"Some vague hints, sir. But I took them to involve my letters. And my exile. He wasn't sure what had happened to me, either. He had written before, demanding me to answer him, to answer Caroline, or tell him why I would not. But how could I? I never got those, either!"
"And thought to use me as intermediary, after he no longer could trust the Navy to forward mail. Or trust the Navy at all, sir," Colonel Deveaux said grimly. "He's begun to suspect something foul in our government, and said to me he'd also begun to nose about, to make discreet inquiries. I only pray to God they are discreet. There're thousands at stake in this, and the men involved are not above murder to keep their doings quiet. And to ask about John Finney's doings… though a power of talk about him is common coin. People love to gossip about 'Calico Jack.' He's the sort who gets talked about. And loves it."
"Do you know him well, sir?" Alan inquired.
"Well enough, only as an acquaintance, mind," Deveaux smirked. "He's not the sort one has for a firm or trustworthy friend."
"I hear a lot of people say the same, Colonel Deveaux."
"Nodding acquaintances before the Dons landed, and allies when I mustered the volunteers. He helped arm them, you see, and brought his battleworthy bully bucks along," Deveaux chuckled. "In such need as we were, beggars can't be choosers. Back to those suspicions, and the rumours, though. Drunk sailors will brag, and the brag in taverns on the docks, and in Over-The-Hill, is that some of Finney's old hands were up to their old games, once their wartime prize money ran out, as you and Commander Rodgers believed. Too smart to take British ships, but assured that no one'd cry over foreign vessels if they got taken. Not only was Finney profiting from the cargoes he bought up cheap, but he was selling arms and powder to support them out of his chandlery, and brokering the best ships they took after they were repainted and renamed, and all marks of their former identity erased. Just as you thought in the beginning."
"And I wish we'd caught just one of 'em who could have been made to swear to that at his trial, sir!" Alan growled."Faint hopes of that, Lieutenant Lewrie," Deveaux smiled. "Look at how quietly Doyle's men went to the gallows. I suspect Finney was no longer dealing with Doyle. Just too untrustworthy and wild! But he'd done so in the past, and they could have exposed it all to save their lives, were it not for the certain knowledge of what Finney would have done to their wives, sweethearts and parents. Their children."
"I find it hard to remember that murderous buccaneers have such, sir," Alan responded.
"Now who stands to profit most from their depredations?" Deveaux prodded. "Who gains? Who loses if it ends?"
"Finney, of course, sir," Alan said quickly. "He's reaping a bumper harvest from it, and undercutting the other Bay Street traders something sinful. I'm surprised they haven't done for him long ago."
"Ah, but he only undercuts them by a few pence overall, so as long as their prices stay high, they have no complaints," Deveaux said with a crafty glint in his eyes. "British ships are not bothered, so their insurance rates stay low. Foreign traders are… discouraged, also keeping cheaper goods off the market to compete with theirs, most of the time, at least. Now, who else might profit by this?"
"Well, the ships'-husbands in England, the shipowners here in the Bahamas," Alan pondered. "Insurance companies and mercantile interests in England. Stap me, I s'pose that pleases Parliament, too, if they own commercial interests. Or members who are owned by merchants!"
"Parliament is pleased, brokers and bankers in the City," Colonel Deveaux chanted, "the Privy Council is pleased, and so, do I assume, is His Majesty King George. Revenues are up, insurance is low, trade flows freely… and piracy is a minor inconvenience for foreign competitors only, just the thing for Dons, Frogs and crude rebel Yankees. And not so much piracy that anyone has to really do anything about it! Until you came along, that is, and quashed Doyle's band like so many noxious bugs. You even made our Royal Governor look good!"
"Surely not the governor, sir?" Alan frowned. "You cannot mean that Finney could purchase a Royal Governor. Were the Bahamas still owned by the old proprietors, but we're a Crown Colony now, and…"
"Oh, not Maxwell!" Deveaux barked in sour humour. "Our previous governor was decent enough. And certainly not this new clown, our third Earl of Dunmore! He's too rich to bribe, and so arrogant, he'd be insulted if one tried! Lord Dunmore was Royal Governor of Virginia before the Revolution, you know. And I do think he started it, all by himself! Had he not been such a venal, greedy, lofty, pustulant toad as to set off Patrick Henry and Thomas Jefferson, we…" Deveaux had to sip his tea to calm down. "No, Lewrie, Lord Dunmore was born without a jot of brains, and he's lost ground as he's aged. While he may be grasping and greedy, he'd never scruple piracy. I was thinking of someone a trifle lower down. Someone… nautical, perhaps."
"You can't mean…!" Lewrie almost choked on his tea. "Damme, but… your pardons, Mistress Deveaux… Commodore Garvey, sir? What possible motive could he have?"
"Beyond money?" Deveaux snorted. "Think! How does one enforce the Navigation Acts? How does one succeed in command of a foreign squadron? And prosper?"
"Suppressing piracy'd suit," Lewrie said, rankled by Deveaux's impatient tone. "Keep down smuggling, keep the sea lanes safe. Seize ships and goods not British, and… oh! And avoid getting sued to his hairline for false arrest! Christ! Pardons again, ma'am. As long as Finney and his crowd pillage only foreign ships, he's every Bay Street merchant's darling. The competition is frightened off, so he doesn't have an armada of interlopers to deal with, so our weak squadron isn't overrun. And if Finney does Garvey's dirty work, the Navy isn't sued so often. And money, of course."
"And money, of course," Deveaux echoed. "And how is it done?"
"We're too few already, sir, to really patrol the Bahamas," Alan said, shutting his eyes in thought for a moment. "Finney would be told which areas are unpatrolled. Maybe Finney asks him to keep warships away from certain cays. Or, he could send our worst officers, knowing which ones are just too bone-lazy, stupid, or fearful to intervene, to certain areas."
"In like manner, once you and Commander Rodgers are perceived as energetic officers, you are sent very far away," Deveaux added. "To isolate you from this year's playing field So there will not be any Court of Inquiry at which any dangerous discoveries might appear that would harm either Garvey, or Finney. And your evidence from Walker's Cay is lost forever. Peyton Boudreau has heard some whisperings about that Some very guarded rumours, so far. One goes, 'we won't have no more trouble from those sods any longer-Calico Jack's stopped their business for us.' He overheard that one personally, Captain Lewrie, which sent him to digging and suspecting."
"Well, I'm damned, sir!" Alan breathed. "Despise Garvey though I may… and you'd best believe I do!… still, he's a Commission Sea Officer, sir, and a senior one. A man sworn, and an English gentleman! To condone piracy for a price, that's…!" Lewrie spluttered. "I know you must consider me hopelessly naive, Colonel Deveaux, but condoning Finney's piracy is condoning wholesale murder!"
"Peyton Boudreau is a top-lofty, aristocratic cynic, Lieutenant Lewrie," Deveaux said with wistful amusement. "Or at least, he poses as one. A hard man to shock. Yet even he found it hard to dismiss after a time. There were too many rumours, too much muttered gossip to ignore. There's a toast that's heard in Over-The-Hill that Finney's old mates and sailors enjoy. 'To our Navy-our own, and the one we rent' d'ya see? He's learned enough to lay evidence with the solicitor-general, William Wylly. He's another Loyalist, not so long in these islands that he's been corrupted. Nor will ever be, if his repute is as good as I've heard. They were going to peek into Garvey's finances."
"Stap me, sir, should Finney get wind of it, though," Alan said.
"I know. Thank God he had enough sense to see Wylly, instead of proceeding further on his own. I fear for him. We like him very much, sir. And there's too much at stake for them to go gentle with him, if his investigation was exposed."
"As do I and Caroline, sir," Alan assured them. "Remote as you are here on Cat Island, how do you converse so easily with Nassau?"
"I've a small schooner. I know nothing of the sea myself, you know," Deveaux confessed with a small laugh. "But, with packet boats so rare or irregular, I thought to establish a mail-boat service for my own use, and the use of my neighbors. It breaks even, just."
"I must get a letter to Caroline!" Alan exclaimed. "And one to Mister Boudreau, as well, warning him. Tell me your schooner is here!"
"Anchored in The Bight, due to sail two days hence," Deveaux was quick to reassure him. "Your wife will be overjoyed to hear from you at last. Instruct her to send future letters here, addressed to me. Better yet, have her give them to Peyton, so she's not seen with my mail-boat captain, and we will have to pray no one will suspect him sending mail to me, an old friend from South Carolina. The fewer who know you're in communication with Nassau again, the better, for a lot of people."
"You don't think Finney or his mates might harm Caroline, do you, sir?" Alan paled.
"I told you there were thousands at stake in this, Captain Lewrie," Deveaux cautioned sternly. "There's no telling what they might do, to protect their reputations, and their profits. It might be best if she could give no sign to anyone that she had heard from you."
"I understand, sir. I'll tell her," Alan said, rising. "With your permission, Colonel Deveaux, I'll go back aboard Alacrity. With mail to cheer my people. And letters to write. Lord, thank you for everything, Colonel Deveaux! I cannot begin to express my gratitude. Even if my exile was mere spite, F m forever in your debt for being able to exchange letters with my Caroline again."
He pumped Deveaux's hand energetically.
"Before I sail, though, sir," Alan added. "Could I have a fair copy of all that you and Mister Boudreau suspect? Before, we had no way to prove Finney guilty, none a court would accept. This time, we just might have a chance of having his head on a plate! And nailing Commodore Garvey's hide to my mainmast into the bargain!"
"You will have everything, Captain Lewrie," Deveaux promised. "But sail, sir? For where? Not Nassau, I beg you. It's too early to tip your hand, before Mr. Wylly finishes, his secret investigation."
"Nay, sir, 'tis far too late, I'm thinking," Alan countered, in a fever to be on his way. "But not Nassau. Good Lord, sir, I'm banned from going there, am I not? But," he concluded with a crafty smile, "I don't recall Commodore Garvey saying a blessed thing to keep me from sailing south!"
"South, sir?" Deveaux was forced to query with a frown.
"To put my wits together with Commander Rodgers, sir," Lewrie told him gaily. "And after that, why… one never knows, sir!"
Chapter 5
Abeam the Trades, on a soldier's wind, Alacrity flew like some mythical courier, threading between Rum Cay and Watling's, and out to deep ocean, taking the outside passage nor'east of Samana Cay, a day's run of 160 nautical miles from one noon to the next When they "shot" the sun, they'd gained 72°40' west and 23°30' north.
"Another day's run'll put us in Turks Passage, sir," Lieutenant Ballard nodded happily as he stowed his sextant away after taking noon sights.
"Wish to God we'd done this months ago." Lewrie paced, restless and impatient. "Garvey might have relented. Whippet may no ' longer be in the Caicos."
"He hadn't relented against us, sir, so why should he spare her before Alacrity" Ballard shrugged. "I still can't absorb the fact our commodore is up to his neck in collusion with Finney and his pirates!"
"Money!" Lewrie snapped, scanning his masts to see if there was one more place where stuns'ls or stays'ls could be deployed that wasn't already being used. "It all boils down to money. What happens to the crews of the pirated ships, he never sees, and it's no concern of his. Even if he did sometimes wonder 'bout it, then money is a great salve to one's conscience."
God knows when I stole that French Commissary gold in '81, it, did a power o' good for mine, Alan confessed to himself with a rueful grin.
"Sails ho!" the mainmast lookout called from the cross-trees of the upper mast. "Deck, there! Two ships beatin' nor'west, fine on the bows!"
"What's showing?" Ballard hallooed back in that deep, carrying voice which was a surprise for most to hear coming from such a small man.
"Tops'ls 'bove the horizon, sir! Courses, a corner! Under all plain sail!" the answer came wailing back.
"No one's running from pirates, then. They'd have their royals and t'gallants flying, else," Lewrie speculated. "Damme, as much as I hate to, we'll have to close 'em and speak 'em. They might be Yankee interlopers."
"Shall we board them if they are, sir?" Ballard queried.
Alan tried to imagine how long a delay that would be-hours, a whole day, if they had to inspect cargoes and manifests, fetched-to!
"No, Mister Ballard, we'll close 'em, and see if they frighten off with a stern warning," he announced. "We can't spare the time!"
"Sir!" the lookout said after skinning down a stay to the deck. "Capt'n, sir! I seen those ships afore. One's Whippet, sir. And the other's that Yankee merchantman we saved last year, the Sarah and Jane."
"Whippet, by God!" Lewrie whooped with sudden delight. "Thankee, Lord, thankee kindly! Mister Ballard, did you hear, sir? Wear us hard on the wind, get us up to windward of 'em so we may take station on 'em as they fetch us. And get my gig down and ready."
"Aye, aye, sir!"
It was Whippet, shepherding the dowdy Sarah and Jane of the year before off West Caicos. As they came hull-up over the horizon and the distance between them shrank, Lewrie could make out a Yankee flag flying beneath the Red Ensign aboard Sarah and Jane as a prize. Alacrity reduced sail, and as they came abeam, hauled her wind to leeward, and rounded up a quarter-mile off Whippet's starboard side. All three vessels then fetched up into the winds, and Lewrie was in his gig and off towards Whippet before Rodgers could hoist "Captain Repair On Board."
"Damn my eyes, what the devil're you doin' down here, Lewrie?" Rodgers shouted, pumping his hand energetically after the salutes were done. "You'd not be poachin' in my own game park, would ya now?"
"There's been wondrous news from Nassau, sir, so I…"
"News from Nassau?" Rodgers gawped, getting keener. "Then you're leagues ahead o' me, Lewrie. I haven't gotten letter onefrom anybody since I fetched Turks Island! Thank God I stumbled over this Yankee clown, buyin' an' sellin', bold as brass, in Hawk's Nest Harbour, which gives me a legitimate excuse t'sail back to New Providence."
"News from Nassau?" Rodgers gawped, getting keener. "Then you're leagues ahead o' me, Lewrie. I haven't gotten letter onefrom anybody since I fetched Turks Island! Thank God I stumbled over this Yankee clown, buyin' an' sellin', bold as brass, in Hawk's Nest Harbour, which gives me a legitimate excuse t'sail back to New Providence."
"Aye, sir, but…" Lewrie tried to interject, but Rodgers was on one of his "tears."
"Damme, sir, Whippet's ready t'drop her quick-work, same as the Royal George, an' sink at her moorin's," Rodgers ranted on. "Copperin' or no, she leaks like a sieve, there's a forest o' weed on her, and I suspect I'm teredo-wormed! Thank Christ, here comes an interloper for me to arrest an' take back to Admiralty Court, so I may get her into a dockyard 'fore we keel over an' go under."
"Sir, if you would but listen to me…"
"Well, if it ain't young Captain Lewrie!" Sarah and Jane's captain said, coming on deck to join them. "Now you're here, young sir, I trust you'll tell Commander Rodgers how I aided the Royal Navy, and let me go 'bout me innocent occasions, as you did last year, sir. I've already give him enough threats 'bout false arrest and all. But will he heed me, sir? He will not!"
"I've noticed," Alan snapped in exasperation. "Captain Grant, I recall. Delighted to make your acquaintance again, sir. I did warn you, did I not; sir, that you should not return to Bahamian waters?"
"I'm but a poor merchant skipper, sir, and…"
"Later, perhaps, sir," Lewrie cut him off. "Commander Rodgers, I've abandoned my patrol area. There's news from Nassau, and we have to talk. It's urgent, sir!"
"Signal Ballard to get underway," Rodgers nodded. "And let us go below. Mister Cargyle? Get sail on her and resume our course!"
"Good Christ!" Rodgers sighed when Lewrie had finished. Hehad cut his hair much shorter for summer, close to the scalp as an urchin infested with lice and fleas, and he rubbed his stubble with two hands. "The bastard! The son of a bitch! No, more'n a bastard, he's a bastardly gullion! In league with Finney an' his pirates? I always wondered how he could afford that palacio of his. Damn' near good as the Governor's mansion, an' filled with fine plate an' furnishin's. A commodore won't draw more a year'n a post-captain of a 1st Rate, an' Ј350 or so won't cover half his expenses, high's he's been livin'. Him an' that chick-a-biddy wife o' his, that semi-ugly daughter, an' good Chaplain Townsley an' his lawful blanket're sure to be expensive to keep as well. What'd ya wager, Lewrie, he banks with Finney's private merchant bank, an' there'll be no way your Mr. Boudreau and Solicitor-General Wylly'd ever smoke him out?"
"I hadn't thought of that, sir," Lewrie deflated as he poured them more claret from Rodgers' much-depleted final stock. "Surely, though, there must be something we can do, if the investigation can't convict them."
"I'm tempted t'sail into Nassau Harbour, all guns blazin', myself," Rodgers gloomed, knocking back half a glass." 'Nother reason for action. Damme, but I'm outa champagne! Wish we knew which ships were patrolling where. That might give us a clue as to where to go."
"Banned though we are from going north," Lewrie commented with a sneer.
"We've this interloper Grant as a fine excuse," Rodgers perked up, leaning his elbows on the table they shared. "He has t'face the Admiralty Court for violatin' the Navigation Acts."
"Not both of us, sir," Lewrie counseled. "You and Whippet, for certain. And the Governor's Council and the Bahamian Assembly were kicking 'round the idea of turning Nassau into a free port If they vote that in, Finney's undutied goods are safe as houses from here on out. Might as well void the Navigation Acts, too, I suppose."
"Did you really let him off last year?" Rodgers grinned.
"Needed his testimony hellish bad, sir," Lewrie blushed. "Only way I knew to have evidence the pirates were caught in the act. But I thought he was smart enough to take my warning to heart. What was Captain Grant up to?"
"Sellin' bricks an' timber, buyin' salt, so the Yankee fisheries can preserve their stock-fish for export," Rodgers sniffed. "Hell, name a good he wasn't sellin'!"
"So he's bung to his deckheads in salt now, sir?"Lewrie asked.
"Aye. Takin' it north as evidence against him."
"Hmm, sir," Lewrie grinned.
"What, sir?" Rodgers grinned in reply, expectantly.
"I was thinking, sir, that bagged salt is just as good as dirt-filled gabions to absorb round-shot and musketry," Lewrie mused.
"Whatever are ya drivin' at?" Rodgers asked, sitting up.
"Bait, sir," Lewrie explained. "Were we to find where pirates are operating, we could trail Sarah and Jane under Yankee colours as a tempting bit of bait with a Navy crew, armed and ready for anything."
"And just where'd we do the trailin', Lewrie?" Rodgers demanded. "We haven't more of a clue than we did last year. Walker's Cay was a fluke o' fortune." He winced. "Of a rough sort, mind."My Lieutenant Ballard suggested that one of us put into Harbour Island or Spanish Wells, on Eleuthera," Lewrie went on quickly. "They're major ports, and a man o' war from the squadron should be in the area, or at anchor. They could inform us where our ships are operating, sir. Now we know Finney's a pirate for certain, now we almost have it as Gospel our commodore's involved, where our ships are would point the way. Or, more to the point, where our ships are not."
"Or where fools such as your Lieutenant Courtney 'Cow-Flop' hangs his hat?" Rodgers grinned briefly, then scowled. "Lieutenant Ballard. God! He's the one got us banished, when you get right down to it. All that talk o' his 'bout irrefutable evidence, and that missin' slaver, Matilda.'"
"Damme, sir, but wasn't he right?" Lewrie pointed out. "Matilda was pirated, and her people slaughtered. There's a knacky wit churning in that head of his, sir, 'click-clack' like some German clockwork. I know he's right about this, too, sir."
Pray God Peyton Boudreau was wrong for once, Lewrie cautioned his eagerness; don't let him be a slender reed one couldn't count on!
And, Alan also warned himself; keep your bloody mouth quiet for once! I can't urge him any harder, or he'll balk like a hunter at the high fence! We either pull this off successfully, or we get cashiered at the easiest-or hanged for mutineers!
Rodgers twisted and turned for many long minutes like a corpse on the gibbet, shifting restless and frightened on his chair, trying to decide what to do that wouldn't ruin his career if they failed.
"There's Captain Childs in Guardian," Rodgers said at last. "I think he should be informed, Lewrie. About the commodore, that is."
Shit! Lewrie thought.
"The more who know, the more who talk, sir, and word gets back to Garvey and Finney, and then we'll have abandoned our patrol areas for nought," Alan shrugged, taking the softest approach he could.
"If Coltrop's in an Eleutheran port, word'll get back to them, you can wager a rouleau o' guineas on't," Rodgers spat, lips pursed in a sour pucker. "Dammit t'hell. Dammit t'hell, though… if they get away a second time! If we end up with nothing to show for it!"
"Not if they take the bait, sir," Lewrie promised.
"Hmm," Rodgers stalled. He slapped the table top hard with the flat of one hand. "Damme, let's do it, then! This Yankee-Doodle Captain Grant… I s'pose I'll have t'let him off, same as you did, once we find our pirates?"
"I fear so, sir," Lewrie nodded, all but turning St. Catherine wheels with barely repressed glee. "A small price to pay, after all."
"Best it be Whippet stands into port To water, let's say," Commander Rodgers schemed. "You take over escort for Sarah and Jane, make what arrangements you will aboard her, and stand off-and-on, tops'l down over the horizon, t'the east'rd. Pray God Childs an' Guardian be the ship in port. Not that Lieutenant 'Cow-Flop'!"
"He may be as out of touch with Nassau as we were, sir," Lewrie hoped out loud. "And that somnolent arse wouldn't stir up his bones to see the Second Coming."
"Somnolent, sir?" Rodgers laughed, rising and fetching his hat "Damme, but you've been readin' again, ain't ya? After I told ya it was bad for ya, for shame."
"Well, it was only the one book, sir," Lewrie chuckled, getting to his feet to drain his glass. "And a damn' thin 'un, at that."
"Let's go on deck, then, and beard our Captain Grant, sir. And then, lay a course for Eleuthera!"
Chapter 6
Sewallis Alan Lewrie lay sleeping in his cradle, at last, after a noisy afternoon of colic and wailing that had quite worn his young mother to a frazzle. Caroline sat at the side of the cradle, formed in the shape of a miniature dory, that a New England Loyalist joiner had made for her months before, feeling vaguely disloyal.
Women were supposed to adore children, she thought wearily. It was a given that all a young woman could wish for in this life was a brood of offspring to tend. But so far, one was more man enough to deal with, and after six weeks of maternal devotion following the boy's birth, she wasn't so sure she cared to experiencethe terror and pain again. The physician had rated her labor easy, a mere nine hours! To hold her firstborn like a tightly swaddled roast at the end of it, to peer into those grave little eyes, had not seemed worthy enough reward.
Then had come the interrupted nights, at the mercy of his cries, the shambling sham of wakefulness between precious naps, to brave his supping at her breasts with the frantic lustiness of his absent father, almost dreading the aching, until Heloise and Betty had suggested a wet nurse to spare her, to let Wyonnie tend him for a few hours.
Her body felt destroyed. Where was the lissome figure she'd had, she wondered when she bathed? There was still a heaviness, a gravid and palpable puffiness that only now was departing as she began to take rides and putter in her gardens, her kitchen and pantry. And the stretch marks which traversed her formerly alabaster flesh like fault lines, or desert tributaries of a failed river. Would Alan be repulsed by the sight of her when he returned? She could no longer claim to feel like the lithe girl she'd been-and she had yet to feel comfortable accepting a role of young matron; it was surreal.
Yet… She looked down at the puffy little face screwed up into a puckered repose. And had to fight the urge to pick him up to hold him close to her, to carry him out to the dog-run and croon to him as she sat and rocked in the clean air, instead of the humid stuffiness of the bedroom, permeated with the smells of incontinent infancy.
Sewallis Alan Lewrie had been powdered and changed, and she bent down, fearful of waking him, to inhale the aroma of his skin, and of the milky, corn-silk smells he bore like a Hungary Water. She kissed him lightly, brushed his little tuft of hair, and sat back in her straight-backed chair with a fond smile, in spite of all.
Yes, he was a darling baby (most of the time), with his father's gray blue eyes, but with her nose, her paler hair. And her mouth. It felt more than odd to feel his tiny, demanding lips at her nipples, yet it was her mouth, not Alan's.
"You take a rest, missus," Wyonnie offered, entering the room. "I watch 'im fo' awhile. Po' chile cry hisse'f right out. But, he be bettah when 'e wakes. Dot obeah-mon's yarbs get rid de colic, jus' as I tole ya. Un de corn-meal fo' dot rash'll ease 'im."
"And I expect he'll wake up hungry," Caroline grinned with a wry lift to a brow. "God save womankind, Wyonnie, from men's… hungers!"
"All de mo' reason ya naps a spell, missus," Wyonnie chuckled in reply as she sat down opposite Caroline and began to fan him.
"I will, and thank you, Wyonnie," Caroline said. She left the room on tiptoe. Darling or not, Sewallis Lewrie showed signs of a light sleeper, and she felt she'd more than earned this brief respite.
She paused in the parlor to open her stationery box and take out her letter from Alan before going to the dog-run. Even though she had devoured it fifty times at least in the week since it had arrived, it was forever new and reassuring. Hugging it to her bosom, she went out onto the dog-run terrace where a fair wind was blowing, and the air was so much cooler and fresher. She took a seat in her rocker, put up her feet on an embroidered, padded footstool, and began to read it all over again between small sips from a glass of Rhenish.
All over again, she savored his protestations of love, his fear for her and the baby's life, his anguish at being separated so long, and his inability to communicate with her. Once again, Caroline seethed with outrage at the injustice of their mail being cut off, by how base Commodore Garvey could be. She blushed as she read Alan's curses called down on Finney and Garvey, knowing that she had used similar curses directed at him in the bleakest moments of her despair during his hellish silence. Or what she'd called him during her labor, she snickered!
"Two months I fretted," she whispered. "Damn Peyton and Heloise. I know they didn't want me worried, but they could have told me their suspicions… to ease me!"
But, all was right again. Alan still loved her. And, with her harshest memories of pain and fear subsiding, she was once more as much in love with him as the first moment she saw him. And surely he would come back soon. Do something about Finney and Garvey. Hold her again. And there would be no more cause for longing and dread.
The late afternoon heat was ebbing, and a cool wind rushed into the dog-run; Alan's nor'east Trades, which might waft him home at last. She finished her wine, folded up the letter and slipped it onto the table under the wine glass, then put her head back on the small lashed-on pad to take Wyonnie's advice about a nap. She eased the ache of her neck and shoulders with a shrug and a stretch, closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and, with a wistful smile, fell asleep.
She woke in the twilight of another spectacular sundown, rummy with barely eased exhaustion, rocking forward with a start, andlistening close for her baby's waking cry, which was what she thought had stirred her. But it was a carriage.
Bay Street, a narrow sandy track, ran in front of their house, and a second, narrower sand-and-shell lane forked off southeast from the coast road, parallel to the front porch for awhile before winding south along the garden to the great house. A coach had turned in at the gate, and now stood in the lane, half hidden behind the tops of her palmetto hedge. A man was walking towards her through the gate in the "tabby" wall, and up the crushed-shell path to the front porch.
Caroline stood and peered to see who it was. The hat was laced with gold, and for a fleeting moment, she thought it was Alan returned.
"Hello, the house," a voice called. "Anyone to home, be they?"
"Good God!" she whispered in alarm, putting a hand to her mouth.
It was John Finney!
"Ah, there you be, Mistress Lewrie," Finney said, stepping upon the deep front porch and coming to her in the mouth of the dog-run. "A very good evenin' to you, Mistress." He took off his cocked hat, laid it upon his chest, and performed a deep, formal bow, one leg extended.