Page 99 of The Pirate and the Pagan
“Rory … forgive me … I thought you had gone over to the enemy.”
He shook his head. “You still don’t understand. I didn’t take the ship because she was a Dutchman, I took her because she fired across my bow. If she’d been English, I would have taken her just the same. I am a pirate.”
Her eyes lifted to the captain still lashed to the mast. “What will you do with him?”
“Probably turn him over to Ruark along with the ship.” He grinned at her. “But not before I strip her of every last piece of booty.”
She staggered a little. “Go below and bathe and rest if you can. We have our work cut out for us up here,” he said.
She looked down at herself in dismay. “Does the smell of blood ever wash off?” she asked him quietly.
“Not really,” he said, shaking his head sadly.
That night they didn’t make love, but he clung to her in the great bed in a towering need. Their closeness brought him some small measure of sanity in an uncivilized universe. It was hours before peaceful calm descended to slow his thudding heart and racing pulse. By dawn she had given him back his powerful strength.
“I think you’ll be glad to get back on land again, won’t you?” he questioned.
She hesitated, not wanting to hurt him. “I love the sea … but perhaps we are too close to Holland in these particular waters.”
“I’ve been thinking about sailing to New Guinea for gold. Would you go with me, Cat?”
She thought of her baby and wondered how he could ask such reckless behavior of her. “I don’t know,” she said truthfully. “I would need time to consider such a thing.”
He stretched and laughed and kissed her deeply before he went abovedecks to again take over the helm of the Phantom. By late afternoon they had sighted England and Summer came up on deck. She was vastly relieved to see everything had been swabbed and scrubbed to remove all evidence of the recent carnage. The gulls and terns circled and screamed overhead as she climbed to stand beside Rory. A stiff breeze was blowing his black-and-white-streaked hair about his shoulders and he seemed lost in thought.
“Where are we?” she asked, and her words brought him back from the distant place his mind explored.
“That’s the Isle of Wight,” he answered.
“When will we arrive in London?” she asked.
His eyes sought hers. “I’m not taking you to London. When it’s dark, we’ll sail into Southampton, which is only twenty miles from Salisbury where the court has moved.”
“To hell with the court, I want to go to London,” she argued.
“London is still a pest hole. Believe me, the moment the plague starts to disappear Charles and the court will return to the city.”
“But I must see if my brother is all right. I’ve been away too long now.”
“Cat, your duty is to yourself and my son that you are carrying. My business is in Southampton and yours is in Salisbury, and you will obey me for once.” His face was stormy and she thought better of arguing with him. She also realized that his self-assurance was so great he didn’t believe the child she carried could be anyone’s but his.
It took most of the night to make port, for first, of course, he moored the Dutch merchantman in a safe haven where he could empty her of the spices, ivory, and gold she had brought from the Guinea coast of Africa.
Summer went below to write a letter. She could not bring herself to tell him to his face the decision she had made. Her thoughts had slowly sorted themselves out day by day until she had come to a final conclusion. There were more foul days at sea than fair, and though they had enjoyed a fantastic liaison, it was over.
Black Jack Flash was a superb adventurer and lover, but he was not the right stuff for husband or father. Summer and her baby would become anchors about his neck until resentment would destroy them. She faced the truth for once. She wanted Lord Ruark Helford for husband or she would do without.
In the note she bade him goodbye and told him she loved him too much to chain him. She bade him sail the seven seas and urged him to go to Guinea for the gold he so much wanted. Then she hid the note where he would not find it until they had parted.
At dawn he put Summer on the coach for Salisbury and told her he would make contact with her in a week’s time. He lingered over his goodbyes, kissing her deeply, then grinned and dropped a pouch of gold coins into her lap. “You’ll need this,” he whispered. “Gambling will be the only diversion in Salisbury.”
She waved until he was out of sight. Then she sighed deeply and resolutely opened the heavy coach door and climbed down.
“Hey, missus, get back inside, we’re ready to leave!” ordered the coachman.
She gave him a cold glance. “Are you speaking with me or chewing a brick? You’d be better occupied unloading my trunks and putting them on the coach for London.”
Summer was set down in deserted streets upon arrival in London. Its citizens had barricaded themselves against the horrible death, so that it looked like a ghost town. A disgusting smell hovered over the city like a charnel house. Vendors no longer hawked their goods in the streets. Horse-drawn drays and wagons no longer plowed a path between crowds of citizens bustling about London in pursuit of her wealth. Most of the shops were shut up tight as a drum, for who would purchase a wig when the hair likely came from a corpse? Who would buy clothes or even jewelry which had adorned a plague victim? Who wanted furniture from an infected house? Summer was unable to hire a chair to carry her to Cockspur Street, since the chair stands had all closed, so she offered an old man with a handcart a gold piece to cart her trunks through the empty streets while she walked beside him.
