“This is going to sound strange, I know, but it was worn by a pirate. He’d had it made into a belt buckle.”
“A pirate? Do you mean that to be a joke?” Lady Dryden asked, clearly disappointed. Before Sara could protest, Lady Dryden’s expression altered and she added, “Wait, you must be the young lady who traveled aboard the Chastity. My friend in the Ladies’ Committee told me about you. The ship was accosted by pirates and you narrowly escaped capture.”
“Yes, that was me,” she said dryly. Jordan’s story had certainly spread widely. But perhaps it was time that someone knew the truth, especially this someone. “Actually, I didn’t escape capture at all. I spent a month with the pirates on an island in the Atlantic. I got to know them very well, especially their captain.”
Lady Dryden looked shocked and just a little surprised at the way a complete stranger was taking her into her confidence. “The Pirate Lord? You spent a month with the Pirate Lord himself?”
“Yes. Have you never heard his real name?”
Lady Dryden shook her head, clearly confused to have Sara ask her such a thing.
“It’s Horn. Gideon Horn.”
The blood drained from Lady Dryden’s face. She looked as if she might faint, and Sara rushed to her side. “I’m so sorry, I’ve upset you. Are you all right?”
“Did…did you say ‘Horn’? The man’s name was Horn? You’re certain?”
“Yes. I came to know Captain Horn quite well during my stay on his island.” She hesitated to continue, given Lady Dryden’s obvious distress. But the woman had abandoned her son, after all, and she deserved to be upset. Sara’s voice hardened. “Indeed, I was surprised to learn he wasn’t an American at all. He was born English, the son of a duke’s daughter. Apparently his mother had run off with her tutor, an Englishman named Elias Horn, then had abandoned her child after her family asked her to return.”
“No!” Lady Dryden protested. “That’s not the way it was at all! I never—” She broke off, tears welling in her eyes. “So that’s why my son never looked for me. All this time he must have thought…” She trailed off as confusion spread over her face.
Sara shared the woman’s confusion. This wasn’t the reaction she’d expected. “Lady Dryden, are you saying that you are indeed Gideon Horn’s mother?”
The woman stared about her distractedly. “Of course! Surely you had guessed that or you wouldn’t have spoken to me of him!”
Sara’s heart thundered in her ears. She’d found Gideon’s mother. “I wasn’t sure. Elias Horn told Gideon that his mother was dead. But there was only one duke’s daughter named Eustacia in Debrett’s Peerage, and it was you. Then, when I saw your pendant…”
“You were sure.” Lady Dryden gazed back into the dining room, tears coursing down her cheeks as she surveyed the crowded room. She seemed almost frantic as she grabbed Sara’s arm. “Oh, Miss Willis, we must find my husband! He must hear this at once!”
Sara felt all at sea. Lady Dryden didn’t look or act like a woman just hearing that the son she despised was a pirate. And why, after all these years of not caring about him, would she suddenly be so eager to hear about him? Or to tell her husband of her sordid past?
“Lady Dryden,” Sara murmured with concern as the woman tugged her toward the door, “are you sure you want to tell your husband of this without any…preparation?”
“Yes, of course!” Then, as if the full import of Sara’s question hit her, Lady Dryden darted a glance at her, eyes rounded in distress. “Oh, but you must think—If my son thinks it, then you must think—Never mind. It doesn’t matter. You’ll understand when you hear my tale. But Miss Willis, we must find my husband first! I assure you he’ll want to hear everything you have to say. Everything!”
“Certainly, my lady,” Sara said. She could hardly say anything else.
But she made herself one promise as she let the woman drag her into the ballroom. After the marquess heard what she’d told his wife, she was going to get some answers of her own.
Gideon paced the drawing room in Silas’s newly built cottage. Molly was ensconced in Louisa and Silas’s bedchamber and was screaming for all she was worth. Thank God one of the women had taken Jane off as soon as she’d seen her mother. He wouldn’t have wanted the girl to hear her mother suffering so.
By God, he’d never dreamed that birthing babies was this awful. He’d never had any dealings with a woman in labor before. The few minutes he’d been in the bedchamber had almost been more than he could stand. And when he’d hurried out as soon as Jane had been taken from the room, Louisa had mumbled something derogatory about the entire male sex.
He hadn’t taken offense. How could he? Molly was screaming her blasted head off and enduring hours and hours of pain, all to bring forth a child without her husband. At the moment, he had the utmost respect for women and nothing but contempt for himself and his kind.
Ann slipped through the bedchamber door, a worried look on her face. “The baby is in the breech position, cap’n. That’s why Molly’s havin’ such a hard time of it.”
“Breech position?”
“When a baby comes, its head is supposed to come out first. But this one’s wee behind wants to come out first, and that won’t work. Louisa and I don’t know enough about it to make it right, and there ain’t a midwife amongst the women. We already asked.”
“Surely there’s someone who can help,” Gideon protested. “There are fifty women or more on this island.”
“That’s true. But most of ’em have as much knowledge of childbirth as I do—enough to take care of a normal birth. For somethin’ like this, we need a midwife, and we don’t have one. Ain’t you got a doctor at all on this island?”
He shook his head as guilt sliced through him. No doctor. No midwife. Eventually, of course, he’d intended to coax a doctor to the island, but he hadn’t done so yet. Still, he should have thought to bring a midwife here for the women.
Suddenly a raucous voice came from the entrance to the cottage. “All right then, where is she? Where’s the laboring mother?”
They both turned to find Queenie standing there, her sleeves rolled up and her face set.
“Queenie,” Ann said in a firm voice, “you mustn’t disturb Molly. Things aren’t goin’ so well. The baby is breech. She needs to be kept still while we figure out what to do.”
“She needs a woman who knows how to help her, that’s wot she needs,” Queenie retorted. Another scream erupted from inside the bedchamber, and Queenie headed toward it purposefully. Ann moved to block her path, and Queenie scowled at her. “Get out of my way, country girl. Who do you think delivered all the babies in the whorehouse? Me, that’s who. We couldn’t risk a doctor turning us in to the magistrate, so I always done it. I’ve birthed more babies than you probably held in yer lifetime. And I’ll birth this one, if you’ll just let me by.”
Ann hesitated, staring at Queenie as if she didn’t quite believe the woman.
“Let her pass,” Gideon ground out. “If she says she can do it, let her do it, by God. We’ve got no choice.”
When Ann stepped aside, Queenie sniffed, then flounced into the bedchamber, leaving the door open.
“Queenie!” Louisa exclaimed from inside the room. “What in God’s name do you think you’re doing?”
“It’s all right,” Ann said as she entered behind Queenie. “She says she used to birth babies.”
Louisa harrumphed. “She’s probably seen more things going into a woman than coming out of one.”
“That’s true enough,” Queenie said mildly. “But I know a thing or two about bringin’ a child into the world. And you ain’t got much choice just now, Miss La-Di-Dah.”
Gideon went to stand at the doorway and looked in, but all he could see were Ann, Louisa, and Queenie crowding around the bed. Just beyond them, he glimpsed Molly’s pale face and her hair matted with sweat.
Queenie settled herself on the edge of the bed with a murmur of distress. He couldn’t tell what
she was doing, but when she finished, she wiped her hands on her apron and announced, “Aye, the baby’s breech, all right. We’ll have to turn it.”
“Turn it? Can it be done?” Louisa asked anxiously.
“Aye, it can be done. Sometimes. I’ve tried it a couple of times before.” Queenie sounded grim. “It worked only once, though. Sometimes you can’t turn the baby.”
“Do whatever you have to!” Molly’s high-pitched voice rose above the others’ murmuring. “Just get the baby out of me, damn it!”
Suddenly, Ann and Louisa moved away from the foot of the bed, both going around to help comfort Molly, and Gideon got his first sight of Molly’s parted legs. He gasped. Blood and water smeared her thighs nearly to her knees.
“By God, do something!” he choked out.
“I’ll take care of it, Cap’n,” Queenie retorted. “You go fetch us some boilin’ water, all right? And have Silas make extra for tea. The poor girl’s gonna need it after this.”
She didn’t have to ask twice. Gideon fled, cursing himself for his cowardice. Molly was so small, so fragile. How would she make it through this? And what would become of her baby and little Jane if she didn’t?
He found Silas in their new communal kitchen and gave him Queenie’s order. Silas already had a pot boiling. He took it off the fire, then came up next to Gideon. “You’re lookin’ green around the gills, Cap’n. She’s havin’ a rough time of it, eh?”
Gideon looked at the older man with wild eyes. “She might die. The baby might die.” He pounded his fist on the table, full of self-loathing. “And it’s all my fault, do you hear? I should have brought doctors to this place and midwives. But what do I know about taking care of women? I don’t know a goddamned thing! Sara was right. I didn’t even consider their needs, not once! It’s no wonder she left me!”
Setting down the pot, Silas patted Gideon’s shoulder, then went to the cupboard and poured him a cup of whisky. “Here now, settle down and drink this. It can’t be so bad as all that. And Miss Sara didn’t leave you because you didn’t bring doctors here. She left because she had to take care of family. But she’ll be back. She said she’d come back, and I believe her.”
“She won’t,” Gideon said grimly. “She hates me, as well she should.”
“Stop talkin’ that way. It don’t do no good to think such things, most especially when they ain’t true.” He picked up the pot again. “You sit here and drink a bit while I bring this to Louisa. And maybe by the time I come back I’ll have some good news for ye.”
Good news? What good news could Silas possibly bring? Even if Molly lived, which looked doubtful, the poor woman was still trapped here, thanks to him.
And he was still without Sara. He had to get out of bed every day and move forward and work and eat and live, all the while knowing that Sara had not loved him enough to stay. For that matter, he didn’t even know if she had loved him at all. She’d never said she did. Of course, he’d been equally silent on the subject, afraid to put into words something that might make him even more vulnerable than he already was. But he’d lost her anyway, and now it was too late to tell her that without her he was a ship without sails—dull, listless, emptied of meaning.
No wonder his father had drunk himself into a stupor every night after losing the woman he loved. It was one way of getting through the silent nights and the empty, cold days.
Gideon wouldn’t do that, however. He had too much self-respect for that. No, he would just…exist. He would go on. But no matter how he tried, he would never succeed in driving her image from his mind.
With a groan, he dropped his face in his hands. If she had wanted to punish him for all his sins, she’d certainly found the way to do it. He hadn’t realized how much she’d brought to his life until she’d taken it all away, not even giving him a chance to ask her to stay.
Rising from his seat, he thrust his chair aside in sudden anger, watching as it skittered across the new plank floor. That was what made it hardest. She hadn’t waited for him, hadn’t said a word, not even good-bye. She’d slipped away as if eager to take her chance to be rid of him.
And after all she’d said about wanting to help, after all she’d said that night on the deck of the ship…he remembered that night so clearly: the way she’d given him hope, the way she’d goaded him out of his despair by saying they could rebuild Atlantis—
Confound it, what had she said? If you’re willing to fight for it instead of letting it die. Perhaps he hadn’t fought hard enough for her either. She’d gone away, and he’d let her, so angry over her betrayal that he hadn’t acted when he could have.
But now that he looked back on those weeks they’d had together—and especially the last two days—he couldn’t believe she hadn’t meant any of the things she’d said about wanting to marry him and help him rebuild Atlantis. No one had forced her to agree to marry him, after all. And if she’d known her brother was coming to rescue her, why hadn’t she simply resisted Gideon’s attempts at seduction until her brother arrived?
His blood ran cold. Perhaps he’d been too hasty in assuming she wanted to leave. He strained to remember what Ann and Petey had told him that night on the beach. Petey had hinted that Sara had been forced, before Ann had stopped him. And what had Ann said about Sara’s begging her brother not to attack the island? Perhaps it hadn’t been her brother she was concerned about.
He shook his head. He was pinning his hopes on a few chance words and misconstrued meanings.
Yet he couldn’t shake the feeling that something else had gone on that day to make her leave without a word.
“Well, Cap’n,” came a lilting voice from the door, “she’s borne a fine baby girl.”
He turned to find Ann standing there beaming. Relief swept through him, so intense it staggered him. “And she’s all right? And the baby?”
“Both right as rain. Queenie surprised us all, she did, but she knew what she was doin’ and took good care of them both.”
“Thank God somebody knew what to do.” He raked one hand through his hair wearily. “I certainly didn’t.”
Ann started to leave.
“Ann?” he called out.
“Yes, Cap’n?”
“I want you to tell me exactly what happened the day Sara left.”
She dropped her gaze to the floor. “I…I already did.”
“You didn’t tell me everything, did you? You kept something back.”
She drew a circle on the floor with her slippered foot. “It don’t matter what happened that day, Cap’n. Miss Willis will come back soon as she can. I know she will.”
“I can’t wait for that.” He drew in a breath and thought of how close Molly had come to losing her child and her life. “I’m going to England. I’m taking any women who wish to return. I won’t have the blood of any more women on my hands.” He paused, feeling more at peace than he had in a long time. “And I’m going to find Sara, and make her see that her place is here. I have to find her. I must tell her that I need her…that I love her.”
Her gaze flew up to his, fraught with worry and fear. “Oh, but Cap’n, you can’t! You mustn’t! If you go after her, what she did will all be for naught! She’d never forgive me if I let you go! Never!”
He went still. “What do you mean?”
Clapping a hand over her mouth, she stared at him with round eyes.
“Ann, tell me the truth. Why wouldn’t she forgive you? Does she…does she hate me?”
“Oh, no, Cap’n! How could she ever hate you?” Ann twisted her hands in her apron as if debating something. Then she sighed. “Her brother—the earl, that is—he told her he’d raze the island if she didn’t go back with him to England. She feared he’d do it, too. He’d brought plenty of men and guns to do it and was sore determined. He relented only when she agreed to leave with him.”
So Sara hadn’t betrayed him. Sara had done what she always did—sacrificed everything for the ones she loved. Anger filled him—anger at Sara’s broth
er, anger at Ann and Petey for lying to him…and most of all, anger at himself for believing that Sara would ever willingly abandon him.
“Why did you let me think she wanted to leave?” he said in a voice raw with pain as he took a step toward her. “Why would you do that, knowing how I felt about her?”
Guilt shadowed Ann’s face. “I didn’t want to do it. I had to. She made me promise not to tell you the truth, because she was afraid of the very thing you’re speakin’ of. That you’d go to England after her, and get yourself hanged. She feared for your life too much to risk it.”
“As if I have any kind of a life without her,” he bit out. “Now I have to go. I can’t leave her there with her beast of a brother.”
“No, you can’t go after her! It would break her heart if you were caught! She said she’d do whatever she could to return, and I know that she—”
“Do you really think he’ll let her come back here? A man who’d threaten to destroy everything she loves to get her to return with him?” He clenched his fists, wishing he could use them on Sara’s brother. “He won’t let her go. I wouldn’t if I were him.”
“Oh, Cap’n,” Ann wailed, “if the English take you, they’ll hang you!”
“The English haven’t caught me before this,” he said fiercely, “and I certainly won’t let them catch me this time.”
“But—”
“I’m going to England, and that’s the end of it, Ann. Tell the women that I’ll take anyone who wants to return with me. Or if they fear returning to England, I’ll take them to Santiago and pay their passage to wherever they wish.”
Ann’s face mirrored her astonishment. “There are some who would go, but I think most would prefer to stay.”
He softened his tone. “If any of them want to stay, we’ll be happy to have them, of course, whether they choose to marry or not. But I’m done with the business of finding wives for my men. From now on, they’ll have to find wives of their own…willing wives, if I have anything to say about it.”
The Pirate Lord Page 33
