HF - 04 - Black Dawn (17 page)

Dick continued to smile. 'And I was thinking how short you people must be of true conversation to engage in so much gossip. Mistress Gale is the one in a difficult position, sir. She is my housekeeper, in the most strict sense of the word. You may believe me.'

Kendrick stared at him. 'True? Good God. Well, I . . . Mrs Kendrick will never believe it. No one will ever believe it. Especially in view of what that Laidlaw woman is spreading all over Kingston.'

Dick got up. 'Your wife may believe whatever she wishes, Mr Kendrick. I understood this to be a social call. If you have come here merely to criticize my domestic arrangements I suggest you take your leave, now.' He wondered if his anger was induced by his own guilt, at his thoughts, his desires, his certainty that Harriet planned nothing less, at some future date.

'Oh, permit me to apologize, Mr Hilton. I do, indeed, and abjectly.' Kendrick remained seated. 'I am here on a far more important matter. Your seat.'

'Eh?' Dick sat down again.

'The Hilton seat in the House. It is yours, as owner of Hilltop. Here again, I must say, your uncle cared little for politics in his later years. The seat has gathered dust these last twelve sessions. But we have hopes that you, sir . . . well, these are dangerous times. The English Parliament, God damn them, is out to get us, sir. There is no doubt about that. This abolishing of the slave trade, and done by a relative of yours too, I believe . . .'

'You are referring to my father, sir,' Dick said. 'And he would hate to take the credit for that accomplishment. He merely supported Mr Wilberforce and Mr Fox.'

'Your father? God damn. Matthew Hilton is your father?' Kendrick looked thunderstruck. 'I remember Matt Hilton. Building churches he was, when any young man of sense would have been turning a card or raising a skirt. And running off with his . . . good God.'

'My mother, sir.'

'Oh, I say, my day for disaster. Of course, he had two sons. Do you know, I had not linked the matter? Well, well. Once again, Mr Hilton, I apologize.' He frowned at his empty coffee cup, then set it down, seemed to be drawing himself together. 'Yet, sir, I must speak plain. How do you stand?'

'On what, sir?'

'Slavery, sir. You have undertaken the ownership of this plantation. You
are
aware of the scurrilous methods they are employing in England? They know the nation would never stand for Abolition, so they are preaching Amelioration, sir.'

'You had best explain.'

'Well, sir, if they
are
forced to agree that slavery is decreed by God, and more important, is an economic necessity, they
are
concerned that it should be as polite as possible. Why, sir, there is a contradiction in terms. Will a slave ever work unless driven to it?'

'No doubt you are right, Mr Kendrick. But cannot even the driving be divided into the vicious and the necessary?' 'You'd withdraw the whip?'

‘I
understand it is mainly intended to be withdrawn from the women. But in fact, I have withdrawn it altogether, or at least, not found sufficient cause for its use in my week on Hilltop.

And the plantation appears to prosper.'

'A week? By God. You've not had to plant. And from the women? You've not sampled their tongues.'

Dick thought of the gang he had just left. Indeed he had no idea how else to bring them to heel. But his spirit rebelled at being ordered to brutality by his neighbour.

'Anyway,' Kendrick continued. 'You'll learn the facts soon enough. 'Tis your seat we
are
concerned with. You'll take it?'

But now Dick was very angry indeed. He wonder if it had not been bubbling within him all this time, ever since that ill-fated duel, perhaps, but certainly since the bookkeepers had abandoned him. And all for the wrong reason. He got up again. 'And will I be welcome, sir, if I bring Mistress Gale to sit in the gallery to oversee me, and if I stand up and support Amelioration or, indeed, Abolition?'

Kendrick had also risen. His cheeks were so purple he might have been about to have a fit. 'Indeed, sir, you would not, on either score.'

'Well, then,' Dick said, 'as I perceive that Jamaica has managed to survive without a Hilton in the House these twelve years, it had best continue to do so, and allow me to get on with my own problems. And my housekeeper, sir.'

'Gad, sir,' Kendrick snorted. 'Gad. I had hoped we could be friends. Gad, sir. You're nothing but old Robert, come back to life.' He stamped down the stairs, vaulted into the saddle, and rode off.

Dick sat down and wiped his brow. Christ, what a stupid way to act, he thought. It must be the heat, affecting my senses.

'You were magnificent, Mr Hilton. Magnificent.' Harriet Gale carried two goblets filled with sangaree, iced red wine to which brandy and fruits had been added. She held one out for him to take, sat beside him. 'He spoke nothing better than the truth. You
are
a reincarnation of Robert Hilton.'

'Me? He was having his little joke. As you are, no doubt. Me? There can be no man in all the world more confused. More miserable, perhaps. I know not where to start, to be a Hilton, to be a planter. To be a man, even.'

Harriet Gale gazed at him, over the top of her glass as she sipped.

'Then there is the matter of you. If you were listening, you must have heard what he said. What everyone is saying, perhaps. Oh, don't be alarmed. I would not have you leave, Mistress Gale. I would protect your reputation. And mine, no doubt. Perhaps if we could obtain another white woman, to live here with you. Aye, that is the ticket.'

Harriet Gale put down her glass beside Kendrick's coffee cup.

'I do not wish, or need, another woman to live with me. Are you afraid of people's talk?' 'Why, I suppose not. But. . .'

'Well, then,' she said. 'The best way to answer gossip is to make it the truth, then the wagging tongues lose interest.' She leaned forward, held his face between her hands, and kissed him very deliberately on the mouth.

6

The Betrothed

Where Ellen Taggart had thrust, and Joan Lanken had ballooned, Harriet Gale licked. The sensation was so delicious, the assault was so sudden, the feel of her body against his was so much what he had wanted throughout the previous week, that Dick was for a few moments unable to move. Then he remembered where they were, and seized her wrists. 'Mistress Gale. Harriet. . .'

'Don't you like me even a little?' Her face was only inches away, her enormous deep brown eyes looming at him. And her body still rested on his.

'Of course I like you. But on this verandah . . .'

'There is nobody here. Save slaves.'

'Yes, but

She laughed, deep in her throat. 'I forgot. You regard them as important. Will you come upstairs?'

'But. . . they will know.' There was no question of refusing her. As a quick exploration now assured her.

She gave his breeches a squeeze, smiled at him. 'Of course. But does it matter?' She rose away from him, holding his hand. And God, how he wanted. How he had wanted, it seemed, since that evening with Ellen. Ellen. And all his promises.

But Harriet was already at the stairs, and starting up, and he was still holding her hand.

Boscawen was standing in the archway to the dining room. 'You want me put away the horse, Mr Richard?'

'Ah . . .' Colour flamed into his cheeks. 'If you would be so kind, Mr Boscawen.'

'Right away, Mr Richard.' Boscawen looked up at the gallery. 'You there,' he bawled. 'Come down here.'

Two of the maids hastily appeared, armed with dusters and brooms and pans. They scurried down the stairs, averting their eyes from Harriet, who had released him and reached the top, and smiled at him. He almost ran after her. 'My God. They know.'

'And are anxious that you should enjoy me.'

'My God,' he said again. 'I doubt I will be able.'

Again the low laugh, and she went into her bedchamber. 'Out.'

Judith had been lying on the bed, peering at one of the books from the library; she could not read but enjoyed the illustrations. Now she scrambled to her feet, gazed at Dick.

'Oh, my God,' he said. 'This is impossible.'

The child sidled past him, and as she reached him, gave a little moue with her lips and tossed her head, almost suggestively.

'She'll be a right whore, one of these days.' Harriet closed the door. 'I'll have to watch her.'

'Mistress Gale,' he gabbled. 'Really
...
we must be mad.'

'I am mad,' she agreed, and held his arm to escort him across the room. 'Mad with desire for you, Dick. God, even to think of you inside me reduces me to a jelly. And you want me as well. I can see it in your eyes, Dick.'

He found himself sitting on the bed, and realized what had been bothering him for the previous ten minutes; she was absolutely sober. She released her gown, stepped out of it— she wore nothing underneath—and knelt to pull off his boots, her breasts sagging towards him in a most entrancing fashion, and below the breasts the fold of flesh at her waist, the pout of her belly, the sudden rise of silky brown hair. He reached for her, closing Ins hands on the soft mounds of flesh, to hold them and use them to bring her against him, while she smiled, and busied herself with his breeches, and lay on top of him as he fell back across the bed, kissing his mouth and eyes and nose and chin, sighing as he caressed, her
hair drooping on either side of
her face to scatter across his.

But he wanted to possess, as she was willing enough to be possessed. He rolled her on her back, watched her eyes dilate with pleasure, and then without warning she uttered a scream of ecstasy, and dug her fingernails into his back and shoulders, scraping them across the flesh so that he too reached an orgasm in a frenzy of pain which left him lying panting, on the no less exhausted woman.

'I
did not mean to hurt you.' His li
ps were against her ear.

'You have not hurt me enough. Nine years? I think I was almost a virgin again. Dick. Dick. How I have longed for your coming. And yet, I feared it, too. I did not know what you would be like, whether you would like me
...
I cannot breathe.'

He rolled away from her, and she sat up, and knelt above him, straddling him, to remove the last of his shirt, play with his nipples in turn, while she w
orked her haunches to restore h
im once again to desire.

And this time she would be the mistress, her fingers digging into his chest, her tongue lolling, her hair scattering as she shook her head.

Her entire body sagged, and she slowly lowered herself, to lie on him, blood pumping through the arteries of her neck to fill her cheeks, while her flesh was sweat-wet to his touch. 'Christ,' she said. 'You must have wanted, as much as I.'

A time to think. As if thought were possible, except of the woman, except of desire, except of wanting to arouse again, except of feeling her legs lying on his, her groin pulsing on his, her nipples scraping on his, her mouth sucking at his. But yet, a time to think. The whole house would have heard her scream, would have known what they had accomplished. But the whole house would have known, anyway, once the bedroom door had shut behind them. How could he ever look any of them in the face?

And there were hooves, outside the opened window, and that so well remembered voice.

'Oh, my God,' he said. 'Tony.'

'Now
perhaps he will leave me alone’
she said. 'Eh? Tony?'

'Ever since the first night. Oh, I permitted nothing. But he would persevere. Will he be jealous?' 'Of me? Very likely. I must get up.'

Because there were other voices, rising through the old wooden floors. Boscawen, certainly, protesting. Tony, laughing. And boots on the stairs.

Harriet rolled away from him, regained her robe in a single movement, and pulled it on, in the same instant draping his breeches across his thighs.

The door opened. 'Great God in Heaven,' Tony said. 'I did not credit my ears.'

'You are a rude fellow, Mr Hilton,' Harriet said. 'Breaking into a lady's bedchamber.'

Tony nodded. 'Oh, I am. Well, madam, I am to congratulate you. For at least knowing what you wanted. Are you alive, down there?'

Dick sat up. 'I'll not apologize, to you or to anyone.'

'Spoken like a Hilton, old boy. Why should you apologize, to me or anyone? But while you tossed your delightful grandmother, I have been working for Hilltop.'