“Captain Leverett has expressed a desire to see you, if it would be convenient,” Mrs. Pryor continued, again with that air of vague disapproval which Miss Pickett in her day had used to such advantage.
Persis guessed that while the Captain was fevered and practically unaware of his surroundings, the housekeeper had welcomed her aid in nursing. But now that he was in his right mind, if not mended of body, visits to the sick room certainly did not meet with her approval. In her present mood Persis was perfectly willing to agree with the housekeeper.
“Whenever it is convenient I shall be very glad to accede to Captain Leverett’s wishes,” she answered with all the primness of her school days.
Lydia suddenly laughed. “You sound as if the last thing you want to do is to see Crewe. Is he so trying as a patient then? He has the temper of a devil, you know—a cold, sarcastic devil!” Her tone had been light but she ended with such vehemence and a look in her eyes which matched that of her brother’s at his most exasperated.
“Very few men,” Persis remarked, “take kindly to being ill. Uncle Augustin at times would have no one near him save Shubal. But your brother was unconscious, I think, most of the time, of who cared for him.” She remembered her own short conversation with a rational Crewe Leverett, but saw no reason to enlarge upon that.
She mounted the stairs in Mrs. Pryor’s wake, breathing a little fast. It was so like, somehow, being summoned into the presence of Miss Pickett to have one’s sins of admission and omission reckoned up judiciously against one. And—but what had Crewe Leverett to do with her? She had helped to tend him during his illness, mainly because she still owed him the debt of being alive. Of course, her meeting with Ralph Grillon could well have been witnessed by some islander (she would be the first to admit she was not skilled in the processes of intrigue), and if that were so— then, she decided swiftly, as Mrs. Pryor lifted her hand to rap on the Captain’s door, she would admit freely all that had passed between them. She certainly owed no loyalty nor duty to the Bahamian.
There were a number of candles alight in the room and a kind of curtain netting pulled over each of the open windows, while that veiling about the bed had been drawn back to fully reveal the man resting there.
He had been shaven of his stubble of beard, and, though his face looked a little sunken, his eyes over-large, he had certainly taken a great stride back toward becoming the self he had shown when she had last seen him.
“Miss Rooke-”
She found herself, without knowing just why, falling into the pattern Miss Pickett had so drilled into her pupils, and making a curtsy. As if, she thought, with a kind of nervous laughter rising from within her which she struggled hard to curb, they were somehow being introduced for the first time.
“I see you find yourself better, sir,” she schooled her voice to its most formal tone.
For the first time she saw him smile fully. And even on that worn face that change of expression made him shed both years and authority.
“I understand that I owe that somewhat to your efforts, Miss Rooke.”
“I am well acquainted with nursing, Captain Leverett. My uncle was long in his bed after his seizure. But here I did little enough—only aided Mrs. Pryor when there was need.”
“Come here!” With his good hand he beckoned sharply, his smile gone now, that familiar faint frown of displeasure easy to see.
Persis’ chin lifted a fraction. He need not believe that he could carry his shipboard commanding ways here and against her. If that was the tone he habitually used with Lydia, she did not wonder that his sister made her own schemes for the future. But Persis did move a step or two forward into the direct light of the candles, to discover that he was surveying her with a steadiness which made her uncomfortable.
There was no subtlety about Crewe Leverett she learned a moment later for he said, without any dressing of polite usage:
“I understand you met with Grillon—down on the point.”
There must be plenty of eyes on Lost Lady Key to watch and report, Persis thought. But his own brusqueness aroused answering resistance in her. She was not his sister! At that moment she thought she could forgive Lydia any wiles she thought to use against this man.
Only long ago Persis had learned that truth in itself could be a potent weapon, sometimes disarming an attacker who did not expect it.
“I did,” she returned quietly.
Crewe Leverett’s frown deepened. “He dares—because he thinks I am helpless!” There was anger in that small explosion. “What did he want?”
“To strike a bargain.”
“A bargain?” Now she had succeeded in surprising him and for that she felt an odd little twist of pleasure. “What kind of a bargain?”
“News for news—of a sort. He had a tale of the Bahamas he thought of interest to my future—”
“And,” Captain Leverett interrupted, “he wanted information concerning this household in return? Was that it?”
Persis shrugged. “If you know all—why ask me, sir? I will tell you this much, I am your guest, uninvited and unwilling, but nevertheless, your guest. There was no reason he should expect me to fulfill the conditions he desired.”
“Sit down!” Again that abrupt command. Mrs. Pryor moved from the doorway to draw forward the same chair Persis had known during her night watches. The last thing the girl wanted was to prolong this interview, but for the moment she saw no way of escape. “And you, Mrs. Pryor,” he turned his head a fraction on the pillow, “leave us, if you please. But keep an eye on Lydia.”
Such sharp orders. Persis glanced at the dignified housekeeper, more than half-expecting to see some sign of resentment at being dismissed so summarily. But if that lay in the old woman’s thoughts no such emotion showed about mouth or eye. She gathered up a small tray on which was cup, spoon, and covered bowl.
“A quarter hour, Crewe,” she said, “and that is all. It is more than the doctor would allow if he were here.”
The Captain waited, but he gave an impatient grunt before the door had quite closed behind her.
“So you turned him down, did you?” Crewe Leverett raised his good arm, scratched his chin. “I take it that annoyed him a little. Grillon is not used to anything in petticoats being indifferent to his wishes.”
The Captain, catching Persis’ outraged expression, laughed. “Ah, that fetched you, didn’t it? But you’re going to tell me more—what did Grillon have to offer on his side of the bargain?”
“Nothing,” Persis fought to keep her voice neutral. The man was insufferable! As if she could ever appeal to him! All she wanted now was to escape to Key West. She was not a ninny and in spite of Uncle Augustin’s put-downs in the past she thought she had intelligence enough to seek the proper help in the proper places. “Nothing,” she repeated, “except that which is a private affair of my own, concerning my uncle’s visit to the islands.”
“So? Well, I have a warning for you, Miss Persis Rooke, in the places where Ralph Grillon foregathers with his kind you would be a nice tempting pigeon meeting hawks. His hands are not clean, and a good many of us know it. We have our turncoats just as any profession may, Miss Rooke. There are captains who will make bargains and run their ships on some convenient reef, then share secretly with the prize money.”
“Pirates,” she could not resist that one word which had lain at the back of her mind ever since she had come into this house.
He gave a half shrug and then winced at the pain from his shoulder.
“If you wish—pirates. These waters have long attracted the lawless. There has been blood spilled up and down the Keys and not all that of enemies either. In fact,” he hesitated as if there was something more to be said and then, seeming to have come to an inner decision, he added—”we go in peril right now.”
“From Ralph Grillon?” She could not believe that.
“Hardly. Grillon may be a mosquito, annoying enough but easy to be handled in time. No, I am thinking of Indians.”
Persis was diverted from her own wary thoughts enough to echo that last word—”Indians!”
“The ship we went to help,” he appeared frank now, “had bespoken earlier a gunboat out of Key West. That had sailed to carry the news of a massacre at Crow Key and so to warn us all. So far Lost Lady has never been threatened. Those who built here, the Old Ones, are dead. But the Seminoles the Spanish brought in to wreck their mound cities believe that certain places are still under unseen guards. I have tried to foster that—there’s a strange old woman-she’s a kind of witch as far as they are concerned—”