A Wicked Way to Burn (20 page)

B
Y GEORGE!” SHOUTED
Jonathan Pratt, following at the large woman’s heels.

Chairs immediately scraped as all four diners rose to pursue the cook and the innkeeper down the dark passage. Because Charlotte and Longfellow knew the miller’s ways, as well as his strength, they hurried on with trepidation. Diana was only glad for some exercise to counteract the dulling effects of a large dinner. And Edmund Montagu thought, as he followed Miss Longfellow’s swinging skirts, of Tom Jones’s preposterous inn at Upton—though he suspected this situation might prove to be far more dangerous. The scene they found in the kitchen did little to allay his fears.

Elizabeth stood facing the scowling Peter Lynch with a butter churn paddle, while several feet away, Mary wielded a wickedly sharp boning knife—not, Montagu noted with interest, in the usual way of women, but low
and underhand, as one who had witnessed this sort of fight before. Trapped against a table near the far wall, Fortier could only watch. So far, he alone had been unable to find a weapon. The whole scene was lit by the glow from the long fire, where meat continued to roast on an unturned spit while its attendant, the cook’s young daughter, cowered in the warming nook.

“I need no one else to tell me my business,” Peter Lynch roared, shifting away from the two women and making for the Frenchman. Gabriel picked up a bench and held it like a shield before him. He had not been carrying a gun or a knife after all, thought Montagu, while he watched Longfellow walk bravely between the miller and his intended victim.

“Since you’re careful of your own affairs, Peter,” Longfellow soon suggested in a remarkably dry tone (considering the circumstances), “you might want to consider this: Captain Montagu represents the law; in fact, he has been sent on the king’s business by Governor Bernard. Perhaps you know that the governor takes a dim view of the murder of his subjects, be they court or country … or even Frenchmen. He’s also fond of taking their persecutors to court, because it gives him a chance to make someone’s possessions his own. Or, let us say, the Commonwealth’s. This sort of thing also helps keep many lawyers busy and well exercised, which in turn keeps them out of trouble—at least as much as can be expected.

“After considering the evidence, Captain Montagu sees no reason to charge Fortier with any crime. So you can see, Peter, that it would be in your interest to stop now, turn around … and leave.”

“Leave her to lie with this?” the miller snarled, flinging an arm at the corner. “Why, for all I know he’s already—”

Abruptly, a new thought struck Peter Lynch, causing
first a grimace, and then a grin. Slowly, he lowered his clenched fist, and soon a heavy chuckle could be heard coming from his straining, casklike chest.

As Lynch relaxed, Gabriel took the chance he’d been waiting for. With the scream of a panther, the smaller man raised the bench he held up into the air, rushed forward, and brought it down hard against the miller’s head. The whole thing was done with such force that the two soon found themselves lying on the plank floor, in a tangle of limbs and boards.

At the same time, Mary bent and crawled closer, as if to better see what damaged had been done. But as she began to rise, Montagu came up behind her and clapped a hand onto her wrist. Then he took away the deadly knife. Her face in her hands, Mary fell forward and wept. Gabriel saw, and his face reflected her anguish. Peter Lynch looked, and grew a cruel, lopsided smile. Thrusting himself up and back onto bulging haunches, the miller rose to totter unsteadily on his thick boots, and finally broke into an ugly laugh.

“She’s promised to me, innkeeper, as soon as you’re done with her. And no brat of a boy is going to stand in my way! Let him follow me like a pup, and starve if he wants to. It won’t change the way things are with you or me, or with Elias Frye, either. Her father’s given me his word, and I intend to see he keeps it! Sooner or later, the girl will be mine.”

Finished with his speech, he turned to go, but Charlotte Willett’s clear voice surprised him into stopping. In fact, the ringing tones startled even her own ears.

“Remember, Peter Lynch, there’s still a matter of bearing false witness against your neighbor.”

“Why should any of us listen to a woman who hides criminals … especially one who’s being sought by the whole village?” countered Peter. “We know you sheltered the Frenchman, and it won’t soon be forgotten, I
can promise you that! They burned his kind for witches, in years gone by. Remember, mistress, they hanged Quakers, too, in the town of Boston—and not so very long ago!”

“Friends,” Charlotte corrected him without rancor, while Gabriel Fortier defended her in more bitter tones.

“She knew nothing! If you do more against this lady, or mine, I swear that I will come for you, Lynch, and then I will
kill
you!”

The hush that fell was brought to an end by the miller’s drunken laugh.

“It could be that one of you, or all, might disappear first, one fine night. Poof!” Lynch exclaimed, exploding his bunched fingers in a startling gesture. And with another gale of scornful laughter, he slammed out of the kitchen and into the rainy night.

Mary rushed to shut and bolt the door. Then she flew to Gabriel’s arms, while Elizabeth pulled her child from the hearthside and hugged her tight, for the little girl had begun to cry. Montagu laid down the narrow, horn-handled knife he’d taken from Mary. Everything was again moving toward harmony … at least for the moment.

The four guests had barely agreed to go back and finish their dinner, when they found their retreat blocked by a scurrying Lydia Pratt. Her eyes were bright, and her breath was short. Lydia looked all around; then, her glance rested questioningly on her husband. Jonathan calmly played down the recently concluded drama, as he thought how to approach a delicate subject.

“Lydia, my dear … I have offered to give Mr. Fortier a chance to do some work for us, in exchange for his keep and a little something more. It strikes me we could use another man about the place, for a while.”

His wife seemed ready to argue. But quite suddenly
she drew up short. It appeared to some of the others that as she looked at Mary, she eyed the girl with something beyond her usual disdain. Lydia had never had any true cause to dislike her servant, as far as anyone knew. Still, her refusal to favor Mary in any way had been marked—until now. To her husband’s pleasure, Lydia only nodded at his latest suggestion, keeping her lips tightly together. It was an unexpected triumph.

“I thank you,” Gabriel said quite simply.

“Prove yourself useful then,” Lydia finally responded grimly, leading Charlotte to wonder again at the woman’s motives.

“I think I’ll retire to make some small repairs,” Diana decided, walking around the landlady. “Mary might be of help. Shall we withdraw upstairs, Mrs. Willett, while the gentlemen start their coffee and brandy?”

Charlotte agreed at once, and Mary followed them up to a small pair of rooms set aside for the immediate comforts of the inn’s female guests. While Diana sat at a table and removed several items, including her new perfume, from her bag, Charlotte watched Mary pour water from pitcher to basin, then arrange two embroidered towels.

“It looks as though you, too, have triumphed over a dragon, like St. George,” Charlotte suggested to the girl, once she decided they would not be overheard. But Mary’s face looked back from the mirror with its usual solemn expression.

“I won’t believe it. No matter how willing she seems.”

“If Lydia really means to help you and Gabriel—”

Mary laughed briefly, and dabbed at her face with a dampened corner of her apron to remove the remains of her tears.

“You
must
know better!” she replied bleakly, looking away from the mirror. “She’s only agreeing now
because … because of something I know, although she’s not sure I know it. Something best left unsaid, as long as I still have to live under the roof of a witch! It may be that something will come out, when I leave—or it may not,” she considered, offering both women a smile that was at once mysterious, and a little sad.

“Well,” said Diana, resetting a curl, “this is one of the most dramatic evenings I’ve had for months! I’d no idea life in the country could be so full of passion, and danger! What do you suppose will happen next?”

With one little finger, she rouged her lips from a tiny pot on the table in front of her, and then reapplied a dab of scent from the Oriental bottle.

“If it were up to me,” she continued, “I’d choose something comic to end the evening, and send everyone home in high spirits. Although I’m not entirely disposed to laugh after such a large dinner, with these stays!” She stood and twisted her torso in several different directions, causing her hoops to brush against the vanity table. It teetered alarmingly, until she stepped away.

“Let’s go back before the gentlemen forget we exist. I’m sure they’ve already begun to bore each other with their political views again,” she concluded, waiting for Charlotte to finish a brief appraisal in the small mirror. After she had cleared the tabletop, Diana’s rustling skirts led Mrs. Willett down the hall, while Mary stayed behind to tidy up the room.

Only when she was sure the two women had gone did Mary take a small enameled bottle from her pocket. For a moment, she looked at it with great curiousity, watching the way the dragon caught the candle’s light, as she turned it round and round in her work-rough hands.

I
THOUGHT THE
Court of St. James’s less impressive than it might be,” Longfellow said languidly to his new acquaintance, as they both sipped well deserved brandy, after their bold encounter. “One could wish it had more brain and culture attached to it, and a little less pomp and powder. It might be wise for the gentlemen of the upper classes to try breeding not for wealth, as they do now, but for brighter children—
that
would be progress.”

They saw the ladies returning, and Longfellow rose to pour for them, as well. But the conversation continued much as it had gone on during their absence. Richard now waited for Captain Montagu to take the next shot.

“One can hardly disagree with your …” Montagu cleared his throat, wondering if a word existed to describe them. “… your
antic
observations. Of course,
from your own dress and habits, sir, I’d already guessed that you might prefer the company of, how shall I put it? People who work with their hands? But then, you Americans have many origins, which allows you to choose your fashion from a very great diversity of tinkers and farmers.”

“Ah, yes, we do enjoy the styles of many countries here, and many occupations.”

Apparently, thought Charlotte, noting an absence of ill humor, their exertions together in the kitchen had begun to form a bond.

“That, to my mind,” continued Longfellow, “is preferable to relying on the tastes and foibles of a crumbling elite in a moribund capital—although your Old World does have notable
architectural
remains. But as you’ve said, Captain, we have admirably simple tastes here. And our colonies are even more widely admired for having men of inventive minds, like Dr. Franklin, whom I imagine you’ve heard of by now. I expect that’s also true of most countries of the Old World, however—in their
general
populations. I’ve been impressed by a great many things I’ve seen throughout Europe, both in science and the arts,” he finished, pleased with himself for the fairness of his argument.

“Then perhaps you’ve also seen the way the Continental peasants struggle to survive outside the gilded capitals your wealthy young men tour and overpraise. Have you visited the less lovely sections of Paris? At least we English rarely starve
en masse
, the way they do now throughout France. Englishmen all enjoy certain rights, as Monsieur Fortier pointed out. Rights developed, I might add, solely by your English ancestors, and upheld by the government they alone created!”

“A greater pity, then, since you’re so proud of them, that you don’t extend all of these rights to Americans!
But we ‘children,’ I assure you, must soon grow larger and stronger than you or your ancestors … as children will, when given a superior diet. As the proprietor of a dairy, I’m sure Mrs. Willett agrees.”