“Two fans—” he said slowly. “And one a weapon. It is a deadly trinket—I wonder who first devised such a deceit. But I think we can know now how the Lost Lady escaped her captor. It is very old, I think, and deadly–”
“Not always—it helped me,” Persis said soberly. “And the lady–” She hesitated. Though Dr. Veering had displayed no sign of incredulity over her story of the discovery of the fan, the fact she had returned it to the ground, and then it had appeared again—oddly when, in spite of her repulsion, there was a need for it. The other tale of the “impression” must certainly place her in his mind as one of those hysterical females credulous to the point of silliness.
“Miss Rooke,” he drew one of the stools away from the table and sat down, his expression one of serious consideration, “you have probably heard some of my past history. I have lived among native peoples—people who have beliefs—and, yes, talents—which our world would scoff at. I have seen, half-smothered by the jungle, parts of an unknown city, stone built, carved with forgotten beasts—or maybe gods—which has endured against the push of nature perhaps as long as the stones of that Rome, which our historians so revere, have been planted one on another.
“I have witnessed rites performed by those the outsider would term ‘naked savages’ which produced results our most learned doctors cannot begin to achieve. There is more in this world than we in our blind arrogance of race, we of the North, have been taught. Sometimes a fate or power beyond our conceiving moves and we are caught in that move—to play a part we do not even understand.
“This island has known many different peoples—and each has had their own beliefs. Did you ever think that belief in itself is a very powerful thing? It has caused men, yes, and women, too, to die painful deaths, by fire, wild beasts, hanging—even torture—because it was so much a part of their lives that they could not deny it. When I was very young Fox’s Book of Martyrs was a favorite reading for Sunday. I am afraid that my youthful reaction to the heroes and heroines held up to the admiration of the reader in that dark chronicle of fanaticism was that they were stupidly self-righteous. Now I wonder if they were not possessed by beliefs they could not make the uninitiated really understand.
“There are many strange and wonderful things to be discovered yet. We are, I think, on the edge of a new age in which man is going to set forth exploring—not only land, but within himself—I know the story of the Lost Lady, of course. I also have spoken with three people who do faithfully believe that they have seen her. A land so soaked in blood and tears and violence as this island, may well project to the sensitive some fragment of the past—not what the ignorant term ‘ghosts’ but rather ‘memories’ or dreams of an emotion so overriding that time means nothing to what is netted in it.”
Persis blinked. She could see he was in earnest—that his belief in his own explanation was perhaps as strong as that of the martyrs who had suffered for their fate generations ago.
“I saw her—twice—” she said slowly and this time did not expect derision from him in return. “No, not saw, perhaps—but there was a presence.” And now she dared to tell of that meeting in the upper hall, and again of what had walked before them last night on the mound. “But that still does not explain how this,” she gestured to the fan dagger, “returned to my keeping when I had buried it.”
“No, But it served you well. And it served her in its time, did it not? It could be that your own uneasiness and fears made a path or thread of communication between you and this ‘presence.’ She had great determination and courage of her own. Maybe that is the thread which united you. Now, Miss Rooke, put out of your mind that you have been visited by fantasies which suggest a weakness of intellect. Rather rest your thought upon the fact that had it not been for that,” he pointed to the fan he had once more put down within her reach, “one, or perhaps two, worthwhile and needful lives might have come to an end last night. I would advise you now to rest. And when Carrie comes for you do just as I have suggested—get to your chamber, dress yourself in your best frock—come down to dinner as if nothing has happened. I do not know what play Crewe would set in action, but it is of utmost importance to his own plans for putting an end to this, that I can assure you.”
He arose with a bow and left, giving Persis much to think over. But the languid heat of the afternoon did not aid thinking. She drowsed before she knew it and awakened to Carrie’s soft shaking of her shoulder. Slipping behind the island woman, she crossed the open, sure at any moment in spite of the dusk, to be sharply challenged out of the shadows.
Then they came into the kitchen, a kitchen so much as usual that Persis could almost believe the happenings of the past twenty-four hours had been a complete nightmare. For Mam Rose was busy at her usual tasks, and both Sukie and her younger companion working well under her eyes.
But Persis, herself, might have been invisible. None of them looked up or appeared to notice her and, before she could thank Carrie properly for the shelter and tending the other had given her, she too, was gone. Dr. Veering’s instructions, or rather Crewe’s delivered through the doctor, carried her on, into the back of the lower hall, up that much narrower and steeper staircase used by the servants.
Only there were lamps in the rooms tonight and a different feeling in the house. It was alive and—expectant—somehow that word came into Persis’ mind as she gathered up the loose robe with both hands and hurried up the staircase, seeking the chamber which had been assigned her, ridden somehow by the need for haste.
She had been expected, that was very sure she saw as she entered for there was a hip bath filled and waiting behind a screen, towels laid out to her hand. Only Molly was missing.
Shedding the robe, she washed, reveling in the soft herb scent of the soap. There would be no time to deal with her hair, except to work it into the most possible coiffure, rather more severe than her usual one. And only time could fade the bruises showing black and ugly on her skin. Some had been spread with Carrie’s ointment and that she washed off, making use of a box of salve left well in sight on the wash stand.
Persis deliberately selected one of her brighter dresses—a rose with satin stripes and rather more lace than usual about the shoulder bertha. It seemed to lend color to her face, and in a way that kind of courage a woman gains when she knows she is well and fittingly clad for some occasion.
Her hair was the hardest to handle. Carrie must have dried it and gotten some of the saltwater out of it. But there was no way Persis could produce the fashionable side curls. She braided and rebraided twice until she got top loops which looked at least smooth and then defiantly fronted them with her coral-topped comb, adding the coral earrings, which were a part of the same set, to offset the lack of ear curls.
Studying her reflection in the gold-edged mirror Persis was not entirely satisfied. But at least she presented the most proper appearance within her ability to achieve. She gathered up a handkerchief, folding it into a small drawstring bag of rose satin, just as the gong which had always heralded dinner sounded from the lower floor.
Looking herself straight in the eyes of her mirrored reflection, Persis raised her chin a fraction. But, before she moved to the door of the chamber she hesitated and made one more choice. Her hand closed on the false fan. Carried this way no one might guess that it was not real—and she felt safer with it for protection.
17
P ersis reached the head of the stairs as the mellow tones of the gong sounded a second time. Pausing, she summoned all her courage. What game Crewe Leverett would play she could not guess. But, a little to her amazement, she discovered that her confidence in him was as great as once had been her acceptance of Uncle Augustin’s complete command of any situation.
There was no one she could see below, but there came the murmur of voices through the high-ceilinged rooms and she descended step by step composedly. Her hands were covered with mitts of white silk thread she herself had skillfully knitted, and in the left she gripped the dagger fan. Though
that she needed any such weapon she doubted.
“Miss Rooke—”
The voice from below was low, clear, and unmistakable. Persis felt a wave of relief as she looked down at the man who had moved into the brightest pool of lamplight. Most of his figure was muffled in a dressing gown of green and gold, such a robe as a king might envy him. And the bulky bunching of the material on one shoulder, the flapping sleeve, told her that he had probably chosen this garb because his injuries could not allow him a coat. But she could also see as he moved the cream-white trousers of Southern evening dress, and his hair was carefully arranged, his face, in spite of a bruise or two, impassive.
“Should you—” she tripped a little faster down those remaining stairs between them, “not be resting?”
There was an odd light in his sea-blue eyes. “Rest for the weary, eh? Veering would have me in bed again, eating slops and half-mad with my own worries. No, Persis,” he had dropped his first formal salutation. “There shall be time enough for rest later. One deals with a snake before it can truly strike. Now, they are awaiting us—though they do not know it. Play up, my girl, give them your haughtiest stare and your grandest manner.”
He bowed a fraction and held out his good arm. Making herself smile, Persis curtsied and laid her fingertips on the heavy brocade covering his forearm near his wrist. She longed for him to give her some clue as to what was about to happen, but there seemed to be no time, for already he was urging her on toward the entrance to the dining room.
More than the light of a single lamp beamed out through that door and Persis heard the sound of voices growing louder, but at that moment she was too flustered to make much sense of the words. Then—Crewe took a step into the full beam of that light as if he would first face any trouble, but she was only a step behind.
The long table had been covered with the whitest of fine linen and spaced along it were five candelabra, which seemed to Persis to light the room with a steady glare not far from the fullest reach of the sun. She was so dazzled for a second or two that it was difficult to sort out the company gathered around the table.
But the moment of instant silence, which had followed their entrance, in its way steadied her. And though her face felt frozen in expression, she hoped it expressed only polite acceptance of the fact that dinner was served.
A chair grated on the floor as the man at the end of the table pushed that back and rose to his feet. Her own companion broke the silence first:
“Lydia, my dear, you are looking well tonight—”
The blonde girl’s breath hissed. Her dress, an elaborate one of lace ruffles and bows in a delicate blue, was in sharp contrast to her face. That was a mask of fear, her usually full lips flattened against her teeth, her eyes very wide and staring.
“One would begin to think,” Crewe Leverett glanced about the table, his eyes catching each who sat there for an instant of meeting, “that this was indeed a festive occasion. May we be allowed to share the secret also?”
Persis’ momentary bedazzlement was gone, she could identify some of those gathered here. Others were strangers. And in that company Lydia was the only woman—sitting on the right of the man who had arisen so suddenly.
The girl had seen Ralph Grillon in his working clothes, as master of a ship of which he was manifestly proud. Now he wore a super-fine cloth jacket of dark blue, a ruffled shirt and complicated cravat, trousers of black strapped under shoes never meant to tread the deck of a working wrecker.
His handsome face was not flushed, and if he had paled under his tan, it was not visible in the softer light of the many candles. But his eyes—Persis might have shuddered at the look of them earlier—now she seemed armored against any threat from the Bahamian captain.
There was Dr. Veering, twirling the stem of a half-filled wine glass between his fingers, his glance turning from Crewe to those at the table, back again—although he showed no expression. But was rather as one who watched a play.
Three other men sat along the board—one wearing a captain’s jacket, its insignia dimmed from the breath of the sea.
“Yes,” Crewe continued, “a festive occasion. Captain Van Horne,” he nodded to the stranger who arose and made a rather awkward bow, “and naturally Julio Valdez–”
The man on the other side of Grillon showed his teeth in what might have been meant to be a smile, but his eyes were very cold and calculating.
“It’s been a long time, Valdez,” Crewe continued, “though, of course, I knew that our account was not yet completed.”
“Account?” The man’s dark eyebrows lifted. “If one deals with thieves, Captain Leverett, one can only expect trouble to come of it.”
“How correct you are in that prediction, Valdez. ‘Deal with thieves.’ But why do you not follow your own wisdom?”
“Halden had no right to Lost Lady!” Valdez put palms down on the table, leaned forward, angry animation in his narrow face. “Mariana Valdez had no right to sell what was ours since we cleaned this isle of the rabble of Indians who infested it. I am Julio Valdez; there was a Valdez ruling here before your country even had a name to call itself by.”
“Granted,” Crewe commented. “But Martin Valdez was, there is no doubting, the heir-in-law. When he died his property passed to his wife and she sold it to Halden. I believe your offer, complete with threats if I am not mistaken, was thrown out of court and you were warned off. If Halden then chose to sell to me it was a perfectly correct transaction with not a hint of illegality about it—no matter how hard you have since tried to prove that true. Times have changed since the days of Satin-shirt Jack—”
The dark-faced man drew in his breath with a hiss which made Persis think of a threatening snake. Dr. Veering still kept his expression of lazy watchfulness, and the Dutch captain looked merely as if he were at a complete loss. Persis expected Crewe next to carry battle to Ralph Grillon himself, but instead he looked to Lydia.
“Is this occasion of your devising, my dear?”
Persis hoped that never would anyone use such a tone of voice to her. But Lydia had recovered quickly from any surprise she might have felt at her brother’s sudden appearance.
“It is an occasion, yes,” she returned in a voice as cool as his, but edged with defiance. “I am the betrothed wife of Captain Grillon.”
“How very interesting,” was Crewe’s comment. “Has he yet explained how he intends to rid himself of the present Madam Grillon? Though I cannot but believe that he has already planned some highly ingenious method—not that such are always successful. My own appearance here is proof of that.”
Lydia rose from her seat, her face contorted into an ugliness which was near that of the strange mask Askra had worn.
“Liar! Liar!” She beat both small fists upon the table. Her wine glass trembled and went over, discharging its contents, like newly shed blood, across the white linen. “Ralph will marry me—”
“Since bigamy is a crime, both here and in the islands, that presents a problem,” Crewe continued his even, considered speech. “He does have a wife—oh, it is true enough,” now he had a faintly contemptuous tone. “Do you think I am too dim-witted to check on any young buck who comes paying his addresses to my sister? But the present situation must task even his abilities. How do you balance the situation, Grillon? Is it Lost Lady and what you can gain here, against that which might or might not fall to your hands through Caroline Rooke?”
Persis started. Who was Caroline Rooke? In a second or two her mind leaped forward in a guess. Ralph Grillon had talked of a missing heir. She had always accepted that the child of James was a man—but what if the opposite were true and her rival for the Rooke fortune was a woman? Was that why Grillon knew so much and in such detail as to taunt her?
“If you were a whole man—” for the first time Ralph Grillon spoke, “I’d call you out—”
Crewe shook his head, an odd half smile on his face.
“Do not try to play the gentleman here, Grillon.”
&
nbsp; “No!” Both Lydia’s hands were at her lips now, half-muffling what she had to say. “You can’t keep me here with your lies! Ralph loves me—we’re to be married—”
“Where?” asked her brother. “In the islands—or in Key West?”
“It doesn’t matter. He’ll take me away—he—” Suddenly her voice was gone. Persis saw that the younger girl’s eyes were fixed not on her brother but on that seemingly closed fan she herself had brought with her.
“No!” Lydia backed away and her long skirts pushed against the chair behind her, sending it crashing to the floor, the noise so startling that Persis herself shook for a moment. But her brother seemingly had no interest in the fan.
“You little fool,” he said with a kind of weariness which made Persis uneasy. So far he had held them all, and more than half of these gathered here must be his enemies. “He wants Lost Lady—thanks to providence and the courage of this lady he did not succeed in his first attempt. It was a mistake, Grillon, to leave the sea to do your ill work for you; it is always capricious as you should know by now.”
“You were in no harm!” Lydia cried out. “Just left for a space so Ralph could—could—”
“Make sure of me.” Crewe was brutally direct now, as if his weariness was increasing so he felt he must make a swift end to this confrontation. Persis saw Dr. Veering move unobtrusively up the table, come to stand at Crewe’s other side, and that action added to her worry. “Yes, Lydia. I was left well bound, in a dugout which had been holed—death was already lapping at me when you left.”
She shrank even farther away and now her eyes went to Grillon.
“That is a lie—you would say anything to—”
But some slight change on the Bahamian’s face must have broken her last defense against the truth. “But why, Ralph, why?”
“I have already said it—Lost Lady—” Crewe returned. “Once he no longer needed your help—another accident—” He tried to shrug and winced. Dr. Veering put a hand gently on the well-swathed shoulder.