Easton's Gold Page 9

  Fleet begins to bundle up his medicine bag. “While you were steering the ship, my lord,” he says with a touch of hesitation, “the captain came to me with a request.”

  “Indeed?” says Easton, now crossing the room to the panelled wall.

  “He is lovesick for Gabrielle and wishes me to fill her with the same passion.”

  Easton, now crouching, glances back. Then he pulls out his strongbox and busies himself with the key.

  “And what did you say?” Easton asks in a low voice, lifting the strongbox lid.

  “I said I must think about it,” Fleet replies.

  Easton remains bent over the box, counting out the coins for some while.

  “I think you should do what the captain asks,” Easton says quietly, his back still turned. Fleet has to cock his head and think. Did he perhaps hear it wrong?

  “You think I should help the captain?” Fleet says, taking a step forward.

  Easton stands and turns toward Fleet. He doesn’t answer straightaway but approaches and begins counting the coins into Fleet’s open palm. “We want the captain to be happy during this voyage, Mr. Fleet. Our safety depends upon it.”

  Fleet feels the increasing weight in his palm. “I thought you regarded Gabrielle highly, my lord. I know she adores you.”

  Easton sighs and looks to the carpet. Fleet drops the coins into his purse, pulls the string tight and slips the purse inside his breeches.

  “How am I not being Gabrielle’s friend in promoting the match?” Easton asks, his dark eyes suddenly mournful. “He will look after her, house her in comfort, save her from toil and an early grave.” Fleet feels himself frown. Easton is right, he thinks. Though poets and playwrights may say otherwise, this is life and these are the rules. “I may be the cause of her discomfort, Mr. Fleet,” Easton continues, “but I will not be the cause of her downfall. If she does not marry a man of substance, all her beauty, all her virtue will decay like a wind-fallen apple.”

  Fleet nods and takes a half-step backwards.

  “Is there physic that could make Gabrielle love the captain?”

  “I may have physic that will make Gabrielle love. The captain must be on hand to ensure she burns only for him.”

  Easton reaches out and holds Fleet’s shoulder. “We will arrange it so.” He turns and paces to the porthole. “I will take away the burden of his navigation, and the captain will spend his time with Gabrielle,” he continues, dreamily staring through the porthole. Then, as though remembering his presence, he turns to Fleet. “I will rely on your genius, my friend. Everything is in your hands.”

  Fleet makes his way through the narrow corridors, his shoulder still warm from Easton’s grip. Everything is in your hands. The phrase repeats over and over. Fleet knows he has fallen under the pirate’s spell once more. Years of solitude have turned him inside out; his enemy has become his friend, and he feels helpless to prevent it. Perhaps he doesn’t really want to prevent it. A traitor’s thought begins to burrow into his mind. What if I just forget who I am? What if I slip away from the battle like a ghost, shedding my armour and letting my flag fall to the mud? What if I become what I am pretending to be—Fleet of Fleet river—and nobody besides? Who is there to know any different?

  Fleet reaches his cabin and stops. The door is not fully closed, and the narrow gap shows that the space inside is already lit. This makes no sense. When he left for Easton’s cabin half an hour ago, Fleet extinguished the candles and secured the door.

  He listens for a moment; there is silence save for the soft creaking of the ship’s timbers.

  Fleet pushes the door. He sees first the bed with the mound of the skull showing beneath the bedclothes, then the far wall, glowing orange under candlelight, then the brine barrel with a candle on top, burning.

  “Mr. Fleet,” comes a whisper from behind the door.

  Fleet steps inside and turns quickly. Crouching by the three barrels at the near wall is Gabrielle, her dark eyes shining like a hunted animal. “Mr. Fleet,” she repeats, “I need to talk to you.”

  Fleet closes the door.

  “Please,” he gestures her toward the stool upon which the captain sat. She goes to it but stands until Fleet reaches the bed and sits upon it. Gabrielle now perches on the stool and leans forward.

  “Mr. Fleet,” she says urgently, “I have argued with the Marquis, and I am afraid.”

  Fleet looks at her earnestly.

  She wrings her hands and continues. “You see him every day. I thought perhaps you would know his mind better than me.”

  “Tell me what you are afraid of.”

  Gabrielle frowns deeply, then her eyes become sharp as they focus on the floor. “I am afraid that the physic you have given him, though good for his body, has changed the way he thinks.”

  “In what way?”

  “I was so glad, so glad at first when he took control, writing on his desk, dispatching orders.” The memory makes her smile, her eyes catching the candlelight. Then the sparkle dies away and furrows appear again. “But he was so gentle, so sensitive before. He used to weep for insects, and one time he…,” she makes a gesture with her arms as though holding a child and then stops, pained. “But now I see the gentleness leaving him. He schemes and doesn’t tell the truth.”

  “What in particular, Gabrielle? What made you argue?”

  “I believe he wants to sell me to the captain.”

  “Sell?”

  “In return for control of the ship perhaps. In return for taking him where he wants.”

  Fleet puts his elbows on his knees and drops his jaw into his palms. In return for control of the ship. Of course! Easton doesn’t care about her; he cares about his mission.” I will take away the burden of his navigation,” he said. He doesn’t want the captain happy as he claimed. Nor does he want to save Gabrielle from a life of drudgery and an early death. All he wants is the captain out of the way.

  “But, Gabrielle,” Fleet says dully, trying to stay awake to every possibility, “if the Marquis wanted to promote a marriage between you and the captain, would that not be a good thing for you? Is he not merely acting like any father?

  “A father would know his daughter. The Marquis does not know me if he thinks it is a suitable match. I can never marry such a man.”

  “Why?”

  Something in her words catches in his brain; there is a cursed ring to her voice he recognizes.

  “I am not like the other women he will meet.”

  “Why?”

  Fleet stares across at Gabrielle. Her dark, shining eyes tell of a thousand tears waiting to be shed. His chest tightens.

  “You would not know the place in Savoy where I grew up, Mr. Fleet.” Her voice has turned harder, and she talks as though spitting out pebbles. “We were not from there, my mother and I, but they found us out. The girls here, Philippa and Maria, they call me “gypsy” and they think it a great hurt. If only they knew.”

  Fleet has the oddest sensations; a burning heat is rising in his chest and a tingling has spread all over his skin. He feels Gabrielle is telling his own story, and the intimacy it creates between them could scarcely be greater.

  “Knew what?” he manages to gasp.

  “Philippa and Maria did not know the people from the village, Mr. Fleet. They could have given them worse words than gypsy with which to taunt me.”

  She stops and stares at the floor. A tear runs down her cheek. “The people from the village accused me of betraying their God and giving His son to the Romans.”

  “You’re a Jewess?” Fleet whispers.

  Gabrielle sniffs and wipes away a tear. “My name is not Gabrielle. I am Bathsheba.”

  She sniffs again and laughs, but there is a glint in her eye.

  “Nobody knows?”

  “I would have been turned from England if anyone had known. My race is long banished, is it not?”

  “Nobody at all knows? Not even the Marquis?”

  “No,” says Gabrielle, wiping her eyes with
her sleeve. “No one living.”

  Fleet is caught between pity and a formless anger, which bubbles like lava in his chest. Finally it is the anger that finds expression.

  “So you think you know about suffering because you are a Jew?” he says, rising from his bed and crossing the room to the barrel of brine. “You think that makes you a freak?” He opens the barrel, bends and splashes water on his face. His heart is beating hard and his voice is ominous, but he hasn’t decided how to continue. He can sense her watching him—amazed, perhaps intimidated. Am I jealous of her burden? Or is it that she expresses so easily and with tears that pain which smoulders unspoken in me?

  The cool water runs down his face. Gabrielle remains behind him, silent. Fleet’s hand reaches toward the top button of his tunic, and he thinks for a moment of unfastening it. This is, after all, a moment for revelations. But he lets his hand drop, turns and faces her.

  “You must forgive me,” he says softly. “There is not room enough in my heart to pity another.”

  Gabrielle’s damp eyes fix on his face, watching keenly for a clue as to the nature of his torment.

  “But I can tell you this. My medicine has done nothing to Easton’s mind. You knew him when he was ill and needed help. He is returning slowly, day by day, to his true nature. You must prepare yourself for more disappointments.”

  Gabrielle winces, shakes her head and tries to speak.

  “And I will tell you one thing only about myself,” Fleet continues before she can form any words. “I do know Savoy very well. I was living there last year when your master first thought of settling in London.”

  Gabrielle gasps and looks up at him.

  “What were you doing there?”

  “I helped the apothecary in a town not far from Easton’s château.”

  “No, why were you in Savoy? You are English, are you not?”

  “Not. But neither am I French. I was looking for someone.”

  Gabrielle stares at him and pushes a dark curl out of her eyes with her fingertips.

  “And, yes, I found him,” Fleet adds, looking to the floor. “And that’s all I’ll tell you. I should not have said so much.”

  Gabrielle obeys the tone in his voice and stands. She wipes away a tear with her palm and goes to the door. She opens it and looks back. “You’re more of a mystery than I thought, Mr. Fleet.” Then she disappears, closing the door behind her.

  Fleet moves over to the bed and sits, then he lifts up the blanket and plunges his hand underneath, hauling out the sack. His mother’s skull has grown heavier with Easton’s gold. As he lifts the smooth dome from its bag, the surface is almost warm enough to scald his hands. It seems wildly perverse now to have choosen this precious vessel to hide Easton’s gold. At the time it seemed part of the promise; the touch of Easton’s coins would—he hoped—whisper to his mother’s spirit of vengeance to come. But now the money seems merely to soil Fleet’s memory of her.

  Fleet tips the skull and begins shaking it. The gold coins clink together and spill piece by piece from his mother’s orbs onto the blanket. When the last coin rattles free and drops onto the bed, he lays his hands on the skull. Do not fall in love with Easton’s gold, it seems to tell him, nor allow yourself to forget about revenge. He strokes the dome and holds it to his chest for a moment. How irresolute he has been! How close to complete desertion!

  He lays the skull carefully upon his pillow and begins counting the gold pieces on the bed. He takes the purse from his breeches and spills those coins onto the blanket too. There are thirty in all. He gathers them together in his cupped hands and looks at each of the three barrels standing along the far wall. He stands and paces to the one on the left. With his hands still cupped, he lowers one finger and pulls open the half-circle hatch at the top. The strange damp odour of the snails greets him, together with a thin rising mist. He lets his cupped hands descend slowly, his fingers pushing past cool laurel and delicate shells. When his knuckles touch the lake of cold slime in the bottom, he lets the coins drop.

  __________

  PURE WILLPOWER RETURNS LIKE iron to my sinews. I have captained this ship, and at last we are reaching the end of the Channel. Henley, the imbecile, has at least had the good sense to leave the sails alone since he returned to the deck. We will clear Land’s End by morning and will continue to make good progress until the wind changes.

  I did not at first know why I ordered so many candles lit. But now, in the silence, with the golden lights bobbing with each slight movement of the cabin, I realize the reason. I need flames about me to stand in for the stars that are now hidden from view. Gabrielle worries about—what?—losing her virtue, her right to choose? None of us choose. Copernicus and Galileo were right. We are all circling some greater star. The very earth upon which we love and scheme and fight is merely an emissary of the sun. The sun is, in turn, only one flame among millions. Gabrielle must be sacrificed. I will find the African boy and give him my name, my gold, and my lands.

  It was remorse that fired me toward this journey, but day by day and hour by hour, a fresh emotion joins, just as strands of fibre converge upon a rope. I will pass everything on—my knowledge of ocean and sail, the tactics I learned in battle, my tastes in wine and music, the honeycomb treasure of my thoughts. Before I die, I will breathe my very soul into the boy.

  __________

  GABRIELLE LOSES HER WAY AGAIN. Tears have blurred her eyes and a headache has fogged her judgment. Why did I tell my secret? What vain promise for help did I hope to wring from him in return? It was a foolish and wanton thing to do. She passes under the ladder to the upper deck; she went that way before and got lost. Everything looks different in the dark. Then she comes to the crossroads again. She turns right this time, but immediately slows down. Some yards ahead there appears to be a large sack blocking the passage and leaning up against the door. She takes another step and hears what sounds like weeping, punctuated by an irregular thumping of wood. Her eyes strain to make it out. The sack shifts and a foot appears. It isn’t a sack. It is Maria, bent over and leaning against a closed cabin door. The thumping noise comes again, and this time Gabrielle sees Maria’s fist rise and fall on the cabin door.

  “Jacques!” she cries between sobs. “Please, let me in, please.”

  Gabrielle breathes in sharply and braces herself to step over the prostrate woman. As she does so, her foot tugs at Maria’s dress. Maria doesn’t notice, however, and thumps the door again.

  “Jacques!” she cries more impatiently than before.

  “I told you. Go away!” snarls Jacques from the other side.

  Gabrielle turns another corner, and this time a lantern shows the way. In a few moments, she is running up the steps that lead to her cabin’s deck. She turns and takes the three-step ladder down. The space outside her own cabin is dark; even so, Gabrielle can tell there is someone standing there. She approaches cautiously. The figure moves a couple of paces away. Gabrielle recognizes the clumsy tread; it is Philippa.

  Without a word and without looking at Philippa, Gabrielle opens her door and steps inside. She leans back against the cabin door and closes her eyes, wondering how she will survive this voyage.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  The ship is rocking harder now, and Fleet sits up and listens. Was it a knock at my door or just the crack of a beam? He pushes the skull deep under the bedclothes just in case. The noise comes a second time. Fleet slides off the bed and rises.

  “Yes,” he calls.

  The door opens and the young serving man in the blue tunic enters with a tray. He places the tray on the cabin’s only table. Then he takes a step backwards and bows.

  “Good morning, sir.”

  Fleet nods back.

  “The captain asks whether you have any special instructions regarding the lady Gabrielle’s breakfast this morning?”

  “What?” Fleet answers, bewildered.

  “The captain was under the impression, sir, that you thought some physic to be taken with food m
ight be advisable for her.”

  “Oh!” sighs Fleet, sitting down again on the bed. “You will perhaps advise the captain that I have not settled upon a course of treatment as yet.”

  “I will, sir,” the man says, again with a bow. He turns and goes to the door.

  “Just a moment, please,” Fleet says. The man stops and turns. “Is Captain Henley navigating the ship at the moment?”

  “Of course, sir.”

  “And where are we?”

  “On the open Atlantic now, sir. We cleared Land’s End early this morning.”

  “Thank you,” says Fleet.

  The young man nods once again and leaves.

  Fleet stands and goes over to the opposite wall. He lifts the latch of the barrel to the right.

  The daylight streaming in through the gaps in the ceiling is just enough for him to gauge the contents of each jar and sack he lifts. Something tingles deep in his belly at the idea of feeding an aphrodisiac to Gabrielle. He remembers the shape of her arms, both slender and full, and the shape of her full lips. He longs to start afresh, to meet her for the first time with no secrets or hidden schemes. Their intimacy, he knows, is a freak accident. They are like two creatures caught in the same trap, each alien to the other, yet joined in fate.

  He roots around and lifts up a jar of kelp then puts it aside. Everything is packed tightly together. This is his contingency barrel, and he had hoped it would not have to be used. It contains every remedy an apothecary might need but each in a small quantity. He picks up a sack and shakes it. Opening the cloth he sniffs the bitter powder of the coco plant, the physic once used by Aztecs and now spreading in England and France. He puts it back. Dried oyster powder, somewhere in the bottom, is the only ingredient he possesses from which a love philtre can be prepared. Even so, he is quite unsure of its efficacy. Physic that can induce love unbeknownst to the taker is not good medicine, and Fleet is merely toying with the idea. He knows he cannot acquiesce to the captain’s demands, yet he delights in the theoretical search. He picks up a bag that is half-open and threatening to spill. He looks at the colour—white—and sniffs, but there is no odour. He wets his forefinger with his tongue then touches the powder and tastes: sea salt.