Distant cannons were still rumbling when summer faded into an autumn made glorious with the fiery maple trees. Across the lawn the leaves drifted to form a carpet of scarlet, yellow, orange, and gold. Joe Tupper was not there to sweep them up, having joined the Ontario navy. The hired boy in his place carried out every task in a desultory fashion, and clusters of leaves remained in the hollows until Sarah herself took a birch broom to brush them into a bonfire.
Agnes Jenkins had also left, called away to look after an aged parent, and Sarah had welcomed the chance to take over the cooking herself, for time was often long and heavy on her hands. She saw little of Lucy, who spent several days a week at the meeting hall, which had been converted into a hospital to take the overflow from the garrison’s inadequate facilities. Although most of the patients were well on the way to recovery, hopping about on crutches, learning to cope with a peg leg, or needing dressings on wounds still unhealed, Philip had initiated Lucy into her nursing duties by the old sink or swim method, getting her to assist him while he performed an amputation. She had not disappointed him.
After the attack on Queenston by the United States forces on the thirteenth day of October, Lucy was called upon to give longer hours when some of the wounded were brought in from there. British and Canadian forces had overwhelmed the invaders, putting a stop to active hostilities for the duration of the winter, and capturing nearly a thousand prisoners. But the death in the fighting of General Brock, who had galloped seven miles from Fort George to lead the counterattack, took much of the jubilation out of the news of the victorious defensive action when it was received. Sarah, remembering how gallantly he had danced with her, was saddened with the rest of the colony by the loss of a brave man and a great soldier.
Early in November the snow came. It was little more than a thin powdering that sparkled in the pale sunshine, but Jenny and Robbie became wildly excited. Warmly clothed, their faces rosy in the bitter air, they ran and played with Sarah in the garden. When Flora came home from the local school that she had started to attend, she joined in, and their running feet made patterns all over the snow.
But these were covered again by another fall by the time Sarah made her last round of the house, checking that all the doors were locked and the downstairs shutters fastened. The light of the candle flickered about her. It was late and the house was silent. She had sat a long time by the fire, finishing off a dress she had made for Flora.
When she was ready for bed, but still in her lilac-colored robe over her nightgown, she blew out the candle and held back the drapes to look out at the snowy garden. She gave a little gasp of fear. Unmistakably in the snow was a fresh track of footprints, which showed that someone had come round the side of the house to try the front door and the shutters. A prowler was seeking a way to get in! Her mind flew to the tales she had heard of deserters on both sides, who broke in to plunder, taking whatever food and valuables they could find.
She hurried into the dressing room. Out of a drawer she took the box that held the fine pair of flintlock pistols which Bryne had left there for her. With no thought in her head of anything except the defense of the house and everyone in it, she loaded both weapons with swift and expert fingers, having practiced often since recovering from her cracked ribs, determined never to be caught off guard again. Satisfied that the pistols would serve her well if she pulled the triggers, she held one in each hand as she crept slowly and soundlessly downstairs to investigate.
The shutters over the windows enabled her to move about without the risk of anyone spying on her from outside, and she went first into the kitchen to make sure that the back door was not being forced. But not a sound came from outside.
A little puzzled, she made a tour of all the rooms, listening by the windows of each for any slight noise that would let her know where the prowler might be, but everything was peaceful. Perhaps he had broken into the servants’ quarters by the courtyard, no longer used since Joe and Agnes had left, both Beth and the hired boy preferring to go to their own homes to sleep at night. In that case it would be better, Sarah decided, to let the intruder stay there until morning, when, with her pistols and the help of the hired boy, she would soon rout him out. In the meantime it would be advisable to stay awake in a chair, and make a tour of the house at intervals to make sure that nothing was amiss.
Coming back into the hall, she was passing the door that led down to the cellar when she heard a faint clatter. Her heart drummed high and hard. The prowler was in the house already! Quickly she put her ear to the door, straining to catch whatever he was doing. Was he opening wine, or helping himself to the hams hanging there?
She drew back hastily as she heard a little clink of metal hit against the iron handrail. A beringed finger had gripped it for support. Where should she stand to have him at a disadvantage? Her silken robe rippled about her as she darted to the stairs. From there she could cover him with the pistols, no matter in which direction he turned.
Her heart was hammering so loudly that she was sure he must hear it as he mounted one step after another in the blackness of the cellar. She cocked the pistols the second before the door swung slowly open. To her utter astonishment a powerfully built Indian stepped silently into her line of vision, holding at his shoulder the customary striped blanket that was swept about him like a cloak.
“Don’t move!” she ordered, low-voiced, thankful that the banisters stood between her and the man, making it impossible for him to make any wily, unexpected attack on her. “Or I shall fire!”
He answered her in a voice that she knew so well and which she had been longing desperately to hear again. “Sarah, honey,” he drawled, letting the blanket fall swinging from his shoulders, “I’ve been dodging bullets and cannonballs for weeks now. Point those pesky pistols somewhere else. I don’t want to get killed in my own home.”
“Bryne!” she whispered, trembling with joy.
He came to her, not to take her in his arms as she had hoped, but to remove with a deliberate and gingerly care the pistols from her shaking hands. “How are you?” he asked, unloading the pistols and rendering them harmless.
“Very well,” she replied in a voice stilted with disappointment. Lifting the hems of her robe and nightgown, she went past him to light some candles from the drawing-room fire, which was kept burning night and day since the onslaught of the cold weather. The flames tinted and highlighted the taut planes of her face, and would have given him an insight into the depths of emotion assailing her if her head had not been turned away from him when he followed her into the room. His calm, unruffled greeting had doused all the tender longings that she had hardly dared to acknowledge, even to herself, and she had forgotten that when they met again he would have no idea how her feelings in the intervening months had been changing toward him.
She turned, her face controlled, holding the candelabra high. They regarded each other steadily, each taking note of the other’s appearance. He looked tired but alert, his deerskin garments worn and travel-stained, and his hair had grown longer.
“How long can you stay?” she asked levelly.
“Not as much as a day if my presence here doesn’t remain a secret.”
She gave a brief nod. “I must work out how to keep you hidden. How on earth did you get into the house? Everything was locked up.”
“I slipped through the window in Flora’s cupboard,” he explained. “I tried an old key from the stables in the door, but you’ve had bolts fitted.”
“There was a good reason for that, and now it looks as if I must get that window secured permanently, too. It has been completely overlooked. Suppose it had been anyone else but you getting through it!” She found the thought alarming.
“Who would know it was there?” he said reassuringly. “The shrubs have always hidden it, and the snow will cover it now for months to come. Leave it. It could happen that I might find it useful on another occasion. I guess I could fix up some kind of warning system with wires attached to a bell in your bedchamber if that would set your mind at rest.”
Her bedchamber! He did not know that she had moved into his room and that all her possessions were set about in it. She must choose the right moment to tell him. “I’d be glad if you would fix an alarm. I do assure you that I have good reason for my fears, but there’ll be time to talk about that later.”
He moved forward to hold his chilled hands out to the fire and she ached to warm them in her own. Or against her body.
“It’s good to see flames on a hearth again instead of a campfire,” he said with satisfaction.
“Have you traveled far today?” she managed to say.
“Many miles. I’ve been in the saddle for nearly a week. A companion rode with me as far as the corner of the street and took my horse away with him. I didn’t want Joe Tupper asking questions and talking about a strange horse suddenly appearing in the stables.”
“Joe isn’t here anymore. He’s a seaman on the Prince Regent, patrolling the lake.” She told him about Agnes leaving, and explained that only the children, Lucy, and Mary Anne were on the premises during the nighttime.
“There’s little danger of any of them waking up,” she added, taking a few steps across the floor away from the fire, “but we’ll be safer beyond the baize door. You must be weary and hungry. I’ll prepare a meal while you have a bath.”
There was plenty of hot water in the caldron over the kitchen hearth. He brought an old tin bath up from the cellar instead of using the one upstairs, and she chased a spider out of it before he poured in the water, steam rising in the air.
“I must fetch some clean clothes,” he said, unbuttoning his deerskin jacket.
Now she had to tell him. “You’ll find some of my things in your room.” She avoided his eyes, taking soap from a cupboard. “I was carried in there after an accident—”
“Good God! What happened?” he demanded anxiously.
“I’ll tell you all about it while you bathe.” The emphasis on the accident had eased the way for her. She faced him with cool eyes. “I’ve never moved out again. I kept meaning to, but it is by far the best upper room in the house. All your clothes are in the drawers and the dressing room exactly where you left them.”
He soon returned from upstairs with what he needed, and put the clean clothes on a kitchen chair. With her back turned rigidly toward him she heated some nourishing soup, thick with delicious chunks of meat and chopped vegetables, which she had made only that day, and set the table, adding a jug of ale. Out of her line of vision he soaped away the grime of travel, sloshing the water about, and all the time she talked, not only answering his many questions, but telling him in detail about the night when the mob had gathered outside the house and what had resulted from it.
“If only I’d been here!” he fumed.
“I’m glad you weren’t,” she said with a shudder.
There came the wet slap of his feet on the stone floor, telling her that his bath was at an end. “I must thank Dr. Manning for taking such good care of you if ever the chance comes my way.” There was no expression in his voice. “How convenient that he should have come to York. Any idea why?”
“He wanted to see me again,” she answered frankly. Unconsciously she held her breath as she waited for his next words.
But he took his time. There was the rustle of a shirt followed by the flick of a belt about his waist. The silk lining of his velvet jacket whispered as he slipped it on.
“How often do you see each other?” he said at last.
“Very rarely. It’s weeks since he was here.” She glanced at Bryne warily as he dragged the bath out to empty it, expecting the questioning to continue, but he said no more.
While he ate with relish the meal she had made ready, she busied herself collecting up the towels he had used and took them out to the laundry basket in the wash house. On her return to the kitchen she knelt to wipe up the splashes of bath water left on the floor.
He frowned. “You shouldn’t be on your hands and knees.”
“We mustn’t leave any trace of your being here. I’m working out where to keep you out of sight when everybody is around the house.”
“Do you think Beth would be sharp in putting two and two together? Or is Mary Anne to be feared?”
“Neither girl is particularly astute.” She rose to her feet, the task completed.
“Oh. So it’s Lucy.” His tone was one of cynical amusement. “I might have known that she’d be the one ready to betray me.”
“You’ve only yourself to blame for that!” Sarah gripped the edge of the table, leaning forward slightly on straight arms as she addressed him, her face flushed. “She’s never forgiven you for locking her in on the night you left this house! It was a cruel and crazy thing to do! She was hurt and humiliated.”
He had finished eating, and he sat back, tilting his chair. “I see you’re still prickly as a porcupine toward me,” he taunted, watching her under lowered lashes, his shadowed eyes mocking. “Well, well. Did Lucy tell you what I said to her that night? No? Get around to asking her sometime.” The chair legs clacked back on the floor as he stood up. “I guess we’d better get these dishes washed and stacked. One glimpse of the table here and Lucy would get the Redcoats in to drag me away to a firing squad.”
Sarah bit her lip in exasperation as she cleared the table. How could he take the danger of possible betrayal so lightly?
While he dried the dishes for her she outlined a plan that she had formed. “You’d better sleep in the dressing room. Nobody ever goes in there except Beth, to dust and polish, and I can stop her doing that. I’ll have to remain in your bedchamber for the time being. They have all become used to my being there, and it might seem strange if I suddenly moved out for no reason at all.”
“It would indeed,” he agreed laconically. His words brought a fresh color to her cheeks, and she attacked the soup caldron with a birch-twig scourer as if she hated it.
In the dressing room he leaned a shoulder against the wall, hands in his pockets, while she made up the couch there with crisp linen, blankets, and a soft down pillow. “That’ll be mighty comfortable after the nights I’ve spent rolled up in a blanket on the ground.”
She smoothed the last crease from the turned-down sheet, and straightened up. “Where have you been all these months? Were you among the American troops when Fort Detroit surrendered to General Brock? Or with them at Queenston when their assault was turned into a shambles?”
He raised an eyebrow at her pointed reference to his country’s defeats. “I was at neither place on those occasions.”
“At least tell me why you’re here,” she implored. “Are you an escaped prisoner of war waiting to slip back over the boundary?”
He shook his head slowly. “No, Sarah. Have you forgotten that I said I’d find a way to come and see you? I’ve made a special secret journey.”
“But you’re an alien in a hostile land! You were mad to do it!”
His shoulders lifted in an easy shrug. “I don’t feel alien. I feel at home. I guess you haven’t been in these parts long enough yet to know that the Canadian soil can take the roots of men and grip them hard—like the great forests. It’s a hold that can be hard to break.”
She had been in Upper Canada long enough to understand what he meant. In moments of homesickness she had experienced only a nostalgic desire to see old friends and old places, but never once—in spite of all that had happened—had she wished the clock back or herself away from this land. Already she belonged. But he was split asunder from it by the ax of war. Like a felled black spruce or a toppled red pine.
Her hands clenched in despair. “But you’re in such danger! Why ever did you take the risk?”
His eyes did not leave her. “I couldn’t stay away from you any longer. Yet now I’m here I dare not touch you.”
The silence that fell between them seemed to tremble like the candlelight that threw their shadows on the walls. His face was immobile, but the passionate hurt showed through. She saw that he, unable to call back what he had said, expected her to draw away from him.
“But I’m your wife.” Her words, barely audible, were whispered on a sigh.
He did not stir from where he stood, but his eyes were searching hers as if he was unable to believe what he had heard. Still unsure, he took one step, spreading his hands wide. “I love you, Sarah.”
She stood motionless as if it had become impossible for her to move in any direction, so suffused by a melting joy that it seemed to her that her face and body must have become luminous in love there in that dimly lit room. Perhaps that had happened, for she saw a look come into his eyes that was more tender and gentle and adoring than she could have imagined possible.
“I love you too, Bryne. With all my heart.”
On silent feet she went to him, the skirt of her silken robe floating about her, her long, loosened hair spun-gold as it wafted in the candlelight. She closed her eyes as his arms enfolded her, slipping her own arms about his neck, feeling his hard embrace mold the softness of her body to him. He moved his lips, almost in wonder, against hers, and the delicate shivering of her limbs passed into his own flesh. Suddenly his passionately alive mouth took possession of hers and the spark set them both ablaze.
The candle drowned in its own wax. The bedclothes on the couch were still in their untouched, pristine neatness when the first touch of the wintry day filtered into the deserted dressing room. Only Sarah’s robe made a touch of color, lying where it had fallen, a shimmer of lilac on the shining floorboards.
The door from the bedchamber opened. Sarah, a pale ghost in her nakedness, entered to hasten across and snatch up her robe. She passed her arms swiftly into it as she hurried back again. Leaning over Bryne as he lay sleeping in the wide bed, she shook him by the shoulder.
“Dearest! Wake up!”
He sighed and rolled over, only to grin happily when he saw her, reaching out to gather her to him again, but she evaded his grasp. He propped himself on an elbow. “Why are you rushing about? It’s early yet.”
She had vanished under a fine white shift that rippled down over her like the bloom of some vast Canterbury bell. “The children could come banging on the door at any second,” she said, her lovely face reappearing.
“You must put a stop to that.”
“They don’t come every morning—only if I’m not up first.”
He groaned, falling back in mock despair into the pillows, making her laugh. But she clapped her fingertips over her lips, glancing nervously toward the door as someone went by with a quick tap of heels. “Was that Lucy?” he asked.
She nodded, putting on her dress. “You must move into the dressing room until she has left for the hospital and Mary Anne has taken the children for a walk.” Her fingers were busy with the loops of the tiny buttons that fastened the bodice to the frill at her throat. “Lock both doors on the inside for safety, and don’t make a sound if anyone enters this room or the one on the other side.”
“Suppose somebody tries a handle to get in?”
She was pinning up her shining, newly brushed hair before the swing mirror. “Nobody will. Be sure and keep away from the window. I’ll bring you up some food later, and find you some Upper Canada Gazettes to read.”
He had put on a morning robe and was pouring water from the pitcher into a rose-patterned bowl. “How long do you reckon to keep me hidden without discovery?”
She darted across to slide her arms under his and press the side of her face hard against his chest. “Until this stupid war is over!”
He put down the jug. Taking her by the shoulders, he held her back from him to look down into her eyes. “I’m counting on a week together. Maybe two. If we’re lucky—three. After that I’ll have to get going.”
“Why so soon?” she cried, not knowing how she could bear parting from him when the time came.
“This conflict has to be settled or there’ll be no peace in this land for many years to come.”
She wrenched herself away from him. “How can you take up arms against this colony where you say you feel at home?” she demanded desperately.
His mild expression did not change. “I’ve never struck—nor ever will strike—a single blow against it.”
She was completely baffled by his answer. Her normally capable hands almost hung on the air, curved back gracefully from the wrists, in an uncharacteristic attitude of uncertainty. “What do you mean? I don’t understand!”
“I happen to come from that division of the United States called New England, a fact that I told you when we first met, hoping that it would warn you not to judge me too harshly at any time. My Massachusetts birthplace has always had strong Loyalist associations, and my affiliations have been always with those of my countrymen—and there are many thousands—who are wholly against this campaign to conquer British North America. I have been engaged in secret activities under orders from New England congressmen to ensure that such a conquest doesn’t come about.” He smiled slightly at her astonishment. “I told you long ago that I considered myself first and foremost a citizen of this entire continent. Two flags flying over it and men passing peaceably to and fro across an undefended boundary. That is our aim.”
“But I believed all along that you were spying for the United States against Canada! I saw you hand over a packet of papers in the darkness to a man who came out of the shadows at Niagara!” she protested. “You used the pretense of wanting me to see the falls as a cover for meeting him!”
“Is that what you thought?” he exclaimed incredulously. “But not wanting to postpone our journey, I’d had the dispatch rider redirected to meet me there. He came to collect some information I had gathered about a dangerous Canadian agent in the pay of the War Hawks.”
She knew he was referring to a number of hotheaded and nationalistic United States congressmen from the West and South who cared more about their damaged trade than what it would mean if Napoleon conquered Europe. But still she was bewildered.
“But if you are working against the enemies of Britain, why do you fear to have it known that you are in York?” she asked, frowning.
He took her face between his hands, and kissed the frown away. “There are those in high places here who know what I am about, but at the moment they consider it expedient to keep lesser fry in the dark, as well as those warmongers on the other side of the boundary. Be patient, my love. There’s a good reason, I assure you.”
“May I hear what that is?”
“All I’m able to tell you is that it involves the capture of a vast supply of much-needed arms and ammunition. It will be the climax of countless sorties carried out with the help of my Indian friends, but until that mission is successfully carried out I must not risk its being known that I’m in York.”
She leaned against him. “Did General Brock know you were to be involved in all this with the New England Loyalists?”
“He did.”
She looked thoughtful, her eyes smiling. “So that’s why he danced with me before all the other ladies at the ball.”
Bryne laughed, hugging her close with warm exuberance. “You’re mistaken! It was because you were the most beautiful woman in the room!”
His mouth found hers, but hardly had they lost themselves in a sweet violence of kissing when a tap sounded on the door, freezing them into stillness.
“Are you awake, Sarah?” It was Lucy’s voice. The tapping became impatient.
“Yes!” Sarah signaled frantically for Bryne to gather up everything he had left about and go into the dressing room. “What do you want?”
“What do I want?” Lucy repeated sharply. “To come in, of course. I’ve a favor to ask.”
“I won’t be a moment!” Sarah called. Bryne went leisurely into the dressing room, and she checked quickly to see that his boots were out of sight, his cutthroat razor back in the washstand drawer, and his gold watch gone from the bedside table. “Coming!”
She unlocked the door. Lucy entered with raised eyebrows. “You’ve taken long enough. Did I catch you putting rouge on your cheeks?”
“Does it show?” Sarah asked with a casualness she did not feel, seizing on the excuse offered for the wild rose color that came so swiftly to her cheeks in moments of stress or tension. Lightly she smoothed her fingertips over her cheekbones, deliberately glancing at herself in the mirror. “What was it you wanted to ask me?”
Lucy strolled farther into the room. To Sarah in her anxiety it seemed that the girl’s gaze swept piercingly around as if looking for something—or somebody. But Lucy’s next words put her mind at rest. “Is your blue shawl here? It’s warmer than mine. I’d like to borrow it today.”
“Of course you may have it!” Did she sound overeager? “It’s in the … dressing room. I’ll get it for you later.”
“I’ll take it now. I’ve had my breakfast and I promised Philip to be extra early at the hospital today—there’s to be an operation. Shall I fetch the shawl?”
“No!” Sarah’s sharp note halted Lucy, who had already made a move toward the dressing room. “You won’t be able to find it. I know exactly where it is.”
There was no sign of Bryne as she entered. Looking neither to the left nor right, she went straight to the chest of drawers, aware that Lucy had come to hover in the doorway, watching her.
“Here you are.” Sarah held out the blue shawl to Lucy as she went sweeping back to her. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Bryne leaning against the wall behind the door. He tossed her a kiss from his fingertips as she went by.
The days and nights that followed were the happiest and most traumatic in Sarah’s whole life. Many times Bryne narrowly escaped discovery. Mary Anne was surprised by the number of walks she was sent on with the children, but Beth was delighted with the amount of time off she received, and Lucy’s days at the hospital were long. With the house to themselves, Sarah and Bryne loved and laughed, ate, played chess, chased each other, and loved again.
They often sat in the firelight. She liked it best in the security of the bedchamber when the fire danced and crackled, sending thousands of golden sparks flying up the chimney, and he would lie with his head in her lap, their conversation sometimes serious, sometimes lighthearted, and often the most tender of all love talk, which always ended with him drawing her down into his arms, all else becoming lost to her except the wonder and ecstasy and exultation of their passion for each other.
The day she dreaded came at last. She found him studying a map and knew that their precious time together was starting to dissolve into hours and minutes that would soon disappear. Resting a hand on his shoulder, she looked down at the map with him and saw that it bore a number of scattered crosses marking sites of some kind. He pointed to a dotted trail and followed it with his forefinger.
“This is the way I shall travel back across the boundary.” A scarlet cross came under his finger and he gave it a tap. “That’s a Mohawk reserve. I’ll break my journey overnight there.”
Enlightenment came to her. “I see now what the crosses represent. Indian encampments. Scarlet north of the boundary and blue south of it. Are any of the blue hostile?”
“In that particular area, only with those with whom they have an old score to settle. Vengeance for lost hunting grounds is sweet, and no chance is allowed to slip by.”
“When must you leave?” she asked, no tremor in her voice. She had determined not to make their parting harder in any way.
“In the early hours of tomorrow morning.”
It was like a little reprieve. She had feared it would be that very evening. “I’ll make an excuse to retire early and bring supper up on a tray.”
Throughout his stay she had had to take her meals with the others for the sake of having no questions asked, but there could be no risk attached to this final little plan.
Lucy, sitting with a book by the fire, looked up with a frown when Sarah packed up her sewing, ready to go to bed. “It’s not late yet. Have you a headache? I’ll mix you a draft.”
“I’m perfectly all right, but I’m getting up early tomorrow morning,” Sarah answered truthfully. “Good night.”
Lucy gave a nod in acknowledgment, but her eyes, slightly narrowed, followed Sarah’s retreating back until the door closed. Her expression remained thoughtful and she did not return her attention to the book.
It did not take Sarah long to set the tray with cold chicken, slices of ham, a dish of pickled oysters and some other delicacies saved for special occasions. But on her return from the cellar with a bottle of wine she halted abruptly on the threshold of the kitchen, her heart giving a wild lurch of fear. Lucy stood by the table, the silver lid of a dish raised in her hand as she took note of the food made ready.
“You’ve prepared quite a feast.” Lucy spoke quietly, but her eyes on Sarah were hard and piercing.
“I felt hungry.” Sarah tried to sound unconcerned. Somehow she must bluff her way through.
“Bryne likes pickled oysters.” Lucy’s stare was unwavering.
Sarah caught her breath. “Most people enjoy them.”
Slowly Lucy replaced the lid of the dish. Her even tones did not change. “Let me see him before he leaves. Please.”
With shaking hands Sarah put the bottle on the table. “How long have you known he was here?”
“Since the day I came home early and caught a whiff of cigar smoke. Then I remembered the morning I’d borrowed your shawl. Usually you sleep with one pillow on top of each other, but on that occasion they were side by side. I took a look in the cellar. There were newly emptied bottles. Only Bryne drinks that much wine.” A lopsided smile touched her mouth. “So you see, it wasn’t so hard to guess. Why didn’t you tell me?”
Sarah sank down onto a chair, all the strength seemed to have gone from her limbs. “I was afraid you’d give him away. You’ve spoken of him with hatred so many times.”
“You were right to be wary of me. I did hate him the night he left this house and for a long time afterward. Who knows what dreadful revenge I might have taken had he returned at that time?” Lucy shuddered, rubbing her arms as if chilled. “But these recent months being with Philip and working in the hospital have made me realize how petty and unimportant my own troubles have been. I had nothing else to think about but Bryne when I was shut away in that horrible school, and I lived for the times he came to see me. After each visit I’d go over everything he’d said, every look he’d given me, and twist it all romantically to feed my stupid, nebulous dreams of living happily ever after with him.”
Sarah, who had dropped her face into her hands, raised her head again. “He’d like to see you. He’s very fond of you.”
Lucy made a tragicomical grimace. “There was a time when I’d have considered drowning myself in the St. Lawrence had I been told then that Bryne would never feel more than a gentle affection for me. You’re fortunate to have had the choice of two of the most exciting men that ever crossed a woman’s path, Sarah. Ah! You didn’t think I knew about that either, I suppose. You must realize I’ve had to watch Philip forgetting you in his work. At first I used to hope that the day would come when he’d look up and see that I was always there when he needed me, but I’ve become resigned to that never happening. No more dreams for me.”
“When did you first realize that you cared for Philip?” Sarah asked. It was obvious that Lucy was in complete control of herself.
“It happened so gradually that I hardly know. He made an impression on me the night I ran to him for help when the mob came to the house—he was so quick and cool-headed and practical. It made me ashamed of my blubbering hysterics. He used to spend a little time talking to me every day when I was looking after you, asking me what I thought about this or that. I’d never had anyone really listen to me before.”
“I can understand that.”
“But I started to feel jealous of you all over again when he paid you too much attention,” Lucy continued frankly. “At least you were married to Bryne, which was some safeguard, although I’d never expected to feel thankful for that! Especially when I remembered the agony I’d gone through when he’d told me the reason why he’d married you.”
“What do you mean?” Sarah leaned forward in the chair.
“That night Bryne was leaving I made a terrible scene. I wanted him to kiss and hold me, but when he kept me at a distance I completely lost my head. I told him that you didn’t even like him, and that it was Philip Manning you really loved.”
“Lucy!” Sarah exclaimed on a low note of dismay, knowing the anguish it must have caused Bryne.
“Do you know what he said to that?” Lucy’s head fell back on the stem of her throat with a little gurgle of self-mocking laughter. “He said he’d fallen in love with you the first time he’d clapped eyes on you—those were his words—and he’d made up his mind to get his ring on your finger before the war took him away from York. He married you to make sure he didn’t lose you to Philip Manning! That’s Bryne! I nearly went crazy with jealousy. I would have clawed his eyes out if I could have reached him. He locked me in the room for my temper to cool off.” She paused. “He wasn’t going to let me ruin his last minutes with you.”
Sarah sat with her hands in her lap, pondering the headstrong audacity of the man she loved, the corners of her mouth curled in a secret smile. She must have said more about Philip than she had been aware of when the French brandy had loosened her tongue, making it obvious that she knew he had come to care for her during the voyage. And Bryne, seeing there was no time to waste, convinced—and rightly—that Philip would seize the first opportunity to come back into her life, had decided to wed her first and win her love later.
“Why don’t you have supper with Bryne in the parlor?” Lucy suggested. “You and he can be alone there. After I’ve had a few words with him I’ll go and sit with Mary Anne by the fire in her room. I’ll do nothing to spoil your parting this time, I promise.”
They ate their supper at the round table in the parlor, holding hands across it. Now that the hours were dwindling, they talked little, saying more with touch and with their eyes. He had no idea when he would be able to get back to see her again.
“I love you,” they said to each other as they lay in the wide bed. The clock ticked the minutes away. He buried his face in the spread of her hair on the pillow and longed for time to stand still.
In the bitter cold of early morning she stood on the porch to watch him go. He was wearing again the deerskin garments, the Indian blanket wrapped around him, with a fur hat pulled down over his ears. His booted feet plunged deep into a fresh fall of snow as he made his way down the drive to the gates, where his traveling companion waited on horseback, a second mount stamping hooves restlessly, its bridle jingling.
Bryne swung himself in the saddle, and turned to raise his hand in farewell to her. Careless of the snow, she rushed down the porch steps to gaze after him as he and the other rider sped away along the silvery-white street. When would she be in his arms again?