'And I must endure more of this cruelty?' she gasped. 'Oh, I cannot bear it! I shall have to enter that woman's dreadful house, after all. It's the only place that will take me.'
'There's housekeeping, still,' Alan suggested. 'Quite a few households here on Antigua would hire a young widow who's experienced at caring for children, or such like. It's not as if you had debts.'
She fell back to lay her head on his stomach and hug him.
'Do you think I have not tried, Alan? They have slaves here, not hired servants. And if hired, paid less than a dog's dinner.'
Here comes the sly little hand on my purse-strings, Alan said to himself. Yet she stayed silent, hugging him like a child in her parent's lap. Alright, I'll say it for her and get it over with. Damn fool.
'I could loan you a little to tide you over, Dolly.'
'I'll not hear of it, Alan Lewrie,' she replied, looking up at his face in the gloom. 'If I needs must, I can deal with the humiliation of this shameful trade for a short space, and there are still things to sell of my possessions. Thank you, but the answer is no. I must own that I am only a weak, stupid woman, but I can guess what you may think of me if you do loan me money. I'd like you to think better of me than that.'
'You're serious!' He gaped in astonishment.
'That I am,' she agreed. 'After this delightful experience with you, I would not do anything to cheapen our memories of each other. I'd rather starve first. Oh, how masterful you were. and how kind to me, to take me out of that place rather than shame me by making me behave as those others. I've been such a fool to think that taking money for men to pleasure themselves is possible, even for a little time. You have opened my eyes to how low and base I would have become had you not saved me. I shall treasure you forever for that. And for this.' She teased with a shy smile, and reached down under the sheet to touch his belly and lion's mane.
'Another man may wish you to be his and his alone. Have you heard of mistresses, Dolly?' Alan asked, sounding her out to see if she still rang true, that it was not a whore's lie yet.
'It would be gentler, and safer, would it not?' she asked. 'But, I can think of only one gentleman that I'd care to keep house for.'
Another light brush of her fingers over his groin.
'What about your husband's things, then. Have you sold any of that yet?'
'I have his chest here. But Alan, I could not bear to part with all that I have left of that gentle, wonderful man,' she objected sadly. 'To auction him off to the highest bidder, all that represents what's left of him, it's too horrid to contemplate.'
'Let's see what there is,' Alan said, sliding out of bed. 'Which chest was his?'
'The one with the mirror atop,' she told him, and wrapped the top sheet about her as he put on his long-tailed shirt. They knelt and she unlocked his chest with a key, lifted the lid with all the reverence of a parson opening the bread-box of a Sunday, and he helped her pull out the top tray, which was full of papers and correspondence.
There wasn't much, really. Hats and uniforms of the infantry unit he belonged to. Breeches and stockings, a high pair of boots more suited to a dragoon or horse artillery unit. A cheap watch, and the man's sword, one of middling quality.
'Twenty, twenty-five guineas for the sword,' Alan said with a heavy sigh. 'The boots might go for five, and the watch for ten. The chain and fob are worth more. Maybe one hundred pounds all told.'
'But, Alan, that's one hundred pounds more than I have now,' she said with a childlike burst of hope. 'Though I do hate to part with his sword and watch. I mean, a man's honor, his…'
'Twenty pounds at the least is twenty pounds. He won't be needing a sword where he's gone, and there's no son to inherit,' Alan said with a harsh rasp. He sorted through the papers in the top tray while Dolly fetched their wine glasses and topped them up, bringing a second candle Alan had ordered to better light his perusings.
'At least he didn't leave you any bills from the mess or from his tailor's,' Alan jested. 'Did you contact his fellow officers? What did they say they'd do for you?'
'What any man would pay for.' Dolly frowned. 'They thought him a little silly, I think. And… he wasn't exactly that popular with his fellow officers. I don't know why, but I always got that feeling when we were around them. Some jealousy, some argument or something.'
'Goddamn!' Alan exclaimed, after he had folded out a large sheet of paper all hung with ribands and wax seals. 'You've not talked to them at all?'
'I was afraid they'd sneer at me, Alan,' she whispered.
'Not while you hold his commission document, they wouldn't!'
'What is that?' she said, with all innocence.
'My dear Dolly,' he began, rocked back on his heels by her naivety. 'You know that officers in the British Army
'I meant to have it framed, as a memento, but I couldn't afford to yet,' she said, staring at him goggle-eyed with building wonder.
Why, dear Lord, is every woman I meet and hop into bed with as feeble in the brains as cold, boiled mutton? he wondered to himself with a shake of his head and a reflective grin.
'It costs an ensign in a good regiment three hundred pounds to buy a commission. A lieutenancy goes for about five hundred, and I have it on good authority that a captaincy is worth nigh on a thousand pounds, Dolly. As dear Roger's nearest living relative, the one he's most like willed everything to, you now own it, d'you see, girl? It's like a small-holding, it's yours to sell.' She stared at him as if he wasn't quite getting through to her. 'For
'Oh, Alan!' she shrieked and flung herself on him, bearing him over on his back on the cold bare boards to straddle him and chortle with glee while she rained kisses and squeezed until he thought he might see stars. 'I'm saved! I'm saved! You saved me, you dear man, you wonderful, lovely man! How can I ever repay you, dearest Alan?'
'Well, if you put it that way…' He laughed heartily with her.
'I can go home to England! I don't have to be anyone's mistress, or anyone's whore! Oh, out of my darkest night, God has shown me the way to security! How can I ever thank you?'
'I'm just glad I could do something…'
'I won't have to drudge as someone's domestic back home. I can live well, if I watch my pennies, and I'm not a spendthrift, I know how to economize and manage. I did well enough on Roger's pay and the pin-money he allowed me. I made a good home for him, and I can make a good home for myself. Or'-she calmed-'I could make a good home for you. Yes, I could, Alan. I could stay here on Antigua, take a tidy set of rooms, nothing grand, no need for servants… well, maybe a maid to help me clean. I'm used to cleaning for myself, Alan. And she would not have to be a live-in, just a day-servant. What's that, six pounds a year, and a dress and shoes? Oh, would it not be grand, Alan? You would come in from your ship, and we could be together again.'
Hmm, he considered hard. She's a wonderful gallop, no question about that, and it wouldn't cost me tuppence. How many men can boast of free mistresses. Even if she does stray, or take in someone while I'm at sea, it's nothing more than I'm used to already. Had I bought her, I'd worry about that anyway.
'Dolly, my dearest, loveliest girl, I'll be gone for months on end. I'd love to see you again, but it would be so cruelly lonely for you. Best you go home to England, much as I could wish…'
'And if I just happened to be here, Alan dearest? Would we be able to share things? There's no one else in your life?'
'Of course we could, Dolly. And no, there's no one else.'
'Oh, you have made me the happiest woman tonight. In all ways, my wonderful Alan. I had not hoped to aspire to so much joy in my life ever again. I shall love and cherish you while I have you, and you shall know how much joy you've given me by how much I give myself to you. Like now. Say you're not so tired, dear Alan. Can we do that again, could we please, my love?'
II
