Leslie LaFoy (45 page)

“Devon, no,” she said softly from beside him as she slipped her hand around his. “You can't. He's your brother. Let others do what has to be done now.”

No, justice was his responsibility and his alone. But he didn't have the strength to explain it to her. Not now. If he paused for so much as a single second, he'd never move again. “Stay with Mother,” he said tersely, drawing his hand from her grasp and stepping past her.

Claire turned to go after him, watching him bleed and knowing that he wasn't strong enough to deal with Wyndom's madness. And then Edmund suddenly filled the doorway.

“Oh, Jesus,” the lawyer whispered, his eyes widening
as he took in Devon's bloody shirt. His gaze swept on, touching Claire briefly, his relief at seeing her whole and sound existing only until he saw the still, silent body of Mother Rivard on the bedroom floor. His knees buckled. “Sweet Almighty Jesus.”

“Sir! No! Don't!”

A stranger's voice, startled and fearful. She and Edmund turned at once in the direction from which it had come, but it was Devon who took the first steps toward the window that overlooked the front drive, Devon who reached the window first.

And it was Devon who bellowed in warning as Wyndom stood in the carriage box and viciously slapped a set of reins against the horses' backs, Devon who fumbled to raise the window as the horses bolted from their unfastened traces.

The horror unfolded with a slowness that pressed each detail forever into Claire's memory. The lead reins being pulled from Wyndom's hands, his moment of relief. Another set of reins popping tight, the terror on his face as he pitched backward and his feet were yanked from under him. The stiffness of his body as he was jerked out and down from the box, the hard snap of his neck against the edge. Darice's and Elsbeth's piercing screams. The horses running furiously on, terrified of the broken, lifeless burden they dragged in their wake, heedless of her ragged pleas for them to stop.

Devon gingerly laid the pistol down on the tray, his heart aching and heavy, his body and mind past exhaustion, past endurance. “Edmund,” he said softly.

“I'll see to it,” his friend answered, gently squeezing his good shoulder before slipping out of the room.

He turned to Claire and saw the unspoken words shimmering in her eyes. “It's not your fault, sweetheart,” he said, feeling his strength ebbing away, his knees weakening. “Don't blame yourself for any of this.”

“But—”

“Hold me, Claire,” he begged, reaching for her. “Please.”

Her arms came around him, and knowing he was safe in her care, he let the darkness steal over him and take away his pain.

F
ROM THEIR VANTAGE POINT
on the rise, the breadth of the devastation was easy to see. Devon glanced to his left, first at Edmund and then past him to Ephram, noting that both were scowling as they surveyed the labyrinth of small streams cutting deep courses across the newly planted fields.

A man couldn't ask for better friends, he thought, shifting his attention back to the wreckage of his hopes. Rain pouring down, their horses mired in mud up to their hocks, and not a word of complaint out of either one of them. Just stoic silence. The third day of stoic silence, in fact. And constant, hovering companionship. The kindness, concern, and unspoken fears were beginning to wear on him.

“Amazing what damage four straight days of rain can do, isn't it?” he ventured.

Ephram grimaced, but Edmund found the wherewithal to quietly ask, “Can you replant?”

“Some of it,” Devon answered, relieved to be talking about something other than death and funerals. “I've got a few sacks of seed left. The problem isn't so much seed as it is timing, though. God only knows when it'll stop raining. Then the ground has to dry enough so that we can get back in there and work it without sinking up to our knees. And reseeding so late in the growing season will put me more at the mercy of the weather than usual. Replanting will be a complete waste of effort if the summer's dry or winter comes early.”

“At least you're not growing tobacco,” Edmund offered
with a sigh and a shake of his head. “Think of how much those poor bastards have lost the last few days and how long it'll take them to recoup. Years.”

Devon nodded slowly, his mind tracking along the course of consequence. “Rosewind won't be the only estate facing bankruptcy. And if there's anything positive in that reality, it's that she'll be one of the last carcasses the creditors come to pick. I've got more time to find a solution than others do.”

“Have any ideas as to what you're going to do?” Edmund asked.

With a rueful smile, Devon admitted, “Not a one that doesn't involve spending money I don't have.”

“I have a bit of savings set aside,” his friend offered. “It's certainly not much, but if you need it, it's yours.”

He'd expected the offer to come, and readily replied, “Thank you. But if Rosewind can't stand on her own, then she deserves to fall. I'll figure something out. I always have.”

But he'd never been this deep in the hole. In the past, he'd counted on his fellow Virginians to have the money necessary to buy the things he was forced to sell in order to pay his bills. And they had. They'd bought his slaves, his tobacco production equipment, and some long-stored household goods he'd had discreetly auctioned to pay the taxes. But with their own fields awash and their own pockets cleaned out, he couldn't count on them to bail him out this time. He was on his own and the odds of success weren't good. The only thing to be done was to salvage what he could and whom he could.

“Ephram?”

“Yes?”

“Claire sails for Boston next week,” he said, his gaze fixed on the ruined fields below. “I want you and your mother to go with her.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“I'll admit to not following that one, either,”
Edmund chimed in. “I know you can't go, since the House of Burgesses will be in session and you're required to be there. And I can see why you'd want someone to go with her. A woman shouldn't travel alone. But why Ephram and Hannah? Why not me?”

“Because you're not a slave.”

“And what difference does that make?”

“None in Boston. But all the world in London.” He leaned forward to look around Edmund and meet his half brother's gaze. “Ephram, if I can't make a miracle for Rosewind, she goes on the auction block for debts and taxes. You know that just as well as I do. And you also know that you're listed on the asset ledger. Would you rather be sold off on the block or live as a free man in England?”

“I'd rather stay and count on you to gain passage of your manumission law.”

“Not a wise gamble, Ephram,” he answered, looking away. “Time and circumstances are against it. The House agenda is going to be filled with matters relating to the support of Boston and the preservation of our liberties. A manumission bill isn't likely to be considered this session. And, barring a divine intervention of Red Sea proportions, Rosewind will be on the block before the next one. I appreciate your confidence in me, but it's groundless. You and Hannah need to go to England.”

“Might I point out that you don't own my mother anymore?” Ephram asked quietly. “That she's not yours to send anywhere for any reason.”

Devon smiled. “Slaves run away all the time.”

Edmund cleared his throat. “And it's a crime to aid and abet them in doing so.”

Sliding a glance over at his friend, Devon grinned. “Are you planning to testify against me?”

“God, Devon.”

“I'm a desperate man,” he quipped. “We're known to take desperate actions.”

The wariness that had clouded their gazes for the last three days was instantly back. Weary of the fear that had hung silently between them, he forced himself to laugh and chide, “There's no need for the two of you to look so damn grim. I'm not about to put a pistol to my head just yet. I have a few things left to do.” He cocked a brow and more somberly added, “One of which is to bury Mother and Wyndom. We should probably be heading back to the house.”

He wheeled his horse and set off down the trail through the woods, hearing the others fall in behind him, not having to see their faces to know the expressions they wore. That was the worst of it—people trying so hard to mourn as they thought he was mourning. Everyone except Claire. She didn't hover over him like the others did, didn't creep around the house as though she was afraid to remind him that others went on with living. Life had taught her about death and how to move on, how to get through the dark days. She attended to the somber tasks she needed to and then looked past them to deliberately see the simple joys of today, the promise of better tomorrows.

“I haven't asked you today, Dev… How's the shoulder feeling?”

“Better than yesterday,” Devon answered truthfully.

“The rain's not bothering it?”

“No. But I'm sure the weather's a concern for other people. Any bets on whether Reverend McDowell makes it out for the service?”

“The creeks are running high and fast,” Ephram pointed out. “They'll be almost impossible to cross.”

“Hell,” Edmund groused, “the land's running high and fast. It's just going to be us at the service. Us, a hundred pairs of funeral gloves, and a mountain of food.”

And no river of tears, Devon silently added. No one would cry for the two lives ended. Elsbeth hadn't shed a single tear. Neither had Darice. Both had looked past
Wyndom's broken body and ordered the horses put back in the traces. The death of family hadn't mattered to them at all.

That was the sadness that haunted him: knowing that his mother and brother had lived their years without truly touching the lives of others, that their passing created no holes in the world of those left behind. Even if the sun had been shining, a hundred pairs of funeral gloves would have been at least ninety pairs too many.

HE SUN WAS ACTUALLY SHINING
. For the second straight day. Not that it made any difference to how she felt. Devon had made arrangements for her to sail out in three days. And she didn't want to go. Something deep inside her said that leaving was dangerous, that if she turned her back and walked away, she'd never see Devon again. It was a fear she carried alone, not wanting to add her fears to the burdens Devon already bore. His grief and regrets ran deep and silent, hidden beneath his more open concerns for his fields and Rosewind's future.

Claire looked around the second-story meeting room at the Raleigh Tavern, resenting that she was ensconced among the dozen or so well-dressed women with handiwork projects. She'd been formally introduced to everyone, but her thinking had already been scrambled by that point and none of the names she remembered went with the faces. Each was the wife of a
burgess, but which wife went with which burgess was well beyond her.

“Well,” Gray Mitten Knitter was saying, “a day of fasting and prayer seems like such a small thing to do for those poor people. Surely we Virginians can do more than that. Our going hungry doesn't feed the children of Boston.”

“And the only prayer I seem to be able to muster,” said Coat-of-Arms Needlepoint, “is that of asking God to please smite the King and his advisors with the jawbone of an ass.”