Once a Scoundrel (Rogues Redeemed #3)

by Mary Jo Putney

  Hiding his amazement, Gabriel said, “I’ve won some sea battles. But none where the fate of Britain was at stake.”

  “If you’d stayed in the Royal Navy, you might have fought at Trafalgar.”

  “Lord Nelson managed nicely without me, though he didn’t survive the battle.” The damned fool man wouldn’t have died if he hadn’t been wearing all his medals, making a perfect target for a French sharpshooter. Gabriel preferred life to grand gestures. “The past is done with. I’m happy with my life even if you aren’t. But I hope that I won’t be banned from your house till you die.”

  His grandfather gave a rusty chuckle. “You’re the heir, can’t ban you now.” After a long silence, he said, in an almost inaudible whisper, “I’ve missed you.”

  Could Gabriel say the same of the admiral? No, the old man’s anger had always been with him. There was never a chance to miss him. But today Gabriel’s view of the past had changed. “There’s no need to miss me in the future, sir. And if you find me a disappointment, I guarantee Rory can charm any man out of the sullens.”

  His grandfather laughed outright. “That puts me in my place.” With effort, he rose from the bench. “Time to go in. I feel the cold in my bones these days.”

  With wonder, Gabriel realized that he and his formidable grandfather had made peace. There was even a wary fondness between them. He would not have believed it possible.

  They returned to the sitting room to find his grandmother and Rory chatting happily away. When his wife looked up at him, he gave her a small nod and a smile.

  She responded with her own radiant smile. Rising, she said, “We’ve overstayed the limits of a proper call, Lady Vance, but I’m so happy to have met you. I hope you don’t mind if I call again soon.”

  “Not at all,” his grandmother said, looking younger than when her visitors had arrived. “Good-bye, my dear girl.” She kissed Rory, then Gabriel. “You chose well, my lad.”

  He grinned down at her. “I know.”

  He said no more until they were outside. “Have I mentioned lately how much I love you?”

  “Not since last night,” Rory said. “I’m glad to hear that hasn’t changed after the events of today.”

  “You were right to persuade me to come.” He looped an arm around her shoulders. “My cousins have died, and someday you’ll be Lady Vance. A mere baroness, but it’s the best I can offer you.”

  “It will more than suffice, my love.” She stopped and turned to him, her gaze mischievous. “Can we book a room in a hotel tonight?”

  “If you wish,” he replied, puzzled. “But don’t you wish to stay at Lawrence House?”

  She leaned in and whispered wickedly, “I’m not sure I have the courage to ravish you with my parents just a room or two away!”

  Laughing, he swept her up in his arms and kissed her for all of Mayfair to see. “I look forward to being ravished, my lady bright!” He leaned his forehead against hers, vastly content as he added softly, “And I rejoice in knowing that I’m the luckiest man in Britain.”

  “I’m glad you think so,” Rory said with matching softness. “But I am surely the luckiest woman.”

  Author’s Note

  I remember as a child singing the “Marines’ Hymn” and being puzzled by “from the halls of Montezuma to the shores of Tripoli.” Montezuma I got, that being nearby Mexico, but what’s this Tripoli business? That’s North Africa!

  Much later, I found that line referred to the Barbary Wars in the early nineteenth century. (The first was 1801-1805, the second in 1815.) The school history lesson was that the Barbary states of North Africa were pirates who captured American and European ships, held the crew members for ransom or sold them into slavery, and demanded tribute as protection money from nations that wanted their shipping to be left alone.

  I do not find pirates romantic. They were greedy and sometimes murderous criminals who preyed on the vulnerable. Barbary pirates were the scourge of the Mediterranean from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries, and sailed as far as Iceland and even South America. The town of Baltimore in County Cork, Ireland, was famously sacked and virtually the whole population was captured and sold into slavery in 1631.

  In the early nineteenth century, when Once a Scoundrel is set, many of the larger European nations found it easier to pay tribute to the Barbary states, particularly those countries that were busy fighting the continent-wide Napoleonic wars. The United States, on the far side of the Atlantic, preferred to stay neutral and maintain a healthy shipping trade with European countries.

  This did not work out well for the U.S.; Britain was blockading France and didn’t want irresponsible colonials selling their goods in Europe. This was a primary cause of the War of 1812 between Britain and the United States.

  Barbary pirates were another matter. It wasn’t just national pride that made the United States go to war, nor was it the chip-on-the-shoulder testiness of a fragile new country that felt it was being disrespected. The plain fact was that the demands for tribute were so insanely high that the country couldn’t come close to affording to buy the pirates off. Hence, the United States went to war.

  An excellent and highly readable account of the Barbary Wars is in Thomas Jefferson and the Tripoli Pirates, by Brian Kilmeade and Don Yaeger. I recommend it.

  It may sound unlikely that a European ship was forced to carry men and a menagerie to Constantinople, but in fact the USS George Washington was compelled to do exactly that. Besides having to transport over two hundred extra men, greatly overloading the ship, Kilmeade and Yaeger said there were “4 horses, 25 cattle, and 150 sheep, in addition to 4 lions, 4 tigers, 4 antelopes, and 12 parrots.” And the ship had to orient toward Mecca for prayers. Gabriel and the Zephyr got off lightly!

  Fantasies of harems and polygamy were wildly popular in the West and inspired lush paintings and lascivious writings, and those institutions did exist. But the Koran specifies that multiple wives must be treated with strict equality in economic, emotional, and sexual terms. Which would be both expensive and exhausting! In real life, the clear majority of Muslim marriages were (and are) monogamous. Hence, Malek’s devotion to his wife is as true and real as any romance—and I do love a good romance!

  Read on for an excerpt from Mary Jo Putney’s

  next Rogues Redeemed novel,

  Once a Spy

  London, Early February 1815

  Even though Suzanne was working under her room’s small window to get the best light, it was now too dark to continue sewing. This far north in midwinter, the days were short and often rainy or overcast. She might have to buy candles to finish these alterations by the end of the week.

  She set aside the gown and stood to stretch. Perhaps she should go for a short walk. The day was raw and her old cloak barely adequate, but she loved having the freedom to go outside whenever she wished.

  Solid steps sounded on the stairs outside her room and she recognized the dignified approach of her landlord, Mr. Porter. He knocked on the door and announced, “Madame Duval, there’s a fellow here who says he’s your cousin, Colonel Duval. He’s down in the sitting room. Do you have a cousin who is a colonel?”

  Suzanne opened her door, surprised. After the last tumultuous years, she had no idea what relatives might still be alive, or what they had been doing. “I might, but I’ll have to see him to be sure. I assume he looks respectable or you wouldn’t have allowed him in.”

  “He has the look of a soldier, not that being one would make him a saint,” her landlord said dourly. “I’ll go down with you in case you want me to send him away.”

  She nodded her thanks. Mr. Porter was very protective of the female tenants of his boarding house. It was one of the reasons she’d chosen to live here.

  She peeled off the fingerless gloves she wore to keep her hands warm while sewing, brushed a casual hand over her dark hair, and straightened her knit shawl over her shoulders, glad that her appearance was no longer a matter of life and death. Then she followed h
er landlord down the narrow stairs.

  When she opened the door to the small sitting room, the dim light revealed a man gazing out the window, his hands clasped behind his back as he studied the shabby neighborhood. Lean and powerful, he did indeed have the bearing of a soldier. Wavy dark hair in need of cutting, a familiar grace as he turned at her entrance. His searching gaze met hers and he became very still.

  She froze, paralyzed with shock. Jean-Louis!

  But her husband was dead, she’d seen him murdered with her own eyes. Also, Jean-Louis had been twice her age when they married. This man was younger.

  When she saw his cool, light colored eyes, she remembered a young second cousin of her husband. Simon Duval had been a boy, only a few years older than she’d been as a very young bride, but he’d shared a strong family resemblance to her husband. The years had emphasized subtle differences in his features and she guessed that he was a shade taller and more broad-shouldered than Jean-Louis.

  Realizing she wasn’t breathing, she inhaled slowly. “Well met, Simon. Or should I call you Monsieur le Comte?”

  “So it really is you, my cousin Suzanne,” her visitor said with soft amazement. “The name is not uncommon and Hawkins didn’t say you were the Comtesse de Chambron. But though you are a countess, I am no count. Merely a distant cousin by marriage who is very glad to see that you are alive.”

  He spoke English with no hint of a French accent and she remembered that his mother had been English. “Though I am no longer a countess, you might be the Comte de Chambron if enough members of my husband’s family have died.” Which was true, but the world where French courtly titles mattered seemed very far away. She extended her hand. “Mr. Potter announced you as a colonel. Which army?”

  “British, though I’ve sold out now that the emperor has abdicated.” He took her hand and bent over it, a gesture wholly French. “I’m glad to see you well and more beautiful than ever. I’d heard you were dead.”

  His hand was warm and strong and competent. “You flatter like a Frenchman, Simon,” she replied with a smile. “I am no longer a dewy young bride and I was very nearly dead several times over. But I have survived.”

  Her landlord cleared his throat and she realized that he’d been monitoring this meeting from the doorway. “I imagine you and the colonel have much to discuss, so I’ll bring you some tea.”

  “That would be lovely, Mr. Potter.” After he left, she knelt on the hearth and added a small scoop of coals to the embers of the fire. “Indeed, we have much to catch up on, cousin. It’s been a dozen years or more.”

  Simon had been one of many guests at her wedding to the Comte de Chambron. She’d been only fifteen, thrilled to be making such a grand marriage. Since Simon had been near her age, they’d developed a teasing friendship, but that had been a lifetime ago.

  She settled in the chair to the right of the cold fireplace. “How did you find me?”

  “Captain Gabriel Hawkins.” Simon took a seat opposite her. “He and I shared an alarming adventure in Portugal some years back. He told me that he’d just completed a voyage to Constantinople, and that you returned to London on his ship.”

  She stiffened. “Did he tell you my circumstances?”

  Voice gentle, Simon said, “He said you were in the harem of a powerful Turkish official, and that your aid was invaluable in rescuing two English women, including the young lady who is now his wife.”

  Those were the bare facts. She hoped that Hawkins had said no more than that. “And in return, he rescued me and brought me here.”

  “Hawkins said he offered to take you to France, but that you chose to come to émigré relatives who were in the French community in Soho.” His perceptive gaze evaluated her and the clean but sparse sitting room. She could guess his thoughts. Soho was London’s French quarter where the wealthy émigrés lived. The poor ones struggled to make a living in this rundown neighborhood in the St. Pancras parish.

  Answering his unasked question, she said, “After Napoleon abdicated, those cousins returned to France to reclaim their property. I was not surprised to find them gone. But no matter. I prefer to make my way in England rather than return to France. There is nothing for me there.”

  His gaze flicked around the worn sitting room again. “Forgive me for asking, but how are you managing?”

  “I sew well and I’ve been doing piece work. Soon I should be able to find a permanent position.” She smiled wryly. “But I do wish I’d been able to bring the jewels I once had when I was a favorite in the harem! I’d have been able to buy my own shop.”

  “Money makes everything easier,” he agreed, his brow furrowed. “I’m fortunate that my mother came from a successful English merchant family and her fortune had remained on this side of the Channel.”

  “Very prudent of them.” She cocked her head to one side. “Are you here only to look up a distant family connection? Perhaps you are bored now that you’ve sold out of the army?”

  He hesitated, not returning her smile. “There are two reasons I called, and the greater was indeed to see if you were the right Suzanne Duval, and if so, to learn how you are faring. But there was another reason.”

  Before she could inquire further, Mr. Potter returned, a tea tray in hand. The tray was dented pewter and there was a chip in the spout of the teapot, but her landlord presented the refreshments with the air of a duke’s butler. There was also a dish of shortbread. “Thank you, Mr. Potter!” Suzanne said warmly. “You and your wife have outdone yourselves.”

  “The pleasure is ours, my lady.” He inclined his head, then withdrew from the room.

  “My lady?” Simon asked as she poured tea for them. “He knows that you’re an aristocrat?”

  “No, he’s just being polite.” She took a sip of tea, then offered him the plate of shortbread. “Have a piece. Mrs. Potter is a wonderful baker.”

  He followed her advice and murmured appreciatively after he bit into it. “She is, and she doesn’t stint on the butter.”

  Suzanne ate an irregular chunk of shortbread, savoring the way it melted in her mouth. “You said there was another reason for seeking me out.”

  He studied her face as if deciding how much to say. “This is not a matter that should be discussed elsewhere.”

  Curious, she said, “I know how to keep a secret.”

  “Yes, I imagine you do.” He finished his tea in a long swallow, then set the cup down with a clink. “You have surely heard speculation that Napoleon might contrive to escape his island prison in Elba and return to France to reclaim his empire.”

  “There is always talk, but Elba is guarded by the Royal Navy.” She leaned forward to refill his cup. “Surely they can keep him contained.”

  “Perhaps, but the emperor is a wily beast, and he still has many supporters.” Simon nodded thanks for the tea, then continued. “I was an intelligence officer so I’m experienced at ferreting out information. The gentleman who gave me your address is in the same business, and he asked if I might investigate rumors in the émigré community. When I heard you were alive and in London, I thought perhaps you might have some useful connections.”

  Her mouth twisted. “None at all. The grand émigrés in Soho will have nothing to do with a woman who was a whore in Turkey.”

  He winced. “Surely no one said such an appalling thing!”

  “The aristocratic ladies said that. Their husbands tried to corner me in empty rooms,” she said dryly. “I decided I would be safer among my more humble countrymen here in St. Pancras.”

  He bit off a curse and took a deep breath before he said intensely, “You deserve so much better than this, Suzanne!”

  She sighed. “If there is one thing I have learned, it’s that no one ‘deserves’ anything more than the right to struggle for survival. I’d rather be here altering gowns in a cold room than living in luxury in a Turkish harem and wondering which night might be my last, so I think I am doing well.” She raised her teacup in a mock toast. “Will you drink to my
survival, Simon?”

  “I can do more than that,” he said, his gaze burning. “Marry me, Suzanne.”