This Other Eden (24 page)

Thomas
smiled, watching him. It would be good for the lad to taste the pleasures of
London. He had a full purse and healthy appetites. A fortnight in the
cosmopolitan city might polish some of the rough edges, make him a more
suitable companion when they returned to Eden. Thomas had to look to such
things. Ragland was getting old. He could not survive many more damp cold Devon
winters. Thomas required reliable male companionship, and among the bumpkins of
Mortemouth, Russell Locke seemed the most likely candidate for the job. Hadn't
he been a loyal associate in their smuggling enterprise, displaying a
willingness to strict obedience, yet advancing his own ideas when he felt they
were sound?

With
the keen eye of a professional judge of men, Thomas had acquired the habit of listening
to him, even when he had proposed their present journey to London for the
purposes of making new French contacts. As Russell had respectfully pointed
out, Captain Girard's weekly deliveries were dispersed within a matter of daj^.
Beyond Wednesday of every week the men and their horses had been idle. It made
sense to Thomas, although he loathed the thought of a journey to London. Still,
Locke had made his point. London Town would be teeming with Frenchmen; refugees
escaping the madmen who ran Paris, rich refugees most of them, who perhaps
would be eager to double, triple his supply of goods.

The
journey had been planned and undertaken, and as a reward for fathering the idea
he'd invited young Locke to go with him, and Ragland to look after him, for
there still were moments when the young man displayed the most inept of habits,
wearing his country ways as though they were a shield of honor instead of an
embarrassment of low birth.

As
his coachman guided his carriage onto Oxford Road, Thomas felt a surge of
excitement himself. My God, how long was it since he'd last been here? He felt
changed. The slight paunch was gone, the belly lean and hard from his constant
exercise, his shoulders strong from hoisting the kegs of brandy, his face
weathered and rugged from constant exposure to the bracing North Devon winds.
At the inn in Salisbury, stopping for a meal, he'd caught an inadvertent
glimpse of himself in a window glass and had been incredibly pleased with what
he had seen. He glanced across the hobbling carriage at the excitement on
Locke's face. In a way he envied him, discovering London for the first time.

"Oxford
Street," Thomas said, in the manner of a guide. But Locke scarcely lifted
his eyes from the street outside, the throngs of people, a few uniforms here
and there, a steady procession of carriages, his hand, rough and calloused,
clutching at the window.

In
front of the Pantheon their carriage stalled to a halt in the rush of traffic,
a hopeless bottleneck. The sudden cessation of movement jarred Ragland awake.
He sat up with a start, his old eyes as searching as Russell's young ones.

"Welcome
to London," Thomas greeted him, feeling in remarkably good spirits.

The
old man blinked and drew back from the late afternoon sun, his hands reaching
out to steady himself. "Where are—"

"We're
almost there," Thomas reassured him. "After that nap, you'll be fit
to dance half the night."

Ragland
snorted at the suggestion. "Getting too old," he muttered, and fell
back into the comer of the carriage, his eyes gazing dully at the traffic
beyond the small window.

Russell's
head bobbed from side to side as he tried to take it all in. He read,
faltering, the white banner stretched between the colonnades of the Pantheon.
"Post-Lenten Masquerade."

"Quite
a revelry," Thomas said. "Drinking and debauchery from dusk until
dawn. Perhaps a bit heady for your first night in London, but if you
wish—"

Russell
looked directly at him. "I must see my sister first, milord, but later,
with your permission—"

Thomas
felt a surge of annoyance. Which sister, he wondered, the one who was living in
questionable circumstances with some gentleman in Bloomsbury, or the one who—

The
carriage started forward again, moving at a snail's pace through the clogged
road. Thomas leaned back against the cushions. Not much farther, thank God. He
was sick to death of the two faces across the way. Let them go and do as they
wished. As for himself, he would dispatch his business here as quickly as
possible and herd both of them back to Eden where they belonged.

Amazed
by the rapid plunge in his good spirits, he leaned out the window and shouted
at his coachman, "Can't you go faster?"

The
man yelled something in return, but Thomas couldn't hear. Locke, apparently
impervious to the state of Thomas' spirits, continued to bob from side to side,
one roughened hand continuously stroking his satin brocade knee britches, a
coarse gesture which served to annoy Thomas further. See his sister! What right
did he have to fill his purse with Thomas' riches, clothe himself with garments
purchased from those riches, ride in Thomas' carriage, then announce calmly
that he first had to see his sister?

Thomas
closed his eyes to blot the dull bobbing head from his vision. A few minutes
later the carriage rattled to a halt. They were here at last, at the end of
Oxford Road before the elegant Tudor house that was his London residence. The
house had been built by his grandfather, lived in by his father, and avoided by
Thomas. It was staffed by people he scarcely knew, but who all too eagerly
accepted the generous yearly allowance he sent them. Again that feeling of
regret at having left Eden washed over him. No matter how much he might rail
against its seclusion, it was still the safest place on earth.

Quickly
he alighted from the carriage as though he were trying to leave his
disillusionment behind. The source of his annoyance, Russell Locke, merely
followed after him, engaged in endless conceits, adjusting the ill-fitting wig,
then straightening the tight knee britches.

As
Thomas strode angrily through the sturdy Tudor arch, a strange man bowed low.
The butler? How was he to know? Inside, he looked back over his shoulder.
Ragland was helping the two coachmen with the luggage while Locke was still
preening this way and that, clearly impervious to the labor going on around
him.

Thomas
shouted, "Help with the luggage!" and finally the young man did as he
was told, not putting his back to it, however, merely lifting a comer of a
trunk gingerly as though afraid of soiling his new feathers.

Thomas
had seen enough. As he turned to take refuge in his second-floor chambers, he
saw a staff of four women standing before him. Garbed in black, their faces
tight with nervousness, they looked as though they were in mourning.

He
was in no mood for introductions. Weary and parched, he merely ordered,
"Brandy upstairs." He took the steps three at a time, confounded by
the mantle of misery which had dropped like lead about him.

He took
refuge in the small drawing room, a sparsely furnished, almost mean room. Years
ago, following the deaths of his parents and brother, he'd moved the most
valuable furnishings out to Eden. All that remained were tattered remnants from
his grandfather's day, a few threadbare tapestries, two fairly decent carved
wooden chests, and a scattered arrangement of uncomfortable furniture.

He
shed his cloak and sank into one of the miserable confinements. The room was
stuffy. Obviously the staff of ghouls had not aired it.

Still
wrestling with his mysterious misery, he looked ruefully about him. The trouble
with any journey was that sooner or later one reached one's destination. Then
what? He lifted his hands and pressed them against his eyes, seeing in the self-imposed
blindness the clean, windswept rugged headlands of Eden Point.

There
was nothing to do but complete his business as quickly as possible and pack the
lot of them back to Eden where they belonged, where a man could stand by his
window and hear nothing but the cries of sea gulls and the rustle of wind.

There
was a soft knock on the door. A moment later Ragland appeared, carrying a tray
with a bottle of brandy and one glass. "To help you recover, milord,"
he smiled and placed the tray on one of the carved tables.

The
implication that there was something wrong with him only infuriated him
further. "I am not ill," he snapped. "I have no need for
recovery." He reached quickly for the bottle, poured himself a glass, and
downed it in a swallow.

Ragland
watched him with a tolerant look, as though to say they had ridden out a number
of crises over the years and they could ride out this one as well.

Thomas
saw the look and resented it. "What are you standing about for?" he
raged.

Wearily
Ragland asked, "Shall I sit, milord?"

"Do
what you wish." Thomas waved him away and returned to the window. The
street was clogged with carriages and foot traffic, the center of attention
seeming to be the Pantheon down the street.

Thomas
extended his empty glass in midair, clearly signaling Ragland to fill it. The
old man obeyed. "You're out of sorts, milord, fatigued no doubt. Why don't
you lie—"

But
Thomas would hear none of it. Still staring down at the street, his eyes
leveled, he asked, "Where's Locke?"

Ragland
hesitated. "I took the liberty, milord, of giving him a few free hours. He
has an obligation—"

"To
me," Thomas interrupted, confronting the old man. "He has an
obligation to me. That is his one, his only obligation."

Ragland
disagreed politely. "He has a sister—"

"In
ill-favor," Thomas cut in again, "or have you forgotten?"

Ragland
moved closer to the anger. "Not forgotten, milord. But Russell's not come
to see that one. It's the other one, sir."

When
Thomas saw his calm face and heard his reassurances, he turned back to the
window. When would he learn not to reveal himself so pitifully?

"You
take some time, too, Ragland," he urged, keeping his face turned away from
the old man. "Go and do what you wish. If you're fool enough to think that
Paradise"—and he gestured toward the clogged street below—"then go
and join them."

Behind
him he heard the clink of the bottle as Ragland returned it to the tray.
"I'll stay if you wish," he heard him mutter.

"I
don't wish," Thomas said.

"What
will you do, milord?"

"I'll
attend to my interests as rapidly as possible, so that within the week we can
leave."

"As
you wish, milord."

"Go
on," Thomas scolded. "Leave me be."

There
was a moment's silence from Ragland as though he were debating with himself
whether he should stay or go. Then Thomas heard the door opening, then closing,
then silence save for the constant procession of carriages rattling by on the
street below.

He
continued to stand gloomily by the window, staring down. There was no reason
for him to stay here in miserable seclusion. He had friends, many of them, who
would greet him warmly, the fellows at White's who would delight in filling his
ear with the latest scandal. On the strength of his name alone, he could,
within the hour if he wished, collect dinner invitations to the finest houses
in London. He could do all this and more, if he chose.

But
he didn't choose. Instead he dragged a chair close to the window, retrieved the
bottle of brandy from the table, discarded the glass and, cradling the full bottle,
he sank heavily into the chair.

He
felt small and insignificant in the bustle of London. The brandy helped. At
least it numbed. Still, in his present state of mind, all his defeats, both
large and small, paraded before his memory: his inability to run the estates at
Eden Point; his failure to wed; his failure thus far to produce a legitimate
heir; his past debauchery; his present illegal smuggling enterprise; his wealth
(even that somehow seemed a failure); his temper, which in the past had led him
to ignoble behavior; the public whipping of a—