Lady in the Mist - Laurie Alice Eakes [94]
“Dorset is beautiful,” Dominick said. “It’s lush and green, and we have the sea. But this is more peaceful than the channel.”
“You haven’t lived through a hurricane. When I was a child, we lost our roof to one. A tree fell and came right through it. I’ve hated storms ever since.”
“Yet you came out night before last without hesitation.”
“It’s my duty to do so.” She began to crack open a crab with her fingers. “Some people use small hammers, but my fingers are strong enough to not need one. Just squeeze the body.”
“I’m supposed to eat that?”
“No, not that. That’s his innards. Here’s the meat.” She plucked the soft, moist flesh from the shell and held it on her palm. “Go ahead.”
He took it, tasted it, then smiled. “More?”
“Crack your own. I’m hungry.” She proceeded to open a claw and draw out the flesh.
Dominick sighed and picked up his own crab. For several minutes, they cracked and ate in silence. They tossed the discarded guts and shells to the edge of the water, where the gulls swooped in with shrieks of glee and pecked the matter clean.
“I suppose I can’t put off my tale forever,” Dominick said at last.
“No.” Tabitha returned a strawberry to the bowl, no longer hungry. “Now, are you going to tell me that you’re a spy for the British government?”
24
______
Raleigh sat on the jetty, his head in his hands. He felt so dizzy he feared he might tip forward and land face-first in the water. Both his father and his mother had encouraged him to go home and rest, as Tabitha had instructed him to do, but he knew the waves of pain rushing through him bore little relationship to the blows he’d taken on the jaw and head two days earlier.
Tabitha, his Tabbie, had walked down the beach with the lordling servant.
It was all his own fault. He hadn’t trusted in the Lord to bring her back to him and had tried to be rid of the competition for her attentions, her affections. Now he was injured and had angered the man who was perpetrating the disappearances, thus making learning his identity more difficult. And Tabitha now knew that Raleigh’s faith in God was a fraud. No man whose faith was sincere would wish to harm another, whatever the provocation, whatever the odd circumstances surrounding the man.
And this wasn’t the first time he hadn’t trusted in God to get him out of a difficult situation. He’d prayed for release from the Navy, then taken matters into his own hands.
No wonder Tabitha considered him to be untrustworthy. He was.
“God, how can I make things right?” he murmured, watching the waves lapping at the soles of his boots. “How can I get Tabbie to forgive me and trust me again if I behave this way?”
Gulls screamed overhead, seeming to mock him with maniacal laughter.
Below him, the incoming tide carried Tabitha’s basket, a reminder of the danger she’d been in. Either danger to her or to Dominick Cherrett. Everyone knew a snake wasn’t likely to crawl into a covered basket, regardless of the contents, with humans so close by. Yet any person who dared trap one to sneak into the basket showed determination or courage. Too easily the serpent could have turned on its captor before being used as a weapon. If Cherrett hadn’t possessed and been so skilled with his wicked-looking knife, he could have been dead now. But the creature had been in Tabitha’s basket.
“No one would want to harm Tabbie,” Raleigh declared aloud. “No one.”
“What did you say?” Footfalls echoed on the jetty, and a shadow fell across the sunlit water. “Do you think that snake was meant for Tabitha?”
“It was in her basket, but, no, no one could want to hurt her.” Raleigh swallowed against the dryness in his mouth. “No one would risk killing her.”
“Unless her work has given her secrets someone wants to protect.” Father crouched and fished the half-submerged basket from the water. “They took a great risk.”
“Too great a risk to harm someone so . . . necessary to the community.” Raleigh glared at the now empty basket as though it were to blame. “Now, Cherrett, he seems a likely target