‘For every kind of beast, and bird, and serpent, and thing of the sea, is tamed, and hath been tamed of mankind.
‘But the tongue can no man tame. It is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison.’ Straining further forward he lowered his tone dramatically.
‘Do you hear that? Do you hear? It’s unruly. It’s evil. It’s deadly. It’s poison. And I’ll tell you another thing, it’s damn hypocritical as well. Aye, just you think on it.
‘It says: “Therewith bless we God, even the Father; and therewith curse we men, which are made after the similitude of God.” Out of the same mouth proceedeth blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not to be …’
Annabella could not help feeling impressed and even a little proud of her husband. She had never thought much of his ranting and ravings before and she usually managed to think of other things to while away the time during his sermons. On this occasion, however, she, like the rest of the congregation, was all attention as he expounded on the evils and dangers of gossip and went on, in a voice that echoed in every corner of the church, to ring out another quotation:
‘Speak no evil one of another, brethren. He that speaketh evil of his brother, or his sister,’ he added knowingly, ‘and judgeth his brother, or his sister, speaketh evil of the law, and judgeth the law. But if thou judge the law, thou art not a doer of the law, but a judge.
‘There is one lawgiver, who is also to save and to destroy: who art thou that judgest another?
‘Go to now, ye that say, today or tomorrow we will go into such a city, and continue there a year and buy and sell, and yet again. Whereas ye knew not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life?’ He ended with tears in his eyes and much emotion. ‘It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, then vanishes away.’
There was a silence only broken by miserable sniffling from the congregation. Then Mr Blackadder noisily blew his nose and said quite cheerily.
‘Uh-huh, aye. Weel, I suppose we’d better have a wee prayer noo.’
Afterwards when everyone spilled back outside, Harding was the first one to approach Annabella, bow, and enquire after her health. Lord Butler came next, followed by his wife, albeit in none too warm a fashion. Then Mr and Mistress Burleigh paid their respects.
Public gestures from these people, Annabella knew, were all she needed to assure her of being once more accepted into Williamsburg society. She returned home along the tree-lined street on her husband’s arm, with a gay and thankful heart.
Her feelings of ease, however, were short-lived. Mr Blackadder had no sooner gone visiting his parishioners when Harding called at the house. Nancy came first to tell her that he was waiting in the hall. She was unusually agitated.
‘Take my advice, mistress,’ she urged. ‘Let me send him packing without further ado. Don’t risk having any words with him, I implore you.’
‘Don’t worry, Nancy,’ Annabella said, ‘I have no interest in conversing with such a man. Tell him I do not wish to see him.’
Nancy went to do as she was bid but in a matter of seconds Harding’s giant, rock-like body had come bursting into the room, dwarfing it, making the bright chintz of chairs and curtains shrink and fade.
Annabella said,
‘I see you have not changed, sir. You are still as brutish and ill-mannered as ever.’
‘Will I go and try to find Mr Blackadder, mistress?’ Nancy asked.
‘No, that will not be necessary. I believe that Mr Harding will soon realise he is not welcome here and leave. I will call you if I need you, Nancy.’
Reluctantly Nancy left the room and immediately they were alone Harding said,
‘I have never stopped thinking about you.’
Annabella raised an eyebrow.
‘Indeed?’
‘I am sorry if I distressed you at our last meeting but …’
Annabella let out a sarcastic tinkle of merriment.
‘Distressed me? Distressed me, sir? Surely you should say raped me. You are usually a man of blunt speech, are you not?’
‘No, I am not sorry that I possessed you. That I can never be. Knowing your beautiful and exciting body has been the delight of my life.’
She laughed again.
‘Come, come, sir. It is a pretty speech. But how can you be such a prodigious liar. To say that our brief association meant anything to you is not borne out by facts. You rode away to Port Glasgow that very same night and sailed for Virginia without even a word to me. Nor did you make any attempt to contact me since.’
‘It was no use. Everything was hopeless. I am married.’
‘It is a pity you did not think of that sooner.’
‘I had been drinking solidly all day.’
‘Oh, shame, shame. You are claiming drink as an excuse?’
‘No. I was desperately unhappy. I heard about you and saw you and realised that you were the only woman for me. One way or the other I had to have you.’
‘Am I supposed to be flattered, sir? For I am not.’
‘It was selfish and brutish of me to take you by force. I repeat I am truly sorry that I caused you distress.’
‘I accept your apology. Now goodbye.’
‘Have you no pity?’
‘Pity? You want my pity, Mr Harding?’
‘If you cannot give me your love.’
She laughed.
‘I certainly cannot give you love, sir.’
‘Give me your friendship then.’
She arched a brow.
‘Why should I?’
Suddenly he shouted:
‘Because I ask you to, damn you!’
She laughed again, this time with genuine amusement. She did not know what to make of him. Protestations of love seemed strange coming from such a rugged, broad-shouldered bull of a man. His eyes smouldered with what looked more like fury than affection.
‘If you laugh at me again,’ he said, ‘you cruel, impertinent, wild and beautiful hussy, I shall take you over my knee and thrash you.’
‘You have a prodigiously violent nature, Mr Harding. I am the minister’s wife, don’t forget.’
‘I cannot bear the thought of you tied to such a man.’
‘My husband, sir, is a wondrously good man. I refuse to countenance a word said against him.’
‘Your loyalty does you credit. But I still say your life is wasted with him just as my life is wasted with the person I am married to.’
‘Ah, yes, you think we would have been better married to each other.’
‘I do.’
‘What makes you think that, Mr Harding? I care nothing for you.’
‘I would make you care.’
‘By thrashing me, no doubt.’
‘We could have a full and exciting life.’
‘Fiddlesticks!’
‘Come here!’
Before she could answer, he had grabbed her into his arms and his mouth was on hers. She struggled and eventually freed herself but not before she had experienced a disturbing emotion. It was like an electric storm, thrilling yet frightening and not in the least pleasant. She felt convinced that, like the electric storm, it was better to be without such an experience.
‘I think it’s time you left, Mr Harding,’ she managed, escaping to the door and calling on Nancy before he could touch her again.
He hesitated, his eyes glistening like knife-points and making her flinch and look away. Then without another word he strode from the room.
‘Damn the monstrous creature,’ she thought afterwards. ‘Damn him! Damn him!’
25
‘IS REGINA seeing to your every need?’ Harding asked his wife. As he stood at the end of her bed, the whip he was holding kept tapping impatiently against one of his riding boots.
Back home and propped in her own four-poster bed at Forest Hall, a patchwork quilt tucked high round her twisted face, Kitty Harding was still unable to speak. But she managed to nod her head.
‘I have ordered Doctor Mason to attend you
regularly until you are cured.’
She nodded again, her eyes wide with gratitude. He turned abruptly away and, as if unable to remain a moment longer, strode from the room. Regina waited for a few minutes, glancing round to see that everything was in order and going over to straighten the coverlet on the bed. But when Mistress Kitty’s hand reached out seeking hers she drew away.
‘I’ll send Jenny up to keep you company. I’m going out for a walk but I’ll come back and read to you.’
She left the silent, stuffy room, clean now but still cluttered and claustrophobic, and descended the stairs. Collecting her cloak on the way she left the house and went round to the kitchen building. The kitchen was also much cleaner than it had been in the past. Wooden tables and shelves had been scrubbed, pans and kettles gleamed, joints of meat hung in neat rows from the ceiling beams.
‘Jenny,’ Regina called sharply. ‘Go upstairs and sit with Mistress Harding until I return.’
The wind was blowing hard and she had to put up her hood and hug her cloak around herself. But she was glad to escape from the house so that she could think in peace. In the bedroom that she shared with Mistress Kitty she was constantly aware of the older woman’s eyes upon her. It was an even worse distraction than her prattling voice had been. She had not been able to gather enough nerve to take over another bedroom for herself but she had ordered a large closet in Mistress Kitty’s room to be cleared and a bed put in there. So at least she was not forced to sleep with the woman any more.
As she walked along, head bent against the wind and cloak tugging and flapping, she mulled over her recent visit to Williamsburg. The attack in the ballroom crept about at the back of her mind like a spider but, shrinking away from it, she tried to concentrate on Williamsburg’s spacious houses and gardens sweet-smelling with flowers and rustling with trees. The shops, too, had been places of attraction with their stocks of coloured silk petticoats, aprons and hoods, dress caps, stomachers and knots, French flowers for trimming, silk gloves and mitts, leather and brown thread, fine Irish muslins for ladies’ gowns and many other articles.
One day she and Gav would visit Williamsburg from their own plantation and they would wander around these shops making purchases. Already she had begun compiling lists of things they would need for their house as well as for their persons. The personal articles would be mostly for Gav because she had many gowns and other possessions that Mistress Kitty had given her.
She had made inquiries about the price of land, too, but it was not so much that expense that worried her. Slaves would have to be bought to work their plantation. Tobacco growing needed a great many workers if it were going to be a paying proposition of the kind she envisaged. She wondered if it might be better to make do with Gav’s fifty acres at first and have enough slaves to work it. Then, after Gav and she had sold a couple of crops, and could afford it, they could buy more land. Such thoughts and dreams obsessed most of her waking hours. She was more truly in the house and on the plantation that one day she and Gav would own than she was in the house and plantation owned by Robert Harding.
‘What are you doing out here?’ Harding’s voice slashed unexpectedly through her thoughts. He reined his horse to a halt near her. She could smell it and feel the steam from it and feel the little earth tremors as it pawed the ground.
‘Walking and taking the air. I left Jenny with Mistress Kitty.’
‘It’s pouring with rain,’ he said.
She hadn’t noticed the rain, so deep and safe had she been in her dreams. Now, looking up at Harding, she became aware of icy water whipping her cheeks and blurring her vision. She said:
‘I suppose I’d better turn back.’
‘You can ride with me.’ Suddenly, leaning down, he hoisted her up to sit side saddle in front of him.
His arms enclosed her on either side as they held the reins and she felt the jerk of his body hard against hers as he kicked the horse’s flank to urge it on. She sat as still as the movement of the horse permitted, her stillness coming from deep inside. It was as if she were spiritually paralysed or waiting like a cornered hypnotised animal. Eventually Harding said:
‘You’re a strange female. What age are you?’
‘Sixteen, nearly seventeen.’
‘My wife had hopes of marrying you off.’
‘I’ve no wish to be married.’
‘Why not?’
‘I don’t like men.’
He gave a short burst of laughter.
‘That could soon be cured by the right man.’
‘No.’
‘You’ll have to marry sometime.’
‘No.’
‘It may not always be possible for you to live here.’
‘I’ll live somewhere else.’
‘Now that you’re such a beauty, no wife would trust you in her house.’
‘Your wife did.’
‘My wife is a fool.’
Regina would have liked to say, ‘She was a fool to have married you,’ but she hadn’t the nerve. Instead she lowered her head and muttered,
‘I have my plans.’
‘Yes, I don’t doubt that. I’ve often wondered what schemes you were hatching during your long silences.’
Keeping her head lowered and her gaze averted she made no reply. His nearness and the way they swayed together in tune with the animal beneath them tortured and confused her. His arms, like two iron bars imprisoning her against the heat of his body, made her feel safe, yet at the same time in terrifying danger. Never before had she been so glad to see Forest Hall.
He lifted her down and no sooner had her feet touched the ground that she hurried away into the house. Running up the stairs she did not look back to see if Harding had followed her indoors, but she heard another of his abrupt humourless laughs before she burst into the bedroom. After ordering the servant to leave, she shut the door. Leaning against it taking deep breaths, she felt too distressed to care about Mistress Kitty’s large eyes riveted upon her.
She couldn’t understand what was happening to her. She seemed to be breaking up into two people. One part of herself hated all men, was sickened and revolted by them; another part was causing her fear and confusion by unexpectedly different reactions to Harding. There were times when one part of herself actually admired him, admired his hardness, his abrupt dogmatic manner, even his craggy face and hefty muscular body.
Now more acute and frightening feelings were taking possession of her. Trembling against the door, she struggled to quell them. The tingling excitement of Harding’s body rubbing against hers as they swayed together on the horse. The easy strength of his arms as he lifted her down. The closeness of him. The heat.
Stumbling away from the door she tore off her cloak and flung it aside. Then she dabbed at her face with the cool water in the jug on the washstand. Feeling calmer she sat down in front of the dressing-table and with slow determined strokes brushed her hair and arranged the long thick curl that hung over the front of one shoulder.
All the time, Mistress Kitty’s eyes watched her through the looking-glass. As last she rose and went out of the room to call down to Jenny that she would have her meal with Mistress Kitty instead of in the dining-room. Then, picking up a book, she went over to sit by the bed, but not too close so that Mistress Kitty could not reach her to touch her. She read without interest or feeling in her voice. The spiders were multiplying in her mind but she was ignoring them. She was thinking of the bedroom she would have in her own house. She was thinking of how she would go downstairs and have her meals with Gav and of how they would be happy and safe together.
Her voice was still droning on when the door opened and Harding towered in the doorway.
‘You’ll come downstairs and have your meals in the dining-room as usual, mistress.’
‘I want to stay with Mistress Kitty.’
‘You’ll do as you’re told.’ With that he swung the door shut.
She sat with head bowed staring at the book yet unable to continue read
ing it. Eventually she said,
‘I hate that brute. I wish I had never come here.’ It was as if they were two magnets and their hatred was drawing them together. The thought terrified her. ‘I hate him. I wish I was back at the store with Gav. But it won’t be long now until his indenture is finished. Then we’ll have our own place and I won’t need to care about anyone.’
Gav often thought of the time he would be free but he did not think of it in the same way as Regina. He was happy working in the store. Since Regina had gone he worked mostly downstairs and he enjoyed meeting and talking with the folk who came in to do business. He had plenty of help too in the shape of Tom, another, younger indentured servant and also Booster and Coolidge, Negro slaves purchased by Mr Speckles on behalf of Master Ramsay. There was Mamma Sophy too, who cooked for Mr Speckles and himself. Mr Speckles enjoyed a good dram but unfortunately did not have the constitution to contain it. Often the morning after having had a few too many, he was unable to lift himself from his bed. There he would moan and groan and feebly writhe about, hair straggling across a sickly green face, skeleton fingers plucking at the blankets.
Mamma Sophy would cluck her tongue and shake her black head and say,
‘Liquor goin’ be the death o’ that pore man.’
And she would puff up and down the stairs with tempting delicacies to try and put some strength back into the invalid. But many’s the time she complained about how inconvenient the layout of the store building was.
‘What they make this stair outside fo’? And why’s the eatin’ room not downstairs? And what’s this kitchen hut stuck on the back o’ the store fo’?’
But as she scolded herself most of the time, nobody paid much heed to her.
More and more Mr Speckles depended on Gav to run the place. Gav didn’t mind in the least. He thrived on the extra responsibility. The longer he worked in the store, the more he realised that that was what he wanted to do. One day he would be a store manager, just as Master Ramsay had predicted he would. Regina was wrong about Ramsay. Back in Glasgow she had spoken of him with hate and prophesied that he meant to ruin Gav’s life by sending him to Virginia and that he meant to sell him to the plantations as a slave.
The Tobacco Lords Trilogy Page 53
