Mistress Below Deck

Matthew’s face took on a look of incandescent rage. ‘What the devil are you talking about? How dare you force yourself into my house?’

Rowena was speechless, frozen in shock, unable to assimilate what was happening. She gaped at her father in blank confusion. When she moved towards him, bewilderment was written all over her face. ‘Father, what is this? And why are you not pleased to see Mr Whelan? Did you not tell me you were expecting him?’

Matthew looked at Rowena as if she had taken leave of her senses. ‘You brainless, witless girl,’ he snarled. ‘This isn’t Phineas Whelan.’

Rowena stared at him through eyes huge with horror and disbelief. ‘He isn’t? Oh, God,’ she cried. With sudden, heartbreaking clarity all the pieces of this bizarre puzzle began to fall into place. The whole gruesome picture was suddenly presented to her in every horrendous detail. In the space of two seconds, all those images collided head on with the reality of what it all meant, bringing her whirling around on the stranger in a tempestuous fury.

He smiled sympathetically. ‘I apologise.’ He cocked a mocking brow. ‘I take it that Mr Whelan is a suitor?’

‘How dare you?’ Rowena hissed with poorly suppressed ire, stepping closer to the intruder. ‘How dare you do this? Of all the treacherous, despicable, underhand… How dare you tell me you were Mr Whelan?’ Her mind screamed at the injustice of it, and her fury increased a thousandfold when she found his eyes resting on her with something akin to compassion or pity. It was too much to bear.

‘I didn’t.’ His tone was brusque where before it had been soft. ‘You assumed. I am sorry. I’m not proud of deceiving you. You do right to put me in my place.’

Rowena’s eyes narrowed into slanted slits of piercing green. ‘Your place? Just who are you?’

A crooked smile accompanied a slight inclination of his head. ‘Tobias Searle—at your service.’

This pronouncement of the name that had bedevilled them all since her father had been brought home close to death was like acid on a raw wound to Rowena. ‘You fraud. You disgusting fraud. You’re no gentleman, that’s for sure, and you are not welcome in this house. How dare you come here hoping to be received?’

Tobias stared at her with a look like a man who has just realised that the fragile flower he has casually picked is in actuality a hornet’s nest. It came to him that there was a changeling in the room, for this termagant was not the winsome girl who had let him in. The face that had been so open and radiant was now closed and turned against him.

‘I was quite prepared not to be received. I considered it wise not to tell you who I was until I had been admitted to your father.’

‘You told me my father was expecting you.’

His lips curved in a cynical smile. ‘That was true. He has been—for the past four years, in fact—but I confess I wasn’t invited.’ He fixed his gaze on the man in the chair. ‘Have a care, Golding,’ he warned, ‘for I would not hesitate to expose your ugliest secret to the illustrious people of Falmouth and beyond.’

‘What do you want from me?’

‘I would like to say I want recompense for a cargo of rum and sugar you stole from me, but it is as nothing compared to the compensation you owe to the families of the men who perished on one of my ships—the NightHawk—when it was fired in Kingston Harbour four years back. The lengths you went to to prevent the ship collecting the cargo you coveted for yourself was nothing short of murder. Men who were asleep on board didn’t stand a chance of saving themselves.’

Purple veins stood out on Matthew’s forehead, his eyes protruding from their sockets as he glowered up at the other man. ‘That was not my doing,’ he said hoarsely. ‘I swear it. Jack—Jack Mason—’

‘I know Jack Mason. Captain Jack Mason, the master of the Dolphin—your vessel, I believe.’

‘Aye—and Mason, renegade that he is, made off with it and left me to rot on Antigua.’

‘Perhaps like everyone else he thought you were dead—myself included. Had I known you had survived the shooting, I would have been here sooner.’

‘Mason’s the one you should be looking for, not me. I had nothing to do with what happened to your ship.’

‘I am looking for him, only I’m having a little difficulty in tracking him down. But I shall—be assured of that. You were there that night. You saw what happened. As owner of the Dolphin, who had command of his own crew, I hold you responsible. Believe me, Golding, I am no respecter of your standing in society and I would gladly see you ruined and your house razed to the ground for what you have done, so do not think for one minute that my threat is idly voiced.’

Matthew’s usually florid features had become chalk white and his breathing shallow and rapid, as he felt the ghosts of the past begin to claw at him with savage fingers. ‘What is it you want from me?’

‘I’ve told you. Compensation for dead men. It’s a matter of human decency. Compensation for their families and for those men who were badly burned, some blinded, some with life-limiting injuries, men who will never work again, who are unable to support their wives and children.’

Appalled by what she was hearing, Rowena stared at him. ‘What are you saying?’ she cried. ‘That my father killed those men?’ The look he gave her said it all. ‘But that’s outrageous.’ She looked at her father. ‘Tell me it’s not true. Tell me he’s lying.’

‘Rowena, I did not do what he accuses me of. I may not always have done what I should, but at least I have no man’s death on my conscience.’

‘But you were there. You sailed on the Dolphin to the West Indies. I would like to know the truth of it.’

‘Damn you, Rowena. You think your father a killer, do you? I was there, I admit that, but I was nowhere near the Night Hawk when the fire started.’

Rowena believed him. She knew what Jack Mason was capable of—she hadn’t forgotten his attack on her before he had sailed for the West Indies. She directed her hard gaze on Tobias Searle, icy fire smouldering in the green of her eyes. ‘You speak of compensation for the families of those men who died. What of my father? Does he not warrant compensation from you, sir, for shooting him in the back like a coward and leaving him a cripple?’

‘And that’s what he told you, is it?’ He looked contemptuously at Matthew with a lopsided smile. ‘You have been living under a misconception. I am not a man who would shoot another in the back. God knows I wanted to shoot you; had I done so, I would not have maimed you—I would have killed you. As I recall, you were the worse for drink on the night I ran you to ground on Antigua. I doubt you can remember much of what happened. But that is not what I am here for. The debt, Golding. I do not intend remaining in Falmouth overlong, so it must be paid within the week.’

‘And it is thanks to you making me a cripple—despite what you say to the contrary—and unable to conduct my business as I would like, that I lack the wherewithal to pay,’ Matthew said, refusing to believe Searle innocent of shooting him.

Slowly, distinctly, the younger man said, ‘I have heard you soon won’t have a pittance to your name. Do you think I don’t know you have money lenders and creditors hounding you—and I don’t doubt you have even used your daughters’ dowries to put towards paying them?’ His smile was sarcastic. ‘They are like sacrificial lambs to your ambitions, are they not, Golding? However, after meeting your eldest daughter—’ he turned his head, his gaze leisurely sweeping over Rowena appraisingly ‘—I’m somewhat surprised there have been no takers. She would make the most charming companion. Perhaps I should make a bid for her myself.’ Tis obvious she doesn’t take after you.’

Matthew clenched his hands into tight fists. ‘Keep yourself away from my house and your filthy hands off my daughter. She’ll have nothing to do with the likes of you.’

Undaunted, Tobias smiled blandly into Rowena’s rage-filled eyes. ‘I am tempted to try to change her mind—if she would allow it. It would be interesting to see what might come of it.’

Her chilled contempt met him face to face. ‘Why? To try to thwart my father? Do not even think of adding me to your long string of conquests.’

He smiled with wry humour. ‘Conquest? You mistake me, Rowena. Don’t be too hasty. I might be prepared to be—generous.’

‘Generous? What are you talking about?’

‘Aye,’ Matthew said, clearly bemused, ‘explain yourself.’

‘I am not usually an impulsive man, but in exchange for your daughter’s hand in marriage, I would be prepared to reduce your debt to me.’

‘Why, you arrogant, pompous oaf!’ Rowena gasped. ‘Your callousness disgusts me. I would marry the ugliest, oldest man on earth rather than have anything to do with you.’

‘Never!’ Matthew railed over his daughter’s surprised gasp. ‘I won’t have a daughter of mine married to the likes of you. If you know what’s good for you, you’ll keep away from her.’

Tobias considered Matthew with open mockery. ‘Why not ask Rowena what her pleasure might be?’

‘I’d kill you before I’d see her take up with you. So be warned.’

Tobias laughed derisively. ‘I’d be careful with my threats if I were you, Golding. The last time you threatened someone, he put you where you are now. I don’t think I have anything to worry about.’ He looked at Rowena, who was glaring at him with eyes burning with indignation. ‘Do not concern yourself, Rowena. I mean you no harm.’

‘My name is Miss Golding to you,’ she retorted, twin spots of colour growing on her cheeks. ‘Take your offers and endearments and inflict them on some other willing ear.’

‘And this Mr Whelan you mistook me for—is he someone your father hopes to saddle you with? Rich, is he? Rich enough to get him out of his mess?’

‘That is none of your business. One way or another the debt will be paid in full. I promise you that. Now will you please leave. As I said, you are not welcome in this house.’

The muscles flexed in his cheek, giving evidence of his constrained anger. ‘I don’t intend staying any longer than necessary. I find merely being in this house with the man who murdered members of my crew extremely distasteful.’

He took a step closer to his adversary, his eyes merciless in their intensity, and his next words were uttered slowly, like uncoiling whips. ‘But heed me and heed me well, Golding. Were it just a matter of the cargo you stole from me by burning my ship, I might have seen fit to cancel your debt in view of your unfortunate disability—and if you had agreed to my offer to marry your daughter. But since my offer has been rejected, you will pay in full for what you did to those men. I swear, if you try to evade your obligation, I will crush you out of existence. There will be a scandal, but it would be worth the scandal to see you go under. You have a ship for sale—the Rowena Jane. I might have a buyer to put your way, which will go some way to settling your debt.’

Rowena stepped forward, her hands clenched in the folds of her dress. She felt sick and more than a little afraid of this new threat to their future security, but her anger and indignation were much stronger. Pride warred with the years of resentment she had harboured against her father’s weakness to succumb to his disability, which had seen his once-thriving business slip into a decline, but he was still her father and the ties of blood and duty bound them irrevocably. Loyalty and anger rose like a phoenix out of the ashes of her resentment towards this stranger who had tricked his way into her home.