The Fever Tree (11 page)

She was suddenly and completely out of her depth. She tried to make a grab for the shoulders of her dress, but he held her wrists until the skin stung, and she stopped struggling.

“What have you got to lose?” he asked, rubbing the back of his hand across one of her breasts, and she trembled as he touched her. Her breath came in a heavy mixture of fear and pleasure. He pushed his taffeta dress down around his waist and stepped out of it. He wore loose cotton trousers underneath, ruched with a drawstring on his hips, just below the clustered muscles of his stomach. He smiled, drawing her towards him, into his chest, and kissed her softly on the forehead. A sob broke inside her. “Frances,” he said, kissing her wet cheeks, “don’t be frightened.” There was the warmth of his chest against her own, and then the gentle pull of his arms drawing her down onto the bunk until she was lying, looking up at him. He propped himself up on one elbow next to her. Then he stroked the hair off her forehead, and with his other hand lifted her skirts and brushed his fingers across the tight place inside her.

She shivered, her body shocked by such a sudden intimacy, but he shushed her, stroking her face. All the time his other hand gave her caresses, very softly, until her hips began to push up against him and her legs opened wider. Then his fingers flickered inside her, she moaned, and his mouth was against hers. His weight shifted as he levered himself on top of her. There was an urgency about him now, a fumbling as he bunched up her skirts. She tried to push them back down, but he had her pinned under the weight of him. He pulled her drawers down with one hand, and a moment later she felt a sharp, tearing pain. She cried out, but her mouth was crushed into his shoulder. He thrust deeper into her, his hips bruising hers, pleasure grinding into her pain, until he stopped suddenly, shuddered, and went slack.

When it was over he rolled off her, breathing heavily. She tried to cover herself with a sheet, but he stopped her hand, looking boyishly pleased with himself. He brushed the damp hair off her cheek and said, “Your eyes are green like a cat.”

His lips were slightly parted in a lazy smile, and his eyes were dark and half lidded as he looked at her. She reached out a hand and touched the muscles on his shoulder, tracing the line of their tautness with her fingers. There was a throbbing inside her, half pleasure, half pain, as if she had been hollowed out. She thought she might cry, and wished he would hold her, but he didn’t move.

After a few moments, she said, “Mr. Leger. He saw us.”

“He won’t say anything.”

“Who was that with him?”

“The ballerina?” William rolled away from her, onto his back. “Some girl from steerage.”

His words stung, and for the first time she felt ashamed and realized what she had done. Was she any different to the girl she had seen lying across Daniel Leger’s lap? She looked around the room, masculine in its every detail. What had she been thinking, letting him bring her here? William must have sensed it in her silence, because he reached for her hand.

It gave her the confidence to ask, “Your marriage with Eloise?”

“You have to give me time. I’ll need a day or two in Cape Town to smooth things out.”

“The Society has a boarding house.”

“You can stay there?”

She nodded.

“And the doctor?” he asked.

“I’ll write to him.”

“Wait until I’ve worked things out with Eloise’s family. It’ll make things easier.” He put a hand to her hair, stroking her neck. A flickering, like static, ran down her body. She turned towards him, curling her head into his shoulder, but he touched her cheek lightly and said, “Time to go.”

He lay on the bed while she undid the hooks at the front of her corset and pulled it up over her breasts. Then he handed her the hairpins which had come loose on the sheet. She looked at herself in the glass. Her eyes glittered back at her, dark and strange. Her face was thin and pale, and her hair had sprung loose, swirling round her face in wiry, copper coils so she looked like Medusa in a nest of snakes.

When he stood up she felt his body pressing against her back. He swept the hair off her neck, and kissed her skin at the nape so that a shudder ran down her spine and every muscle cried out for him to pull her back down to bed. But instead he began tugging at the fastenings on her dress, sealing her back up inside it. He was as good as Lotta, and she realized this wasn’t the first time he had helped a girl get dressed. Then he patted her on the rump, and said, “The music will be over soon.”

She turned to face him. She could almost taste the warmth of his skin, the sweat from their bodies, and his lips, red where he had kissed her. Suddenly he seemed very remote.

“When can I see you again?” Her voice quavered, and she knew she sounded desperate. She hated herself for asking.

“Alone? Not until Cape Town. We should be careful.”

“Not before?”

“Frances. Be patient.” He pulled her shawl off the bed and wove it around her head. “Boudica becomes bedouin. If you see anyone you recognize, say you wanted to find the surgeon. His cabin is along this corridor.”

He opened the door for her, one arm resting on top of it, so she had to duck under him to get out. She turned as she went and drank in a last glimpse of him. He was smiling at her, feet bare, trousers hanging low on his hips, dark hair creeping up his chest. She wanted him to kiss her, to say something final to seal the future, but instead he slipped his hand off the frame of the door in a gesture that could have been impatience. She turned and walked down the corridor into the wheeling music and cold night air.

F
rances was terrified by what she had done, and worried that William wouldn’t keep his promise. Sometimes, listening to Mariella talking about George Fairley and their plans for Stellenbosch, she burned with apprehension. She wanted to tell Mariella, but until William had called off his engagement, what was there to say? Mariella, with her efficient, practical mind, might not understand the delicacy of their situation.

At night she gave in to imagining herself as Frances Westbrook. William would become a great politician, a successful statesman, and they would explore Africa together. She would go with him on his hunting trips. They would camp in the bush, and when he came to bed at night she would feel his hands winding round her body, crushing her ribs, pulling her closer to him. He wouldn’t be easy to live with, but she understood his ambition. He was restless and determined, but this was part of his passion for life. He lived closer to excitement than most people. She would offer him a steadiness that would tame his wilder moments. And in return William would liberate her. He judged people on whether they interested him, not because of who they were. He wasn’t tied to the skirts of Society like her uncle, and he didn’t give a damn about the Hamiltons, or where her father had come from.

The Cape drew nearer, and she realized that she needed to talk to him about practicalities. How long would she be in Cape Town before she heard from him? Where would they be married? She would need to pay for the boarding house, and although she didn’t want to mention money, the truth was she had almost nothing to get by on. The little her uncle had given her had been sent ahead to Edwin as part of her dowry.

On the third day after the ball, a cry went up across the ship. “Land ho!”

The shadow of Table Mountain loomed like a storm cloud in the distance. The captain made an announcement that they would dock after breakfast the following day. Frances felt queer. Very soon now, one way or another, everything would change. In a panic, she wrote out a note to William asking him to find her on deck after supper, and gave it to Gilbert to deliver.

She waited for him for half an hour, anxiety flipping over inside her. What if he didn’t come? What if she never spoke to him again? The visible reality of Cape Town seemed to call everything into question.

“Frances.” Suddenly he was there, saying her name and putting his hand lightly to her cheek so that her hair crackled against her ear.

“I was worried,” she said.

“That I wouldn’t come? Or have you changed your mind about me already?” He smiled, his eyes glinting green as he laughed at her, and she felt relief throw off her concerns.

Now that he was here she felt foolish. He had other, more important things to think about. It was nothing for her to break off her own engagement, but he would have to make enemies with Eloise Woodhouse’s family. Mariella had told her that they were very influential at the Cape. She reminded herself that he was taking enormous risks for her, but she didn’t entirely forget her own position. “How long will I have to wait in Cape Town?”

William stroked her face with the back of his hand. His knuckles grazed against her skin. “So impatient.” He was assured and confident. When she was with him, she could feel the world bending itself to his will.

“But you don’t even know where I’m staying!”

“Frances,” he said, with just a glimmer of impatience, “I have contacts. The Society’s details will be down on the ship’s register.”

Of course. What a fool she was, always asking him to spell everything out. Why couldn’t she just trust him? But she also knew from experience that when he was gone the confidence she felt when she was with him would be torn to shreds. “Will you write to me?”

“Are you always so demanding?”

She looked away from him, stung, but he put a finger under her chin and brought her round to face him. “I’m teasing you, Frances. I will write to you the very day we arrive. I promise.” He took her hand and brought it to his lips.

“But what about you? What will you promise me?” he asked with a mischievous smile. He eased the glove off her hand and lifted the tip of each finger to his mouth in turn. “You must promise me”—she felt the wetness of his mouth on her middle finger—“that you will think about me every night that we are apart.”

“I promise,” she said, her fingers burning where he had kissed them, and her heart beating in her throat like the wings of a butterfly against a glass bottle. It was only when he was gone that she realized she hadn’t asked him for money. She would have to make do with what she had.

•   •   •

T
HE
C
APE
was within touching distance the next morning, and before the bell had sounded for breakfast the deck was swarming with passengers eager to get a look at the new country. It was a perfectly calm day, and a flotilla of small fishing boats edged towards them, their crews heaving at the oars. When they were within earshot, they called out from all sides, “News? What news?”

There was a shouted relay as sailors condensed the happenings of London a month ago into a few short sentences.

Frances stood amidst a huddle of other passengers pressing against the railings to get a good view. Table Mountain rose every second larger in front of them. Its majestic bulk towered over the bay, flat-topped and imposing, like the grand gatehouse to a new continent. Soon they were so close she could make out the trees which covered its lower slopes. Looking back down the ship, she caught sight of William weaving through the crowd towards her, shepherding Mrs. Nettleton in front of him.

“There’s a good view of it from here.” He levered Mrs. Nettleton through the group of passengers so she stood at the railings next to Frances.

“Miss Irvine,” William said, bowing to her.

Frances greeted him, and Mrs. Nettleton said a curt how-do-you-do before turning her gaze back to William. He had positioned himself directly behind them both, looking over their shoulders, and Frances felt the other passengers press in behind them.

William pointed through the swirling fog to a small, bleak-looking island with a low, flat terrain. “There it is! Misery Island.”

“What a terrible name. Who lives there?” Mrs. Nettleton asked.

“Mostly lepers and lunatics.”

A few minutes later they could just make out a large lighthouse on the mainland and an imposing-looking building next to it. “That’s Somerset Hospital, just finished for the princely sum of twenty thousand pounds. You can’t say the British don’t spend money on their colonies.”

One of William’s hands came to rest, very gently, on the small of Frances’s back. She froze, every muscle in her body tightening.

“And that, Madam,” William said, talking blithely on, “is the infamous Breakwater Prison.” He pointed to a squat, gray building. “It’s not full of your usual criminals. You’ll find doctors, lawyers, merchants, all doing a full day’s labor. Anyone caught stealing diamonds at Kimberley. So don’t be tempted, Mrs. Nettleton, to slip any stones into your pockets when you tour the mines.”

“Oh, you are naughty.” Mrs. Nettleton giggled, tugging at his sleeve, and at the same time Frances felt William stroking his thumb across her buttocks. Her skin, like velvet, took the imprint of every touch. She had never wanted anything as much as she wanted William.

“Is it a horrible place?” Mrs. Nettleton asked, hoping to be terrorized.

“Terrible.” William worked his foot between Frances’s boots, pushing her legs a little apart so she fell forward slightly and had to support herself against the rail. She could feel his knee pressing into hers, and his thumb tracing a circle across her skin. “At least a thousand prisoners at any one time, sleeping on concrete floors. Lights are kept burning all through the night so they can’t sleep, and they labor all day chained between two kaffirs to stop them talking. Any indiscretions and they are put on the treadmill.”

“Treadmill?”

“It’s a kind of mill with steps that turns against a tight wall. The prisoners’ punishment is to walk on it—sometimes for twelve hours at a stretch. Can you imagine what that feels like on a summer’s day?”

“And if they don’t walk?” Mrs. Nettleton asked, deliciously involved in this story of cruelty.

“The planks keep turning, scraping their shins to the bone.”

“How dreadful!” Mrs. Nettleton exclaimed. Then turning towards him, she said, “Now, Mr. Westbrook, I must make sure everything is in order downstairs.”

“Certainly.” William removed his hand from Frances’s dress and without a glance in her direction guided Mrs. Nettleton back through the crowd.

This was love, Frances realized. He filled her up with it just by touching her, and when he moved away she was nothing more than a husk, with the breeze blowing right through her.