Page 52 of Exile's Return
‘Why? Why did he turn his coat? Why did men have to die?’ Daniel’s words were slurred, but with emotion, not drink.
That was not a question she could answer. Instead, she touched the paper he held. ‘What’s that?’
He glanced down at his hand as if seeing the paper for the first time, and with a heavy sigh slid it across the sill toward her. As she picked it up, he gave a hollow, humourless laugh. ‘It’s an official Pardon for all my sins. All this time I have been a free man, Agnes. I could have come back to England years ago — I could have just walked away from the plantation. Instead…’ He broke off. ‘He told me that he came looking for me in Barbados, to give me this. He was too late. Outhwaite had already done his worst.’
She swallowed. ‘Who is this Outhwaite?’
He looked sideways at her. ‘He was the overseer of the plantation to which they sent me with the Scottish prisoners after Worcester.’
She held her breath, hoping her silence would be invitation enough for him to confide in her.
‘I don’t know if it was because I was English or I was the son of a viscount, but my case was quite different to those of my fellow captives. I was given a cabin and allowed to walk the deck, and when we arrived in Barbados I was assigned to a sugar plantation. I could read and write and I became the clerk of the estate. The owner of the plantation treated me as he would a respected paid employee. I had a room in the house and the freedom to come and go. It was — endurable.’
He balled and unballed his hands, stretching his fingers as if trying to steady himself.
‘Despite being a prisoner, I had no complaint about my life. Pritchard’s daughter Jennet and I formed an attachment of sorts.’
A flutter of disquiet stirred in Agnes’s heart.
‘You were in love?’ she asked through tight lips.
Daniel gave her a sharp glance and shook his head. ‘She loved me,’ he said in a flat tone, ‘but my motives were not prompted by anything more than a liking for her. Pritchard dropped hints that were we to marry, my release could be secured, my future guaranteed as his son-in-law, so I agreed.’
The flutter grew to the full-scale beating of a bird’s wing and she acknowledged with a shock that what she felt were pangs of jealousy. She hadn’t realised how much this man had come to mean to her in the past few weeks.
‘You married her?’
‘No. She died of yellow fever a week before our wedding.’
Agnes bit her lip as the jealousy died away as quickly as it had arisen. The death of Jennet Pritchard had been merely a marker on the journey that had brought him here.
‘Pritchard’s grief was so great he had a seizure and became paralysed and unable to speak. Management of the plantation fell to me. Of course, if I had married Jennet it would have been quite different. But with Pritchard ill, to all intents and purposesI was still a prisoner with no right to claim management, and the overseer of the prisoners, a man called Outhwaite, did not hesitate to remind me of my station.’
At the mention of the name, every muscle in his face contracted, stretching the skin tightly across the high cheekbones. His eyes became dark smudges, filled with an unimagined pain.
Agnes reached out and put her hand over his. A secret for a secret? Could she, would she dare, confide in him as she was asking him to confide in her? Maybe…but not yet.
‘He … ?’ She swallowed. ‘Your back?’
He flexed his shoulders as if he still felt the fall of the metal-tipped scourge. ‘Among other atrocities he committed, and not just on me.’
‘Sometimes,’ she said, her fingers tightening on his. ‘It helps to speak of what troubles you.’
He pulled his hand away and gave a harsh, humourless laugh. ‘You are always ready with advice, Agnes. Outhwaite is dead. Dead these four years past but he still haunts my nightmares. I came across a newssheet that reported that he and three of his men had been hanged in Holetown for murder — my murder and another’s. When I read the news it filled me with anger that he had not died at my hands. Hanging was a merciful death.’
His mouth clamped shut, a hard, thin line, and Agnes knew that she would hear no more. Whatever had lain between Outhwaite and this man still ran too deep for the whole truth.
Wherever Outhwaite was, Agnes hoped he was rotting in Hell. She smoothed the paper against the sill of the window and lifted it, squinting as she tried to make out the words, but they were illegible in the poor light of the moon. Only the heavy scrawled signature and the seal proved its authenticity.
She looked up at Daniel. ‘Was this the price demanded of Kit for turning coat?’
He drew a sharp audible breath. ‘What do you mean?’
‘He could surely not have obtained a Pardon for you unless…’
Daniel looked down at her. ‘Are you saying that he bought my freedom with his life and his conscience?’
‘Only he can tell you that, Daniel.’
