A feeling of acute unease brought Ameline to her feet. Her spine stiffened as the handle of her bedroom door was slowly turned.
‘Who’s there?’ Her voice came out as an unrecognisable squeak.
The door was opened fully. Ameline’s eyes enlarged in their sockets, her throat constricted to choking point.
‘I… I thought you would be at sea…’
‘I have delayed leaving until a later tide,’ Hezekiah Solomon poured through his teeth.
His smile did nothing to lessen her horror. Ameline lurched backwards until her back hit a bedpost. She could not tear herself away from his steely-blue snake’s eyes.
‘What… what do… do you want? Why are you here?’
‘I’ve come to keep you company, Ameline.’
‘I… I have plenty of company, Captain Solomon. Kerensa—’
‘Is fast asleep. I crept into the house unseen. There is no one about. No one knows that I am here.’
Ameline watched petrified as he slipped off his brocaded frockcoat and took meticulous care to fold it and place it over the chair she had vacated. Seemingly from out of nowhere he produced a thin stiletto blade and after testing the point on a fingertip in front of her stricken eyes he placed it on her jewellery case. As he came towards her, soundless as a cat, there was not a hint of expression on his ageless face.
* * *
Ameline had drifted off into a short dreamless sleep. When she awoke Hezekiah had not moved but lay still with his arm, hot and moist, under her shoulders. She had not struggled or pleaded with him, she had been too scared, but he had not hurt her. His touch had been light and silky and he had patiently coaxed her young, inexperienced body until it was entirely relaxed and responsive. His expertise had magnified her terror, giving her shame, making her hate herself; it hadn’t been a natural loving gentleness but something pitiless and calculated to add to his own pleasure. There had been no pain and his body was smooth, light and strangely soft and warm. She felt strangely elated now, wanting to laugh, cry, shout, and sing. He had forced himself upon her and made himself her first lover, and yet, cruelly somehow, she felt he had taken her to the heights of fulfilment.
With a liberal-minded mother like Rachael she had not been brought up to think that the act of physical union was something a woman had to endure, but surely the first time was usually uncomfortable. Ameline knew now that Bartholomew Drannock had offered her no more than the selfish gropings of a lusty youth. With him it would have been clumsy, painful and far more degrading than what she had just experienced.
She raised herself on an elbow and looked down into Hezekiah’s face. He was over fifty, or so she thought, but there was hardly a wrinkle in his smooth, perfumed skin. If he had asked her at that moment, Ameline would have agreed to marry him, even become his mistress. Although he would undoubtedly have slit her throat if she had resisted him earlier, now, she would willingly have departed with him on the next tide. For one mad moment her mind and body surged with the desire to warm his ice-cold heart with the fire of her love. Hezekiah turned his head and looked back at her and his eyes deepened into shards of kaleidoscopic colours. She could see pure evil there. She gulped and shuddered. He returned his gaze to the canopy above them; Ameline was dismissed.
He made no attempt to stop her fleeing to the tiny connecting room where some of her clothes were kept and where Peters slept. Numbly she dressed herself. When she returned to the bedroom Hezekiah had gone, and with him the jewelled stiletto. The bedcovers were smoothed down without a crease. She sat back at her dressing table and trying not to think she proceeded to arrange her hair in its usual style.
Then for over an hour she cried her heart out. She had known terror, numbness, hysteria and a kind of madness, all in a very short time. But at the end of her distressed weeping her mind was clear and she knew exactly what she would do. She would return at once to Tolwithrick and ask her father to send for the one man she knew she could trust, and perhaps one day, as he deserved, she would truly return his love and devotion. With him she would be able to leave Cornwall and she would never return and risk facing the man who had so coldly violated her, the man she hated with all her being, whom she could never bring to justice for his heinous crime for fear of retribution and the risk of losing the man she now wanted to spend the rest of her life with. Ameline intended to tell the comfortable, serious, uncomplicated James Mortreath she would be honoured to accept his proposal of marriage.
* * *
When Hezekiah Solomon returned to his ship, after spending the evening at a brothel, there was someone waiting for him on board.
‘You have a passenger, Hezekiah, I was going to seek a berth on any ship going across the Channel but as you have delayed setting sail…’ Oliver leaned against an overhead beam, his over-generous height preventing him, as it did Clem only hours before, from standing fully upright. A packed canvas bag sat on Hezekiah’s table.
‘You really mean to sail with me, Oliver?’
‘I do. Now the festive season’s over I’m leaving Cornwall for a while.’
‘I see. For how long?’ Hezekiah wanted to question him further but Oliver’s gaunt expression spoke of an intention to keep his reason to himself.
‘That remains to be seen. I’ve made all the necessary arrangements at home, the Renfrees and O’Flynn, and Angove the head gardener and even Jack are all capable men, they’ll see to everything between them in my absence. I’ve taken the liberty of opening a cask of your boot-legged brandy. Will you join me?’ Oliver gave a shudder that made Hezekiah raise his silky eyebrows. He explained, ‘I’ve not long since seen a sight so hideous that it will haunt me throughout the rest of the night.’
‘Oh? What was that?’ Hezekiah asked, taking a glass of his own brandy and warming the bowl in his delicate hands.
‘A body. A man’s body, at least I think it was a man’s. It was badly slashed and cut up, and apparently left in the gutter for hours in the belief it was an animal. I am told there were parts of it everywhere. I’ve seen men killed on the battlefield, but this… ugh! Some believe him to be a sailor – not one of your ship, I hope.’
Hezekiah smiled. It had been a very good day. ‘Have no fears, my crew are all safely on board to a man. Drink up, my friend, and put it out of your mind. It will be good to have the company of a gentleman on the journey, but I can delay leaving port if you’d like time to reconsider your plans.’
‘No!’ Oliver said adamantly. ‘My mind is made up.’
‘Then let us raise our glasses to the Channel Islands.’
Oliver looked blankly into his glass. ‘Yes… but that won’t be the end of my journey.’
Chapter 21
Nothing could thaw the deathly coldness Kerensa felt inside. She pushed Charity away without realising she had done it, unaware of the dog’s hurt looks before it moved away and flopped down in front of the hearth. She crumpled the dampened folds of her cloak between tensed hands. She sighed over and over. She flicked the tips of her nails together, making tiny clicking sounds that set Clem’s nerves on edge and made Charity blink every time.
Clem watched her anxiously. ‘Kerensa, is there anything I can get you?’ he asked gently, hoping to counter her vacant stare. ‘Shall I make up a fire?’
It was ages before she answered and he was about to repeat the question when she whispered, ‘No, thank you, Clem. You’ve got a tidy blaze going already. Won’t people wonder why there’s smoke coming out of the chimney of this house?’
‘No, the neighbours are used to me calling here when Mr Barbary goes on a long visit to Lamorna. I’ve been doing this for years, keeping an eye on the place for the old boy. I usually light the fire if it’s been cold and damp for several days to keep the house aired out.’
‘Where did you meet him, this Mr Barbary?’
‘At the Bible classes. When he said he was afraid of having a break-in with the house standing empty for long periods at a time, I offered to look in on it from time to time. You
know me, my little sweet,’ he smiled, ‘if I get the chance to spend some time alone I take it. It’s even better with you here.’
‘It’s a nice little house,’ Kerensa moved her eyes round the four white-washed walls, ‘in reasonably good repair except for that creaking window.’ She settled her gaze on its small square panes. Raindrops were sliding down to merge with others and form links like strands of diamonds. ‘I take it Mr Barbary is comfortably off.’
‘Kerensa, my dearest love.’ Clem moved to her side on the settle. He took her hands from her lap, peeled off her gloves and rubbed her stiff fingers. ‘You have no real interest in who lives here or in what circumstances. What is it, what’s happened? You’re in a worse state than you were a couple of days ago.’
In a pitiful whimper, she replied, ‘He’s gone, Clem.’
He eased her against him and wrapped her in his arms in the same way he did with Jessica when she was upset or in pain. ‘Who’s gone, my love?’
‘Oliver… he’s left me… and the children.’
Clem was relieved she couldn’t see the shock on his face. This was the last thing he had expected.
‘Left you? But surely not for good, Kerensa, he’d never leave you for good, he’ll be back. He’s probably gone away to one of his business meetings.’
‘No, he hasn’t, it’s not like that. I knew he’d been trying to tell me something just before I rode to Perranbarvah to see Bartholomew. He came back from Ker-an-Mor later in the day and found me lying abed and Ameline packing up to leave. He was very quiet and after the children were in bed he told me he was going away. He said he was sorry that we hadn’t spent the day together because it would be the last day for a long time. I pleaded with him to stay, at least not to go until we had worked things out between us, but he insisted he had to go away before he could do that. Far away from Cornwall. Far away from me! From everything until he’s sorted it all out in his mind about us and Samuel Drannock. He refused to tell me where he was going or when he’s coming back.’ She swung round and clung to Clem with considerable force, digging her nails into his neck. ‘What will I do, Clem? He might stay away for months, years. He might never come back! What will I do?’
He fought to control her clawing hands and held her tightly until her trembling ceased. She cried with her heart breaking and he whispered in her ear, ‘You’ve done the only thing you need to do. You’ve turned to me, my love. You’ll always have me, I’ll never let you down.’
She looked up with frightened eyes. ‘Oh, Clem, why didn’t I marry you when I should have done! I loved you and yet I treated you so badly. Now I’m paying for it.’
‘No, Kerensa, that’s not how I see it is. It cuts me to the quick to admit it but you love Pengarron more than you could ever love me and despite everything I’m sure he loves you very much too. I don’t want it to be that way… because I want you all to myself. I know it’s selfish of me but I can’t stop loving you.’
‘And I’ll always love you, Clem,’ she said softly, then her ravaged feelings came to the fore and she said resentfully, ‘You would never leave me. Why did he have to go? Why is he making me suffer like this? Must I be punished for ever? It’s not fair, I tell you it just isn’t fair!’
‘Don’t, Kerensa,’ Clem pleaded, ‘don’t get bitter.’
‘I’m sorry,’ she whimpered, and went limp in his arms.
Clem stroked her hair and held her close. ‘I have one comfort for you, my love. I promise that you’ll never be bothered with the sailor again. You can at least live in peace that Kane will be safe for ever from any threat from him.’
‘What did you do, Clem?’ Kerensa murmured against his chest, and although she trusted Clem she became tense again.
‘Well, after you left me the day before yesterday I went to see Cap’n Solomon.’
‘Hezekiah? Why him? I thought he had sailed on the early-morning tide.’
‘He changed his mind apparently. I’d noticed his ship moored up at the Mount before I brought you in here out of the rain. I went aboard the Free Spirit and asked him to help us.’
‘What did he say?’ she asked, looking anxiously at him now. ‘Did he do something?’
‘We talked, and he was only too happy to help. He said he happened to know the sailor was wanted for a hanging offence, somewhere abroad he said it was, it’s of no matter where. He assured me he’d take the sailor back to see justice done. You can forget all about him.’
Kerensa sighed, then said in a small voice. ‘If Hezekiah didn’t sail until later perhaps Oliver sailed with him. He didn’t take Conomor when he left.’
‘You think he’s gone across the Channel then?’
‘He could have. I thought perhaps he’d just gone off somewhere close by to think. I sent Jack over to Mullion to look around our cottage there but the caretaker had seen no sign of him. If he’s gone overseas, it suggests he’ll be gone for a long time.’
‘I’ll wait with you, Kerensa,’ Clem said softly.
She traced a finger down his cheek, ‘Yes, I know you will.’
They looked into each other’s eyes. Clem smiled. It was the same gentle smile that had looked at her every day of their betrothal long years ago. It made her feel special, so loved and cherished. If she had married Clem he would never have let hurt and resentment overshadow his love for her. His love would have grown only stronger over the years.
She smiled back then kissed his cheek. He returned it. She kissed his other cheek then ran a fingertip over his lips. He looked deeper into her, searching her eyes. Her lips sought his and kissed them lightly. He held her closer and tried to put her face against his shoulder but Kerensa kissed him again.
‘What are you doing, Kerensa?’ he whispered.
‘You like me kissing you, don’t you?’
‘Of course I do.’
‘Then don’t talk,’ she smiled.
Clem kissed her gently, relishing the feel of her soft mouth under his but when it ended, Kerensa clung to him.
‘I want you, Clem,’ she said huskily, kissing him fervently. ‘I want you…’
‘Do you know what you’re doing, Kerensa?’ and now his voice was husky as he held her face away from his.
‘I love you, I always have and at this moment I need you. Please, Clem, don’t hold back from me.’
He could no more resist her plea than he could stop breathing. He allowed himself to be overwhelmed by the sensations of her body pressing into his. It had been so long since he had kissed her like this, so long since he had held her and felt that at last she could be his.
Disengaging herself, Kerensa stood up from the settle and untied the ribbons at the neck of her cloak. Clem watched trance-like as the black voluminous cloth fluttered to the floor in slow folding movements.
Clem lowered his arms to allow her to push off his coat, then she took his hands and led him across the room to the other door. He opened the door, and together they crossed the threshold of Mr Barbary’s bedroom. The room was cold but rather than allow the heat from the fire to filter through, Kerensa closed the door against the rest of the world.
Moving to either side of the small narrow bed they discarded their clothes and lay side by side under Mr Barbary’s sheet and blankets. Kerensa was shivering but did not notice the cold. Taking Clem’s hand she moved into his arms. He gasped at the sensation of her skin against his and was lost the next moment as she lay over his chest and kissed him with hungry passion.
He loosened all restraining pins from her hair, then slowly and gently he turned until he lay over her. He clasped both her hands on the pillow above her head. He was aware of every sensitive part of her body, it screamed at him to give her release and fulfilment.
But tears suddenly stung his eyes as he knew with a deep painful ache that he could not possess her. He couldn’t bring himself to perform the act of love that would meet their long-time need, that would claim her as his own. Not after what she had told him two days ago. Not when he was so fully aware of the
outward curve of her gently rounded stomach – and the presence of another man’s baby living and growing between them.
The tension and desire left Kerensa when she realised Clem had stopped returning her love. She read the pain in his eyes and pulling her hands from his she tenderly wiped away his tears. Then they cried together. They held on to each other, their nakedness no embarrassment or barrier to their special need for closeness and comfort. They stroked each other, not intimately as in the way of wakening a physical response or in the natural winding down after the deep emotional release of lovemaking, but to give reassurance and affection.
‘I hate to see you hurt like this,’ Clem said, his voice carrying fragments of his anguished emotions.
‘Why, Clem?’ she whispered. ‘Why did you stop?’
‘I couldn’t go through with it, not with your body showing the beginning of the new life you’re bearing. It’s not my baby. It reminded me you’re another man’s wife, and that you love him more than me. Kerensa,’ he moved to look at her full in the face, ‘I know you love me and in your distress it was all too easy to turn to me, to make love with me and block out your pain. Tell me this, my love, how would you be feeling now if we had made love? Could you look me in the face without the horror coming to you of what we’d done.’
Pengarron Pride Page 27
