by Olivia Drake
“The English entrenched themselves in the barracks,” he said emotionlessly. “Women and children numbering in the hundreds were crammed in with the soldiers, enduring constant bombardment by the mutineers. The English held out for almost three weeks, until their food and water dwindled. People began to die of starvation and thirst. Then Nana Sahib made them an offer.” His expression somber, Damien puffed on the bidi. The pungent perfume of smoke drifted to Sarah.
Suspense gripped her. “What sort of offer?”
“He said he’d let them go free if they would surrender their weapons. He offered to provide them with boats.”
“Did Wheeler accept?”
“Of course. It meant certain death if they remained in the garrison. The entire British party—what was left of it—filed out of the entrenchments and down to the Ganges. Soldiers, women, children, the whole lot. They were escorted by a company of mutineers.” He paused. “As soon as the English got into the boats, the sepoys opened fire.”
Sarah touched icy hands to her cheeks. “No,” she whispered.
“Yes,” he said, his tone gritty with disgust. “It was a massacre. Nana Sahib left nothing to chance. He’d secreted smoldering charcoal in the thatched roof of every boat. The boats began to burn. People leaped overboard and tried to swim to the opposite shore. The sepoys shot them dead. Others drowned or burned. Except for a small group of women and children, every last one was butchered.”
“What happened to the survivors?” Sarah asked in a faint voice.
“Rumor has it they’re being held captive in a bibighur, the local house of ill-repute.” Damien savagely crushed the half-smoked bidi beneath the heel of his sandal. “Henry Havelock’s supposed to be coming to their aid. But frankly, I don’t give them an angel’s chance in hell.”
The tinkle of the goat’s bell drifted through the summer air. From inside the hut came Kit’s whimper, and then Batan’s voice crooning a soft lullaby.
Sarah viewed Damien through a veil of tears. On his harshly handsome features she saw a mirror of her own shock, her disbelief, her torment. Vile images marched through her mind. Soldiers like Uncle John, women like Aunt Violet and Mrs. Craven, babies like Kit, all mown down. She heard their shrieks, felt their agonized fear, saw the water run crimson with blood...
Her stomach lurched. Unexpectedly, Damien pulled her tight against him. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t have told you. You aren’t going to be sick, are you?”
She shook her head. She ought to draw back, yet his arms eased the horror inside her. His chest rose and fell against her cheek, and she heard the steady thrum of his heartbeat. As if he, too, drew comfort from the embrace, he rested his chin on the crown of her head, his breath feathering her hair. His male aroma, part spice and part smoke, was as tranquilizing as incense. Warmth seeped into her cold body; his vitality was a salve to her grieving spirits.
His hand drifted over the nape of her neck; the other gently caressed her wet cheek. On impulse, she turned her lips to the smooth skin of his throat. He sucked in a breath, then grasped her shoulders and held her at arm’s length. Shadows guarded his eyes, eyes that were dark with angry pain.
“The English have been bloody fools. Six years ago, they denied Nana Sahib his rightful place as Maharaja of Bithur simply because he was adopted rather than trueborn. They took away his title and his pension. The man seized his chance at revenge.”
“But to kill so many.” She shook her head in sickened awe. “Those poor, poor people. Thinking they were about to escape the horror of starvation.”
“Wheeler ought to have laid in more supplies.” Frustration grated in Damien’s voice; his hands dropped to his sides. “He was a damned fool, same as Hewitt was in Meerut. All the signs of dissension were there, but the English refused to believe their sepoys would dare to revolt.”
Sarah thought bleakly of her own arrogance. At one time she believed she could ride the fence of her conscience by expressing her political opinions under the guise of I. M. Vexed while living as a demure English lady.
“I ought to have worked harder to make people understand,” she said. “I ought to have insisted, instead of making idle commentary—” She broke off, afraid to speak the truth and shatter their truce.
He smiled sadly. “There was nothing you could have done.”
“I wish I could believe that.” Suddenly she ached to unburden herself, to share her secret with Damien, even if it meant suffering more of his sarcasm. He had confessed his darkest deed to her; she could do the same. “Wait here. I have something to show you.”
Before she could succumb to cowardice, she hastened to the bedroom and pulled open the drawer to the rattan dressing table. Hidden beneath silken folds of clothing lay a thin pile of paper, her editorial about the Meerut mutiny. Fingers trembling, she picked up the essay, marched back out onto the veranda, and handed the pages to Damien.
“What’s this?” he asked.
“I’ve been keeping secrets, too.”
Anxiously she waited until he scanned the neat script. His features assumed a succession of expressions: perplexity, interest, and contemplation. When he lifted his head, he regarded her with keen surprise.
“You’re I. M. Vexed?”
“Yes.”
His frown swept over her, as if he were taking her apart and putting her back together again, finding some missing pieces in the process. Sarah held her breath and refused to lower her eyes. Like any man, he preferred his women subservient and opinion-less, and she girded herself for a derisive comment.
“I married Shivina,” he said slowly, “because I’d read your essay on the shabby way Englishmen treat the native women.”
“Yes. You admitted so. That was when I first suspected you had a conscience after all.”
“You even stood as witness to the wedding.”
“Yes.”
To her great astonishment, he threw back his head and let out a hoot of laughter. “How in hell did you manage to restrain your sharp tongue? You must have been dying to claim responsibility for caging the wild beast.”
“Well...” A tentative smile flirted at the corners of her mouth. “I admit I wanted to rub your nose in it. But I was afraid you might tell someone who I was, just to make me suffer the condemnation of society.”
“Sarah,” he chided. Unexpectedly he ran a finger over her cheek, with the same gentleness he might use to caress a rose petal. “You don’t know me very well, do you.” It was a statement rather than a question.
Seduced by his soft touch, she shook her head. “Perhaps not. I only see what little you’ve let me see.”
“Then know this: I would have cheered you on.” He rolled her essay into a tube, which he tapped against his scarred palm. “Because, despite our differences, we do share the same views on justice for the Indian people.”
“Then you can understand how awful I feel. I valued my position in society far more than doing the right thing.” She let her gaze wander down the lush green hillside. “I knew General Hewitt, yet I was afraid to approach him and rally support for the native cause. I...I was even afraid Reginald might refuse to marry me if he found out about my secret identity.”
Damien snorted. “If he can’t accept your writing, he can’t love you very much.”
She frowned, trying to sort through her confused thoughts. “He’s simply misguided, like most Englishmen. If only I’d had more courage, perhaps I could have changed his mind. Perhaps in some small way I might have helped avert the bloodshed.”
Damien arched a black eyebrow. “I doubt that. To put it bluntly, the military wouldn’t have heeded the word of a woman. At least your nom de plume made men read your column and debate your opinions. Some men must have taken them to heart.”
“I suppose so.” She wanted to believe him. Yet the load of regrets weighed heavily. Closing her eyes, she pressed her hands to her temples. “But I can’t stop thinking about all the people who might still be alive today if only I’d done some
thing. Aunt Violet, Mrs. Craven, so many soldiers. And dear God, the innocent children, the babies—”
“Don’t.” Damien grasped her forearms and drew her hands down. “Sarah, don’t torment yourself. You had a hell of a bigger impact on public opinion than I ever did.”
She opened her eyes. His handsome features loomed over her. Fleetingly she wondered why he would try to comfort her. “But you’re writing a book about India. Photographs as poignant as yours are certain to make the English realize the Hindus are people, with the same rights as we have.”
“I’m too late to stop the bloodshed. So, you see, I have more cause to flay myself than you do.”
He held her arms in a warm bond. She looked down at the rolled essay, lying between his hand and her arm. He was touching her with the ease of a friend, and the thought stirred an absurd thrill in her heart. The oppressiveness within her began to lift. “Perhaps we can share the burden of guilt.”
“I’m hereby declaring a moratorium on guilt.” He released her and stepped back. “You’re a fine writer, by damn. You must have been sent to me by Saraswati herself.”
“Saraswati?” she said, tilting her head in puzzlement. “The river goddess?”
Grinning, he shook the cylinder of papers at her. “For shame, Sarah Faulkner. You should know your Hindu namesake better. Saraswati is also the goddess of scholarship and the arts, including pen and ink. You’re the perfect person to write the text to my book.”
As soon as the words were out, Damien could have kicked himself. He’d only meant to cheer her gloomy spirits. But the impulsive offer meant spending more time with her. A lot more time. He worked best alone, certainly not with an outspoken female who held the allure of a goddess.
“I’ve never written a book before,” she said doubtfully. “Do you really think I could?”
Tell her no. “Yes,” he heard himself saying. He was still shaken by the idea of the very proper Sarah Faulkner secretly composing radical essays. What other surprises did she hide? “Your writing is filled with insight and perception. Mine is dry and detestably dull. My sentences come out sounding as if they were written by the school dunce.”
A smile sparkled like a sunbeam over her delicate features. “If I say yes, O Great Master, how much will you add to my wages?”
Her teasing touched a chord of response deep within him, a chord which appalled him. He ruthlessly squelched the softening. He’d already softened too much. “So the five hundred pounds has failed to satisfy you. Your greed is showing, Miss Faulkner.”
Her face sobered, her eyes as blue as the enameled sky beyond the veranda. “I shan’t be working for you and Kit forever,” she said. “I have no other money of my own. If both my uncle and Reginald are dead, I must consider how I’ll provide for myself, if and when the mutiny ends.”
Chagrin trickled through Damien. Even after ten years of living like a commoner, he sometimes still thought with the blind arrogance of the aristocracy. “I’ll add on fifty pounds. And share any profits equally.”
“My name must be on the cover.”
He smiled. “I. M. Vexed? Or Sarah Faulkner?”
“My real name.” Solemnly, she put out her hand. “We’re partners, then. I hope we can become friends, too.”
He grasped her hand. Her fingers felt feminine and fragile, and the softness of her skin blazed through him to smolder like a hot, hard coal in his loins. With the clarity of a photograph, he pictured her lying naked beneath him, her face aglow with passionate adoration and her thighs opening in sweet acceptance of his caresses—
He scoured the image from his mind. God! She was getting too close to him, proposing friendship, stealing into his very fantasies. He’d tried by turns ignoring her and insulting her; he’d even opened his black soul and let her see the ugliness within. Yet he hadn’t driven her away. How was he to survive the coming weeks if a mere handshake aroused him to vivid lust?
Inspiration struck. He knew the perfect way to convince Miss Sarah-Prissy-Faulkner to keep her distance. If the lingam shrine had made her blush, what he had in mind would shock her to her prim little toes. He would force her to acknowledge the insurmountable differences between them and impress upon her what an uncaring rogue he really was.
‘‘We’ll start tomorrow,’’ he said, releasing her hand. “I took some photographs last summer at a place in the hills nearby. We’ll go there, and you can make notes for our text.”
“What sort of place is it?” she asked.
“You’ll see.” And then run from me in horror, he thought.
“May I look at the pictures?”
“No.” Smiling, more to himself than at her, Damien took her fingers and curled them around the rolled essay. “I wouldn’t wish to spoil the spontaneity.”
Chapter 17
11 July 1857, High in the Himalayan Foothills
Karma is the Sanskrit word for action. The Hindus believe that how a person acts in life determines his next incarnation. The Untouchable deserves his low status in society, for in his past life he might have been a dacoit. In the same vein, the Brahman must have acted in a saintly manner. Thus, if a person has poor karma, he has no one but himself to blame.
Tramping beside Damien over a hillside bright with poppies, Sarah reflected upon the journal entry she’d made only a few hours ago. She’d awakened before dawn, too exhilarated to sleep any longer, too anxious to start a day radiant with possibilities.
Even the fine weather harmonized with her dreams. A golden oriole sang from the branches of a walnut tree. Tilting her head back, she absorbed its liquid trill, two long notes and two short ones. Happiness hugged her, as fresh and fragrant as the summer air, as brilliant and beautiful as the rolling meadows and wooded slopes. She must have good karma, she mused, for at last Damien had extended the hand of friendship. The notion of writing a book with him challenged her.
Surreptitiously she studied his long brown legs beneath the white dhoti, the sun-burnished skin of his arms, the polished perfection of his black hair against the paleness of his shirt. Over his shoulder he toted the knapsack containing their goat cheese and chupatties.
Like him, she was sensibly shod in a pair of chapplis, the Kashmiri sandal with an inner-laced boot of soft chamois. Her Moghul trousers and tunic were far more comfortable than the snug corsets and wide crinolines required of English ladies. Today she felt freer, more natural, as if she had shed the last clinging cobwebs of strict society.
In Meerut, she would never have dreamed of striking off alone with a notorious scoundrel like Damien. Everyone would assume they had stolen away to engage in illicit lovemaking. In a delicious flight of fancy, she imagined herself clasped in his arms, his lips tasting hers, his hands caressing her breasts...
Warm and agitated, she reflected on her bodily yearnings. Aunt Violet had never mentioned desire, only the duty of a wife to her husband. But the liquid heat Sarah felt while gazing at Damien must be what The Kama Sutra meant by the passion of women.
Apparently the body could ignore the mind, for she desired a man who had lied to her, a man who had insulted her. A man who had scars on his heart as well as on his hands.
Damien certainly had his faults, but he was also a sensitive, complex person who could weep and hurt, laugh and tease. His compassion for the victims of Cawnpore sobered her for a moment. Yet today the horrors of the mutiny seemed only a distant shadow on the horizon.
Again her gaze focused on him. Over the past weeks, her feelings for him had undergone a subtle blooming, like jasmine unfurling its petals to the sunlight. Now she felt on the brink of a great adventure, as if they were turning over a new leaf in their relationship. It struck her that their destination mattered little. What did matter was the thrill of being together, truly alone for the first time, the baby left behind in the care of Batan. Perhaps she and Damien could put their differences behind them and start anew.
At the crest of a hill, he stopped. “Look,” he said. “That’s where we’re heading.”
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He pointed down the slope. Nestled in a grove of deodars at the base of the hill sprawled a great ruined structure, the carved stone pillars twisted with vines, the domes and arches gilded by slanting sunbeams.
“How lovely,” Sarah breathed. “It looks like a maharaja’s palace.”
“It’s an abandoned temple.” He gave her a strange look, keen and calculating. “No one comes here anymore.”
Did he doubt her ability to describe the shrine? Perhaps this excursion was a test of her talents. Sarah made a private vow to prove herself to him, for otherwise he might yet withdraw his request for her to help with the book. The possibility dismayed her.
As they entered the copse of trees surrounding the edifice, she said, “This place reminds me of a cathedral—the branches interwoven into a roof. There’s even a reverent hush in the air.”
He cocked an eyebrow at her fanciful depiction. “Deodars are considered holy,” he said. “The Hindus believe that spirits live in them.”
“What sort of spirits?”
He shrugged. “Perhaps those lucky souls that have reached nirvana, the heavenly end to the cycle of life.”
Beside the elegantly proportioned entrance to the temple lay a stone face sheared from a long-vanished statue, the great eyes perpetually staring up at the network of damp vegetation. The chitter of a few monkeys came from the turrets and high copings. The air held the earthy scents of greenery and crumbling mortar.
Damien motioned her through a cool shaded archway built of rock-hewn bricks. Hazy sunshine streamed through the fallen roof to light the vast room within, where thick grasses and colorful wildflowers carpeted the floor. Statues lined the nooks and crannies of the huge, circular chamber.
“It’s like stepping back in time into a private paradise,” Sarah marveled. “Is this temple dedicated to a certain god?”
“To Shiva,” Damien said. “Take a look around.”
The walls held panel upon panel of carved, life-sized figures. Curious, she moved past a pile of rubble and stopped before one of the sculptures. Her blood surged. Her eyes widened. She was gazing at a naked, copulating couple.
