“Sister!” On the upraised deck, carrying over the ruffled water, came a familiar shout. Shay?
Her nettled spirits soared. How long her younger brother had been away, all because their father believed him bored with merchanting and in need of a different venture. He stood by Captain Kendall, looking cheerful if a tad thinner than when he’d left James Towne six months before. Salt pork and ship’s biscuits did not suit him. How she’d missed his company.
He was first off the ship, running full tilt down the gangplank on unsteady sea legs through the crush of men. He finally reached her and nearly knocked her down, more from his rank smell than his embrace.
“Selah, at last!”
She held her breath as she clasped him, joy bubbling inside her. “You look none the worse for the voyage, Brother.”
“Eight dead and twelve landed sick,” he told her sorrowfully, looking about. “Where’s Father?”
“On his way.”
“And Mother? Is she well?”
“In her garden, aye.” Where else would she be in spring?
“I’m ravenous and needs be off.” With a gap-toothed grin he bolted, reminding her of Xander’s departure in the same direction a quarter of an hour before. With a last look over his shoulder he shouted, “The stories I shall tell you!”
Smile fading, she returned to her list. Which poor women had perished, and which would be taken to the infirmary? Their own charge, a faceless if not nameless lass—Cecily Ward—might be among them. Already she felt she knew these women. So rigorous were the Virginia Colony requirements, only those young, handsome, and honestly educated need apply. The youngest was but sixteen, the eldest eight and twenty. As for their Cecily...
The daughter of a deceased gentleman, knows how to spin, sew, brew, bake, make cheese and butter, general huswifery, as well as being skilled in making bone lace.
Selah returned her gaze to the women now turning away from the ship’s rail to disembark. The trials and tribulations of being shipbound was telling, their expressions guarded, even grave as they faced whatever James Towne offered them. And James Towne, recently christened JamesCittie in a laughable bid to appear other than it was, boasted aplenty. Each bride would receive a parcel of land, something unheard of in England and that surely helped hasten them here. On the voyage they’d been given new clothes and white lambskin gloves. For those who craved sweets, prunes were purchased. All funded by English investors.
On this side of the Atlantic, Selah and her father were to oversee disbursing other promised goods now shelved in the James Towne store. Petticoats, aprons, two pairs of shoes, six pairs of sheets, and white caps, or coifs, that married women wore as a mark of distinction.
But first, the brides themselves.
Rose-n-Vale was part two-storied frame timber house, part Flemish bond brick, an odd melding of the old and the new, the rustic and genteel, but it was his and it was home. Several miles upriver from James Towne, Xander’s “castle in the air,” as Rose-n-Vale was called, was a haven for no other reason than it was away from the petty politics and ongoing squabbles of Virginia’s largest settlement.
Surrounded by tobacco fields in various stages of cultivation, the sprawling, hard-won estate was a testament to how he spent his time. Beyond his far-flung borders his neighbor’s fields lay fallow. Xander still felt the lack of his fellow planter and friend felled by the violence of 1632. On the other side of him lay Hopewell Hundred, equally idle, but owned by Ustis Hopewell, the cape merchant, another trusted friend. ’Twas rumored some of it was Selah Hopewell’s dowry. But till she tamed her tongue and her temper, he doubted any man would claim it, or her.
Xander entered through the riverfront door and removed his hat. He sent it sailing toward a table near the stairwell, where it landed with a soft thud, nearly toppling the vase of flowers his housekeeping aunt had placed there. With a wince, he righted the skewed arrangement before entering his study, easily the most used room in the house.
“Alexander?” A feminine voice carried from a side door.
“Aunt, are you well?” She’d had a headache when he’d left for James Towne. The Virginia climate did not suit her Scottish sensibilities.
“Fully restored, Nephew.” She smiled, drying her hands on her apron. A touch of flour whitened her wrinkled cheek. “I’ve just finished the sennight’s bread baking. But I’m hungrier for news of the tobacco brides.”
Starved for feminine company, likely. He rounded his desk, eyeing the tardy ledgers and mounting correspondence. “TheSeaflowerwas almost in when I left town.”
Her eyes rounded. “You did not stay to see all the maids land?”
“Nay.” Clearly this was a trespass of the highest order. “If I’d known you were interested, I would have delayed my leaving. I spoke first with Mistress Hopewell—”
“Selah?”
“Aye. She told me the women were to be put up in married households, and then the courting would commence.” He cast about for more details, the disappointment in his aunt’s expression making him dig deeper when he’d all but forgotten the matter. “There were a good many eager fellows on hand to greet these would-be brides.”
“But not you, sadly.”
“My mind is more on plantation matters.”
“Understandably, after so long a winter. Will we be dining alone again this evening?”
Again.The simple question sagged with dismay. Alone. Adrift. With no bridal prospects in sight. “Aye, but tomorrow we’re invited to the Hopewells’, in fact.” He turned toward the mantel, where his pipe collection rested, a far more attractive sight than desk work. “I had business with Ustis Hopewell at the last, and he extended the invitation. How about you accompany me? Rest from your labors.”
