The Queen's Lady by Barbara Kyle

Author:Barbara Kyle [Kyle, Barbara]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, General, C429, Extratorrents, Kat
ISBN: 9781780335605
Publisher: Canvas
Published: 1994-09-01T00:00:00+00:00

20

Speedwell

“Boat off starboard bow!” the bosun shouted.

Richard Thornleigh looked up from his charts spread out in the sterncastle cabin of his new ship. He pushed away from the table so suddenly it made the chair legs screech on the floor and the horn lantern beside his charts tremble. He strode to the door and pulled it. It stuck. Curse fresh carpentry, he thought, and kicked its base to loosen it. He stomped down the four stairs to the main deck. As he crossed to starboard, several crewmen backed out of his way.

At the railing Thornleigh glowered out at the skiff skimming toward the ship through the twilight. Honor stood in the bow, obscuring Jinner at the oars. One corner of her emerald green cloak fluttered behind her like some great butterfly’s wing. Thornleigh clenched his teeth. Damn! You’d think she’d have learned by now to keep low. He glanced back across the deck and frowned at the shore. Lights were glinting in the towers of Yarmouth’s medieval wall and in a couple of the windmills scattered on the beach. And three ships—a pair of Dutch carracks and an English coaster—lay at anchor not far from his own stern. Anyone could be watching. He looked back at the skiff and saw why Honor was standing. A low hump covered the space between her and Jinner. Well, at least she’d had the sense to cover the old man with a tarpaulin.

The skiff bumped alongside the ship. Thornleigh jerked his head at a crewman to throw the rope ladder over the side. Honor scampered up it. Thornleigh strode over to her and asked in a furious whisper, “What in the name of the fornicating Devil have you been up to?”

“Collecting your cargo,” she whispered back. “Better late than never, they say.”

“Who says it?” he boomed. Then, whispering again, “Curse you for a Turk, woman, this crew of mine would not be likely to say it. Not with their necks stretched under a gibbet! Where have you—”

But she had turned away and was signaling down to the skiff. Thornleigh looked down at a wizened face peering out from under the tarpaulin. The fugitive crawled out and stood—a stooped, wrinkled old man. He cautiously peeled back the tarpaulin, revealing three curled figures: a boy of about four and a pale young woman with a baby in her arms. Thornleigh was shocked into silence.

Honor beckoned the fugitives to hurry up the ladder. She pulled them the last few feet and pushed them gently on deck one after another, like a cat moving her kittens. They huddled together. Thornleigh could see that they were limp with fear, seeing his glaring face. Jinner came up last.

Honor wrapped her arm around the little boy’s shivering shoulders. She reassured him with a gentle voice, even as her eyes struck sparks of defiance off Thornleigh’s. “Master Thornleigh means no harm, lad,” she said. “He’s just very careful of his ship.”

Thornleigh wanted to shake her, but he swallowed his anger. Madness to wrangle out here in the open.

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