“Your sister is coming from Williamsburg, and we shall go together as a foursome.”
“Eliza never misses a frolic.” Esmée placed the invitation on a shelf. “She and Quinn are a popular pair. They dance divinely.”
“As do you.” At last he moved away from the window. “I shall be your proud escort. No doubt you’ll not lack dance partners, even at eight and twenty. ’Tis not too late, you know . . .”
Not too late for love, for marriage.
The ongoing lament was now a familiar song. “I’ve no wish to wed and leave you, Father. An occasional frolic is enough for me. Besides, who would manage the shop? Your other business ventures take all your time. You don’t even like chocolate.”
He chuckled. “’Twas your mother’s preoccupation. But she came by it honestly, being a chocolatier’s daughter.”
“A preoccupation I am happy to continue.” Esmée eyed the almonds for any imperfections. “At least for now. I’ve none of Eliza’s ambitions. I want to live simply. Be of benefit to somebody somewhere.”
She reached for the commonplace book stuffed with recipes penned in Mama’s faded, scrolling hand. The secrets of the chocolatier’s trade. She’d not exchange the old book for a chest of buried treasure . . . or a husband.
Smoothing her soiled apron, Esmée set the chatelaine at her waist clanking. Crafted of sterling silver, it had been her mother’s, a practical yet whimsical piece of jewelry she was rarely without.
“Be that as it may”—her father cleared his throat—“you were in love once.”
His low words rolled across the empty shop like a rogue wave, swamping and nearly upending her. Schooling her astonishment, she stared at him. “A foolish infatuation I’ve since recovered from.”
“Have you?” He kept his gaze on Water Street. “Or is it more you met a man who’s made every would-be suitor of yours unworthy ever since?”
How pithy he could be. How wise. But how wrong he was about this antiquated matter.
“A man who set me aside for the sea.” Esmée untied her apron and hung it from a wall peg. “A man who is deemed a respectable privateer in some circles but a pirate prince in others.”
He looked at her then, no apology in his weather-beaten features. “I don’t mean to nettle you, Daughter. I only mention it because there’s been talk that Captain Lennox has returned to the colonies.”
Her hands fisted in the folds of her skirt. Though she’d been about to retreat into the kitchen, all such practicalities flew out of her benumbed head.
“The scuttlebutt is he intends to finish the lighthouse on Indigo Island. And I must say I heartily approve. Virginia—Chesapeake Bay—has ne’er needed it so much as now. Guard ships are not enough. We must have a light.”
The light that was my idea and he abandoned upon our heated parting.
Her father talked on, unaware of the maelstrom in her head and heart. “No doubt that and his usual business bring him back, owner and part owner of several vessels as he is.”
Captain Lennox—Henri—hadn’t been home for years, at least not on the streets of York. Last she knew he’d been sailing the trade routes of the Spanish Main, his many exploits printed in the Virginia Gazette. Of late he held the record for the fastest sailing time, some 240 miles in less than a day. Exploits she’d dismissed as more fancy than fact. Betimes he seemed more ghost, haunting the coast.
Haunting her.
She’d grown used to thinking him afar off, not hazarding a meeting on some side street in York or even Williamsburg. The very possibility of stumbling across him had her all aflutter, her claimed recovery in question.
“Time for supper.” With a jangling of keys, her father locked the front door. “I’ll walk up the hill and home with you after I dismiss the indentures.”
She hardly heard him, lost as she was in the tattered memories of the past. His footsteps retreated, but his hard words outlasted him.
“You were in love once.”
Absently she fiddled with her chatelaine, toying with the ornamental chain with its many pins and clasps. It bore several significant trinkets. A key. Scissors. A watch. A pincushion ball. A needle case. A heart-shaped vinaigrette and another for sweetmeats.
Even a tiny silver lighthouse.
CHAPTER
two
Henri’s homecoming had been as silent and stealthy as he could make it. He’d struck his vessel’s colors, emptied her of all crew, and moored the Relentless at the island’s opposite end, facing the mainland and not the Atlantic. Now, climbing rickety, weathered steps to the stone cottage he once called home, Henri stowed his captaincy as he’d soon stow his tarred garments.
Behind him trod Cyprian, his steward and a native of the Mosquito Coast. Clad in trews and a Monmouth cap, he was still barefoot, as he was when on the deck.
“You needn’t shadow me,” Henri said over his shoulder. “You’re as deserving of a pint and freedom as all the rest.”
“Aye, sir. But first I must see this pile of sand ye call home—and the light tower ye oft speak of.” Cyprian’s dark eyes reflected new appreciation. “Are ye lord and master of all the island?”
“Such as it is, aye. But not the ordinary on Indigo’s opposite end. That is Mistress Saltonstall’s business.”
“And who is this woman, sir?”
“The widow of one of my ablest sailors, God rest him,” Henri replied, anticipating his next question. “When he died he left her enough prize money to build the ordinary.”
“She will not care ye seek yer cottage instead?”
“Nay.” Henri reached into the bosom of his shirt and withdrew a coral necklace. “Give her my regards. I’ll pay her a visit in time. For now, she’ll be hard-pressed to keep up with you henhearted numbskulls.”
Cyprian laughed. “We shall drink and eat our fill and tie our hammocks to the trees tonight, then row to the mainland tomorrow?”
“I row to the mainland. You stay and careen the vessel.”
“So my role as steward ends? Ye’ll be alone tonight? Is that not lonesome?”
“Nay.”
Even as he uttered the half-truth, Henri wished it back. How could he explain the pure pleasure of profound solitude after crowded months at sea? The disorienting process of regaining one’s equilibrium as well as one’s land legs, which were better acquired alone?
They came to the cottage, tarrying outside its locked door. His gaze swept the shore, the sunburnt grasses and sand, till it came to rest on the half-finished light tower rising like a smokeless candle over the beach.
Cyprian’s mouth sagged when he saw it. Recovering himself, he gave an admiring whistle. “Ye’ll finish the light?”
“It requires a stonemason and a glass top.” Henri discarded the longing he felt when he looked at it. In memory it stood taller, needed less work. The keeper’s cottage was finished, at least, though it would remain empty till the tower was done.
Would it always remind him of Esmée?
The boxy lines of his cottage—deceptively plain outwardly—were softened in the September gloaming. He unlocked the door, and it creaked open at the push of his hand. As Henri entered, Cyprian all but gaped on the threshold. Fine furnishings. Colorful Turkish carpets. Framed maps. Dutch paintings in gilt frames.