The Raider

by Jude Deveraux

  Alex leaned back on the pillows and laughed. “Jealous, Raider?” he said aloud. “You ought to be. She never talked to you like that.” He tossed the wig on the floor and settled down to sleep, a smile still on his lips.

  Chapter Twelve

  WHEN there was no sign of the Raider immediately after Admiral Westmoreland’s arrival, and the town cowed so easily at the sight of the English troops, the admiral began to relax. He enjoyed the sight of the people looking at their feet, their eyes angry but not daring to contradict him. He even began to brag. He told anyone within hearing distance that all that was needed was an iron fist.

  Thus, he was unprepared for the Raider’s next appearance.

  The townspeople were wakened at dawn by the ringing of the big bell on the end of the Montgomery house that signaled danger. The bell had once been used to warn of Indians but now heralded fires and other disasters.

  Men and woman, in various states of dress, came running from their houses. They called to each other, “What is it? What’s happened?”

  One by one, they began to see the handbills tacked onto their doors. With eyes that widened with every word they read, they gaped at the posters. The bills stated that Americans had rights, that English rule was going to come to an end. They said the English had no right to search without warrants or to house troops in American homes. There were words against the customs laws, saying Americans had the right to import and export goods without going through England.

  “Seize them!” Admiral Westmoreland bellowed, standing on the Wentworth porch, wearing his uniform jacket over his long nightshirt. After a look of disgust at Mrs. Wentworth, he tore the handbill from her hands. “Back to the kitchen where you belong, woman.”

  He turned on his heel to return to the house, but then the bell at the lighthouse on the south end of the peninsula began to ring. People stopped to look.

  There, standing precariously on the top of the lighthouse was a figure dressed in black.

  “It’s the Raider,” someone whispered and the word “Raider” seemed to spread like a typhoon throughout the crowd.

  As the town watched, he loosened a sheaf of handbills and let them float to the ground. Then he was gone.

  “After him!” the admiral shouted to his half-clad soldiers. Two men had shaving lather on their faces.

  “And seize these filthy things,” the admiral shouted, crumpling a handbill and throwing it to the ground. “Anyone found with one of these will be hanged.” With that he went back into the house and so didn’t see Mrs. Wentworth step on the wadded handbill and slide it under a flowerpot.

  That afternoon, Alex looked up from a tankard of ale in the Montgomery common room to see Jessica enter, a smile on her lips. She threw down a net of fish. She smiled even more broadly when she saw Alex.

  “Did you see him?” she breathed. “I didn’t. I couldn’t get here in time, but everyone says he was wonderful.”

  “I assume you mean the Raider?” Alex looked down at his ledger. He was trying to see just what Pitman was doing with the Montgomery books. “Damned foolish if you ask me. Now the town’ll have serious problems from the admiral.”

  “I agree,” Eleanor said as she held her hand in the oven, counting off seconds to judge its temperature. “We’ll all be punished for what he did.”

  “Yes, but did you read the handbills? I didn’t see one.” Her face fell. “He didn’t leave one on our door.”

  “First sensible thing I’ve heard,” Alex said. “Now, Jess, could you please stop interrupting me with your fairy tales of that overdressed rabble-rouser? I’m trying to add these figures.”

  Jess glared at the top of his powdered wig, then jerked the ledger around to face her. “Two hundred thirty-eight pounds and twenty-nine shillings,” she said almost immediately. She glanced up at Alex, then took his pen from him, ran her finger down the other five columns and wrote the total at the bottom of each one. She turned the ledger to face him. “Some of us can do things. Not all of us sit on our behinds and watch.”

  With that she turned and left the house, ignoring Eleanor’s demand that she return and apologize to Alex.

  But Alex’s words, unfortunately, turned out to be true. Admiral Westmoreland was enraged that the Raider would dare appear while he was in command. Three cargoes were seized immediately and put under guard. He said the shipmasters were suspected of carrying contraband, but everyone knew the three men had been in the street the morning of the Raider’s appearance and the admiral had seen them reading the Raider’s handbills.

  Two men were jailed after English soldiers appeared in the middle of the night, searched their houses, and found the illegal documents.

  But the admiral didn’t dare hang the men, because even he could see how the townspeople were reacting. The Raider had done just what Jessica had wanted him to do—he’d given the people hope.

  The admiral didn’t want to push the rabble over the edge—as he thought a double hanging might—he just wanted to let them know who was in command. He whipped a young man for impertinence when the man was heard to mutter something about “independence.”

  Jessica was returning one evening from gathering fish when she saw someone in the stocks in the town square. She almost tripped over Abigail who was hiding and sniveling in the shadows.

  “What are you doing?” Jess demanded. “I almost ran into you.”

  Abigail began to cry harder.

  With a sigh, Jess put the bag of clams down. “What’s wrong, Abby?” she asked, trying to make her voice sympathetic. “Have a fight with Ethan?”

  Abigail blew her nose, then pointed toward the stocks.

  Lately, the stocks had always been full, but now Jess’s eyes widened. “Is that…your mother?” She was aghast.

  Abby nodded and began crying again.

  Jess put her hand against a tree to steady herself. It had been amusing to see Mrs. Wentworth frying clams, but now to see that proud lady like this was not amusing. “The admiral?” she asked.

  Abby nodded. “He said her attitude wasn’t properly subservient to the English.” Her voice rose. “He dropped cigar ash on her brocade chair and she complained.” Abigail began to cry harder.

  “How long has she been in there?”

  “Four hours. She has to stay three more, in the dark.”

  “With no water, I guess.”

  Abby looked appalled. “Oh no, the admiral’s orders—” Jessica said something that made Abby’s eyes widen. “I think I agree with you,” Abby whispered, “but he said no one was to speak to her.”

  “I won’t say a word,” Jessica said firmly, then went to the public well, withdrew a dipper full of water and carried it to Mrs. Wentworth. The woman was pathetic, her eyes dull, lifeless, her neatly arranged hair scraggling.

  The woman looked up in surprise as Jess held the water to her lips.

  “Your maid is probably stealing you blind,” Jess said softly. “And I hear Mr. Wentworth is allowing the dogs in the front parlor. And Abigail and Ethan are fighting.”

  Mrs. Wentworth’s head came up as far as it could, considering the yoke about her neck. “If she thinks she can come home after the way she embarrassed me, she’d better think again. And I’ll have James’s hide. And that maid—” She broke off, a smile beginning to form on her lips. “Thank you, Jessica,” she whispered. “I don’t deserve your kindness after all the things—”

  “Ssssh,” Jess said, smoothing back Mrs. Wentworth’s hair. “You’re my best customer. Shall I bring you a cartload of oysters tomorrow?”

  “Yes, and could you get Eleanor to bake me half a dozen of those wonderful oyster loaves of hers? That is, if Sayer doesn’t mind. And I’ll need—” She stopped abruptly. “Oh, Jess, run!”

  Behind Jessica, on horseback, appearing suddenly out of an alleyway, as if he wanted to catch evildoers, was the admiral. He held Jessica where she was with his swordtip.

  “Who are you?” he roared down at her.

  “Jessica Tagg
ert, former captain of the Mary Catherine,” she said loudly.

  He pulled the sword up, making her face him. “Ah yes,” he said softly, “the one the Raider wanted. I can see why now.” He dropped his sword. “I gave orders that no one was to speak to this woman.”

  “She didn’t say a word,” Mrs. Wentworth declared. “She was just passing.”

  The admiral looked from one woman to another, not sure what to believe.

  “Mistress Jessica delivers the clams you like so much, sir,” Mrs. Wentworth said, a pleading tone in her voice.

  Jessica just glared at the man.

  He looked Jess up and down. “You’re too pretty a lady to dress like that. Wear women’s clothes or you’ll find yourself in the stocks.” He smiled. “Or perhaps I shall let my soldiers dress you. Good evening…ladies.” He turned his horse and left them.

  “Go!” Mrs. Wentworth cried. “Go, and thank you, Jessica.”

  Jessica ran, through the square, past Abigail who was staring at her as if she were half fool, half saint, grabbed her clams on the run and then headed toward the Montgomery house.

  The common room was empty. As she was trying to catch her breath, Alex sauntered into the room.

  “I saw you running,” he said, concern on his face. “Is everything all right?”

  “Has Eleanor gone?”

  “One of the kids was sick. Marianna sent her home.”

  “Which one?”

  “One of the smaller ones.” He shrugged. “Why were you running?”

  Quickly, she told him about Mrs. Wentworth and the admiral. “I have to go home. These clams are for tomorrow.”

  Alex grabbed her arm before she could leave. “Jess, I wish you’d stay out of the admiral’s way. Did you ever think that maybe the reason the Raider didn’t leave a handbill on your door was because he wanted you to stay out of this?”

  She turned on him. “I am sick of your cowardice. Are we sheep that we are to go meekly to the slaughter? We have to fight.”

  “Let the men fight,” he said angrily. “This is not a place for women and children.”

  “Poor Mrs. Wentworth is sitting out there in the stocks merely because she was protecting the covers on her furniture and you say we women aren’t involved in this? Release my arm, I have to see to my family.”

  “You won’t have any family left if you keep antagonizing the admiral,” he called after her. “Damn the Raider!” he said under his breath and when Marianna walked into the room, he thought, damn her too because she’d married Pitman and started it all.

  “What a look, Alexander,” Marianna said. “Have I done something?”

  He swallowed his anger. “You can help me find some dresses for Jessica Taggert.”

  Marianna opened and closed her mouth a couple of times. “I’m afraid to hear what that young woman has gotten herself into now. Come along to Mother’s room and talk to me while we search for things Jessica can wear.”

  It was hours later that Alex was on his way to his bed and his father called to him. Immediately, Alex’s spine stiffened. It seemed he could forgive everyone for believing his disguise—except his father. The way the man had greeted him when he’d returned home, so coolly, still made Alex angry when he thought of it. What was it Jessica had said? Something about Kit and Adam being the “best” sons.

  “You wanted to see me, sir?” Alex asked stiffly from the doorway. At least, his voice was stiff. Whenever he saw his father, he exaggerated the languid laziness of his body that he affected.

  “Did I hear Jessica’s voice raised in anger?”

  “You did.” Alex yawned, allowing the lace at his sleeve to flutter. “She was angry because I did not agree that the Raider is our savior.”

  “You don’t agree that he’s helping the town?”

  Alex bent his knees so he could see himself in the mirror across his father’s bedroom. He adjusted a curl on his shoulder. “I think the man is merely stirring up trouble. If he didn’t appear, perhaps the admiral would go back to England.”

  “You told Jessica this?”

  Alex looked at his father. “Of course. Shouldn’t I have?”

  “Everyone has his opinion. By the way, did she find you the afternoon she was thrashing through the weeds?”

  Alex didn’t allow his surprise to show. “She came the next morning. Was there anything else? I am quite tired after my recent illness.”

  “Go,” Sayer said with a grimace. “Go get your sleep.”

  Alex’s fists were clenched at his sides as he went down the corridor to his bedroom.

  * * *

  Jessica was still angry at Eleanor the next morning as she gathered her nets and started toward town. She’d left her clam shovel at the Montgomery house and, besides, Eleanor had insisted she go to Marianna and thank her for the four dresses she’d sent last night.

  “That woman is getting altogether above herself,” Jess muttered, referring to her older sister. Eleanor had wasted precious early morning moments fussing with Jessica’s hair, tying her corset and worrying over how her sister looked.

  “How am I to fish wearing these skirts?” Jess had wailed.

  “You can’t fish if you’re in jail,” Eleanor had said. “And that’s where you’ll be if you don’t obey the admiral.”

  So now she was dressed up like a dressmaker’s doll and on her way to the Montgomery house.

  She was so angry that she didn’t see what was happening around her. One man, on horseback, was so taken aback by the sight of her that he ran his horse into a carriage. The carriage horses shied, but the driver couldn’t control them because his attention was focused on the beautiful Jessica Taggert. His horses leaped, and the driver fell forward and landed in a horse trough. The carriage horses panicked and began running with old Mrs. Duncan inside screaming—but no one paid her any attention. Two men, gaping at Jessica, walked into a woman carrying six dozen eggs. The eggs fell, some broke, some started rolling. A man carrying a cage of geese and watching Jess, slipped on three of the eggs. The geese ran out of the cage and under the blacksmith’s legs. The blacksmith dropped a hot horseshoe—he was watching Jess and not paying attention to what he was doing—the horseshoe grazed the leg of a horse and the horse kicked out the side of the building, which felled a post that was supporting an anvil, which hit another post. The building collapsed just as the blacksmith and the horse escaped.

  Unfortunately, the admiral, standing next to Alexander at the top of the hill, saw it all.

  Alex’s eyes were full of tears from suppressed laughter by the time Jessica reached them.

  “I came to thank you for the dresses,” Jessica said belligerently, not looking at the admiral.

  The admiral looked down the hill at the chaos: men and women yelling, animals screaming, everyone running about, then looked down at Jessica. His face turned red.

  He raised his finger to point at her. “Married!” he roared. “Married in a fortnight and heaven help the man.” He stormed past her, went down the hill and began to shout orders to try to organize the chaos.

  Jessica turned to look after him. “What in the world?” she gasped. “What happened down there?”

  Alexander’s laughter exploded as he pulled her inside the house.

  “What jellyfish got you?” she asked, thinking Alex had lost his mind.

  Alex was going to tell her except that Amos Coffin turned around, took one look at Jess and hit his mug against the stone fireplace. It shattered, but Amos just stood there gaping and holding the handle.

  “You see a sea monster?” Jessica snapped at Amos. Alex began to laugh again. “Men!” she sneered, got her clam shovel and started out the door.

  “Don’t go through town again,” Alex called, choking on his laughter. “Warbrooke can’t afford your walking through town again.”

  She gave him a look of disgust, then slammed the door behind her. Of course she wasn’t going through town again. She always took the forest path; he knew that.

  Ch
apter Thirteen

  JESSICA had difficulty figuring out how to fish while wearing a dress. Since she was alone in the private little cove that she was beginning to consider hers—hers and the Raider’s, she thought with a smile—she removed the scarf from the deep, square neck of the dress and used it to tie the hem of the skirt to her waist. The removal of her scarf left her breasts rather fully exposed, but she was too busy to consider that. She took off her hose and shoes and, bare-legged to the knee, she cast her nets.

  It was nearly sundown when Eleanor appeared, clumsily making her way down the cliff side into the cove.

  Immediately, Jessica was alert. “Someone’s hurt,” she said, nearly dropping her net.

  “No,” Eleanor answered. “I hoped you might be here. Alex is watching the children so I could come talk to you.” She looked her sister up and down, eyeing the way both the top and bottom halves of her were exposed. “I certainly hope none of the men followed me.”

  “What men?” Jess asked, pulling in a net full of fish, lobsters hanging onto the edges.

  “I told Alexander you’d have no idea what was going on. Jessica, didn’t you hear the admiral? He said you had to marry someone within the next two weeks.”

  “Oh, that. Did you make the oyster loaves for Mrs. Wentworth?”

  “Jessica!” Eleanor shouted. “Listen to me. You have to pick a husband.”

  “Eleanor, I am not going to let that man bully me. I have no intention of marrying anyone—at least not now.”

  Eleanor moved to stand in front of her sister. “A lot of people heard the admiral this morning and he has to stand behind what he said or look like a fool. Oh, Jessica, how do you get yourself in these muddles?”

  “I don’t know anything about this. Let Alex talk to the man. They seem to be friends,” she said nastily.

  Eleanor sat down on a fallen tree. “What can I do to make you listen? The admiral has his reputation at stake. Twenty people within my hearing have told him you’ll never marry and every time anyone says that, the admiral gets angrier. Now he’s saying you’ll marry an American in two weeks or on the fifteenth day, you’ll marry an Englishman.”