by Henke, Shirl
Beth breathed a sigh of relief when the old harridan was gone and found that many members of the household staff immediately became friendlier to her, actually daring to smile and perform tasks cheerfully. She sent inquiries to the vicar in the nearby village and soon located a new housekeeper with excellent references. Mistress Widlow was plump, with a lusty laugh, but she knew how to run the manor with no nonsense.
All of this freed Beth's time to consider what she would do for the six weeks until Christmas. She'd read Derrick's note and prayed that he would indeed return to spend the holiday with her. Perhaps she would give him the portrait as a Christmas gift. He had never seen it. Would he like it? It recalled a far happier time in their lives. Perhaps remembering it would bring him closer to her.
In the meanwhile she busied herself doing sketches of the servants and, on the rare sunny days, drawing the bleak hills and river valley, even the old stone monstrosity in which the Jamison clan had lived for centuries. As she worked at such mundane endeavors, thoughts about doing the seraglio paintings teased the edge of her mind, but she refused to consider them. That would drive a wedge between Beth and her husband that could never be breached. No, she would wait for the holidays and see if they could make some sort of peace for the sake of their child.
She received a post from Bertie saying he would be arriving at his estate within a week. Mercifully, Annabella would not be coming until a few days before Christmas. Beth hoped her sister-in-law and husband did not decide to travel together, then dismissed the idea as silly jealousy. Derrick did not suffer fools gladly.
Biting off her pride, Beth sat down to compose a letter to her husband, assuring him that she was staying close to the Hall. She gave a glowing report of Mistress Widlow and the changed demeanor of the staff, asking him to forgive her for dismissing the former housekeeper. She told him she was looking forward to their spending a quiet Christmas away from London.
* * * *
As soon as he arrived in London, Derrick set out to locate Evon Bourdin. The Frenchman was living in rather elegant quarters on Chapel Street. How the devil did an unemployed professional soldier afford such luxury when his cousin the Count d'Artois could not?Derrick intended to find Bourdin's source of income. He hired a Bow Street Runner to watch the Frenchman's movements and report to him. Sooner or later, Murat's old comrade in arms would make a mistake.
Liam Quinn was nowhere to be foùnd, although the Runner continued to search. Derrick was dismayed to learn that many of the city's literati had actually found the corsair dashingly romantic. Beth had been given the cut direct because she had been Quinn's victim while the bastard was feted for despoiling innocent women. He itched to deal with the Irishman just as he'd dealt with enemy agents.
Did he miss the excitement of his former life as a spy? No, the rush of danger no longer lured him. Ironically, he, too, was feted by the ton, a sought-after celebrity who cut a dashing figure of mystery and romance. A patriot. A spy. What would his father think about it? he wondered sadly. He was not at all certain the old earl would find his method of serving their country totally acceptable.
The Earl of Lynden immersed himself in business affairs and politics. He attended social engagements only if they were essential for political purposes. At one such event, a scant two weeks after returning to the city, he chanced to encounter his cousin Bertie, who informed him that he was leaving for the country shortly.
Since the day he'd ridden away from the Hall, leaving Beth sleeping with so much left unsaid between them, he had tried not to think of her. And, of course, failed. She was in his dreams nightly. He ached for his wife and knew no way to express his feelings for her. She was doubtless still furious with his high-handed methods of keeping her safe, although she could not know his motives. Perhaps he would oil the waters a bit in preparation for his return at Christmas. He even dared to hope some reconciliation might be possible as he composed a letter...
* * * *
The fog was thick as molasses, swirling in eddies so dense with foul-smelling smoke that it brought home to Derrick again the necessity for appropriate legislation to improve conditions in the city. He had just left a soiree at Lord Buckingham's house, where he had made several converts to his agenda. Immersed in thought, he took the reins from the groom outside the stable and swung up on Dancer. Kicking the big stallion into a brisk trot, he headed for home.
Home. Where was that? Certainly not in the empty city house where every room bore Beth's imprint. It was tasteful and lovely and utterly empty without her presence to light it. What would he find when he returned to Lynden Hall? He mulled over the situation, his preoccupation dulling long-honed instincts. He did not see the two men materialize from the fog behind him. A third leaped from the top of a carriage, tumbling him from his horse as the other two ran up. One seized the reins of the black and the other joined the melee on the ground.
Derrick had the knife from his boot drawn before they hit the hard cobblestones. The thug who had jumped him felt it bite deep, striking his heart before he could cry out. But the dying man's weight pinned Derrick. Through the noisome swirl of the London fog a stiletto gleamed as it descended. He felt the icy slice of the blade, then the impact of a pistol ball tearing into his gut.
They were professional and quick. Someone spoke in a familiar accent, instructing the two assassins to strip his body. Then he heard the swift pad of their feet and the clop of Dancer's hooves vanishing into the darkness. He lay in the street as the shrill sound of a Charley's whistle rent the cold night air.
Then the fog closed in and he felt nothing at all...
Chapter Twenty-five
Keening moans and wracking coughs were interspersed with muttered curses and frantic pleas, but the stench of excrement blending with that vilest of human offal, putrefying flesh, wrenched Derrick gagging to consciousness. He tried to move, but his body screamed in protest. With a gasp, he inventoried the origins of the agony. Both his chest and lower abdomen were afire, while his right arm merely throbbed.
When he managed to pry open his eyes and look about, he ascertained he was in a huge room with small, high windows ringing three walls. They were so grimy from the accumulation of city air, almost no light penetrated. Row after row of small, lumpy pallets lined the floors, leaving only narrow aisles between for walking. On these rude beds lay the patients.
At first the scene from hell surrounding him made no sense, but then the fog-drenched street, the three thieves attacking and robbing him, stripping his clothing and valuables, all came back to him. He was in a charity hospital.
Strip him of anything of value.
Bourdin! Telling his minions to be certain the death looked like a robbery. His thoughts swirled as he reached up to touch his itchy face...and found a heavy growth of beard. How long had he been lying here?
Then a husky female voice said, “So, ye've finally come ‘round, 'ave ye? Me nursin' ain't been wasted.”
A tall robust brunette with the pale complexion and apple cheeks of an English schoolgirl stood at the foot of his pallet, looking down at him with a smile that revealed several missing teeth. Other than that defect, she was pretty in a wholesome countrified way. Heavy eyebrows arched over deep brown eyes that had seen more of human misery than most people three times her age. “Me name's Peggie, 'n' I be given yer charge,” she continued, still smiling.
“How long have I been here?”
“It be three weeks yesterday, sor. The very devil’s luck yer alive after them cutpurses tried to finish ye.” She knelt by his side and added in a whisper, “The leech, ole Kitchner, 'e weren’t goin' ta bother stitchin' ya after 'e dug the ball out'n yer gut, seein' as 'ow ye were cut so bad. Said it weren't no use, but I told 'em ye were Quality. Even if 'e laughed at me, the ole fool did ‘is sewin'. After that I kept yer wounds clean like I were showed, 'n' give ye plenty o' water whilst the fever took ye.”
Derrick realized he owed the young woman his life. Even in decent hospitals many patients died f
rom lack of proper attention, and in a dumping ground for the impoverished such as this, his chances of survival without this woman's diligence would have been nil. “I'm profoundly grateful, Peggie...but what made you think that I was Quality?”
”Aw, cor, ye talked up a storm in yer fever, ye did, talked like an apothecary...” She flushed brightly and looked down. “Sides, ye 'ave that look about ye, refined 'n' ‘andsome. I knowed ye 'ad to be a gentleman, sor.”
“I'm Derrick Jamison, Earl of Lynden.” At that announcement her eyes grew enormous and her jaw dropped in awe.
Peggie bathed his face with cool water and gave him a drink, assuring him that she'd been taught to boil the dirty water by the physician who had trained her, a nobleman who had given his life in service to the poor of London. The last thing he remembered was asking her to send word to his house on Pall Mall.
* * * *
Liam Quinn replaced the glass in his saddlebag and cursed in frustration, then turned his mount and rode carefully from the elm hedgerow where he had hidden as he watched Beth sketching. He had pursued his quarry back to Naples only to find that she had wed Jamison and sailed for England. Kasseim would not be pleased. But abducting an American female wandering the streets of an Italian city was far easier than kidnapping a countess. When he was told that she would be a guest at Lady Holland's soiree, he had been certain he could accomplish his assignment. The new Dey of Algiers had become obsessed with recapturing her and offered the last of his dead father's corsairs an exorbitant reward for bringing her back.
Either she had been utterly remarkable in bed...or else Kasseim had not yet had her. Although the arrogant young prince would never admit such a thing, the Irishman knew it was the latter. He'd heard rumors from the palace that the night she'd been presented to Kasseim a large amount of opium was found missing from a secret hiding place in the women's quarters. He grinned, thinking of the haughty prince waking up with a brain clouded by opium-spun cobwebs.
“Ah, colleen, what a pair we'd make...if I could but afford to keep you,” he murmured to himself. Of course he could not. It was ironic that he and Kasseim wanted a woman who had bested them both.
But he would have her first.
* * * *
Bertie arrived early just as he'd promised, and Beth considered his visit a gift to save her sanity. The boredom of her confinement in the manor had been intensified by the worst winter in memory. Snow piled up until the dead shrubs in the gardens were white shapeless humps and the roads were all but impassable. Derrick's cousin managed to get through between storms and bring a ray of cheer into what had been the gloomiest December of her life. At her entreaty, he remained at Lynden Hall instead of proceeding on to Wharton to open up his manor. It made sense for all the Jamisons to spend Christmas here.
“Never fear. He'll be along,” Bertie assured Beth as she sat disconsolately staring out into the gathering darkness.
“Christmas is only three days away, Coz.” She had explained about the numerous letters she'd sent Derrick. The first had been conciliatory. The last beseeching. He had not deigned to reply to any of them. “I do not believe he will come.”
“Don't do no good to be all Friday-faced, m'dear,” Bertie replied with false heartiness. “Why, my cousin is a man of such unbending principle, he'd never give his word, then break it.”
Unable to think of what she would do if Bertie proved wrong, she changed the subject to another almost as unpleasant. “When will Annabella arrive with Constance? I am so looking forward to seeing how much my niece has grown.”
“On the morrow, I expect. She and her maid are taking the Carlisle coach, with the nurse for Constance, of course,” he added dismissively.
Beth would never get used to the way the English upper classes distanced themselves from their children practically at birth. What would she do if Derrick insisted upon separating her from her babe? Hiring a wet nurse? The practice was not unknown in America, but Beth's mother and Aunt Barbara had never considered it. Nor had she or her siblings and cousins been raised by servants. She would fight Derrick bitterly if he insisted upon English tradition.
“You needn't fear that Bella will spoil the holiday, m'dear,” Bertie said, breaking into her brown study. “I read her a peal before I left London. Family and all that. She understands how things are to be,” he said, red-faced.
“You are very sweet to think of me after all the trouble I've caused this family.”
“Stuff! Our puritanical old Scots roots needed some pruning, if you ask me. Derrick will learn to appreciate that. Probably has already. I imagine he's riding pell-mell for the Hall even as we speak.”
Mid-afternoon of the following day Annabella and her entourage pulled up in a hired coach. As Bertie had assured Beth, her sister-in-law treated her courteously. If it was flummery, Beth did not care as long as they could maintain the veneer of civility sufficiently to get through the holidays. She spent more time with Constance than she did with the child's mother, which suited both women—as well as the little tot—just fine.
Christmas day arrived, Derrick did not. For a change, the weather was bright and sunny, as if mocking her misery. Beth had cursed the rain and snow for weeks but now would have welcomed it—any excuse to explain her husband's untimely delay. There was nothing to be done but put a good face on it, pretending that she was not wounded to her very soul by his absence. She walked down the stairs to the tantalizing aroma of roasting Christmas goose and plum pudding.
Everyone was gathered in the great hall before a roaring fire, even little Connie with her nurse. The mantel and windows were hung with festive greenery trimmed with red velvet bows. And brightly wrapped gifts were scattered about the hearth. Beth looked at the largest one—her portrait of Derrick, which she'd had framed by the village cabinetmaker and lovingly wrapped herself.
Swallowing a lump of utter misery, she managed a smile as she entered the cavernous room. “Merry Christmas, everyone,” Beth said brightly.
Annabella smiled tightly and nodded, saying, “The same to you, dear sister.” Then, as Beth proceeded to pick up Connie, she added, “I do not see how you can remain so...limber in your delicate condition. I was quite unable to lift so much as my jewel case when I was as far along as are you.”
“We Americans are a hearty lot,” Beth said, winking at Bertie, whom she knew to be embarrassed by any mention of “female matters.”
They unwrapped gifts, oohing and aahing over scarves and hair clips and all manner of extraneous things that no one needed but everyone felt obliged to give. If not for the joy of watching little Connie tear into the toys and then cuddle her new doll, Beth would not have been able to make it through the afternoon. As they withdrew to the dining hall for the traditional feast, she cast one last bitter glance at the largest of Derrick's unopened gifts.
Perhaps she would burn the painting in the Yule fire that night.
* * * *
“I say, Coz, are you there?”
The gentle tapping at her studio door caused Beth to put down her brush and rise, bidding Bertie to enter. “I've been so busy that I quite forgot the time.” She had begun work at dawn that morning after spending Christmas night tossing and turning in the big empty bed. By the time the first hint of light gilded the eastern horizon, the idea had become fixed firmly in her head. She had painted through the day, and dusk was descending. Now she wondered if she dared let her friend in on what she was doing.
“You have been busy. Mind if I take a peek?” he inquired as he walked over to her easel.
“You may be shocked,” she cautioned. She watched as he studied the work. Although only just begun, the sketched-in outlines made the subject matter quite apparent.
His eyebrows rose and then he doubled over as a hoarse guffaw of laughter burst forth. Slapping his thigh, he said, “Ain't you the dry boots, Coz! I love it! 'Tis positively smashing!”
“I won't sign them, but 'tis possible my identity will be discovered. Are you sure you don't mind that
I might bring further disgrace on the family?”
“Twas Byron who gave you the idea. Demned good one, if you ask me.”
“Since he's been in the suds, all he may wish is that my scandal will distract from his peccadilloes,” Beth replied dubiously.
“Painting nudes in a seraglio bath hardly compares with carrying on with one's own half-sister,” Bertie said dryly. “How many paintings do you think to do? I know an art dealer on Berkeley Square who will be all cock-a-whoop to handle the sales.”
* * * *
Bertie and Annabella departed for London, leaving Beth to her paints. By the end of January she had completed six, four of which were already with Bertie's dealer. She nervously awaited word about how they were received in London. If nothing else would bring Derrick back to Lynden Hall, this just might. Of course he'd be livid and most probably take away her art supplies. As a precaution, she hid in dusty trunks another dozen freshly stretched canvases, pigments, oil and solvents, along with a complete assortment of brushes.
Let him come and try to stop me. Her bitterness had grown with each passing day since the heartbreak of the holidays. She vowed to leave him after the birth of their child. If it was a girl and not his precious heir, she would take her infant daughter with her to America. Not even the bloody Earl of Lynden could take her child from the power of the Blackthorne family.
But what if it was a boy? How could she deprive her son of his birthright? How could she leave her own child behind? The idea tormented her nights as she grew heavy and neared the time for her delivery. The idea of spending her life in this gray wilderness was mind-numbing. The idea of spending her life without Derrick was even worse, but it was his choice to remain in London and banish his scandal-ridden wife to the country.