by Willa Ramsey
Mama took her hand and kept it.
Caro sighed. “I might have lost my ability to move so highly in society,” she continued, “but at least I will have my own home my whole life.”
“Why do you say that, Caro?”
“You’ve heard me say many times that I would never marry.”
“Yes, but I’ve always assumed you would change your mind for the right person.”
She scoffed. “Mama—I’d have to give over the control of my inheritance if I married. I’d have to tailor my views and activities to those of another, and that is anathema to me.”
“It’s no secret,” Mama replied, putting her arm around her with a laugh, “that you feel thwarted and wronged when you are asked to make a compromise.”
“I am being quite serious,” Caro replied as she stopped walking. She braced herself, trying to stop the tears from rushing onto her cheeks, though they hit her with all the force of a flash flood. “We are not talking about the likelihood of marital spats, Mama. We are talking about the likelihood of losing everything I love to do. And it is my worst fear.”
“Oh—dearest. I am sorry. Come here.” Mama turned and reached out for her, putting both her hands on her shoulders and massaging them gently. “I do not mean to mock you, dear Caro.”
“I—I only want to lead the life that you could not.”
Mama stepped back and let her hands fall to her sides. “I do not wish you to live your life for me, Caro. I have never wished for that.”
Caro stopped sniffling and looked at her through bloodshot eyes.
“Although I see now how you might have concluded that,” Mama continued, looking at the ground and wringing her hands. “My sadness must have seemed like regret all these years. Then I sent you to a strange school—”
“—under somewhat dubious circumstances,” Caro finished, smiling despite her tears.
“And I am the one who has cheered every one of your schemes. Even the harebrained ones.” Mama chuckled and reached out to her, rubbing her arm.
Caro put her arm around her mother’s waist, and turned them onto their path again.
“And you’re right that marriage is a risk for a woman,” Mama continued. “But my own situation should serve as proof, Caro, that you needn’t avoid it entirely! Our marriage was not the cause of my pain.”
“But it could very easily become the cause of my own.”
“Then you are very fortunate, my sweet Caroline, that Lord Ryland will support you in whatever you want to do with your talents, regardless of what the law allows.”
“I beg your pardon?” she sniffed.
“Do not play coy with me, young lady,” Mama replied. “It’s obvious to anyone with eyeballs or earlobes that that gentleman cares for you, a great deal.”
“Lord Ryland may have…concern for me, but my scandal makes a union with him impossible.” She tightened Toby’s leash around her hand. Two days had passed since she had pushed Adam away—since she’d implied to him that he was no different from any other suitor, or any other man she might kiss. The mere recollection of her dismissive words stung her.
“He seems like a good man, Caro. And well suited to you. I believe your attachment to him shows good judgment.”
“Mama—you are ahead of yourself. Please consider that any formal association with me would ruin Edie’s prospects for marriage.” She let go a great, shuddering sigh and added, “He may not wish to have me anymore, at any rate.”
“I haven’t kept up with the nitty-gritty of society’s rules, so I cannot guess what the future holds. But you and Edie and Ryland—”
“Oh, he’s Ryland, now?”
She smirked. “I do beg your pardon, daughter. I was just going say that the three of you would not lack for money, and have a circle of family and close friends who will stay by you.”
They walked slowly the rest of the way to Carlton House, indulging Toby in stops over rubbish and unexplained stains on the sidewalk. They talked of too-light shawls and muddied gloves and compared remedies for both; they talked to small children and encouraged them to pet Toby and gave them a sweet from Caro’s pocket. And they arrived at the work site hand in hand.
Chapter Twenty-Five
“How about accounting, then? I could keep the books,” Caro said, accepting a growler of ale from Mama, who was sitting beside Papa and removing pies and cheeses from a large basket.
“Dearest, you do not like numbers. You run everything in our household except for the books, and yet you wish to do so for the business?” Papa replied. He was seated on the opposite corner of a wool blanket that Caro had laid for the three of them, on the smoothest patch of ground she could find. All around them, workers bustled to and fro, wheeling carts, mixing mortar, climbing ladders, consulting drawings, and arguing over the work ethic of some person or another. They were erecting an especially tricky part of the Prince Regent’s new folly—a faux “ruin” of sorts—and Papa and Mama felt they should remain close, even during their luncheon.
“How about managing the building supplies? I could help you order materials, and—”
“The pupils take turns doing that,” Mama added. “It’s part of their education. You know this.”
“How about managing one of the project sites? You must agree I am quite adept at ordering people around.”
“The pupils do that, too.”
“Cleaning and organizing the studio?”
“You wish to take over some of Mrs. Meary’s fiefdom? Good luck to you.”
“Research, then. I could find precedents from antiquity that could inspire your designs—”
“Pupils, again.”
“What then?” she sighed over a bite of bread. “What do you propose I do with my time now that my charity schemes are no more?”
“Your charity schemes are not over, Caro,” Papa replied. Behind him, a bedraggled stonemason, his clothes covered in mud and some other crusted-over substance, lingered over a cart of bricks. “They are simply on hiatus until society becomes bored with this…with this incident.”
“Now that the other newspapers have reported that Lord Chumsley paid the Gabster’s man to be there, and to print your name,” said Mama, “I believe that society will begin to put the clues together. That he was in debt and desperate for money, that he claimed to have won the wager despite not heeding the real terms of it.”
The workman behind Papa stopped and rested his forearms on the edge of his cart. When he tipped his hat at them, a familiar, faded tattoo became visible on the underside of his forearm.
“Can we help you, Georgie?” Caro asked.
Her parents turned around.
“Beggin’ your pardon, Miss. But I couldn’t help overhearin’ you talking about them bastards. Them ones who made the bet.”
“Sir—” Papa began, starting to get up.
“Please, Papa,” Caro interjected. “It’s all right. Let him speak.”
He tipped his hat again, shifting from foot to foot, perhaps reconsidering speaking to the architect—the only person who stood between himself and the Prince Regent—on a topic of such sensitivity.
“Please. Go on,” Caro added when he still didn’t speak.
“I don’t know if you’ve heard, but that lord—the one who said them things? He’s gone now.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“I heard it this morning, over an Old Tom with a bloke at the Hound and Hare,” he replied.
“Where has the gentleman gone, do you know?” Caro asked, her heartbeat picking up.
“All I heard was that he ran out of the country, like a rat in the night.”
“France!” shouted another workman, passing by with a bag of something slung over his shoulder. “And good riddance, I say. Let the bloody frogs have the bounder.”
Georgie turned back to her and nodded his approval. “Like he said, Miss, France.” Then he went back to rummaging in his cart.
“Lud!” she cried, grabbing the growler from her mother a
gain. She took a long and pensive swig. “France! Edie was right—Chumsley’s scandal really is worse than mine.”
“His reputation is dead now, for sure,” Mama added, taking the growler for another sip before wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. “Mark my words, Caro. This will all turn out in the end.”
“The truth may out, Mama. But even so, society isn’t likely to welcome me back with open arms. Two lords deemed me likely enough to become their lover that they bet a hundred pounds on it. And for many, being that sort of woman is bad enough.”
“Even so,” Papa added, wiping his brow. “To some extent, the tide of opinion will turn in your favor. You needn’t resign yourself to the bookkeeping circle of Hell, just yet. And speaking of Hell, where do things stand for Edie’s birthday extravaganza this year? Should we anticipate damage to the terrace again?”
She scratched her forehead, embarrassment and disappointment dueling bitterly for the larger portion of her expression. “No, Papa. I’ve had to cancel Edie’s dinner. Out of a hundred invitations, not a single person said they would come.”
“That’s too bad.”
“You know what you should do, Miss,” said the stonemason, popping his head out of the cart again.
“What is that, Georgie?”
“You should go to them fights tonight. That would be right entertaining, and take your mind off things.”
Papa’s mouth opened, but Caro spoke up before he could reprimand the poor man. “Thank you for the suggestion, Georgie, but I am not a fighting enthusiast.”
“All right, then. Truth be told, we was hoping you would go and then tell us about it.”
“You don’t say,” she replied as she began gathering the linens and utensils to return to the basket.
“’Struth. The lot of us are right vexed to be missing the big rematch.”
Her hands stilled. “What rematch is that, Georgie?”
“The one with that Lord Ryland bloke. He’s to fight the Duke of Portson for the first time in over a decade. It’ll be a crush, I’m sure.”
Her heart flared. “You must be mistaken, Georgie. Where did you hear of this?”
“’S’right over there,” he said, nodding to a small lean-to where some of the men took a mid-day meal. She jumped up and ran over and sure enough, a newish-looking poster had been pasted over an older one, both of them related to the Harvest Festival. The one on top read:
Get here earl-y and put up your dukes!
Rematch of the century!
She gasped.
“What is it, dear?” Papa called to her.
Why would Adam do this? Fighting makes him ill. He hasn’t trained in years, and he doesn’t like the atten—
Her heart skidded to a stop: Adam was hoping for attention. Of course he was. Win or lose, the Earl of Ryland getting into a ring with the duke he once walloped was going to be a sensation. And a new sensation would draw society’s attention away from her old one; the gossips would parse his triumphs, his humiliations—and soon enough, they would leave her be.
But at what cost to Adam? She could not allow this to go forward.
She hiked up her skirts and turned toward home, without even stopping to say goodbye. Mama and Papa shouted after her, Toby chased her, and Georgie could be heard saying, “See? Now that’s what I would call an enthusiast.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
“Stinson! The carriage—I need the carriage at once.”
“Yes, Miss. Edwards is already coming ’round with it.”
“I need it now, Stinson. Please—go and tell him to hurry. Go!”
Caro smoothed at her dress to stop her hands from shaking. She spotted a laundry maid turning to come down the stairs and called up to her, “Louisa, I need you to pack something for me. Just a small overnight bag, but I need it immediately.” The girl turned and scampered back up.
“If I may, Miss,” said a voice behind her.
She turned and found Mrs. Meary wringing her hands. “What are you hoping to accomplish, running off to this festival?”
“I want to stop Lord Ryland from participating in this bout.”
“But you can’t ask a man to back out of a fight, Miss.”
“Of course I can.”
“And you cannot go unaccompanied to such a place. A raucous festival, with lots of…of theater people,” she added, her voice curdling with distaste.
“I haven’t anyone to ask, Mrs. Meary. I haven’t a lady’s maid, and I haven’t…well, I haven’t any friends anymore, either.”
“Then I’ll go with you.”
Caro noticed, now, the rumpled and threadbare bag at her feet. She looked back up and smiled weakly. “Do you have money on this bout, Mrs. Meary?”
“You’ve never been to a fight, Miss. I have. I know what they’re about, and I can help keep you safe.”
“That’s a lovely offer,” Caro replied, reaching out and taking her hand. “But my lack of experience doesn’t signify—”
“And I’m coming too.”
She whipped around and saw Stinson drop a bag of his own at his feet.
“What is this, a family holiday?”
“Please listen, Miss,” Barclay added as he strode into the hall, holding his hands behind him. “This isn’t the time to exercise your…independent streak.”
She threw up her hands. “All right, family holiday it is.” She was too fluttery, too distracted, too worried to mount a protest. And they were right. Going anywhere without a chaperone—or two—was highly improper, especially to a prizefight, and especially given her current predicament.
“There’ll be no place to stay the night,” said Mrs. Meary. “The inns will be overfull, so we’ll have to sleep in the carriage tonight.” She nodded to Stinson. “You’ll go on top.”
“No,” Barclay added. “There’s no reason you cannot turn ’round and make your way back here tonight. It’s just twenty miles all together, and the horses will be plenty rested. Just be on your way again, as soon as it’s all done.”
Mrs. Meary nodded. “Let’s take our bags, just the same.”
Barclay pulled something from behind his back. “And take this, Miss.”
He held out a thick wooden stick. It was a foot and a half long and tapered to a ball on one end, studded with something metal.
“What is that, Barclay?”
“A cudgel, Miss. Take it.” He gave it a light shake.
“What are these?” she asked, touching a finger to one of the sharp metal points.
“Spikes, Miss. Small ones.”
“We are going to Beauton, Barclay. Not the Middle Ages.”
“Ohhhh! Just give me the thing,” Mrs. Meary snapped, reaching out and snatching it. “Louisa! Get down here at once. Stinson—get those bags stowed, and get up with Edwards. And don’t you just stand there, Miss. I thought you was in a hurry.”
Caro saluted her and smiled, surprised at her ease. The three of them were insisting that she compromise—that she allow them to guide and even join her—and she didn’t mind it a bit. She was glad for their input, in fact, and relieved to have their help and their counsel. She watched as Mrs. Meary unzipped her bag, wrapped the cudgel in a cloth of some kind, and packed it away.
Quillen set his chin in his hand and peered at him through half-shut eyes. Then he walked all around him and when he arrived back in front announced, “I think it’s short enough already.”
“What are you talking about?” Adam asked.
“Your hair, Ryland. We don’t want you getting dragged around the ring by your scalp.”
“Ah. Understood.”
They were standing on a terrace at Banmoor, the sun just beginning its descent toward the western horizon, toward the very grounds where the Harvest Festival was underway.
A servant approached with a tray. “Here. Drink this,” Quillen commanded as Adam picked up a glass and peered into it.
“What is it?”
“Eggs. Three of them.”
“No, th
ank you.” He set it back down. It wasn’t that he feared vomiting; indeed, he felt oddly calm, as if in some respects, his body still knew how to prepare itself for sparring.
Although this time, the fight would be real.
“You’ve already declined a brandy,” Quillen replied, gesturing to the tray on a nearby table.
“It’s best if I stay sharp, Quillen. I haven’t done this in many years.”
“In an hour or so, you might wish your senses were a bit dulled.”
“I’ll take that risk.”
Quillen grabbed the brandy and sucked it down himself. “We’ll need at least two more,” he called out to the servant as he reentered the house. “And see if you can find some oranges!”
“Aside from the hair-pulling, Quillen, what else can you tell me about the fancy these days?”
He shrugged. “The rules haven’t changed: No hitting below the belt. A round ends whenever a man goes down on one knee, and that man has thirty seconds to get back to the scratch line, or he’ll be pronounced the loser. There’ll be a referee, although given the role of the Sadler Wells folk in this festival, he may be more clown than umpire.” He picked up the glass of eggs and after a quick shrug, drank them down himself. “So what’s your strategy, Ryland?”
He ignored the question. “You’ll be my second?” he asked instead.
“Of course. And my friend here will be your bottle man.”
Adam turned to the grizzled fellow lounging drunkenly on a nearby chaise. He’d been sunning his belly on that same terrace ever since Adam arrived, two days prior. His face was nearly as ruddy as a cherry tart, and a pair of missing teeth punctuated his cheerful grin.
Adam extended his hand. “And what is your name, sir?”
“Never you mind it,” Quillen interjected. “You needn’t know.”