“That ain’t the kind of education I’m interested in,” sneered one trapper. “The kind of education I want in a woman is all got thrashin’ around under a blanket!”
“At your price we oughta have her tonight,” grumbled the other. “I still say—”
“Why, ye’ll thank me for beddin’ her tonight,” declared Bart intensely. “I plan to teach her some tricks twixt now and mornin’ that’ll make her worth more to ye. Don’t mind none if y’hear her screamin’ tonight—she’s bound to kick up a ruckus at first until she is tamed, but she’ll come round to it right enough and be real respectful and glad to go with ye come mornin’.”
Glad to go with them! Teach her tricks! Warm their beds in the wilds! Horror washed over Charity in such an engulfing flood that she almost fainted. First Bart—loathsome Bart—and then this coarse crew. She pictured herself being dragged along with a thong tied around her neck—for that was surely the only way they could force her to accompany them—along a hundred dirty trails, with tree branches slapping her in the face; being forced to cook for them by day and to endure all four of their unwashed bodies by night. Horrible pictures flashed through her mind as she imagined herself struggling like the poor trapped animals slowly dying in their cruel snares. And if she became pregnant or if she could not keep up, she supposed she’d be left by the trail to starve, or traded off to the Indians in return for a strong young squaw!
“Another round here!” roared someone at the next table, and with her nerves taut as a drawn bowstring, Charity jumped. She sat up, deliberately yawning. “That man woke me up,” she declared pettishly. “I’m going up to bed. Bart, you can stay down here until you fall off that bench for all I care!”
Bart laughed. “I’ll accompany you!” He winked at the others.
“No, you won’t,” snapped Charity. “I’m going to take a bath first and comb my hair.” She hoped he did not know she had already taken a bath; it would make him suspicious.
Bart shrugged. “Time for another round of beer then.” He watched her lasciviously as she moved away from them. She could almost feel the naked lust in that stare.
Very pale, but moving with apparent aimlessness, she had reached a point midway between the stairs and the door. She did not think there was a back stairway. At least she had not seen one. If she climbed those stairs she would be trapped.
She took a deep breath and strolled toward the door.
“Ho there,” yelled Bart, his voice suddenly sharp. “You’re goin’ the wrong way!”
“I want a breath of air,” she called back over her shoulder, moving steadily toward the door.
There was the sound of a table going over as Bart leaped up, as she streaked through the door and went flying up the street. She had turned down a dark narrow alley when she heard them come thundering and cursing out into the street.
“You go this way, I’ll go that way!” she heard Bart yell. “She can’t have gone far!”
Her heart sank. If the trappers were looking too, they would surely catch her. She nearly tripped over a sleeping dog in the alley. He moved with a growl as she jumped away, and she tiptoed on. If he had barked, she would have been lost. It brought home to her how dreadful was her position. These men were used to trapping animals—animals far more wary than she. They would have little trouble trapping a friendless woman alone in a town that was strange to her.
Turning a corner she gazed into an empty street that led straight down to the docks. Before her stretched a maze of boats and ships—there was her hiding place!
She slipped off her shoes and, holding them, ran silently toward the docks. Many of the smaller craft were drawn up there, side by side. Some would have cabins, all had sails and gear—she would find a place to hide.
Behind her there was a drunken shout. “She’s headin’ for the docks!” Footsteps pounded behind her.
Charity redoubled her speed, sprinted across the dock and leaped onto the deck of the nearest boat. Luckily the night was dark and the boat was deserted. She dodged behind a low sail, jumped from the deck to the next boat, landing silently on bare feet, scrambled to the higher deck of the river sloop alongside and hid, crouched down behind a huge pile of rope. The pursuing men ran cursing in both directions. On the sloop where she was hiding, heavy footsteps suddenly ascended to the deck and a voice as heavy as the footsteps growled something in Dutch. Though she didn’t know the language, she guessed it was a sharp “Who goes there?”
One of the trappers gave a surly answer in English.
The heavy voice spoke again in thickly accented English. “No woman is aboard the sloop of the patroon!” the voice thundered. “Get you off or I’ll split your gizzard for you.”
There was some angry muttering, and one trapper growled, “Come on, Bart. She didn’t go this way anyhow!”
Riveted with fear, Charity crouched where she was. The loud-voiced Dutchman, if he found her, might very well turn her back to her pursuers. After a time, the angry muttering receded. She was about to peer out when several sets of footsteps sounded across the dock. She kept her head bent low, hoping Bart and the trappers had not come back. From her hiding place, she could not see the men approaching, only hear them.
A voice of great authority gave rapid orders, footsteps hurried below, and after a few minutes she heard other footsteps. This time, only one man sauntered down the dock and came aboard the sloop.
“Ah, Mynheer van Daarken,” said a deep strong voice.
“You are prompt,” replied the voice of authority that she had heard before, now speaking English. “I suggest we speak only in English, as my crew speaks nothing but Dutch—save Jan, who is in my confidence.”
“As you wish.” The deep voice was refined, a gentleman’s voice. “My ship lies off the point. Here is a list of the cargo. You will find all the goods of first quality.”
“Yes, yes.” Van Daarken’s voice. “Let me see the list. I think I can read it by moonlight. Yes, yes, this is excellent. Especially the wine. That I can use myself.”
“And the rest you can sell to advantage since there will be no tax involved,” the other observed sardonically.
Charity blinked. This was a smuggling transaction! Was everyone in the New World a smuggler? she asked herself incredulously.
“Send your longboats to the usual place around midnight,” directed van Daarken.
“And the wine? Will you transport it upriver in this sloop? It is an easy distance.”
“No,” said the Dutchman thoughtfully. “There is some risk and I am a man who prefers to take no risks. Deliver it all ashore in the usual manner. My men will transport it upriver to me.”
“Then the price is agreed?”
“Yes—although I find it a trifle high.”
“It would be far higher if it were taxed.” The deep voice took on a note of steel. “Besides, I take all the risks for you, Mynheer.”
“That is true,” said the other hastily. “The price shall be as you wish. Here—the moon is bright enough for me to pen it—here is a draft upon the Bank of Amsterdam. But tell me,” he added on a note of curiosity, “how will you transport the money from Holland?” “Mynheer van Daarken, the money will not need to be transported. It will merely be transferred from your account in the Bank of Amsterdam to my account in the Bank of Amsterdam.”
“An excellent arrangement,” said the patroon, sounding surprised. “So then we are agreed.”
“Good. I will take my leave of you then, Mynheer.”
“You must be a rich man,” observed the Dutchman dryly. “Tell me, do you put all your money in Dutch banks? Holland must be bursting.”
“My expenses are large, Mynheer van Daarken,” was the cool answer. “And in my profession a man may need large sums at any time. I find it convenient to have money here and there.”
The Dutchman sighed. “The world of business could have used you.”
“My career is not of my choosing,” said the other voice grimly. “I must make the best
of what is offered.” Goodbyes were spoken, and the footsteps of the man with the deep voice resounded across the deck. The Dutchman gave another goodbye from the deck. Charity presumed van Daarken was watching the smuggler go. Then the heavy-voiced fellow joined van Daarken, and Charity heard him speak respectfully to the patroon asking about the departed smuggler.
“Did you mark his rapier, Jan?” murmured van Daarken. “It is said he has spitted more men with it than anyone since—” Charity could not catch the name.
“I will break his neck if he crosses us,” growled the man called Jan.
“He will not cross us,” said van Daarken comfortably. “It is known that his word is good. He is a man of honor, Jan. He would be a force today in his own country, but because of his politics, he cannot return home. So he makes his living as he can. Such men are to be pitied—and used.” He sighed. “It might have happened to us, Jan.”
“Not so,” said Jan sturdily. “You would have found some other way. You would have bought someone.” Their voices faded a little, but they remained on deck. Charity knew she dared not attempt to leave while they remained there. She closed her eyes and sagged against the pile of rope. She was cruelly tired from her day of trudging through the town looking for work. She must look healthy and able to do a hard day’s work tomorrow, if she were to have any hope of finding a situation.
Bits of their conversation played through her mind as she drowsed there. He is a man of honor ... he cannot return home . . . and that deep cultured voice that had stirred her. She wished she knew what the smuggler looked like, she wished she had had the courage to lift up her head and peer out. But had she done so and startled them, she might well have been spitted by that rapier of which the patroon spoke so admiringly. She shuddered and slipped down another notch into unconsciousness. Soon she was asleep.
When she awoke the sun was shining brightly and the sloop was moving. She sat up sharply and looked around her. Land was far away. They were moving upriver.
“Ah, I see you have awakened,” said an authoritative voice.
Charity’s breath caught in her throat and she scrambled to her feet.
The man who faced her was square-built and portly with stocky legs, big feet and hands and thick ankles, a peasant’s build. Beneath bushy dark brows that now met in a frown, two small keen eyes of a pale watery blue considered her. An auburn periwig added to the ferocity of his demeanor and showed that, however coarse might be his appearance, he was not a peasant but a gentleman.
His clothes also were clearly those of a gentleman. A long coat of dark red broadcloth with wide black cuffs, a long waistcoat and knee breeches of the same dark red material. All of it trimmed with handsome gold buttons and black braid. Red stockings covered his heavy legs and ran down into red-heeled dark leather shoes with small buckles set high on the instep. His neckcloth was of snowy linen with lace ends. Beneath one arm he carried a plumed hat and his manner was entirely one of authority.
Even if she had not recognized his voice from last night’s exchange Charity would have known that she was in the presence of the patroon.
CHAPTER 10
“Mynheer van Daarken,” she said shakily, “I—I can explain my presence here.”
“Pray do,” he said, frowning. “And also how it is that you know my name?”
“Everyone knows your name,” said Charity meekly, hoping to flatter him.
It was apparent that he was pleased with this reply. His broad chest expanded a little in its dark red broadcloth covering, but he took her remark only as his just due. “You speak as if you were gently bred,” he observed with some surprise.
“That is true,” answered Charity, choosing her words carefully. Hope was rising in her. She assumed her most genteel manner. This man at first glance might seem coarse, but he was a patroon and therefore had been gently reared. Like speaks to like. “I am come to unfortunate circumstances, being—” she almost said “newly come from Massachusetts,” but remembered in time that van Daarken might take a dim view of having a convicted witch aboard—“newly come from England to find my relatives in Virginia,” she said quickly, her inventive imagination racing ahead. “Once there, I was told that they were all dead, killed in an uprising of the Indians. A cousin was said to have escaped north to New York. But when I arrived to seek him in New York, some—some ill-bred men, much the worse for drink, pursued me from my inn, where they were trying to force their attentions on me, and I sought refuge on your boat. I—I was so tired I fell immediately asleep.” There was sincerity in that last, and a touch of the hopelessness she had felt the night before.
“I see.” His voice softened a bit. “You are young to wander about alone.”
Charity sighed and brushed back a strand of bright hair that blew in her face. “My mother died in Torquay, and I came across the ocean seeking my relatives.”
He pondered this. “Your trunks? Your belongings?”
“All lost,” said Charity regretfully, remembering the pretty wardrobe Countess Stéphanie had counseled over. “I was set upon by bandits.”
“And they took your clothes—and let you go?” There was an undertone of amusement in his voice as his pale blue eyes coolly roved over her soft feminine curves, saying plainly that given the choice he would have stolen the girl and let the clothes remain.
Charity flushed. “I escaped,” she said tremulously. “And I have walked a very long way. I was lost.”
“It is an interesting story,” he said. “And it must have cost you something to invent it.”
She winced. “My mother did die in Torquay,” she said defensively, “I did come across the ocean to find my relatives.”
“But the rest of the story is not quite right, is it? Trunks and belongings are cherished by women. And you are a long way from Virginia. But we will let that pass.” He studied her. “You are no doubt hungry. Will you join me for breakfast?”
Charity was afraid to let him know how grateful she felt. Grief and fear had exhausted her, but now she had had several hours’ sleep and had waked with an enormous appetite. She joined the patroon in his cabin. Seating herself in the chair he drew out for her with a sweep of her skirts, she ate with the delicate grace Stéphanie had taught her, and made polite conversation as if she were once again seated in the French countess’s drawing room in Bath.
Across from her the patroon ate greedily, then sat and watched her in a detached way, but alertly, as if he hoped to catch some chink in the perfection of her manners.
It was a small success, but Charity came through breakfast with flying colors. In an effort to pass what seemed a test for she knew not what, she entertained her host with stories of her life at school, with Stéphanie in Bath. And in these stories, she changed places with Margaret Yorking, wealthy, with much to fall back upon—held back only by a vengeful guardian and a delicate mother in failing health.
He listened in amusement and some fascination and when she had finished he said, “You speak an aristocratic brand of English. You say you have been instructed in French and Spanish as well. Please to address me in French.”
Charity, mimicking Stéphanie’s Parisian accent, spoke readily in that language. And when he next asked her to speak to him in Spanish, she felt as if she were again addressing her old school friend Mercedes, for she had not spoken Spanish since last she had been with the unhappy girl.
“You speak both languages quite well,” he commended her, and sat studying her for so long that she was tempted to fidget, but managed not to, remembering Stéphanie’s remarks about the dismal future of young ladies who fidgeted.
“You could pass for the daughter of a duke,” he said suddenly, his manner at once cold and approving. Charity flushed, half with pleasure and half with alarm, for she did not like the crafty look in his eyes. “I take it you have no one to write to for funds?” he added in an offhand manner.
“No,” she admitted. “All—all are dead.”
“I see.” He sat lost in thought.
> “As you may have heard, I have an estate upriver,” he said, finally.
“All have heard of it,” lied Charity.
“I doubt it,” he said. “But it is pleasant to hear. My manor is named Daarkenwyck, and there I have a wife and a son. My son Pieter is to go next year to Amsterdam, there to spend a year continuing his studies before he returns to us. He is a pleasant boy, a year or two older than yourself, but he finds it difficult to apply himself to his studies. Since I have business interests overseas which he will one day inherit, it is essential that he be proficient in languages. Dutch is of course his native tongue. French he speaks passably, English indifferently, and Spanish not at all. I would propose to you that you join my family in the capacity of, say, distant cousin? Thus you would eat with us at table and be present at our social gatherings, and could engage the boy in conversation. Pieter would not wish a pretty woman to find him wanting, and so it would be a great spur to his endeavors if you would converse with him in English, and at times, in French and Spanish. He will undoubtedly teach you our own mother tongue in return but that is not of interest to me. It is my desire that my son speak these three languages fluently, and with a patrician accent so that he will be instantly recognized in any company as a gentleman and the son of a patroon. Do I make myself clear?”
“Yes,” said Charity, almost overwhelmed. By this weird turn of fate was she to have thrust upon her, at last, the life for which she had so yearned at school and which she had so envied Margaret Yorking and the others? She would live in a great house, eat at table with the others as an equal and—
“But I have not the proper clothes,” she said with a sinking feeling. “I had a beautiful wardrobe, truly, all chosen by Countess Stéphanie de la Croix, but—I have lost it all.”
“As to how you came to lose your possessions,” his voice hardened perceptibly, “I make one condition. Since you are to eat at my table and live with my family as my cousin, I must know the truth about you. If you lie and I find it out, it will go ill with you, I promise.”
This Loving Torment Page 12
