Code of Honor (Australian Destiny Book #1) (20 page)

Luke Vinson saw her instantly and came down off the porch to greet her. He extended his hand. “Miss Connolly. Join us.”

Samantha accepted the squeeze of his hand; it was somewhat less than a full handshake. “Thank ye, but I cannae stay. Me sister’s glare be withering enough from this distance. Ye married Amena O’Casey to Byron Vickers, is that correct?”

“I did.”

“And they be yer close acquaintances.”

“Close. Yes.”

“Then ye might know where they plan to take up housekeeping. Where they’re headed for, having left here.”

“Of all the despicable tricks!” Meg leaped to her feet. “To do Mr. Sloan’s spying for him!”

“Hardly. Amena decamped owing her employer a sum of money. He is just now returning from Cairns in vain pursuit of that sum and I’m testing other waters. ’Tis a financial matter.”

“All slavery is.” The Reverend folded his arms loosely in front of him. “Financial expedience, exploitation, whatever you wish to call it. Ah, but here.” The long arms undraped. One waved toward the verandah as the other wrapped around Samantha’s shoulders. “Do join us for a spot of tea. You needn’t consider it a social obligation.” He piloted her toward the porch. “Frankly, I want to see you get out of the sun. Your nose looks burnt.”

If angry looks were hammers, Samantha would have been pounded into the ground paper-thin. Meg fumed in silence as the minister brought another chair and teacup.

He sat and poured. “Close acquaintances. Well put. Byron and Amena are recent converts; I led them to the Lord.”

Samantha frowned. “I would’ve thought Amena was born into the church. Never spoke of it, but I assumed—”

The minister paused. “I’ll rephrase. No, I’ll do better than that; I’ll explain. I knew Byron socially for over a year. He’s been a long-term employee here. We talked of spiritual things, and one conversation led to another until he committed himself to Jesus Christ. That is, he declared Jesus to be the ultimate ruler of his life. When Amena arrived, he was instantly drawn to her, and she to him. He told her about his renewed life in Jesus and shortly thereafter she, too, gave her heart to God.”

“And to Byron Vickers.”

“And to Byron.” He nodded. “When the cutters were dismissed, he wanted to stay around, but there was no work. He appealed to Cole Sloan and was rebuffed. He asked to buy Amena back and was again rebuffed. It was not their preferred choice of action, but they decided to elope. They couldn’t see any other way to be together, what with neither of them earning any money.”

“And of course yerself had nae part in all this.”

He shrugged. “I married them. That’s my job. I helped them grow in the faith as best I could with teaching sessions—classes in discipleship—and gave them a Bible. That’s also my job. So I suppose that’s some part in it.”

Samantha toyed with her teacup a moment, assembling and rearranging thoughts. They weren’t coming together well at all. “The words he spoke to me—Byron Vickers—sounded as though—”

“Ye talked to him?! Just now?” Meg stared at her.

“Aye. He fled and I found him. But he got away clean, he and his bride, if that’s yer worry.” Samantha turned her face back to the Reverend. “The words he used would’ve come from yer own mouth, Mr. Vinson. Calling—”

“Call me Luke. Please.”

“As ye wish. Calling indenture slavery. Words from a man who can see only one side of the thing.”

“We discussed it frequently after he met Amena. He knows that I feel very strongly about labor injustice in this region. But I didn’t counsel him. I didn’t suggest he take one action or another.”

“I cannae believe that.” Samantha waved a hand and very nearly bumped her teacup over. “’Tis all so very one-sided, and very much a man’s opinion. The views of a do-gooder who wants to revise the human race along lines more to his own liking. Make the whole world perfect.”

The minister should have been angry with her. Instead, he threw his head back and laughed. It was a delighted, happy laugh, too, with no derision in it. “You got all that out of some speech Byron gave? Please explain.”

“That be hard to do. I see—he said—” She stopped and started over. “He makes out indenture as an illegal sort of slavery, with Mr. Sloan taking unfair gain from poor Amena. He could see nae atall the other side of it—the good side.”

“You mean there’s a good side to exploitation?”

At last the brambles of her thoughts were clearing away. Her mouth was running off with itself again, and she didn’t care. “Mr. Vinson—”

“Luke.”

“Mr. Vinson. The auld sod’s fallen on hard times, with scant opportunity and very little luck left, for a man, and for a woman even more so. There be more girls in Ireland who’ll die an old maid than there are girls who’ll marry. And none of them facing aught but a dreary life of hard work. I saw the pattern of me life and I dreaded it, yet I had nae means to change it. Then Mr. Sloan’s notice appeared out front the butcher shop.”

“An offer of indenture.”

“Aye. He pays me way here and I return his kindness with three years’ labor.”

“You can pay back the cost of the passage in less than a year of very low wages. He’s cheating you of two years. More. He’s extracting two years’ free labor from you, and that’s slavery, illegal and immoral.”

“Mr. Vinson, ye be nae hearing me. It matters not atall to me what the moralists and the law-makers think of the practice. ’Twas not a pound-for-pound business value I signed up for. ’Twas an opportunity. He gave me opportunity to change me life, something I could never do on me own. Without him I could nae break the sorry pattern me life was taking. I owe him far more than boat passage.”

“You give away your freedom for an opportunity.”

“Nae. Put me freedom in hock a few years, perhaps, with the hope of a far better life in the future.”

The gray eyes stared at her; the pale lips broadened into a bright smile. Perhaps her argument was getting through! He turned to Meg. “There, Meg! She said it perfectly. You pawn the present as surety against a better future. That’s the Christian faith! You enslave yourself to Jesus in this life, and reap the richest of rewards in the life to come. Indenture yourself now in order to reign with Him tomorrow.”

He had missed the point completely. Samantha was talking not about the spiritual but about the practical, the everyday, from an Irish spinster girl’s point of view. Nor did she feel like arguing any more at a brick wall.

She stood up, her tea untouched. “Mr. Vinson, clearly, I’ll not change your mind. I meself be breaking nae law in black and white, and I’ve a clear conscience.” She glanced at Meg. “In all matters, I might add. I best go now. There be chores waiting.” She stared at Meg.
And there be chores waiting for you, too, sister
. “I thank ye for yer hospitality and yer ear. G’day for now.”

He was standing, too. He grasped her hand again in that same warm squeeze. “Thank you for coming by. I’m sorry I couldn’t be a better help to you.”

She nodded to him and to Meg and stepped down off the porch. Her stiff legs complained painfully. She walked out across the goat pasture and through the little church, because that was the only way she knew in or out. Her legs loosened up as she reached the road and started home.

Fluffy clouds up there were taking turns blotting out the midmorning sun. She still had no luck predicting rain, but there must surely be some sort of rules to the game. Familiar hoofbeats behind her made her turn. It was Sloan, back already. He rode Sheba with Gypsy in tow.

He swung down from his saddle, apparently not the least bit sore. “You’re just getting back?”

“Nae, returned last evening, sir. Pleasant trip up. Thank ye again for the thoughtfulness. Yerself wasted nae time.”

“With two horses I could rest one and ride the other. It became something of a challenge to see how quickly I could make it. Care to ride the rest of the way?”

“Thank ye, nae, sir.”

He grinned. “Still stiff.” He glanced at the road ahead, thought but a moment and pulled the bridle off Gypsy’s head. He gave her a swat. Her nose high, she bolted forward, surprised by the sudden freedom. At a loose-limbed canter she took off for the barn, quickly, no doubt, lest her master change his mind. Sheba nickered and waltzed in place.

He started walking and she fell in beside him comfortably, in rhythm, as if from long practice. He was the master, she the servant; if he wanted conversation it was for him to initiate. She spent the silence happily analyzing her feelings just now. She was enjoying this walk immensely. They were walking purposefully, striding the last few furlongs home. And yet this walk was akin somehow to the gentle stroll of a lass and a swain.

That kiss …

Come now, Samantha. Let’s not get sentimental and romantic.
She rebuked her wayward thoughts.

“If you got home yesterday, why are you out here now?” He didn’t say it accusingly, but there was an edge to his voice.

“I took it upon meself, sir, to speak to Mr. Vinson—”

“You don’t speak to Mr. Vinson a blooming thing! You don’t go near him. And that’s an order.”

The spell shattered. The conversation ended. He the master had spoken, and she the servant had pawned her freedom to reply. Humbly, silently, she followed him home to the messy kitchen and their dinner hanging on the clothesline.

Chapter Sixteen

Desperation

One expects trees in a forest, and of course this rain forest abounded in trees. Scores of different sorts of trees fought shoulder-to-shoulder for space and sunlight. A few of them, bold, tough fellows, managed to thrust themselves above the canopy, paying for the sunshine with the vulnerability of their unnaturally long trunks. Below the thick mat of branches and leaves grew myriad bushes, some gangly and some squat. Strangler figs and delicate vines tied top to bottom, branch to earth. And hidden in the cracks and crotches of all this, a hundred kinds of orchids bloomed.

With those millions of millions of leaves, one would think it a wonder rainwater ever reached the ground. It did. It poured from the sky into the forest, cascaded down the countless leaves and dripped off their specially pointed tips to the leaves next below. Tiny raindrops gathered thus into huge blobs of water, plopping finally into the mud or coursing in rivulets down the trunks and vines. Indeed, the ground never truly dried out.

Samantha stood under the back porch roof mindlessly watching the deluge. Irish rain fell sweetly, almost like a gentle mist at times. Not like this. Not like this at all. The only hearts gladdened by this downpour were those of the green tree frogs. Their piercing songs rang from all directions.

“The gnomes have been working overtime.” Linnet’s light voice at her shoulder made Samantha jump. The girl stepped in beside and leaned casually against a porch post.

“Gnomes? Sure’n we left them behind in Erin.”

“Eh, nae. Fat Dog’s wife says the gnomes here around swab the tree frogs’ throats. They use some medicine mysterious and sweet to keep the poor things from going hoarse.”

“Ye wouldn’t want a frog to croak, now.”

“The soul of a poet ye’ll never have, Sam.”

“Nae more than yerself’ll ever have the soul of a worker. Be the carpets swept?”

“I would nae dare stand here if they weren’t, would I?”

“Ye’d try.” She felt damp, for want of a better word, all over. The pervasive humidity seemed to creep past her clothes into the very fabric of her being. Samantha turned and walked back inside.

A thousand little chores begged for attention. Samantha felt like doing none of them. Still, she ought—

Someone pounded on the front door. Samantha covered the length of the house at a jog to answer the knock.

Mr. Butts stood under the roof absolutely drenched. He stepped into the foyer and handed her his water-logged hat. “Is Cole around?”

“I’ll go see, sir, if you’ll excuse me momentarily.” She curtseyed and hurried off down the hall.

“Tell him it’s absolutely critical,” called the half-drowned man to her back.

She rapped at the office door and entered. “Mr. Butts here, sir. Says ’tis urgent.”

He sighed heavily. “I’ll see him.”

Samantha grabbed the brocaded wingback chair and dragged it to a corner. Quickly she pushed the leather-upholstered chair—the essentially waterproof chair—to the center of the room across from the desk. She nodded curtly to the gaping Mr. Sloan and hurried back down the hall to fetch his guest.

She ushered Mr. Butts through the office door and hastened to the kitchen for tea. She steeped the Fortnum and Mason black pekoe; Mr. Sloan looked like he could use it. When she returned with the tray, Mr. Butts was perched on the edge of the leather chair like a crow on a fencepost, gesturing wildly.

“ … Even though I explained to them. They insist I must honor the note now. I’m sorry, Cole, but I need the rest of your pledge. All of it.”

“I understand, John. And I hope you understand that the money is not right here. I’ll have to send for it. Be a couple days. Maybe a week. But it will be in your hands just as soon as I can gather it in.”

“Of course. You don’t keep a sum like that in your petty cash box. Uh, might I have some sort of written promise from you; you know, just to be able to hand them something?”

“Certainly. Least I can do, since I’m keeping you waiting. Miss Connolly, a snack tray.”

“Not for me.” Mr. Butts raised a hand. “Much too agitated to eat.” He fidgeted and tugged at his necktie. “Cole, every time I think I can see the light, something else rears its ugly head. It’s so bloody frustrating. Perhaps I’m not cut out for this business, after all. And yet, I do love it.”

“They say the most gratifying relationships are those built on a love-hate basis.”

John Butts laughed nervously. “That’s it exactly!” He watched with hungry eyes as Mr. Sloan wrote across a letterhead and tucked it in an envelope.

“That should hold the wolves at bay a few more days.” Mr. Sloan passed the envelope across to the distraught businessman.

Mr. Butts bolted to his feet. “Thank you, Cole. Thank you! I knew I could depend on you! Thank you!” With a few more expressions of eager gratitude he backed out the office door. Samantha saw him out.