by Kerryn Reid
Mr. Stanley’s family lived in Bristol—there must be some excuse for the mail that would come from there—but with him gone, Mrs. Stanley and her maid had returned to their own hometown. Only Leeds did not feel like home, not to Anna.
Putnam twirled a curl into place on Anna’s forehead. She reached for the wretched cap but seemed to change her mind.
“It’s soiled, miss. You’ll have to do without.”
Anna stilled her fingers, torturing each other as they twined in her lap.
“How could you write that note, Putnam? Have we not talked about how disastrous it would be if we were found?” Anna was too tired for anger. It would do no good now, in any case; the deed was done. Besides that, Lewis would hear.
“I had to do something. Sir John knows, and when I saw Mr. Aubrey at St. Peter’s I just knew he was searching for you. Can’t make it any worse, Miss Anna.”
“But it does, Putnam, don’t you see? It puts me in an impossible situation.” Gooseflesh prickled on her arms with the agonizing awareness of his presence in the next room. She lowered her voice. “It puts him in an impossible situation.”
“The whole thing is impossible, Miss Anna. But in case you’ve forgotten, there’s someone else to think of too.”
Anna said nothing, hoping to further postpone the conversation she had stubbornly avoided.
The broadening of Putnam’s Yorkshire accent marked the extent of her anguish. “It just tears me up inside to think o’ that wee bairn growin’ inside ye, comin’ into this world an orphan, no one to care about ’im.”
Anna couldn’t think about that. “We haven’t time for this. You’d best get out there and talk to him while I finish here. He’ll be thinking we’ve climbed out the window.” Another subject for the cartoonists.
Putnam blew her nose. She collected Anna’s cloak and carried it with her to hang in the other room.
Anna sank onto the bed. She squeezed her eyes and lips tight, put her hands over her ears, closing off her senses. She didn’t want to think about the baby. She didn’t want to think at all.
But Lewis was on the other side of that door, waiting for her. What on earth would she say to him?
The truth would hurt. The truth was unthinkable.
Yet anything else would be worse. He was the gentlest, kindest man she had ever met. She would not repay his kindness with lies.
The truth, then, but as little of it as she could manage. She would await his questions, and answer with as few words as possible. It would be best if he thought she disliked him. He would be more likely to go away and leave her alone with her shame. Yes, that would be best for both of us.
Before the tears could fall, she stood as straight as she could, leaning back to balance the weight in front. She drew her fingers down from forehead to chin, leaving a wooden mask behind them. Not a smile, no—he would see through that in a heartbeat. Something cool and expressionless. Something daunting and unapproachable.
God help us both.
Anna heard Lewis’s voice as she opened the bedchamber door, but it stopped immediately. He and Putnam stood by the fireplace, quite close to each other, as though sharing secrets. Secrets about her, no doubt.
He spun on his heel, nothing to be seen in his expression but pleasure to see her. No contempt, no guile. No remote resemblance to Gideon. No reason at all for the tears that burned her eyes.
His lips parted, ready to resume his conversation with Putnam or to greet Anna herself. Then a flinch, no more than a pucker of the skin around his eyes, a twitch of his brow. Shock.
She couldn’t fault him for that. It was his first sight of her without that appalling cloak. Oh, the garment served its purpose. It was warm, and it could hide a variety of sins. Not mine, though. Not anymore.
He’d tried to hide his thoughts, but she knew how she appeared. Her gown was a sack in a hideous shade of green, made high to the neck with a simple drawstring beneath the breasts. The cheap, coarse wool made it warm, but also bulky. They’d found it at one of the rag shops.
She had almost asked Putnam to apply a little rouge to her cheeks. But why? There was no earthly reason for pretense. The ugliness of her pregnancy should drive him away, whether she showed him cordiality or dislike. Dislike would be pretense of a different sort. If she wasn’t going to pretend…
“Mr. Aubrey,” she murmured as she lumbered forward to shake his hand, pushing her belly in front of her.
She must pretend. What she could not show him was weakness. Fear. Need. Because if he saw those things, he would never go away. And if he didn’t go away, he would find himself trying to reassemble the million pieces of her scattered across the floor.
He shook her hand but seemed to have trouble letting go of it afterward. His touch felt warm, human. The baby kicked.
“Miss Spain. I owe you an apology for surprising you in the library. Putnam has been chastising me for not waiting until you’d reached someplace more private and she could—”
He was nervous, as he’d been in London. It was touching, and sad. He had liked her then. But she’d had nothing to give him, and now she had less. Her heart was free, but it was empty.
“No matter.” Anna pulled her hand away. The ice in her fingertips, which had receded slightly in his grip, crept back. “The shock would have been equal in any case. Though I am glad I did not quite faint.”
“Heavens, yes. Please, sit down.” He led her to the sofa and sat beside her.
She held her hands out toward the fire and he jumped up again. “You’re cold.” In three strides he’d retrieved his greatcoat from its hook by the door, in another three he was back again.
He hesitated. She had no lap to cover with it, and he was probably worried that he’d touch her belly or breasts if he tried. Quashing an hysterical urge to giggle, she took the coat from his hands and draped it nearly to her neck, covering all those forbidden parts.
Did he remember that other occasion, following their visit to Green Park, when it rained and he gave her his coat? It had been warm from his body. It was not warm now, but the weight of it comforted her, protected her.
Lewis resumed his seat but rose yet again to take the cup of tea Putnam held out to him. She moved a rickety little table to the front of the sofa, within easy reach for both of them, and set the tea things on top.
“Anna takes a bit of sugar, Mr. Aubrey. I’ll go downstairs and see if I can find some biscuits.”
Frowning, Lewis watched her leave. He put a spoonful of sugar in Anna’s tea. “Does she take good care of you? You shouldn’t be walking in this weather. And the fireplace! These rooms are utterly inadequate.”
Anna let the coat drop beneath her arms so she could take her cup. “They serve us well enough, and the rent is right. The building belongs to Putnam’s cousin.”
“And leaving you alone like this. I don’t like it.”
“I’m not alone, and no one could think I need a chaperone anymore.” She managed a laugh, but his face reflected no semblance of amusement.
The tea gave her an excuse to look down. “Please sit, Mr. Aubrey. It hurts to crane my neck.”
He sat on the very edge of the sofa, angled toward her, holding his teacup on one knee. Now it begins.
“Why did you not tell me, Anna? I could have… Surely you knew I would…”
Had he lost his mind? “What would you have done? You had poor Mr. Wedbury to worry about. Besides that, it was neither your responsibility nor your business.”
“I certainly felt responsible,” he muttered.
“I know you did.” She reached out and touched his sleeve. “You were so sweet to me.”
“I would have stood beside you when you faced your family. You must have had an uncomfortable summer.”
Uncomfortable? She laughed again, bitter and tight. “You should thank God you were not there. My mother had already done her best to trap you. Don’t you remember the last time you came to see me in London? How she fawned and cooed over you? She all but said the
words for you.”
His jaw clenched. “I remember.”
“That’s why I was so rude. I hated taking leave of you that way, knowing it would be the last time I saw you, but I could not bear that you should be deceived that way, unaware that I…unaware of what I’d done.”
Lewis stared down at his untasted tea as though he’d forgotten it was there. He set the cup on the table. “It never occurred to me that my brother might go so far. He’d been in trouble over women before, but not ladies of quality, not innocents. It still seems incredible that he could—”
Leaning his elbows on his knees and gripping his hands together, he turned his anguished gaze toward her again. “It was Gideon, wasn’t it?”
Anger jolted through her, sloshing tea out of the cup, out of the saucer and onto his greatcoat. “I cannot believe you’re asking me that!”
He leaped to his feet, pacing round and round the sofa, in and out of her view. She longed to do the same, or to march into her room and slam the door. But it would take five minutes of huffing and puffing merely to get out of her seat.
“I know,” he said. “I’m sorry. But people kept suggesting—”
She struggled to sit upright and slammed her own cup down, spilling more tea on the table. His coat slithered to the floor. “People? What people? Does all of Yorkshire know of my predicament? My sin?”
“Of course not.” He stopped in front of her, glaring down. “Only Sir John, and my vicar. Don’t you know me well enough to—”
“I’d have thought you knew me better than to ask such a question!”
“I did.” He drooped, sinking onto the sofa and digging his fingers into his hair, too long as always. “I do.”
Anna’s anger evaporated. She collapsed again, leaning into the worn cushion behind her. God, I’m tired.
But it wasn’t over. She had to strain to hear him when he said, without looking up, “Did he force you?”
The truth was so stupid, so humiliating. She had decided, though, that only the truth would do.
“No.” Her voice was no louder than his. “It shames me to say it, but no.”
He rose again and wandered to the window. He stood calmly enough, his hands clasped behind him. But she’d caught a glimpse of his expression, and she didn’t think he was calm at all.
“He talked so prettily. He recited poetry—‘There be none of Beauty’s daughters With a magic like thee.’ It’s Lord Byron—do you know it? And more in the same vein.” Be quiet, Anna. You’re to say as little as possible, remember? She clamped her mouth shut.
“Did he promise marriage?”
She shook her head, but he wasn’t watching. “No.” Oh, it sounded stark. She couldn’t let him think she’d been so wanton, so reckless. “Not in so many words. But he… He talked about your father’s estate and he painted such a picture of the place, like Longleat House, or…or Chatsworth.”
Lewis made a rude sound like a snorting horse. “If it sounded like Chatsworth, it was fiction.”
“Was it? I didn’t know.”
“How would you?” He turned toward her, stiff and somber, but did not approach.
Oh, how she wanted him to understand! She rushed on. “He told me how much I would love it there. The formal gardens, the wood, the waterfall. He said he would hire Lawrence to paint my portrait in the rose arbor. He said…”
She peered at Lewis, shaking his head, his expression wintry.
“All lies?” Her voice was a squeak.
He waved one hand in dismissal, wandering back toward the sofa. “Oh, we have a small wood, and a couple of rose bushes. And the Wrackwater divides our property from the Wedburys’. When it’s in spate, it rushes over the rocks and looks a bit like a waterfall.”
There was a long silence. She shivered and hauled his greatcoat up again to cover her arms. If she’d been alone, she would have hidden her head as well. It smelled like him, safe and warm.
“I wanted so badly to believe.” Later there would be tears, but for now she had none.
Standing behind her, he rested a hand on her shoulder. “We need to believe, Anna. It’s human nature.” His voice was almost as quiet, almost as shaky as her own. “And Gideon is an expert at deception. You had no reason to doubt him.”
Anna said nothing, and after a moment the hand withdrew.
Lewis walked around the sofa and worked the coals toward the center of the fire, adding more around the edges from the half-empty bucket. Such a tranquil, domestic scene. But the emotions running through it were all wrong.
He did not look at her. However kind his words might be, however gentle his voice, her revelations this day had surely destroyed his respect for her.
With a click of the latch and a creak of the hinges, the door opened and Putnam came in. Thank God, an end to this appalling tête-a-tête. Within a remarkably short time, Lewis was gone.
Chapter 28
Lewis stumbled on the narrow stairs in his hurry to get away. He’d gotten the answers he came for, but they were not the ones he wanted.
First, the child was an Aubrey, whatever surname he might carry.
Second, Gideon had needed no force.
And third, she was not safe. What’s more, she showed no interest in becoming so.
She’d also answered a fourth question, one he never thought to ask. She might have given up on marriage, but she had not given up her love for the beast in the gilded pelt, the one she’d written about in her poem. Her wistful memories told him that clearly enough. An altogether unsatisfactory conversation.
Putnam had returned with not only biscuits, but a chunk of mutton and some bread, even a bottle of ale. Evidently she hoped to entice him to stay a while longer, but he had no appetite, except for solitude.
As he regained his balance at the bottom of the staircase, he heard a door close above and footsteps on the stairs. “Mr. Aubrey!”
Putnam. He waited there in the filthy vestibule, begrudging the delay.
She came into sight, his hat in her hands. “Oh, sir, I’m glad I caught you.”
He grunted his thanks. The cold would have reminded him soon enough that he’d forgotten it.
“Will you come again tomorrow, sir? I bought all that food…”
“Give it to her,” he said, with a jerk of his head upward. “She needs to eat. I’ll be sending over some coal too. Don’t you dare skimp on the fire.”
She trotted behind him as he pushed the door open. “But will you come?”
“She doesn’t want anything to do with me.” He stared at her, her face pinched with trouble, her faded blue eyes beseeching. Her mobcap sat crooked, gray hair sticking out on one side. She looked a bit demented.
“She does and she doesn’t, if that makes sense. She’s been through so much, she hardly knows up from down. In any case, I don’t care what she wants.” She broke off, shivering.
“What in God’s name…” Scowling, Lewis closed the door again, shutting out the wind. “You’re paid to care for her!”
“Aye.” Putnam eyed him for a moment, gauging his temper, or his interest, or maybe his trustworthiness. Either she was satisfied or she was desperate, because she continued.
“She probably didn’t tell you. Her parents will take her back, though they’re sure to make her life miserable. But the child?” She shook her head. “They won’t have anything to do with the child.”
He gaped at her. Whatever did she mean? His mind went whirling and tumbling, rolling off the edge of the world. He put a hand to the wall to steady himself.
“Unless she can figure some way to make a living for herself and the babe, he’ll have to go to the workhouse.”
Lewis shoved the door wide, gulping the cold air to clear his head. How do people lose their humanity? His father, and now the Spains.
“May they rot in hell. Yes, I’ll be back.” He crammed his hat on his head and stalked away.
Lewis recited all the curses he knew. He’d learned them from Gideon—the one thing Lewis could
thank his brother for. Except that without Gideon, he wouldn’t need them.
By heaven, Gideon had a lot to answer for! If he knew about Anna, would he give a goddamn? Or if not Anna, the baby? How could he not? To father a child and not care whether it lived or died? Not care that it faced abandonment? It seemed impossible. Would it not run counter to the laws of human nature? Lewis had read Cicero recently. ‘Of all nature's gifts to the human race, what is sweeter to a man than his children?’
There were exceptions to every rule, of course. Lewis ground his teeth. In a case like this, those exceptions should be shot. Or at least stripped of the parts that enabled them to procreate. And for good measure, deprived of property, charm, good looks, and any other attributes that made them irresistible to naïve young women.
The workhouse! Lewis had relegated it to the end of his list because the thought of finding Anna in such a place turned his stomach. How much worse an innocent child?
Well, he had never seen inside a workhouse. He couldn’t imagine doing so would change his feelings in the matter, but he headed north instead of south, back past Anna’s alley, across the Headrow to Lady Lane.
The workhouse was an ungainly hodgepodge of rectangles and triangles and smokestacks. Except for the long buildings like barracks, he could not guess what purposes they served. Thankfully he did not need an intimate knowledge of the inner workings. He only needed to see how they treated the children.
He entered into a spacious room busy with the whir and clack of twenty or more spinning wheels and the women operating them. Lit by the afternoon sun, it was cheerful despite the cold stone floor and unadorned brick walls. So far, better than he’d expected.
A man emerged from a small office in the corner. He was perhaps forty, tall and spare, dressed modestly in brown. “Sir,” he said, bowing. “I am Robert Brumbage, the master here. How can I help you?”
He was happy enough to provide the tour Lewis requested, focused on the children’s facilities. The way led through a cavernous dining hall and a huge laundry room, past an infirmary and dormitories. Children toiled alongside the adults and a handful of girls no older than little Barbara, with runny noses and chilblains on their fingers, swept floors or scrubbed tables.