Smugglers' Summer (28 page)

He kissed her hand, and she went away to sleep with it pressed to her cheek.

In spite of Mr Wynn’s hurry to leave for London, he and his rosy-cheeked bride did not come down until nearly noon, when they appeared with their arms entwined about each other in a total disregard for propriety.

Sir Tristram looked dispassionately at Julia’s glowing face. She was beautiful, certainly, but he had not the least desire to spend the rest of his life with her. Even when he had thought himself in love with her, he had had difficulty imagining her settled quietly at Dean Park. She was destined to become a brilliant political hostess, like Lady Holland or Lady Melbourne. He envied neither her nor James for anything but their obvious happiness together.

Octavia had been chatting intimately with the lawyer’s daughter all morning, ignoring his discreet attempts to attract her attention. The fear that she truly loved the lieutenant grew till it seemed to choke him.

It was mid-afternoon before Mr and Mrs Wynn and Ada and a large quantity of baggage were safely packed up inside and outside a hired chaise at the Golden Hind. Last good-byes were exchanged, the postilion urged the horses on, and the carriage rumbled out of the yard with Julia hanging out of the window waving happily.

Octavia looked up at a nearby church clock.

“We must hurry!” she exclaimed. “The tide turned half an hour ago and I promised my aunt to return today.”

“I must talk to you!”

“Not now. There will be time later.”

He followed at her heels down the busy street to the harbour, unwilling to embark upon a private conversation in the midst of a crowd but determined not to go back to Cotehele while she was engaged to the lieutenant.

When they reached the quayside, she turned to him.

“Will you hire a boat?” she requested breathlessly. “I sent a note to Mr Cardin this morning and he will be waiting for me, I hope.”

Not waiting for an answer, she dashed off towards the Customs House. She was excessively eager to see her betrothed, he thought.

He found a boat willing to sail upriver and hired it, with a sinking feeling that Octavia would sail alone on it. When he turned back towards the Customs House, Mr Cardin had come out. Her hand tucked into his arm, Octavia was walking up and down with him, talking earnestly.

Utterly dejected, he sat down on a bollard and watched them.

After a few minutes, they came towards him. As he stood up, he tried to read the lieutenant’s face. It displayed none of the hoped for misery that would have signalled a disappointed suitor, looking more perplexed than anything else.

“I daresay I ought to call you out, sir,” said Mr Cardin hesitantly.

Sir Tristram’s heart leapt.

“I beg you will not,” he responded with forced calmness. “I’ve no desire either to hurt you or to be forced to flee the country."

“I should lose my place in the Service if I fought a duel.”

“Then you may consider the challenge issued, I shall beg your forgiveness, and the matter may be forgotten. Indeed, I am sorry to have caused you pain, but it is a female’s prerogative to change her mind, you know.”

“And a male’s to blame his misdeeds on female inconstancy,” said Octavia tartly. “If you had only
told
me . . ."

“You will excuse us, Mr Cardin,” said Sir Tristram, grinning. “I prefer to quarrel with Octavia privately.”

The lieutenant saluted and went off with a tolerably unafflicted air.

“How very unflattering,” said Octavia with a sigh, as he helped her down the stone steps to the waiting boat. “Instead of being cast into the dismals he was anxious to learn how long Miss Newell is to stay at Mount Edgcumbe. I should never have told him that she admires him prodigiously. Female inconstancy is nothing to it!”

He lifted her aboard and they sat down. The sailors cast off. As they pulled away from the quay, he took her hand and held it tight.

“Alas,” he confessed, “I cannot claim to be a paragon in that respect."

“No, and you are quite as unflattering as he! Would you not have fought a duel for me?”

“Of course I would, my darling, but it seemed wasteful to risk depriving you of two prospective husbands at once." He laughed joyously.

She leaned her head against his shoulder and they sat in companionable silence watching the sailors run about raising sails.

After a while, she asked shyly, “It is not because you cannot have Julia that you want to marry me? Just to keep your brother-in-law from Dean Park?”

“I think I fell in love with you when you fell in the water,” he said contemplatively as they sailed between Cremyll and Devil’s Point. “The splash made my heart stand still. But I did not realise until I kissed you that there was a great deal more warmth in my cousinly affection for you than in my supposed adoration of your cousin. In the well-worn phrase, it struck me like a thunderbolt.” He turned his head as if to kiss her for the second time.

She shook her head, with heightened colour, and quickly asked, “Why did you not tell me then, instead of making ambiguous remarks about the devil?”

“About the devil? Did I really? Was that before or after you told me you had enjoyed my kiss?”

“I did not!” Her cheeks grew still rosier. “I said I had enjoyed
it.
I meant you to think I referred to the scramble down the shortcut.”

“Now who is ambiguous! My love, my love, you were so ambiguous I had no idea whether you cared for me in the least or not!”

“I do,” she assured him earnestly, “very much! Ever since you called me ‘sweetheart’ to deceive the dragoons."

He laughed and hugged her.

“The sailors!” she hissed, disengaging herself reluctantly.

A thought struck him. “My brother-in-law! What do you know of my brother-in-law?”

She was forced to confess to her eavesdropping in the chapel, which made him laugh and hug her again.

When they passed Halton Quay, Octavia at once noticed the scarlet petticoat hanging prominently on the washing line.

“Red Jack left just in time,” she said. “Look, the Excise-men are back. I hope the Riding Officer and his dragoons have not scared my aunt half to death.”

“If they have, I shall scare them half to death,” said Sir Tristram grimly. “However, I expect they are merely searching the cargo of your friend Captain Pilway.”

The light was fading when they reached Cotehele Quay, but they could see that all the wharves were occupied. On the quay a swarm of dragoons inspected the contents of every basket as it was swung ashore. The hired boat pulled up to the reed-grown bank just south of the little harbour.

Sir Tristram swung Octavia ashore safely and made to follow her. He lost his footing, slipped, and landed knee-deep in mud.

Standing there, hands on hips, he shook his head in rueful disgust.

“It serves you right for laughing so heartily at poor Mr Wynn when he jumped off the cliff,” said Octavia severely. “But all the same, I shall help you out. Take my hand.”

He looked at her, suddenly serious. “Don’t offer me your hand unless you really mean it,” he said. “If I take it, I shall never let you go for the rest of my life.”

She held out both hands.

Squelching, he pulled himself out onto the bank and took her in his arms.

“How could I have been such a clunch as to have spent all that time chasing that wretched cousin of yours,” he marvelled.

“And how could I have been such a featherhead as to have done my best to persuade her to have you?”

They looked at each other, half laughing, then he bent his head and kissed her long and hard.

A cheer arose from the smugglers, from the Customs men, and from the wharf labourers. Octavia blushed furiously as Sir Tristram looked up and waved.

Then he kissed her again.

NOTE

Cotehele now belongs to the National Trust, Mount Edgcumbe to the City of Plymouth and the Cornwall County Council. Both are open to the public and well worth a visit.

Copyright © 1987 by Carola Dunn

Originally published by Walker and Co in 1987; published in paperback by Warner 12/89

Electronically published in 2004 by Belgrave House/Regency Reads

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This is a work of fiction. All names in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to any person living or dead is coincidental.