The Diamond King (39 page)

“Why?”

He went to the window. “You asked me why I could not take a bride on Barbados. There was a reason. My wife was French, She was also a quadroon. A free woman but, in the eyes of society on the island, tainted. That is why I had to look elsewhere for a wife. No family on the island will consider a match.”

“And your grandfather?”

“He did not know about Simone.” He turned back to her. “I knew you might leave when you heard.”

“Nay,” she said. “Not for that reason.”

“My children need someone who will love them. They told me you liked children. I had hoped ...”

Jenna looked at his earnest face. She thought then she could trust him. She had to trust him. She had to leave or Burke would either leave on his own, or come after her.

“I must go,” she said. “I am sorry, but someone I care about needs me.”

He smiled slightly. “I feared that. The captain of the
Ami
?”

She did not answer.

“I know French quite well because of my wife. I had heard that he was with a woman with light brown hair and sea-colored eyes. And she did not seem to be a prisoner. I do not think the lieutenant received the same information I did.”

“Like you, the captain has children,” she said. “He saved ten of them in Scotland and is looking after several of them. They need him.”

“And you? Do they need you as well?”

“I do not know if they need
me
,” she said honestly. “But they need someone.”

“My grandfather was right. You would have made a good wife. But one can not help whom they love. I know that as well as anyone.”

She smiled. “I think you do. If circumstances were different, I would accept your proposal and gladly so. But I cannot.”

“You are sure it is what you want?”

“Aye.”

“I am sorry about that,” he said.

“You will not say anything to the British?”

“I owe them nothing,” he said.

“You owe me nothing, either. You came all this way to... save me.”

“It was selfish. You were my last chance. At least on Barbados.” He hesitated. “And you are kind enough to be honest. I have loved deeply. I would not take that away from you.”

“You can still find someone in England.”

“It was not a good idea,” he said. “My children will suffer as long as we remain on Barbados. It is time to go somewhere else. Perhaps then we can find someone who will love them.”

“And you,” she said. “If I had met you first...”

“I do not think so, Jeanette. You cannot force love.” He turned back toward the door. “
Bonne chance
,” he said, and left. He was not French, but the French expression seemed more meaningful and poignant than any other would be.

She stared at the closed door, wishing for that small bit of time that she could have loved such a good man. She would have been content.

But she had gone beyond contentment with Alex. She had to follow her heart. If she did not, she would wonder and regret all her life. She might be making a terrible mistake, but she could not settle for less than love now.

Her heart was with Alex. She had given all of it to him in Martinique.

And he was ill.

She looked around the room, gathered a few belongings and said a prayer.
Please let David Murray be what he seems to be
. Would he keep his word? Or could she be leading the authorities to Alex?

Jenna opened the door. No one was in the corridor, which was now dark because the oil lamp remained in her room. She turned back and blew it out, then made her way past the doors, wondering which one belonged to David Murray. Was he still there?

She made it down the stairs and saw no one. She opened the door to the back and slipped out. Immediately Burke stepped next to her. “I did not think you would come. I was going to go.”

“I was delayed. Someone saw us.”

Burke took his dagger out of his belt. “What room?”

“Nay,” she said. “He will say nothing.”

“How do you know?”

“I know. And I will not tell you what room he is in.”

He gave her a fierce look.

“We do not have time to argue,” she said.

With an angry look, he pivoted around, leaving her to follow. They stayed to the shadows but moved swiftly through the streets until they reached the shacks on the outskirts.

There they met Mickey and a dark, swarthy man who said nothing as they arrived, merely turned away and started walking. They all silently followed him until they reached water. The swarthy man gestured them to get into a canoe. Mickey went first, and the small vessel swayed back and forth until she thought it would tip over. Finally it settled, and with Mickey’s help she stepped inside. Then Burke entered and finally their silent companion, who took the middle seat and started paddling.

Jenna kept looking back over her shoulder, expecting to see British soldiers behind them, but there was only silence.

David Murray had kept his word.

Alex drank more of the bark. It did not seem to help. The alternating chills and fever continued to ravage his body.

“It takes time to work, senhor,” the priest said.

Alex did not know how much time he had. Each day he felt life ebb from him. Even a few steps exhausted him. His life had become a series of nightmares. He was haunted by Culloden, by those few moments of slaughter. His friends falling under cannon, the agony of his own wounds, the sounds of the dying.

The trees faded into one another, seeming like a shroud closing in around him. The incessant rain was like drumbeats, a sound he’d never wanted to hear again.

“I will... not make the ... ship,” he said.

“Tomas will tell them what happened and that you will be late,” the priest said.

“They cannot stay there.”

The priest said nothing.

“Will you see that the diamonds get to my people?” he said. “There are children.”

“You have told me about them, senhor. It is why I have stayed with you. I did not know at first whether you were a good man. I think you are.”

Chills racked Alex’s body, and his teeth chattered so hard he could not respond.

The priest covered him but the covering was wet and did nothing to warm him. It was too wet to start a fire.

He was barely conscious of a noise. That he was conscious at all was comforting. That he was
barely
conscious was terrifying.

He tried to turn, but the shaking had seized his body again. His vision was blurry and his ears seemed stuffed with some substance.

“The captain?”

He heard the soft but determined voice as if from a great distance. A dream. It had to be a dream.

Jenna Campbell was at sea. Miles away.

Perhaps he was hallucinating again.

But then he saw her face. It was blurred, just as everything was blurred, but he saw the sea-colored eyes, and felt the touch of her hand. It was warm on his icy body. “Alex,” she said.

He tried to concentrate. She
was
here. He felt, saw, and heard her, even if it was as if through a tunnel. “Jenna?”

“Aye, Captain,” she said, and he thought he detected both concern and wry humor in her voice. “You cannot get rid of me.”

He knew now—with every fiber of his weary body—that he didn’t want to get rid of her. He had never wanted to get rid of her.

“The...
Ami
?”

“Safe,” she said. “She sailed to an island south of here to wait for you. It is said to be isolated.”

“The English ...”

“In Vit�ria now, but we—Burke and Mickey and myself—got away safely.”

“Burke ... good. But how ...”

“Do not try to speak,” she said. “We have brought some blankets and found something to keep the rain off you. Rest. Just rest.”

She sat back, her hand on his cheek, and started to sing a soft song, just as she had sung for Meg. Burke appeared and piled several blankets on him and covered them with an oilcloth. He nodded to Burke, then closed his eyes.

He was so tired.

Jenna was frightened. Frightened for him. So frightened that she forgot her own discomfort: the clothes plastered against her skin, the leeches that clung to her body, the insects that attacked in swarms. Her hair was tangled with some of those same insects and sweat and dirt. Her legs ached from traveling through rough terrain, and her arms were cut by all manner of foliage.

But that was nothing compared to the captain’s condition.

Burke had been told he was ill, but she’d not imagined how ill he was. Even through the sun bronze of his face, he looked pallid under thick black bristles of a beard. His body was shaking so hard that she feared it would break.

She had talked to the priest, and he’d told her what he had been giving him.

“Can you not give him more?”

“Not without killing him,” he replied in poor English.

She swallowed and knelt again next to him, holding his hand tight in hers, trying to give him some of her body’s warmth.

“What is it?”

The priest shook his head. “The sweating sickness. I’ve seen other Europeans get it. I only know that the bark of our cinchona tree helps the illness. It is exported to other countries.”

“How long has he had it?”

“Four days.”

“Has it gotten better?”

“No, but it takes time.”

“What else can we do?”

“Just try to keep him warm. The chills ravage his body.”

She looked down at him. “Go away,” she said. “All of you. Leave me alone with him.”

“Nay,” Burke said.

But the priest was looking at her. “
Sim
,” he said, darting a glance at the other three Europeans. “You want him to live?” he asked Burke when the man started to protest.

Burke looked at her hard, then seemed to understand. “We will not be far away.”

The priest gave her a leather pouch. “I have pounded the bark. Mix it with water and give it to him when the sun goes down, then at dawn.” He pointed his hand at the pistol, lying beside Alex. “Fire it if you need us.”

Then he faded through the woods with a silent stranger. Burke, Tomas—the man who had guided her small party— as well as Marco and Mickey reluctantly followed them.

She checked the blankets. They were quickly drying now that the rain had stopped. She piled them on Alex, then lay next to him, putting her arms around him and trying to warm his body with her own.

She felt every shiver, every shake of his body, and held him even closer, willing her strength into him.

“It will be all right,” she whispered. “I will not let anything happen to you.”

Then she started to hum.

After several moments, the shaking subsided slightly. His body relaxed slowly and in minutes he seemed to fall asleep. The shivers did not stop, and she continued to hold him.

He wouldn’t die. She would not let him.

The shaking gradually faded.

Alex was still shivering but the violence was gone. He felt drained, too weak to do more than lie there, absorbing the warmth of Jenna’s body. Her hands had relaxed, and he knew she was sleeping. He feared if he moved, she would wake.

What had brought her here? How did she get here? And what kind of danger was she in? Burke would look after her. Probably Mickey would also, though he did not know him as well as Burke. What if she got the same illness he had?

Neither the priest nor Marco nor their guide had come down with this. But he could not take the chance.

He put a hand to her cheek. It was soft. Warm. He was struck by the fact that she had left safety to come to warn him, to be with him. She had done it in Martinique, but he had thought it had been something spontaneous then, and for the children.

Why? He was certainly no prize. God knew he was probably the least of all prizes. Especially now. His hand went to his thickly stubbled beard. His skin was caked with dirt and sweat. He could not even move a hand without supreme effort.

Yet she had slid in next to him, using her body to warm him. He tried to move. He was so damnably weak, and he was suddenly burning up.

The fever was better than the chills, but not much. The fever did not bring the shaking. He craved water.

A groan was forced from his throat, and he felt her stir.

Her eyes opened. Those beautiful blue green eyes that always so disconcerted him. They looked worried.

“Alex?”

His name had never sounded quite as lyrical before.

She touched his face, almost drawing back from the heat. “You are hot.”

“The illness ... does that,” he said. “You should not be near me. You might get it, too.”

“I’ve been kidnapped by a pirate. Nothing scares me.”

He gave her a weak grin.

She shifted away from him and rose to her feet. He watched as she added water with the same mixture the priest had used. She was dressed in sailor’s garb, a rope holding up her trousers and a shirt falling over her breasts. Her hair was uncovered, twisted into a long braid that fell over her shoulder. Though she dressed the part, no one could think her a man.

She was obviously unconscious of her appeal as she concentrated on preparing the potion. He dreaded taking it. The taste was so bad it was all he could do to keep it down. And his stomach was empty.

“Burke?”

“He and the others went a small distance away. They are close enough to hear, but I thought...”

He remembered waking next to her, her body entwined with his, that her body had
warmed his. But he did not know—had not known—that they had been left alone. For her modesty? Or did the priest believe she could care for him better than he could?

“They are all right? The children? The crew?”

He had asked before. He did not remember
. “Safe,” she assured him. “The
Ami
left before the British came.”

He looked up at her blankly.

“Peace has been declared,” she said.

“You can go ... home, then.”

“Nay,” she said. “No longer.”

He tried to absorb that, but no thought remained in his mind long. He closed his eyes. He couldn’t remember when he had been so tired.

But then she was urging him to drink, pressing a cup to his lips. He opened his eyes and tried to push it away. “You must drink it,” she said softly.