Seducing The Pirate
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Chapter 7
Cat arrived in Portsmouth just as dawn was breaking. The gulls screamed and circled, hoping the ship was bringing in fish, and she smiled to herself as she thought of the cargo of tobacco safely concealed beneath Roseland.
From Portsmouth she had lots of time to take the early-morning mail coach for London. The fare they asked seemed outrageous to Cat, so she haggled and finally agreed to ride outside the coach next to the driver for a cheaper rate. Each time they came to a steep incline the carriage stopped and all passengers disembarked to trudge up the hill on foot, so it wasn’t until five weary hours later that the coach pulled into Lud Lane off Gresham Street.
Cat had paid little attention to the open meadows of sheep and cows, nor had she noticed much difference in the villages which clustered on the outskirts of the city, but once she spotted the spires of hundreds of churches dominating the skyline she felt her excitement begin to well up inside her.
Soon her senses were reeling. Her ears were assaulted by the mixed cacophony of church bells, river traffic, porters, vendors, draymen, and the babble of a thousand voices. Her nose was assaulted by the unpleasant stench of open sewers, rotting vegetation, sweating horses, and unwashed humanity.
Her eyes darted about; she wanted to experience every detail of the greatest city in the world. London was walled, and after they passed over the great bridge which actually had houses and shops built on it, they passed through one of the entrance gates into the city.
To Cat it seemed overcrowded wherever she looked and she wondered what had happened to draw all the people. Gradually she realized it must always be like this. Her eyes were huge in her face as she saw magnificently dressed men and women in satins and velvet walk past filthy cripples and beggars. Some of the ladies wore black masks over their faces; others, obviously housewives and servants, were doing their shopping.
All the places of business had signs hanging outside their premises and apprentices stood in the doorways hawking their goods. Porters staggered under huge boxes of goods, others pushed handcarts over the cobbles, their loads piled so high they were in danger of toppling over.
She saw children singing for pennies, pickpockets and wig snatchers plaguing the crowds, cavaliers on horseback, and drunken fops outside taverns. The traffic slowed the coach to a crawl as they waited for hackney carriages, merchants’ wagons, and sedan chairs. Cat learned a few choice curses she’d never heard before from the driver as he waved his whip and threatened anatomical indignities with it if they didn’t “make way.”
Cat was caught up in the violent energy of the place and she instantly recognized that she would have to be constantly on her toes here if she expected to be one step ahead of anyone else.
Next to the coach station in Lud Lane was an inn called the Swan with Two Necks and she asked a young barmaid scrubbing the steps how to get to Cockspur Street.
“Oooo, ’oity-toity,” replied the wench upon hearing the fashionable address.
“Silly bitch, speak English,” said Cat, annoyed.
“Well, I never!” said the maid, picking up her bucket and throwing the dirty water over Cat’s dusty boots.
Cat grabbed a handful of her hair and said, “Tell me how to get to Cockspur Street or I’ll mop the bloody road with you.”
“Lawks! Leggo! Murder!”
“It will be murder if you don’t tell me,” Cat threatened.
“Down Fleet to the Strand … straight down the Strand nearly to the palace.”
Cat murmured under her breath, “Look out, London, here I come, ready or not.” At that moment her stomach rolled so loudly, a mangy mongrel jumped aside and she let out a peel of laughter. She bought a veal pasty from a pieman to stave off her hunger and strode off toward Fleet Street.
Every detail fascinated her. She glanced in every shop, here an apothecary offering cures for impotence, there a secondhand clothing shop offering dead men’s boots, and on each and every corner stood a tavern named after Charles II, either the King’s Head, the King’s Arms, or the Royal Oak. She saw boy chimney sweeps, soot black from head to foot, and a rat catcher with dead rats and mice hanging from his hat.
By the time she had followed the Strand around the bend in the river and located Cockspur Street she was dusty, dirty, and footsore. She noticed that in this part of town the streets were clean and the houses immaculate. She ran up the steps of number five and knocked loudly. A footman opened the door, looked down his long nose at her, and said, “Get away from this house, you varlet.”
In a flash her boot prevented him shutting the door in her face. She reached inside the jacket and pulled out a pistol. His eyes rolled up into his head and he cried, “Help! Robbers!”
A woman’s voice drawled, “James, whatever is the racket, don’t you know the house is in mourning?”
Cat looked over the sophisticated woman from head to toe, taking in the platinum curls, the painted face, the silk gown, the ivory fan, and the white Persian cat on a silver leash, and said uncertainly, “Auntie Lil?”
The small woman looked at her blankly.
“I’m Summer, but I prefer to be called Cat.” She tucked the pistol away and pulled out the letter. Lady Richwood’s mouth fell open. Recovering only slightly, her hand at her throat, she said, “How extraordinary! How did you get here?”
“I walked.”
“How extraordinary! Come in before anyone sees you.” As Lil stood staring at the young girl who was her niece, her heart melted like snow in summer. “Oh, child, whatever has he done to you?” she cried. She had been prepared to thoroughly dislike Lady Summer St. Catherine, thinking her the spoiled and pampered heiress of Roseland, but the girl she saw before her had obviously had no advantages whatsoever. In fact, by the looks of her, she had been neglected shamefully. “Come and sit down, darling, I’m afraid I have some upsetting news for you.” She took a deep breath. “Your father died last night.”
Cat pulled off her woolen cap and her hair fell about her shoulders untidily. She felt nothing. No sorrow. No joy. “I feel numb,” she said, sitting down hard on the elegant brocade settee.
“Summer, my poor darling, you don’t need to explain things to me. He was my brother. I know what a swine he was. He isn’t in the house—the undertaker took him for burial to St. John’s-in-the-Wood. … I didn’t know if you would come.”
“There’s no money to pay for it, what will I do?” asked Cat helplessly.
“Well, I think we’ve both had experience in coping when there’s no money.” She removed the silver leash from the white Persian cat and it jumped up on the brocade settee. “First things first. You look like you haven’t eaten in a week.”
“I’ve eaten twice.”
“Today?”
“No … this week.”
“Oh, darling, you are droll. We need something to cheer us up. For dessert we’ll have strawberries. I’m particularly partial to strawberries,” she drawled. “I’ll feed you and bathe you, and then we’ll do what women do best. We’ll talk, darling.”
Lil found her a snow-white nightgown beribboned and decorated with lace. It was easily the prettiest garment she had ever worn. Her freshly washed hair curled damply about her face as she sat beside the bedchamber fire to dry it.
“Now then, darling,” said Lil in her beautiful, husky drawl, “your father asked me to give you this book and these papers. Said something about a black man which made no sense.”
Cat unsealed the large parchment and slowly began to decipher the legal words. Suddenly she jumped up and sent her stool flying. “The man should burn in hell!” she cried. “He’s mortgaged Roseland to the hilt and the note is due! My God, if he wasn’t dead, I’d kill him!” She paced the room and tore open a second paper. “Oh, no! It’s a bill of sale for my horse, Ebony. Rancid old bastard! I’ve got to get home … I’ve got to get some money … but how?”