Relentless Pursuit (34 page)

He thought again of what Young Matthew had told him. Maybe someone should consider the girl's feelings, and this spec-tre which still obviously haunted her. He sighed. Anyway, she had gone to London, so that was the end of it. But her eyes had said something else. He smiled awkwardly. How Grace would laugh if she knew. But he had not forgotten how it felt.

Or how it looked.
He glanced down at his empty sleeve. The past was the past.

Adam was only partly aware of Ferguson's concern as he walked through to the study, where John Allday had seen Captain James Bolitho hand the old sword to his younger son.

He felt the leather case in his pocket, the Nile medal which Catherine had sent to him by special messenger. Somebody must have arranged it. There was only a brief note, echoing the one she had left for him in this house with the sword.
He would have wanted you to have it.

He looked up at the portrait of Captain James, with the arm painted out. By right the sword should have been Hugh Bolitho's. The traitor.

My father.

His eyes went involuntarily to the empty fireplace. It was even the same rug, where he had loved and been loved by Zenoria. And now Catherine had broken the link which had brought them together.

Ferguson knew the signs. The ship was his world, and soon he would be away again.
This house will be empty.

“A meal perhaps, Captain?”

Adam had opened the little case and was gazing at the gold medal.
The Nile.
So many memories. So many faces, gone forever.

“I think not, Bryan.”

Ferguson said nothing. He would seek Grace's advice. She might know . . .

He was unable to believe what he saw.

She was standing just outside the opened French windows, by the roses, one finger to her lips, smiling but unsure, as if at any second she might turn and vanish. She was dressed in pale grey, and wore a wide-brimmed straw hat fastened beneath her chin with a blue ribbon. Her hair was tied back, and Ferguson saw that she carried a yellow rose, like the one rumoured to be in the portrait.

Adam said, “I think I shall take a walk, Bryan.” He closed the little case and turned towards the sunlight.

She said, “Then walk with me.”

Adam crossed the room, and paused as she held out the rose.

“This is for you.” Her poise seemed suddenly a lie. “Please . . . I should not be here.” He took the rose from her hand; her breathing was unsteady, as if she were fighting something, needing to speak, unable to find the words.

Adam slipped his hand gently beneath her arm.

“I will show you the house, Lowenna.” He pressed her arm to reassure her, feeling its tension. And then, “You came. It is all I care about. You are here beside me, and I shall not awake and find only a dream.”

“I could not go, to London, or anywhere else, without coming to discover how you are.” She averted her face slightly. “No, do not look at me so, I am not sure if I can . . .”

She was trembling. Afraid. Of him or herself?

He repeated, “And you
came.
”

“Joseph brought me. I told him to wait.” She looked at him directly, her eyes suddenly determined, pleading. “I had no right . . .”

“You, of all people, have every right.”

She smiled, for the first time. “Just walk with me, Adam. Show me your home. The way you offered, that day . . .”

They moved from room to room, scarcely speaking, each intensely aware of the other. And not knowing how to proceed.

She said abruptly, “I saw the portrait. I told Sir Gregory it is not
right
.” She seemed shocked by her own outspoken comment. “Who,
what
am I, to say such things?”

He smiled. “Tell me. I'll not bite.”

It was like a cloud passing away. She said, “Like that, Adam. Exactly that. The smile, as I remembered. And
will
remember it!”

He put his hand on her shoulder, touching her skin, feeling her body's resistance. Like a reminder. As if it had happened before.

He said, “I would never hurt you, Lowenna. I would kill any man who harmed you.”

She touched his face. “A man of war.” Gently, she took his arm. “Walk me to that garden. The roses . . . What are you thinking, Adam?”

He walked with her to the steps, feeling the sun on his face, on her arm. The girl who had visited him in a dream had returned.

He said, “I think that you belong here, Lowenna.”

She did not answer, and he said, “That was badly put. Given time, I would learn to express myself . . . as I feel . . . and
how
I feel. You do belong here.”

They walked on, pausing while he stooped to pat Young Matthew's dog, Bosun. Old and almost blind now, the dog allowed nobody to pass unchallenged.

Adam winced as he straightened again.

“That will teach me a lesson!”

Ferguson was standing by the door of his office, and lifted a hand as they passed.

From another doorway Grace Ferguson also watched, and felt a tear in one corner of her eye.

They made a perfect picture. Like something from the past, and yet something so new and radiant that it was beautiful to see after all the sorrow this house had known. And all the happiness, too . . .

She thought she heard the girl laugh, at something he had said, perhaps. A closeness, a new discovery.

She went back into the house and closed the door, in spite of the heat.

Would she tell him? Could she share something which had all but destroyed her, without destroying this hope of a fresh beginning?

She hurried into the cool shadows, annoyed at herself that she was weeping.

Aware only of the girl holding his arm, Adam strolled through the stable yard and towards the gates. Several people working in the yard turned to look at them; a few, who had served here longer, waved.

She said, “I want you to tell me about your life. Your ship, the men you lead.” She said it so seriously that he wanted to throw caution aside and embrace her. Like the girl in the dream.

“Then you can tell me all about
you,
Lowenna.”

She turned away, pretending to watch some ducks flying across the surface of the pond. She could not answer. And she was afraid.

Bryan Ferguson stood just outside the library door, his hand moving up and down the buttons of his coat, a habit he no longer noticed. It was rare for him to be so agitated.

“I heard a horse, Captain. I thought it was mebbee a courier.”

Sir Gregory Montagu removed his hat and gave a curt bow. “It is not uncommon for people to call upon
me
without prior arrangement. The times we live in, perhaps?”

Adam stood up from the table, the letter unfinished. Barely begun.
My dear Catherine.

It was hard to compare this straight, elegant figure with the paint-daubed one in the grubby smock. He had ridden here along that same dusty track, but looked as if he could have been arriving at Court.

“Very well, Bryan. Thank you.” He glanced at the open door, the windows beyond. For a moment more he had imagined that she had come, too. Was it only yesterday, their walk in that same garden, while he had told her about
Unrivalled,
and some of the people who had made her the ship she had become? For those precious moments, so close, and yet quite apart.

Montagu gestured towards one of the paintings. “That must be some of Ladbroke's work. Ships all out of proportion. Wouldn't know a block from a beakhead!”

Adam was suddenly alert, on the defensive. Montagu had not come here to pass the time of day about a painter who had died years ago.

“I thought you might be in London, Sir Gregory.”

“Did you? Indeed.” He plucked at the short cavalier's beard, his eyes everywhere. It was the first time Adam had seen him uncertain, perhaps unsure how to continue.

“You saw Lowenna, here in this house?”

Adam tensed. It would be easy to lose his temper. Maybe Montagu wanted just that.

“She was concerned about my injury. She would not stay for long.” He could see that his words were having no effect. “I made certain that she was properly escorted.”

Montagu nodded abruptly. “So I heard. As it should be. One can never be too careful these days.”

He walked to a bookcase, his riding boots squeaking on the waxed floorboards.

“Lowenna is very dear to me, otherwise I should not be here. She is my ward, but that cannot last forever. Nothing does. She is a lovely woman, but in some ways . . .”

Adam said quietly, “Then you must know, Sir Gregory, that I care for her greatly.” He raised his hand. “Hear me. I was unprepared for it, but now I can think of little else, only her future happiness.”

Montagu sat down heavily and gave him the same unwavering stare as some subject for his canvas.

He said, “I knew her father for some years. I had occasion to work with him at Winchester. A scholar, and a fair man. But not of our world, yours or mine. He cared and trusted too much. His wife died in Winchester—a fever of some sorts. It was a foul winter that year—many went the same way. Lowenna tried to take her mother's place, and I did my best to help when I could. I felt I owed it to her father. As I said, a fair man, but weak. Unable to find his way after her death.”

“I felt there was something.”

Montagu seemed not to have heard him. “They had a house outside Winchester, near the woods, pleasant enough, I suppose, but remote.” He leaned forward, his eyes very steady, sharing something which he must carry like a sacred trust. “Some men came, asking for food, shelter maybe. Anyone else would have sent them packing. But as I said, he was not of our world.”

Adam felt himself gripping his leg, chilled, held in suspension, as if watching the gun ports of an enemy opening.

“They wanted money. Afterwards, we heard they were deserters from the army, common enough in those times. He had none, in any case, but they would not believe him.”

He was on his feet again. “I am only telling you this because I trust you. If I thought or discovered to the contrary, I would use everything at my disposal to destroy you.”

He had not raised his voice, and yet it was as if he had shouted it aloud.

“It was some time before it was discovered. A visitor from the college where he was employed, I believe. For four days that girl was held captive, at their mercy. I can see from your face that you can form your own assessment, and I shall leave it there. It broke her in mind and body, and she would have died, I know that now. She is a brave, intelligent person, and I have seen what she has given to force that horror behind her.”

Adam said, “With your help. Yours alone.”

“Perhaps I need her as much as I think she needed me.”

“Thank you for telling me, Sir Gregory.”

Montagu regarded him impassively. “Has it changed things?”

“How could it?”

“She may never be able to tell you herself. Who can be that certain of anyone?”

Adam said, after a silence, “Did they catch them?”

“Eventually. They were hanged as felons, not as soldiers. Even at the scaffold they tried to soil her name. Some of it found a receptive ear.
No smoke without fire,
isn't that what the Bard said?” He moved one foot sharply. “I would have burned those scum alive for what they did!”

Adam heard someone leading a horse from the yard. Montagu had timed his visit to the minute.

“The subject of this conversation is safe with me, Sir Gregory.”

Something in his tone made Montagu cross the room and take his hand, their first contact since his arrival.

“No secret is ever safe, Captain Bolitho. Be ready. I think maybe you are the one who can save her. From those four days, and from herself.”

Adam followed him into the sunshine. There was cloud coming in now, blue-grey, from the sea. A change in the weather . . . He watched his visitor climb up into the saddle. Or an omen?

For a moment longer Montagu sat motionless, then he said, “Your portrait will be ready very soon. I was told of a few alterations I should make.” It seemed to thrust some of the earlier anxiety aside. “And I would not wish to annoy your aunt. That rascal Roxby knew a thing or two when he married her, eh?”

Adam watched the horse until it was through the gates.

He knew Ferguson was loitering nearby; it was something they shared, without truly understanding how or why.

He turned and looked at him, surprised by his own calmness.

“I shall need Young Matthew early tomorrow, Bryan.”

Ferguson nodded. No questions were needed here. He had seen it all too often. And yet this was different in some way.