"What the devil are you about, girl, flirting like some demmed Jezebel out here in the dark? You ought to be ashamed of yourself! Your aunt's been looking for you this age!"
Her great-uncle's booming voice finished the process of dragging Lilah back to reality. She took a hasty step away from Joss, who obligingly dropped her arms, and turned to face her fuming uncle as he puffed up the shallow steps. Unlike his wife, Uncle George's bark was far worse than his bite. He was not nearly as gruff as he sounded. She was really very fond of him, and gave him a placating smile as he stomped across die floor toward her. He had once been tall, but he was stooped now with age and required a cane to get around. Still, he was an impressive figure with his thick head of bushy white hair and his elegant black evening clothes slimming a frame that inclined toward portliness around the middle.
"I'm sorry if I worried you, Uncle. But the rose garden was crowded, and-"
"And you wanted to find a spot where your young man here could sneak a kiss," Uncle George finished with devastating accuracy. "No use to try to pull the wool over my eyes, girl, I saw what you was about. But don't let on with your aunt. She's a high stickler, she is. Well, now, am I to expect a visit from you in the morn- ing, young man, asking for my great-niece's hand? Or do I crack this cane over your head here and now?"
"Uncle!" Lilah protested, mortified, as she cast a quick look over her shoulder at Joss. He stood tall and silent behind her, his eyes fixed on Uncle George's face. LUah remembered that he had come to Boxhill on some sort of business that concerned her uncle, and felt a spurt of sympathy toward him. Getting caught kissing one's host's niece was not an ideal way to start a relationship.
"You're not the Burrel boy, are you? Nah, you can't be. His hair's as yeller as Lilah's here. Unless my mind's getting as weak as my knees, I've never seen you before in my life." Uncle George looked at Joss with hard suspicion.
"My name is Jocelyn San Pietro." Joss spoke abruptly, as though he expected the name to have some meaning for the old man. Uncle George glared at Lilah before shifting his eyes back to Joss. Despite her uncle's age and disability, there was suddenly something formidable about him.
"Here in Virginia, we call a man out for less than you've done tonight, sirra. Strangers don't take young ladies out in the dark and kiss them without being called to account for it."
"Uncle…!"
"You hush your mouth, missy! Hell, females got no sense, and this proves it! To come out alone with a man we don't know from Adam-you're lucky I came along when I did! He…"
"I beg your pardon, sir, but you do know me. Or you should. I believe I'm your grandson."
Astounded silence followed this revelation. Lilah stared at Joss, her mouth open, eyes wide. Uncle George and Aunt Amanda had never had children…
"My grandson? What a load of bull feathers! I don't have a…" Uncle George never talked, he bellowed, and he was bellowing now as he reached out to catch Lilah's arm and pull her to him and away from the tall, dark man who stood regarding him inscrutably. The moonlight caught Joss's eyes, making them gleam vividly emerald through the darkness. Uncle George's bluster died. His hand on Lilah's arm tightened painfully as he stared up at Joss. As Lilah watched, her great-uncle's face visibly paled. "Good God! Victoria!"
"Victoria Barton was my grandmother." Joss's voice was expressionless. "Emmelina, her daughter, was my mother. She was also, or so she told me, your daughter. I am sorry to inform you-though I don't believe you ever acknowledged her existence-that she died three months ago. She left some letters for you that I understand were written by her mother, and begged me on her deathbed to deliver them. Once I have executed her commission, I'll take myself off."
"Dear God in heaven." Uncle George sounded as if he were choking. "Victoria! So many years ago! It can't be… You can't be…"
Lilah, suddenly embarrassed, realized that she had no business witnessing this emotion-fraught meeting. Her great-uncle had always longed for a son, and she supposed that this newly discovered grandson would be the next best thing. There were difficulties, of course. Obviously Uncle George had, at some time, fathered a daughter with a woman not his wife, and the man confronting him now was the result of that youthful indiscretion. She looked from Joss's hard, set face to Uncle George's suddenly slack one. The old man looked as if he'd seen a ghost.
"Perhaps you should continue your discussion inside the house?" she suggested, placing her hand on her great-uncle's arm. He shook her off.
"We've nothing to discuss." The old man was more agitated than Lilah had ever seen him. Thinking of her great-aunt Amanda, Lilah understood his concern. If
Uncle George's wife should discover the existence of this grandson, what was left of the old man's life was likely to be miserable indeed. Lilah looked at him in sudden sympathy, only to find that his eyes were fixed on his grandson.
"I want you out of here, now. You hear me, boy?"
"I hear you, old man." Joss reached inside his coat for a slim packet that he held out to his grandfather. Uncle George seemed incapable of taking it. Joss didn't move, didn't relent. After a moment, Lilah reached out and accepted it for her uncle. Neither man spared so much as a glance for her. Their eyes were locked on each other in a silent, bitter war.
"Don't come back here," Uncle George rasped. "Ever. Not to Boxhill, not to Virginia. I don't know what you thought to gain, but there's nothing for you here. You go back to wherever your mama brought you up, and you stay there. You hear?"
Joss moved suddenly, striding across the floor. Lilah's heart was in her throat as she watched him go. He stopped short of the steps, and turned back to look at her.
"I'll see you in the spring. Wait for me."
She nodded. Uncle George made a strangled sound deep in his throat.
"You stay away from her! Delilah Remy, he's no good for you, no good for anything! Damn you, boy, stay in your own part of the world and keep away from me and mine!"
"Uncle George…!"
"I'll go where I please, and do what I please, old man. It's a free world."
"Not for the likes of you, it's not! You stay on your own side of the Atlantic, and don't come around here again! You…"
Uncle George suddenly stopped talking, looked surprised, and clutched at his chest. Then without further warning, he toppled to the floor. Lilah screamed, and tried to catch him as he fell. He was too heavy for her; she couldn't hold him. She dropped to her knees at his side. Joss, his face still taut with rage, was beside her in an instant, his hand going under the old man's coat to feel for his heart.
"Get help. He's in a bad way."
Lilah nodded, and scrambled to her feet, the packet of letters forgotten on the floor. She ran toward the house like a jackrabbit, screaming for Dr. Patterson, who was a guest. By the time she returned with the medical bag the doctor had sent her to fetch, a crowd had gathered by the summerhouse. Slaves holding flaming torches hovered about, providing light for Dr. Patterson. Joss stood grim-faced as he watched the proceedings. Amanda knelt by the sprawled form of her husband, the packet of papers that Lilah had dropped clutched in her hand. Her face was paper white, but she was dry-eyed. On the other side of the old man's body knelt Boot, his face awash with tears, and Dr. Patterson, who was looking across at Amanda's suddenly skeletal face instead of down at her husband. The little tableau left no doubt in Lilah's mind that her great-uncle was dead.