So Worthy My Love (49 page)

“Assassinate that Tudor bitch and free Mary Stuart from prison, and yu shall have it all.”

“I shall of course need a small purse to tide me over until I can make arrangements to return to England.” Maxim smiled blandly. “You may call it a demonstration of your faith in me.”

Hilliard waddled out of the room and came back with an iron-bound chest. Maxim recognized it as a larger but very similar version of one Von Reijn owned, which the captain called his testament. Producing a key from his coat, Hilliard plied it to the lock and withdrew a small purse which he tossed to his guest. He made a waxen impression of his seal and gave it to Maxim. “This vill help identify yu should there come a need, though there are few in England who have not heard of the Marquess of Bradbury.”

“Will your man be contacting me? Or should I seek him out myself?”

“He vill contact yu shortly after yur arrival.”

Maxim stepped to the door where he paused a moment. “Should Nicholas make inquiries about our visit, I would take it much amiss if you tell him of this matter. He fancies himself an expert on Maxim Seymour. I choose to keep him uninformed.”

“He shall be told nothing.”

Maxim gave a crisp nod of farewell and took his leave, releasing a long sigh of relief as he departed the company of Karr Hilliard and his man, Gustave.

T
HE SUN SLOWLY FADED
to an indistinct glow in the western sky, silhouetting the tall spires and sharply pitched rooftops against the horizon. It seemed as if the winds paused to take breath, allowing a still, breathless dusk to descend, but soon, wafts of air stirred from the north, bringing a bitter cold that sucked away the last dregs of warmth the day had managed to instill. The sky darkened from a bloodless gray to a featureless black, then a dust-fine snow began to fall. Inside every pane of glass an intricate and ever-varied pattern of frost began to form, spreading its crystals in an intricately elaborate array. The air grew brisk, and the white bearding deepened on every surface that would hold it.

A weak gust found its way between the solid rows of buildings and became a snow eddy that danced its dervishlike, whirling step up the middle of the empty street in front of the Von Reijn house, there dissolving abruptly in a puff of white that slowly settled with the rest. The only evidence of its passing was the obliteration of tracks and paths left previously in the deepening, fluffy snow.

Elise drew away from the small window in her chamber, and the frost made haste to cover the circle
she had wiped clear. The delicate, weblike tracings that formed before her eyes entranced her for a moment, then the glass trembled as another blast of air shook it. A low murmur moaned in the rafters as a rising wind took up a playful chase across the acute angles of the roof and eaves.

Elise heaved a lengthy sigh of her own and began to pace the narrow confines of her room. Outside, the swirling gusts swept the snow into the streets, whipping the flakes into frenzied flight until a thick haze of white obscured familiar thoroughfares. Anxious worry assailed her fortitude as the wind mounted again to a relentless wail, as if a band of banshees flitted about the rooftops in fruitless searching. Nicholas's grim comments had left her feeling a deep dread of a man she had never met. Karr Hilliard apparently had the power to dispose of Maxim in whatever fashion he might deem appropriate, and, in so doing, would steal every joy from her life. She could not hope for reassurance until Maxim returned, and even then, there would be Nicholas to be dealt with. She had made the decision to approach the captain herself and tell him of their marriage, but as yet any clear opportunity had eluded her, for he too had avoided returning home.

The shutters continued to bang, while every gust of wind seemed to shake the very foundation of the house, and still Maxim did not return. She stayed close to the window, clearing peepholes in the frost as she searched the encroaching storm for any glimpse of that tall, broad-shouldered form she longed to see. The mere sight of him could set her heart leaping with joy, but alas, the moment of elation did not come.

A sudden clattering clamor rattled across the roof, followed for a space by silence, then a splintering crash came from the street below. A freshening, howling wind shook the manse with renewed vengeance and sent Elise, in carefully controlled flight, to the hall below where she found both Therese and Katarina intent on the stitches of their respective tapestries. Justin entered the room only a step behind her.

“The wind must have blown a tile from the roof,
Tante
Therese,” he remarked.

Therese carefully plied her needle to a stitch. “T'at noise scare the vits out o' poor Elise!” She paused to press a hand over her own swiftly beating heart, and then, regaining her aplomb, shook her finger at the amused Justin. “Tomorrow yu go up t'ere and make sure no more come down.”

“Ja! Ja!
I giff t'em good scolding, too.”

“Humph.” Therese raised a brow at him. “Maybe I show yu how first,
ja?”

“Nein, Bitte,”
he pleaded with a laugh, raising his hands wide in a posture of yielding. “You've instructed me well enough.”

Satisfied, Therese returned to her sewing as Justin approached Elise, who had taken up a stance near the front window and was trying to penetrate the thick veil of snow that enveloped the street.

“You needn't trouble yourself so about Nicholas, Elise. He knows this city as well as he knows his ship.”

Though Justin misread her concern, Elise managed a smile for his gentle assurance. It was not that she was unconcerned over the possible plight of the
Hansa captain, but the danger to Maxim seemed far more real and imminent. As the moments passed, the burden of her distress grew more insufferable.

Justin bent closer to a crystal pane and scraped clear a larger peephole as a vague shadow took on the appearance of a cloaked form. The man leaned into the gale-force winds as he approached the house, slipping and sliding as he fought against the powerful gusts.

“Ho, there! I believe we're about to receive a guest who has braved the elements to seek us out.” Justin caught Elise's silent query and read the restrained anxiety in her furrowed brow. A sharp pang of pity made him return to the glass. He strained to make out the figure, moving from pane to pane to get a better view, then he straightened and shrugged as he gazed down at her. “ ‘Tis only a stranger, Elise.”

She sighed and, clasping her hands together, glanced at the timepiece on the table. The hour was approaching eight, late enough for Maxim to have finished his meeting with Hilliard and returned.

“Open the door, Justin,” Therese bade, “ere the poor man freeze to death.”

The young man hastened to the entrance and swung the portal open just as the fellow was about to apply his knuckles to the wooden planks. The startled man gaped at Justin for a moment with his fist raised, then, somewhat embarrassed, he cleared his throat and assumed a more dignified stance. Pushing aside the snow-covered hood of his cloak, he made known his objective.

“M-my name is S-Sheffield Thomas, sir,” he stuttered through cold-stiffened lips. “I-I've c-come
to speak with M-Mistress Elise Radborne about a m-matter. Lord Seymour sent a message that he had a matter of great import to attend to with Hilliard. I assumed he'd meet me at my inn afterward, but he didn't come, and I thought perhaps he might've come back here.”

“Lord Seymour is not here at the moment, but Mistress Radborne is. Would you care to come in and warm yourself by the fire while I fetch her?” The man entered and Justin took his cloak and then led the guest into a small antechamber where a warming fire greeted him. “If you'll wait here, I shall tell Mistress Radborne you've come.”

Sheffield drew a large handkerchief from his blanchet as the young man left him and applied it to his red, bulbous nose. Upon hearing footsteps, he lifted his watering eyes to the doorway where a slender, feminine figure moved with grace through the haze that blurred his sight, taking on a beauty he had not recently beheld. The man hastily dabbed his kerchief to his eyes until he could focus clearly, and was amazed to find the vision incredibly real.

“Good sir.” Justin hid a smile as the fellow snapped his mouth closed. “May I make you acquainted with our guest, Mistress Radborne?”

The aging, bald-headed man managed to bend his frost-stiffened body in a brief bow. “My pleasure, mistress. My pleasure indeed!”

“You have information for me, sir?” Elise questioned softly.

Her voice, though fraught with tension, reminded Sheffield of a spot in England near his home where a wee brook tumbled melodiously over a
rocky bed deep in a small, mossy glen. Indeed, he was half a mind to think he was dreaming the moment. After all, the icy winds were so numbing, he might have passed into paradise without realizing it. “Yea, mistress. Lord Seymour asked me to speak with you about an incident which I witnessed some months ago. I understand he is not here.”

“He was detained,” Elise murmured, struggling to ignore her worries. This stranger could have news of her father, and through him she might learn information of her sire's whereabouts. It should have been a moment of hopeful anticipation for her, but she was ill-met to dismiss her concerns for Maxim so easily.

Justin closed the door and invited the man to take a chair. “Mistress Radborne has asked that I stay and witness. Be that acceptable to you, sir?”

“Certainly.” Sheffield declined the chair and edged closer to the fire as he faced the other occupants of the room. Folding his icy hands behind his back where they would catch the heat, he began to speak. “I'm an English merchant. Some time ago I brought me ship to Bremen and continued on to Nuremberg and the fairs at Leipzig to trade for merchandise from afar. Karr Hilliard bade me come to Lubeck and view his precious wares ere I returned to England. Thus I came to Lubeck a full season and a half ago to trade with the man. I had amassed a rich cargo and had such treasures that kings would have vied for the opportunity to own them. I was sure Hilliard and I would strike many a bargain, but alas, me ship burned at anchor the night after I off-loaded a few samples to show him.” He waxed
slightly morose. “I lost me captain and a full dozen seamen left to guard her. Well-armed the lot were too, but come morning, there was only the charred stubs of a mast jutting up out of the water.

The harbormaster had to haul it over and rip the hull apart with grappling hooks to clear the area, choice spot that it was.” A light syrup of derision dripped from his words. “Not a scrap of her timbers looked familiar.” He jabbed a finger into the palm of his other hand to emphasize his point. “And not a shred of all that finery has come a-bobbin' up this whole time since. ‘Twas as if the brigands stole away me ship and burned an empty hulk in her place.”

Suddenly lost in thought, Sheffield turned to stare into the fire and spread his hands to warm them for a long moment before he wheeled about again and continued as if no time had elapsed at all. “The next morn the rest of the crew was roused from a drunken stupor in a scurvy alehouse and could speak naught of the night before. Few there be who could drink them blokes under the table. Still, when I questioned the burgomaster o' Lubeck, he rattled off excuses so swiftly, he made me head swim. He claimed to have looked into the matter, but as yet no sign of me ship nor me men has come to light.” Sheffield's tale continued to captivate his audience. “I've learned to speak the jargon more ably since, and here and there I've overheard stories of English sailors chained in irons and forced to walk the plank of one o' Hilliard's ships.” He shrugged, and his eyes grew distant again. “When I try to question anyone about it, they sidle away and talk no more
of it.”

“I'm sorry to hear of your losses, Master Thomas,” Elise said kindly. “But what has this to do with my father?”

Master Thomas started to answer her, then coughed and spoke in distressed tones to Justin. “Prithee, sir. Me craw be parched and raw. Would you have a wee draught to ease the blistering of the cold?”

“Of course.” Justin nodded and moved from his place behind Elise's chair to a sideboard where he rang a small bell. A moment later a maid bustled in, bearing a wide tray which in turn bore, to the guest's dismay, a steaming pot and a triplet of cups. Justin smiled as he noted the man's disappointment and, after pouring half a cup, liberally enriched it from a flagon he took from the sideboard.

Sheffield eagerly accepted the proffered brew and, after sniffing its steaming essence, sipped long and loudly. “Ahhh,” he sighed. “The heat”—he paused pointedly—“does wonders for the throat.” He sipped again and returned the empty cup to the tray after another statement of pleasure. In slightly more fluid tones than before he continued his tale. “ ‘Twas some months ago I gots the idea to watch Hilliard's ships as they came into port or took on cargo, just by chance there would be something of me own wares I would spy. In so doing I saw a strange happening, which at first I was sure involved one of me own men.”

Elise sipped her tea and tried not to think of Maxim dealing with such a man as Karr Hilliard. Sheffield's account gave her thoughts no ease at all.

“Hilliard's great ship, the
Grau Falke,
had just arrived from the Stilliards in London,” Sheffield recounted.
“From a safe distance I watched until I saw a man bound and chained with as much weight as he could carry being escorted from the ship.”

“And the man whom you saw was an Englishman?” Elise questioned carefully.

“Aye, mistress.”

“How do you know?” Justin inquired.

“Later I was in an alehouse, and I recognized one of the guards. After buying the bloke a few ales, I asked about the man.” Sheffield chuckled as he enlivened the story. “ ‘I heard ye had a mutiny,' I says to him, and the fellow near cuts me down with his eyes. ‘ ‘Tis all abuzz and about,' I says. ‘Why, ye brought one o' them beggars back to be hanged . . . or so's I heard,' I says, not wantin' to let on ‘at I was spyin' on the ship.