Petals on the River

by Kathleen E. Woodiwiss

  Andrew spied a gull soaring close over the forward part of the ship and ran ahead in hopes of catching it. Shemaine followed quickly behind, but as swift as a little mouse, the boy started climbing across boards in his eagerness to get close. The bird hovered temptingly above him, as if to tease the child. Struggling against her own lethargy, Shemaine scrambled after him, jumping over timbers and crossing braces as she made her ascent. She was amazed that such a little boy had so much energy and such skill at climbing, but just as abruptly, Andrew’s interest was drawn elsewhere, and he began a rapid descent to the main deck, where a frog leaped across the planks. Pausing to catch her breath, Shemaine found herself well forward of the deck and, much intrigued by the view, stepped close to the precipice. Glancing down, she could see large rocks piled around the bracing stocks, but when she looked outward, the scenery was lush and beautiful around the cabin.

  “Dammit, Shemaine!” a voice bellowed, nearly causing her to stumble from her lofty perch. “Get down from there! Get down before you fall!”

  Shemaine realized that Gage was already racing toward her, and before she could adequately obey, he was beside her, catching her arm and snatching her away from the edge. After gaining the main deck, he caught her shoulders and gave her a harsh shake as he rebuked her angrily.

  “Don’t ever go up there again, do you hear! It’s not safe! Just stay away!”

  Shemaine nodded fearfully, shaken by his rage. “Y-yes . . . of c-course, Mr. Thornton,” she stammered, fighting tears of pain. His fingers clasped her arms so tightly she suffered no uncertainty that she would later find herself bruised. Wincing, she sought to shrug free of his steely grasp. “Please, Mr. Thornton, you’re hurting me.”

  As if startled by his own ferocity, Gage dropped his hands away and staggered back a step. “I’m sorry,” he rasped in a hoarse whisper. “I didn’t mean to . . .”

  Turning crisply on a heel, he left her and strode briskly from the deck of the ship. Like statues of stone, Shemaine and his men watched him make a hasty descent of the building slip. Then, as if the banshees of hell continued to dog his heels, he stalked rapidly toward the cabinet shop, and a moment later the distant slamming of a door sounded like thunder in the silence created by his departure.

  Shemaine turned to Gillian with a perplexed frown, shaken by the rage her master had displayed. “What did I do? Why was Mr. Thornton so angry with me?”

  “Don’t ye go frettin’ yerself that the cap’n was vexed with ye, miss,” the young man murmured, seeking to allay her fears. “ ‘Twas the sight of ye on the prow what frightened him. ‘Twas where his wife had climbed afore she fell ta her death.”

  Shemaine clasped a hand over her mouth, smothering a groan of despair. How could she have blundered so badly?

  “Why don’t ye take Andy back ta the cabin now, miss?” Gillian suggested. “I’ll bring whate’er is left.”

  Shemaine accepted his advice and led Andrew from the ship. She was grateful to find that the younger men had rinsed off the tin plates and cups in the river and had left them in the basket beside the door. It took only a few moments to wash them in soapy water, scald them, and clean the kitchen.

  Bringing in the fresh-scented sheets and pillows from outside, Shemaine made the beds and finally lay down with Andrew on her own cot in the loft. She read to him until he fell asleep. With his small head resting on her shoulder, she lay for a long time staring at the ceiling as she recalled Gage’s angry reaction when he had seen her on the prow of his ship. Though she could understand his sensitivity about the way his wife had met her death, in that brief passage of time, during which he had railed at her and shaken her, she had glimpsed a painful torment in those eyes that she had never noticed before. He was indubitably a man haunted by a dreadful memory, perhaps a deed he had done or failed to do, which had not yet faded into liberating forgetfulness. What was there about the accident that she had not been told? What terrible thing, beyond the death of a young wife and mother, had happened that day that had had the power to rend a man to the depths of his soul and leave him roiling in anguish?

  Mulling over the many possibilities exhausted Shemaine mentally, for she could find no simple answers to her questions. With a troubled sigh, she laid an arm over Andrew and curled up beside him, submitting herself to the drowsiness that had crept stealthily over her.

  Ramsey Tate approached the cabinet shop and preceded his entrance with a light rap. At a muttered call from within, he swung open the door and stepped inside, closing the portal quietly behind him. His employer stared broodingly out of a window with a sharp frown creasing his brow, and a stern glance in his direction did little to reassure Ramsey that his presence would be tolerated.

  “Sly an’ the other men are afraid ta come in here, thinkin’ they’ll disturb ye,” the older man said uneasily. “They sent me in ta ask if’n ye be wantin’ them ta return ta work.”

  Gage snorted irritably and tossed a darker glower toward his chief cabinetmaker. “What do you think?”

  Ramsey flicked his bushy eyebrows briefly upward. “Aye, I told ’em as much, that ye’d be wantin’ the work done as usual, no matter how gloomy an’ sour yer mood might be. I need not tell ye how ye frightened yer woman. She was sure she had done somethin’ ta offend ye ‘til Gillian told her ye were just grievin’ over yer wife.”

  Gage deliberately ignored the man’s probing chatter about Shemaine. He knew better than anyone that he had alarmed the girl, but the sight of her leaning forward over the prow had seared his brain with harrowing visions of Victoria doing the same. In a fleeting moment reality had become entangled in a web of tormenting illusion as he suffered through another nightmarish reenactment of the death scene, those damnable paralyzing images that had persisted since his wife’s death, snatching him up from the depths of sleep to send him prowling about his room like a caged animal. Only this time, it had been Shemaine hurtling helplessly to the rocks below while he had seen himself leaning over the prow, watching it all happen from above.

  “My disposition has nothing to do with my expectations,” Gage retorted at last. “I expect the men to finish the day out and give me a fair exchange for their wages. I’ve checked the way they’ve laid out the patterns on the wood for the new pieces, and I think there’s much to be desired in the grains they’ve selected and designated for my inspection. I would have burled wood for the doors and matching grains for the drawers.”

  “Perhaps ye’d like ta show us what ye want,” Ramsey suggested, not unkindly. He knew that neither he nor any of the other workmen could envision the finished product as well as the master woodwright. He also recognized that work could serve as a healing balm for what was tormenting Gage Thornton, at least until he decided to take himself a woman.

  “Call the men in here,” Gage bade sharply. “I’ll show them what I want.”

  “An’ the Morgans?” Ramsey queried uncertainly. “They’ll be wantin’ ta know if ye’ll be goin’ back ta work on the ship today.”

  “Flannery has to replace some planks,” Gage stated curtly. “He’ll not need me for that chore.”

  Wiping a hand across his eyes, Gage released a dismal sigh as the man left. By dint of will, he dragged his thoughts away from that nagging, frightfully deceptive scene of Shemaine falling to her death. He could only wonder about himself, if he would ever find release from the tumult that continued to rage within him, at times leaving him feeling sorely bruised and battered.

  That evening the occupants of the cabin enjoyed a hearty soup for supper, and while the dishes were being washed, Gage read to Andrew and then put him to bed. When he returned to the kitchen, Gage found Shemaine awaiting him.

  “I’m sorry if I disturbed you today on the ship, Mr. Thornton,” she murmured softly. “I didn’t realize how your wife had been killed.”

  A brief quirk at the edge of his mouth was all the smile Gage could manage. “It just frightened me to see you so close to the edge and to think that Victoria may have gone up the
re in much the same way.”

  “I have nothing pressing to do at the moment, Mr. Thornton,” she said quietly. “Perhaps you’d feel better if you were able to talk about it.”

  Her gentle suggestion seemed full of compassion, and he could not bring himself to offend her by refusing. “I wasn’t there when . . . my wife . . . fell,” he replied haltingly. “I had brought Andrew back here to the cabin to clean some tar off his fingers after he had gotten into the oakum on the ship. While I was here, I heard Victoria scream. She sounded frightened. Barely an instant later I heard other screams. I left Andy in his bed and ran to see what had happened. When I got back to the ship, I found Roxanne sobbing in hysterics over the dead body of my wife. She said she had just nudged her canoe into the shallows when she heard Victoria scream. When she reached the ship, she saw my wife lying on the rocks below the prow. The fall had broken Victoria’s neck, and there was absolutely nothing I could do to revive her. I built a pine box to put her body in and took her into town to be buried in the church cemetery beside her parents.”

  He refrained from mentioning what he had been subjected to once he reached Newportes Newes. It certainly hadn’t helped that in prior years he had set himself against certain inhabitants of the hamlet by daring to point out the foolishness of several laws they had pompously proposed for their area. Thereafter, they had looked upon him as an antagonist, and their vindictiveness had become apparent soon after Victoria’s death. British authorities had concluded that their interrogation of him was nothing more than a mean-spirited inquisition and had further suggested that his wife could have climbed to the prow herself and merely slipped. While most of the townspeople had agreed, defaming gossip had continued to boil over the dark, odious caldron of hearsay and defamation.

  “After the accident, I felt as if I had descended into a dark dungeon from which I would never emerge,” Gage continued. “But grief has a way of easing with the passage of time. Caring for Andrew helped me over the hurdle.”

  “You have a delightful son, Mr. Thornton,” Shemaine assured him gently. “Andrew would win anyone’s heart.”

  “He’s been a blessing to me in many ways.” Gage sighed. An awkward moment of silence passed between them, then he inclined his head toward the back corridor. “If you’d like to take a bath now, Shemaine, you may. I don’t intend to work at my desk tonight, so you’ll have time to enjoy yourself at your leisure.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Thornton,” she replied, smiling. “Going without a bath on the London Pride was rather torturous for me, to say the least. I appreciate being clean more than I ever gave heed to before. I’d like nothing better than to indulge myself in a lengthy soak.”

  “Then, by all means, do so,” Gage encouraged. “I’ll read for a while here in the kitchen, so I’ll probably still be up when you finish.”

  Shemaine scurried about to prepare her bath, pouring three buckets of hot water into the tub and bringing two more in from the well. After Andrew’s nap that afternoon she had read to him for a time on the back porch and then later, while she watched him play, had folded freshly laundered clothes. She had stacked everything in a basket, placing the towels on top, but in her haste to start supper and bathe Andrew before the meal, she had left the basket beside her chair on the back porch. While toting in the last pail of water, she carried in the wicker receptacle, leaving it atop Gage’s stool before dumping the water into the tub.

  A moment later Shemaine settled into the steamy water with a deep sigh of appreciation. It was not the fanciest of tubs or the gentlest of soaps, but she reveled in the bath as if attended by serving maids of the royal court. Indeed, she stayed in the tub so long her fingers and toes began to wrinkle and the water took on a decided chill. Only then did she consider leaving it.

  Shemaine pushed herself to her feet and reached for a towel. Grabbing a corner, she swept it from the basket, noticing a strange weightiness to the linen. In the next instant, cold icy horror congealed within her, wrenching a startled gasp from her as a large snake plummeted to the floor. It promptly started hissing and twisting as it righted itself onto its stomach. The reptile’s eyes fixed menacingly on her, and its tongue flicked excitably from its fanged mouth as it hissed a warning. Its knobby tail rose in agitation and began to shake, emitting an odd, rattling sound.

  The snake’s head shot forward, and with a frightened scream Shemaine rapidly retreated out the back side of the tub. She heard what sounded like a chair overturning in the kitchen and footsteps running to the portal. Gage shouted her name in an anxious tone, but she had no time to answer as the serpent lunged toward her again, wrenching another cry from her. Clutching the towel to her, Shemaine stumbled back against the desk just as the kitchen door was flung open.

  The adder, tenacious in its zeal to catch her, had slithered around the tub and was near the door when this new menace appeared. The reptile turned abruptly, striking out as the man stepped through the portal, but Gage leapt back, out of harm’s way, and raced to the storeroom. When he returned, he held a long, wicked-looking knife in his hand. The viper eyed him warily, seeking a chance to sink its fangs into him. Gage eluded another attack, and when the snake recoiled, he was ready. Stepping quickly forward, he brought the wide blade down, chopping through the snake’s skull and pinning the partially severed head to the floor.

  Shuddering, Shemaine clutched the now dampened towel to her as she observed the bizarre coiling of the reptilian body in the throes of death. Gage opened the back door, and then, scooping the flat side of the knife beneath the serpent’s mangled head, clasped his other hand around the scaly body near the tail. Lifting the reptile from the floor, he carried it out beyond the back porch.

  Shemaine sagged in weak relief against the desk, still a-tremble and unnerved. It was a long moment before the thought occurred to her that there might be another snake in the basket. She had no knowledge of whether reptiles grouped together. But surely another one would have made its presence known by now.

  Shemaine’s breath eased outward in a long sigh of relief as she recognized her disquiet. She was simply letting her imagination run wild. She was safe now, she reassured herself. Her master had killed the snake, and if any more were in the basket, then he would kill them, too.

  Water splashed on the porch, making Shemaine realize that she had wasted a chance to escape with her modesty reasonably intact. Clutching the towel to her, she started to race toward the stairs, but when she heard footsteps approaching the open door, she froze in sudden dilemma. She could not leave her cubbyhole without exposing her nakedness to Gage. But if she stayed, the brevity and dampness of the towel would afford her little protection, for the linen only partially masked the front of her. Nervously Shemaine chewed a lip as she eyed the basket, on the far side of the tub. A second towel would provide her better covering, but could she grab one in time?

  Gage stepped through the portal, ending her debate, and in desperation Shemaine wedged herself between the wall and the desk, clasping an arm over her breasts and laying the other aslant her abdomen. It was the best she could do. Even so, her fluttering heart would not be calmed.

  A wealth of emotions swept over Gage as he noticed his bondslave seeking haven behind his desk. He was totally amazed that she hadn’t yet taken flight. With a shoulder, he nudged the door closed behind him and advanced with measured tread into the corridor, diligently lending his attention to drying water spots off the knife with an oiled rag that he kept for such purposes in a box near the portal. Pausing beside his bondslave, he stroked the cloth along the now gleaming blade, conveying a casualness that he strove hard to maintain.

  “You were lucky, Shemaine,” he announced. The faltering limits of his will were sorely strained as he sought to keep himself distracted. He knew well enough what the sight of her scantily clad form would do to him. Yet, for the life of him, he could not abandon the tantalizing situation he now found himself in. “The snake was poisonous. It could have killed you. Or at the very least made you ill.
Do you have any idea how it got in here?”

  Shemaine could not still the nervous quaking that had seized her. She was too exposed to feel anything but trepidation with a man in the room. Indeed, her uneasiness troubled her tongue as she offered an explanation. “The s-snake must have found its way into the b-basket of clothes I left on the porch this afternoon. I w-would assume it curled inside the towel to s-sleep.”

  “You should be thankful it didn’t try to strike while you were bringing in the basket.”

  Shemaine raised her gaze hesitantly to his, and Gage felt inclined to meet it. That simple act proved his undoing. Whatever noble intentions he had meant to manifest in her presence, no matter how scant they may have been, were hacked asunder as his male instincts rose up like some fierce, sword-wielding barbarian on a black charger. He was a man famished for want of a woman, and his hungering eyes devoured the delicious sights as if he contemplated his first meal after a lengthy fast. Heretofore he had cursed the scarcity of the linens, finding them limited in their usefulness for toweling a man’s body dry, but tonight he was greatly appreciative of the fact that this one, in particular, was narrow enough to be extremely generous.

  His gaze ranged eagerly downward from creamy shoulders to her ripe breasts, temptingly squeezed upward by an encompassing arm. The top of the towel was only partially visible above her silken limb, and its furrowed edges did little to hide the cleavage deepened by the pressure of confinement. Indeed, from his height, he could see down into the makeshift bodice where the cloth slanted briefly away from the tantalizing fullness. His advantage allowed him a minute glimpse of a pale pink hue, making him anxious to view the whole of it.

  Where her arms did not hinder his perusal, the dampened cloth revealed every curve and hollow as it clung cloyingly to the womanly terrain, liberally hinting of the sweet delights it veiled. Her whole side, from her right breast downward past the towel that ended at a shapely thigh, lay bare to his wandering gaze. In truth, her skin was as soft and fair as he had imagined it would be. And he was sure it would be just as delectable and sweet to taste.