The Caribs ran across the yard, whooping and waving their weapons.

'Give fire,' Kit roared. 'Give fire.'

The verandah shook, and the black smoke eddied about them, setting them coughing and spitting.

'Replace your weapons,' Kit shouted. 'Replace your weapons.'

The overseers scrabbled at the floor, found the fresh muskets. The smoke began to clear, and they looked at near a score of men, lying wounded and dead in their blood, some thirty feet from the steps. 'Aieee,' Kit shrieked, as he had not shrieked since the day he had charged the Spaniards at Panama. 'Well done, lads. Well done. Sight your pieces. Sight your pieces.'

But there were so many red men. And if they were temporarily halted, they were once again being rallied by the tall man, and now those with the bows were drawing their strings, and the deadly wooden shafts clouded across the morning. Allingham gave a moan and fell forward, an arrow thrusting from his chest. Another man also screamed, although he had only been hit in the leg. There was a clatter, and Passmore had dropped his musket.

Kit realized he would not hold his people here. 'Aye,' he said. 'Withdraw, lads, into the house. We'll fire from shelter. In you go, Marguerite, for God's sake.'

She still stared at the Caribs, as if she would destroy them by the very venom of her hate. But now she moved for the door, and at the sight Indian Warner pointed his sword at the house, and yelled an order.

The Caribs surged forward in a long peal of angry inhumanity. The overseers, getting to their feet to withdraw into the doorway, stared at their foes for a fraction of a second, and then uttered a howl of their own. But this one was of fear, and their muskets hit the floor in unison as they crowded through the doorway, wailing their terror. Desperately Kit ran behind them, thrusting men aside as he reached the door itself, finding it blocked by a body. But this was immediately dragged aside. Kit looked up, stared at George Frederick.

'You should be in the cellar,' he said.

'You give me a sword, Captin,' George Frederick said. ‘I’s fighting with you.'

The door boomed shut as the first Carib reached the verandah, and bolts thudded into place. But still the morning was hideous with the whoops of the red men outside, with the terrified screams of the white men within. For they had continued on their way, to the pantry, and there had wrenched open the trap to the cellar, and were pouring down the stone steps with all the haste they could manage.

'By Christ.' Kit drew his sword, and ran across the dining-room. 'You'll return,' he shouted. He straddled the stairway, elbowing Burn out of the way. 'I'll run through the last man up.'

A musket butt slammed his skull, and he fell forward, on to his hands and knees. He crouched there, shaking his head, and was kicked in the ribs, to go rolling across the floor. Dimly he heard Marguerite's voice, shouting desperate commands, then she was behind him, raising his head. 'Kit,' she gasped. 'Kit?'

'Go with them,' he muttered. 'For Christ's sake, go with them.'

'And you,' she said. 'Come on, Kit. Up, for God's sake.'

He struggled to his knees, and listened to the clang of the trap. He flung himself across the floor, battered on the inches-thick wood. 'Open up,' he yelled. 'Open up. Your mistress is out here.'

She knelt beside him, panting, tearing at the wood with her fingers, striking it with her closed fists. 'The curs,' she moaned. 'The filthy curs.'

Glass shattered behind them, and the whooping filled the entire house. Kit grasped his sword, turned round, and faced Indian Warner.

Easy enough to recognize, certainly, for all his nakedness. Tall; far taller than his half-brother, and thin, with ribs showing against the smooth pale brown of his flesh, but heavily muscled too, at thigh and bicep and shoulder. But it was the face which was unmistakable, the features softly rounded, so unlike the sharpness of the more typical red men about him. But the roundness was tempered with the Warner steel, and the eyes, a pair of blue stars in the surrounding darkness, stared at Marguerite as though she were a scorpion. And directed the right hand, extended to full length, and ending in a pistol.

'You'll drop your sword,' he said. 'Or shall I shoot her in the belly?'

'She is your niece,' Kit said. 'Do you not know that?'

Indian Warner smiled. His lips seemed to ripple away from the sharpened teeth. 'Oh, indeed, my niece,' he said. 'I know that, white man. I know that.'

'Kill him,' Marguerite whispered. 'Kill him now. Let us die together. Kill him, Kit, as you love me.'

But the moment's hesitation had been a moment too long. Already hands were scrabbling at Kit's shoulders, other red bodies clouding between himself and the chieftain. And there were red hands on Marguerite's body as well. The sword fell to the floor.

'She is right, white man,' Indian Warner said. 'You could have killed me then. And you would have suffered no more than you suffer now. But she must watch.' He gave an order in his own language, and Kit was half thrust, half carried across the dining-room and to the foot of the stairs. Here the banisters were almost as high as a man, and against these he was placed. Rawhide cords were produced, and his arms carried behind his back and the wrists secured. Another cord went round his neck, and was made fast to the banisters, and another round his waist, so that he was held upright, and was yet unable to move. He gasped for breath, and attempted to face his tormentors without flinching. But he knew now what they intended. He could remember Susan's stories clearly enough.

The knives were already out, and he closed his eyes. But the time was not yet. They were merely stripping the clothes from his body, the very boots from his feet, all with exquisite care, to leave not a scratch on his flesh. For that privilege must lie with the cacique. Slowly he inhaled, and allowed the air to hiss through his nostrils, and wanted to weep. For suddenly he looked at Marguerite, held in front of him.

'Oh, God,' she whispered. 'Oh, God.'

Indian Warner stood at her shoulder, his fingers thrust into her hair, so that as he chose he could bend her head back to make her eyes stare into his. And now he chose. 'You love him, this man of yours?'

'Oh, God,' she said. 'Your fight is with me. With mine. He is no part of it.'

'Has he not shared your body, shared your love, shared your hate? Will you not partake of his body now?'

Her mouth sagged open as she stared up at him, her head pulled so far back Kit could see the convulsions of her throat.

'Then hate me,' he said. 'Let her go. Do the Warners make war upon women?'

The blue eyes seemed to impale him, and the woman's hair was slowly released. 'Love,' Indian Warner said. 'A loving couple. There is a rare sight. You would die for each other.

Then you shall, die for each other.' He smiled at Kit. 'For how may a white man die, how may a gentleman die, how may a planter die, white man, more cruelly than in watching his wife violated before his own eyes? Answer me that, white man.'

'You'd rape your own niece?' Kit demanded.

'Niece.' The hands were back at her hair, twisting her face this way and that. 'I'd not touch her body, save with a burning brand. That I shall do. But that you shall not see. Your vision, your last vision, white man, will be that of your woman enjoying the embraces of another. For you will enjoy it, sweet Marguerite.' Again the tug, and the flop of her mouth as she gasped for breath. Tom Warner smiled down at her. 'Fetch me that black fellow we found by the door.'

Three of the Indians brought a struggling George Frederick across the room. 'I ain't done nothing, suh,' he said. 'I ain't done nothing. You know I ain't no planter, suh.'

'I know that, black man,' Tom Warner said. 'I know that you are a slave. I was a slave once, black man. I have known the lash.' Again the savage tug. 'Her father gave me the lash, with his own hands. So now you will take your revenge.' The orders were given in Indian, and the fingers released Marguerite's hair.

Those fingers, but there were too many others. For just an instant her head came forward, and she stared at Kit, and then she was on the floor at his feet, as Susan had once been, on the floor of her own house. But how kind, how gentle, how humane, were the Spaniards by comparison with these naked warriors? And in only seconds she was as naked as they, spread-eagled on the floor, a red man kneeling on each wrist and each ankle, her breasts inflating as she gasped for breath, her belly fluttering in its pelvic cage, the muscles of her thighs twisting as she stared at her uncle. Yet she had spoken not a word, uttered not a cry. Her eyes spoke for her.

'Take her,' Indian Warner commanded. 'Take her, black man, until your loins can do no more.'

'She?' George Frederick's voice went up an octave. 'Oh, no, suh, no, suh. Not the mistress, suh. I ain't going harm the mistress, suh. Oh, no, suh, I can't do that.'

'Take her,' Tom Warner commanded. 'And you shall live.

I give you my word on that. You shall return with us to Dominica, not as a slave, but as a member of my people. You shall have honours heaped upon your head. Refuse me this, and you shall die, but slowly, and your blood will yet drip upon that body you fear to touch. Choose.'

George Frederick stared at the chieftain, and his eyes slowly dropped to the trembling body at his feet. For the moment he was ruled by fear, of the future no less than of the past, and was thus less than a man. But as Marguerite continued to fight her captors, and got one leg free, to kick in the air, and half roll on her side, to dominate even the horror of the morning with white buttock and brown hair, fear diminished beneath an irresistible lust.

'You got for see, mistress,' he said. 'I can't just die so, mistress.'

Marguerite's gaze had turned from her uncle to her slave, and George Frederick closed his eyes. Kit wished also to close his eyes, and yet he too was impaled upon the hate emanating from the slight white glory which was his dearest possession. And so he stared, while the Caribs whooped their amusement, and Tom Warner smiled. Kit stared, not at the black upon white, not at the eyes, not at the rigidly clamped mouth, but instead at the right hand, held immobile by the red foot on her wrist, but still clenched and clenched, and clenched, so that before George Frederick lay still there was a trickle of blood rolling across the hand to drip on to the floor, and her fingers were thrust so deeply into her palm that it was difficult to see how they could ever be released.

Tom Warner smiled. 'Now, white man,' he said. 'Now, you are dead, in your mind. Or would you like to follow your slave, for the last time, before I take your manhood, and then your life?'

'Truly must you have suffered, friend, to have so far forgotten your true stature,' Kit said.

Tom Warner frowned at him. 'You are a man of some courage, white man. No doubt it takes courage, to bed with that she-viper. Your name?'

'Christopher Hilton.'

The frown deepened. 'Hilton?' A look of almost pain crossed his features. 'You are called Kit?'

'By my friends.'

The chieftain gazed at him for several seconds, and then spoke in Indian, without taking his eyes from Kit's face. One of the braves ran from the room. The others sliced through the rawhide ropes holding their prisoner.

'Susan's grandson?'

Kit rubbed his wrists. 'By Christ,' he said. 'You remember her?'

'In my life,' Tom Warner said. 'But three white people showed me kindness. My brother Edward, his wife Aline, and Susan Hilton. Now all are dead. I do not ask your forgiveness, Kit.' He looked at the couple on the floor, for George Frederick still lay there, perhaps afraid to release her, now that his passion was spent and he understood the enormity of his crime. 'But I would have you understand. She is my niece. Aye. Her father is my brother. Yet did he send my mother and me to the slave compound, and have us in the fields, my mother, who had cared for him like a mother when Rebecca died. And when we faltered, he himself used the whip. Only a Warner may flog a Warner, were his words.'

'You escaped,' Kit said.

'Aye,' Tom Warner said. 'And waited. For twenty years I waited. To deal with him, and his brood. He has escaped me this time. But she ..." he turned as feet clumped on the verandah. 'I have found your friend, Jean.'

Jean DuCasse hurried in, panting, sweat soaking his shirt. His head was bound in a bandanna, and he carried a cutlass. He had put on weight, and had allowed his moustache to grow and droop beside his mouth. 'Kit.' He frowned at his naked friend. 'Mon Dieu.'

'I discovered in time,' Tom Warner said.

'In time.' Kit seized George Frederick's shoulder, threw him away from Marguerite, dropped to his knees. She said not a word, and her fists were still clenched.

'Kit,' Jean said. 'Ill met, after too long. I knew you were a planter, but not the name of your estate. I should have guessed.'

'Aye.' Kit smoothed the hair from her forehead; it was matted with sweat, and there was sweat on her face as well. But no tears in her eyes.

A tablecloth fell on her shoulders. Hastily Kit wrapped it round her, and gazed across her at his friend.

'You'll take my hand, Kit. I would not have had it so.'

Kit hesitated, and then thrust out his hand. Jean squeezed it. 'And you, madam? Do you remember me?'

Marguerite's head turned. 'I remember you, Monsieur DuCasse. I shall, remember you.'

'I would not have had it so,' Jean said again. 'It is war, and a savage war. No doubt my time will come. But they shall not burn your house. This I swear. Nor will they take your blacks.'

'Leave me only that one.' Marguerite's voice was hardly more than a whisper, but George Frederick, crouching six feet away from her, jerked his head, and stared at them with wide eyes.

'You cannot, suh,' he screamed. 'You cannot leave me, suh.'

'Leave him,' Marguerite said. 'Or take my curse.'

Jean sighed. 'Then must I accept both, madam. You will murder him, for a crime he was forced to? Then are both Kit and I deserving of a far worse fate.'

'Leave him,' Marguerite said.

'No,' Tom Warner said. 'I leave you your life. I had not intended that. Be grateful, bitch.'

Kit stood up. 'Can there not be an end to hating, Mr Warner? You have done my wife a mortal injury. I understand, that her father ..." he hesitated, glancing at her. 'Her father did you and your mother nothing less. Can there not be satisfaction?'

Tom Warner pointed at the slight figure on the floor. 'She lives,' he said, 'because she is your wife. I pity you, Kit Hilton. You know not where you rest your head of a night. As she is Philip's blood, so does she reek with his venom. Had my braves sliced the skin from your bones, you could scarce have suffered more than you will suffer, tied to that reptilian creature. I shall not see you again, Kit. Will you take my hand?'

Kit looked down at the proffered fingers. Christ, to end emotion, to do what mattered. If one could tell, what mattered. 'Perhaps,' he said. 'When we meet again. If that should happen.'

Indian Warner looked into his eyes, then nodded, and gave his orders. And left the room, his braves at his heels.

Jean hesitated in the doorway. ' 'Tis your government you must blame for this, Kit,' he said. 'Benbow needs more ships in these waters. Then must DuCasse meet his end. Until then, why, DuCasse must injure the English wherever he can. But not Kit Hilton. Nor his wife.' He bowed to Marguerite. 'I am truly sorry, madam. Had I the power to accomplish one miracle, I would command time to turn back, for but a scant half hour. I would beg you to believe that.' He gazed at George Frederick. 'You'd best run behind me, fellow.'

Marguerite crawled across the floor to the door, the tablecloth forgotten. 'Bring him back,' she whispered. 'Bring him back, Kit. Take who you need, what you need. Bring that bastard back.'

'We are all bastards,' Kit said.

Her head started to turn, and then checked. The house echoed to shouted questions from the cellar.

'Our heroes,' she said. 'The Indians would have fired the house, Kit. Why do you not, and leave them to perish of suffocation?'

'Your own children are down there.'

She got to her feet. Slowly she inflated her lungs until her belly swelled and her breasts stood away from her chest, then she released it again, and her body sagged. 'Then no doubt you should release them,' she said, and climbed the stairs.

Kit knelt by the trap. 'Open up. It is done,' he said. They stared at him in amazement; he had forgotten he was naked. 'They have gone,' he said, and followed Marguerite up the stairs, closed the bedroom door behind him.

She lay on her belly across the bed. Perhaps now she wept. But he knew better than to expect that. 'I am in a unique position,' she said. How steady was her voice. 'For me. My situation is beyond my experience, or my comprehension. What does one do, Kit, with a woman, after she has been raped, by a slave?'

'One loves her the more. For her courage.'

'And could you bear to touch me?'

He crawled on to the bed beside her, kissed the nape of her

neck, parting the matted hair with his tongue. 'Should you wish it, I would enter you now.'

She rolled away from him, sat up at the foot of the bed, legs dangling, back held to him. 'No. No, no, no, no, no, no.'

'The stigma is in your mind.'

'Of course.' She got up, walked to the window, gazed at the smouldering fields, inhaled the crisp smell of the burned cane.

'It will rise again. Everything will rise again. Had they burned this house, it too would rise again,' Kit said. 'Had they slaughtered your slaves, they would have been replaced. Had they murdered your children, I would have given you others.'

'And had they torn the flesh from your bones, before my eyes?'

'Then would you have secured for yourself another, more able, more virile husband.'

At last she turned. How beautiful she was, through all the marks on her body, through all the agony on her face. Or did the agony itself, and the knowledge of how it was gained, add to her beauty? To her desirability? For how perverse is the mind of man.

'No, not more virile,' she whispered. 'Do you not fear that this may also have happened to Lilian?'

'It has not,' he said. 'They had no means of storming St John's. But had it happened, Meg, I would pray she would have borne it with as much fortitude.'

Marguerite crossed the room, looked out of the other window, at the slaves milling about in the village. 'Poor creatures,' she said. 'Had they but an ounce of vigour in their gut they would have used their temporary freedom to murder us all. And I have had one of their black tools inside my body. Christ, had I a knife.'

He held her shoulders, brought her back against him. 'You'll not give way now, Meg.'

She turned, in his arms. 'Then say you'll avenge me, Kit. Bring me back that slave. I want no more.' She smiled, and it was a terrible sight. 'No. I set my sights too low. Bring me back Tom Warner as well, Kit. Bring them back alive. With men at your back, that were not difficult, for Kit Hilton.'

He stared down into her eyes, hardened facets of gleaming green. 'To perpetuate this hatred, which may well rise up again and overwhelm my own children? That makes little sense to me. Your uncle claims to have been savagely mistreated by your father. No doubt this raid satisfies his sense of revenge. Yet he is not a savage, Meg. He would not take my life, or yours.'

'.My life?' she whispered. 'What is my life, when I have lain beneath a black man? How do I look at myself in the mirror, Kit Hilton? How do I touch myself, as I must, if I live? How do I accept your lust, if indeed you can ever feel such for me again? Tell me, Kit. Tell me.'

'Would you be easier in your mind with George Frederick at your mercy?'

'I would be easier in my mind,' she said. 'I would be easier, knowing that he will no longer dream, of that moment of glory, that he will no longer remember, how his belly pressed against mine, how his semen mingled with my own juice. By Christ, I would be easier.'

'Aye,' Kit said. 'I have no answer, to such a memory. Save to overlay it with others. With sweeter thoughts. Have no fear of my love, my darling Meg. Command it, and it belongs to you alone. Be my wife. That is all I ask. Say the word, and I will never go near Lilian Christianssen again.'

'And I almost believe you,' she said. 'Oh, God, to be alone with you, now and always, shipwrecked upon some lonely isle where we should have none but each other, and our love. I have sought only yours. I will ever seek, only yours. So perhaps you are right. Perhaps with your sweet aid I may overcome that memory. Then let it commence now. Quickly, I beg of you, Kit.'

Her eyes were shut. He swept her from the floor and laid her on the bed, and knelt above her, and looked up as the door opened.

'Papa,' Tony cried. 'We were so afraid, Papa, when you did not come.'

He led his sister by the hand, and she still cried. 'But we are here now,' Kit said. 'Safe and well. Eh, sweetheart?'

Marguerite also sat up, and smiled at her children. 'Come here,' she said.

They crossed the room, slowly and timidly. They were unused to their mother, naked and dishevelled. They found her a stranger, and Tony, at the least, was old enough to link her appearance with the whispered gossip which already seeped through the house.

Marguerite took a child in each arm, hugging them against her. 'We are all here now,' she said. 'Safe and well, as your father says.'

'And did you beat them, Papa?' Tony cried.

'No,' Kit said.

'There were too many,' Marguerite said. 'Too many even for your father. But he fought as no other man could have fought, for there is no other man of his stature. And when they finally overcame him, Tony, and would have killed him, they learned his name, and their anger turned to respect. Thus we live, and our plantation lives, and we will prosper.' They buried their heads in her shoulders, and she looked over them at her husband. Now at last, after so long, the tears came, rolling silently down her cheeks. The gates of hell had opened wide, and she had stumbled in, and then been dragged back to the light and air outside. So perhaps she would need to lie and cheat a little to remain above the ground, but she would do that. And surely, he thought, as he leaned forward to kiss her eyes, if I can but keep her this high for a short time, the gaping chasm which yawns before her mind will fill, and disappear.

Marguerite Hilton.

The crowd roared its anger. It stamped its feet, and dust eddied into the air. It whistled, and the noise pierced the very heavens. St John's was an ant-heap of outraged manhood. Their anger swelled up towards the dais on which their Governor, and his deputy, stood, and the redcoats grasped their firepieces tighter as they formed line before the steps, and stared at the people who were their brothers-in-law and fathers-in-law and drinking companions, in saner moments, and prayed that the explosion of hate would lead to no more than words.

Sir William Stapleton regarded them without the slightest emotion other than a frosty smile. He had confronted hostile crowds before. Now he waved the paper again.

'Peace,' he shouted. 'We must all be grateful for that, my friends. Certainly while the French are so superior in strength in these waters.' Once again he paused, and smiled at Philip Warner, standing beside him, mopping his red neck against the heat of the sun.

The noise subsided. 'Grateful,' he bellowed, 'because it permits us to devote our attention to the real enemy. To the Caribs, my friends. What say you to that?'

There was a moment of surprised silence, and then a roar of rapturous approval set the glasses tinkling in the windows bordering the street.

'Aye,' Stapleton said, holding up his hands, confident that this time they would obey him. 'Did you think I had forgotten them? Did you think that your Governor would allow such an outrage to pass unavenged? No, no, my friends, my people, for every life they took, nay, for every stalk of sugar-cane they burned, we shall exact a full retribution.'

The crowd cheered.

'But I would have you know,' Stapleton shouted, 'that the path will not be easy. No sooner did I learn of the attack upon our fair island, than I wrote letters to our countrymen in Jamaica and in Barbados, requesting their assistance in settling this matter once and for all. The Governor of Jamaica has replied to say that his heart, and those of his people, march with us, but that owing to the devastation caused by the dreadful earthquake at Port Royal only a few years ago, he can assist us with no military force. We are grateful for their good wishes. But the Governor of Barbados has replied to say that we must fight our own war.' He paused to allow the boos and hisses to run their course. 'Further, he says that the more the Leeward Islands are reduced, the happier will the Barbadians be.'

This time the howl of execration sent the gulls scattering from the harbour.

'I cannot believe,' Stapleton shouted, 'that such a sentiment expresses the true feelings of the Barbadian people. But it is the point of view taken by their governor. So we must act on our own. Yet we are not so bereft, dear friends. Have we not many good men and true in these islands who will bear arms to avenge our recent catastrophe?' The crowd roared.

'And have we not, living in our midst, nay, standing beside me, a man of vast experience in dealing with the Caribs? Gentlemen, I give you Colonel Philip Warner. His father and brother faced no less a challenge, and carried it to a successful conclusion. Shall we be lesser men than those heroes of the past? Colonel Warner.'

The men and women stamped their feet and cheered and clapped their hands, and dust and sweat and passion filled the morning air. The horses shuffled restlessly, and Kit had to rein hard to keep still. The trap waited at the back of the crowd, and Marguerite's fingers were tight on his arm.

'They will not lack for volunteers,' he said.

'Nor should they.' She smiled, a tight-lipped smile. 'Although Papa here exists on reputation. He did not accompany my grandfather and my uncle on that famous expedition.' She glanced at him. 'But he will have you at his side.'

Kit said nothing. He watched the Deputy Governor calling for silence.

'Aye,' Philip Warner shouted. 'I know these brooding devils. I know them well. They are led by my own brother.'

The crowd fell silent. They had not expected such frankness.

'But does not the Bible itself command me,' Philip said. 'Should your right eye offend thee, cast it out? My brother will pay for this outrage, and I shall see that he does. I need men. Men of courage. Men of purpose. But more than that, I need men of anger. Are you such men?'

The loudest of all the shouts came crashing through the still air.

'So then,' Philip shouted. 'If you are such men, enter your names on the tables set out by the Ice House. Enter them, and assemble this time tomorrow, to be given arms, and to be told what we intend.'

The crowd cheered, and the two governors turned and left the platform to enter the Ice House itself. Kit urged the horses forward, and the people parted before him.

' 'Tis Captain Hilton,' someone said.

'You'll lead us, Captain,' shouted another man.

'Aye, we'll march with you, Captain,' someone else bellowed. 'Or are you afraid to meet Monsieur DuCasse again?' a voice said.

For everyone present knew that Green Grove had been spared the worst of the assault.

Kit turned his head, and his eyes searched the crowd, but found no man looking sufficiently defiant. And now they were abreast of the warehouse, and he could see Agrippa and Abigail, and the Christianssens. And Lilian. He had sent a message into town, the moment the roads were safe, both to inform her of his own survival, and to learn of hers. But now ... the rumours were already spreading of what had happened to Marguerite. Lilian would not expect him to return.

As the crowd knew.

'You'll lead us, Captain,' said the man who had first spoken, grasping the bridle. 'You've a cause, same as us.'

Marguerite stared at them as the carriage stopped, and she stepped down. 'Aye,' she said, not speaking loudly, but with an edge to her voice which cut across even that huge assembly. 'He has a cause. The Captain will lead you.'

The crowd cheered, and hands reached up, both to assist Marguerite to the ground and to slap Kit on the back as he followed her up the steps. He sighed with relief when the doors closed behind them. But here was a new kind of ordeal. For every planter on the island was present, coming forward to greet the new arrivals.

'Marguerite,' Philip said. 'Thank God you are safe. We had heard such rumours.'

All of them true,' she said, and faced the men, and their women.

'Oh, sweetheart,' screamed Mary Chester, throwing herself at her friend. 'Could you not reach St John's?'

Marguerite embraced her. 'I chose to fight for my plantation,' she said, looking over the young woman's head at the rest of them. 'And we were defeated, thanks to the cowardice of our overseers. And so I was thrown on the ground and raped, by one of my own blacks. Is that not what you wished to hear, gentlemen? But I am still alive, and my husband still stands by my side, as he fought at my side, and lost at my side.'

'Kit,' Philip Warner squeezed his hand. 'It seems a miracle.'

'No miracle,' Kit said. 'Your brother spared my life when he discovered my relationship to Susan. And then DuCasse arrived, and called a truce. You'll recall that we sailed together as lads.'

'A fortunate circumstance,' Edward Chester remarked.

'But you will march with me, Kit,' Philip said hastily, before Kit could take offence. 'I have need of men with experience of the jungle.'

'I would know your purpose,' Kit said.

'Our purpose?' Stapleton demanded. 'Why, Captain Hilton, it is to avenge this catastrophe.'

'Scarce a Christian thought, Your Excellency.'

'Christian? You speak to me of Christianity, in regard to these heathen monsters? You, who have seen your own wife ...'

'And you are indelicate, sir,' Kit said. 'If my wife chooses to mention her own misfortune, that is her decision, but the next man to speak of it, uninvited, before her or before me, will face my pistol, be he governor or book-keeper.'

'By God, sir,' said one of the St Kitts planters who had accompanied Stapleton. 'You cannot speak to the King's representative in that tone.'

'Be quiet,' Stapleton said. His face was red, and yet he smiled. 'I had expected no less a reaction from Captain Hilton, and I honour him for it. Yet, sir, if you will turn such anger on me for reminding you of the guilt of these savages, can you not spare some for the Indians themselves?'

'I doubt whether anger would accomplish anything of value, Your Excellency,' Kit said. 'You ask me to accompany the expedition because I have been on such an expedition before. Well, sir, if you wish my experience, then kindly do me the honour of accepting it. I marched with Morgan. He took a year and more to prepare his expedition against Panama, reconnoitred the ground over which we had to travel, hand-picked his followers, understood truly what he was about.'

'He fought the Dons,' Harding said. 'We plan to light naked savages.'

'I would have thought we oppose the more deadly foe, sir,' Kit said.

'Yet must it be done,' Stapleton pointed out. 'Although certainly it will be necessary to proceed with caution.'

'And there are ships, sir,' Kit said. 'Where will we find the vessels to transport our men at short notice?'

'Now there we are fortunate,' Philip Warner said. 'As the news of the peace with France was brought to us by a flotilla of three vessels, all anxious to lend their support in our expedition to Dominica.'

'The three anchored in the bay?' Kit demanded, with a sinking heart.

'None others,' said a man who had hitherto been lurking in the shadows at the corner of the room. 'And happy to make your acquaintance after all these years, Kit.'

Kit frowned. 'Bale? Can that be you?'

'Captain Bale, lad. Captain Bale.'

Certainly the buccaneer had prospered. His coat was of broadcloth, and his shirt cambric, if somewhat dirty. But his cutlass was bright enough and there were two pistols at his belt.

'I had thought you long dead.'

'I'm not that easy to kill, lad. As I told you gentlemen, I was a good friend of this lad's grandfather. We sailed together, when I was but a boy, Tony Hilton and I.' He gestured his companions forward. 'Captain William Hamblyn, and Captain Edward England, at your service, gentlemen.'

'Pirates,' Kit muttered.

'Privateers, Kit, privateers,' Bale insisted. 'Temporarily out of employment, with the news of this peace, and eager to play our part in your campaign.'

'With good crews, Captain Hilton,' Stapleton said.

'If allowed to plunder, sir,' Kit said.

'And yet,' Stapleton mused, 'on the last occasion that it was necessary to mount an expedition against the Caribs, did not old Sir Thomas and Edward Warner, good men and true, happily avail themselves of the aid of two famous buccaneers to gain their victory? One of these men, as I recall, was named John Painton. And the other ... now strange, his name escapes me.'

'It was Tony Hilton, sir,' Kit said. 'Like Colonel Warner here. Your Excellency, I make no apology for my family. Or indeed, for my own past. But you have raised the most important point of all, sir, in my opinion. The objective of the expedition.'

"Why, to kill as many of the devils as possible,' Chester said.

'And to regain as many of our kidnapped slaves as possible,' Philip Warner said.

"And the women, gentlemen,' Stapleton observed, drily. 'Were not a dozen white women also carried off?'

Feet shuffled. 'Aye,' someone said. 'The women.'

'The slaves and the women must be regained,' Kit said. 'But I wonder if we achieve anything by mounting an expedition of pure vengeance.'

'Sir?' A dozen voices shouted the query.

'Hear me out,' Kit bawled. 'I but seek to know whether we approach this affair as angry men, or as statesmen. There is all the difference in the world between the two. Sir William has just reminded us that there was a previous expedition, which cost many lives, which was intended to avenge many lives. Yet it did not end the Carib menace. Nor will this one, if we seek to do nothing more than kill. Do you imagine we can destroy the Carib nation in Dominica? Has any one of you the slightest concept of the shape of that island? Of the forests there? Of the precipitous mountains up which we must march? Can we do more than raid, as they raided us? And by doing that, will we not be exposing our own sons and daughters, and ourselves, in our old ages, to another violent and bloody conflict? Were we not discussing our own futures but a few weeks gone, and planning even treason with but one objective in mind, the security of our plantations and of our families?'

'The only secure Carib is a dead Carib,' Chester said.

'Yet it would seem that Captain Hilton has an alternative scheme, and I have no doubt at all that it is worth hearing,' Stapleton said.

'Well, gentlemen,' Kit said. 'I was neither born nor brought to manhood in these islands. But my grandmother knew them well, and remembered them sufficiently to impart some of their history to me. And no doubt Colonel Warner can confirm much of it, and point out where I err. Is it not a fact, Colonel, that your illustrious father, and my illustrious grandfather, were welcomed to St Kitts by the chieftain of that island, the cacique Tegramond, and given land to plant their tobacco, and treated as friends? And more. Did Tegramond raise any objections when his own daughter Yarico became your father's mistress? I speak no slander; it is a well enough attested fact. It is that fact that we are discussing now. The men quarrelled, or there was a suspicion of treachery. No one will ever know the truth. Suffice that the white men, outnumbered and insecure, felt themselves menaced by the Carib peril, and forestalled it by a surprise attack, which led to the massacre of Tegramond and his people, and which began this deadly feud. Which was fanned by the adherence of Yarico to her English lover. And is it not true, Colonel, that you and your half-brother, the fruit of that liaison, quarrelled, and that he and his mother fled to Dominica to perpetuate a hatred which might otherwise have died a natural death?'

'I early saw the villain in him, if that is what you mean,' Philip Warner said. But his face glowed with angry embarrassment.

'And is it not true that the French, seeking to make capital between Englishman and Indian, elected Tom Warner to the Governorship of Dominica, meaning thus to enlist him for all time on their side? Yet is he half-Warner, and half-English. And so he proved at Green Grove, that he has not finally turned his back on that glorious heritage.'

'Yet would he revenge himself upon my body, and as he hoped, upon my mind,' Marguerite said.

Kit turned to her. 'Indeed, my sweet. But there is the nub of the matter. The quarrel is entirely between Warner and Warner. Sad it is that it should involve so many innocent people.'

'And would you leave it to my father to fight it out with my uncle?' she demanded angrily. And stand to one side, and congratulate the victor?'

'That were no less a pre-Christian solution,' Kit said. 'But gentlemen, suppose Tom Warner and Philip Warner were to shake their hands together, and attest their names to a treaty of peace between Indian and Englishman, between Dominica and the Leewards? Suppose that could be done, gentlemen. What then of the future? For be sure that we will have fight-

ing enough, against the French and the Dons, to satisfy the most bloodthirsty belly, without raising the redskins against us into the bargain.'

'Balderdash,' Harding shouted. "What treaty could a savage understand?'

'I speak of no savage,' Kit insisted. 'But of a man who can bend the savages to his will.'

'Yet it is still specious talk,' Philip Warner said. 'There is much hatred between Tom and myself. Too much to be reconciled at the snap of a finger. I know not how I should go about it. Nor do I know how I could force my nature to speak friendship with a devil from hell.'

'Then allow me, Colonel Warner,' Kit said. 'For as you once pointed out, I too am a devil from hell.'

The assembly fell silent, afraid to agree with him, unable to argue that point.

'And why should he listen to you, Captain Hilton?' Stapleton inquired.

'Because, sir, as he told me but a few days gone, my grandmother, and her lover, Edward Warner, were the only white people ever to show him kindness.'

'And you'd put your trust in that, buccaneer?' someone asked.

'They'd have you stripped and tied to a stake before you could draw your sword,' Bale remarked.

'The risk is mine, gentlemen. I will take it. I have a son and a daughter. I have no wish to see them on the ground at the feet of a red man. And be sure that that fate is one which may overtake the family of every man here if this feud is allowed to fester.'

They stared at him. Stapleton was first to speak. 'If you have sufficient faith, in yourself and in this savage, to attempt such a solution to our problem, why then, we were men of little sense, and certainly of little Christianity, did we not consider the attempt worth our while. What say you, Colonel Warner?'

Philip Warner hesitated, and then snorted. 'Let the captain pursue his aims, Sir William. But he'll go alone, by God. Bring my brother, and his fellow chieftains, down to the beach, Kit, unarmed and in a mood for talk, and by God, we shall meet them, unarmed, and in a mood for talk. But until they appear beside you, why, by God, my armament and my ships and I will stand in a posture of defence, and if need be, we shall avenge you together with all our other dead.'

'Aye,' Edward Chester said. 'Spoken like a sensible man, Philip.'

'Then it seems we have arrived at an equitable solution,' Stapleton said. 'We shall recruit our army, and send it across the sea, and pray that it shall not need its strength. Aye, there were a Christian intent.'

'And do I have no say in this matter?' Marguerite demanded. 'As it is my body you partly seek to avenge, and my husband you are so carelessly sending to his death?'

'At his request, Mrs Hilton,' Stapleton protested.

'It is the best way, Marguerite,' Kit said. 'You know of what we spoke. I cannot give you back those terrible moments on the floor. I can but erase their memory with moments as beautiful as those were horrible, time and again. I can only give you happiness where you have known misery. But we are both young. We have a great time to live, God willing, and be happy. Can we really swear to do so with the Carib menace hanging above us like a cloud for the rest of our lives, and knowing too that it will similarly overhang the lives of our children?'

Marguerite gazed at him, her lips parted as if she would have spoken again. Then her eyes flickered, across his right shoulder, and he knew she looked at her father. Still she hesitated, for several seconds. Then she muttered, 'So be it,' and turned, and left the chamber.

The sun filled the sky with all the splendid power of a Caribbean noon. But the island remained dark. A green so intense it seemed almost black, clustering over rock and valley, headland and bay, appearing to grow out of the black sand beach itself, which did no more than form a narrow bridge between the forest mass and the deep blue of the sea. Susan had never seen Dominica, but she had spoken of it, often enough, and it must have appeared no different, Kit realized, to Tony Hilton and Edward Warner when they had come here more than half a century ago.

'No peace in their hearts,' Philip said at his elbow, and he turned in surprise. The Deputy Governor had avoided him during the overnight sail from Antigua, even as he had studiously avoided being alone with him during the week of frenzied preparation just past. Now he smiled, grimly. 'Aye, I can read your thoughts, Kit. They can be little different to mine.'

'You were not on that expedition.'

'No. My father wanted one of his sons, at the least, to survive. But they accomplished their objective, which was to destroy the Carib power for a generation. And to regain Edward's wife, Aline. What the devil is that leadsman doing?'

For indeed the dark mountains seemed to overhang the three ships.

'Yet have I heard that deep water extends practically up to the beaches,' Kit said.

'In places. I would not like us to go aground, just in case the savages do not respond to your peaceful notions, Kit.' Philip went to the rail. 'You'll wear ship and prepare to anchor, sir.'

Bale looked up. 'We have not that much chain, Colonel Warner.'

'The weather is settled, man. So long as the anchor but nudges the bottom to hold us from drifting, there will be no danger. We are not planning to abandon our vessels here. And break out the long-boat.' He came back to the stern. 'You'll not change your mind, Kit?'

'That would scarce be either honourable or wise, sir,' Kit said. 'And in any event, it would certainly be unnecessary. I perceived in your brother a heritage he could not throw off no matter how hard he tried. And a wisdom which was all I had expected, of a Warner. An appeal to both of those things must have results.'

'Then here is my hand.' Their fingers clasped. 'But mark me well. Stand once again on the beach by noon tomorrow, or I shall mount an assault in which quarter will be an unknown word.'

'I shall be there. And you will guarantee the safety of whomsoever I bring with me? There are some right cut-throats in this fleet.'

'Their safety will be my responsibility, Kit,' Philip said.

'Then I am content. 'Til noon tomorrow.'

He climbed down the ladder, sat in the stern of the boat as it pulled for the shore. Now they were in the shelter of the mountains the breeze had dropped, and the day was steaming hot. The sun seemed to hang over the stern of the longboat, and the men sweated as they pulled. But then, Kit realized, he also sweated. With fear? He did not think so. But memory kept crowding him, of that day off Hispaniola, when they had lain in the swell, and watched the Spanish coaster drifting. The commencement of a lifetime of violence, from which he only vainly attempted to escape. There was a specious statement. Could any man, or woman, own a plantation and turn his back on violence?

The keel grated, and the sailors backed their oars. Two men jumped over the bows to hold the boat steady, and Kit made his way forward. Now there was cause for fear; the crowding trees were certainly within bowshot, and waiting beneath them were six of the great war canoes, upturned on the black volcanic sand. Yet not a leaf moved, and there was no sound above the gentle splash of the little surf.

He jumped on to the beach, and the men immediately pushed the boat back into the swell before scrambling on board. 'God go with you, Captain Hilton,' the coxswain called.

'I thank you, friend.' Kit gazed at the ships, nodding to their anchors a hundred yards away. The ports were opened and the guns run out, and they presented a splendid sight. His last, of European humanity? But now was scarce the time for backsliding. He turned, to face the trees, and instinctively dropped his left hand to rest on the hilt of his sword, only to have it fall uselessly at his side. For he had left his sword, as he had left his pistols, on board. Kit Hilton, alone and unarmed. And how alone he felt.

Slowly he walked up the beach towards the trees, seeking some sort of path. And there it was, a distinct thinning in the forest, immediately behind the war canoes, a roadway of earth and leaves beaten flat by the tramplings of innumerable feet. But still the canoes lay there, untended. But not unwatched. He was sure of that, and turned again, sharply, hoping to catch the forest unawares.

The green wall stared at him.

He took off his hat, and the bandanna he wore underneath, and dried the sweat from his face and neck. Then he replaced both, and stepped beneath the trees, following the uneven path up a shallow hillside. After a few minutes he paused, and looked back, and saw nothing but trees and bushes. The forest had closed around him like a living creature. Perhaps the beach was not there, nor the sea, nor the ships. Certainly that was easy to believe.

But in here it was no longer silent. He was surrounded by the rustle of flowing water, to suggest a stream nearby. And the air was cooler too, as the glare was diminished. Not even the Caribbean sun could fully penetrate these leafy rooftops.

He climbed, and lost track of time as rapidly as he had lost track of his whereabouts. Often the path became too steep for walking, and he had to use his hands as well as his toes to pull himself upwards, while the sweat drained from his hair and shoulders and soaked his clothes. It was while climbing thus that he suddenly faced naked feet, and reared back so violently he all but fell. His head jerked, and he stared at a savage standing above him, bow already bent and arrow fitted, scarce seeming to breathe, perhaps a statue, but for the venom in his eyes.

Kit balanced himself as best he could, and raised both his arms high into the air. 'Don't shoot,' he shouted. 'I am unarmed. I come in peace. I seek your cacique. I seek the Governor.'

'Why, Captain Hilton?' asked Indian Warner, and Kit dropped his hands to grasp the rock as he turned his head. Tom Warner stood behind and below him, with a dozen of his braves. And now he realized there were others on either side of him. They had been there, no doubt, since he had started his climb.

'Why?' Tom Warner asked again. 'You come as the representative of a fleet of white men. Do you know what happened when last the white men landed in Dominica, Captain Hilton? They fought a battle, and won, by their superior arms, and then they burned and pillaged. They seized the wounded braves, and any women they could find, and they hanged them, Captain Hilton. Why should I not have my men strip the flesh from your bones, now?'

Kit got his breathing under control. 'Because I hope to convince you that it would be to your interest to listen to me, and even to agree with me. If my people have wronged you, Mr Warner, be sure that you have wronged me. Thus we can meet on equal ground, at least this once.'

Tom Warner hesitated. And then smiled. 'You speak the truth, Captain Hilton. By your lights, at the least. Come, we will talk with my people. And with my mother.'

'Your mother still lives?' Kit asked in amazement.

'Should she not, Captain Hilton? And she will be glad to talk with Tony Hilton's grandson. Now come.'

He climbed up to Kit and past him, and Kit hastily scrambled behind him. The Indian with the bow loosened his string and put away his arrow, and the other Caribs followed. Some of them. More melted away into the forest, to watch the white man's fleet. They suspected treachery. That must be his principal concern, Kit realized, to overcome the suspicion which afflicted both, but which had been started by the massacre of the Indian tribe in St Kitts by this very man's father.

They climbed for more than two hours, and then they must have been high above the sea, Kit thought, perhaps a thousand feet and more. Yet the trees never thinned, and it was not possible to see the ocean, and the peaks covered in trees went on soaring on either side. Then they at last descended, and soon enough his nostrils were afflicted by the ghastly taint of sulphur. But Susan had warned him of this also, and he was prepared for the sudden cessation of the forest, which ended with an abruptness as if some deity had drawn a line, as perhaps He had, to allow below them only a valley of empty rock, dotted with pools and crossed by a stream, all of which seethed and bubbled and emitted clouds of noxious vapour. The Valley of Desolation.

Here Tom Warner stopped for a moment, and glanced at his companion. 'This was the site of the battle, between Edward Warner and Tony Hilton, and the Carib Wapisiane,' he said. 'A good place for men to die, would you not say, Captain Hilton? We must cross it. But beware. Do not allow your feet to slip into any of that water, or you will be stripped to die bone with a speed far greater than my men could accomplish. Follow me, closely.'

He scrambled down the side of the hill, and Kit followed. The Caribs fell into single file behind him, and they made their way across the valley. Here the heat really was intense; not even the boiling house at the height of grinding quite equalled it, and instead of the sickly smell of evaporating sugar juice there was the lung-blocking stench of sulphur, which rose around them and blotted out the sun; the clouds themselves were a sickly yellow.

And now there came a roar from somewhere to his left, and the earth shook. He checked, and Tom Warner turned with a smile. 'That is the volcano. My people call it the Boiling Lake, because it bubbles without ceasing. But it has not actually exploded within the memory of any man of my tribe; I think it is because the excess of steam is carried off by these pools and this stream. We shall soon be across.'

And indeed already the air was clearing, and the ground beginning to rise, and there were other sounds to be heard above the hissing of the steam. Soon Kit saw green leaves again, and a puff of wind dispelled the worst of the vapour, and now he saw the palm-thatched roofs of the Carib benabs. A few moments later he was surrounded by women and children, all entirely naked, leaping and shouting, reaching out to touch his clothes, to squeeze his arms and belly, to fumble at his thighs.

'They suppose you are for the stake,' Tom Warner said.

'I hope you will be able to persuade them otherwise,' Kit remarked.

Once again Tom Warner smiled, and stopped and clapped his hands. The Indians fell silent, to listen to their Governor. His voice echoed across the clearing, while Kit seized the opportunity to look around him. The breeze still blew, but he was not at all sure that the scents which now afflicted his nostrils were preferable to that of the sulphur. Apart from the expected odours of a savage village there was another, more intense tang in the air, the stench of putrefying flesh, and now he saw, to his horror, three stakes erected in the centre of the rough circle formed by the houses. To each of the stakes there clung a skeleton, suspended by throat and waist as he had been strapped to his own banisters, tatters of rotting flesh dripping from shoulder and thigh, faces the more horrible because the heads had been untouched, and were mouldering on the bones as they grinned at him, expressions still caricatures of ghastly fear and pain.

Tom Warner ceased speaking, and the crowd melted away, casting glances over their shoulders at the white man they would not possess. 'They will not harm you,' Tom said.

'As they did those poor devils?' Kit demanded. 'Tell me, Governor, did you partake in that feast?'

'I thought you came here to talk peace, Kit,' Tom remarked. 'Indeed, I have eaten human flesh. Those were brave men, before they were tied to the stakes. They died screaming, yet there was sufficient courage left in them to impart some to those who tasted their flesh. Come.'

He walked across the clearing, and Kit followed, acutely aware that he was being watched by every man, woman and child in the tribe, and there seemed to be a great number of them, more than he had expected, crouching in shaded doorways and standing in clusters beneath the overhanging branches of trees. And suddenly his courage and the confidence of his demeanour was assailed by a new threat.

'Captain Hilton,' a woman screamed. 'Captain Hilton.'

He checked, and saw a white body, naked and stained with dirt and filth, tumbling from a doorway to his right, to be seized by the ankle and dragged back into the shade.

'Captain Hilton.' The sound wailed on the wind.

'Bv Christ,' Kit said, once again feeling for his absent sword hilt.

'She is one of our captives,' Tom Warner said. 'There are eleven of them, and some slaves. Fear not, Kit. We do not eat either blacks or women. As for their misuse, I have been told that you sailed with Morgan, and were at Panama. Women, like gold, are the spoils of war, are they not?'

'Yet must they form part of any negotiation between us,' Kit said.

Tom nodded. 'If your people would have it so.' He stooped, to enter a house somewhat different to the others, in that the palm fronds which composed the roof had been thickened and allowed to droop closer to the ground, to provide more shade and more privacy to those within. Kit had to bend almost double to gain the interior, but here he could straighten without difficulty, and blink into the gloom. Tom stood beside a gently swaying hammock, perhaps six feet away from him. 'I would have you meet my mother,' he said. 'Yarico.'

For the first time in too many years Kit was embarrassed, unable to move, uncertain what words to use, or even if to use any. But the woman in the hammock knew no such restrictions. 'Kit Hilton,' she said, in amazingly good English. 'Come closer, Kit.'

He crossed the beaten earth floor, frowning into the shade, and stood beside the hammock. His impression was first of all of white hair, descending to the shoulders, and this struck him as odd, because in all the village there had not been a single white-haired Indian, of either sex. Then there was brown flesh, surprisingly firm. She did not bother with the apron of the other married women, nor was her body, which could hardly be younger than seventy years old, he realized, less attractive than those outside, and her grasp, which now fastened on his hand, was as strong as a man's.

But it was her face he searched. And without disappointment here either. Like all Carib faces it was long, and the features were prominent, high cheekbones, straight, thrusting nose, firm chin, wide mouth. And glowing black eyes. It seemed the most natural thing in all the world, to drop to his knees next to the hammock, to feel her fingers rippling up his arm and across his shoulder and into his hair.

'Susan's grandson,' she said, softly. 'Did she tell you of me?'

'Endlessly, princess,' Kit said. 'Of how you loved and laughed together, and how you fought together, too.'

'A long time,' Yarico said. 'A long time. Now all are dead, from those days.' Her voice changed. 'Save Philip.'

'He waits with his fleet.'

'I know that, Kit. My son has told me. Philip was my son, too. Not of my belly. He was Rebecca's child. But when she died, I felt guilty. Because his father had neglected her, for me. I was beautiful then, Kit. There was no man could look upon me and not wish to share my hammock.'

'You are beautiful now,' Kit whispered.

Yarico smiled. Her teeth were the whitest he had ever seen. 'Now,' she said. 'Now I am a goddess. I am unique, Kit. My people do not grow old. It is the custom amongst the Caribs for any man or woman feeling the onset of infirmity to take themselves alone into the forest, there to die of starvation. But my people would not let such a fate overtake me. Because I have known the great white man, Sir Thomas Warner, and his even greater son, Edward.' Once again the change of tone. 'Would that the white people had felt it also.'

'It is my purpose,' Kit said. 'To bring an end to that strife.'

Her eyes searched his face, in the gloom. 'Aye. You have the breadth of spirit of your grandfather. I would speak of him again. And of you. But now my son's chieftains await you.'

Kit realized that Tom Warner had left his side, and that almost the entire Carib nation, it seemed, had gathered beyond the hut to wait for the white man. He stooped, and returned to the sunlight, gazed at the assembled warriors. Here were men. He wondered if Philip Warner understood the force by which he might be opposed, should these talks come to nothing. But then, did he understand what would be his fate, should these talks come to nothing.

'Speak to them, Kit,' Tom Warner said. 'I will relate your words, as faithfully as I can.'

Kit hesitated, once again staring at the stern red-brown faces, the muscular arms, each one holding a spear or a bow, the heaving chests, the powerful limbs. But was he not just such a man, to them? To all men? As white men were ranked, he was more of a warrior than any man present, even Indian Warner himself. He inhaled. 'Tell them that I know of the past, Mr Warner. That I know how Tegramond and his people welcomed the Warners and their people to St Kitts, and how the English and the French repaid that kindness and that trust with blood. Tell them that I know how the Caribs were expelled from all the Leewards by Edward Warner. Tell them that I know how the Caribs under Wapisiane sought to avenge themselves, and how they kidnapped Edward Warner's wife after destroying his colony in Antigua. Tell them that I know how the Warners, aided by the Hiltons and their people, came to Dominica and won a great victory, and killed and murdered and raped and plundered, also in the name of revenge. And say also, that I understand why the Caribs came to Antigua last month, once again in revenge, and why they murdered and plundered and raped. Tell them that my own wife suffered, and that I know why she did. Because her name was Warner.'

Tom Warner gazed at him for a moment, and then slowly translated. The language was guttural, and brief. No flowery phrases for the Caribs.

'You may continue,' he said.

'Then tell them that, knowing all this, I have accompanied the fleet of Colonel Philip Warner to these shores. They know it is there. Then let them know this also, that there are two hundred and fifty men on board those ships, more men, every one of them armed and determined to fight, than all the people in this tribe, from the newest babe to your mother. I come here in no consciousness of weakness, from no fear of the Caribs. But knowing too that the fight, when it comes, will be long and terrible, and that many brave men on both sides will die. No Carib fears to die. Every Carib may wish to do so in battle. But there is more. The white man is coming, in ever-increasing numbers, finding his way across the sea to live in these magnificent islands, to make himself rich from the sale of his sugar-cane. Every Carib warrior who dies is gone for ever. Every white man who dies will be replaced a hundred, a thousandfold. This struggle is one the Carib nation cannot hope to win. And why did it begin? Because of an act of the Warners. Why does it continue? Because of the hatred of Warner for Warner. Now there arc so many wrongs on both sides, there is no hope of surrender. There is only hope of a mutual forgiveness. It is to see if this can be done that I have come to your village. Here is your noble and valiant chieftain, your Governor, Thomas Warner, and down there on the ship is our noble and valiant leader and Governor, Philip Warner. They are brothers. Now is the time for them to shake hands, as is the white man's way, to look together at the great Sun, as is the Carib way, and to break their swords together.'

He paused, and Tom Warner frowned. 'My brother will do this?'

'He has promised. There will be some argument, I am sure.

But he wishes to talk with you, and your chiefs. No harm can come out of that. You have my word, and his, that your lives will be safeguarded.'

Tom Warner nodded. 'I will tell my people. Then we will feast.'

The Carib women were already preparing the slaughtered birds and the fried fish, and pouring the cups of piwarri, the fermented juice of the cassava plant. Now they waited to serve their men as the braves sat in a vast circle, and ate, and drank, with much solemnity, and muttered at each other, and watched the white man sitting next to their cacique, while the heat left the sun as it dipped towards the mountains. And Kit stared back at them, and beyond, at the ghastly things that had been men hanging from their stakes, and listened, to the whimperings of the white women confined to the huts behind him. As the afternoon wore on, and the piwarri mounted its attack on his senses, he ceased to believe that he was here at all, eating and drinking with the fiercest people on earth. And by the time the feast ended the day had become a long dream. He found himself in a hammock, and there was a soft body next to his. Carib custom, or Tom Warner's way of making some atonement for the crime he had committed on Marguerite? Or perhaps it was Yarico herself, moving her ancient limbs silently against his, bringing him to enticing orgasm time and again. Or was that also a dream, for certainly the ground no longer existed, but he floated on air, and the night no longer existed, as bright lights hovered around his brain, and the darkness dissolved into eternity, which ended with the rising of the sun, with a nudge in the thigh, and with a sudden return to reality.

He was in a hammock, and alone, and the day was already hot.

'My chieftains say they will come, to hear what my brother has to say,' Tom Warner said.

Kit sat up, and scratched his head. 'When will we leave?'

'Immediately. But my mother wishes to speak with you again, before you go.'

Kit followed him across the still mist-steaming clearing, into the sheltered hut. Here Yarico swung in her hammock. Yarico? It could not be.

She smiled at him. 'My son tells me you have brought a proposal of peace, between your people and mine.'

'It is my hope. And if they will come and talk, then it is a possibility.'

'Aye,' she said. 'It will allow me to die happy. And you also. For these are your people no less than mine. Do you look often in a glass, Kit?'

He frowned. 'No more than any other man.'

She nodded. 'But you have been taught enough about your family's history, I have no doubt. Susan has told you much about her past.'

'She valued her experiences.'

'And so she should,' Yarico said. 'We were in the forest of St Kitts together, Susan and I. And Edward Warner. We shared everything, the three of us, and Aline. But Susan was ever his favourite. Do not doubt that, Kit. Aline's son was murdered by Wapisiane. Her daughter hated the islands, hated the memory of what my people did to her family, of the anger of her own father, and so she returned to England. She lives and prospers in that far off land. My son still lives and prospers, outside. And Susan's son also lived and prospered, and died. And yet lives on, in his son. But they are all Warners.'

Kit's frown deepened. 'I do not understand you, Yarico. Is there yet another Warner, tucked away amongst these islands?'

She smiled. He would never forget the flash of her teeth. 'Aye,' she said. 'Yet another. Perhaps the best of them all. Now kiss me before you go, Kit. I doubt we shall meet again.'

He lowered his head to hers, and she seized his face between her hands and brought his lips to hers. 'Now go,' she whispered. 'Go, and prosper.'

She held his hand for a moment longer, and then released him. He stepped outside, found Tom Warner waiting for him, with seven other chieftains, wearing bright feathers in their hair. Behind them were the women captives, roped together, and guarded by a dozen braves, and then a good score of Negroes. He could not resist inspecting them, before asking Tom Warner, 'What has happened to George Frederick?'

‘You would demand him as well?'

‘I would know where he is.'

'He sailed with DuCasse, for which I thank our mutual good fortune, Kit.'

'Aye,' Kit agreed. He stepped past the Indians, smiled at the women. 'Have no fear, ladies. You shall soon be returned to your husbands and families.'

They gaped at him. Several of them he had met, although none was a planter's wife; they were the families of overseers and book-keepers, and one or two came from Falmouth. All were clearly still suffering from the shock of their ordeal. And no doubt they also had spent a busy night, as every night since they had been captured would have been similarly busy.

Tom touched him on the shoulder. 'If we are to reach the beach by noon, it would be best to hurry.'

They descended from the village into the Valley of Desolation, made their way across, and then climbed into the mountains before beginning their descent to the beach. They made a vast array, the chieftains leading the way, Kit in their midst, the captives following, and behind them the warriors of the tribe, fully armed and ready for war. But having come this far, it would not reach the ultimate. Of that Kit was sure, now. Even Philip Warner must respond to this willingness on the part of the Caribs.

'You are doing right,' he said to Tom Warner.

The half-caste thought for a while before replying. 'I am doing the best for my people, Kit, because I too am well aware of the growing strength of the white men. As to what is right, no man can tell that, because no man knows what is right. There is a risk that with the determination to live at peace with our invaders, my braves might degenerate into a nation of women, like the Arawaks.'

'That is not necessarily so,' Kit said. 'Do not the white men desire to live at peace with their neighbours? And are they not still capable of waging war?'

Tom looked at him, and burst out laughing. 'Do you honestly believe what you are saying? There is no more warlike creature on the face of this earth than the white man. He merely endeavours to disguise it under a variety of specious pleas for peace. We are at least honest about our pleasures. But come, we have arrived.'

The beach opened in front of them, and the ships waited, patiently at anchor, guns still run out. The Indians halted at the fringe of the trees, and Kit went on alone down the beach, past the war canoes, and waved his arms.

A cheer broke out from the ships, and a moment later the longboat pulled away from the side of the flagship. 'Welcome back, Captain Hilton,' said the coxswain. 'We were all but giving you up for lost.'

'Not so, friend,' Kit said. 'I have brought the chieftains with me.' He turned to the forest, and Tom and his seven caciques came down the sand.

'Your men are armed,' Tom observed. 'I had expected to meet my brother on the beach.'

'Will you not take his word? He gave it to me personally,' Kit said.

Tom hesitated, glanced at his companions, and then climbed into the boat. The other Indians followed his example. The white sailors looked towards the trees, and the women they could see there.

'They will come, when the talking is finished,' Kit said.

The boat pulled across the calm sea, into the looming side of the ship. How enormous she looked from down here, and how powerful, with the ugly muzzles of the cannon protruding from the row of ports. But there at the gangway were Bale and Philip Warner, waiting to receive their guests.

Kit was first up the ladder, to grasp hands with his father-in-law.

'Well done, lad,' Philip said. 'Well done. Welcome aboard, Tom.'

The brothers gazed at each other. Then Tom took the proffered hand. 'My chieftains,' he said.

Slowly the seven Indians came up the ladder, looked around them at the sailors and the great cannon, and up at the towering masts and the furled sails.

Tom made a remark in the Carib tongue, and then smiled at Kit and his brother. 'They are amazed, at the size and strength of the white man's ship. They do not understand why you should seek for peace when possessed of such strength.'

'We seek for peace because we, too, respect the Carib strength,' Kit said.

'Aye,' Philip Warner agreed, glancing at the people on the beach. 'You'll bring your people below, brother.'

Tom hesitated yet again, and he also looked from the armed seamen to the distant shore. Then he nodded, and ducked his head to follow Kit into the great cabin.

'You'll stay on my right hand, Kit,' Philip Warner said. 'And you, Bale, on my left.'

The captain grinned, and nodded. He appeared to be in a high good humour this morning. Kit found himself on the opposite side of the table to the Indians.

'I feel that we outnumber you unfairly, Philip,' Tom said with a smile. 'Eight to three.'

Philip also smiled. 'But you are on my ship, brother, and therefore in my power,' he said. 'And perhaps it were best to put an end to this farce immediately.' He clapped his hands, and the door opened once again, to admit six seamen, four carrying pistols and the other two carrying lengths of chain.

Tom frowned. 'What's this?'

'As you have seen fit to surrender yourselves,' Philip said. 'I intend to clap you in irons before taking you back to St John's, where you will be hanged.'

Kit's jaw dropped in consternation. Tom's reaction was more violent. With a roar of rage he leapt across the table, his fingers searching for his brother's throat. But Philip was already shouting, 'Now,' and at the same time throwing both arms around Kit's shoulders and stretching him full length on the deck.

The doors to the cabins behind the white men swung open, and the entire morning exploded into a crash of musketry.

9

The Traitor

The deafening crash of the explosions, the cloud of nostril-clogging black smoke, the cries of the assailed men, the entire suddenness of the event, for a moment removed Kit's senses. He was aware of sprawling on the deck of the cabin, Philip Warner on top of him, and then of feet stamping on him as men swarmed over him, their passage being marked by the rasp of their swords. The confined space was filled with curses and groans, and the shrieks of the dying. But now he was understanding what was happening, and with an effort forced himself to gaze up at the companion-way to the main deck, and watch a Carib chieftain running up, to pause at the top, and then come tumbling back down the narrow steps, a pike protruding from his breast.

The thump as he cannoned into the door was the end of the brief conflict. Now there were only the gasps of exertion issuing from the lungs of the victors. Perhaps the entire task had taken them ten seconds, and yet they panted as if they had been fighting for several hours. This was the measure of the guilty effort they had put forth.

Slowly Kit climbed to his feet. Someone threw open the stern windows, and the smoke began to clear. Men stared at the bloody swords in their hands, and began to pick up their discarded muskets, and from the hatchways and skylights other men peered in, gaping at the scene of destruction below them.

Someone laughed. 'Twas easy, after all, Colonel Warner.'

Kit stood at the end of the table, looking down at the dead bodies, looking down at Indian Tom Warner. Perhaps he had fallen in the first volley; there were two gaping bullet wounds in his chest, but no cut marks. His eyes were open, and he stared, at Kit and beyond. The expression in his eyes was the most terrible Kit had ever seen.

Revulsion filled his belly, bubbled to his chest, took control of his brain and the muscles of his body. He uttered a yell which outdid that of any of the Caribs, and as Tom Warner had done, threw himself clear across the table to wrap his fingers around the Deputy Governor's throat.

'Stop him,' Philip bawled, as he fell back on to a chair. Kit's knees ground into his belly, and he landed, and swung his lists. But already men were clawing at him, throwing him to one side, stamping on his arms and legs, regaining their own weapons as they sought to put an end to his anger.

'Do not harm him,' Philip commanded. He sat up, straightened his cravat. 'He has cause for distress. It was his word we pledged.'

They dragged Kit to his feet. 'My word,' he said. 'You cur. You crawling thing. You ...'

Philip Warner slashed the back of his hand across Kit's mouth. 'My decision,' he said. 'As commander of this expedition, as Deputy Governor of Antigua. You'll convince no one that I was wrong, Kit. And if you'd keep my friendship, you'll maintain a civil tongue in your head.'

'Your friendship?' Kit demanded. 'I'd as soon take the hand of a snake. That creature at the least pretends to nothing more than its own belly-crawling treachery.'

Philip's brows drew angrily together, but he was interrupted by a cry from Bale, who had gone on deck.

'Colonel Warner, sir. They must suspect something is afoot. They are launching their canoes.'

'By Christ.' Philip ran for the steps. 'Raise your anchor, Mr Bale. Make sail, man. Make sail. And signal the fleet to do likewise.'

The rest of the men ran behind him, and Kit was left alone, with the dead. But he too had reason to be on deck. He climbed the ladder, emerged into the afternoon heat, gazed at the six great canoes being dragged down the sand and launched into the water, at the spears being waved, the arrows being fitted to the bows.

'Would you compound crime upon crime?' he yelled. 'The women are still there. Our women.'

Philip Warner looked down on him from the poop deck. 'Not our women Kit. They belong to the Indians, now.'

'You'd desert them?' He could not believe his own words.

'Would any white man want them back?' Bale demanded. 'After they'd shared a cannibal's hammock?'

Kit continued to stare at Philip, who had the grace to flush. 'Aye, my brother took his wife back,' he said. 'But Edward was always an unusual fellow. Like you, Kit. You'd do well to ponder that.'

Kit turned away to look at the beach, at the green mountains which towered upwards towards the sky, at the myriad figures running up and down the sand, at the men already digging their paddles into the water as they urged their canoes towards the ships. Too much had happened, too quickly and too relentlessly, this past fortnight. Too much for his mind to assimilate. His brain rejected utterly the conception placed there, firstly by Yarico and now by Philip himself. He was the victim of a gigantic conspiracy. For if this deed had been planned before the fleet left St John's, then the decision to abandon the women had also been taken, before the fleet left St John's. And every word that had been agreed there had been a lie.

But the women. Almost he thought he could see them, waving their arms and calling, nay begging, for deliverance from the impossible fate to which they had been deserted.

Impossible was the word. He left the stern of the ship and ran forward. Men were heaving on the capstan to raise the anchor; others were already aloft unfurling the sails, and still others were gathered by the forehatch from which the boatswain was passing up cutlasses and muskets, for the canoes were fast approaching.

'Listen to me,' he shouted. 'There are white women back there. Eleven white women. Women from Antigua. We cannot just sail away and leave them to the mercy of the Indians. Would you abandon your wife or your daughter? You cannot do that.'

They turned to look at him, at a man demented.

'You have arms in your hands, and the cannon will cover us,' he shouted. 'God knows I wanted no bloodshed, but as it is come upon us, at least let us get ashore and rescue them.

Will no man follow me?' He seized a sword and ran to the side of the longboat. 'I, Kit Hilton, call for volunteers. I will lead you, my bravos. I marched with Morgan on Panama. You'll find no better leader in these islands. Who'll follow me?'

They stared at him. Perhaps, had he been Morgan, they might have come. Perhaps, had he been Jean DuCasse, they might have come. But then, perhaps not. He offered them no gold and no glory. He could not even offer them beautiful women. He could offer them only death, for the sake of eleven women they already counted as dead.

Bale stood before him, a pistol in his hand. ' 'Tis mutiny you're after, Captain Hilton,' he said. 'To suborn men from their duty in the face of the enemy is downright treason. I've orders to place you under arrest in your cabin.'

Kit looked down at the weapon he held. How he wanted to thrust it forward, to kill Bale, as could easily be done, and to confront the lot of them. And then make his way aft and settle with Philip Warner. His father-in-law? His own uncle? But was that not part of the hate and anger he felt? That he should be a part of this unhappy family.

But would it avail anyone for him to die now, when there was so much for him to do, by living?

He dropped his sword to the deck. 'I've a long memory, Bale.'

The pirate flushed, and jerked his head towards the after companion-way.

'Be sure he is secured, Mr Bale,' Philip Warner called down from the poop. 'We can stand no more eruptions of this nature. 'Tis certain we shall have to fire into these men.'

'Aye, aye, Colonel Warner.' Bale pushed Kit inside the cabin, hesitated. 'Remain in here, I beg of you, Kit. And remember if you will that this was not my doing.'

'Not your doing?' Kit turned on him. 'By God, you prating coward.'

'Hear me,' Bale begged. 'I knew naught of this plan until I was given my instructions, after you had left the ship, yesterday afternoon. This I swear. And who was I, Kit, to gainsay the Deputy Governor? I am no planter, protected by wealth and precedent. You yourself were quick enough to accuse me of piracy. He'd have had me under arrest and on my way to,Execution Dock before I'd have known what was happening.'

'On your own ship, and surrounded by your own men?' Kit asked, bitterly.

Bale flushed. 'There are sufficient of his volunteers on board as well. There is the truth of the matter, Kit. You'll believe it or not as you choose. My conscience is clear.'

Kit seized his shoulder as the captain turned for the door. 'Then you'll so testify, Bale, when the time comes. Or be sure that you will indeed find yourself on that ship for London.'

Bale hesitated, and then nodded. 'When the time comes, Kit. But it'll not come at all if I do not con this ship to open water.'

Kit let him go. He could hear the cries of the savages as they came alongside, and now the cannon began to speak, causing the vessel to shudder and roll. Kit sat on the narrow bunk, and listened. He had never been below deck in a fight before, found it difficult to decide exactly what was happening. But soon enough the ship began to heel to the wind, and he could hear the sluicing of water past the hull as she gathered speed. Now the cannon were silent, and the shouts of the Caribs faded.

Soon he heard the tramp of feet in the great cabin beyond the door, followed by the splashes from astern as the dead bodies were thrown to the sharks. After that there was nothing to do but wait, as the little fleet beat north. To wait and to think, to remember and to vow vengeance. His door opened but once, to admit two sailors, one with his breakfast.

'We'll be home soon enough, Captain Hilton,' one of them said with a grin. 'Antigua is rising fair on the port bow.'

Mocking him? Or revealing their sympathy. As if he cared for their sympathy. As if he cared for anything beyond his own sense of outrage, his own determination to have justice done to Tom Warner.

Now the cannon were firing again, but this time expelling empty air from their blank charges, and even as he heard the anchor rattling through the hawse-pipe, he could also hear the distant cheering from the Antigua waterfront. They were celebrating a victory.

The door opened. Philip Warner stood there, backed by six of the Antiguan volunteers, all armed. 'Good morning to you, Kit,' he said. 'I have some hope that by now you will have come to your senses. Sir William approaches in his barge, and I have no doubt that he will wish to congratulate you as much as me. We were sent to destroy the possibility of the Caribs ever mounting such a raid again, and we have accomplished our purpose, without the loss of a single man. They will not grow eight such caciques again in a hundred years. Leaderless, they will fall to squabbling amongst themselves, and perhaps into a pattern of mutual destruction, and our islands, our plantations, and our families, will be safe. I'd have you stand at my side to receive the plaudits due to the victors.'

Kit did not reply. He picked up his hat and went outside, to blink in the sunlight, to look at the trim rooftops and the sharp church steeples, now all echoing joyous sound as the other ships in the fleet also brought up to anchor.

The Governor's barge was already alongside, and Stapleton clambered up the ladder. 'Philip,' he cried. 'By God, sir, but it is right glad I am to see you. Kit. By God, sir, and you fly the pennants of victory. But it was so rapidly accomplished. Tell us straight, man, you suffered heavily?'

'We lost not a man, Sir William,' Philip Warner said. 'And we seized the eight most prominent Carib chieftains.'

'By God.' Stapleton looked around him as if expecting to see the Indians on deck. 'They're confined?'

'No, sir. They resisted arrest, and we were forced to execute them.'

Stapleton's smile slowly faded, and he frowned at the Deputy Governor. 'Executed, you say? Your own brother?'

'My father's bastard son, Sir William,' Philip said, speaking very evenly. 'I knew him only as the man who had my daughter raped by her own slave.'

'By God,' Stapleton said. He turned to Kit. 'Your plans came to naught, then?'

'My plans were successful, Sir William.' Kit also spoke with great deliberation. 'I visited the Carib village, alone and unarmed, and I spoke with their caciques, and I persuaded them to attend a conference on board Colonel Warner's ship, in order to discuss a just treaty of peace between the Caribs and the English. They came, willingly and unarmed. And no sooner were they seated in that cabin than they were set upon and most foully murdered.'

'Murdered?' Stapleton gazed from one to the other in horror.

'By God, Kit,' Philip Warner said. 'But you make it hard.' 'Murdered?' Stapleton repeated. 'Now come, the pair of you, confess to having had another of your interminable quarrels.' 'You'd best ask the crew,' Kit said.

'For God's sake,' Philip shouted. 'Were they not murderers? Were they not the inhuman creatures who have been butchering defenceless people for too long? By God, sir, the question of how they were done to death does not enter into it. One does not ask the hunter, how did you kill that pack of wolves, the fisherman how he managed to destroy the shark that was taking from his line. You merely say, thank God the deed is done.'

'By God, sir,' Stapleton said. 'You do not deny the crime?'

'I deny any crime. The deed I will admit. You charged me with avenging our losses here, and with ensuring that no such raid could ever take place again. Well, sir, I have accomplished both of these objectives, in the shortest possible space of time, and with the least possible loss to ourselves. You should be doubling your congratulations rather than wasting your time in listening to this ... this pirate become Quaker.'

'By God, sir,' Stapleton said. 'And you the Deputy Governor of this island, the representative of the King, God bless him. Where would English justice be, sir, were it always carried out in so arbitrary a spirit? The men were on board your ship, sir. And you arrested them. As they had been granted safe conduct, why, that would have been treachery enough for the most hardened blackguard. But to slay them in that cabin there, why sir, my brain still finds it difficult to grasp the enormity of such a deed.'

'They endeavoured to resist,' Philip said again.

'And so they were killed. Eight unarmed men before the entire crew of this ship. By God. You'll consider yourself under arrest, sir, until this charge is proved or disproved.'

'Bah,' Philip said. 'You'll not find a jury in this island, in all the Leewards, to convict me on any charge arising out of this affair. Those men were Caribs. There you have my defence.'

'Aye,' Stapleton said. 'No doubt you make a fair point. But there are other courts of law, Colonel Warner. As of this moment you are relieved of the duties and responsibilities, and prerogatives, of the Deputy Governor of this island, and you will be placed upon the next ship bound for England, to stand your trial there, and may God have mercy on your soul.'

' 'Tis done.' Kit laid down the quill, and slowly straightened his fingers. He had never written so much in his life.

The clerk scattered fine sand across the ink, raised the papers, one after the other, blew them clean. Stapleton was already reading the first sheet, standing by the window where the best light was to be found, every few seconds jerking his head at the steady cacophony outside.

'This will serve admirably,' he said. 'You'll dictate your statement as well, Mr Bale. My clerk will pen it.'

'And then I'll be free to leave?' Bale was sweating with fear.

'Aye. You'll be free to leave. Now make haste, man.' The Governor put down Kit's statement. 'You hear those people, Captain Hilton? You'll need a file of soldiers to see you from town.'

Kit set his hat on his head. 'Do you mean to leave me a file of soldiers for the rest of my life?'

Stapleton frowned. 'Why, that would be impossible.'

'My own opinion entirely. I've never needed protection in the past, Sir William. I'll not require it now, I promise you.'

Stapleton walked with him to the courthouse door. 'I do not rightly understand my feelings for you, Kit,' he said. 'I know you for what you were: a buccaneer. No doubt you will claim provocation, but 'tis little enough excuse for the mayhem caused in these fair islands by Morgan and DuCasse. I know you for what you are now, a planter, as stiff-necked a profession as I have ever had the misfortune to encounter. Neither of those are reasons for me to like you. And now you see fit to oppose public opinion and who knows, even public welfare, in the cause of an abstract concept of justice. I see you as a man who will cause trouble wherever he goes, because you will not bend with the times, with opinion. You will merely stand rigid until you break. But I would be doing you less than justice did I not also say that, as a man would rather look upon the towering oak, knowing full well that its rigidity must in time bring its downfall when the winds grow too strong for it, than upon the blade of grass which but lies flat and then recovers its stance when the gale is over, so I wish there were a few more like you. In all the world, to be sure. But here in the West Indies most of all. My hand, sir. Be sure you will ever have my support should you seek justice.'

Kit grasped his hand. 'I thank you, sir.'

'And now you go home to Green Grove?'

No idle question, that. It was twenty-four hours since the fleet's return, twenty-four hours since Philip Warner's arrest. The news had spread throughout the island, as the angry mob outside testified. But Marguerite had not come into town. She, who was usually in the forefront of any public occasion. But perhaps that was a happy sign.

'Yes, Sir William. I shall return to Green Grove.'

Stapleton nodded. 'Then I will wish you God speed. But Kit, be careful, I do beg of you. Watch your back. Tempers are running high, and we have seen how careless these people can be of honour.'

Kit nodded. 'At least they will know the risk they run.' He pressed his tricorne a little more firmly on his head, opened the door and stepped through. The crowd were baying and shouting, and for the moment did not notice him; their attention was taken by the tall figure of Agrippa, who stood with the two horses at the foot of the steps.

'Nigger,' they chanted. 'Pirate. Nigger pirate.'

'He should be hanged,' someone yelled. ' 'Tis the pirates should be suffering justice, not our Governor.'

'Aye, to the gallows with him,' someone else yelled.

Agrippa stared at them, and they made no move to close him. But their temper was rising.

Kit walked down the steps. His own anger simmered only just below the surface. And he had recognized Chester in the throng.

'Edward,' he called. 'Dear chap, you'd best send your friends home, lest someone gets hurt.'

There was a sudden silence, as they turned to look at him. He continued to walk down the steps, and now reached the foot.. Agrippa held his stirrup for him, and he swung himself into the saddle.

'Indian lover,' someone yelled.

'What did you do?' asked someone else. 'Hold your own wife on the floor for the red devils to make at her?'

Kit swung his horse smartly aside, knocking two men from their feet, reached the last speaker, bent from the saddle to seize the man by his coat and whip him from the ground. He held the wriggling body close, while the fellow's feet kicked feebly and the crowd gaped a such a display of strength and determination.

'The next time you address me, sir,' Kit said, 'have a weapon in your hand, or take a whipping." He threw the man away from him; the flying body cannoned into three more men and all fell. The crowd surged back, and then surged forward again, to check and once more retreat as Kit's hands dropped to the pistols at his belt. And Agrippa was also armed.

'Ow, ow me God,' screamed the man he had thrown down. 'My leg is broken.'

'Now there is a pity,' Kit said. 'I had intended it to be your head. Will you gentlemen stand aside, or must I clear a way with my sword?'

'By God, Kit Hilton,' Chester shouted. 'Would you declare war on us all?'

'If need be, Edward. Will you be the first? These people can make a space for us. I have here pistols and a sword. Or would you prefer daggers and bare hands? Name it, man. Name it. Let us be at it.'

Chester stared at him, the colour slowly draining from his face. The crowd stared also, from one to the other of the planters. But others were separating from in front of the two horses. Kit urged his mount forward, and Agrippa clattered immediately behind him. A few moments later they were through the crowd and trotting along the road leading south.

'I thought we would have to fight our way out,' Agrippa remarked.

Kit shook his head. 'They have too high a regard for their own skins. They have to be whipped to it, or shown the way, and the planters lack the belly to draw on me.'

'Yet can they still harm you, Kit.' Agrippa urged his mount level. 'For how may a man exist, without human companionship?'

'And am I that bereft? I have you, old friend. And any others?'

'They support you entirely, Kit. They are distressed you would not immediately call upon them.'

‘I’ll have no man be forced to declare his support for me, Agrippa, especially one who lives in the centre of that rabble and yet refuses the use of weapons. Nor could I expose Lilian to such contumely.'

'Yet is she already exposed,' Agrippa said.

'How can that be?'

'God alone knows, Kit. But it is common knowledge in St John's that she is your mistress.'

Kit frowned at him. 'Dag has heard this?'

'He has said nothing to me. But if he is not stone deaf, he has heard it.'

'By God,' Kit said. 'But no one in the island knew of it, save you, and me, and Marguerite ... by God.' He kicked his horse in the ribs, set it to a gallop. A man, rushing to disaster, with anger in his heart. For did not his strength truly depend upon Marguerite, and the wealth of Green Grove? And he could expect nothing but anger there, at what he had done. That indeed was why he was hurrying home now, to placate her. And how could he do that, with anger colouring his own emotions?

Yet he would not slacken his pace. He felt like a ship caught in the full force of a hurricane wind, blown hither and thither and unable to do more than keep afloat, by doing the correct things, trimming the sails, manning the pumps, shifting the ballast, from hour to hour, intent only upon survival, but without any knowledge of where in the ocean the storm would eventually leave him floating, or if, indeed, he would be left floating at all, and not stranded upon some rocky shore.

He galloped down the last of the road and into the drive. The Negroes stopped work to stare at him. They were busy clearing the burned-out fields, saving which of the plants could be used as ratoons for a fresh crop. Others laboured on the Great House, plugging bullet holes, removing the shattered doors where the Caribs had broken in, standing by with pots of paint to remove the last traces of the conflict, as were still others working down in the overseers' village. But all stopped to stare at their master, flogging his horse into the compound, throwing the reins to Maurice Peter and stamping up the stairs on to the verandah, while Agrippa also reined in beneath him, but remained mounted.

'Father,' Tony came tumbling through the withdrawing-room, starkly empty as most of the furniture had been removed, to be repaired or consigned to the flames. Only the spinet remained, strangely overlooked by the marauding Indians, or untouched because they did not recognize its meaning.

'Boy.' Kit swept him from the floor, hugged him close.

'Did you win, Father? The news from town is that all the Caribs are dead.'

'Not all.' Kit set him back on the floor, stooped to kiss Rebecca on the cheek. 'Where is Miss Johnson?'

'She has not come out today, Father. There is so much tumult and excitement she feared to ride alone.'

'And your mother?'

'Mama is upstairs, in bed.'

Kit frowned at the boy. 'Marguerite, in bed, at this hour?'

'She has been in bed for two days, Captin,' Maurice Peter said. 'Since the fleet sailed, almost.'

'By God,' Kit said, bounding up the stairs. But how his heart overflowed with relief. Because there was surely the reason she had not come to town.

He pulled the door open. She sat up in bed wearing a shawl over her shoulders, but nothing else so far as he could see. Her hair was loose on the pillows propped behind her head. She looked as well, and as beautiful, as ever he had known her, and there was a jug of iced sangaree on the table beside her.

'Meg. They told me you were ill.'

'A slight fever,' she said. 'Nothing more.'

He crossed the room, and noticed the thin lines running away from her eyes, the bunches of muscle at the corners of her mouth. She had been under some strain, and she was nervous. 'Sweetheart.' He held her arms, and kissed her on the mouth.

'I expected you yesterday,' she said. 'Did not the fleet return, yesterday?'

'Indeed we did. There was much to be done.'

Their eyes seemed to lock. 'Indeed,' she said. 'A victory to be celebrated, as I have heard.'

'We were ever straight with each other in the past, sweet Meg.'

'So be straight with me now, Kit. I have heard so much, and all of it garbled and contradictory. I would not injure your projects by appearing in town. I also would believe nothing of what those foul-mouthed gossips brought to me. I would hear it all, from no other lips than yours.'

He got up, and her fingers left his, reluctantly. He paced the room, paused to pour himself a drink. 'You knew my purpose?'

'I doubted it would succeed.'

'It would have. Unfortunately, your ... father did not respect it. I gave Tom Warner my word, Meg. I gave his people my word. And they were shot and stabbed and carved in cold blood. You have mirrors scattered throughout this house, in which we have enjoyed preening ourselves and thinking, and saying to each other, what a splendid pair we make. Had I not accused your father of the crime he committed I should have had to break them all.'

'Then the rumours are true.' She spoke very quietly.

'Philip Warner has been removed from the position of Deputy Governor, and is under arrest. He leaves St John's tomorrow, for London, and his trial.'

Marguerite gazed at him for some seconds, then she threw back the covers and got out of bed. She left the shawl behind her, went to the door, and threw it wide. 'Ellen Jane,' she called, her voice clear and high as a bell.

'Yes, mistress?'

'You'll prepare my bath. And my town clothes. Quickly, girl.'

'You'll go to town?' Kit asked.

Marguerite draped her undressing-robe around her shoulders. 'Should I let my father go to his trial without saying goodbye?'

'No,' Kit agreed. 'I had not expected that. Shall I ride with you?'

'No.' She extended her left hand, looked at the ring which glinted there. 'No. I prefer to go alone. But it would be best for you to return there, before I return here.'

'To be with my mistress, you mean, as you have so carefully put about?'

Her head came up, and her gaze scorched his face. 'You can be with whomsoever you please, Kit. But I do not wish to see you again.'

How quietly she spoke. And how ridiculous her words. 'You, do not wish to see me?'

'You have forced me to understand my own stupidity. You watched me lie on the floor beneath a black man, and then sought to forgive the man who caused it. I do not understand the mind of a man who could do that. I endeavoured to understand. I endeavoured to tell myself that perhaps you have a stature, a breadth of vision, that exceeds mine. I placed you above other men, ten years ago, when I elected to marry you. Father endeavoured to dissuade me, and I would not listen to him. But it would seem he was right. Or I overestimated my own powers. I knew you then for what you are, Kit. At least, I knew your strengths and your weaknesses, your past crimes and your possibilities. I did not understand, alas, that streak of deep wayward revolution that runs through your soul. I should have. Not only did my father warn me of it, but it was there in your own past, in the history of your family. Tony Hilton was ever a rebel. Edward Warner was ever a rebel. Susan Hilton was the daughter of an outlaw and the wife of another. Perhaps it is simply that too much of the wild Irish runs in your veins. I knew all of these things, ten years ago. But I thought I could change you.'

Almost she smiled.

'How many women make that mistake? I thought I could take that strength and that vigour and that demoniac energy and harness it, for the use of Green Grove, for the use of the Warners, for the use of Antigua. And you have proved me wrong, time and again. So leave this place, Kit. I took you from the dust. I'll not return you there. Sign what bills you wish, find what happiness you wish, with your Danish whore. I'll not gainsay you. God knows ...' she hesitated. 'I love you. I have never loved any man but you. I shall never love any man but you. But to have you in my bed now would sicken me no less than the memory of George Frederick.'

The sun dropped into the Caribbean Sea with its invariable suddenness, and darkness swept across Antigua. The two horsemen walked their mounts slowly through the main street of St John's.

They had waited till dusk, deliberately, to avoid the mobs, the risk of giving offence. Out of fear? That at least was not true. Out of a desire to cause no more harm, to bring about no more of a catastrophe than had already happened.

What was it Jean had said, only a short fortnight ago? He had wanted to turn back the clock a brief half hour. But how far should the clock be turned back now? To the minute before he had accepted Philip Warner's offer of the command of the Bonaventure. Yet would he still have met Marguerite, soon enough. Well, then, to the moment before he had thrown his cutlass to Daniel Parke? He had done then what he had always done since, what he had believed to be right, at the moment, without any thought of the consequences. He had always been proud of that.

And he had left Green Grove this afternoon, in that spirit. It had been the most difficult decision of his life, especially knowing the shortness, as he also knew the vehemence, of her anger. But the plantation was hers, and she was entitled to be bitter, about what had happened to her, about her father, and about Lilian. Nor could he expect her to do anything but hate the Indians. So he had ridden away into the darkness, away from wife and children and wealth and prosperity, as she had commanded, with only his sword and his pistols and his faithful friend at his shoulder. As he had done before.

And yet his instincts had not always led him down the path of right. Else why was he here, seeking once again a girl he had cruelly wronged, and could now wrong only some more.

He dismounted, and knocked on the door. St John's was quiet, save for the occasional burst of laughter from the tavern, where, no doubt, they were consigning Kit Hilton to hell for all eternity.

Astrid Christianssen opened the door. 'Kit?' Almost he could read the dismay in her tone, although her face was indistinct. 'Agrippa? We had feared for you.'

'We are sound enough, in wind and limb,' Kit said. 'May we come in?'

'Come in? Oh ...'

'You may come in, Kit.' Dag came out of the parlour. 'I thank you.' Kit took off his hat and stepped into the hall. Agrippa at his shoulder.

'What has happened?' Dag asked. 'I have left Green Grove.'

Astrid frowned at him. 'You have left your wife? And your children?'

'It was a mutual decision, between Marguerite and myself. She feels that I have betrayed her father. Everyone feels that I have betrayed Philip Warner, by not permitting him to get away with fratricide. I am probably the most unpopular man in Antigua at this moment. Do you share that view?'

Dag shook his head. 'No, no we honour what you did, in that respect. And we grieve for the sorrow it has brought upon you. I grieve even more that we cannot offer you a bed for the night.'

'As you see best, Dag. I would like to speak with Lilian.' 'She has retired.'

'And it is scarce an hour since dusk? You are playing the father.'

'And should I not, as she is my daughter?' He sighed. 'Whom you have outraged.'

'And have you, then, taken your stick to her?' Kit asked softly. 'For be sure that I will see her, Dag, and should she be harmed, then will I harm you.'

The Quaker hesitated, glancing at Agrippa. 'Truly, you revert easily enough to the buccaneer, Kit. You'd see mayhem where we have given you a home, Agrippa?'

'I'll not draw against Kit, Dag,' the Negro said. 'I'd beg you not to force that issue.'

'Good evening, Kit,' Lilian said from the foot of the stairs. Her undressing-robe was pulled close across her nightdress.

'I told you ...' Dag began.

'And I wish differently.'

'You are a common slut,' he shouted. 'Your name is bandied

about in this town like a piece of filth. You fill me with disgust every time I look upon you.'

'Then look upon her no more,' Kit said. 'I have come to take her with me.'

'To ... why, sir ...'

'I am appealing to your common sense, Dag. As you say, her name is being used too freely. That was not my doing. It is Marguerite's. But as it has been done, why, nothing we can do will unsay it, except openly to declare ourselves. I have in mind a house down in Falmouth, somewhat removed from the tumults of St John's, where Lilian may live in peace, with me as her protector.'

'Protector?'

'You are still married to Marguerite Warner,' Astrid said. 'How can you gainsay that?'

'I cannot gainsay that. I know what I am asking of Lilian. I would not have done so, had the event not been made public'

'Aye,' Dag said. 'No doubt you can, as always, explain your motives to your own satisfaction. Well, that is not our way. You were no doubt sent by the Lord to try our patience and our spirit, Kit. I hold nothing against you for that. But now you would compound another moral crime on top of your first, just as you have spent your life compounding crime against crime, always in the hope of expiating the original sin. Crimes are not expiated by other crimes, Kit Hilton, but by prayer and resolution, by patience and by good works. You have dragged our daughter's name through the gutter. It will be her punishment, and ours, to live in the gutter for a while. But in time we shall re-emerge from that filthy place, cleaner and better than before. Sure it is that Lilian will not need to crawl from one gutter to the next.'

Kit stared at him, his brows slowly drawing together. 'I respect your morality, Dag, even if I think you set too much store by it. But then, I have no such advantage of faith, in either people or the hereafter. Morality in my world consists of honour and courage; there has never been room for patient resignation. I ask Lilian to let me honour her, as publicly as I may, and I ask her also to show the courage I know she possesses, the courage to take life and circumstances by the throat and say, I will live, and be happy, no matter what the odds against it. These things I ask of her, not you, Dag. And by God, I'll not leave this house until I hear the answer from her own lips.'

Dag turned to look at his daughter. 'You'll be a whore, now and for ever.'

'Oh, Lilian,' Astrid cried. 'You cannot. You ...'

'Will you stop me by force, Father?' Lilian asked, very quietly.

He opened his mouth, glanced at Kit, and closed it again. 'You'll do as you see fit, daughter. But once pass through that door in this man's company, do not seek ever to re-enter.'

'Well, then,' she said. 'It seems I must bid you farewell.'

They rode, four mounted figures under a darkening midnight sky, south for Falmouth. Their clothes were tied to the backs of their horses, and the two men possessed their weapons. They said little. They had hardly exchanged a word since leaving the town. There was too much to be thought about. And perhaps even some things to be anticipated. They were four against the world. The thought made Kit's blood tingle.

Lilian yawned, and swayed in the saddle. 'Should we not rest by the roadside, Kit? It wants another six hours to dawn.'

'But only two to Falmouth,' he said. 'There is a tavern, where we shall find ourselves shelter and comfort. Unless you are truly too tired to continue.'

'No. I will ride. I am but ill-prepared.' She smiled at him. 'I have slept little this last week. There has been too much to keep awake for.'

He reached across to squeeze her hand. 'But from henceforth you will sleep sound every night, Lilian. I give you my word for that.'

'Kit Hilton's woman,' she whispered. 'I want no more than that, Kit. I have wanted no more than that, since the day I met you. in the harbour at St Eustatius.'

'And fool that I was, I looked elsewhere, and became involved in events which were too big for me.'

'Too big for you, Kit? That I deny. There is no man will not honour your courage in denouncing Philip Warner's crime, when thev give themselves time to consider the event.'

'Pray God you are right.' Not a man. But what of a woman? And then, what terrible thoughts were those, to have while riding in the company of yet another woman, who, like the first, was giving everything she possessed into his care. But Christ, Marguerite, all the memory of her, that glorious animal sexuality which shrouded so much beauty, that confident laughter, that arrogant awareness of herself as a person and as a power, that aura in which she moved. And she was the mother of his children.

Almost he wanted to weep. And then he whipped their horses into a faster trot. Marguerite could only be lost in the softness of Lilian's arms.

And these were not for the taking, that night. She was asleep in the saddle when they rode into Falmouth, and banged on the door of the inn, to get an irate innkeeper out of bed, to watch his anger change to fear as he discovered the identity of his visitor. Beds and rooms were hastily made available, and in one of these Kit placed his mistress. She wore a grey gown, and her hat was tied firmly under her chin. He removed the hat, and took off her boots, to marvel at the straight slender toes, so white, so perfectly shaped. Now she smiled in her sleep, and sighed. She was his. He could undress her completely. Indeed, he should do that, for she did not possess so many clothes that she could afford to sleep in her gown. But he did not dare touch her. To touch her, while she slept, to strip her while she slept, to love her while she slept, was to conjure up too many visions from the past. And here was one vision he did not dare risk losing.

He bade Agrippa and Abigail good night, and slept in the chair, removing only his own boots and weapons and hat. He snuffed the candle, and leaned his head, and stared into the darkness. He felt the emptiness which comes after battle. For ten days he had charged forward at the head of his mental troops, first of all in rising above the catastrophe of the French and Indian invasion, then in recruiting and preparing the expedition, then on his march into the interior of Dominica, and since then in his attack upon Philip Warner. Culminating in his assault upon the Christianssens themselves. Why, Daniel Parke would be proud of him, for that was how that wild-eyed Virginian lived every moment of every day of every year.