“The widow of one of my ablest sailors, God rest him,” Henrireplied, anticipating his next question. “When he died he left her enough prize money to build the ordinary.”
“She will not care ye seek yer cottage instead?”
“Nay.” Henri reached into the bosom of his shirt and withdrew a coral necklace. “Give her my regards. I’ll pay her a visit in time. For now, she’ll be hard-pressed to keep up with you henhearted numbskulls.”
Cyprian laughed. “We shall drink and eat our fill and tie our hammocks to the trees tonight, then row to the mainland tomorrow?”
“I row to the mainland. You stay and careen the vessel.”
“So my role as steward ends? Ye’ll be alone tonight? Is that not lonesome?”
“Nay.”
Even as he uttered the half-truth, Henri wished it back. How could he explain the pure pleasure of profound solitude after crowded months at sea? The disorienting process of regaining one’s equilibrium as well as one’s land legs, which were better acquired alone?
They came to the cottage, tarrying outside its locked door. His gaze swept the shore, the sunburnt grasses and sand, till it came to rest on the half-finished light tower rising like a smokeless candle over the beach.
Cyprian’s mouth sagged when he saw it. Recovering himself, he gave an admiring whistle. “Ye’ll finish the light?”
“It requires a stonemason and a glass top.” Henri discarded the longing he felt when he looked at it. In memory it stood taller, needed less work. The keeper’s cottage was finished, at least, though it would remain empty till the tower was done.
Would it always remind him of Esmée?
The boxy lines of his cottage—deceptively plain outwardly—were softened in the September gloaming. He unlocked the door, and it creaked open at the push of his hand. As Henri entered, Cyprian all but gaped on the threshold. Fine furnishings. Colorful Turkish carpets. Framed maps. Dutch paintings in gilt frames.
And dust.
A mouse skittered by his booted feet. He’d need a cat. The tiger-striped feline on board theRelentlesswould do.
“Fetch Clementine for me the next time you come round, aye?”
“Shall I bring the wee hammock she sleeps in?”
“Aye.”
With a nod, Cyprian continued surveying this treasure chest of stone as Henri passed into the kitchen. His cupboards were bare of all but tinned tea and a few unopened bottles of Madeira, which was mostly for guests, as he drank little but bumboo and brackish water.
What he craved was chocolate.
As Henri poked and prodded his way about the cottage’s four rooms, Cyprian grabbed a rag and wiped a Windsor chair clean in the parlor. The hearth bore a blackened log and soured ashes from Henri’s homecoming five years before. He’d avoided York and done his business in Norfolk then. But this time he’d lay over longer. Attend to his investments and business ventures. At the very least deliver the letters from fellow seamen to kin on shore.
With a low whistle, Cyprian eyed the shelves that framed the fireplace like bookends. “So many books, sir, and I cannot make out a single word.”
“Find someone to school you.”
A ready grin. “Someone in petticoats.”
With a wry smile, Henri sat down on the dusted chair. When he said no more, Cyprian saluted him and sailed out the open door in the direction of the Flask and Sword with urgency in his rolling gait.
In the utter stillness came the familiar lapping of water against the shore and the odd chorus of cicadas in the surrounding trees. The richly appointed room tilted and spun and finally settled. Henri fought to stay awake.
He was too weary to shed his sea-tainted garments. Too weary to quench his thirst. Too weary to even shut the door on the encroaching night. His head tilted forward, his bristled jaw nearly resting on his chest. His clasped hands, never far from the pistol at his middle, relaxed. He drifted ... dreamed. In time his own snoring jarred him awake.
Or was it something else?
He blinked the sleep from his eyes. Tried to focus on a cobwebbedcorner. Someone seemed a part of the velvety shadows now filling every crevice and cubbyhole, a rebuke in her unforgettable forest-green eyes.
Esmée Shaw.
