by Rose Lerner
“Then why are you looking so guilty?”
Even the shame pooling in the pit of her stomach curled lower, caressing her secret places. It wasn’t fair, that women be formed to want this so badly, and then be so heavily punished for it. “We did…other things,” she admitted almost inaudibly.
Her sister’s eyes flew wide. “Without kissing?”
Phoebe covered her face with one hand. “I’m sorry, Ships. I should have remembered my promise. But I wanted him so badly, and I thought—oh God, everything’s gone so wrong.” She pinched the bridge of her nose until it hurt to keep from crying.
Helen pulled a chair up beside her and sat. “What’s gone wrong, sweetheart? What did he do to you?”
Phoebe turned her head to look at her sister. “You told me he didn’t force you. Did you lie to me?”
Helen shook her head vigorously. “But men don’t always have to force women, do they? I wanted to please him, and I thought—I thought it would feel good. It felt good when he kissed me, but—”
Phoebe clenched her teeth together to keep from shouting, throwing something—doing something, not to feel as angry as she did. “It does feel good, Ships,” she said. “It feels splendid. It hurts the first time, but he should have been gentle with you. He should have taken care of you.” He should have kept his filthy hands to himself.
“Was Will gentle?”
In spite of everything Phoebe giggled at the skepticism in her sister’s voice. “Gentle” wasn’t the first word most people would have chosen to describe Will. But… “Will thought he was going to break me in half. He was afraid his—his member was too big.”
Helen blinked. “Was it?”
Phoebe rolled her eyes. “Of course not. Will worried about everything, you know that. He didn’t even want to stay inside me that first time after I said it hurt.” He had been so gentle and slow, and taken so long as a result, that it really had become uncomfortable and he had had to pull out and finish himself off with his hand. But she had felt like a goddess anyway. Walking home, the soreness between her legs had been a promise that her life was changing.
Helen looked away. “He didn’t stay inside me either. He…he…”
“You can tell me, Ships,” Phoebe said softly. “You can tell me anything.”
Helen ran the ends of her braids through her fingers, testing that they were the same length. “He said he was being careful and I had nothing to worry about. I don’t know how he got me with child. It shouldn’t have happened. I thought he pulled out before he—you know.”
“Before he spent.”
“He cleaned his—he cleaned me off with his handkerchief,” she whispered. “But he didn’t get it all and I could feel it drying on my skin all the way home. And then Mama was about and I couldn’t wash. I knew it was the least of my problems but I was so unhappy.”
Every word she said made Phoebe angrier. A little spunk wouldn’t have bothered her, but anyone who knew Helen ought to have known that would be torture for her. “I promise it isn’t always like that. There’s a reason women want it. One day you’ll find a man who makes you want to dance down the middle of the road.”
“Down the middle of the road? Fee, that’s dangerous!” Helen said with mock horror. She sniffed and giggled a little, and Phoebe felt as if her heart would break with affection. “Does Mr. Dymond make you want to dance down the middle of the road?”
Phoebe blinked, startled. Right now, Mr. Dymond mostly made her want to slink into a hole and hide. But if Helen had asked her this morning? “I don’t know. I thought I just wanted to—to bed him. I thought I was lusting after his refined good looks and thrillingly patrician accent. Like daydreaming about Lord Byron.”
“But you weren’t?”
“I couldn’t have been, could I? He touched me a great deal this afternoon, and I wasn’t satisfied.”
“You weren’t?”
Phoebe blushed. “He was going to—well—I may have shouted at him for not being eager enough.”
“What? Oh, Fee.”
“He made me feel pushy!”
“You are pushy.”
“I know, but—I wanted him to push back. I wanted him to want me as much as I wanted him.”
“Men don’t bed women out of charity, generally,” Helen said with an air of superiority that was entirely unjustified.
“I know that, but you weren’t there. You didn’t hear him, he sounded so practiced and kind and as if—as if he were only trying to please me.”
“And that’s bad?”
“No…yes! I don’t know. It wasn’t really him. He hasn’t always been like that with me. Sometimes he’s talked to me, been honest with me. I wanted that. I know it was selfish, but I thought, just for a week—” Her voice was going to wobble. She pressed her lips shut.
Helen put a hand on her arm. “Don’t get married next week. You don’t have to. I’ll go away on my own. I’ll pretend to be a widow and work in a dress shop. Or—Tom Tuff would marry me, he’s been after me for years.”
Could they do it? Go to another town, start again, raise Helen’s child together? Women did it all the time, certainly—but women were also ruined all the time when their stories were found to be false. Phoebe didn’t want to live in fear for the rest of her life. She didn’t want the threat of exposure hanging over Helen’s child. She wanted this over and done with.
“You’re not going to marry Tom Tuff,” she said. “And you’re not going anywhere. It’s time I married again anyway. I’d like to be married again.”
“I never thought I’d hear you say that.”
“I never thought I’d say it.”
“You want to marry him, don’t you? Mr. Dymond.”
“Of course not. I barely know him.” On the other hand, she knew him better than she knew Mr. Moon or Mr. Fairclough. She tried to imagine being married to him—cooking him dinner, darning his socks and washing his shirts, sharing private jokes and annoying all their friends with how they couldn’t keep their hands off each other. Going to sleep with a strong arm wrapped around her.
Of course, men like him had servants to cook them dinner and darn their socks. Probably his wife would have her own room and her own bed. And what friends could they have in common? “He can’t marry me. You know that. He’s from a different world.”
“He could marry you if he wanted,” Helen said stubbornly. “If he doesn’t want to, he shouldn’t be—doing whatever it is you did.”
Phoebe put up her chin. “We are adults, we are being discreet, and I know ways to keep myself from getting with child. He wasn’t taking advantage of me.”
Helen snickered. “No, it sounds as if the shoe was on the other foot. Poor man.”
Phoebe shoved her.
“Fee?”
“Yes?”
“What if I can’t give up the baby?” Helen said quietly. “What if I see it, and I can’t give it away?”
Suddenly Phoebe wanted nothing but to go back to bed and never get out. “Do you think that will happen?”
“I don’t know.”
This nightmare was never going to end. Phoebe tried to think. Could they raise the child together, saying it was a cousin’s? Could they convince anyone it was Phoebe’s own, and if they did, would Helen feel that Phoebe had stolen her child? Would Mr. Moon or Mr. Fairclough be willing to have a bastard in his home?
“If it does, I’ll think of something. I promise.” She ought to promise not to see Mr. Dymond again, too. But she didn’t.
Chapter Twenty
Mr. Dymond didn’t come to the printing office the next day. So that was probably that.
She didn’t want to believe it. For the entire eleven hours that she worked on the paper, she listened for his uneven step and the rap of his cane on the sidewalk, no matter how hard she tried not to. Once she thought she heard it, but it was old Mr. Briggs wanting to advertise for a lost watch.
The only good news she heard all day was that Mr. Jessop had hired Jeffrey back agai
n. Maybe he was taking Mr. Dymond’s advice.
“I like these,” she told Mr. Moon late that evening, sucking on a coffee-cream bonbon. “May I have another?”
He grinned and held out the bowl. “Have as many as you like.”
Across the kitchen, Peter was chattering quietly to Betsy as he washed the day’s dishes. “Oh, stop your clapper about Shakespeare already,” Betsy said. “You’d think you were the first person ever to read him.” Phoebe was aware that her own smile was more for Peter than it was for Mr. Moon. She took another bonbon and set it on the counter by her.
“Only one?”
“Enough is as good as a feast.” She grimaced. “I can’t believe I just said that.”
Moon looked inquiring.
“It’s what my mother always used to say to me at dinner. Only for her, ‘enough’ was when I was still hungry.”
Mr. Moon’s eyes widened in horror. “She didn’t feed you enough?”
She flushed. “She wanted me to be thinner.”
Mr. Moon’s eyes traveled over her body reverently. “A figure like that is the best advertisement for a sweet shop there is.” Phoebe tried to feel warm with something other than embarrassment.
“What book did you bring today?” Peter called.
“Histories or tales of past times, told by Mother Goose, with morals,” Phoebe said. “Only the morals aren’t always what you’d expect. It’s rather an old book. Well, the book isn’t that old, because it’s a reprint. But the tales are, and they’re based on even older ones, like the folk tales we have here in Sussex.”
Mr. Moon frowned as he kneaded the last ball of dough. “Mother Goose is for children, isn’t it? I know I’m not much for reading, but—”
“I like stories for children,” Phoebe said, trying to sound cheerful and not defensive. “It’s what I write, after all. I don’t think it’s always necessary to put away childish things. Simplicity is not the same as shallowness.” That had definitely sounded defensive. Putting away childish things was another of Mrs. Knight’s favorite aphorisms.
He nodded, laying a towel over his lumps of dough.
“What are you making?”
He gave her a small smile, his brown eyes sparkling. “You’ll see in a couple of days.”
“I can’t wait.” But it wasn’t true. She realized as she said it that she didn’t care a straw if she never knew. Mr. Moon was a very nice young man, but if she never saw him or his confectionery again, the thing she’d miss most would be Peter. She couldn’t do this. She couldn’t. She ought to tell him so, right now.
Better be sure of Mr. Fairclough first.
Phoebe wished she were a better person. Even more, she wished she were rich and could make all her problems go away. And more than all of that, she wished she could talk to Mr. Dymond.
She opened her book and began, “There was a miller who left no more estate to the three sons he had than his mill, his ass, and his cat…”
Phoebe waited for Mr. Fairclough to come and take her for a drive before church. Today she would tell him she would marry him, and that she wanted to meet his daughter.
Her stomach growled with mingled nerves and hunger. She hadn’t eaten breakfast, ostensibly because there was work to be done at the printing office before meeting Mr. Fairclough. The real reason was that when she was anxious, all her bad girlhood habits came back. She took a deep breath to calm her nerves. It didn’t work, so she took a deeper one. Her breasts looked like a fat Rowlandson caricature in the mirror as they heaved up and down. She tried to remind herself that that was a good thing when trying to charm a man.
She should have worn the green. Of course, he’d seen the green three or four times already, and he hadn’t seen the lavender. But with her gray pelisse, she felt like a blob of the hideous shade you got when you mixed too many watercolors together. Perhaps she should wear her new Turkish shawl. Or would it clash?
Footsteps sounded on the stairs. That was odd; she hadn’t heard horses stop. She opened the door, putting a coquettish smile on her face—and saw Mr. Gilchrist.
It was the first time she’d ever seen him at a loss. “Mrs. Sparks,” he said, and stopped. His bow was too low.
Her heart hammered in her chest. “What is it?”
“I hate to be the bearer of bad news.” He paused. “I abhor it, honestly. May we sit?”
She nodded, instinctively taking Will’s armchair for reassurance. “Where is Mr. Fairclough?”
Mr. Gilchrist wrung his hands. Subtly, but it was a definite wring. “Mr. Fairclough isn’t coming.”
“Yes, but why not?”
He pressed his lips together unhappily. “He’s withdrawing his suit.”
Phoebe’s heart plummeted into her boots. She couldn’t even bring herself to ask why. All too many answers suggested themselves, none of them flattering.
“Mrs. Sparks, I hope you won’t take offense at what I’m about to say. And you may rely absolutely on my discretion.”
She doubted that. Mr. Gilchrist struck her as a born gossip. “Please,” she said dully.
He looked about and lowered his voice. “Someone has told Mr. Fairclough that you’re engaging in a clandestine affaire”—he said the word with a little French flair, probably to make it more discreet—“with Nicholas Dymond.”
It wasn’t what she’d expected. “I—but I haven’t—” Guilt swamped her. Helen had been right. She’d selfishly risked too much and this was her punishment. “Is this—is this a common rumor? Is everyone saying—” She swallowed hard.
“No, actually. Your reputation is sterling; the worst anyone’s said is that you should stop making calf’s eyes at him before you give him false expectations. Believe me, I’d know if there were more. It sounded to me as if someone from the Whig camp spoke to Mr. Fairclough on purpose to put him off the match, and so I told him. He replied—” Mr. Gilchrist blushed. For all his show of worldliness, real cynicism seemed to elude him.
Evidently Mr. Fairclough had been insulting. Phoebe didn’t blame him. He had his daughter to think of. But who would have done such a thing?
But what if you say no, and he’s angry? Helen had asked. He could tell everyone you kissed him.
Nick wanted his brother to win the election. He wanted her vote. Could he have—?
Mr. Gilchrist cleared his throat delicately. “Is there any chance Mr. Dymond himself might have—”
“No,” Phoebe snapped. “He is a gentleman.”
Mr. Gilchrist raised his eyebrows. “I know more gentlemen than you do, Mrs. Sparks. Take my word for it, most of them are cads.”
She drew herself up. “For all I know, you made this whole story up to put me off the Whigs yourself, sir.”
“But I didn’t,” he said reasonably. “Now, I know this is a serious setback, but give me half a day or so and I’m sure I can find someone you’ll like just as well—”
She leaned back against Will’s chair. “I have to go,” she said tiredly. “Thank you for coming to see me. And thank you for your discretion.”
“As the grave,” Mr. Gilchrist said. “Silent, I mean. Are graves discreet? I don’t imagine much of note happens in their purview. But really, Mrs. Sparks—”
She rose from the armchair. “I have a paper to put out. If you need to talk to me again, I’ll be at the printing office.”
“If you wish me to escort you and your sister to church, I would be honored,” he offered. It was generous, offering them the public backing of the Tory establishment. Unable to bring herself to snub him, she agreed, resigning herself to a morning of fashion talk. She had planned to avoid church—and Mr. Dymond—altogether.
As it turned out, Mr. Dymond wasn’t in church. She wished she were more relieved and less disappointed.
After his exertions with Mrs. Sparks, followed by two days of hiding in his room and sitting still, Nick’s leg hurt with a constant, distracting pain, like someone standing there screaming in his ear while he tried to go about his business.
Nick’s face heated with shame. Toogood hadn’t said a word about his master’s sudden relapse into hibernation, but then, he hadn’t said a word about it in London, either. The valet had to know it wasn’t normal.
But if he went out, he might run into Mrs. Sparks.
He wanted to see her, though. It had taken a strong effort of will not to go to church the day before.
The smell of fresh-baked rolls and fresh-churned butter wafting from his breakfast tray was a mere reminder of a duty: I must eat if I don’t wish to feel weak and sick later. The image of Mrs. Sparks smiling at him as he walked through the door of the printing office, on the other hand, was irresistible.
She might not smile this time, of course. She might frown. He wanted to see that too, desperately.
He wanted to listen to himself, for once.
He looked at the rolls and thought, If I leave without eating, I could see her a quarter of an hour sooner.
“Would you like a robe? It’s a chilly morning.”
Until Toogood said it, he hadn’t realized he was cold. Other people noticed when they were cold, he felt sure. He couldn’t even blame it on the privations in Spain; he remembered being scolded by his tutors as a boy for omitting meals, going out without his coat, and reading with so little light he was sure to strain his eyes.
“I’d like to get dressed, actually,” he said. “I’ll stop in at the Honey Moon for breakfast. Have the rolls if you like, or return them to the kitchen.”
“Thank you, sir.” Toogood coughed. “Sir, if you will be returning to the printing office, I took the liberty of borrowing some older clothes from Mr. Anthony. Your wardrobe is not yet extensive enough to survive repeated ink stains.”
It didn’t sound like a reproach, but Nick felt the urge to apologize anyway. “Good idea. Thank you, Toogood.”
Tony’s clothes fit pretty well, which shouldn’t have startled him, but did. In his mind, he still topped his brother by half a head.