Dark Prelude (2 page)

Her brows arched. She felt a rise of unease.
“Sir, you speak of dealings that are unknown to me. I merely
stopped to take shelter from the cold. The notice aroused my
curiosity, nothing more. I believed you had taken pity on my plight
and invited me in to warm myself.”

He stirred a gnarled hand on the desk top,
pulled out a sheet of paper and removed the cap from an inkwell.
With a shaky hand he dipped in a pen and wrote a few lines.

Looking up he said in a low voice, “Again I
am mistaken and I beg your indulgence. My name is Weber.” His hands
wove together momentarily as if he needed to control them. “I am in
the employ of Wilhelm Schlange, owner of this shipping
company.”

He paused and stared at Miss Bradstreet. If
his instinct for judging people did not fail him, this young woman
told him a little less than the truth. She had been interested in
the notice, anxious for a chance to run away from someone or
something. The look had been there in her face. He could not have
been wrong. She was hesitant, unsure, but not lost to him yet.
There was something she wanted to get away from, or someone. He
knew most of those who entered willingly into bond service were not
so much seeking a new life as fleeing the old one.

“I thought you sought passage to the
colonies.” He continued. “A Schlange ship, the
Eastwind
,
sails in two weeks and the position is one of importance on Mr.
Schlange’s estate. And a fairer agreement than most. If you should
change your mind, you can notify my man Wickes here to make the
arrangements.” He paused and Silvia thought how penetrating and
unusual his eyes were as they searched her face. “There is good
opportunity in the colonies for a young, healthy woman. And when
your time of service ends, you would have a share of property with
what wages you earn.”

“Sir, I thank you but I have no wish to
leave England.”

He seemed not to hear as he opened an
embossed leather box on his desk. From within he lifted a block of
black sealing wax and a gold signet. His feeble hands scrawled a
few words with pen and ink then folded the paper. With more
sureness he struck a flame to life and dropped a glossy spot of wax
on the fold of the paper. The heavy scent of the melted wax reached
her nostrils as he pressed the seal into it.

“Take this.” He stood and handed her the
letter. “It bears the Schlange seal. If you change your mind, give
it to Wickes here.” He indicated a man in a distant shadowed corner
whose back was to the two of them. “I bid you a good evening, Miss
Bradstreet.”

She took the paper and tucked it into her
pocket thinking it might be best to humor the old man. “Good
evening, Mr. Weber. I thank you for your kindness.”

Her first intake of breath outside came in a
rush that filled her 1ungs with such freezing air it yanked her
back to reality. For that very few moments in the warm shipping
office she had glimpsed a chance to be someone else, to start a new
life. But now on the familiar dismal street she remembered the task
before her.

Lifting her skirt to avoid the muddy slush,
she ran as best she could in the wet snow and reached the row of
plain, dark houses where she had resided since the age of fourteen.
Inside, all was quiet. She went straight to the kitchen, thankful
Uncle Hollister was not home. A disquieting excitement lodged in
the back of her mind as she thought of the strange events and her
conversation with Mr. Weber. But then she shook off the thought. It
was out of the question. Uncle Hollister would never consent.

Tension tightened her shoulders as she went
about her work. Apprehension swept through her head with a
depressing thought. He would arrive half drunk at the dinner hour,
for he never missed it. Food and drink were the only events for
which Uncle Hollister observed punctuality.

At seven the chops were roasted and the
vegetables boiled. Silvia set the table with two pottery plates as
she heard a rattling at the door and the thump of a cane in the
hall. Fear and anger knotted inside her as she quickly stoked the
fire in a blackened grate and set the kettle on. Two rough wooden
chairs at a table covered by a muslin cloth filled the dim kitchen.
Uncle Hollister had sold what good furniture they had until the
house was barely furnished and the only decent pieces remaining
were the small cherry dresser and wash stand in her bedroom.

She flinched but forced a smile as he burst
into the kitchen like a burly hound eager for his supper. The red
veins in his face prominently lined a bulbous nose and flabby
cheeks. As he loosened a waistcoat splattered with ale, he grunted
a greeting. She detected the aroma of his breath, rancid with the
foul staleness of drink. Silvia shivered in spite of herself as she
watched in disgust while he settled his heavy frame in the kitchen
chair. A pity. Since Aunt Agatha died, he had sunk deeper and
deeper toward the gutter until his business was ruined and what
little money he made, he lost in gambling.

The meal passed with not a word uttered
until he had finished the chops. “That’s a good girl, Missy.” He
wiped his greasy mouth on a sleeve and leaned back in the chair.
“Now you mark it down to consult me before you set dinner on the
table. Never could abide a stew, more broth than anything else. A
man needs meat and that’s a matter you should take note of if you
want to catch a husband.” He paused a moment to light his pipe and
puff until the acrid smoke filled the kitchen. “Past time you found
a man, Missy. Too choosy I say. There’s room in the house and a
pretty girl’ll have no trouble gettin’ a young gent to say the
words.”

Silvia’s cheeks reddened a little and her
eyes flashed with anger. He rankled her with his talk of husbands.
She suspected his interest in her state of matrimony was solely
aimed at finding a new provider for the household. They had come to
harsh words many an evening after he had brought home one swain
after another for her consideration. Finally she had stamped her
foot and refused to come down from her room if he paraded another
“gent” through the house.

“I dare say I don’t want to catch one. The
last thing I want is another man to be cooking and cleaning for.
I’ll marry when I find a man who will give me love and a good life.
Be assured he will not be one of your unsavory blokes who waste his
wages and his wit in a tavern,” she retorted hotly, holding the
edge of the table with fair, slender hands. “And as for your fine
appetite, I know we haven’t a shilling to pay the butcher. Perhaps
you should look for meat in your tankard.”

Uncle Hollister’s face reddened and his
black eyes, like stones, lost any trace of warmness. “You forget I
took you in when you had nowhere else to go.”

“I know who took me in and who spent the
little inheritance Mama and Papa left. And who sold all of Aunt
Agatha’s things after she died.” She lifted her chin proudly and
her nostrils flared angrily. “Until we are reduced to living in
squalor and shrinking from the door lest the knock be from a
creditor or another of your gambling gentlemen here to
threaten.”

His bushy brows twitched angrily and then he
dropped his head and covered his face with fleshy hands. “You do me
ill, Missy, to remind me of Aggie and the sorry state I’ve made of
things.” Tears welled in his reddened eyes and he drew a soiled
handkerchief from a coat pocket and snorted into it. “She managed
it all and when she was gone the life was gone from me.”

He snorted again and Silvia gave up the
cause. Every attempt to jolt some sense into Uncle Hollister ended
with him in a breakdown of self pity. She would have to take in
more sewing. Her skill with the needle was gaining her a fine
reputation as a dressmaker and she hoped someday to be able to open
a shop. But if Uncle Hollister did not end his gambling, she would
never be able to save the money.

He broke into a fit of coughing and wheezing
and roughly shoved his chair back as he rose. Without another word
he put on his topcoat and hat and left the house. Silvia had no
doubt his destination was the Hare and Hound and it would be far
into the night before he returned. With a heavy heart, she cleared
the table, covered a loaf of bread with a napkin and stored it in a
cupboard. Tomorrow morning it would be as if the quarrel had never
occurred, and in a few days the same one would erupt again.

Lighting the stub of a candle, she started
up the gloomy, creaking stairwell that led to her room. Such a
shame. Uncle Hollister had been a fine enough man while Aunt Aggie
lived, but he had gone completely soft in the head the four years
since he lost her. Perhaps she had been wrong to stay, but he had
been a pathetic case at the funeral and had begged her not to leave
him alone. Silvia shut her eyes tightly just a moment to rid
herself of the thought. No use thinking about it anymore
tonight.

She closed the door behind her. The candle
on her dresser gave a soft glow of prettiness to her small room as
she slipped into her warm flannel gown. At night she could not see
the faded, peeling wallpaper nor the cracks in the neglected floor.
Sitting at her dresser she could dream of being in a fine house as
she brushed her long sable hair. She could look at the tiny
portrait of Mama and Papa and remember the happy evenings of
childhood when Papa would read fairy tales and Mama would tuck her
in with a kiss.

Her face paled. It was gone! Frantically she
opened the dresser drawer, praying her fears would not be realized.
Her heart seemed to sink a little in her chest. The remains of the
miniature portrait of her parents lay beneath a pair of stockings,
ripped asunder when it had been roughly removed from the small
silver frame.

Frantically, she searched the drawer. The
frame was not to be found. With a sob and trembling fingers, she
took the shreds of canvas, torn so that the precious faces were
visible no more, and gently touched each piece. He knew how much
the portrait meant to her but it had not stopped him. She glanced
at her trembling fingers. She still had her mother’s wedding ring
and wore it proudly on her right hand. But the portrait had been
her greatest comfort and now it was destroyed.

There was only silence in the house and in
the void Silvia could hear the thunder of her heart. Oh, Uncle
Hollister! How cruel! He had pawned the frame. He must have. And he
had destroyed her most precious possession.

Aching as if part of her heart had been
plucked out, Silvia climbed in bed. Fitfully, she turned and
twisted and cried until a troubled weariness overcame her and she
slept.

But at some point in the night she awoke,
terrified. Her eyes opened but she dared not move. Blackness
shrouded a hulking figure, yet she could feel the threatening
presence, hear the guarded breathing. Her muscles quaked with fear
as the ominous sound of padded footsteps, ever nearer, sliced into
the silence like a knife blade in soft flesh. Someone crept
stealthily across the floor. Inside her fear she knew it, saw the
black shape of him coming closer. Yet she could not flee. Her arms
weighed heavily against her sides like wooden limbs she could not
move.

The seconds were leaden, time hanging frozen
with terror until she felt a horrifying grasp draw her arm from
beneath the covers. For a moment longer her lungs were paralyzed
and she thought her heart would burst with fear. Then a sudden pain
as if her finger was being wrung off spurred her to life and she
screamed.

The black shape stumbled back, tottering to
stay upright. “Hush, Missy. It’s me. It’s your uncle.” His voice
was thick and the stench of his sour breath sickening.

She felt suffocated by his nearness, her
breath a ragged catch in her throat as she massaged her sore hand.
“What do you want, Uncle Hollister? Why are you waking me at this
hour?” Her voice trembled with fright and anger. Presenting a
boldness she did not feel, she flung the covers aside and hurried
to the dresser to light a candle. “What is it?”

He put a hand to his brow, shielding his
eyes from the sudden brightness. “Be calm, Missy. I only came to
see if you were sleeping soundly. Just looking in on my little
girl.” She turned to see him in the light. Above his round face his
hair was disheveled and his eyes puffy with drunkenness.

“No you weren’t. You were taking my ring.
Taking it off my hand while I slept.” She tucked her arms behind
her and backed away from him, repulsed and feeling as if her last
link with humanity had been stripped away. “You took the frame and
you destroyed the portrait. The last thing I had from Mama and
Papa. You took it to feed your drunkenness.” Her reproachful gaze
turned full upon him and she sobbed. “You have no heart left, Uncle
Hollister. In another month you’ll be wandering the streets not
remembering where your own house is.”

“Hush girl!” His black stare came from a
livid face Silvia had never seen. And then he lifted a stocky arm
and swung at her. His blow missed, thanks to the work of the ale.
But she fell against the dresser dodging him, knocking the candle
to the floor and shutting out the light.

In the darkness Uncle Hollister staggered
out.

Momentarily, she heard the vicious slam of
his door. Her cheeks burned with fright and a bruise throbbed on
her thigh where the sharp edge of the dresser had struck. A gasp of
breath came out in a panicky rush and her muscles tightened in
outrage. Hurriedly, she propped a chair beneath the doorknob. A
brief flash of anger gave way to a calm resolve. Tomorrow she would
visit Wickes.

Her eyes did not close all night. At the
light of daybreak she arose but stayed in her room until midmorning
when she heard her uncle go out.

In her pocket she found the paper Mr. Weber
had given her. Turning it carefully in her hands, she examined the
seal. Odd she had not noticed yesterday how unusual the design was.
She touched a finger to the dark wax imprint of a serpent, an evil
looking creature, forked tongue flashing from an open mouth, its
body entwined ominously about the trunk of a sapling. A shiver of
revulsion pulled her fingers away and she dropped the letter to her
purse. She could only hope Mr. Weber would be true to his word.