belatedly tried to portray. “Not that it matters…. It’s time I returned before I’m missed….” And where was Menika? She had been sleeping (supposedly) right there in the shadow of the tall hedge. Where had she gone? How much had she witnessed?
“Are you sure you don’t need an escort? A beautiful young woman can never be certain what kind of depraved monster she might run across on a night like this!”
“Thank you, if that was meant to be an offer; but I have a pistol,” Alexa said coldly. “And I am accounted an excellent shot by everyone who knows me. On the last hunt we were on I bagged the most game….” She wished that he would not watch her so intently as she attempted to knot the camboy around her waist while holding the pistol she’d grabbed up hastily from the folds of her discarded shawl in one hand. And fastening up tiny buttons across her breasts proved even more difficult under his interested survey.
“If you need any help I should be glad to oblige you…without any more attempts on your virtue I assure you. Pistols have always made me cautious.”
“I don’t need anything from you!” Alexa snapped waspishly, wishing he would not lie there so casually, as if he felt quite at home, and watch her in a suddenly detached fashion. And damn and double damn! The silly little buttons on her bodice wouldn’t fasten easily, and holding the pistol made it even more awkward. In fact, she had almost fired it accidentally a minute ago while trying to get one arm at a time into the short, tight sleeves. He could have tried to make a grab for it if he had really wanted to, she supposed resentfully, but quite clearly he had already decided she wasn’t worth either the effort or the risk. Forgetting herself, Alexa swore under her breath—one of the very worst oaths she had overheard.
“Are you sure you don’t need help? Or an escort? Unless, of course, you happen to have a jealous husband or lover waiting for you…?”
“That’s enough out of you!” Alexa said furiously, leveling her pistol at him, and angry enough to fire it too. “What I do and where I go is none of your business; and since you are an obvious trespasser, why don’t you go back to wherever you came from?”
“I suppose I might as well, since you are so plainly capable of looking after yourself.” His drawling voice sounded almost indifferent as he came easily to his feet without any signs of embarrassment and stretched, making Alexa remember guiltily a picture she had once seen—a painting of a naked man that Uncle John had told her was a reproduction of a sculpture by Michelangelo. There were the muscles rippling under smooth skin, the width of shoulders narrowing down to the hips. And she remembered unwillingly and far too well the hardness she had felt pressing along her thighs. Although she had not been told too much about what Harriet termed “certain unpleasant topics,” she had lived for most of her life on a plantation, and the South Indian laborers were remarkably open and uninhibited about every facet of their lives. Since she understood their language she had heard many things she had not quite understood until now. Until tonight…
“Good night, sweet moonwitch. Or should I say good morning? You really should hurry back before they send a search party out for you.”
She would have dearly enjoyed the pleasure of shooting him if he had given her only the slightest provocation, Alexa thought. How dare he pretend to tease her in such a familiar fashion?
“Oh, go away! And I hope you drown!”
“You really are a vicious little bitch, aren’t you? Well, don’t worry, I’m a good swimmer, and my ship isn’t as far away as she looks. Adios!”
She might have actually fired her pistol at him after that impudent speech and the crude expression he’d used to describe her; but his body was already cleaving the silverblack surface of the water by the time she thought of it, disappearing underneath it and staying under long enough to make her stand there irresolutely while she wondered if perhaps he’d dived into a place that was too shallow and was drowning…?
And then she heard a low whistle and saw him, well beyond the inlet now and out to sea, turning lazily onto his back for an instant to lift one arm in a mocking salute before he began to swim in earnest again, making for the distant-seeming ship whose lights she had noticed much earlier.
So he was nothing more than a common sailor, with a different woman in every port, no doubt! And thank God I am not likely to set eyes on him ever again, Alexa thought guiltily, not wanting to be reminded of her own weakness. It had been her fault for giving in to ridiculous flights of fancy, a willing victim caught in a moon-spun web of dreams. Practical—Aunt Harry was right, of course. Only children allowed themselves to play at games of make-believe.
In spite of all her self-castigation, Alexa could not help turning to look after him just once more—an unwilling glance over her shoulder. But the moon was dipping low over the horizon by now and turning to gold; and she could make out nothing at all against the pewtered surface of the sea.
As if she had been a wraith, Menika suddenly seemed to materialize from nowhere as Alexa turned back again.
“I waited here for the missy, where the light of the moon did not shine in my eyes and blind me. But please, we must hurry now!”
It was much wiser and much safer not to ask questions, Alexa supposed as she followed the girl silently. Not even of herself, perhaps; like wondering how she might be feeling now if she had yielded to the temptation of a devil moon and a man who had reminded her of Lucifer himself.
5
Both silent, each wrapped in her own thoughts, the two young women, who were so unlike each other except for being about the same age, were fortunate enough to regain the safety of Alexa’s room without being discovered. Luckily for them the young soldiers who had the night watch were too busy fighting sleepiness at this hour of the morning to be as alert as they were supposed to be; and even more fortunately, Aunt Harry was still asleep and snoring lightly when Alexa finally went back to bed.
Alexa had already decided, very firmly, that nothing had happened. She had slept the night through, with Menika watching over her, and even if she had dreamed occasionally…well, dreams were nothing more than figments of a fevered imagination and had no significance at all.
After going down alone to an early breakfast, Harriet shook her head at finding her niece still asleep when she came back upstairs. Alexa’s pillow was hugged to her and the rumpled sheet barely covered her hips. Really, Harriet thought exasperatedly, I must try and make Alexa understand that young ladies—any lady for that matter—do not go to bed quite naked. Alexa possessed at least four pretty nightgowns, none of which she had ever worn yet. What must the servants think?
Looking about the room, Harriet’s observant eyes had noticed that there was fresh fruit and a fresh carafe of water placed by Alexa’s bed, and that her rumpled traveling dress had been washed, starched and pressed already before being carefully laid across the back of a brocade-covered chair. Well, at least they were efficient here. And they ought to be, Harriet thought grimly; with more than a hundred servants running about, each trained to do but one particular task. Even at informal meals there was a servant stationed behind the chair of each guest, ready to spring forward if necessary. She thought it a ridiculous waste of government funds, but of course the governors of a British crown colony were supposed to keep up certain standards of style and elegance, and the ball tonight, she hoped, would prove an example of both.
Alexa stirred and mumbled in her sleep, burrowing her face against the pillow she hugged so fiercely. What a child she could be sometimes, while at others…But it was high time the girl woke up and took some nourishment. Why, her hair alone would require hours of careful detangling and brushing out before it was ready to be styled. Bending down, Harriet shook the sleeping girl’s shoulder firmly.
“Alexa! Out of bed with you quickly, before they bring up the breakfast I ordered for you. Please have the good taste to wear a nightgown and that pretty wrapper your mama had made for you. And it’s no use your pretending you’re still too fast asleep to hear me, either. Up this instant, my girl!”
Recognizing, even in