 
The Sea Above Me, the Sky Below

Mi Ackland

Copyright 2018 Mi Ackland

Smashwords Edition

Licence Notes

Thank you for downloading this ebook. It remains the copywrite property of the author and may not be redistributed for commercial or non-commercial use.

Chapter Zero, the Prologue

The air was fresh with the scent of newly scythed grass. Zipping in pursuit of insects, a huge dragonfly hunted on the evening breeze. There was little time to rap on the ancient door before a smiling maid opened it. Inside all was bustling with preparations; a man servant hurried past carrying glasses, another bore a punch bowl. In acknowledgement of James's relationship with the only child of the house, the Mace family had arrived ahead of the festivities to take a private drink. James peaked into two rooms opening off the passageway, hoping by chance to find Kassandra supervising last minute arrangements, but only the servant with the punch was to be seen. James continued into the Tudor extension at the back and up the stairs.

"Mr Eton has put you here, Sir. Hot water is on the cupboard, and wine too." The door squeaked shut.

James took a long draught of wine and, suddenly exultant, flung open a window. The breeze lifted the ruffles of his shirt and stirred the heavier fabric of the curtains. Flowery scents rose from below. It wasn't a big garden; the area was constrained by the stream which in medieval times had been diverted to create an island. But this was a charming scene and for the first time, it occurred to James that one day it could be their home if they chose, if Kas and he chose. We are engaged. We are engaged. His mind shouted the words. And tonight the world would know it, if they hadn't guessed already.

He perched on the window ledge, contemplating his prospects as much as the view before him. Choices opened ahead... A floorboard creaking outside the door recalled his mind to present things.

"Well boy, ready?" Roderick's voice sounded as if he had sunk a few while dressing.

James grimaced and made for the water jug. "Not yet, father. I'll join you presently."

He listened till Roderick's footsteps had faded, then stripped naked, sponged himself and dressed in an evening suit of black decorated with gilt buttons. A new suit. His engagement suit. Most probably it would be his wedding suit, too...

He surveyed himself briefly in the mirror. Exuberance of spirits made his metallic grey eyes beam against the darkness of his clothes. He laughed aloud then swung out into the passage. The murmur of voices from downstairs was audible as he descended and, unmistakable to him, were the low, cultured tones of Kassandra. He paused at the door hoping to watch her while she was unaware of him, but he was not quick enough to achieve surprise.

Her eyes lit up. "Jem!"

"Couldn't prise the boy away from his mirror," said Roderick. "He's not usually so careful."

Mr Eton, flicked an imaginary speck of dust off his own outfit of powder-blue and darted an approving eye over James's long figure. "James will make my daughter a fine husband when he attains his majority."

James laid a proprietary hand upon Kassandra's shoulder. "I will certainly try."

"But how we regret your decision to join the army! One member of the family in uniform was enough." Mr Eton gestured to Paul who was standing beside his wife Clara and looking very plain, despite his fine uniform.

"Don't blame me!" laughed Paul. "James made his own decision, always does."

James glanced at Kassandra whose features betrayed the hint of a frown. "I have no intention of transforming into a career soldier. I leave that to Paul. My future lies back at Hill House, with Kas."

A door slammed and from the threshold a voice rang out. "Where's the old boy, Roger? Still upstairs prettifying himself, or in the library with his books?"

"We're in here man and there's no need to shout." James was glad of the arrival of his cousin Harry to divert attention from the sensitive subject of why he had decided to serve in the army. It had caused the one point of friction between himself and Kassandra. His real reasons he had to conceal: that he desired a year or two of freedom before shouldering the responsibilities of Hill House forever and – a secret never to be told – an increasing reluctance to chafe along in the company of his father. He needed time and space. But he also needed the guarantee that Kas would be waiting for him when he got back. And now he had that.

"James, good to see you. Mother sends her regards and regrets she can't be here. You could have knocked me over with a pincushion when I got Uncle Roderick's letter. Off to fight the Frenchies, ay? You're as wooden-headed as Paul, after all."

"Hello Harry."

"Paul, didn't see you there. Mr Eton, how do you do." Harry extended a hand which was accepted limply by his host. "Kassandra, when I see you after an absence I always wonder if you are real, or an idealized work of art."

James glanced down at Kassandra's shining crown of hair. Harry's right, he thought, with an uncomfortable shaft of insight. "She's beautiful, but I'm too complacent in my possession to really appreciate it. A little shiver accompanied the thought, as if - for the first time - it occurred to him that there might be folly in his outlook.

Musicians had been hired for the evening and installed upon an open landing. There was barely enough space on the dance floor, though the sparse furnishings had mostly been removed. If it hadn't been for the height of the hammer-beam roof, the stuffiness would have been over-powering.

Dancing was not usually high on James's list of pleasures, but after leading Kassandra out to open the proceedings, he threw himself joyfully into the fray. Dick Richardson, the vicar, forgot to be grave for once and joined in. Squire Thomas Clifford refused to sit out any dance, despite his fifty-odd summers. And Roderick was among them too, red-faced but light footed, till drink obliged him to seek a bench on the front lawn.

James watched Kassandra bobbing and twirling further along the line. She was with the squire's son, smiling absently, till James caught her eye and then the smile illuminated her face. Two more changes of partner and she would be his. The musicians played on. Her fingers reached for his. Their eyes met. Brief contact of hands. Energy crackled between them, then with a flounce of her grey dress she moved on and he found himself hand in hand with Mary Clifford, the squire's pretty daughter. The dance ended, and he saw his friend Geoff Clifford approach Kassandra. She seemed to be demurring and peering intently among the crowd. James shouldered through the dancers and reached for her hand.

"Kas."

Her answering smile caused Geoff to melt away.

"My own engagement, and the competition was never stronger. I even saw you on the dance floor with my father." James glanced towards the door, where Roderick was swaying tipsily and leering at a middle-aged dowager. "And that fellow over there, not tall but very good looking – who is he?"

A shadow passed across her face. "Anthony Castor. He is from Bristol. His uncle bought an estate near here last year."

"Castor? Aren't they something to do with the slave trade?"

"They own ships. Father doesn't care for him. He says he is rich with unholy money, but Castor is staying with my cousin and so he is here."

"Here and dancing with you."

"James, I need to talk to you." Her expression changed. "A private word on the back lawn?"

"Of course." He didn't need to be asked twice.

"Follow me at a discreet distance." With a little, secret look she began threading her way through the crowd.

James's eyes impatiently followed. He was about to head towards the door when a languid voice behind him pronounced, "Whatever has possessed you, Jem? I could not believe it when Mary told me you had opted for a soldier's life." Geoffrey Clifford, his oldest friend.

He could confide in Geoff about most things, but not this.

"I hope you don't regret it. You've the whole world to live for." Geoff's eyes ghosted momentarily after Kassandra, whose silvery-blond hair was just disappearing from sight at the door. "And your father must need you."

"Father can manage the farm, he always has." Even when he's drunk, thought James.

"The battlefield is a more dangerous place than it once was. Casualties are heavier now bayonets have replaced pikemen. Make sure you come back in one piece."

James warmed to the tone of his oldest friend and laid a hand on his shoulder. "Thank you, Geoff. Hopefully I won't blunt someone's bayonet for them. Now, if you'll excuse me."

He turned and pushed his way out as politely as he could, dodging other interceptions. From the stone-flagged passageway he passed into the Tudor wing at the back of the house, and from there to the garden.

Mr Eton's beloved library was always out of bounds to visitors, but a few candles burned in its mullioned window which overlooked the lawn. Only a pale bar of blue in the west indicated where earth met sky. Overhead a bat flitted, chasing moths which fed on the wall-flowers and honeysuckle. James breathed deeply on the scented air and sipped his wine. About him the aromatic fragrance of rue and thyme and hyssop drifted. At moments like this he wondered if his scratchy urge to up and leave home for a couple of years was no more than the whim of a spoilt fool. The Maces hadn't amounted to much since the restoration, but most men would still swap their worldly lot for his and few men could ever dream of winning a girl like Kassandra. Most men - but his thought train snapped as a figure materialized from the shadows.

"Kas! I wondered if I had missed you." He drained his glass and placed it on a stone bench.

She stepped into his arms and turned her face up. There was not enough light to pick out her features, but her pale hair caught what little there was. He drew her on tiptoes and stooped to kiss the lips which were offered him. Time ceased to mean anything to either of them, till the hooting of an owl recalled them to the world of which they were a part. Slowly they separated. He took her hand and led the way along a crunching gravel path which wound among the herbs. At a mulberry tree on the lawn he stopped; they were no longer visible from the house. Beneath the mulberry he kissed her again. She returned his kiss, tentatively this time, then gently disengaged herself when he became too insistent.

"I know what you think of me going away," he whispered forestalling the words which he knew must follow, "but we will not be apart for long. Two years, I hope. Your father won't permit us to marry till your twenty-first birthday anyway."

From behind a cloud the moon emerged, revealing the tensions in Kassandra's expression. "I won't pretend to like your plan. It's is a mistake, Jem, to tempt fate. Here we can hope for many tranquil years together. As a soldier you will face unnecessary danger. And it's not as if it will enrich you to any extent, even with your commission..."

James had heard the same arguments before and not only from Kassandra. Logically he could see that they were all true, but at heart, he wanted to go, not for long, not to pursue the conventional pleasures of a soldier, but to affect some temporary escape from his father and to gain a sense of being his own man. He did not want his entire life to be spent at Hill House, growing turnips and wheat, raising sheep, the not very well-off son of a gentleman farmer, waiting, in effect, for that gentleman to die and pass on his turnip acres. This option opened up a little time, space and - adventure. There was no getting away from it; he wanted a little adventure.

He pushed a wisp of hair behind her ear and kissed her again. It wasn't as if a delay of a year or two could change anything between them, he thought. He would not be twenty-one until the end of November and Kassandra had only turned nineteen at the start of spring. It was unimaginable that anything could come between them.

Sensing that his reasons for going did not concern herself and fundamentally confident of him, Kassandra reached up and kissed him lightly. Then she extracted something from a pocket in her dress and reached up and fastened it round his neck. A miniature of herself, and a very good one. "Knowing we were to part I had this painted in Stow," she explained. "I must let you go - for now - I see that. I pray that we neither of us regret the parting."

James gazed from the beautiful features in the miniature to the flesh and blood ones before him. "I'll never take it off. Not till I have the original before me again."

A nightingale started singing in a stand of timber on the other side of the moat and moments later a few huge raindrops fell on them. They were still under the mulberry bush listening to the bird, when the clouds truly opened and a thunderstorm splattered down, sending all the delicious scents of earth and herbage into the heavy night air.

Laughing, they ran hand in hand back to the house.

Chapter One

It was only five miles from Stow on the Wold to Chipping Campden. He could relax his tired muscles and aching injuries now and anticipate the pleasures of home before they became real and alloyed with responsibilities. It might be only two and a half years since he'd left by this same road, but it encompassed a lifetime of change. No Paul rode at his side, nor would he ever again. An attack of the flux, so devastating in its effect, so sadly commonplace among soldiers, had seen to that.

Through the murky December light James could spy the tower of St James Church in the distance. Hidden in the dip lay Aston Subedge and the ancient moated farmhouse that was Kas's home, but dead tired, and hungry, his own hearth was his goal. Reunion with Kas was something which he'd dreamt of since he'd woken from the fever which almost claimed him after Blenheim. He'd imagined that reunion with all his senses, but it would save for just one more night. It would save until he was washed and fresh and a night's rest had dulled the pain of his wounds.

Leaving Kas had been the downside of seeking adventure with the First Foot Regiment. Space from her had never been one of his needs. In time he'd grown weary of the marches, the tedium of winter camp; but service had satisfied his craving for experience of life beyond the sheep pastures and turnip fields of the Cotswolds and the brandy-breath of his father. Bavarian beer cellars and mountains were known to him now. He was content, he felt, for the ordinariness of home.

His mount became hesitant on the downhill stretch to Campden and James's attention returned to the moment. He dismounted till the slope levelled then leapt back on using a convenient tree stump. They were almost in the honey coloured streets of Campden now. He closed his eyes and drew on the sheep-scented air. Home...

In the fading light a passer-by turned abruptly with startled eyes. It looked like Mrs Drinkwater, wife of the sexton. Her mouth fell open. James smiled into his muffler and lifted a hand in greeting. He expected people to be surprised by his reappearance, but not stricken. Someone else, he couldn't be sure who it was beneath a voluminous hooded cloak, was also regarding him with every symptom of astonishment. James hadn't the energy or will to stop and talk. He pressed on up the street. It was at the turning to the church, that he reined in. On an impulse he headed up the lane. A tree did to tether his horse. "Five minutes boy, then home, a rub down and a brimming manger."

He knew where to find the memorial. On the church wall near the west window, Clara had written. James blew on his chilling fingers and went inside.

Emotion stirred as he spied the name through the sinking December light: In memory of Paul Uttley January 2nd 1679 - January 9th 1704, nephew of Roderick Mace of Hill House in this parish. He died while serving his country. And then James's heart gave a great, squeezing, lurching thump. It bumped and raced and his breathing lost its rhythm. A freshly carved postscript had been added on the plaque: Also Roderick's son James, who laid down his life at the battle of Blenheim, August 4th 1704, aged twenty-two.

He stared at the inscription and passed an unsteady hand over his eyes, replicating the gesture of the sexton's wife in the High Street. Also of James aged twenty-two. He continued to stare stupidly as if the words might change, translate into some comprehensible form, if he gazed long enough. Then he plunged up the nave, ran from the graveyard and leapt on his startled horse.

An owl was already hooting in the wood below Hill House when he rode through the gates. At the sight of his home, a pulse of reassurance steadied his shock. The ancient raised herb bed still stood crumbling in the middle of the court yard, with its woody lavender and rosemary bushes shooting out of control; the door in the wall to the orchard was still squeaking in the wind. Home: it hadn't changed.

From the shadows a stable boy emerged. James recognized him and nodded before leaping down, but the boy stumbled backwards with a gasp. James opened his lips to issue an instruction, but stopped when the front door opened and a woman emerged. It was Clara, Paul's widow, and she too shrank backwards, staggering to rest against the doorpost. Chives, the family cat, slunk out and minced forward. He, at least, suffered no doubts.

"It's me Clara."

She uttered an inarticulate gasp and peered through the dusk. "James? James?" Her voice was feeble with incredulity. "It really is you... You're not a ghost."

"Ghosts don't need horses." He dismounted with a crunch of boots on the gravel.

That settled it. She flung herself into his arms and clung there. "Oh James, James you're alive!"

Something in her attitude had always suggested deep feeling for him and he returned the embrace before gently disengaging himself. "Believe it, it's true. You were ahead of yourselves when you added that postscript on Paul's memorial."

Clara wiped a sleeve across her eyes. "Word was that you were killed. It seemed easy to believe, with Paul dying earlier in the year - good news was something which didn't come our way. But now it has!"

"I wrote on my own account as soon as I could after I recovered."

Clara struggled to find the next words. "I received no news direct, but Henry Andrews was injured in the same action and word got through from him. He said you'd been felled with a musket shot to the neck and, and - bayoneted through the chest." Her voice shook. "He saw you dead at a field hospital."

"Henry may have seen me, but I wasn't dead. I was in a fever for days and despaired of." He glanced at the wintry sky and shivered. "Let's go in." He scooped Chives up in his arms.

A single candle burnt upon a table at the bottom of the stairs; its buttery flame wobbled in the draught as they closed the door. Something in Clara's manner hinted at troubles as yet unspoken, and James laid a hand upon her shoulder. Her jade-green eyes looked up to meet his and in that instant a thought crashed into his tired mind.

"But if everyone thought I was dead then Kas must have too!"

She turned sharply away into the parlour. "That's just it James, she did." Clara's voice was pained and her eyes sought a place to hide. Her hands fumbled as she poured glasses of brandy. She struggled on, "That's why when Geoff Clifford rode over to offer his condolences they were natural partners in grief."

Apprehension. Foreboding. James could hardly force himself to speak. "Geoff? Where does he come into it?" It was natural that his friend of old would be saddened by his death. That was all.

"He rode over, daily. The servants at Honeywells said Kassandra did nothing but stare into the empty fire grate for weeks after the news broke that you were dead. He made himself her rock. That's why Mr Eton welcomed Geoff's help. That's why he favoured Geoff when the offer of marriage came. Nobody thought there was any chance of you returning." Her voice trailed away. "You were buried in all our minds."

James was scrambling for his hat and crop which he'd discarded on the bottom stair. "When are they to marry? When is it to be?"

Clara dropped her eyes and pretended to attend to some spots of wax on her cuff. "They already are married James." Her voice was so low he could hardly hear it. "Less than a month ago."

He heard the clink as a jug of water was placed outside his room. He couldn't face the servants nor anyone, not even his father who had been out at the time of his arrival, or Paul's daughter Alice. With the shock freshly searing his heart and mind he could do nothing but shrink into his room and plead exhaustion. November the thirtieth... While he had been making his plodding progress home, they had been exchanging vows. He couldn't believe it. It was a misfortune which blasted into atoms every personal certainty which he had constructed: Kas was meant for him, he was meant for her; nothing could change that. But now she was somebody else's and everything was changed. How had it gone so wrong, so quickly?

He paced to the door, to the wash-stand, to the chest, swigging brandy, tearing through his memories for a sign that Kas might ever have favoured Geoff. But he could find none. Kas had been his own special friend in childhood and she had returned aged fifteen, from an experimental term at a London girls' school, transformed by adolescence into something else. After that return there had been no future for them except a future together. Everyone had recognized it. Their fathers had welcomed it. "Bit of an odd girl, like her father. Spend too much time with their heads in books. But they're good people and she's the best-looking girl for miles around..." had been Roderick's summing up. Mr Eton had minced more delicately through his words of welcome: "I believe there are qualities in you which fit you to be my daughter's husband like no other man could... And you are a handsome fellow, James; anyone can see that you make a natural pair..."

James threw another draught of brandy down his throat and reached again for the bottle. To remember the past now was beyond bearing, but he could think of nothing else. He sank onto the bed and tried to close his eyes, but rest was impossible and no sooner had be pulled the cover over himself than he was up again and pacing round the room. If he had been shipwrecked by a giant wave he could not have felt more that his entire world had turned upside down. The sea was above him, the sky below. Sickness hurned his stomach. Disorientation spun his mind.

From his window, the tall chimney pots of the manor at Aston Subedge were just in sight, a solid darkness against the lesser darkness of the sky. Kas would be asleep or plaiting her pale hair in preparation for sleep. Geoff would be doing - whatever it was he did... James tore his neck cloth off with violent force. Of all people to steal into his shoes and take his place! His closest friend! If it had been any other man the shock and pain would not feel so great, but Geoff! Some time in the next few days he would have to ride over and face them. Banquo's ghost would have nothing on him. Better to face them on his terms, ready with words prepared than to encounter them suddenly, unexpectedly on the streets of Chipping Campden. He couldn't trust his composure to a chance meeting. A spasm of despair racked him, and he slashed the curtains shut.

He was too weary to look much into the future, but a voice whispered that the best chance of his life had come and gone early. Shivering, not only with cold but with shock, he undressed and splashed water into his ewer. Then, for the first time since she'd fastened it round his neck, on the lawn which ran down to the moat and where a bat had flitted, he removed the miniature, placed it carefully at the back of a draw, and turned the key.

Brandy-soaked exhaustion finally drained James into sleep when the first reluctant promise of light smudged the horizon. But it was not a peaceful or prolonged sleep. Nightmares of a wedding where he found another man standing in his place at the altar disturbed his rest and visions of Kas dressed for their wedding in a shroud started him into wakefulness. His eyes were heavy, and his head ached when he blinked upon the first day of his changed world: yesterday he had thought to be Kas's husband in the New Year; today he knew that would never be. Outside his window, low cloud swirled. Getting out of bed seemed a worthless effort, but to lie there with his thoughts for company left him prey to every regret.

Roderick was seated at the table when James trudged down, and his mauve-blue eyes glistened into heightened beauty at the sight of his son. He stepped forward and laid a hand on both James's shoulders. They were almost on a level. It was as close as they would ever come to an embrace.

James heart gave a little tug of emotion which took him by surprise. "Father..."

The two men regarded each other.

"I never quite believed it when Andrews told us you were gone, boy. Never felt it in my bones. And now we've the greatest gift ever... Welcome home."

His father's voice was thinner than he remembered and there was a look about him which did not suggest improved health. For all the disgust Roderick occasionally aroused in him, James felt a glow of warmth, a relief almost, to encounter him again in this world. For all his faults, Roderick mattered. He hadn't particularly known it as an intolerant twenty-year-old; already failure and suffering and experience had made his values truer.

"It's good to be back, father." It was hard to speak the words which tumbled within him and to discharge the emotion he sat down and cut a slice of bread, a mundane, steadying act.

"I was over at the vicarage with Dick Richardson yesterday. You'd gone to bed when I came back, and Clara broke the news." His voice shook. "I let you sleep. Thought you'd need the rest."

"...I did."

Roderick coughed uncomfortably. "You'll have to tell us about your experiences. When you're ready, that is."

James's life as a soldier already felt distant and unimportant. The news of yesterday had seen to that. "Yes, some day."

"Losing Paul - it was a blow. It leaves Alice without a father. Paul wasn't a year old when he lost both his parents." Roderick glanced at Clara who was fiddling nervously with a napkin. "Brought back memories."

"Yes, it must have." It occurred to James that he had never much considered his father as possessing a life before his own existence, that Sophie Uttley had been Roderick's sister and that Roderick might have felt a deep care for Paul on her account. More gently he continued, "He was not ill for long. The life drained from him very quickly. Do not fear that he suffered greatly, it wasn't like that. Many men died that month."

"Thank God you escaped. We are twice blessed." It was unlike Roderick to be so effusive and James noticed.

"Thank God..." So James had felt at the time, but now he wondered if he cared so much. His spirit burnt low and the effort of forging on and generating a new future did not offer shining attractions.

"You will come to life again," Roderick pronounced quietly, as if reading the blankness of his son's expression. "No disappointment lasts forever." It was his first reference to the subject, a veiled one.

This one might, thought James, but he said nothing.

"You are young and have much on your side. New directions will appear."

New directions didn't interest James. He wanted the old ones.

"But you will not see that just now, you won't even want to see it." Roderick understood his son well enough to make no closer reference to Kassandra. He perceived the conflict which swirled behind James's flinty expression.

"The farm prospers? Nothing untoward has struck since I went away?" With relief, James switched to homely matters. He had dreaded the subject of Kas being broached.

"All is well." Roderick stretched his legs painfully. "No trouble with the stock. No disasters with the weather. No fires in the hayricks." He smiled, the mauve-eyed, lazy smile of old.

"And yourself?"

"Fine fettle, boy."

James eyed him. The long thin frame looked thinner than ever, but he did not press the point. "Where is Alice? She will have grown a lot since I last saw her."

"Eating in the kitchen. We told Gwen and Dan she should take her breakfast there and give you peace on this first morning. We'll have her in when you've eaten."

"There was no need for that. She can come in now."

"I'll get her, and the servants. They've been excited to explosion point since Clara told them the news."

Facing the astonished joy of Dan and Gwen and Dizzy was a trial, but it was soon over. Alice's naïve squeals were easier to take, but they also left a disturbing echo: for the first time it occurred to James that with Paul gone responsibility for her fell partly on to him. He gave her a squeeze and put her down on to the floor. He'd returned home looking forward to new responsibility, but fate had played a sour trick on him. There was going to be new responsibility, but not the kind he'd dreamed off.

James dreaded the inevitable attention that his ill-timed reappearance would cause among his neighbours. In a country district where drama rarely amounted to more than someone's prize ram escaping, every tongue for miles around, he guessed, would be chattering once this news spread. And his bizarre downfall was unlikely to only be a five-minute wonder.

"It's a relief to have you home," declared Clara when Dan had carried the last of the plates away. "The responsibility of the farm has weighed heavily, hasn't it?" She looked across the table to Roderick who smiled.

"Not a responsibility which we couldn't carry. Will do so again, if the need arises."

Clara's pretty mouth pursed at Roderick's bluff response.

James took a swig of ale. "I thank you Clara for the extra effort you have made. You are a tailor's daughter, not a farmer's. I realize that."

Roderick gestured to James with his own tankard. "That arm looks stiff as a hay fork."

"But not half so useful. Luckily, it's the left one. In London I delayed my return by a day or two to see a famous physician. Dr French advised that I should regain most of the use, eventually." He shrugged. "The bayonet which cracked the bone was aimed for my heart, so I'll settle for a bad arm, recovery or no."

Clara raised an eyebrow and James got up. "Time to see how the farm has been getting along. Will you come with me, Father?"

"Oh, best if you arrive at your own conclusions. I'm tired. Didn't sleep a wink last night with the excitement of having you back. Spent half the night pinching myself to see I wasn't dreaming." And he looked as if he hadn't slept. "A miracle, boy, better than a miracle." Roderick rose unsteadily from his chair. "I'll be going over the books when you're done."

It was another change, James thought. The books could have gone hang two or three years earlier and Roderick would have been all for an excuse to leap into the saddle. He was slowing down. That was clear.

James occupied the rest of that morning riding round their land and visiting his strips of farm which were not enclosed. His father's assurances were all well and good, but it made sense to see it with his own eyes. And at least it occupied time. During the many tedious hours in camp, he had dreamt of this reclaiming of all that was his, or all which would one day be his, but now it felt less than meaningless. Kas wasn't joining him at Hill House. If the door fell off the barn, who cared? If that rotten plank in the hayloft wasn't fixed, what did it matter? If the pond at the back silted up, so what? But he viewed it all and endured the greetings of the labourers, most of whom had worked with him in cheerier times and were pleased by his return. Jethro Jinx was foremost among these. Jethro was a tall young man, almost as tall as James himself and broader and heftier by far. James remembered him as steady and unusually temperate - precious qualities in the workforce.

Jethro's ink-blue eyes lit up when James rode by. "Sir, I never believed much in Bible stuff, though I sit in church most Sundays, but when Dizzy told me yesterday you were home - well I started to believe miracles are real!"

"Talk of miracles is on everyone's lips today, Jethro, even my father's, and I do not believe he was ever very God fearing."

Both men laughed, but there was restraint in their humour. Jethro understood as well as the next man what James was going through behind his smile. He knew it better than most.

"Clara tells me you're to marry Dizzy and you'll both be staying on with us."

"S'right, Sir. Course if Dizzy gets to have a babe then it might be just me in harness, for a while anyway." He grinned. "But we'll take that fence when it comes."

"Has father talked about a cottage - but of course he will."

"All's arranged, Mr James."

All's arranged. James wished the same were true of his own life. Jethro was the servant and he the master, but, just for a second, he felt envious. He squeezed his horse's ribs and shook the reins. "I wish you both the best Jethro." And he nodded and moved on.

James continued his ride beyond the limits of Roderick's land, just to occupy his time and avoid inaction. It was time to start thinking of returning home for some food when he reined in and viewed the landscape. A plume of smoke curled among trees in the distance. From his close knowledge of the area he guessed it to be coming from Honeywells. Mr Eton was reclusive and seldom crossed the moat to leave his home, but news of James's resurrection from the dead would have reached the Eton household. It would take more than a moat to block sensational news like that. Word of his return would have burst upon other households too... James turned in the saddle and glared at an array of taller chimney pots: the Manor. Suddenly incandescent anger ignited in him and he spun Gus round and galloped home.

Baking bread, a favourite scent in former times, met his nostrils when he shoved through the door and began to haul off his boots.

Clara appeared from the kitchen with flowery hands. When she saw his demeanour her cheerful expression fell. "Were things not as you hoped?" Her voice was anxious, so anxious that it cut through his self-absorption.

"The farm looks well enough, what I've seen of it. Don't worry, Clara." An effort to be business-like, shake off his emotional cloud. He dropped his voice, "I think the old man must have been ailing a while."

"Slowing down, may be."

"For all father's become - intemperate - he's always looked to his property." He glanced to the parlour door which was shut. "There are hedges which need work, ditches which are silted up, tiles to be secured, trees that need pruning. Not like him to let the farm slide."

"I'm sorry not to have attended to more."

"I didn't expect to find you personally up the ladder. Father's had a lifetime to learn his craft. He knows what's to be done." They passed into the parlour. From here Roderick could be seen on the other side of the yard feeding apples to the horses with Alice. No need for hushed voices.

"I forgot, there are a few letters waiting in the study. Roderick remembered them after you rode off. He hadn't the heart to do anything with them when you - died. I think one of them must be from your uncle."

"Yes?" James's voice was flat, without interest.

"It arrived shortly after we lost Paul, so the news must be very stale. Anthony Castor brought it by hand. He was in Jamaica on business."

"Anthony Castor?"

"You know, that man from Bristol. He was at your engagement."

Mention of the engagement felt like a needle shoved in his flesh. "Was he? Oh, yes. I think I remember. Let's find out what stale news he has brought." James passed into the small 'study' which was in the newer wing of the house. It occupied a cold, north-eastern corner and was unwelcoming. A small portrait of James's mother, painted when she was still unmarried, hung from the wall. James glanced at her fine but cold features. What could her brother wish to say to him?

James broke the seal and unfolded thick paper. It was headed Wiseman's, Jamaica. My dear James, the letter began, although I have never seen you, your mother wrote of you when you were very young, and now that I have more years behind me than ahead, you come often to my mind. Well, you're never in mine, Uncle, reflected James. His eyes returned to the paper. My plantation here prospers and I am become moderately well-do-do. But I am fifty-three years old, an age when a man starts to think of his legacy. James began to sense how his uncle's thoughts might be running. The letter continued another circumstantial paragraph or two before it came to its real point. James, if it pleased you to join me here and take over some of the burden of the estate, you would be claiming your right as my kin. There is a fine house, not vast but...

The letter had plenty more to say, and James read it all through twice with growing interest, to ensure he'd misunderstood nothing. He stepped to the window which faced east across the winter vegetable plot towards Meon Hill beyond. Today the view looked intolerably dank and miserable, as miserable as his spirits. His eyes wandered over the letter again and he moved back to the smaller window, with its limited but reassuring view into the farmyard. Dan was at the pump filling a bucket.

A dry cough from the doorway refocussed his thoughts. "What news did he have, James?"

It was not in James's mind to uproot and bolt to Jamaica to escape his demons, so there was no reason to conceal Vallender's proposal from Clara, but he knew that the mere mention of moving on would trouble her. He made a show of folding the letter and replacing it in the draw. And all the while tension tweaked Clara's features.

"You know that my uncle owns a sugar plantation, of course."

"Yes. He left Stow and tried his luck in the Caribbean before you were born. Roderick mentions him occasionally. He did not like his brother-in-law much."

"Well, Vallender is in his fifties and finding the running of the place harder. He would like a younger man to come and begin to learn the business. I am a farmer and he believes the transition would not be difficult."

Clara's heart began to pump harder, hard enough to have made the rhythm visible through her dress, if James had been detached enough to observe it. But too many thoughts were whirling in his mind for him to observe anything at all. "In short, I have an open invitation."

Clara pulled up the other chair and looked intently at James. "And the property which is already your responsibility, this one – who will look after that? Your father who is not much younger than Vallender, and slowing down by your own observation? Me perhaps, a woman, and not born to farming?" There was a crack in her voice.

"I'm only telling you what my uncle wrote. I didn't say the idea attracts me; the death rate, I'm told, is high in the Caribbean even among the planters. Also, I am not pleased by stories which I've read about plantations. I know little about slavery, but it can only be an immoral system: on the continent of Africa native tribes routinely make slaves of each other in conflicts and war, and merchants send ships to buy them up at slave markets. Anthony Castor must be one such who has accrued a fortune by shameless exploitation. Vallender talks of the virtues of using indentured labour, but reading between the lines most of the workers must be slaves."

Clara examined the look in James's eye. Something there made the corners of her mouth turn down. Her voice was uneven when she spoke. "Now Kassandra is married to Geoff you wonder if Jamaica would be an escape from yourself. Well, you left this home once to escape something." She eyeballed him. "And it cost you a terrible price. What price might Jamaica cost, eh James? What price this time?" She threw him a last burning look then swung out of the room.

Chapter Two

In later times, James was to wonder how he ever endured those first anguished days. Time, which he wanted to speed forward to a phase of healing, stood still. Kassandra had been so surely his. It had been so plain to everyone that he had not even had to ask for her hand. On that last Easter morning before he had joined the military, Mr Eton had simply commented to Roderick, "We'll be in this church for a better occasion in a year or two, when your boy weds my girl." And all of them had just smiled as if it were to be taken for granted. Yet it had not happened; instead she had moved on in super-fast time, after his own apparent demise. How could that have been? So his thoughts endlessly whirled and swirled, as he sawed through a pile of wood with maniacal zeal.

There was, at least, work a plenty to occupy him while he considered his future. The longer James looked about him, the more convinced he became that Roderick was not the force of old. The farm had always been shabby, but it had deteriorated beyond his expectations. Roderick, for all his easy-going ways had always kept an eye on his property. Something must have been slowing him down in the last year or two. James noted the early hour at which he retired now and the many hours which he passed in front of the fire. It wasn't idleness, an active man didn't become lazy over night; something deeper was influencing him. James was glad of the physical work and personally dealt with tasks unless they required a craftsman's skill. His efforts were limited only by the hours of daylight. Sometimes Clara came out to watch and chatter a while. And always she commented on his fanatical activity.

She was watching from the parlour, while hemming a curtain, when Joe Jones, a servant from the vicarage, rode over one sleety afternoon at the end of December. The servant carried an invitation to supper the following Sunday. It was an invitation which gladdened her, because winters at Hill House felt long and James's desolation had done nothing to brighten the cheer of the place.

"I will be five minutes with a reply," she alerted the servant.

Jones waited while Clara skipped off to find Roderick and to interrupt James's toil. Roderick's eyes sparkled at once, but it was plain that James was in no mood for social occasions, when she announced the invitation to him.

"You two go and enjoy the evening. I am needed here."

"To saw wood?"

"Well, that - and other things."

"Would it not do you good James, to resume life as it used to be? You like Dick Richardson. His sermons are always short, you used to say."

James laughed, despite himself. "I like him, but supper, no. And besides, was not Dick very smitten with Geoff's sister? Imagine turning up and finding Mary and the whole damned crew from the Manor there."

"Dick would not do that. He would tell you if Kassandra and Geoff were invited."

James sawed through a few last tendons of wood with such ferocity that the saw suddenly sheered through and came close to raking his shin.

"Put that down for a moment," exclaimed Clara, "or you'll have more injuries to nurse. You can't cut yourself off from life forever! You haven't been over to the Manor, you haven't contacted Geoff and Kassandra. Now you don't even want to go to the vicarage."

"Kas and Geoff haven't contacted me." It wasn't one hundred per cent true. Kassandra had transmitted a verbal greeting via her father, but James had refused to respond.

"They must feel as awful as you do. Geoff is probably scared that you are back. Have you thought of that? He must wonder what kind of life he is going to have with her, now you are alive and in the flesh and living one mile from his front door. Make a start with normality now. Please come James. You can't spend the rest of winter hacking tree trunks."

All the spleen drained suddenly from James and he dropped the saw. "I - I don't know. Perhaps I'll come. Tell Joe I will let them know." James took up the saw again and resumed at a more tempered pace.

With a last, hopeful, backward glance, Clara went to dash off a note explaining the arrangements. Then she returned to the hemming.

It was half an hour later and she had just gone upstairs, when she was surprised by a glimpse of James's best black coat disappearing through the gates. She stopped to stare then ran into her room, which afforded a view to the east of the house. James was striding vigorously towards Aston Subedge. He was going the wrong way for Dick's vicarage, and something in the set of his shoulders told her that he had been seized by the need to confront Kassandra and Geoff.

James had ridden and walked to the Manor in many moods during his lifetime, but never one to rival this. He passed few people on this mile journey, and the few who did make to greet him, or respectfully touch a forelock, shrank away after a glimpse of his expression.

The Manor was silent when his feet crunched past the decorative pond and up to the door. A curtain moved on an upper story, but it might have been stirred by a breath of wind, not a defensive hand. James halted a moment to survey the whole front of the building, then rapped upon the door. He was prepared for a wait, but it opened almost at once and it was no servant's hand that held the latch. Geoff himself stood there. In Geoff's face, though James was too consumed with his own turmoil to perceive it, jostled a mixture of conflicting emotions: pleasure at seeing his friend alive in the world, when shortly before he had supposed him to be a rotting corpse, and trepidation of the deepest kind.

A hand was offered, but James did not take it. With exaggerated politeness Geoff stepped aside and pronounced quietly, "I thank God for your return James. Come in." He led the way to a room at the back overlooking a pond where they had often played as boys. A startled housemaid peeped at his white face then scurried away with her dusters.

Geoff's handsome features were flushed, otherwise he was his usual languid self. "We were overjoyed when Molly returned from the draper's and told us you'd been seen riding through the market square the night before. It's a miracle of the first order to have you back." He hesitated, smiled hoping for an answering smile. When none appeared he continued, "One day we supposed you dead, the next - "

"You thought wrong." James's tone was grim.

Geoffrey stared. He pushed one silky, flaxen ringlet from his eyes then turned to a sideboard and carefully poured two glasses of wine. It bought him time and composure. "That we now know." His voice was very quiet. "We have not approached you because we wanted you to come to us when you were ready. But Mr Eton will have explained all that. He passed on a verbal message."

James flinched, angry that Geoff was in Kassandra's confidence about the message.

"Won't you sit down? By chance I spotted your approach from upstairs."

"Where is Kas?" The name was spoken now, it crashed like a ton of rocks between the two men.

Geoffrey made a show of sipping his wine. "Kassandra knows you are here. She will be down. In due time she will be down."

James didn't touch his wine. "I came to see Kas."

"My wife will be down soon." Geoff's voice was quiet, equable, but he'd made his point.

It was the first time James had heard her referred to by that title and his mind balked. He made to argue but only a slight spray issued from his lips. What was there to argue about? A crack appeared in his stony expression. "I, I - " He faltered. "I need to talk to Kas. It's why I came."

Something like pity crept into Geoff's eyes. "I'm not sure what news you received from home while you were away, word must have been unreliable."

"You could say that."

"Yes, well, my father died in spring as a consequence of falling from a horse, the quietest in the stable."

"I heard, through Clara."

"It was a complete tragedy. He'd been at Honeywells to discuss parish matters with Mr Eton."

"Parish matters? Since when did Mr Eton concern himself in anything beyond his own moat?"

"That's why poor Father rode over."

"Are you sure he wasn't there to propose you for his daughter?"

"He did not! We supposed you to be alive. Nothing would have induced us to interfere with your engagement." There was an edge to Geoffrey's voice this time.

A faint roush-roush of skirts in the hall obliterated Geoff from James's consciousness. Gathering his self-control, he turned. If he had felt only ire at beholding Geoffrey, the feelings evoked by confronting his lost love were nothing like so equivocal. Resentment, frustration, disappointment and desire sharpened by the knowledge that she would never now be his, all competed. Her eyes were unbearably sad and that drained some of the bitterness festering within him.

Geoffrey coughed. "I must speak to Bradley. I will only be in the next room." With that diplomatic formula he withdrew.

James and Kas stared at each other. Low cloud, which smothered the dull December day, intensified the atmosphere within the room. Outside the world seemed remote, removed; reality was themselves and the energies crackling between them.

"Jem... I don't know what to say..."

He struggled before answering between tight lips, "You hardly thought me dead, yet you married him." His voice was under such rigid control as to be almost unrecognisable. "If anything had happened to you, I'd have taken years to get over it; you were soon partying on my grave."

Kas's crystal-grey eyes regarded him without defence. "They told me you were dead, that you'd never come home. It was definite, you'd been shot and – dispatched - Father tried to hide that detail from me, but I heard servants muttering." Her eyes looked haunted by the detail even now, though James stood safely before her. "There were no doubts, I must have no hope they said." Her voice which was usually so cool and controlled sounded raw and uneven today. "My world was knocked into ruins." She made a gesture of despair.

"I was shot, and bayoneted. They were collecting the corpses when I showed signs of life. But if anyone had told me you would marry another man when you hardly thought me cold in the burial pit, I wouldn't have believed it! I can't really believe it now. Did the lure of becoming mistress of the Manor overturn everything?'

"You know it didn't!" Trembling, she struggled to modulate her voice. "But the future split open like a chasm when they told me you were gone. Geoffrey couldn't fill the emptiness, but he offered a hope of life. The offer astonished me." She made a gesture. "I wanted something to obliterate the pain. I took the chance and I took it quick."

James scoffed. "Astonished? Why astonished? At our own engagement he never stopped insinuating himself between us."

Her flush deepened. "That's not true. It's no good blaming Geoff. I may have been off balance when I agreed to the marriage, but the decision was my own. Of course now - " Her voice broke with distress. "Now, that decision has exploded into its own punishment. When Molly came home on Wednesday and said that you had been seen riding through the market square, my first reaction was joy, joy that you were still in this world. But it was joy followed by terrible regret. Jem, if there were anything I could do to rewrite these last months..."

"Which there isn't."

She drifted to a window and stared out into the greyness. The gloom outside was reflected in her expression. "There's nothing I can say, Jem." Her voice was so low now that James barely caught the words.

Anger at this unrightable wrong erupted inside him and he stormed over and grabbed her arm to make her face him. The force exerted was a multiple of what he'd intended, and he almost swung her off her feet; only his grip kept her upright. Her muffled squeal of pain and surprise punctured his anger, leaving nothing but shame and desolation in its place. He released her, and she darted past him and out of the room without a backward glance.

Silence. The pattern of entwined birds and flowers appeared suddenly very vivid on the silk curtains. They had hung there for years, for all his life, yet James saw them as if for the first time. On the couch he sank down. A book lay beside him, it was about herbs and he knew Kassandra must have been reading it. He picked it up and turned over the pages, lightly brushing them as if they might provide contact where Kas's fingers had touched.

His footsteps were slow and heavy as he left the house.

There was no sign of Roderick or Alice when he got home, but Clara was making a show of polishing tankards. He offered no explanation of where he'd been, and only commented, "I'll be attending to the accounts for an hour or so."

"Alright."

James changed his clothes then settled in the study. For several minutes he sat at the desk doing nothing at all. At length he opened the draw and slowly unfolded his uncle's letter. This time he studied it with deeper interest.

Wiseman's is a small concern and I used to manage with indentured labour. These days the supply of such men is insufficient and one has to make do with negroes. James looked out of the window to Jethro who was sharpening an axe and laughing at something the stable boy had said. His staff worked. They worked hard, from dawn till dusk during harvest, but they were not miserable. James knew little about the life of negroes either in Africa or in the West Indies, but the little he had read troubled him. Our profits are not built on misery, the letter continued. James wondered how true that was. John Vallender's plantation might be run on liberal lines, or he might be glossing over an unpalatable truth. His eyes travelled to his mother's portrait, to the fine features and metallic grey eyes. As a child he'd occasionally crept into the study to examine her picture and wonder what her living presence had felt like. But regarding her now, he couldn't help noticing the hard set of the well-modelled jaw, the flinty eyes. Did John Vallender look the same? Did features reflect the character within?

James drummed his fingers on the desk. With me you would have the opportunity to learn the sugar business from top to bottom in accelerated time. Well that was probably true. And you would be well accommodated in the plantation house itself, naturally. As my nephew the best of Jamaican society would be open - his uncle had no idea how unsociable he was, or he wouldn't have bothered offering that enticement. Joining me would give you the opportunity to travel as my representative to other Caribbean islands and the colonies at Chesapeake and beyond. Travel to faraway places. Finally John Vallender had strummed a sweet chord in James's ear. Even if he hated his uncle's plantation and the way of life; even if Vallender was brushing over his exploitation of slaves; it would open new horizons. And there was nothing to prevent him returning to Gloucestershire, if the adventure ultimately failed.

He turned to the window and the comforting view of Gus looking over the stable door and shaking his mane. Dan was brushing the cobbles. Jethro's muscular shoulders were disappearing into the plough horses' stable. All this, the animals, staff, property, needed his care and attention. With his father's vigour diminishing, did it really make sense to flit off, once again, concerning himself with someone else's business?

With Kas beside him at Hill House, Vallender's letter would only have been handy to light the fire. Being without her should make no difference to a decision of this magnitude. And yet it made all the difference in the world.

Chapter Three

Through that winter James continued to work fanatically while daylight permitted. After dusk, many of his hours before the hearth were spent pondering John Vallender's offer. The impulse to agree at once, he suppressed. He'd made one precipitate decision in his life and it had brought unimagined consequences. This one at least would be considered with more care. And besides, Hill House demanded his attention. If everything could be brought up to scratch, he could leave it with a clearer conscience. Or so he told himself. To his father and Clara he confided none of this. Until he was certain which way his mind inclined he would say nothing. Time enough to trouble them then.

Clara could not be expected to spend her whole time in the service of Hill House without enjoying some respite and recreation and that forced him into occasionally attending small social gatherings at their neighbours' homes. Nobody ever mentioned the occupants of Aston Manor during these evenings, indicating to James that his misfortune was very much in people's minds still. But as the weeks passed, he became less sensitive to their sympathetic glances, more reconciled to the certainty that his case would live long in local memory.

The Manor he carefully avoided, and if he needed to be in Chipping Campden he went early when an encounter with Kassandra or Geoffrey was least likely. To Honeywells, though, he retired often. Before the roaring fire in the hall he could converse with Mr Eton freely, knowing that he was in the company of a man who understood fully his situation. As the leaping flames cast strange shadows across the ancient walls, it was easy to imagine that Kassandra was close by, just out of sight. In that house where, man and boy, he had spent so much time with her, her presence felt almost tangible.

It was towards the end of a sleety March evening when James was sipping port beside that very fire, that Mr Eton asked without warning, "Will you be staying with us, James?"

It was a startling question, given that John Vallender's letter had never been mentioned to anyone outside the walls of Hill House. Mr Eton's eyes glittered crystal-bright in the firelight and were at their most candid.

James turned sharply away. "That is something which I can't say."

"You have not made your mind up?" Mr Eton's beautifully modelled features moved into the softest of smiles. "Clara mentioned to me, a month or two ago that your uncle had need of you, and that you, perhaps, had need of escape. Do not blame Clara for making this confidence..."

"Hill House has need of me, or I would be gone," said James, deciding to be frank. "Clara has carried a share of my responsibilities for more than twelve months during my father's - infirmity. I cannot assume she will want to shoulder my burdens while I take a break from life." It wasn't the only consideration tethering him to home, but he couldn't tell Mr Eton that travelling thousands of miles from Kas, perhaps never to see her again, also obstructed a decision.

Mr Eton nodded. "You probably do not receive news from the Manor."

"...No." James held his breath. 'News' from the Manor was the last thing he wanted. It would please him if nothing of significance ever happened there again.

"Well there is none, nothing important."

"Oh..." He hesitated. "Are they – happy?"

Mr Eton pushed a lock of blond hair from his eyes with a long, tapering finger. "I think it best, my boy, not to try to answer that. You will understand my reasons. More port?"

James extended his glass.

"You would be welcome at the Manor, you know, if you called. By both of them. They ask how your farm is doing, they ask after Roderick. They enquire about Clara. Alice's name is often on their lips. But I know it is you who is in their mind."

James's body tensed. "Not now. Later perhaps." He flexed and unflexed his fingers round the stem of the glass. "I dined with Geoff's sister when we were both guests at the vicarage, so the ice was broken there."

Mr Eton sipped his white port while the shadows flickered between them. He would never drink anything which stained his teeth, even when he was alone, and his clothes were never less than immaculate. He leant forward and poked at the flaming log. It was a scene conducive to confidences. "I have not spoken of this, till now. I felt it to be an awkward subject between us, but I greatly regret encouraging Kassandra to marry Geoffrey when the news came to us of your death."

Silence, only the crackling of the woodfire broke the silence. James stared into the flames.

"Had there seemed the limpest wisp of hope that you were alive I would never have chosen such a course. How I regret my decision now."

"I know that. You do not have to tell me."

Mr Eton stared into the flames. "Kassandra was so overthrown by your death that I imagined a new hope in her life was the best remedy. I was afraid she would never get over your death, that she might become permanently withdrawn. She has always been a quiet girl and only you ever got past her reserve. Also, you may not realize this, but I have little in the way of ready cash to leave her. If I should die, she would inherit little, apart from the farm and this ancient house. With you gone, I thought Geoff could protect Kassandra's future like no other man." His eyes became very remote. "I have not dared mention it to you before, but it was a subject which needed airing between us. You are the son-in-law I wanted for my girl. You always will be. You must know that."

Subject aired, both men lapsed into quiet, sipping their port, content in their special companionship and the crackling of the fire. Branches on the trees at the other side of the moat began to whip furiously in a rising wind, but the men were too lost in their own thoughts to notice.

Lengthening days meant more opportunity for outdoors work, and more need of it from James's point of view. Lambing was a season of hard toil, early mornings and late nights. It was the first year that James remembered Roderick ceding all the work to himself and Jethro; another sign of declining energies. Both men were red eyed with lack of sleep, but James enjoyed the distraction from his troubles.

Towards the end of March, Clara appeared at the door of the study where James had been idly turning over some accounts. The world beyond the study window was pale and bleached of colour. Thin, bright sunlight shone on the starved fields towards Meon Hill. Looking out, James felt a prickle of pleasure; winter's grip was slackening. He'd been perusing John Vallender's letter, but that was out of sight under a blotter when Clara slipped in and perched on the edge of the desk. Her face was smiling, but he immediately sensed that no ordinary announcement was coming. He put down his quill and sat forward.

"Come to the parlour James. It's icy in here."

"I wasn't really doing much. I felt tired."

"It's not like you to feel tired."

"Everyone tires sometimes." His smile diluted the irritation in his voice. "Even our plough horses feel tired sometimes. What do you want?"

Clara hesitated. "I have been into Campden."

"Mm?"

"And I met someone."

James knew with crashing certainty who she meant. He turned abruptly to the window.

"I met Kassandra near the market place." Clara paused for a response. When none came she continued, "We stopped to talk." Still no response. With more emphasis she went on, "It is her birthday next week."

"I'm aware of that."

"It is a pleasant excuse for them to have a few people round to supper, only a few, you understand. They want to enjoy the occasion with more than just Mary and Josephine for company."

James opened the window as a distraction, not because he needed air.

"She intends to ask Dick. Dick is become very attached to Mary and they wonder if an arrangement may be come to soon."

In days past James would have been curious to hear of developments in the lives of his childhood friends; now he was too absorbed in his own loss to care. "I think not. You and father can provide the relief from Mary and Josephine," he added with a wave of the hand. "Not that Mary is bad company. But I am too busy. Kas and Geoffrey will understand. They understand the farming calendar."

"They understand it well enough to know that you could get away for one evening. Do you not think James, that this might be a good moment to ease back into a normal life? To resume a connection with old friends? They actually want you to come."

James snapped the window shut, dropped into the chair, and snatched up his quill with such ill-adjusted vigour that it snapped. For a moment he stared stupidly at it, then tried bending it back into shape. "Best behaviour for a whole evening at the Manor? No Clara! Go and enjoy yourself, but I can't smile through hours in Geoff's company." He scrawled a few illegible figures in a ledger. "I seek no friendship with him - ever."

In the event only Roderick went, Alice inconveniently coming down with a fever that morning. James sweated through a fever of a different kind as he glanced at the grandfather clock throughout the evening of the gathering, wondering what the inhabitants of the Manor were saying in his absence, what glances were passing between Geoff and Kassandra. It was on that night that convictions swirled together in his mind and a decision about his future made itself. The clock had just struck eight. Clara's eyes were starting to droop shut on the other side of the hearth, when quietly he took a candle to the study and pulled out his uncle's letter. More light was needed for this. Extra candles were soon lit. He sharpened his quill and began to write. He took care to choose exactly the best phrases. When he was sure that his letter said everything that he had intended and nothing that he had not, he sealed it and stared out into the starry sky. What the future held he couldn't say. Whether it glittered or encompassed bitter disappointment was as yet unknown. His mind ran back into the past, trying to recall the moment when he had decided to buy a commission, that bid for freedom which had so misdirected the course of his life.

A dry cough made him turn. Clara was little more than a dark shape in the hallway. "You're going, aren't you?"

"Yes, I have not wanted to deceive you or father, but back in December I wrote to my uncle indicating that I might take up his offer of joining him in the business. Last week I received word that I could join him any time I liked. The offer was open-ended. Tonight I made my mind up. I'm going."

Her hand gripped the door jam. "James, you can't. You can't just abandon your own property like this again! You father isn't well enough to mind things in the old way. Oh, I know all you've said about me doing fine in your absence, but I'm a trained dressmaker, not a farmer!"

"You've lived on this farm for eight years."

"I'm not a farmer. I'm not steeped in it like you are. And there's heavy work that I could never do."

"That's why we pay labourers, like Jethro."

"Stay here and look to your property!" Clara seized a bottle of brandy, threw some in a glass with great vigour. Splashes of liquid bounced out and landed on Chives who was curled up on the desk. The animal looked up with surprise, decided that all was well and settled again.

James passed a reassuring hand over the cat. "I cannot stay in this stifling place," he explained gently. "I can't. You must see that. It's not a question of being gone forever, but I cannot settle here with those two living a mile from my doorstep. And I hate the gossip of my neighbours."

"Gossip fades." Anger and exasperation animated Clara now. "Yes, when you came back your trouble was on everyone's lips. But they've got their own concerns. Forget the whole sorry mistake and make your own life work!"

"Which I intend to do. But not here. I even thought of moving just a few miles away, but my uncle's offer sets up an opportunity to - "

"To do what exactly?" interrupted Clara. "Make another mistake?"

"To use my farming skills while promoting a family concern."

"Is sugar growing like raising wheat, turnips and sheep?"

"Perhaps not - "

Clara snorted inarticulately.

"But I have a basis of skills which will soon develop."

"And what of the climate? I've heard the Caribbean described as a white-man's graveyard." She sniffed furiously. "Don't go James. Don't go. It's not that I can't manage here with Roderick. But don't go! We want you here."

Ever since Clara had entered the house as Paul's eighteen-year-old bride, James had been aware, or sensed, a feeling towards him. Occasionally, such as when he returned before Christmas, a tiny suspicion had risen in him that if only one family soldier could return safely from the war she was glad it was him and not Paul. Tonight, again, a ghost of that idea passed over him.

"I will pay you some money to help father look after the farm. I have understood in these last months that you will make my best possible overseer."

"Don't be ridiculous! It's my home! I care that it prospers as much as you. You don't need to pay me to do that."

"I will make over some money. One day in the future, who knows, you may marry again, and you would be glad of a tiny nest egg. I know that Paul had little to leave."

Clara shrank back, her expression inscrutable. "I will not leave Hill House, James. I will help Roderick look after it for you. But please, please consider before you ramble away again."

Despite himself James smiled. "No ramble. I have a goal, a purpose."

"Escaping from unhappiness is your goal and you won't succeed. You can only outgrow it."

"As well to outgrow it in Jamaica, as here then," he concluded. "I'll do everything I can to leave all in order for you and Father, but I am going."

He broke the news to his father next morning. Roderick's expression did not change during the halting explanation. When James had finished, the mauve-blue eyes creased into a slow smile.

"If you need to go, boy, then do it. I'll manage here." Roderick nodded as if nothing more need be said. He spread some fresh butter on a roll of bread.

James was left flat-footed by the selfless simplicity of his father's stance. Roderick could manage. That was his only consideration. James wondered how often he'd failed to spot fine qualities in his father. He remembered a time when he'd felt impatient at his very presence. "I'm sorry to leave you all the responsibility. I - "

"Sit down James. You haven't eaten. I've already said, do what you have to do."

"You and Clara - "

"Will get on with what needs to be done. If you ever want to return, I'll be here. Nothing else need be said, James, except good luck."

Nothing else needed to be said... Haltingly, James sat down and took up his tankard. Humbly he muttered thanks for Roderick's good wishes.

He was going, and he wished to be gone without leave-takings this time, but Mr Eton was made privy to his plans. |James couldn't go without saying farewell to him. Dick Richardson, too, was given a full explanation at the vicarage on the last Sunday before his planned departure.

"I am sorry that it has come to this." Dick's features were clouded. "I hoped that you would find a way to settle after your disappointment. You do not know perhaps that Mary and I are to be engaged? No? I had imagined that you would be attending our wedding."

James smiled. "I guessed that something of the kind was to come. I hope you will be very happy."

"You will say goodbye to Mary, before you go?"

"Actually Dick, I intend to slip away quietly. You will understand my reasons."

"More madeira?" Dick's features were compressed with thought. Then he blurted, "You cannot leave Kassandra without a word. It's not possible James."

A long silence. James sipped the madeira. "Perhaps you could pass on a verbal message?"

"I would rather you told her yourself," Dick replied slowly, "but yes, if you prefer no direct meeting, I will do it."

"Tell her, tell her - just tell her that what happened was all my fault, not hers. I was the fool who insisted on marching away." James rose abruptly and finished his madeira in a gulp. "Just tell her that."

In the event James delayed his departure a week until the hay was in, which happened early in that hot summer. It was a last gesture of consideration to Clara and his father. When the last field was cut the labourers wearily made their way home with extra coins tinkling in their pockets. It was always a time of satisfaction when the hay was cut. One job accomplished for the year. Now it only needed to dry. Plenty of feed for the animals in winter. James felt the labourers deserved to enjoy a few extra jugs of ale in the tavern. On that day he gave everyone a half holiday.

As Jethro, Dizzy, Gwen and Dan set off towards Chipping Campden and the Red Lion, a rare peace settled over him. Across the field their laughter drifted to where he perched on the raised herb-bed at the centre of the court, cupping a goblet of wine. Warmed by mellow sunshine, the wine gave off a heady bouquet, but James preferred to chew on sprigs of mint growing beside him. He closed his eyes, restful in his soul for once, listening to the tweetering of birds and fading laughter. Around him the essences of lavender and rosemary drifted. No needs, no responsibilities, no desires pricked or troubled him. A flagon of heady wine sat beside him, a good supper awaited. If he could only stop in this moment...

In that mood he opened his eyes to perceive a distant figure moving through the long grass towards Hill House. A plain grey gown. A tall, slender figure, pale-blond hair swinging uncovered. Ahead bounded a large pointer. James's heart lurched then began to thump irregularly. He watched, rigid, as first Kassandra's figure, then her features defined themselves in the milky sunlight. At the iron gates of Hill House she hesitated, then stepped cautiously forward to where James was still perching woodenly.

She'd come to him. She'd come to him and his hostility, nurtured and nursed for more than six months, vaporised. Always attuned to his moods, Kassandra's lips curled into a pensive smile and she sank down on the rockery, very close to him.

"You may not want to see me, but I had to come Jem. I know that you are going."

Dick or Mr Eton had broken his confidence and told her, but it didn't matter, now. She'd searched him out. That was all that mattered.

Always pale, her face looked ashen today. "Jem, I can't ask you not to go, I don't have the right to interfere in your hopes or plans, but I do pray that you return." Ticks and trembles worked her features. "Please may this not be a lifetime venture in the Indies! We haven't spoken all these months, but every time I've left the Manor, I've longed for even a distant glimpse of you. I couldn't confess it, I couldn't come here, but when I found that you were leaving I had to see you one last time." The words tumbled out.

A few purplish stains marked her grey gown and a scent of blackcurrants clung about her. The bodice of the gown was embroidered with tiny white asymmetrical flowers, angelica. Normally an inobservant man where such things were concerned, James's eyes became, in this moment, alive to every detail.

"Why didn't you come to me months ago?"

"I couldn't. I'm not married to the farrier or rat catcher. Nothing I do is anonymous and none of this is Geoff's fault. I came here today on foot to try and stay out of sight. I only came because I had to say goodbye."

"Where is Geoff?"

"At Bretforton Manor. He will be back this evening. He might be back very soon. I chose my moment to slip away when Josephine was occupied."

Her thigh was still touching his. James's fingers crept towards her hand. If Roderick or Clara passed by a window the contact might be visible. Everyone else was at the inn, even the stable boy. Her eyes flickered up to meet his. Usually they were withdrawn, their expression private, but today everything fighting in her heart could be plainly read there. His breathing tightened. A stolen peep towards the house. Roderick and Clara would be indoors, or perhaps enjoying the cooler air of the orchard at the back, a peaceful evening after the cutting of the hay. Inwardly James cursed. Now, now was his moment with Kassandra. His whole body knew it. There was no resistance in her. He knew it.

He struggled with himself. "I have to go, Kas. I can't settle. I need a new life amid people who know nothing of me. That can't surprise you. Did you really think I was content with my wheat fields and turnips while you and Geoff were living it up, practically under my nose?" His voice rose despite himself and his hand tightened around hers.

"In time you would be content. In time you might - have a wife of your own."

"Is that what you want?"

"...No."

They were both silent. "Anyway, for now time moves at a snail's crawl. I can't wait for brighter times to come to me. I have to seek them out."

She made a move and he gripped her hand tighter.

"I'm not going." A ghost of a smile lived momentarily behind her strained features. "I have a few minutes yet before I abandon you to the wheat fields and turnips." She'd always had an economical sense of humour. It was one of the things he liked. "Jem, there's something I must say before I leave you. I never really explained to you about my marriage."

"Don't try." His voice was heavy.

She sucked her lip. "I felt so angry with you Jem, when they told me you were dead."

"Angry?" He hadn't expected that. It was a perspective he had not considered. He had accepted without question Clara and Mr Eton's description of desolate sorrow. But anger, directed specifically at him?

"Yes. Angry. Miserably angry because you had flung your life away."

A bleak, wintry smile played about his lips. "Some might have called me a patriot."

"I saw you as a reckless fool. Marrying Geoff was a clutch at hopefulness, but I think it was more a way of punishing you beyond the grave for hurling your life into nothingness and destroying mine."

James struggled to fit her words into the scheme of the past as he had perceived it to be. "I don't understand. When I mooted the idea of buying a commission, you did not offer a stone wall of resistance."

"I was barely nineteen. How wise and strong did you expect me to be?" Their eyes met with sorrow. "You were foolish, I was weak... Jem I must go. Geoff may return and Josephine has a nose for secrets, even Mary may wonder." She rose and clicked her fingers to Charlie who was stretched out by a drinking trough.

"I will walk back with you. There may be drunkards about. The hay has been cut these last days and men with extra pennies in their pockets usually have more drink fuming their heads."

"Charlie would deal smartly with any drunk. Goodbye Jem."

"I'm coming. If Geoff hears of it, he can go hang. More so Josephine." James moved to her side. "Escorting a woman home is no crime."

Slowly, in no rush to have the minutes pass, they left the gates of Hill House, side by side. They headed back by a footpath over James's land, avoiding the main track. In places they passed through coppices. In such spots it was possible to avoid the prying eyes of the world. Time was short and words flowed fast between them now. They crossed the lane to Chipping Campden and entered the Dingle above Aston Subedge. A woodpecker dinked away and disappeared. Somewhere close by bees were buzzing. The sun sinking behind the Malvern Hills was not visible here. At a stile, where a stream bubbled and hissed, and the dingle gave way to Hanging Meadow, the roof tops of the hamlet became visible.

"You can leave me here Jem. I'd rather you did."

The inadequacy of what they'd said, the impossibility of finding the right words now, overwhelmed them both.

James placed his hands on her shoulders. "This isn't farewell Kas. I will see you again in this world. I know it."

"Don't go and you'll certainly see me again."

Only the moment mattered, and James tugged her on tiptoe and kissed her with an intensity born of disappointment, unhappiness and despair. Her lips were flavoured of blackcurrants, and in that kiss seemed to be distilled all the sweetness of summertime, first love, and youth.

Chapter Four

From Bristol he sailed, this time. He felt dislocated, mind, heart, and soul, during his rattling journey to the port, and the sight of the ship at anchor only deepened the emptiness inside. It was a relief when the waiting was over, and they sailed out of port forty-eight hours later. Some of his fellow passengers were sick before the sails were full of wind, but James was fortunate to possess a natural stomach for the movement of the ship beneath him.

The life which had burnt low in him since December flickered again. And it flickered brighter as the days passed. Waves crashing on the prow, storms, squalls, all of them brought pleasure to his dulled senses. They sailed south past Portugal and over the ocean to Madeira, from where the trade winds would hopefully carry them on to the Caribbean.

His fellow passengers were a mix of young men in search of the quick riches reputed to be obtainable in the West Indies, and a more desperate sort seeking to mend their already failing fortunes. James fell into neither category and observed his company without gravitating towards any individual. But he enjoyed listening to a piper and blind fiddler who wiled away the hours on deck with music.

"The water is wide, I cannot get over, neither have I wings to fly," the fiddler sang melodiously. "Give me a boat that carries two and both shall row my love and I."

The piper stopped piping and joined the verses, "A ship there is and she sails the sea. She's loaded deep as deep can be, but not so deep as the love in me. I know not if I sink or swim."

The fay, wistful tune struck a chord with James and he listened with ears for no other sounds. Music moved below deck when an immense storm struck and raged all night. And now James was sick. He might have drawn some comfort above deck in the fresh air, but he was forced below with all the other suffering passengers who heaved out their stomachs into buckets and basins.

Nearing North African waters, the crew became tense and alert. James observed it in their intense scrutiny of every sail which appeared on the horizon, and the preparation of firearms. But James and his fellow passengers were fortunate: no Barbary pirates hunted them down as flesh for the African slave markets.

It was a relief when they caught the trade winds and set out in earnest across the Atlantic. James felt sobered now by the vastness of the water and the emptiness of the horizon. After enduring freezing Cotswolds winters and the even lower temperatures of his soldiering on the continent, James was unprepared for the heat of the tropics. For the first time, he considered the reality of fagging and labouring in melting temperatures. But the tropics also brought wonders: sharks' fins cut the surface, turtles appeared and most magical of all, flying fish burst from their watery element and shared, for a few measureless moments, the powers of birds.

James's military life had not all been one of bloodshed and horror; he had passed through landscapes of continental beauty, but no experience rivalled the wonder of this. At last, for the first time since that December afternoon when he had arrived home to reclaim Kassandra, he felt the life force breathing within him again.

Like most of the passengers, James knew little about seafaring, but he knew enough to fear becalming. During his two nights in the inn at Bristol before his voyage, an old salt had told him tales of ships becalmed for so long that everyone was dead on board when they were eventually discovered. No such disasters beset their vessel though; the ship was at sea only seven weeks when James heard a sailor hailing land to the north-west: Montserrat was in sight. Only a few more days of sailing and they would reach Jamaica itself. It flashed into James's mind to wonder what his uncle was doing at this precise moment. Mr Vallender would not know that he was close to joining him. If by some mischance James's letter had not reached its destination, he would know nothing at all. But James was not worried by that possibility. Hope was not thoroughly renewed in him yet, but he felt its stirrings.

And his hope and confidence weren't knocked when he disembarked in dazzling sunshine and sought out a horse or cart to get him to Wiseman's. Wiseman's not being a big concern, James had supposed that he might have to seek a while before finding someone who knew its location, but he struck lucky in the first drinking den he tried.

"Well I never, James Vallender, you say? Of course I know your uncle, by name anyway."

"James Mace. My name is Mace. Is it possible I can hire a horse? I need to get to Wiseman's."

"I don't have a horse for hire, but for a fee Jed will drive there in the cart. Won't be comfortable mind. Not what you're used to." The tapman's eyes travelled over James's decent clothes.

James's noted the man's long drawn out vowels, the unfamiliar lilt of his voice, and wondered if his uncle would sound the same after so many years out of Gloucestershire. "Comfort not essential."

The tapman grinned. "You've come to the right place. You got baggage, Sir?"

"This is it."

They settled a fee and James stepped out into the dusty street where Jed pulled around the corner with a cart. "Climb up Mr Vallender. My God you look like your uncle." Jed's accent was lilting and unfamiliar too.

"Mace," said James, "I'm James Mace."

"Well you look like John Vallender. Maybe you his ghost!" Jed laughed at his own humour, shook the reins and they moved off.

Much of James's thoughts now leapt to the reception he would meet at his uncle's, but he still had attention for the people they clattered past. Some were not only grandly dressed but dressed as if they were home in cooler climates. Many of the men had a look he did not like: they resembled the type to be seen hanging in gibbets near the parish boundary back in Gloucestershire. And the women seemed the sort to hang around in taprooms with cheats and thieves. He wasn't seeking culture, but nor was he aiming to ditch civilization.

"I did not expect my uncle's name to be so instantly known," James ventured, after digesting the very first impressions of his new land. "He is not one of the big men here."

"Oh, your uncle's well known," replied Jed, in the distinctive accent of the locals. "This is a small place. Rich men are known to everyone."

Rich. Modestly prosperous was what he had been led to expect. He chewed over the news in startled silence.

The countryside through which they passed also had the effect of a shock on his senses. Used as he was to the subtle colour palette of England, the bright tints here dazzled him. Vermillion, scarlet, crimson, magenta; bushes and trees flowered in the most intense, clashing colours and the greenery seemed too lush, too verdant. He loosened his stock as if that could give his overloaded visual senses a breather. "Wiseman's is not far from town, I'm told."

"That's true."

James had already had time to notice that his driver and the tapman pronounced this as dis, that as dat. Were they Jamaicans, born on the islands? Or would he find his uncle had acquired the same pronunciation? Perhaps, if he stayed on the island long enough, he would end up talking in the same way. James suddenly laughed, imagining the effect it would have on the country folk back home, if he ever returned sunburnt and drawling like a Creole.

Jed glanced at him. "We getting to your uncle's lands now. His place is always well kept."

They turned off the main trail and Jed was proved right: Mr Vallender's private track was in a better state of repair than the public one. James squinted across the fields, then blinked and started forward. The figures in the distance were black, his first sight of field slaves. Seeing a toiling slave immediately struck him as different to impersonally reading about slavery. "Those people." He hesitated, "Do they work for my uncle?"

Jed glanced at him as if he were a fool. "Course. This is your uncle's land."

He was tempted to ask if the Vallender slaves were treated well, but he knew it was a stupid question, especially of a stranger. James gripped the edge of the cart and said no more. The tall mill came into view, with a cluster of negroes moving about it like ants. And now a white man appeared from behind the mill. James narrowed his eyes and followed the man's movements. Too young to be his uncle, he decided, too elastic in movement; and not tall enough either, if Jed and the tapman were right about his own resemblance to John Vallender.

"We're close now."

The track curved sharply left, and there was the house. Not vast, his uncle had told the truth about that at least, but elegantly designed with its three Dutch gables. It took a lot of money to build a house like that. In comparison Hill House was shabby and utilitarian. The cart pulled up with a flourish, but James's gaze continued to rest on the lovely home. Jed gave him a few moments then coughed politely.

"You need help with your bags?"

James woke from his reverie. "No - thank you." He handed over the other half of his fare which he had agreed to pay when he was safely at Wisemans. "You've been a help. Perhaps I'll see you again."

"You need drink, you come to the Monkey Tavern. Best drinking house in town."

James smiled. "I surely will."

Jed shook the reins. "Walk on Dessie."

At that moment, the fine door of the plantation house opened, and a tall, well-found negro came out. James wondered if he were a servant rather than a slave. His clothes were good and his hair greying. He appeared to have nothing in common with the semi-dressed young slaves in the fields.

"Mr Mace?" He spoke with the same accent as Jed. "Mr Vallender's been looking out for you for a week or so. He will be pleased. I take your bags." Three steps led up to the house. "A room has been prepared. Some drink and food are coming. Please wait here."

It was an airy hall from which an elegant staircase climbed to an open landing. James seated himself in a chair next to a set of double doors, which he suspected opened into a dining room. On the other side of the hall were two other rooms. James wondered what lay inside them. It was cooler indoors than he had expected. The walls were thick and the windows deeply set. And there was another door, James spied it now, set unobtrusively beside the stairs. From this door issued a greying, pleasant faced negro woman with a tray. She placed the tray on a table beside him.

"Master should not be long, Sir." She pointed to a bell on the table. "If there is anything else you need..."

He nodded and smiled. Dealing with a slave - assuming she was a slave - was new to him.

It took only half a glass of wine and a slice of cake to make his eyelids droop. The accumulated tiredness of a couple of months travel and excitement were finally working their effect, now that he was safely under the Vallender roof. His eyes had closed completely, when a noise started him into wakefulness and he found himself looking up at a lined, tanned, handsome face. James blinked his eyes into focus. He would have recognized this man for his relation if they had met anywhere on earth. Instantly he threw off his sleepiness and leapt up. The older man's gaze was almost on a level with his, in youth he would have been at least as tall.

"So, you are Alexandrine's boy."

Alexandrine. Even the name wrong-footed James. Everything today was new and startling. At home he had mostly heard his late mother referred to by their relationship, your mother. On occasions Roderick had spoken of her as Etta. Etta never liked Quintus Eton. Thought him a damned fool... Etta had a good head on her, could have done with a bit more heart... James had seen the name Alexandrine Henrietta on her memorial plaque in church of course, but he had never heard the name spoken.

"You're slow with an answer boy. Your mother was never like that."

Tired and off-balance, James laughed and his uncle's brow clouded. A peculiar perception that things were destined to go wrong between them from the very start, sprouted in James's mind.

"I'm sorry. I'm tired, but it's good to be here." It didn't feel as good as he'd hoped; his pleasure had subtly diminished after seeing the slaves labouring in the fields, but he couldn't state that within hours of landing in Jamaica. He didn't even want to admit it to himself. "Forgive me if my manners seem jaded."

Vallender relaxed. "You're not come to a society where manners count for so much as they do at home, so you should fit in well. Come and sit more comfortably. Bring your wine."

They went through one of the doors on the other side of the hall, and passed into a modestly sized room with views to the south and east. It was comfortably furnished with a fine rug and large couch. Sun was blazing through the windows and James wished they'd stayed in the hall.

Vallender gestured to a chair. "You favour your mother, but there's something of Roderick in you too." Criticism so faint as to be almost untraceable laced Vallender's last words.

James detected the criticism instantly and smiled to deflect it. "You've a good memory. I'm pleased to have something of my father in me." As long as it's not the wrong bit, he thought.

"It must be twenty-five years since I saw Roderick, yet one look at you brings him back. You are nothing like your sister promised to be."

James felt a startled knock. He was surprised almost as much by his reaction as by Vallender's words. "I am not like Carolina, no." He raised his glass to his lips, gulped hurriedly.

Vallender watched as if aware of the reaction he had set off. "More wine? You may have wondered why I wanted young blood around me here, when I can hire all the help I choose. Well, hired help is not the same. I seek someone who will maintain Wiseman's with a view to the future rather than squeezing a quick profit and never mind the longer term. Only family think about the longer term. Only family want plantations to be a success in another twenty, fifty, a hundred years from now. You would understand that. Hill House has defied civil wars and epidemics and crop failures for hundreds of years."

"The oldest part of it, yes." James fiddled with his glass.

"I was thinking of the Mace family, and the Rackhams before them, rather than the stonework. All your ancestors."

"Yes."

"That invests you in Hill House in a way no mere overseer could be."

James shrugged. "I'm here, not caring for the stonework of my ancestors."

Vallender's eye crinkled into a smile. "Which brings me round to a question: why are you here? What brought you round to accepting my proposal?"

"I might have accepted it immediately, had I been home when your letter arrived." A complete untruth, but Vallender didn't need to know everything. "Then, when my injuries forced me out of the military, I needed time to consider where my future lay. I needed to feel that I was fully recovered." The truth, as far as it went.

Vallender waited, as if he needed to hear more, but nothing came. He rose. "And you decided it lay here. I'm glad. I remembered your father's obstina - hm, attitude - on the issue of slavery. He said he was happy to sell a turnip to anyone and a horse to a good man, but human beings should not be sold. We talked of it not long before I set out on my new life in the West Indies. Etta didn't share his quibbles! But believe me, if I could get enough reliable indentured labour to run my plantation, I would. James, it just can't be done. The flow of men is no longer there. Planters were short sighted and misused them. Treated them only one degree better than slaves. Like I said, you need to look far ahead when running a place like this. Still, you'll find my slaves better treated than most. That's something you'll understand when you see the big picture here."

Possibly it was true. He looked at his uncle's face and read hopefulness there. Perhaps he could be of service without compromising himself deeply. Perhaps he could even help in improving the lot of the slaves at Wiseman's. Now he was here in Jamaica it was hard to start with an argument. He either worked for his uncle or else he moved on - to what exactly? "I will serve you honestly; I hope I can serve you well; I hope I can keep my principals intact," he pronounced.

A tap at the door prevented Vallender from responding at length, but his expression said enough. "You do not have to abandon anything here. I hope we will make a fine team, James. Alexandrine would have been pleased, I know it." He turned to the door. "What is it, Micah?"

"A Captain Christy to see you, Sir, from the militia."

Vallender groaned. "Inopportune, but show him in. James, get some rest and a wash and shave. We'll be sure to wake you in time for supper."

His bedroom looked west. A floor-length window opened onto a small balcony with ornate railings, and James immediately foresaw the prospect of enjoying the last minutes of each day watching the sun sinking into the distant sea. In a storm he guessed it would be possible to hear the waves. There would be lots of storms in Jamaica. He knew that much.

His limited belongings were quickly unpacked, then he bathed and combed his long, waving hair. In the mirror Kas's image gazed back at him, reflected from the miniature resting against the smooth skin of his chest. He took the miniature in his fingers and considered the lovely face. Now he was under his uncle's roof he wanted to remove the little portrait and stow it somewhere safe from buffetings and wear. But he wanted it to be just as safe from the prying eyes of slaves with dusters. So, for now, he kept it safe around his neck. With tired eyes he stole a last glance at Kassandra's pensive face, then threw on a clean shirt. His eye were already drooping shut, when he relaxed beneath the netting on the bed. Sleep claimed him.

Chapter Five

Next morning was set for his first real exploration of Wiseman's. John Vallender entrusted this task to no body but himself.

"You can use any horse from the stable except Cossack. He is a beautiful beast and particularly my own. Koko is peaceful and reliable. But for this morning I think we are best on foot. We may be sometime around the mill and the factory."

It had surprised James, when he arrived, to see how close the sugar works were to the main house. He had imagined it would be set in something approximating to the grounds and gardens of a manor in England.

"Well, Hill House doesn't sit inside a garden, unless things have changed since my day," laughed Vallender. "A door at the back opened straight into the muddy farmyard, if I remember. Yet the Maces are gentry - minor gentry."

"Parlour still looks out over the farmyard. Point taken." And the Maces were still only minor gentry. James smiled privately.

Vallender led him to the boiling room. No activity except cleaning was in progress. "We have to cut the cane when the time is right and that's not now."

"When do you cut it?"

"In the dry season. Work here will be all-out then. I have reached the age where all-out does not suit me." Vallender turned away, but James watched a team of negroes as they cleaned the cauldrons which were arranged as a series along one wall.

"I did not expect such a large boiler room."

A small, tight twitch of the lips passed for a smile on Vallender's face. "Wait till you see it in operation. It'll be a few months yet. But it's a sophisticated process, way beyond anything which you practise back on the cool hills of the Cotswolds."

"In our muddy farmyards?"

Vallender's smile broadened. "I'll show you the mill. It's not working at the moment, of course. Follow me." He led James into the sun which beamed painfully bright after the more subdued light of the boiling room, then onto the milling floor.

James viewed the great vertical rollers into which the cane would be fed.

"It's a complicated procedure from planting to obtaining the end product. We have to plant at the right time to have it ready just when appropriate. It's easy to get things wrong. The early planters did just that. But they persevered. We're succeeding on their backs really. Well, nothing to see here now." Vallender led him out. "Now some of our fields. What was your first impression yesterday?"

James lifted a hand to shade his eyes. "I imagined a smaller acreage than this. Your letter suggested a modest operation. My father didn't realize you owned a large plantation either."

"Oh, there are bigger than this. You'll meet Fred Hake in a few days. He's bound to be over when word gets out you're here. I've told him you would probably be joining us. His land is nearby. He has more acres and more slaves, Tom Eland too. And as for the Ralls plantation, that's the biggest one of all."

Carts trundled past, leaving the earthy smell of rotting muck on the wind. Muck spreading was a process which James was infinitely familiar with. "You feed your lands richly."

"The canes are hungry, too hungry. I wonder sometimes if there will come a time when we will strip the land bare of its goodness." Vallender's voice was bleak, as if the fate of the land concerned him. "And what will we do then?"

James was a man of the soil before he had put on an infantry officer's uniform. For the first time, he sensed a spark of common feeling with his uncle. "Time is long. We must husband the soil. Not..." He sought the precise word. "Not despoil it."

"Despoil? I'm afraid you will witness a lot of things on this island which are not based on a long view." Vallender's eyes became distant, as if he contemplated things beyond the sight of James. "You learn to live with them, or you get out. Great riches are to be made here, with effort and industry. And luck. You must be aware, that many people wilt and die young on these islands." He screwed his eyes up against the sun and watched while an overseer applied a lash to the back of a slave who had stopped work and was leaning against one of the carts. "This is not a climate which encourages long term thinking. Enough Ashendon," he called to the overseer. Sharply he moved on.

James stared, startled by the naked brutality of the scene he had witnessed. As a solider he had seen men flogged to maintain 'discipline'. Sailors, he knew were controlled by the same means, and back home even minor felonies could be punished by death. He recognised that sometimes it was necessary to use brutality when dealing with the brutal, and on occasions had done so himself. But this was a degree different: the slave could not leave the Vallender plantation; he could not seek to improve his lot elsewhere; his entire life was controlled by others.

James said this when he caught his uncle up and Vallender listened while all the time his grey eyes watched the activity of the great gang of slaves in the next field. When James had wound to a stop, Vallender swivelled his eyes upon him. Cold eyes, James noted. Not cruel, but lacking in life and feeling. They matched the portrait of his mother back home at Hill House. He wondered if he might come to look the same himself, some day.

"Ashendon has to get results from these slaves and he is not dealing with ideal personalities."

"He's not dealing with people who enjoy an ideal situation, either."

"Do you think he could obtain work from these negroes if there was no threat of the stick?"

James sighed. He did not want to enter a war of words on his first day. He'd chosen to try his luck in Jamaica and couldn't turn his face against it in the first five minutes. It was unrealistic to hope that he could heal the moral blindness of a man who'd been running a plantation for twenty-five years. Softly he said, "In their situation I think I would rather die than submit."

"You are not in their situation." Vallender's expression changed and his demeanour became more animated. "Perhaps you don't know how these negroes come to slavery! Don't imagine that it is necessary for slave merchants to sail to Africa and then chase around the interior catching them. Oh no. Their fellow Africans do all that. These slaves will have been taken by rival tribes and then sold at slave markets. Some may have been captured in wars, others will have been snatched on raids by one tribe on another. Did you know that?" A breath of life had crept into Vallender's voice. "Slavery is part of African society."

"It changes nothing."

"Others, after being captured by fellow Africans will have been sold to Mohammeden slavers from north of the desert and they may come to us by a circuitous route."

An unsettling tale. A horrible reflection on human nature when no bridle was put on it. James grimaced.

"If you supposed that these men have been ripped from a peaceful, ideal world of freedom you are much wrong."

Rotteness everywhere in humanity, no matter where one looked. "I accept your point: Africa is not a civilized place; they still enslave their own." He turned forcefully to his uncle. "But does that mean, as the supposedly civilized ones, that we should exploit them? Are you not making excuses?"

Vallender met his eyes unflinchingly. "When Africans stop enslaving their own, then I will feel obliged to free our slaves here." He half turned away. "Not until. Come, there is still much to be seen."

They spent the rest of the morning viewing the fields close to the plantation house, and the forge, the distillery and kitchen plots where the slaves grew their own food. The heat was energy sapping beyond anything James had ever experienced, and he wondered how anyone who endured it could retain the will power to drive forward a plantation. It would be easy, he suspected, to dribble away one's days reclining in the coolest part of the house reaching for a bottle. It remained to be seen how he would use his own time.

Thunderclouds were gathering and the wind was getting up. Clouds of a different kind sat over James and Vallender, since their 'discussion' about slavery. Silently James followed his uncle back to the house.

James had rarely seen a downpour to match that first storm of his new life, and it transfixed him. He retired early to his room that evening, still feeling the effects of his journey from home. But he did not get into bed, preferring to watch the distant flashes of lightening cracking open the dusky sky. A decanter of port sat on his desk and he sipped slowly on the drink while writing a letter. The words were not coming easily and mostly he watched the distant storm and listened to the thunder claps.

Dearest Kas, he wrote, I am safely here under my uncle's roof. Even after just four and twenty hours in this new land I am doubtful of my decision to uproot here. I have to admit that. Already I feel wary of my uncle and whether we will get along together. He dipped his plume in the well and paused to reflect on his relationship with Roderick in recent years. But I must of course give things time, as all is new around me and my perceptions may be influenced by the strangeness of Jamaica.

A particularly rasping thunder clap made him pause from writing to view the thrashing rain. He resumed: Kas, my sea journey has made me realize what a huge place this world is. Everything doesn't revolve around Gloucestershire, or even the Kingdoms of Europe. His hand rushed on excitedly now: Kas, you could join me here in the West Indies, we could run away to New England. In the New World it would be possible for us to disappear, melt into the crowd. But if you cannot face leaving England, London would offer us as much anonymity. If we changed our names, no one would ever know where we came from. We could call ourselves Mr and Mrs Vallender, or whatever you liked. I don't know why I had to sail half way round the world for this to become obvious to me. Thunder roared again. We do not have to suffer for our mistakes. Leave Geoff...

We do not have to suffer... But even as James sipped his port, he knew that they must continue as they were for other reasons. Kas might agree to leave Geoff, under certain conditions, but she would never abandon Mr Eton. Nothing could tempt her far from Honeywells. He might just as well try persuading the mulberry bush to up and leave from the back lawn.

He didn't write another word, but scrunched the letter, filled his glass, and stared into the lightening-rent sky.

Chapter Six

It was two or three weeks after his arrival that they were invited by Fred Hake to the White Hall estate. James was glad of the chance to break his routine. For all his misgivings about playing any part in the function of a slave estate, he had committed himself to work as hard as possible, learn what he could about the business, and then move on - if such a move was financially feasible. It wasn't feasible now, so he needed to get his head down and use what limited powers he possessed to ameliorate the conditions of the slaves whose lives touched his own at Wiseman's. And then wash his hands of the guilt. He was a practical man. He couldn't change the world. He was beginning to learn that.

As a result of this commitment to industry, there had been no opportunity to find a tailor and John Vallender had not considered the matter till the day they were due to ride over to White Hall.

"You'll need something good to wear, James. It may surprise you, but islanders dress to the height of fashion."

They were taking breakfast in the big dining room. It was light and airy and they always ate there, though the space was designed to accommodate a large gathering.

"It doesn't surprise me, Uncle. On the day I arrived I was taken aback by the clothes I saw in Kingston. The climate is all wrong for such fashions and fabrics. Simpler garb would be more suitable."

"Garb. Our minds are of one on this, at least," replied Vallender. "Still, we cannot completely ignore local standards. You can borrow an outfit of mine to change into. The fit will do well enough. And next week you shall visit my tailor."

"If you don't mind me wearing your good clothes."

"I don't mind in the least. You will have little choice of cut and even less of colour. We will certainly be the dullest men there. Smart but dull."

And so they rode over to the Hakes at White Hall.

James realized what his uncle had meant about Wiseman's being a modest place. A long driveway led to the big plantation house. White Hall was indeed painted white and a wide balcony ran along the whole facade. If the house was anything to go by, the Hakes must be richer by far than his uncle. There was a scale to Caribbean wealth, clearly.

That wealth in no way filtered down to the well-being of the slaves though. White Hall might be a richer estate than Wiseman's, but its slaves fared worse, if James's first glimpse of the tattered negros in the fields were a guide. Mr Vallender might lack a good heart, but he had a good head which told him to maintain all his possessions - including slaves. Fred Hake appeared to have no heart and not much head. As they trotted along the drive and past one pair of trudging slaves, James eyes leapt to the unhealed scars and wheals on their backs.

"You will have to see this place when the processing season comes, James. It makes ours seem a small concern." Vallender showed no sign of noticing the trudging slaves. They were less to him than the grass or a stray leaf blowing under Cossack's hoof.

James hid his expression from his uncle. The image of those scars would not easily be erased from his mind. "Yes. I can see this is a bigger concern."

They trotted on in silence. Near the steps to the house, another slave appeared and took their mounts. "A good wiping down for the horses, Gloves." Mr Vallender tossed the man a couple of coins, a gesture which surprised James.

"What fists that fellow has," James observed as they climbed the steps to the house. "I suppose that accounts for his name."

"It does. By the way, did you notice I gave him a small renumeration?"

"Yes."

"Always worth offering to anyone who cares for the horses, same as in England. They may be slaves, but no one debars them from making a bit here and there."

"I'll remember that," replied James dryly.

The ornate front door opened, and they were shown in to a hallway which made that of Wiseman's look pokey. A thin, fair woman was standing at the foot of a curving staircase and raucous laughter thundered from a room beyond.

"That you, Vallender?" The man who appeared from the room immediately affected James in a way which he could not define, but the effect was visceral. His eyes were bottle green and his hair lank and black. In stature he was not especially short, but besides James and his uncle, he seemed to be. Those bottle green eyes travelled all over James before he offered, "Vallender, this is like encountering yourself long ago. You've brought a ghost with you."

His accent was unfamiliar to James. Not a Gloucestershire gent. Not a gent at all, James was pretty sure. He senses something in me which he doesn't like, James's thoughts ran on. It's just like with my uncle, the moment we met. They both know I won't fit here.

"My sister Alexandrine's boy, James Mace, born after I left England."

Hake extended his hand. "Welcome to White Hall. This is my wife, Cissy."

Cissy Hake's lips twitched into a nervous smile.

"Ma'am."

"Let's not hang about in the hall, young Mace," rasped Hake. "Come and meet the company. Come on Cissy."

Fred Hake led them into the interior room where the gathering wasn't as great as James had expected, given the noise they were generating. As John Vallender had indicated, many were dressed to the height of English fashion. Cissy Hake, for all her shrinking manner, wore a gown embroidered in bright silks. She didn't outshine her husband, though, his coat was patterned with elegant spots. More pleasing, to James's sensibilities, was Tom Eland with his red face, yellow-brown hair and bright blue eyes. His clothes were quiet and he would not have looked out of place at a local party in Gloucestershire.

James mingled with the guests, trying to spin out his small talk. For today at least he could resort to answering questions about his voyage and recent events in England. News of England animated all the guests, though some of them had left decades earlier.

"Got a bit of a military look about you boy," one elderly planter commented, after John Vallender had made an introduction then drifted away to join Cissy Hake.

Images kaleidoscoped before James: splattered blood blinding his eyes and a frantic effort to scrub them clear; gore on his white cross-belts which belied the free movement of his body, and the confused realization, seconds later, that a truncated corpse close by accounted for the blood. "I was an infantryman..."

"Left arm doesn't quite do what you want it to. I noticed." The old man chuckled at his own observation skills. "Legacy of your soldiering days?"

"Yes." He was sensitive about his weakness, but it didn't seem to matter so much amongst old soldiers, for James had guessed the background of the aging planter. "I suppose you came here after the Civil War, Sir?"

"Hah! No fool are you? You're right indeed. Fought on the wrong side, fined and imprisoned. And when they let me out I took ship and sought my fortune elsewhere. Never looked back."

A flash of primrose silk caught James's eye, but the new comer moved among a young group near to an open window then disappeared.

"You would find your home very changed, Sir. A settled country now, looking to the future."

"Oh, no doubt, no doubt. But I chose my home. You'll feel the same fifty years from now."

God help me, was James's reaction, but he only answered with a smile. He was content to continue conversing with Captain Denman, whose reminiscences of the Civil War were pithy and evoked scenes James had heard of from his grandfather. He would have liked to know how Edgehill felt from the perspective of a man who fought on the other side, but Fred Hake announced that dinner was on its way and their discussion was cut off. James's duty was to accompany in a plump girl who spoke with such a strong Creole accent that it required all his concentration to decode what she said. As she took her seat he glanced at the sun blazing through the window and counted the hours till it would set and he could escape back to the relative peace of Wiseman's.

The meal dragged on. James listened, or pretended to listen, to the talk of his neighbours seated either side of him, and sipped his drink. And he thought about the work he could be pressing on with back at the plantation. His ears pricked up though, when he caught a remark from Fred Hake on the other side of the table.

"Would you believe that some of these religious maniacs actually believe that the blacks are human like us, with souls to be converted."

A roar of laughter went up from the group involved in the conversation. "They'll be trying to convert my chickens next!"

More laughter.

James heart began to beat harder. He was new in Jamaica, a guest in Hake's house, but words bubbled to his lips involuntarily. "And are they not the same, inside I mean, as us?"

Silence. Deafening silence. All conversation lapsed. Everyone's eye was upon him.

"Well Vallender, this is a surprise. Have you imported a Trojan horse among us?" Fred Hake's tone was more amused than angry. "Five minutes here, Mace, and you're for overthrowing our ways."

A split second to consider, then James replied, "Some of them." His uncle's face was a storm cloud and out of consideration for Vallender's standing among these people, he smiled to soften his words. The smile fooled no one.

"You don't understand what uncivilized barbarians these men are, Mace. I couldn't leave Denise safely on our plantation for one night," Ralls nodded to his wife further down the table, "without keeping the savages strictly in their place. A beating is what they understand - and the threat of worse."

"You're too easy on 'em Ralls," someone muttered. "A whipping then put honey on the wounds to attract stinging insects. That's the way to deal with 'em."

James's mood had turned suddenly reckless. "I can't argue with you, Mr Ralls. You have many years of experience and I am a new comer. But if the slaves were on their own shores in Africa they would be no danger to Mrs Ralls, or anyone else here. Instead they could wreak havoc among their own people. Are we not creating our own problems in Jamaica?"

Angry voices cut him off at that point and the mood among his fellow guests threatened to become ugly. Without planning to, he'd had his say, but it was time to shut up. By the scowl on his uncle's face, it was clear that Vallender wished he'd never started.

"Yes, well," resumed Hake, in a changed voice. "like I said, there are some religious - types - who hold strange views about the darkies..."

Yet the day was memorable for James in a totally positive and unexpected way: he enjoyed his first taste of pineapple. He'd heard mention of the pineapple back home; Geoff had eaten it on a visit to Gloucester, his father had seen one, James had observed stone representations embellishing gate posts. But this was his own first acquaintance with heaven. It was a moment to savour as the sweet juices ran down his chin and he snatched for his napkin.

When the meal ended Cissy Hake rose like a shadow and the women filed off. James's eyes detected a swish of primrose from the other end of the table, but he was pouring himself a brandy and did not turn. Moments later someone lightly brushed his shoulder, though there was ample space between himself and the wall. His sub-conscious mind divined that it had been a primrose-clad body which touched him. His eyes swivelled to the door as the women passed through it, but the last figures were retreating from sight.

With the women gone voices became instantly louder, though they had not been quiet before, and the men eased themselves in their chairs. Top buttons of breaches were undone and the really serious drinking began. A new beverage was produced, one James had heard mention of from his uncle but not been offered, rum.

"Time to cut your teeth on the real stuff," barked Fred Hake when James hesitated. "Forget that French swill."

James accepted a glass and took a healthy swig. The spirit had a fiery heat which he didn't need in the tropics, and an aromatic essence which didn't appeal to him on top of everything else he had drunk. "Prefer the French swill."

"You'll have to get used to this in the West Indies, young Vallender."

James smiled. "Mace."

"Ah, I keep forgetting."

James put his fingers over the top of the glass when another hand moved to fill it. "As I said, the French swill is good enough for me." He could feel his uncle's gaze on him from the other side of the table, though Vallender's eyes expressed nothing. James kept his hand over the glass, smiling evenly.

Hake held the bottle poised till the moment tipped when he recognized James wasn't going to budge. He crooked an eyebrow. "Well I know when there's no gain saying a man. French swill it is. Dennis bring the French swill."

A rumble of laughter passed among those sitting close enough to have witnessed the little stand-off. James sipped his brandy and glanced uneasily down the table. Only Vallender and Tom Eland, seated slightly isolated from the others, were watching with any sign of interest. Eland's was a permanently smiling face and it occurred to James to consider what, just at this moment, lay behind the smile. Wonder who I'd most trust between you and Hake? That question popped into James mind without reason. His eyes wandered between Eland and Hake and back again. Eland's smile widened a fraction, then he looked away.

The drink flowed. James refilled his glass an inch, sipped, joined in here and there with the conversation where he felt inclined. Fred Hake sloshed away glass after glass of rum, his eyes looking glassier and greener all the time. Tom Eland's eyes also seemed to shine more brilliantly as the afternoon wore on and his face grew ruddier. James was wondering if rejoining the women was not the social formula for Jamaica, when without warning Fred Hake rose and announced that it was about time they did precisely that.

"Better see what the women are about, while we can still walk," cackled Hake. "Ralls, can you stand?"

"Just watch me," slurred Ralls. He hauled his big, hefty figure out of the chair, lost his balance and all but fell back into the seat.

Laughter accompanied this, and the guests began variously to walk or stagger to the door.

Cissy Hake's eyes jittered nervously over them as they entered a large room on the east side of the house, where the women were gathered. James met her glance and out of politeness moved to his hostess's side.

"This is a splendid house, Mrs Hake. Was it built to your own specifications? I confess I didn't expect anything so grand."

If James had hoped to flatter Mrs Hake with the question, he succeeded only in flustering her. "The house wasn't here when we came, I mean when we left Tadcaster. That is, part of it was here. The old kitchens were here. They still are, the shell of them. The rest is gone."

He nodded and tried to untangle that jumble. "When did you come to Jamaica?"

"Twenty-five years ago, now. Longer. A long time."

James knew that it took a strong constitution to last that long in Jamaica. Cissy must be hardier than she looked. His eyes travelled to Fred who was leering at a slave girl bearing yet more drinks. Fred looked tough as the dried crocodile which James had seen at an apothecary's shop in London. "Your son will have a fine concern to take over." He wished he hadn't approached Cissy. Small talk with her was difficult and he would have preferred to listen to Captain Denman again.

"We don't have any children. That is, we had six. They are all in the graveyard."

"Oh..." Well that squared with what James had heard of family life in the tropics. Many marriages left no living issue, such was the mortality rate. "I'm sorry. I thought I had seen your son. Dennis looks very like your husband."

"That would be Fred's nephew." For once her words were decisive. Hard. Crisp. "I hope you visit us often, James. Excuse me while I attend to the other guests." Ghost like, she slipped away.

Strange woman, thought James. She seems nervous of the very air she breathes. He watched till she disappeared among a cluster of women by the long windows. Neither his uncle nor Tom Eland were to be seen, but Captain Denman had withstood the drinking and heat. He waved a sinewy hand and approached.

"Not my idea of fun, these drinking parties. Wouldn't have lasted as long as I have, if they were!" The old man laughed brightly. "And you did well to avoid the rum."

"It tastes like devilish stuff to me."

"Devilish. That's the word. You made Hake pull up short. Think he hoped to mould you into another follower, like that nephew of his. On a short acquaintance I could have told him he was wrong." Captain Denman cackled and, as if to himself, he murmured, "I knew Hake had got it wrong."

James and his uncle rode home without attending the evening gathering. "We have a great deal to attend to and although Ashendon is a good overseer, I never like to leave the plantation for long. Besides, I can only listen to so much twaddle."

James laughed freely, an unusual thing for him. He had wondered if Vallender would be incensed by the airing of views critical of slavery and Jamaican culture, but he had nothing to say about events at White Hall. That was a surprise. When James probed the issue, Vallender shrugged his shoulders.

"You spoke up against slavery, not me. You showed yourself to be wet behind the ears, not me. If Hake and company take umbrage it will be with you, not me. You will have to learn to carry your own responsibility, moral and otherwise."

"I have no wish to shirk that."

"Good."

"You often say that you don't liking leaving the plantation, yet you have an overseer. Is he not to be trusted?"

"One never knows what the overseer may get up to. He too needs to be overseen. I have prospered by endless vigilance."

It sounded like a penance. Until drink doused his fires, Roderick had been a vigilant farmer -but not endlessly vigilant. He'd had his carefree moments. "Does Ashendon need overseeing?"

"I'm disappointed in you asking a question like that James: everyone needs overseeing."

"Will you have me overseen?"

Vallender considered him for a moment. "Not where money's concerned, boy, no, you're solid there. But you might need watching in other ways." He spoke without emphasis, but the point was well made.

They rode on together in silence a while. Now that the social entertainment was done a contentment seeped through James. No more rattling chatter with empty vessels, no more disjointed talk with Cissy Hake. He hoped it would be possible to avoid White Hall and the Hakes in future. Colonel Denman was an exception though. He hoped to see more of him. "Your friends surprised me."

Vallender took a moment to answer. "Friends? What friends?"

"...The ones we just met. Hake and company."

"You misunderstand me, James. I have no friends, certainly not Fred Hake or his rake-hell nephew. I run a business. I live in a difficult and dangerous landscape; sometimes I need the help of my own kind, of which Hake is one. That does not make him my friend."

James was on the wrong foot, once again. "Tom Eland with the smiling face, then. By the way you were talking I assume that he is your friend."

"Ah, Tom. Perhaps he is my friend. If I had to choose an hour's company, it would certainly be his and not Hake's."

"Ralls?"

"Last man on earth I'd share space with. Can't ignore him though. Wiseman's would fit in to his Green Acres plantation twice over."

They rode on. All around birds chittered in the thick undergrowth. Back home in the Cotswolds it was an entirely different sound. There, James was so used to the tuneful song of a thrush or robin that it often passed unnoticed as he went about his familiar work. Here the clamouring chorus commanded his attention. He wondered if a time would ever come when these cries and booms and squeaks would fade into the background of his mind.

"The dark sinks very fast here, Uncle."

"That was part of the reason we left smartly. We are armed, but better to avoid trouble than to defend against it. Even minor wounds turn foul very quickly in this heat."

"There are a lot of run-away slaves?"

"Yes. Whole encampments in the interior. I'm surprised Denman didn't try to rope you into the militia at once."

James smiled broadly and Vallender laughed, a short, dry laugh. "He's quick off the mark still. And you're for helping the militia, I can see it in your face."

"I would be, but this arm still troubles me. There was damage to the nerves, not just flesh and bone. When I am tired it becomes very disobedient. They could find better men than me."

"Denman must be persuasive. I feared you'd be inclined to help run-aways, not chase them."

James couldn't mistake a jarring note in his uncle's voice. "Chasing run-aways isn't the whole purpose of the militia. Denman talked of other threats."

"The French, the Spanish. One never knows. As I've said, the island needs young men like you. Men with drive and something more than an appetite for sensual indulgence."

A memory, very vivid suddenly kindled in James, and for a split second, he was kissing Kassandra in a wood near his home. He smelt bluebells as if they and not a tangle of exotic undergrowth surrounded him. He felt her body, willowy and firm, pressed against him and his breathing tightened urgently, just as it had on that evening in spring seventeen hundred.

Almost as if his uncle divined something of his thoughts he asked, "You never have told me why you really made the decision to come here. It interests me to know what persuaded you."

The dusk of a May evening in Gloucestershire transmuted suddenly into the brilliance of a Jamaican sunset. If James's face had not already been ruddy from the heat, he would have flushed. "It was hard to settle."

They rode on a few paces before Vallender turned his eyes on him. "That was all?"

"Yes."

Vallender indicated left. "Our turning. I confess that I'm pleased to be back on our own land before full darkness. We were a little late leaving White Hall. I met a man in Spanish Town a year or two ago," he continued, "by the name of Castor."

James yawned. He was tired and had drunk too much and the name sounded no more than vaguely familiar. "Yes?"

"Under his educated voice I recognized a western burr and told him that I was myself a Gloucestershire man, born at Stow On The Wold."

James grasped where the conversation was going.

"We talked for rather a long time. It turned out he knew you. He was at your engagement party."

The engagement... Cogs turned. Bristol. Slave ships. Anthony Castor. James had not spoken to him, but Castor had been at the party. James's over-heated body warmed another degree. "And?"

"And nothing. But naturally I am curious. I could not help wondering if you are, in reality, a married man escaping from a grave mistake or else a jilted one escaping grave disappointment."

Abruptly James answered, "I am neither." Which was true, as far as it went. James's nerves tightened. He couldn't bear it that Vallender should know, or think he knew, about Kassandra. But nor could he bring himself to offer an explanation.

Friendly lights were glowing from the plantation house. A welcome sight. Only the crunching of the horses' hooves and chittering of night creatures broke the silence between them now. Neither uncle nor nephew were talkative by habit, and they'd said what they had to say during the ride home. Both were looking forward to a quiet brandy in their own company.

"I ordered a cold, light supper for tonight."

"I will wash first."

"By all means."

A slave loped out from the side of the house and reached for Cossack and Koko's bridles.

"Good rub down for both of them, Lucky."

"Yes Sir."

Vallender sighed, as they entered the hallway and flung his hat on the couch. "Good to be home. No more social drivel for at least a few days."

Unintentionally echoing his uncle, James also drew a sigh of satisfaction. Could it be that he was settling down at Wiseman's?

Chapter Seven

It was another week or two into his new life when James paused to consider for the first time what had driven his uncle's own upheaval to the tropics, long ago. He had clearly done well, more than well, but he had not returned home with a fortune, nor did he live in opulence like many of his fellow planters. It was hard to guess what motivated him, beyond the acquisition of more wealth for its own sake.

"Why don't I go home?" echoed Vallender, when James put the question. "Wiseman's is my home. I created it. What does Stow on the Wold hold for me now? Alexandrine is dead. I have a cousin, Wilfrid, in Broadwell, but I confess that I have no urge to return to Gloucestershire to talk old times with cousin Wilfrid. You are here. Why would I go back to Gloucestershire?"

"But is it not an empty life? You say the other planters are not your friends, except perhaps Eland. You must have had friends in Stow."

"I was a young man and yes I had friends. But that stage of life is past. I am not chiefly looking for friends now. Occasionally when the weather is intolerably hot I long for the cool banks of the Windrush or the Dikler; but I never long for a winter on top of the Cotswolds. Let us leave aside my motives though. I am more concerned with yours. I did not intend for you to assume the role of slave when I invited you here. You do not need to be in the fields at six with the gang. Your role is to oversee the overseer and learn the sugar-making process, not to dig the trenches for the plants."

James smiled and drank his coffee, strong and aromatic and stimulating after the early start. Physical endeavour sedated his restless spirits and brightened his mood. It wasn't just that he enjoyed hard work, he needed it. At the breakfast table, now, in this moment, he felt content. "I intend to be back in the fields as soon as I've eaten and drunk my fill."

Vallender watched him evenly. "Be careful of your energies, James. At your age they feel infinite, but this is an unforgiving climate. You cannot drive Wiseman's on to success by yourself. It requires the efforts of many hands. You would not believe the generations of men I have seen come here only to wilt and die."

James finished his coffee. "I thank you for the care." He was all the more grateful because the care was unexpected. He smiled. "But now I must go. Work awaits."

Out in the fields the great gang were reassembling after their less hearty breakfast. Ashendon was shouting at a slave and cracking a whip in his direction, but when James appeared he hesitated. It was difficult for James to know exactly where to pitch his authority. He'd given orders all his life both at Hill House and in the army, so leadership came easily to him. But Ashendon had been the overseer for ten years, and however much James might like to up-date the regime at Wiseman's, he couldn't pretend to know what the long-term ramifications of his intervention might be. Sowing the seeds of a mutiny wasn't his aim. Slavery was wrong: he'd always known it in his head, and now after a brief practical acquaintance, he knew with his heart, and with his gut too; but he couldn't just overturn the system. Incremental change was required. It would take years to shift public perception and stir the planters from their selfishness. A slave shambled past hitting an ass which could plainly move no faster and James roared at him to stop. The entire human race needed regenerating. That was the trouble. He watched the startled slave continue on his way, monitoring the man's husbandry of the animal, and ready to intervene again if necessary.

Among the great gang was a very tall, strong slave. Nehemiah was his name. James had heard it called by Ashendon and Vallender, with whom he seemed to be something of a favourite. But it was clear the other slaves thought well of him too. Nehemiah's expression was calm. His eyes, when they were not focussed on putting the sugar cuttings into the long trenches, had the look of a watchful observer, one who took in everything.

There was no real purpose in engaging him in conversation, but James wanted to know something of this distinctive slave. "Nehemiah."

The slave straightened up. "Master?"

"What do you think of our soil?" James crumbled a handful and let it fall to the ground. "Do you think we condition it enough?" Sugar cane was a hungry crop that stripped the land of its nutrients. It needed extensive manuring to replenish the goodness. "Can we hope for years more good harvests?"

Nehemiah took the opportunity to rest a second from his toil. The question, the appeal to his opinion may have come as a surprise to him, but his expression did not change, "Many years more? Perhaps not, Sir. Mr Vallender husbands the soil, but the drain upon it is strong. The first men to these islands had the best of it."

James grunted agreement. Jamaica must have been a paradise to the first men who farmed the land.

Ashendon was watching from the distance, while pretending to be intent on the slaves. James was aware of it from the corner of his eye. For his next words he dropped his voice. "How long have you been here?"

Now Nehemiah did display surprise. "In Jamaica? Six years. On your uncle's estate, five years."

"Which estate did you come from?"

The inflection in Nehemiah's voice changed imperceptibly. "My first plantation was the White Hall estate." A brief sentence, but it carried a depth of feeling.

Conscious of Ashendon's attention, James nodded dismissal to the slave and turned away, but not before he had murmured, "We will talk again."

Learning the whole sugar process from beginning to end was James's intention and the best way to do that was to be part of that process. He hung his jacket on a tree and took up a mattock. There was a brief lull in which everyone thirstily drank and wiped sweat and dirt from their eyes. All the slaves were watching, and even Ashendon forgot himself and allowed the break. James took his first swing at the ground. And another. And another. It was satisfying to feel his muscles flex, better still to feel the ground giving way to his strength. He could have done with bullocky work like this when he'd come home from the war. A remedy for disappointment. An outlet for frustration. A target for suppressed spleen. He would have liked to sling a punch at Geoff, but it hadn't been possible. Nothing to stop him smashing a trench into the ground now though.

He was used to hard physical work, but he wasn't used to enduring it in this heat. A tiny smile curling up the corners of Ashendon's lips told James, during a pause to tie his hair out of his eyes, that the overseer didn't expect him to last long. Similar looks were on the faces of some of the slaves. Others showed no interest. But James wanted to explore the physical endurance required for the work. In just a few weeks on the island, he had become aware that the death rate for the slaves was very high, hence the dependency on the slave ships buying up new stock in Africa. It wasn't as high at Wiseman's as at White Hall, his uncle had told him, but it was too high and the survival rate of children born to slave women was poor. He couldn't put an end to slavery, but he could possibly persuade his uncle that it was in his own interest to reduce the workload and up the rations. Possibly...

Ashendon called the return to work and everyone flexed their limbs and took last gulps of water. James sweated on with his labours till the need to replenish his own fluids forced him to stop. Unlike the slaves he could pause as long as he liked. Without haste, he moved to Nehemiah's side.

"Before Jamaica, Nehemiah, where did you live then?"

Nehemiah toiled on. "I am of the Akan tribe." He kept to his task but glanced to meet James's eye. "And I was captured by a people called the Assante." A spasm passed through the calm mask of his face. "A slave market was my destination. And the white men. Then a long march to the coast. Far, far; days of walking, and finally, the fort beside the sea."

James peeked at Ashendon. "And the sea journey?"

The slave's expression became glazed. "To recall it is to open an old wound, Master." Nehemiah attacked the earth as if he had his own demons to contend with.

Ashendon's fingers were twitchy on the whip, from the corner of his eye James could see it. It was unfair to lay up trouble for Nehemiah with the overseer. He could personally issue orders to Ashendon to treat individual slaves in a better manner, but he couldn't guarantee that such orders were heeded, and he couldn't be everywhere at once to check.

Again he murmured, "We'll talk some other time," and vigorously resumed his own activity, as if he had thoughts for nothing else.

There was no company for supper and James was glad of it, as he sat down opposite his uncle after cleaning away the grime of the day. They always ate in the large dining room which occupied the entire floorplan on the left side of the hall. The room and the table were far too big for the pair of them, but Vallender had been used to eating alone there for years. Shadows lurked in every corner that evening and James found himself longing for the brisk footstep of Dizzy, or the clumsy clanging of his servant Dan thumping down a tray. His house servants at Hill House were all contented. They knew their place far too well to cause contention and Roderick rewarded them with comfortable lodgings which they couldn't expect to find elsewhere and a standard of fairness which they knew to be unobtainable. No servant ever exchanged work at Hill House for a situation elsewhere. The joke was that they only left to go to take up a plot in the graveyard.

The indoor slaves at Wiseman's, though privileged compared to their brethren in the fields, had none of the freedoms of Dan, Gwen, Dizzy or Jethro back home. They could make no plans of their own, their destinies were out of their hands. If Vallender chose to sell them, they could be separated from friends and kin. What hopes and fears lay behind their expressionless faces, James wondered?

Dolores came in with a dish of fruit and just as silently left.

James took a draught of wine. "How long has Dolores been here?"

Vallender looked out into the darkness. "Nearly as long as I have. She worked for a man called Adams over on the Ballinode plantation. I paid a lot for her. It's essential to choose house servants carefully."

"I believe you." When no explanation was offered James said, "But can you explain why?"

Vallender took a spoon of vegetables. "For a man with an active mind, that is a dull question, James." They exchanged smiles. "Think. Who has a better opportunity to murder their master than the house slaves? They handle our food. Their business takes them into every corner of the house and although they do not have access to us at Wiseman's during the night, they have certainly found me asleep in a chair by day many a time. No slave has a better opportunity to kill us than the house servants, and for that reason I have always made it my business to win their loyalty. I couldn't rest safely in my bed for a single night if I was unsure of my house servants."

So that was it. "You don't trust them too far, or else their sleeping arrangements would be different."

Rough shacks housed the field hands near the sugar works, but the house slaves were accommodated indoors, at the back of the house, above the kitchens. Just one door connected their quarters to the house and Vallender himself personally locked it when he retired to bed. After that time the slaves had no access to the main house. It was a far cry from Hill House, where the servants slept in a corridor adjacent to the family's night quarters. James's servants had the opportunity to murder him every night of the year, if they chose. He smiled.

"Humour should be shared, James."

"What? Oh... I was only recalling the arrangements back home."

"More pork?" Mr Vallender's hand hovered over the dish. They served themselves when there was no company.

"Thank you, no. I have eaten well."

"Not considering the work you have done."

"I've already said, Uncle, that I want to learn everything I can about the sugar business." Some of the skills would translate to other work, if he found the life unbearable and moved on to Chesapeake or elsewhere on the mainland of New England. Impossible to tell his uncle that, and not much better to tell him that he wanted to explore the life of the slaves from their perspective, that he might ease their condition. So he added nothing.

Mr Vallender replaced the lid on the pork. There was no extravagance at this table, no wasted food. James had observed that his uncle made no attempt to compete with his neighbours in hospitality.

"Brandy?"

"Thank you."

"I commend your energies, though I am unsure that they will produce anything except a weakened constitution."

"Then similar activities will weaken the constitution of the slaves too and you will need to purchase yet more."

Vallender swivelled his eyes to regard him. "Many of the white men you see here worked with tireless energy when they first set out to make their fortunes - including me." His voice was harsh. "You are not the first man to try."

"I didn't suppose myself to be."

Vallender sipped his brandy. All his movements were careful. Everything was measured. James wondered if he had ever been the victim of impulse, if this iron discipline was the product of lessons expensively learnt. He recalled his own compulsion to exchange the fields of Hill House for military life. And he recalled the unimaginable outcome it had brought. Perhaps over time he would react by becoming as controlled as Vallender.

"I do not criticize you for being a man of conscience, nor for your hard work, James, but I urge you to consider that you have entered a world where the values are rather different to those you left at home. It is not a world you will change. Do not break yourself trying."

"Did you make any efforts to change it, in a small way?"

Vallender gently swilled his brandy round the glass savouring the vapour it gave off. "I saw no reason to. The Africans I purchased here were enslaved by their own race before ever they left their land. I created no slave. I merely purchased them. They have not come from a land of milk and honey: you forget that. Always you forget that. And where I could, I used indentured white labour. It is no longer possible, so I don't. That's all there is to it. The government tries to make us employ a certain ratio of white labour and fine us if we don't, but in practice white labour is so hard to come by that it's easier to just pay the fine. Only my smith, Robertson, and distiller, Medoc, are white, so I'm one of those planters who contributes to what is basically a form of revenue."

Outside, the shrubbery was stirring, the wind swirling. A change of weather was in the air. All the downstairs windows had shutters inside and outside. It wasn't only a matter of security: this house would be blasted by hurricanes in a bad wet season.

"It has been a strange season this year," commented Mr Vallender. "Normally the storms would have been more active. You do not experience Jamaica in a typical year." His voice was conciliatory.

James listened to the rustling of leaves and vines and rather enjoyed the sound. He was tired, and it heightened the sense of comfort within the shadowy dining room. "I have a lot to learn," he admitted, "about Jamaica and mankind. That is something which I must take into account." Quietly he finished his brandy. "And now, if you will excuse me, I would like to retire. It has been a hard day."

Vallender raised his glass. "Make tomorrow an easier one. We are to have company, remember. Tom Eland is even bringing a couple of his slaves who play the fiddle proficiently. We will enjoy an hour or two of dancing."

Dancing. At Wiseman's. James hid his astonishment and retired.

He sponged himself in cold water again, to make his night more comfortable, and lay down with a sigh of satisfaction. Sleep claimed him almost at once, but the mental doubts and battles which troubled him by day did not relent at night, they only pursued him in a more painful form. No sooner had the shadowy outlines of the windows and balcony blurred into nothingness, than a deeper level of his mind conjured up a dream of home. A leafy track running towards Ebrington was the scene of his dream and along it, in a state of what felt like imperishable content, he wandered with Kassandra. It was no imaginary location, but one which they had rambled together on an unseasonably mild November morning when he was seventeen or eighteen. In the dream the hedges were foaming with wild roses and lush greenery. He and Kas didn't speak much, but their fingers linked often. At a fork in the track he cut left and strolled a while before reaching for her fingers again, to find they weren't there. In surprise he turned and realized that at the fork she had gone right. She was not far ahead, he could catch her up. But though he hurried his step and then broke into a run, and though she only glided without haste, the distance between them never closed. Sweat poured off him and he called her name. She peeped over her shoulder but continued, at her serene pace, to mysteriously elude him.

Chapter Eight

James woke next morning feeling tired and unsettled. The dream had been strangely clear, vividly bright in both its pain and pleasures. James reclined on his pillow in a beam of dawn sunlight, allowing memories of that November day to replay in his mind. They had perched on a gate looking down at Paxford, he recalled. Just a fragment of their conversation floated back to him: "Father was married off to my mother because she had a little money; but then my uncle died and father became heir to Honeywells..." James had not tried to kiss Kassandra. The whole future had been theirs; there had seemed no urgency to grasp at it.

He swung his legs over the side of the bed and drew a deep, dissatisfied breath. Hard work had enabled him to push Kassandra from his thoughts by day, but on a deeper level he realized that his wound was unhealed. Hard work was good. It always produced results. But other ingredients were needed to heal a lacerated heart. Fun, perhaps. Why did the prospect of fun hold so little attraction? Thoughtfully he splashed himself with water, dressed and went out to the fields.

He made a conscious decision to heed his uncle's advice and restrict his activities that day. It was common courtesy to pay some respect to Vallender's wishes and council, and he did not want to be yawning his head off at the dance, however little enthusiasm he felt for it. He worked steadily till breakfast, which he took with Vallender at greater leisure than usual and did not go back into the fields after eating at mid-day.

Visiting a tailor in Kingston or Spanish Town was a task he had still not got around to and once again he had to borrow clothes. James wondered if he would still be wearing cast-offs when he left Jamaica. The black silk suit and frilly shirt suited him well, but it was harder to find a suitable pair of dancing pumps among his uncle's long-disused stock. It amazed James that Vallender possessed any at all. Eventually Dolores unearthed a pair, long out of fashion, from an old chest and James put the touches to his attire and went down stairs looking forward to when he could escape and come back up. By an association of ideas, he yawned.

"Exhausted? But the entertainment has not even begun!"

At the bottom of the stairs a small and dainty figure stood. He did not recognize the pretty face which was looking up at him, but her primrose gown stirred a memory. No colour could have highlighted more perfectly the coffee colour of the girl's skin or her black hair and dark, dark eyes. She knew it too, this was not the same gown he had momentarily spotted at Hakes, it was a sheeny evening affair made up in the same hues.

James hesitated, smiled then continued his way down. "I didn't know I was overlooked. Excuse me."

Tom Eland stepped out of the dining room. "James, not sure if you've met my wife Pernel."

James gave a small bow.

"Pernel, this is Vallender's nephew, James Mace. You've heard Vallender talk of him."

The girl, who James judged to be not far into her twenties smiled, showing a row of white even teeth. "It is a pleasure to meet you."

Eland put a hand on his wife's shoulder and it flashed through James's mind to wonder how this dowdy, aging man had acquired such an exotic catch.

"The pleasure is mine," James replied. "I mistook you for a single man," he continued, dragging his glance from Pernel to Tom momentarily.

Pernel's eyes flickered up to take in James through her curly eyelashes and he sensed a ripple of interest. At that moment his uncle's voice called from the dining room, "Found her Tom?"

"Didn't have to look far." Eland smiled confidentially and led them into the dining room.

"Ah, so Pernel flushed you out of your lair, James. You were introduced at Hake's when you first arrived?"

James tugged his eyes from Pernel. "No, indeed. Very many people were present, we did not meet."

Vallender smiled. "We've saved the best till last then."

There were two or three dozen present, including the Hake clan and Ralls. Many of the cream of the Jamaican planters were among the number, but Vallender, while supplying excellent food, had kept the variety of dishes modest. Alcohol, too, was not flowing in the style of a Bacchic revel. Brandy, madeira and good French wines were to be drunk, but they were brought round at intervals. Some of the company would be dissatisfied, James suspected, but they would not dare voice it.

During dinner James found himself occupied by Cissy Hake who was on his left, but when the meal was over the couples relaxed and some headed out through the long windows onto the terrace. After Cissy had rejoined her husband and James had renewed his acquaintance with Colonel Denmen, he too headed out onto the terrace to enjoy his brandy in peace and to feel the benefit of the night breezes. In the distance white crested waves were visible out at sea. It would be cooler and fresher by the water's edge and he wished himself there.

Such thoughts didn't have long to take hold before an exotic voice surprised him. "James Mace, am I intruding on your solitude?"

He turned to find the dainty Pernel Eland peeping up through her lashes. Her hair hung in sheeny, crinkled curls, as if a mix of southern European and negro blood had melded flatteringly together a few generations back. A mocking smile tweaked her plump lips.

"Not at all. I was merely taking the air."

"There is enough of that for two."

They took a few paces down the terrace towards a huge shrub whose orange flowers glowed almost luminous in the candlelight from the dining room. Pernel, he noticed, only came up to his chest. She must be at least half a foot shorter than the graceful Kas, but she possessed a pixie charm of her own and he found himself wishing her no higher.

"I saw you, you know James, on that visit to Fred Hake's."

"Yes?"

"I listened when you talked about the slaves and the planters' mistreatment of them."

"If I offended you I can't apologize. I said what I thought."

"No apologies needed. I admired your stance."

"Humph." James took a moody swig of brandy. "My clumsy outburst influenced no one. I spoke like a naïve oaf."

"It influenced one person - me."

He looked down, seeking jest in her eyes.

"You won my admiration before I'd even spoken to you."

They were unexpected words. He considered before answering, "I'd better be careful not to lose it then."

"Not many men would have spoken as you did. It took courage."

"Plenty would have spoken better."

"Most wouldn't have bothered. A few present may even have felt like you, but none would ever speak up and be different."

James shrugged. He felt no capacity to help the slaves beyond minor gestures. More than just good-will was needed. It had occurred to him that if he possessed the endurance to stick it out at Wiseman's till his uncle passed, he could free the whole company. But that would still only amount to a hundred souls or so, a drop in the ocean compared to the thousands already in the West Indies. The prospect of remaining at Wiseman's for a duration which might pile into decades did not appeal. A few years he could manage: earn some money, learn the business, move on. More he couldn't face.

"What about your husband?" he asked. "Does he have no scruples about his slaves?" The question might offend, but James was not interested in diplomacy.

"Scruples? Yes, he has some; Tom is not a bad man. But he would no more free his slaves, than give away his plantation. But Tom is a good man." She repeated the words, either to reassure herself or to impress the idea onto James. Emotion enriched her voice, as if she cared for Eland's reputation.

They paced further down the terrace, moved by a mutual desire to escape the burr of voices issuing from the dining room. Now and again a sharp laugh cut the night air. James thought he could identify the rollicking laugh of Ralls among the others. Strange cackles from night creatures and the sawing and buzzing of insects created an atmosphere so tangible that James felt almost cut off from the party.

"Pernel - you don't mind me calling you that, do you?"

"Not if I can call you James."

"In that case - "

"Mace, the fiddlers are about to warm up!" A strident voice shattered the spell that was weaving around them. "They've cleared the chairs. You're needed for the dance. Pernel, I'm claiming the first, if your old man isn't quick."

James and Pernel spun to find Dennis Hake watching them with a knowing leer which made James's hackles rise. Both Hake men possessed a quality which sparked natural antipathy within him. Hake the younger had the same shiny black hair as his uncle and his eyes were of a similar, unpleasant green hue. The look in those eyes deviated not one fraction from the uncle's: predatory, replete with unpleasant appetites. Nothing noble or good hid inside Dennis Hake's nature, James guessed, and Hake himself wasn't ashamed of it.

"We will rejoin the company presently." James spoke as if something more significant than a family dance was at issue.

Hake eyed the tall figure at Pernel's side. James's good-looks had always tended towards prettiness, but Hake perceived the substance within. He was aware, too, that James was ex-infantry. Without intending to, he withdrew a step. "I'll be after that dance, Pernel." He smiled suggestively and disappeared back into the house.

James and Pernel looked awkwardly at each other. The spell between them was broken. "We had better rejoin the others."

"Go ahead of me," said James. "I'll follow after an interval."

With a swish of primrose skirts she nipped away. At the doors she hesitated and threw him a challenging smile. In the fading light her pearly teeth created a brief dazzle of whiteness. Then she was gone.

Thoughts, stirrings, awakenings... As James sipped the last of his brandy, all were germinating inside him. An hour or two earlier he had been bored by the prospect of the entertainment, now he wanted to get back to it.

He didn't completely admit to himself why he launched into the dancing with such enthusiasm. No woman present was left out. He danced with Cissy Hake, Captain Denman's tall grand-daughter Kerstin, Mrs Beckford, the blousy Denise Ralls, everyone. John Vallender determinedly danced with no one, except Denise Ralls who hauled him onto the floor twice. Vallender watched his nephew with mounting surprise as the night wore on, but James was enjoying himself too much to be bothered with what anyone else was about.

James of course danced with Pernel Eland, though he was careful not to single her out for special attention. But it was with her that the night achieved its fizziest highs of enjoyment.

Sleep was a million miles away when he lay down on his pillow, in the early hours of next morning. He was still awake when the sun rose against the smudgy pinks and lemons of the dawn sky.

Chapter Nine

Vallender raised an eyebrow when James proposed taking himself off to Kingston to order new clothes. Such a trip was overdue as shoes and boots which fitted were a necessity, not an extra, but the interest in clothes was a new development.

"I'll do better than sending you in with Asher, I'll come myself. The man who fits me is in Kingston. But you would have a wider choice in Spanish Town."

"It's not necessary, Sir. I have a fancy to see Kingston. If you direct me to the man who dresses you, I know I'll have good service."

"You'll obtain even better service if I make the introduction personally. I don't believe in delegating. That's why I've kept a tight hold on Wiseman's and not left it to overseers and accountants."

James laughed cheerfully. "I'm only to be measured for broadcloth. The worst that can happen is I'll be over charged, or the fabric will be second rate."

"We don't want even that."

James had secretly been looking forward to riding in by himself, with a couple of pistols at his side just in case. At the recent entertainment he had learnt that Tom Eland kept a town house and he had planned to ride up the road, not with the purpose of calling, but merely to see it. Kingston was newly developing after the destruction of Port Royal a few years earlier and he was interested to see what was going on there. But he couldn't tell his uncle that going alone was his preference, so in the event they rode off together, both of them armed in case of encounters with run-away slaves or other lawless men.

Business at the tailor was dispatched first, with Vallender insisting on the order of more items than James had planned. "Can't have you wandering round looking - and smelling - like a slave, James. You need to learn to look the part. Boots and shoes next. And hats. Your good looks won't last long under a tropical sun without appropriate head gear."

James saw the point about wide hats and chose suitable ones for work and leisure.

"We'll try Tom Eland's town house now," Vallender said when all purchases were complete.

James carefully avoided responding with too much enthusiasm.

"Not sure if he's around, but he'll appreciate a call if he is. Planters have to stick together. You'll learn that, James. No, not that way. Turn left up here."

Tom Eland was in his town house, and so was Pernel. Her greeting was gracious but contained and James responded in like fashion. Tom was all for cracking the brandy out, but Vallender asked if they could have coffee, Tom's kitchen having an especially good way with the drink. James seconded his uncle's request, as they had plenty of riding under the hot sun ahead of them.

"Have you pointed out Port Royal to young James?" asked Tom, when the aromatic brew had been brought and duly appreciated.

"Yes."

"My God, what a day that was!"

"You're talking of the earth quake?" James sat forward keenly. Word of the disaster had reached even sleepy Gloucestershire, the consensus of opinion being that God had wreaked vengeance on a den of wickedness. "Were you there, Sir?"

"No, thanks be to God. We were in Spanish Town, but we felt the quake and saw the bodies floating in the bay when we rode over to view the aftermath. The stink was unbearable."

James considered that. "Do you never fear another quake?"

Tom shrugged. "Early death can pounce anywhere." He smiled. "I'm a Somerset man. One day I shall buy land near Ditcheat and build, young James. For now I trust that earth quakes miss me."

James caught Pernel's eye. So that was Eland's plan, complete his fortune then enjoy it back in Somerset. But Eland couldn't be a day under fifty - probably more. And surely he already had enough money to live well. What kind of estate did he hope to live in, a royal one?

"One day a star shall appear at Ditcheat such as the world has never seen!" laughed Pernel.

"Bit of a faded old star, Eland, eh?"

"I hope your plans come to fruition," offered James politely.

"Thank you. Now if you're finished with your coffee you might wish to see the garden."

It flashed through James's mind that viewing a garden was something he would have enjoyed with Kas who was enchanted by flowers and seasoned in raising herbs and vegetables. But he pushed the thought away. She was gone. That was over. No profit in dwelling on lost times. "I'd like to."

"Good. I like to show off our garden." It was Pernel who spoke. Her eyes were glinting.

"You enjoy gardening?"

"I have the ideas and the garden boy gardens."

"Don't let her talk about you like that, Eland."

Pernel's eyes crinkled into a smile. "The garden boy gardens, but Tom likes to get his hands dirty too. You should see him out there tugging up weeds as if he has nothing else in the world to occupy him and no one to do his work!"

Eland smiled. "Follow me. You will be surprised by this, young Mace."

They passed through a modest room. Unlike Fred Hake's residence there were no signs of opulence, instead it felt comfortable and homely - qualities lacking at Wiseman's.

"Our slaves live at the top of the house." Pernel explained, though James had not enquired. "We have three floors, of course."

"Do you? High, if there were an earth quake."

"I am assured it is very well built, should there be another disaster like the Port Royal inferno twelve years ago," said Eland. "And we sit on solid land here. Port Royal was nothing much but a sandy island. A disaster waiting to happen. Well, what do you think?"

The garden provided a pleasing prospect. Flowering trees and bushes had been trained skilfully and stone paths laid out enticingly. Some of the flowers gave off a perfume which challenged the smells of town. Slowly James paced off along a narrow path followed by Pernel, while Tom and his uncle took a wider one. More could be done at Wiseman's, James realized, to achieve a pleasing view from the main windows. A passion for gardens wasn't needed to appreciate scent and colour. Light fingers touched his shoulder. They were briefly out of sight. He glanced down and found her eyes fixed on him enquiringly.

"Back home, James, do you have a garden?"

Not the question he had expected. "Certainly. I grow potatoes, cabbages..."

Pernel's laughter was tinkling and bright. "You have no beautiful outside space then? I have heard so much about English gardens. Colonel Denman still regrets his!"

"Colonel Denman comes from a Devonshire valley. I live on top of a hill in Gloucestershire and a lot of plants wouldn't survive our exposed winters. But my kitchen garden is attractive in summer, to me at least, and we have lavender in the court before the house and honeysuckle growing over the privy behind."

"You're making fun!"

"Only in my tone. I'm painting a true picture of Hill House."

"Hill House, I like that name. It sounds like a place with stormy skies above and secrets within."

"The stormy skies wouldn't let you down."

"Is it a big house?"

"Large."

"Presided over by your father still."

By association, James imagined the scent of brandy. "...Yes."

"A farmer and a gentleman."

"He is."

"James, we'd best be on our way." Vallender's voice was close at hand among the shrubbery. "You know I like to be home well before the sun starts to set."

James maintained eye contact with Pernel. "I'm coming, Uncle."

"Pernel?" Tom's voice this time.

She spun away and disappeared among the bushes towards Tom's call. She was arm in arm with him when James emerged from the shrubs, and nothing in her demeanour suggested that she had thoughts for anyone but her husband. James would have lingered and accepted the meal which was offered, but Vallender was all for moving on. The foursome parted on the front steps with banter and promises to meet again soon.

"I like that house," pronounced James, when they rode off for home. "Have you never thought of living in town?"

"Not I. There was next to nothing at Kingston when I was first here. My attention is devoted to Wiseman's. It doesn't do to leave the overseers in charge for long. I've told you that before."

James smiled. "I know, and it explains why you have made such a good concern of Wiseman's."

"Now that you are here in Jamaica, I have a man who, in time, can discharge business for me beyond the boundaries of Wiseman's. It will be invaluable."

James digested this. "I get the feeling that you are not talking of discharging business in Kingston."

"Nor even in the West Indies. I am thinking of the colonies in New England."

Pleasure was James's reaction, pleasure accompanied by excitement. "Certainly I would like to go!"

"Thought you might! But you need to learn the ropes first." Vallender's eyes turned to the fading sky and he urged Cossack forward. "The light is failing. We need to press on home."

Chapter Ten

James didn't sleep well that night, but it was a pleasant sleeplessness, nothing like the condensed misery he had endured at Hill House in the months after returning home. This time he felt energised and he knew that tomorrow he would rise full of strength and focus for the tasks ahead.

At dawn he went down and found the house still locked up and his uncle a bed. That was unusual. Vallender hadn't become the success he was by lying in bed in the mornings, as he frequently reminded James. James liked the silence and stillness. It reminded him of mornings in summer back home, when sometimes he used to rise with the sun to be at work before even the servants were stirring. He unfastened the front door and went outside.

Around the corner was the terrace and he headed there, to the place where he had talked and laughed with Pernel a few days before. From here he could detect sounds of activity behind the house where slaves were chopping sticks and drawing water from a well. They at least were up and preparing for the day ahead. James had never been into the yard. There was no reason for him to go there. But today some magnet drew him. Dolores was pumping water. On the kitchen step sat a girl James had never seen, slender and very lovely. He wondered what her place was in the hierarchy of slaves. The girl was laughing with Dolores and did not see James's approach, but when she did spy him she reacted like a startled deer, springing to her feet and vanishing into the house on long legs. He looked across to Dolores, but she only pumped the water with greater vigour. Puzzled by the little scene he had just witnessed, or caused, James returned to the house.

"Early today James." Vallender was descending the stairs, sprucely dressed and ready for the new day.

"I couldn't sleep."

"Not coming down with something, are you?" Real concern darkened Vallender's voice, concern which reminded James what a precarious and precious commodity health was in the West Indies.

"I've never felt better. I am just off to the fields."

Vallender's lip curled a fraction. "Remember your hat. Wouldn't want those good looks fried up by the sun."

"I came back for precisely that." With a self-conscious smile James plucked a hat from the couch where it had been flung the previous evening. "That tall kitchen slave with the pretty face," he added, turning abruptly back on the step, "who is she?"

Vallender's face had never looked emptier. "Tall?"

"Yes. I just wandered round to the kitchen yard and noticed her there."

"...Oh, that must be Dot. An excellent cook. No point in wasting her on dusting and sweeping."

James stood fingering his hat, expecting more, but Vallender turned into his study and closed the door.

James worked mindlessly that morning, giving no thought to the task he was performing. He glanced up once to find Ashendon watching him speculatively, as if he sensed some change of mood. James had never suspected Ashendon of possessing subtle perceptions, but on reflection decided that an overseer in charge of a hundred slaves needed the ability to read people. I mustn't under estimate him, he thought. Someone else who wasn't to be under estimated was Nehemiah.

"You in a good mood today, Mr James."

James pushed his hat back and rubbed his left arm. It was aching today and seemed to have lost some of its ready movement. "Perhaps this hat is cheering me."

Nehemiah grinned. "I get me a new hat Mr James, if it makes me smile like you."

James straightened up and took a drink. He was in no hurry. It interested him to watch the massive muscles of his companion flexing and contracting in pursuit of the work. "Your passage across the ocean to Jamaica, Nehemiah. You never did tell me about it. What happened?"

Now Nehemiah drank too. His eyes wandered to Ashendon who was watching them both. "You want to know, Mr James?" He finally said. "It was like being parboiled in Hell then washed in a latrine. Packed in close together we were, so the air was dead to breathe. And chained in our own filth. The stink was like nothing you ever smelt." Nehemiah's eyes were remote, lost in the anguish of those times. "Where was I going? I didn't know. And I couldn't talk to the slaves around me because they spoke in other tongues. If they knew anything they could not share it with me. The masters on the ships were white, and what they meant to do with me I did not know. But it was a horrible fate. I was sure of that. Sometimes I thought it would be better to die in the sea, like the sick and troublesome who were thrown there, but I was not brave enough for death, Mr James. I feared going down and down into the water. And I feared the great fish who swim there. I wanted to live."

"And you did."

"Many didn't. But I was one who was alive when we reached land. And then at least we were washed in the sea; given some better food; made ready, I realized afterwards, for the slave market. A new Hell had begun, but it was not so bad as the Hell on board that ship. Nothing could be." There was finality in Nehemiah's voice.

James wiped his brow, plumped his hat back on his head and silently resumed work.

When he returned to the house for breakfast Vallender was in his study talking to a stranger.

"Come in here, James. This is Fletcher from the militia."

"Hello Fletcher."

"There is a move afoot to flush out some of the run-aways from dense forest in the interior. I have explained that we will not be swelling the militia's numbers. I am needed here, and you are already full of lead."

Involuntarily James rubbed his arm. He was grateful and surprised that his uncle was obstructing Fletcher's hopes of roping in extra men. Vallender's motives for keeping him from the manhunt would be selfish, but James was glad of the helping hand. "That is how it is. My soldiering days are over, Fletcher, or else I would be in Marlborough's army still."

Fletcher looked him up and down, but James maintained secure eye contact, though a worm of embarrassment budded in him. His injuries weren't a lie: they caused pain and would become unbearable during long marches and the discomfort of camp, but they would not prevent him from undertaking short actions any more than they stopped him being a farmer. This just happened to be action of a type he had no taste for. Let the run-away slaves go free, unless they began to aggressively encroach.

He thought for a moment that Fletcher was going to become demanding, but in the end, he only turned on his heel and said, "For now then," and stalked out.

James and his uncle exchanged a long glance till the footsteps disappeared and the front door banged shut.

"Let us hope we do not see him again." Vallender's voice was calm and bland. "Come, let's eat."

A deputation turned up next day. James had suspected that they would. And this time he agreed to join the venture. 'Maroons' or run-aways had been coming down out of the hills above Kingston and attacking settlements. His uncle's own plantation, while in no way near their path, was not far from Kingston and while he had no will to protect the institution of slavery as such, nor did he wish to wake up one night with the roof burning over his head and his uncle murdered. Eland's plantation was close to the trouble and that also influenced him. Pernel could be affected...

"You know my convictions on slavery. I don't believe that human flesh should be bought and - "

"Never mind all that now!" It was the voice of Dennis Hake who cut in. He had led the group which turned up at Wiseman's seeking extra support for the militia. "It's the flesh of your own people which is at stake. Only last Thursday the Exeter plantation was raided and burned. Men killed, women carried off. Animals stolen. You name it. But I suppose you see all that as just retribution!" Hake's voice was rising angrily.

James wasn't imaginative by nature, but the images which flashed through his mind were disturbing enough. "Have the women been recovered?"

The timberous bass of Ralls broke in, "No and they're never likely to be if everyone feels like you."

James looked at his uncle. Vallender's expression was wooden, but James guessed by a tension in his stance that he was not pleased to have this deputation on his porch.

"I will catch you up in town. It'll be necessary for me to gather a few necessities."

"We're waiting here. You're a soldier - or were; you're used to decamping suddenly. Get your stuff now."

"He's used to being shot too. I hope there is a concerted scheme to this, Hake."

"We're going to destroy some of their out-lying settlements at the very least, force them higher up into the hills. We'll try to take captives and make 'em squeal about the whereabouts of the women. You can't argue with that Vallender." Hake's voice reverberated with incredulity that Vallender had interjected at all.

No arguments against that existed; Vallender turned back into the house, as if he had said his bit. James followed, changed his clothes and gathered a roll of provisions which he assumed were likely to be needed in the next few days.

James had often wondered at the wisdom behind military decisions when he was a regular infantry man, and his extra years and experience made him instantly critical of this domestic raid. From the very start he perceived the rashness which drove the mission. There appeared to be no long-term strategy and constant bickering even about short-term tactics. He couldn't stand the company he was in and did his best to avoid it, in as much as it was possible to evade company on such an enterprise.

Disorder of any kind was anathema to him, and he possessed zero sympathy with the slaves raiding plantations and helping themselves to people and animals. Nothing wholesome led down that route; but nor did he wish to be instrumental in bringing those slaves to a gruesome end, if they were caught. He'd happily shoot them to recover the women. That was as far as his goals went. If all the slaves on the island became free men able to sell their labour for a market price, many of the troubles which beset Jamaica would dry up, that was his view. James glanced at the men riding ahead of him. Blasting a few escaped slaves would represent nothing more than a bit of sport to them, he suspected; torturing a few more would alleviate their boredom for a week or two. He allowed his horse to walk even more slowly.

At Kingston their party swelled and now at last he had Tom Eland for company. Eland's Athelney plantation was close to the maroon's raiding zone, and his interest in the venture was understandable.

Horseback was not suitable for where they were going. They reached the fringes of where the trees and vines became too thick for anything but movement on two legs. There a camp had to be made to maintain the animals. James put himself forward as one of the men for that job, but he was told that his professional experience as a soldier made him invaluable. It was complete nonsense, he knew, as he had never fought in these conditions, but for some reason they all wanted him in the main party, so there he would have to stay. He shrugged and acquiesced.

They tried to move quietly and in small groups, but the difficulty of the terrain obstructed this. Every branch seemed to be clutched by vines and hacking through was a task made harder by the swarms of black ants that climbed over the leaves and dropped into their hair, mouths and eyes. It was exhausting work. He wondered how the original white settlers, coming to a land tangled with trees and vines, had ever found the energies to carve out plantations at all; their tools had been inadequate, their clothing unsuitable and their bodies unaccustomed to the frightening new range of tropical diseases, but they had triumphed. He had heard tell of how they had lived in caves or the crudest of shacks during the early years, sleeping in hammocks strung with tarred ropes to deter insects from swarming over them. As for flying insects, the settlers could do nothing much about them, except to light smoky fires close by. Hard men. And hard men beget hardness. It was not difficult to perceive the influences which had forged the culture.

James had been advancing among a small group including Tom Eland, but in such conditions it was difficult for the men to remain cohesive. The advance of the groups was no longer synchronised too; James could hear blades hacking at vines far behind. He was not sure if he himself was veering away east in the strangling undergrowth, but once when he paused for breath, he realized that all the man-made noises had become fainter. He listened intently. The ticks and rustles of the forest sounded louder now. To look about was hopeless; as well to look about if he had been sealed in a coffin. This particular isolation unsettled him. Marching towards an enemy identifiable by uniforms and colours was one thing - even if they might blow him to bits at any second; being alone amid crowding undergrowth, where an invisible presence might be inches away felt different. He did not suppose that the maroons would deal kindly with any stragglers who were picked off - in their shoes he wouldn't. By listening intently, he could just pick out the swishing of vines and undergrowth being cleared somewhere to his right. It would have been comforting to believe in the good sense of the men advancing with him, but most were unknown quantities and he already recognized Hake and Ralls as irrational hotheads.

Hotheads was the precise word flitting through the verbal nerve centres of his mind, when a sudden report, dulled by the undergrowth, rang out. His body experienced a shock which experience made instantly, terrifyingly, recognizable, and he fell to the ground clutching his shoulder. Blood oozed through his fingers as he clapped a hand to the injury. His mind suddenly turned over in super-quick time: to call out for help or not to call; which direction had the shot come from? He tried to grip his own weapon and gritted his teeth against the pain. Noises, movements, crashed in his direction. His companions had located the general direction of the shot. Discipline was ruptured, voices were raised now.

Tom Eland appeared first. That made sense. At the last head count, he'd been one of the closest. Fletcher appeared next, looking cross and bewildered. His confusion deepened a degree or two when he saw James on the ground nursing his wound.

"How did you do that man?" he demanded, as if it were possible for James to have shot himself.

"You tell me." James clenched his teeth.

Other voices were calling now and the noise of men wading through the undergrowth became louder.

"Over here," called Fletcher. He stooped to look at the wound. "That will need attention. Even minor wounds can mortify rapidly in this heat and damp. How in God's name did it happen?"

Tom Eland was watching James closely. "I will go back with Mace."

"How did it happen?" repeated Fletcher shortly.

The world was swimming before James's eyes, but he took deep breaths. Other members of the party were struggling through to them now, red faced and sweating. Ralls's queer, fawn-coloured eyes alighted on him. Ralls looked startled. Dennis Hake, coming just behind, appeared almost amused.

"Been shooting yourself Mace? Nobody like an infantry man to be careless round a gun."

James continued to breathe deeply. He struggled to get to his feet. Eland steadied him.

"Couldn't have shot himself from that angle!" snapped Fletcher, whose thoughts had finally caught up with reality. "There are maroons close by. Mace, you will have to leave us."

Everyone was quiet now.

"I'll help him back." Eland's west county drawl should have been reassuring at a time like this. He applied a make-shift bandage to James's shoulder. "Come on. Have a drink. You'll be thirsty with all that blood loss." Eland examined a red splash which was already on his own clothes.

"Take Linwell and Alverton too. We do not want to risk being picked off in dribs." Fletcher sounded frustrated and angry.

James was too dizzy to offer resistance or contribute to the plans for his evacuation. But he was glad not to be helped away by just one man. An unnerving thought had sprouted during the moments when he was lying on the ground alone. What if it was not a stray maroon who had made an opportunistic attack on him? What if one of his own party had taken advantage of the dense, anonymous cover, and pulled the trigger?

Chapter Eleven

The ride back to Kingston felt worse than long. His injury was not severe; some flesh had been lost but there was no damage to the bone. However, he'd bled, and in the hot, de-hydrating conditions of the ride his strength had evaporated. They stopped off at a shack - Eland called it a cottage - belonging to a man called Brendan who supplied them with extra water, but James was struggling when they reached Kingston. He was all for recuperating at the Monkey Tavern, where he would be safe from possible conspiracy, if not from incompetent handling, but Tom Eland insisted on instating him in a spare room at his own house. A doctor lived at the end of the street, which added extra recommendation to the plan.

Pernel was home when James and Eland staggered through the door, accompanied by the doctor who'd already been rustled up. Her dark eyes opened wide when she saw his blood-soaked shirt and she darted away to summon boiling water from the kitchen and clean towels.

Dr Bregawn was able to extract the musket ball. He cleaned the injury dressed it and promised to return next morning. "I am hopeful that the wound will heal cleanly, but it is never a certain process. You are lucky it lodged in the flesh at the top of your arm. If the bone had been involved it would have been a more complicated job. Any sign of a fever, call me at once."

Pernel glanced anxiously at James. "Certainly we will."

Eland went downstairs with the doctor, leaving James alone with Pernel. He stared up from the pillow wordlessly.

"I hoped to see you again; I have to admit. But I did not have these circumstances in mind..." Her voice was soft. She approached and perched on the end of the bed.

"I hoped to see you, too."

Her eyes flickered over the crisp white sheet which covered his body. "You get shot, always you get shot, James. Blenheim, Jamaica, it is all the same. I believe that even if you stayed peacefully at Mill House you would get shot."

James laughed and winced. "Hill House. You make is sound like I attract gunfire. But I had no wish to go chasing maroons. First I tried to refuse outright, then I put myself forward to look after the horses. I've a horrible feeling someone really wanted me there in the line of fire."

The shock in her eyes couldn't be faked. "Why should they do that?"

"Jamaica is lawless. I've already noticed. And I've put some backs up."

Pernel's featured crumpled into a deep frown. "No James. Surely not! No one could care that much! Tempers run high here. They might shoot you over a game of cards. But no one would hatch a plan because of a war of words."

What she said made sense. "Perhaps you're right..." His voice trailed away.

Pernel rose and went to the door, but there she dithered. No one was on the landing or stairs. She returned silently, and this time tentatively sat down closer. And he knew instinctively what she wanted him to do. He put his left hand on her shoulder and pulled her lightly down. Their lips met. It was not a long kiss or a passionate one. They were both too wary for that, and James, at least, hadn't got the energy, but it was a kiss that had been in their imaginations since that first evening on the terrace at Wiseman's.

"Sometime James," she whispered, when she had gently eased herself away, "sometime when Tom is stuck at a council meeting or out at the plantation, you must visit me here. I will get word to you."

They kissed again, briefly, and this time the kiss sealed a promise.

Chapter Twelve

"Shot again." Vallender was standing by James's bedside next day. "I have ridden into town directly to check that the message concerning your mishap was not overly optimistic."

"You like to check everything for yourself," grinned James. "But in this case, you could have saved yourself the effort. Tom's message was accurate; I believe I will survive." James was confident of it after enjoying a peaceful night with no ominous sign of fevers.

"You seem prone to misfortune."

"I didn't go out looking for this one, as you know."

"That is true." Vallender was silent a moment. "I imagine you will be all eagerness to ride home and get into the fields again." This said with an oblique smile.

James could not see the smile because Vallender was turned away from him and took the statement at face value. "Hmm - no. Dr Bregawn insists I rest here. Doesn't want the wound pulling open on the ride home."

Pernel who was seated by the washstand modestly dropped her eyes.

"And as it's my right arm I wouldn't be much use to you anyway."

"Happy to nurse your injuries... this is a new you James. I must go up the forest and get shot. Perhaps I will come away a more tranquil man."

Pernel laughed. "James is just listening to sense."

"That's a new development."

"Is there any news from Fletcher?"

"Not that I've heard. Rather than chasing the run-aways round the hills, I would have thought it better sense to tighten security in the plantations which are most likely to be attacked. A few well-organized men can discourage a rabble. I always said indentured workers should be treated better in these islands. There would have been plenty of the poorer sort of white settler, then. No need for all these negroes. We've created our own threat by relying on slaves. Society's all lop-sided. Too late now." Vallender rose from his seat. "Well, if you are really on the way to recovery, I shall leave you. I will use this trip to town to discharge a little business." He took up his elegant grey hat from the chair. "Make sure he doesn't try hurrying back to Wiseman's too soon, Pernel."

"I will be sure to do that." Pernel's voice was at its most honeyed.

"James."

"Goodbye, Sir."

Vallender left them. When they heard his shoes clicking on the wooden floorboards of the hall below, James reached forward with his good arm and Pernel darted across the room into his embrace.

Perfect health had never been less welcome to James than on the day when he rode back to Wiseman's. Encouraged by Pernel, he'd drawn out his convalescence as long as plausibly possible. But Tom would soon be back from his plantation to which he'd retreated for a couple of days, and it was as well not to be in Kingston looking a picture of virile health when he did.

Pernel was concerned about Eland, James could see that. She was manifestly excited to fizzing point about his own arrival in her life, but she still felt anxious to preserve the stability of her relationship with Tom. It caused him to wonder momentarily how Kas's feelings might have divided, when he reappeared after her marriage. But he didn't want to spoil his present happiness probing the past and severed the thought abruptly.

"How did you come to marry Tom?" He had been lying in bed when he asked the question and Pernel was sitting on a basketwork chair near to the door, which she had left wide open to discourage suspicion should any slave come up and hear their voices.

She narrowed her eyes, as if she needed to focus her mind very carefully to summon up the past, though it was not distantly over. "The time before I married Tom is a time to be forgotten." She fell silent.

Her reluctance to explain reminded him of Nehemiah's wish to forget the crossing of the Atlantic. The desire to forget was something James could understand. He had no wish to blether about the time when he had considered Kas to be his, or the explosion of that dream. But curiosity drove him on. "When did you marry Tom?" he continued gently.

She made a show of tucking in a trailing corner of the sheet before answering abruptly. "Four years ago. He was nearly fifty, but he was kind. And his kindness never varies." She smiled briefly.

"And you have had no children?"

"...I slipped a child once at five months and was ill for a time afterwards. Perhaps some mischief was done; I never conceived again."

"A blessing. You will not be dragged down by endless births."

She crinkled an eyebrow. "It's not without blessings. That is true."

James reached forward with his good arm, took her hand and pulled her to him. Her arms were instantly round him and her plump lips sought his. He closed his eyes, relishing the texture of those lips, the warmth of her body. The moment was sweet, till, unexpectedly, she pulled away and backed towards the door. James blinked surprise and followed her movements with his eyes, supposing that loyalty to her kind old husband was controlling her. But after peeping onto the landing she softly closed the door, and he realized with a leaping thrill that there were primary forces which loyalty could not out trump.

So perfect health was not so welcome a boon, when James swung up into the saddle and began his journey back to Wiseman's. Pernel's little face was watching from behind a curtain and she gave him a tiny wave as he moved on up the street. New sensations stirred James's soul as he trotted home. He wanted to gallop along the track, so alive were his senses, but galloping wasn't what his horse needed in the heat, even after a week in the stables at the Monkey Tavern, and his own healing wound might not be the better for it, so he contained his exuberance.

Irrational guilt was not entirely absent from his soul. He had considered himself bound to Kas so early in life that the sensation had become part of his being. It wasn't something which had dissolved simply by the act of Geoff claiming her. An effort of will was needed to ignore the old emotional ties, but he was making the effort of will.

Lucky came loping out from the direction of the stables before he reached the house. "Master be pleased to see you, Mr James. Everyone been talking about your accident."

"I'm none the worse, Lucky. Is the Master in?"

"Yes, Sir, he is."

James handed over Koko's reins and went into the house. As always, he was struck by its unexpected coolness. There was a swish of skirts as someone disappeared smartly into the service wing at the back of the house. The study door stood wide open and Vallender was making a show of sifting through letters, though James had a feeling that he really had no attention for them.

"I recognise that tread. James, it's good to see you looking so fit. No after effects?"

"No. The wound stayed clean - thank God."

"Thank God indeed."

"All's well that ends well."

"So they say. You certainly look remarkably well on it. There is a brightness which was lacking when you left here with Hake's rabble. Getting shot has its compensations."

"There are pleasanter routes to a bright countenance."

Vallender rang the bell and Micah appeared. "An early lunch, Micah. Cold stuff. Let Dolores know."

Micah withdrew silently.

They talked inconsequentially about the Elands' hospitality for a few moments before Vallender declared, "The cutting of the cane begins shortly, as you know. There won't be much time for anything else then. It'll be all hands to the deck. Full time activity."

It seemed to James that the slaves' lives were already brim-full enough of other men's activity. "I'll be ready."

Vallender tilted his head. "No doubt. For now, no more frantic work. You may be tough as old leather, but Bregawn told me that you lost a lot of blood." He held a hand up as James made to argue. "No. For the next week you can look over the book work with me and take some leisure."

James was a grown man, but he knew when it was no good arguing and anyway, for once, he didn't feel like arguing. He hoped that during the next week Pernel would come over to Wiseman's, and the prospect of that would cheer any blank time.

"So did you capture some of the run-aways?" Vallender handed a dish of vegetables across the table.

"Two captured, four shot and an outlying settlement burnt. That was the extent of our success." Eland's voice was flat.

"The women were not recovered?"

"No. They'll have been carted deep into the maroons' territory. Heaven knows where. It would take a full-scale operation to make an impression. London needs to send us a regiment and supplies. A few militiamen and casual well-wishers won't do it. We've clipped their wings and pushed them back a bit. That was the extent of the success."

"They couldn't squeeze any information out of the captives, about the women I mean?"

"Nothing useful."

Vallender made a noise of regret. Pernel was seated demurely opposite James. He was careful to offer her only the normal level of polite social attention, nothing that would arouse suspicion in either Vallender or Eland. But this meal was a pleasure to him. Gone was the dreariness of nothing much to look forward to. His mind was teeming with excuses to visit Kingston and snatch time with her.

"Still I am sorry for the women," resumed Vallender. "God help them."

"Ralls and Hake were for pushing on, but Fletcher felt that they could achieve no more than they already had, with supplies running out. It's ghastly territory. At one point they found it easier to wade up a stream rather than keep hacking their way forward. And even there, rocks barred their way and vines strangled them up. They were all bitten to pieces by insects and sucked by leeches." Eland's voice sounded uncharacteristically drained and colourless.

"What about the captured maroons?" enquired James. "Will they be questioned again before they are hung?" He guiltily avoided all eye contact with Eland.

"They are in a lock-up. I do not know what will be done with them. Fletcher considered it wise to keep their treatment as private as possible. It's not impossible that word will reach the maroons about their fate, and that could influence their treatment of white captives."

Distaste rippled through the features of both James and his uncle.

Eland continued "For that reason I imagine they will be quietly hung, rather than used as an example. Some of the party were for burning them."

James couldn't suppress an expression of horror.

Tom's eyes were on Pernel now. "What they have done richly deserves severe punishment, but perhaps not that severe."

Pernel's voice was agitated, and her expression strained. "Perhaps it's time for Somerset, Tom?"

"A year or two more, my dear, just a year or two." He reached across and touched the back of her hand.

James thought he heard a suppressed sigh from Pernel, wondered what it signified. Did she want to leave the Caribbean, or was she relieved, for now, to be staying? He liked to hope it was the latter, but he'd been so utterly wrong in his assumptions about Kassandra that assurance didn't come readily now. No possibility of making long term plans this time. So much the better. The long term wasn't what interested him - this time. Pleasure was the moment.

Chapter Thirteen

It was the dry season. Time to cut the cane. All the planting and hoeing and manuring had been leading to this. Now the full-on cycle of labour reached its boiling point. Out in the fields at six, the great gang began their exhausting toil. And James was among them, learning the sugar business from the bottom, as he termed it.

Ironically, the season arrived just when he would have appreciated some time for Pernel. He could have done with this relentless cycle a few months earlier when he had nothing to occupy his leisure hours but bitter reflections on the past. In this season Vallender would be instantly suspicious if he developed an uncharacteristic penchant for riding to Kingston. Too bad. He had to get on with what came to hand.

The crushing of the canes was a dangerous process, he learnt that quickly. Great rollers devoured the canes as they were played into them, and they would just as easily devour a limb if a stray finger got drawn in.

"Care's needed," Ashendon barked over the noise of the rollers and the hub-bub. "See that axe? It's to chop off a hand if anyone gets a finger trapped. If we're too slow the whole man will get dragged in and ripped apart."

"My God, has that happened?"

"Not at Wiseman's, not in my time. Happened over at the Ralls plantation though a couple of years back. But I've had to use the axe twice." He grinned. "I'm quick. Saved both men. Nice clean amputations too."

James made a face and visibly slowed down.

"Skill is to go fast but keep your fingers clear." Ashendon gave him a look and turned away after a final, cautionary glance in the direction of the axe.

"I take over that job," said Nehemiah who had been hovering close by. "I'm quick."

"In a while." James was careful to keep his eye on his work. "You quick with that axe too?"

Nehemiah chuckled.

"Why does the green juice have to be processed so quickly?" James asked, one morning later that week, when the sweat was pouring off him and he felt likely to vaporise. If he'd thought the atmosphere intolerable in the mill, it was as nothing compared to the steamy hellishness of the boiling room.

Vallender himself was on hand to answer. He liked to be around personally at this stage of the proceedings. His expertise had been built up by direct, sweaty experience over a quarter of a century. "It ferments rapidly. That's why we have the boiling rooms so close to the mill. Anything to save time."

James could only watch these stages of the process, but Vallender was hands on, checking the work of his slaves, though these were the most skilled on his plantation.

"The fresh juice goes into the biggest of the boilers, the first one," Vallender called. "Nocco is skimming off the impurities. Then he'll ladle it into the next cauldron."

James looked at the series of cauldrons, each getting smaller. He walked, watching the skilled slaves at work with their ladles. The sugar had boiled to a thick, dark viscous mass by the last cauldron. "I wouldn't like to fall into that."

"Don't. It sticks like glue. We've never had anyone go in, but we've had slaves stumble and get an arm in. They both died of the after effects. Tomba knows exactly the moment to dampen the fire and put the liquid into the cooling cisterns. Good boiler slaves are worth their weight. I give them privileges. You can't make fine sugar without them."

James nodded. A pity they couldn't be given their freedom and paid a market price for their skilled work. But he only said, "I'm melting, Uncle. I need to go outside and drink,"

"Go back to the house. You've been at it for hours. There'll be plenty more boiling for you to watch."

I must be going soft, thought James, as he followed his uncle's advice and walked back to the house. His step was slower than usual going up the stairs, but he came down at least smelling better in clean working clothes. Dolores surprised him in the hall.

"Visitor for you, Mr James. I was about to send Lucky to find you."

At any other time, James would have guessed who his visitor was at once, but he was too hot, tired, and jaded for ideas. "Visitor?"

"You can't get many," Pernel's voice lisped from the small room next to Vallender's study. "Mention of visitors and you're astonished." She stepped into the hall.

Dolores melted back into the service wing and closed the door.

"Pernel!" James's voice was cautious, but a note of elation lifted it. He glanced about quickly. It was never possible to be sure when a slave might be tucked around a corner with a duster, but all was silent. "Is Tom here?" He hoped he wasn't.

"No. Tom has had to ride out to Spanish Town. I have slipped away."

"Alone? The road isn't safe."

"It is full daylight and I am armed." She pointed to a side weapon lying on the table.

"I admire your plu - "

He had no time to tell her what he admired. With her quick movements she was in his arms and her lips silenced him. To Hell with caution; he kissed her back with equal relish while the clock ticked on the wall, marking the moments. It was the striking of the clock which belatedly roused their minds and doused their passions momentarily. Pernel disengaged herself and looked around. The house was silent; a curtain had escaped its loop and all but covered the front window; the inner shutters were still closed over the east window. Only someone peering in determinedly could have seen anything - but nobody had.

"Tom is up to his eyeballs in work at this time and I took my chance and slipped away."

"Still we must take care." They weren't being careful at all, and he knew it.

"I had to see you. Ride to Kingston, James. Come soon! Tell your uncle that you need to see Dr Bregawn, or order new cravats, anything, but come. Tom will not be back till Saturday night."

"I will come Thursday in the afternoon."

"Come after dark. Our garden has a back gate."

"I noticed it."

"It will be unlatched."

"I will be there as soon as the sun sets. I shall tell my uncle I'll be staying at the Monkey Tavern."

"Tell him anything, but be there."

They kissed again with vibrant intensity now that the assignation was made.

"I will ride back with you."

"No, no! It is not necessary. I am a practised pistol shot." She laughed. "I am not joking. Tom insists on making me practise out at the plantation," a shadow passed across her face, "just in case the slaves should rise. Besides, I brought a slave with me. He is in the kitchen now, taking a drink." She went to the table. "There is a package for your uncle. I have brought a shirt embroidered at the neck and cuffs with the Spanish black-work which he likes. It is my excuse for riding here, in case anyone ever asks! It is a weak excuse, I know, but I had to come. Now, till Thursday!"

They kissed again, in the shadows behind the door. The urge to be together was irresistible.

Chapter Fourteen

James did not tell his uncle about the projected trip to Kingston till Thursday arrived. The pretence that his shoulder was troubling him after days of toil seemed moderately convincing. Since seeing Pernel, he'd been careful to rub and flex it in a not too theatrical manner; as he now had two damaged shoulders he hoped he was remembering which one was supposed to be paining him. By allowing a few days to elapse after the delivery of Pernel's gift, he guessed that a connection would not immediately form in Vallender's mind. Fortunately, Vallender was too engulfed in the sugar making drive to have thoughts for much else and he only urged James to take all precautions.

"If I cannot locate Bregawn quickly I may stay at the Monkey Tavern overnight," James replied, as casually as he could. "So I should not be on the road after dark." He thought about Pernel riding out to Wiseman's armed with pistols.

Vallender looked surprised but said nothing more except to issue a superfluous warning against losing at cards in the Tavern.

The ride to Kingston was uneventful and James had no resort to his firearms. In town, to preserve some fragments of pretence, he went through the pantomime of visiting Bregawn and asking him to manipulate the shoulder. Having completed that, he returned to the Monkey Tavern where he had already stabled his horse and ordered water and towels to be taken to his room. Then he lay down and rested till the sun started to set. It dropped suddenly below the horizon in those latitudes. It was something that still took James by surprise. The setting sun would be a great flaming blood orange when at suppertime he turned wearily from the sugar works towards the plantation house; nothing of its form would be visible by the time he turned on the steps to look back. Only a crimson luminescence would indicate where it had hidden beneath the horizon.

One of the disadvantages of being very tall was that James was also very conspicuous. With his body sponged from head to foot, he waited until the sun was well down before heading for the Eland house. It was not many minutes before he turned into the street onto which their garden opened and tried the door in the wall. Which opened silently at his first touch. A subtle fragrance was upon him and a dark form materialized against the lesser darkness of deep dusk. Next moment Pernel's arms engulfed him.

"I have sent the slaves to rest early. There will be no one around. Stay in the shadow." Her voice was a whisper. She drew the bolt back into place, securing the garden door. "Come." Her hand reached for his.

Subduing laughter, they hurried to the house. Then, after listening for signs of human movement, they sprang softly up the stairs. Pernel guided him into a room overlooking the garden. All shadows and big solid furniture. The night was theirs now. There was no need for haste. But their wait had already felt too long. With unsteady fingers they undressed each other and sank on to the bed.

"Do you have a large family living at Mill House?"

They were nestling together at rest, bodies entwined. Dawn might surprise them. They must be ready. But for now, neither wanted the hours together to end.

"Hill House. No. My father is there and my cousin-in-law and her daughter, who is a child still."

"Where is the cousin?"

"He died on campaign. Not in battle, but of the flux."

"Your mother?"

"Died before I can remember."

"And you are the only fruit of the marriage?"

James stirred. "Yes. Four others were born. Only I came through the lottery of childhood illness."

A tightened quality in James's voice made Pernel break the comfortable reverie which bound them together and she leant up on one elbow. "Do you remember them going?"

"My brothers - barely. I was tiny. But Carolina died when she was thirteen. A fever carried her off in forty-eight hours. Horrible. I was nine then."

James's features were only shadows in the dark, but Pernel scrutinized them. "You must have wondered when it would be your turn."

"What? Oh, maybe. Yes, maybe I wondered that. But I was lucky. I came through. I was ill as a child, fevers, distempers, all of it. But none of them affected me badly."

"Lucky James. You came through when you were soldiering and you came through when you were chasing the maroons. You must have your very own patron saint."

"I don't know that I have one, but in Jamaica I feel that I need one. What about you? You didn't tell me how you came to be married to Tom."

She made a little sound and her body withdrew from him a subtle fraction. Her answer was a long time coming and he had to prompt her to begin. "My start in life was not so fortunate as yours, James. I have a mixture of ancestors, Spanish, French and even Cornish, but there is also slave blood not far back. When I was seventeen my father died leaving me alone with little money and no resources. I took work in a Barbados tavern ran by a man called Blind Dave. You must not think I was a harlot," she rushed on. "My work was honest. I cleaned. I served drink and sometimes I sang. I have a good voice. So did my father." She fell silent.

"Go on."

"Then one night a gang of rowdies came into our tavern. I suspect they may have been one-time buccaneers forced out of their old haunts and ways and trying a new life on a different island. There are still some about though their great days are over."

"Go on."

"They dragged me off James. They carried me through the dark streets down to the wharf and raped me. They meant to steal me off to sea I think, but thought better of it, and left me a bruised mess. Blind Dave who ran the Black Dog Tavern paid a doctor to clean me up and I went back to my work after the bruises had faded. But I never sang again for entertainment."

The sort of uncivilized horror which James hated most... Human nature let lose to indulge its vicious pleasures. He stroked her shoulder softly and they lay together without speaking for some minutes. "Where did Tom come into the picture?" he asked at last.

"He walked into the tavern one evening and asked for a brandy. I never brought drink round the tables anymore but still hid behind the bar serving, and cooked and cleaned up when we had closed our shutters. He talked all evening to me when I wasn't serving, and he had a kindly way which I needed then. It wasn't a kindness which lasted only while he wanted something either. We married three months after that first meeting and he's been good to me ever since."

James gently rubbed the soft flesh at the top of her arm. She'd needed a father, he thought, not a husband, but synchronicity was everything and Tom had arrived at the right time. Lucky Tom, but he might not feel so fortunate if he knew what was happening now. Old men who marry young girls are courting trouble, James told himself, to snuff out any twinges of guilt about cuckolding a kindly soul. But his voice was gentle and even when he asked, "Did you tell Tom what had happened?"

"Yes. He had to know. He had to know what troubled me. And besides, the ruffians left me with a problem to deal with: it ended at five months with a slipped child; do you remember what I told you? Dear Tom, he offered me safety. And practical care; out at the plantation he taught me to shoot. Becoming a pistol shot wasn't all a matter of keeping rebellious slaves at bay, though it provides a convenient excuse."

Her story needed wise words. Eland must have found the right formula. James couldn't think of anything wise, so he just continued stroking her shoulder and gathered her more closely in the crook of his arm. She nestled her cheek against him and they lay together in mutual peace, till dawn birdsong outside reminded them that the night was over.

Chapter Fifteen

Steam was rising from the roof of the boiling house when James rode along the track towards Wiseman's. He took a startled glance at the steaming vapour, then leapt off Koko and called for Lucky.

"The roof! What happened?"

Lucky stroked Koko and glanced to the boiler room casually. "Oh, they been pouring water on it."

"The roof was burning?"

"No Sir. But boiler room got so hot the shingles on roof were about to catch fire." Lucky laughed merrily as if it were great entertainment. He led Koko away, talking all the while to the animal. "You had a good journey, Koko, boy? I give you a rub down..."

Vallender was trudging up the bank from the boiler house. He was scrubbing his face with a square of calico. James went to meet him.

"All well with the doctor?"

"Yes. All well with the boiler house?"

"Yes. Come inside. I'm ravenous." Vallender led the way indoors with no further words until he reappeared in the dining room with washed hands and face.

Dolores placed the dishes in front of them and left without a glance at either man. Vallender was not normally a big eater but James noticed that he ate with a sharp appetite today. Talk was rarely free between them, but today it was non-existent till their plates were clean.

"This is where you will become invaluable to me James. I'm getting too old for this frenetic activity. If you can master all the work of the boiler men it will be a huge weight off me. Leave the sugar work to the boilers, for now, but watch, take in everything they do. It's not a job to be learnt quickly."

"I will try to learn, as you once did."

"I have an excellent chief boiler. None better, but I need to keep my own thumb on the pulse." His napkin slipped to the floor. "An hour's rest James, I need that today, then I will return to the sugar factory."

"I'll go there directly."

Vallender nodded and James listened while his tread, tired for once, disappeared up the stairs. James took a sip of wine. He would go to the sugar factory. He would oversee the work. But for ten minutes he needed to let his mind rove freely over the events of last night and relive his night in Kingston.

It was exhausting work which drained the temper. The heat, the smells, the humidity, the need for caution close to the boiling cauldrons; all of it frayed James. None of these discomforts would pacify the soul of the planters, James reflected, as he wiped the sweat from his eyes for the hundredth time. Since his immersion in Jamaican life, he had started to understand some of the influences magnifying human wickedness there. Hake and company were bored men, filling time in a climate which discouraged much ordinary activity. The West Indies were isolated from the relative civilization of Europe and many of the plantations were isolated from each other. Conditions were ripe for distortions in the human personality to become even more warped. And there were too many men. James couldn't be sure what the ratio of men to women were, but women were thin on the ground and he sensed that that, too, fanned the seeds of violence and aggression.

Everything is out of balance here, he thought, irritably wiping his sweat-doused eyes again. It made no difference how often he dried them, seconds later they were sightless with sweat again. Everything is out of balance here, his thoughts continued, as he flung his sodden handkerchief to the ground and wiped his face instead with a piece of sacking, and it corrupts the planters' souls and blinds them to their own selfish wickedness.

James was young enough to be unaffected by his night without sleep in Pernel's moonlit bedroom but, coming on top of it, the exhausting toil boiling sugar drained him. Supper was a brief meal and Vallender, who had obstinately rejoined the fray in the boiling room after a couple of hours rest, retired to bed early. James relaxed at the long windows reading a book about sugar cultivation in a desultory manner, and sipping brandy. Among the shadows, Pernel's presence felt close in the place where their attraction had first been forged, and it pleased him to linger there rebreathing those moments.

Eventually, reluctantly, he roused himself and went upstairs. But though he tried to sleep and wanted to sleep ahead of all the work which faced him next day, he was too alive with pleasant sensations to do so. Eventually he struck flint and lit tinder. Soon three candles were burning. He looked about, but his book was not on the table or bed. It was not anywhere, he must have forgotten it in the dining room. A few minutes and he could recover it. Silently, he slipped out into the passage. Hard to guess how long he had been lying awake, but it felt about midnight now. He skimmed down the stairs, found the book by the long windows in the dining room, and soon was half way back upstairs. And then a sound slowed him. Laughter, very soft, low laughter, rippled from his uncle's study, from where a subdued light glimmered under the door. The laughter faded away and he wondered if he had imagined it. More deliberately James continued up, wondering if his ears had deceived him. Then a renewed murmur of laughter stopped him again, and this time he was sure that it contained higher as well as lower notes - there were two people in the study. Holding his breath, he listened a moment longer, perplexed, unable to fix it in his scheme of life at Wiseman's. Then, fearing to be discovered and fearing to uncover a secret he would dislike, he tip-toed silently up the stairs and closed his own door.

Chapter Sixteen

There was no let-up in the work; even James, who constitutionally needed physical occupation, looked forward to the end of the dry season. He had little free time or energy to observe his uncle's movements closely. But after that midnight mystery on the stairs he did begin to consider the person who lived behind the handsome, inscrutable façade. 'Knowing' Vallender was clearly difficult, the man himself gave too little away. But there was more to him than first appeared, that much James now guessed.

And then there was the identity of which woman had supplied the gentle laughter from the study. He had noticed Denise Ralls trying to engage Vallender's attention more than once but dismissed her after a brief consideration. For one thing, it was next to impossible that she could have been concealing herself in the house that night. Moreover, she was noisy and it was beyond belief that Vallender held a flame for such a blowsy piece. Not her then. But who? A rather displeasing possibility rose in James's mind: the pretty slave who he had seen in the back yard one morning might be a candidate; she seemed to be kept out of general sight and she'd been lounging on the step as if she had little work to do and no worries about being caught doing none. Whatever else James had thought of Vallender, he had not taken him to be a man who would exploit a slave girl who was young enough to be his daughter. Time to reconsider...

But James wasn't especially interested in his uncle's secrets, he had pleasant ones of his own to hide. During the sugar season Tom Eland was regularly away at his plantation, personally checking on the work, and Pernel found excuses to remain in town. Not too often. Not often enough to create suspicion, but enough to deepen the relationship with James. If Vallender ever wondered at James's professed urges to go drinking in the Monkey Tavern - during the busiest of seasons - he never said so.

"The scar on your neck is very visible in that beam of light. You were lucky, James, that it missed the bone." Pernel was perched in deep shadow on a fancy cupboard by the window. She had put back on her knee-length cotton knickers and bodice. The garments were both embroidered by her own hands and their whiteness contrasted with the deep tones of her flesh. The moonbeams in the room treated James differently. By their light his naked skin appeared almost without colour.

He leant over the bed and picked up his stock and started to tie it over the scar.

"Oh James!" Pernel stifled tinkling laughter. "Attired like that you are a sight for the sorest eyes."

James chuckled, and after a last few moments reclining on the bed, breathing in his pleasure of the night, he reached also for his linen and breeches.

"No, no! I didn't mean for you to dress!"

"Dawn is not too far off." He began, slowly to restore his clothes. "I wish I could think of a more plausible excuse for coming here than visiting the Tavern. My uncle will think I am drifting into my father's ways." He kissed the top of Pernel's head and peeped from the window, taking care to remain masked behind a curtain.

"Poor Roderick. Always you talk of his brandy breath. If you had lost your wife and four of your children, you would probably take to drink."

James checked the buttons on his breeches. Pernel looked delectable and his impulse was to tug them off again, but he had to maintain secrecy, above all for her sake. "I never really thought of that..." Roderick had not been a drinker during James's early childhood and he wasn't sure when it had started, but certainly not before Carolina's death. He frowned. Perhaps there was a link that he had not considered. Young and intolerant, James had just judged his father for an old fool. He stopped fiddling with buttons and his shirt fell open across his torso. Pernel made a little gesture bidding him towards her.

"I have to go." His voice was business like now. He crossed to where she was sitting on the cupboard, intending to give her a perfunctory kiss. But at the last second a gear shifted inside him, and instead he lifted her abruptly so that she looked at him on eye level. Her arms went instantly round his neck and she kissed him. He needed to be leaving soon... It made sense. There was no other reasonable course of action.

Lightly he tossed her on the bed and tugged off his breeches with such vigour that the top button ripped off and pinged across the room.

"You got lines under your eyes, Mr James. You been in one o' them taverns again?"

James jumped as a rat fled out of the cane, just where he was cutting. Both he and Nehemiah burst into laughter made hysterical by tiredness.

"Never mind the bags. They won't get in the way of work."

"I said lines, not bags - Sir."

James began laughing again, and this time he couldn't stop. He laughed and laughed until he felt weak and could laugh no more. Definitely over-tiredness. He realized that. And the economical, dry humour of Nehemiah also had power over him. It reminded him of someone else's humour, though he couldn't think who. When James's laughter had finally exhausted itself, he looked over at Nehemiah who was regarding him with a smile and quizical eyebrows. "I've told you before, call me James, not Mr James or Sir."

"Can't do that, Mr James, might forget and do it when your uncle around. I do it when I'm free."

Peacefully, companionably, they returned to work.

Chapter Seventeen

James was displeased when a week or so later an invitation to the Hake plantation turned up at Wiseman's. His initial reaction was to refuse to come, but Vallender persuaded him to ride along as company. Reluctantly he agreed, and his reluctance deepened when he found none but men present at White Hall. An afternoon of uproar and boozing was not what he'd hoped for. It seemed unimaginable that it was what his uncle wanted either, yet he greeted Hake with an inscrutable smile and sat among the planters who'd already arrived and were swilling rum.

Fred Hake's face was reddened with drink and his bottle-green eyes looked even greener. "Rum, young Mace."

"Madeira please."

"Come, if you're to be a Jamaican - "

"I'm a Gloucestershire man transplanted to Jamaica, not a Jamaican." But he smiled, as an afterthought.

Perhaps the smile disarmed Hake. "As you like. Here, Jago, bring the madeira."

A slave hurried forward. The drink was soon fragrant in James's glass.

"Fine drink, you're right Mace," continued Hake. "Heat doesn't effect it. All the other wines spoil if you keep them long in this climate. Thank God for madeira. Come on. Nearly everyone's here."

And nearly everyone was drunk. As a soldier James had swilled plenty of drink himself, and after the disappointment with Kassandra he'd hardly gone to bed fully sober for two months, but the mood here displeased him. These were men drinking themselves away from civilization towards something far worse than animal. He caught the fear in a slave's eye who carried a platter of food. I won't come here again, thought James, not on anyone's persuasions.

Foremost among those boozing and rousing a rumpus was Dennis Hake. It was as if he was deliberately shedding his self-control, and revelling in it. James sat beside Tom Eland, who though not participating in the revelry, appeared oblivious to it. He was his usual smiling self, though it seemed to James that the smile expressed nothing.

"I trust Mrs Eland is well."

"She is."

James was itching to hear more of Pernel, though it was only days since they had last met. Native caution suppressed the questions bubbling on his tongue. Instead he enquired about the progress of the sugar making at Athelney.

The dishes were all on the table now and the last slave had scuttled out. The men attacked the food with the same gusto which they had indulged when tipping drink down their throats. James calculated how long he would have to endure it all. His uncle was sitting near Hake, inscrutable still, politely eating. James wondered how Vallender could tolerate the society of these men. Ralls was laughing with his mouth wide open as if he had just heard the greatest joke ever told. The whole crew of them jarred on James's nerves. His uncle must be wedded to money to put up with them.

James picked his way through the meal exchanging an aside now and again with Eland, whose attention however was largely hogged by a man sitting on his other side. When the food was eaten the rum truly began to flow, though James was suffered to take brandy. His mood turned from disgust to boredom but at least the clock was running down till he could make an escape. He looked across to his uncle who shook his head, as if reading his intentions. Another hour and I'm going to make my excuses whether it suits you or not, thought James. More of this tedious insanity I won't be able to stand. For a brief moment it flickered through his mind to ride away to Kingston and snatch an hour with Pernel, if she was home, but for her sake he dismissed it. Without moving his head, he peeped at Eland and found to his surprise that Eland's eyes were quietly upon him. With guilty haste James snatched his own glance away and extended his glass towards Ralls, who was waving the brandy flagon with abandon.

To his surprise Dennis Hake sidled off alone, with an unsteady sideways glance at Fred, and five minutes later Ralls followed him with the deliberate care of a drunk. James saw his chance and left too. He would not be heading back to the dining room soon, he decided. Only his uncle cared to have him fit in to Jamaican society; the other planters, whatever else might be said about them, were content to let him be an outsider, if he chose.

He sat down on a low wall and contemplated the view of the sugar works. This life was not for him. It was useless to pretend otherwise. Yet to up and leave his uncle after only a few months was not possible. He accepted that. He owed Vallender something and he owed it to himself to try and squeeze useful knowledge and experience from the venture. But Jamaica was not the place for him and he could never adapt. He didn't even want to adapt, not to this way of life. He had heard it said that life in New England was more civilized. And then there was home... But he couldn't go creeping back to Gloucestershire without having achieved something. He couldn't bear to.

The wall where he had taken a seat was near the stables. Normally his acute ears would have noted the muffled cries issuing from there, but today his mind was in another place. But a sharper squeal did penetrate his thoughts. It was a human cry. He stayed seated but turned to listen. The cries were distressed, there was no doubting it now. Moving quietly, he approached the stable, listened, then stepped stealthily in. It was dark after the sunshine outside, and for a second his eyes discerned only blackness. Then he picked out the form of a negress pinioned by Dennis Hake. Her eyes were wide with fear and Ralls was ripping her clothes from her. The men were too drunk to notice him, but the slave did. At the last second, Hake realized something unexpected was afoot and turned, just in time for James to fell him with a straight right. Ralls let go of the girl with an inarticulate roar. He was not so tall as James, but was broader and heavier. James though, possessed fine balance and co-ordination and the in-born ability to explode a punch straight through its target with full force. A vicious right hook sent Ralls crashing through the rotten wooden partition. Hake's insignificant figure squirmed feebly in the straw, Ralls didn't move. James ignored Hake, seized the slave and dragged her into the daylight. She looked terrified of him too.

"Go," he ordered.

She did, at great speed, and disappeared towards shacks in the distance. James waited till she was safely on her way, then retraced his steps back to the house. Consequences. Now they started crowding in. Not just consequences for him, but the girl too. All very well for him to flatten Hake on his own territory and knock Ralls out - he'd better hope Ralls was all right - but the girl could not just swan off and leave it all behind. Tomorrow, or even later today, things might become a whole lot worse for her because of what he'd done. His uncle's stance was unpredictable too. He wasn't a man to approve assaults on slaves, James felt sure, but nor would do anything to jeopardize his relations with the other planters by standing up for what was right; he was too steeped in cynicism for that.

On the steps, where he hesitated, his indecision suddenly fell away, and he strode into the house. In the dining room Fred Hake was lolling in his chair, laughing like an idiot. Some of the men had gone, James knew not where.

"I'm off, Uncle. I will see you at supper." He turned.

"What? Not yet. We need - "

"Goodbye." He strode out, gestured to a slave and went to the stable to saddle up himself. He wasn't afraid of Dennis Hake. He'd knock him flat again if need be. And Ralls. And anyone else.

At the threshold of the stables he hesitated again to allow his eyes to adjust to the low light within. Hake was pouring water over Ralls but shrank back at James's appearance. Footsteps sounded behind, and James spun with a fist at the ready, but it was only his uncle.

"What are you about?" Vallender's voice was tense and lit by anger. His eyes adjusted, too, and travelled over the bloodied figures of Hake and Ralls. His mind had no difficulty leaping to the truth. "Is this your work?"

James said nothing, and Hake had reasons of his own to stay silent.

"James! I'm talking to you!"

Neither James nor Hake offered an explanation.

Vallender understood the silence. "It was you!"

James rounded on him. "Yes. And so help me God, I'll do the same again if I ever witness such a scene. Don't ask me to play the civilized house guest in this - in this iniquitous hole!"

The eyes of the slave saddling Koko rolled between James and his uncle. James sprang on Koko unaided and trotted off without waiting for Vallender. He had not gone far when the speedier Cossack caught him. Together they rode down the track that wound away towards the main public route. As they rode, James tersely described what had taken place in the stables.

"But you had no right," bit Vallender between clenched teeth. "What the Hake clan do on Hake land is not your affair."

James reined in and stared hard into his uncle's eyes. "Was that how you saw the world in Stow? If someone assaulted his dairy maid on his own land, did you say it was alright?"

"Of course not. But this is not England. You've never grasped that!"

"I don't want to grasp it." Without another word, James squeezed his horse's ribs and rode on.

At Wiseman's he leapt down, flung the reins to Lucky who stared after him and hastened inside and up the stairs.

He shut his bedroom door behind him. To make a life here was not possible. He had tried, but he couldn't stomach it. To build a relationship with his uncle would involve sacrificing every belief that drove him. To leave was the only option. He took up a quill and paper but threw them down abruptly. God, it was airless! He strode to a window and flung it open. There was a ship making out to sea and he wished that he were on board. Now. This second. Never mind where it was going, he just wanted gone.

It was a sleepless night. he didn't even try to rest, instead his mind churned over the possibilities for his future. His uncle owed him something for the work he had done in the last months. He would have to hope that that was honoured. Then he could move on, perhaps to Virginia, perhaps to Rhode Island. And there was home... Kassandra's form rose before him in the darkness. He had been used to shoving all thoughts of her instantly aside. But tonight, she would not stay hidden in his deeper consciousness. Her lips curved into a smile, her crystal-grey eyes sharpened from their usual withdrawn mystery into sparkling life. The boundaries between consciousness and sleep blurred.

Chapter Eighteen

"Moving on?" Vallender's voice was at its flattest.

They were at breakfast, the stiffest and most awkward meal James had ever taken in his life.

"Yes." No need to add more.

Vallender chewed thoughtfully on his roll of bread. "May I ask why?"

James regarded his uncle in astonishment. "I would have thought it obvious."

"Not to me."

God, the man must be made of stone. James put down his knife. "Disagreements that go too deep."

"Disagreements? What disagreements?"

James met his eyes incredulously. "You can ask me that, after all that has passed?"

"What has passed?" Vallender's voice was as even as if he were making polite and meaningless conversation with Cissy Hake.

"What has passed? I have flattened your friend's nephew on his own land, knocked out Ralls. We have disagreed constantly, fundamentally over the status of the slaves, over slavery itself. We have nothing in common."

Vallender patted his lips with a napkin. "We have much in common. We are both men fully in control of our appetites."

James's face reddened under its tan and he turned away and reached to top up his drink.

"We are capable of exerting control on ourselves and on others. We are capable of planning towards a long goal. And have you forgotten? I have no friends, or very few, and certainly don't rate Dennis Hake or Ralls among the few. I mix in this society because I require the support of other planters sometimes. If I did not occasionally need the likes of Hake I would eschew their company altogether. So you flattened Hake's nephew? You flattened Dennis Hake, not me. Hake will accept my apologies and forget the whole incident in the matter of twenty-four hours. He is not sensitive. He will forgive 'n forget."

James felt himself wrong-footed. He had expected his uncle to be livid. Instead he was at his driest.

"I - but all the same, we feel so differently, about everything."

Vallender shrugged. "We feel differently about some things."

James swallowed a mouthful of food, not because he felt hungry, but to give himself a second to think. He put his knife down, picked it up again. "Sir, you are my mother's brother. You invited me here to share in your success; I have tried in my own way to carry on that success. But there are differences between us which can never be resolved, and I am gashing my own conscience to try. I do not wish to argue with you, Sir, but I must leave here."

If Vallender was disappointed he did not show it, he merely made a gesture of tilting his head, as if no more need be said. "That I regret, but I believe I know when to give up on an experiment, so I will offer no more resistance. I am sorry to say that you are going to be very disappointed by life, James."

Already had been.

"Those who trust in humanity always end up feeling let down."

Never a truer word spoken.

"Do you know where you will go?"

The sticking point. "Hmm - no. Perhaps to Chesapeake." His voice trailed off.

"Well you will need money for your passage and to get started in Chesapeake. I will not ask what you intend to do. You have worked here with what I can only call fanatical zeal. Perhaps you would be prepared to accept a hundred guineas from me in recompense, even though you may consider the money to be immorally earnt."

James would have liked to grandly refuse the generous sum which had been accrued on the back of the slaves, but he had the common sense to recognize this was not the time for grand gestures. As humbly as possible, he expressed his thanks.

"When do you intend to go?"

"I think it would be better if I went soon. I was thinking of next week. By then I should have prepared." By then he could take a proper farewell of Pernel, but he couldn't tell Vallender that. And he wanted more time with Nehemiah, another thing not to be confessed.

Vallender nodded. "I sense that your mind is made up. I am sorry, James, I won't pretend differently. I believe you have it in you to be a great success as a planter. Perhaps this is not the time, or place."

They ate the remainder of their breakfast in silence.

James did not have a large collection of possessions to assemble. He had added little to the clothing which had been tailored for his early Jamaican days. But there were a few people who he wanted to take proper leave of before departing. This was not a place that he expected to visit again, and he guessed he would be leaving them forever.

Captain Denman was at home when James called and expressed himself sorry that the friendship was to end so abruptly. It was obvious after only a few minutes of conversation that Denman knew nothing of the fracas in Hake's barn. Just as Vallender had predicted, the Hakes had elected to keep matters to themselves.

"Wish you could have got over some of these qualms of yours, Mace. The island needs men like you. Men who keep out of squabbles and see the long game are just what is required. Place is too full of faction and rivalry. Idiots like the Hakes will never build anything except a personal empire."

James flushed, he seemed to be doing it a lot lately.

"Still, I suppose we must be content to let somewhere else benefit from you."

Wherever that might be. James rose reluctantly and took the bony but firm hand which was extended to him. "I've enjoyed our acquaintance. Perhaps we may meet again."

Parting from the Elands whipped up a storm of cross currents in James. He could not leave the island without seeing them one last time. Eland was one of the few islanders who James had spent comfortable time with, and although he had never felt totally sure of him after the mysterious gunshot when they were seeking the maroons, a last word felt appropriate. The coward in him would have preferred to jump in a boat and avoid an emotional leave taking of Pernel, but James's disposition was not of a kind that could callously sail off in that manner; the sensualist within him struggled to part at all.

He rode to Kingston praying he might find Pernel alone yet dreading the encounter at the same time. Fate did not allow him to slip away: Pernel was home and Eland was not. James was going to have to personally break it to Pernel that he was leaving and leaving within days. There was going to be no hiding from her reaction.

She was in the garden when he was shown through, tying up a plant and giving directions to a slave. Her expression changed as soon as he appeared. His face, he guessed, was giving away more that he'd realized.

"We'll finish this later, Yaya."

Well-trained, the slave disappeared without a word.

"Don't frighten me, James. Take that look off your face." Pernel stood very still, with a length of string as yet uncut in her fingers.

James's answering smile was a strained one. "Why don't we sit down? Your slave tells me Tom is not at home."

"Tom is dealing with an agent. He won't be home for more than an hour." Her voice was apprehensive. She did not suppose that this sudden appearance augured good things.

In the courtyard they sat down. A flower near his chair suddenly appeared incredibly bright to James. At times of strain his senses became heightened, he'd noticed it on the battlefield at Blenheim, and now, with a battle of a different sort to face, it struck him again. "Pernel, I don't know any kindly way of telling you this, so I will simply spit it out." He took a breath. "I am going. Leaving Jamaica. I will be gone very soon."

She did not gasp, but her sharp intake of breath could not be missed. "No! Why so soon? What has happened?"

It was not his wish to discuss all that had happened at the Hake plantation, especially with Pernel. Instead he cited his many objections to life in Jamaica, and his inability to square his moral feelings with life on a slave plantation.

"But that does not mean you have to leave suddenly! You always felt these reservations about slavery!" Her voice was rising uncontrollably, and James made a pacifying gesture.

"There are too many things to explain it all in a few words Pernel. But I can't continue here. I am not the first to come and find it distasteful. Many with the means to return home do so or move on to more settled places in New England. Slavery is my great objection, but it is far from the only one. I would meet slavery in New England too. The wildness of Jamaican society is not for me. I believe I knew it from the start." More softly he continued, "Knowing you, becoming your friend has, has - " He struggled to explain himself. "Has made life bearable." It was an inadequate summing up of what her role in his life had been and he knew it.

"Bearable!" Those dark eyes flashed.

"No, not that. I did not mean that. You have made my days in Jamaica memorable." That was not much better. He couldn't seem to find the words, now it mattered. He wanted to tell Pernel that life had sparked again inside him, once he met her. But somehow clumsy words bubbled to his lips. "I will not forget you. I am grateful for the chance to be with you."

A little angry noise escaped Pernel. "But you don't love me, James?"

The word astonished him. He had not been thinking on those lines at all. His time with her had been exciting, it had been fun. Instinct, rather than experience of women, kept him from saying that. "I am very, very fond of you Pernel. But love? What does the that even mean? If you had been single when I met you perhaps things would have moved in a different - "

"Rubbish!" She struck the garden table with her little fist, causing the glass of lemon there to bounce and spill some of its content. "You don't want me." Tears were in her voice if not her eyes. "Why don't you admit it?"

James was dismayed by her reaction. He had expected her to be sad at their parting. He had not expected this angry grief. She was married to Eland and had always appeared to feel some contentment with her marriage. It had never entered the remotest corner of James's thoughts that she might hope for more from him than the passionate moments which they'd stolen when Eland was away. "I wish we could continue as we are," he offered. "I wish circumstances could be different."

"But they could be." Pernel leant forward eagerly. "Take me with you James! Let us go together!" Her voice was hopeful now, where moments before it had been despairing. "We could go to New England - or old England. You wouldn't have to live at Hill House, we could settle somewhere different, call ourselves Mr and Mrs Smith or Vallender or anything you liked. Who would know? Our life would be quiet. No one would be bothered with us. Do James!"

He averted his eyes. Her suggestion exactly mirrored the letter he had scrawled to Kassandra, but never sent, months ago. And Pernel's idea had even less chance of success than his own futile dream. News of Pernel's elopement would likely travel to the God-fearing communities of New England; wealthy planters were known by name and reputation beyond the boundaries of the West Indies. And he had no great reserves of capital to draw on. A groan escaped him. "Pernel, I am not a wealthy man, nor am I trained in a profession. My father owns the farm. He may live twenty or even thirty years yet. I hope he does. Alone I can scrape along while I wander, but I could not guarantee providing well for a wife."

"I was not born a lady, I provided for myself once."

Her spirit impressed him, and he made to take her hand. At the last second, he remembered that any number of windows overlooked the court. A slave could be at one of them. "And what if you had a baby? It may be unlikely, but it is not impossible. Our situation would be a horrible, bumpy mess, Pernel. You must see that. The fun would soon fade."

She cocked her jaw angrily. "You are afraid to speak the truth: you don't want me!" And this time tears did spring from her eyes.

James floundered for the best reply. Kassandra had not been a girl who sought words of love or assurances of devotion, either because she was not herself a wordy person, or because she felt so sure of James that such tokens seemed superfluous. It had not occurred to him that Pernel would feel differently, though he was aware that they were very dissimilar women. "I don't know what to say Pernel." By any stretch of the imagination it was a lame response, but in the pressure of the moment he could think of nothing better.

"You don't love me." She sounded, angry and distressed in equal measure.

"I don't know what I feel Pernel. But I know that if we ran away together we would face a lifetime of secrecy. And there is Tom to consider."

"What is Tom to you?" she demanded.

"Not much. But he is something to you. He helped you at the worst time of your life and he has been good ever since; you told me so yourself. You can't just chuck all that up in the air as if it never happened. You owe him something."

"Now you are telling me this, after all that has passed between us!"

James made a hopeless gesture. "I did not think it needed to be said. I was not thinking at all." He was speaking the truth. It had never crossed his mind that Pernel could wish to leap from the settled security of her married life into limbo with him. Even when \- if - he eventually inherited Hill House, it was worth a fraction of what Eland had built up. Only now did he stop to link together the fleeting perceptions which he had experienced over the last few months, concerning Kassandra and Pernel. Kassandra had represented the whole spectrum of life to him, its glories and the mundane things, the light and the dark; life without her had seemed unimaginable. Pernel represented excitement and - he couldn't escape the admission - fun. But nothing had really grown beyond those pleasant boundaries. He couldn't tell her that. He had to keep silent on that point. A smack in the face would be his instant reward if he spoke honestly. "I should have been more careful, Pernel. But I was happy in your company, and I felt alive for having you in my life. It never occurred to me that you would want more. You were happy with Tom, or so I thought."

"I was until I met you!"

"Oh..." James recalled the many dreary sermons he had sat through as a boy, while Dick Richardson's predecessor had harangued the congregation about the hidden snares of sin; perhaps the old fool had had a point after all. "I didn't know, I didn't understand. I'm sorry if I have hurt you. If you were single, perhaps it would all be different." He wasn't sure that it would have been different. "But you are not, and I haven't the temperament for running off and hiding from Tom. I'm sorry. I assumed you were happy just to steal a little joy when Tom was not looking. I should have considered more. There is nothing I can add to this." His voice, which was usually brisk and matter of fact, was at its least certain.

Belatedly Pernel peeped back at the house, as if she had finally considered that someone inside might wonder why she was furiously scrubbing her eyes with a kerchief. She composed herself and sniffed. "When are you going?"

"Soon. Very soon now." He stood up and looked around the walled garden which held such secret memories for the pair of them. He wanted to linger, but to do so would only prolong the pain. He had experienced life and passion and intimacy in this house. Now that it was over, he realized that for him personally these had been good times, however much he had been torn over the plight of the slaves and his own role in oppressing them.

With a deathly expression, Pernel led James inside and opened the front door onto the street. They clasped hands in a brief shake. Pernel's grip was weak. "Farewell." She held his fingers a second longer than necessary then swung into the house with a small sob and slammed the door.

For a moment James stood, stupidly, staring at the shiny paintwork, then slowly descended the steps. At the corner of the street he looked back, but there was no outline of Pernel at the window. She was gone, out of his life. A phase over. A chapter complete. He stared at the door a moment longer, before slowly retracing his steps towards the Monkey Tavern, where Koko was stabled. James had saddled horses countless times in his life, but today his mind was elsewhere and he struggled with the straps and buckles. A stable lad stepped forward with a surprised smile and took charge while James stood aside and waited wordlessly in the shadows.

It felt like a long ride home.

Chapter Nineteen

He had already taken his leave of Nehemiah and that had been a sad parting too. Nehemiah's hopes of James becoming master of Wiseman's and freeing everyone were now dust. And James could not avoid revealing that his attempt to purchase Nehemiah's individual freedom had failed. Vallender had no intention of releasing him within his own lifetime, not for money, not for good-will. No happy post-script was attached to James's venture in Jamaica. It had been misconceived from the start. By trying to outgrow his desolation at losing Kassandra, he had launched himself into a situation where personal happiness had ambushed him unexpectedly, but where he could never experience inner peace and a clear conscience.

When James dismounted in front of Wiseman's, the house was only a black silhouette against a dark blue sky. He had not intended to be out in the fading light without a companion or a couple of friendly pistols, but other issues had been dominating his mind. Lucky sloped out of the shadows, not at all in his usual cheerful, up front manner. He took Koko and shifted away quickly. No one seemed to be them self today.

Light was shining under the door of his uncle's study, and at the sound of James's footsteps Vallender peered out. "I'm glad you're back. I was about to go to supper."

"Give me five minutes, Uncle. I will not hold you up long." A few more days of this routine, he thought, and I will be away from here, forever. The lurking shadows about the hall particularly displeased him tonight. Had he been of a nervous disposition, he would have glanced over his shoulder. He didn't know why, but the house felt alive with jitters of its own. He should have left within a month of arriving in Jamaica. He accepted that now.

Upstairs he washed and considered the few items which needed packing. It would have suited him to have more to organize and therefore occupy his mind. Kassandra's miniature had been stored carefully at the back of a cabinet since he arrived. Against the possibility of it being left, he hung it round his neck, then looked again at her lovely features. Quite suddenly, the last few months seemed to fall away, as if they had never been, and he felt like a newcomer in Jamaica again with all his experiences ahead of him. He continued to regard the portrait, immersed in his private thoughts. Only a knock at the door, and an enquiry form Asher to see if it were convenient to serve supper, tugged him from his reverie.

Vallender was silent over the meal. Whatever thoughts occupied his mind would remain hidden now, James knew. He had tried to persuade James not to leave Wisemans. Having failed, he would say no more on the subject. It was not impossible that he already had some other young replacement in mind.

If James had been more self-satisfied, he would have wondered if his imminent departure was having an effect on the slaves. Micah and Dolores both dropped dishes at the table. To a man they seemed on edge. Or perhaps it was him who was on edge and it was communicating itself to everyone else. That was the likelier alternative, he decided, as he climbed the stairs for bed. Ahead of him lay another journey by sea, with all the dangers and discomforts which that entailed. And if he was thankful that life at Wiseman's was coming shortly to an end, there were no guarantees about what the future might hold.

James slipped into bed and read for a short while, before blowing the candles out. His room was situated at the back of the house, closest to the dense shrubbery and tonight its whispering and rustling disturbed him. Though he was tired, sleep would not come. He got up and looked out of the window then checked that his door was locked. It was a thing he had never done before. He wasn't sure why he was doing it now. Another peek out of the window. And this time something surprised him. There was a glow in the distance. He narrowed his eyes. Not a mistake. A glow, in the direction where Green Acres, the Ralls plantation stood...

James's heart lurched and his mind whirled into diamond sharp clarity. And in that moment of understanding, a smell of burning identified itself to him. For a second he thought it was suggested only by the glow in the distance. Then he realized it had been there, unrecognized, but detected by his subliminal senses for a while, too faint to arouse him from his day dreams. And there were noises in the house too, noises which he had never heard before. He hastened to his door and made to undraw the bolt, but at the last second a primeval sense of self-preservation stayed his hand; unfamiliar sounds came from where they should not be. Panther-like, he tiptoed to the side cupboard where his arms were stored. Both guns were ready to fire. They would not save him against a mob, they might just buy him a second or two if he faced only a small posse sent to drag him down.

The smell of burning intensified suddenly, as if a door had been opened inside the house and the flames fanned. He shot to the other window. It wasn't possible to see the front of the house from this room, but he detected movement at the corner of the terrace: a gang of slaves was gathering, he guessed, and others were joining them. These were not only from their own plantation, there were too many of them assembling. In a few minutes the house would be surrounded. Some must have come from further afield, perhaps from the Ralls place. In the horror of the moment they seemed to James like souls raised from Hell. The Lord is my shepherd I shall not want... The words leapt into his mind from other crises in his adult life and from further back, in childhood: mornings in church when he had squirmed restlessly in his pew; candle-lit prayers over his infant brothers and more fervent supplications for Carolina - he remembered that now. Strange that he should remember it now... He had given Carolina the fever which killed her. It had hardly affected him, but she had died. Why was all that crowding back on him in this moment of horror? How had that memory managed to breach the screens which normally kept it hidden away?

The house was alive with noise and cries. Every second the emergency deepened. Furniture crashed over downstairs. He didn't know if time was rushing on or standing still.

"How dare you threaten me?" His uncle's voice, angry and astonished rang out from the stairs; evidently he'd left his room, a brave - or desperate - thing to do.

James's heart gave a squeeze of pain and admiration for him. For a second he considered stepping out and pleading for the life of Vallender, but half the slaves raiding tonight wouldn't even know him, he guessed. It was arrogant and stupid to imagine he could exert any influence even in the best of circumstances. His firearms would be useless against the scale of this danger. He snatched a cautious peak from behind the shutters. No one was looking up at his room, but the crowd had mushroomed. Some of them carried torches. Now they had assembled in numbers, wild roars were going up. What means could he use to help his uncle? Could he create a distraction, a diversion?

Cold sweat began bursting out all over him. He had never faced a danger like this. An army of enemies, men he was commissioned to fight - that was definable. This was different. The slaves had no reason to hate him personally, but he did not think that would obtain him leverage on a night like this. And his uncle... He heard a great cry on the stairs and the sound of footsteps racing desperately up towards the landing. Vallender must be trying to break away. Despite his dislike for his uncle, James wanted to save him, to snatch him from the mob.

Smoke had begun fuming under the door. He coughed and pulled out a handkerchief to cover his nose. There was water in his ewer and it served to dampen his clothes and hair. Where ever the fire had been started, it was well away and blazing now. A door slammed somewhere upstairs. Perhaps his uncle had made it to his room, after all. If he had, there was no where he could go from there. A woman screamed, a long drawn out scream that startled and horrified James.

The room was filling with smoke quickly, though he'd put a mat against it. Screams and cries were everywhere now. He could try leaping from the window. It might be a kinder death than the one he faced in the hands of the mob. He was fighting for breath. Struggling, drowning. He had to get out. He swayed across to the door and fumbled, grappled with the bolt. But it was stuck, or perhaps his fingers were not obeying him. It didn't matter though. Darkness was engulfing him, drawing him in. And that was alright... It didn't matter. It didn't matter because his mother was there, and Carolina had come too. Of course she had; he had always known that she would forgive him. They both reached out to him.

Then the door smashed off its hinges.

Chapter Twenty

Lemon scents wafted. He sniffed. Who had brought lemons up to his room? Lemons were never in the bedrooms at Hill House, not unless someone was ill. Ill... That was it, someone was ill, labouring to breathe, lungs burning. Their croaks and coughs disturbed the calm peace. His eyes flickered open, just for a painful second and he saw a flash of ornate pattern on the ceiling. What had happened to the old beams at Hill House? Who could have restyled his home? Not Roderick surely. Was Roderick dead? A dry moan interrupted the coughs and croaks.

"James?"

His right hand sensed contact, and that too was painful. A whimper left him as he realized that the burning was in his own lungs, the struggle for breath was his.

"Lie still James. It is going to be all right. You are safe. Sleep. Rest."

Sleep... Rest... The hushed tones lulled him. The boundaries of the conscious world faded and melted again. Melted into oblivion.

Shadows were long when his eyes flickered again. Just opening them hurt, even though the sun was no longer dazzling. And now bewilderment overwhelmed him. He tried to speak, but his voice emerged only as a raw croak.

Movement near the door. A swish of skirts. A discernible shape in the shadows. The smell of lemons intensified. He parted his lips to speak. Licked them. "Kas?" Painfully he turned towards the movement.

The figure hesitated, shrank back a little. "No James. It's me, Pernel. You are in Kingston. Do you remember?" She paused, giving his scrambled wits time to realign themselves.

He swallowed. "Kingston?"

"Rest James. You are going to be well."

Experimentally he reached a hand towards the shadowy form. "Smoke."

"There is no smoke, James. You are safe."

He could taste smoke. His metallic grey eyes flashed open wide. "Fire!"

She took his hand firmly. "There is no fire. Rest, James."

"My uncle?" James swallowed. Fragments of memory kaleidoscoped in his jumbled wits. "The fire!"

Pernel hesitated, measuring the gulf between his need to know and the shock which would inevitably follow the truth. But she knew the man she was speaking to, even if he was reduced to a trembling invalid for now. "Your uncle is dead James." Her voice was at its softest. "And Wiseman's is gone with him. Nothing much is left except the stables, the distillery and animal pens."

An inarticulate cry escaped James.

"I am here. I will stay by your side. Rest now. You are safe. Sleep will make all well with you."

James struggled against it; he had questions to demand, but exhaustion drew him out of the conscious world into a deeper one, where all horrors resided.

James relapsed after the news of Vallender's death. It opened the channel of his memories and he began to relive again the horrors of that last night at Wiseman's. Pernel from his bedside, watched his eyelids flickering and ticking and wondered what scenes were flashing and raging within him. Yet it fell to Tom Eland to fully reveal how he had escaped from the blaze and the fury of the rebelling slaves. James was propped up in bed three days after his relapse. He was stiff and leaning slightly askew against the pillows when Eland stopped at the door with a gentle smile on his face.

"You look for all the world like a wounded soldier."

James's eyes swivelled to the door, but he remained in his awkward position. "A wounded ex-soldier." His voice was dry and feeble.

Eland smiled. "Just so." He entered the room and sat down. "You have begun to recall what happened on that night?"

"Some. I think it might have been better not to remember."

"Perhaps."

"The miracle that saved me... of that I recall nothing."

Eland watched him steadily. "Your escape was less of a miracle than you imagine James. Rather a human agent intervened."

James again swivelled his eyes to Eland. "I thought I must die that night. I couldn't breathe. The world was going dark and then - "

"And then what?"

James shook his head. "I don't know."

"A slave saved you. Your uncle's body was being - " Eland swallowed " - dragged about the hall, while Ashendon was lynched in view of the house. Some of the slaves switched to looting and one staggered out with a fine carpet rolled up on his shoulders. The carpet was from your room. Now do you remember?"

"Someone stole a carpet?"

Eland smiled. "You were in that carpet."

Now James did move and winced with pain. "Nehemiah?" He recalled the slave's great torso which had been bulked by endless heavy toil.

"Do you remember?"

James racked his mind then fell back onto the pillows. "It's almost there, but no, I can't. My memories are a jumble. I think towards the end the smoke was robbing me of my mental powers."

"Nehemiah carried you away and in the uproar nobody noticed or suspected. The house was being torn apart for valuables and the slaves were focussed on Ashendon and your uncle. Perhaps they weren't aware you were in the house at all, but you were never the prime target of their venom. Nehemiah carried you away into the undergrowth and from there out of sight."

A terrible thought plunged into James's mind. "The house slaves. What about them? Were they trapped in the blaze?"

"I'm sorry. No one came out of the house that night, except you. The smoke had almost done for you and Nehemiah was burnt."

"God. God in Heaven... Dolores and Micah! And the others..."

"God was not watching, it seems. Lucky has confessed to me that he had heard some rumour about slaves serving up retribution on the Ralls plantation, but he was not sure if it was just talk. He swears he did not know that the trouble was to spill over to your uncle's, and I believe him. I am telling you this and I trust that you will never reveal it to any of the other planters, for Lucky's sake." Eland's blue eyes clouded. He made a little gesture, as if wishing to say no more about the destruction of Wiseman's. "There is a matter which I must broach with you. You will certainly hear it from someone else, if you do not hear it from us."

James delicately explored a patch of burnt skin on one hand. "Yes?"

"Your uncle was a very rich man. Not only did he own Wiseman's but he was involved in certain importing and exporting ventures."

"I knew nothing of the imports and exports." I knew nothing much at all, thought James.

"Your uncle changed his will when you came to Jamaica and for a while you stood to inherit a considerable sum - but not the bulk of the estate."

James turned surprised eyes on Eland. "Who stood to inherit that?" His voice was very quiet.

"Dot and Dolores."

Silence. A long silence. "Dot and Dolores? Are you telling me that Dot stood in some special relationship to my uncle?" So Vallender had been carrying on with a girl young enough to be his daughter...

"Hm - actually Dot was Mr Vallender's daughter," Eland continued, after James had expressed his disgust. "She was to inherit the bulk of his estate, and her freedom. Dolores, her mother, was to be freed too and to share in the bounty. But when you joined him here Mr Vallender set aside a good portion for you."

Dolores. A pleasant faced, middle-aged slave: James had never considered her as anything more. "Was my uncle's relationship with Dolores and Dot well known?" It was a very important question to James. Wiseman's had felt like a place of mystery to him from the very start. He didn't want to discover that its enigmas had been transparent to everyone else.

"It was so unwell-known as to be hardly suspected, I think. He was a reserved man. Your uncle did not choose to expose his private life while he was still living it, unlike many planters with children by their slaves. Why?"

James ignored that question. "He had a right to leave his money as he pleased. We were not in accord from day one, and Dot was his natural heir." James's shaken mind was slow to grasp the implications of what Eland had told him. The connection snapped into place though: "But who is to inherit the bulk of the estate now?"

"Hm." Eland coughed. "Actually, I am. As I was saying, your uncle put aside a generous portion for you, but he changed his will only a few days before he died. I do not know what prompted him to take that action. For years there had been a clause in the will, I understand, which made you his heir if something happened to Dot and Dolores. A new clause was added to put me in that position."

James's expression still had not changed. Eland shifted uncomfortably, waiting for a response, but nothing else was forthcoming. At length he rose. "Well, perhaps I should leave you in peace now." He looked at James, still expecting some further reaction, but James only continued to regard him inscrutably. "Oh," Eland paused with his hand on the door. "I almost forgot. Your uncle did leave you two hundred guineas, 'for your trouble'. I think it was to recompense you for your efforts on his behalf." Eland's face expressed sadness. There was no triumphalism in his manner. "If it is any consolation, I believe he rather admired you - in a way."

The door closed softly, leaving James to his thoughts and regrets.

The recuperation of another week saw James able to come downstairs and sit outside for short spells. Despite his impaired breathing capacity, restless impulses had begun stirring in him; he might be injured, he might have survived a shocking experience, but he was not fundamentally a changed person. As he sat in the sun and listened to the chattering birds, his mind began to explore the possibilities of his future as well as rove across the painful territory of the past. The Elands and their staff had looked after him well, and his own extremely robust constitution was making up the difference. Failing to inherit Wiseman's or his uncle's assets only weighed on him because it prevented him from releasing the slaves.

He was contemplating that very subject one morning when Pernel came out, followed by a slave carrying drinks. She perceived that his mood was improved. "This is good, James. You have brightened during this last day or two."

"I feel much better." His voice was still not restored to its old tone and timber. "But I sound rough and gravelly like Henry Andrew's old father back home." When Pernel gave him a questioning smile James continued, "Andrews was an associate of my father and for years they used to sit before our fire sharing a brandy flagon, while Andrews smoked pipe after pipe of rough tobacco."

Pernel's eyes crinkled into a smile. "Your poor father. When you speak of him always brandy is fuming in the background. We must keep you off brandy... But your voice is starting to improve. You almost sound human again." Her own voice became dusky. "Tom tells me we are to lose you very soon, you feel that your recovery is near complete." The regret in her voice was unmasked.

As he opened his mouth to reply he was racked by a spasm of coughing. When he recovered he replied, "Not as complete as I'd like, but I feel better every day. I have no excuse for lingering here enjoying your hospitality." He met her eyes. "And Tom, perhaps, would like to see me gone..."

Softly she answered, "Tom knows nothing." She continued more conversationally, "We will both miss you. Tom does not have your drive to change the world, but he enjoys sharing the company of a man whose life is not solely devoted to wanton self-indulgence."

James reached to take her hand, then remembered where he was. Their own self-indulgence must be over. "Something has been on my mind this last day or two since I began to recover. I have been thinking of my uncle's slaves, those who survived and are not to be made an example of."

"Y-e-s." A look passed over Pernel's face.

"Tom is not a harsh man. I know that. Might he not be persuaded to free them, the ones he perceives as worthy, at least?"

"Tom has enormous expenses at the moment. The equipment in his sugar works is old and constantly needing repair. This injection of capital is timely."

James swilled his drink energetically round the glass. "How much capital does he need? He has inherited a comfortable estate, horses, stock, money."

Her manner became a degree more defensive. "The house is in ruins. Also the mill and sugar works, forge, workshops. Only the distillery, stables and pens are untouched. It would require a vast amount of money to put Wiseman's back to work."

James struggled to keep his voice even. "Still, if he sells the land it will fetch a large sum. He doesn't have to reinstate Wiseman's. And my uncle left money, not just land."

"It is Tom's decision James, not mine. Mr Vallender left Wiseman's to Tom, not me." Her tone was dignified.

James looked into her eyes seeking a mote of sympathy for his suggestion and found none. A shaft of enlightenment penetrated his mind. Pernel might have slave ancestors close up in her family, but she herself had made good. Against all the odds she had climbed the ranks of society to occupy a comfortable spot. Since the reading of Vallender's will, it had become even more comfortable. She did not identify with the slaves. She identified with the slave owners. She would not treat a slave badly, she would warmly approve other people freeing their slaves, but she would not casually give up her own financial advantages. Freeing Vallender's slaves was no more in her mind than it was in Tom's. There was no point in arguing further. James recalled his uncle's warning about the disappointing nature of humanity.

He heaved a huge sigh. "It's not my business to exert pressure, and I know that at least if they must endure slavery Athelney is the best place. You and Tom have been good to me and for that I sincerely thank you. But there is one last thing which I must ask."

"What do you want James?"

"Mr James!" Nehemiah was working under the direction of Jackson on the cane fields of Athelney. Those slaves not singled out for punishment or death had been removed from Wiseman's and integrated.

James leapt off Koko and nodded at Jackson who gestured them both to move away from the rest of the gang. James noted that the expressions of the ex-Wiseman's slaves were either blanker than in past times or else more sullen, according to their dispositions.

"You looking near like your old self, Mr James."

James smiled. "It's no good pretending to be casual, Nehemiah. I know what you did for me. I don't remember, but I have been told. And I thank you for it. I owe you my life."

Nehemiah's demeanour became sheepish as if he had been found out in some bad act. "Saving a good carpet wasn't such a big thing."

They both laughed. Nehemiah's quip had defused the emotion of the moment.

"I will be in your debt forever. It's still clear where the flames caught you too, that scar on your arm."

"It is nothing, Mr James."

"How often have I told you to call me James, not Mr James."

"I said I would do that when I was free."

"Well then."

"Sir?"

"You are free."

Nehemiah stared.

"I repeat, you are free. You've been free for more than twenty-four hours. You do not have to dig trenches, or plant cane, or water the roots or do anything else. You can leave the Athelney plantation if you please or work here for a wage. Mr and Mrs Eland will keep you on if you wish."

Nehemiah stared with an expression in which wonder, and the fear that he was the victim of some strange joke were all mixed.

"Come Nehemiah. You know I would not entertain myself at your expense. You are free, you became so when I paid Mr Eland yesterday."

Money was tangible and readily understood, even by a slave who had rarely possessed any. It was easier to grasp the handover of money than the word freedom. A light ignited in Nehemiah's eyes. He grasped James's hand. "It is true? I am free?"

"You are free. No need to thank me," rushed James, to cut off Nehemiah's gratitude. "The great debt is mine. You saved me that night. I remember nothing, but the Elands were able to piece together what happened and they passed it all back to me. You saved me, and I will be grateful to the end of my days."

Nehemiah made a disclaiming gesture. "Many of the slaves were drunk that night. And others started taking things from the house. It was easier for me to get you out than you think. Nobody was bothered with what I was doing."

"It changes nothing."

The two men gripped each other's right hands.

"I thank God that I was able to save you - James."

A rare sense of peace. Sea breezes blowing on his face. Birds bobbed out at anchor and he stopped to watch and listen to their calls. Close by him two sailors argued over a game of dice. Usually the quarrel would have irritated him, but today he felt content with the moment. No return on anger. His eyes wandered slowly over the perfect arc of blue above. The cry of sea birds was pleasing, the sea exciting to a man who had spent most of his life many miles from it. He breathed deeply on the air which was fresher than usual, sweetened for coming briskly off the sea. The after effects of the smoke were minimal now. He had physically recovered from the horror of it all, almost.

For now, the future didn't stretch ahead as a void. It didn't encroach on the moment.

"You are sure you will not come with me?"

Nehemiah shook his head. "All who are here know me to be a free man. Mr Eland is employing me now. If I travelled I might be mistaken for a run-away, captured, enslaved again. That is my fear. I will stay here." Nehemiah smiled. "There are pirates in these waters still. If your ship is captured, then you may become a slave. Then perhaps I can rescue you - again!"

"If I get captured by pirates I think I will just join them. A short but simple life."

The two men embraced, briefly, oblivious to the frowns of other people on the harbour. A shout rang out from the ship followed by the sharp ringing of a bell.

"Farewell Nehemiah."

"Farewell James." They had said everything that needed to be said. They were not garrulous men.

James boarded with a final wave and watched as Nehemiah's figure retreated along the harbour wall and into the distance. At the corner of a warehouse he stopped and turned, made a last eye contact, a faint wave and disappeared. James caught a fleeting glimpse of Nehemiah's tall figure crossing an alleyway, then he was gone.

The ship was rocking beneath James, and the feeling was full of promise. Another chapter over, a beginning which had led nowhere. But the rocking ship signposted change and better times.

Behind him a sailor began to sing. "The water's wide. I cannot cross over, nor do I have wings to fly. Give me a boat which carries two..."

Softly, unprompted by conscious will, James began to hum along.

###

Book Two

Tell Her My Tombstone Lies

Chapter Zero, the Prologue

"It's a lie! It's a lie! Tell her my tombstone lies!" Frantically James bawled the words, he even thumped his fist upon the table, hurled a tankard across the room, but everyone was oblivious.

Geoffrey calmly straightened his stock and knocked dust off his riding gloves; Mr Eton gazed out of the window watching a shooting star; and, most incomprehensibly of all, Kas herself drifted serenely in from the passage and sat confidingly beside Geoffrey.

It was then that he realized he was stamping his bare feet against icy mud and his only attire was a nightshirt. A nightshirt... But it was not a nightshirt, it was a shroud, a shroud already stained and streaked with the grave.

Then he screamed and woke up.

Chapter One

"Mr Mace? Is it you? What in God's name are you doing here?"

James slopped rum into a glass and accepted coins from a pimply youth, then moved down the bar. "Medoc! I could say the same to you! This is a lucky chance."

"I thought you were at Salem." Medoc flickered his eyes about the dimly lit bar. "I certainly never pictured this."

"Salem? No. That wasn't the plan." There'd never really been a plan. He'd been desperate to escape Jamaica. That was all.

"And you're a tap-man?"

James laughed. "Roddy Owen who runs this place is my friend. He's upstairs ill. I came to see him yesterday and he asked for help."

Medoc's expression said everything.

"A favour to a friend. I met Roddy the very first night I sailed in here. I was sitting in that corner musing on my future, when another boozer started creating a fracas. The row disturbed my peace, so I threw him out."

Even through the dim light and leaping shadows, damage to one of James's prominent cheekbones was evident. Medoc remembered how James's good looks had tended towards prettiness; he didn't recall the pirate-like aura of the man before him now.

"Roddy saw what happened and offered me a job on the spot. Not much of a job, but with it went a room upstairs, so I grabbed it." He turned away as another customer demanded attention. When the man was served, he resumed, "I soon moved on. I'm farming near the James river."

Medoc made a face. "Still, not much of a berth for a gent, this, Mr Mace."

"Mace - or James. I'm not the master's nephew anymore." James smiled, or maybe he grimaced; in the candlelight it was hard to tell. "All that's history..."

That was history, but it was a history which they trawled over when the last drinker was gone and the shutters closed.

"I never discovered how you escaped that night. I heard you were safe, that was all."

Medoc stared into his rum. "Escape's the wrong word. I was never in danger. Lucky came tapping on my door in the night with a tale of slaves on the move from the Green Acres plantation. He was intent on hanging about the stables, to keep an eye on the horses - good old Lucky! Not that the marauders were interested in the stables, it was the sugar factory and house they wanted to sack."

"So with Lucky's warning, you made it clear."

"Made it clear and slunk off to the Rafferty's plantation to raise help." The expression on Medoc's red face crumpled. "Don't think I could have saved your uncle or the house, Mace! All I possessed was one old duelling pistol which misfired as often as it shot."

"I know you couldn't have saved my uncle - I didn't save him either. Let's forget that night. I've done my best in the last three years never to think of it."

"It still gives me nightmares."

"When did you leave Jamaica?"

"Not long after you. I was shaken by the revolt, sick of the island. I needed something new, and besides, I had family in Rhode Island."

James drained another brandy. "What do you do there?"

"Same as I did for your uncle. I'm a distiller." He paused to take a swig of the thick rum James had poured. "What are you farming here? Tobacco?" His eyes travelled over James as if he found something there to surprise him.

"Yes. I've a small farm. It keeps me in the essentials and as the land degrades it becomes suitable for beans and veg. I'll have to move on again in another couple of years if I want to continue with tobacco. I've had a thought to go into another concern though. Meeting you seems preordained. I've been thinking about distilling rum. Small scale. Supplying Roddy and locals. No thoughts of anything big."

"Might be predestined but I'll be off again as soon as the weather lets us put to sea. I'm sailing to Jamaica on behalf of Mr Tennant, going to see his supplier of molasses."

"And who's that?"

"Man by the name of Eland, Tom Eland. You must have known him. Think he rode out to Wiseman's sometimes."

James was glad of the darkness to hide his reaction. He couldn't stifle a slight choke on his drink. The choke transmuted into a cough. "Eland? Yes, of course I met him." His voice resonated unnaturally even to his own ears.

"Something I ought to know about him, Mace?"

"No, no. Good man. To be trusted. One of the best."

"That was my impression." Medoc's face assumed a hint of wickedness. "That wife of his makes a mark too. Where did he find her?"

James didn't dare answer. Instead he swallowed his brandy as if its relish obliterated all else. "Tell me about rum, Medoc. If I'm to be a distiller, tell me what to do and what not to do."

Medoc looked as if he would prefer to talk about Tom Eland's wife. With difficulty he changed tack. "Rum? Oh, rum's not difficult. 'Course they all have different flavours, depending on what you put in."

"What do you put in?"

"Can't tell you that Mace. Don't want to give away all our secrets. But the process is simple enough."

"Simple's good. I like simple."

"If you can grow sugar cane and tobacco, making rum won't be too much to learn." Medoc yawned. "Time for rest. I hope to be on me way tomorrow."

James extended a hand. They had survived the mayhem at Wiseman's on that unimaginable night and the experience had forged a bond. "I'll see you again. I know it."

Medoc retired up the groaning staircase to his room at the back, while James checked that all was locked below. But even when he was sure that the bolts were home, he didn't go straight up. He'd been afflicted by nightmares of his own all winter, and they didn't concern slave uprisings. The prospect of closing his eyes was uninviting. Instead he took a final glass of brandy before the glowing embers of the fire and considered how this chance meeting might affect the future.

As Medoc had predicted, he was able to sail early next day and James only caught a few moments with him.

Roddy Owen was still feverish, but James couldn't stay away from the farm another night. He had his own concerns to look to.

"He was my uncle's distiller," James explained as he refilled the jug by Roddy's bed. "My uncle only made it on a small scale for local consumption. At the time, it was something I felt could be developed."

"And you fancy developing it now?"

"It's a thought. Start small." James shrugged and coughed. "Further than that I can't say."

Owen stroked the stubble on his chin. "You need money to set up a distillery James. And there's risk. I'm doing alright with the White Tavern, though this settlement's shrinking. Not sure I want to join the risk."

James had expected that. Admitting that he had a certain amount of capital himself was something he wasn't ready for, at this stage. Natural reserve had deepened in him these last years. For now, he was just a one-time tap-man come friend to Roddy, not a business partner. "No need to start with a big distillery. The Tavern would be your first outlet."

Owen took a heavy swig from the jug, as if the prospect was worrying him already. He coughed and lay back among his pillows. "Rhode Island's where most of the rum comes in from. You might be better to keep your mind on farming and let the Rhode Islanders do what they're good at."

James nodded. "I might indeed." It wasn't the time to press. He hadn't even thought through the practicalities himself. When he arrived in Virginia his mind has been thumbing through the possibilities of mercantile work. He had not looked far ahead at all. That was the trouble. He wondered if it had always been his trouble. "I'll do some hard thinking. I'm not planning to do anything soon."

Chapter Two

James soon forgot Medoc in the grinding work on the plantation. Tobacco didn't allow a farmer time to think. Just clearing the new land was effort enough. He employed two servants, Alf Pinkerton and his wife Violet. Between them they had to keep everything running. As Pink and James cleared a stretch of land, Violet would move in. There was too much for three, but the horses had a heavy pull and could drag up roots and debris.

It was an exhausting round, but James felt satisfaction in it. If all came to fruition his harvest would be valuable, something would be achieved. Of late though, during the autumn and winter months, James had started to wonder if it was any more satisfying than raising wheat and turnips on the Cotswolds. He was into his fifth year away from Hill House, the 'real' Hill House as he still considered it, and in his quieter moments the thought sometimes formed that his self-imposed exile no longer served any real function.

"Take five minutes, Pink." James put his axe down and reached for the flask. His breath was coming fast and his muscles ached. A cough was itching in his lungs. He was weary and his stomach had started to growl for its supper. In a tree not far away, a bird was calling. It occurred to him that he didn't know the names of many birds here; back home he knew all but the rarest of visitors. Pink and Violet wouldn't be able to enlighten him, he felt sure; they perceived birds as being either good to eat, or useful as consumers of insects and pests; only the most spectacular bird impressed them in any other way. Roddy wasn't without an eye for the world which surrounded him, but he'd spent all his days near the waterfront and knew next to nothing about life even a mile or two in land. No good asking him.

Horses' hooves were crunching on the road and when they branched onto his track he went to meet them. A visitor was a rare thing. James removed his hat: two well-dressed ladies were in the party.

"Can I do anything for you?"

"I doubt it."

Not the answer he had expected.

"We were riding home from town and thought to be neighbourly and say hello."

"Hello."

The girl laughed as if he had made a witty riposte.

"Are we neighbours? Easterby is just up the track."

"Do you take me for an Easterby?" It was an arch smile which curved her lips.

...Silk clothes and pearl drops dancing on her ear lobes: not an Easterby. "No."

She tilted up her chin. "Our estate lies further west. I live at Watersmeet."

Watersmeet. The Anstruther estate. Anstruther did have a daughter, James recalled. "Justice of the Peace Anstruther is your father?"

She smiled.

"I'm sorry. I should have guessed."

"I have never met you among the guests at Watersmeet."

"I have never been there."

Again she laughed as if he were a wit. "We must change that. I spend nearly all my time there. Next summer, though, all will be different."

James had neither the desire nor time to make small talk at Watersmeet, but could not brush off a lady as well born as this one. "My farm takes up so much of my time. I've little left for leisure." He maintained a politely neutral expression.

The second lady of the party spoke. She was finely dressed but it was difficult to gauge her relationship to the girl. "We must be moving, Epiphany. We have barely enough light left."

The girl began to turn her horse. "You know my name but have not told me yours."

He had the feeling that she knew who he was. "Mace, James Mace."

"Goodbye Mr Mace. I'm sure we will meet again."

The brows of the older lady came together. "Come, Epiphany."

"Goodbye." James watched them ride on their way with his hat raised, then plumped it on his head and paced back down his track.

Pink was still enjoying a breather. With no look or words did he show interest in the group which had just stopped by the farm. His eyes were placidly watching waterfowl near the river.

"What kind of year do you think it's going to be?"

Pink paused from drinking and wiped his face with a tatty bandana. "Can't answer that, Sir. Not an Indian scout."

James laughed aloud. "You've told me plenty about when there used to be Native Indians around these parts." Too much. James would have suspected Pink of making half of it up, if the man hadn't been so devoid of imagination.

"Well they were wise about the weather alright, and the seasons. They didn't have writing, just passed it father to son. Don't know how they remembered it all. I've already forgotten most of it! They weren't like us worrying about the boundaries of our land. They just fished and hunted and lived day to day."

"Were you afraid of them?"

"Well, not so's you'd say afraid. I never interfered with 'em. Didn't go wandering off alone, mind. There's a fair few came unstuck doing that. Nasty end. Course I wasn't here in the early days. No, that were my grandfather's time."

James replaced the cap on his flask. The light was fading but they had another hour perhaps where the work could continue. "Vi," he called. "Leave that now. Time to get supper ready. Pink and I will follow."

Violet took a last thirsty draught from her own flask, then turned wearily towards the shacks.

James retrieved the axe, tested the blade. "Ready Pink?"

In answer Pink clicked his tongue and took up his own axe. It was exhausting work, but to one of James's disposition, it brought its own rewards. His breathing settled into a rhythm. Muscles flex. Strike. Tug axe free. Back swing. Strike again. Think of nothing. Clear mind. No troubles. No nightmares. No nightmares. Not for the moment. Strike again.

It was cold by the time supper was eaten, and the sky starry-bright and clear, but James took his pipe outside while Pink and Vi cleared up. Under his cloak he clutched a letter. He had read the pages countless times already, since picking it up while collecting provisions in Williamsburg, but the urge to see the handwriting often seized him when darkness had fallen and there was no more to be done with the day. He placed a horn lantern down on the bench.

Dearest Jem,

It's been nearly a year since last we heard from you, and we are all anxious for assurance that you are alive and well on your farm. We are praying no harm has come to you. I had supper at Hill House last Sunday and Roderick said that you have probably sent word, but it has not got through. He is ever the optimist. Anthony Castor, who has many connections with merchant men, assures us that the crossing to the Americas is very hazardous. Perhaps this letter will end up on the bottom of the sea, too, and you will never read it.

Jem, many things have moved on since last I wrote. Mary and Dick have a son and he is to be named Henry. She had previously slipped two and Geoff privately hoped that she would not conceive again, as he felt concern for her health, but all went well, and Mary is up and about.

Of your cousin Althea there is sad news. At the beginning of the year she also had a son, but she never came right afterwards. Your aunt Eleanor sent Harry over last week with the news that Althea is gone. To us, Harry expressed the opinion that she was ailing before ever the child arrived and that her decline was caused by something else, but we will never know. Her case baffled Dr Stalbridge. Little Josh thrives though his mother is gone.

James felt a twist of sadness, even though the contents of the letter were familiar to him. He had not seen an enormous amount of Althea. Usually it had been Harry who rode over from Stanway, but of course there had been visits at Christmas and in summer. Althea's death was a reminder, if he needed one, that all life was precarious. His fingers gripped the page more tightly as he wondered if Kas and his father still continued in health, since the letter was written.

Eleanor has the comfort that Harry and Iris are as well as ever.

Your father is in good spirits, though I believe he misses you (as do we all). Perhaps I am being fanciful, but he seems to have become brighter since he took to drinking chocolate.

Roderick drinking chocolate! Time was when nothing weaker than French brandy ever passed his lips. This was a different father to the one who had repelled an adolescent James with his glassy eyes and slurred speech.

Clara complains at the price, but perhaps he is wise to drink it daily. Father suggests that there may be something healthful in it.

The thick paper rustled as James turned it over.

Jem, it does not seem possible that four years have passed since we last met. You will reach twenty-eight at the end of November. Last year I thought about you a lot on that day. I ate with Father and he noticed that my mind seemed in another place. He did not allude to the date, but I believe he understood. When I left towards twilight, I did not return straight to the Manor, but walked up on to the hill near Hill House, and allowed my thoughts to rove...

Geoff is well. He retreats more and more to his study but has also allowed himself to get roped in as a magistrate, though the work displeases him greatly. I do not believe he will ever be disposed for such things. In the end he agreed because he considered it to be his social duty. He is writing an essay on the origins of the wool trade in Gloucestershire, which is far more to his taste. He spends many hours perusing old texts which are mighty difficult to decipher and is sometimes away now pursuing information in other parts of the county. Rather him than me... Occasionally, I wonder what he does when he is away, though I know the thought to be unworthy. I can confess this to you, who is well placed to guess our troubles.

James wondered for the umpteenth time what troubles he was supposed to guess.

I hope you get this letter Jem, even if it is months and months from now. It is not possible to say all which is in my mind, as the letter will be entrusted to the hands of others... I wonder where you are at this moment and what you are doing. Do you remember the room where you came to confront me when you returned from the continent? I am at a window there, more gazing at the sky than writing. It's not yet completely dark, but the stars are very bright and there is a sliver of moon reflected in the pond. Already a layer of ice covers the bird-bath, Bradley says.

I wish you were here, Jem. In spring and summer, when the daylight is long and there is much work to be done outdoors, you disappear from my mind for quite a time on end. But autumn and winter when dusk falls early and the leaves come off the trees, then it is a different story.

Ever your K.C

The temperature was dropping but James remained rooted to his bench, smoking and sipping brandy and coughing intermittently. He sat there so long that Pink came to check if all was well. Pink had to speak twice before he obtained an answer, and even then his master's voice was remote and indistinct. Surprised, but satisfied that nothing was amiss, Pink retired to his shack and welcoming bed-roll, and fell straight asleep.

But hunched inside his cloak, James continued to stare sightlessly at the vault of stars above.

Chapter Three

Clearing the ground for next year was one job - you had to think ahead with tobacco - but there was this year's crop to attend to as well. January came and went with weather that kept the three of them in their quarters much of the time. That was anathema to James. When he'd completed such work about the barn and animals as could be accomplished, he even turned to domestic tasks, oblivious to the raised eyebrows of Pink and Violet. Anything to avoid sitting in a chair or staring out of the window hoping for a break in the weather.

Come February they were out preparing the seedbeds. It was a task which energised James. The fertile part of the year lay ahead, and the weather was losing its grip. In a month or two it would be possible just to enjoy the balm of the sun on his shoulders. Like Kassandra, he could be forgetful of the past, so long as the sky was blue and he had work to engage him outside the confines of his house. It was during the smothering darkness of winter that his mind was apt to roam the lost possibilities of the past.

But deep regrets were hard to corral, strangely insistent in making themselves remembered. It was precisely during those seasons when his conscious mind was able to forget Kassandra, that she haunted him most persistently in recurrent nightmares. Details varied, but Geoff never failed to appear, languid, handsome, elegant as in life, and always Kas drifted through the dream, oblivious to his screams and despair as he struggled in the slimy burial pit...

A certain understanding, though never sympathy, for some of the ideas expressed by his uncle had developed since James came to Virginia. John Vallender, he remembered, had sometimes - often - declared that next to no ties of friendship bound him to his fellow cane growers in Jamaica, but he occasionally needed their collective help and so had to maintain amicable relations. James didn't feel naturally drawn to most of the tobacco planters in Virginia either, but it was an environment where a man couldn't always trust only to his own strength and he tolerated, even sought out, contact with them. In small doses.

His relationship with the church was more thorny, so it was with no pleasure that he spotted the stocky figure of C.J Dodds riding towards his home one morning when there was much to be done and seemingly not enough hours in the day to accomplish it. He could guess what Dodds wanted. Pink stole a questioning glance to his master.

"Reverend."

"Mace." Dodds's voice was hard and rasping.

"A drink of something to sustain you after your ride?"

"Thank you, no. I am sustained by the word of the Lord. It is about that which I have called. Your absence from church has been noted these last weeks."

James leant on his hoe and looked up at a fleecy cloud which was scudding by. He hoped Dodds would be gone by the time the cloud had cleared his farm. "The weather was bad, and we've had a lot to catch up with. I've not been in perfect health all winter. It's a longish ride to get to the church."

"Provision is made for out-lying districts, Mace. There are chapels where I preach to make it easier for farmers. Worshipping our Lord is not optional."

James was silent.

The focus of Dodds's dark eyes hardened. "To be frank, Mace, I have not observed in you any enthusiasm for worship at all. How often is the good book in your hands?"

James's hackles rose. In an easy-going way, his father had shown a superficial respect for the church while paying no real attention to it. Roderick had raised James to show that same respect, but James was of a different temperament to his father. "I have had a great deal to do. When I get in at sunset there is barely light enough to see my plate, let alone a chapter of the Bible."

"And you will have a great deal to pay, in fines, if I do not see you in attendance next time. You there, man! Yes you!"

Pink straightened up and turned uncertainly.

"Come here!"

Pink's eyes questioned James.

"Alf Pinkerton is paid by me, to carry out work on this farm. He is no servant of yours, Reverend. Continue with your work, Pink."

Pink froze with hoe in hand, his eyes swivelling helplessly from one authority figure to the other.

For a moment Dodds was too astonished to speak. His face crimsoned and his barrel chest swelled. "How dare you address me in that way? You young boor! And before an inferior at that!" A vein stood out in Dodds's neck, as if it might explode.

The situation was running out of control and James made a placatory gesture. His words needed to be considered. "I will be at church next sunday, but the farm cannot be left unattended. I shall pass on the words of your sermon to Pink. Pink can then go to chapel, when you are preaching out here."

It was a climb-down of kinds, and Dodds was sharp enough to perceive it as such. To risk further affronts was not in his own interests, especially in front of the servants. He hesitated then squeezed Arkle's ribs and swung back towards the main track. "Be there Mace!" With no more looks or words, he rode off.

James drew a breath and approached the motionless Pink. "I mislike talking to him like that, Pink. I've no wish to insult him, but his manner is as grand as if he were Archbishop of Canterbury. I preferred old Mayhew who died last summer."

"The vestry went for a bit of a fire-brand in this man, Sir. I've heard he came down from New England. Salem or some such place."

"I think he did, and I wish he'd go back. Massachusetts was welcome to him." James collected his wits. He knew he shouldn't be talking of a minister in this way; he trusted Pink implicitly, but it was always safest to keep a guarded tongue. "Sunday next I'll ride to the main church. The week after, you will have to show your face in the chapel with Vi. That should - " James went to say shut him up, but recalling the wisdom of caution, changed it to, "Satisfy him and the local dignitaries. As for the keys of heaven, don't worry, he doesn't hold them."

"I find it hard not to fall asleep in church, Sir, except when he shouts."

"Luckily he does plenty of that. Remind me to tell you what the actual content of his sermon is, as I can imagine him checking up." James looked down at his hands and was surprised to see that they were actually shaking with suppressed anger. His father, he knew would have dealt with the situation far better. A smile and a little charm would have had Dodds eating out of Roderick's hand. He might have been a boozer, James thought, but there was more to learn from Father than I realized. He sighed. "Come on, back to work. There's no need to worry about him. I'll deal with any consequences."

To his own annoyance, the confrontation with Dodds had disconcerted James more than he liked to admit, and after an hour of hoeing seedbeds with furious energy he indicated to Pink that he needed to ride into town and might not be back that evening.

James's relationship with craftsmen represented the same story as his relationship with farmers and he accepted an odd hour's recreation over a brandy bottle when it was offered. 'Red' Rower was a very skilled craftsman who made the hogsheads which all planters needed for packing and shipping their tobacco, and James found his company less jarring than most. He was in his workshop when James rode over to place orders.

Rower put down his hammer and nodded as James leapt from Crisp. The ride and dismount caused James to cough energetically into his muffler.

"Mace."

"Good to see you Red." Another spasm of coughing overtook him.

"Don't believe you've ridden this way just to see me."

James laughed. "Well, not only to see you. I'll be needing more hogsheads. But I could have sent Pink over with a note of that. I'm playing truant."

Red grinned. "Bottle of brandy by here. Toby! Bring us a pair of beakers."

A thin black slave nipped into view then darted away. James wondered if he would ever get over his distaste at seeing slaves, but swallowed both the thought and accompanying emotion. He couldn't change the world, as his uncle had frequently reminded him.

Red pushed a shaggy lock of auburn hair out of his eyes. "Hurry up with those beakers!"

Toby returned and took over pouring the drinks.

"Best slave I ever had," grinned Red, when the boy was gone.

James drank without comment.

"Don't know why you bother with that pair of old Pinkertons. Buy a couple like him and you'd get twice the work done." Rower swigged the brandy.

"I know where I am with the Pinkertons. Good brandy." James raised the beaker appreciatively. "Red, I'm thinking about distilling rum."

"Thought you didn't like the stuff. Devilish fiery, you said

"I wasn't planning to drink it myself. I'm wondering how much local business I'd drum up."

"You'd drum up mine, if that's what you're wondering."

James laughed but the laugh turned into a cough. "I don't think even you could keep me in business."

Rower's eyes twinkled, but he said no more about rum. "Talking of business, there's a medical fellow arrived recently. Not just an apothecary. London College of Physicians or something. He'll be looking for business. Might be able to help you."

The abrupt change of subject left James momentarily behind and he wondered if the new doctor might be a rum drinker. When the misunderstanding had been cleared, he replied. "Nothing wrong with me." He took another glug of brandy. It went down the wrong way and a helpless coughing fit followed.

"So I see."

James put down his empty beaker. "Perhaps I might look for him. Not impossible Pink or Violet might need a doctor in future."

Red gave him a look. "He's over at Williamsburg. Blizzard's his name, Kenton Blizzard. Young fellow, about your age, bit younger perhaps."

"What street's he on?"

Red explained then took up his hammer as if there were no more time for small talk. "You'll have your hogsheads."

"Thanks. Think on what I said about the rum."

Chapter Four

The ride, drink and change of company had been enough to shake loose James's anger concerning Dodds and he intended to head for home, but at the last moment he reined left instead. It might not be possible to locate Blizzard today, but it wouldn't hurt to know exactly where he lived. There might come a time when a doctor was needed urgently.

The house described by Red Rower was easily found, handily situated on the near side of town, not far from the ducking pond and stocks. It was larger than James had expected, as if the new physician possessed a little money which did not depend on his profession. At the last second James hesitated about admitting his concerns and tapped quietly, half-heartedly upon the door. No answer. Good. He would discharge other business and ride home. He was turning to do just that when an impulse restored him to the task. With committed force, he knocked. This time footsteps sounded within and, after a struggle with the lock, the door opened. Confronting him was a very tall woman with wisps of lustrous auburn hair escaping from her coif. She wore a dress of deep, muted red. A plain dress, but this was no servant, James was sure. Her bearing marked her as the lady of the house.

He removed his hat. "Excuse me, I was hoping to find Dr Blizzard." James stared into the opaque grey eyes of the woman. "Perhaps he isn't in." A handy excuse to duck the issue.

"Is it you who needs him?" Her accent was soft, fudgy, pleasing.

"I hope to see him."

She stepped aside. "Follow me. Mind your head; the beams are low. Who shall I say is calling?"

"James Mace."

"Thomas, deal with Mr Mace's horse."

They passed along a dark passage into a well-lit room at the back of the house. "He will be with you soon, Mr Mace." A faint smile lit her features.

As soon as she had left, James went to the window. It had been recently glazed. The young doctor must be planning to use this room for his profession. At the front, where there was always the risk of a flying stone, he had been content to leave the wooden shutters. A pump was to be seen at the centre of a large, tidy yard. A tall fence cut off any other view, though trees grew beyond. A pleasant, spacious area.

Footsteps warned him the doctor was approaching. A man almost as tall as himself entered. Auburn hair and sculpted features made the doctor instantly striking. This man's appearance would be an asset to him in any walk of life.

"Dr Blizzard?"

A slight bow did for acknowledgement. "How can I be of service?"

Now that it was time to admit being unwell, the words tangled and jumbled on James's lips, though the explanation was straight forward enough. "Not in any great way, I hope. I feel quite well - most of the time \- but going back some weeks, months I suppose - " He frowned, looked away to the pump in the yard, and abruptly started again. "I've got a cough. Had it all winter. At night sometimes it keeps me awake, though I am tired from my labours. I hoped you might be able to assure me there is nothing seriously wrong."

The young doctor smiled. "I hope I will be able to do that Mr Mace. Now, if you would care to remove your shirt, I will examine you. We are not overlooked here, and the fence is high."

"I do not think you need trouble the carpenter with your measurements, Mr Mace," pronounced Blizzard, after putting away his equipment. "You will not be filling a coffin yet a while, not on account of your lungs anyway. I need not even prescribe medicine, except perhaps a little more rest and common sense about avoiding the damp and cold till you are quite well. You are, may I say, over-thin for a man as well-dressed as you are."

A sensation which James recognized as relief flooded through him. He laughed and breathed a sigh. "I'm a planter, Doctor, I can't avoid work and weather."

"I can only make my recommendations." Blizzard smiled. "You accent, Mr Mace, I believe you are from the west of England, not so far west as me - "

"You're a Bristol man?"

"Yes indeed!"

"I hail from North Gloucestershire."

The reply evidently delighted Blizzard. "That is good to hear. One feels lonely for the old places."

"Yes, at times." Lonely for that and a whole heap else. "You wouldn't know Chipping Campden, or Aston Subedge? I live close by. Or Ebrington perhaps?"

"No I have never ventured there, but I have heard of Chipping Campden. It is famous for its wool and its church. Are you acquainted perhaps with the Endecotts of Painswick?"

Hell, yes, and so were Kas and her cousins the Clares. They'd all danced together, one New Year's Eve at the Endecott manor. "Indeed I am. Fancy you knowing of them! The world is becoming a small place."

Blizzard's expression suddenly fluttered. "It is." He went to the door. "Suzannah." The lovely woman who had admitted James appeared and Kenton's tone brightened once more. "Suzannah, we have a man here who hails from Gloucestershire. Let's take a glass of wine. Mr Mace, this is my wife."

A bubble of disappointment so tiny as to be almost unrecognizable, rose to the surface and broke within James. My wife. Blizzard and Suzannah looked so similar that James had taken them for brother and sister, or at least first cousins. His eyes travelled over their well-shaped heads, auburn hair and pale grey eyes.

Suzannah filled three glasses. Her glance wandered for a brief second to Blizzard. There hovered an uncertainty in her eye. A few years ago, James would not have perceived it. Now he was personally more observant.

"You are missing home, Mistress Blizzard?"

Her lovely eyes looked very directly into his. "Doesn't everyone? I have noticed the names of tobacco farms and homesteads during my short time here. Bretforton, Exeter Fields, Deerhurst. It's hard to forget the old country."

Painfully true. "I have forgotten it."

Suzannah sipped her wine and exchanged a smile with Blizzard who put an arm around her shoulder. For no definable reason, a spasm of pique clutched James.

"Mace, could we persuade you to take a meal with us? Congenial company has been thin on the ground since our move." Blizzard's expression said much.

"I'd be pleased to take the meal, but you might still find yourself short of congenial company."

Husband and wife laughed. "I don't think so, Mace."

"James. My name is James. Let us get off on a friendly foot, given that we have mutual acquaintances."

"I'm Kenton. Suzannah's name you have already heard."

A lovely name for a lovely woman, thought James. Perhaps his countenance said more than he realized, because her eyes, for a brief second, radiated confused pleasure.

"Our mutual acquaintances are in Painswick, Suzannah," said James over dinner, experimentally trying out her name; he liked the feel of it on his lips.

Her eyes wavered. A hint of something unexpected was discernible in their depths. Might that something be anxiety?

"I've explained that we know the Endecotts." Blizzard seemed over-quick with the words.

"I have not seen them for several years, not since a New Year's Eve ball." A vision of Kas stealing from a terrace to join him in the darkness, while musicians scraped on their instruments within, possessed James; momentarily, the vision was more real than the parlour where he sat, then it faded. "There is a Bristol man who you may know. Anthony Castor. Not a friend of mine, but a merchant who I met - hm - once. Heavily involved in the slave trade. His uncle has amassed an immense fortune that way."

Kenton frowned. "An ungodly way to make money. Castor? The name is familiar, but I do not know him. Do you remember him Suzannah?"

"They have a great house in Bristol. That much I know."

It occurred to James that he was being unguarded in admitting that he knew Castor. He had no wish that these people should learn of his shattered engagement with Kas. But Castor was unlikely to show up in the colony on business, and even less likely to blabber about the engagement party of eight years ago, even if he did. And anyway, the two Blizzards were looking ill at ease themselves, too ill at ease to be interested in his neurotic sensibilities. Time to change the subject. "Best to forget old times perhaps. None of us left England because we wanted to hang on to the past."

Blizzard's smile illuminated his natural good-looks. "True."

"Won't you find this a sluggish backwater, isolated from all the latest medical thought at home?"

"If only! You over-estimate the enlightenment of the profession in England. They are glued to the most medieval ideas and practices. It is frustrating in the extreme. You would not believe how the profession itself stands in the way of rational thought and progress. And though this may be a backwater, there are patients aplenty; a doctor should never starve anywhere in the world."

"My father has no opinion of doctors. He always preferred to trust his own common sense." Common sense and a flagon of brandy to wash away the pain...

"What brought you here - James?" Suzannah used his name self-consciously, as he had done hers a few minutes earlier. "What gave you courage to make the break?"

He'd long got used to employing a made-up answer to that. "Courage wasn't a pre-requisite. My uncle in Jamaica had need of a young man's energies to push his plantation ahead, so I agreed to join him there for a limited time. Unfortunately, he died during a fire caused by his own slaves and I felt the need to move on." A neat explanation which avoided mention of every detail which he wanted to hide. "Farming tobacco provides me with cash and I grow much of the food which I need. And I am hoping to go into a new venture, though it may take a year or two to hatch."

"What is that?"

"Rum. Small scale production for the local trade."

"I'm not competent to comment on it as a business venture. But given the drinking which I've already observed, you could hardly fail. I will benefit too."

"You like rum?"

"No. You will create a stream of chronic patients requiring my attention."

James was invited to stay the night and to avoid a dark ride home he did so. In fact, he had no wish to leave. In front of the Blizzard's fireplace, he talked about Williamsburg and his avoidance of local politics. He found himself better informed than them about the colony's recent history and filled in such details as he could.

"The Bacon Rebellion set back the colony and more or less put a stop to Jamestown," he wound up. "And you see it undeveloped as it is. A pity. I believe the colony has been ill-run from the start. But that is probably the story of humanity the world over."

"Let me top up your glass, Suzannah." Blizzard poured the brandy carefully and the sound of the golden fluid bubbling into the vessel stirred unexpected pleasure in James.

Brandy gurgling in a glass. Who'd have thought that sound would ever warm my heart? Must be missing the old man.

"Another glass?"

"Thank you, yes. It'll ensure I sleep." He sipped the drink, relishing its heat. Close beside him the cat was curled up, a comforting reminder of Chives back home. James reached out a hand and stroked Mouser's fur. On the other side of the hearth, Suzannah was indistinct among the shadows, only where her feet were stretched towards the fire did the flames pick out the colour of her skirt. And on a chair close by, Blizzard reclined. James hadn't sat like this for four years, not since those last months at Hill House... He felt peculiarly at home, as if he'd known the Blizzards all his life instead of a few hours. Wiseman's, in Jamaica, had never drawn him in like this, though beneath its roof he'd sometimes felt electrifyingly alive.

"Jamestown shrank after the rebellion and the capital moved to Williamsburg," James took up again. "It won't be long till there is nothing left at Jamestown at all."

"There was a pirate strung up in chains there when we arrived. A ghastly sight, a reminder to us that we had not come to a perfect new world."

"We can waste a lot of time searching for perfect worlds."

"Yes..."

It was late when they lighted him up to his room. On the landing Suzannah stood aside. "Good night." She lit a candle from her own flame and passed it to James. Their eyes met in its glowing, intimate orb. All else around was darkness and shadows.

"Good night." He passed close by her, so close that their bodies brushed.

"Follow me," said Kenton. "You're in here James. Not much of a bed, I'm afraid. Not like the one we could have offered you back home."

"I didn't leave Gloucestershire to feel like I was back home."

"Well put. I will leave you. Molly has brought up hot water and a towel, in case you need them. There is a flask of water and a glass too. Also wine."

"I'll be more comfortable than in my own bed."

The door squeaked shut. It was a solid building and Kenton's footsteps were muffled as he retreated to his own roosting spot. Quickly James cleaned himself and got into bed. Brandy and a toasty fire had tired him, but his thoughts continued to roam the house, wondering about the Blizzards and what their life together was. They were certainly a handsome and personable couple. It was hard to imagine why they would choose to bury themselves on an uncivilized frontier, when they could have enjoyed the relative comfort of Bristol. Comfort... James drifted into sleep.

Chapter Five

A mellow mood enveloped James next morning as he departed from his hosts. He had spent time which he could ill afford away from the farm, but in this moment, he didn't care. Some of the mellowness burnt off as he spied C.J Dodds riding beside a local luminary, Justice of the Peace Anstruther. An unfortunate encounter. A poisonous stare was Dodds's mode of greeting, but Anstruther gave him a nod.

"Reverend, Mr Anstruther."

"In town, I see Mace. The ride is not so long, is it? I look forward to having you in my congregation on Sunday."

James suppressed the urge to answer according to his feelings. "I will be there Reverend."

Marcus Anstruther smiled. "We have to set an example, Mace, attend church as per our duty, or else how can we expect our inferiors to attend?" His voice was bland, his manner urbane. His approach in upholding the church differed to Dodds's, but James wasn't fooled.

James spared a moment to observe Anstruther the man. Epiphany did not seem to have taken anything from him in looks or manner.

It wasn't the moment to pick a futile quarrel and there was nothing James could do about the reminder to attend church. "I look forward to seeing you there, Sirs." It was the law to attend and he couldn't fight the law.

The men nodded and rode their separate ways. James was doubly glad to have guarded his tongue, when he glanced back to see Dodds peeling away from Anstruther's course and dismounting at the side of the Blizzard residence. Evidently Dodds was planning to be there some time, as a servant was summoned from the house to stable Arkle. Kenton must be in professional contact with him, or else they've fallen out about church attendance already. As well I didn't abuse Dodds over the dinner table last night. Self-restraint has had quick rewards.

James lingered in town. He'd brought a firearm with him which required maintenance of the hammer and he took it to the gunsmith now. Then he purchased two wide, functional hats for Pink and Vi as theirs were no longer fit for the scarecrow, and sunny months lay ahead. On display was a rather smarter black hat, which he fancied would enhance his new spree of church visits. He already possessed a best hat, and required no new one, but a nameless impulse prompted him to make the purchase, and the glow of pleasure didn't evaporate when he left the shop and mounted Crisp with the hats strung behind the saddle.

And he still didn't rush to get back to the farm and immerse himself in its responsibilities. He wanted to hang on to this contented mood, it would prove unstable enough, he knew. Crisp sensed that his master was not in his usual hurry and slowed almost to a walk, so morning was well on when James reached his own land.

When he appeared among the trees, Pink and Vi both waved as if they'd secretly been fearing cut-throats, wild animals or a stray native Indian.

"All's well. Pink?"

"Yes, Sir. Let me take them hats. Been on a spending spree 'av ye?"

"Of sorts. There's a hat for each of us. You'll need one against the sun soon. The brim is almost off yours. Vi's isn't much better."

"Year's o' wear in 'em. That velvet one mine, is it, Sir?"

"Afraid not. That's my new Sunday best."

"Thank you for the hats," put in Vi, who had joined them. "There's some food left covered up, Sir, if you want it."

"Good. I'll join you in the seedbeds once I'm out of these clothes and Crisp is rubbed down."

Settling Crisp at his manger was a pleasure never a chore. Back home, as a boy, one of the early responsibilities entrusted to James had been to care for the horses. It was a task he still liked to reserve for himself, when time allowed.

Once Crisp was safely stabled, he turned to gobbling his own meal. All very well relaxing with the Blizzards and stealing admiring glances at Suzannah - his experiences in Jamaica must have primed him to desire married women - there was still a field of hard work awaiting.

James had a calculation that it would take a seedbed about forty yards square to raise an acre of tobacco; Pink had explained all that to him during the early days. Now that the seedbeds were prepared it was time to sow. Violet had already mixed the dust-like seed with sand to make it easier to distribute. This was only going to be the beginning of his crop. Endless care would be needed to guide it to fruition. So far, he had been fortunate and managed to bring off one harvest, but he knew that pests or mildew were just two threats which could wipe out a year's sweat. And he wasn't only responsible for himself, Violet and Pink relied on his success.

At Wiseman's he'd worked energetically, but the full weight had really sat on his uncle's shoulders, as master of the property. James's feelings about slavery had not changed one iota, quite the reverse: it rotted the souls of the men who profited by it, as well as destroying the lives of its victims, but he now understood some of the forces which had warped and misshapen his uncle's character.

A tiny sound, the snapping of a twig, made him spin towards the nearby trees. His senses were naturally alert, and out here an instinct for self-preservation had refined them further. Loaded firearms were ever at the ready. Pink had told him gruesome accounts of the fate of settlers set upon by Indians. And James knew these were not exaggerations, because the stories were the same from everyone's lips. He was not without sympathy for the native people pushed from their land, but that sympathy didn't translate into a desire to get scalped or burned alive.

In ordinary circumstances, he was not inclined towards nerves or anxiety. On the eve of Blenheim, when he had anticipated the momentous dangers which lay ahead, sleep had been impossible. He had lain awake on the grass beside his fellow foot soldiers, imagining the ordeal to come, but once battle commenced, all his fears had evaporated. Yet this morning, with bright sunlight throwing the shadows into deeper contrast, he felt uneasy near his own doorstep.

"Just a squirrel, Sir, I reckon." Pink had paused from his exertion and was watching. "Only a squirrel. Old Bluey's in the house. Reckon I heard him bark a minute or two back, but he stopped. Want me to let 'im out?"

James smiled tightly, half amused that Pink had read his apprehension. "Leave Bluey inside. We're armed if danger's about." James's eyes continued to flit among the trees. Instinct told him it was not a squirrel which he'd heard, but Pink was right that Bluey would be barking and scrabbling at the door if a stranger was about. "Who was the Indian nation that had its home here when the first settlers arrived? I never can remember. Al something or other. You told me once that they used to carve strange markings on their bodies."

"Algonquin."

"Algonquin. That's it, but I'll forget the name again. I was trying to tell someone last night."

Pink evinced a polite lack of interest. Or perhaps it was a genuine lack of interest.

Smiling, James returned to work.

Chapter Six

"I'm afraid you'll have to go to the chapel with Pink, next week. I want both of you here while I'm away." Nothing would have made him admit it, but on a gut level he remained wary about the sounds he had heard in the woods. "Reverend Dodds may even be out this way preaching mid-week. I'll find out. Pink, firearms about you at all times."

Pink quit polishing his boot. "All times, Sir."

"Same for you, Vi."

"Always ready, Sir. Been in these parts a long time."

"Yes, sometimes I forget that."

Violet's eyes travelled over James's smart suit and new hat. The hat was stark black, but a band of silk leant a decorative touch. A departure from James's style. "Haven't seen that suit before, Sir. Very smart, if I may say."

James turned to the square of highly polished metal which passed for a mirror in his establishment. His metallic grey eyes beamed against the matt-black of the fabric. "It hasn't been out of the box in over three years. Does it smell of smoke?"

"Not as I can tell, Sir. Taken some trouble with your hair today too. The minister will be impressed. Reverend Dodds likes a show of respect, they say."

"...Yes."

"He doesn't like people coming to church smelling of the farmyard. Will dinner be at the usual time?"

"Keep something cold for me. I may be late."

Not only might he be late, he was positively hoping to be. As he rode to town he whistled cheerily and took in the world about him as if he was seeing it afresh. The pine trees were especially fragrant this morning. He reined in at the tiny hamlet where Red Rower had his workshop. Sunlight was glinting on the ducking pond. There was no sign of Red, so he pressed on.

When James had stabled Crisp at the Holly Tree Tavern, he sauntered the few hundred yards to church. On a board outside was stencilled the name: Reverend Caleb Jehosephat Dodds. Caleb Jehosephat. What kind of a name was that? His parents must have been eager for a ranting fanatic.

He nodded left and right to familiar faces. Marcus Anstruther was sitting at the very front and did not see him, but beside him was the ginger haired girl who had boldly introduced herself to James at his own property. Her eyes were darting about the whole church, missing nothing, and they sparked interest when James moved up the aisle. It was impossible to miss her with that ginger hair and James smiled absently, but he was too busy hunting for another face to have much thought for Epiphany.

Linus Turner raised his chin from his chest, where it seemed always to rest, but offered no sign of recognition; Bodelle another senior figure in the vestry inclined his head, but there was only one face James really wanted to see. And he found it: glinting auburn hair under a grey hat; pale skin luminous against the dark interior of the church; a graceful presence - Suzannah attracted his eyes like a magnet. His footsteps hesitated, then he moved forward. Kenton was beside Suzannah, and it was Kenton who noticed him. He smiled and gestured to the unoccupied place beside him.

"There's room by us. We did not expect to see you." Their expressions proclaimed that the surprise was a very pleasant one.

"Reverend Dodds noted my absence in winter and rode out in person to warn me a fine might be pending. I decided it was worth making the effort to be seen by the law enforcers of the community from time to time."

"Ah! It isn't just a question of avoiding fines for me, I am a physician and it behoves me to be seen in church. The sick and dying do not care for a Godless man."

Suzannah leant around her husband. James couldn't think of a thing to say, but fortunately Dodds himself saved the moment by sweeping to the front and cutting off all possibility of greetings and conversation. The congregation fell into silence. Someone at the back sneezed. Dodds's gorgon eyes transfixed the offender as if a worse slip had occurred. Then he led them in prayers, and the church became silent again.

Dodds glared as if he were facing an enemy, not his flock. "My lesson this day is taken from the Book of Isaiah." He rasped the words, with eyes half closed, like a man in a trance. "Your lips have uttered falsehood..."

James glanced to Kenton who caught his eye with raised brows. We're in for an ear bashing, Kenton's expression said.

"...but your iniquities have separated you from your God. Your sins have hidden his face from you. Your lips have spoken falsely..."

James focussed on Dodds, but he couldn't resist sneaking glances at the Blizzards on his right. Suzannah's grace and presence struck him among the sea of commonplace faces. What surprised him was the intense concentration with which she listened to Dodds's rant about lies. Kenton, too, appeared to be taking his pastor's oration seriously. To James it was all a piled heap of humbug, with a few nuggets of common sense thrown in to stop the pile collapsing. But he kept his features composed: members of the vestry were sitting on the other side of the aisle. I'm getting like my uncle, keeping in with the right people, James thought.

"Who among us is living a life of sanctity?" thundered Dodds. "Who is spotless and without the sin of falsehood?"

Not me, thought James.

Dodds oration boomed on. The congregation was becoming restless and a child began to cry at the back. Feet were shuffling when Dodds brought his sermon to an abrupt stop.

People looked round, as if unsure if they were free, then they started to rise and voices began to murmur. James hoped to exchange words with Suzannah, but she seemed affected by the harangue.

Kenton whispered in her ear and she shook her head. They filed out into the sunlight. A hint of disappointment hatched in James; neither of the Blizzards was going to invite him to their house, he guessed. But he could take his own initiative.

"Perhaps I could invite you to supper at my farm some evening?" he offered, when they were at the door. "The accommodation would not be so good as you're used to, but there is a room upstairs which is never used. You could spend the night there. Or perhaps you would prefer to come over in the middle of the day to eat."

"You're a busy farmer, James. We don't like to trespass."

"Not so busy that I couldn't disrupt our routine for once. You would be more than welcome."

The Blizzards looked at each other. "My own work gets in the way," replied Kenton. "But you will be most welcome at our home. We will send an invitation over with Thomas, won't we Suzannah?" His voice was encouraging, as if he wanted to bolster her resolve.

"Yes."

"I will look forward to seeing you."

Suzannah gave him a strained smile and Kenton exchanged a last few words before they turned up the street. James watched them continue on their way. Their behaviour, the behaviour of both of them, had been a disappointment to him. He had hoped for a renewal of the closeness which had sprung up on that first meeting. Instead both had shown signs of constraint. Could I have said something to offend them? he wondered. But he dismissed the possibility. He'd hardly said anything significant at all. Might Kenton have spotted me watching Suzannah with a touch too much admiration? I could hardly take my eyes off her over supper. Again, he rejected the idea. His expression had been guarded, however much his eyes had been on Suzannah. Kenton had impressed him instantly as a fine man and he hoped a friendship might develop with him too; James had been without real friendship since he left Wiseman's and the society of Nehemiah, his uncle's slave. Kenton's was the very last applecart which he wanted to overturn: the appeal of Suzannah couldn't be ignored, but alienating Kenton was unthinkable.

"...It is an afront that conjurations and witchcraft should be afoot in a civilized society. The Natives of these parts were bad enough with their idolatry, but we are rid of them."

A thin voice attracted James's attention and he glanced back to see it was Bodelle fulminating.

A young female voice joined in, "Mrs Cather's pig was well one day, sick the next. The pig ailed after a neighbour had visited."

James could not see the girl because she was standing beyond Anstruther, who was showing signs of being irritated by the whole conversation. "That is enough, Epiphany. You don't know what you are talking about. Pigs get sick. It happens all the time. Don't encourage her, Bodelle."

The girl went to speak again, but Anstruther cut her off angrily. He noticed James and read the scowl behind James's eyes. "You must take no notice, Mace," he called. "Women love such tattle."

James had hoped to slip away quietly.

"This is my daughter Epiphany, and my cousin Mistress Harkness."

So the lady who had ridden past Hill House with Epiphany was Anstruther's own cousin. James raised his hat. "Good day. We have met once."

Epiphany looked very fine today in a cherry gown which contrasted with her green eyes and made their colour more startling.

"You could come home and join us, Mr Mace." It was Mrs Harkness who put the invitation.

"That's kind, but I have to get back to my farm."

"The Sabbath is a day of rest, Mace," growled Dodds. "Only the ungodly fail to observe it."

"I need to be a presence on my land. I must ensure my servants respect the Sabbath." Oh God, and the sermon had been about lying! "But I thank you for the invitation." Time to go. As quickly as possible. James touched his hat to the Anstruther ladies. "Again, thank you for the invitation, perhaps some other time." Briskly he moved away.

Crisp greeted him with a snort and a neigh when he reached the Holly Tree, and they were soon heading home. Not quite the day I hoped for, James thought, with a smile at the futility of human hopes.

Today he pressed on smartly and was back in good time. There was work to catch up on, Dodds would not be likely to check his movements. Pink and Violet could take their leisure. They needed it.

"Back in good time, Sir." Vi was straight out of the shack to greet him. "I'll hang that suit directly you've taken it off and your hat needs hanging too, so it don't get sat on."

"No need. I'll do it." He went to his room and changed into working gear.

Food was on the table when he returned to the kitchen. "It's time for me to tell you about Reverend Dodds's sermon." He smiled expecting them to grimace, but they only answered with the dead-pan expressions which their faces always wore. "Well, the sermon was about the price of living a lie. All who live a lie will pay in the end."

"I see, Sir. We mustn't do that then."

"No. We mustn't. Reverend Dodds said it came from the Books of - um - Isaiah, I think."

"If he asks us, we'll be sure to show him we know all about it. The book of Jeremiah you said, Sir?"

"Isaiah."

"Ah."

"He will be preaching at the chapel of ease next Sunday, so you can, - er - enjoy his wisdom then."

Chapter Seven

The emerging tobacco seeds were covered with pine boughs to protect them. James said a small prayer, that all would be well, that flea beetles would not do their worst and that this harvest would be a fine one. Many hazards lay ahead before that end could be achieved. Meanwhile there was barley and beans to be raised, potatoes and corn to plant. He grew a wide variety of vegetables for his own table. The surplus could be sold for a little extra cash, insurance against the vagaries of fortune or a disaster with the tobacco. And the best seed needed to be reserved for next year, without which he could grow nothing.

His rum project had died a death for the simple want of time. Or so he told himself. A measure of interest had also shrivelled because of the arrival of the Blizzards in his life. The utter dedication to his farm and business, which had characterized him during the first three years of his life in Virginia, had slipped. It had slipped only a degree, but the slip was visible. It was pleasant to ride into town and take a meal with Kenton and Suzannah, and while he was doing that, he couldn't be researching rum making and the costs of setting up. He was doing alright as he was, why spoil life with more risks and worries?

Mounding the soil up into hills was hard work. They had to be three feet or so apart and knee high and he waited for rain to soften the soil in preparation. But with the mounds ready they would be able to transplant the tobacco come May, assuming pests hadn't decimated the young plants by then. He worked at the mounds steadily, wielding his hoe. Pink kept pace with him for the first half hour or so, then James forged ahead. His linen began to stick to him, sweat ran into his eyes, his long, dark hair stuck to the back of his neck. A quick pause to drink was the only rest from his toils, till the sound of hooves stayed his hoe. Pink straightened up too and flexed his back. James's heart gave a jump and he nearly dropped his hoe. Two horses trotted smartly up. On one rode the Blizzard servant, Thomas.

"Suzannah!" Instantly the sweatiness of his linen stank its way to the front of his mind. "Give me a moment. Pink, get Mistress Suzannah a drink." He darted into the house, grabbed a clean shirt, splashed water about his torso and, after a cursory wipe with a towel, whipped the shirt on.

"I'm sorry to have taken you by surprise, James." Without intending it, her eyes travelled over his square shoulders and chest, where the damp shirt stuck. "I see you're disconcerted."

"Don't be sorry. I'd rather be disconcerted by a visit from you than toiling in that field, feeling - concerted."

They both laughed. Vi appeared with a tray and Pink led the horses to a trough.

"I am only here with a supper invitation. Kenton would like you to come over on Saturday. If you are unable to make that date, name any other."

"I will be there." It struck him that she could have sent Thomas alone with the message. She did not have to make the ride herself. But he was glad she had gone to trouble. Tobacco mounding could go hang for an hour.

"You will be welcome to stay the night and can attend church with us on Sunday, if it pleased you."

A thrill of pleasure breathed in James. "If it's not asking too much of your hospitality I would certainly prefer to stay. You will encounter me in a more civilized state than today. I'm sorry to be such a dust sack. I believe I look worse than Pink."

A light in her eyes told him that he did not look worse than Pink, that his appearance, in fact, did not displease her at all.

Her reply was matter of fact. "You are a farmer - show me a farm with no dirt. You should see Kenton sometimes! Only on Monday he came home drenched in blood. He looked like he'd wrestled a mountain lion and barely survived. A patient had raked his own thigh on a saw."

"The man lived?"

"Yes. Kenton stopped the blood."

"I'm sure Kenton is a fine doctor."

"He is." Her voice sang with pride and affection, there was no mistaking it. "And he has an open mind, an observant eye. He dismisses as superstition much of what his colleagues practise. Unfortunately, it did not always gain him the regard of other doctors, or even patients. Many patients _prefer_ superstition."

"Yes. Do you remember how I told you that Bodelle and Miss Anstruther were affecting to believe in witchcraft a few weeks ago? Talking of it outside church of all places! Anstruther didn't like it. Someone - I forget if it was my father or uncle - told me that you will never lose money underestimating the intelligence of human beings! The saying has more my uncle's stamp than Father's, it was probably him."

"Did you not get on with your uncle?"

"He owned a sugar plantation, as you know, and kept many slaves. He was cynical, driven by dry self-interest. There was no opening his eyes to the immorality of making money by breaking the lives of others. His argument was that Africans enslave their own and sell the slaves on to Europeans, therefore he was benefitting from their system not creating it." James sighed. "But he was not gratuitously wicked in the sense that many of the planters were." Dennis Hake flashed through James's mind. "He did not entertain himself at the expense of his slaves; but at some point in life, money had become God and he worshipped no other."

"And so you argued?"

"Yes. I should never have gone to the plantation. It was a misconceived arrangement from the start."

Suzannah sipped her lemon. "So what drove you from Chipping Campden to Jamaica, James?" She spoke his name as if she liked it. "You must have known what you were heading into."

The nub of the issue. The unmentionable truth. James had talked of Kassandra to nobody since he left England. The mischance of his being assumed dead after Blenheim, Kassandra's rapid leap towards consolation in Geoff's arms; none of this could he speak about, though more than five years had settled over the wound. He hesitated, took a thirsty draught from his glass, glanced at the sky. "A sense of adventure, I suppose." Not a complete lie. He looked into her calm eyes. "What brought you here?"

Now it was time for her glance to creep away. "Adventure? Not that. But Kenton was weary of the medical profession in London. He wanted newness. We both wanted it."

It seemed an inadequate answer, even more inadequate than his own, but he said nothing. He'd become used to hiding his motives and accepted that other people were concealing secrets. The Blizzards were good people; of that he was certain: he needed to know nothing more of their motives.

"I didn't realize you'd lived in London."

"For a time yes. Kenton studied there and we stayed." She looked about her. "Hill House, it seems a strange name for your plantation, James. The highest hills are your tobacco mounds."

He laughed. "I think we might be on a slope... My father's farm back home is called Hill House. And that truly sits on top of a hill."

She smiled, a beautiful, slow smile which engulfed her face and reminded him, for a split second of someone else. "I told you it is hard to forget the old country, but you tried to deny it on the day I first met you. I knew you were not being truthful!"

He laughed again, pleased that she had paid enough attention to remember his words. "I must be careful what I say. It seems that you can see straight through me."

Abruptly she leapt up. "What does _he_ want?"

James followed her glance and was astonished to find C.J Dodds bearing down on them. Suzannah's presence had rendered him blind and deaf to all else. He collected his wits and stepped forward to intercept the minister. A show of politeness. "Reverend. Some refreshment, you look in need of it."

"I will trouble you for that. I have been thrown from my horse and he galloped back towards town. I was not far from here and am seeking help." His manner was uncharacteristically emollient, but his little, dark eyes leapt backwards and forwards between James and Suzannah, as if he was drinking in things that normal human vision could not see. Suzannah was modestly attired, but her comeliness was not lost on Dodds, James was sure.

James wished that the minister had called at any other time. An effort to be practical: "You can borrow a horse if you like. My man will ride back into town with you and bring both animals home." Pink had more useful claims on his time, but better to keep on terms with this influential pest.

"Thank you for the trouble. We may find Arkle grazing on our way."

"I hope so."

"I had better go, James. I'll call Thomas."

"And I'll saddle Crisp and Bobsworth. Wait here Reverend Dodds. There's lemon in that jug and Vi will find a clean beaker." _What an accomplished hypocrite I'm becoming._ "Pink! Pink, you're needed for a ride into town with the minister to bring the horses back. Keep your eyes open for Arkle, in case he's stopped to graze."

Pink's features brightened at the rare chance of a ride and escape from drudgery. "I'll keep a look out, Sir. Arkle's a fine horse. One of the best."

The horses were soon readied. James nipped forward to help Suzannah into the saddle before Thomas could do his job. There was a brief, charged, contact between them. Her eyes evaded his. James waved goodbye and they were off. Suzannah turned briefly, then disappeared into trees.

When there was no more sight of her, and the beating of hooves had faded, James returned to the bench and sat down, suddenly empty. He felt alone, though Vi was toiling in the next field. Something was missing from his life, and in this second it was impossible to pretend otherwise.

_I have to be careful, very careful._ The words drummed in his head. Kenton was becoming his friend, and he was a truly good man. James had no wish to lose his friendship or betray him. Not for anyone, not for anything. Nor would he betray Kenton. Nor would he... He looked to the sky, where a flock of starlings were wheeling. Why did he feel hollow because Suzannah had gone? She had not been in his life for long; they did not know each other well. He poured more lemon and looked about him, at the house - not much more than a large shack really - at the barn, at the animal pens. All this he'd carved out. It had cost him his whole strength and time for the last three years. There had been nothing left of himself to regret the bareness of life: for regrets you needed time to reflect. But natural needs and wants couldn't go unrecognized forever; they were making themselves felt now.

He wished Suzannah were free. That he couldn't deny. He might hardly know her, but he wished she were free. None of the other women of Williamsburg or the neighbouring area interested him. They were either coarse, or dull, or waspish, or something didn't appeal. With Suzannah he sensed there might have been the chance to build a satisfying life. He swilled the lemon round his beaker. Well, too late. She was already married, and to a worthy young man, a handsome man, a better man than himself in every way, no doubt. There could be no excuse, as there had been with Pernel, that her husband was an older man who knew what the risks were when he took on a lovely young wife.

He drank his lemon, considered the house, the barn, the river glinting not far away. _Am I going to do nothing but raise tobacco and exist in a glorified shed for the rest of my life?_

He stood purposefully. There was work to be done, and he had best get on with it. He flexed his back, took off towards the next field. Vi looked round when he joined her but said nothing.

He grasped his hoe and resumed work. Break the soil. Break it deep. Loosen the clods. Scrat it up. Make a mound. And again... And again... Think of nothing...

Chapter Eight

James kept an anxious eye on his tobacco seedlings every day during the next month. In the morning an inspection was his first activity, and it was his last in the evening too. While he couldn't save the seedlings by looking at them, nor could he resist the temptation to keep checking. But this year they were in luck, neither bad weather non pests did for the infant plants. Now came the task of thinning them out to about four inches apart. The crop cycle was moving. His hopes rose.

James visited the Blizzards three times in quick succession. Intimacy blossomed rapidly and the warmth of their company forced him to confront again how dull his three years in Virginia had really been. And having once been confronted, the thought could not readily be thrust aside. But company of a different kind beckoned. James, Vi and Pink were all working on the seedlings, when an invitation arrived. It was to Marcus Anstruther's and it came as a surprise.

As a Justice of the Peace, Anstruther, was wrapped up in law and the established church. James respected fully the difficulties of trying to administer law on any level. He had no sympathy with thieves or murderers and understood how quickly human behaviour could descend into destructive chaos. For the church he had somewhat less respect. It too played a role in discouraging crime and mayhem, all to the good, but it pried a little to deeply into the lives of its congregation and its ministers were often poor advertisements for a Christian way of life. Do as I say, not as I do, seemed to be their maxim.

When the invitation came, he sought about for a polite excuse not to attend. There was always too much work awaiting his attention, and he had slipped into the habit of abandoning it too freely since Kenton and Suzannah arrived at Williamsburg. Kenton and Suzannah... They might be at the Anstruther home, and if they were not, it would be possible to call on them again while he was in town. He dashed off a quick reply agreeing to come to the reception and thrust it into the hand of Anstruther's servant.

His tailor in Williamsburg had certainly benefitted from the arrival of the Blizzards. After three years of purchasing next to nothing, James had visited the establishment twice replacing shabby clothes. Kenton dressed to the best standards of a professional physician and Suzannah was always attractively, though quietly, attired. He had no wish to be mistaken for the rat catcher when he called at their door.

His only evening clothes, hardly warn since he arrived in Virginia, would still do, he decided when it came time to prepare. They were black and austere, but none the worse for that. And they still fitted. He passed the suit to Vi to be smoothed and for a polishing of the buttons.

"It should arrive in town fit to be seen," she assured him. "But you'd best hang it straight up when you get to Dr Blizzard's. Let the weight pull out any creases from being in the box. No doubt they'll have a servant there who can touch it up, or maybe Mistress Blizzard herself will be handy with it."

A pair of evening shoes had also migrated with him from Jamaica. His room had not been destroyed in the blaze at Wiseman's and his personal gear was mostly still usable from that time, the smokiness having defused. He deliberately blocked memories of having the shoes made during his early days in Jamaica. It was not that long ago, but so much had happened since, that he felt as if he was recalling a separate lifetime. He dusted the shoes off, packed them carefully into a box and returned to work.

James was unable to imagine why he had been invited to Anstruther's gathering, but Kenton and Suzannah thought they might be able to provide an answer.

"You do?"

"Yes. Did you not tell us that your mother was one of the Vallenders of Stow on the Wold?"

"She was." James had forgotten mentioning it. "She's buried there, in the Vallender tomb."

"I think a Vallender played some significant role in the Royalist army during the Civil War. Anstruther is fond of telling everyone that his own grand-father, or great-grandfather, did the same. Anstruther is the type who ferrets out such information."

"He didn't need to ferret it out. I told him myself, when we first met. I forget why."

"There we are then. You are a Vallender, or a son of that family, and worthy of drinking his wine and wearing out his dance floor."

"So that's it." James smiled but raised his eyebrows. "My Mace ancestors fought on the other side in the Civil War. I probably never told him that."

"And I shouldn't mention it tonight either." Kenton refilled the wines glasses. "This slips down too easily. I better not drink too much. We have a whole evening ahead of us. It wouldn't do to stagger around the Anstruther mansion."

"Anstruther does not mention what these festivities are in aid of. He seems to be going to a lot of trouble. Everyone with any gentlemanly pretentions for miles around has been invited. I would have preferred to get on with my work."

"Oh, don't be like that, we're glad you're not getting on with your work, aren't we, Suzannah?"

"Yes." Her smile was candid.

"I didn't think it a good idea to say no to Anstruther. Living on the edge of the civilized world like this, you never know when you might need his friendship. And it would have been needlessly uncivil to refuse."

"We thought so too. And his wine will be even better than ours."

"The best reason of all to go."

The three of them laughed. It occurred to James that he would far prefer an evening just with the Blizzards in their comfortable home. Anstruther occupied a fine dwelling on one of the main streets and the food would be excellent, but James guessed that he would feel happiest when the night was over, and he could take a last quiet drink with his friends in their parlour. He looked out into the yard, which had been so dull in winter, but was now coming to life with raised beds of flowers and pots of herbs.

"I think it is time we should dress." Suzannah glanced at the clock. "We'd better not offend this great man whose ancestor led the Royalist charge at Edgehill."

With much laughter the three of them went upstairs.

James had never visited the Anstruther home before, though he had occasionally been admitted - dragged - into other gracious houses. The interior reminded him of Wiseman's with its staircase sweeping up to a gallery. Anstruther greeted them personally with an easy show of bonhomie. Standing close by were Bodelle and Turner. Reverend Bell, the minister of a neighbouring parish also hovered. Turner was saturnine and looked as if he had about as much interest in the festivities as James did, even less perhaps. Bodelle soon drifted away to talk law with C.J Dodds, leaving James and his friends with Bell, who was like no vicar James had ever encountered. Bell had the mannerisms of a flighty girl and a tinkling laugh to go with it. Dodds glowered from the door, before turning his back on his fellow theologian.

"Mr Mace, my wife and I have occasionally spotted you in the distance and wished to meet you."

A wife, well thank God at least Bell had one of those... "Really? It's pleasure to make your acquaintance."

"You probably do not realize that we have mutual acquaintances."

Mutual acquaintances? Oh God... So that was why Bell wanted to talk.

"Hah! I see you are surprised! It was my wife who noticed the connection."

James fiddled with the stem of his glass. "Connection?"

"My wife is one of the Castors of Bristol. She is here somewhere, though I have lost her in this press."

James gulped his wine. "The Castors... I don't think I know them."

Bell giggled. "Leticia has a cousin, Anthony. It seems that he knows you."

A cold little hand twisted James's guts. There was no escape. Kenton and Suzannah were watching him; they seemed mesmerized. Bell was smiling as if he held the key to a wonderful mystery.

"Ah, Castor. I have met him. He has a home near mine."

"Leticia maintains an occasional correspondence with him."

What luck. "And he mentioned me? Is he here tonight?"

"No, my dear, he is not. I do not think he has ever visited our colony."

"You must tell me if he does." Then I can be sure to avoid him.

"Unlikely, but I will do so. Doctor, you look a thought green, as if you required your own services."

"...It must be the light."

"Miss Epiphany, let me introduce you to James Mace."

Anstruther's daughter had approached from an adjacent room, unnoticed by James. She turned glittering green eyes upon him. Her figure was slim as a reed in its gown of silver tissue.

"We have already met. Mr Mace, you have been an elusive shadow around Williamsburg."

James gave a slight bow. "No shadow, merely busy."

She was very young, and very handsome, but James's instinct was to back away from her. The snippet about witchcraft which he had overheard outside church irritated him. Why mix with a troublemaker?

"You have not been in Father's house before. At last we have put that right."

James inclined his head.

"Perhaps you are not a dancing man?"

"I am not, as you will see for yourself when the dancing beginnings. And that will happen soon; the musicians are warming up. Keep an eye open for my three left feet."

She laughed. Pity every woman didn't respond to his jokes like this one did.

"There is nothing worse than a tall man who dances gauchely. The whole world notices."

"As bad as that? I'd better stay on the side." Already his attention was wandering; Suzannah's auburn hair was visible out of the corner of his eye. He wondered when it would be seemly for him to ask Suzannah to dance. Not the first of course. Kenton would properly take that. Nor the second, he couldn't appear in too big a rush.

Epiphany gave a little cough and he refocussed his attention to her.

"I said you must come to our home more often, Mr Mace," she repeated, "now that the ice is broken here."

"Yes."

"Yes." She laughed. "Is that your only answer? Would it not be gentlemanly to pretend enthusiasm to visit us?"

She was regarding him with an air of importance, but his attention wandered again. The Blizzards had moved a yard or two and a mulberry coloured panel of Suzannah's skirt was just visible. A patch of Suzannah's skirt was more fascinating to him that the whole of this Anstruther girl.

Suzannah's dress wafted out of James's peripheral vision and his eyes returned to Epiphany. Complacency and defiance were equally measured in her green gaze. She was expecting him to ask her onto the floor, suddenly he realized it. Almost, as the young lady of the house, she was demanding it. Why not satisfy her, if that was what she wanted? He couldn't care less about dancing with her, but what harm would it do? "The first dance, Miss Anstruther. If you are not engaged, would you do me the honour?"

She gave a little bob. He shot a self-deprecating glance to Kenton and Suzannah who were both looking on woodenly. "I do not know any fashionable steps. I have been out of practice in recent years." He'd been out of practice all his life.

"I can teach you."

Oh God. "Kenton, Suzannah, are you not joining us?"

"Later, perhaps."

They passed though double doors onto the dance floor. Plush maroon curtains hung to the floor at the long windows and candles flickered in sconces, casting uncertain shadows. The candlelight muted the hues of the gowns and evening suits, invested extra beauty in the figures and scene. The ginger of Epiphany's hair was less strident, the lustre of her eyes more mysterious.

Anstruther and his cousin Mrs Harkness stepped out, they danced a few steps, then the instruments paused, and the rest of the room formed up. James could think of nothing worth saying, and in any case needed all his concentration to recall the steps and moves.

"You are out of practice."

"I was never in it."

"You should be. It is a gentlemanly requirement, Mr Mace. Father says that you are wedded to your tobacco in the backwoods."

Laughter. "I'm not so far from Williamsburg." No comment on being wedded to the tobacco.

"I have seen you in town occasionally, at a distance." Those feline green eyes glinted.

"Mm?" Suzannah and Kenton had decided to join the throng after all. They appeared flushed and unhappy, but still their fine looks were enhanced by the candlelight. There could be no more striking couple in the room.

Epiphany reached up to speak more intimately when they came together again. Her lips were very close to his ear. "I have seen you in town occasionally. I have seen you with the doctor and his lady. You sit with them in church. You walk home with them."

His expression stiffened. Her manner was coquettish. She was playing a social game, but he perceived the pitfalls. He did not want this girl observing his movements or commenting on them.

"She is a very lovely woman, Mistress Blizzard." Epiphany's eyes met James's to gauge their reaction. "But she is a thought over-tall. Of course, that would not matter to you. You are even taller. And that birthmark on her shoulder - you can see it under her gown tonight - most unsightly."

James could not hide a frown this time. "So is her husband very tall. As for any tiny blemish, we all have them."

"Y-e-s."

She was trying to lead him somewhere. He realized that. But he was determined not to be provoked and made no further reply.

She tried again. "It was me who suggested to father that you should be invited. Did you know?"

"I didn't." He maintained a neutral countenance. "But it was kind of you."

A threat was starting to brew in Epiphany's feline eyes. The music took them apart for a second. "You should come to town more often, Mr Mace, be seen among people of your own class."

He smiled thinly. "You mistake me, Miss Anstruther. I am not a wealthy man." He wished the dance would come to an end. He glanced at the musicians hoping for signs of it. Couldn't that smiling fool on the violin wind things up?

"I did not talk of money. Your family are gentlemen, my father said so."

"In a minor way."

"The Vallenders were not so minor. Father told me that too. Around Stow on the Wold they were one of the great families."

So that was her interest. "At one time yes, but not now. The main line died out at the time of the Civil War." Would the dance never end? How much did this girl know about him? Why was she smiling in that complacent fashion?

"You are a Vallender. They were great people for the Royalist cause! So were the Anstruthers."

"I'm a Mace. They weren't."

She tittered as if delighted by the sally. "If you were inclined, you would be received almost anywhere in town. Father likes company for supper and he likes to discuss politics. But there are purely social evenings here too. You don't have to spend all day talking to your tobacco."

She was right, up to a point, he thought. Much of the sterility of his life was self-imposed. But would listening to Anstruther's views on taxation be more fulfilling than minding his own business at home? His narrow life needed fresh stimulus, but he didn't imagine these were the people to provide it. "Oh no, is that the music stopping so soon? I am engaged elsewhere for the next dance. You must forgive me, Miss Epiphany." He bowed and escaped with the best show of made-up grace that he could.

Suzannah and Kenton were retreating from the floor too and he rapidly over took them.

"May I have this dance with Suzannah, Kenton, if it pleases her? I could think of no polite way of escaping the claws of Miss Anstruther," - why had he used the word claws? - "except inventing another partner."

"No excuses needed, James. Miss Anstruther certainly seems intent upon you."

"Hard to imagine why."

"Probably those Vallender ancestors."

"Humph!"

Suzannah gave James her hand. A tingle of excited connection flashed through his flesh. Such feelings could not be one directional, they couldn't be, he told himself.

They stepped out onto the floor, while Kenton watched from a corner. James had to work hard to keep Kenton at the forefront of his mind. A tight grip on yourself, Jem...

Together they formed up amid the other sets on the floor. Suzzanah's eyes were only four inches or so below his, though he was very tall. She smiled confidingly at him. Kenton evaporated from his thoughts.

"I think Miss Anstruther is watching you even now. You have made an impression there."

"I had hardly spoken to the girl before tonight. She once rode off the track by my farm to be 'neighbourly', as she put it. I did not understand then how she was even aware of me. Perhaps she knows I have offended Dodds and the vestry, by missing sermons. Girls of her age can be capricious and enjoy little rebellions."

Suzannah's face was serious. "I do not believe it is sermons which she has on her mind. She is a good-looking girl. She will not lack admirers."

"Good-looking, but not good-natured; I'd wager that. And too full of her own importance as an Anstruther. I don't know her, but I know the type." James caught a fleeting glimpse of Kenton's face near the door. "Kenton seemed very pensive back in the hall. And he's shown no signs of enjoying the entertainment since. He was bright enough before we set out."

She hesitated. "He is tired. There is never a lack of people needing his skills. His reputation has grown quickly."

James focussed on the steps. Tiredness seemed an inadequate excuse for Kenton's strained look. He couldn't be more tired than James himself. And why had his demeanour changed suddenly? "I suppose..."

They danced on in silence.

"I can tell you do not enjoy dancing. You are stiff and mechanical." Her fingers gripped a little tighter on his as she pirouetted. There was a glint of approval for James the man in her eyes, whatever she said of his dancing.

"Will you give me the third dance too?" He hadn't meant to blurt the question. He'd only stepped out with her to avoid Epiphany Anstruther, or that was what he told himself.

Elation and trouble immediately competed in those opaque grey eyes. "Reverend Dodds is watching us with a glowering brow and one of the old hens from church looks about to lay an egg."

"Mrs Bodelle, probably. That's her usual look."

"And you are right about Miss Epiphany. She is watching us and there is spite in her glance even now, though heaven knows why. Let's avoid comment, James, and return to Kenton. We must consider him."

There was no arguing with that. James didn't even want to argue with it. The music drew to a graceful halt.

"Perhaps one of the later dances?"

"I would like that. Miss Anstruther is following you with her eyes, though she is talking to Reverend Bell. Let us move."

"When my ancestor got shot at Edgehill he didn't know how he would influence the future."

Suzannah's eyes ghosted over James's frame and face, as though she appreciated what attracted Miss Anstruther, though James himself might not. "She is used to having her own way, I'd say. Mr Anstruther is usually in town and she may rule the roost at Watersmeet."

They joined Kenton whose glance was wandering uncertainly. James did not think he was displeased because of the dance Suzannah had just enjoyed, something else was spoiling his night.

"Kenton, dear? Shall we not dance now?"

James experienced another little twist of pique: Kenton dear. It was natural enough that she should express herself affectionately, and James understood that his resentment was irrational, unhealthy even.

With empty eyes, Kenton took his wife's hand and led her onto the floor where the dancers were already stepping and twirling. James would have cared to watch the handsome couple dance, or he'd have liked to watch Suzannah, but out of the corner of his eye he spied a shimmer of silver tissue and escaped as hastily as he could without displaying his purpose.

He passed out into the hall and followed a trail of male voices into an adjacent room. Anstruther saw him at once and moved forward.

"Not dancing Mace? I was relying on you young folk to buoy up the evening."

James could think of no worthwhile reply, so he just smiled.

"How prospers your farm, Mace?"

"Superstitious caution prevents me saying that things go well: a plague of pests could be descending at this very second."

Anstruther acknowledged the vagaries of chance. "Spread your risks. A mono crop and you are vulnerable."

"You talk of pests. Do you think there is some special reason why you should be at risk?" It was Bodelle, with his sharp voice and sharp pointed nose, who spoke.

A glass of wine was thrust into James's unready hand. "Some special reason? Insects, weather, I was thinking of these things." He couldn't perceive the direction of Bodelle's question.

"But why do you think you are vulnerable?"

James stared. "We all are, surely?"

"Last year we lost two cows at our farm. My wife and I were suspicious about our neighbours. We had made many offers for their land, but they refused. Lucilla believes they ill wished us."

James's expression could not have been more blank. Anstruther frowned.

Bodelle lifted his chin in defiance of James's look. "The forces of darkness still walk the earth, Mace. Perhaps they are freer here where civilization barely has a hold."

This sounded like a fragment of the conversation James had caught outside church.

"I only fear insects, Bodelle and I don't think my farm is at special risk." He turned to Anstruther. "I plant as wide a variety of vegetables as the soil will support and limit the tobacco to earning cash to supplement the farm."

"Tobacco depletes the land quickly. You'll have to move on in a few years, cut out new uncultivated acres, if you want to stay in tobacco, or your yield will dwindle."

"I'm not sure that I care to do that. Eventually I would end up a frontiers man, and there hazards truly lurk!" His eyes swivelled to Bodelle.

"Native Indians? You are right. Eventually the men of this colony will have to push them further west, right out of their homelands."

James replaced his glass on a tray carried by a slave and accepted another. He sipped the drink, made an appreciative face, thought about a reply, decided none was necessary. In Jamaica he'd learned a lesson about diplomacy. Pushing people even further off their homelands was not his wish, but Anstruther and Bodelle didn't need to know. Rather than riding west, his mind was inclined towards sailing east. For home. Permanently. Anstruther could find out after he'd already sailed.

Mr Turner, the saturnine looking man, wound himself up to speak. "Vigorous young men like you are what the colony needs. You were a cavalry man?"

Oh God, I've heard all this before. "Infantry."

"A trained soldier and a farmer. Ideal."

Instinctively James manipulated his left arm, the one bayoneted at Blenheim. He gently rubbed his neck where a musketball had left its mark in the same action. It might not be in his interests to be perceived as a fully fit man. He'd learned that to his cost before. "I came out of the army injured. In fact I was almost killed."

Turner smiled, or at least the corners of his mouth threatened to turn upwards. "Men like you will always be in demand, whether you realize it or not. You're a fighting man. It's in your gait, in your look."

Uncomfortably, James's considered the question of why he had been invited to the evening's entertainment. Politics and militias were the last thing he wanted to get drawn into.

"Acelin Vallender fought with my great-grandfather at Edgehill," put in Anstruther. "He was a man of the greatest bravery and loyalty to his king, as were my ancestors." Anstruther's voice lifted proudly, though the events were long ago.

"You must come to town more often, Mace," took up Bodelle again. "Pulling caterpillars off plants all day is commendable - one admires an industrious man - but it's work for a slave not a master. I've got a couple of slaves I could sell to you."

A spasm of anger gripped James's stomach. Here were these wealthy, privileged men, casually disposing of the lives of others. They never scrutinised their own consciences. They made a public show of upholding the power of the church yet ignored any Christian message about reciprocal decency. Yes, these men had difficult work to accomplish in maintaining order in an uncivilized new world, but could they not show a little more humility about their own fittingness to rule?

"There is a line in the Bible about doing unto others as would be done unto you, I think. On my farm, in a modest way, I try to practise it, gentlemen."

It was not the reply they had been waiting for, he could see that in the gaping expressions of Bodelle and Turner. Both men looked affronted.

"You will not prosper many seasons if you are truly living according to that precept." Turner recovered his tongue first.

"Gentlemen," Anstruther's smile was bland. "The conversation has become a trifle weighty. This evening was intended as a celebration. At least we have got Mace here tonight. You do not appear to know why I have assembled so many guests?"

"No." And he didn't care either.

"Next week is my daughter's seventeenth birthday."

"Miss Epiphany? I imagined she was a little older than that."

"She will be seventeen. Hence the music and dancing. Occasional frivolity is good for the soul. Ah, Dodds, you look red in the face."

"The wine is strong, Anstruther," offered Turner.

Dodds eyeballed Turner. "I have been dancing, not imbibing."

"Dancing? You Dodds? That is a first." Bodelle was amused. "We must come and watch."

"Miss Epiphany and I were talking about the book of Revelations and I asked her for the honour of a dance. She graciously accepted."

"I hope you're not here to expound Revelations for us," said Anstruther. "Any other night, but not this one."

"Perhaps you will excuse me, gentlemen." James took advantage of Dodds's arrival to affect his escape. There were doors opening onto a garden and he went out with a deep sigh of relief. The air outside carried a fragrance of blossom.

It was not yet fully dark, and two tall figures moving across the grass hooked his instant attention. There could be no other couple as tall as them; Kenton and Suzannah were arm in arm and apparently in the deepest conversation. It would be impolite to impose himself. Instead he decided to linger on the lawn, hopefully avoiding the attention of Epiphany, and to drift in the right direction when the chance presented.

It was not long before that happened. "James, you are hiding too."

"Taking the air and wishing I might be in your home rather than this one." Through the fading light he saw them both smile agreement.

"We have only just been saying the same thing. Still, we must try to put on an act. Perhaps it would be courteous if I asked Miss Epiphany to dance."

"I'm sure she'd appreciate it. Her father tells me she is seventeen next week and this occasion is partly in her honour."

"Her father may be looking for a suitable mate for her," suggested Suzannah.

"True."

"You're fortunate Kenton, that rules you out." I wish I was in your shoes. "I don't like the attention they're giving me. They've just alarmed me by talking about my military past. Bodelle thinks I'm marked out as a fighting man."

"You are," they chorused.

James pressed on, "Worse still Bodelle talked a heap of rubbish about someone cursing his cows. However big an idiot he is, I would have thought he had advanced beyond a belief in witchcraft."

"Hardly the subject for Epiphany's birthday celebrations. I will act the good guest by asking her to dance. I can't skulk in the garden all night." Kenton's smile was weak. "Suzannah dear, James will look after you while I am gone."

"Perhaps James would ask me to dance."

James hid his expression from Kenton and followed them back to the house.

On the dance floor James forgot everything in the delight of Suzannah's nearness and touch. As they twirled and pirouetted, he realized more than ever, that just building a farm was no longer enough for him. At home Kassandra had bestowed sparkle on a life of seasonal routines; in Jamaica Pernel had provided a very different, but intoxicating excitement. Virginia had been one long blank. Work left him few spare moments to contemplate life, but it was becoming ever more evident that something needed to change.

"You will not go home?" exclaimed Suzannah, when he admitted his doubts about life in Virginia. "We feel fortunate to have met you - both of us feel it."

James waited for the music to bring their faces close together. "And I feel fortunate to have met you. Your arrival here has certainly improved everything - the arrival of both of you."

"So?"

"But meeting you has forced me to consider what I want, and I can't persuade myself that it's a shack in the woods."

Shyly she suggested, "Would it be different if you were married?"

"...Not necessarily." He had the birth to acquire a wife, his finances were not the worst. But what wife? One of the nonentities who listened to Dodds with rapt expressions every Sunday and parroted his sermons? Some scold who would forever require a new parasol? Life with the right wife would bring its blessings, life with the wrong one would not. He wanted Kassandra, or someone like her. Suzannah seemed like her, but Suzannah was equally out of reach. "If I had the right wife, it would be different. To be frank," caution muffled his tones, "It is time I found her."

She dropped her eyes. "James there are things I wish I could say to you, but the situation is impossible."

They both forgot the dance and came to a stop. Another pair regarded them crossly and they resumed their movements, out of time with the music or each other.

"What is it you wish to say?"

"You don't understand James. The situation is impossible." Distressed notes trembled through her voice. "I can't explain."

"Why can't you explain?"

A tiny shake of the head was her only answer. They danced on in strained but intensely intimate silence till the musicians brought the music to a graceful stop and Suzannah hastily retreated. James followed and was irritated to find Epiphany barring his way. Kenton and Suzannah both disappeared into the crush.

"You have been hiding, Mr Mace."

"Hardly, I've just been on the dance floor. And I've talked with your father and Mr Turner."

"I trust they appreciated the compliment. You may not know that it is my birthday next week."

"Your father mentioned it."

She looked at him very boldly.

Don't give in and ask her to dance, he told himself. You'll only store trouble for another time. Stay politely aloof.

Marcus Anstruther appeared with Mrs Harkness. "Not dancing Mace? And my daughter only a foot away and needing a partner. What ails you?"

No escape from that. He forced a smile and extended his hand. "Miss Anstruther, I think there is room on the floor." Subduing his irritation, he led her out.

She danced well, he had to admit that. Far better than he did. Far better than Kassandra or Suzannah. If married life were one big dance, she would no doubt make an excellent partner. But she would be no more comforting than those drab nobodies in church whose chief pleasure was tattling about other women's flaws.

"You look very serious, Mr Mace. You ought to have studied the law. Sentencing men to death would have come naturally."

He couldn't help but laugh. "Book learning never suited me unless it shed light on practical matters. But I would have been quite happy to don the black cloth when passing judgement on murderers."

"I recognized it in you. There is an edge to you Mr Mace. I admire that."

God, everyone was offering their assessment of him tonight.

"A man will not go far in life without it."

"In some walks of life, perhaps. I don't know that it requires edge to grow beans or pick caterpillars off tobacco."

The answer seemed to amuse her and she pressed on, "I do not admire softness."

I couldn't care less what you admire.

"There are people, you must have listened to them, who do not like to see a man in the stocks."

"Crime must be deterred."

"There was a man last week dragged across the ducking pond for brewing bad beer."

"The worst of crimes."

"You're mocking me!"

"Partly. But how does this concern me? I don't seek to administer the law."

"I only talk of admiration, Mr Mace."

He considered revealing his views on slavery. That should flatten her interest forever, but the dancefloor was hardly the place to expound his views. "I think you'd be disappointed if you really knew me, Miss Anstruther."

"There is little chance to get to know you."

God, would she never take the hint? "I do not for example believe in curses and witchcraft," he took up with asperity, "and I hate to hear honest people accused of such tat."

This time the point got home and confusion clouded her eyes. In silence they danced on. The silence continued unbroken this time. When the music wound to a stop, she shot a last, dart in his direction. "Perhaps the lovely Mrs Blizzard has bewitched you, though, eh?" Epiphany flounced from the dance floor with no graces and disappeared through the big archway.

Angry with himself and her, James marched into the hall, where he almost ran physically into Kenton. Kenton was red in the face and Suzannah's eyes were darting left and right, as if seeking escape. Close by Reverend Bell was giggling at some quip by Mrs Bell.

James regarded his friend closely. "Perhaps you would like to leave, Kenton? You look tired."

"Too much wine, only that, but it was in my mind to go. Suzannah dear, it will not spoil your evening?"

"I'll find Mr Anstruther and say goodnight."

That was a quick answer. "I will make my apologies too."

"What, not you too, Mace? I wouldn't have thought the wine had addled your brains." Bell's laugh tinkled about the hall.

"It doesn't take much."

"Strength exudes from you, Mace, if you don't mind me saying." Admiration lit Bell's eyes.

James turned sharply away.

"Mr Anstruther is through there."

It was a brief leave taking of their host, and they departed in haste.

Chapter Nine

A month elapsed and James began to hope that the Anstruthers had forgotten him. During that time, he saw the Blizzards weekly: they appeared to cling to his friendship as much as he did theirs. Kenton's round continued to grow, but Suzannah's face was pale, as if she rarely left the house.

When a smart servant rode up to the farm one humid afternoon, James groaned. It was easy to guess what the business would be about. He was planting out his young tobacco stock in the knee-high hills which they'd raked up with such effort over the last weeks. Interruptions were not welcome.

Impatiently, he tore open the note. He had no inclination to shake out his velvet suit again. If he couldn't be with the Blizzards, he wanted to be at home, bringing off his crop for the year, and thinking through his plans to leave Virginia.

His eyes raced over the words. An informal supper - so he'd be stuck there over night. Quick excuses sprinted through his mind. Anstruther would understand the importance of his crop, he wasn't a frivolous man. But he wouldn't understand why James was so intent on rejecting all overtures of friendship. James made a verbal acceptance and stamped back to his field in a testier humour than he'd left it.

"I shall not be here on Saturday night, Pink. I am wanted in town. There is chapel to attend on Sunday."

"Sir."

"I'll get back as quickly as I can."

Pink nodded and returned to planting the tobacco.

The invitation preyed on James's mind as he worked his way along the row. Why could Anstruther not leave him alone? It must be obvious that he had no stomach for local politics. If some kind of uprising happened, he would not be able to avoid his duty in the militia, but he had no ambition to extend the frontiers of Virginia by taking up arms. If Anstruther imagined him in that role, he was much mistaken.

He worked on till overwhelmed by the need to escape from his mood for a brief while. The hogsheads had been waiting at Red's for a month. Now would be a good time to get them. A ride to vent some energies.

"It's time I went to Rower's and got those hogsheads, Pink. I've a mind to do it now. Keep on with this till I'm back."

"Will do, Sir."

He left Pink and Violet steadily progressing along the hills. Bobsworth was soon hitched to the cart and James drove off more speedily than he would normally do. The drive did him good. He had to focus on the track, look out for fallen branches and hazards; it stopped him churning the Anstruther matter in his mind. At the fork to the Lansdown place he encountered something worse than a deep pothole or fallen tree. Dodds was walking his horse.

James reined in. Arkle did not look lame. "Not another accident? If you were coming to see me, I am attending business."

"I was not coming to you."

Dodds expression surprised James. The smile was not natural. Dodds never smiled.

"I am only enjoying a little exercise. It is a fine day."

A strange explanation. Riding provided plenty of exercise, and James had not before encountered Dodds on foot beyond the limits of town.

"Well, if I can't help, I'll leave you to your exercise."

James flicked the reins and urged Bobsworth forward. He sneaked a glance over his shoulder and found Dodds still standing at the fork in the road, continuing to watch him.

Thoughtfully James drove on.

James's social pill was sugared when he received a note from Kenton saying that Anstruther had surprised them with an invitation too. But when James arrived at the Blizzard house for a preliminary drink, he was disappointed to find no Suzannah, and Kenton dressed for a night at his own fireside.

"I'm sorry that we will not be with you, James. Suzannah is unwell. I have sent apologies."

"Ill?"

"There is no cause for alarm. A trifling ailment. But she cannot go out. She is resting now upstairs."

Disappointment. So he was in for a dull evening after all. But at least he had a little time in Kenton's company before setting off. "I envy you the excuse Kenton." I envy you your wife too. "I am wary of this attention from Anstruther and his friends. I would like to be left to my farm. Do you know who is going tonight?"

"No."

James sipped his wine and relaxed into a chair. The parlour was quite bare. The Blizzards had brought little with them and had not rushed to acquire possessions. James had not noticed it before, but with no Suzannah to fill his attention, he had eyes for domestic things. It had the look of a house where the occupants did not intend to stay. And yet there was an aura of comfort which must emanate from the personalities of the people who lived there, James thought.

Kenton provided the easiest possible company. James had never felt this relaxed with a friend since he'd ridden off to war and left Geoff Clifford behind. I must remember that that friendship ended in disaster, he reminded himself. Better be vigilant with this one.

"Suzannah mentioned that you are wavering in your commitment to continuing here. We would be sorry to see you go."

James blew a little puff of air through is lips. "At times I wonder what I am doing. For tobacco, my farm will be exhausted in a year or two. I can keep on with other crops, a few hogs, chickens, the goats, but real money is in tobacco and if I want to grow that I will have to move out further into new land. In fact I'll have to move miles further. I was lucky to acquire this little acreage in a convenient spot. And if I do move into uncivilized places, the natural occupants of those lands will get shoved ever further from their own home. If I gain a tomahawk through my skull, I can hardly blame them. It's not for me. I'm not a frontiersman."

Kenton nodded. "Our gains are their losses."

"I am not a naïve boy. Pink has told me how the tribes round here fought each other and took advantage of one another's weaknesses when pestilence struck and so on. They are men like we are, not gods, or doves. But - "

"But you do not want to be the one to shove them out."

"Not when I have a comfortable home awaiting me on the Cotswold Hills of Gloucestershire. Should I not be minding my own business?"

Kenton warmed his glass in his palms and drank in the aroma of the wine. "It is different for me. I have not come here to drive anyone out. As a medical man I can stay put right where my foot first landed." His voice was flat as if staying put was not attractive.

"You're disappointed in Williamsburg?"

Kenton's eyes strayed to the window, into the yard whose pots and raised beds were flourishing now. It was taking on the look of an English garden. Someone was putting in a lot of care there.

"I don't know James. One can be forever on the move." Tiredness deepened the western inflections in his voice.

"At least your profession is in demand. A doctor may work anywhere."

"True."

The clock stuck an unwelcome reminder to James that he needed to shift. "I had not noticed the time. At the farm I have no clock, a pocket watch but no clock. The sun tells me all I need to know."

"That is the best way to live." Kenton topped James's wine up. "One more before you go, then I will see how Suzannah does."

James sipped on his wine till the time to be at Anstruther's was minutes away, then took his leave. In the street, he turned for a last look at the house. The front was shuttered, and no life could be seen within, but at the side he glimpsed the curtains moving in the bedroom which he knew to be the Blizzards'.

Perhaps he was imagining it, but he thought he spied a hand letting go of the curtains, as if someone had been watching him.

A servant showed James into the supper room at Anstruther's home. Today he took in the furnishings about him. Paintings hung on the wall. Perhaps the Anstruther ancestor who had fought for Charles the First was among the portraits. At the far end of the room guests were already gathering in a large space overlooking the garden. Dodds was listening to Epiphany as if she had something interesting to say. Turner and Bodelle were among the guests. Mrs Bodelle, a fashionable woman in low cut silks was there too. There appeared to be no Mrs Turner. Other figures were hardly known to James.

Epiphany's eyes were on him as soon as he entered. "Mr Mace. You have found time for us."

Clearly he had so there was no point commenting. He nodded and smiled with much courtesy and no warmth.

"Why do I feel that you would rather be guarding your tobacco against slugs?"

Impossible not to enjoy a laugh. "Because you are sensible and know it to be important work." A glass was soon in his hand. He wasn't sure who presented it, but a drink was just what he needed.

"Good answer Mace." There was a smile in Anstruther's eyes.

Mrs Harkness gave Epiphany a reproving look. "I did not get chance to speak more than a few words with you the other night, Mr Mace."

James hoped she wasn't going to speak many this night, either. "The evening passed very quickly, Mrs Harkness."

"Your farm is doing well?"

"Yes. I have time for little else."

"I tried to persuade Mace that a few slaves about the place would make his life easier, but he pulled a face. You did, Mace!" Bodelle chuckled. "You probably thought I didn't notice."

The edge had been knocked off James's conscience during his year in Jamaica. There he could never resist a chance to speak out against slavery, now he remained quiet. His views hadn't changed, but his optimism about the potential of human nature had nose-dived. Entering politics and putting himself in a position where he might help slaves was not on his agenda. So he thought his private thoughts, but remained quiet.

Turner and the Bodelles looked at him with suspicion. Epiphany's eyebrows were raised high.

"Mr Mace," exclaimed Epiphany, "you are not a member of the Society of Friends, are you?"

Anstruther turned to his daughter. "That will do. Mr Mace will wonder what kind of society he finds himself in here."

A murmur of laughter.

"That sounds like Bell's voice in the hall."

Anstruther's good at defusing tensions, thought James. He pitches it right. Wish I could.

Reverend Bell entered with his wife who was dressed to the height of fashion and beyond. Bell himself looked as if he'd sat long while a servant dressed his hair. "I'm sorry we are late. Leticia's hair was refusing to do what she wanted it to."

"Blaming me, Anthony!"

"The time was well spent, Leticia." It was Anstruther again with a well-placed comment.

"Thank you. I told Anthony that. Anyway, he was so long in front of his own mirror he must have near worn it out."

"Don't give a man's secrets away, Lettuce."

Mrs Bell giggled and flipped an evening glove at her husband. "How often have I told you not to call me that."

A glance was exchanged between Turner and Dodds. Turner's mouth turned down like an inverted rainbow.

"You are in time, anyway, Bell."

"We were talking about witchcraft, Bell, before you and Mace decided to favour us with your company," took up Bodelle. "Reverend Dodds assures us it's taken more seriously in Massachusetts."

James was too startled to hide his expression and Epiphany gave a little smile of victory.

"It certainly is." Dodds compressed his lips. "Satan visibly reigns on this continent. I think I may preach upon the matter. Bell, your flock need to hear the message too."

Bell fluttered a silk handkerchief about his forehead. "Witchcraft! Among my parishioners?"

"Yes, yours too. The devil still walks the earth, Bell! Do you doubt it? Will you not stand before your congregation and shine a torch into the darkness?"

"Well - "

"My neighbour cursed our cows last year," said Bodelle. "It was a clear case of maleficium."

"Last year I rode past your farm once, I believe," James spat. His voice drew all eyes upon him. "Would you accuse me of cursing the cows?"

By a freak chance, or perhaps it was a zephyr or air from the hall, the candles, which had just been lit, guttered and almost went out. It was an uncanny moment, even James was not insensible to the timing of it.

"You don't understand Mace," said Bodelle, when he had recovered. "It was Pennyfeather. We have tried and tried to buy his land. He ill wishes us."

Didn't Bodelle own enough land already? "It sounds rather like you ill wish him."

Mrs Bodelle gave James a look such as he had rarely received anywhere.

Anstruther was required to step in again. "Yes well, I believe supper will be with us shortly." He turned and led the company to the table.

James hoped he might be seated away from Epiphany, but instead he was right between her and Mrs Bell. Epiphany immediately seized his attention.

"It is a fine gathering tonight. Father often has twenty people together like this. I promised you that invitations will come your way, now that I'm not rusticated at Watersmeet."

James couldn't help smiling. "Your estate must be healthier than town and will offer lots of attractions, surely."

"But not much company. My mother died years ago and Mrs Harkness was shipped in from Salem to raise me. Father is always in town, always busy. I did not see much of him. There was little society at Watersmeet."

James considered this. Before, he had perceived Epiphany only as an example of spoiled, spiteful young womanhood. That her life had been stultifying had not occurred to him. Her mind was sharp, but she had no outlet to use it. And she probably never would.

A touch of sympathy lit his eyes, but he said nothing. He was not the man to relieve her boredom. Mrs Bell made a comment on his other side, and he took advantage of it to disengage from Epiphany.

He had special reasons to avoid the Bells, but they got as far as the sweet courses, before the subject he dreaded was raised.

"I think I have a relation, Mr Mace, who knows you."

James calmed the wave which rose inside him.

A tinkling laughed escaped Letitia. She sounded astonishingly like her husband. "I have a relation called Anthony Castor who knows your family slightly."

"Anthony Castor? Oh yes, I think I have met him," Managed to sound quite casual there. Keep your eyes on the custards.

"He is friends with the Clare family. They live near Painswick."

"Mm." James took a sip of wine to avoid the obligation to reply further. Mrs Bell chattered on, but she said nothing of the broken engagement, and it seemed that she took James to be a cousin of the Clares. Anthony had evidently mentioned his connections in Gloucestershire without revealing much. The night at Honeywells, when he had attended as a guest of Richard Clare, probably meant less to him that a drop of rain falling in his lake at the great house near Bristol.

"Mrs Bell can probably tell you things about your friends, the Blizzards," stabbed in Epiphany, from James's left.

Anger blistered under James's skin, though Mrs Bell showed no sign of elucidating Epiphany's remark. Instead she was laughing at a joke from the other side of the table.

Epiphany frowned and repeated, "Mrs Bell can probably tell you things about the Blizzards." Spite sizzled through her voice.

This time Mrs Bell did respond to the prodding. "I didn't know the Blizzards."

"But you knew of them."

Mr Bell chose that moment to make a witty remark at the end of the table. A gale of laughter broke out and Mrs Bell forgot James and Epiphany.

Angrily Epiphany hissed, "There is something not right about that pair. I knew it from the start."

James stabbed his custard tart energetically. "The Bells?" He kept his voice low.

"No! Your friends, the Blizzards."

James drank all of his wine in one go, spilling some. "I am not interested in malicious gossip." Indeed he wasn't. He risked being at the centre of it himself, if Castor ever said anything about his night at Honeywells.

Epiphany drew proudly away. She looked at him through narrowed eyes. "You are interested in Blizzard's lovely wife though."

And with that she turned to the supper guest on her left.

Epiphany did not approach him again, though he was aware that her eyes strayed towards him often. He was thankful that there was no dancing, instead some of the company sang for the entertainment of the other guests. It saved him from conversation.

Reverend Bell was chief among the singers, possessing a high but tuneful voice. Epiphany also sang two songs. Her voice had evidently received training from some coach. She turned away from him to sing, as if to emphasize her disfavour. Mrs Harkness played upon the virginals. He enjoyed her performance better than Epiphany's.

In Gloucestershire they had passed companionable evenings like this. Only Geoff naturally possessed a voice and the burden of entertaining had always fallen on him.

James watched the hands of the ornate clock ticking round, waiting for the hour when he could decently leave. He suppressed a yawn as Mrs Harkness left the instrument. Bell was stepping forward again. After a theatrical flourish over the keys he threw himself into a performance which impressed with its extraordinary ease. He possessed a talent for music if nothing else; James could have listened to him play all night. When Bell had finished, with a final, extravagant embellishment, Epiphany took his place.

"Would you favour us with a song Mr Mace? I could perhaps accompany you."

"I'm afraid I'll have to decline. You'd deem it no favour if you heard my voice."

"Don't be shy, Mace."

"Shyness doesn't enter into it. My voice sounds like a rusty cartwheel. And it is late. I fear I must go. I lost track of time during your performance, Reverend Bell."

"Glad to have pleased."

"You can sleep here, Mace, if you prefer. The offer is still open."

"Thank you, but I am expected by Dr Blizzard."

Resentment and ire glinted in Epiphany's eyes, but she did her best to mask the look when James wished her goodnight.

Anstruther saw him personally to the door and James wondered what Epiphany and the Bodelles would whisper during the hiatus.

In the hall Anstruther saw fit to offer a word of apology on his daughter's behalf. "You mustn't mind Epiphany. She's a high-spirited girl and my only child. I have spoilt her. Losing her mother compounded the errors I made. She's a good girl. She'll make someone a fine wife."

James took his hat, from the servant. "Thank you for the entertainment." After a few more diplomatic words, he left.

Kenton had stayed up to let James in personally, as if he had not done with his company for the night. He was writing up some notes about his medical cases in a small room full of strange glass bottles containing pills and powders.

"Forgive me if we sit here. I have got far behind with these notes. I must lock them up before bed." He began gathering them together.

"I am happy to sit anywhere. Is Suzannah better?"

Was he imagining it, or did Kenton hesitate for a split, for an infinitesimally split second? "I gave her a powder and she should sleep through the night now."

"...Good."

"These summer agues, it is nothing."

"That is reassuring."

"And your evening, James, went it well? You do not look as bored as I expected."

James laughed aloud before remembering they must be under Suzannah's night quarters. "Not so badly as I feared. I was seated between Epiphany and Mrs Bell." Not a good idea to tell Kenton what had been said at the table. "That was tedious, though it's possible to put up with Mrs Bell. Thankfully there was no dancing and Bell sang to us for an hour and played on the virginals. I almost enjoyed that."

"Yes, I've heard he sings well."

James frowned. "He seems an oddity."

"Oddity's the word. I think he is a younger son of some quite grand family with no money to bestow on him. Mrs Bell is of the merchant class, as you know, though she comes from the very rich end of it. An accommodation was reached between the families, I've heard. He is - considered worse than odd at home and I did hear that the family wanted him gone from England. I have closed my ears against the reasons for that."

James closed his ears too. "His connections got him into the church?"

"I suppose. Then got rid of him here." Kenton pushed his fingers through his shiny auburn hair. The move transformed into a stretch and a yawn.

"Do not let me keep you up."

"You are not. I would have been attending to these notes anyway. I am drinking port. I always find it comforting. For some reason it makes me think of Christmases back home, though my parents had it in all year."

"Are your parents alive?"

Again that faint hint of hesitation, as if Blizzard was used to thinking before he said anything of his past life. "Unfortunately, no. Very likely I wouldn't have uprooted here if one of them still had been."

"Was your father a physician?"

"Yes. My mother had modest independent means. My father was a younger son who managed to acquire a small estate. He was a very good physician. From an early age I knew I wanted to be like him."

James was in a confidential mood. "My father drank a lot. From an early age I knew I didn't want to be like him."

Kenton laughed softly, the laughter spread to James and they found it difficult to stop.

"I must let you rest, Kenton. I will ride home early tomorrow and attend the chapel. I decided against another encounter with the Anstruthers in church here."

"That pleasure awaits me, though if Suzannah continues unwell I will send apologies. Dodds can hardly take umbrage at a physician attending his own wife. I'll light a candle for you."

Kenton saw him up the stairs. James wondered perhaps if the young doctor was going to return back down to complete his notes, but instead his feet passed over the creaky landing towards Susannah's bedroom, at the far side of the house. The door squeaked open and shut, and Kenton was gone to her.

Envy. That was the last emotion keeping James company before he drifted into sleep.

Envy...

Chapter Ten

As James's crop grew, removing pests by hand became a pressing task. One of the most feared was horn worm. Pink had told him that it was possible to lose the crop in a week to them. To avoid that, it was imperative to examine the underside of every leaf on every plant and destroy the eggs before they hatched. James, Pink and Vi spent endless hours on this activity, moving from leaf to leaf, plant to plant, row to row.

"This will send me blind, Vi," he breathed, as they came to the end of a row and stopped to drink. He swatted at a mosquito with his hat. The insects had been especially irritating this summer. They found a good breeding ground in the swamps and marshes.

"It's the weather, Sir, it's suited 'em this year."

James coughed and looked at the sun sinking behind banks of gilded cloud in the west. More rain was about, he guessed. "Time to get supper, Vi. It'll be too dark for this soon."

Vi didn't need to be told twice and trudged straight off to the shacks without a word.

In June the flower stalks emerged, and it was time to top the plants to direct all the energy into the remaining leaves. Hope was rising in James now. His plants still had a long way to go, but they had already cleared the early obstacles.

Another invitation to the Anstruther home arrived, but this time James used the excuse of urgent work to refuse. The Anstruthers were likely to notice that he still found time to visit the Blizzards each week, and even to ride over to Roddy Owen's on occasions, but that was too bad. He had seen more than enough of Epiphany.

James had no interest in gossip, even if it came from apparently reliable sources. _Believe half of what you see and none of what you hear,_ had been the motto Roderick instilled in him. But still Epiphany's veiled insinuations about the Blizzards were not completely forgotten. They rose to the surface of his mind one Sunday, as he sat beside Kenton at church in Williamsburg. His eyes were on Suzannah's neat foot which protruded from under her skirt and rested against Kenton's more solid boot. He wished her foot was against his own and felt a fool for thinking it. _Pity I've nothing better to wish for at my age._

Across the aisle. Epiphany's green eyes sought out his and for a brief moment the contact was made, before James looked indifferently away, towards Suzannah again.

Dodds stepped up to the pulpit, prayers were intoned, then he eyed his congregation at theatrical length, before thundering, "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live!" He paused for effect and scanned the faces before him. What man, what Christian was not familiar with that supreme wisdom from the Book of Exodus? All Christians could quote it, but who had considered what it really meant?

James tensed angrily. Exodus wasn't even in the New Testament, he thought, so what had it to do with Christ's teaching? Why should 'all Christians' be bothered with it?

Simply, Dodds explained, a witch uncovered should be destroyed immediately. No delay should be tolerated. Legal processes were not competent to deal with the armies of Satan.

James started in his pew and his lips opened to challenge, but Kenton's hand was on his arm and he choked the protest back.

Saul, Dodds bellowed, had not hesitated to cut off necromancers. The sermon thundered on with quotations about witchcraft from books of the Bible which James had never heard of. Dodds's message to his flock was clear: their complacency about witches in their midst was giving space to evil.

Angry tensions knotted James's gut, his breath drew shallow and fast. He stole a glance at his friends, but their faces were white and blank. Without wishing, he suddenly pictured how discomforted they had both become at the Anstruther residence, when Reverend Bell had appeared. What had Bell said? James couldn't remember clearly.

He punched the thought away. Why was he even weighing Epiphany's spiteful tattle? It would delight her to know her barbs had injected some poison. He turned his shoulders against the the green eyes which still surreptitiously watched him from under long lashes.

"I can't sit through much more of this," he whispered to Kenton in an undertone.

"Nor I." Kenton's voice was grim.

But they didn't have to. Dodds brought his sermon to a thunderous climax then as abruptly ended it, leaving his congregation blinking and confounded. Anstruther's party recovered themselves first and rose.

"Thank God that is over," James muttered between clenched teeth.

"Sh, be careful of taking the Lord's name in vain, or anything these people could charge you with, James. I do not like what is going on here. That man is both a focal point for malice and a generator of malice. It's flowing both ways."

"Anstruther needs to bring him to heel, while there is chance," whispered Suzannah.

Kenton took her arm and they passed slowly into the sunlight, all three attempting to avoid the eyes of other members of the congregation.

Marcus Anstruther was at the door and intercepted James, as he tried to slip away. The Blizzards moved on a pace or two.

"Mace, we haven't seen you lately."

"Work has been pressing." _Anstruther must wonder how often I'll say that._

"Perhaps when the season is less busy."

James had nothing personally against Anstruther, though disliked the company he kept. "Yes. Thank you. I hope." He moved on.

"No mention of wanting to see us when we are not busy," whispered Kenton. "That's something to be thankful for. Perhaps we offended him by not attending his supper in April."

"I doubt it."

"Then something else must have made him reassess us." Anxiety stretched Kenton's voice.

James noticed it. "I wish they would reassess me! Let's forget them. I am looking forward to that dinner which you promised."

Suzannah smiled. "Be careful what you wish for!"

Chapter Eleven

Work at the farm continued at its seasonal pace. With the plants topped, suckers appeared, and these had to be removed if the leaves were not to end up small. Vigilance against pests was essential and the hills needed re-mounding as they flattened. It was necessary to remove weeds if they sprouted beneath the shaded canopy of leaves, as they competed for nutrients and offered cover to pests.

The year was wet and about a month after Dodd's fantastical oration in church, James could no longer pretend that he was continuing at his own seasonal pace. The cough that had started to trouble him the previous autumn had returned accompanied by bouts of feverishness. Previously he had not taken seriously the idea that he might be really ill, but now as he sweated and coughed through the night, the danger was impossible to dismiss.

He was feeling drained when he rode into Williamsburg to consult Kenton. Kenton was not in, but Suzannah perceived the depth of his trouble and sent Jacob up to arrange a room.

It was a new experience for James. All his life he had been supernaturally healthy. Contagions which had expunged swathes of neighbours missed him altogether, or if he got sick, he was scarcely affected. Subconsciously, it had inculcated feelings of immortality; now, as he laboured up Suzannah's creaky staircase, he understood, with his mind, his heart and on a gut level too, that he would die just like anyone else and that death might not be decades away.

Even in sickness, it was pleasurable to snatch rare moments alone with Suzannah. She shyly remained a step outside his bedroom door when he had washed and lay down.

"Kenton may be some while. The good thing about coming here to Virginia is that he has lots of trade. He faces little competition from men as capable and well-qualified as he is."

James swallowed, coughed and settled himself comfortably among the cushions. "This is the perfect spot for an invalid. I can look out on your lovely garden when I sit up. It is maturing even after this short while. It was just a bare yard in winter."

"Even in London we had a garden. I grew medicinal plants." Her voice warmed in recollection. "There is more evidence for God in a garden that all the books of the Bible. Do you see in that pot there?" She took a few steps into his bedroom and pointed. "That is camomile. It will bring down temperatures. And that is comfrey. It can help with inflammation. Downstairs I'm gently brewing a tea of thyme to help with your cough. Somewhere in the world of plants, is a cure for all ills."

Her voice was a balm to him. He could listen all day. She didn't conjure the heady ecstasy of first love that Kas had once done - first awakenings couldn't happen twice - but she wove an effortless spell.

"I have planted small fruit trees to be trained along the fence. It is a promise for the future, but I'm not sure that future will materialize, James. Less and less we like Williamsburg. That man Dodds is an incubus shadowing the community."

"He would not like to be described in those terms." A grim smiled fashioned James's lips. "He imagines himself some Old Testament patriarch sent to save us."

"He's an old hypocrite servicing his cravings for power." Her voice was low as if she was afraid to trust even her own servants who might be moving about the house on soft feet.

"Yes, that is an insight. I think that's what he is." James regathered his strength. "But I wonder if he is also a puppet for other forces in the community."

"The Bodelles?"

"Yes, them. I was thinking of Anstruther's daughter too. She is bright and sharp but has nothing to do with her sharpness except create trouble. I think she is a pin goading him."

"Would he be influenced by a girl? He must be at least fifty."

James took a long breath. "If her views chimed with his own, he might, especially as she is Anstruther's daughter. And I'd guess she rules the domestic roost out at Watersmeet in her father's absence; she has the presence of one who is used to giving orders."

Suzannah pulled a curtain aside to look out at the fruit trees. "Goodness! I see them now! They are on horseback with a maid servant!" She swished the curtains speedily shut.

"Who?"

"Dodds and Epiphany."

James's brows knitted. "Here? Behind your house? Are they looking this way?"

"I'm not peeping out to check, James, not even for a second. They were on the other side of the street. I don't want them to know they were seen."

"They may just have been passing. I believe one of Bodelle's cronies lives at the end of that road."

"They were not passing. They had stopped. I wish Kenton were here."

"...Yes."

"That was the door! That is his footstep." Her face lit up and she darted away to the staircase, leaving James to endure a stab of feeble envy.

Kenton did not instantly appear. James could hear their voices murmuring in the hall, but caught no word of the exchange. At length Kenton's tread mounted the stairs and he appeared at the door.

"This is a sorry sight James." He sat down by the bed.

"Did Suzannah tell you that that old spider Dodds was reined in behind the house and Epiphany was with him?"

"Yes, she did." Kenton's voice was hollow.

"Well?"

"Well what?"

"What do you think?"

Kenton's silence lasted so long that James wondered if he would ever answer. When he did the reply was a surprise: "I do not think this climate suits you James. I think you should leave Virginia."

The plants were about five feet tall now and nearly ready for harvesting. James left the decision on that to Pink. Pink knew exactly how yellow, how rough, how thick, how downy the leaves needed to be. He knew the exact pliancy the leaves should show in his fingers.

James had not witnessed all the growth the plants had put on. He had spent a week at his friends' home on the orders of Kenton. "You will never leave the work to anyone else if I let you go back there," had been Kenton's summing up.

Not that he had needed much professional pressure to stay with his friends. It had provided the chance to talk daily with Suzannah and conversation had flowed freely, though she had remained strictly outside his bedroom when he was laid up. They talked about fruit growing, and animal husbandry, the iniquity of the slave trade and Kenton's efforts to improve hygiene among his clients. They had talked of nothing remarkable, but it had strengthened the invisible links between them, and had the effect of a tonic on James.

The effects of the tonic did not last long once he went home. The long hours and habitual damp of his farm near the river brought back his cough soon, and the lightness of his mood slumped. Kenton's advice had been to leave Virginia. His own mind was now almost made up to do it.

There was a fastening of hands between servants at the Lansdown plantation nearby and James gave Vi and Pink leave to go over and enjoy the drinking which would accompany it. They had worked like slaves for months and he reasoned that if his farm couldn't last a couple of hours without them, it was hardly worth struggling on. Besides, he fancied the chance of a few hours alone on his land. There was no friction between himself and the Pinkertons. They were easy people to ignore, but the chance to be alone with his plans attracted him.

"Don't rush back from the hand-fastening."

"We won't be late."

"Do you have everything you need, Sir?"

"If I don't, I can get it. Be off. Have a drink for me!"

Smiling, Pink and Vi nodded.

He watched their figures, dressed in their best clothes, shamble into the distance. As soon as they were gone, he gave vent to a coughing fit which he had been suppressing. He had hidden his condition from the Pinkertons, but he was hardly capable today of returning to the fields after dinner. There was a book about rum production in his room which he'd picked up in Williamsburg. He would enjoy the treat of a thorough wash then sit outside reading the manual, rather than straining his eyes deciphering it by candlelight, when the day's work was done.

The plan suddenly possessed his mind and he warmed the water for his wash, combed his hair, decided to wash that too.

When the water was ready, he stood over his pan and poured and re-poured it over his head. Then he sat down in the water and luxuriated in his wash. He had some dried rosemary and scented the water. There was no need to rush, and he didn't.

At last he felt ready for clean clothes and his book, and after combing his hair went outside into the sun. He put a cushion on the bench. Usually he wasn't there long enough to need one. He would see what was to be said about rum production and those additions which would produce the best flavours. Medoc had hinted that choosing the right recipe was important.

But he put his book down without reading it. Close by a cardinal bird had found some berries and was energetically eating them. They were his favourite birds. They even delighted Vi and Pink. Watching the creature's brisk little movements pleased James. The bird snatched another berry, smacked it against a stone as if he wanted to soften it and devoured it hungrily. There were more berries and James hoped the bird would want them. Time passed without James being aware. Eventually, the bird fluffed up, as if it had taken umbrage, and flew abruptly away.

James stretched and resumed reading. His eyes wandered over a paragraph without taking much in. He wondered where the bird had flown to and if it might come back. It would be worth attracting it with food. He was still drowsily considering this plan, when the jingle of a harness attracted his attention. He peered around the corner of the house and leapt to his feet, all drowsiness dispelled.

"Suzannah!"

She accepted his help dismounting. "I could not resist riding out here today. Thomas has gone to the hand fastening of two of the Lansdown servants, so I only had a little way to continue alone."

"Kenton would not like even that. We are not in the wilds, but you never know who you might meet."

"It was only a little way."

"Pink and Vi have gone to the Lansdown place too. They never get a moment's rest, so I told them not to hurry back. And I decided not to hurry into the fields myself." He tried to look bright. "I will ride back with you, when the moment comes, right back to your home."

"It's not necessary. Come with me as far as the Lansdown's, if you wish."

"Kenton is not heading this way too?"

"Alas, no. He has patients."

There was a long bench in front of the barn, near the horse trough where they tethered Oats. They sat there rather than going to the house.

"We have to be glad something has worked out. Uprooting was a gamble, but it is a gamble which has paid off. It's just - time can feel long when he is out so constantly. I have not made friends with any of the women of the community, as I had hoped. I must not complain! Better to be a little lonely than a lot poor! Your apple trees look well James. You will have a good crop."

"I could have thinned them out a bit more."

"No, you've got it right."

"You can have some when they are ready. They store well. The cookers are looking good too."

James stretched his foot. He did not mean to touch Suzannah, but his leg brushed against hers. Carefully he eased it back. Suzannah did not seem to notice the contact and remained serene. Her eyes were on a tree where a cloud of bees buzzed. I know someone who would be your friend, if she were here, thought James. Kas. But the right people are never around at the right time. Life isn't like that.

"Why are you buried alive here, James?" Her voice was quiet but demanded an answer.

"Oh, I'm not buried." He forced his voice to sound perky. "I like farming. It was what I was born to. Sometimes I'd see few outsiders back home during a hard January and February. But we had labourers in cottages on our land and I lived with family, of course. And there was the Manor and Honeywells close."

"Honeywells?" She had perceived a changed inflection in his voice.

"Yes, a moated farmhouse about a mile from Hill House."

Thoughtfully she looked about, at the woods which were musical with birdsong in this moment, at the fields and the glinting river. A scene of rural beauty, but one empty of human life for a young man living alone.

He read her expression. "I enjoy my own company."

"This much?"

A rueful laugh was his honest answer.

"I've watched you in our house. You can be very companionable James. You have talked for hours with Kenton, and with me. You like to play cards." A silence settled between them, before she continued, "Why did you really come here?" And now she moved a fraction and her arm touched his; they both noticed the contact, this time.

"It's like I said, when my uncle's plantation burned down, I had to move on. This seemed as good as anywhere. I'd heard about the profit in tobacco."

"Did you not think to go home?"

Her voice was soft, low. It drew him in, as Kassandra had once drawn him in.

He stared at the blue sky where no cloud passed and he recognized that the moment had come. The true explanation was close to his lips. At last he wanted to speak of it. "I could not go home."

"Why?" Her own voice was rich with regret.

A deep breath. "I left for a special reason."

Her face did not express surprise. Sympathy, curiosity, understanding, sadness, all were etched there.

Another breath. "I was engaged to be married, but there was a misunderstanding. My fiancée married someone else, my best friend actually." The words were out, and it did not feel so bad.

"Oh!"

"Oh \- that comment sums it up."

"How could such a misunderstanding arise?"

"You know I was a soldier. I was almost killed at Blenheim. They were moving the corpses when I stirred, even then I lay in a fever at the field hospital for days. Word got back to Gloucestershire that I was dead. My fiancée" - he still didn't want to speak her name to another person - "despaired and she was encouraged by her father to accept the local squire. There were sensible reasons for that. It was rushed through very quickly. I believe that was because the squire himself sensed she might change her mind. Or perhaps he feared I might resurface; the fog of war is thick. It's not uncommon for people to be wrongly reported dead."

Sorrow radiated from her eyes. "Life so often doesn't give us what we thought it would. We make a mistake and we cannot escape from the consequences." She plucked at a fold in her linen skirt and her hand brushed James's. Her skin was very white, like Kassandra's.

"You remind me of her, not in your actual look, but in your presence." His voice was quiet.

A few spots of rain began to fall. It didn't spoil the scene. The scent of damp earth added to the other sensory stimuli. Then a few more spots fell. They stayed where they were on the bench, expecting the rain to pass, happy in the closeness of the moment. It started to rain harder, then quite suddenly intensified to a deluge. A look passed between them before they dived for the nearest cover, inside the barn. At the door they stood to watch the massive raindrops bouncing off the ground, then withdrew inside where the cavernous space magnified the drumming on the roof.

"I like this sound. When I was a child, I used to go into our barn during a storm, to listen to the rain. And in my bedroom at night I liked it too. My room faced south-west and often took the force of a storm."

"What was your room like?" She edged closer. "I would like to picture your farm."

The rain battering the roof obliterated all sounds about them. The outside world seemed temporarily unreal, disconnected from their lives. Only the connection fizzing between them was real.

"My room was big, with two windows facing over the front courtyard. There was a raised herb garden in the centre of the court. You mustn't imagine anything grand. It was a gentleman's farm, but a solid working place. My bed was huge with posts, but no hangings. There was a fire at Hill House when Father was young, and he had a horror of bedcurtains. They were stripped from all the rooms. Father said it was better to be cold at night than excessively hot!"

He looked into her grey eyes and found them unguarded. A split second later and she glanced away into the blurry distance outside, but he had seen the look, and its implications could not now be hidden. Her fingers were near his and he took one, just the littlest, between his own. The contact, and her lack of resistance, were the last sparks which lit a powder trail of fires. Her lips were not many inches below his and he reached down and kissed them, heart thundering. "My life has been barren here," he murmured. "I never allowed myself a spare moment to think, but once I met you - " He kissed her again and this time she kissed him back as if all consequences were forgotten.

Caution was an unstable element in James's character, and it burned off in a trice, as her arms went around him. He'd enough presence of mind left to walk her into the darkest corner of the barn, where sacks of beans were stacked. A second of misdoubt pierced him as Kenton's face and the aura of his friendship took life for a second, but he'd already gone past the point of no return. He'd been longing for this from his first encounter with Suzannah. In this second there was no denying it. He'd never imagined it could happen. He'd never intended to engineer an opportunity, but with Suzannah warm in his arms, he lacked the strength, or faith in his future fulfilment on earth, to reject it.

Chapter Twelve

Well this marks my zero point. At dawn James stood by the door of his shack, gazing morosely into the fields before him. It could perhaps have sunk a degree lower. Coupling with my best friend's wife on a sack of potatoes might have out trumped it. Or a sack of coal. That perhaps would have plumbed the final depths... But really I'm near rock bottom. Perhaps Dodds recognized something desperate in me...

One thing he was certain, was that the relationship, if it could be dignified with that name, ended there. His betrayal of Kenton would be a one-off hour of madness that would never be repeated and never alluded to. He must not even think of it.

The scent of Suzannah's skin, the coil of auburn hair which had fallen lose, the compulsive pleasure of contact with her, lived again for a second in his mind. He hurled his coffee to the earth, almost sending the cup with it. Why did she have to be Kenton's, of all the men on earth? Why couldn't she be married to Bodelle, or Bell, or anyone but Kenton? They could have leapt on a ship and simply sailed away together.

In the hours after he had seen her back to the Lansdown place, to re-join Thomas, he had floated on a cloud of indescribable sensations. But when he got home and the Pinkertons arrived, reality walked back through the door with them. His life was not changed, almost it was worse. Now he had to live with a guilty conscience and an appetite which was sharpened.

He stamped back indoors. The coffee pot was still warm. He slopped another draught into the cup and drank it in a drowning gulp. Yesterday must be forgotten. A wall must go up between himself and Suzannah. She was his friend, his dear friend, but they must not be alone together.

Vi was watching him from the corner where she was slicing bread. She knew her master to be a reserved man and the mood which possessed him today was one with which she was unfamiliar. Instinctively she remained silent, but her mind turned over the possibilities of what had happened.

"Master's in some strange humour," she whispered when she had gone outside to feed the chickens. "Never seen the like." She glanced back at James who was still grimly staring at the fields.

Pink went on sharpening his axe. "Perhaps he drank a tankard of bad beer."

"Bad beer? Where'd he drink that? Not here. My brewing's never given anyone a dickie stomach."

Pink tested the blade of the axe, was satisfied and took up another, began working on that. "He might have gone off and took a drink somewhere else."

"Mark my words, he didn't. He wasn't well, though he covered it up."

"Might have sat on a spider an' got bitten somewhere tender."

Vi pulled a slow face. "Umm. Maybe that's it."

"Don't concern us anyway. Master wants to act strange, it's up to 'im."

Fundamentally agreeing, Vi returned to her work.

James was surprised - horrified - two days later when a cavalcade turned off the track and came to rest in front of his house. He had not recovered either his equanimity or his health but was more determined than ever to blast on with work regardless. He was just returning to the house with a hoe over his shoulder, having been weeding his plants. He was aware that he neither looked nor smelt good. Among the group were the Anstruthers, Bodelles and Dodds. Epiphany and Dodds were just about the last people who James had any desire to see.

"How nice to see you."

"We will not interrupt your work, Mace. We know how wedded you are to it." Dodds's eyes bored through James, as if he could read his soul.

"We are on our way to our own plantation," explained Anstruther.

James had never encountered Anstruther out of town and was almost forgetful that the famous Watersmeet belonged to him. Almost it seemed as if Epiphany or Mrs Harkness were mistress. He hoped he wasn't going to get invited.

"We are only come a little way off our route. Epiphany wanted to see how your crops are doing."

"Well this is it. They must seem a poor lot compared to yours, though the apples are promising. You can see all from here. It doesn't stretch far over that brow."

"I told her it was not so great a place as her father's," pronounced Dodds, with a gracious glance at Anstruther.

Epiphany's eyes expressed agreement. Probably she had been expecting more of a man descended from Royalist heroes. She patted her fine horse, Jodami, and said nothing.

"If you are thirsty I can offer you refreshment." That much he had to say out of common courtesy. He was pleased though when they refused, though two off the horses drank from a trough. Good, she's disappointed, thought James. It's obvious now that I'm not good enough for her. I should have shown her the farm on that very first day when she turned off the track to be neighbourly.

"I don't know how you came to acquire it," thrust in Bodelle. "Easterby wouldn't sell to me. He just left it as woods on the fringes of his place."

"I probably offered him more." James couldn't resist the challenge.

"We will press on if you do not mind," shot in Anstruther. "We have other stops along the way. I admire your efforts here, Mace. You have accomplished two men's work."

They turned and rode away. James pulled off his sweaty stock and waved, but only Epiphany turned in the saddle to notice and return the salute. An emotion flashed through her eyes which was gone before James could read it, then she urged her mount sharply forward.

James mopped his brow with the stock. He watched till he could see nothing but the cloud of dust they kicked up. Then he slowly trudged back.

At the trough he used his stock to sponge his neck and face. The cooling water was welcome. "Don't worry, Vi, they weren't come to catechise us on our scripture. They are just passing to their estate. As usual Bodelle had some beef. He wondered why Easterby sold this patch to me and not to him."

"Mister Bodelle is cheese paring, Sir. They say he never wants to pay the value of anything."

James answered with a grunt.

"Watersmeet's a fine place. Great orchards there be."

"Better than my orchard of old cooking apples?"

"Oh yes, Sir better than that, though the apple trees here are a promising lot."

James wondered if Pink or Vi had ever possessed a sense of humour. "Reverend Dodds looked dressed to visit a king. I could almost see my reflection in his boots."

"He'd want to look fine, Sir, going to Watersmeet. Even the servants and house slaves there are well-dressed, they say."

"Oh..."

Vi returned to the house and James continued, with as much energy as he could muster, to hoe his tobacco.

Chapter Thirteen

James invented excuses to stay away from Williamsburg. He had in any case the best excuse in the world: his crop was declared by Pink to be ready. Now it was time for them to work up and down the rows with sharp knives, cutting the plants. The crop was then taken to the barn - the barn which James could never visit without vividly reliving his moments with Suzannah - and there it was hung along sticks. If no disaster occurred at this stage, the leaves would have to rest there for another six or even eight weeks. James felt zephyrs of air lifting his wings now. It was possible to start really looking forward to the time when the crop would pay out.

To look Kenton in the eye was a trial he hadn't the strength for, and as for Suzannah, the first instance of confronting her again was beyond his imagination; he didn't know how he'd deal with it. She was in his mind all the time though, whether he was sleepless at night or harvesting his tobacco crop with feverish energy. Pink could ask him the simplest question and obtain no answer.

Upping the tempo of his work had always been James's method of blocking out thoughts and feelings he didn't want to deal with. He was mature enough to recognize it now, but it was still the tool he fell back on. Kenton's advice about conserving his energy was disregarded. He worked while there was light in the sky and strength in his body. He worked on reserve tanks of nervous vitality when he was spent.

Pink and Violet noticed.

"Looks like master's going to kill himself with toil," Violet whispered one dinnertime as James trudged back to the house ahead of them. "Bin coughing in the field all day."

"Year's o' work in 'im yet."

James didn't notice the exchange and went inside and ate with a dull appetite.

When the dishes were removed, he remained at the table, turning over some pages of accounts, while Pink and Vi cleared the dinner up. He puffed on his pipe and considered whether there was any point in researching his rum project still. In winter perhaps. Or next year. Or never.

"Go and rest. I'll call you when I go back out."

They didn't need to be told twice.

James's eyes were drooping shut over his list of figures, when Bluey began to bark. A horse's hooves clip-clopped off the track. James instantly checked that his firearms were to hand and hoped that Pink was doing the same, if he was awake.

There was no need to worry about firearms, though battles of a different kind were at hand: it was the tall figure of Kenton who leapt from Oats and tethered him at the trough.

James felt as if something had dropped through him and hit the bottom. The accounts fell on the floor. "Kenton!" He could hear the strangeness in his own voice. He hoped Kenton didn't notice it. Guilt, delight at seeing his friend, disgust with himself, uncertainty, all inflected his tones. It flashed though his thoughts to wonder if Geoff had once suffered this muddle of emotions.

"We have not seen you in a while and were anxious. My round took me out this way and I decided to ride on a few miles further and be neighbourly."

"I'm glad you did." For all his painfully inflamed conscience, James was truly glad now that the moment of trial had unexpectedly arrived. He could confront the worst of his guilt and start to move forward again. He looked into Kenton's fine eyes, fearing to find doubt, but only friendship moved there.

"You've been overwhelmed with work, I imagine, James."

"...Yes."

"I suppose you did not get invited to the Anstruther place last week?"

"No. I think they've had enough of me."

"I should think they have."

James's face was blank.

"You don't know the news. I can tell."

"I haven't left my own property this last month. I will certainly be fined, but I have been overwhelmed with work." He didn't mention his health.

"Let's go inside." Kenton closed the door. His voice was low when he spoke. "I came here for a special reason."

Oh God.

"Dodds is married."

"What?" James shouted the word. "There is some lunatic in the world who was persuaded to have him?"

Kenton glanced to the door and put a quietening finger to his lips. "No lunatic. He has married Epiphany Anstruther."

James was too astonished to respond. Then he exploded. "He's married a girl young enough to be his grand-daughter? After all that sermonising about sin?" He leapt to his feet and the chair crashed over.

Kenton righted the furniture. "I thought it possible you didn't know. I wanted to tell you in person. I imagined your reaction might be - intemperate."

James ransacked the cupboard for drink. In his agitation he chose the wrong one and unearthed nothing. "Does this not sum up everything which I hate about the church? I never want to listen to that old spider again. He is nothing more than a sack of poison. But how came that girl to marry him?" he resumed, recalling the heart of the drama. "She is Anstruther's daughter. She could have found a husband easily enough."

Kenton noticed brandy hiding behind a flour bin. He took it upon himself to administer a drink to James, and as an afterthought took one himself. "I do not know. But he is associated with influential men in the colony and the church gives him a platform. To many girls that matters above all." He sipped his drink. "There was a time when I thought she had you in her sights. You did well to signal your lack of interest."

"What can Anstruther be thinking of, permitting such a mismatch?"

"The influence probably counts for all with him. And perhaps Dodds boasts the right kind of ancestors, like you."

"My ancestor who fought at Edgehill? Dodds is nearly old enough to have fought there himself!"

Kenton went to the door, opened it and peeped out, but there was no one there to eavesdrop. "James I must urge caution. No good will come of abusing Dodds, or the church. There are those who will be quick to point a finger." His voice was resigned. "Sadly, leading a good life is not what counts. One must be seen to follow the prescribed rules."

James crimsoned and his stomach squeezed. He was silent.

Kenton's unearthly grey eyes were very distant. James could not read the look in them. He recalled that he had committed an unforgivable wrong against this man. The startling news concerning Dodds had driven that fact temporarily from his mind, but it was going to keep him company for a long time yet.

"You are better, James?" Kenton's tone became brisk. "That is another reason why I extended my ride to call."

"...Yes. I've no wish to die young. I heeded your advice and take a little more rest, daily."

Kenton's eyes travelled professionally over James's gaunt frame. "I had best leave you to that rest. You will have a long afternoon's work ahead."

James accompanied him to his horse. He gave Oats a pat.

"You are busy till your crop is in, but it would please us if you took a meal with us."

James felt another twist of his gut. He ached to see Suzannah but shrank from it too. He didn't trust his voice, his countenance or his manner with her. But breaking the ice with Kenton had advanced him a step. It was possible to move on, with the secret buried forever. His first encounter with Kenton, after the betrayal, had not been so traumatic as he had feared. He had got through it. He must face Suzannah too.

"Saturday night we would love to see you."

"And I would love to be there." The turmoil swirling inside Suzannah would be unimaginable, but they had to face each other. He couldn't stay away forever. He must practise maintaining a calm mien. He must start now, as soon as Kenton was gone. This was a barrier that had to be broken. He would break through it. He would.

He couldn't hide among his tobacco plants forever.

Chapter Fourteen

Processing his guilt concerning Kenton, was not going to be a quick task. The euphoria of coming through that first meeting slumped the second his friend had ridden away. James liked to think of himself as a moral man in the ways that really mattered. His standards might not be those of his society in all things, but where they differed, he'd assumed that the advantage lay with him. Now he was confronting a different version of the truth.

Guilt was a painful stone rubbing in his boot. James pondered his near-death experience at Wisemans four years earlier and how it had forced him to acknowledge long buried guilt concerning his dead sister: he had transmitted the fever which killed her, and his father's drinking had begun after that terrible tipping point. James now understood that beneath the surface, he had been aware of his own part in that tragic chain, though he had done everything to block knowledge out. Why did I almost have to die to fathom it all? James asked himself, late one evening, as he steadily cut the wilting tobacco leaves and set them on sticks. Well, he wasn't going to hide from this guilt. He was facing it. He was going to make up for it. Anything he could do for Kenton...

He wondered if his neighbours were as tormented by their shortcomings as he was. Probably not, he concluded, considering the sample who surrounded him. C.J Dodds might fulminate from the pulpit about sin, but he wasn't willing to come to grips with his own baseness. Bodelle was a member of the vestry, but virtue and his own self-interest were inextricably intertwined in his mind, in fact he couldn't tell them apart.

The knife slipped and he came close to slicing his own hand. He looked up at the overcast sky. It was getting too dark for the work. "It's getting late for this. We'll end up cutting our own throats. Get the supper Vi. Pink and I will follow."

It only took minutes to clean the tools and put them away. Vi was already bustling with pots when he went inside. There was a task which he meant to complete this evening and he would do it before supper. James took a quill, sharpened it, stirred his ink and prepared to write. He had not written home since New Year, though he had constantly promised himself he would do so. Indefinable impulses drove him now.

Outside was the bench and a rickety table. He placed his lamp there. He didn't rush. He had no special news. But he needed contact, even though it could only be tenuously obtainable through inadequate words on paper.

Dearest Kas

It has been a long time since I put quill to paper, but finally I am sitting here in a mood to write. Well, my tobacco harvest has reached its closing stages now. There is still much that could go wrong, but once it's in the barn those hazards are more in our hands and I have an excellent man in Pink who has grown tobacco for thirty years.

When last I wrote, I told you that I would probably move further west, seeking fresh soil for the tobacco. I think I must have envisaged myself developing into a big farmer here. But my enthusiasm has waned. Is that just my character, Kas? Can I never stick at anything? You know me well, what do you think?

I seem to have got at cross with our minister, Caleb Jehosephat Dodds. I tell you his full name because it may help you to picture him. He is quite a short man, but stocky and emphatic. Especially he is emphatic about telling us about our sins. His own, I fancy, go unnoticed by him. But we are all like that... You will quietly tell me to get on with my work, giving only superficial regard to his words. Father would say something similar. I believe Father would have more success than me at charming Dodds.

This year has brought me a great blessing, two friends who hail from Bristol (Bristol seems close to home, when you've travelled halfway across the world.) Kenton and Suzannah Blizzard are their names. I sup with them often, more rarely they come to my backwater farm. Kenton is a doctor.

James was about to write that Kenton's skills and knowledge had helped with his cough, but he stayed his hand from forming the letters. On the other side of the world, Kas would fear a more serious illness. Roderick might get to hear of it... Instead he wrote:

A doctor friend, especially one who is as insightful as Kenton, is a boon.

And there is someone else here from Bristol. Her name is Leticia Bell, formerly one of the Castor family. I admit to turning cold when I met her husband at the home of a local JP. I imagined that Anthony might have recounted what he knew of us... Do you remember that he was at - James still balked at forming the words 'our engagement' \- your father's party seven years ago? He came with your cousin Richard, the one I didn't like much. Fortunately, though both of the Bells are frivolous feather-brains, they do not appear to be gossips, as nothing embarrassing has got back to my ears. Or perhaps Anthony did not consider it worth mentioning. To a rich man like him we probably rate as invisible nobodies.

I nearly can't see to write this Kas, and I can smell that supper is ready. I must close now. I don't know what I meant to say, but I know I haven't said it. I will send this though, because if I wait to compose a better letter, it might be months before you hear from me. And by that time, you may all fear me dead.

I wish we were at Honeywells now, in the hall before the great fireplace, or on the settle at Hill House, side by side, like we used to sit.

Jem

He sat as darkness fell, recalling the mistakes of the past. Vi was rattling pans inside, a sign that supper was on the table. One last message. He dipped his quill in the ink and added:

I pray that all is well with Geoff - tell him that.

He coughed, folded up the letter and went inside.

The sight of his crop sweating in the barn warmed optimism in James's heart. Something, at least, was almost achieved. A good revenue. Security for the coming year. Nobody could do without that. You couldn't live on dreams, not even the best of them.

"I'm going into Williamsburg, Pink. I'll be staying overnight." He had been preparing mentally to face Suzannah; he had even practised controlling his features in front of the square of polished metal on the wall, but he knew that the first moments of looking into her eyes would represent an ordeal. "Be sure to keep your firearm about you."

"Will do."

"I will be back for chapel here tomorrow. If something should delay me don't leave the farm."

"Sir."

James washed, donned sober clothes, combed his long dark hair. He looked into the polished metal. What did he see? The face of a man who had trespassed with his best friend's wife: a man he had never supposed himself to be. But he was not frozen in time as that man. The trespasser had existed for just an hour. He no longer existed.

James checked the sky which was threatening to turn rosy in the west. The daylight hours were shortening, and he needed to be on his way. He sprang onto Crisp who trotted smartly off, his big, loppy ears flopping in rhythm to his stride.

They had not gone very far when Crisp pricked those ears.

"Just a possum, Lad." James patted his mount's neck. Firearms were at the ready if it were something more menacing than a possum.

The threat of autumn hung in the air. Plumes of smoke curled up from the small settlement over the rise of ground. Red would be hammering away in his workshop. James considered a detour to be neighbourly but didn't want to get delayed by the brandy bottle. He pressed on.

At the edge of town, near the ducking pond, he spotted a horse as big as his own trotting towards him, Jodami. James admired Jodami. He wasn't so positive about the rider, Miss Epiphany as he still thought of her, though she was now Mistress Dodds. For a while he had succeeded in avoiding her, except at a distance, but he couldn't sidestep her greeting now.

She was dressed, he noted in a flashy riding habit of scarlet. He was sure he'd heard Dodds preaching about biblical women of modesty. Either Dodds's strictures had washed over his wife, or else he didn't think they applied to her.

She reined in her powerful horse while the groom kept a polite distance on his lesser animal. "Mr Mace."

"Mistress Dodds."

"You have been an outcast, always with your head in a tobacco plant. Will you be with us in church on Sunday? My husband is planning a special sermon."

"Alas that is not possible. I look forward to the sermon at chapel."

"I saw your friend Dr Blizzard as I rode down Duke of Gloucester Street." That frozen glint in her eyes.

James said nothing. He refused to be hooked.

"He looks a small matter haggard, as if something ate at his mind."

James's heart leapt. "He is a doctor. He deals in death every week. He has to impart bad news. We would all look haggard carrying his responsibilities."

She flounced her fine head. "There is haggardness and haggardness, Mr Mace. This looked the haggardness of a man with personal torments."

James's patted Crisp and pulled one of his loppy ears. I must be careful. "Mistress Dodds, you claim the powers of a mind reader."

Her expression froze. "You do not perhaps know the rumours about them? I tried to tell you once, but you would not listen." Satisfaction curved her lips. She watched him from the corner of her eyes, monitoring his reaction.

"Mrs Bell was not interested in rehearsing them, if I remember."

"Oh, Mrs Bell... Well I will tell you now." She lowered her voice. "They say that Mr and Mrs Blizzard are not really that."

"Not really what?"

"Man and wife."

James controlled his expression. Experience of cataclysmic reversals helped him hide his feelings, but he had the sensation of a dark pit opening beneath him. Sparks of apprehension spewed forth. Some burned him, some beamed light. That there was mystery surrounding his friends, he already accepted. It was the nature of the mystery which eluded him.

"I do not believe that." He didn't. Their manner was confidential and affectionate and both of them emanated decency. Why would they contravene the ordinary social laws?

Jodami was becoming restless and shaking his bridle. He needed exercise. Triumph was in Epiphany's eyes. She could afford to ride away. "I must bid good-day to you. My horse has been in his stable too long. Perhaps I will see you at my father's soon." She leant forward and whispered, "You do not understand, I see, but Dr Blizzard and Suzannah are said to be brother and sister. Why would honest people try to disguise such a relationship?" She squeezed her horse and they moved smartly on, followed by the well-trained groom who had stayed out of earshot.

It took all of James's presence of mind to move Crisp forward. He wanted to refute Epiphany's words. But he couldn't. Brother and sister had been what he took Kenton and Suzannah for when they first met. Their features were not especially similar, but their height and colouring proclaimed a family relationship. And if they were lying about it, what slimy secret did it conceal?

The temperature was cool, but James felt over-heated as he rode. One or two passers by turned to say hello, or offer a greeting, but all hesitated when they saw his expression.

He rode up to the Holly Tree and went in. He was surprised to find Roddy in the taproom enjoying a drink. Roddy greeted him like a long lost relative.

"Lucky I rode into town today, James, I haven't seen you in a while. Hope all's well." Roddy took a second glance and decided that something definitely wasn't well. Brandy was the answer to all troubles, be they troubles of the body or troubles of the mind. He called for two big measures.

James took a long glug, coughed, took another glug. Roddy nodded for refills and decided health might be the cause of James's rat-gnawed look. He said nothing and waited for James to offer his own explanation, or no explanation at all, according to his inclination.

Still James said nothing.

Roddy took a big drink. "Worrying about the rum project perhaps? Got it preying on your mind?"

"Rum?"

"Yes. Last winter you were thinking about producing it, worrying about the investment."

"I'd forgotten."

"You're not going into rum?"

"No."

"Not now?"

"Not ever."

Roddy rubbed his chin. "Probably for the best. Stick to what you know."

Silence.

"How's the farm?"

"As good as it'll ever be."

"Fair crop this year?"

"Think so."

Roddy made a gesture. "One year at a time. You can't look further ahead with farming."

"You can't look even that far ahead. You should never look ahead."

Roddy waited, glass poised at his lips.

"I think I am going home, Roddy."

"You've only just got here. Have another drink." More brandy in the glass.

"No, I mean home home. Gloucestershire. Hill House. The real Hill House. While there's time."

"Ah... I'd heard you were often at that doctor's. The good-looking one, not old Cartwright."

"I'm not ailing, Roddy." Hopefully. "But I want to go home while there's still time."

"Time for what."

James finished his brandy in one slurp. "I don't know."

James left the Holly Tree having accomplished nothing. He had gone with no purpose and left wishing there was a ship he could jump directly on. But he had enough perspective to recall abandoning Jamaica in just such a humour.

It was all very well flinging portable belongings onto a boat. Life didn't mend just because you moved. Perhaps life never mended once you once took the wrong turn... Mess up one wonderful chance and you couldn't expect another string of them.

The light was fading when he reached the Blizzard's house. He knocked at the door uncertainly. Kenton opened it. For the briefest moment his eyes betrayed surprise, but his voice was polite as ever when he spoke.

"James, you look rough." He remembered his role as host. "Thomas, take Crisp and stable him. James come inside. Suzannah will be with us soon."

James stepped across the threshold. His eyes wandered about the hall. What secrets did the walls of this house conceal? Even obfuscated by shadows, Kenton's face did look haggard, that couldn't be missed. Part of Epiphany's tale was true anyway. But the whole story couldn't be. There was an explanation. There had to be.

"Let's deal with professional matters first. Hospitality can wait. I heard you coughing on the doorstep and knew who had come to call without even opening the door. Follow this way."

James followed into the room at the back, where he had first set eyes on Kenton. A wired skeleton was now hanging in one corner. Its presence did not encourage James. No doubt it aided Kenton in his professional knowledge, but it needed to be out of sight. He said so.

"You think?"

"I feel nearer the grave already."

"In that case he must certainly go to my study. One fails to see matters through the patient's eyes sometimes. Now if you will take a deep breath."

He spent some minutes sounding James's chest. His expression was intense. At last Kenton turned away to his instruments cabinet.

"You can put your shirt back. It is chilly in here. Well, I can offer reassurance: I do not believe you are suffering any advanced condition, which perhaps is what you have feared."

Now the words were spoken, the possibility sounded more real, though Kenton had declared it wasn't. Voicing fears seemed to give them life.

"I would repeat my advice which I issued when we first met: a little more sleep and care to avoid the worst of weathers. And - hm, a drop less alcohol."

James's expression was rueful. "And I can only repeat my answer, Kenton. Farmers work long hours out of doors."

Kenton's nod acknowledged the fact. He smiled and the smile only made his face look more exhausted. He produced glasses and a bottle and gave James a look. "You see, I know you will take no notice of what I say!" He poured large measures and drank half of his quickly. He was not usually free with drink. He never liked to be so incapable that he could not answer a professional summons, Suzannah had once explained.

"If you continue in this colony you could perhaps avail yourself of more labour about the farm, James. I am not suggesting a slave." Kenton held his hand up to forestall protests. "But there would be other possibilities. Just one able-bodied man would make a difference." His expression became apologetic, his voice soft. "It is perhaps something you should consider before it is too late."

They were both silent. James's eyes wandered outside to the developing garden.

"I can supply you with many cuttings and seeds," James offered, as if their whole conversation had been on mundane things. "I grow some sweet-smelling climbers close to the house and privie."

"I would be pleased of the cuttings, or Suzannah would. She is the gardener."

Her name dropped into the conversation like a bomb. Or James perceived it that way. Kenton only continued to look exhausted.

"Let's find her. If she heard your voice she will wonder why I have kept you locked up here so long."

James braced himself. Control face. Control breathing. Control voice. Control everything.

Suzannah was in a small room extracting seeds from dry pods. She looked up at the approach of feet and her features appeared yet more drawn than Kenton's. The blanched faces of the pair, the auburn hair and pale, opaque grey eyes marked them out as blood relatives, James was more sure than ever of it, now.

She kept her eyes on the pods and only looked up when Kenton spoke. James noticed and guessed she were battling for inner composure as much as he was. Then the briefest, tiniest glance. "Hello James."

An amalgam of angers, jealousies and suspicions swirled together in him. He deeply liked both these two people, and that regard fanned the flames of doubt and uncertainty. He couldn't bear that they should be less than the good souls he took them for. His chest tightened and he started to cough. The cough itched and squeezed his lungs. He coughed and coughed, then choked. The world swirled and he clutched at a table.

Kenton thrust him into a chair.

"I am glad to have at last seen the worst of your condition." Kenton's face was grave. "James, I must urge you to listen. Virginia is all creeks and rivers and marshes. It is damp. Miasmas hang in the air. It may not be the place for you. There is time to mend, but do not delay. Your friend Owen, I did not wish to say this, but it is common knowledge that he is unwell. And with him too it is the lungs. It is not impossible that you have contracted some illness from him. But you have chance to look after yourself. Do it. Now." Kenton went to the door. "You can come in again, dear."

She did. Her pale eyes blazed from dark, stress-smudged circles. The strain of facing each other again after that impassioned hour in the barn had been superseded by James's near collapse. The collapse provided cover for red faces, shifty looks and unsteady hands. James was almost thankful for the diversion.

"You will not go to church tomorrow either. If you insist on heading home, I will accompany you personally. There has to be an end to this madness James. I speak as your doctor and your friend."

"You must listen to Kenton, James." They were the first words she had spoken. The ice was broken.

"I will."

Kenton's back was towards him, and against his own will James's eyes wandered in search of Suzannah, but she snatched her own glance quickly away and slipped out of the room.

Chapter Fifteen

James did not return to his farm till Wednesday. He could have ridden back sooner, but the collapse had impressed him in a way Kenton's warnings could not. There were four crosses in Weston Subedge church yard bearing the names of his three infant brothers and his sister, who had made it to her teenage years. They were in his mind as he lay in bed at Kenton's house, and he thought of his father too. Life had been disappointing, profoundly so, but he did not wish on that account to give it up and leave Roderick with no hope for his old age. And so he stayed on at the Blizzards.

Kenton came often to his room and servants appeared with medicines and soups. Suzannah stayed away and he was glad of that. Weakened in body as he was, there was only so much vitality which could be drained from a twenty-eight year old. He was desperate to maintain his own self-respect and Kenton's friendship.

On the second day he ventured downstairs towards mid-day and seated himself before the fire in the parlour. He had felt quite well when he woke, but the effort of dressing and coming down made him tremble. Chilly fingers explored his innards. I am ill. I am ill. I may not see home again, whether I want to or no. Father, Kas, Geoff, Clara, Alice, I may never see them... He remembered the New Year ball at Painswick and how he had fallen ill with le grippe the next day. He recalled lying on a couch before the fire in the library, while Kas read to him. The book he'd forgotten; the magic of her proximity survived in an imperishable afterlife.

"Are you warm enough, James?"

Suzannah was standing at the door. She closed it to conserve the heat, then on a second thought opened it again. They must not be too private together.

"I am."

Suzannah took up another chair, a distant one. There was no ease between them.

"Kenton is pleased with your recovery. He thinks you can go home soon."

"I don't want to trespass."

"You are not trespassing."

"Does he say what is wrong with me?"

"He never talks of his patients, not in any detail. He is pleased. That is all. But it is good news; if he were not pleased he would have remained silent."

The fire gave a great crackle.

"I believe he thinks I have phthisis..."

She couldn't hide the fear in her eyes, though her answer was reassuring. "Even if you do, you might live long. You do not need to labour in unhealthy conditions. You can have the best of foods. You can rest in comfort."

He considered that. "Sitting here has reminded me of when I was taken ill at the Endecotts. Do you remember you said you knew them?"

"Yes."

"I was ill for more than a week, and even when I got up, I was fit for nothing except sprawling on a couch in the library. Ka - someone - read to me there. It was cold and murky outside, and just for a couple of days I felt myself floating on some cloud removed from normal life."

Suzannah sighed. "That would be a nice place to be, insulated against normal life." Her eyes drifted to the window. "It is not possible though to remove yourself."

Closeness, confidentially, intimacy were descending on them in that parlour which was darkened from the autumny murk outside, just as January fogs had enveloped him and Kas all those years ago. "Suzannah," he asked. "is there something which troubles you and Kenton? I hope that - " He balked at referring to own their private secret. "I hope that what happened at my farm has not come back to haunt you. I would not refer to it," he hurried on in a whisper, "but both of you look changed. If there is anything I can do?"

She stared into the flames. He wondered if she was going to answer at all. Then she made a false start. Her eyes wavered from him to the fire. She stood up. Sat down. Went to the window. Returned to the rocking chair.

A new approach. "Suzannah. There are stories, I have heard them from Epiphany Anstruther." If the anguish in his voice was anything to go by, he reckoned he must be looking haggard too.

Her eyes opened wide. "What rumours?"

Taken at their worst, the rumours were almost too horrible to speak, but James did not believe them at their worst. He took a breath. "She says you are Kenton's sister."

Suzannah turned sharply away.

"Suzannah," he went to extend a comforting hand, but stopped himself. That could lead to worse disasters. "Suzannah, dear Suzannah, I know there is an explanation for this. I know that things cannot be as bad as they seem. I know you. I know Kenton."

"You don't. That's just it."

"I know you are good people, better by far than Epiphany and the Anstruther crowd. Some awful misunderstanding has happened. Tell me."

She left her chair, went to the window again. Anxiety would not let her settle. Her eyes were dry but anguished. "Kenton is not in. I cannot tell you without talking to him first."

"Your secret is safe with me. Didn't I tell you of my past?"

That unlocked her confidence. Abruptly she rushed into speech, "James, it is true. I'm not Kenton's wife."

His heart leapt. Every possibility, good and bad, hit him at once.

"I'm married to a Dutch merchant called Van der Elst."

That blasted one possibility.

"I was born Suzannah Oxlade. Kenton's mother was an Oxlade. We are second cousins, though we did not know each other as children and only met when we were sixteen."

"How came you to be living like this?"

"At age twenty I made a marriage to a merchant who visited Bristol often. It was a foolish choice as I knew little about him, but he was young and handsome and at twenty that is often enough. It's enough to get on a road to disaster, as I discovered. Kees turned out to have women and even children in other ports. I wanted to part discreetly, but the suggestion angered him and I was trapped in an awful situation. Kenton came to the rescue. There had been a closeness between us since we met, perhaps we would have got together if we had not been closely related. I ran away to London where he was coming to the end of his studies. We went through a sham marriage and hid ourselves amid the great throng of the city. We never felt at ease though and decided on a bold move here. With hindsight I think we were better camouflaged in London."

"That could well be."

"We tried to be careful not to talk of the past, but sometimes details slipped out when we were with you. We never feared you though, James. We knew you would not talk about us. Kenton said you seemed to be running away from something yourself and would not pry into the secrets of others."

"Did the Bells reveal your history?"

"They hardly seem malicious, but something must have been said. I'm not sure that they know the real truth, but Leticia may have heard a garbled story in Bristol and garbled it further. Oh, James I wish it were possible to go back to the beginning and start again. I wish I'd married Kenton!"

James's mouth turned down.

"We could have been happy. Kenton's tastes and outlook are so similar to mine. Instead, in a censorious world we are adulterers masquerading as husband and wife. And with you I've gone one worse even than that!" Tears threatened now.

James experienced his own throb of pain. "Say nothing of what we've done. It's as if it never happened. It cannot hurt us, and it cannot hurt Kenton. We will not let it. But this other trouble... What will you do?"

"Kenton says perhaps we must go away again, even back to London. It may be urgent that we act."

"Oh God."

"Don't let Dodds hear you say that."

The confession had left them both drained. If there was more to say could not drag up the energy to say it. They stared into the grate, forlornly, lacking even the hope to cast about for solutions.

Chapter Sixteen

Now that the tobacco was in in the barn James was freed from some anxiety. It would still be possible to lose his crop, but the hazards were narrowing. There was land on his small farm which could be cleared, but he wasn't doing it. Instead he heeded warnings. The climate of Virginia, Kenton has suggested, might not be good for him now his system had been compromised. It occurred to James that the rigours of Jamaica had done him no harm, but there he had lived in domestic comfort, not a damp, insect-ridden shack.

And so he did not bother clearing the woods. Instead his destination was home. He would not write to his father. He would turn up. Not quite the surprise of rising from the dead after Blenheim, but surprise enough. He could disburden Roderick of some responsibility. Another reason to go.

The family would be overjoyed to see him. The circle of life had spun round and he felt himself wanting them too.

Vi and Pink were taking their after-dinner hour of rest on a damp afternoon when the sun couldn't make up its mind whether to shine or hide behind the clouds. It was a good opportunity for James to sponge himself down in his room. The clean-up made him feel better; he was fed up of smelling like a goat pen. After a brief towelling, he sank back onto the covers, letting the air blow over his body to complete the last drying. No one would pass this way now... A pity in a way. It would be fun if Caleb Jehosephat came for a rant and found him in this natural state... Leaves were rustling in the trees behind the shack; it was just possible to hear the stream bubbling towards the river, he didn't usually notice it, but in this moment when he was empty of thought and industry, the calming balm of nature around him did its work. The rectangle of light from the open door started to blur and he drifted into shallow sleep.

It was the barking of Bluey that wakened James. He had been dreaming of sitting on the cool banks of the Dikler with a noisy hound, then his mind swirled into consciousness and he realized that the barking was real and a human figure blocked the light of the main door. With a sharp inhalation, he sat up and snatched for his firearm.

For a moment the figure did not speak. Then a voice lisped, "So this is how you greet visitors, James. I am surprised that the track to Williamsburg is not choked with women struggling to find you. I did knock, but no one answered."

Given their history together there was not much point in grabbing a towel to cover himself, but he did anyway. "Pernel!" Just that one word. He wondered if he was hallucinating.

She stepped forward from the door and now her features were clear against the light of the fire. "None other, James. Were you expecting someone else?" She cocked her little head on one side and lowered her lashes teasingly. Her presence had lost none of its charm or challenge.

"Pernel, it is you!" They had not met for four years, not since the trauma of Wiseman's destruction and his recovery at her house, but one moment was enough to breath in the power of her intense vitality. He smiled, though in this moment he hardly knew what he felt. "You have not come here alone, surely. I know you are a pistol shot, but \- "

"Lucky is with me."

"Lucky! My uncle's Lucky?"

"Who better with horses? Don't go out to meet him like that," she added when he struggled up. "A pair of breaches at least to satisfy etiquette." She regarded him, frankly watching as he dressed. "Stay a moment, James. Lucky can wait. You look even thinner than before, if that is possible. Gaunt."

"I am well." He buttoned his linen, hunted about for a stock. "But how come are you here, Pernel? You've explained nothing." He glanced over her, more observant now that the first shock was passed, and detected changes. Her eyes were a little less bright, burdened with some species of sadness, he guessed, her figure not quite so slender and supple.

She plucked at her skirt, then plunged on, "Tom has died." There was a sudden catch in her voice. "It happened six months ago."

"Tom! I am sorry." He truly was. Tom Eland had been one of the few planters who he had liked during his year in Jamaica. "Was it sudden?"

"He ailed for a long time. He grew thin. He was thirsty. We consulted physicians, but they could not help. One physician poured his urine outside on the dirt to see if ants were attracted. They were. Tom was suffering from the sugar sickness, he said."

"I've heard of others back home who have passed with that. So the burden of his estates now rest in your hands."

She sighed. "Yes. They do. I have a good overseer, someone Tom relied on for years. Good stewards. But someone has to oversee the overseers."

James smiled thinly, coughed.

Pernel's expression focussed. "Not you too, James! That cough is bad."

"I am young. Tom was in his fifties. My uncle used to say exactly what you just did, about overseers, someone has to oversee them. But how come you to be in Virginia? Did Tom have concerns here?"

She shook her head. "Nothing of significance, but he had business in Rhode Island. I have been there. I wanted to see all for myself."

"Very hands on. I commend you. What was that business?"

"Rum production."

"Rum!" James strangled another cough which was rising in his chest. "I've been thinking of getting into that line myself. I've been stewing on it for months."

"What has stopped you?"

"Time. I'm tied to the farm so much that I have limited opportunity to think, never mind formulate a plan and take action. And my mind has been turning against Virginia. When this crop is wound up, I'm thinking to return home."

Pernel bit her lip and her eyes wandered about the shack. "I can be frank with you James: this is not much of a dwelling."

"I can't argue with that."

"You are a gentleman and this is a shack."

"A very superior shack, but not much of a gentleman." His smile was reflected in her features. "Minor gentry only."

She shrugged. "At any rate you are not a dirt farmer by birth. Is this really how you choose to spend your life?"

"No, that's why I'm going home. When I came here, I imagined I would be moving on to clear new land for tobacco within a few years. There seemed no point in putting down firm roots. But a more profitable concern lies in Gloucestershire and my father is in his mid-fifties. He will need me soon." Roderick seemed to have abandoned the bottle and picked up in health - perhaps the trends were linked - but Roderick couldn't go on forever. "I have been gone five years, so there will be no sense of scuttling home with my tail between my legs. I've given the Americas a fair shot. I've gained experience of the world." Most of which he'd have been happy to do without. "My mind is almost made up."

It was Pernel's turn for silence. Then she stood abruptly. "I have a message for you from someone you once liked a great deal."

The cogs turned in James's mind. "Nehemiah?"

"Who else?" She smiled. "I think James, you would be more pleased to see him than to see me." Her voice was soft. Notes of hurt still echoed in it.

"I'd be pleased to see him in a different way. He fares well?"

"Yes. He still works for us - me." Her face puckered with distress. "I often forget. I still often forget that Tom is gone."

"Time will pass. Tom's death is still close. Time heels all wounds." Not quite all.

"Nehemiah told me to say that he remembers you often. He has not forgotten what you did for him."

"Tell him that I have not forgotten that he saved my life!"

"I will. Nehemiah bought a slave of his own last year."

James stared. It was as if a physical shock had smashed his body. Optimism about humanity would never be possible again if one such as Nehemiah could sink into iniquity. He continued staring at Pernel.

"He bought her, freed her and married her."

A wave of relief flooded through James which could only be released through laughter. Joyous laugher. "I hope his life will be good. He deserves it. I never met a better man." They talked a little about Nehemiah, before James returned to an earlier theme. "But why are you in Virginia? You have explained the journey to Rhode Island, but not how you come to be here."

She bit her lip. "I knew you were in Virginia James and had an impulse to find you." Silence.

"So you sailed here and looked me up." It was a big undertaking, yet she talked as if she described a stroll up Duke of Gloucester Street.

She turned away. "Come and meet Lucky. He will be pleased to see you. It was difficult to shut him up when I explained I was seeking you out."

Lucky was more than pleased, his spirits were effervescent when they went outside. "Mr James I never thought to see you no more in this world!"

"Nor I you. I'm pleased that you are still faring well."

Lucky stole a glance to Pernel. "Did Mistress Pernel tell you?"

"Tell me what?"

"I'm a freed man now. A paid servant, not a slave."

"It seemed right, when Tom died." She half turned away. "I often thought of those words which you spoke to me when we last met. They took a long time to sink in, but they are not all forgotten. I have taken some small steps."

"I know you'll be a good servant to your mistress, just as you tried your best for my uncle."

"I always will."

Pernel suddenly looked at the sun though there were plenty of hours of light left. "We should be on our way. I am at the Holly Tree Tavern. Do you know it? I will be there a few days before I continue my journey. My mission was to find you."

Their eyes met.

"I will certainly ride into town."

"There is a changed look about you, James." Her voice was uncertain, troubled.

"I'll be twenty-nine in a month or so, not the boy you first met."

Her eyes lingered on him. "It is not so much a question of age... Nor even health, though I sense that you are not well. Something else has happened." She became brisk. "Let us agree a time to meet."

They fixed an arrangement.

"Now we must go. I will leave you to your silk couch. Until Tuesday." Her eyes sparkled with some of their old mirth and she rode off smartly.

When she was gone, energy drained from James. On the nearest bench, the one by the barn, he sat heavily. Questions started to crowd in: why had she gone to such lengths to seek him out? Had she perhaps a job for him? He had the feeling that there was some fact which she had not revealed.

He was there fully ten minutes considering possibilities, before an idea crept into his tired, distracted mind; years might have passed, but was she perhaps considering a role for him that was not so much professional as personal?

Chapter Seventeen

Despite his reservations and qualms, meeting Pernel had a positive effect on James's mood. Every time I have a proper wash, a good-looking woman comes to see me, he thought with a smile. Even his health seemed to enjoy a slight upturn.

Kenton did not rubbish the idea when James outlined a heavily abridged history of the friendship in Jamaica and described the alleviation in his symptoms.

"The connection between the body and the mind is overlooked," commented Kenton washing his hands. "One day it will be better understood, I think. You have cleared your mind of doubt and decided to return home, also you have met an old and amusing friend: better sleep and better health are the outcomes. One good thing fuels another in the upswing." Kenton's face was serious. "I wish an old and amusing friend could solve all troubles."

A note in his voice warned James that something momentous was coming.

Kenton plunged on, "We are leaving. I know you will say nothing of this to anyone, but soon we will be gone. Already we are quietly packing up and making arrangements. We will be gone within days."

"Oh no!" James was doubly glad that he had embraced the need to be gone himself. Life in Virginia would be impossible with the Blizzards. "I shall not be far behind. As soon as the crop is in the hogsheads."

"Dodds was here last week demanding to know if Suzannah and I are man and wife. I asserted of course that we are, but I think that may only have confounded matters. I would not be surprised if he questioned you." Kenton's expression was wintry.

"Dodds will get nothing out of me, Kenton. Be sure of that. Where will you move on to?"

"Pondering that has caused our delay. We have decided on Edinburgh. It is surely more anonymous than the colonies and I am certain we will never meet connections there."

James thought hard. "Have you considered Jamaica? It was my home for a year. Whatever else might be said about it, it is not a place of moral busy bodying. There are few churches or ministers."

Kenton sighed. "We gave it thought. But the death rate is very high. If Suzannah were to die I would lose all will to go on, and Suzannah could not do without me."

A hot wave rippled through James.

"Besides, we have another reason to be on the move soon." A strained smile brightened Kenton's handsome features. "We are expecting an event."

"What sort of event?"

"A child. Suzannah is with child. I would not have told you at this stage, but as we will be gone soon..." He shrugged and left the sentence dangling.

James froze. Only a moment ago he'd felt over-heated with guilt. Now his veins were chilled as if some colder fluid than blood ran through them.

"It is seven months away. Early days. Dangers still lie ahead."

A quick calculation. A sigh of relief. Not his. Thank God. "Congratulations. It is a hope for the future. We all need hope."

Kenton's face did not look especially hopeful. "Ordinarily I would not have been pleased, with our life so much unsettled, but as you say, it opens up hope and a means to forget our own worries. Already I've found myself looking forward to the change and troubling less about gossip here. Once we are escaped from Virginia, I believe my whole heart will be in it."

"I should think so. I am pleased that you have a new prospect. I can see why you would not consider moving to the dangers of Jamaica. I think that is Suzannah just come in now. It is not Molly's heavy tread."

"My love, James is here."

She came in, removing her hat, and as soon as he saw her a change was detectable. Worry was deeply carved on her face.

"I have told James all our news."

"All?"

"All. We have no secrets."

James maintained a composed countenance but squirmed inwardly. "I will miss you both enormously. But my plans here do not extend far into the future."

"When you go back to England you must correspond with us. Before we leave, we will ensure that is possible, though we must be careful."

"I have loose ends to tie up here, arrangements to close, stock to sell. Something needs to be done for Pink and Vi too. Life will be a blank page without the two of you. But I've begun to feel excited about returning to my home again. The move feels real now, not just a matter of speculation." He looked at the clock. "Talking of friends, I must be on my way. I am meeting the friend I spoke of from my Jamaican days and must not be late." James did not want to even try explaining the situation to Suzannah. "Do not quit Virginia abruptly without sending word."

"If things deteriorate, we cannot guarantee our movements."

Suzannah nodded urgently. "I passed Mistress Bodelle when I was out. I smiled, but she gave her husband a look which alarmed me and she murmured something about Reverend Dodds's health being shaky. They thought someone was to blame but I couldn't hear who."

"Me probably!" exclaimed Kenton with uncharacteristic fire. "Reverend Dodds - " He recalled professional etiquette and swallowed a great chunk of anger. "But I must not forget the standards of my profession and discuss patients, not even those I no longer serve."

"I was afraid they might be imputing his illness to you." Suzannah's voice was unsteady. "But you gave him honest service!"

"You do well to leave soon. I believe Dodds has imported special poison with him from Salem. He is like one of those lurking spiders which dash out from where you least expect it."

They talked some more in low voices then both Blizzards saw him to the door. As per James's simile, Dodds was skulking on the street corner at that very moment but shot behind a piled waggon when he realized he was seen. The Blizzard's door closed quickly behind James.

They're already out of here in their hearts, James thought. A stab of loneliness lanced him as he looked back at their door. Then his own home near Campden, and the people waiting there, came alive in his thoughts, and hope lifted again.

Though he was not late, Pernel was pacing up and down when he joined her at the Holly Tree. "I was worried you would not come. You seemed such a shadow of yourself the other day." She took his hand.

"Did I?" The degree of change, not change itself, surprised him. "I must be aging rapidly."

Her touch was pleasant, but in recent months his thoughts, emotions and desires had all centred on another woman. In a few days, Suzannah would be sailing out of his life and his chances of seeing her again were low, but he wasn't of the type to change direction this abruptly. Gently he freed the hand. "You will be sailing soon?"

"...No. I have decided to stay a while in Virginia. A week or two." She sucked her lip. It wasn't like her to be short of words.

"Then we must see something of each other. A meal. A drink. For old times' sake."

She pulled the bell and ordered drink and cake be brought up. "It is old times that I wanted to talk of now," she explained when the servant had gone. "Old times can have an afterlife."

"That's true."

She flickered a quick little glance to him. She did not seem as confident and certain as the girl he had known in Jamaica, though now vast wealth was at her personal fingertips. If he was changed, then so was she.

But she had lost no attraction in these missing years. Her hair still fell in tight, glossy black curls. Her coffee coloured skin was smooth and had suffered no abrasion from insect or illness. Her figure had thickened slightly, but it was still a neat, pleasing form which stood before James. The pale yellow of her gown suited her; she had always known how to dress.

"Is something troubling you Pernel? Is that why you have gone to such lengths to visit me?"

The servant came with a tray and the interval provided pause for James to try to fathom Pernel's mission.

"It is difficult James, running a vast plantation without help." She drummed her fingers on a nearby cupboard.

"Yes, I'm sure it is. At Wiseman's I failed to truly grasp that."

"Always there are decisions to be made. I have good advice. But the decisions rest with me."

"The responsibility is great."

She fell silent again before resuming, "There are things about the past James of which you know nothing."

"I'm sure there are. Tell me of them, Pernel. We are old friends, more than friends," he added in a lowered voice. "Tell me what's on your mind. It may not be in my power to help, but don't be afraid to ask."

A wave crashed through the floodgates. She grasped both his hands. "I have not told you that I have two children, twins. A boy and a girl. They were born after you left Jamaica. They are four years old." Her voice was ragged with suppressed emotions.

Not what he had been expecting. Money worries; troubles with the overseers; uppity slaves: these had been difficulties he had foreseen. But not children. "Twins?" He shrugged. "How can I help with that?"

"They're yours, James," she blurted. "Acelin and Isabeau. You had a relation called Acelin. And it is your second name. You mentioned it once and I liked the name. My Acelin is your son."

James was incapable of making the smallest noise. He stared down with mouth open.

"They're yours James, only yours."

"You can't know that."

"You should see them. They are very tall for their age. Everyone comments on it."

He looked away.

"And their eyes are mauve-blue."

A vision of his father's mauve gaze pierced James's mind. "Tom had blue eyes. And your father's eyes were blue. You told me so." The shadow of a net was threatening. "And my eyes are grey, not blue." James's heart was half-way home already. He didn't want to know about ties in the Americas. It was ties at home which were linked to his hopes now.

"It is their height you will recognize. They are only four years old, but they are very tall." She sprang up and went to a cupboard. Small portraits were taken out. "Look."

James did. The faces were like his father's. He turned to the window. The shock was too much for him to take in. Half an hour ago he had discovered that the Blizzards were to become parents; now he found that he already was one, and to twins at that. "Pernel, I can't make sense of this. You didn't send me any word. That day I said goodbye, you never hinted. Not a word."

"Of course not. With Tom alive why should I? I did not wish to cause him trouble. I cared for Tom. And I could not know for certain then who was father of the child I carried. But Tom is dead now and it is possible for you to do your duty to them."

Duty. A quake shook his hopes and assumptions.

"I want you to marry me. I wasn't sure when I came, but I have seen the hovel that you live in for myself. If you had been leading a wonderful life with hopes for marriage, I planned to go away and never tell you the truth. But by marrying me you will be giving nothing up. You will be bettering yourself."

Nothing except my restoration to home. He walked over to the fireplace and stared into the grate, as if the answer to this problem lay there. Years before, he hadn't needed even to propose to Kas, both their families had simply assumed they would marry and talked of it as a fait accompli. Now, years on, here he was, the recipient of a proposal of marriage. And he was as startled and blushing as any well-bred young lady...

"Pernel, I don't know what to say. I'm honoured - " Oh God, he even sounded like an untried girl.

"Tell me what you really feel, James."

"It's too sudden for me to tell you anything."

"Bah, James!"

Her foot would soon be stamping, he knew that of old. Sparks were glinting in her eye. The old Pernel was firing into life, now the news was broken.

"I didn't know I was a father till five minutes ago."

"I am not lying to you James. The children are yours. I would never play such a trick on anyone."

He believed her. She was an honest person and the portraits told their own story. If she was simply seeking a husband, she would come right out and declare it: I need a man I can trust to take over the estates. Take it or leave it, that's what she would say. He groaned and strode to the window. "Pernel. I cannot answer your question this minute. I have to think. If we were to marry, I could not stay here, nor go home. Your possessions are mostly in the Caribbean."

"We could live where you liked, James. Jamaica, Rhode Island, the Carolinas. I do not want the fogs of England, it is true, but England is not the whole world."

The whole world was how England had started to feel in James's emotions. Hill House, Roderick, Kas; he'd imagined returning to them... "I can't tell you now, Pernel. I have to think. I'm sorry." He moved to the door hastily.

"I shall be here another week or two." She was crestfallen; disappointment was written in all her features and in her sagging shoulders, too. "Today I shall say no more."

He seized his hat and nodded. For the moment, he had no more words.

Chapter Eighteen

A battle could have raged around him on the ride home and James would not have noticed. Pernel's own artillery shell had shredded to tatters all plans which had been generating in his mind. He did not doubt that she was telling the truth and he couldn't deny the moral argument that if the twins were his, he had a responsibility towards them. But it was a responsibility he didn't want.

Crisp was dripping with sweat when James leapt off. They had never made the journey back home so quickly. He settled Crisp in his stable and went directly to the house, where he was disconcerted by the sight of C.J Dodds planted before the kitchen table. Uncovering a rattlesnake in his bed could not have been less pleasing.

"Reverend Dodds. This is a pleasure."

"Mace. I am not on a social call. I am not even here to do my duty and remind you of your sins."

That was a surprise. "No?" What other purpose could he have?

"I will come to the point. There is ungodliness amongst us."

James took his gloves off. Too many of his own troubles swirled in his head for him to consider where Dodds was heading. He went to the door and called Vi, who was in the chicken pen. "Get Pink, I want him."

She hurried off.

In his tribulation, James confused Dodds's message with the twins he had just learnt of. "I know nothing of ungodliness but say your piece."

"It is your duty to confess all you know."

A horrible sniff of the truth reached James's nostrils.

"You are intimate with those sinners the Blizzards. What can you tell of their vile habits?"

James went to the cupboard, picked up the brandy bottle, then put it down. He thought for a very long second, scratched at his neck, ripped off his stock. "There is the door. Leave. Get out while you're on two feet."

Dodds's eyes opened wide, but for once his tongue failed. Those onyx black eyes travelled from James to the stock and back again.

"Go. Get out. Leave my house. You heard me."

"I've been watching you, Mace." Dodd's voice lacked its usual rasp and power. "My wife warned me what you are. I did not believe her." He backed away and out of the door. "A blasphemer, that was all I took you for. I have watched you. I have had my ears open. I have observed you when I have been out on the route to my chapel or to Watersmeet. You deserve the rope."

"So you have been snooping in these woods. I've long wondered if someone was spying." James stepped forwards menacingly, and Dodds edged away, though he did not flinch. "You always talk of sin, yet you gathered to yourself a girl young enough to be your grand-daughter. If that is not sin, I don't know what is!"

"How dare you! My union has been sanctioned by law and God!"

"So you say."

"I am a minister of religion."

"You think you are God. You muddle your power with his!"

Dodds's face empurpled. He sprang but did not reach James. With a crash he fell face first against the edge of the table, then crunched onto the floor.

For once, James's sharp reactions were blunted, then he rushed to aid the minister. Dodds struggled as if with some internal battle. His face was contorted and he clutched his chest.

"Help," James yelled. "Help. Vi, Pink, quickly. The reverend is ill!" Where were they?

He shot to the door. Vi was coming as quick as she could. In her haste she almost fell on the step. She knelt beside Dodds, looked into the onyx-black eyes which were half-open.

"He's gone, Sir, it's too late."

James stood. His hands were steady; his head was functioning at half-speed. There could be ramifications from this. He had not laid a finger on Dodds, but there were no witnesses to that. He could ask Vi to swear she had been in the kitchen. She would probably do so. He wasn't sure whether it was wise. Close questioning might expose the lie.

Pink came in, breathing hard. "In the privie, Sir, couldn't get here any quicker." He saw Dodds on the floor, looked at his master and Vi, who was standing with her apron to her face. "Reverend died 'av he, Sir?"

Pink's reaction steadied James.

"I'm afraid he has. He collapsed."

"Didn't look too grand in chapel last week."

"Pink, I do not want to ride back into town. Saddle Bobsworth and bring back Dr Blizzard. Tell Mr Anstruther too, or Mr Turner or any member of the vestry you can find. Then ride straight back. Be sure to find Dr Blizzard. It must be him who examines the reverend."

Kenton arrived ahead of Pink. His usually lustrous auburn hair was grey with dust thrown up from the track.

James heard the horse and was outside instantly to take the bridle. "I'm sorry Kenton. I didn't want to drag you here. He is inside." He took the lathered horse to the drinking trough and tethered him.

Kenton was terse. "Anything I should know?"

"He collapsed. That is all. I never touched him. We had an argument. We exchanged words."

Kenton met his eyes and James had the impression that he read his thoughts, though it could not possibly be true.

"This way."

Kenton knelt beside Dodds and examined him. "He has struck his face on the edge of the table. That much is clear. There is another mark where he has hit the floor. I can see these are not wounds inflicted by a fist." He stood up. "I should not reveal this to anyone James," he continued, "but I have expected Reverend Dodds to die for some months. He abandoned my services, but I knew he was ill. I will be able to give that testimony to the legal officials. You do not have anything to fear."

Relief. James sagged onto a chair. "Kenton, we were arguing because he came here demanding what I knew of your private life. He said his wife had called me a blasphemer and worse things. He has been watching me here, on the sly."

"What did he say about me?"

"I forget the words. I was too angry. I called him something. I told him he was the sinner."

Horses pounded to a halt outside. Raised voices summoned Pink and Vi. Booted feet stamped up the step. The door burst open without ceremony. Epiphany stood there. A cry escaped her.

"Mrs Dodds, I don't think - "

Her father pushed into the room a step behind and Bodelle followed. "Mace, what has happened?"

"Your son-in-law dropped dead, Mr Anstruther. I am sorry Mrs Dodds."

Kenton winced and Epiphany shot a hand up to her face. Shock was written there. But not grief, James thought.

"What is that mark on Caleb's face, father? He has been struck!" She shot furious eyes in James's direction. "That man has killed Caleb."

"I did not! You husband slumped and fell against the table."

"What was my husband doing here?"

"...Telling me to attend church. I reminded him that I have been ill. My physician will confirm that."

Pure venom crimped her features. "That is not why Caleb came here!"

Anstruther intervened. "That will be all, Epiphany. You are here as a wife, not to uphold the law."

"James Mace is a blasphemer! Now he has killed Caleb."

"All will be looked into. Leave us."

With many signs of anger, but few tokens of grief, Epiphany went outside, accompanied by Vi.

Kenton's expression was stern. "There is a mark on Reverend Dodds's face consistent with striking the table. I must tell you, Mr Anstruther, that the minister had received medical supervision from me. He abandoned my services some months ago, but I do not believe it possible that he improved in that time."

Anstruther said nothing.

"Reverend Dodds's body must be taken back to town, then I can do a thorough examination."

"That will not be necessary, Dr Blizzard. Dr Cartwright has been warned and is standing by. Mace we will need your cart."

"Both my horses need rest and feed."

"We are not in a rush. Poor Dodds is going nowhere. Where is your man? I want to question him."

Pink told the story they had rehearsed. Reverend Dodds had worked up a storm in the kitchen then collapsed against the table. Pink had heard the quarrel through the open door and seen him fall.

Anstruther asked what had enraged Dodds. Mr Mace's broken record of attending church and long-term failure to mend his ways, that had been the cause. Had Pink seen the moment when Dodds went down? Yes. He'd been walking towards the door and seen it. Had Mr Mace struck the minister. No. They had been on opposite sides of the table.

The story was a simple one to remember and not far from the truth. They had agreed on it while waiting for Kenton and the officials to come.

Anstruther put the same questions to Vi and got the same answers. Bodelle tried befuddling her by rephrasing the questions, but her story remained the same. It was after all, a simple story.

Dodds's earthly remains were loaded onto the cart with such dignity as could be mustered. Epiphany wiped her eyes, but James noted that Anstruther, though his face was drawn, paid no attention to her. Anstruther weighed her emotions at their true value, James guessed.

"Do not go anywhere, Mace. There may be further investigations. The same to you, Dr Blizzard, your testimony will be required."

Bodelle was watching James with intense scrutiny. He looked sharply about the farm, then accepted Kenton's help into the saddle. "You will hear more from us Mace."

"Walk on." Anstruther flicked the reins and Bobsworth moved forward with the cart and its unexpected cargo.

The last thing James saw, before they disappeared into the trees were Epiphany's eyes blazing at him.

Chapter Nineteen

Everything but the threatening danger was blasted from James's mind in the aftermath of Dodds's death. Pernel, the unwanted twins, even his crop, all were relegated. He had seen the hate in Epiphany's eyes and the covetousness in Bodelle's. He knew that the same company had focussed their malice on Kenton and Suzannah too. It was time for all of them to be gone out of the colony to safety.

"Thank Heavens we brought our plans forward," breathed Kenton, a day or two after the incident. "Things are moving a pace here. We have stayed too long."

"When your crop has paid, go James." It was Suzannah who spoke. "Go before that if you can afford it. Dodds was a focal point for malice, but life will not return to normal a while yet. He's unleashed something."

"I never touched Dodds. I swear it. I have witnesses." James had not told the Blizzards that Pink and Vi were lying for him; the less who knew, the safer it was for all. "I will surely not be imprisoned and sent to the supreme court."

A knock on the door made all of them start. An agitated voice was audible from the hall and someone was ushered speedily in.

"Roddy! I didn't expect you."

"Excuse me Dr, Mistress Blizzard." He spoke like a man with no time to lose. "James, I was in town and heard your horse had been seen coming here."

"This is Roddy Owen. He provided my first berth when I landed in Virginia. He's my friend, though one I don't see enough of."

Kenton reached for the brandy. The alcohol consumption of all of them had risen steeply in the last year. "A friend of James is a friend of ours."

"I've got to warn you all. I overheard talk and galloped here as fast as I could. I was going to - "

A peremptory hammering at the door cut him off. "It's too late. They're here! Out the back. Run!"

Angry voices and the muffled thud of someone being chucked aside told them escape was too late. Booted feet stamped from room to room. The intruders quickly located the right one.

Bodelle led the party. With him were Turner and four servants. Their expressions were grim yet satisfied.

"We are here on the worst of business. We know that we are in the presence of a witch!"

Someone gasped and Suzannah gave a stifled scream.

Kenton stepped forward. "Get out of my house! You have no authority here."

"The marks of a witch have been spied. We know what the old books say. Witches may be fair of face. Witches have marks upon them that may be recognized by honest Christians."

James moved in front of Suzannah.

"Mistress Dodds has identified the witch. It is you Mace! You are fair of face and you have a witch's mark."

Silence screamed through the house.

"Arrest him."

One of the servants shoved forward to take James. A whipped left hook which surprised the man with its speed and the wing from which it flew, sent the servant crashing. Another servant leapt in. He shot over the table with a spume of blood and teeth flying from his mouth.

"Get him! Get Mace. Don't just stand there!"

More feet rushed from the hall. Fists flew. Broadcloth ripped. A woman screamed. Someone was thrown bodily through the window. The kitchen was a wreck of fighting men and shattering crockery. James punched someone else. He didn't know who it was, but he made full-blooded contact. Roddy was grappling with a fat man next to him. A swift one-two from Roddy's hams put the man in the grate. Kenton wielded a pan. Someone else went down.

Then the lights went out.

Chapter Twenty

The smell of stagnant water was in his nostrils and his mouth tasted coppery. Feebly he coughed and opened his eyes. He was on the bank of a pond, that much he understood, though he didn't know what he was doing there. His head throbbed and viscous blood oozed into his eye. A small gathering of onlookers had assembled. Kenton's was the face he recognized first. A makeshift bandage - it looked like a shirt sleeve - was tied round Kenton's head. Roddy was there and blood was still seeping from his nose. He was being restrained by two burly men. The threat of danger sizzled through James's nervous system and he struggled to rise, with an immense throb of his head.

Then he realized his hands were tied. And his ankles. With effort he struggled into a sitting position, then gained his feet. Balance was just possible. He looked at the dark waters of the pond and the horrible truth hit home. Bodelle advanced. There were no bruises on him. He must have stayed safely at the back while others performed his work.

"Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live! The Good Book gives us an unequivocal command, Mace. But we are men of justice and are subjecting you to the water test. If you sink it will prove you are no - "

"It's not unequivocal." A different, reedy voice piped up. "There has to be a legal trial with witnesses."

"What are you doing here Bell? Get back to your parish!"

"He'll sink. He'll drown. Of course he will," wailed Bell. "He's a man. He's all bone and muscle. He can't float."

"Go back!" Epiphany Dodds, used to issuing commands, despite her youth and sex, entered the fray. "My husband elucidated that verse for me personally. It means execute the witch with no delay. Even this water test is superfluous justice. Caleb only believed Mace to be a blasphemer, or he would have moved against him before."

"Mrs Dodds has identified you as a witch, Mace. She has seen the witch's mark."

"Nonsense!" Kenton's voice was shaky. "She sees her own spite in the world around her, nothing else."

"He has a mark. On his neck!" Bodelle shouted. "Mistress Dodds saw it when he was without his stock."

"That is the scar of a musket ball, and you know it! I was an infantryman. I fought for my country at Blenheim. All you do is fight for your own profit."

James was powerless, balanced there with tied hands and feet. Bodelle approached him smiling venomously. "You charmed Easterby to make him sell you his land, when I could never persuade him."

At once the darkness beamed painfully bright and James understood all that motivated Bodelle.

"That's what all this is about."

"Witch!"

The woodpecker punch which James landed on Bodelle's nose produced a spray of blood and a crunching of bone. Bodelle fell back with a cry of shock, grasping his nose, and James toppled on top of him. Unknown hands ripped James away.

"Throw him in," screamed Bodelle. "Throw the witch in."

Other onlookers had been drawn to the fracas. Entertainment of this kind was a rare treat.

There was a further scuffle. Kenton tried to obstruct the men who had seized James. Roddy was hurling abuse at Bodelle but couldn't get free to take action. Bell was darting back and forth on the bank, quoting the New Testament.

"Our Lord Jesus Christ said, 'He that is without sin may cast the first stone.' Who - "

"Shut up Bell!"

They were the last words James heard. He was torn up and hurled bodily into the pond.

To keep afloat was his desperate instinct. He tried to hold his breath, but as Bell had predicted, he lacked buoyancy. His very thinness was a disadvantage. He rushed downwards into the murky water. Down. Down. Bubbles roared in his ears. He could hear but no longer see. Sounds were distorted. The outline of figures on the bank were no more. Pure horror. Terror. This was how his life had always been destined to end. From the moment of his birth, he had been heading here. Joining the First Foot Regiment; uprooting to Jamaica; choosing to farm in Virginia; every decision had brought him closer to this destiny. His lungs burned with the effort not to breathe in water. Like an eel he struggled.

Horror reached a crescendo. But after all it wasn't so bad... Even horror had its limits. It softened, blurred, diffused. His struggles weakened. The fight was lost and sensation numbed. His perceptions flared again momentarily, then faded into nothingness.

The taste, the smells, the textures of grass and mud. The blackness of the burial pit. His tombstone had not lied: the grave imprisoned him. Grief blubbered from his lips, turned into a heave of filthy water and vomit. Sounds echoed, human sounds. Voices. The world was audible, though nothing could be seen in its darkness. A finger flexed. Twitches reawakened his body and he drew breath. The familiar sound of coughing. The coughing was close, so close it felt as if he was hearing it from the inside. His eyelids flickered. Light. Wonderful light. He retched. Hands were pummelling his back.

"I think he may live!"

"Turn him over. Keep everyone back. He needs air. Go away! Stand back. Haven't you seen enough for one day?"

"James?" A rougher voice. A voice he knew.

"You are going to be alright James. Mr Anstruther is here. Suzannah summoned him. It is Bodelle who is in trouble now. James, did you hear?"

The voice reassured; the words signified nothing.

"It lies... Tell her..."

"What was that?"

Long hair tickled his face. Somebody was leaning very close.

"It lies," he breathed. "It lies. Kas - tell her my tombstone lies."

Chapter Twenty-One

"You said nothing untoward. Do not concern yourself on that score, James. Anxieties seem to have disturbed your rest, but you have really said nothing to regret."

Kenton was sitting on the edge of the bed. The room was clean, calm, reassuring, everything James needed after the murky waters of the ducking. Herbs in a bowl scented the air.

James remained sunk in the pillows. "I've dreamt and dreamt of mud and the burial pit."

Kenton went to a small table, poured water into a glass and added a few drops of tincture. He placed the glass besides James. "Your rest has been disturbed by nightmares. You were reliving, I think, the water test."

"No, not the ducking. The burial pit. I thought I was there. I could taste mud."

Anxiety clouded Kenton's eyes. "The pond waters perhaps. Or the turf. I pumped water from your lungs. You were face down on the mud."

"Lungs..."

Kenton leant forward. "You were hurled into the pond. Don't you remember?" He hovered waiting for a response which didn't come, then moved to leave his patient in peace.

"Don't go." James's voice was faint.

Kenton returned to the bed. "Would you prefer Suzannah sat with you?"

"No..." James regathered his strength. "How was I saved?"

"When they dragged you away to the pond, I urged Suzannah to stay safely in the house. In her condition it was imperative she didn't see you killed. I ordered Thomas to guard her." He paused to contemplate the full range of disasters which they'd avoided. "But she took the initiative. She raced to Anstruther's home in the hope that he might be there and met him riding back from the governor."

James drank in the details. "And I was hauled out?"

"Anstruther's servants did that. I thought you dead, but I pumped water from your lungs and discovered a spark of life. You were muttering about your tombstone, but there was no way I was going to let you slip away once I detected that spark."

A long shadow was cast from the doorway. Suzannah looked to Kenton and found reassurance in his eyes. "It is good to hear you talking rationally, James." Her voice was rich and warm.

Kenton rose, but Suzannah looped her arm though his to stay him.

A ghost of a smile stirred James's features. "You have a lump over your eye, Kenton."

"That was in the fight. I am not normally a man of violence."

"You should have seen him, James. He even hit that gnome Turner with a pan."

James's body was shaken by a feeble laugh. "I saw Turner go down." He swallowed. "But everything happened so fast. I didn't know who hit who."

"Your friend Owen was worth his weight. I kept him here overnight as he was knocked about, but he rode home as if nothing had happened. We even had Bell here for an hour."

"Bell? The minister? What was he doing?"

"He had been in town and chanced to be drawn to the fracas. The New Testament was his weapon to combat witch hunters. He fainted when you were slung in and we had him on our hands as well."

"Oh... And you are sure I will face no charges?"

"You are safe. It is Bodelle who is being held."

"Has Kenton told you about the extraordinary occurrence, James?"

There had been so many extraordinary occurrences. "Which one?"

"Concerning the woman."

James thumbed his disordered memory. "Epiphany?"

"Yes, and the other one."

"The crowd at the pond got bigger and bigger as word spread," took up Kenton. "You'd already been hauled out of the water and were lying on the bank like a dead fish, when a pretty little woman forced her way through. Epiphany was still squealing that you were a witch and you'd killed Dodds. The little woman went right up to her and gave her the greatest slap across the face which you've ever seen. Epiphany nearly ended up in the water too. You should have seen her. For once she hadn't a word to say."

Sleep was claiming James, but his tired mind made a last connection. "A yellow dress? Was the pretty woman in yellow?"

"Yes." Kenton exchanged a glance with Suzannah. Softly he answered, "She wore a fine gown. She must be very rich. She has been to the house here, to check that all was well. She knew you a little in Jamaica, she said. We took her for the old friend who you spoke of."

James had already drifted from the conscious world, where Suzannah and Kenton still conversed in low voices, but a small smile curled his lips.

Chapter Twenty-Two

James had plenty of time to reflect during his recovery at the Blizzard's house. His life in Virginia was approaching its end - it had almost come to an end in the absolute sense. Kenton and Suzannah had fixed their date for leaving, and it was imminent. Get his crop in the hogsheads and he'd be gone too.

He could go home, but there he would still have to watch Geoff sitting beside Kas at dinner, walking with her, talking with her, enjoying all the privileges of being her wedded mate, while James had no guarantee of ever turning up something similar.

But guarantee of a different sort had opened up: Pernel offered him a new life and the trauma of the ducking had made him reassess that offer. He didn't doubt that the children were his and he accepted that in creating them he had initiated an obligation. If Tom Eland had lived, that responsibility was hidden in the hands of others, but now Tom was dead it was time to step forward.

And there was Pernel, vivacious, bright, witty, very pretty. His great friend. She offered more than most women - and she wanted him. She did not represent the person he had really sought. She was nothing like Kas or Suzannah, but - but that train of thought needed to be snipped. He was almost twenty-nine now and couldn't wait forever hoping to stumble over some single woman possessing a tick list of Kas's qualities. No happiness lay down that route.

So he sent a spidery note as soon as he was able, assuring Pernel that his stay on earth was likely to continue longer and promising to call as soon as he could leave his bed.

Against Kenton's advice, he went to the Holly Tree at the first possible moment. The proprietor, Fosdyke, was expecting him.

"I thank God to see you alive and well, Mr Mace. We hope this talk of sorcery will be done with now Dodds is dead." Fosdyke remembered to drop his voice. "He was like a carbuncle which grew on my arse once and stopped me sitting down, till old Cartwright lanced it."

"Very apt."

"And Bodelle and Turner are in trouble. I never liked them, especially Bodelle. Entitled to everything, that's his attitude. Glad he's been brought down. I was told to give you a letter," he continued, recalling himself. "I knew you'd come." He went to a cupboard, unlocked it and drew out some sealed sheets. "Mrs Eland left it for you."

James's heart gave an irregular beat. Life had taught him to expect setbacks. He thanked Fosdyke and took the letter into a quiet corner.

Dear James

Events in Williamsburg have overtaken us, and I will have sailed when you read this. Ever to the point, thought James. I slapped the daughter of an important man and though I'm protected by my wealth, I think it best not to hang around. Watching that harpy screeching made me understand why you don't like people much. And so many idiots willing to listen to her!

James, I have not changed my mind. I want to marry you. Tom tied some of his money up in trusts for me and the children, so those portions can never be separated from us, but much will fall under the control of my husband, if I remarry. With most men it would be a risk, but you are honest and will deal fairly with my money, I know. I'd trust you above all men.

You know that I wanted you even when it would have meant running away from Tom with nothing at all. I wanted James the man. And I want you still. Time has changed us both, but I believe we can still be happy together.

I will never tell the children that you are their father. It would not be for the best, though they are young and will hardly remember Tom in future years. Admitting to being an adulteress would achieve nothing for me and might make them hostile to you too. If you marry me, you will simply be their stepfather.

I have plantations to run, a rum business to manage, much else that you could turn your great energies to. You will point to difficulties about the slaves. This can be worked out. James had forgotten that in his desire to change his life. I have already made a will freeing all of them on my death. More can be done.

Enclosed here is an address. James, write to me as soon as you know your own mind. I do not wish to bring pressure on your decision. That would not make for a happy future. But let me know as soon as your mind is made up.

Pernel Montoya Eland

Kenton evidently read something in James's expression when he came back from the Holly Tree. He was carefully packing medical instruments away in boxes with lots of felt padding. His medical rounds had stopped. He was dealing with nothing but emergencies now. Life in Virginia was already over for Kenton and Suzannah and they were investing nothing else in it. "Did you manage to thank your old friend?"

"...No. She has sailed. She feared consequences from striking Mistress Dodds."

That satisfied Kenton. "I don't think she needed to worry on that score. Thomas heard from a servant of Anstruther that her father is furious with her. He has packed her off to the country again. Anstruther is anxious that the lawlessness will reflect badly on him, no doubt. The governor himself is asking questions."

James opened the empty instrument cupboard. His expression was bleak.

"Is something wrong? Something else, I mean?"

"No, but the empty cupboard sums up a great deal in life."

"Ah, yes... Change... But I am starting to feel new optimism, James. I think you will too when you are out of here."

You haven't fully grasped yet that new beginnings don't automatically improve everything, thought James. And hard work isn't enough on its own either, you need luck, too.

"As you know, I was not best pleased by the prospect of a child in our unsettled state, but my views, or my feelings have changed. I am growing excited."

"Ah, I am pleased for your hopefulness then."

Kenton closed the last box and looked about the room which was empty except for the sparse furniture. "Well that is it. Nothing more to be done here."

These months James and Suzannah had exerted an iron will in staying apart, and it was only during the last day or two that he sought her in the garden, when he spotted her alone. The windows were shut, the wind was blowing: their voices would not carry if anyone was placed to overhear them. Her eyes were shy and uncertain when she saw him.

"I only made an excuse to come out here, James," she murmured, wrapping her shawl about her shoulders. "This was where I was happiest, during our year in Virginia. It started as a bare yard and it will return to being a bare yard. These trees will never give us fruit."

"Someone else will benefit. All your efforts will not be lost." He took a breath. "Tomorrow I will ride back to the farm and get the cart. Then I will be ready to take you to the harbour. And I will take Oats and Mouser to Roddy. He is pleased of them."

She nodded and her shapely lips compressed. He longed to know what she was feeling in this moment but knew that she would keep all her emotions hidden. They had shared an hour of passionate connection, but that experience had, if anything, intensified not diluted her devotion to Kenton. It had clarified issues.

"As soon as I am finished with my tobacco I will be gone too."

"Home?"

A long silence. "That is why I wanted to speak to you." He paused, then plunged on, "Suzannah you mustn't think less of me, but I plan to marry." No point in beating about the bush.

She looked quickly away.

"I have told no lies about my life, but in Jamaica I knew a lady who has since become a widow. Mrs Eland visited me recently to reveal her changed circumstances. I would have told you all, but events ploughed me into the ground, and I had no chance. She is active about these parts on her late husband's business and was travelling to Rhode Island. It was Mrs Eland who smacked Epiphany Anstruther's face on the day of the ducking and called at your house afterwards." He dropped his voice so low it was almost inaudible. "Suzannah, if things could be different with you, Mrs Eland would belong to the past. But things cannot be different and I need my life to change. I've been alone in a shack for too long. I'm nearly twenty-nine and I've had enough of sitting on the outside of life looking in. I like Mrs Eland. She likes me. I am taking this chance. The future may bring no better opportunities."

She took a great breath, steadied herself. "I wish you well James. Truly I do." Ticks flickered about her face and her lips parted as if words wanted to be spoken, but with an effort of composure she suppressed those words and passed slowly into the house.

Chapter Twenty-Three

They sailed within days. James felt a complete spiritual inertia when the moment came to drive them to the harbour. He had experienced painful separations in the past, but youthful optimism had buoyed him up then. Optimism was no longer his automatic friend.

Their few boxes were stored on board, then the three of them stood near the gangplank living out their last moments of friendship.

"We will maintain contact," Kenton promised. "Though it may be difficult."

"If all else fails, send word to Hill House. My father is a discreet man with other people's secrets."

"We wish above all to find lasting security now," Kenton said.

The bell rang on the ship and a voice yelled for all to board.

"Goodbye James. This year would have been bland without you."

Mine would have been worse than that.

Suzannah took both James's hands, but seemed not to trust her voice. Their eyes met for a painful, super-concentrated moment, then she turned onto the gangplank. Kenton followed. They gave a last wave, a final backward glance.

James watched them disappear through the hatch to the lower deck and with the emptiest of hearts turned away.

When he pulled the cart up before his farm, he realized that he had no recollection of completing the journey. He had driven in a lonely daze, only wishing to be home, though little but duty awaited him there.

Pink came out when he heard the cart trundling and read his master's expression to the extent of stepping forward to deal with Bobsworth, for once. Despite his dust and ashes loneliness, James craved solitude and the Pinkertons left him to it as soon as supper was served.

When he was alone and brandy was fuming in the glass, James took a quill. For five minutes he only brushed the feather along his smooth cheek, then he began:

Dear Pernel

I decided almost at once to accept your proposal of marriage - Bah! It was true, but he couldn't write that. No woman would want to hear it. He tore the paper up and started again.

My dear Pernel

This phase of life is coming to a close. Soon the crop will be in the hogsheads and I will be free to leave Virginia. Believe it or not, I am even happier to quit this place than I was Jamaica.

Pernel I want to marry you and have you for my wife. That is the truth. I always cared for you and I know that you care for me...

It was not a long letter. He did not say very much. When he was finished, he reread it three times, to be sure nothing could be misconstrued. Wax fastened the flap shut. Tomorrow he would convey it on its way. Once sent, it could not be rescinded. He understood that.

He stared into the darkness beyond his candle flame. The candlelight created strange shapes of familiar objects. His coat and hat hanging on a peg cast a shadow oddly like the profile of C.J.Dodds. Nerves were not James's weakness. The shadow meant nothing to him. He picked up the letter, stroked it with his fingers, considered. It would be easy to burn it in the flames, but he didn't.

Tomorrow he could think again. If he liked.

###

