The Devil's Mistress by David Barclay (summer reads txt) 📗

wondering… Why did you have the boy’s clothes on you if you knew you were coming to town? Did you not think you would be caught?”

“Why indeed,” the man said. There was another unbroken silence that seemed to stretch to the ends of the forest. In it, Isabella could feel his eyes on her, studying her from the deep. At last, Hunter said, “I think you are a great deal more clever than the men around you, Isabella. That can be a dangerous quality in one so young, and in a woman, doubly so.”

“What do you mean?” To this, there was no answer. She prodded him with several more questions, but Hunter, it seemed, was done speaking for the day.

Isabella straightened her sleeves and marched back to the road, more troubled now than when she had first entered. “Justice is a rich man’s illusion,” her father had told her once. She hadn’t known what he had meant at the time, but today, it was becoming clearer each moment.

As she passed the front of the town hall, she looked up at the gallows, and marveled how quickly Blackfriar was to welcome this illusion into its midst.

Chapter 8

The Huxley house was built upon a field of violets just outside the town borders, with its own dirt road and a sweeping view of the bay, beyond which sat the mill, and the three dozen men who toiled six days a week in the name of the family’s industry. A craggy, shale stone hill stood at its back, making it easily defensible, and a short stone wall encompassed the front. It had its own ground-dug well, stable, granary storage, for when the winters grew harsh, and its own slave quarters, which, as Marianne often said, was a necessity for a thoroughbred white woman surrounded by Africans.

Isabella entered the grounds at a quarter past eleven and was greeted by the Huxley’s dark-skinned butler, who showed her into the grand foyer and up the stairs without a word. “Aren’t we going to the dining room?”

The man didn’t reply. He was sweating when they reached the door to the upstairs sitting room. He held the door for her without once meeting her gaze.

With a frown, Isabella stepped inside.

“Ah, there you are, my lovely. Come join us.”

Isabella let out a small gasp but managed to stifle the scream that lay behind it.

Her betrothed stood in the center of the room, beckoning her with one hand. A pretty slave girl not much older than her was down on all fours beneath him, oriented perpendicular to the man above her. She had been stripped of her clothes. Upon her back sat a freshly opened bottle of wine, two full glasses, and a plate of expensive cheese. On the floor beneath the girl, a large carving knife had been tied to a wooden base. The tip of its blade rested less than an inch from her belly, threatening to penetrate the flesh at the slightest miscalculation. If she arched too high, of course, the food would spill.

Thomas motioned to the butler. “That will be all, Fredrick.”

The man closed the door behind Isabella and disappeared.

Isabella could barely force her own eyes up.

Thomas was possessed of the extraordinary, if severe, good looks of his parents. He was blessed with smooth, pale skin, an oval face with high cheekbones, and thin, English lips. He had the slender hands of one born to royalty, with fingers that might have been suited to harp or piano-playing had he the time and interest. And of course, there was his sense of fashion. He was dressed in one of his most extravagant suits, with a fine leather vest, a red silk cravat, and gold lace embroidered around the sleeves of his coat. With the rich brown peruke upon his head and rouge upon his cheeks, he might have been attending a ball at the governor’s mansion. For all the delight on his thin face, he might have been.

“Come, come! Sit, my love.”

The chairs before them were not chairs at all, but two young men of a slim, muscular build wearing rags. They were on their hands and knees in much the same fashion as the girl.

Oh, to be young and foolish again. To believe that marriage is only for love.

Isabella’s lip quivered. She had never told anyone the things Thomas visited upon those around him. Not her father, not her friends, not even the Lady of the Hill, who might have been the only one to understand. Each visit to the Huxley house revealed a new and terrifying side to her betrothed. Just when she thought she had seen the worst of the house’s sole heir and beloved businessman, he would surprise her with some new humiliation, usually upon those beneath him. How long after their marriage had been consummated would he visit such a thing upon her?

He patted the bottom of the slave closest to him. “Over here.”

She crossed the room and sat down, being as delicate as she could.

Thomas thrust himself down upon the young man on his side. He speared a piece of cheese with a small fork and popped it into his mouth, relishing its chewy texture. “You absolutely must try one of these bonbons, dearest. I cannot lie. They cost a small fortune.”

Isabella skipped the cheese and went straight for the wine. The sudden movement caused the slave girl to twitch, and her belly grazed the tip of the blade beneath her. Isabella’s hand went to her mouth, wanting to apologize, and knowing such a thing would cost her in some subtle and terrible way.

“Don’t mind her,” Thomas said. “Winifred has been such a nuisance this week. Haven’t you, Winifred?” He tapped the girl’s scrawny flank with the tip of the cheese fork.

“I—” the girl stammered.

“You what?”

“I have…Master Huxley. Been a nuisance.”

“Ah, that’s better.” Thomas sighed. “What am I to do with such help? All around me, the throngs of incompetence. First, we have a young man of the