Laird of Ballanclaire (17 page)

He blinked. The glassy sheen in his eyes didn’t shift.

“I really need you to move. My leg is starting to pain again. I still have to bind it. I canna’ leave until that is done. And I need to cover myself. As do you. Now. You’ve brought trousers?”

Constant slid from him and gathered her discarded clothing in hands that didn’t feel like her own. She tossed him the trousers. They weren’t finished, but she didn’t think her fingers would cooperate enough to hold a needle. He’d just have to do with what he had. She didn’t speak to him. She didn’t look at him.

Constant wiped another of her incessant tears away with the back of her hand and returned to chopping onions. She’d volunteered for the chore with alacrity because it would hide her emotion better than anything else she could’ve done.

When she’d returned to the bedroom she shared with Stream in the predawn, she’d barely been keeping the tears at bay. Stream had taken in Constant’s bedraggled state, her weepy, red-rimmed eyes, and had done nothing more than hold out her arms. Constant hadn’t been able to stop the tears. Now, hours later, she still couldn’t.

“We need those onions for a stew tonight, Constant.”

Mother looked into the darker corner of the kitchen. Constant nodded and kept her face averted.

For a magical span of five days, her entire world had been alight with a sense of joy, anticipation, and excitement, and in the hours before dawn it had ended. Kam had said more after she gave him the trousers. A lot more. He’d said he didn’t want her knowing anything more about him, or where he was going, or how he was planning on getting there. He wasn’t interested in doing anything other than leaving this hellhole as rapidly as possible.

Constant gulped, sniffed, and gulped again. It wasn’t working. Tears obliterated the onion in her left hand and the paring knife in her right. She only wished they were doing the same for her memory.

Shame accounted for some of the salt trails down her cheeks. She realized that much as she lifted her hand and wiped again. She’d acted worse than a brazen hussy, and the continual throbbing of her woman area was the result. It added to her punishment for forcing herself on him. Charity had been right about the humiliation part, too. But nobody had said a thing about the heart-sore, bereft portion of it.

Nobody.

Constant gave up, put her arm up to block her eyes, and sobbed. There wasn’t anyway to stop the moisture, but maybe she could get some of it out of her system before Mother checked on her again.

She’d known Kameron had to leave. She didn’t need him to tell her. She knew they didn’t have a future. She hadn’t needed him to speak of that, either. She didn’t like anything about Britain. She’d spent her entire life hearing about the wickedness over there and how class-conscious and full of snobbery they were. She knew he was going back there and she wasn’t.

She only wished her heart knew it.

“Constant!”

It was Henry. He’d been running. Constant sniffed deeply and wiped away as many tears as she could.

“These are very strong onions,” she commented before turning toward him.

“You must . . . come quickly!” Henry reached for her sleeve. “They’ve got him.”

“Who?”

“They’re hurting him again! You’ve got to come. You’ve got to do something!”

“Who?” Constant dropped the onion into her bushel barrel of them. Her heart already had the answer.

“Kam. Hurry!” He had her hand and was trying to pull her.

“Who is Kam?”

She used as innocent a tone as she could manage. He looked heavenward for an instant before looking back at her. Constant didn’t move.

“The bird-man you had in the stable loft. You know who Kam is! Hurry! They’re going to
kill
him!”

Her eyes flew wide and she stood. “Who is, Henry?”

“Everybody. Please hurry! They’ve got him strung up at Middle Oak. We’re going to be too late!”

“Oh, dear God! Not that!”

Constant didn’t bother saddling Eustace. It would take too long. She put a bridle on him and placed Henry atop the animal. Then she jumped up in front of Henry and kicked the horse’s sides.

Middle Oak was aptly named. It had been used as a landmark for as long as Constant remembered. It was the sturdiest of the three oaks that marked the corner of the Ridgely property. It was also perfect for a hanging tree.

“How do you know all this?” she yelled over her shoulder as the horse settled into his longest lope.

“I watched them. They discovered the loft. They trailed him.”

“You watched?”

“Kam’s my friend.”

“What?” she asked.

“I’ve been helping him. I brought him water and . . . handled his bucket duties. I visited him during the day. He told me not to tell anyone.”

“You kept it secret? Really?”

Constant would never have guessed Henry had it in him.

“He asked me to. He didn’t want you worried. You’re all he talked about. I think he likes you a lot.”

“No, he doesn’t. He couldn’t wait to leave.”

“You’re wrong. He was sad. He sure looked it.”

“When was this?”

“Just before dawn. Look! You see them? They’ve strung him up! Do something, Constant! Now!”

The fear staining Henry’s cry transferred to her and then the horse. She could see the crowd ahead through the leafless limbs. She clucked her tongue, nudged with her knees, and flicked the rein. Eustace responded, taking the final field like he was a yearling rather than an old plow horse.

“Wait!”

Constant reached the edge of the mob and swung down from Eustace even before he halted.

“Stop!”

There were more men than she had suspected and Constant’s nerve would’ve failed her if she hadn’t seen Kameron. He was astride a horse, his hands strapped together on the pommel of his saddle, his neck stretched upward with a noose about it. And he was hurt. Her heart shared every bit of his pain. She’d spent so much time working to heal him, and all of it for nothing. It looked as if they’d taken a strap to every inch of his upper body again, to even worse effect. Thomas Esterbrook was brandishing the two-sided coat again.

The homespun trousers were torn, muddied, and there was a stream of blood dripping from the foot of his injured leg onto the ground. He was conscious, but it wasn’t by choice, she decided. He was probably staying aware in order to keep from hanging himself with any slackening of his posture. And one of his eyes was so swollen he might be in danger of losing it.

“Stop this immediately! Father! Thomas! Daniel Hallowell! Stop!”

“Get back to the house, Constant.”

Her father had a feeble voice when he’d overexerted himself. This was one of those times. Constant turned on him.

“I will not!”

“You dare disobey your own father?” Thomas asked.

“I dare anything to stop a crime from being committed.”

“What crime is it to put a traitor to death?” John Becon asked.

Constant looked at each of them in turn before answering. “And who are we branding a traitor? And why? As we’re still an English colony, and that man is an English soldier, how can he stand accused of such?”

“Leave the politics to the men, Mistress Constant. Friend Esterbrook, take your intended wife to task, since her own father is failing to do it.”

“Lay one hand on me and you’ll regret it, Thomas Esterbrook.” Constant spat it toward him. She was just as surprised as they looked when Thomas took a step back from her.

“Your children have been spared the rod too long, Master Ridgely,” John Becon said in a loud voice.

“Constant—” her father began.

“Cut him down right now and let him go . . . or I’ll bear witness to this. I’ll swear to a constable about all of you. And all of this.”

Nobody answered. Nobody moved. Constant looked up at Kameron. He was focused on something over their heads. He didn’t meet her eye.

“Cut him down. Give the order.”

“You’d take responsibility for such a man. Why?”

“Because no man deserves such treatment without a trial. You know this! You’re a burgess. You uphold that very right.”

“He’s a British spy, Constant!”

Constant spun on Thomas. He looked even smaller than usual. “He still deserves a trial. Everyone does! You know the law. All of you!”

“And I still ask why you’d take responsibility for such a man. You failed to answer. We are still awaiting it.”

John Becon spoke without the slightest hint of emotion in his voice. Everyone listened until he’d finished. He had a position of authority in Boston. The quality and range of his speaking voice were obviously part of the reason.

Constant flushed as she turned to him. “An injured man is being strung up by a mob! Without a trial, with no magistrate, and not one charge leveled against him other than baseless rumor. I’m stopping it because someone has to. You know this. You’re sworn to uphold the law.”

“The man wears a turncoat. He is a turncoat. Wait a minute. This is the same jacket I gave you yestermorn.”

They all watched Thomas flip the coat inside out and back.

Constant gulped. Then she lifted her chin. “What of it?” she asked.

“You gave it back to him? You?”

She didn’t answer. Nobody said anything, and then her father spoke up feebly, with a pleading tone.

“No. Please no. Say it isn’t so, Constant.”

“I don’t know what it is you ask,” Constant lied.

“It was you. You had him in our loft, didn’t you? You fed and nursed and protected him, didn’t you?”

“I—”

“You betrayed your own family?”

“How is helping an English soldier betrayal, Father? We’re still English citizens, are we not?”

There was grumbling, but no one answered her outright. Then John Becon spoke up. “Well, gentlemen! We all heard. By her own mouth, she acknowledged guilt.”

Constant stepped closer to Kameron’s horse and grabbed for the loosely dangling reins. They’d been fashioned of rawhide strips, braided together. She wound them about her fingers, tightening her hand until it felt bloodless. She ignored it. It didn’t matter. As long as she had the reins, the horse wouldn’t bolt. And that’s what mattered. She took a deep breath, stood straighter, and turned to face the mob.

“I haven’t said anything of the sort, and there’s no crime I stand accused of, now is there?”

She directed her query mainly to John Becon. Charity’s husband was a like height. He was twice again as heavy as her, and three times her age. He was still a frightening man. He raised his big, gray eyebrows. Constant swallowed with nervousness.

“You were with a man in a hayloft. Without chaperonage.”

She tossed her head. “What of it?”

“Constant, no,” her father remarked.

“We strung him up not a moment too soon, I would say,” Thomas remarked in a snide tone. “And you can consider our engagement ended, Mistress Ridgely. I don’t offer for, nor will I accept, damaged goods.”

“We’ve heard enough. Haven’t we, friends?”

John Becon used his orator voice. Everyone seemed to stop and listen. The very air seemed to join in the silence.

“This man is not only a traitor and a spy, but he has compromised a good patriot’s daughter. A hanging may be too good for him. We all agreed?”

There was a chorus of yelling. Prudence’s husband reached for the reins she held.

“No!” Constant backed closer to the horse.

“Give me the reins, Constant. Go back to the house.”

“Wait! You don’t understand.”

The horse was shuffling and pawing at the muddy ground near her feet. Constant had to continually step away from its hooves.

“Give me the reins.”

“You’re wrong. All of you! This man is no spy. He never was. He wore the coat to disguise himself, true, but it wasn’t to ferret out any secrets. It was to visit with me at night. You have wronged the man, I tell you.”

“Constant!” Her father’s voice carried every bit of his shock.

“You—you and the turncoat are lovers, then?”

Thomas had an odd look on his face, and was running his eyes all over Constant’s frame. Constant moved farther along the horse’s side and jostled Kam’s leg as she did so.

“Con . . . stant?”

The feeble sound of her name gripped at her heart. She looked up. His swollen eye was bleeding.
Oh, dear God
. Her eyes filled with tears, and she sent them away. Then they filled with nothing but hatred. She turned back to the mob and glared at each one in turn. She’d never felt such hatred. She was vibrating with it. There wasn’t one man there she wouldn’t gladly take her knife to. But that wouldn’t save Kameron. There was only one thing that might. She opened her mouth and said the only thing she could think of to stop them.

“If you hang this man, you are murdering the father of my unborn child. He has done nothing more than that! Nothing!” She was yelling when she finished. It wasn’t necessary. There was complete and absolute silence.

The horse shuffled closer to her.

“Is this true?”

John Becon looked up at Kameron to ask it. Kam spat on the ground, and the spittle contained blood.

“Are . . . you actually asking me . . . something?”

“Have you been intimate with this woman?”

Kam’s good eye regarded her. There wasn’t any expression on his face. Then he looked up again, over all of them. “I never . . . saw this . . . woman afore,” he finally answered.

More crowd noise followed his announcement, and Constant used her weight on the animal’s reins to subdue it. Shock was the emotion stinging her, stealing her breath and her voice, and then it cleared. Kameron had told her he was an expert liar. She should have expected it.

“He lies!” she shouted.

“He lies? But why would he do such a thing? If admitting to fornication with you would save his skin, what sane man would lie? Even an innocent man would admit to it.”

There were murmurs of agreement among them.

Constant swallowed. “Kameron?” She looked up at him. Kam wouldn’t meet her eyes.

“She knows his name!” Thomas was pointing a finger at her as he said it.

Constant looked back at him. With his face twisted in murderous intent, he wasn’t the least bit handsome.

“Of course I know his name. I just told you we were lovers. Why wouldn’t I know it?”