by Nina Mason
Benedict greeted her with a friendly smile and cordial nod. “Good morning, Miss Bennet. Are you looking forward to the party tonight?”
“I am indeed, Mr. Churchill. What about you?”
“Oh, yes. I expect it will be jolly good fun.” Turning to his father, who was standing by the fire, he said, “What do you say, father? Will not tonight’s party be jolly good fun?”
“It might be, were I more intimately acquainted with anyone in attendance.”
“What do you mean?” Benedict inquired. “Your two sons will be there … as will your future daughters-in-law. What more could you ask for than that?”
“Have I not warned you before about counting your chickens before they are hatched?” Lord Wingfield scoldingly replied. “For neither of my sons, insofar as I am aware, has put a ring on any young lady’s finger.”
“Not from lack of trying, I daresay,” Benedict told him while grinning impishly at Georgie. “But, as I’ve just told you, the lady’s brother will not permit me to court her officially until we have both completed our educations.”
“And what about you, Miss Bennet? Have you seen my eldest since he and I spoke?” After a momentary pause, Lord Wingfield, realizing his lapse, added, “Oh, but of course you have. For he informed you of my summons, did he not?”
“He did, yes,” Georgie confirmed. “In the kitchen just now.”
Benedict laughed. “Which would explain, I expect, why you are covered in flour.”
Georgie, reminded of her appearance, felt a blush rise to her cheeks. “My sister and I have been making pies this morning … for tonight’s gathering.”
Lord Wingfield came nearer and smiled at her warmly. “Flour becomes you, Miss Bennet. As does your industry.” As he turned to his son, the smile fell away from his lips. “Please leave us now, Benedict, and do close the door as you exit. For I wish to speak to Miss Bennet in private.” As his son started toward the door, the Earl called after him, “Go and see if Miss Stubbs has yet left the house. And, if she has, bring your brother to me.”
“Of course, father,” Benedict said, and took his leave. “I shall do so at once.”
When the door shut behind him, Lord Wingfield led Georgie to the pair of chairs by the fire. As she took one, she blushed, remembering her assignation with Christian the night before.
Lord Wingfield began thusly: “First, I want to thank you for bringing to my attention my eldest son’s dilemma. Had you not, I fear the worst might have happened. For I believe he meant to keep it from his parents until after he married that conniving little croqueuse de diamants. Upon my word, the thought of it turns me inside out. Can you imagine such a creature as the mistress of Wingfield Hall? Heaven and earth!—of what was he thinking?”
Georgie, unsettled by the violence of his lordship’s assertions, merely said, “My motives, as you are no doubt aware, were not entirely selfless.”
“Even so, Miss Bennet, I am exceedingly grateful to you for sparing my family the embarrassment of Miss Stubbs. I have spoken to her, and believe I have effectively nullified any claim she pretended to have on him.”
“I am pleased to hear it, your lordship,” Georgie said, looking down at her fidgeting hands. “As I am certain Christian shall be.”
There was a silence before Lord Wingfield said, “I believe you have been a good influence on him.”
“You flatter me, sir. For I can assure you I have little or no effect on his character.”
“You are too modest, Miss Bennet. For I find him much changed—or dare I say tamed—since the last time we met.”
“If he is altered, as you say, it was accomplished through his own labors, and not mine.”
“Your honesty and modesty do you credit, Miss Bennet. As does your unswerving devotion to my son. For it is rare indeed to find a lady who attaches herself to a gentleman, especially a knave like my son, without secretly designing to change him.”
“To be honest, sir, I confess to being a bit of a knave myself—an inclination of which I have only become aware since my father’s demise. And I do not desire to be tamed, as you say, any more than I wish to break your son’s spirit.”
“Then you will make him an even better wife than I already suspected.”
“Perhaps ... if circumstances allow us to marry.”
“Circumstances? What circumstances now stand in your way? Have I not just cleared the way for the two of you to wed?”
“On the contrary,” she said gloomily. “You have made it impossible for us to do so.”
Forgive me, Miss Bennet, but I do not take your meaning. How have I made it impossible for you and my son to marry?”
“By revoking his legacy, you have thrown him to the wolves. Surely you knew what would befall him when you cut him off.”
“And you will not have him, I suppose, now that he is bankrupt.”
“No, sir. It is he who will not have me. For he feels it would be unfair to leave me destitute and unprotected whilst he rots away in debtor’s prison.”
Lord Wingfield seemed surprised. “He told you this?”
“Yes, just before I came in. And, though it pains me dreadfully to delay our marriage, I cannot say I disagree with his logic.”
“To delay your marriage?” he asked, astonished once more. “Do you intend to wait for him, then?”
“Of course. Just as I would if he were a sailor at sea.”
“That is very handsome of you, Miss Bennet. Very handsome indeed. And if he were free and clear of his debts, would you marry him at once?”
“Yes,” she replied without hesitation, “if he wished it.”
Their discussion was interrupted by a rap upon the door. “You may enter,” Lord Wingfield called out to the knocker.
With bated breath, Georgie watched the door swing open. To her relief, Benedict was not alone on the other side. That Christian was with him meant, God be thanked, that Miss Stubbs had left the house. And with her gone, they would at least be free to enjoy themselves that evening without further harassment.
“Miss Bennet.” The Earl turned to her with a cordial smile. “Will you kindly excuse us? And you, too, Benedict. For I require a few moments alone with my eldest.”
“Of course,” she said, rising from her chair. Then, with burning curiosity and a cordial nod to Christian, she and Benedict promptly quitted the room together.
* * * *
“I must say I am impressed with your Miss Bennet,” Lord Wingfield said after Christian claimed the seat Georgie had only just vacated. “But was dismayed to learn from her that you have elected to postpone your nuptials until you’ve served out your term in debtor’s prison.”
“Under the circumstances,” Christian said gloomily, “it seemed the most chivalrous path open to me.”
“Is that the real reason for the delay?—or might you be entertaining second thoughts about marrying the lady?”
“Not at all,” Christian replied with fire in his belly. “I still wish to make her my wife more than anything in the world.”
His father sat back and steepled his fingers. “That being the case, I have a proposal that will enable you to do so immediately.”
Christian struggled to keep his hopes in check, for it was unrealistic to expect his father to reinstate his inheritance so painlessly. “I’m all ears.”
“Firstly, I propose to pay off your debts, so that you can evade incarceration.”
“That is very handsome of you. Very handsome indeed. But, at the risk of sounding like an ingrate, I will still need an income to support a wife.”
“And providing you with one encompasses the second part of my proposal.”
“Which is what?”
“I mean to give you the command of one of my ships.”
In addition to his sugar plantation, Christian’s father operated an import/export business that shipped sugar, rum, and other goods in and out of the West Indies.
Christian was flabbergasted. “You, give me the command of a ship?
You who raised such a hullabaloo the first time I went to sea?”
“That was different,” his father insisted.
“Was it? How so?”
“At the time, you were the heir to the Earldom … and there was a war on. You might have been killed or maimed, like your poor friend.”
“Captain Raynalds manages well enough,” Christian offered resentfully.
“Better now that he has a wife to look after him, I’ll wager.”
“Indeed,” Christian agreed. “He’s very fortunate in that regard, given her father’s objections. You wouldn’t know this, unless Benedict told you, but the Captain and I searched high and low for Louisa Bennet, as was, before we finally found her, in the church where her arranged marriage to a cousin was to take place in a matter of hours.”
“I never did approve of Sir Malcolm’s methods,” his father said, scratching his nose. “For rumors circulated in London, you know, that he beat his wife and trifled with his daughters.”
So shocked was Christian by his father’s revelation that his jaw went slack and his mouth fell open. “Trifled with them? Surely you cannot mean he …?”
“That is precisely what was implied … though I cannot confirm if the rumors were true. Has Miss Bennet never spoken to you of her father? Has she given you no hint of the sort of relationship they had?”
Christian racked his brain for anything Georgie might have said about Sir Malcolm. He knew, of course, from first-hand observation that the gentleman beat his daughters and ruled over his household with an iron fist, but so did a goodly number of fathers and husbands of his acquaintance. She’d also said her father was an elitist snob who hated Catholics, but that was not out of the ordinary, either.
“She has said very little about him, actually.”
“May I ask you something?”
“Of course.”
“If Sir Malcolm had been inappropriate with her, would it lessen your desire to wed her?”
“I honestly cannot say.” Christian forced the words past the lump in his throat. “I’ll need to think … and talk to her, of course … and recover from my shock … before I make up my mind.”
“Well, I advise you to do all of those things before going off half-cocked, my dear boy. For your Miss Bennet is a treasure, and ought not to be condemned for her father’s sins.”
Yes, she was, a treasure too precious to discard over something imposed upon her by an unscrupulous villain. This, he understood intellectually, but his heart was less rational, as hearts were wont to be.
“Will you excuse me, father? For there is much for me to consider before I know what to do.”
“Of course, my dear boy. It’s perfectly understandable, given all I’ve thrown at you in the space of a few hours.”
“Yes,” he said abstractedly as he bolted from the room. He started toward the stairs, but changed his mind halfway there. He needed to get away from here, to go somewhere he could think this all through without the fear of bumping into Georgie before he was ready to discuss their future. Veering toward the entry hall, he put on his outerwear and left the house.
Fortunately, he’d put on his Hessians after rising, so he marched straight to the stable and asked the first groom he came upon to saddle him a horse. Too anxious to stand still, he paced while he waited. When, at long bloody last, the beast was ready, he threw a leg over, and set off across the grounds at a brisk trot.
The snow was deep, but the sun was shining. Its warmth cut the chill and felt good on his face. Despite all that weighed on his mind, it was invigorating to be out of doors with a horse under him. Since leaving the Navy, he’d become too sedentary, too accustomed to carriages, and far too soft around the midsection.
As he rode through the woods behind Greystone, he struggled to wrap his mind around all he’d been presented with that morning. Each was a sword that cut both ways. He had lost his fortune and livelihood.
Yes, he would still be the Earl of Wingfield, a role he’d spent the better part of his life both rebelling against and preparing to undertake, but in name only.
Though a devastating blow in many ways, it also freed him to live his life as he chose—within limited parameters, of course. He could command a cargo ship or go to debtor’s prison. He could marry Georgie, whatever her father may or may not have done, or remain a bachelor. He could mend his ways or remain a rogue. Those were the choices open to him at present. The only choices, as far as it went.
The first was the easiest to make, as there was really no contest between a prison cell and the wide-open sea. He would, therefore, accept his father’s offer to pay off his creditors and purchase him a ship.
Captain Churchill.
He liked the sound of it well enough, even if he had no idea at present what to do with a ship. He might transport sugar, he supposed, or rum, between the West Indies and Great Britain. He might even carry passengers, but not slaves. Passengers were one thing; human cargo quite another.
Where Georgie was concerned, the choice was less clear. While he loved her without question, he feared he could not wholly accept her past—if indeed anything untoward had taken place.
Had her father trifled with her? Every feeling within him rioted in protest, but he could not forget the twisted things he had read all those years ago. He had found the handwritten manuscript among the dispatches confiscated during the capture of Didon, a forty-gun frigate of the French Navy he and his shipmates boarded at the Battle of Finesterre.
Scrawled across the title page was the word “Incest.” The story, true to its title, told of a father who reared his daughter to be his consort, under the unsuspecting eyes of his blindly devoted wife. The tale’s only redeeming quality, in Christian’s opinion, was that the father got his just desserts in the end.
Only later did he learn the book had been banned from publication in France, the reason, no doubt, the copy he found had been laboriously written out in longhand.
Was Georgie’s father like the man in the book?
As much as the thought galled and repulsed him, he must know the truth. But how to broach such a delicate subject without upsetting her?—or, heaven forbid, ever crawl out of the hole he would dig for himself if the rumors were false?
The first time they made love, she gave every indication of inexperience. “Christian,” he clearly recalled her saying, “while I know this will work—because, well … it has worked since humanity began—I fear it will not be agreeable … on my part, at least.”
Would she have been so unsure and afraid if she’d done it before? Not unless she was acting a part, and he refused to believe she was either artful or talented enough to deliver such a convincing performance. He could, therefore, only conclude that if her father had interfered with her, he’d not taken things as far as penetration.
Not that stopping short of intercourse made his crimes any less unforgiveable. No indeed. But he must take care not to leap to conclusions. Until confirmed, the rumors were only rumors. And he knew very well how vicious the fashionable set could be when dishing dirt on their fellows. Unfortunately, there was, as often as not, a kernel of truth at the heart of their twattle.
Christian was equally aware how common it was for fathers and brothers to sexually exploit their daughters and sisters, especially in working-class households. He’d heard tales of it from more than one shipmate under the influence of strong drink. Even Capt. Raynalds had once or twice let it slip that he’d fought tooth and nail to keep his father away from Winnie.
It was despicable, really, what beasts—nay, monsters—men could be when unconstrained by conscience, religious conviction, or the rules of propriety. He might be a scoundrel, but he was not without good principles or the facility to distinguish right from wrong.
Incest, in his books, was irrefutably wrong, and so was impugning the victims of familial molesters. Yes, yes. Now that he’d thought it through, he could see that Georgie deserved not his denunciation, but his sympathy, benevolence, and protection. He would
, therefore, not only marry her, but also offer her his shoulder to cry upon.
As for the third choice, well … he’d already made up his mind, more or less, to reform. He’d meant it when he told his father he was ashamed of himself. He was determined to be a better man from now on, for Georgie’s sake, as well as his own.
Christian looked out from his thoughts to find he had reached the main road. This startled him, as did the one-horse carriage parked along the lane. The driver’s seat was unoccupied, but there was a passenger within. A lady, judging by the frilly bonnet he could see through the lowered window. Was the poor creature stranded out here all alone?
Presuming the driver had walked toward town in search of help, he urged his horse forward, to offer whatever assistance he might. He could not see her face from atop his horse, as it was hidden beneath the brim of her fashionable bonnet. When he was a few feet from the carriage, he climbed down from his horse. As he made his approach on foot, her head remained titled toward her lap. Either she was asleep, he decided, or so engrossed in reading she’d not heard the crunching of his footfalls in the snow.
He stopped an arm’s length from the carriage door. When still she did not look up, he cleared his throat and said, “Madam, may I be of service?”
Up came her head, making visible to him the last face in the world he wanted to see. Shock and suspicion struck a two-fisted blow. “Miss Stubbs! Judas God. What the devil are you playing at?”
He heard behind him what he attributed to his horse pawing at the snow. Too late, he discovered his error. Something struck the back of his head so hard he saw stars.
“Did you really think you could be rid of me so easily—or so cheaply?”
The second blow produced a flash of white light and a lightning bolt of pain. He was too dazed to reply … or even gather his thoughts. Whoever was behind him clocked him again. He saw a flash of white light as his legs went out from under him. He landed in the road, face-down in the snow. Before his body could register the cold, the world faded into darkness.