Souls Dryft

by Jayne Fresina

  "You have no right!" I repeated.

  "I have every right," he hollered. "Shall you apologize now and promise never to spy on me again? Shall you say, Yes, sir and Thank you, sir and Anything you say, sir, to me in future with all due deference?" He paused, breathing thickly. "Beg my forgiveness, or I shall proceed."

  "Never! Do as you please then, I can take your blows." I twisted around in his lap. "Why dally? Beat me as my husband did and I shall curse you, as I did him!"

  There was a very odd look on his face. Too late, I remembered my ears and how fond I was of them. Ready to protest again, my lips flew open, but his mouth covered mine, stealing the curses out of it. I could not believe his audacity. His tongue was purposeful and arrogant, just like its master. He tried to devour me, one hand tangled in my hair, holding the back of my head — the other on my waist, inching upward slyly. Although I squirmed, pushing my hands into his shoulders, he was not done until his lungs needed air; only then did he loosen his hold.

  Before my feet touched the ground, I was running.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Arriving home in a state of undress, a fierce stitch in my side, I took sanctuary in the apple tree. Bob Salley hovered by the great front door, looking even more irritable than usual and I had no desire for his lectures. Shaken to the core by the memory of the Captain’s unexpected kiss, I needed time alone to gather my wits.

  A distant plume of dust appeared in the lane, gradually getting larger, until it formed the shape of my uncle on horseback. Cantering under the gatehouse, he was met by the grim-faced steward, eager to spill bad tidings.

  "You’ll never guess what jiggery pokery be afoot now." Bob Salley danced about, as if he had stones in his shoes. "I told him you don’t care for folk sitting in your house when you en’t home, but he would not be moved."

  I had a dreadful hollow feeling in my belly and considered staying in my tree forever. Alas, curiosity won out again and I climbed down to follow them across the yard. Through the open cookhouse shutters, Broad Bess could be heard scolding the new kitchen lad who had fallen asleep at the spit. The thick odor of burnt pork followed us into the hall, along with her ribald curses. It took a moment for our eyes to adjust to the darkness, but a tall shape unraveled itself from the shadows beside the gaping hearth and there was just enough creeping sun to outline his unmistakable profile.

  "Baron Deptford, I beg a word with you."

  "See," Bob Salley exclaimed, "no manners. Came charging up to your door on his sweatin’ beast, hollerin’ fer Scrapper like this were a dockside hovel. I said to him—"

  He was abruptly cut off by my uncle’s hand pressed into his face, pushing him firmly to one side. "Well, now," said my uncle, beady eyes slowly sweeping upward to take in the full height and breadth of the enemy before us. "To what do we owe this honor?"

  "Or to whom," the villain replied, looking at me. He must have taken shortcuts across fields to beat me home and lurk in wait. Being a Carver, he would get away with shortcuts, naturally.

  My uncle grew a few more inches, like a neglected plant that spied rain clouds on the horizon. "You took your time, feller."

  "Shall I tell them why I stayed away so long?" the pirate demanded of me, tapping his riding crop against his boots. "Shall I tell of your sad demise?"

  "It was naught to do with me at all," I cried hastily, "You had better pickings in mind!"

  My uncle’s head snapped around. "What’s this?"

  "He plans to marry another — some Lady Moneybags. That nonsense about my behavior being unacceptable and how it would be a mistake to marry me – it was all a masquerade, because he has a better prospect."

  "I changed my mind." He idly swung his riding crop, enjoying the cat he’d thrown among the pigeons. "Today is the day to put things right."

  Running to see what the ruckus was about, Bagobones first thought he came for her; when she saw this was not so, her quivering breaths became one long, distressed mewl. She was joined by her sister, who moved at a much calmer glide, like the cookhouse cat, come to see if any crumbs were likely.

  Bouncing on his heels, my uncle exclaimed, "Well, you missed your chance, we’ve other fish on our hook now. Good day to you, Carver. ‘Tis time for my supper."

  Anyone more thin-skinned would have left immediately. Having no sensitive bone in his body, however, Will Carver followed us to the table and claimed a seat beside me. My uncle was now more interested in the food, than he was in throwing anybody out, and when Bob Salley came to complain in his ear, he received the curt reminder that his stinking breath was enough to singe hair from a man’s nostrils and put anyone off their supper.

  A deathly stillness settled over me, my senses filled by Will Carver’s nearness, the heat of his body and the odor of sun-baked leather. His hands were broad, masterful, thrice the size of my own. I looked across at his scarred knuckles and thought of him hammering those slate tiles into place with such determination, the sweat dripping down his forehead. Like those tiles, he wanted me in my place.

  Food was passed around the table and he stabbed at it with his knife, eating like a man starved. My uncle’s wine was similarly devoured. Only the women seemed at all put out. Mary Sourpout stared in sheer wonderment, while her sister’s eyes turned brown about the edges, like dry leaves smoldering on a bonfire. My uncle watched his uninvited guest with barely constrained amusement, even calling for another jug of wine as the first was emptied. It occurred to me that he enjoyed the rarity of male company. It must have been a pleasant change from a house full of women.

  Mary could not remain silent long. The company of another man at the table was fresh meat for her talons. "Captain Carver," she said, "why have you never considered marriage until now? After all, if you were a woman, you might be called an old maid."

  He considered his answer carefully. "Men have many responsibilities and must be capable of providing for a wife, before we look for one."

  She sighed. "How fortunate we are that men carry all the burdens for us. I thank the Good Lord every day, for the hand he dealt me — the sweet liberty of womanhood."

  Red faced beneath his beard, her father muttered, "And so you damn well ought to be thankful. If you were a man, I’d have tossed you out on your ear long since, but as you’re a woman, I’m obliged to keep you fed and clothed, until some other bugger takes you off my hands." Then he bellowed at the Captain. "And so, Carver, you give me the deed to Souls Dryft and you can have the Scrapper." He knew little of subtlety, of course, and this abrupt turnabout surprised no one, except the Captain, who choked on his burnt supper.

  "The deed is not mine yet."

  "But it shall be soon," my uncle prodded.

  Bagobones burst into tears, Sourpout snorted with laughter and I shouted that I would not be bartered. Raising his hand for silence, my uncle said, "Does the contract stand, Carver?"

  My cousins looked on – one in tearful jealousy, the other with macabre interest. The trap closed in. After all I did to make him see how disagreeable I was, the Captain still wavered.

  "For the Love of Saint Pete," I exclaimed, "I think that fall you took as a boy truly did dent that thick head of yours."

  He leapt to his feet. "Damn you, woman! You in…insult me for the l…last time."

  I thought he was about to commit murder, and so I acted in my own defense. You will not be surprised to know I took a knife from the table and stabbed him in the thigh.

  But you might be surprised to know what happened next.

  Part Three

  Villainous Pirates and Cunning Tricks

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Grace

  Sabotage. The plumber insisted it was the work of someone intent on sabotage, stabbing holes in his pipes.

  Having developed a rotten cold, I was in no mood for arguments. "Fix this mess today, or I’ll find anubber dab plubber."

  "Yer sweatin’ like a horse." He wrinkled his nose; leaning away from me, he looked as if he might hold up a crucifix.r />
  I blew my nose loudly on a frayed tissue and dropped to the nearest chair, suddenly exhausted. Everything was falling apart – the house, my bank account, me. This fight took the strength out of me, and I don’t mean the fight for the house. Genny was after my body, and there were times, I was sure, when she took over.

  "Grace? Good Heavens, what have you done now?" My mother was in the doorway, looking for somewhere to put her feet, her tone suggesting I was personally responsible for the mess, as if I tore up the floor with my bare hands. My father peered over her shoulder, wide-eyed with wonder at the amount of destruction his daughter caused.

  "You should have told me you were coming," I sputtered.

  Her sucking-on-a-lemon expression was one with which I was familiar. Nothing I ever did met with her approval and I believe she sincerely thought I did it purposely to annoy her.

  "It’s just a burst pipe," I mumbled.

  Finally her eyes traveled full circle and found me again, just as I sneezed. "Tsk, tsk. You need an aspirin. And you look dreadful!"

  "Thanks. Would you like some tea?" It was just about all I had left in the pantry – apart from some Mr. Kipling's Bakewell Tarts, which I was certainly not willing to share. Sorry, but a woman has to have something to look forward to.

  She shivered, clasping her handbag in both hands. "Here? In all this dust?" Appalled by the idea, she tucked her chin into her neck. "You’d better come back to the Rogue’s Repentance and have afternoon tea."

  They were staying at the Inn? Oh no. I knew immediately why they were there. They came to talk me out of this, of course.

  * * * *

  My father drove us to the Inn, taking the narrow, windy lanes at the pace of a funeral procession, braking every time he saw a cow in a field, just incase it might suddenly leap over the fence into the road.

  "Didn’t Clive send you an invite?" my mother was saying. As usual I’d blocked a good part of her conversation out, but there was something about a birthday party for Marian.

  "Nope."

  "It’s a surprise party. Clive’s organizing it all. Of course, he’s very good at things like that." This started her off on one of her fondest subjects – Clive the Saint.

  "I don’t think I can make it," I muttered, staring out of the car window as the verges crawled by.

  "Why?" she demanded, screwing her head round to look at me. "What have you got to do?" I mumbled about the house and my writing and not having anything to wear. "You really should make an effort for your sister’s thirtieth birthday," she said sharply.

  I was suddenly thirteen again, sitting in the back of the car, being shouted at. Marian should be next to me, pulling faces, stretching her long, bony leg out to kick the back of our mother’s seat. I’d get the blame, of course. When I protested the injustice, I’d be told to "pipe down" because I was in enough trouble as it was and giving them all a headache.

  Bizarrely, I missed Marian. We might never have chosen one another as friends, yet we were born into the same family, forced to endure the same experiences. We’d sat in the backseat of a procession of cars, listening to the bickering, while we strained to hear the radio and suffered the scalding pain that comes from sitting, in shorts, on a black vinyl car seat in summer. We’d both suffered stews and soups made of something we were quite certain wasn’t any kind of meat legally served to children, forced to sit at the table and finish, even when the cartoons were coming on.

  I was feeling quite nostalgic, but of course I’d done a lot of memory searching since moving into the house. Several hundred years’ worth of memories. "Can’t you go any faster, Dad?"

  "You’re always in such a hurry to get somewhere, Grace."

  "If she knew where she was going," my mother exclaimed, "that would be one thing. But she’s always so scattered."

  "Hello," I waved at the rear view mirror. "I’m still here, you know. You don’t have to talk about me as if I’m not."

  "There’s no need to be sarcastic. You’ve always got a tone, Grace. It’s very harsh and unbecoming."

  Umm. I wonder where I got my tone from.

  Her head bobbed. "You’re so critical of everybody and always so defensive. No wonder that Jack person finally left. And after losing that baby and everything, when he was so good to you, looking after you when you came out of hospital, I really thought you’d make more effort to keep him."

  I was stunned. After all this time, she brought it up to slap me across the face with it. She never liked Jack when he was around; now, suddenly, it was all my fault that he left. I only told them he took care of me, because I didn’t want them to think badly of him, but I looked after myself, like I always did. And Jack did what he always did – looked after himself. Jack felt guilty, because he hadn’t ever wanted that baby, and when it was gone it was a relief. Not that he could say that. But he wasn’t very good at hiding his thoughts to save other people’s feelings; he certainly never bothered about mine. He wasn’t a bad man, just a self-centered one who expected me to fit around his life and grew frustrated when I couldn’t. Or wouldn’t.

  My father made a low, grumbling sound and cleared his throat— the signal to her that she’d gone too far. Her response was to sniff, turn her head and glower through the passenger window at any poor sod who had the misfortune to be out there.

  "I daresay Jack would have talked some sense into you about this house business," she replied briskly.

  I wished Marian was there to kick the back of her seat for me.

  Once we got to the Inn, my father drove round the car park for twenty minutes, until she was happy with a spot. Goldilocks had nothing on my mother.

  "Do up your coat, Grace," she snapped. "You won’t get better, if you walk about with your coat flapping open in weather like this."

  I wondered if there was ever an age one could reach when other people stopped telling you to do up your coat and left you to your own devices. If people suddenly stopped reminding us and we all ran about with our coats brazenly undone, would we be struck down with pneumonia? Would the death toll rise to epidemic proportions, as a consequence of this lax undoing of coat buttons?

  Afternoon tea was served in the small lobby of the Inn, where there was a fireplace, chintz sofas and leather chairs. Meant to be casual country house elegance, it might have passed my mother’s inspection, if not for the decidedly "low class" gossip magazines and tabloids littering the coffee table. She shuffled them together and tucked them under a cushion, incase anyone walking by thought they were ours. Rather than relax in her chair, she perched on the edge, her bag clutched in her lap, her eyes continually watching the door for any arrival more exciting than her present, pedestrian company.

  "Have you seen a doctor?" Dad asked.

  "For a cold?"

  "I don’t know why you bother telling her," my mother interrupted. "She never listens."

  "I don’t need a medical degree to diagnose a cold."

  Wasting no more time on small talk, she launched into a half hour harangue about the house, urging me to concede defeat and go home. When I told her I’d asked Marian to sell my flat, because I had no intention of returning, you’d think I was running off with the circus. As she watched me lick my finger and use it to gather chocolate flakes from my plate, the horror stretched her face tight.

  "Why don’t you do something with that hair?" she exclaimed. "Get a cut like Marian’s." As usual, she ignored the fact that Marian’s hair type was nothing like mine. "And what are you wearing? Haven’t you got any clean clothes? I hope you’re eating properly. It’s no wonder you’re not well if you don’t take care of yourself."

  My father kept his nose buried in the newspaper.

  "Are you planning to stay long?" I managed to spurt out.

  She straightened her shoulders. "Just one more night. This place is dreadfully expensive, but we didn’t want to impose on you at the house. And we weren’t invited."

  "You don’t need an invitation to visit me."

  "Of course we d
o," she exclaimed haughtily. "You might not want us there." This was expressed in such a manner as to suggest I might be up to something shady and not want them to know. "Good thing we didn’t expect to stay with you at the house," she added. "It’s no better than a deathtrap, just as Richard said."

  I’d just taken a large bite of meringue and now sprayed sugary dust in all directions. "Richard?"

  She confessed they’d had dinner with him the night before and a "nice long chat".

  "Traitor!" I spat the word out with such wrath that the delicate china teacups rattled in their saucers. "He wants to take the house away from me."

  "But it isn’t yours," she said calmly.

  "Did you know Uncle Bob was only a tenant then?"

  "Well, no, we always believed Rose’s story about the house coming to her as a wedding present." She rummaged in her handbag for her powder compact. "I suppose we should have known better."

  "So now you believe Richard Downing."

  My father looked up over his newspaper. "He seems an honest chap."

  I could not believe my ears. This was my father – who never trusted strangers and eyed foreigners with great suspicion, even people from other counties.

  He dipped his head to look over his glasses. "I thought he was quite the gentleman. Very apologetic about the entire thing. He’s even offered us a share of the proceeds, once the sale of the land goes through."

  So now, having failed with me, he tried to buy my family off. He would employ any cunning trick to win and I’d always known that. I mulled over that day in the yard when I thought he was about to kiss me. Whenever I thought of that, my hands grew hot and clammy. And I thought about it quite often.

  My mother was checking her face in the mirror of her compact, and my father ducked back into his newspaper. I stared at the headline – something else about that plane crash. Was that still news? Must be nothing else going on around here. Once again, I heard Genny.