"They'll burn the house over our heads," Grace whimpered. "I want to go home. I want my mother."
More gunshots echoed from outside. Overhead, Anne heard running feet, and the sounds of breaking glass. She glanced back at her sister. Mary was visibly shaken, her face pale and strained.
"Here," Anne said, handing her the pistol Michael had given her. "Keep this. Use it if you have to." It was terrible that Mary had to go through this ordeal in her condition—unthinkable that any of them should.
Suddenly the hall door crashed open. Two pillagers spilled down the cellar steps. "Stop right there or I'll shoot!" Sean yelled.
"Get down!" Anne warned the women.
Mothers and children scattered in the far recesses of the multiroom cellar. Grace ducked through a door into a darkened chamber that held casks of wine and vinegar.
One of the intruders raised a pistol and fired. Sean and George shot back. The first man tumbled down the stairs. The second leaped over him at Sean, and Anne recognized him as the sailor with the shaven head and pigtail.
He landed on top of Sean. The two fell to the floor, rolling over and over in the darkness, locked in combat. George scrambled to the top of the steps and pulled the door shut.
Anne ran to the edge of the stairs. In the faint light, she could see the pirate, his butcher knife inches from the Irishman's face. She looked around and saw a stack of small lard crocks lined up against the wall. Grabbing the nearest stoneware container, she smashed it down on the raider's skull. He slumped on top of the Irishman, and Anne seized his arm and tried to drag him off.
She heard footsteps behind her and glanced over her shoulder to see George coming toward her. "Help me," she said. "He's heavy. I can't—"
Her brother-in-law stopped and aimed a flintlock pistol directly at her head. "A pity, Anne," he said. "You weren't meant to survive this—"
"No! You can't—" she began.
The pistol blast rocked her back. She threw herself facedown across Sean. Seconds passed. Anne took a breath and waited for the pain.
"Anne?" It was her sister's voice.
Was it possible that the bullet had missed her at this range? "Stay back, Mary," she warned.
"George isn't going to hurt anyone, not ever again."
Anne raised her head and saw her brother-in-law sprawled on the floor. For an instant she couldn't comprehend what had happened. Then she became aware of the smoking pistol in her sister's hand. "You—didn't..."
Mary dropped the heavy handgun and kicked it toward the fallen pirate. "Poor George is a hero, isn't he? He died defending us from those—those villains." She wiped her hands on her gown, and looked back over her shoulder.
As far as Anne could tell, there were no witnesses. Sean was still groaning on the floor, his assailant was unconscious or dead, and the others were hiding in the recesses of the dark cellar.
"You killed him," Anne said.
"Obviously someone had to."
"But he was your husband," Anne whispered. "You saved my life."
"You were always far too dramatic," Mary answered matter-of-factly. "Yes, he is—was my husband, but you are my only sister. A resourceful woman can always find another husband."
Anne stared at her in shock.
"Surely you didn't think that I would let George kill you." Mary shrugged. "I suppose I shall have to content myself with being a rich widow now."
Trembling, Anne knelt by George's side. "He may still be alive."
"I should hope not. Papa would be ashamed. He taught me to shoot, too."
Anne touched the nape of George's neck and found it warm. But when she rolled him onto his back, one look told her that there was no need to feel for a pulse. "He's gone."
"Good." Mary helped Anne to her feet. "Nothing, sister, not my hope of heaven or my fear of eternal damnation, would keep me from choosing your life over George's. Now, let's speak no more of it. We'll say the pirate killed him."
"You don't feel any regret, do you?"
"Some, perhaps. But George brought this on himself with his greediness and his wicked plotting."
Mary pulled a folded parchment from the bosom of her gown. "This is your mortgage. And it's caused far too much upset." She marched deliberately to the single candle and slowly fed the contract to the flame until there was nothing left but drifting ashes.
Anne stood motionless, trembling, and unable to accept what had just happened until she heard Sean moan. The sound broke her from her trance. "Call Nora," she said to Mary. "Her husband's hurt. He needs her."
A dark stain covered one side of Sean's shirt. "I think he's bleeding again from his shoulder wound," Anne added.
She glanced over at the fallen pirate. He hadn't moved since she'd hit him with the crock. She was no better than Mary was, she thought. If she'd killed a man, surely she should feel some remorse. But she didn't. He would have gladly killed any of them, and she was beyond pity for his kind.
Instead, she took George's pistol and stepped back so that she had a good view of the stairs. Part of her wanted to go up into the house to try to find out if Michael was safe, but she knew she couldn't. She had to remain here and keep the women and children from harm.
"Dear God, please don't let him die," she whispered." Bring him back to me."
Nora and one of her friends came to Sean's side. Together, they helped him back into one of the windowless rooms. Grace brought a second candle and lit it so that they could see to tend his shoulder.
"Don't let the pirates get me," Grace begged Anne. "I don't want to die."
"You're not going to die," Anne assured her with more enthusiasm than she felt. There were no more loud noises from the house, but the sound of gunfire still came faintly from the yard. "I want you and the others to hide in the back, away from the stairs," she said. "You too, Mary."
Blanche nodded and shepherded the curious children away from the main section of the cellar. Anne carried the remaining candle to a shelf near the top of the steps, then retreated to the darkness below. Now if anyone tried to get down to them, she could see better than they could.
She waited, pistol in hand, trying not to think about the two bodies lying on the floor. Suddenly, behind her, she heard a faint scrape. "Who is it?" she demanded. "Who's there?"
Suddenly, something hot sliced down her arm. Instinctively, she raised the pistol and fired. There was a grunt, and the gun flew from her hand, propelled by a powerful male fist. Then she was flat on her back, fighting for her life with the pirate on top of her.
"Bloody cow!" he swore. "I'll kill you! I'll—"
His fingers closed on her throat. She struggled, gasping for breath, striking out with knees and fists, but he was too strong. Slowly, gradually, she could feel his hold tightening, and she knew that she had only seconds to live.
Then, without warning, the awful pressure was gone. His weight flew off her chest, and she caught a glimpse of a second man's legs as he smashed the thug against the brick wall.
Anne crawled to the bottom of the stairs and staggered to her feet. She heard a heavy thump and then the scraping of cloth on stone as one of the men slid down the wall to the floor.
"Anne!"
"Michael?" She tried to scream his name, but she could only whisper. "Michael. I thought you were dead before. I... saw your coat... the bullet hole—"
"It was hot, darling. I had my coat off, tied behind my saddle. They shot my horse, but I jumped free and made it into the woods. Sean and I came to warn—" He caught her as she fell, lifting her in his arms.
"I thought—I thought... I'd lost you... forever."
"Annie, Annie, my love," he murmured hoarsely. "It's all right, I have you. I have you safe. And I'll never let you go again—not on this green earth or the golden fields of heaven."
* * *
Later, the dead pirates were laid in rows in the barnyard. Anne's own dead and wounded people were carried into the house and made comfortable or decently prepared for their next of kin.
&n
bsp; Six had died defending Gentleman's Folly: both of the sheriff's deputies, the Irishmen Owen Conway and Patty Gilmore, a free black fisherman named Johnny Thomson, and Anne's brother-in-law George. Sheriff Clough, Sean, and four more were wounded.
But the island marauders had suffered far worse. Nine were dead, most of the fourteen prisoners wounded. And the shaven-head pirate that Michael had fought in the cellar breathed his last within two hours of the struggle.
Nora's young son Daniel was safe, as Anne had predicted. He'd seen the group of raiders on horseback and gone to Greensboro Hall for help. It was the combined force of Nate's followers and those of Swan's Nest Plantation that had turned the tide of battle.
"Not one of them got away," Nate said proudly. His face was smeared with black powder, and he bore a gash along his right cheekbone.
O'Ryan extended his arm and the two shook hands firmly. "Without your help—"
"You'd have done the same for me," Nate answered. He looked around the compound and shook his head. "You've a right mess to clean up, neighbor."
"Aye, that I do," Michael replied. "But I've all the time in the world to do it."
"Have you?" Anne asked, coming up behind him with her sister Mary. The knife wound on Anne's arm was a shallow one, but Mary had insisted on washing and bandaging it against infection. "Are you staying?" She waited, not daring to hope, but hoping just the same.
"Aye, wife." Michael blue eyes caressed her tenderly. "If you'll still have me after I've proved myself the total fool."
She nodded and reached for his hand. It was warm and strong, and the touch of him made her heart leap with joy. "I've always wanted you," she murmured. "From the first minute I laid eyes on you."
"'Tis natural, I suppose," he teased. "For a Shannon man's a rare thing on these colonial shores." He pulled her into his arms and kissed her, oblivious to the amused audience.
"I hate to be the one to add trouble to what you've suffered here today," Sheriff Clough said. "But I came to serve papers on you, Mr. O'Ryan, and nothing that's happened changes that. As much as I hate to do it, I've still got to take you back to Annapolis to—"
"Why?" Mary demanded. "What business have you with my brother-in-law?" She'd had a good cry brought on by belated sorrow for her George's passing, and looked the proper grieving widow.
"There's been a charge, ma'am—your... your late husband instigated charges that Mr. O'Ryan is really a suspect named Cormac Payne. He's wanted—"
"Ridiculous," Mary answered haughtily. "He can't be Cormac Payne."
"And why not?" Clough asked.
"Because he is," Anne said, pointing to the dead pirate who had nearly killed her.
"Yes, Miss Anne, I'm sure you want to protect your husband, but—"
"No," Mary said. "That is Payne. He once worked for my husband. I know his face well. How could you miss that shaven head?" She made a sound of disgust and covered her mouth with a lace handkerchief. "He's the one who killed my dear George."The sheriff looked doubtful. "Ma'am, I don't—"
"That's Payne, all right," Nate agreed. "I've had dealings with the rascal before. I caught him cheating at cards in Oxford."
"It is," chimed in Gerda. "It is Cormac Payne. I heard Master George call him by that name. And I vill go to court and svear to it."
"You're liars all," Clough answered. But he sighed heavily and shrugged. "You swear to the fact, each one of you? That dead man lying there is the accused, Cormac Payne?"
The verdict was unanimous. "Absolutely," Nate said. "My wife can attest to it. She was with me—"
"At Maudy's Inn while you were playing cards," Clough finished.
"Absolutely," Anne said. "I was there. So was Mrs. Brady and—"
"Enough," the sheriff said, shaking his head. "I know when I'm licked. I'll inform those that need to know that Payne's dead, killed while committing another heinous murder."
"Then it's over?" Anne said, holding tight to O'Ryan. "Michael's free?"
"As free as any married man," Clough answered.
Laughing, Anne turned in Michael's embrace and put her uninjured arm around his neck. "Welcome home, darling," she whispered.
He kissed her again. "Have I ever told you that I loved you?"
"Do you? Truly?"
"Aye, darling. I love you."
"Both of us?"
His blue eyes clouded with puzzlement.
She stood on tiptoe and whispered in his ear.
"...a baby?" She nodded. "In late spring, I think." And his whoop of joy answered every question that lingered in the recesses of her heart.
Epilogue
Gentleman's Folly Plantation April 1825
One warm afternoon in April, nearly four years after she and Michael had wed, Anne went out to cut an armful of lilacs for the house. She meant to take just enough blooms to fill the silver vase in the entrance hall, but the sweet-smelling clusters of purple flowers had run riot this spring, nearly blocking the arch leading to the garden maze.
Shannon lay at Anne's feet, wagging her tail and burrowing her nose in the grass while a Carolina wren scolded them both noisily from a nearby branch. Anne laughed at the small bird's bravado and murmured to the dog, "Best be careful, girl, or that wren will yank out a few of your hairs to build her nest."
"Who's building a nest?" Michael called.
Anne turned to see her husband stride around the corner of the house with a chubby-cheeked child riding on his shoulders. Golden-haired Lizzie, soon to be three, wore her father's broad-brimmed hat, no shoes, and a very dirty dress and apron.
"Mama! Papa's a horsee!" the moppet declared. "My horsee!" She giggled mischievously, and Anne's heart swelled with joy.
These two, father and daughter, were all the world to her. She dropped her lilacs and the shears and hurried to meet them. "Where have you been?" Anne asked. "And how did she get so filthy? You look as though you've been planting corn with your nose, Lizzie. You promised you'd be only a little while. You know that Lizzie will be a bear at supper if she misses her naptime."
"Will she? Will she be a bear?" Michael teased, grabbing the child by the waist and lifting her high in air. Lizzie squealed with delight and growled ferociously as her father's hat tumbled off.
Michael laughed and Anne laughed with them, fooling no one with her halfhearted scolding, least of all her husband.
"Aye, that's what we were doing, wasn't it, Lizzie?" Michael said. "Planting corn with our noses." He set the bear cub lightly on the grass, and she ran to her mother.
Anne scooped her up and showered her with kisses, heedless of the smears of mud and the small dirty hands. "Someone's going to have to give you a bath, isn't he?"
"I suppose someone will," Michael agreed. "Maybe we'll both wash off in the bay."
"In April? You certainly will not take this child—" She broke off as the twitch at the corner of her big Irishman's mouth became a grin.
"It seems to me that I can remember when you didn't mind taking a dip there," he teased.
"That was when I was a foolish colleen who knew no better," she answered in as close an imitation of his Irish accent as she could manage.
"You're sassy, woman. I can see I'll have to take you in hand—as soon as I get this small Lizzie bathed and ready for her nap."
"Noo," their daughter protested, rubbing her blue eyes with two grubby fists. "Not sleepy."
"We rode out to see the wheat in the north fields. It's looking good, Annie, very good, bigger heads of grain than I've ever seen. Do you know what they're paying for wheat this year?"
She nodded. The two of them had turned out to have a knack for farming. His steers brought the best prices at market, and she was selling her cheese as far away as Philadelphia. Gentleman's Folly had flourished, so much so that it had become common for Eastern Shore planters to drop by to ask Michael for advice. And if Anne no longer lived in as grand a manner as she had before her father died, she knew that Lizzie's financial future was secure.
"A letter from Ma
ry arrived early this afternoon," Anne said. "She and Kathleen and the children will be coming to spend a few weeks with us as soon as Conall finishes his first term at school. And Mary's new beau—"
Michael had recaptured the squirming bear cub. "You can tell me all the news as soon as I—"
"There she is!" Grace, her white mobcap only slightly awry, pushed up a downstairs window and leaned out. "I've been looking for Miss Lizzie. She's way past her naptime."
"She needs a bath," Michael warned.
"Yes, sir. I can see that," the serving girl replied good-naturedly.
"Go along with Grace," Michael urged, "and Papa will see that you get a piece of strawberry shortcake after supper." When the little girl nodded, he passed her through the open window to the maid.
"Two shortcakes," Anne heard her daughter say. "Two."
"One dessert is enough for one small girl," Anne said firmly. "I vow the two of you will spoil her beyond redemption."
"What about me? Can I have two pieces of shortcake?" Michael pleaded.
Anne smiled and knelt to gather up her fallen lilacs. Suddenly, Shannon sniffed the air, gave a sharp bark, and plunged into the maze.
"She's on the trail of another rabbit," Michael said, retrieving his hat and putting it back on.
Anne glanced up at him and went all fluttery in the pit of her stomach. God, but I'm a lucky woman, she thought.
The years on the land had been good to her husband. The bluest eyes on the Chesapeake were framed by rugged, sun-bronzed skin and wheat-blond hair. And his full-sleeved linen shirt still spanned shoulders that would have done justice to a blacksmith.
Michael's sleeves were rolled up, revealing muscular arms and strong, lean hands as tanned as the exposed vee of his throat and chest. A flush of heat spread through Anne as she let her gaze skim lower, over his flat belly, lean hips, and long, sinewy legs thrust into knee-high leather boots.
"And what are you looking at?" he asked. "Staring at me with bold, dark eyes that would lure a saint into temptation."
In answer, she let the blooms fall, caught up her petticoats, and dashed through the lilac archway.
"Annie?"
The Irish Rogue Page 29
