Alex sat down beside her. “Come on, lass, buck up. It’s only for a while, then you’ll be back with your family.”
“And how am I to get there by myself? What if robbers attack me?”
“You can outrun them. Or maybe just slip to the side of your horse and hide, as I taught you to do.”
She heard the laughter in his voice. Standing up, she glared down at him. “While you go running into the wilds of Florida enjoying yourself!”
Late last night they’d made camp amid a thicket of spiny plants, and as had become the way between them, they slept near each other. It was too warm to need the cloak or a fire, so there was no real need to sleep just a foot from each other, but they were too tired to make up excuses of why they shouldn’t be together. Alex put a blanket on the moist ground and started to put a second one several feet away, but after a glance at Cay, he put the other blanket next to hers. After all, it was their last night together.
They were too tired to do much talking, but this morning Alex showed her T.C.’s map and she saw how close they were. All morning they’d ridden hard, and Cay hadn’t so much as cracked a smile.
“Come now, lass, surely you have a joke in you,” Alex said as he rode beside her.
“No, not one.”
“What if I poured more oil on my hair?”
She tried to think of something funny to reply, but couldn’t.
In the early afternoon, Alex pulled off the rough road into a clearing among the fierce shrubs that threatened to overtake them, and built a fire. He knew he was wasting time, but like Cay, he was well aware of how much longer they had before they would part forever. He was going to miss her. He didn’t tell her, but he was deeply worried about what they’d find waiting for them.
Now, sitting on the log, he looked at her. “I wouldn’t do this if I didn’t have to. You know that, don’t you? If I had my way I’d . . .” He smiled. “I’d go back with you and meet your brothers.”
She sat back down on the log beside him. “If you didn’t need to hide in the jungle, you’d be a married man and you wouldn’t even have met me.”
“True,” he said. “But maybe if I can find out the truth of what has been done to me, I can visit you one day.”
“You won’t.” She sighed. “I think my entire life is ruined.”
“I’m sorry for that, lass. I never meant to make you into a fugitive, to have gunmen chasing you, or—”
“But that’s just it,” she said, standing up again. “I think I like all this. Before this happened I was a very happy person. I have a wonderful family, nice friends, and I live in a great little town. I had everything. But now—” She stretched out her arms. “Now I have nothing but the clothes on my back and—”
“And the dress in my saddlebag,” he added, “plus three diamond pins.” He was so glad to see her energetic again that he wanted to dance about with her, as he’d done in the store.
“Did you know that my mother ran a company?”
Alex had to stop himself from saying that he knew all about it, but he didn’t want to interrupt her. “What kind of company?”
“It was in Boston, before she was married, and she hired a lot of women to sell fruit. She was very successful, and when she sold the business, she made a great deal of money, which she gave to her employees. My mother did some truly wonderful things. But what have I done?”
“Driven three men insane with your indecision?” he offered.
She knew he’d meant it as a joke, but she didn’t take it as such. “That’s just it! The truth is that I’m having trouble remembering what those men look like.”
“Ugly, handsome, and in between.”
She nodded. “More or less.”
“So what are you saying, lass? Would you like to stay in Florida and wait for me to return? I don’t know how long I’ll be gone.” He wanted to give Nate plenty of time to investigate.
“Wait,” Cay said. “I’m to wait.” To her, the word sounded awful, but at the same time she thought maybe she could sketch what she saw. Her teacher, Mr. Johns, had often said it was a shame she couldn’t go out west and paint the magnificent landscapes he’d heard were there. Maybe while she waited for Alex to return, she could go to the big plantations they’d passed and paint portraits of the inhabitants.
“Maybe it won’t be so long,” Alex said, and he couldn’t keep the hope out of his voice. Maybe by the time he returned, Nate would have found out the truth. In the last few days he’d been asking himself why someone had wanted Lilith dead. Why her but not him? And, also, a couple of times, he’d asked himself if it was possible that what had been suggested at the trial could be true, that Lilith had drugged the wine and given it to Alex. But, always, he came back to the question of why.
“You’re thinking about your wife, aren’t you? You have that faraway, sad look in your eyes again.”
“You’ve come to know me well.” He put his hand on the log beside him, and Cay sat down. “I won’t stay long on the trip. What if I stay a month or so, then tell Grady that I have to leave? I’ll help him find someone else to take care of the horses, and I’ll return and escort you back to Virginia.”
Cay grimaced. “Doing that would defeat the whole purpose of your escape. No, we need to part from each other. Your plan of leaving me behind is good, it’s just that I don’t like it.”
He was pleased at her logic—and at her self-sacrifice. “I hope to prove my innocence.”
“If you don’t, you’ll be hiding all your life.”
“I know, lass,” he said softly, “but I can assure you that I’ll do whatever I can to clear your name.”
“I’m sure my father and brothers will prevent anything from happening to me. It’s you I’m concerned about. You’re a nice man and—”
“Am I now?” he said as he mounted his horse.
“Sometimes you are,” she said tightly as she put her foot in the stirrup. She was giving him a compliment, but he was, as always, laughing at her.
“Will you invite me to dinner at your big house? You and I will recall the days we slept together on our wild ride south, and it’ll make your husband insane with jealousy.”
His teasing was infectious. “Then he and I will argue, but my husband and I will reconcile lovingly and that will make you jealous.” She reined her horse away, her nose in the air.
“Ha!” Alex said as he pulled up beside her. “By that time I’ll have two women on my arms—no! three of them—and I’ll own the biggest horse farm in all of Virginia.”
“You’ll lose your shirt in gambling, and what woman is going to want a smelly old man like you?” She was glad to see him smiling, and she was especially pleased to hear him talk about women other than the wife he’d lost.
“The scent of jasmine will become all the rage in men’s clothes,” he said, sounding like a man who cared about fashion. “Even the traders will be wearing it with their buckskins.”
“They’ll attract butterflies, and that’ll start a new trend for women. Our bonnets will be covered in butterfly wings.”
“And your husband will hate them because they make him sneeze.”
“I’m going to marry someone who is so manly that he never even sneezes,” she said as she urged her horse forward.
Her good humor lasted another hour, but when she began to think about what was going to happen when they got there, Cay felt more gloomy with every step they took. She was to stay in a boardinghouse alone for a few weeks after Alex left, then she was to proceed, as he’d told her repeatedly, cautiously toward home. She couldn’t think of anything more boring, lonely—or frightening. She couldn’t help but think of a hundred things that could go wrong. Even though she’d told Alex that she was certain her family would clear her name, she still worried about the timing. What if the Charleston police realized that their prisoner had probably gone south? Many people knew of Uncle T.C.’s explorations, so surely they knew of his next trip. She knew that T.C. and Mr. Grady had been planning
the journey since the spring, so it wouldn’t take much detective work to figure out that the escaped fugitive—and his accomplice—had probably gone to Florida to meet the exploration team.
If this were true, what would Cay do if the authorities showed up in Florida after Alex left? Cay would be there alone. All by herself.
As often happened, Alex seemed to read her thoughts. “Before you leave for home, you must ask people for the news and find out if you’re still being hunted. But I feel sure that T.C. has already taken care of that.”
“How could he do that?”
“There are a lot of ways. He could have told them you were meeting someone and got caught in the chaos caused by a prison break. When your family gets to Charleston, they’ll verify that you weren’t there when I was with Lilith. In fact, you’d never met me.”
“So they’ll think it was just a coincidence that Uncle T.C. visited you in jail, and that I, his goddaughter, was with you when you escaped?”
“Maybe he could say that you were riding out to secretly meet one of the many men who asks you to marry him. I don’t know. I’m sure T.C. could come up with a hundred stories.” Alex had to take a breath to calm himself because his voice was betraying his worry. “What I do know is that they’ll have fixed it and it’ll be safe for you to return home. If I wasn’t sure of that I’d not let you go.”
“But you aren’t safe.”
“I don’t have a home anyway,” he said softly, but he managed to smile at her. “Think of the good, lass. You’ll get to see your family again, and you’ll get to see the men you love.”
“Oh. Them,” Cay said without much interest. “I’ve been thinking and I believe I should look around some more. Maybe I should look outside Edilean.”
“That’s a good idea,” Alex said. “Maybe you could even look outside Williamsburg.”
“What am I going to do without you to make fun of me?”
“You’ll find out soon,” he said cheerfully.
She gave him a sharp look. “You’re looking forward to traveling into this jungle, aren’t you?” It was beautiful around them, with palm trees, shrubs bright with blooms, and large birds such as she’d never seen before.
“I do believe I am,” Alex said. “When T.C. first told me his idea, I was in a jail cell, and I couldn’t imagine being on a boat and floating through what he said was a paradise. But now that I see this land, I think I would like to see more.”
“Who’s going to take Uncle T.C.’s place as recorder?”
“I don’t know.”
Cay’s mind began to form an idea. “Has Mr. Grady been told that Uncle T.C. won’t be going?”
“I don’t know. I assume T.C. wrote Grady a letter telling him he’d need a new recorder, so maybe Grady will arrive with one.”
“But we came too fast. If Mr. Grady was also traveling here, no letter could have reached him.”
“That’s not my concern. I’m sure he can find someone else to draw the plants and animals. How hard could it be?”
Cay nearly launched into a long explanation of what went into preparing to be an artist, but she didn’t. Instead, she was quiet as she began to think of another possibility. It was an idea much too far-fetched to be possible, but still, she liked what was in her head.
An hour later, they rode into the settlement, and Cay looked around her. The few houses were plastered over with what looked to be whitewashed mud, and the roofs were covered with dried palm fronds. Cay thought that the structures were enchanting. To the right was a long, low building that she assumed was the boardinghouse. Two adolescent girls were outside in the shade, one shucking dried corn, the other using a big mortar and pestle to pound the corn into meal. They paused in their work and looked at Alex and Cay with interest.
Alex nodded toward the house. “Let’s get you settled first.”
“No!” When he looked at her, she said, “I mean, let’s see where you’re to meet Mr. Grady. He might be waiting for you and wondering if you’re going to show up.”
“We’re here a day early, so I doubt if he’s hired someone else yet.”
“But we don’t know that, do we?”
Alex tried to repress a smile. “What’s frightening you the most, lass? The thought of being alone, or the fear of how much you’ll miss me?”
“How will I get out of bed in the morning without you pulling me up by my breeches? And how will I live without the scent of jasmine around me at night?” She’d meant her words as a joke, but they fell flat, for she really would miss those things.
Alex smiled sympathetically at her. “All right then, lass, let’s go find where I’m to meet Mr. Grady.” He reined his horse away to the left and Cay was glad to follow him. She didn’t want to be stuck inside some boardinghouse. The air was balmy and warm and fragrant, and she wanted to stay outside as long as possible.
It was easy to find the rendezvous site, as there was a wharf projecting into a calm, placid river. There were piles of wooden boxes, and two men were looking through them. One man looked to be in his forties, and was short, stout, and had neatly trimmed salt and pepper hair. The other was a boy, tall, thin, with straw-colored hair, a big nose, and freckles. He’d never be handsome, but he was appealing in a way. And he had a swagger about him that reminded her of Tally.
“Are you T.C.’s friend?” asked the older man, looking up at Alex. “The one who works magic on animals?”
“I don’t think I can live up to that,” Alex said as he got off his horse. Or that’s what he thought he said. What they heard was, “Ah dornt think Ah can bide up tae ’at,” so the two men just stared at him.
Cay dismounted and went to stand beside Alex. “What my brother meant to say is that he’s not sure he can live up to such an accolade as T.C. Connor has given him.” She put out her hand to shake. “I’m Cay. I—” As soon as she said the name, she halted. People usually thought her name was short for Kesia, a girl’s name.
Alex put his arm around her shoulders in a brotherly way. “It’s an abbreviation for Charles Albert . . .” He hesitated for a moment. “Yates.”
Cay gave him a sharp glance. She didn’t like being named for the man who’d called the sheriff on them. “And this is my brother . . .” She hesitated over his first name, but “Alex” was common enough. “Alex Yates.”
Obviously, Alex didn’t like the last name either, since he tightened his fingers on her shoulder, but she moved away from him. “All this belongs to Mr. Grady?”
“It does,” the older man said as he shook Cay’s hand. “I’m Elijah Payson, and everyone calls me Eli. And this young rascal is Tim Dawson. Where’s T.C.?”
“He fell and broke his leg,” Alex said. “He won’t be coming.” He spoke slowly as he tried to enunciate his words carefully so Eli could understand them.
“Mr. Grady won’t like that,” Eli said. “He wants us to go some places white people have never been before, and he wants it all recorded.”
“If we see plants that eat people, he’ll certainly want drawings of them,” Alex said.
Eli laughed. “I can tell you’ve heard some of T.C.’s yarns. If we do see any of those, we’ll have to throw young Tim in, so we need someone to draw a picture of him being eaten alive.”
Tim didn’t seem to like being the object of a joke. His face turned red with anger. “He’s smaller than me!” He nodded toward Cay.
“True enough,” Alex said, “but my brother isn’t going with us. He’s staying here while I’m away.” Alex turned back to Eli. “So show me what’s in the boxes.”
“Glad to,” Eli said, and the two of them walked away to start looking inside the crates.
Cay went down the pier toward the river and admired the beauty of it. When she was a child, she’d spent a lot of time sailing and rowing on the James River with her brothers. She hadn’t realized the expedition would be traveling by water, but that made sense. Over the last few days the roads had become more and more impenetrable, and what surrounded the settle
ment looked to be nothing but jungle.
“So you aren’t going with us?”
Turning, she saw the boy Tim. He was taller than she was, but younger, and he was so thin it was as though his body hadn’t caught up with his height. “No,” she said, smiling at him.
“Afraid, are you?”
“Why no, that’s not why I’m not going.”
“They have alligators. Ever hear of them?”
“Yes, I have.” She was still smiling, but his attitude was making it difficult. He was almost belligerent.
“Seen any?”
“No. If you’ll excuse me—”
He blocked her from leaving. “You gonna go cry to your big brother that I called you a scaredy cat?”
Cay drew herself up straight and stared at the boy. “I have no intention of mentioning you to my brother or to anyone else on this earth.” Her eyes let him know she didn’t consider him important enough to speak of.
“You think you won’t remember me?” he said, then in the flash of a second, he hit her hard on the shoulder.
Cay fell backward, tried to regain her balance, but couldn’t, and the next second she went into the river. She went down under the water, into the plants and rubbish people had thrown out. She saw several animal skulls as she fought her way up to the top. Alex was kneeling on the dock, his hand extended to pull her up, and she could tell that he was on the verge of jumping in after her. He was frowning deeply.
“What the bludy heel waur ye daein’?” His voice was angry and fearful. “Ah dornt hae enaw tae fash yerse abit withit ye drownin’?”
She answered him in the same dialect. “‘At worthless wee stumph gae me a stoatin skelp.”
“Did he noo?” Alex said, a smile twitching at the corners of his lips.
“He fell,” Tim said loudly. “The boy tripped over a box and went right in the water. I tried to catch him, but I couldn’t.”