Lisbon (45 page)

"When you have lit a candle upstairs, come to the window and wave," said Tom tersely. "Then I will know you are all right."

"Yes." She had almost started in when suddenly it was borne in upon her that this might be the last, the very last time that she would ever hear his voice or see his face. Almost had she stepped inside when she whirled about and ran back in panic to fling her arms about him. "Oh, Tom, I cannot let you go," she said brokenly.

He held her tightly for a moment, and when she looked up, she saw that his face in the moonlight was very white and set.

"Go now, Charlotte," he said huskily, and put her away from him.

Walking backward now, seeing him through a veil of tears, she again reached the door and went inside. She did not lock it, she did not have the key, but there was a finality in its closing that made her stop for a moment and lean against it. A chapter of her life was closing with that door. . . .

There was not much furniture in the great hallway, and Charlotte moved forward surefooted to find the stairs, pooled in moonlight from a high window. She forced herself to hurry up them, afraid her resolve would break and she would turn once again and run back to Tom. Now she had reached the top—and she came to an abrupt halt.

A door had swung open, and silhouetted against the candlelight stood Rowan, tall and menacing.

For a moment Charlotte hesitated, her light apricot silk skirts swirling with indecision, poised like a butterfly on the top step. Rowan . . . was back. And advancing upon her.

She summoned her courage. “I have been out all day,” she said, trying to sound casual. “When did you get back?”

“I never left,” he said in a colorless voice.

She realized her error then and turned in panic to run. Rowan’s long arm snaked out and seized the pannier of her skirt. The thin fabric held sufficiently long for him to swing her around to face him before it split with a rip.

“I have ransacked the city looking for you,” he grated.
“Where have you been?”

Desperate, she tried to brazen it out. “With the Milroyds. I left word with Wend, did she not tell you?”

“Liar!” His hand clamped down on her arm. “I was gone but a matter of hours
and then returned here.
There are no Milroyds! You have been with Westing. Admit it! My God, how long had you been planning it?”

Charlotte’s eyes were great dark pools.

Rowan had set a trap for her.

And she had walked into it.

“I am not the only liar,” she said from between white lips. “You told me Tom was dead.
You left him there to die!”

He brushed that aside with a shrug of his shoulder. “That does not signify. You are my wife. I told you long ago that I would not look back to what you did before you wed me, but that I would not forgive a further slip.” He towered over her.

Charlotte held her breath.
Oh, Tom, Tom, leave
 !
she said in silent prayer.
Go now while you still can! There will be other days for you, but this man is going to kill me!

Suddenly Rowan barked a command, and four men came through a doorway below and stood on either side of the closed front door.

Charlotte felt her breath leave her body as she saw them, for their presence there could surely mean only one thing.

“Let him go,” she whispered. “Let him go, Rowan, and I promise you—”

“Be damned to your promises,” he cut in bitterly. “You are a lying, faithless wench and I was mad to take you to wife. Call Westing in,” he added brutally. “Open your mouth and call his name.”

“Tom!” she screamed. But before she could utter her next words, which would have been, “Run,
it s a trap!”, 
Rowan s big hand had closed over her mouth, stifling the words.

On the street below, Tom heard her call his name. He came through the door in a rush—and was attacked from both sides. His attackers used no weapons but their fists and boots, but the blows they struck were quick and hard. Overwhelmed by numbers, Tom never had a chance. He went down groaning to the floor and was kicked into unconsciousness.

“Oh, stop them, stop them,” Charlotte moaned, writhing in Rowan s iron grasp. “Can t you see they’re killing him?” And then, to bring Rowan to his senses, “You’ll be accounted a murderer—I myself will accuse you!”

At her words an expression so ugly crossed his face that at any other time she would have blanched before it. “I have no intention of killing your lover, Charlotte,” he drawled, and called down sharply to the men below to desist.

“Then what do you intend?” she cried, terrified.

“I intend to have him thrown upon a ship in irons and transported far away,” he said coolly, and she realized with prickling skin that he had given this considered thought, that while she had been lying in Tom’s arms in 
the velvet darkness, Rowan must have been pacing the night, making his plans.

She closed her eyes, trying not to see the future—and opened them again at the scrape of boots and saw them dragging Tom’s inert body to the door.

Rowan’s voice held devilish amusement. “He will wake up on the high seas, penniless, chained, and with his body a torment to him.’’ He seemed to relish the shudder that went through her. “He will wonder what has happened to you.’’ That stabbed at her too, for she was suddenly caught by the certainty that she would never see Tom again.

Love had left her life. It would not be back.

“I will not kill your lover, Charlotte—others will do that. ” His voice was like a whip flicking an open wound, and Charlotte stared at him in horror.

“What . . . what do you mean?” she faltered.

Rowan was pleased to explain. “The captain’s instructions are to take Westing five days out to sea and there drop him overboard sewn in a sack. He is one of those Madagascar blackguards, and I have paid him well—never doubt that he will do it.”

Charlotte recoiled from him. “You are lying,” she said at last, but she said it without conviction. “Tell me that you are lying, Rowan!’’

His short laugh was answer enough. “The ship sails within the hour. You do not believe me? Come, I will escort you to the waterfront, that you may view her departure.”

Charlotte was dragged down the stairs screaming. At the front door Rowan thrust his handkerchief into her mouth, wrapped a scarf around her wrists, tied cruelly tight. He himself carried her into a waiting coach that seemed to have appeared from nowhere, dumped her contemptuously upon the cushions, and sat staring at her the whole way to the waterfront.

There he pulled aside the coach’s curtain so that she could see in the dawn’s pale light a tall ship just now making her stately way down the Tagus toward the sea. It was too far to read her name, but her white sails billowed in the freshening breeze.

Not till then did Rowan free her hands and jerk the gag from her mouth.

“Have you nothing to say for yourself, Charlotte?” he demanded harshly. “Do you not care to weep, to supplicate?” Desperate, Charlotte leaned forward. She was trembling, and there were tears in her voice. “Find a fast skiff, overtake the vessel, bring Tom back! Give him back his life, Rowan, and I will do anything,
anything
, I promise you!”

The sneer that passed over his dark features was not pretty to see. “It is too late to ask me to save Westing,” he told her brutally. “I thought you might wish to plead for mercy
for yourself.”

Too late
. . .
too late. . . .
The words rang like a funeral dirge in her ears.

“Murderer!” she screamed at him. “Murderer!” Panting, she flung herself upon Rowan, scratching his face, beating her fists against his chest. When he seized her wrists, she sank her teeth deep into his hand. With a howl of pain he flung her from him, flung her with such force that her head struck the side of the coach and she slumped unconscious down into the cushioned seat.

Charlotte was kept aboard a vessel in the harbor for several days, bound and gagged, lying in darkness, listening to the rats creep about. She almost went mad during those days, but was sustained by the thought that if she were indeed on a vessel—and the rasping of the hawsers and the sounds that drifted down to her assured her that she was—then she must be going somewhere and there would surely be an end to the voyage.

And when the voyage ended, she told herself with clenched teeth, trying to hold on to her sanity while a curious rat nibbled at the toe of her shoe, she would burst forth somehow and find her children and sweep them away. She would hie herself to the English consul and tell him how she had been treated—she would win his sympathy and institute divorce proceedings against Rowan. Surely, even though the world would judge her an adulteress, people would realize as well that she had been tricked and duped and treated with inhuman cruelty—the rats were proof of that!

But the captain of the small vessel found time to look in on her with a lantern, saw the rat, and forthwith dispatched his cabin boy to sit by her and scare the rats away. When the boy removed her gag to give her water—nobody offered her any food—she tried through dry lips to question him, to ask where the vessel was bound. But he spoke 
a language strange to her and she could not get through to him.

At last, when she felt she must surely starve, a coarse blanket that smelled of ship’s biscuit and moldy cheese was thrown over her and she was carried away under cover of darkness. She was lifted up—she thought into a coach, for there was a cushion beneath her, the vehicle lurched over the cobbles, and she could hear the clip-clop of the horses’ hooves. She knew that they were passing through city streets but she did not know what town it might be—perhaps some fishing village along the coast, where she could make her escape.

At last the conveyance stopped and she was carried into a building, for she heard doors open and close, and up a flight of stairs. Her skin prickled with fright. Could it be that she was being locked up in a tower somewhere? Then she was abruptly plumped down.

It was a terrible shock to have the blanket removed and to find herself sitting in a chair in her own bedroom in the house in the Portas del Sol and to see by the light of a single candle, Rowan standing there with his legs spread apart and an evil expression on his dark face, looking down at her.

“Well, I see you are none the worse for your nights aboard ship,” he remarked conversationally, reaching out to remove her gag.

None the worse? Filthy and rumpled and starving, with her hair matted and uncombed? Charlotte stared at him in wonder. Did he intend to act as if nothing had happened?

“I am famished, ” she said shortly. “And eager to see the children. ” It came to her suddenly that the house was very quiet. Too quiet. “Where are the children?” she asked in sudden alarm.

Rowan shrugged and she saw that he was dressed for traveling. Indeed she now realized that the doors of the great armoire stood open and that it was empty—her clothes had been removed from it! And there was a heavy chest with a curved top lying near the door, as if waiting for removal.

“Where is Wend?” she demanded.

“Wend and the children are already aboard ship.”

“We are going back to England then?” she inquired as calmly as she could.

“I 
am going back to England. You will stay here. A mad wife will be of no use to me there.”

Numbed though she was, new prickles of alarm went through her. “I am not mad!” she protested.

“No, you are dead,” he said softly. “Your funeral was held the day before yesterday, and now the house is being closed up. It was a problem what to do with you, for the quarters you will henceforth occupy are not yet ready. But have no fear, they are promised by tomorrow. You will be taken there tomorrow night, and afterward my key will be turned back to the owner of this house. For myself, I sail in an hour. Meantime, I will leave you here in the care of these good people.” He nodded toward the closed door. “Their name is Bilbao.”

Charlotte’s wits began to work. “People will say that you have murdered me!” she warned.

His dangerous smile deepened. He seemed to be enjoying himself. “The funeral was swift because the doctor certified that you had gone mad and that some dangerous malady might have caused your illness—it seemed best to inter you quickly. So I have buried an empty coffin and even raised a stone to you. That should quiet any well-wishers you may have who come poking around. Ned came by to offer condolences—and left in a hurry when I told him there was fear of contagion.” Rowan’s tone was sardonic. “I told him I was taking my broken heart back to England to mend. And he’ll bear witness that he found me in deep mourning for my beloved wife—as indeed you see me now!” He spread out his arms and Charlotte realized that he was wearing funereal black; even his cocked hat was as black as his boots.

“You make sport of me,” she said bitterly. “Loose me at once.”

His brows shot up at this show of spirit.

“I had thought you might ask me why I did not fill that empty coffin with your strumpet’s body.”

“Very well,” she snapped. “I do ask you.”