Sea Fire (45 page)

They stood glaring at each other while tension crackled like lightning between them. In her crib, Virginia broke the quivering silence with a whimpering cry.

“Your bastard’s calling you,” Jon snarled, and turning abruptly on his heel stalked from the cabin.

Pure, simple, unadulterated rage was Cathy’s only bedfellow that night. Jon didn’t return to the cabin, and for that she was heartily glad. When she’d said she never wanted to set eyes on him again, she’d meant it. She would never forgive him for his insults, never!

Sometime during the night they docked at London’s harbor. Cathy, up at the crack of dawn with a cranky Virginia, saw the pier from a porthole. Even at such an early hour, the wharf was busy. . . .

She dressed, and gathered up what few possessions she and Virginia had. As soon as possible, they would be going ashore. She would put up at an inn, and send at once for Martha and Cray, and her father. Then she would sort out the tangled mess that was her life. She’d just been sniping at Jon when she’d said
she might stay married to Harold. She still despised him as much as ever. But she certainly was not going back to Woodham with Jon! She would die first, after the unspeakable things he believed of her! What she would do was start an entirely new life; preferably, one that was completely devoid of men!

She was just getting ready to leave the cabin when a knock sounded at the door. Virginia in her arms, Cathy went to answer it. Most likely it was Captain Davis, wanting to know when she would be leaving the ship. Certainly it would not be Jon. Knocking was a piece of good manners he’d never practiced!

When Cathy swung open the door, she stood staring, dumbfounded.

“Good morning, Cathy,” Harold said affably, his pudgy face every bit as unattractive as she’d remembered.

“What are you doing here?” she gasped, making no move to invite him in out of the passage.

“I received a most interesting caller last night—or should I say this morning,” Harold told her with every evidence of enjoyment. “Your pirate, to be precise. At first I was in fear of my life, thinking that his purpose was to make you a widow. But he assured me that that was the furthest thing from his mind!”

“I presume there is a point you’re trying to make?” Cathy grated, when he paused dramatically.

“Is that any way to talk to your long-lost husband?” he reproached, his beady blue eyes snapping maliciously. “Yes, I do have a point: your pirate came to me to make a deal. He said that he would be happy to give me my wife and daughter,” here Harold snickered, shooting a droll look at Virginia, “in return for his son!”

seventeen

B
y the time the tall ship sailed into Charleston’s harbor, Cathy’s rage had cooled and hardened into icy implacability. It was little more than three months since Jon had left her on the
Victoria
, catching the next vessel bound for the States and taking Cray with him. Although she had been in little doubt as to Jon’s destination from the time Harold had smirkingly brought her word of what he had done, Cathy had hired a couple of Bow Street Runners just to make certain, using money drawn from her trust fund with a sense of savage satisfaction. She was no longer Jon’s wife, and she could spend her money as she chose without fear of angering him. And she chose to use it to recover her son! Jon may have thought to neatly spike her guns by absconding with Cray, but he was soon going to learn that he had made a mistake: Cray was her son as well as his, and she would have him back if she had to spend every penny she possessed to do it, by fair means or foul!

The one thought that slightly mitigated Cathy’s fury was that Jon had at least had the decency to take Martha with them. How Jon had managed to persuade the woman to let him take Cray she
couldn’t imagine, but knowing Jon she guessed that he hadn’t bothered with much persuasion. More than likely he had just scooped the boy up under his arm and walked out, leaving Martha to follow or not, as she chose. And of course Martha would never leave Cray. Cathy took what comfort she could from the knowledge that her son was being well cared for, and hoped that he wasn’t missing her too much. Which he probably wasn’t, she acknowledged wryly. She had been away from him for such a long time, especially in the eyes of so little a boy, and Cray had always adored Jon. With Martha to see to his creature comforts, Cray was probably as happy as a clam at low tide. Which should have made Cathy feel better, but, perversely, didn’t.

Harold had been ridiculously easy to deal with. He had come aboard the
Victoria
plainly thinking to bully her into returning with him, as his wife, to the life he had mapped out for them. The steely-eyed, grim-jawed woman who turned on him with such scorn clearly took him aback. Gasping, he had floundered, had even tried to use physical force to put her in what he termed her proper place. Cathy had routed him with fierce enjoyment, refusing to even so much as accompany him to her Aunt Elizabeth’s townhouse to talk things over. When he saw that he had not a hope of persuading her to live with him, Harold had changed his tactics. Whining with frustration, he had told her that she had a duty to support him, as he was, after all, her husband. Cathy had laughed at this. Not for long, she promised him grimly.

Her father, quite recovered and able to walk with the aid of a stick, was a great help to her in the matter of obtaining an annulment. Harold, fueled by malice, had at first refused to give the sworn statement necessary for the granting of such a decree. But the promise of a handsome settlement, if he did as she asked, promptly inspired him to a positive fever of cooperation. After that, it needed only to get the written testimony of certain members of the
Tamarind
’s crew, now safely returned to England. They
swore that, due to Cathy’s constant indisposition from the time she and Harold had boarded the ship, there was no possible way the marriage could have been consummated. Armed with these documents, and greatly assisted by her father’s influence at Court, Cathy encountered little difficulty in obtaining both legal and ecclesiastical annulments of her marriage to Harold.

Sir Thomas had insisted on accompanying her on the voyage to the States. He wanted to be in at the kill, he said grimly. Cathy, mindful of his still precarious health, had done her best to dissuade him, but he would not budge from his stand. Mason had privately whispered in her ear that it would probably do him more harm to be left behind to fret than it would to go, so Cathy at last gave in. Now, standing at his side at the rail as the ship dropped anchor in Charleston’s harbor, Cathy was glad of his presence. He and Mason had been her bulwarks throughout the voyage, cosseting her and doing their utmost to cheer her when she teetered on the verge of giving way to depression. They, along with Alice, the nursemaid she had engaged to care for Virginia, and Martha, and of course the children, would be the nucleus of the household she intended to set up when she had Cray safe and they had returned once again to England.

Cathy was dressed as befitted the weather, which was sunny but crisp, as October usually was in South Carolina. From the tips of her elegantly-heeled little shoes to her dashing feathered bonnet, she looked every inch the great lady, which was just as she had intended. Before she took Cray away, she intended to impress on Jon exactly what he had lost. Not only his son, and daughter, but herself.

Her dress was of peacock blue silk, the bodice shaped close to her slender figure and slightly elongated as was the fashion, the skirt flaring out in an enormous bell from her tiny waist, the sleeves full and caught in at the wrists to fall over her hands in a froth of white lace. More lace cascaded from her throat to
where the silk of the dress formed a deep V between her rounded breasts. Her bonnet was a frivolous and vastly becoming confection of the same shade of blue silk, ruched to frame her small face enchantingly, and set off with an emerald green peacock feather which trembled as it just brushed her cheek. Wide, flat, emerald green ribbons were tied in a saucy bow beneath one shell-like ear. The color of the dress made her eyes glow like twin sapphires set aslant beneath sooty black fringes of lashes; her hair, worn in a soft roll at the back of her head, framed her features like gleaming gold floss. With temper at the thought of seeing Jon again putting a spark in her eyes and flushing her cheeks a becoming shade of rose, she was a vision to bedazzle the most hardened of men. The sailors, busy with chores about the deck, could hardly keep their eyes off her.

It was mid-afternoon before they were at last able to go ashore. On the dock, Cathy hesitated before climbing into the carriage hired to transport them to a hotel.

“I would really prefer to go directly out to Woodham,” she told her father. He looked down at her, the expression in his blue eyes, so like Cathy’s own, grave.

“Don’t you think you should rest first?” he asked mildly. “After all, Hale and the boy aren’t going anywhere. They’ll still be there tomorrow.”

“I know,” Cathy said, “But. . . .”

She couldn’t put into words this sudden compulsion she had to go at once, to see Cray and hold him in her arms, to be enfolded in Martha’s warm embrace—and to tell Jon exactly what a bastard she thought he was before taking his son away! She would even show him the sworn statements attesting to the truth of her relationship with Harold, just to watch his face as he realized what a stubborn, stupid fool he had been. And when she took Cray and left—how she wished she could watch him then! The biggest ambition in her life was to see Jonathan Hale bleed to death right before her eyes. He had taken her love
and trampled it, turning it to an intense, burning hatred in the process. She hoped viciously that it hurt when he discovered his mistake. She hoped he hurt enough to die. . . .

“I would really rather go at once,” she told her father again. “But the rest of you must go on to the inn. I’ll fetch Cray myself, and join you in a few hours.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” her father said crisply, sounding so much like his old self that Cathy started. “If you are determined to go at once, then I will of course accompany you. I wouldn’t dream of letting you face Hale alone. Mason can look after Alice and Virginia.”

“I’m not afraid of Jon, Papa,” Cathy answered, the light of battle gleaming in her eyes. She was already anticipating with savage pleasure the upcoming confrontation with Jon. Her inward vision so engrossed her that she completely failed to notice the interested stares fixed on her and her father, both dressed in the height of London fashion, standing amidst the piles of their obviously expensive luggage while Mason and Alice, holding Virginia, waited patiently nearby.

“Lady Catherine! So good to see you back home again!” The voice belonged to Eunice Struthers, a flighty maiden lady who lived with her widowed sister in the heart of Charleston. The pair of them had been frequent callers at Woodham. “Does Captain Hale know you’re arriving today? He said nothing about it, when I visited your dear little boy. In fact, Captain Hale indicated that you might be away for quite a long while, since your father is so ill. . . .”

Here the woman trailed off, her eyes on Sir Thomas. Clearly she was puzzling over his identity. His dress, bearing, and manner all proclaimed him to be a man of standing.

“Miss Struthers, I’d like to present my father, Sir Thomas Aldley, Earl of Badstoke,” Cathy said, seeing nothing for it but to perform the introduction the woman was obviously expecting. “Papa, this is Miss Eunice Struthers.”

Sir Thomas murmured something
civil, while Cathy added: “As you can see, my father has recovered from his illness. And no, Jon didn’t know we were arriving. I wanted to give him a—surprise.”

Cathy’s slight hesitation before the last word was lost on Miss Struthers. She giggled, a high-pitched, girlish sound that went oddly with her prim dress and manners.

“I’m sure he’ll be delighted,” she gurgled, already backing away in her eagerness to spread the news. “It was such a pleasure meeting you, Sir Thomas, and seeing you again, of course, Lady Catherine. We must have a little supper party soon, to celebrate your return home. . . .”

“Now I have to go to Woodham immediately,” Cathy said wryly, watching her leave. “She’ll have the news of our arrival spread all over town before dark. And if Jon hears that I’ve come before I have Cray safe. . . .”

Sir Thomas nodded grimly. He understood that Jon was unlikely to let Cray go without a fight. They had already decided that the best thing to do was to get Cray away while Jon was in the fields.

Mason and Alice were hustled into the waiting carriage, not without some protest from Mason, who felt he should accompany them. But Sir Thomas told him that he could be most useful by looking after the little girl, and assuring them all of comfortable accommodations. The Charleston Arms was reputed to be the best inn in town, and Mason was to secure rooms for them there.

When the carriage had gone, Sir Thomas set himself to obtaining transportation for himself and Cathy. In a very short period of time he had managed to procure a curricle and driver. Soon they were moving smartly along the cobbled streets through the town, and finally out along the winding road that passed eventually by Woodham.