Night Winds (32 page)

If their owners yet lived
. For many, it appeared, were not so fortunate. Here and there, he glimpsed a foot sticking from a pile of debris, hands sprawled above a corpse, already bloating. Many beasts had died as well. Everywhere he looked, he saw them, cattle, horses, dogs, and cats. Even the creatures of the Gulf had not been spared. The miasma of rotting fish hung heavily, despite a light breeze, and he saw several carcasses that looked like dolphins.

The stench would be intolerable shortly
. Men must be organized to help clear bodies from the streets. Otherwise, not only would their noses suffer, but their health as well. Pestilence would claim whatever last night’s raging seas had not.

Already, he realized that the dead were too numerous, the risk too great, to identify the bodies
. They would have to be disposed of quickly, of necessity.

It was altogether possible that he would never claim Shae’s body, would never see it buried properly
. He might never even know where or how she’d died.

Or whether
. Though he knew, logically, she could not have lived, he’d seen enough families of lost sailors to know he’d have no peace. Sometimes, even years after, they clung to the threadbare hope that their loved one yet lived upon some lonesome stretch of shore. Without a body, peace came slowly, if at all.

He almost wished that the assassin’s attempt two days before had been successful.

*

The Marlin
, Shae read on the schooner’s shattered bow. Beneath it, in gold letters, she could just make out the edges of a logo she’d seen many times before:
Lowell Shipping
.

The ship was in worse shape than it had appeared from a distance
. Shreds of filthy canvas and tangled lines covered much of it. But not so much that she couldn’t see the hull was breached and two masts broken. She wondered what had happened to the crew.

One break, on the starboard side, was wide enough for her to squeeze through
. A narrow shaft of sunlight illuminated splintered crates and jumbled wreckage, obstacles that might mangle her only way to search for Phillip, her bare feet. She hesitated, loathing to push herself inside, where most of the hold remained in darkness. Still, the possibility of fresh water drew her powerfully, until she felt that she had no choice but to take the risk.

She whispered a prayer that there might yet be unbroken casks and pushed through the gap
. Quickly, she shuffled to the left so her body would not block the precious light. She stood still for a long time, until her eyes adjusted to the dimness beyond the rivulet of sun.

She scanned the hold for any curve, which might well indicate the presence of a container of some liquid
. But what quickly captured her attention was the huddled body of a man.

Until today, Shae had seen death only at its most carefully arranged, in family visitations held inside well-ordered parlors
. But the raw truth of it, she saw, was so stark, so ugly, it made her doubt her earlier notions of a long and blissful sleep. Thankfully, she could see little of this poor man, for his finely stubbled face was nearly covered by his disheveled brown hair and one long arm, which was folded over both eyes as if he didn’t wish to see his fate.

The arm moved, and he groaned.

Shae screamed, her heart thudding wildly. After all the bodies, both animal and human, she was shocked by the presence of another living person. Especially one who had appeared so very dead.

The man’s arm slid completely off a surprisingly young face, and he stared at her, his eyes widened in surprise or fear.

“Sweet Mother Mary. I’m not dead after all.” His accent was distinctly English.

She shouldn’t be surprised
. After eight years in Port Providence, she’d learned a sailor might come from nearly anywhere. She shook her head in answer to his question. “I thought you were. You scared me when you moved.”

“What’s happened
? How’d you get on board? Them boys haul you up out of the storm? It’d be just like ‘em to try to keep the likes o’ you from me.” He sat up and swung a thumb toward his broad chest. “Y’see, I’m the ladies’ man on ship.”

Shae decided he only barely qualified for the “man” part of the statement
. He might be nineteen or twenty at the most. She tried to explain their situation. “This shi
p
it isn’t in the water.”

He unfolded gangly-looking legs and hooted with laughter, then rubbed the back of his head, as if the sound had hurt
. “Are you daft, girl? It’s a bloody ship, it is. Where else would it be?”

“Come look.” She gestured toward the opening.

He stood and came close enough to see that she’d been right. Then he turned to stare at her once more, with large blue eyes. “Maybe I’ve gone to Davy Jones’ locker after all. This ship might look like hell, but I’ll be keelhauled if you don’t look like sailors’ heaven.”

He must have been at sea a long time, Shae decided, if he thought anything as bruised and bedraggled as she was held appeal
. Apparently, he fancied himself a young Don Juan, and he felt obligated to keep in practice. Despite the circumstances, he’d doubtless flirt with her even if she looked like Aunt Alberta. Shae ignored the comment and moved on to the most pressing matter.

“I washed ashore near here as well, but I came to find fresh water
. Please, could you help me look?”

“But where’s me mates?” he asked, ignoring her
. “We had a crew of eight aboard.”

“They could be nearby, I suppose
. Why don’t we look for them while we’re searching for some water?”

He nodded his agreement and started moving through the hold
. Occasionally, he paused to shout, “Cap’n! Cap’n Stanley! Gil! Where are ye, mates?”

There were other names as well, but no one answered
. Shae was relieved that neither did they find the seamen’s bodies. She was grateful for whatever respite this ship offered from the squalid face of death.

The Englishman’s next words made her skin prickle with a thrill of hope
. “Here’s your water, Missy.”

Several casks lay amid the debris in the hold
. Two were broken, but, thankfully, a full one had survived. He searched until he found a ladle, which he filled for her. She drank greedily, not caring about her noisy slurps. He refilled the ladle for her several times before he, too, drank his fill.

“You
were
thirsty, weren’t you?” he asked afterward.

At her nod, he continued
. “I guess me mates’re dead, then. It’s a hard end to a good life. On the sea, that is. This ain’t me first time shipwrecked. I’m Harry, by the by.”

“Shae,” she offered
. “If you’ve been shipwrecked before, maybe you know what to do. I was in Port Providence before the storm washed me out into the gulf. I have no idea where we are now, but I have to get back home. There’s someone there . . . someone I must find.”

“Yer beau?” he guessed.

She nodded.

He shook his head, and chagrin stretched his handsome features
. “Aye, that’s the way of it. The pretty ones’re always spoke for. But I’ll help. Me next best skill, besides fer pleasin’ the fair ladie
s
” He interrupted with a wink.
“
has always been for navigatin’ me way out of unknown waters.”

“All right then, Harry,” Shae said
. “Let’s see if you can do as well on land.”

*

“Your carriage is ready, Mister Lowell,” Maxwell announced crisply. Half the city was supposedly in ruins, yet his driver’s mustache did not have a single bristle out of place.

Looking around Fairwater Haven, Ethan could almost pretend that yesterday’s hurricane had only been a routine late summer squall
. The mansion, as Cullen had predicted, had taken on a bit of water. Wood floors had been ruined and some walls would warp and bow, yet despite these inconveniences, most of the family’s treasures had been saved.

Except his Rachel, the woman with whom he’d planned to build his life
. His stomach clenched with the bloodsoaked memory of her ruined face, the weight of her limp, wrapped body as he’d helped carry it inside. He forced his attention back to her father. With Maxwell’s assistance, he helped guide the wounded man out the front door.

His own father looked annoyed
. “You’re certain this infirmary trek is absolutely necessary, Maxwell? We’ve always been able to get physicians to come here before.”

The coachman looked unruffled
. “As I explained, sir, the doctors are overwhelmed with injured. Mr. Tisdale will be seen much more quickly if we go there.”

Augustus Lowell raised an eyebrow, as he often did when he was irritated
. “You told Dr. Tuttle he was wanted
here
?”

“I did, and by you, sir.”

“Yo
u
a
h
encouraged him, no doubt?”

Again, the driver nodded dutifully
. “Neither bribe nor threat would move him or any of the others.”

Raymond Tisdale picked that moment to slump
. Both Maxwell and Ethan tightened their grips on his arms to hold him upright. From the bruising and swelling around his eye, Ethan guessed he’d been struck in the head by one of the same bricks that had killed his wife and daughter.

Ethan looked up at his father
. “I’d suggest you stop arguing with Maxwell and let us get this man some help.”

He felt quite satisfied when his father relented and even helped them to the waiting coach
. Though Ethan wasn’t especially fond of Tisdale, he felt that, at least for Rachel’s sake, he ought to do his best by the old man.

Augustus Lowell did not follow his son inside the coach
. “I would go, of course, but I must check on our ships and property. We’ll have sailors and schooners scattered from Hell to Havana with this storm, and the docks will be in ruins.”

As they drove past a wrecked church, Ethan thought once again of Rachel
. He didn’t delude himself that the two of them had been in love, but they had been especially well suited for each other. He’d admired her cunning and cool beauty; she’d seen him in a way no other had, as pure potential. With Rachel’s intelligence behind him, he could have been his own man, a success apart from Lowell Shipping.

He swore to himself that he still would be, that he would force his father to see him as something more than a parasitical presence, a son who need do nothing useful to inherit well
. Someday soon, he’d bring Father Payton Enterprises on a platter, and he’d bring it for a fraction of its value. Perhaps after this storm, Phillip would lack the capital to properly repair his holdings. That, coupled with the pressure that resulted from his earlier decision about the Negroes, would force his former friend to sell the brokerage at last.

Ethan imagined himself running Payton Enterprises on his own
. An infusion of Lowell money would enable him not only to mend but expand the brokerage properties. Phillip would be forced back into workaday world of medicine to support himself and his family. Villa Rosa would be sold at a tremendous loss. Both his father and Shae Rowan would finally realize that Payton was a failure. Perhaps, she could even be persuaded to return to him.

Yes, perhaps she could at that
. He smiled, even as Old Man Tisdale sagged and leaned against him more heavily.

“Hurry up, Max,” he called out to the coachman
. “I don’t want him puking on me!”

Tisdale’s gaze caught his and tried to hold it, but Ethan looked away
. He couldn’t stand the pain in those dark eyes. He wished that Max would move the horses at a decent clip.

Everywhere Ethan looked, he saw more signs of devastation
. The storm surge had piled beams from crushed buildings like mammoth stacks of toothpicks. On top of one sat a lithe-looking yacht, its thin bow pointed like an arrow to the sun, its main mast snapped in two. Though he saw many corpses as they picked their way past debris, it was that ruined yacht, and the realization that the
El Dorado
might have perished, that finally brought tears to his eyes.

*

Phillip had meant to leave St. Michael’s as soon as he’d determined that his sisters were both here and safe. Though Lydia’s formerly private room was now crowded with refugees from the storm, her bright eyes and liveliness quickly reassured him she was feeling better. He spoke with her in low tones, so as not to disturb the sleeping women and children huddled all around.

After several minutes, John Frindly’s haggard face appeared in the doorway
. He looked rumpled, but altogether neater than did his mud-stained employer.

“I’m so sorry about Miss Rowan,” Lydia told Phillip. “Justine told me that you’d planned to marry her.”

Phillip nodded, his throat too tight to speak, then kissed her cheek and stepped out into the corridor. With an effort, he collected his emotions for a moment when he might deal with them in private. “You’re a sight for sore eyes, Frindly.”