Elizabeth Boyle (108 page)

Maureen turned to her and said softly, “There is a man in a phaeton outside. Go to him; tell him you are his new housekeeper. If I don’t come out in five minutes, have him take you to his house and tell him he is to pay you twice what you made at my aunt’s.”

If Mrs. Landon found these instructions strange, one more glance at the pistol aimed in their general direction erased whatever questions or objections she seemed about to lodge.

The woman hurried down the remaining steps and sidestepped the Captain in a matter of seconds.

“Thank you,” Maureen told him, moving slowly down the steps until she came to the last one. There she sat down and looked up at the man who might well hold the keys to her past and her future. “You know that I am Lord Ethan Hawthorne’s daughter.”

He flinched at the name, but after a moment he nodded.

“And you know why the Lord Admiral is so determined to see not just de Ryes hang, but me as well.”

His hand wavered, and Maureen knew from the sight of his bloodshot eyes that he’d been drinking again.

Drinking to erase the past.

She decided to test her suspicions. “You testified at my father’s court-martial. You know what all of this is about. Tell me, Captain Johnston, I’m not so wrong when I say there is more to this than just a court-martial based on false evidence, am I?”

He remained silent, unwilling to give her the facts she wanted.

Straightening up, she faced him. “How is it that you’ve continued all these years, knowing what you did to my father?”

She took a step toward him. “That he was forced to take to piracy.” And then another one, even closer. “Into a hard life that killed my mother.” Another one. “That he was eventually hunted down and murdered because you drove him out of the world he belonged in.”

She stopped as the muzzle of the pistol came to rest in the middle of her breastbone. She took hold of it and moved it over her heart. “You can pull the trigger now and give me a quicker death than the one you condemned my father to, or you can tell me the truth. Wash the blood off your hands.” She looked up and stared hard into his watery gaze.

William’s hand wavered, his finger shaking over the trigger, but then his shoulders slumped and he shook his head. “I can’t kill you, lass. How could I?”

“That didn’t stop you from what you did to my father. You might as well have pulled the trigger.”

“It was because I had no backbone that I let the likes of Peter Cottwell chart my course, rather than standing up to him.” He sighed and walked over to the steps, slumping down on the threadbare carpet covering them. He put his hands on either side of his head and sobbed.

Maureen crossed the entryway and sat down on the step beside him. “Tell me about my father.”

It took some time for the Captain to find the words, but when he did, the entire sorry tale spilled forth.

“Your father was like a brother to me. Ethan kept me safe when we were just lads starting out. We weren’t much more than nine or ten, any of us— Ethan, me, Peter, and James Porter.”

“Porter?” she said, wondering why the name sounded so familiar.

“You know Porter. The judge who tried your case.”

Maureen had always thought it unusual that their case had been moved to an Admiralty court, but now she saw the Lord Admiral’s hand in even that twist of fate.

“Ethan was the best of us, but Peter was the cunning one,” William said, continuing his story. “Never seemed to matter much, cause we all rose through the ranks together. Helping each other out. I thought we’d always be friends, until. . .”

“Until?”

“Until about two years after we’d all made captain. We’d been in a squabble with the Dutch, and it turned out bad. The way Peter told the story, it made it look like your father had committed treason. At first I didn’t believe him, but then he brought me evidence—other men who’d seen what Peter claimed—like a fool I went along with him. I didn’t realize until then that Peter hated your father.”

“But why? Why would the Lord Admiral hate my father so?”

“Because Ethan had a title, and Peter didn’t.”

“I never knew about the title until recently,” Maureen told him. “Why should the Lord Admiral care if my father had a title?”

“Your father was a baron in his own right, and Peter had nothing. It gave your father a leg up on promotions and connections, or that’s what Peter believed. Didn’t matter to him that Ethan was a good captain, a fine leader, just that he was being earmarked for a promotion Peter wanted.” The Captain closed his eyes for a moment, as if recollecting all those events. “And then there was your mother.”

“My mother?” Maureen looked up in surprise. “What did she have to do with all this?”

“Ethan and Peter had been vying for her affections for over a year. By gad, we were all in love with Ellen. She was pretty as a picture. But any fool could see she loved your father to distraction. Peter had himself convinced it was the title she wanted, not the man, and that if he had a title or superior rank, she would forget Ethan.”

Maureen bristled at this notion. “She didn’t. They were married.”

“Aye. They weren’t just married, they eloped. Peter was beyond furious. He thought your father had disgraced her by carting her off to Scotland. It didn’t help that her family agreed with Peter. They were a bunch of high sticklers; hadn’t paid much heed to any of us courting Ellen, because they thought she would never take anything less than an earl as a husband. Her sister had eloped six months earlier—bad business, it was— and they just assumed your mother wouldn’t be so foolish.”

“In the meantime, Peter Cottwell set out to have his revenge.”

“Yes, revenge.” William paused, glancing down at the pistol in his hand. Hastily, he set it aside. “He falsified evidence, though I didn’t know it at the time. From the looks of it, your father had let Peter and another captain go into a skirmish unaided. Treason, it was, and a hanging offense. He convinced Porter and me to join him in testifying against Ethan. To bring honor back to the Admiralty, he told us.” He laughed bitterly. “Like a fool I went along with his plans.” Captain Johnston turned his head, but Maureen could see the single tear glistening in his eye.

“Then what happened?” she prompted.

“There was a court-martial. I’ll never forget your father’s eyes on me as I testified. The accusations behind them nearly tore me apart.” He looked over at her. “You’ve got his eyes, lass. Shook me right back nearly thirty years when I saw you that day in Porter’s court.” He looked away and then continued. “After I was done testifying and saw the disappointment in your father’s eyes, I knew that Peter had been wrong all along. Oh, it wasn’t anything definite, but Ethan’s expression just told me—I was on the wrong side.”

“But it was too late.”

He nodded. “At least for your father’s career. They sentenced him to life on a prison hulk. Again Peter was furious. He wanted your father dead.”

“So he could marry my mother,” Maureen whispered.

“Aye, that and other reasons. But I couldn’t be part of it anymore. Your mother came to me and begged for my help. She was a bold lass, like you, full of spirit and fire. Afraid of nothing. She never believed Peter’s lies. She stood steadfast by your father, no matter how damning the evidence.”

Maureen glanced away. A lesson she might have taken to heart if only she’d known.

What had Julien said to her that fateful day on the
Destiny
as it appeared he was moving to join the British lines?

There’s still a chance .. .but I need your help.

Please don’t jump. Let me explain.

What if she had been more like her mother and trusted with her heart? What if she hadn’t jumped and instead let Julien explain?

The Captain cleared his throat, bringing Maureen back to the present. “Aye, Ellen could be quite convincing when she put her mind to it.”

“What did my mother want you to do?”

“She had a plan to get your father off that hulk and out of the country. It would mean that they would never be able to set foot on English soil again, but she didn’t care. All she wanted was your father’s freedom, so they could be together. And so I agreed to help. ‘Twas the least I could do.”

Maureen looked at the Captain with a new measure of respect. “And you succeeded.”

“Yes. It was a bold plan, one your mother carefully plotted. Right down to the last detail. She knew Peter Cottwell would never rest until he had what he wanted most—your father’s death. So she went as far as to bring along a body.” William shuddered. “I never asked her where she got it. It was unthinkable—a lady like her, carting a body around, the dirt still clinging to it as if she’d dug it herself. She’d even found a poor bugger that was about your father’s height and coloring.” The Captain shuddered. “After we got Ethan out, the guards began firing down on us as we made our way to shore. In the darkness and confusion, we set the poor stiff afloat.”

“Wouldn’t someone realize it wasn’t my father?”

William cringed. “Have you ever seen a body after it’s been in the water for a few days?”

She nodded. After the slaughter of the Alliance, the bodies had floated ashore for days.

“Well, then you know there isn’t much left to identify. That poor fellow could have been the Prince of Wales for all the authorities could tell. Your mother had even gone so far as to shoot a few bullets into it to make it look like the fellow had died in the escape.”

“And when they found the body, they assumed it was my father.”

“Aye. He was declared dead. After that he and your mother slipped away, free to start their new life.”

For a moment they both sat in silence, each considering this extraordinary tale.

Maureen gave the man’s hand a gentle squeeze. “Thank you, Captain Johnston. Thank you for telling me the truth.” She rose from the steps. “Now I know what I am up against.”

“He’ll stop you, lass. He’ll not rest until he does.”

“I know. But I have to face him. He’s taken my son, and I can’t leave without my child.”

“
Your son
?” William shook his head. “The lad’s in grave danger then.”

“I know. But I have de Ryes on my side. And I’m off to join him. We’ll get our son back and see to it that Peter Cottwell never harms another Hawthorne for as long as he lives.”

“But, lass, there’s more. You need to know—”

She expected his protests and that he would try to stop her. Before he could utter another word, she snatched up his pistol and clouted him over the head. As he slumped forward she caught him and laid him gently down on the steps.

“Are you coming, Maureen?” Charles called from the street.

“Yes.” Maureen looked down at the prone figure at her feet and hoped she could repair her life in better fashion than Captain Johnston had tried to do with his.

For the past, she now knew, was a traitorous mistress. One best forgiven and left behind.

L
ady Mary had watched the Lord Admiral follow Maureen and Lord Hawksbury out of the ballroom and could only pray they would escape. And when they did, she knew full well, Peter Cottwell would be back to question her as to Maureen’s whereabouts.

Instead of remaining at the Traherns, where he could easily find her, Lady Mary slipped out through the crush and waved down a hackney to take her home. William would protect her, or at least he’d know a place where they could hide until the Lord Admiral’s wrath subsided.

As she entered the house, to her horror she found her husband slumped at the base of the stairs.

Could it be that the Lord Admiral had beaten her home?

“William, oh, William, what has that monster done to you?”

She cradled his head in her lap and began to cry over and over, “Oh, what has he done to you?”

After what seemed like forever, William stirred. He sat up slowly, blinking his eyes and rubbing his head.

“It wasn’t Cottwell who hit me, Mary,” he said sharply, “but that damnable niece of ours.”

Lady Mary sat back and stared at her husband. “Our niece?”

“Yes, you heard me say it. Our niece.”

She stared at her husband. “Maureen did this to you?”

“Aye, Maureen.”

“Why would she hit you if you finally told her the truth? I can’t see how knowing that Ellen was my sister would be cause for violence. I thought she would be happy to find out she is our niece.”

Much to Mary’s distress, he shook his head. “No, the lass still doesn’t know. She didn’t give me time. Not that I should have told her anyway; it will just put her in greater danger.”

“How can knowing that we are her family put her in danger?”

“Because then she could unravel the rest of this sorry business.”

Lady Mary hardly saw the sense of that. She rose to her feet and glared at her husband. “Well, where is she? I will tell her myself!”

“If I knew that, Mary girl, I wouldn’t be lying here on the floor with a lump on my head the size of a goose egg.” He tenderly touched the swollen flesh. “She packs a wallop, that one. She’s got Ellen’s spirit, all right, as well as her father’s foolishness. Thinks she can outwit Peter Cottwell.” He shook his head sadly.

“Oh, no, William. You have to stop her. You have to tell her the truth. Then she’ll see the sense of it.”

William snorted. “If I tell her the truth, it will only drive her harder.”

What a vexing muddle
, Lady Mary thought. Why, none of what William told her made any sense. Maureen had left the ball to elope with Lord Hawksbury, not to go after the Lord Admiral.

“I thought the earl would protect her,” Lady Mary said aloud.

“What earl?” he asked.

“The Earl of Hawksbury.”

“That young cub?”

“He’s not so young,” Lady Mary told him. “He’s quite eligible. I think he will make a splendid husband for our niece.”

“A husband?” William shook his head. “Mary girl, I would remind you that Maureen is already married. The girl has enough problems without adding another husband to the mix.”

Lady Mary had quite forgotten that. Oh, how terrible for her to be still married to that wretched pirate when Lord Hawksbury seemed so interested in her welfare.