by Fiona Monroe
"Hold still, you wretched girl," he said, "or I'll end up blowing my own foot off."
"Let me go! Let me go, Duncan! Blow your foot off for all I care! I won't go back, I will marry Lord Daventry! Lord Daventry! My love! Say something! Defend me!"
"Yes, Daventry, why don't you say something." Sir Duncan was slightly out of breath now. "For instance, you could tell my sister all about Chiara di Mazi of Venice. You remember her, I take it? Or perhaps it's been so long that you've forgotten all about your wife."
It was almost too cruel. Catriona felt shock like a physical blow under her breast, but her dismay could be as nothing to her poor cousin's feelings. Caroline immediately stopped beating her fists and kicking her feet, and went nearly limp in her brother's arms.
"Your wife?" she whispered. "Lord Daventry—it is not true—it cannot be true."
"Out of the carriage, Daventry." No longer needing both arms to restrain his sister, but keeping her clasped against him, Sir Duncan aimed the pistol directly at the figure which climbed slowly down the two steps of the curricle.
"The word of a Scotch gentleman means nothing, then," the Viscount drawled. "I had not expected that."
"When I gave you my word not to tell a soul about your marriage, Daventry, I hardly anticipated your attempting to seduce my sister. By God! I have held my tongue these past three years all the same. Even after you tried to ravish that poor servant girl—I truly thought you would never dare come within a hundred miles of Lochlannan ever again. I kept my word because I thought Caroline was safe. Force me to choose between my honour as a Scotsman and my sister? My sister wins out, I'm afraid."
"Tell me it's not true!" Caroline gasped again.
"Besides," Sir Duncan continued coolly, not lowering his aim. "I needed her to hear it from you, Daventry. Go on. Tell her about the lovely Signorina di Mazi. Or as she should be properly styled, Lady Daventry, future Countess of Exminster."
There was a long pause. Lord Daventry let out a breath.
"Tell her the truth," said Sir Duncan, "or I'll blow your damned head off."
Caroline whimpered.
"It was a long time ago." Lord Daventry's tone was flat.
At his words, Caroline let out a long wail and seemed to collapse once more against her brother.
"Tell her," Sir Duncan insisted.
"Caroline... my love." Lord Daventry took a few more steps towards her. "I met Chiara di Mazi in Venice when I was only nineteen years old. I was on my Grand Tour before going up to the University. She was nothing, merely the daughter of a glass merchant."
"That is not nothing in Venice," said Sir Duncan, the habitual mocking undertone back in his voice.
"What can I say? I was a boy of nineteen, she was a beautiful girl, I fell violently in love as one does at that age. She was virtuous, or she was cunning enough to make the pretence of being so. I was wild to possess her, I could not let her go. In the end I agreed to a secret ceremony in a tiny chapel down some stinking backwater canal. It was Papish, of course, and all in Latin. Quite honestly, I thought it barely counted. I did not think that the son and heir of an English peer, respectable member of the Church of England, could be held to a so-called marriage performed in Latin, under a Roman Catholic priest, to the daughter of a tradesman in a foreign city." He made a shrugging motion with his hands, and actually smiled wryly. He advanced another half-step towards Caroline.
"He severely underestimated the power of the Venetian scuoli," said Sir Duncan. "Which only goes to prove that the Grand Tour does not always achieve its purpose of broadening a young man's understanding of foreign manners. Not when the young man in question is a prize ass, at any rate. Turned out that Senor di Mazi, far from being what we would understand as a tradesman, was one of la Serenissima's foremost citizens. Money matters more than titles in Venice."
"The marriage was supposed to be secret!" said Lord Daventry. "She swore she would not tell her father."
"Aye, but I expect she had little choice once you got her with child," said Sir Duncan.
Caroline let out a moan.
Again, Lord Daventry threw his hands in the air. "I could hardly help that. I promised her money. She would have been provided for."
"She didn't need money, did she, though, you fool. Her family was wealthy. She needed you to restore her honour by acknowledging her as your wife."
"It was impossible! I tried to explain to Senor di Mazi that a Venetian commoner could not be the wife of an English earl. Her child could not be my heir. He would not understand that it was impossible. Well, thank God, the child turned out to be a girl, so that is one problem I do not have to worry about... Caroline!" Suddenly, he reached for her and grabbed her hand. "Caroline, I swear, this was eleven years ago. I have not set eyes on that woman for eleven years. The whole affair lasted a matter of weeks. Good God, she could be dead for all I know."
"She was alive and in excellent health three weeks ago," said Sir Duncan calmly. "I have her letter in my bureau, dated tenth of May. Your daughter Federica sends her love, too."
"Caroline—"
Caroline snatched back her hand and broke away from her brother's enclosing arm. She took two deliberate steps backwards, reaching for Catriona but not taking her eyes from Lord Daventry's face. "Get away from me," she hissed.
"Caroline, my love—"
"Don't call me that! You were never free to call me that! Dear God—you would have ruined me."
Catriona put her arms around her cousin, who was shaking like a leaf but seemed too distraught for tears.
"No, no," said Lord Daventry, in a horribly soothing voice, still coming towards her.
"Get back!" Sir Duncan barked, raising the pistol. "This time, Daventry, I will have satisfaction. Meet me at dawn, any place you choose."
Catriona expected Caroline to protest, but she was silent. Her own heart jumped within her breast.
After a long, hard stare at Sir Duncan, and a quick contemptuous glance at Caroline, Lord Daventry said, "I'll see you in hell first, Buccleuch."
And he swung himself back up into the curricle, flicked his whip and set the horses straight to a gallop. With a thunder of hooves and a storm of dust, he was gone into the night.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
It was the deepest time of night when they at length returned to the castle, Caroline supported all the way between her brother's arm and her cousin's. They had stumbled back up the road almost in silence, Catriona wrapped in shock and consternation, Sir Duncan ominously quiet, and Caroline sobbing quietly. She was evidently wretched, but in a subdued and somehow much more real way than she ever had been while bewailing her lot upon the chaise longue.
Instead of waking up a servant to let them in and attend to them, Sir Duncan opened the garden door himself and took them quietly through the sleeping house to his study. Catriona realised that he was making a very deliberate effort not to rouse the household.
He lit a lamp on the desk, then turned to face the two girls trembling on the rug before him.
Caroline was drooping, her dark hair in disarray, her head hanging low.
"You have had," said Sir Duncan after a long moment, "a very lucky escape, sister."
She put her hand over her mouth and nodded, still not lifting her head.
"If I had not happened to come across Miss Dunbar here, ineptly attempting to rob your own jewels for you, you would be on your way now to irretrievable ruin. And I would have had to blame myself for not letting you know the truth when the blackguard first started to trifle with you. But I tried, I tried a hundred times to tell you what sort of a man he was, without absolutely breaking my promise of silence. God damn it, how could you do it, how could you actually leave my roof and put yourself in his power?"
"I was wrong," she said, in a very small voice.
"Well—thank God I got there in time," he said gruffly, then pulled his sister into a sudden fierce hug.
Caroline clung to him for the few moments that he held her tight.
When he released her, he turned away abruptly. "I will clear the castle of Rosses in the morning," he said. "Since you are hell-bent on not having the wretched fellow. I was never going to drag you in chains to the altar, you know. I thought you had come to your senses."
"I have!" Caroline cried, with a sudden return of animation. "Duncan, I have now. Don't send Mr. Ross away."
Sir Duncan looked at her doubtfully. "You're certain?"
"Yes." There was a definite pout about her now. "I will not let that—that person rule my heart any longer. He would have ruined me. Even if he did love me a little, it was a wholly selfish love. I will marry a good man and make him happy, and maybe I can be happy myself. That will be the best revenge."
Sir Duncan's mouth twitched into a half-smile. "That's more like the sister I know. Good to see you putting that spirit to a better use. Well, Ross will have a handful to deal with, but I've warned him of that. He claims he is equal to the task. In the meantime—while you are still my responsibility..."
Catriona watched Caroline's expression change to one of apprehension as her brother started to look purposely about him; she sucked in her lower lip and shifted slightly from foot to foot as, with a soft exclamation of satisfaction, Sir Duncan retrieved the heavy wooden ruler from amidst the clutter of papers on his desk. He turned to look between them.
"You have both behaved very badly," he said, tapping the ruler against his palm. "Sister—you know full well now what the consequences of your folly and disobedience might have been, and to some extent you have had your own punishment. That doesn't mean you're not going to get a well-skelpt hide for being a wilful little fool."
"Yes, sir," Caroline whispered, subdued again.
"As for you, Miss Dunbar..." Sir Duncan's voice was suddenly icy cold, as he turned his gaze upon her.
A terrible wave of shame rose up through Catriona, so strong that she could hardly breathe. She wanted to sink into the floor in mortification. She could feel her cheeks burning and tears welling behind her eyes, hot and pressing. She could not look at him.
She had known that what she was doing was wrong. She had known ever since she had agreed to keep the secret of Caroline's intended elopement that she was colluding in folly, and actively helping her flight had compounded her guilt tenfold.
She could not look at him.
"I seem to recall ordering you quite explicitly not to interfere in my family's affairs. I even tried to give you the hint that there were things you did not understand. I was beginning to think you might have something of cleverness about you, perhaps even a modicum of plain sense. And now I find you encouraging my scatter-brained sister to flee the protection of her family and put herself in the power of a penniless would-be bigamist."
"Sir, I did not encourage her, I must say in my defence that I did everything I could to persuade her to—"
"You will hold your tongue, my girl!"
Catriona swallowed, hung her head and felt the tears fall freely now. She determinedly did not sob aloud. And she realised, she could not and indeed must not offer any justification for her behaviour. It did not matter that she had advised Caroline to do the right thing; what mattered was what she, Catriona, had in fact done, despite knowing herself that it was wrong. It was true that she could not have known about the Viscount's marriage, but the enormity of the disaster that would have befallen Caroline horrified her and a large part of the blame would have been her own.
"You've got more to answer for than Caroline," he continued. "Her head was addled with passion and there was not much in there to begin with. But you, Miss Dunbar, you have a clear enough understanding, you must have known it was a reckless folly. You must have known where your duty lay. You should have come to me the instant you knew of my sister's wild scheme. The fact that it didn't end in disaster was down to sheer luck—no thanks to you."
Another wave of sickness passed over her as she thought again of Caroline with Lord Daventry in some foreign palazzo, irretrievably ruined and as yet unaware of it.
"I am sorry, sir," she muttered, her voice thick.
"With any luck," he continued, pacing a little and still tapping the ruler against his palm, "we can keep knowledge of tonight's fun and adventures within this happy little family circle. The servants are all abed, and as far as I know, everyone else is soundly sleeping the sleep of the good. Nobody but our three selves need ever know. Are we clear about that?" He looked a stern challenge between the two girls.
Catriona could only nod. Caroline's reputation—and her prospects for married happiness—would hardly be enhanced by her attempted elopement becoming known, and she was not eager to have her own part in the escapade exposed to the world.
"Then let's get this over and done with." He settled himself on his leather armchair, tapped the ruler on his knee, and said, "Caroline."
Shoulders hunched, Caroline stumbled obediently forward and then hesitated. Sir Duncan caught her lightly by the wrist and pulled her face down across his lap.
"I would leave this to our mother," he said grimly, "but it's best she knows nothing about the whole business. Besides, she needs her beauty sleep more than I do. And I think, moreover, that on this occasion you deserve a sharper lesson than a woman's tender hand could deliver."
There was a muffled whimper from Caroline, buried under hair. "Please, Duncan. Not too hard!"
"Oh, I think it needs to be hard enough to make your remember it tomorrow, even as you're saying your marriage vows. It's as well for you to go into matrimony with a tender behind, sister. And a few marks to let your husband see that you've been taken care of."
"But—but—he will see—what will I say if he asks why?"
"I leave that to your wifely ingenuity, sister. I'm sure you'll think of something."
As he was talking, he had bundled Caroline's coat, skirt and petticoats up her back in a business-like way, to expose her long legs. Her feet were encased in muddy walking boots, her legs in stockings held in place by garters. Above those, was a clear bare expanse of thigh and two perfectly round, plump bottom cheeks.
Catriona averted her eyes, partly not wishing to shame her cousin by staring at her nakedness, and partly from a fear of witnessing the coming punishment when she knew quite well that it would be her own turn soon. She did not, therefore, see Sir Duncan raise his arm and bring the ruler down hard upon his sister's unprotected backside. But she heard the sharp crack of wood on flesh, and Caroline's gasping yelp. There was as much surprise as pain in the cry, as if the blow or the instrument of correction was harder than she had expected. The first crack was followed immediately by another, and another, without pause, while Caroline's gasps mounted rapidly to yells and then screams.
"No! No! Duncan, it is too hard, it hurts—oh please! Stop, oh please!"
Catriona opened her eyes. Sir Duncan was wielding the ruler on his sister with firm, relentless strokes, his mouth set in a grim line and his brows drawn in concentration. He was holding her steady over his knee with the other arm, at the same time keeping her many skirts clear of her exposed behind as she kicked and thrashed her legs. He ignored that, and he ignored her pleading, as he chastised her. Catriona could no longer look away, though she trembled.
Hidden under the layers of clothing thrown over her head, Caroline stopped protesting and started to sob helplessly. Catriona could not help seeing that her buttocks and upper thighs were now criss-crossed with dark red lines on the white skin.
"Aye," said Sir Duncan, sounding a little out of breath. "I think you're properly sorry now. You'll be Ross's problem from tomorrow, but here's something more to remind you of your duty to your family."
With slow deliberation, in contrast to the furious hurricane of blows, Sir Duncan raised the ruler as far back as his arm would stretch and slammed it down upon the underside of Caroline's backside. She jerked her whole body upwards and screamed, but he held her firmly down and repeated the swingeing stroke twice more.
Then he put the ruler aside on the de
sk, took his sister gently by the arms, and helped her to her feet.
She stood before him sobbing, shamelessly and frantically rubbing at her bottom, her hair all loosened and tumbling into her face. "Oh, Duncan. I am so sorry, I am so sorry."
"Hush, dearest sister. It is all over, you have paid for your folly, and you are safe."
"Yes. Oh! Thank you, thank you for rescuing me! Thank you for—for taking care of me—for punishing me, even—I know I deserved it!" She threw her arms around his neck.
Sir Duncan clasped his sister warmly to him once more and muttered, "There now. You must get to bed now, get what sleep you can before the morning. After all, it is your wedding day." He held her at arm's length, and smiled, slightly.
Despite her tear-streaked cheeks and puffy eyes, Caroline managed a small smile in return. Then she winced, and her hands went to her behind once again. "Ow! It is sore! That—that ruler hurt so much—more than when Mother gives me the hairbrush."
"Just be thankful I did not take down the razor strop. Perhaps you can persuade Ross to use an instrument of your pleasing."
"Mr. Ross will not need to use anything!" said Caroline, with a small return of spirit. "I will be a model wife, and he will never have occasion to chastise me."
Sir Duncan raised his eyebrows. "Admirable intentions, sister. We shall see. Now get to bed!" He patted her shoulder dismissively.
Caroline held out her hand to Catriona. "Cousin, come with me."
Catriona was moving forward very willingly, but Sir Duncan—icy cold again in an instant—put out his arm to prevent her.
"Oh no," he said. "Caroline, be gone. Miss Dunbar—we have quite a few things still to discuss."
Catriona looked at the carpet, and did not watch Caroline hasten out of the room, still rubbing at her backside. She heard Sir Duncan close the door with a solid clunk, and a sense of doom settled over her. She was aware of him pacing into the room, and rubbing the back of his neck as if perplexed.