"Are we, Charley?"
The oarsmen pulled steadily towards deep water and the ebb tide sweeping out to sea. The boat was no more than a tiny smudge on twinkling waves under a black sky pricked with stars. When the moon went behind a cloud, the boat was invisible.
There was a small struggle and a soft splash.
Chapter 22
The tavern's reception rooms were packed with the elite of Charlestown in their finest clothes: the governor and his lady — who were the host and hostess — the councillors and their ladies, the assemblymen, churchmen, lawyers, merchants, and all their ladies, along with every other man in the town who'd sold his soul for an invitation in the interest of advancement in colonial society, together with their ladies.
A fortune had been spent on candles, the town's bakers had lost their flour to powder hundreds of wigs, the finest musicians in the Carolinas were playing, corks popped in volleys, wine flowed as if without cost. Outside, the streets were packed with all those who couldn't get in but had come to ogle the rich and the mighty, and especially to cheer the arrival of Commodore Sir Richard Scott-Owen and the officers of his squadron, come to save Charlestown from rape and pillage by the French — for what other purpose could this naval presence have?
In the midst of all this, Selena was transported nearly unto heaven, even though she knew it would be her last night in Charlestown, and that Allardyce — at Flint's orders — would be knocking at Meshod Pimenta's door in the morning to take her out to the ship. She knew all about Flint's business with the Indians, and what that meant, because Flint had told her. He'd told her earlier that evening, aboard the ship, and he'd gazed at her and opened his heart.
"You go to the ball, my dear," he'd said. "You enjoy yourself."
"The invitation says Mr and Mrs Garland... won't you come, Joe?"
"Can't be done. I've three hundred savages to embark aboard this ship and Danny Bentham's, and shiploads of stores to shift. I want that done neat and nimble! I've no time for dancing, but I'm happy for you to go."
And then he kissed her! He dared to kiss her cheek, then her chin… then her lips. He put his arms around her and held her close, and kissed her with something approaching a lover's passion… something approaching it, but not quite reaching it… which was a huge relief to Selena, who dared not reject him, but would not encourage him; not while she had strength of mind to be her own woman and make her own choices.
So she stared up at him as, finally, he released her with a smile. The workings of his mind were a mystery, but she'd known something like this was coming ever since he'd seen her in the yellow gown. At least he wasn't a full man towards her… not yet.
"Now," he said, "go to the ball!"
So he stayed aboard, and in the boat pulling for the shore, she wished Charley Neal hadn't gone: headed back to Ireland, according to Flint, seizing the sudden good luck of a ship on the tide for Dublin. It was a shame, because
Charley was kind and wise, and she could have spoken to him.
Soon, however, she forgot the dangers all around her and began to enjoy herself in the company of Meshod and Esther Pimenta and their friends… and the delight of wearing the spectacular yellow gown… and knowing she was spectacularly beautiful, and that every man in the room was elbowing his way forward to ask her to dance! This was especially wonderful, because — while she'd grown up on such books as Tomlinson's Art of Dancing and Rameau's Le Maitre a Danser, and while she'd learned the minuet with Miss Eugenie and the maids — she'd never danced with a gentleman. Plantation nigger-women didn't do that.
So she danced. And never noticed that one particular gentleman — a gentleman in green silk — was looking at her very curiously and very carefully, and taking great care that she should not see him.
She danced with shoals of others, though, including both the young gentlemen who seemed to be the centre of attention among Commodore Scott-Owen's officers: Lieutenant George Hastings, a tall, shy young man, with curly hair, and Mr Midshipman Povey, a relative youngster — he was just fifteen — but already settling into heavy muscle and lead- footedness. He was a poor dancer but an exceedingly jolly fellow who made her laugh.
He said a number of very silly things to her when he came up and begged a dance, and even contrived to whisper in her ear, so he could tickle it with the tip of his tongue. Some men were nervous around beautiful women, but not David Povey, for all his youth. She rapped him with a fan for that, but she still laughed.
"It's all his mother, you know!" he said, when he led her on to the floor away from a reluctant Hastings. "I'm nothing, don't you know! Unlike your good self — you're like an elf from a story book!" And he gazed at her in wonderment — but then, all the gentlemen did. Selena was becoming used to it.
And all the while the gentleman in green stared harder at Selena.
"What about Mrs Hastings?" she said, as the band struck up and they executed the formal steps of the minuet, timing their conversation to the gentle rising and falling of the music, and the gliding choreography of the other dancers in their silks and brocades.
"Lady Hastings. Constance Manners as was."
"Yes?"
"Well, her sister — Lady Catherine Manners as was — is married to the Prime Minister, Mr Pelham."
"Oh!" said Selena.
"So she's got the most colossal interest, don't you know."
"What's interest?"
"It's what runs the navy, ma'am. It's who you know!" He grinned. "We was knocked about a bit, you see, me and George Hastings, so his ma, the lovely Lady Constance — who's so lovely, she's almost as lovely as you…"
Selena laughed, intoxicated.
"… Lady Constance had a word in the right ear, and that's why we got such fine ships and Commodore Scott-Owen, who's the best there is!"
"But what for?"
"So's we can hunt him down. We're the only ones left who know him."
"Know who?"
"Him. We sailed with him, did Hastings and me. We were set adrift by him."
"Who?"
"What? Don't you know? I thought everyone knew."
"I don't."
"Flint. That villain Flint! We're here to catch him and hang him."
The gentleman in green saw Selena's hand go to her mouth.
"This is the poster," Mr Governor, said Commodore Scott- Owen, and the blue-and-gold, white-powdered, sea-service officer handed a rolled sheet of paper to the red- and-gold, white-powdered James Glen, the middle-aged, long-faced professional politician who'd been Royal Governor of South Carolina since 1743. "This is the reason for our presence in Charlestown, which soon will be common knowledge."
"Thank you, Commodore," said Glen, Scots accent still strong after all his years away. "But can't this wait?" He looked at the pleasures of the ball, from which he'd been drawn into a quiet a corner, trailed by a clutch of councillors and assemblymen: climbers-of-the-greasy-pole who sniffed after him even tonight… just as Scott-Owen was likewise followed by a clutch of his officers.
"No time, sir!" said Scott-Owen, a serious and surprisingly young man — he was barely thirty — who was determined to make the most of the ships and command he'd been given. "We have so little time before the villain knows we're in the Americas. We must maintain the precious advantage of surprise!"
"Huh!" said Glen, unrolling the document and feeling the paper. "Who paid for this? Thirty inches by twenty-two, finest quality…"