by Lena Dowling
But Nellie was already gone, her steps thundering down the stairs. Doors slammed, Jammy barked, then silence.
Downstairs, the little bed made from a nest of rags near the stove was empty. Jammy’s lead was missing from the hook. As soon as he had done what he needed to, he would find Nellie, but in the meantime he took small comfort in thinking that she at least had Jammy with her.
Harry went to his chamber to do the thing he now fervently wished he had done right from the very first moment he had heard about Pike. He unlocked his trunk and took out the only things from the voyage to Australia he was yet to unpack, items that were to have made up his outfit for the wedding: a linen shirt, heavy silk stockings, black pantaloons, a fitted waistcoat, a jacket in royal blue and a pair of shoes made of softest kid and adorned with patterned silver buckles; all of which, apart from the shirt, which had been fashioned from Ireland’s finest linen, had been made for him in London.
He should have burned them after he had called the wedding off, but now at least they had a use. They were ridiculously ostentatious and expensive enough to give weight to his claim.
Harry felt around the inside of the trunk lid for the indentations from which he could remove the false lining, and from there removed the papers that proved his true identity.
He paused, turning the documents over in his hands; taking a moment to appreciate the last moments of his anonymity. They were letters he had obtained from influential friends in London as insurance, but ones he had fully expected never to need. There would be no going back from this. From the moment he presented himself at Government House in these clothes with the documents, everything would change.
The pantaloons and coat, combined with the waistcoat, felt uncomfortably restricting, the stiffly starched shirt rasped against his neck, and the shoes, meant for a groom who would be conveyed from home to church to reception and back by coach, would be ruined, if not on the walk over to Government House, then they would most certainly be in tatters on the way back.
But they would serve his purpose.
‘What tailor did you rob to get those?’ Agnes said, setting down a basket of clean folded laundry on the table as he emerged from his chamber into the kitchen.
‘Will you tidy up and put something on for the guests’ dinner,’ he said, ignoring the comment but grateful to have run into her. In his haste he had forgotten to consider who would watch the guesthouse while he was gone.
‘Why, where’s Nellie?’
‘Out,’ he said, unable to admit that he didn’t know her whereabouts.
‘And what about the work that Pike usually does? I can’t be doin’ me own work, watchin’ the front and cutting the firewood as well.’
‘Pike will be back before nightfall.’
‘You’re sure about that?’ she said doubtfully.
‘That I guarantee,’ he said, striding out the door.
It was the only thing, now, he could be sure about.
Harry covered the distance to Government House at full stretch, as fast as his feet would allow without breaking into a run. He could arrive with nothing between the soles of his feet and the contiguous ruts that served for the colony’s roads for all he cared.
And when he arrived at Bridge Street where the Colony’s premier residence stood, he didn’t pause to be received. He admitted himself. When he found the two front rooms empty, he barged deeper into the place looking for signs of life.
‘Sir, I bid you, stop. What is your business here?’
‘I wish to see the Governor without delay.’
‘You’ll have to make an appointment. His Excellency’s diary is full,’ the clerk said.
‘Give him these and I’ll wait,’ Harry said, handing over the letters of introduction.
But rather than scurry away, the clerk scanned the pages himself. Then, with a deferential dip of his head, refolded the letters, carefully replaced them in the envelope and handed them back. ‘Pardon me, my lord. If you wait in the front room, the Governor will be with you soon.’
The clerk hadn’t said which of the two rooms facing the street was the front room, but Harry chose the one with a large desk in the centre, taking a seat in front of it.
A short time later, the Governor, rotund with a faded wig in grand but faintly shabby attire, bustled into the room, nonplussed. ‘Chesterton. I regret I was not advised. The passenger lists. Somehow you were missed.’
Harry waved off the man’s apologies. ‘That is of no concern. I’m here in respect to a Mr Pike who I understand is being held at your pleasure.’
‘Yours is the second approach I’ve had on the same matter,’ the Governor said, lounging back in his chair then running his penknife around an apple he had produced from his pocket. The red and green peel came away in one intact strip, while a smidgen of egg white adhering to the corner of his mouth led Harry to suspect he had interrupted the Governor indulging in a surreptitious late nuncheon or early dinner.
‘I regret to say, Captain Tompkins is not to be trusted.’ Harry said.
‘Tompkins? What does this have to do with Tompkins?’ The Governor looked baffled, ‘Mr Pike has been released.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Surely you are not questioning my mental capacity?’
‘Of course not, it’s just—’
‘I signed the paperwork less than an hour ago. Apple?’ The Governor leaned forward, holding out a slice speared on the point of his knife.
Harry waved off the offering.
‘How long have you been in the colony, my lord? I regret you have been overlooked for invitations that should otherwise have been extended.’
‘Not at all.’
‘In fact, my wife and I are hosting a dinner this evening if you would honour us with your presence.’
‘I regret I have a prior engagement,’ Harry lied. He had to find Nellie and try to explain everything before the news that the Earl of Chesterton’s son, the heir to Osbourne Hall and Ballychirvan Estate, had arrived in the colony made its way around the town.
‘Another time then.’
‘There is one other thing,’ Harry said quickly, having no wish to commit himself to any future engagements.
‘Of course.’
‘I require a word with Somerset.’
‘This is his half day, and the poor man often requires a fortifying beverage before showing himself at home, so you’ll likely find him at the Wallaby.’
***
At the club, his outfit raised the friendly waiter’s eyebrows but he had the discretion not to comment, directing Harry to one of the tables beyond the billiard area where Somerset was reading while taking port.
‘Mr Chester, do join me,’ Mr Somerset said, looking up over his open book.
When Harry had pondered the places Nellie might possibly have gone, Somerset seemed the most likely. She might have gone to the Biggs’, but Harry doubted she would do that before she had tried all other options. The idea that she might have gone to Tompkins lurked just beyond his consciousness, one he refused to admit to his thoughts.
‘Thank you, but I’m not here to socialise, rather to procure information. I was hoping you would know Nellie’s whereabouts.’
‘She’s not at the Tullamore?’
‘No.’ Harry said, working hard to hide his irritation. What aspect of ‘Where is Nellie?’ didn’t indicate she was not at her usual residence?
‘I see.’
A clinking of coins caused Harry to turn back to the bar in time to see the waiter emptying the contents of a wooden box into a canvas bag. Now he held it aloft to a great whoop and cheer from all the other club members present.
‘What’s going on over there?’ Harry asked.
‘The house has paid out on a bet.’
‘Which one?
‘The one on Nellie.’
Despite feeling as if he were choking on a tide of saliva, Harry’s throat burned. His stomach heaved. He stood up and ran, his hand to his mouth. With the other patron
s crowded around the bar, there was nothing to impede his progress. He slammed his way through the swing doors, to the foyer, then bolted down the stairs, only stopping when he reached the small garden between the club and the street.
‘Are you alright, sir?’ Somerset was at his side, holding out a handkerchief.
Harry declined it, taking his own from his pocket and swiping it across his mouth.
‘Nellie has gone to Tompkins?’
‘Why would you say that?’
‘Pike was taken into custody on a charge engineered by Tompkins. Pike has just been released. And in there just now—’
‘You think that was to do with Tompkins?’
‘Then who?’ Harry said, utterly confused.
‘I prepared the release order in respect to Mr Pike myself, right after Richard Henley’s regular meeting with the Governor.’
‘She’s gone to Henley?’
‘Indeed.’
***
When Harry arrived at the home of Richard Henley on the far eastern side of the town, his mind was a maelstrom of emotions.
He cursed himself for many things, not least of all for not having had the presence of mind to change out of his costume. Dressed the way he was wouldn’t help the situation. He could only hope the news that Pike was a free man would dampen the furious reception he expected.
Being dressed as he was, however, proved to be advantageous when he had little difficulty convincing the housekeeper to admit him. But once in the drawing room, Jammy growled.
‘It’s me, old girl,’ he said.
Jammy’s ears perked up, tilting her head from one side to the other.
‘It’ll be your get-up,’ Nellie said, looking up from a piece of sewing.
‘I’ve just been to Government House on Pike’s behalf, but I’m given to understand that, thanks to Henley, he’s already been freed.’
Nellie’s stare cut through him. ‘Is that why you’re all dressed up like you’ve been to visit the King? Who loaned you those?’
‘The clothes are mine,’ he said.
Jammy trotted over and sniffed at his legs as if not fully convinced of his identity either.
‘And who are you then? The Prince of Wales?’
‘Lord Henry Chesterton,’ Harry said, quietly.
Nellie tucked the needle into the piece of fabric and tossed it down on the occasional table beside her. ‘So that makes it twice now you’ve not told me the truth.’
‘When I left Ireland I rejected my birthright outright. But for Pike’s situation I would never have acknowledged my heritage.’
Nellie stood up and smoothed down her gown. ‘You told me you were Irish.’
‘I was born in Ireland.’
Harry felt Irish in a way his father would never understand. The earl saw himself as a visitor in Ireland, a custodian, but for Harry it had always been different.
‘You also said you grew up on a farm.’
‘Ballychirvan’s income is all derived from agriculture.’
Nellie made a disgruntled, disbelieving sound.
‘I’m of high birth. I can’t change that any more than you can change your low one, but nor do I do I acknowledge or want it.’
Nellie crossed the room, walking to the large window that looked out over the bay below the grand house. Jammy followed her, jumping up onto the window seat.
‘I still wish you had told me.’
‘Pike is free, it’s time to go home.’
‘And where would that be?’
‘Back to the Tullamore. It’s your home as much as mine.’
She looked out the window. ‘I thought that too, once.’
‘I’m a blacksmith as much as I’ll ever be a lord.’
Nellie swivelled around to look at him, her eyes bright. ‘You think that’s all this is? That I would stop loving you because of finding out who you really are?’
‘I thought you despised the rich?’
‘The ones that walk all over the poor, who take what they like, cheat if they have to and don’t give a damn about the likes of us and then transport the little people halfway across the world for takin’ no more than a handkerchief or a loaf of bread for their starving children. I hate them alright. But you’re none of those things, or at least I thought you weren’t.’
She had loved him? They had never exchanged those words. He hadn’t been able to bring himself to say it. Not because he didn’t feel it but because he had declared his love for Selina and she had repudiated it in the most hurtful, perverse way possible.
And with Nellie it hadn’t seemed necessary. Their devotion had been an unspoken truth between them. To hear it now for the first time, just as it was ripped away, was more than he could bear.
‘There is something I need to explain. It’s not a justification but it is a reason and I want you to know it. Before I came out here, I was engaged. Selina was her name and we had been promised as children. Not that I was unhappy about it, I’d loved her for as long as I could remember. But the night before the wedding I found her and my half-brother, Jonah, together.’
‘Together how exactly?’
‘In her bed, and as I discovered later, at her invitation, and not for the first time.’
Nellie stood up straighter, and took in a deep breath.
‘That must have been horrible.’
‘It was,’ Harry said recalling his devastation on discovering them together. On the eve of what should have been their wedding, he had ridden over to Selina’s in the moonlight and snuck up the stairs to her room, planning to surprise her. But when he’d got there, it was he who got the surprise. Mounted astride his half-brother, he would never forget the outline of Selina’s naked body in the lamplight or the switch from rapture to grey-faced horror as she turned to see him standing in the doorway of her chamber.
‘I wish I could say that was the worst aspect of it. But when I called the wedding off, the reason came as no surprise to anyone.’
‘Why would your own family go behind your back like that?’ Nellie said, visibly shocked.
‘Our marriage would have united the two grandest estates in Ireland, giving my father huge influence and brought badly needed funds to Selina’s family. Her father was endowed with a great deal of land, but not much else.’
Nellie shook her head. ‘I am so sorry.’
‘It had been going on for months.’ Everyone from the gardener to his own father and stepmother had known and no one chose to tell him. That was the thing he hadn’t been able to forgive. He wasn’t sure he ever would.
Nellie looked at him sadly.
‘Nellie, please. Come home and at least let me try to make it up to you.’
‘I can’t.’
‘You just said you loved me.’
‘But you didn’t love me enough to be honest about who you are.’
‘Who I was.’
‘Who you are, who you were. You’re just splittin’ hairs. The point is, you lied to me.’
If he could only make her see he wasn’t that person anymore.
‘I’m no longer part of the Chesterton dynasty. The door to that part of my life is closed.’
Nellie shook her head.
‘God damn it, Nellie, you were a prostitute, and I could overlook that.’
As soon as the words left his mouth, he wished he could drag them back.
Nellie jerked backwards, grasping for one of the long brocade drapes that hung to the floor. ‘Well bully for you. And now here you are doing an old washed-up doxy a favour, is that it?’
‘Nellie. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—I just—’
‘You should go now. Henley will be home soon from the bank lookin’ for his dinner.’
‘You don’t love Henley.’
Nellie’s eyes were heavy with regret. ‘Henley has never lied to me.’
‘I should have been honest with you, from the start.’
‘I wish you had.’
‘But trust can be rebuilt.’
‘Could
you rebuild trust with Selina?’
While he was still reeling, Nellie turned back to the window.
Then she spoke again, her voice sounding far away.
‘When you go, take Jammy. She belongs with Pikelet. She’s not warmed to Henley.’
***
Outside, walking back to the gig, neither the sultry spring air nor Jammy’s warm little body in his arms did anything to shield Harry from an invisible wind that sliced him through with cold.
Chapter 28
‘Thank you—you’ve made an old man very happy.’
The butler stepped up, discreetly proffering his arm. Richard took it, knees creaking, levering himself back onto his feet. ‘I know you don’t regard me in the same way I care for you, but I hope that in time affection will grow.’
Richard’s voice choked up with an emotion that felt strange and out of place to Nellie. ‘I didn’t think this day would ever come. I’ve waited so long for you.’
She smiled at him rather than have to say something that wasn’t true.
Waiting.
She knew all about waiting.
Ten years she’d waited for a man who was never going to come. If the truth be told, she’d been putting Henley off, knocking back his proposals, waiting for Harry, half hoping he would come back. Pikelet had been to visit several times, but Harry hadn’t come near.
But then, what good would it have done?
She had to face facts. It would never have worked between them. She should have gone with her instincts from the very beginning. Even if she could forgive Harry for lying to her about who he was, he would never be able to get over her past. Deep down she had known that from the start, only she had conned herself into ignoring it because she’d stupidly let herself fall in love.
But if she ever needed proof that love wasn’t for her, then this was it.
She was better off with someone like Richard who was good and kind. And maybe she’d be lucky like Colleen had been with her Mr Biggs and eventually love might grow.
It was time she stopped waiting and started living.
And somehow she would find a way to forget Harry.
She had to.
Richard pulled a velvet box from his pocket. ‘And now I have something special to celebrate our engagement.’