by Lex Croucher
M
r Burton was still as taciturn as ever, but to demonstrate his support for his niece he had formed the habit of giving her reassuring shoulder-squeezes whenever he passed, which perhaps said more than words anyhow. Georgiana visited the library one morning to find a small stack of new books, tied neatly with string as if they had only just been delivered. Mr Burton would not confirm or deny that he had procured them, but as Mrs Burton only sighed and rolled her eyes when Georgiana questioned her, she knew that her uncle had guessed at another way to lift her spirits – and had succeeded magnificently.
Although Mrs Burton had largely forgiven Georgiana for her behaviour over the summer, she would not relent over the matter of church. Georgiana dreaded the journey to St Anne’s the following Sunday, and the possibility of seeing Cecily or Jane or – God forbid – Frances herself. Mrs Burton was convinced that her niece needed to show her face and look respectable, as by now word of what had happened between her and Jeremiah was very public knowledge; Georgiana did not think that a high neckline and extra white ribbons in her bonnet would tip public opinion in her favour, but she put up with Mrs Burton’s fussing anyway, knowing that it came from a place of kindness.
Thomas would be at church to support her, and she knew Betty would be in attendance as well; with Mrs Burton scowling by her side (and Mr Burton looking vaguely embarrassed by the whole thing, but sticking by both of them nonetheless) she would have a tiny army of rather unconventional soldiers ready to defend her honour.
They arrived early. It was a lovely day, although Georgiana barely noticed. The already bright August sun was offset by a gentle morning breeze, and the church gardens were ablaze with a cacophony of wild flowers.
Georgiana kept her gaze on the ground as they entered and found their seats, feeling eyes boring holes in the back of her head as she did so. Her aunt had insisted that they sit towards the front, to demonstrate that they had nothing to be ashamed of, but Georgiana had pleaded with her to choose a less conspicuous place and had won that particular round. Now that she was seated, she felt able to watch the other churchgoers as they arrived and chatted in the aisles and over the backs of pews. Thomas had not yet appeared; Betty was there with her grandmother, and gave her a very enthusiastic wave from across the room.
When Cecily walked in, Georgiana felt her breath catch in her throat; she braced herself for impact, but needn’t have worried. Cecily walked past as if she hadn’t seen her – perhaps she genuinely hadn’t – and took a seat towards the front. When Jane entered, she threw a quick sidelong glance in Georgiana’s direction, and kept walking. Christopher was the only one to acknowledge her; he caught her looking, and gave her a lecherous, unfriendly wink that was clearly intended to make her feel cowed – and succeeded.
Mrs Burton was keeping up a low running commentary of those she had written to and who had responded, but had the good sense to direct this towards her husband, knowing that her niece was not in any state of mind to hear it. Georgiana chanced a look back towards the door just before the service began and then froze, her heart in her mouth; Frances Campbell was standing in the entryway, dressed in her Sunday finery, looking a little bloodless and uncomfortable.
The vicar was taking his place, riffling through his Bible, but still Frances did not take a seat, looking behind her as if she were expecting someone. Just as some of the last stragglers were entering – Thomas was not among them, Georgiana noticed, with a flutter of concern – she saw Frances’s face suddenly jolt alive with recognition. She appeared to be speaking to somebody standing on the other side of the doorway; by craning her neck inelegantly, Georgiana could just make out the sleeve of a man gesticulating towards her. He moved, taking a step towards her, and in that moment Georgiana realised who it was.
She got up very suddenly, and Mrs Burton looked at her quizzically.
‘I just . . . I need some air, Aunt. I’ll only be a moment.’
She patted Georgiana on the arm consolingly, but did not attempt to prevent her from leaving.
Georgiana made her way out of their pew and to the doorway, grateful that the room was still loud enough that she went largely unnoticed.
Jeremiah Russell was now standing a little way down the path with Frances, gesturing rather insistently for her to follow him. She was not prepared for the rush of anger and hatred that welled up in her at the sight of him. She wanted to run away – no, she wanted to hit him; she wanted to hit him and then run away, very fast, never to cross paths with him again. Frances seemed to be resisting, was shaking her head as he tried to get her to leave with him – and then suddenly he took her quite forcefully by the arm and pulled her away, marching her towards the other end of the churchyard where they were unlikely to be disturbed.
Georgiana hesitated for a moment, but then followed them. They were talking in low voices, Frances hissing her responses. Georgiana could sense the thick tension between them in Jeremiah’s frown and Frances’s hunched shoulders, but could not decipher exactly what was happening. Perhaps, Georgiana thought wildly, they had reconciled – perhaps Frances would corroborate his side of the story, if it meant being back in his favour? She knew that most of the well-off families had closed ranks to protect him, but surely Frances would not take up such an enormous lie for a man who had treated her so abominably?
As she drew nearer, attempting to remain out of sight among the trees, Georgiana could hear the alcohol in Jeremiah’s voice. It was thick and slurred, as if he had been drinking for hours already. Perhaps he had not gone to bed; he certainly didn’t look particularly well-rested. He was getting louder and louder, and Frances was shrinking away from him as he did.
‘This is getting out of hand. It’s starting to affect . . . There are men cancelling their meetings with me. My own parents are looking at me like I’m some sort of – some sort of criminal, Frances, and it must stop. I even had a letter from Annabelle, of all people, from inside that bloody convent, and her parents, too, levelling all sorts of accusations. I know I was unkind to you, I . . . I recognise that things did not go as we had hoped—’ ‘Not as we had hoped, Jeremiah?’ Frances’s voice was racked with disbelief. ‘I think they went exactly as you had hoped.’
‘Please, Frances. I am in a . . . a very difficult position.’ His voice had taken on a wheedling tone, and Georgiana wrinkled her nose in disgust. ‘Can’t we just . . . treasure what we had, for what it was, and leave it in the past?’
‘Somehow, Jeremiah, it’s hard to treasure a handful of good memories, knowing what came after them,’ she spat.
‘Oh yes, poor Miss Campbell. Everyone always says you’re the picture of innocence, of course. If you were to talk unfavourably about me, I hope you know that I have plenty to say about your particular character, and nobody would have any trouble believing it of you—’
‘Be quiet, Jeremiah,’ Frances said coldly. ‘You are embarrassing yourself. You have no cause for concern. I am not going to implicate myself in any of your messes.’
Georgiana saw some of the tension go out of Jeremiah’s shoulders. He was so drunk that he was swaying a little where he stood. When she looked at him now she did not see a rich, handsome young man; she saw a drunken reprobate. A selfish, spoilt boy who had never faced consequences for his actions and reacted like a squalling infant when they came to call. Frances was looking at him as if she was finally seeing the same thing.
‘I know you did it,’ she said quietly, fixing him with a defiant look. ‘I might not be shouting about it, but I want you to know that I understand exactly what kind of man you are. I know – I know that George was telling the truth.’
Georgiana’s fingers closed tightly around the branch of the tree that concealed her; she hadn’t known until that moment how much it would still mean to her to hear Frances say those words.
‘That . . . That odious bitch,’ Jeremiah snarled. He had grabbed Frances’s arm again; she tried to shake him off, but he would not let her go, drawing her closer. ‘She’s a liar,
Frances, she’s a liar and a whore who came begging to me for—’
‘Let go, Jeremiah. God – you’re hurting me!’
Frances struggled, trying to prise his fingers off her – but he was smiling at her triumphantly, clearly enjoying watching her fight against him and lose. Georgiana could stand it no longer.
‘Let her go!’ she cried.
She stepped out from her cover, and Jeremiah looked around, startled. Frances used the opportunity to break free and backed away; Jeremiah’s eyes fixed on Georgiana, and as soon as he realised who he was looking at, they narrowed.
‘You! You’re trying to ruin me!’ he shouted.
Georgiana tried and failed to move out of his reach as he ran clumsily towards her. He grabbed her by her shoulders, and up close she saw how bloodshot and unfocused his eyes were. His breath was pungent with drink and smoke, overwhelming her as she tried to twist away from him, and she was suddenly back in the orangery, a scream stuck in her throat; he seemed terrifyingly far gone, a hundred miles past the point of reason. There was no point in trying to refute what he’d said – it was true, and he wouldn’t listen to her anyway. Instead she tried in vain to break his grip on her.
‘Frances! Get help!’ she cried.
Jeremiah knocked her off balance and she fell to the ground, hitting her head hard against a gravestone and struggling to get back up as splitting pain erupted in her temple. Through half-closed eyes she could see Frances scrambling to get away, but Jeremiah had started after her; she reached around for something to throw at him and her hand closed around a large pebble, which she launched at him with as much strength as she could muster. It bounced off his leg, doing him absolutely no harm – but she had his full attention again, leaving Frances free to run.
Georgiana managed to drag herself upright using the crumbling gravestone for support, but by that point he had reached her. In one quick movement he twisted her arm behind her back, pushing so hard she felt it must surely snap. He was so strong, even like this – she hated that.
‘Take it back,’ he hissed at her. ‘Admit that you’re a liar. Tell everybody what really happened. That you were asking for it.’
‘No,’ said Georgiana, her voice shaking, wondering internally at her stupidity even as she did so.
Jeremiah took a furious breath, his eyes widening, and then suddenly wrenched her arm so violently that it felt as if he had torn it off; now Georgiana did hear it break, as clearly and distinctly as she heard herself scream. She had never made a sound like it before, and was quite impressed to find herself capable of it. She fell back to the ground, cradling one useless, excruciating arm with the other, her vision narrowing as she wondered if she was going to vomit. Jeremiah seemed genuinely taken aback by what he had done, even on the verge of an apology, taking a few, staggering steps towards her with his arms outstretched – and then, as if from nowhere, Thomas was upon him.
He had leaped at Jeremiah with such force that it brought them both tumbling to the ground. They struggled there, Jeremiah trying to push him off and failing, and for a moment it seemed as if it all must be over. Thomas had one arm pressed against Jeremiah’s throat, pinning him to the ground – but then Georgiana saw what Thomas had not.
‘Look out!’ she cried.
Thomas noticed the dagger Jeremiah had pulled from inside his coat a second after she did, and threw himself out of the way just in time. Jeremiah pointed it at his former friend with a shaking hand.
‘Have you lost your mind?’ Thomas shouted, scrambling to his feet, blood trickling from a cut on his cheek.
Jeremiah laughed hollowly. ‘Me? What about you? You throw away years of our friendship, for this? After all I did for you . . . They are trying to take everything from me, Hawksley. I – I challenge you!’ he roared, spittle flying from his mouth as he did.
Georgiana stared at him in horror, focusing on breathing evenly in and out so she would not faint from the pain.
‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ Thomas said, raising his hands slowly.
The two men stared at each other for a moment, chests heaving. Jeremiah raised the hand holding the dagger once more – and then suddenly there was a loud crack, and Jeremiah was stumbling, listing to one side, then falling limply to the ground.
Betty Walters was standing where Jeremiah had just been, holding a thick section of tree branch aloft like a sword, her expression going from one of deep concentration to abject horror in an instant.
‘Oh God,’ she whispered. ‘Oh God, oh God. Have I killed him?’
‘I think not,’ said a breathless Frances, who had just arrived from the direction of the church with the entire congregation in tow; they were all making painfully loud noises of consternation. She stopped for a moment to catch her breath, doubled over from the effort, and then walked over to where Jeremiah lay face down in the dirt and nudged him with the toe of her boot. ‘He’s still breathing, more’s the pity. Just knocked out.’
Now that the danger had passed, Georgiana, whose deep breathing had gone more the way of hyperventilating, gave herself permission to faint. As black spots danced and fractured across her vision, she heard Mrs Burton scream; and then, just as she felt Thomas’s arms close around her, the world vanished into darkness.
Chapter Thirty
W
hen Georgiana came to, she found herself lying on a hard wooden pew with a bundle of fabric beneath her head. It seemed to be Mr Burton’s summer coat, judging from his appearance as he stood over her with a worried expression on his face. A stranger was wrangling her arm into a splint with a wooden stick and some strips of fabric, and it was the pain of this that had dragged her back into consciousness.
‘Ow,’ she said, quite unnecessarily.
Thomas, who it transpired was sitting behind her where she had not seen him, took her good hand.
‘Squeeze it until it breaks,’ he said as she tilted her face to peer up at him. He was smiling at her weakly, unable to conceal his concern.
‘Surely that would defeat the purpose,’ Georgiana said, wincing and breathing hard while her arm was wrapped tightly against its support. ‘If I broke your fingers, we would have to make five tiny splints, and you would need to squeeze my hand, and we’d begin a never-ending . . . a never-ending cycle of splinting.’
She gasped as the last strip was tied off, then thanked the man who had done it through gritted teeth.
‘You need a surgeon,’ he said. ‘I haven’t set this properly, but it’ll hold for now. It’s a clean break, but it’s a bad one, miss.’
‘Oh,’ Georgiana said, her head still swimming.
Mrs Burton was peering down at her, eyes pink from crying.
‘Have they arrested him?’ Georgiana asked her aunt, while her uncle shook hands with her makeshift doctor.
Mrs Burton shook her head, her worry turning to anger.
‘They sent for the constable, but all concern was for you. One man was watching him, but he awoke and slipped out of his grasp. He was long gone by the time help arrived.’
‘I imagine he’ll return to his family’s house in Manchester,’ Thomas said grimly, ‘where they shall close the doors for a while until they hope all has been forgotten.’
Georgiana sighed and gingerly sat up, ignoring Mrs Burton’s protests. Her head was throbbing painfully. When she put her hand to it, she found that her hair was matted with dried blood, but that she did not seem to be currently bleeding. She searched the crowd still assembled in the church – nobody was likely to leave any time soon, and render themselves unable to retell even a small part of this story later – until she spotted Frances sitting in a pew, Jane’s arm firmly around her shoulders.
‘I would like to speak to Miss Campbell, if she’ll come,’ she told Thomas.
He nodded and went to fetch her, politely drawing the Burtons away upon his return so that they could be alone together.
Frances looked shaken, but fiercely angry; now that she had summoned her, Georgiana wasn’t quite sure what to
say.
Luckily, Frances spoke first.
‘Betty Walters, hero of the day,’ she said incredulously, and Georgiana laughed, stopping abruptly when it hurt too much. ‘She had noticed you were gone, you know. She was coming to look for you when I bumped into her. I went to fetch the others, but she barrelled on ahead. Who knew she was so adept with a blunt object?’
‘She’s wonderful,’ Georgiana said emphatically.
Frances shrugged. ‘I wish she had killed him,’ she said simply. ‘If only Ces had brought her bow. You looked like you had died, passing out like that with your head all covered in blood.’
‘I gave it a good go.’
‘Incidentally,’ Frances continued, ‘it was excessively stupid of you to follow us.’ She was fiddling with the fingers of her gloves as if she might actually be nervous. ‘Frankly, it was none of your business.’
‘Well, I think we’ve all made some questionable choices of late,’ Georgiana said with a wry smile.
Frances stiffened, as if she might be about to take offence, but then just rolled her eyes instead and got to her feet.
‘Speak for yourself.’
Georgiana tried to sit up straighter and found that it hurt far too much to be feasible.
‘Look – I know we’re not friends anymore. I won’t come to the house again. But if you do want to talk – about any of it – I am still here.’
‘You look dreadful,’ said Frances stiffly, ignoring this. ‘You should burn that dress.’
‘All right, Frances,’ Georgiana said, sighing and closing her eyes. ‘I give up.’
She was far too tired for any more of this – it had probably been foolish of her to attempt it in the first place.
When she opened her eyes again she expected Frances to be gone, but she was still hovering, her jaw tensed.
‘I’m . . . I suppose, overall,’ she said with some effort, ‘I do regret that things have turned out the way they have. He certainly wasn’t the man I thought he was, and there are some things I could have . . . Well, anyway. I’m glad. That you’re not dead, I mean.’