Giles
yelled as her teeth sank deeper, and she tasted blood. Then her wrists were
suddenly released, and she sprang away from him, toward the door, recognizing
that there would be no safety upstairs where she would simply be trapped. With
the bellow of a wounded bull, he charged at her, slamming the door over her
head as she wrenched it open. Ginny ducked beneath his arm, running to the far
side of the table, looking wildly around for some means of escape. There was
none. Giles advanced on her, his fists clenched, the foul words still spewing
from his mourn. He was quite crazed, Ginny thought with a nauseous jolt,
swallowing the bitter bile as it rose in her throat. She was in the same room
with a madman, one not accessible by words and reason, one who had already
proved himself capable of blind savagery when his mind turned in this way.
In a
kind of mesmerized horror, she saw him pick up the carving knife from his side
of the table. He was going to kill her. They were alone in this little house,
their nearest neighbors a mile away by canoe, no passers-by, no one to hear a
scream, a whimper—it could not be happening. A scorching smell suddenly
infiltrated her petrified trance. The sweetbreads were burning in the now
blackened butter in the heavy iron skillet behind her. Stealthily, Ginny
stepped backward, not taking her eyes off Giles as he edged round the table,
the knife gripped in his fist. Stretching an arm behind her, her hand closed
over the handle of the skillet. It was hot, searing her flesh, but she ignored
the pain, in fact hardly felt it, as slowly she brought the pan to the front.
As Giles pounced, she hurled the scalding contents of the pan in his face. The
knife whistled down, slicing her forearm. Giles screamed, blinded by the
burning butter dripping down his face, but he still held the knife and came at
her again. She hit him, using every vestige of strength born of desperation,
bringing the skillet down upon his head.
A
startled look pierced the fanatical blue eyes. Giles teetered, then fell into
the fireplace. His head struck the andiron with a sickening thud, and the knife
dropped to the floor from his slackened grip.
An
eerie silence filled the room, broken only by the incongruous, almost
indecently cheerful crackle of the logs. Ginny knelt beside the still figure,
placed her fingers on the pulse point in his neck. There was nothing, not even
a tremor. His face was waxen, the eyes wide open, staring at the ceiling, a
purple bruised lump on his temple the only sign of injury.
Ginny
crept backward, away from the dead man, and crouched against the table leg as
she fought the sickness of aftermath for long minutes. Shivers went through her
with invincible repetition so that even her hands shook as if palsied, and her
mind was a blank void denying all reality.
But
slowly life and warmth returned, the shivering ceased, and her mind cleared to
look squarely at the fact that she had been responsible, directly or indirectly
was merely a matter of semantics, for the death of her husband. In the eyes of
the law, she had killed him. There were no witnesses to the provocation, no one
had seen the sequence of events, there was only her word —and the blood dripping
from her slashed arm and the marks of the two blows to her face. Now she needed
Alex more than she had ever needed him. In this matter, he would know exactly
what to do. It required the soldier's clear head to steer a path through this
tangle.
Ginny
got to her feet, bandaged her cut arm with less than her usual care, found her
cloak, and went out into the night. It was now full night, a weak moon fuzzed
by clouds the only light to aid her as she untied the canoe and stepped in. But
the darkness was reassuring as she paddled as silently as possible, only the
faintest swish as the paddle broke the surface of the creek. She must try to
find Alex without alerting the Harringtons, but if she could not, then she
would have to throw herself upon Robert's mercy, trusting that his knowledge of
his cousin's true character would weigh sufficiently with him to allow them to
cover up the truth. If not, she supposed she would have to stand trial, but at
least Robert and Susannah would be witnesses to her present condition, and them
would not doubt her word. Maybe her pregnancy would bring sympathy and mercy;
no one was to know that it was not her dead husband's child.
These
thoughts went round and round in her head, but what really mattered at this
point was to find Alex. She couldn't manage on her own any longer, and only the
thought of his arms, strong and safe around her, his voice, calm and even
making the decisions, gave her the fortitude to keep going.
Ginny
tied up against the bank, a hundred yards before reaching the landing stage.
She did not want to advertise her arrival unless there was no choice. She
approached the house through the trees, her feet noiseless on the damp, mossy
ground. Only one light showed in the house, from the small parlor at the rear where
Robert was wont to work on his accounts. Then she remembered Giles saying the
family had the fever, presumably taken from the nursemaid, Lizzie's mother.
Were they all abed, then? She crept across the grass to the lighted window,
crouching for a minute under the sill to catch her bream. Her heart seemed to
be drumming loud enough to summon a brigade to drill. Cautiously, she stood on
tiptoe, peeping into the room, and nearly sank down again with relief. Only
Alex was there, perusing some documents with that intent frown she knew so
well. She tapped on the glass, too softly obviously, since he did not look up.
Biting her lip hard, she rapped again, sharply this time.
Alex
heard the noise and in his absorption put it down to a bird. Then remembered
that it was night. He looked toward the window and saw a ghastly white face,
shrouded in the hood of a cloak, enormous eyes full of mute appeal. The chair
fell to the floor with a clatter as he jumped to his feet, hastening to the
window. But Ginny shook her head frantically, pointing at the door. Clearly,
she wanted him to come outside, and secretly. But why had she not approached
the house by the front door like any law-abiding, respectable citizen? He took
the branched candlestick from the mantel and went out into the darkened hall,
setting the candle down on the hall table as he slipped the bolts on the great
door, which he pulled gently closed behind him.
He ran
round the house to the back. Ginny was sitting on the ground beneath the
window, curled up in her cloak, and to his dismay made no move to get up as he
reached her "What has happened?" he demanded, anxiety making his
voice harsh. "Are you hurt?"
"A
little, but not much," she whispered back. "Let us go into the trees.
No one must see me here." She held her hands up to him.
"Whyever
not?" Taking her hands, he pulled her upright, feeling the sudden dead
weight of her, as if she had no strength of her own. Her hands were like ice.
"You must come into the house," he insisted, but she shook her head
violently, with a little cry of distress. Deciding that for the moment, he must
do as she wished, Alex lifted her up and carried her toward the darkness of the
trees. Once there, he set her down, although keeping a supporting arm around
her, and pushed back the hood from her face. What he saw brought a violent oath
to his lips. "I am going to kill that whoreson," he said in a flat
voice. "And to hell with the consequences."
"No
. . . no." Ginny shook her head, stuttering slightly. "There is no
need. . . . He is already dead."
"What?"
Alex stared at her in the darkness. "What are you
saying, Ginny?"
"I
have killed him," she whispered. "Hold me, please."
Immediately,
he held her tight against his chest. "You must tell me exactly what has
happened, chicken. I do not understand anything yet, but unless I much mistake
the matter, I had better do so without delay."
Ginny
was instantly soothed, instantly confident that everything was going to be all
right, that she had played her part and could abdicate the minute she laid the
full burden upon the soldier's broad shoulders. She told him the whole, sparing
no detail, right up to the moment when she had knocked on the parlor window.
Alex
heard her out in silence, although his mouth tightened ominously, and the
green-brown eyes were cold and hard as quartz chips. "You are a most
untrustworthy planner, Virginia," he said when she had done. "After
everything that passed between us this afternoon, after you gave me your word
that you would do nothing without telling me first—"
"You
are angry with me!" Ginny looked up at him in utter disbelief. "After
—after . . ."
"Shhh,
sweeting, I am sorry." Full of remorse, Alex stroked her hair, pulling her
head down against his chest again. "It was only because I am so filled
with horror at what has happened to you. I would have done anything to have
spared you." He continued to hold her, stroking gently but now almost
absently as he stared into the darkness, formulating a strategy. "Yes . .
. yes, that will serve the purpose," he said with sudden decision.
"Where is the canoe?"
"Over
yonder." Ginny pointed through the trees. "What are we going to
do?"
"You,
my love, are going to do exactly as I
tell you, for once. We have a long night ahead of us, but it will go all the
quicker if you do not hinder me with objections or questions. I wish I could
leave you here, tucked up in bed, but unfortunately that is not possible."
All the while he was speaking, he was bundling her down to the river, helping
her into the canoe where she sat huddled in her cloak while Alex paddled back
to the cottage.
"Inside,
in the warm," he instructed briskly, when she hung back outside the door.
"There will be nothing worse in there than you have seen already."
His almost callous tone was exactly what Ginny needed, stiffening her resolve
so that she was able to enter the kitchen with barely a tremor. Everything was
exactly as she had left it. "Go upstairs and lie down," Alex
directed, but she shook her head.
"I
do not wish to be alone."
He
nodded. "Very well, then sit down by the fire." He picked up a flagon
from the dresser. "Is this brandy?" When she nodded, he poured a tot
and passed it to her. "Sip that." Ginny took it, sipped, and felt the
slow warmth of relaxation creep through her.
"What
are you going to do?" she asked, watching curiously as he moved around the
kitchen, building up the fire to a roaring blaze, tipping over furniture,
emptying out the contents of grain and corn sacks and the flour barrel.
"Preparing
a funeral pyre," he replied shortly. "I need material, sheets,
linens."
"Upstairs,
in the linen press. I will fetch them." She half-rose, but Alex told her
sharply to stay where she was, so she resumed her seat while he took the
rickety stairs three at a time.
"Why
will I not be burned in the fire, also?" Ginnv inquired. The question
seemed of some interest, even in her state of bemused abstraction. "And
how did the fire start?”
"Renegade
attack," Alex told her succinctly. "There was one over by the Grove
plantation three weeks ago, so it will cause no great surprise. You happened to
be out of the house at the time of the attack, hid in the woods, petrified,
until the attackers had gone, then you fled through the woods to Harringtons'.
Your bruised face is easily explained by running into tree branches or some
such." He looked down at the dead man for the first time. "There is
blood on that knife."
"My
arm. But it is not a severe cut." Ginny moved her bandaged arm out of the
covering cloak. A bleak look shivered in Alex's eyes, but he said nothing,
merely continued with his task.
"I
am going outside now, to release the ducks and chickens, and turn the horses
loose."
"I
cannot stay in here alone with—"
"Come
along, then." He had no need of further expansion and took her hand,
leading her outside. "Release the fowl. I will drive the cows and horses
across the garden; that should leave it convincingly trampled."
Ginny
did as he said, and wondered at the perversity of human nature that she should
feel a sorrowing reluctance at this systematic destruction of everything she
had worked for in the last few months, when that destruction was going to
repaint the picture of her life.
At
last, it was finished to Alex's satisfaction. The herb and vegetable garden was
a churned mess of mud, the fowl house was ready for the tinder box, the lean-to
emptied of hay that was now piled into the center of the kitchen. "If
there are any small things you would save, Ginny, do so quickly," Alex
said quietly. “You cannot have escaped with much, but things about your
person will go unremarked."
"Only
my mother's combs and jewelry," Ginny said. "All else but my clothes
are Courtney possessions. All my worldly goods are in a house at Alum Bay, no
longer mine."
“You
will come to me as you stand, then, my own?" Alex said softly. "At
last truly my own, that I may love and cherish without further obstacle. Not
war, nor politics, nor difference of conviction, nor the past will stand
between us again. Will you wed Parliament's general, my little Cavalier?"
"I
will wed the father of my child," she said softly. "I will wed the
man I love with a love that has always transcended our differences. And while I
may not be able to embrace your political principles, my Roundhead love, I will
live in peace with them."