Silently Georgiana wept into her pillow and told herself she did not care.
From that day there was a new coolness between them. A coolness that lasted right through to the ten Haers’ ball. When Georgiana had asked Brett about his trip, he had frowned. “I believe the Michaelius woman to be innocent of her husband’s death. Her neighbors of course do not share my view. They insist that she and Kray killed him.”
“Kray is her lover, then?”
“Reputed to be.”
“Why? Why do you who never really knew her believe her to be innocent when those who know her well are so convinced of her guilt?”
He turned toward her, frowning, and tossed back a lock of dark hair that had fallen over his eyes. “I don’t know exactly. But there was something in her face, in her voice when she spoke of him... something lost. But there is much evidence against her.” He sighed. “I have sent for the schout.”
“Is she beautiful?”
He nodded. “In a dark, sensuous way. Hers is a face to stir men—I think that may be why the women are so set against her.”
Georgiana’s lip curled. Beautiful... that was the reason Brett believed the Michaelius woman to be innocent! Erica Hulft had beauty too....
“It may be true about Kray having an affair with her, Georgiana, but I cannot believe she had any part in her husband’s murder. I have learnt more about Jan Michaelius, the murdered man. It seems that he treated his young wife with great brutality. She was seldom without bruises. Once he broke her arm. Perhaps she had reason to kill him.” He looked moody.
Georgiana could not resist asking, “Did Erica decide on the site for her castle?”
“I don't know. I stopped at the place nearest the Michaelius bouwerie and set out to reach it overland. Erica sailed on; I do not know what she has decided.”
Georgiana moistened her lips with her tongue. “Then she did not stop when you did?”
A look of anger passed over Brett’s dark face. It gave him suddenly an evil look and she would have shrunk back from him had not jealousy urged her on.
“Georgiana,” he said quietly, spacing his words. “I will not tolerate these long tiresome inquisitions. Be direct. Ask me what you want to know.”
“Did she not stop when you did?” repeated Georgiana stubbornly. Brett passed a restless hand through his hair. “Yes, damn it, she did! Her sloop had fouled its rudder with a drifting log and my crew helped clear it.”
So Erica had stepped ashore with Brett. They had been alone together, the fox-haired minx and the tall man who had once loved her, perhaps loved her still. Alone in the virgin wilderness. The great chestnut trees had sighed above their heads and they had walked through a primeval Eden together. . . . She had asked him and he had told her—and now Georgiana wished she had not asked at all. A clock was ticking very loud in the stillness of the room. Georgiana drew a long shaky breath.
“Now,” he continued—and she felt the sting of contempt in his voice, “ask me what you really want to know. Did I sleep with her?”
Georgiana’s hands were clenched so tightly she felt the bones of her fingers must break from the pressure, but she kept her mouth tightly shut as she glared at him.
"Ask!” His tone was rough and peremptory.
“How dare you use that tone with me?” she cried wildly. "I am your wife—I have a right to know where you are and with whom!
“Very well, I was with Erica Hulft—-but briefly, for her sloop sped on as soon as we had cleared the rudder.”
She stared at him in an agony of doubt, for she was not sure she believed him. She had been asking herself strange questions all the time he had been gone: If he chose to keep a mistress, would she even know about it? If he chose to renew his old relationship with Erica, would she know when they met or where? Would she know when they clasped each other close, what they murmured, what promises were made?
No, she told herself miserably, she would not know. Marriage was based on trust and she was beginning not to trust this tall determined fellow she had married.
“I am telling you the truth, Georgiana,” Brett said quietly. “I have always told you the unvarnished truth.”
She looked back at him, wondering, doubting. True, he had before this told her bitter truths. He had said that if one of Bernice’s homely daughters had been heiress to Windgate, he would have married her. Why, then, should she doubt him now?
In her heart she knew it was the blazing vision of Erica herself that stood between them. A sumptuous woman, sophisticated, worldly, adorned in the latest fashion with jewels sparkling at her ears and throat. A woman who would stop at nothing.
She was desperately afraid of Erica. For Erica, she felt, could destroy her.
“I don’t wish to discuss it,” she said hoarsely and stumbled from the room. In the hall outside she leaned against the wall and felt her whole body shake with spent emotion. Beautiful Erica, twining her coils around Brett again—what could Erica not do to her life?
That night Georgiana locked her door. Brett tried it once—but not again.
The coolness between them increased.
As she dressed for the ten Haers’ ball, her face flamed again at the memory of that humiliating conversation with Brett. She had not locked her door after that night, but to her distress he had not again tried her door. He had slept in his own room. She did not know quite what to do about that, for she had always known he was a man who would not plead—he would accept or he would take, nothing in between.
And she was too proud to make the overtures.
It was only too clear that she had alienated him. He seemed hardly to see her, to be absorbed in the affairs of the estate.
Whether that indifference was real or imagined on her part, she told herself she could not be sure. Brett was a strange, complex man, she did not even pretend to understand him. He had one love—Windgate. And after that, did anything else really count?
To Georgiana, the girl who so desperately needed to be first, it was a galling realization.
Linnet was dressing her. One by one, with maddening slowness, Linnet’s fingers fastened the myriad hooks that held the tight bodice of Georgiana’s beautiful Chinese gold satin gown.
“This color goes wonderful with your hair,” Linnet observed. “But ’tis a pity to hide this lovely petticoat.” She touched the embroidered lemon satin reverently.
“You can pull the overskirt back into fluffed panniers when we get there,” Georgiana promised her indulgently. “And then the petticoat will show nicely. Come, you must wear something nice too, Linnet. What about that blue kirtle I gave you? And the doublet with the slashed sleeves lined in gold?”
It had been almost her favorite costume around the house but Linnet had admired it so, Georgiana had given it to the girl.
Linnet brightened. “I was afraid you’d think it was above my station,” she admitted honestly. “I was so glad you were taking me along, I was going to wear my homespun!”
“All the ladies will bring their maids along. Wear the blue, it becomes you. Who knows, perhaps one of the footmen will fall in love with you!”
Or perhaps one of the male guests might fancy her! thought Linnet joyfully, and hurried away to dress herself in her best.
Georgiana cast a wistful look after her. If only her heart were as light as Linnet’s!
BOOK IV
The Notorious Rake
What will he remember, when his life is spent?
Gold that trickled through his fingers? Where it went?
No, he’ll remember turquoise eyes that smiled into his own
A lilting laugh and fair white arms—that could have brought him home....
Part One:
The Handsome Schemer
What a choice he now must face
Here at the ten Haers’ ball....
The lady or the great estate?
Faith, he would have them all!
Haerwyck On The Hudson,
1673
Chapter 15
>
Clad in a gown that made her seem—like her mother before her—a woman of gold, Georgiana boarded the River Witch along with Brett and an excited Linnet, for the short sail to Haerwyck. Just before leaving she reread the part about Rychie ten Haer in her mother’s journal:
It is plain Rychie hates me. And she is envious too, for she once turned down Verhulst's offer of marriage and apparently she expected him to languish forever! So although the ten Haers are our nearest neighbors downriver, I can expect no help there. If only I could reach Vrouw Berghem who was so kind to me in New Amsterdam!
And now Rychie’s daughter, Katrina, had expected to marry Brett, and Imogene’s daughter had cut her out! Georgiana thought wryly that she could expect no help there either!
The trip downriver was uneventful, punctuated by Linnet’s bright chatter and Brett’s deep-toned answers. He was very kind to Linnet, Georgiana thought, troubling to explain to her that the mighty Hudson on which they traveled was only half as long as the Rhine but much deeper.
“ ’Tis said that in places it’s bottomless!” Linnet said in awe.
Brett laughed. “No river is bottomless, else it would flow into the ground and be lost, but I suppose the Hudson is as deep as any. It cuts a deep gorge down to the sea.” Georgiana leaned against the rail, watching the water and listening idly in the dusk, with the dark shapes of the rounded hills rising up about them in grandeur. The sky was a mellow gold and shadowy blue as the sun set and above them a narrow rind of pale moon was rising. The wind blew her hair and from the shore came the sleepy night sounds of birds chirping a last good night, and all the little creatures of the night beginning to stir. There was a nip in the breeze tonight that told her the soft days were waning and the harsh northern winter was soon to come.
“I still don’t understand how a river can flow two ways,” Linnet was insisting. She was having a wonderful time, sitting there in her blue kirtle and slashed sleeves, talking to the patroon!
“Well, that’s because the tide comes upriver and meets the waters cascading down from the Adirondacks,” Brett explained indulgently.
“But don’t they meet in a big swash?”
He laughed. “No, they flow over each other. Sometimes it will hold a boat back. Ask our schipper to tell you about it. He waxes voluble on the subject!”
“I don’t speak enough Dutch to do that and, besides, the only time I ever spoke to the schipper he pinched me,” pouted Linnet.
“He must have drunk too much Kill-Devil,” Brett chuckled, using the local name for Barbados rum. He was in a very good mood tonight, thought Georgiana, even though they had not exchanged more than two words in the last day and a half. He had eyed her gown with approval as she boarded. She had half expected him to comment on it, but he had not. Oh, well, she was sure Nicolas would comment on it—and hopefully in Brett’s hearing!
“But you’ve got more than pinching to worry about,” Brett was telling Linnet with mock seriousness. “I hear they’re counterfeiting wampum now in New Orange.”
“Oh, no!” cried Linnet in real distress, for she had been hoarding the black wampum beads, three of which were worth about a stiver, in the belief that they were getting scarce and she would double her money.
Georgiana, who knew about Linnet’s secret hoard, was about to tell Brett to stop teasing Linnet when there was a cry from the other side of the sloop. A whale had been sighted, swimming majestically upriver. They watched the great beast in awe, saw water spray suddenly from its snout.
“That’s a rare sight,” Brett told them gravely. “And it well may be the last whale you’ll see on the river. When I first came here it was fairly common to see a whale.”
“Civilization,” sighed Georgiana whimsically, joining in the conversation at last. “It’s creeping in everywhere. The big wild cats are gone, and now the whales. What will be next?”
“The trees, I imagine,” said Brett.
“The trees!” She was fascinated, for on all sides all she could see was virgin forest.
“Some of them at least. I’m referring to the tanners. I can see it becoming a great industry here. They’ll strip the trees of bark and the trees will die.” He sighed. “That’s progress, I’m afraid.”
And with his words Georgiana was wistfully reminded how very much Brett loved this country—more than he could ever love any woman. She shivered and pulled her silk shawl around her although the night was not cold.
She tensed as their sloop docked at the ten Haers’ wooden pier, identical to the one at Windgate only not quite so long. Another sloop was just docking as they gained the dock but Georgiana’s gaze was focused elsewhere.
“Isn’t that Jack Belter?” she asked, peering at the big black-bearded man who was just then striding up the pier.
Brett’s dark head swung around to look. “So it is,” he murmured. “I didn’t know you’d met him. He keeps to himself mostly.”
“I rode by his bouwerie once. . . . What do you think he’s doing here? He can’t have been invited!”
“No, I doubt the ten Haers would invite him.” He grinned. “Maybe Belter’s having an affair with one of the chambermaids!” She would have made him a tart rejoinder but at that moment the party from the other sloop that had just docked spilled over and Jack Belter was forgotten as Brett introduced the patroon of Rensselaerwyck and his family. All of them swept in together.
From the outside, Georgiana had had an impression of an overgrown Dutch farmhouse but inside she was impressed by Haerwyck’s handsome furnishings. The small deep-silled windows held Chinese vases and articles of cloisonne and chased silver. On the wide scoured boards of the floors—except for the big living room, which was cleared for dancing—lay thick Turkey carpets, and the chairs and tables were of exotic woods: teak and sandalwood and other woods from the Far East—a reminder to Georgiana that Holland was a seafaring nation and New Netherland was her colony. Tall-masted East Indiamen had brought across the oceans the blue-and-white China plates that were so proudly displayed on the curtained mantels.
Icily correct, her saffron-haired hostess, vividly gowned in scarlet overgown and yellow petticoat, greeted her. She was a tall buxom woman, was Rychie, with large powerful features. How well her mother had described her, thought Georgiana: Rychie is overpowering. She flashes her big white teeth like a wolf and shakes all that startling hair to gain attention. Men are attracted to her but they are also afraid of her. I think. Afraid she may devour them.
Now Imogene’s daughter, staring into Rychie’s brilliant blue eyes, hard as China plates, had the same impression.
Now it was Rychie’s daughter who was welcoming her and Georgiana’s heart quickened as she viewed her other rival.
Katrina ten Haer’s manner could not have been more correct. She smiled winsomely at Georgiana. Like her mother she was big and showy. She had her mother’s large white teeth and thick saffron hair, but from her father’s side she had inherited large expressive brown eyes as melting as a spaniel’s and a more slender graceful figure than Rychie had ever possessed. Despite Erica’s spiteful comments, Georgiana saw that Katrina had a complexion as smooth as cream. The sun and wind of the Hudson River country had kissed her skin to gold and she was wearing a wide-skirted gown of saffron velvet with huge puffed sleeves slashed with brown satin and laced with wide brown velvet strips the color of her eyes. Her petticoat was a rippling brown satin embroidered in gold and almost as handsome as Georgiana's. Her neckline seemed to plunge down forever toward her voluptuous rounded breasts as though to an abyss, and her cleavage was fantastic.
Georgiana drew in a quick breath. Here was competition.
“We are so glad you could come,” Katrina was saying in her lightly accented English. Her smiling gaze passed over Georgiana to rest lazily on Brett.
Georgiana was suddenly uncomfortably aware that she was in very fashionable company. She had had the passing impression of a farmhouse—and it was not. She had expected these people to be basically simple country fo
lk—and they were not. Her gown, which she had taken up only a little, for she hated to spoil the long sweep of it, was unfashionably long here. The sophisticated Dutch ladies all wore their dresses daringly short, displaying excellent ankles. She wished she had had her gown hemmed up more deeply before leaving Windgate, but it was too late now!
Her gaze focused suddenly on the delicate necklace Katrina ten Haer was wearing around her sun-kissed throat. Gold links and a diamond pendant—why, it was the exact same necklace that Nicolas had given to her with such protestations of infatuation, the one Brett had torn from her throat, that had almost caused a duel between them! Nicolas must have had it repaired in a hurry to give it to Katrina, she thought with a little rush of indignation at this sign of his fickleness.
She came back to the world. Katrina ten Haer was speaking to her.
“Are you happy in your new home, in Windgate?” Katrina inquired in a bored voice, as a chattering group swished by.
“Oh, yes, very happy,” said Georgiana mechanically, stepping a little to the side to let the group pass. She thought she might escape then, but it was not to be. Katrina’s voice—as penetrating as her mother’s—found her, pinned her.
“You do not find it strange here? This northern landscape when you are used to balmy weather and palm trees?”
“No, it is very beautiful here,” said Georgiana truthfully. “And very wild,” she added. She had been about to say “savage” but thought better of it. This spaniel-eyed girl with the commanding features would certainly respond unfavorably to that!
“And the house,” persisted Katrina. “Does it please you?”
“It astonishes me,” admitted Georgiana. “I did not expect anything half so grand.”
“Indeed?” A little coldness crept into those melting brown eyes. “But then we Dutch do things on a grand scale.” Her lofty manner seemed to diminish the wife of the “English patroon,” to point out that, after all, Windgate with all its glories had been built by a Dutchman.
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