“But you don’t remember telling me about the sherry.”
“No.”
“Or anything else, for that matter, after you were sick.”
He was looking at her so oddly that Corisande began to feel quite nervous. “Why did you say that? Is there something I should have remembered?”
When he gave no answer, merely staring at her, his handsome face set and unreadable, she felt a flush race from her scalp to her toes, her sense of unease growing. “You didn’t…I mean, we didn’t…oh, Lord, surely not—”
“No, we didn’t, but you not knowing is another damned good reason to stay away from the sherry, wouldn’t you say?” Donovan interrupted gruffly, ending her torment. Time to end his too—damn if he couldn’t drive the image of her sitting naked in a tub out of his mind!—and get on with why he’d come to her room in the first place. “I was already on my way to see you when I met Miss Biddle in the hall. She mentioned she’d asked for your help in replacing some of the household help, so you must know—”
“Yes, I know,” came the snappish reply, Corisande’s deep brown eyes full of angry fire. “How gallant of you to come to my rescue, kind sir! It must have been a fine show, indeed. I wish I’d seen it! Ah, yes, the vengeful husband protecting his bride! But I fear you’re too late, the damage already done.”
“What damage?” Donovan demanded, not liking it at all that her words had stung. “Those girls are gone, enough said.”
“Ha! You think by dismissing them the gossip has stopped? A story like that has wings, my lord. It’s already flown through the servants. By the end of the day, everyone in the parish will have heard every detail and think I’m a fool. A silly romantic fool for believing that a fine aristocratic gentleman like yourself could come and sweep me away, a vicar’s daughter, while all you actually wanted was a good breeder to help you win your inheritance.”
“Bess said that too? A good breeder?”
“She said a lot of things.”
Corisande’s voice had grown so quiet that Donovan felt his throat tighten, much as it had last night. And good God, it was bloody ridiculous! He didn’t want to feel sympathy, he didn’t want to feel anger for the hurt she’d suffered. He didn’t want to feel anything when it came to this long-legged waif of a woman!
Why, just look at her, dressed once more in her dowdy ragamuffin clothes and probably quite happily too. She wasn’t anything at all like the sophisticated women he’d known, women whose perfume alone could fill a man with lust. This chit smelled medicinal, reeking of lavender. Nothing sensual there. Damned unpleasant too!
The only good thing he could say about her, Corisande wasn’t like those grasping title-hungry virgins who’d been thrust at him every Season until he’d gone to war. She wouldn’t have looked at him twice if not for the business arrangement she’d accepted, not to benefit herself, but the people she cared about. In fact, she despised him! Despised him, and she didn’t know a damned thing about him. So why should he care if her feelings had been hurt—oh, hell, enough!
Donovan glanced out the window to see that Henry already waited for him below, their horses saddled and snorting in the heavy drizzle. The man had worked fast. God, how Gilbert had tripped all over himself to swear he hadn’t betrayed Donovan’s confidence. It had been almost laughable, but the last thing he felt like doing right now was laughing as he grimly turned from the window to find Corisande scowling at him.
“Obviously, my lord husband, you’ve nothing further to say, which doesn’t surprise me in the least. After all, it was never a question of your reputation—”
“Or yours, if you’d pause to consider things a moment before spouting at me. Is that bloody possible?”
Stunned that he had raised his voice at her, and so harshly, too, Corisande clamped her lips together, which apparently was just what Donovan wanted.
“Excellent. Now, as for your reputation, it doesn’t matter what the servants think, or the parish, or the blessed whole of Britain. Good marriage, unhappy marriage, indifferent marriage, it doesn’t make a damned bit of difference. And believe me”—Donovan’s voice grew even harsher—“unhappy marriages are far more common among those of my station than the blissful roles we’ve been playing—which is exactly my point. You don’t have to pretend that you’re happy anymore.”
“I—I don’t?”
“No. In fact, it would probably be better if you acted as if you hate me, at least for a time, considering the terrible surprise you’ve just suffered. That shouldn’t be too difficult for you.”
His sarcasm was so biting that Corisande could only stare at him, never having seen this darker side of Donovan before…well, except a few days ago in the stable, and even that hadn’t been as bad.
“Nothing to say? You surprise me, Corie. I’d have thought you’d be ecstatic to know you’re free to act however you please—ah, no matter. Do what you will. Just remember, people can think whatever they want about us as long as they don’t suspect our marriage is a purely temporary arrangement. That’s the only thing you and I need be concerned about.”
“Why did you dismiss Fanny and the others, then, and not simply reprimand them?” Corisande asked, confused. “That would have made the most sense instead of leaving poor Ellen Biddle short of help and with three times as much work to do— Donovan?”
He had strode past her so abruptly that she stood stunned, but before she thought to go after him he had spun back to face her, his eyes an angry black.
“Stick to your affairs, Corie, and I’ll stick to mine. Is that understood? Those young women overstepped their bounds, upsetting the peace of this household. They should have known to keep their gossip well to themselves.” With that he strode into his bedchamber but stopped again, his swarthy face grown as dark and hard as she’d ever seen it.
“Oh, yes, something else that might please you. I plan to spend much of my time at the mine, at least during the day. So you won’t be plagued with my presence. I’ve also informed Miss Biddle and Ogden that you will be continuing with your charity work throughout the parish and with helping your father, and that I wholeheartedly approve. So you see, your life hasn’t changed so drastically. You’ll be busy, I’ll be busy. The time will fly, and soon we’ll be free of each other’s company forever. I’ve sent a letter to my brother to let him know that yesterday we became husband and wife, as well as a formal announcement to the London papers. That should make things move swiftly. Now, was there something you wanted to speak to me about?”
Corisande shook her head, speechless.
“Good. I’ll see you at supper. By the way, you might wash that lavender smell from yourself before you go out. It’s damned overpowering. Not pleasant at all.”
Gasping softly, Corisande felt her cheeks growing hot as Donovan moved to the door.
“Have the coachman take you wherever you need to go. No matter the state of our marriage, you’re Lady Donovan Trent now. There are certain proprieties to be observed. I don’t want you going out alone.”
“But—but that’s ridiculous! I’ve always gone everywhere by—” Corisande jumped, the door slamming behind Donovan before she’d even had a chance to finish. Outraged, she almost went after him but instead ran into his bedchamber and threw open the balcony doors, cool rain pelting her face as she went to grip the iron railing. She was determined to tell him exactly what she thought of his preposterous command as soon as he emerged from the house, and she didn’t care if the whole estate heard her. She wasn’t one of his regiment to be ordered about!
“Why—why, Lady Donovan. Should you be standing there? It’s begun to rain, you’ll take a chill.”
Corisande looked at Henry Gilbert’s upturned face, tempted to snap at the man—of course she knew it was bloody raining!—but something Donovan had said made her hold her tongue.
Do what you will.
Oh, yes, he had said those words as plain as the rain dripping off her nose. Why bother screeching and hollering? He was going his own
way, she would go hers. What could be better? He probably couldn’t care less what she did anyway.
That thought stuck with her as Donovan strode outside, Henry gesturing to him that she stood on the balcony. Donovan barely gave her a glance as he donned his hat and mounted Samson, then spun his stallion around and urged him into a gallop. Within moments, he and Henry had ridden from view while Corisande stood shivering on the balcony, feeling strangely hollow inside and quite, quite alone.
It was clear that he’d dismissed her from his mind as easily as flicking lint from his greatcoat. She was money in his pocket, nothing more. Why, he’d scarcely given her a look while she was…
“Standing here like a bloody fool getting soaked and chilled to the bone, is what you’re doing, Corie Véronique,” she muttered to herself, running back inside the room.
Lord, what was the matter with her? So she was alone. Wonderful! She wanted to be free of his company, yes, forever. She could hardly wait!
She shut the balcony doors against the rain and then ran her hands over her face, which made her stop and stare at her palms, her skin fairly reeking with a distinctive smell.
She smiled.
So Donovan didn’t like lavender, hmm?
Chapter Seventeen
“Are you sure this is the place, Gilbert?” Donovan studied doubtfully the crumbling white cottage with its small shuttered windows, no smoke pillaring from the stone chimney. “Looks quiet as a tomb.”
“He’s probably still sleeping, my lord. Jonathan Knill said he’d heard Pascoe was working the last core at Great Work mine, so he wouldn’t have come home until after dawn.”
“I’m surprised the bastard was able to find work at all,” Donovan said tightly as he dismounted and left Samson to nibble at the sparse grass alongside the muddy road. And as a bloody mine captain no less. Gilbert had brought the astonishing news this morning, though Great Work in neighboring Breage parish was so huge that there were a dozen such men overseeing hundreds of tinners. Jack Pascoe ranked the lowest of them all.
To Donovan the man was just that, the lowest of filth. If he discovered Jack Pascoe had had anything to do with those pilchard barrels yesterday, bearing some murderous grudge against Corisande…
“All right, Gilbert, let’s get on with it,” Donovan said in a terse whisper as Henry crept along in his wake, the agent’s eyes round and apprehensive. Henry’s eyes grew even rounder when Donovan pulled a pistol from inside his greatcoat. “Stay behind me if you want to and remember, if there’s trouble, duck the hell out of the way.”
“Y-yes, my lord. Duck, oh, yes. That I’ll certainly do.”
Thinking dryly that he would have probably done just as well to leave Gilbert back at the estate, Donovan signaled for Henry to get out of line with the door and to stand flush against the cottage wall. The agent nearly tripped over his scrawny legs in his haste to oblige. “Easy, man. Easy.”
“Yes, yes, forgive me, my lord,” Gilbert whispered back, his large Adam’s apple pumping.
Donovan inhaled very slowly, waiting, listening, then took a step backward and violently kicked in the door, the weather-worn wood giving way with a splintering crash. As he rushed inside he heard a raspy intake of surprise and a woman’s scream, high-pitched and terrified, Donovan making out a pair of humped shapes atop a mattress in one dark corner.
“Get up! Both of you!”
The dark-haired woman obeyed him at once, whimpering in fear as she half stumbled to her feet and came forward into the light from the doorway, a soiled blanket clutched to her fleshy, sagging breasts. “Lord have mercy, sir, what have we done? I—I don’t even live ‘ere—”
“Wait outside, woman.”
She fled, skittering out the door like a plump terrified rabbit while Donovan pointed his pistol at the corner. “I said get up, Pascoe—”
“Ais, so I am, so I am! Must ‘ee bluster an’ shout?” came a decidedly surly voice, Jack Pascoe not even bothering to cover his wiry-limbed nakedness as he rose from the mattress on the floor. “What do ‘ee want here, my lord? God in heaven, an’ look what ‘ee did to my door! Smashed it t’ bits—eh, there! Is that Henry Gilbert standen outside? I see you, ‘ee bloody scarecrow, an’ ‘ee better keep yer bugger’s eyes off my woman or I’ll—”
“You’ll what, Pascoe?” Donovan demanded. “Push a few hogsheads down a hill and hope you’ll crush the man? Just like you did yesterday in Porthleven? But then it wasn’t Gilbert you were after, was it?”
A long silence fell over the cottage; Donovan felt a vein pounding in his temple now that the man hadn’t immediately proclaimed his innocence. Just when he thought he’d have to grab the fool and throttle an answer out of him, a low, hoarse chuckling broke the stillness. Jack Pascoe scratched his crotch as he shuffled forward into the light, the red hair on his head dirty and matted and sticking up like a rooster’s comb.
“Ais, I should have known you’d come looking for me. But I didn’t do it—though I’ve no liken for that bitch ‘ee took for your bride.”
“So you know what happened,” Donovan said through his teeth, suddenly tempted to shoot the man right then and there.
“‘Course I do! One of the mine cap’ens from Great Work saw the whole thing—visiting his dear old mother in Porthleven, he was. Said those barrels caused quite a stir. Wish I’d seen it. But I was already at the mine, an’ ‘ee can ride right out there an’ check for yerself too. Spent the whole day there an’ into the night, then, for my first core, just to get used to the place. ‘Tes huge, ‘ee know, five times bigger than yer little place and richer to boot. And fancy them hiring me so fast after leaving your mine only this past Saturday—”
“Fancy them firing you, too, if I hear the slightest word that you’re making the tinners suffer as you did at Arundale’s Kitchen,” Donovan cut him off, sickened by the man’s smug smile that he was very pleased to see had suddenly faded. “The same thing, too, if you’re seen anywhere near my wife or her family. Are we understood, man?”
Jack Pascoe didn’t readily answer, but his pocked face had turned a mottled red that nearly matched his hair. Yet finally he spat, “Stuck on that meddling wench, are ‘ee? Well, more’s the worse for ‘ee, then. I hope she yells yer ears off like she used to holler down into the shaft whenever she came looken for me, calling me names that would make the saints blush. I think she might have followed me, too, if it wasn’t that the men’ll have no women down in the mines. Bad luck, ‘tes, and I wish you plenty of it with that one!”
Donovan smiled grimly, thinking that he could tell this man a thing or two about having his ears yelled off. Now that he knew Pascoe hadn’t been involved in yesterday’s incident, he wanted out of a cottage that stunk of urine, sweaty unwashed bodies, and sex. He lowered his pistol and left the place without another word, Jack Pascoe shouting after him.
“Eh! What of my door here? I hope ‘ee plan to pay for it, my lord. A good door costs dear these days, it does!”
“Give him five shillings,” Donovan ordered Henry, who was hard-pressed to keep his eyes off the woman’s fat, jiggling bottom as she ducked back into the cottage. “Gilbert?”
“Oh, yes, yes, my lord. At once!”
Donovan didn’t wait for the transaction to be completed but strode away, inhaling deep breaths of fresh drizzly air as if he could cleanse himself of the unnecessary filth he’d just encountered. The man was disgusting, living like a rat in a hole.
“All done, my lord. Where to now? Arundale’s Kitchen?”
Donovan nodded at Gilbert, his jaw clenched as he glanced back at the cottage. “Why does Pascoe live like that? He must have some coin to his name. God knows you paid him like a king when he was under our employ, and I’ve no doubt that he stole his share from the tinners.”
“Gambling, my lord. Terrible vice. And women.” Henry gave a nervous shrug, clearly having nothing more to say and probably afraid to.
It was enough for Donovan. His insides churning to think that their family age
nt could have given so much power to a man who was no more than scum, he didn’t trust himself to speak as he caught the reins and mounted Samson while Henry clambered atop his horse.
Finally, after they’d ridden some distance from Pascoe’s cottage, he had calmed himself enough to ask, “Did my wife really do that? Yell down into the shafts?”
Gilbert bobbed his head, looking somewhat apprehensive after Donovan’s long silence and more than anxious to please. “Oh, yes indeed, she did. You could hear her across the heath sometimes if the wind was right, all the way to the house. I’m ashamed to admit it, but that was always a good sign it was time for me to hide.”
Donovan couldn’t help smiling.
It was all so ridiculous, really. Jack Pascoe heading deep into the earth, Henry Gilbert no doubt diving under a bed, and all because one angry-eyed, sharp-tongued woman had the conviction to stand up to injustices she was determined to change. Good God, she was admirable!
His smile faded just as quickly as it had come, Jack Pascoe’s words ringing in his mind.
“Stuck on that meddling wench, are ‘ee?”
Bloody hell, was that how he appeared? Surely not. He’d gone to see the man because he had his business arrangement to protect, nothing more. He’d be damned if he was going to start over with some other country chit, oh, no. One wife was enough for any lifetime, even if she was only temporary…
“It must have been an accident, my lord. I don’t see any other way around it.”
Donovan looked over at Henry Gilbert, who blinked at him in the thickening rain.
“Those barrels, I mean. If it wasn’t Jack Pascoe—”
“We’ll be keeping our eye on him all the same, no matter what that bastard said.” His tone must have been dire, for Henry gulped, the man keeping any further thoughts to himself as they galloped in a spray of mud toward Arundale’s Kitchen.
“Are ‘ee sure that I can’t send one of the men along with ‘ee? It’ll be dark before you’re halfway home—”
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