Dark Before the Rising Sun (40 page)

Shelby glanced back at his men, feeling some of his courage returning, for he had nearly an entire army at his back. Dante Leighton was, after all, only one man.

“You will be the first one to die, Shelby,” Dante spoke quietly, reading his thoughts. “And I will die gladly knowing that I have sent you to hell. One of your men will die too, if he means to kill me. But he will have to wait until the fire cuts through his flesh,” Dante added cunningly, knowing just how to plant the seeds of worry in the other men.

Shelby heard an uneasy muttering go through his men, and wished he could shoot all those sniveling cowards. “Just in case ye've forgotten, we're all in this together,” he shouted. “If I go to the gallows, I'll take the whole lot of ye with me. Don't be forgettin' that ye be the Sons of Belial, and there's many a Redcoat who'd like to make a name for himself by arresting even one of them. And I know your names, ye curs, and where most of ye came from, and what ye was wanted for before ye joined me,” he reminded them.

One or two of the group were braver than the others. Or perhaps they had more notorious pasts to protect, for, stepping forward, they gave their support to their leader. After that, the others seemed to think twice about abandoning the man who kept food in their bellies and ale warming their blood, and they began to move forward menacingly.

Rhea, holding the edge of her nightgown pressed firmly against the blood seeping from Francis's shoulder, glanced up nervously at the men steadily approaching. Her heart was pounding as she caught sight of the evil grin widening across Shelby's face. He had won, the grin said.

“Rhea, take Francis and get out,” Dante ordered, sure he would not leave that room alive. “Get out, Rhea!” he said again. He did not risk a glance at her, but he knew she was still there.

“No,” Rhea said weakly. She would not leave him. Francis, although his face was as pale as death, was struggling to his feet. But he was so weak that he could only sink back into her arms.

“Come on, men, we can take him. He's only one. But if ye can do it, take him alive. I'd like to make him suffer for all the lonely years he deprived me of my Lettie,” Shelby told his men, allowing them to close the distance at his back.

“You are mistaken,” a voice announced from the darkness behind Dante's back, startling the men who, only moments before, had felt so brave.

Out of the shadow of the doorway moved Alastair, a pistol in one hand, a sword in the other. Then, slipping in behind him came a short, bandy-legged figure. Kirby was suddenly at his captain's side, two pistols held firmly, while a knife protruded from his waistband.

“Aye, looks like the odds have changed a bit, but then ye never were good at bettin', Shelby,” Kirby commented as he eyed the big man with dislike. “And I ain't the gentleman the captain is, so I might not even be waitin' for them pigeon-hearted mongrels of yours who ain't fit to dig in a dunghill to turn tail and run before I'm puttin' a hole through your head,” the little steward said earnestly.

Shelby returned Kirby's stare with equal hatred. He'd never liked the man. “One of these days I'm goin' to squash ye like a beetle,” he spat, his narrowed, yellow eyes glaring at Alastair in turn. “Ye be lucky this time,
m'lord
, but next time ye might not have them cullions at your side. Then we'll see how brave a man ye've become,” Shelby challenged the man whose pale-eyed stare had never moved from his figure.

“Reckon ye've been back to your home? Heard tell there's been a few changes. Reckon ye was a bit surprised, eh,
m'lord
Jacqobi? Reckon all ye be is the master of some reeky, maggoty jakes. But then, 'tis where the stinkin' likes of ye belongs,
m'lord
,” Shelby said, forgetting danger as he baited the man. But his men weren't so blind with rage, and they murmured to him in low voices.

Rhea could sense Dante's rage building, and she knew it wouldn't take much more for him to pull that trigger. “Dante, please,” Rhea said. “Francis needs attention. No one can win now,” she said, her words the first sane ones spoken.

“Cap'n, Lady Rhea's right,” Kirby added. “If ye shoot down that dog, then the others might be on us like a pack of wild hounds. Ye can't be riskin' the lives of Lady Rhea and Lord Chardinall, and ye know there'll be another time for ye and that bastard to be settlin' your differences,” he said.

But it was Sam Lascombe, his big hairy legs sticking out from beneath his nightshirt, who settled the argument—and most diplomatically. He appeared in the doorway with a long-barreled blunderbuss, which he swung around the room with no concern for whom it was aimed at.

“Reckon I'm findin' it difficult to tell friend from foe in this crowd. The Bishop's closed. Ye gents can come back later. Or ye can be meetin' someplace else to continue your argument, but this ain't the time or the place,” he suggested, that big blunderbuss raking the group again, making everyone nervous, for Sam still looked half-asleep.

“Get Francis,” Dante said. Alastair didn't wait for further orders before bending over Rhea's fallen brother. Handing her one of his pistols and tucking the other in his waistband, he slid his arms around Francis and carefully helped him to his feet.

Holding him firmly, Alastair led Francis from the room, Rhea following slowly behind. She kept glancing back to make certain that Dante followed, but she needn't have worried, for Kirby was of the same mind, and he lingered in the doorway until the captain moved backward into the shadows.

Shelby watched that tall figure disappearing, those pale gray eyes never once leaving his face. The message was only too clear: without question they would meet again, and only one of them would walk away the next time.

We have scotch'd the snake, not kill'd it.

—Shakespeare

Francis made a grimace as the bandage was tightened around his arm. “Ouch, any tighter, Kirby, and my arm will drop off,” he said, trying to get a better glance at the little steward's handiwork. As he caught sight of the blood seeping through the white strip of bandage, he swallowed, glad he was sitting down. The sight of his own blood made him only too aware of mortality, Francis thought, sitting there on the edge of his bed.

“Now, now, my lord, 'tis just a flesh wound and shouldn't be causin' ye any trouble at all. Reckon ye be mighty lucky Jack Shelby's aim isn't as good as it used to be, otherwise we'd be makin' plans to bury ye,” Kirby told the young gentleman with such a total lack of concern that Francis actually felt the ache in his arm lessening, which was exactly what the cagey little steward had intended. That, and to set her ladyship's mind at ease, for Lady Rhea was as nervous as a mother hen. She was standing just behind his shoulder, watching with what he thought was an overly critical eye. It only reminded Kirby that his patient was, after all, the Duke of Camareigh's son and heir.

“So that was Jack Shelby?” Francis said with an incredulous look at the people standing around. “If I'd known that when I'd entered, I would have shot him before I'd taken the time to introduce myself. Lord, he's even worse than I thought he'd be,” Francis exclaimed. “He meant to kill me, didn't he? Even though he knew I must have friends who would avenge my death? Didn't he even care that those friends might have been nearby?” Francis demanded. How could Jack have such a total lack of fear? the young man wondered.

“He's crackbrained,” Kirby muttered, and he slit the bandage with the knife that had been resting in his waistband only moments before. As he tied the two ends of the bandage together, he wished he were tightening a noose around Shelby's scoundrel neck.

“No, he isn't crackbrained, Kirby. He believes in his own power,” Dante disagreed, his booted feet stretched out before him as he sat in a chair watching, “and that has made him arrogant, perhaps even careless. At least we shall hope it has.”

Rhea, satisfied that Kirby knew what he was doing and that her brother wasn't in any immediate danger, left her watch at Kirby's shoulder and walked around the bed to Dante.

“Where were you?” she asked. “I awoke to find you had left, and I was worried. Where did you go?” she questioned him anxiously, for she had not missed the thick coating of mud on the soles of his boots, or the green stains on the side of his breeches. The stains reminded her of that velvety coating of mold covering the stones of Merdraco. “I was frightened, Dante.”

Dante quickly got to his feet. Taking her in his arms, he felt her slim body shaking. “Forgive me, but I did not wish to disturb you. I had to go to Merdraco. I had to find out if the smugglers really had been using one of the towers to signal from. I hoped to catch one of them in the act,” he admitted, knowing what her reaction would be.

“Oh, Dante, you might have been killed! Why didn't you wait and ask the authorities for help?” she asked, for she still placed her faith in the law. “Or, at least, take Alastair with you?” Rhea said, turning an accusing eye on that young gentleman, who managed to look guilty even though he'd had nothing to do with the captain's stealthy errand, having been fast asleep at the time, a circumstance which still irked him. But as the lady implied, he should have been at his captain's side. “And why tonight?”

“My dearest, have you forgotten that I am a former smuggler? I know how a smuggler plans. This was the first night he could move the contraband. So…” he said with a shrug.

“So you decided to face the smugglers by yourself? How could you do such a thing?” Rhea demanded angrily. Why, she might have been sleeping peacefully in her bed while he died.

“Never have I been so surprised or so frightened as I was when I found you with Jack Shelby, the man I'd been out searching for,” Dante said, his eyes kindling again with wrath as he remembered coming into the inn, but quietly so as not to awaken anyone, only to hear the roar of a pistol shot, then the sound of a woman's scream. Having rushed to the open taproom doorway, he had halted, his pistol ready, thinking he'd fallen into hell itself, for a sulfuric cloud was hanging over the room and a figure lay crumpled against the floor, blood seeping from a wound. In the hazy light, the dark shapes had seemed figments of his imagination, but the woman straining to release herself from the imprisonment of a man's embrace certainly had not. It was Rhea. Her unbound hair had seemed alive as she'd struggled against the hand holding her, the long, curling length of gold appearing to be fighting its own battle.

Dante finally dragged his mind away from the memory, shuddering as Francis demanded, “Were they using the tower?” Now that he knew he wasn't at death's door, he was burning to know what Dante had found out.

“Yes. I climbed to the top of the tower without having to sweep aside one single cobweb. And on the top floor, I discovered several blankets and empty bottles where the lookout must have spent many an uncomfortable night waiting for that signal from the sea,” Dante explained.

“A pity one of them wasn't up there when you arrived,” Francis commented, suddenly feeling quite bloodthirsty and hot for revenge.

Rhea sent her brother a hard glance.

“I had hoped so too,” Dante admitted. Then frowning, he added, “But I do not believe there was any chance of that. I got the impression that the tower has not been used in a while.”

Kirby, who was a man of no nonsense, glanced curiously at the captain while placing several blood-soaked cloths into a bowl of water.

But Alastair had a bit more imagination. “Why would they use it, only to stop? You felt it was not being used as a watchtower any longer?”

“It does seem strange, but I couldn't help feeling that way. I've no logical explanation,” Dante murmured.

“You sound like Aunt Mary. If she were here, Rhea, we could get her to tell us where the smugglers were meeting and even where they were landing contraband,” Francis said warmly, ignoring the disbelieving snort from Kirby.

“Reckon we got enough wild stories of ghosts and Wild Huntsmen to last a lifetime, Lord Chardinall, without ye addin' more by usin' the Lady Mary's good name,” Kirby told him severely, for he had the utmost respect for the kindhearted Lady Mary.

“Maybe one of them standing guard had a bad dream and awoke screaming about seeing ghosts. Most likely they have frightened themselves with their own ghost stories,” Alastair said, preferring that explanation of the tower's abandonment to the only other explanation.

The sound of feet shuffling beyond the closed door, followed by a sharp, imperative knock, found Alastair standing against the wall on one side of the door, his hand resting on his sword as Dante pulled Rhea behind his back, his hand moving to the pistol lying on the chest at the foot of the bed.

“Enter,” Dante called. Although he had watched the Sons of Belial leaving the Bishop as dawn was breaking, he wouldn't have put it past Shelby to sneak back.

But it was Sam who entered the room, a group of tall tankards and a china teapot on the tray he was balancing on one large hand. “Dora thought ye might be in need of somethin' bracin',” Sam explained as he set the tray down on the chest by the bed. “She thought her ladyship might like a spot of tea, seein' there's a chill in the air,” he added, looking around for Lady Rhea. “I'm sorry, I thought for sure her ladyship was in here.”

“Thank you,” Rhea said, stepping out from behind Dante's broad back. “I could use something to warm me. I'm still shaking.” But she smiled, which relieved Sam's mind, for he felt partly responsible for the dangers the lady had seen. After all, it had happened under his roof. He thanked his lucky stars that he had gotten down to the taproom in time to halt further bloodletting. That the Duke of Camareigh's son had come to harm at the Bishop would give Sam nightmares for months to come.

“I wish I had some of Mrs. Taylor's Special Treat,” Rhea said with a wry smile at Francis, who grimaced.

Sam stared blankly at her for a moment, then allowed himself a grin. “Reckon Dora was thinkin' somethin' the same, m'lady, for she added a goodly portion of somethin' special to your cup. 'Tis her Uncle Alf's secret brew. He was always an odd fish. Bit of a wanderer, he was, but finally settled down, he did, somewhere around Buckfastleigh, in the South. Don't know what he's up to nowadays, most likely no good, which wouldn't be no surprise considerin' Alf's mother. They say she was part Gypsy,” Sam explained as he noticed the bewildered looks, then he shook his head as if including all his wife's relatives in his disapproval.

Silence descended, and Sam continued to stand there, looking around him, his eyes never quite meeting anyone's. “I—I don't quite know what to be sayin' to ye, m'lord. I wouldn't have any harm befallin' Lady Rhea for anythin' in the world, and I'm grievously upset by what happened to Lord Chardinall. I—I hope ye're believin' me?” he asked worriedly, his big hands twisting and untwisting as he faced the stern-visaged marquis.

“You warned them off, didn't you, Sam?” Dante panicked the innkeeper by asking. “I am familiar with the ways of smugglers. Surely you have heard about my former exploits from Master Brady?” he questioned the red-faced Sam. To be suspected of smuggling was one thing, but to be admitting to it was something altogether different.

“Well, reckon we get all sorts in here, bein' the only inn between Merleigh and Westlea Abbot,” was all Sam was willing to admit. “I know, of course, of the bad blood between ye and Jack Shelby, and if I could be keepin' that kind of vermin out of the Bishop, I would, but…” Sam's voice trailed off uncomfortably. “Lots of things have changed around here since ye left, m'lord,” he said with dark meaning. “A person has to look out for himself, or he's likely to end up in the sea like a bloated haddock.”

“You don't need to explain, Sam. We do what we must to survive,” Dante told him, receiving a grateful nod from the tired innkeeper. “And you needn't worry any longer about any more incidents here, or that your inn will be burned to the ground, for we shall be taking up residence immediately at the hunting lodge. You have already done enough for us by giving us your hospitality,” Dante said sincerely, and even Kirby was impressed by the captain's graciousness.

“Well, it has been a privilege, that it has,” Sam said just as sincerely, but he couldn't hide the relief in his voice. Now that his lordship and his party were leaving the Bishop, he would be sleeping a bit easier.

Dante went on, “I do not think you need concern yourself with Jack Shelby. He will be too busy trying to find a way to get his revenge against me to be bothering with you. Besides, the Bishop is too important to the smugglers' operations for them to burn it down,” Dante told him. The argument didn't relieve Sam's mind very much, however. He couldn't help but be concerned for his lordship's safety.

The danger Dante was courting was uppermost in Rhea's mind as she met Dante's hard gaze. She knew he was still savoring the moment when he had faced Jack Shelby and known he could end the man's life.

The thought was indeed occupying Dante's mind, for he said, more to himself than to anyone else, “And you may expect there to be some changes around here. I am once again the largest landowner hereabouts, and I will not be bullied by this rabble. I promise you now, Sam Lascombe, that I will see the Sons of Belial in hell before they set foot anywhere near Merdraco again. I pledge that vow.”

The astounding revelation had startled the innkeeper. Sir Miles Sandbourne owned most of the land around there, including that which had once belonged to the Leighton family, or so Sam thought. He rubbed his chin absentmindedly, and as realization began to grow, so did dread. It seemed Dante Leighton had yet another enemy, for the changes the Marquis of Jacqobi was promising were certain not to sit well with some. Sam would have bet his life on that.

And his own life might well be what Dante Leighton would have to forfeit in order to vanquish his enemy, thought Sam with a pitying look at the lovely Lady Rhea. She was gazing up into her husband's grim face with an expression of undying love, and the innkeeper felt as if he were intruding into an intimate moment between lovers. He wondered what the young lady would do if the winds of fortune turned against the man who had fought so valiantly to return to Merdraco.