A Lady's Honor

by Laurie Alice Eakes

  She loosened her fingers from the others and held out her hand. “Thank you for your service, Mr. Curnow, but we can no longer ride together.”

  “I understand.”

  Did he now? She wanted to kick herself for the annoyance over his easy acceptance of her dismissal.

  “Accompanying you has been my pleasure, Miss Trelawny.” For the briefest moment, his gaze dropped to her lips. For a moment, she feared he would try to kiss her hand. Even gloved, she didn’t want that kind of contact. But he merely clasped her fingers for another instant and released her, bowed, and strode away without looking back.

  Elizabeth nodded to the stable hands, who had emerged to take the horses, thought about saying something about them being bribed, and decided against it. If Curnow wanted to waste his money such, then it was his concern. And who could blame the hands for wanting a little extra money?

  She entered the house through a side door and raced up to her bedchamber. Feeling a breeze flowing beneath the portal, she feared opening it in the event she found evidence of another intruder. Instead, she found Miss Pross leaning over the sill above the garden.

  “The roses are beginning to bloom.” She drew back into the room. “Where have you been all this time?”

  “Riding.”

  “Without a hat? Take off that habit and sit.”

  “I lost my hat.” Behind a Chinese screen, Elizabeth exchanged her habit for a dressing gown, then seated herself at the dressing table. “Is everyone awake and breakfasted?”

  “Lady Trelawny has gone off to visit the village. Some of the children are ill.” Miss Pross began to work a comb through Elizabeth’s hair. “Nothing serious, but they need nourishing broths and jellies.”

  “And toys, if I know Grandmama.”

  “She does spoil them.”

  “She’s very kind. I should have been here to go with her. It could be my duty one day.” Elizabeth looked at herself in the mirror, trying to work out why Rowan Curnow would want to kiss her. Noting only her ice-blue eyes, she dropped her lids. “And Miss Penvenan and Sir Petrok?”

  “Miss Penvenan is practicing Spillikins in the rose sitting room, and Sir Petrok is in his study. Shall I have your breakfast brought up, or will you go down?”

  “No breakfast.”

  The notion of what she must ask Grandpapa sent nausea to her middle. Or perhaps the sight of her own pale eyes reminded her of Rowan Curnow’s words, his touch, his kiss . . . and her wholly inappropriate attraction to him. But when he had spoken of Paine and the American War for Independence, he had grown so intense, so quietly enthusiastic about his subject, not at all trying to simplify what he said because she was female, her heart turned to moldable wax. That kiss threatened to melt her altogether.

  A very dangerous man.

  “I shall see if I can speak with my grandfather. Perhaps that pale blue muslin with the velvet spencer. Today is sunny, but cool.”

  “And this old stone house is always cold.” Miss Pross wrapped her woolen shawl more securely around her shoulders.

  Elizabeth donned the short jacket of blue velvet over her thin muslin gown and glanced at the mirror again. No, the deep blue didn’t help to darken the color of her eyes, alas.

  She’d always liked the color of her eyes. It was a family trait passed down from the ancestress who had saved Bastion Point after the English Civil War nearly destroyed it. Now, however, since Rowan’s words regarding her frosty demeanor, the light blue hue of her eyes repulsed her. She didn’t want to be an ice maiden.

  Except with him. Icy was preferable to the way being near him warmed her clear to her marrow.

  “What do you plan to do today, Miss Pross?” Elizabeth asked as she opened her bedchamber door.

  Miss Pross glanced toward her own room. “If you don’t need me, I intend to help plant the kitchen garden. It’s time some of the herbs got into the ground.”

  “Enjoy yourself.”

  Miss Pross would. She often complained how she missed her home in Dorset, where she’d had a lovely herb garden. But her brother had died and the house had gone to a distant cousin by the laws of inheritance, and Miss Pross, with little money, needed employment. She welcomed the role of Elizabeth’s governess, then, when the summons for Elizabeth to go to London came, her companion, confidante, and lady’s maid.

  Laws of inheritance didn’t matter with Bastion Point. There was no entail. Grandpapa could give it to whomever he pleased, and Elizabeth intended to please him.

  Except speaking up for Morwenna wouldn’t do so. Less would him learning how she’d let the hired man kiss her in a meadow.

  At the bottom of the staircase, she paused in the great hall to take several deep breaths. She must not be flushed when she entered Grandpapa’s study.

  “Miss Tre—”

  Elizabeth waved the footman to silence. The clatter of the colorful sticks used in Spillikins rattled from the cozy sitting room at the back of the hall, and she didn’t want Senara to know quite yet that she’d returned.

  Silent on her kid slippers, she crossed to Grandpapa’s study at the front of the hall and tapped on the door.

  “Come in, Elizabeth,” he called.

  She entered and closed the door behind her. “How did you know it was I?”

  “The servants scratch, your grandmother is away, and Senara doesn’t dare come in here.”

  “Is that how you survived as a pirate for seven years?”

  He gave her an exaggerated scowl. “I was no pirate, whatever the Royal Navy tried to claim. Now come in and sit and stop being impertinent.”

  Smiling, Elizabeth crossed the room, kissed his cheek, then settled herself in a chair facing his desk.

  Most people called into the study were accused of a crime, from pilfering a cup of flour, to stealing jewelry, to suspicion of something worse in the event that person needed to be referred from the justice of the peace to the circuit judge during the assizes. Most of those persons were anxious, even terrified.

  Elizabeth relaxed, inhaling the aroma of Grandpapa’s pipe smoke lingering in the chamber, the beeswax and lemon used on his furniture to make it glow, and a hint of Grandmama’s lilac scent from all the hours she spent reading or working on her embroidery at Grandpapa’s side.

  Grandpapa removed his pipe from a corner of his desk and began to fill it. “To what do I owe this honor? You wish to talk to me, or you wish to escape Miss Penvenan?”

  “The former, of course. We have scarcely spoken since I arrived.”

  “And a little to escape Senara.” He clamped the stem between his teeth, removed a candle from the holder on his desk, and held the flame to the bowl of his pipe. “You don’t mind my pipe after all those city ways of yours, do you, child?”

  “No, sir.” She edged her chair a little to one side so the smoke streamed past her instead of to her. “If you must indulge in such a vice, who am I to stop you?”

  “You sound like your grandmother.” Sighing, he tamped the burning tobacco into a bowl of sand. “I know I should stop, but it’s a long-standing vice and not easy to give up. Rather like your impertinence.”

  Elizabeth laughed, suddenly happier than she’d been in too long ago to recall when. “It is so good to be home.”

  “I expect it is, though you should have come a more conventional way.”

  “And have Romsford abduct me off to Guernsey or someplace where I wouldn’t so easily be able to stop him from claiming me to be his wife?”

  “Yes, well . . .” Grandpapa cleared his throat. “I’ve written to your parents that the offered marriage contract is null and void, as I’ve changed your inheritance so that the wording of the contract is incorrect as to your assets.”

  “You changed—” Elizabeth’s heart skipped a beat. “To . . . what?”

  “I’ve given you the deed to houses in Truro, Tavistock, Plymouth, and London. They bring in rents of around thirty-five thousand a year.”

  “But that’s ten thousand more than my dowry.” />
  “Which I’ve removed. It seemed the most expedient way to null the marriage contract.”

  “Except he might keep trying.” Elizabeth gripped her hands together in her lap. “I am certain he wanted my dowry. What else would cause him to pursue me so vigorously?”

  “Other than the fact that you’re beautiful and intelligent and a Trelawny? He wants a pure young lady for his wife.”

  Elizabeth ducked her head. “You’re right on the last three of those, sir.”

  “I am right on all of those, child.”

  She shook her head. “I am too tall. My shoulders and hips are too broad and bony. And my eyes . . .” She covered her eyes with her hands. A shudder too close to a sob for comfort raced through her.

  A whoosh sounded above her. Elizabeth jumped and uncovered her eyes in time to see the bowl of sand sail past her left shoulder and crash against the hearth.

  “You broke your ash bowl.”

  “You set me in a humor to break many more things than proposed marriage contracts to unworthy men and this old pipe of mine.” He tossed the stem onto the cold hearth. “When did my elder granddaughter grow to dislike her looks and think that is all that matters?”

  “I do not think that is all that matters. The money matters as well. But it apparently was not enough to counteract my preference for philosophy and poetry over playing cards and being taller than and a better rider than most of the gentlemen in London who do not need my dowry. And those issues were obviously the things those who did need the money were overlooking to get it.”

  “I never should have let them take you away.” He shoved back his chair and stalked to the window. “I saw no one here in Cornwall worthy of you except for Conan, and he was still too young to take a wife. But I should have known my son and daughter-in-law would be more interested in making connections than your happiness. Their ambition knows no bounds, for which I blame myself. I once thought money and the right connections were all that mattered in life, and here I pay the consequences in my grandchildren.” He turned back toward the desk and sorrow etched the lines in his face more deeply. “Is that the real reason you risked damaging your reputation by kissing a stranger at a ball?”

  And worse, one in a meadow.

  Elizabeth nodded. “I did not wish to go on the shelf never being kissed.”

  Grandpapa emitted a guffaw. “I hope you chose well.”

  Only if he approved of an upper-level servant, which he had made clear he did not. If anyone in Cornwall was not worthy of her, it was Rowan Curnow.

  “I did not know his identity, since it was a masquerade. I only knew, as I said, that he was taller than I and not married or fat or smelly.”

  Grandpapa laughed so hard he drew out a handkerchief to mop his eyes. “I’ve missed you, child. But don’t think I approve of you kissing strange men. Kissing men at all, mind you. Not until you’re betrothed to one.”

  “So never.” She suppressed a sigh.

  “Now, Elizabeth.” He sobered and leaned back in his chair, his arms crossed over the front of his plain blue waistcoat. “One day you’ll fall in love with the right man. I’m so sorry about Conan for too many reasons to list, but we did have hopes for you there if no one in London took your fancy.”

  “I’d not have agreed to a marriage with Conan. We were friends, but perhaps too much like brother and sister for the right kind of affection between us.”

  “Your grandmother and I were friends for many years before we started courting. We still are friends after more than fifty years of marriage.”

  “You’re fortunate.”

  “We are blessed. The Lord has seen fit to allow us to leave our past in the past and make us new creatures in Christ even at our age.”

  Elizabeth squirmed on her chair. Nothing clever or appropriate came to mind, so she said nothing.

  “You look dubious.” Grandpapa’s eyes softened. “Have you forgotten your Bible readings?”

  “I’ve not forgotten, sir, just . . .” She took a deep breath and plunged. “I think God wound us up and set us in motion like automatons, then let us go.”

  “Ah, Elizabeth.” Now he looked sad. “Even your earthly father cares more about you than that. Why would you think God would care less than your earthly father?”

  “Because he is not on earth.”

  “Yes, he is. He is in the hearts of those who invite him in, and he’s right here waiting for the rest to do the same.”

  “So we can be puppets in his celestial fair?”

  Grandpapa sighed and reached his hands toward her across the desk—big, once strong hands now growing gnarled with rheumatism, but still gentle and generous. “My sweet and beautiful granddaughter, that kind of manipulation is human flaw, and I am more guilty of it than most.”

  “As with Drake and Morwenna?”

  “Drake and Morwenna needed stronger measures than their fathers were willing to put upon them when they were more of an age for it to do them good. They are willful and spoiled, and giving in to their desires does them no good.”

  “But Morwenna needs us.” Elizabeth seized the chance to change the subject away from God. “I saw her while I was out riding this morning. She’s . . . frightened. She wants to come here for her protection.”

  Grandpapa’s lips thinned, and his dark eyes snapped.

  “Does God not teach you to show mercy, if he has been so merciful as to forgive your past?” Bold and possibly disrespectful enough to produce negative consequences, but she’d made a promise.

  Grandpapa rose again and stalked to the fireplace where he jabbed at his broken pipe with the poker. “I’m still learning the line between mercy and discipline. If I give in to her, we may never learn the name of the father and she’ll be condemned in the eyes of the world, if not God’s, provided she repents of her misbehavior. I don’t want that for her—condemnation in the eyes of the world. It’s an uncomfortable way to live, and the child will suffer too.”

  “But what if she truly is in danger?”

  He shot her a raised eyebrow glance over his shoulder. “Do you truly believe she is?”

  “I don’t know, but she thinks she is.”

  “Afraid of what?”

  “I’ve no idea.”

  “And she won’t say, will she?”

  “No, but she looked scared.”

  Grandpapa nodded. “Her future is precarious. She’s got the cottage and she’ll be taken care of, but impending motherhood without a husband is an uncomfortable position to be in.”

  “It would not be so much so if she had her family behind her.” Elizabeth spoke from her heart in this.

  Grandpapa’s lips thinned again and his eyes narrowed. Elizabeth braced herself for a verbal lashing regarding minding her own concerns.

  Instead, he crossed to rest his hand on her shoulder. “My sweet granddaughter, we have offered to send her away. She wants to stay. We are seeing she’s well taken care of. Other than that, we can do little. I’d rather she weren’t in the house with my unmarried granddaughter, and now Senara is here, it would be even worse. We have your reputation to think about as well. When we know who the man is, we will arrange matters from there.”

  “And what if he is married?”

  “Elizabeth.” Grandpapa’s silver-shot eyebrows shot to his hairline. “What has London done to you that you would think of such a thing?”

  “I may be innocent, but I am not naïve.”

  “Alas. Well, we will cross that bridge if we must come to it.”

  “You will arrange a marriage for her anyway.”

  Grandpapa inclined his head in assent. “But we would rather she wed the child’s father. And that is all we will discuss of Morwenna.”

  “But—”

  “Enough. Your grandmother no doubt has arrived home by now and you have a tedious day of entertaining Senara. But you get a reprieve this afternoon.”

  “Not more guests.” Elizabeth nearly wailed the objection.

  Grandpapa smiled.
“No, child. Lord Penvenan has requested permission to take you driving.”

  CHAPTER 12

  ROWAN STOOD IN HIS BEDCHAMBER AT PENMARA THAT afternoon and watched the diminutive figure once again leaning on the gate between Penvenan and Trelawny land as though waiting for someone. Elizabeth’s cousin, Morwenna, the black sheep of the Trelawny family. Even in her condition, she was a stunning female with those huge eyes and full lips. She looked like the sort who kept men at heel by the score. Perhaps Conan had been her latest victim and that was why he wanted her to be protected as well as Senara and Elizabeth, why he did not want to marry Elizabeth. But Conan had given no indication of that.

  “You have got to be the one to go with Elizabeth,” Conan had pleaded the night before he died when it had become apparent that they would have to separate to save both Elizabeth and Miss Pross with Romsford close behind them. “If I spend hours with her at night, Drake will make sure their grandparents find out, and they’ll try to have me wed to her before the next day is out, if they can arrange it, which Sir Petrok Trelawny always can.”

  “What would be wrong with being wed to Elizabeth?” Rowan had asked what, to him, was a logical question.

  “Nothing, except she’ll never leave Cornwall once she returns, and there’s too little here to hold me.”

  “Your land? Your people?”

  “Will be better off if I sell it to someone with money. If I can break the entail, I have buyers.”

  “And what will they do to me if they find out?” Rowan wouldn’t complain of Conan’s predicted fate.

  Conan had given him a sympathetic glance. “Nothing. They will scold her and most likely send you back to Charleston to keep it all quiet, but they would never want you to marry. She’s destined for better things.”