The Pirate and the Pagan (52 page)

“Come on,” she said decisively, “we’re getting out of here.” As Spencer stood up his knees buckled beneath him and he vomited.

“Oh, dear God, no, please no,” Summer begged under her breath. He staggered down the hallway and into a second small
bedchamber, which mercifully held a clean bed. He fell down upon it and Summer quickly stripped him down to his shirt and placed a chamber pot beside the bed ready for a second round of vomiting.

She remembered the wine she had brought and poured out a small glass and fed it to him. It seemed to settle his stomach for the moment, but he was still very flushed and his eyelids closed heavily. She had no idea how long he’d been lighting off Edwin’s death, but realized he was exhausted. She heard a cry from the street and dimly realized it was a death cart. She ran out to the balcony and cried, “Up here, please, I need help.”

The cockney shouted back, “We only pick up from the street … we ain’t obliged to come into yer bleedin’ house, missus.”

“Wait … wait right there!” she ordered in her most commanding voice. She held her breath and plunged into the first bedroom. She forced her mind to dwell on other things as she lifted and hauled the bloated, black thing that had been Edwin Bruckner from the bed to the floor. She then pulled him by the bedclothes he’d fallen onto. Some reserve of strength she never knew she had enabled her to drag him outside onto the landing, “You’ll have to come up and get him,” she panted, holding a painful stitch in her side.

“Do ye fink yer the bloody Queen an’ I’m yer lady-in-waitin’?” he asked in outrage. “Rules is rules … I pick ’em up from the street.”

Summer was so angry she wanted to get her pistol and shoot the bastard, but then she would have a cartload of bodies instead of one to dispose of. With her last ounce of strength she dragged Edwin to the top of the stairs, placed her foot in the middle of his back, and kicked with all her strength. The body toppled down the stairs and landed in the courtyard with a sickening splosh.

“Christ Almighty, yer stupid cow, now I’ll ’ave ter use a shovel.”

She closed her eyes and uttered a prayer. It was for poor Edwin Bruckner, a great lord’s brother being carted off in such an ignoble manner, it was for her own beloved brother so deathly ill inside the dreaded number 13, and it was for herself and her precious unborn child.

She had descended to the pump eight times before she had scrubbed the rooms enough to remove some of their putrid offensiveness. Between buckets she continually checked on Spider’s condition, but he was sleeping heavily and she shoved from her mind
the suspicion that he might be unconscious. She had pushed herself far beyond the limits of her strength and knew she needed some sort of sustenance, but she did not dare to rest until she had lit the fire and set the kettle to boil. She would make some tea and force herself to sit and rest before the fire while she drank it.

Absently she moved a chessman on a board which had been set up before the fire. A tear slid down her face. The boys must have been playing an innocent game of chess before the angel of death paid them a visit.

A sudden hammering on the door nearly made her jump out of her skin. She grabbed the pistol, not knowing what to expect, and cautiously approached the door. It was going dark and the lord mayor of London had ordered a curfew, so she knew whoever was at the door spelled trouble.

She opened it slowly. Ruark Helford stood on the threshold, dressed in black with a powder blue ostrich feather in his wide-brimmed cavalier’s hat, exactly as she had seen him the first time they’d met. Her heart turned over in her breast at sight of him. His eyes were blazing with anger. He shoved the door open all the way and demanded, “What the hell do you think you’re doing in a place like this?” He grabbed her roughly. “I’m taking you out of here
now,
this minute, madame.”

“No, Ruark, I can’t leave,” she said wearily.

He raised his voice. “I’ve nearly gone mad looking for you. Finally I broke into Cockspur Street and found this address on a piece of paper. If you don’t give a damn about yourself, at least think of my child! To be in London this week is your death warrant.”

Her heart cried out to him to take her into his arms because she was so afraid, but her lips uttered very different words. “So all you care about is this baby—you don’t give a tinker’s damn about me!”

“Like a bloody fool I ran all over Salisbury looking for you and now, to add insult to injury, I’ve spent two days running all over London for you.”

“Why were you looking for me—to tell me the annulment has gone through?” she demanded sarcastically.

He was so angry he lied. “Yes, as a matter of fact, it has.”

“Oh,” she whispered, all the wind taken from her sails.

As he looked at her he saw her face was tinged with gray like a dirty gown. Her beautiful hair was a disheveled mess and she
looked weary beyond belief. “Are you coming or do I have to carry you?” His voice brooked no disobedience.

She raised her pistol and said between her teeth, “Get the hell out of here, Helford, or I’ll blow your bloody head off!”

The anger set like stone in his face. He brought his hand up and struck her in the face. She fell down and at the same time pulled the trigger. As the acrid smell of gunpowder filled her nostrils she thought wildly, I’ve killed him … I love him! The ball had ripped open the shoulder of his coat. It was the only damage apart from his pride. He snatched the gun from her. “I’m going to beat you for that,” he said very deliberately, and reached down for a handful of her hair.

Remembering his violent temper, she cried out, “Ru, please help me … my brother is dying with plague.” She buried her face in her hands and began to sob brokenly.

“My God,” he said hoarsely, and stepped over the threshold to pick her up. He carried her to the fire and gently sat her in a chair. His nose had already told him what she had been battling all day.

“When I got here, I found Edwin already dead,” she choked.

“Young Edwin Bruckner?” he asked in disbelief.

“I had to get rid of the body … the death cart came … I had to do it, Ruark.” She clutched at him.

“Of course you did. The plague doesn’t respect wealth or title, sweetheart, that’s why I have to get you out of here. I have my coach and driver below.” He brushed back her hair and stroked the cheek he had slapped so hard. “Darling, listen to me. I’ll get Spencer a nurse. I wouldn’t let you stay here even if you weren’t in a delicate condition.”

She shook her head. “I won’t leave him.”

“You will
die
if you stay,” he said emphatically.

“Then I will die,” she said simply.

He knew she meant it. Every instinct told him to pick her up and forcefully remove her from such a pest hole, yet he knew if he did so, she would hate him forever. He took off his coat and rolled up his shirt sleeves. “If you are staying, I’m staying with you. Where is he?”

“No,” she cried. “You will die if you stay.”

“Then I will die,” he said flatly.

She laughed through her tears. “Come, he’s been sleeping for hours.”

Ruark strode up to the bed and was alarmed at the dark red
flush on the boy’s face. “He’s not asleep, Summer … I think he’s unconscious. He cannot last much longer. The choice is yours —will we allow him to slip away peacefully or will we try to revive him and put up a hell of a battle with the Grim Reaper? A battle, I might add, which we’ll probably lose in the end.”

“Fight and survive or fight and die … we’ll fight, I know no other way.”

“Good girl,” he encouraged. “What do you have to drink here?”

“Water … tea … port wine …”

“We’ll give him all three. We’ll start with water.”

Summer ran to fetch the water and Ruark flung open the window and pulled the covers off the bed. Spencer was burning hot, and when Ruark lifted him into a sitting position, he began to mumble and then to rave. Ruark took the water from Summer and held it to Spencer’s mouth. He almost knocked it from Ruark’s hand in his raving, but Ruark persisted until the boy took some of the water. The minute he tasted it, he drank greedily until it was finished, then began thrashing about again.

“More,” ordered Ruark, and Summer ran to do his bidding. With infinite patience Ruark fed him the water, and bade Summer make some tea. After he got some of the hot tea into him, Spencer began to sweat so heavily he drenched the sheet upon which he lay.

“We’ll bathe him, fetch some water.”

Summer picked up the empty bucket.

“What the hell are you doing?”

“The water pump’s in the yard,” she explained.

He strode toward her. “Never, ever let me see you haul water again.” His voice was like the crack of a whip and she gladly relinquished her hold on the handle and let him take over. They bathed him, fed him more tea, then bathed him again. They had no clean sheets and made do with the bare ticking of the mattress.

Ruark felt the swollen glands in his neck and examined his groin for the telltale plague boil. Spencer’s groin was only slightly swollen and Ruark took it as a bad sign. Anyone who had ever survived the plague had done so because the carbuncle came to a head quickly and burst, releasing the body’s poison. He said nothing to Summer save, “Let’s try him with some wine and water.”

He held the boy in one strong arm and fed him the watered port wine with his free hand. After three glasses, Spencer stopped thrashing about and his breathing became slightly more regular.
“He’ll sleep for a while. I must go out and get you food, Summer. I know damned well you’ve had nothing all day.”

“I’m not hungry, Ruark, I’m too tired and worried to eat.”

“That is beside the point. I will get food and you will eat it,” he said as if speaking to a child of five.

She nodded. His strength and determination were too much for her. “There’s a curfew, the guard will stop you.”

“You mean he’ll try,” said Ruark.

It seemed that she just dozed off for a moment and Ruark was back. He brought a roasted capon and a bottle of cider, which brought memories of Cornwall flooding back to her. She smiled sadly as she nibbled on the crisp brown skin of the bird. “Once, when my brother and I were starving, we survived by stealing one of your prize cockerels.”

“At last! You can be yourself with me. I like you best when you are honest with me, Summer.”

She knew better. She knew being honest and having no secrets was just one of those things men paid lip service to. She knew that if he found out she had been intimate with his scoundrel brother, he was capable of killing them both.

As if he knew she was thinking of Rory, he said, “I asked Rory to take you to Salisbury, why did you deceive him?”

She wondered wildly if he knew Rory had lured her to Holland and France before delivering her to Southampton. She doubted it very much. She shrugged. “He’s easier to deceive than you.”

“I should have taken you myself, but I knew you’d listen to my suggestion and do exactly the opposite just on principle. We’ve been like gunpowder and match lately.”

“A dangerous combination,” she murmured, looking at the firm set of his mouth.

“You seemed to get along with Rory so comfortably, like old friends, I thought you’d be more amenable to his suggestions.”

Her heart screamed, We’re not friends, we’re lovers! Are you blind? She wanted to tell him not to trust Rory because his first loyalty was to himself and he made no bones about it. Brothers, kings, and countries were the last things he cared about.

“How did he get the wound which put the white streak in his hair?” she asked.

He was silent for a while, then almost reluctantly he recounted events from the past. “My father and I had quarreled as usual. He was such a fierce loyalist, he would have climbed the scaffold with
King Charles I … except by the time that regicide took place he’d already sacrificed himself to the cause.” He was quiet for a minute or two, but she knew he wasn’t finished.

“We had agreed to mortgage all the Cornwall holdings to raise money for the Stuart cause. I had the gall to tell him that was enough, that he was too old to fight and he should leave that to us younger men. We almost came to blows that day and he never forgave me.” He stood and kicked a burning log to the back of the fireplace with his elegantly booted foot. “Cromwell’s army finally penetrated Cornwall. They set fire to our town of Helston then swarmed over Helford Hall. They drove my father and a few defenders into the raging waters of the Helford River. They fought valiantly, but of course they were outnumbered. Rory rode into the raging torrent to help Father and instantly received a sword slash which cleaved his scalp in two. They thought him dead, but he was washed out to sea and deposited unconscious on the beach below the house.”

“Our beach,” she said softly.

“Yes, our beach,” he said, his eyes licking over her like candle flame.

Summer saw Rory’s amused face in her mind and knew she could never betray him to the King, but her husband Ruark was another thing entirely. She knew a great need to warn him, caution him about the black sheep of the family. “Ru, I think Rory uses the cellars at Roseland to smuggle people in and out of the country.”

His eyebrows went up and the muscle in his jaw stood out like a lump of iron.

“I … I think he sells secrets to the Dutch … to the French … to anybody.”

He looked outraged at her words. “I thought you were his friend! You’re betraying him!” he accused angrily.

“Not to the King … I wouldn’t … I couldn’t … only to you, so you can protect yourself,” she said, faltering.

“So, you have chosen between us, and I’m the lucky man to receive your favors, am I?” he mocked.

“No, damn you. I choose neither of you. You can both go to hell!”

She drained her cup of strong cider and then threw it at him. He pulled her from the chair into his lap. His lips seared her throat and he whispered, “What will we do to pass the long hours of the night?” She could feel his sex, hard as marble against the softness
of her buttocks. The heat from his body seeped into hers and she almost succumbed to his powerful strength. “We could play”—she felt his shaft jump—
“chess,”
she finished repressively. “Winner’s choice,” he insisted.