The Wedding Wager

by Hale Deborah

  She stared down at their clasped hands, refusing to meet his eyes. “In spite of everything, I want to believe you.”

  After a moment of awkward silence between them, Leonora eased her hand from his grasp and walked away.

  At the door, she paused for a moment. “You did right, Morse, of course. I shouldn’t have let my own interests and prejudices in the matter blind me to that.”

  Before he could choke out a reply, she added, “We must both try to get some rest. Whatever tomorrow brings, we’ll need as many of our wits about us as we can muster.”

  Though he knew sleep would surely elude him, Morse made his way to bed a few minutes later, just as Leonora had bidden him. For a wonder, the ale he’d drunk eased him to sleep before he knew it. Though it might have been better if he’d lain awake.

  Dreams came to torment him with vivid images of his approaching disgrace. What a juicy feast of gossip he’d make for the idle pleasure-seekers of Bath. Again and again, he pictured Nettlecombe’s bacon face pulled into a gloating grimace of triumph.

  But the nightmare that plagued him worst of all put him in a great church with a vicar pronouncing his blessing on the marriage of Mr. and Mrs. Blenkinsop. When Morse tried to intervene, Sir Hugo held him back, saying over and over, “Fair’s fair now, Archer. You lost the wager.”

  Morse sat bolt-upright in bed, sweat beading his brow and his heart tripping like a snare drum.

  Was there nothing he could do to salvage the situation? If he groveled enough to Nettlecombe and withdrew his challenge, might the fellow retract his insinuations about Captain Archibald’s identity?

  Not likely, but it was worth a try at least.

  Morse dressed with fastidious care for the interview, rehearsing his apology again and again in his mind. As befit his role of penance, he did not summon a carriage, but made his way to the Pump Room on foot.

  He had no idea where Nettlecombe’s lodgings might be, but someone there would be sure to know. More likely still, he would find Nettlecombe in attendance, for Bath visitors tended to congregate in the Pump Room during the morning hours.

  It took every ounce of will for Morse to put one foot before the other as he entered Bath’s holy of holies. The high-vaulted ceiling and imposing pillars made him feel more insignificant than ever. Was it his imagination, or did all talk cease in his wake? The room grew quieter with his every step, until even the musicians in the gallery fell silent.

  The statue of Beau Nash seemed to glower down at him and demand an account of why he had seen fit to trespass on the decades-old prohibition against vulgar dueling. Only the long-case Tompion clock continued its ticking, oblivious to the scene unfolding below.

  Morse cleared his throat. “Can anyone tell me—” his voice exploded in the breathless hush of the Pump Room “—where I might find the lodgings of a Mr. Nettlecombe?”

  An ominous stillness met his question. The pungent stench of sulphur and bismuth from Bath’s famed waters made Morse’s stomach churn.

  Then a man stepped forward, his quizzing glass raised. “Captain Archibald? I am Phineas Blount, Mr. Nettlecombe’s second. He instructed me to convey to you and to the young lady his most humble apology for any insult you took from his remarks last night.”

  A wave of relief almost toppled Morse onto his backside. He was too overcome to reply.

  Young Blount hastened to counter his silence. “Imagine Mr. Nettlecombe’s chagrin when he discovered his own uncle was once an intimate of your father’s. He deeply regrets the misunderstanding and hopes his apology will satisfy you.”

  How like the contemptible coward to back down when challenged. Lacking even the mettle to deliver his apology in person. Though he was tempted to demand it, Morse restrained himself. He had pushed his luck quite far enough for one day.

  He bowed to Nettlecombe’s second. “I was too hasty in taking offense and most uncivil in proposing a duel. I can only plead my long term in His Majesty’s service for making me prone to settle disagreements with force of arms. I offer my humble apology to the memory of Beau Nash and to the good citizens of Bath.”

  The hum of approving comment that greeted his words emboldened Morse.

  “Errare humanum est,” he declared. To err is human. Who had better cause to know it than he?

  His Latin flourish met with a smattering of applause. After a final bow, Morse withdrew. He was halfway back to Laura Place before his knees quit knocking.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “By Jove, Leonora, have you heard?” Sir Hugo burst into the sitting room with the force of a North Atlantic gale. “Why, all Bath’s agog!”

  The blood in her veins congealed into ice—or so it felt. “Tell me, Uncle. Is it Morse? Has he been hurt?”

  How could she have been so self-centered? Thinking only of how this duel would affect her future. Never considering that it might cost Morse his life.

  “Hurt?” Sir Hugo looked at her as though she’d sprouted a beard or a third eye. “What nonsense are you talking, girl? Damn me for a fishmonger if that insolent Nettlecombe whelp hasn’t run off whining with his tail between his legs.”

  The ice in her veins began to thaw, but slowly. “Now who’s talking nonsense? I can’t make head or tail of what you mean.”

  “Didn’t you hear me?” Sir Hugo exhaled a wheezy chuckle and wiped his face with his handkerchief. “Nettlecombe’s backed down—apologized. By proxy, mind you, but apologized none the less. In front of the whole Pump Room. Went so far as to claim his uncle was an intimate acquaintance of Captain Archibald’s father. There isn’t a soul in Bath who’ll dare to question Morse’s identity now.”

  So her wager was not forfeit, after all? She wouldn’t be doomed to wed Algie and give up her books and her teaching?

  “Why, may I ask, does the news put you in such fine fettle, Uncle Hugo? I vow, I never heard a man sound so overjoyed at the prospect of losing a bet.”

  “Losing?” Sir Hugo blustered. “What do you mean—losing? I’ve lost nothing yet, and you’d do well to not get complacent just because Morse has cleared this hurdle.”

  He trundled over to the side table and poured himself a generous measure of port from the decanter. “The truth is, I’ve come to find this whole game quite amusing and I didn’t care for the thought of its being over before it had properly begun.”

  Try as she might, Leonora could not let his remark pass. “So you’re like the cat who wants to toy with the mouse before he gobbles it up?”

  The flush in her uncle’s cheeks faded and he collapsed into the nearest armchair. “Now, my dear, don’t be too harsh in your opinion of an old man who has never meant you any harm.”

  Instantly Leonora relented. No matter how she tried, she could not stay angry with him. Until Morse Archer had barged into her life, she’d never met another man who had the same vexing effect upon her.

  Perching on one arm of Sir Hugo’s chair, she clasped his hand. “I’m sorry, Uncle. I know you want what’s best for me.”

  If only he could trust her to decide what that might be.

  Sir Hugo squeezed her fingers. “Promise me you’ll remember that—no matter what happens with this wager?”

  Now that her future prospects looked rosy once again, Leonora was able to nod her agreement.

  The sitting room door opened hesitantly to the width of a sliver, then began to close.

  “Morse, is that you?” Sir Hugo called. “No need to slink about, boy. Come in and regale us with tales of your triumph!”

  The door’s movement froze for a beat, then it swung fully open. Morse entered as Sir Hugo had bidden him, though, to Leonora’s eyes, he looked anything but triumphant.

  “Shall we drink a toast to your success?” Sir Hugo hefted his glass of port. “I heard you put young Nettlecombe in his place without so much as having to draw a blade or fire a shot.”

  Morse’s wide mouth curled up at one corner. Was it a smug grin of victory or a self-mocking grimace? “That was a piece of undeserve
d luck. I’m grateful for it just the same.”

  Grateful on whose account? Leonora wondered.

  Sir Hugo would not let Morse escape so lightly. “Luck be blasted! Men of action make their own luck, as you made yours. You knew a bullying little worm like Nettlecombe would slither off the moment someone threatened to bring him to account.”

  Morse shot Leonora a look. If it had been just the two men alone, he might have swaggered a little. Clearly he knew better than to try fooling her. “I knew no such thing, Sir Hugo. I threw the dice and Fate smiled. Alea iacta est.”

  His gaze found Leonora’s and she sensed that his next words were addressed more to her than to her uncle. “Sometimes there’s nothing else to do when you’re backed into a tight corner.”

  Was he referring to the Upper Assembly Rooms at Bath, she wondered, or a rearguard skirmish in Portugal? Did he regret either—or both?

  The door swung open again, with no discernable hesitation this time. Algie breezed in, beaming more broadly than usual, if that were possible. He strode to the hearth and clapped an arm around Morse’s shoulders. “Well done, old fellow! You’re the toast of the town.”

  Sir Hugo held up his glass and gave it a waggle, before tossing back the last drop of port. He and Algie laughed. Morse quietly suffered Algie’s forceful expressions of goodwill. He must realize it was futile to protest his unmerited luck.

  “Thought I’d never get home.” Algie chuckled. “For all the people stopping me in the street to go on about you. I had no notion old Pewsey’s nephew had made himself quite this unpopular about town. You’re being hailed a hero for putting the boots to him, and a true gentleman for apologizing in front of the whole Pump Room. No sending a deputy to grovel for you, eh, Morse?”

  Morse shrugged, reddened and stammered something dismissive.

  Leonora rose from the arm of Sir Hugo’s chair. “Apologized? To whom? What are you on about, Algie?”

  “Didn’t he tell you? You’re too modest, my friend.” Algie thumped Morse on the back again. “He begged pardon from the people of Bath and from the ghost of old Nash for calling Nettlecombe out. Not that anyone held it against him. Made a great show of higher sentiment, though. And finishing up with that Latin quote—stroke of genius!”

  He had curbed his pride to that extent? Leonora tried to summon the words to commend Morse. Before she could speak, another thought struck her. What had he been doing in the Pump Room in the first place?

  “Oh, I almost forgot.” Algie plundered his coat pocket and produced a sealed note, which he handed to Morse with a flourish.

  Leonora could smell the scent of rose water on it from halfway across the room. Had the paper been fermented in perfume?

  “I was asked to deliver it.” Algie looked gratified by his commission. “From Miss Hill,” he added for the benefit of Sir Hugo and Leonora—as if she couldn’t have guessed.

  Morse glanced over the note. “Her sister and brother-in-law are giving a supper party in my honor at the end of the week. Miss Hill asks me to call on her at my earliest convenience so she may express her thanks in person.”

  “Capital!” cried Algie. “Leave it to you, Morse, to fall in a pigsty and land in a bed of roses.”

  The overpowering odor of roses from Miss Hill’s note made Leonora queasy.

  “The young lady was far from indifferent to you before.” Algie prattled on. “But now that you’ve championed her against Nettlecombe and won so smoothly, there’s not a beau in Bath who’ll stand a chance against you.”

  He launched into a tiresome litany of Miss Hill’s virtues as a prospective bride. All of them financial. Morse did not appear to pay any heed. Instead he looked up from the note, his gaze boring straight into Leonora’s.

  She could not read the meaning of his look. Might it be a plea—or a challenge? Had Morse gone to the Pump Room looking for Nettlecombe in an effort to make peace for her sake? If she recanted her refusal to wed him, might he put aside the notion of Frederica Hill and the heiress’s lavish expectations? Mistrust of men and her overwhelming self-doubt locked Leonora’s lips from any rash commitment. Her gaze wavered before Morse’s.

  He might have taken that for some kind of answer. Or perhaps he never intended a question. As Algie’s raptures over Miss Hill’s future income petered out, Morse tucked the scented note into his pocket.

  “If you will excuse me.” He looked from Sir Hugo to Algie, ignoring Leonora altogether. “I’ve a rather urgent call to pay.”

  “By all means.” Algie all but pushed him out the door. “Strike while the iron’s hot!”

  Sir Hugo chimed in with some similar hearty banality as Morse took his leave. Their heavy aura of smugness on Morse’s behalf threatened to suffocate Leonora.

  “I must go lie down.” She bolted for the door. “I’ve got a terrible headache.”

  Her final glance at Sir Hugo and Algie found the pair of them not the least bothered by her indisposition. If anything, they looked even more pleased with themselves.

  Leonora gave the door a forceful jerk shut. Really, men were the most heartless creatures!

  Did the woman have a heart in her bosom? Morse fumed as he stormed off to the very elegant Camden Place, where Miss Hill’s family had taken a house for the Season.

  Whether by his own actions or by luck, he had managed to salvage their wager. Now, their chances of success looked better than ever. He’d been willing to prostrate himself before that odious spawn of the nobility for Leonora’s sake, and she hadn’t spared a single word or soft look to thank him.

  Very well, then! He was done with looking out for her. From now on his own interests would take precedence.

  Morse found his progress to Camden Place frequently interrupted by passersby. Complete strangers took the liberty of calling to him from their carriages. Merest acquaintances stopped him in the street to shake his hand. Little by little, his bruised self-esteem began to recover.

  By the time he reached the elaborately decorated front parlor of the Hill establishment, he was in a more temperate humor than when he had quit Sir Hugo’s house. The reception he received from Miss Hill soothed him further. She greeted his arrival with raptures, towing him over to a chair by the window. Glancing out at the magnificent view of the town below, Morse could understand why rent in Bath became dearer the higher up hill one went.

  Lady Fitzwarren, a thinner, paler, less vivacious version of her sister, Miss Hill, made only a token show of chaperoning.

  “Truly, Captain, you were like a knight errant in a story I once read.” From her chair opposite him, Frederica Hill fixed Morse with an admiring gaze, clear blue eyes fringed by pale lashes. “If that awful man had struck me with a sword, I could not have been more dismayed. I know certain superior people in Bath think such things about me and my family. No one has been so insolent as to say them in public, until last evening.”

  Lady Fitzwarren chimed in. “If my Eustace had been within earshot, he would have demanded satisfaction, you may be sure.” Her tone betrayed less certainty than her words.

  Having been introduced to the listless patrician, Morse had his own doubts.

  “To think Mr. Nettlecombe had the impertinence to extend his insult to you, Captain Archibald.” Miss Hill looked more shocked on his behalf than her own. “You cannot be as used to such slights as Henrietta and I have become over the years. Coming from such a fine family, I mean.”

  Morse choked back a bitter chuckle. “Short of being the king, I expect most of us suffer people who fancy themselves superior. And are more than willing to let us know it, too.”

  He nibbled on one of the tea sandwiches Lady Fitzwarren had pressed on him.

  “So you do understand, Captain. I felt certain of your sympathy. Tell me more about your home and family. Miss Freemantle said you come from the north. We are Yorkshire people, ourselves, though Father sent Henrietta and I to school in London after Mother died.”

  After an uneasy night and the reversals of the day, Morse
did not feel up to reciting the painstakingly memorized biography of Captain Maurice Archibald. Instead he noted the puckering of Miss Hill’s brow as she spoke of her schooldays.

  “With lots of superior little girls?” he asked, turning their conversation onto the safer topic of her past.

  She nodded readily. “Some very superior. And the teachers, too. One day they’ll be sorry they snubbed me.”

  “Why did you not ask your father to send you somewhere else?” Morse felt his sympathy rising higher. Unbidden came the thought of Leonora’s school—how much warmer and more encouraging a place it would be than the pretentious establishment Miss Hill and her sister had suffered.

  The young lady grew pensive. “We begged him to, but he’d have none of it. Said his daughters must attend the best school and cultivate the right friends so we could take our places in society one day.”

  Heaving an almost tearful sigh, she made an obvious effort to recover her spirits. “Thanks to your gallantry, Captain, we have been invited into company that was quietly barred to us, up until now. Father will be so pleased when he and Stepmother come next month.” Her tone suggested he was not easily pleased.

  At Morse’s urging, she talked of the family’s summer home in the Yorkshire dales. Of travels she had taken abroad with her sister. The excitement of Henrietta’s wedding to Sir Eustace Fitzwarren. Miss Hill was not the most stimulating company in the world, Morse had to admit. Instead she had rather a soothing effect on him, which proved a pleasant change from…Resolutely he pulled his thoughts back from that path and tried to concentrate on Miss Hill’s plans for the party in his honor.

  “Of course we must invite your particular friends, Mr. Blenkinsop, Miss Freemantle and her uncle.”

  Morse nodded. It was futile to hope Miss Hill’s transparent admiration might provoke Leonora to jealousy.

  He looked forward to the party—hoping, just the same.

  Leonora had dreaded this party since the moment she heard about it. Now that the evening had arrived, she found the experience no better than she’d expected.