Rebecca Read online

  Rebecca

  The Foxbridge Legacy, Book Two

  Jo Ann Ferguson

  This book is dedicated to Charles and Mildred Stern

  Agents and Friends

  Thank you for believing in my dream …

  and helping make it come true

  Chapter One

  The sun was bright off the mountainsides to the north as the young woman adjusted her veil on her dark hair. It would not have mattered to her if it had been the dreariest day of the year, for she could see only the glory of her happiness reflected around her. With a joyous laugh, she twirled about so that her full skirts belled out even wider around her.

  She turned once more to view her appearance in the small mirror. The veil did not hide her blue eyes and brilliant smile that were the two most admired features of her lovely face. She smoothed the silk dress along her body. She had never had such a fine gown, so it was appropriate that today she would wear it.

  Today Rebecca North would become the wife of Keith Bennett. After their courtship and the thrill of him asking her to marry him, she would this morning take the vows that would make her his wife forever. It was a dream come true. He had proposed marriage several months ago, but had asked her to delay the wedding until he could finish the cabin he was building for them. At last, the day had come.

  Her bags were packed and in the front room, ready to go to that new house. When she and Keith returned from their wedding party, her things would be waiting in the house they would share. Her smile softened as her eyes grew distant with thoughts of the life she would have from this day forward with the man she loved.

  “Rebecca, are you ready?” came a voice that jarred her back to the present.

  Her smile broadened as she turned to greet her older brother Hart. He would be giving her away, because their father, Major Henry North, had died in service to his country during the battle of Saratoga. The horrors of the war so recently over were forgotten in the midst of her joy. “Take Aunt Dena out to the wagon, and I will be with you directly.”

  He nodded and closed the door. Rebecca looked around her room. Today she was leaving behind everything she had known all her life. Today she was beginning a new life that would incorporate all the love from the old one with a new love that would be the center of her being. “Good-bye,” she whispered to her room, her home, her self who had lived there for all of her nineteen years.

  Cloying thoughts of nostalgia disappeared as she went out to the cart. An ecstatic bounce was in her step as she walked out of the cabin without another backward glance.

  “Here comes the happiest bride I have ever seen,” teased Aunt Dena. She was a spare woman, well wrinkled with time. Laughter and sunshine had etched lines in her face. Her white hair was pulled back beneath the outrageous hat she wore for only the most special occasions. Its feathers and ribbons added six inches to her slight height.

  Hart laughed as he helped his sister onto the hard wooden seat of the wagon. Unlike Rebecca, he had the light hair of their mother, but in many ways the Norths were alike. They shared a deep joy in life and a closeness which had strengthened when they had lost both of their parents. Hart was pleased that she would not be moving far from their home. The two of them and Aunt Dena were the total of the surviving North family.

  It was a very short ride to the church, but Hart had insisted that they drive. He had not wanted her to walk and to get dust on her new gown. When they reached the white clapboard building, he lifted the older woman down so that she could go in to take her seat of honor in the first pew.

  “All ready?” he asked, jokingly.

  “I know brides are supposed to be nervous,” Rebecca said with a laugh, “but I’m not. I know that this is just the beginning of the most wonderful part of my life.”

  He bent and kissed her check. His voice was very serious as he said, “I hope you are right, Rebecca. I hope you are right.”

  “Hart, what is wrong?” Her smile faded as she saw the bleakness in his eyes.

  A weak smile crossed his lips. “I’m the one who is nervous, I guess. It’s hard for me to realize that in a few minutes you will be Keith Bennett’s wife. I’ve been used to you being my little sister.”

  “That does not change, silly!” She hugged him. When she heard the music from the church, she said, “I think the ceremony is starting.”

  He held out his arm to her. “Then let us make our grand entrance, my lady.”

  “What fancy manners from someone who used to dip my braids in mud puddles!”

  Rebecca smiled up at her grinning brother as they walked into the church. He had seemed as delighted with this wedding as she was. Keith was his friend, and it had been Hart who had first suggested she take a walk with Keith along the moonlit path home from church services. Soon Keith had come calling on her. She had long admired her brother’s friend, and her admiration became love. She guessed this wedding was the fulfillment of Hart’s dream, as well.

  As they walked past the rearmost pew, Rebecca noticed a stranger sitting there. Her eyes were caught by his dark ones, which were narrowing with an emotion she could not read. She wondered who this scowling man was. Something about the strong line of his jaw and his black eyes tugged at her memory, but she could not connect his handsome face with anyone she knew. As she passed him, she shrugged off her concerns and told herself he must be an acquaintance of Keith.

  All thoughts of him faded as she looked at her fiance waiting with uncharacteristic formality by the altar. Keith was more comfortable making jokes around their supper table than standing at the front of the church dressed in his stiff collar and knee breeches. When he turned to see her walking toward him, his face split into a grin that made him look much more like the normal Keith.

  Rebecca took his hand as she stepped up onto the raised section in front of the altar. He brought it gently to rest on his arm as together they looked at the minister. He glanced down at her as if to share an ecstatic secret while they listened to the clergyman intone the words that would make them one for all eternity.

  Hart answered when asked who gave this woman in marriage. In a stage whisper, he warned the groom, “She’s grouchy in the morning, Keith. Beware.” Along the first few pews, a ripple of laughter sounded as brightly as the blush glowing on Rebecca’s face.

  The groom held out his hand to Hart. For a moment, he looked startled, then he shook it seriously. Rebecca glanced from one face to the other, but could not read the emotions on either. Keith was grinning delightedly, but Hart’s face was completely blank.

  She forgave her brother his jest when he bent to kiss her cheek and added more softly, “Be happy always, Rebecca.”

  When he was seated, the minister—who had appeared pained at the levity—continued with the rite. He read a blessing on the couple. Before he started the exchanging of vows, he asked, “If there is anyone here who has a reason why this marriage should not take place, let that one speak now or forever remain silent.”

  “I have a reason!”

  Rebecca gasped as she turned to see the stranger on his feet in the pew at the back of the small church. She looked up at Keith and saw the mixture of shock and rage on his usually placid features. Her thought that this was a prank he had devised to tease her disappeared as she saw his furious expression.

  The stranger began to walk up the aisle toward the altar. A rumble of whispered comments preceded him like the foam of a wave rushing to embrace the shore. All eyes were on him, but he paid them no attention. His dark ones were riveted steadily on the bride. His lips curled up in a smile as he saw the astonishment in her eyes. The pretty bride clearly had no idea who he was or why he had stopped her wedding.

  The minister stated, shortly, “Sir, it’s a serious thing to interrupt a holy ceremony in this wa
y. You say you have a reason why this marriage should not take place. What is it?”

  He grinned coldly, and the pastor had the feeling he was looking into the face of Satan himself. Only the fallen angel would carry such dark malevolence in his black eyebrows and sternly chiseled features. His eyes returned to the bride. There was amusement in their obscure depths.

  “Why don’t you ask Rebecca?” His voice was as mysteriously rich as his sable hair.

  “Me?” she gasped. That this man knew her name was as astounding as the rest of this outrageous situation. His gaze held her eyes as if he was trying to look past them to examine her soul. Lowering her eyes, she said, “Sir, as Reverend Poore said, this is no time for such antics. You have disrupted my wedding long enough.”

  His eyes slowly and with obvious pleasure moved along her slender body. In the gown that flattered her delicate curves, she was the image of the maidenly bride. “I admit I wouldn’t have known you, Rebecca, but I had thought you would recognize me. I haven’t changed that much since our last meeting.”

  Once again memory tried to stir within her, but brought no answers. “I’m sorry, sir. I don’t think we have met. You must be mistaken.”

  Keith stepped between his bride and the stranger. “Sir, Rebecca has asked you to desist. I suggest you do so, or you may not like the result.” Although he stood several inches shorter than the dark-haired man, he was not afraid to take on the intruder who had ruined their wedding. He had been waiting so long for it to take place, and he would let no one halt it. “I don’t know who you are or why you think you have the right to interfere.”

  “Let me introduce myself.” He gave a half-bow in their direction. “My name is Nicholas Wythe. That woman next to you is my wife.”

  Immediately the church erupted into chaos. Hart leapt to his feet and over the front of the first pew to join in the confrontation with this man who dared to make such a pronouncement. Keith caught Rebecca as she gave a small cry and swayed against him. He feared she would faint, but she only clutched his arm as her life felt as if it was whirling out of control.

  The elusive memory had been so close to her heart. While packing her personal and dower items that morning, she had pulled out from under her bed, the box which contained her most precious mementos and discovered the faded marriage lines that announced she was the wife of one Nicholas Wythe. It was a secret which had been kept for so long that it was no longer worth revealing.

  Nearly five years had passed since the day she had discovered a wounded man delirious in their barn. The only thing he had been able to communicate was his need for secrecy. She had smuggled food to him and had cleaned the wound in his side and bound it for him. Around his head had been a bloody turban she had not dared to touch.

  For two weeks, he slept in the barn. Each morning she expected to find him dead in his hiding place behind the bags of feed for the animals. Both her brother and her father had been away fighting in the War of Independence from England. It had been just she and Aunt Dena, Father’s spinster sister who had come to live with them when Rebecca’s mother had died before her young daughter’s fourth birthday.

  Slowly he recovered enough to escape his delirium. Whenever she had been able to get away from her other duties, Rebecca went to sit in the barn with him. She entertained him with her young impressions of the war, the village she lived near in northern Connecticut, and the world in general. He seemed ancient to her, for he must have been in his early twenties. Soon she learned how to cheer him so he was not so unhappy in his confinement. What little he told her of his own life she had forgotten in the passage of time.

  She did not remember exactly when she had discovered that he was not a Continental soldier, but a loyalist. By that time she had come to see him as a person, not as an enemy. When he gave her a crudely written note to carry to a friend, she did not pause to wonder if she was doing something to compromise the ideals of independence she valued so highly. Her friend would never ask her to do something wrong.

  Shivers of fear had filled her young body when she had had to face those she knew were enemy soldiers. They were frighteningly close to her home. Only her friend’s name kept her from being shot by the men. She gave them the note and scurried away once they were sure she would not betray them to the Patriots. The next morning, the man who had told her his name was Nicholas was not alone. She recognized one of the men as the person to whom she had delivered the note the day before. The other man had been a stranger.

  Clearly she could recall his deep voice as he said, “Rebecca, I fear I shall not survive this. I—”

  “No, don’t say that!” she gasped. The idea of death was alien to her young heart. Tears filled her eyes. She had come to value his friendship and did not want to think of him dying.

  “You must do me a favor.”

  “Anything!”

  He smiled weakly and glanced at his companions as if her answer confirmed something he had said before she entered the barn. “Rebecca, you have taken care of me. I owe you something.”

  “No, you don’t!”

  “All right. You can’t disagree that you are my very best friend in Connecticut.”

  Twisting her hands in her apron, she nodded. That was undoubtedly true. Loyalists were not welcome in villages where Patriots were the majority.

  “Rebecca, it would make me feel better if I had someone to leave my personal effects to if something does happen to me. For that reason, I’m asking you to marry me.”

  “Marry?”

  “It’ll make it easier.”

  She looked into his ebony eyes and nodded. At the time, it did not seem odd for a fourteen-year-old to be wedding a dying man nearly a decade her senior simply to be his heir. The stranger had been the chaplain who had witnessed their vows. He gave her a brotherly kiss on the cheek before he was secreted away by his comrades. His promise to write he kept well for a few months.

  Then after a large battle where many members of the unit to which he belonged were killed, there had been only silence. For twelve long months, she had hoped he survived, but when the first anniversary of the battle came, she knew it was useless to pray any longer. She packed away the three letters he had sent her and the marriage lines which had been kept secret at the bottom of the box. They had been tied with a piece of velvet ribbon which had once belonged to her mother.

  The war ended, except for the formalities of signing treaties and exchanging ambassadors. The war had cost her her father and had sent her brother home with a limp from a poorly healed bullet wound to his hip. In those years, she had changed from a child to a woman. She had been courted for the past year by Keith Bennett without anyone knowing that Keith would be her second husband. She had thought that since Nicholas Wythe was dead, there was no reason to bring up the subject. She had planned to tell Keith someday of that secret wedding which had netted her only pleasant memories of a man who had passed through her life so quickly.

  As Rebecca stared into the dark eyes which matched the ones from the depths of her memory, she could form no coherent thoughts. When she spoke, the wedding guests fell silent as they waited to hear her reaction. Her voice was rough as she spoke past the lump in her throat. “Nicholas Wythe? Captain Wythe? I thought you were dead!”

  Hart demanded, “You know this man, Rebecca?”

  She could not meet the eyes of the man she loved. She raised her left hand and pulled off the engagement ring Keith had given her. With a half-sob, she placed it in his hand. He glanced from it to her, not knowing what to say. When she stood on tiptoe to kiss him one last time, she squeezed his arms convulsively.

  Only then did she turn to answer her brother. “I know him, Hart. He is my husband.”

  A shout came from someone to catch Aunt Dena as she swooned. All shreds of decorum disappeared. Reverend Poore closed his black book and placed it on the altar. It was clear there would be no wedding today.

  The dark-haired man reached up and took Rebecca’s hand and drew her down to stand ne
xt to him. As if he was the groom, he raised her veil to be able to see her face undistorted by its fine mesh. He bent slightly and kissed her cheek. “Hello, Rebecca.”

  She gazed up into his handsome face which was far above hers, for he was well over six feet tall. Knowing why he had seemed so familiar, she could not believe he was here. In her memory, he had been a faceless entity whose identity had been blurred by the passing of time. “I thought you were dead,” she repeated in a whisper. She was afraid that if she spoke aloud the vibration of her own voice would shatter her. “I thought you had been killed. I waited for a year to hear from you, but there was nothing. I could think only that you were dead.”

  He chuckled at a joke only he could share. Holding out his hand, he touched the soft skin of her cheek. The unmolded face of the child had matured into beauty. He had not been prepared for the change. In his mind, she had remained the youngster who had risked her life selflessly to save his. Only because he had learned that it was Rebecca North being married in this backwater village had he known that the bride was his wife.

  “I’m afraid I am very much alive. It was impossible to get mail out of the prison hulks which were my home for the last four years. I have been released with the end of the war. Now that I have found you, my dear wife, we must be on our way home. We have only time for you to pack what you want to take with you, if we want to meet our ship.”

  “Ship?” she repeated. She knew she sounded moronic, but just now her mind was unable to function. All she could think of was that this man had come out of her distant past to interrupt her present. Until he had said he meant to take her with him, she had not considered that he would want her. “You are taking me away? Where do you live, Captain Wythe?”

  “Nicholas, my dear. We are married, so it would be more normal for you to call me by my given name. Your new home is across the ocean in England. It’s called Foxbridge Cloister, and you, my dear Rebecca, are Lady Foxbridge.”

  Hart stepped forward and took his sister’s arm. He pulled her away from this man he had already decided he disliked intensely. “I have heard enough of this nonsense. You have disrupted my sister’s wedding, and you have so shocked our aunt that she has fainted. I think you have done quite enough. Sir, I ask you—no, I insist one final time that you leave.”