Forever Waiting Read online

  She was surprised and heartened by his words. “And?”

  He didn’t have to make a commitment this moment, and he wouldn’t be lying if he told her he had considered marrying her. “And, to answer your question, I’ve never felt for any woman what I feel for you. So, yes, I would consider marrying you, have, in fact, contemplated it more times than you would imagine. But I’m a rogue, Charmaine. I don’t want to hurt you, have you grow to hate me.” He paused, still thoughtful. “Marriage, the vows, they are simple. But how can either of us be certain of our feelings years from now? Yes, I want you tonight, desire you greatly, and, yes, I love you. But I’m a man. I can’t promise another woman will never turn my eye. That is what I fear most. A pledge to love, honor, and cherish for all eternity? I won’t make such a vow lightly.”

  He pulled her into his arms and his lips snatched away her reply. Slowly, her hands encompassed his back, relishing the feel of his sturdy body, the warmth of his flesh under her palms. He coaxed her back to the settee, his caresses extending to her breasts and hips, awakening sensations that teased her insides. She relaxed into the cushions, he half-kneeling, half-prone above her, his kisses growing furious, his breathing heavy and unsteady. Then he was shifting his position, pressing her farther back. As he lowered himself, she could feel the weight of his body, something hard against her thigh, and an inkling of reluctance washed over her again. She pushed onto her elbows, coming up for air.

  “Charmaine … ” he murmured, his voice husky, “if you’re worried about conceiving a child, you needn’t be—”

  She frowned, disconcerted. Curiously, that thought hadn’t crossed her mind, but she quickly capitalized on it. “That is easy for you to say.”

  He leaned in close again. “There are ways—”

  She turned her face aside, hands braced against his chest. “I can’t,” she whimpered, “I’m sorry, I can’t.”

  Disappointed, he moved to the end of the sofa. She stood to bid him goodnight. “Don’t leave,” he said. “It’s our last night here. I won’t press you if you’re not ready. Please, come and sit with me.”

  Again, she was gladdened by his words and returned to him. His arm closed around her, his hand stroking her hair, nudging her head onto his shoulder. They stayed there late into the night, talking and staring into the fire …

  Christmas Eve, 1837

  Charmaine and the girls spent the day decorating the house: weaving pine and holly sprigs, fastening fruit to them with string, and garnishing the balustrade, mantel, and French doors with the festive boughs.

  After dinner, the family gathered in the drawing room. It was quite chilly, lending the day a true holiday air. Paul lit a fire in the hearth. Frederic invited the staff to join them, and so, the Thornfields, Jane Faraday, and Fatima settled in for eggnog and Christmas cookies. Felicia and Anna were spending the night in town with Felicia’s parents. The girls sang to the Christmas carols that Charmaine played on the piano. When she tired, Paul took over at the keyboard and entertained his sisters, who were as surprised as Charmaine to hear him play.

  The twins begged to open the packages that had arrived yesterday. They were from John, the first they had heard from him since October. Charmaine acquiesced; there would be more gifts tomorrow. They dove into the wrapping, revealing two finely tailored riding jackets in royal blue, complete with tan jodhpurs, velvet riding hats, boots, and crops.

  Agatha began to object to Frederic’s daughters wearing boys’ clothing, but her protests over the breeches Charmaine had sewn for Yvette last September had gotten her nowhere, so she took a sip of her brandy instead.

  The package also contained a book for Yvette and Jeannette: The New-York Book of Poetry. A note from John was inserted like a bookmark at the page where the poem A Visit from St. Nicholas appeared. They greedily read the brief letter aloud, then the poem, and the letter again …

  Dear Yvette & Jeannette,

  Perhaps St. Nick will fill your stockings this Christmas Eve— that is, if his eight tiny reindeer don’t need snow, Auntie allows them to land on the roof, and Yvette is well behaved. The odds are not very good. If St. Nick does not visit, then I hope my gifts will do. Happy Christmas.

  Love, John

  Agatha gripped tight the arms of her wing chair, offended. John continued to ridicule her, even across the Atlantic. The girls, however, were thrilled, and the poem sent them scrambling to find stockings to fasten to the mantel.

  Charmaine was heartened by their enthusiasm, amazed once again at how John could cast a whimsical spell on them, even from so far away. She looked to Frederic, who observed the tableau with intense interest. When he realized she studied him, he turned away, his gaze lifting to the painting that hung above the fireplace. What is he thinking? Her heart answered: He never imagined it would be like this. He doesn’t want it to be like this.

  There was also a small package for her.

  “Open it, Mademoiselle,” Jeannette said. “What do you think it can be?”

  Charmaine glanced at Paul, who had moved to the fireplace, staring into the flickering flames. She untied the ribbon and pulled the wrapping aside. Inside was a simple ivory hairbrush. She smiled, running a finger lightly over the smooth handle. It was much finer than the one John had broken that first night last August.

  “A most pleasant evening,” Agatha declared. “It truly feels like Christmas: a warm room, a crackling fire, and the family together. So much like England this time of year. Everything Christmas should be.”

  Charmaine bristled at the callous remark. She glanced around the room: at Paul, with head bowed, George hiding behind a magazine, Frederic with his turbulent eyes, and Rose with her mournful face, even Fatima Henderson, lips pursed indignantly. She wondered where John was this evening. Instinctively, she knew he was alone.

  Later, as she turned down the lamps in the nursery, Charmaine nearly cried when Jeannette innocently asked, “Do you think Saint Nick can bring Pierre and Mama back to us for Christmas?”

  She looked with a heavy heart at Pierre’s empty bed and remembered sleeping there with him, remembered John sleeping there. She would be glad when this Christmas was over. As she completed her nightly toilette, she thought of her mother … of Colette and Pierre … She lay down and wept. But tears were futile, so she prayed, prayed for her deceased loved ones and comfort for her grieving. But mostly, she prayed for the Duvoisins.

  Christmas Day, 1837

  Richmond

  The crisp air frosted John’s breath as he descended the steps of the St. Jude Refuge. He tightened Yvette and Jeannette’s scarf around his neck, unhitched Phantom, and pulled up into the saddle. It was early, and although the Richmond streets were deserted, the refuge was busy. He had stopped in to see Father Michael Andrews before morning Mass and the ensuing bustle of the refuge’s customary turkey dinner for the poor.

  “Why don’t you join us, John?” the priest had asked. “We can have dinner together after the soup kitchen has closed.”

  “No, no. You would have to hear my confession, and that could take all day,” John had quipped hollowly. “You’d best direct your efforts where you’ll have some success. There’s no redemption for me.”

  In truth, John wanted to be alone this day. He couldn’t think of anybody with whom he cared to be, save perhaps Charmaine. Pulling his woolen overcoat closed against the cold, he prodded Phantom into a brisk trot, setting him west on Wilderness Road toward Appomattox. He would ride to Freedom, a trip that would take most of the day. The road would be empty and the plantation house deserted, precisely what he wanted.

  Michael had hoped John would spend Christmas day with him and had purposely set time aside yesterday to stop by his Richmond town house and extend the invitation. When the butler let him in, he found John at the piano. Michael knew from the steward that John had gone home to the family’s islands late last summer. He surmised something grave had happened there. Michael had seen this distant mood before—the day they had met at the refuge
four years earlier. Then, John had drowned himself in alcohol, seeking succor in drunken oblivion. This time, he was sober, and Michael thought it best not to probe. Yesterday, they had conversed briefly. As Michael pulled on his coat, he was encouraged when John agreed to stop by the refuge. But today, it was painfully apparent John was spurning his company, for he’d stayed all of ten minutes.

  A disturbing disquietude welled up in Michael. I was naïve to think I could make a difference in this pitiable world. Another year of useless ministering to those I serve—of meaningless existence for myself …

  He turned away and opened the leather purse John had handed to him at the door. Twenty banknotes were inside; the sum easily exceeded the soup kitchen’s expenses for the day, not to mention the Christmas donations he expected to collect at Mass. “You are redeemed, John,” he intoned with a shake of his head, his moment’s antipathy assuaged. He entered the church to lay out his vestments for the Christmas Day celebration.

  Saturday, January 6, 1838

  Yvette insisted she and her sister wear their new riding habits. When they arrived at the breakfast table, she was beaming. Frederic’s brow raised in amusement as she sashayed before him like never before in any feminine apparel. “What do you think, Papa?” she queried. “Do you like it?”

  “No,” he answered, “but I can see you do, and that is all that matters.”

  She pretended to pout, but her happiness quickly bubbled over.

  Rose chuckled. “I’d say she looks like a Duvoisin ready to do business.”

  Frederic nodded as he considered his other daughter. “What of you, Jeannette? Do you like wearing boy’s clothing?”

  “It feels strange, Papa. I think I prefer a dress.”

  When they left for the day, Charmaine sighed. Paul was preoccupied as well, and she would be alone. She and Rose talked for a while, but when the older woman went upstairs complaining of her rheumatism, Charmaine stepped outdoors for a peaceful stroll.

  She meandered about the grounds, finding herself at the family cemetery. It was no longer gnarled and ill kept. She surmised Frederic had ordered it manicured and maintained. A bench had been placed near the two newest graves, and she sank down on it, as she had often done over the past few months, lifting and hugging Pierre’s soiled lamb. She closed her eyes to her gathering tears and jumped when Paul placed a comforting hand on her shoulder.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

  Unable to speak, she shook her head.

  “Gerald said you were headed this way,” he commented, allowing her a moment to compose herself, offering her his handkerchief. She read compassion in his eyes as he sat down beside her. “I thought you were working today,” she said.

  “I was. But Father and the girls caught up with me and sent me home.” He chuckled softly. “Yvette is a wonder. She’s starting to impress even me.”

  Charmaine smiled. Yvette had indeed taken over the mill’s books, and Charmaine had yet to find a mistake in her ciphering. Even Frederic was pleased; he checked her figures only once a week now.

  “Do you come here often?” Paul asked.

  “Occasionally,” she whispered, her grief regrouping. “Oh Paul,” she murmured, surrendering to it, “when my mother died, I didn’t think the pain could be any worse. But I was wrong! I miss him every day. I think of him every morning. Sometimes I even forget and go into the nursery … ”

  “There now,” he said, gathering her in his arms, cradling her head against his shoulder. “This is only natural. You loved Pierre like a son.”

  She sobbed until her body shuddered, and still Paul held her.

  “I scolded the girls after Colette died!” she declared angrily. “Their mother had been dead for only a month, and I scolded them. And now, look at me! It has been three months and … How could I have done that to them?”

  “Charmaine, you did what was best. You brought them out of despair and made them whole again. With time, the same will be true for you.”

  Charmaine nodded, deeply consoled.

  Paul closed his eyes to agony. Why did this happen to my family?

  He was nine years old again. The sun was setting, the harbor cast in long shadows. He watched anxiously with John and George on the quay as the last casks were rolled off the ship. The crew was loitering nearby, waiting for their mates to finish up. Then, they all fell in together, a boisterous, smelly, backslapping procession making its way to Dulcie’s. Frederic had taken the captain into the warehouse office to reconcile invoices. The brigantine was theirs!

  Paul scrambled up the gangplank with his brothers. Tonight John, George, and he were pirates. They battled the crew with pistols and swords, vanquished them and commandeered the vessel. They made the captain walk the plank and crept into the bowels of the ship, plundering the coffers of gold and jewels nestled in the hold. Down below, they could barely see, but they could hear their father calling for them. The fantasy was over.

  Paul swallowed hard and pulled Charmaine closer. Little boys didn’t die on Charmantes. This was, after all, paradise. But then he remembered: three little boys had lost their lives on this paradise island, over fifty years ago, during a pirate raid. His father had been little more than two, with an elder brother and sister, ages fourteen and twelve, and three brothers in between, ranging in age from five to nine. The boys slumbered peacefully in their beds as a fire was ignited over their heads, destroying in one short, horrific hour, the first house ever constructed on Charmantes.

  Charmantes had enjoyed twenty years of peace, guaranteed by the deal Jean Duvoisin had struck with the pirates who roamed the waters of the West Indies. He allowed them safe haven in the hidden coves of his three islands as long as they did not set foot on the beaches. The quietude nurtured a fallacious sense of security; Charmantes should have been wary of the carnage wreaked upon neighboring islands, careful about boasting of its own prosperity.

  According to Frederic, the renegades waited until his father traveled abroad, landing on the western shore in the middle of the night and penetrating the island’s limited fortifications in less than an hour. They spent the remainder of that bleak night pillaging and destroying. Frederic’s mother was only able to carry her youngest son to safety, perishing when she re-entered the inferno. By the following afternoon, only ashes remained.

  When Jean returned, he proclaimed the ground hallowed. Embittered, he turned from his life on the seas and became a farmer. He built the mansion in which they now lived, complete with back staircases: escape routes should they ever be threatened again. He settled in with his three remaining children, hired Rose to help raise Frederic, and nursed a broken heart for the rest of his days.

  Today, there was little threat of a pirate attack. With Great Britain’s sovereign claim to the Bahamas, the British navy patrolling her waters, and Frederic’s allegiance to the crown, complete with tithing and the upholding of British law, Charmantes enjoyed military protection that had not existed fifty years earlier, when Caribbean raids were commonplace. And yet today, the sorrowful past lived on. Little boys did die on Charmantes.

  With a deep sigh, Paul leaned his cheek atop Charmaine’s head.

  Her arms encircled his waist, and he drew strength from her vulnerability. Taking solace from each other, they rose and walked back to the house.

  New York

  John looked out the bedroom window of his row house and stared, unseeing, at the street below. It was busy, even for late Saturday night. The noise of the city had awoken him. But then, he hadn’t been sleeping very well these days. He breathed deeply and sighed. The woman in his bed stirred. He regarded her for a moment, but when she didn’t awaken, he turned back to the window.

  He thought of Colette. He thought of Charmaine. Strange, last night, Charmaine had been the centerpiece of his fantasies. Charmaine … How he’d love to hold her, cry with her, laugh with her again.

  Saturday, January 13, 1838

  Charmantes

  C
harmaine had plans to meet Paul in town. The sun was quite bright for January and because she would be riding Dapple, the name Jeannette had dubbed her gray mare, she turned back to the house to fetch her bonnet.

  From her room, she could hear the twins conversing with their father in the nursery. Apparently, they were remaining at the house today. The door stood slightly ajar, and Charmaine listened, appreciating the easy banter between them.

  “Papa, do you think Pierre is really in heaven with Mama, now?”

  A moment’s silence, then, “Yes, Yvette, I’m certain he’s with your mother.”

  Charmaine could hear sorrow in Frederic’s voice. He changed the subject. “I was late today because I was involved with some of the planning for Paul’s celebration. We’re to meet with Mr. Westphal tonight.”

  “I don’t think this celebration is ever going to arrive,” Jeannette lamented.

  “April isn’t far off. It will be a splendid affair—the first one on Charmantes in many, many years.” Frederic sounded enthusiastic, and Charmaine realized he, too, was looking forward to the event. “There will be a great ball, elegant ladies and gentlemen, and musicians.”

  “Will we go to the ball?”

  “Of course, and you shall wear beautiful dresses, which have already been ordered.”

  “Where will all the fine ladies and gentlemen come from?”

  “Georgia, the Carolinas, Virginia, Maryland, and even New York. Some Caribbean farmers have also been invited.”

  “Will Johnny come?” The inevitable question came from Yvette, and the room fell into another awkward silence.

  “No, Yvette, I’m afraid not,” Frederic murmured.

  “You won’t allow him to come, will you?”

  “He can come if he likes,” her father answered in earnest.

  Unconvinced, she added, “It wasn’t his fault, Papa. He loved Pierre.”

  “I know he did, Yvette, but there is more to it than Pierre.”

  “But you’re better now!” she said. “Why do you still hate him?”