A week later, Lilah stood on the gently rocking deck of the Swift Wind, its white sails billowing against a blue sky overhead, the sound of popping rigging in her ears. Her arms were wrapped around herself in a futile attempt to ward off the stiff sea breeze. She was staring out over the rail toward the far horizon in a desperate attempt not to be aware of the slaves jumping up and down some twenty paces farther along the deck. Kevin was pacing amongst them, shouting, "Jump, you devils, jump!" and prodding malingerers in the leg with the cane he carried in one hand. The chains that were wrapped around the slaves' waists and wrists and bound them to one another clanked noisily as they obeyed. Bare feet thudded arrhythmically on the boards of the deck.
The ship skipped through curling white-capped waves, the sun dipped toward the horizon in a beautiful display of crimson and pink and orange, and playful spumes of salt spray splattered the fine blue muslin of her skirt every few minutes. Lilah took in none of this. Her whole consciousness was focused on Joss's tall form leaning against the rail perhaps fifteen feet beyond her. His injured ribs had exempted him from the exercising Kevin required of the other slaves, and the chain that ordinarily would link him to the others was undone. She wasn't even looking at him, and yet she was conscious of every shift of his feet. She hated herself for being so aware of him, for even thinking about him now that she had done her Christian duty by rescuing him from the horrible fete he would almost certainly have faced after the auction block. After all, she now knew exactly who and what he was, so there was no excuse she could offer for her weakness in not eradicating him and what had happened between them from her thoughts. But no matter how she wrestled with herself, she was as sensitized to him as a poison ivy sufferer is to the plant. She could not help being aware of him whenever he was anywhere near her vicinity. She refused to give in to it, though; refused even to glance around at him as her instincts urged her to do-now, while Kevin had his back turned, his attention fully occupied with the rest of the slaves. No one would ever know, except herself. And maybe Joss. She had the feeling that he was as aware of her presence as she was of his.
Ever the conscientious overseer, Kevin was careful to bring the Heart's Ease slaves up on deck for fresh air and exercise almost daily, depending upon the weather. It was simply good business, he'd responded when, surprised and unnerved to set eyes on Joss surfacing with the other slaves the second day they were on board, Lilah had questioned him. The slaves represented a major investment; he wanted to get them back to Heart's Ease in reasonable health and able to do the work they were bought to do. All but one of the other owners of slaves were content to leave their property to get by as best they might with no fresh air or sunlight for the duration of the voyage, but Kevin was not.
He was right, Lilah knew, yet Joss's presence in the rough slave garb that Kevin had issued to all those bound for Heart's Ease made her uneasy. Cleaned up now, his hair restored to glossy coal black waves tied by a bit of string at his nape and the unsightly growth of whiskers gone from his face, he was much as she remembered him from that magical night. The only difference in his appearance was his slave-issue clothes-a loosely woven white shirt and poor-quality black breeches-and the absence of that dashing mustache. Slaves did not sport mustaches. The bruises on his face were nearly healed, and she guessed that the rest of his injuries were mending as fast. If it had not been for the chain around his waist-used to link him to the other slaves when they were on deck-and linking his wrists, she would have had trouble remembering that he was a slave like the rest.
But she had to remember. To allow herself to forget for even a moment would be dangerous to the fragile peace of mind she had achieved since she had accepted Kevin's proposal. And if Kevin were to suspect that she felt the slightest interest in Joss above and beyond the dictates of Christian charity, her forgetfulness would be dangerous for Joss as well. Kevin could be ruthless when it came to protecting his possessions, and as his fiancee she was now considered exactly that. To say nothing of the fact that Kevin and her father and the rest of her acquaintances would be horrified, scandalized and sickened if they guessed that she could not get the gleaming green eyes of a slave out of her mind.
To guard against the possibility of any unwary look revealing her secret, Lilah usually made it a point not to be on deck when the slaves were brought up. But on this particular afternoon she had left the stuffy confines of the cabin she shared with Betsy hoping to regain her usual good spirits with a few swift turns around the deck and the breathing of some brisk sea air, and had lost all track of the time. Then, when Kevin had shepherded the slaves up not twenty feet from where she stood, she had not wanted to rush away for fear of drawing his attention to her discomfort in their-Joss's-presence. She had lived with and around slavery all her life. She took the daily presence of slaves around her as much for granted as she did air to breathe. Never before had she felt the least uneasy around any of them, even the rawest of the gullahs. But it was difficult to consider Joss a slave like those others.
Oh, how she longed to be at home again! It seemed like forever since she had set foot on Barbados's sun- soaked earth. Strangely, now that she was closer to home than she had been for nearly five months, she was homesick. In another three weeks or so, if the weather held, the Swift Wind would drop anchor in Bridgetown Bay. And she could put these last dreadful weeks from her mind for good…
"I brought you a shawl, Miss Lilah. You look cold, wrapping yourself up in your arms that way." Betsy came to stand beside her, holding out the lovely Norwich silk shawl that had been a parting gift from Lilah's great-aunt. Grateful for this new distraction, Lilah turned around to smile at her maid. Then she looked down at the shawl Betsy held out to her and shook her head.
"Thank you, Betsy, but I don't want it. In fact, you may have it, if you like."
"This pretty thing? Why, you don't want to give it away! It's new!"
"I guess I can give you a gift if I want to, Betsy. Put it on, you hear?"
Betsy looked at her for a moment, her eyes seeing more than Lilah was comfortable revealing. Then she looked down at the shawl in her hand, and fingered the heavy white silk. "If you say so, Miss Lilah." Betsy wrapped the elegant shawl over the serviceable tan cotton dress she wore and looked down at the six-inch-long fringe as the wind fluttered it against her skirt. "Like my mam would say, gold teeth don' suit hog mouth."
That was a saying common in Barbados meaning that elegant things looked out of place on those who weren't used to them. Lilah shook her head at her maid. "Maida would not say that, and you know it. The shawl looks lovely on you. Ben better look out when you get back. You'll get him this time for sure." Lilah added that last with a teasing half smile.
"What makes you think I want him?" Betsy retorted, tossing her head and grinning. Lilah grinned back at her maid.
"You’ve been after Ben since you were fifteen years old. You can't fool me."
Betsy suddenly looked grave. "Well, you sure ain't been after Mr. Kevin, Miss Lilah! You can't fool me, either."
Lilah turned back to her contemplation of the sea.
"I don't want to hear any more talk like that," she said sternly.
"Pooh!" Betsy's pretty lips turned up in what was very close to a sneer. "You don't want to hear the truth, is all. You was always like that, even as a little girl. But us who loves you, will tell you: Mr. Kevin's not for you."
"I'm going to marry him," Lilah said determinedly, the lift of her chin signalling that the conversation was closed. Betsy ignored the hint, as Lilah should have known she would. After a lifetime's association, mistress and maid were mere titles. Betsy was family, and family could be as irritating as a burr under a saddle.
"You'll do what you want, just like you always do, but if I were you I'd wait. The right man will come along for you one day. He always do."
"Kevin is the right man for me."
"Mr. Kevin's the right man for your pa and Heart's Ease. He's not the right man for you. And you know it, Miss Lilah, deep down. You're just too stubborn to admit it."
"That's enough, Betsy. I don't want to talk about it anymore!" Lilah glared at her maid. Betsy went on inexorably.
' 'You don't even like him to kiss you! What you going to do when he gets into bed with you when you're married?"
Lilah's cheeks flushed. "You were spying!" she accused heatedly, knowing that Betsy referred to the scene that had taken place between herself and Kevin the night before.
He had walked her to her cabin after a late turn about the deck. When she opened the door to go in, he had surprised her by stepping inside with her, pushing the door almost closed behind them. Betsy had been asleep-she'd thought!-in the upper berth, but still the cabin was dark and it was late and they were much too private to be completely respectable. She'd looked up at Kevin inquiringly; it wasn't like him to be unconventional. Without a word he'd pulled her hard against his body and covered her mouth with his. The impression she'd formed of his kiss was that he was trying to eat her lips with his mouth. The greedy wetness of his tongue slobbering over her clamped mouth made her feel sick to her stomach. This kiss was nothing like the soft fire of… no, she must not remember that. Angry, she'd pushed Kevin away. He apologized immediately, and kissed her hand in gentle remorse before taking himself off, but the whole incident had left her uncomfortable. Was that the kind of thing she could expect from him when they were married? And then it would not be so easy just to push him away…
"I was awake," Betsy corrected, very much on her dignity. "I saw him try to kiss you, and I saw you act like you was going to throw up. That's no way to feel about the man you're meaning to marry, Miss Lilah."
"What do you know about it?" Lilah retorted heatedly, angry because Betsy's words came too close to her own misgivings.
Betsy looked smug. "I know plenty. I kept company with John Henry for a year, and then there was Norman and-well, never you mind. What I'm tellin' you is that
I never felt like that when any of them kissed me. And if Ben ever kissed me… Miss Lilah, he'd have to pry me off him with a boat hook! That's how you should feel about the man you're going to marry."
"Ladies don't feel that way about things like that," Lilah said, though with another slight twinge of unease as she once again remembered the excitement of other lips on hers… Resolutely she pushed the forbidden memory away. That single night of madness was not going to be permitted to color her whole life. It had been a night apart from reality, no more substantial than a dream. And she'd better keep that firmly in mind!
Betsy hooted inelegantly. "If you say so, Miss Lilah. But you know and I know you're only fooling yourself. Ladies and maids, we're all alike under the skin-we're women."
The slaves, finally done with their exercising for the day, slogged past, chains clanking as they headed toward the hatchway. Lilah averted her eyes to avoid looking at Joss, now chained securely at the end of the line. Betsy's eyes sharpened.
"You telling me you didn't feel like that with him?" Betsy asked softly, watching Lilah's face with keen knowledge. "You forget, Miss Lilah, I've known you since you was a little girl. And I saw how happy and excited you were, changing into something 'ravishing' for him. You ain't ever been like that before or since! All right, he wasn't the right man for you either, but if you could feel that way about him you could feel that way about another man one day. Don't just settle for Mr. Kevin 'cause you think he's safe! Settling's for old women and old hens, not for a pretty young lady like you!"
"I'm not settling! And I don't want to discuss it anymore!"
"All right, bury your head in the sand if you want to! Me, I've got work to do!"
With a sniff, Betsy took herself off, leaving Lilah to brood. Secretly she feared that there was more than a grain of truth to what Betsy said. Kevin's gentlest kiss did nothing more than rouse in her a desire to wipe her mouth. The one he had tried to give her the previous night had brought with it a tide of revulsion so strong that it had made her feel physically ill. She was not a child; she had a fair idea of what the physical side of marriage entailed. She had just never before taken the time to apply that knowledge to herself and Kevin. Could she let him kiss her like that for the rest of her life, or permit him the kind of intimacies married people shared, the exact details of which were a trifle vague in her mind but she knew involved sharing a bed and begetting children? Could she stand his hands on her naked flesh, not just once or twice but night after night after night for the Lord knew how many years? Lilah actually shivered at the thought. But then her mind ran over all the other men who had begged for her hand over the years, and she realized she couldn't bear the idea of their hands on her either. The only man she'd ever felt the slightest response to was…
She shut her eyes at the shameful image. The only man whose touch she thought she might have been able to bear was at that moment chained in the hold with the rest of the slaves Kevin had bought for Heart's Ease.
Her heart lightened fractionally as an idea occurred to her. Once she was safely home again at Heart's Ease, she might speak to her father about freeing Joss. If Kevin was right, he would probably be nothing but trouble, worse than the Africans brought straight from their mother country to work the fields. Leonard Remy refused to have gullahs on the place. Without generations of slavedom behind them to make them docile, gullahs were too unpredictable, he said. They frequently tried to escape, and were capable of stirring up unrest amongst the other slaves with their hankering for freedom.
Her father wouldn't be hard to convince, she thought, as long as he did not get hold of the idea that she wanted the man freed because she was attracted to him. Which was, of course, an entirely ridiculous idea. She wanted him freed because he was a human being like herself. That that might also apply to Betsy and twenty other slaves at Heart's Ease she refused to consider. This man had no business being enslaved, and should be set free. Once he had his freedom, he would depart from Heart's Ease and Barbados and she need never see him again.
The sun had almost disappeared beneath the horizon, and it was getting increasingly colder by the rail. Lilah shivered. Her dress was long-sleeved, but the thin muslin was no protection against the brisk sea wind. Perhaps she should not have been so swift to turn away Amanda's shawl-but she couldn't wear it. Not after what her great- aunt had done to Joss… There he was again, in her thoughts. Did everything have to remind her of him?