Shake Down Your Ashes

A Historical Novella

She is an unwed woman traveling alone.  He is a widower trying to find the peace he’s never had.  Each carrying a secret of their own to the small inn by the lake nestled in the remote hills of upstate New York, Irene Bell and James Abernathy unexpectedly meet on May 25, 1900.  Having come to the inn to find nothing but solace, they find instead a confrontation of wills that ignites into something more when they witness an unsavory act by a fellow guest.  But when a stranger appears at the inn, both must face a reality neither has wanted to allow.

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Friday, 25 May 1900

These are real trees. They grow in the ground and sway in the air. They don’t grow out of cobblestone and sway in the smog. They chose to grow here. They were not placed here.
My window overlooks them at the back of the house, and I stand and watch them talking to one another. One will dip to whisper in the ear of another while another moves away, repulsed by what he’s heard. I wonder what they’re talking about.
“Supper is at five o’clock. I’m making meatloaf and potato salad, Miss Bell.”
The crooked woman might have smiled at me, but she looks too old and too worn to smile at anyone.
“Thank you, Mrs. Utz.”
She nods and closes the door behind her.
The trees are still talking when I turn back to them, but their conversation has lost its appeal. The lace of the curtains makes patterns of sunlight on the floor. I walk over to my carpetbag, destroying the neat rows of spotted light. One of my bags has not made it up and neither has my pelisse. They must still be in the foyer, but I don’t want to go down and get them. The bed looks smooth and soft. The quilt rests gently across the bed, and I don’t want to wrinkle it. I sit in the chair by the window.
Down in the yard I see two men, one long and thin, the other more thick and slightly shorter. They are working on a motorcar. What kind I cannot say. The shadow of the carriage house blots out the rear end and most of the body. It’s a pleasant green though, and the brass headlamps glint in the sun. The windowpane stops their conversation from reaching me. I’m too tired to unlock the glass and lift the panel. I pretend I know what they are saying.
I have started the chair rocking, and my eyes are no longer open. I remember how he did not touch me after I told him.

He sits there as I tell him.
The kitchen is warm and smells like soap. My hands smell of sulfur from the well water. I have just washed our plates. I do not know how to cook.
He thanks me for the soufflé and rolls.
I say he is welcomed.
I tell him again.
He thanks me for the nice fire.
I don’t know how to make a fire.
He tells me of the chores that need to be done. The fence in the outer pasture is down again. Coyotes maybe.
I nod in understanding.
He is wearing the charcoal pinstripe suit he wore to the station.
What is a coyote?
Will I milk the cows?
Of course, I shall.
Good. He stands up.
I tell him again, and he nods that he’s heard me.
How do you milk a cow?
I help him with his coat and hat.
He leaves the kitchen as I add wood to my fire.

I wake up, and my hand settles across my stomach. Something was wrong in the dream. He had been wearing a blue suit when I had first told him.
I feel better now, strong enough to go downstairs and bring up my pelisse and bag. I get up and lift the window to hear the men in the yard. It doesn’t help for the man is speaking German, and I don’t know what he’s saying. He’s angry at the motorcar.
The long man straightens and rubs the top of his head where his thinning hair tickles his scalp in the wind. He turns around as if he knows that I’m standing here. He sees me. He nods but does not call out. He’s of society then. The other man is not. He is still angry at the motorcar and mostly himself.
There’s water in the ewer on the dry sink, and I pour it in the bowl. The leaves etched into the porcelain fracture with the water lying over them. I splash my face and neck, dabbing it with a towel. The leaves are still broken when I hang the towel on the rod above the basin.
I look in the mirror. I don’t know why. I know what I’m going to see. Why do I still think someone else will look back at me? Because sometimes someone else does. I don’t like her. I don’t like the fear I see in her. I lock her in the closet and swallow the key.
The breeze from the window moves the hair against my neck. I get goose bumps and look around. I feel him watching me, but I know he’s not here.
I go back to my carpetbag on the floor by the bed. I remember my other bag has not made it up. I feel like I could get it now. I take my hairbrush from the bag and go back to the mirror. I look at myself as I smooth the strands into the knot.
You cannot tell just by looking at me.
My eyes are the same brown and my lips the same pink. My nose is still straight and small. My cheeks are still smooth and round. My jaw is still sharp, and my chin is still pointed. My neck is still long and too white.
You cannot tell. Why do I still squirm when someone looks at me too long?
The brush slips from my fingers and hits the wood of the floor. I bend to retrieve it but stop. I am afraid to look under the bed. There may be a monster lurking there.

By Jessie Clever

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In Book Two of the Spy Series, For Love of the Earl, two agents for the War Office in search of Alec and Sarah’s kidnappers boarded a ship for unknown destinations.  In Book Three, we find out what happened to them.  Katharine Cavanaugh, the Countess of Stirling, has always lived according to the expectations of her heritage.  American mercenary Matthew Thatcher has spent his life running away from every expectation he has for himself.  But when their latest mission from the British War Office goes wrong, trapping them behind enemy lines, they must decide if they dare to realize the greatest expectation of all: the expectation of love.

Inevitably a Duchess: A Spy Series Novella

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]]> https://jessieclever.com/now-available-inevitably-a-duchess/feed/ 1 520 https://jessieclever.com/a-special-excerpt-from-for-love-of-the-earl/ Wed, 21 Aug 2013 12:09:46 +0000 https://jessieclever.com/?p=409

Miss Nora and Nathan already?  Here’s a little something from them in For Love of the Earl: Book Two of the Spy Series.

Unbeknownst to our hero and heroine in the port of Dover
Also at the same moment

Nathan grabbed the back of his wife’s coat before she could move out of arm’s reach.  He snapped her back toward him.
“Where do you think you’re going?” he muttered in her ear.
Nora’s eyes flashed in the dim light of the alley, barely visible underneath the floppy hat he’d stuck on her head to hide her identity.
“I’m going to save my family if it’s all the same to you,” she whispered, her tone firm but not accusing.
Nathan grinned.
“And are you going to do that all by yourself, my lady?”
Nora grinned back, her white teeth flashing in the darkness.
“If you continue to be so slow, perhaps, I shall, my lord.”
Nathan stopped grinning and started pulling on his wife’s arm as they made their way through the rest of the alley.
They came out of the small space just yards from the docks.  They were on the backside of the thoroughfare, and Nathan could hear the boisterous voices of dockhands and sailors looking for a place to lay their head that night along with a woman as company.  This part of the port was seedy at best and repugnant at worst.  He felt a twinge of guilt for bringing his new wife here in the middle of a cold spring night, but she had insisted.  And if there was one thing Nathan was learning, it was never to tell Nora no if she said she were to do something.  No matter what that something entailed.
“Do you think they’re still in port?” Nora whispered.
Nathan shook his head, the cold air sweeping in from off the water, sending a chill along his neck and down his greatcoat.  He pulled Nora closer.
“Thatcher has firm intelligence that they were already traded over to the French.  They are now following the men who traded him.  We need to see if this was a one time event or if they are going to take more Englishmen.”
Nora turned to him.
“They?”
Nathan looked down at her, pausing for a moment to admire the shape of her face in the glow of moon.
“Lady Cavanaugh.  I’m not sure you’ve had the pleasure of meeting her.”
Nora’s head tilted.
“I cannot say I have.  She sounds lovely though,” she finished and turned back toward the thoroughfare with its constant stream of rowdy seamen.
Nathan waited patiently even as the cold air began to rattle his teeth.  He looked out to the water, at the outlines of ships bobbing in the quiet ocean and saw the clouds in the distance moving closer.  Soon they would lose the moonlight.  The water in the port already kicked up fierce waves, and the port was filled with the sound of ships hitting against piers and each other.  But the sailors in port took no heed.  The ships were safely anchored for the night.  They had more interesting pursuits to tend to.
“It’s that one there,” Nathan said, pointing discreetly to a dock nearly ten yards down the wharf from their hiding spot.
He could not be sure if Nora looked where he pointed or simply took his word for it.
“That is where they will meet us?” she asked.
“That is where the ship is docked.  The one we are going to use to find Alec and Sarah.”
Nora turned her face up to him.
“And we are certain they are still in the port.  They must have been traded quite some time ago.  Would they not have gotten underway for France?  It seems dangerous to linger.”
Nathan now pointed to the clouds he had spotted earlier, dark masses encroaching on the pale moonlight.
“Storm is moving in.  They’ll not risk their precious cargo for a mere storm.”
“Not even in the Channel?  It’s not as if they’ll be moving in the open ocean.”
Nathan shrugged.
“The Channel can be equally as dangerous as open sea.”
Nora nodded.
“I’ve never been on a ship, so I must take your word for it, Mr. Black.”
Nathan waited a moment more and then carefully gripped Nora’s elbow before slipping into the stream of people moving along the thoroughfare.
The smell grew worse once they were inside the throng of seamen, and Nathan felt his throat constrict.  They reached the dock in question and turned off, slipping out of the crowd of people just as easily as they had slipped in.  They made their way carefully along the dock, dodging crates and coils of rope and the odd drunken sailor, perched precariously against both.  The wind grew sharper as they moved further along the dock, and Nathan kept his grip firm on Nora’s elbow.  They had nearly reached the end of the pier, when the last ship on the dock came into view, looming out of the darkness like a sudden beacon.  Nathan slowly stopped, putting his back to the stack of crates resting four feet from the ship.  He looked up at the vessel, noting its worn wood and wind scarred mast poles.  It wasn’t a big ship, but it would do for their purposes.
Nora pressed against him, and his grip on her tightened.
“Is this it then?”
He nodded.
“And how is it that you know the captain of this ship?”
“He saved me bloody life even if he did not save me blinkin’ leg.”
Nathan felt Nora jump, startled, but the gravelly voice and its owner were nothing that frightened Nathan.
“Reginald Davis,” Nathan said, stepping forward as the man came off the gangplank of the ship before them.
The man looked no different from the last time Nathan had seen him except for the wooden peg he stood on.  He was still tall and broad shouldered with a barrel chest and beefy hands.  He looked as if he should be shoveling dung from a stable rather than captaining a ship, but this was where the War Office had reassigned him after his injury.  And Nathan suspected it was the perfect outfit for his fellow soldier.
“Sorry again about the leg, old chap,” Nathan said then, extending a hand to his comrade,  “But it’s better your leg than your life.”
Nora looked between them.
“I believe I am not familiar with this tale.”
Davis approached Nora then, bowing over her extended hand.
“Tis a pleasure to meet the honorable Mrs. Black.  But allow me one question.  Why the bloody ‘ell did you marry this whelp when you could have had someone as charming as meself?”
Nathan saw Nora blush in the moonlight and stepped closer to remove his wife from Davis’s grip.
“Because she has common sense,” Nathan said, and Davis laughed.
“Shall we be aboard then, chaps?” he said, turning back to the gangplank.
It was then that Nathan noticed the ship had come alive with sailors moving along the ropes and up into the masts.  It vibrated with the energy of preparing to set sail.
Davis was well ahead of them when they began their way up the plank.
“How is it that you know him?” Nora whispered.
“He was in my regiment on the Continent.”
“Your regiment?  But how did he get into a regiment with noblemen’s sons?”
Nathan grinned.
“Who said he’s not a nobleman’s son?”
Nora looked straight ahead at Davis, her jaw hanging slack.
Nathan called up the gangplank.
“What is it you have in mind for our rescue mission, Captain?”
Davis turned at the top of the plank, the moonlight hitting him full in the back and silhouetting his impressive person in an ethereal light.
“How do ye feel about pirates, Nathan?”

The English Channel

April 1815

Sarah shoved her elbow into him, pushing him farther against the wall. So Alec shoved back, sending his wife off the bunk and onto the grimy, disgusting floor of their prison on the ship bound for France. Alec closed his eyes and prayed to every god he knew for patience. His wife was going to come up fighting, and he would not be tempted to fight back. He was a gentleman, an earl, and earls did not box with their wives.

When he opened his eyes and looked at his wife, he felt his patience start a war with his temper.

Sarah looked furious. Her nostrils flared, and her hands fisted, ready to strike. Her lovely golden hair was clumped with seaweed and other unknown sea things, and her once pretty pink dress was covered in saltwater stains. The high lace collar was torn and hung limply down her heaving chest. Alec resolutely moved his gaze away from that heaving chest and up to her face, but then he found his gaze focused on her mouth with its delicious slight overbite.

He had tasted that mouth. But it had been in a fit of near rage and frustration and had been far too brief. He had tasted other parts of his wife as well, but again, it was a stolen taste that he now regretted. He would have apologized for it, but he suspected his wife would hit him. And he really didn’t feel like having a broken nose.

“This is all your fault, you know,” Sarah said, her teeth barely opening long enough to get the words out. Her nostrils flared with greater force.

Alec took a deep breath and sat up, swinging his legs to the side of the bunk. He ran his fingers over his face and through his hair, dislodging his own piece of seaweed. He looked at it before tossing it aside. He watched his feet slide around on the gunk on the floor as the ship rocked its way toward the Continent. The weak light from the lone lantern swinging from the rafters sent shadows dancing around the berth.

What was he going to say to his wife?

It seemed whenever he opened his mouth, she ripped out his tongue only to ram it back down his throat until he choked. So he looked up at her now, her beautiful face so full of hate, loathing really. Loathing him. And he looked at the floor again.

He did not know what to do. After four years, he still did not know how to make his wife believe that she was worth it. Worth everything. Worthy of being the wife of the Earl of Stryden. He just didn’t know what to say or how to say it to her.

Alec Black, the Earl of Stryden, the son of the Duke of Lofton, and brilliant spy for the War Office, could not talk to his wife.

“I know,” he finally whispered.

“If you hadn’t taken off, your family would have been able to protect you. But you packed your things and left!” Sarah yelled now.

Alec raised a finger. “I did not pack. There wasn’t time,” he said and watched the loathing flare in her eyes.

He brought his finger down.

“Do you really wish to argue over semantics right now, my lord?”

Her tone had gone flat and smooth, the loathing searing into a blade of hate that pierced him just above his heart. Alec stopped pushing the gunk into piles on the floor with his boots. One of the piles looked suspiciously like the prime minister, which normally would have made Alec laugh, but laughing wasn’t on his list of things to do just then.

“I know,” he whispered again, this time not raising his head or a finger.

“Now you can’t even look at me?” Sarah fumed.

Alec felt the need to swallow as four years of frustration boiled inside him. Looking at his shoes was not correct. Looking at her was not correct. Looking at her with love in his eyes was definitely not correct. So he raised his head with nothing but coldness in his eyes and looked at his wife.

But he didn’t speak.

He really didn’t feel like speaking again.

He might say something stupid like, I love you, I’ve always loved you, why can’t we act like a real married couple and not like a the-War-Office-made-us-get-married couple, and why can’t we make love all day long and only pause long enough sometime in the dark to eat little cucumber sandwiches with the crusts taken off in bed only to stop halfway through our snack to make love again until dawn when we finally collapse with words of love trailing off our exhausted lips?

Yes, he really shouldn’t say that. His wife would castrate him with her bare hands. He crossed his legs.

“You really don’t have anything to say?” Sarah asked, her voice suddenly, painfully quiet.

Alec shook his head negatively. He was not going to be tricked into saying what he was thinking. He had been thinking the same thing for four years, and it never changed no matter how he voiced his thoughts. How many times had he told Sarah that she was beautiful? That she was smart and witty and kind? And how many times had it not mattered?

Sarah threw her hands up in the air, and a guttural scream of rage tore from her throat. Alec looked back down at his shoes. He watched the shadows’ dance be interrupted as Sarah paced the length of their prison. Five long shuffles of her feet up and five and half long shuffles back down to the door. The ship rolled unexpectedly, and Sarah’s feet slid out from underneath her. Alec looked up too late to see her fall. Her head cracked against the wall of the small berth with a sickening thud. Alec tried to stand and ended up half scrambling across the slippery floor. He fell on his knees beside her, gently picking her up as his heart battered around in his chest.

“Sarah?”

He brushed her filthy hair out of her dirt-smudged face. Her eyes were closed, but her lips parted and soft words tumbled forth.

“Alec, don’t leave me.”