The Valentine Legacy (Legacy 3)

“Because, my dear Jessie, I have you now, and I don’t intend to let you go until I’ve got my share of Blackbeard’s treasure. Not all of it, surely not. I’m certain I couldn’t manage all of it, but a goodly amount, enough for me to travel to Europe and live like royalty for the rest of my life.”

She stopped then and stared up at him. She’d always liked Mr. Fielding, had spent hours in his bookstore, even more hours when she learned that James was there a lot of the time and she would have done anything to see him. And Mr. Fielding had always been kind to her, never talking down to her, offering her books to read—particularly diaries, yes, she remembered that clearly now. “You can’t kidnap me, Mr. Fielding. This is Ocracoke. There’s no place here to hide me. Besides, why? What is all this nonsense about Blackbeard’s treasure?” Even as she said Blackbeard’s name, she jerked free of his hold and turned on her heel. She picked up her skirts and ran back toward Warfield house.

34

JESSIE WAS IN fine physical condition, but her petticoats and skirts got tangled around her legs, making her trip and stumble. She cursed herself for letting Maggie talk her out of wearing her breeches. He caught her soon enough. He leaped at her from behind, throwing her forward onto her knees. She was breathing hard, the pain in her knees deep and raw. She was afraid now, very afraid, and it was her own fault. Why hadn’t she realized she was going off alone? Why hadn’t she thought? No one had realized it. Everyone was so excited about the treasure that no one had thought, not Badger, not she.

“What do you want?”

He jerked her to her feet and turned her to face him. He slapped her hard, first on her left cheek, then on her right. “You won’t try to escape me again, Jessie, or I’ll just kill you. I don’t really need you. All I have to do is send a note to James and tell him I’ve got you and that I want my share of the treasure. He won’t know until it’s all over that you’re well dead. Obey me, Jessie, or I’ll strangle you right here, right now. I’ve absolutely nothing to lose now, you see.”

She nodded slowly, her mind racing frantically, trying to figure all this out, trying to understand, to . . .

“Come with me. You’ll like my little refuge. I’ve been there for two days now. Thank God the winter storms haven’t set in yet. I found out all about the Outer Banks before I sailed here. I didn’t want to end up drowned when my ship ran aground on one of these forever-shifting shoals.”

“Storms can hit at any time.”

“Yes, but they won’t. I just feel it in my bones. At last my luck has changed.”

She walked beside him. Soon they left the rutted path to the village, veering toward the ocean. He said matter-of-factly, “Yes, for the longest time I thought you were a lover of women. Many men have known passion for other men, but not all that many women that I’ve ever heard of. I watched you, and I was fairly certain, what with you always aping a man, wearing breeches, those ridiculous old hats, your hair ratty and in a braid. Yes, I thought, she’s a student of Sappho.

“That’s the reason, Jessie, that Allen Belmonde wanted you dead.”

Jessie, who had never imagined that two women would want to kiss each other as she did James, just stared at him, shaking her head. “Allen Belmonde? What are you saying? This doesn’t make a bit of sense.”

He swatted away a big fly, saying, “He told me before I killed him—naturally I had to encourage him just a bit—that he’d tried to kill you because he was sure Alice was going to divorce him so she could live with you, be your lover. He wasn’t particularly repelled by the notion. What he was, my dear, was desperate. He couldn’t lose her money and he would if she left him. Her father, no fool, had protected her in that. Allen had to lower himself many times just to get enough money to pay his gambling debts. Thus, he tried to kill you. If you’ll remember, I pulled you away from that wagon. I saved your life. That was happenstance, and I am grateful I was there that day. I already knew I needed you, you see, and thus when I discovered it was Allen Belmonde who wanted you dead, I had to eliminate that threat. I needed you alive. I killed him. I saved you. You should be thanking me.”

“Thank you, Mr. Fielding.” She still felt utterly bewildered. “I don’t understand.”

“Oddly enough, Allen was right. His wife would have divorced him, but not for you. It wasn’t you Alice loved. It was your sister. The two of them should suit each other quite nicely when old Bramen croaks.”

“Nelda? She’s a student of this Sappho woman?”

“Oh yes, indeed she is. I imagine she and Alice will move to New York, away from the scandal their union would cause here in Baltimore. But that’s not really important. Naturally Bramen will leave Nelda well provided for in his will. They will do well together. I just wanted you to know that you owe me, Jessie. You owe me part of that treasure because I protected you, because I saved you.”

“You wanted me alive, but why? How could you possibly know about Blackbeard? I didn’t realize I had forgotten all about Old Tom and his diaries until just months ago.”

“Turn here, my dear. Yes, that’s right, into this oak thicket. It’s dense and protected in here, the sun doesn’t beat through the thick leaves. Ah, but these trees are ugly, aren’t they? So twisted and bent and gnarly, like old women shuffling down a road.”

“I’ve always thought of them as old men.”

“Turn in here, Jessie.”

She did as he said, still not understanding, but knowing he was enjoying telling her all about what he’d done. He was proud. She sensed the excitement in him, scarcely leashed. She’d walked away from the house, whistling, all happy, enthusiastic, and now look at her. In the hands of a murderer. What to do?

“Sit down, Jessie. Do you like my little refuge? See how I’ve woven branches together so they form a roof of sorts? It hasn’t rained yet, so I can’t be certain it will protect us. But it’s comfortable. The nights aren’t too cold. Yes, sit down, and I will tell you the rest of it. There’s plenty of time. I won’t send a message to James until later today. I want him to know you’re gone, to be worried, finally, to be frantic.”

He lightly touched his fingertips to her cheek. She jerked away, her eyes going wide.

“No, I won’t rape you. Actually, to see you now, after your transformation, makes me wonder how I could have been so blind. My mother always told me that I was possessed of great discernment. But with you, I was blind. And you’ve a child in your belly, James’s child. Who would have thought the two of you would have married? Who would have thought James would even want to bed you? Well, that’s that and not really important now.

“You probably remember Red Eye Crimson.”

She stared at him. “How do you know about Red Eye? Oh God, we all thought he was the one to protect me from. I remember him so well now, that night when he tried to kidnap me from Papa’s house, how my pug saved me, how my papa told me he would be in jail until he was ninety years old.”

“Oliver was wrong. Red Eye Crimson came blundering into my shop one fine day last December. He wanted diaries, he said, Blackbeard’s diaries. Did I have any?

“Of course I didn’t have any. I’d never heard about that evil man even being able to write, much less keep diaries. But I was fascinated to know why this pathetic creature wanted to know about Blackbeard. I got him drunk. He told me finally how he and Tom Teach—you call him Mr. Tom—were partners, how he was supposed to have met Tom here on Ocracoke and together they would put the diaries together and then they’d have the treasure. He had Blackbeard’s final diary, but it did him no good without the others. He was convinced that Blackbeard was a cagey villain and that he’d scattered clues throughout his diaries. Thus he didn’t intend to kill Tom until he had his hands on the treasure. He was nearly in tears. He said he finally arrived only to find that you’d murdered Tom—he’d watche