One
Are you a passenger traveling on theNorthern Star, by any chance, madam?”
The voice was male, British, well educated and raw with what sounded like pain and shock. It came from the shadowy entrance of a nearby alley. Amity Doncaster stopped cold.
She had been on her way back to the ship, her notes and sketches of the local island scenes tucked into her satchel.
“Yes, I’m traveling on theStar,” she said.
She made no attempt to approach the alley. She could not see the speaker concealed in the shadows, but she was quite certain that he was not a fellow passenger. She would have recognized the dark, curiously compelling voice.
“I am in rather urgent need of a favor,” he said.
She was quite certain now that the speaker was in great pain. It was as if it took every ounce of strength and will he possessed just to speak to her.
Then, again, she had met some very fine actors in her travels and not all of them had been professional thespians. Some had been very talented con artists and criminals.
Nevertheless, if the man was injured she could not turn her back on him.
She lowered her parasol and unhooked the elegant, specially made Japanese fan from the chatelaine at her waist. The tessen was designed to look like an ordinary lady’s fan, but with its pointed steel spikes and metal leaves it was, in truth, a weapon.
Gripping the tessen in the folded position, she went cautiously toward the alley entrance. She had seen enough of the world to be wary of strangers calling out from the shadows. The fact that in this case the man spoke with an upper-class British accent was no guarantee that he was not a member of the criminal class. The Caribbean had once been plagued with pirates and privateers. The Royal Navy and, more recently, the U.S. Navy had eliminated much of the threat from that quarter, but there was no permanent solution to the problem of ordinary thieves and footpads. She had found them to be as ubiquitous as rats everywhere in the world.
When she arrived at the mouth of the alley, she saw at once that she had no cause to fear the man sitting with his back braced against the brick wall. He was in desperate straits. He appeared to be in his early thirties. His night-dark hair, damp with sweat, grew from a sharp widow’s peak. He no doubt usually wore it sleeked back behind his ears, but now it hung limply, framing the planes and angles of a hard, intelligent face set in a grim, resolute mask. His light brown eyes were glazed with pain and the beginnings of shock. There was something else in those eyes, as well—a fierce, ironclad will. He was hanging on, quite literally, for dear life.
The front of his hand-tailored, white linen shirt was soaked with fresh blood. He had removed his coat, wadded it up and now clutched it tight against his side. The pressure he was exerting was not enough to stop the slow, steady stream of blood leaking from the wound.
There were bloody fingerprints on the letter he held out to her. His hand shook with the force of the effort required to make even that small gesture.
She reattached the tessen to the chatelaine and rushed toward him.
“Good heavens, sir, what happened? Were you attacked?”
“Shot. The letter. Take it.” He sucked in a sharp breath. “Please.”
She dropped the satchel and the parasol and crouched beside him. Ignoring the letter.
“Let’s have a look,” she said.
She infused her voice with the calm authority that her father had always used with his patients. George Doncaster had claimed that the notion that the doctor knew what he was about gave the patient hope and courage.
But this particular patient was not in the mood to be reassured. He had one objective in mind and he pursued it with every ounce of his fading strength.
“No,” he said through gritted teeth. His eyes burned with determination to make certain she understood what he was saying. “Too late. Name’s Stanbridge. I booked passage on theStar. Looks like I’m not going to be making the voyage to New York. Please, a favor, madam. I beg of you. Very important. Take this letter.”
He was not going to let her help him until he had made certain that she would deal with the letter.
“Very well.” She opened the satchel and dropped the letter inside.
“Promise me that you will see to it that the letter gets to my uncle in London. Cornelius Stanbridge. Ashwick Square.”
“I am on my way back to London,” she said. “I will deliver your letter. But now we must deal with your wound, sir. Please let me examine you. I have had some experience with this sort of thing.”
He fixed her with a riveting gaze. For the briefest flash of time she could have sworn that she saw something that might have been amusement in his eyes.
“I have the impression that you have had a great deal of experience in many things, madam,” he said.
“You have no idea, Mr. Stanbridge. I will take excellent care of your letter.”
