too far. He was waiting. His other arm was like a steel band around her rib cage.

  “Royce,” she gasped.

  It was all she could say, and all she could think of saying. They stood in the darkness at the bottom of the cellar stairs, unable to see each other, the candle gone out. But he knew her voice, and she sensed the incredulous astonishment in the muscles of his body.

  “Selena?” he asked, although he did not need to.

  “This is my house,” she said.

  There was nothing for a moment, and then, without prelude, without sign, their arms were around each other, and they fumbled into a kiss that was as long as forever, yet over before it started.

  “Dick didn’t tell me…” he started.

  She put her fingers against his lips, and they kissed again.

  In the few moments that followed, something happened to them. It was something timeless and unreadable. Nothing mattered, except their being together, neither danger, nor disgrace, nor even—at that moment—the possibility of death. Far away, Selena’s vows spun within her mind, remonstrating, cautioning. Far away. All things, at that moment, were clear, and she felt as pure and clean and perfect as she ever had or ever hoped to feel. There were many kinds of love in the world, and this was the moment in her life, the moment that comes only to the blessed, courageous few, the moment of realizing forever that Royce had always been the one, and would be even if he died, even if he had to live on only in her heart, which now beat against him like a bird in glorious paradise.

  Once again, they kissed—this time it seemed to go on for hours—until she remembered and broke away. She had to ask.

  “When did you know who I was? At the masque?”

  He laughed softly. “Not until you spoke the word Scotland. I doubt anyone on earth could say it with the reverence you do. I asked you to dance because the resemblance disturbed me. I had long since given you up for dead. I lived on memory alone. I named my ship…”