Ravished by the Rake (21 page)

This time he took longer, waiting as the three were lifted out of the boat and carried up the steps. None of them could walk. She saw Alistair bend over the limp form of the man as they shifted him into a cart, then he went to speak to the clerks and walked back, his face sombre.

‘It is Callum. He’s unconscious now and very cold. He must have dived in when we were overturned. They found him clinging to the upturned boat with the two women—he was holding them on. No sign of Daniel or Averil yet. The Bastables are all right, although she broke her arm or her ankle—the man isn’t sure—getting into the boat. And they found Dr Melchett clinging to an oar, alive and kicking. He’s a tough old buzzard.’

‘Oh, thank goodness for those, at least.’ She bit her lip as the donkey was led away, Alistair walking by
her side. ‘How soon will the news reach the mainland? I must write and let my family know I am safe before they read of the wreck.’

‘The Governor will have it all in hand, don’t fret,’ Alistair said as they wound up the narrowed cobbled street.

He must be exhausted, Dita thought.
He shouldn’t have to keep soothing me.
‘Of course, I should have thought of that.’ The final turn took them to the bottom of a slope so steep that even the sure-footed little donkey struggled before they came out through the gate in the castle walls and on to the wide expanse of grass and workshops that surrounded the strange little Elizabethan castle on the top of the promontory.

The man leading the donkey turned left to follow the line of the battlements, past gun platforms, to a great wide-fronted house set back against the slope and commanding a view over Hugh Town straggling between its two bays.

Footmen ran out to meet them, helped Dita down and ushered them into the warmth and the shelter of the Governor’s residence. It seemed bizarre to be walking on soft carpets, past works of art and gleaming furniture and to be surrounded by attentive servants after the cramped cabins of the
Bengal Queen
and the crude hut that had sheltered them last night.

The Governor’s secretary was on hand to greet them, to note their names and who they wanted notified of their safe deliverance. ‘We are sending a brig to Penzance every day,’ he explained. ‘Anyone who is fit to travel can go in it and we send news to the mainland as we get it.’ He snapped his fingers at a footman. ‘Take Lady Perdita
to Mrs Bastable’s room—I hope you do not object to sharing, ma’am, but I understand she is your chaperon? And Lord Iwerne to the Green Bedchamber—again, my lord, I trust you do not object to another gentleman in the same chamber? The house is large, but with so many to accommodate—’

‘What did you call me?’ Alistair demanded and the man paled.

‘You did not know? My lord, I must apologise for my tactlessness. The marquis passed away over a month ago.’

‘Alistair.’ Dita put her hand on his arm. His face was expressionless, but under her palm he was rigid. ‘Why do you not go to your room now? You will need to be quiet, a little, perhaps.’

‘Yes.’ He smiled at her, a creditable effort, given the shock he had just received. ‘Will you be all right now?’

‘Of course. Mrs Bastable and I will look after each other.’

He nodded and she watched him walk away, his shoulders braced as though to shoulder the new burdens of responsibility that were about to descend on them. Even less, now, should he think of marrying her, she thought. He needed a wife he loved to support him in his new role.

Mrs Bastable, her bandaged arm in a sling, was tearful and shaken and Dita found relief that day and the next in helping her and attempting to boost her spirits. She had the happy idea of suggesting they nurse Callum Chatterton, who was confined to bed. He was almost
silent, asleep—or pretending to sleep—for most of the time. But tucking him in, harassing the maids and bringing him possets kept the older woman’s mind a little distracted from her worries about Averil.

By the next evening the Governor called together everyone who was able and read the list of those who were dead and those who were missing.

‘Every beach has been walked and every rock that remains above high water inspected,’ the Governor said, his voice sombre. ‘We must give up hope now for those who have not been found.’

Dita sat quite still, the tears streaming down her face. They had not found Averil, but they had recovered Daniel’s body just two hours before.

‘I’ll go and tell Callum,’ Alistair said. He put out his hand as though to squeeze her shoulder, then dropped it without touching her and went to break the news. He had not touched her since she had mounted the donkey, she realised.

‘There will be a service tomorrow in memory of those who have been lost,’ the Governor continued.

‘I will attend that,’ Dita whispered to Mrs Bastable, who was mopping her eyes, her hand tight in that of her husband. ‘And then, dear ma’am, we will take the ship to the mainland the day after, unless Mr Chatterton needs us.’

Callum, pale, limping, frozen, it seemed to Dita, in shock at the loss of his twin, still managed to attend the service at the church overlooking Old Town Bay. ‘I’ll take him home tomorrow,’ he told Dita as she walked
back with him, her arm through his, trying to lend him as much warmth and comfort as she could. ‘Lyndon—Iwerne, I should say—has been like a brother, you know. No fuss, no prosing on, just good practical stuff, like finding a decent coffin and—I’m sorry, I shouldn’t speak of such things to you.’

‘Not at all,’ Dita murmured, looking out over the sea and wondering where Averil was now. She had written to her friend’s family in India and to her betrothed, but even now, it still seemed impossible that she would not hear her voice again. ‘We cannot pretend it has not happened, and we need to speak of those we have lost. Daniel was betrothed, was he not?’

‘Yes.’ Callum sounded even grimmer. ‘And Sophia has waited a very long time for him. Now I must tell her that she has waited in vain.’

Dita had thought she would be afraid to go on a sailing vessel again, but there was too much else to think about to allow room for nerves: Mrs Bastable, frail and anxious on her husband’s arm; Callum grimly determined to behave as though he was completely fit, to get his twin’s coffin home and to comfort Daniel’s betrothed; Alistair, who would not speak to her about his father and who was going home to a life utterly changed.

And Averil. ‘I cannot believe she has gone,’ Dita said when Alistair joined her in the stern to watch the islands vanish over the horizon. ‘We were such good friends—surely I would know for sure if she was dead? It feels as though she is still
there.
Alive and there.’ She gestured towards the islands.

‘She’ll always be there for you, in your memory,’ he
said. ‘Come inside now, those borrowed clothes aren’t warm enough for you.’

He was practical and kind and firm with all of them and as distant as a dream.

When they arrived in Penzance, Alistair took rooms at a good inn and then hired maids for both Dita and Mrs Bastable. He procured a chaise and outriders and sent the older couple on their way to their daughter’s home in Dorset and found a carriage to carry Daniel’s coffin and a chaise for Callum and dispatched that sad procession on its way to Hertfordshire.

Finally, at dawn the next day, Alistair helped Dita and Martha the maid into a chaise before swinging up on to horseback to ride alongside.

‘Isn’t his lordship going to sit inside?’ Martha enquired. She stared wide-eyed at Alistair through the window. ‘He’s a marquis, isn’t he, my lady? Surely he isn’t going to ride all that way?’

‘He has been shut up on board ship for three months,’ Dita said. She, too, was watching Alistair; it was very easy to do. ‘He wants the exercise.’

And doubtless he did not want, any more than she did, to be shut up together in the jolting chaise with all those things that must not be spoken off hanging in the air between them. He should be resting, of course, but telling Alistair to rest was like telling a river to stop flowing.

She let her fingers stray to the pearls and found some comfort in running the smooth globes between her fingers. She wore them outside her clothes now; he knew
she had them, after all.
The only thing of his I possess, she thought. If things had been different I might have a child of his. An eight-year-old child to love.

‘Those are lovely pearls, my lady,’ Martha remarked. She was proving talkative, Dita thought, not sure whether to be glad of the distraction or irritated. ‘I thought you’d lost everything in the shipwreck, ma’am.’

‘I was wearing them,’ Dita said and went back to staring out of the window. Alistair had ridden ahead and there was nothing to distract her now, just the small fields, the windswept trees, the looming mass of the moorland. Home. She thought about her family. Mama, Papa and her youngest sister Evaline, who would be coming out this Season, rather late because they had to wait for Dita to come home. Then there was Patricia, two years younger and already married to Sir William Garnett. Perhaps Dita was going to be an aunt and did not know it yet.

And the boys, of course. Serious, tall George, the heir and a year older than her, and Dominic, sixteen now, and a perfect hellion when she had left. Had they changed? Were they well and happy?

She thought about them all fondly for a while, then let her memory explore Combe, the old sprawling house that had been extended by generations over the years. It snuggled into the protection of the wooded valley that surrounded it and shielded it from the winds from the coast to the north or from the moors to the south.

There were thick woods, meadows, small, tumbling streams and buzzards mewing overhead. She loved it, bone deep. Perhaps she could stay there until she could face life without Alistair.

But, no, that would be selfish. She could not keep her family from London and Evaline’s Season, and she could not bear to be apart from all of them either. She must draw what strength she could from Combe and then she would go and face London and the gossip and the snide remarks and the men who would think she was fair game.

At least if anyone tried to take liberties she was prepared now. Dita thought about Alistair’s lesson, the strength of his hands on her body, the feel of him, pressed so close to her, and sighed.

‘He’s ever so handsome, isn’t he, my lady?’ Martha, with her back to the horses, must be able to see Alistair riding behind the post chaise.

‘Martha, if you have ambitions to become a lady’s maid in a big house—
my
maid, for example—you must learn not to make personal remarks about gentlemen, or to gossip. Do you understand?’

‘Yes, ma’am.’ The girl bit her lip. ‘Might you take me, my lady? If I’m quiet enough?’

‘I’ll give you a fortnight’s trial and see how you manage my hair and clothes,’ Dita said, yielding a trifle. Martha’s references from the agency were good and at any other time the maid’s pert observations would have amused her, but she was in no mood for chitchat about Alistair now.

It had been a long day’s journey, broken only by the need to change horses and to snatch a bite to eat at two o’clock. Alistair must have been saddle-sore, but he rode on, attentive to her needs at each stop, but as impersonal
as a hired courier. His eyes promised that this silence would not last.

‘We are almost there,’ Dita said as the light began to fade. ‘Here are the gates.’

Her brothers appeared on the threshold as the party drew up, her parents and Evaline just behind them. Dita tumbled out of the chaise without waiting for the step to be let down and the family ran down to meet her, catching her up in a chaotic embrace. They had never been a family to stand on ceremony, or to hold back on displays of physical affection, and it was several minutes before she emerged, tear stained and laughing, from her father’s arms. He had forgiven her a little, it seemed.

‘Mama, Papa, here is Alistair Lyndon—Lord Iwerne, I should say. You must know that he saved my life not once, but twice—in the shipwreck and in India, from a mad dog.’

The Earl of Wycombe strode over to where Alistair stood at his horse’s head, apart from the family reunion. ‘My dear Lyndon!’ He enveloped him in a bear hug that, after a moment, Alistair returned. ‘We can never repay you for bringing us our Dita home safely.’ Her father held the younger man by the shoulders and regarded him sombrely. ‘You have been through a most terrible ordeal, and now to come home to the news of your father instead of the reunion you must have longed for so much—it is a bad business. You may rely upon me for any assistance I can give you.’

‘Thank you, sir. I appreciate your generous offer.’ He looked directly at Perdita and then, with reluctance, it seemed to her, came across and took her hands in his. ‘Home safe, Dita. Your courage will see you the
rest of the way. We will talk later.’ He bent and kissed her cheek, bowed to her mother and walked back to his horse.

‘But, Lord Iwerne,’ Lady Wycombe called, starting across the gravel towards him, ‘will you not stay tonight with us? I know it is only a matter of a few miles, but you must be so weary.’

It was one mile by the direct route: jumping the stream, scrambling up and down wooded slopes, cutting through the kitchen gardens. Dita had done it often enough as a child and she guessed that that was the way Alistair would take, not troubling to ride the six miles round by road, through the lodge gates and up the winding carriage drive to the castle.

‘Ma’am, thank you, but I should go home.’ It seemed to Dita that he hesitated on the last word, but perhaps it was her imagination. ‘And, besides, you will want to be alone with your daughter now.’

He swung up into the saddle, touched his whip to his hat and cantered off down the drive. Off into his new life, Dita thought. His English life. A new title, a new role and a new wife when I can persuade him that I am not his responsibility.

‘Oh, I am so glad to be home,’ she said, turning and hugging George. ‘Tell me absolutely everything!’

A
listair kept the tired horse to a slow canter across the Brookes’ parkland, then slowed as they entered the woods. The ride had narrowed to a narrow track now, proof of the lack of recent contact between the two estates. He wound his way through, then cut off to send the horse plunging down to the boundary brook, up the other bank. On this side, his land, the track became a path that eventually led him to the high wall of the kitchen gardens.