The Rebels: The Kent Family Chronicles (27 page)

Caleb saw them part way down the stairs:

“Mrs. Kent, the pleasure’s entirely mine. Be assured I’ll call on you promptly with my proposal.”

“I’ll look forward to it.”

From above, Captain Rackham called, “Well both come if you wish.”

Philip said harshly, “That won’t be necessary.”

Caleb glared at the other captain. Ignoring him, Rackham lifted his mug in a wry salute:

“Whatever you say, sir.”

As they left the head of the noisy wharf, Philip said, “Anne, I disliked that Rackham fellow on sight. A low, scurvy sort.”

“I agree. I didn’t care for the looks he gave me.”

“Stay clear of him.”

“I intend to. I’ll make sure I deal only with Captain Caleb. He’s obviously a man of good character. If we’re lucky, we stand to make a great deal of money.”

“Yes, aside from associating with Rackham, I think the gamble could be worth it. And I’m not saying that just because I have no choice.”

Despite his smile, he was troubled. In minutes, he had become less concerned about the financial risk than about Caleb’s partner—who would be within a few miles of his wife after he had gone back to Morristown.

Anne sensed his worry. “Don’t fret,” she said, tucking her free arm around his. “I’ve handled worse than a ruffian sailor before. I can do it again if need be.”

Still, the February sun seemed a mite more chilly, and the prospect of financial gain from privateer shares much less appealing.

But he knew his wife. Anne was a determined woman. So he said nothing more about it.

S
OMETIMES WHEN THE
summers heat of Caroline County weighed too heavily in the cabin, Lottie liked to start their lovemaking outdoors. Tonight was one of those times. Judson heard her call from the darkness under Torn Shaw’s apple tree that had failed to come to bud in the spring:

“Darlin’, hurry up!”

Leaning in the cabin door, Judson tilted the jug of corn across the back of his thin forearm and drained the last of it. He dropped the jug beside the lolling yellow hound. The dog’s tongue dripped moisture drop by slow drop.

A red-hued, steamy moon hung three quarters up from the horizon. Judson could hear Lottie preparing for him; soft sounds of her skirt and blouse being put aside counterpointed the harping of night insects. By now Judson had tired of Lottie. But he’d had no place else to live when he rode home from Philadelphia the preceding summer.

He hadn’t even considered stopping at Sermon Hill. Simply out of the question. To postpone the return to Caroline County even further, he’d bypassed it and spent a week in the stews of Richmond. There, in a brothel, he’d encountered an acquaintance from his home county. Once the red-faced young squire had gotten over his embarrassment at being recognized, he and Judson fell to drinking, and thus Judson picked up word that Lottie’s marital status had changed while he was away. She couldn’t go home to her mother and father; they had married her off solely to get rid of her and create a little more room in a squalid shanty still crowded with six smaller children. So, Judson’s acquaintance related, Lottie had been forced to set herself up in business, accommodating any planter’s boy with a few shillings and a randy feeling in his breeches. Judson went to see her and they reached an accommodation; an accommodation helped along by Donald’s sense of responsibility.

Early on, Donald visited the cabin—Judson having made no special effort to conceal his presence. Donald politely asked his younger brother to go somewhere else besides Caroline County. On that occasion, Judson—as usual—was half drunk. He bluntly refused Donald’s request, offering the very reasonable explanation that he had nowhere else to go.

That stoked Donald’s anger:

“I don’t care—and I don’t want any of your damned impertinence. You’ve disgraced yourself, Judson. In Philadelphia you completely betrayed the trust I placed in you—”

“Oh, so you heard. I wondered.”

“You’ve been back home three weeks. Express letters from Pennsylvania travel almost as quickly.”

“Who wrote you?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“Well, I hope you’re not going to lecture me about killing that damn Tory—I assume you know about that too?”

“That information was also contained in the letter—” Judson’s older brother sighed. “But I won’t lecture. It seems you’ve gone far past the point where mere words will avail—”

“For Christ’s sake stop talking like the old man.”

In that wheezy, unhealthy voice, Donald said, “Nastiness seems to be your stock in trade, Judson. Let’s get back to the issue. If you insist on spending your days here—”

“I told you I’ve no place else!”

“—then be so good as to be reasonably discreet. Keep yourself and your whore out of sight as much as possible.”

Judson shrugged. “That won’t be hard. I don’t have a penny left. Before I came back and made my arrangement with Lottie, I spent my last on a little—ah—holiday in Richmond.”

“Very well, then. I’ll make a bargain with you. Don’t flaunt yourself all over the county and I’ll return from time to time—” He fished in his coat, pulled out a small purse that jingled in his hand.

Judson grinned suddenly:

“You came prepared for a little bribery!”

“Because I suspected you wouldn’t go away,” Donald admitted.

“Shrewd. You always were the clever one of us, Donald. The one Father half admired—”

“Have the decency to let that subject drop. I am sick to death of what you’ve permitted yourself to become. I should turn my back on you—just as every respectable citizen in this county will do—”

“When it’s a chance encounter in public,” Judson smirked, recalling the young squire in the Richmond brothel. The point escaped Donald. He went on:

“I should abandon you, but I find I can’t. Not completely, anyway.”

This time, Judson laughed aloud: “Then the bloodline
is
improving from father to son! The old man takes the opposite view. At least where I’m concerned.”

“Spare me your hatred, for God’s sake!” Donald flung the purse on the ground. “I will see you again—here—
if
you’ve kept your distance. As I say, I can’t properly explain why I should take the trouble when apparently all you want is to go down to ruin—” The puffy face wrenched. “It’s my curse to be unable to forget we’re brothers. But believe me, Judson—any public scandal and I will forget. Forever.”

Scooping up the purse, Judson bowed low. “You, Donald, have the misfortune to be an honorable man.”

“No, damme—only a very weak and foolish one.”

With that he summoned the black who’d been sent to wait out by the road. The black helped Donald mount and the two rode away—

The conversation came to mind this July evening in 1777 because Judson suddenly recalled that his most recent purse from Donald was almost empty. He took an unsteady step into the dooryard, wondering if his brother would pay another call soon—

More immediate concerns re-focused his thoughts. Lottie’s voice whined in the shadows under the dead apple tree:

“What the devil are you doin’, Jud? Stop thinkin’ about it and come do it, sweet—”

How many Virginia gentlemen have their own private whores?
he thought mockingly as he shambled toward her in the humid dark.
Raised from the depths of her foul degradation courtesy of my soft-hearted brother, she accommodates my every wish here on my splendid private estate
—

He glanced past the corner of the cabin, saw the white puff of a rabbit’s tail. The rabbit was hunting edible leaves in the pathetic garden patch Judson had tried to plant in the spring weather. Hardly any of the seeds had sprouted.

Dying. Everything dying
—

In a year Judson had lost about twenty pounds. Gone from fashionable slimness to near-emaciation. His unkempt beard had sprouted fairer than his hair. His mouth, moonlit as he crossed the yard, looked softer than ever. Sweat ran down his bare chest toward the first swelling of an old man’s belly. He wore only ragged trousers—

Well, what difference did it make? He had nothing to dress for; no purpose beyond sheer, perverse continuation of his existence. His days and nights passed in a haze that was like the haze of the summer moon. Indistinct, vaguely unreal—

For a year he’d roamed the back roads with the yellow hound; fished in creeks; worked as little as possible, and slept a lot. When he tired of that, he played one-hand card games with a worn deck he’d bought from a peddler’s wagon. When his need or Lottie’s grew too fierce, fornication brought a moment’s release. But not much more.

And of course Donald’s money bought distilled popskull from the dirt farmers in the county—

“Wish you’d saved a drop of that corn for me,” Lottie complained as he reached the tree. “I’m so damn dry—”

Judson dropped his breeches and squatted beside her, his hand reaching out to begin the wearying routine.

“Oh, we’ll have that fixed in a minute, Lottie—”

She giggled, widening the spread of her legs to allow him a freer access. He ran one palm down the slope of her breast, aware of the premature sag of her flesh. Very quickly he tired of the fondling. He dropped over her and began to work.

Somehow, rolling and clutching at one another, they moved a short distance from the dead trunk of the apple tree. All at once, braced above her on his hands, Judson realized where they were. He wrenched away, sickened—

On coming home to Caroline County, he’d learned that Tom Shaw had been killed one night riding patrol. A fox had spooked his horse. He’d tumbled off the runaway, breaking his neck. Lottie couldn’t afford to bury him anywhere but on his own property.

Now, seeing Judson’s stark eyes blazing in the moon, Lottie giggled again. She reached between his legs:

“Come on, darlin’, you don’t believe all those church stories about souls flyin’ around once the body’s planted. The old fool don’t know we’re doin’ it right on top of him—”

His face almost demented-looking, Judson stared at the crude wood cross just beyond Lottie’s tangled hair. Lottie jerked her hand back:

“Listen, Judson Fletcher! You got me all worked up. You got to finish what you—”

He slammed at her cheek with the back of his right hand. Her head snapped over. She yelled, a low, hurt sound. He jumped up, ran from the grave to the far side of the dead apple tree, leaned his forearm on the rotting trunk, and his forehead on his arm.

Behind him, Lottie was panting, half frightened, half furious:

“You’re turnin’ into a crazy man.
A crazy man!”

In the stillness of the summer dark, he said nothing to deny it. He was sick of her sluttish voice and sluttish ways—because of what they told about him.

His refusal to answer only angered her more:

“You gonna talk to me, or you gonna stand there staring like some stupid, moonstruck—?”

He whirled on her. She’d clambered to her feet, rushed at him, one hand lifted as if she wanted to use her nails on his cheeks; his eyes. When she saw his ugly stare, the hand lowered quickly.

“I’ve had enough of you, Lottie. Leave.”

“Leave?
This here’s my property, not yours—”

“You want to be buried on your property, Lottie? That’s the only way you’re going to stay around here—buried beside that poor wretch lying yonder. I’ll give you till dawn to pack up and get out.”

He flung her hand away like some befouled object, snatched up his breeches and hurried toward the road.

He didn’t have a notion of where he’d spend the rest of the night. But he couldn’t stand to spend it with her.

He heard her screaming at him:

“You’ll be sorry you treated me like this, Mr. Judson Fletcher. You’ll be goddamn sorry, I promise you—!”

He walked faster, pausing only long enough to tug on the filthy trousers. Threatening him, was she? Maybe that meant she was going to respond to his own, completely honest threat of physical harm—and get out. It was some small encouragement—

But he had to suffer the sound of her yammering voice for a good quarter mile before distance and the racketing night insects finally stilled it.

Three mornings later, Judson groaned and rolled over on the straw pallet in the cabin. The yellow hound was licking at his arm.

Judson heard rain through the hole in the roof near the fireplace,
plip-plop,
then another sound—the splash of the hoofs of a horse in puddles in the yard. Before he could stand up and pull on his breeches, the cabin door opened.

Supporting himself on his cane and favoring his bandaged left foot, Donald hobbled in. Outside, standing with two sets of reins in his hand—and getting soaked because that was his function at the moment—Judson recognized the house slave who always accompanied Donald on his trips from Sermon Hill. The young black had charge of Donald’s horse and his own pony. His eyes shone, big and white in the steamy gray of the morning. He was peering toward the cabin, perhaps hoping for a glimpse of its notorious inhabitant.

“Shut the goddamned door,” Judson said, holding his head.

“I will if you put your pants on and try to behave like something halfway human.” Donald pushed the squeaking door closed with his cane.

Climbing into his trousers, Judson let go with a sour-tasting belch. “A little moral remonstrance before I get the monthly dole? Well, you can keep ’em both!”

Donald colored. But he refused to be provoked:

“The Shaw woman’s left you?”

“That’s right, I got a bellyful of her and told her to pack up.”

“Certainly cavalier of you—considering it was her husband who owned this place.”

Judson spat one quick epithet to show what he thought of that sarcastic quibble. He rubbed his eyes, yawned, asked:

“How’d you find out she was gone?”

“Very simple. She’s already selling her fine wares in Richmond. A friend of mine came back from there yesterday. He said Lottie’s informing everyone that you’ve lost your mind.”

That brought a smirk to Judson’s mouth. “Could well be, Donald, could well be. How’s the lord of Sermon Hill taking the news?”