Brianna brushed back a lock of hair and blew out her breath, hardly daring to believe their luck.
“A week from Monday…and it’s Saturday now. God, I wonder how long it will take to get upriver?”
Lizzie crossed herself hastily in atonement for her mistress’s casual blasphemy, but shared in her excitement.
“I dinna ken, but Mrs. Smoots did say as her son’s made the trip once before—we could ask him.”
Brianna swung round on her bench, looking over the room. Men and boys had begun coming in as darkness fell, stopping for a drink or a supper on their way from work to bed, and now there were fifteen or twenty people crammed into the small space.
“Which one is Junior Smoots?” Brianna asked, craning her neck to see through the press of bodies.
“Yonder—the laddie wi’ the sweet brown eyes. I’ll fetch him to ye, shall I?” Emboldened by excitement, Lizzie slipped out of her seat and pushed her way into the throng.
Brianna was still holding the jug of milk, but made no move to pour it into her cup. Her throat was too choked with excitement to swallow. Little more than a week!
* * *
Wilmington was a small town, Roger thought. How many places could she be? If she was here at all. He thought there was a good chance of it; inquiries in the dockside taverns in New Bern had given him the valuable information that the Phillip Alonzo had reached Charleston safely—and only ten days before the Gloriana had docked in Edenton.
It might have taken Brianna anything from two days to two weeks to make her way from Charleston to Wilmington—assuming that she was indeed headed there.
“She’s here,” he muttered. “Damn it, I know she’s here!” Whether this conviction was the result of deduction, intuition, hope, or merely stubbornness, he clung to it like a drowning sailor to a spar.
He had managed the journey from Edenton to Wilmington with a fair amount of ease, himself. Put to work unloading cargo from the Gloriana’s hold, he had carried a chest of tea into a warehouse, set it down, walked back to the door, and busied himself in retying the sweat-soaked kerchief round his head. As soon as the next man had passed him, he stepped out onto the dock, turned right instead of left, and within seconds was headed up the narrow cobbled lane that led from docks to town. By the next morning he’d found a berth as loader on a small cargo boat, transporting naval stores from Edenton to the main depot at Wilmington, there to be transferred to a larger ship for transport to England.
He jumped ship again in Wilmington, without a moment’s compunction. He hadn’t time to waste; there was Brianna to be found.
He knew she was here. Fraser’s Ridge was in the mountains; she’d need a guide, and Wilmington was the most likely port in which to find one. And if she was here, someone would have noticed her; he’d bet money on that. He could only hope the wrong sort of person hadn’t noticed her already.
A quick reconnoiter of the main street and the harbor gave him a count of twenty-three taverns. Christ, these people drank like fish! There was the chance she’d taken a room in a private house, but the taverns were the place to start.
By evening he’d covered ten of the taverns, slowed by the necessity of avoiding any of his erstwhile shipmates. Being in the presence of so much drink, and he without an extra penny to spend, had given him a raging thirst. He hadn’t eaten all day, either, which didn’t help matters.
At the same time, he scarcely noticed the physical discomfort. A man in the fifth tavern had seen her, so had a woman in the seventh. “A tall man wi’ red hair,” the man had said, but “A great huge girl, dressed in men’s breeches,” the woman had said, clicking her tongue in shock. “Walkin’ down the street, plain as you please, with her coat over her arm and her backside in view of everyone!”
Let Roger get that particular backside in his view, he thought with some grimness, and he’d know what to do with it. He begged a cup of water from a kindhearted landlady, and set off with renewed determination.
By the time it was full dark, he had covered another five taverns. The taprooms were full now, and he discovered that the tall redheaded girl in men’s clothing had been causing public comment for nearly a week. The quality of some of this comment caused the blood to throb in his cheeks with outrage, and only the fear of being arrested kept him from outright assault.
As it was, he left the fifteenth tavern after an ugly exchange of words with two drunkards, boiling with fury. Christ, had the woman no sense at all? Did she have no notion what men were capable of?
He stopped in the street and wiped a sleeve across his sweating face. He breathed heavily, wondering what to do next. Keep on, he supposed, though if he didn’t find something to eat soon, he was going to fall flat on his face in the road.
The Blue Bull, he decided. He’d glanced into the shed there as he passed earlier, and seen a good pile of clean straw. He’d spend a penny or two for dinner, and perhaps the owner would let him sleep in the stable for the sake of Christian kindness.
Turning, his eye caught sight of a sign on the house across the road.
WILMINGTON GAZETTEER, JNO. GILLETTE. PROP., it read. Wilmington’s newspaper; one of the few in the Colony of North Carolina. One too many, if you asked Roger. He fought the urge to pick up a rock and hurl it through Jno. Gillette’s window. Instead, he yanked the sodden band off his head and, making an effort to tidy himself into some semblance of decency, turned toward the river and the Blue Bull.
She was there.
She was sitting by the hearth, her tailed hair sparking in the firelight, engaged in conversation with a young man whose smile Roger wanted to wipe off forcibly. Instead, he slammed the door behind him with a crash and started toward her. She turned, startled, and stared blankly at the bearded stranger. Recognition flashed in her eyes, then joy, and a huge smile spread across her face.
“Oh,” she said. “It’s you.” Then her eyes changed, as realization flared up like a brushfire. She screamed. It was a good full-bodied scream, and every head in the tavern snapped round at the sound of it.
“Damn you!” He lunged across the table, and got her by the arm. “What the devil do you think you’re doing?”
Her face had gone dead white, her eyes round and dark with shock. She jerked away, trying to free herself.
“Let go!”
“That I won’t! You’ll come with me, and ye’ll do it this moment!”
Sidling round the table, he got hold of her other arm, jerked her up, whirled her around and pushed her in front of him toward the door.
“MacKenzie!” Damn, it was one of the seamen from the cargo boat. Roger glowered at the man, willing him to keep out of it. Luckily the man was both smaller and older than Roger; he hesitated, but then took courage from the company and lifted his chin pugnaciously.
“What you doing to the lass, MacKenzie? Leave her be!” There was a stir among the crowd, men turning from their drinks, attracted by the uproar. He had to get out of here now, or he wouldn’t get out at all.
“Tell them it’s all right, tell them you know me!” he whispered into Brianna’s ear.
“It’s all right.” Brianna spoke, voice husky with shock, but loud enough to be heard over the growing hubbub. “It’s all right. I—I know him.” The seaman dropped back a little, still dubious. A scrawny young girl in the inglenook had gotten to her feet; she looked frightened to death, but bravely clutched a stone ale bottle in one fist, evidently intending to hit Roger with it, if necessary. Her high-pitched voice rang out above the suspicious grumble of voices.