Eliott looked up from his late luncheon to see his sister tugging at an old muslin gown that had become an indeterminate gray from its many washings.
“Where are you off to, Cass?”
“I am going fishing, as if you didn’t know. I promised Cook some fresh sea bass for dinner tonight.”
Eliott laid down his fork and sat back in his chair. “And just what does your fiancé think about your fishing jaunt the day before your wedding?”
“Edward is spending the day in Little Wimmering with his agent, and will not be here until this evening.”
“So the bride is having her last outing before the groom cracks the whip?”
Cassie frowned down her nose at him. “I’m sure there will be even more outings after Edward and I are married. Actually, it was Becky’s suggestion that I get out today. She thinks some fresh air will do me good.”
“Off with you then, Cass, and don’t forget your hat. Don’t want to have you sunburned on your wedding day.”
Cassie gave her brother a quick hug and stepped outside into the bright afternoon sunlight. She crammed her wide-brimmed straw hat firmly over the braided coronet atop her head and walked briskly across the east lawn to the line of landward-bowed beech trees that sheltered Hemphill Hall from the sea winds. A narrow path snaked through the trees, down the rocky cliff to a small protected cove below. A long wooden-planked dock stretched from the beach some thirty feet into the inlet. She firmly grasped her bucket of bait, small minnows which she had learned from long experience brought her as many sea bass as her baskets would hold, and walked gingerly over the floating boards to the end of the dock where her twenty-foot sloop lay anchored.
It heeled sharply as she stepped aboard, and she clasped the thick-stalked mast to steady herself. She stepped to the helm, stowed her bait safely on the shelf below-deck, and pulled out the folded canvas mainsail. She smoothed out the wrinkles and attached the slides sewn into the foot of the sail to the boom, smiling happily as her eyes followed along the luff to ensure that there were no twists in the sail.
From long habit, she gazed out beyond the mouth of the cove to the sea, and saw that the wind was whipping the waves into stiff whitecaps. She put a double reef into the mainsail and tied the sheets loosely. She cast off the hemp lines, drew out her long-handled paddle, and rowed with deep, sure strokes toward the mouth of the cove, the familiar sounds of squawking birds and the loose flapping of the mainsail in her ears. She sniffed the tangy salt smell and enjoyed the wind slapping lightly at her cheeks until she reached the open sea and eased out the sail to catch the wind. She examined the wildly fluttering wool telltale tied to the shroud to gauge the strength and direction of the wind. She smiled ruefully, knowing that with the tide outgoing and the stiff northeasterly wind, she would be spending more of her afternoon with her hands tightly on the tiller and working the sheets than lazing back with her fishing pole dangling comfortably over the side.
She let her sailboat continue on its starboard tack, and the mainsail bellied out as it caught the full wind. She laughed aloud when the bow of her boat sliced through the trough of a wave and sent a fine mist of salt spray into her face. She steered away from the wind to slow her speed, and relaxed her grip on the tiller, content for the moment to let her boat glide smoothly in a course parallel to shore. She baited her hook with a small minnow, flung the thin hemp rope over the side and rested the fishing pole between her knees.
She sat back contentedly on a cushioned plank and allowed her thoughts to drift with the lulling motion of her boat to the afternoon before and the incredible moments she had spent with Edward before Becky’s wretched interference. The image of Edward’s lean chest and arms as he had stood over her and the vivid memory of his hands and mouth on her body made her tremble even now. She wished she had seen him naked. She had felt the swollen, demanding hardness of him as he had pressed her belly against him, but she had been too shy to touch him as he had her.
Cassie gazed up into the cloudless blue sky and decided that making love with Edward in the middle of the day would be a delicious experience. Her sail suddenly luffed wildly, and she pushed quickly at the tiller, chiding herself for her inattention, before she promptly fell back into pleasant fantasy.
She was disturbed again by waves slapping sharply against the bow, and looked up to see a large sailing vessel in the distance. She drew in her empty line, dropped the fishing pole into the boat, and shaded her eyes, trying to make out the lines of the ship.
She gave a crow of delight when she realized that it was the yacht she and Edward had seen the afternoon before. It rode high in the water, its many square-rigged sails tautly full as it held its northeasterly course close into the wind. She saw the gun mounts on the starboard side and several sailors perched high up the mast, unfurling the royals and topgallants.
Cassie wanted to see the yacht more closely before it passed her by, and she jerked on the tiller, bringing her boat high into the wind. She eased in the sheets, and the mainsail bulged tautly as it took more wind.
As she drew closer, she could make out sailors standing on the quarterdeck. She fancied she could see the captain of the yacht shouting commands to the sailors swarming over the rigging, and to the helmsman as he steered the ship past the dangerous shallow inlets. She was suddenly able to see the name of the yacht, painted in bright yellow letters on the starboard bow. She stared with growing confusion at The Cassandra.
The yacht was overtaking her, and she was perplexed to see that its course had shifted more northerly. In a few minutes, if she was not careful, it would cut in front of her small boat. Grim visions of the huge vessel ramming her, blind to her presence, sent her speeding into action. She jerked the tiller sharply, and tacked to starboard and landward. In her haste, she backwinded her sail, and for a few frantic seconds, her sloop lay dead in the water, bobbing up and down in the crest of waves from the approaching yacht. She let the sheets fly free, and ducked as the boom swung with a grating thud to starboard. She pulled at the tiller to put the wind to her back, and her small sail took the wind with agonizing slowness. Cassie fought off her growing panic, secured the tiller between her thighs, grabbed her paddle, and rowed furiously toward shore.
She heard a man’s shout, and slewed her head about for a moment to see the yacht bearing down on her, its graceful, full bow slicing cleanly through the water.
The huge shadow of the yacht blotted out the sun, and Cassie moaned low in her throat as the specter of death rose before her.
A man’s voice commanded sharply, “Veer off! Hook the ropes and haul her in!”
Cassie gazed dumbfounded at several sailors hanging precariously from rope ladders over the side, each of them holding in his free hand a thick looped rope. By God, they are pirates, white slavers, she thought. She saw herself tied in irons, bound for servitude on the Barbary Coast, and pulled frantically with her paddle.
She heard a whirling sound over her head and was suddenly thrown backward against the teller as looped ropes encircled the mast and the outjutting bow. She shook off the pain in her back from the sharp-edged tiller and scrambled forward. She tugged at the thick hemp rope about the mast, but it was pulled taut.
She looked up when one sailor shouted upward to a man who stood at the railing. “All secure, captain!”
“Pull her close in! Steady now!”
There was something oddly familiar about the commanding deep voice, but her mind was so clogged with fear that she did not heed it. She saw that fumbling with the thick rope about her mast would gain her naught, and quickly stumbled to the stern of her wildly lurching boat. She measured her distance to shore and groaned with frustration, for in her heavy skirt and petticoats she would drown long before she reached shallow water. She was thrown to her knees as her boat heeled sharply, drawn closer to the yacht by the ropes. She watched numbly as the captain gingerly stepped over the side and began his descent down a rope ladder. He was a powerfully built man, dressed in a full-sleeved white shirt, and tight-fitting knit breeches above his black boots.
He is a pirate, she thought, their leader. She grabbed the long wooden paddle and held her weapon tightly against her.
Her boat heeled as he stepped into the cockpit, and he closed his hand about the mast for support.
She took in his thick black hair and deeply tanned face and gasped in astonishment.
“Lord Clare! Oh, thank God it is you. I thought it was a pirate and that I was to be taken, or killed.” She ceased her babble of words when Anthony Welles only gazed at her, unspeaking.
Cassie drew a shaking breath and lowered her wooden paddle. “You frightened me, my lord,” she said more calmly. “I do not think I like your joke; you could easily have rammed my boat. Pray tell me, why have you done this?”
“My purpose was not to ram your boat, Cassandra, only to capture it,” he said in his low, clipped voice. “You gave me quite a chase until you backwinded your sail.”
Her fingers tightened about the wooden paddle. “What are you saying, my lord? You wished to capture my boat?”
“I commend your bravado, Cassandra. However, I must ask you to drop that deadly paddle and accompany me aboard your namesake.”
“Lord Clare, what is the meaning of this? I asked you just why the devil you have secured my boat. I demand that you answer me.” She took an angry step toward him.
“Come, Cassandra, enough of this foolishness. The time grows short. You will come to understand everything, in time.” He stretched out his hand toward her. “Drop the paddle and come here.”
“You can go to the devil, my lord.” She took a wobbly step backward and lost her footing. Her attention wavered from him as she struggled to regain her balance, and a strong hand clasped her arm and jerked her forward. She tried to raise her paddle to strike him, but he twisted it easily from her grasp and pulled her against him.
“Damn you, let me go. My brother will hear about this, my lord. As will Edward.”
Even as she yelled at him, her arms were pinioned to her sides as he lifted her easily and hoisted her over his shoulder.
“Don’t fight me, Cassandra,” he said, and stepped from her boat to the ladder.
Cassie felt a numbing sense of disbelief sweep over her. She had known Anthony Welles for most of her life, as a gentleman, a sophisticated yet kind man. She realized through a haze of fear that he was really someone different, a man she did not know or understand.
She wailed aloud, reared up from his shoulder, and twisted about, smashing her fist against his cheek.
The quickness of her assault took him off his guard and he nearly lost his grip on the ladder. Cassie heard shouts from the sailors above and struggled against him, until she looked down and saw that if he lost his hold, they would be plunged into her boat, not into the water.
She went limp on his shoulder.
“Death is never preferable, is it, Cassandra?”
She gritted her teeth and said nothing.
He stepped over the side, onto the quarterdeck, gently eased her off his shoulder, and set her on her feet. She ran until she felt a palm flattened against the small of her back.
“Leave her be, Scargill, she is not a fool.”
“Aye, my lord.”
Cassie whirled about. “You are Lord Clare’s valet. I recognize you. Will you not tell me the meaning of this?”
She heard the earl say crisply, from behind her, “All in good time, Cassandra. First I must see to your boat.”
She turned slowly. “What do you mean?”
“You will soon understand,” he said, striding toward her. Cassie forced herself not to move, and thrust her chin upward, unwilling to let him see how frightened she was.
He reached out and lifted off her wide-brimmed straw hat. She watched as it floated in the stiff breeze to the polished wooden deck.
“You will have no further need of your hat. I have never really liked them, you know. Your face should be tanned golden by the sun.” She blinked, and before she could respond, he turned abruptly away from her.
“Dilson, is the bow firmly secured?”
“Aye, captain.”
Scargill stepped from her side to stand beside the earl. Cassie gripped the bronze railing and watched as her small sailboat lurched clumsily through the waves, drawn forward by the yacht.
“Harden up a little, Angelo,” she heard him order the helmsman. “No nearer, the rocks are treacherous. Keep her so.” She saw him turn and nod to the sailor, Dilson, and the little man climbed like an agile monkey over the side and down the ladder to her boat. He drew a sword and with several powerful strokes hacked through the wooden mast. It teetered an instant and fell, shrouded in its white sail, into the water.
“No!” She rushed forward, without thought, to climb over the side of the yacht.
She felt a strong hand on her arm and turned in her fury to strike him. He efficiently clasped both her wrists in one large hand.
“I am truly sorry, Cassandra. I know that you love your sailboat, but it must be done.”
He shaded his eyes with his free hand, took in their distance from the clumps of outjutting rocks near shore, and commanded suddenly, “Cut her loose, Dilson.”
Dilson’s sword sliced through the looped rope about the bow. In an instant, he scrambled back to the ladder and pushed off the sailboat with his booted foot.
“Please do not,” she whispered, tears stinging her eyes. “The tide will smash her against the rocks.”
“Yes, I know, but you will not witness it.” He turned to the helmsman. “Lay the course, Angelo. Come, Cassandra.”