Souls Dryft Read online

  "Not now, Mary," I muttered. "Have a thought for your father’s peace."

  "Why should I? He never had a thought for mine." She turned back to Will. "Where is my sister?"

  He looked at her blankly.

  "We missed her at supper, and my father was on his way to find you." Mary showed him the letters, and I waited, cringing. After a moment’s perusal, he assured her they were not his.

  "You deny it? How ungentlemanly of you, but how like a Carver."

  "Madam," he said, firmly, "this is my brother’s hand, not mine."

  As he spoke, the great door creaked open and in sauntered Millicent Bagobones, tossing back her hood, her long, red hair spilling over the shoulders of her damp cloak. When her eyes alighted on the Captain, she let out a mewl of surprise. "What is he doing here?"

  "Scrapper fetched him," Mary said, as if I was a dog and he a filthy bone I’d dug up and brought into the house.

  Bagobones saw the letters in the Captain’s hand, and all color leaked from her face — even her lips paled.

  "Captain Carver insists these letters are not from him," Mary said, "but from his brother. Is this the truth? Speak now, sister. You may as well confess."

  Bagobones struggled, gilt lashes flickering. Abruptly she pushed by her sister and snatched the letters out of his hand; then she squealed at me, "I suppose you thought all this very amusing." This evening she was giddily emboldened, like a workhorse let out into the paddock. "I should never have trusted you in the first place, evil, wicked whore!"

  Mary demanded, "What part have you played in this contrivance, Scrapper?"

  Before I could speak, Bagobones replied; her words were barely contained sobs, too angry to let tears flow. "She told me the letters were from him." She thrust her finger at Will. "But now I know the truth. They were from Hugh. He trusted you to bring his letters to me and knew nothing of how you schemed against us!"

  "I schemed?"

  "I suppose you wanted him for yourself, so you lied about the letters and said they were from his brother."

  Tearing one of them out of her hand, I pointed to the initial at the bottom of the page. "How did Hugh explain this?"

  "You turned the ‘H’ into an ‘A’, of course, by joining the two stalks of the letter together. Hugh showed me. If you look closely, it is plain to see the alteration."

  I assured her that he lied, but she would never believe me, because what he told her was much more pleasing to her vanity. When she raised her claws to me, Will stepped between us and, at this point, Mary remembered family pride.

  "Captain Carver, you have stayed long enough," she interrupted, not wanting him to know all our business. "You served your purpose."

  Millicent added viciously, "Indeed, if we have need again for a dumb beast with brute strength, we know where to find it." Her cruel green eyes swung to me. "And who to send for it. Apparently Hugh was right; you are bewitched, if you come running the moment that whore-spawn beckons."

  I hissed at her to be silent, so then she exclaimed that I may as well go with him. "You’re just another of our father’s strays and there will be nothing for you here, when he is dead."

  Abruptly her father roared from the settle, "When I am dead, as you seem so anxious that I should be, then you may speak till someone rips your ruddy tongue out, but for now, you’ll shut your mouth, ingrate."

  She turned scarlet, gritted her teeth and ran out of the hall.

  My uncle’s voice was faint, his eyes still closed, those grey-peppered curls slowly drying across his furrowed brow. "Carver?" he croaked. "It is good o’ you to come. We shall not forget this kindness."

  Will bowed over my uncle’s hand and took his leave. I followed him to the door, not wanting Mary’s sour face, or Millicent’s spiteful outpourings, to be the last thing he remembered of us that night, but as we passed together through the great door, he stepped down from the shelter of the stone arch, bearing the tiresome drizzle rather than stand with me. His face was stern, his eyes distant. I felt fortunate, by then, to still have both my ears intact, not to mention my head.

  "Come under the arch," I urged, but he looked away, rainwater dripping from his big nose. I shook my head at his stubborn, foolhardy ways. "Will Carver, I came out here to bury the hatchet."

  "In my neck this time perhaps?"

  I glanced over my shoulder to be sure the door was closed. "I suppose you too believe Hugh over me?"

  "No," he admitted begrudgingly. "I daresay you were in it together, thick as thieves from the first day." He folded his arms, shoulders flexing under his wet shirt. When I needed his help that night, he had not even gone back for a coat.

  "Do you want my apology, or not, Will Carver?"

  After another hesitation, during which he no doubt recalled the sting of his mother’s slap, he finally stepped up under the arch. "Very well," he snapped, sullen and moody, "and make it a damned good one."

  "For Pity’s Sake, bend down then!"

  His hands pressing on the stone pillars, he leaned over me, waiting.

  "Further!" I exclaimed.

  "Can you not meet me half way?"

  I decided to take pity on him this once. It was necessary to reach my hands around his neck for a little boost and his lips were damp with rain, making them slippery, but I did my best and all signs suggested he found it satisfactory. I was breathless by the time he was done taking that apology.

  Chapter Forty-Two

  The residents of Souls Dryft thought they were safe, since I no longer paid daily visits. Little did they know. I wrought my mischief in other ways.

  Now, when I wanted to know what was happening within the walls of their house, I simply summoned my mother and saw it all through her eyes. Somehow I had freed her to wreak havoc there. It was as if by letting me into the house, Will Carver had also let the ghost of my mother inside. No longer was she forced to write her messages in the grime of those windows, for nothing kept her out in the yard.

  When I got out my pen and paper, I let my mother show me where she went and what she did there. And she was an eager guide.

  I closed my eyes and saw Hugh, alone in the house, dozing in his chair, soothed by the sweet smell of apples baking. His mother had left him with instructions not to let them burn, but as usual, he was careless. When I put my quill to the paper, he woke with a suddenness that was no natural end to his dream.

  Because someone was banging about above stairs.

  He did not immediately get up to investigate; instead his fingertips sought out the dimples worn in the arms of the chair. Whoever it was, they were determined to get his attention. Eventually, he went to the foot of the staircase, squinting up into the dusty shadows. The noise stopped abruptly. Fists clenched, Hugh went up to the second floor of the house.

  He heard the humming, and I knew he would immediately recognize the tune, for it was the same one I always sang. Through the half open door of his mother’s room he saw the bed, all the blankets ripped from it; her chair was overturned, the damask cushion torn open, horsehair stuffing scattered across the floor. Her coffer was likewise ransacked; shifts, gowns, headdresses, left in piles around it.

  Staring in shock at the destruction, he shouted, "Have you gone mad? "

  The rooms at the back of the house faced south-west, collecting the most sun in the afternoons, so by midday I knew Suzannah’s chamber was still cool, the light transitioning. Lavender, sage and rosemary spiraled up from the herb garden, filling the chamber with sweet, heady fragrance.

  And Hugh would see a girl beside the open window, the soft light dappled across the sleeve of her scarlet gown where she leaned her arm upon the ledge. She breathed heavily, which he would think of as no surprise considering the wreckage scattered about the room. She looked like me, of course, and so he thought I was to blame.

  "If you wanted to meet, you could have left our usual sign on the oak. All this," he swept his arm out over the upturned room, "is so childish. I thought we were beyond this."


  "Beyond this?"

  "Is this about your cousin? She met me in the lane and demanded to know whether I had anything to do with those letters. What was I to say? I had to save myself, did I not? You know she is naught to me," he murmured, searching for excuses. "I think only of …London… when you and I can be together."

  Trailing her fingertips along the window, she sighed, "Just like Rufus."

  "What?" he demanded, never liking comparisons to his father.

  "Where is the ring? Do you know?"

  "What ring?"

  "Naughty Suzy took it," she whispered. "You ask her." Then she resumed her humming, punctuated with bursts of husky laughter.

  "Are you ill?" he demanded. "Or just mad? If my mother finds you here again—"

  "Close your eyes then, feller, and count to ten." My mother brushed her fingers across his lips and, perhaps thinking she meant to kiss him, he closed his eyes. He and I both heard her struggling for breath, wheezing and creaking, just like the house itself, but there was no kiss. Impatient, he opened his eyes and found that she was gone.

  "I’m too old for these games," he called out angrily. There was no reply, just the twitter of birds at the window.

  Stepping out into the hall, he encountered his mother, who had just come up to investigate. "What are you doing, Hugh? Who runs about up here?"

  Hugh replied that he did not know and had come up himself to find out. His mother’s color was high, her breathing unsteady. As they stood in the narrow hallway, a cool wind blew by – not a draft this time, but a wind – and with it laughter. Footsteps tapped along the wooden boards.

  Suzannah looked at the wildly rocking door latches and said wearily, "Now you’ve let the apples burn, too busy playing with her, chasing her up and down this hall. Just like Rufus." She walked into her chamber and shut the door, bolting it and....

  I paused to dip my quill in the inkpot.

  A smug blackbird landed on my windowsill with a fat worm in its beak.

  It had come to show off for me, it seemed. Just like my mother, I realized. She did love to show me these scenes through her eyes, so I could write them down with my quill.

  And what of my pirate?

  I tapped the quill on the side of the pot and wrote on as Grace whispered in my ear.

  My pirate, meanwhile, had been on his best behavior, as he promised his mother. No scowls, no cracking his knuckles and no…something else; he could not remember, and my mother, nor I, would not help him, so he stuck to the first two items, concentrating hard. He wore a new shirt, was clean-shaven and his boots were brushed. He was even persuaded to use a kerchief instead of his sleeve.

  He walked in the orchard with his "intended", having been urged by his father to speak to the girl and entertain her.

  "Your future rests between the dainty thighs of that little mare," Rufus had exclaimed only that morning.

  "Thank you, father, for pointing it out to me so directly."

  "I thought you might not be able to find your way to it."

  But then, before he left his son alone, Rufus had added, "The Sydney girl plans to leave with Hugh." He'd let it rush out of his mouth as if he feared he might be stopped.

  "What?"

  "She gave him jewelry to sell for her. Where do you think he got that coin with which he’s been so flush of late? With that money they plan to return to London together."

  "How do you know this?"

  Rufus gave a wry grin. "I may not be much of a father, but I see through my sons. You’re both more like me than you care to admit." With that he left Will alone to make of that information whatever he wished.

  Once, long ago, Will had scribbled a list of all his requirements for a wife, but lately that list became obsolete. Now he wanted a woman whose company he valued because it was hard won, a woman he looked forward to holding, one who amused, intrigued and challenged him, whose merest touch soothed his skin. All this change occurred over the summer and he was only just beginning to explore it, let alone understand the cause.

  That afternoon, walking in the orchard, he considered Frances Percy. According to his mother, she was a purported beauty, but Will had no idea who decided such matters; no one ever asked his opinion. Every square inch of her was embellished with jewelry, diverting the eye away from her tiny pouting mouth and the shrill giggles that came out of it. He remembered being teased for not knowing the color of her eyes, so he now took the opportunity to look. They were cold, almost lifeless and certainly devoid of warmth, or wit. They rather reminded him of a shark’s eyes, but, this being an ungentlemanly observation, he decided he’d best keep it to himself.

  The next morning he rose early, while the house was quiet, watchful, waiting to be touched. The chair by the hearth, anticipating that he would knock it with his hand as he passed, tilted already in giddy preparation for that first, dutiful rocking motion. The wild, plum-red roses in a jug upon the table unfurled their petals, eager for his sniff, while the cushion on the window seat dimpled, even before he rested his knuckles there to look through the window.

  As gentle dawn crawled like a babe across the flagstones, he relished the peace. There was unhurried warmth in the day’s infancy, a ready fondness, a sweet innocence that daubed sunlight clumsily across the uneven floor and the leaning walls, forgiving faults and mistakes.

  Over at the hearth, the big, iron cooking pot waited on its hook. How many times, as a young boy, had he burnt his fingers on it? His mother used to say he never learned his lesson, but continued to reach for what was in it. Even when he knew his fingers would get burnt, he would not allow the heat to get the better of him.

  The beams creaked overhead, and he made the hasty decision to escape, before anyone came down. His mother’s mood lately overflowed with false merriment, perhaps to compensate for slapping his face in a show of viciousness he never before saw from her. Still rattled by the event, he did not know what to make of it. Now she talked constantly of Lady Frances and the forthcoming marriage, his silence apparently unheeded. As for Rufus, he was strangely quiet on the matter and only spoke of it when prodded by Suzannah; even then he muttered his advice like a boy reciting catechism. Will, himself no stranger to schoolroom punishments, recognized a like sufferer.

  On that morning he could not face any of them. It was beautiful weather, he thought; a perfect day for a stroll. Certain he had no destination in mind, he chose to let his feet wander wherever the mood betook them.

  The mood betook them out of the gates and up the lane to my fortress.

  He was at the gatehouse before his courage almost petered out, but then he saw me, riding the hunter that threw my uncle only a few nights previously. On impulse, he hid, peering around the gatehouse like a spy.

  He envied the beast between my thighs. I felt the heat of his thoughts.

  There I decided I had better leave him again, for his thoughts were of the private kind not fit for innocent eyes to read.

  I set my quill aside and blotted the page.

  The blackbird fluttered its feathers and eyed me steadily.

  "Shoo," I whispered. "I am done with his story for now."

  Truth was I did not want to know any more of what went on in the Captain's head. My mother was being far too mischievous by showing me such as that, and taking great enjoyment in my discomfort.

  Why was she so intent on bringing us together? Perhaps she simply wanted me to know the mischief she could bring.

  Chapter Forty-Three

  The anxious heat of summer slipped into a muted, unhurried, bronze warmth, filling the days like malmsey over-brimming. At night now, my cousins and I lay in the bed we shared, listening to bats scratch at the shutters, while we silently made our own plans for the future. Millicent Bagobones speedily switched her affections from one Carver to the next, in love at her own demand, acting the part, until she made herself believe it. I tried to tell her the truth about those letters, but she would not listen. As for Mary Sourpout, she lost interest in her sister’s affairs a
nd mine, now there were other enemies at the gate, namely her father’s mistress —Beth Downing—and a boy named Nathaniel.

  Being the eldest, Mary had assumed the role of chatelaine and mistress of that house, but, when Beth Downing arrived from Caister, summoned by my uncle, all that changed. It was now Beth who relayed the Baron’s wishes to the servants, not Mary. Anything else that happened was at the wish and command of her son, Nathaniel, who was neither constant in his likes and dislikes, nor thankful when reminded of them.

  We assumed, in the beginning, that Nathaniel Downing was our uncle’s bastard. There was certainly a similarity in their characters, but even if Nathaniel was my uncle’s son, he was illegitimate and therefore could not inherit. He was, like me, another of my uncle’s strays. Mary paid him no attention, and Millicent despised him with the same venom that always made her long for my early demise. Within the first four and twenty hours, he fell and grazed his chin thrice, banged his head while crawling under my uncle’s settle and spilt wine all over himself. My uncle shook with laughter, urging the boy to more misbehavior, as if it was an experiment to see how much havoc that small body might cause.

  As for my plans, I kept them a secret, until Master Scroggs, my old friend from Yarmouth, arrived. Summoned to put my uncle’s affairs in order, he was concerned about my future. "Your uncle will leave no dowry, you know," he warned as we walked together in the lane.

  "I need no dowry," I said. "I mean to be a writer."

  "A writer?" With the melancholic toll of a death knell, he remarked, "I am saddened to hear you kept that up. Nothing good can ever come of it."

  "And just think, Scroggs, you were the first who encouraged me to write. It may be your epitaph."

  Now he regretted ever putting a quill into my hands. "What did I know of raising children, especially a girl?"

  "You cannot be blamed. Being a female, my corruption was inevitable."

  I had almost finished with my pirate’s adventures, but in a matter of days his story would change. He took matters into his own hands, refusing to obey my commands. My creation now had a mind of his own.