Lady in the Mist (20 page)

He suddenly wished he held the coffee in his left hand, with his right hand dangling over the side of the chair. But he held his cup in his right, the bruised knuckle glowing purple in the light.

“You have a bruised knuckle,” Kendall pointed out, “and you had blood on you when you came in.”

“I did, sir, but not from fighting. I know better.”

“That’s not what I understood from the captain of the ship that brought you to America.”

Dominick shuddered. “My circumstances in England were much different. I was a free man there.”

“And you are little more than a slave here.” Kendall leaned forward and his tone harshened again. “Not only that, Cherrett, you are English at a time when few Americans trust the English, especially around here. If I hear that one man disappeared last night, I will have little choice but to presume you were the culprit and have you treated accordingly. Some men would likely circumvent the law and hang you.”

“I’m not involved with stealing Americans for the British Navy, sir.”

“And who would believe that? You’re caught out in the middle of the night and have blood on your clothes. That’s condemnatory behavior right then and there.”

Even the coffee’s heat failed to stave off the chill now.

Dominick nodded. “I know, sir.”

“What you don’t know is that Harlan Wilkins wishes to be mayor instead of me. The fact that my bondsman was out and about in the middle of the night is a weapon he can use against me.”

“I thought you two were friends.” The coffee he’d consumed turned to a whirlpool in his belly.

“Of course we are.” Kendall grimaced. “As much as two rivals can be. It’s too small a town not to be friends. And if my bondsman is found to be an English spy, my political future ends right here.”

The man had been good to Dominick, barring the uniform and powdered hair. He wanted to reassure Kendall that he had nothing to fear, but he couldn’t be certain Kendall wouldn’t see through his protestations.

“I expect the one of us who finds this spy,” Kendall said, “will win the next election. If it’s me, I’ll have no difficulty getting the senate seat in three years.”

Dominick set down his coffee cup. “So what will you do to me, sir?”

“Lock you in your room every night and revoke your permission to attend the Midsummer Festival.” The answer emerged so quickly, the mayor must have had it planned. “And if you get out again, I will have you whipped in the town square as an example to other redemptioners. Do you understand?”

Dominick nodded. He couldn’t speak. His stomach churned, and he tasted bile.

“Then go get yourself some breakfast and rest.” Kendall stood. “After that, please pack my bags for at least a week of travel.”

“Yes, sir.” Dominick shot to his feet. “This is a sudden journey.”

“Some unexpected business has raised its head.” Kendall smiled, but it wasn’t directed at Dominick, and it wasn’t pleasant. “And don’t think you can take advantage of my absence to break my rules again. Letty is more than capable of keeping you under her thumb.”

“Yes, sir, she is.” Dominick edged to the door.

“And Cherrett,” Kendall called after him, “be more discreet with Tabitha. She’s a dear girl who doesn’t deserve to have lost as much as she has. Leave her alone to resume her betrothal to Raleigh Trower.”

Dominick froze, staring.

Kendall laughed, head thrown back. “Don’t look so surprised. It’s my duty to know what goes on in my town.”

Then why didn’t he know who would betray America by selling her young men to the enemy?

The answer was obvious, sickening, making Dominick feel as though he’d been hit as hard as Trower had been. He should have thought of it, of the ambition that would make Kendall need money. He’d been blinded by the man’s kindness to him and the high regard in which everyone held him.

Even now, as he retreated to the kitchen, his back intact, Dominick dismissed the new idea as preposterous. Kendall wanted to run his country, not destroy it. Should war come, a war that would surely destroy the United States of America as a nation, Kendall would hold no power. On the contrary, he might be in danger as a leader of a conquered nation.

Unless he held friends in high places. High British places.

Dominick staggered to a chair and dropped into it like a stone tumbling off of a cliff. He speared his fingers through his hair, dislodging it further. He needed rest before his brainbox exploded with more ridiculous notions.

“I’ll fix your hair for you.” Dinah slipped up behind him and gathered his hair into her hands. “Oooh, it’s soft.”

“Stop that.” Dominick jerked upright, dislodging her fingers with a painful yank on his scalp. “I’m in enough trouble without Kendall thinking I’m trying to ruin his kitchen maid.”

“I just never knew a man’s hair could be so soft.” Dinah gazed at him with big, limpid eyes.

“You, missy,” Dominick scolded, “need to pay more attention to your Bible. Modest behavior is a virtue.”

“And since when do you refer to Scripture?” Letty stomped in the back door, her apron full of eggs.

“Perhaps this morning’s work has given me my faith back.” He spoke with flippancy yet felt an odd tug at his heart, as though he wasn’t being entirely facetious.

God had spared him a flogging. Yet without the freedom to move around at night or get to his rendezvous on June 21, the same night as the fete, he was likely to serve out his indenture without redemption at the end.

Unless the evidence he sought lay under his very roof.

21

______

The storm was going to ruin her roses.

Tabitha stood at the kitchen window and frowned at the streaks of rain down the multiple panes of glass. The scarlet of her roses shone against the gray background like blood, something she’d seen too much of during the night.

Raleigh’s blood staining Dominick’s shirt, staining the cloth of the sofa, staining her hands. Head wounds always bled profusely and made them look worse than they were. She’d seen many in her life. Mrs. Wilkins’s had been the latest before Raleigh’s.

The most recent and the worst.

Tabitha shuddered in memory of that terrible wound. She’d tried to stitch it, but the woman had writhed so much in her pain, Tabitha couldn’t keep the skin together or aim her needle. In the end, it hadn’t mattered. Mrs. Wilkins died, and Harlan Wilkins set out on a trail of vengeance toward Tabitha.

As Raleigh had Dominick?

She couldn’t believe it. No, she didn’t
want
to believe it. Whether or not she
could
depended on whether or not she believed Raleigh had changed in his two years away. Lately she couldn’t seem to believe in anything, not Raleigh’s goodness, not Dominick’s honesty, not God’s interest in her.

Weary, feeling as though she carried a load of bricks on her shoulders, Tabitha leaned her brow on the cold windowpane and wished for the sweetness of the roses, their fresh scent beneath her nose, their delicate flavor under her tongue.

He looks at you like one of your candied flower petals.
Raleigh’s words echoed in her head, and her cheeks grew warm despite the rain-chilled glass beneath her brow. Something about that remark was unseemly, yet her mind drifted to that brief kiss, stolen but not demanded back. Worse, not regretted. Worst of all, enjoyed.

She couldn’t possibly think of marrying Raleigh and have such indelicate thoughts about another man. It was disloyal, a kind of treachery.

And so foolish. If she feared Raleigh leaving again, she was unwise to care about another man who would most certainly leave. And Dominick was up to no good.

So was Raleigh. She had no doubt of that. He wasn’t being honest with her. But she would try again. She would try to get Dominick to be honest with her about the night’s events. Surely one of them would be, with enough encouragement. A little bribery to soften them up? Food worked with men. At least the married women she knew said so.

Her gaze strayed to the pantry holding the wooden box lined with precious paper and the even more precious candied violets from her efforts in May.

Candied violets.

Her cheeks warmed further as light, quick footfalls pattered into the kitchen.

“Miss Tabitha, are you ill?” Patience exclaimed.

Tabitha faced the maid fully. “No, why do you ask?”

“You’re all flushed like you’ve been taken with a fever. And no wonder, coming in soaked like a drowned rat this morning.” Patience pulled out a chair at the table. “Sit yourself down and I’ll make you a nice cup of chamomile tea.”

“Thank you. I should try to sleep.” Maybe the tea would soothe her, quiet her head. She turned to her maid and companion. “Patience, how did you bear to become a redemptioner after being a free woman most of your life?”

“It was do that or starve after my husband died.” Patience spooned chamomile leaves into the teapot. “And you and your family made it possible to survive it.”

“But do you miss home?”

“Nearly every day.” Patience’s head bowed over the tea preparations. “Sometimes it’s like a hole in my heart to be gone.”

“Then why don’t you return?” Tabitha began to pace the kitchen. “You’re free now.”

“God wants me to stay with you.”

Tabitha swung around. “How could you possibly know a thing like that?”

Patience shrugged. “I just do. I prayed about it when I worked out my time and had a peace about staying.”

“But . . . why would He do that to you?”

“Because I promised to serve Him.” Patience faced Tabitha, a smile on her face. “And if keeping you safe and having someone to take care of you is how He wants me to serve Him, then it’s what I’m doing.”

“But why me?”

“’Cause you’re all alone. God loves you too much to let you stay alone.”

“If He loves me so much, why did He cause me to be alone in the first place?” Tabitha lashed back.

“I don’t know, Miss Tabitha. I wish I did.” Tears brightened Patience’s eyes. “But He has His reasons. We just have to trust Him.”

“The pastor says I have to trust God to trust others. But I can’t. I—” The knocker pounded on the front door. “Oh, dear.” Tabitha headed to the door. “I’ll get it, Patience. It could be one of the Trowers.”

Which would mean Raleigh had taken a turn for the worse.

Heart racing, she strode to the door and flung it open.

A bondservant who looked no older than fifteen all but fell into the entry on a gust of rain-laden air. “It’s her time, Miz Tabitha. Mrs. Parks’s pains been going all night and she said to come for you.”

“I’ll just be a moment. Go into the kitchen for something hot to drink.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Leaving a trail of mud across the shining floorboards, he headed toward the warmth of the kitchen.

Tabitha raced up the steps, burden and heart lifting at the prospect of bringing a new life into the world, a life that was welcome. Even if the father was at sea more than at home, this baby would be loved and cared for by mother, grandparents, siblings, and a host of other relatives. It was the best kind of birth, a far cry from Sally Belote’s lying-in.

“Calm yourself, Marjorie.” Tabitha spoke in soothing accents. “Everything is all right.”

“But Momma says it’s two weeks early,” the young mother cried between close contractions.

Momma’s predictions were one reason why Tabitha had cleared the birthing chamber of female relatives—they’d been in the way. Their intentions were good, their presence a hindrance.

“I say it’s not,” Tabitha responded, “and I am the midwife.”

“Momma—” Marjorie groaned through another spasm of her body, then continued, “The last one was late. There’s just got to be something wrong.”

“Everything is well.” Tabitha washed her hands yet again and examined the woman to ensure she still spoke the truth.

She did. This lying-in was progressing as it should. The woman’s pains were powerful, but not too much so. The baby lay in the correct position. When necessary, Marjorie’s body dilated, and little blood showed.

“We can’t predict these things too closely,” Tabitha assured her.

“I can.” The response emerged in a wail as a more powerful contraction racked the mother’s body.

“Oh?” Tabitha looked again. “Wonderful. I can see the head.”

“My husband’s a sailor. He was home for only three days last September.”

“Ah, yes, of course.” Tabitha straightened to smile at Marjorie. “That’s really all right then. It’s not too early.” She moved around to the side of the bed and wiped the other woman’s perspiring brow with a cool, damp cloth. “Only a few—”

Marjorie’s shriek interrupted Tabitha. She scooted to the end of the bed without a show of haste and lifted the sheet. “Yes, I see the crown. Now push.”

“I can’t. It—” More of the baby’s head appeared along with a gush of fluid. The shoulders caught. Marjorie screamed.

“Easy, easy.” Tabitha never raised her voice in the birthing chamber, no matter what the circumstances. “Another push . . . There.”

The wrinkled, red, slimy infant slid into her hands.

“A beautiful boy.” Quickly, but with movements so practiced she looked as though she worked with deliberate slowness, Tabitha wiped mucous from the baby’s mouth and nose, then gave him a quick smack on his bottom to set him breathing. All the while, she kept up a flow of talk. “Look at those shoulders. He’s going to be a big one. And those feet. My, are they ever big. There.”

The baby’s first mewing wail filled the room. For a moment, Tabitha held the infant close to her heart, never failing to marvel at the perfect fingers and toes in miniature. Her heart filled. Her womb ached with emptiness.

Then the mother, grandmother, and two of Marjorie’s sisters burst into the room. The mother whisked the baby from Tabitha’s hands and wrapped it in cloths warmed by the fire. One sister began to wipe Marjorie’s brow. The other sister poured a glass of water for the new mother, and the grandmother began to sing a psalm of praise. Love and joy filled the chamber as Tabitha took care of the least pleasant part of the birthing process—the afterbirth, cleaning up the new mother, and removing the oiled cloth spread out to protect the bed.

Then she was done. After only three hours of work, her mission was complete. Marjorie slept, her mother, mother-in-law, sisters, and grandmother protecting her and the newborn, who slept beside her.

“I’ll take my leave now.” Tabitha stood by the door, loath to interrupt the tableau. “If you have any difficulties, please send someone for me immediately.”

“We will, Tabitha.” Mrs. Denton, Marjorie’s mother, followed Tabitha into the hall and paid her. “As always, you did well.”

The baby began to cry.

“I must go. Thank you.” Mrs. Denton vanished into the bedroom.

Tabitha crossed the corridor to the room the ladies always provided for her. She washed and changed into the clean gown she always kept packed in her satchel. Then she hefted her bag and headed downstairs to let herself out the front door, to her solitary walk home, to the mist.

It lay like a chilly blanket over the village, droplets suspended in the air. Though she heard other people walking, a dog bark, and some chickens cackling, she felt the mist settling on her like her earlier burden—the staggering pain of her empty arms—isolating her from the world around her. This was the part of her work that hurt, the aftermath of the joy of birth. The new mother took her infant from Tabitha’s arms. Mothers, grandmothers, sisters, aunts, friends surrounded both of them.

And Tabitha went home alone.

She could marry Raleigh. She could marry him tomorrow and go home to him—if he didn’t take it into his head to wander again and leave her alone. Too many men did. Burdened by family responsibilities, they headed out to sea or off to the wilderness in the West. Raleigh might do that. She didn’t yet trust him not to.

She doubted that she needed to trust God to trust others. Not true. She needed Raleigh not to lie to her, or at least tell her all of the truth. Or she needed to start a new life somewhere else, where everyone didn’t know her past, her follies, her failings. She needed to be far away from Dominick Cherrett and his tug on her heart.

She reached the square, and there he was, looming out of the mist, as he had that first night they met. He carried a basket in one hand and caught hold of her arm with the other.

“The mermaid midwife far from the sea.” His grin flashed through the gloom. “What are you doing out and about on such a day?”

“A lying-in.” Her voice was rough from so much talking over the past three hours. Her chest felt constricted, over full; the rest of her felt hollow enough to echo. “And what about you?”

“Delivering extra eggs to the parsonage.” He moved his hand from her arm to her face. “Are you all right? You couldn’t have enjoyed much sleep.”

“I didn’t, but there’s such joy in bringing new life into the world, my fatigue leaves me.”

She was discovering a new joy too, one born of a gentle hand against her skin, a voice she would recognize anywhere, a soft question about her well-being. Simply being near this man, despite all she knew, despite what she suspected.

“Are you all right?” she asked, wanting to prolong the interlude. “No trouble about last night?”

“Ah, well, a bit.” He laughed without humor. “I got caught.”

“Dominick.” She grasped his hand. “What happened? He didn’t . . . no, you wouldn’t be here. What happened?”

“It’s too cold out here to talk. Can you come in for some coffee?”

“If Letty doesn’t care.”

“Not Letty. She loves to feed people.” He tucked her hand into the crook of his arm and headed around the side of Mayor Kendall’s house. “I’ll wager you haven’t eaten.”

“I had breakfast when I got in this morning.”

“Morning was eight hours ago. My dear, you’re going to blow away on a strong wind if you don’t feed yourself better.” He paused to open the gate. “After you.”

She hesitated. “Dominick, I’m happy to come in for some coffee, but I want to talk to you about last night.”

“Of course you do.” He slipped his arm around her shoulders and guided her forward. “Are you going to rake me over some very hot coals, or am I forgiven?”

“For what should I forgive you? You didn’t strike Raleigh, did you? Someone else was there.”

“Ah, so you believe that now. Why?”

“Because Raleigh dislikes you so much but won’t outright accuse you.”

“But you still have doubts about me, don’t you?”

“I—yes. You were still there.”

“I was. I want to tell you why. I need to—” Quieting, he took several more steps, then stopped in the middle of the kitchen garden. “My dear, I want—” He stopped speaking again.