Alone.
She always kept a pile of handkerchiefs beside her bed, so her tears were appropriately mopped up. Dispatched and accounted for, understood.
She had loved Miles, in the same mild way that he loved her, with full awareness of each other’s foibles. They hadn’t lived together for ten years, but they were fond of each other. So missing him was part of the tears.
Guilt at being party to his death—ah, that was a greater part. She just kept wishing that she’d told Sebastian that the reconciliation with Miles was imminent. Of course he assumed it was happening at an unknown point in the future. It only made sense: every person at Lady Troubridge’s house party knew that Miles and Lady Randolph Childe had adjoining rooms.
Who would ever think that Miles and she would reconcile for the sole purpose of making a child? That Miles would wish to do so immediately? Sebastian probably thought she meant that they would reconcile when they were back in London.
If only, if only, if only, if only. It beat in her head with every breath of air she took.
More tears, so hard-won that her chest hurt with every gasp. And all those tears couldn’t mask a feeling that she was ashamed to be having.
She missed Sebastian.
Not due to their one night, either. She missed him for his sturdy, commonsensical, aristocratic self. For all the annoying things that drove her friend Gina to distraction when she was engaged to him: his honor, his rigidity, his strength of character and mind. The way he saw straight to the heart of a problem. The way he was always controlled and practical, except—Esme thought with mingled pleasure and guilt—except when it came to herself. Only in her presence was he consumed with passion, and only for her did he discard society’s strictures.
Because Sebastian was gone. He had left for Europe in the wake of a howling scandal. He had told everyone he had mistaken the room when he entered Esme’s chamber, that he thought he was entering the room of his supposed wife: Gina.
Except he wasn’t even truly married to Gina, that he had tried to hoodwink the Duchess of Girton with a false marriage certificate because he wanted to bed her and not wed her.
It was just like her darling, honorable Sebastian: in one blow, he saved her reputation and allowed Gina to return to the husband she really wanted. Gina sailed to Greece with her beloved Cam, and Esme retired to the country to mourn. And Sebastian, rigid, proper, honorable Sebastian, sailed to Europe, his reputation in shreds. All England believed him unmasked as an arch villain, so desperate to bed the duchess that he tricked her into believing he had a special license.
The ton dined out for months on the duchess’s lucky escape: why, if Sebastian Bonnington hadn’t mistook the Duchess of Girton’s bedchamber and ended up in the bedchamber of Lord and Lady Rawlings, why…he would have succeeded in bedding the duchess without the benefit of marriage.
That was the irony of it. Esme was the loose one, the one whose reputation deserved to be ruined, who should be living on the Continent, exiled and alone.
But Sebastian had sacrificed himself and his reputation, and made himself a pariah in the eyes of his countrymen. So now Sebastian was somewhere in the world, alone.
Or perhaps not alone. Now that he knew desire, and he knew pleasure, surely he would find a beautiful woman to marry. A woman who would understand immediately that he was honorable, and understand why he created the story about the wedding license, the one that sent him into exile.
That woman would probably rejoice, in fact, because the scandal brought him to her.
And if Sebastian had a thought for the infamous Esme Rawlings, it would only be with a moue of distaste at his own stupidity, for by seducing her, he had ruined his life.
These tears were bitter, and they tasted of heartbreak.
12
The Next Morning
Tears and Secrets Are the Best of Friends
Lady Rawlings’s morning parlor was utterly charming, and by all rights occupants should feel frolicsome, if not joyous. Henrietta paused for a moment and savored the way the sun danced through rose gauze curtains and sent rosy streaks of light across the floor.
That was before she took a look at Lady Rawlings herself. The elegant leader of the ton had a pallid complexion and shadows under her eyes, neither of which were complemented by lemony yellow wallpaper.
“I have chosen the wrong moment to pay you a visit,” Henrietta said. “I had offered to help Mr. Darby choose a nursemaid, but I could easily—”
“Absolutely not!” Her hostess tried to smile and failed. “Please do sit down, Lady Henrietta. I’m certain Simon will be down directly. May I offer you some tea?”
Henrietta sat down beside her hostess and watched as a tear rolled off Lady Rawlings’s beautifully shaped nose.
“When Mrs. Raddle in the village was enceinte,” she said in a conversational sort of way, “her husband swore that he would never allow her to have another child. She screamed at him like a fishwife the entire time.”
“Truly?” Lady Rawlings handed her a cup of tea and mopped up the fugitive tear with a soggy handkerchief.
“I heard her myself,” Henrietta said. “Poor Mr. Raddle was a bit stout, and first his wife called him a gammon-faced glutton, and then she accused him of being hogbuttocked. It was some six years ago, but I’ve never forgotten the magnificent phrase hog-buttocked.” She put down her tea. Tears were falling faster and faster down Lady Rawlings’s face.
“Oh dear.” Her hostess smiled in a miserable sort of way. “I’m afraid if Mrs. Raddle is a fishwife, I’m a wet blanket. To be honest, I cry most of the time. My nanny says I’ll hurt the babe.”
Henrietta reached in her pocket and took out a clean handkerchief, which she used to wipe Lady Rawlings’s face. Then she said: “I haven’t the faintest idea about crying while in a delicate condition, although I think it is extremely unlikely that it would hurt your child. I do think that crying is not the best choice for the morning though.”
“Why…why not? What could possibly be a better choice?” Lady Rawlings was clearly not herself.
“Tears will make your tea salty. Here, drink this.” Henrietta had found that activity had a tendency to curb hysteria.
Esme Rawlings drank some tea, but it didn’t seem to stem the tears.
“I expect you miss your husband dreadfully,” Henrietta said. “I’m so sorry.”
She gulped and said, “Of course, I miss…I miss my husband Miles, of course I do.”
There was something odd about her tone. Henrietta was as aware as anyone that Miles and Esme Rawlings hadn’t lived together for years. Moreover, having lived in Limpley Stoke all her life, she had quite frequently encountered Lord Rawlings in company with one Lady Childe. Everyone knew about that connection. But then, last night Darby had implied that his uncle and aunt had reconciled before Lord Rawlings died.
“They say the pain eases with time,” she said rather awkwardly.
“It’s just difficult, bearing a child under these circumstances. And now that Darby and children are here, I feel so…so…” Her voice trailed off.
“Perhaps if you think about your baby, it will make you feel better.”
“I can’t imagine,” Lady Rawlings said, and there really was an edge of hysteria in her voice. “I don’t know what my baby will look like!”
“Well, no one ever does, do they? But it doesn’t seem to matter. I can assure you that you will be pleased by its looks no matter how unaesthetic. Mrs. Raddle’s son is as plump as a parsnip, and yet she has never called him a gammon-faced glutton. Which he is, I assure you. He won a pie-eating contest last spring and he’s barely seven!”
Esme Rawlings said, in one long wail, “You don’t understand. I don’t …I don’t…. I’m not certain what my babywill look like!”
Henrietta blinked. “But, Lady Rawlings—”
“Don’t call me that, please just don’t call me that name!”
Esme was clearly descending into a state of hysteria. Henrietta looke
d around. Hartshorn or strong spirits were supposed to cure this sort of thing. She never carried a vinaigrette herself.
Luckily Lady Rawlings didn’t appear in imminent danger of a thrashing fit. “My name is Esme,” she said rather fiercely, taking a spoonful of sugar and placing it in her tea. “Please call me Esme. The fact of the matter—”
She raised the delicate teacup to her lips and met Henrietta’s eyes over the rim of it. “The fact of the matter is that I am uncertain who fathered this babe.”
By a strong exertion of will, Henrietta managed to show no sign of shock. She picked up her own teacup and took a sip. “Ah, is the—are there many candidates?”
“You sound like my friend Gina. The Duchess of Girton. That is just the sort of thing that she would say. She’s so practical. Gina would never find herself in this situation.” Esme started crying again. “I’ve been a terrible friend to her.”
Henrietta tried to think of more practical, bracing things to say. And couldn’t since she didn’t really have any idea what Lady Rawlings was talking about.
“You see, Gina was going to marry Lord Bonnington but didn’t,” Esme gulped. “And I’m afraid that he might be the father of this babe.”
Henrietta’s eyes grew round. She knew, of course, about the perfidious marquess, and his rapscallion attempt to trick the Duchess of Girton. “The same marquess who tried to force the duchess—to—”
“No, no. That whole story was naught but a tarradiddle. He entered my room because he was looking for me. Because—he was looking for me.”
“And he found your husband instead,” Henrietta said. “That was bad luck.” And there was something so gentle about her voice that Esme felt imperceptibly soothed and even forgiven.
“Henrietta—do you mind if I call you Henrietta?” At her smile, Esme continued. “I’m a miserable excuse for a human being. But I do love him, and it’s just so impossible!”
Henrietta was trying to work it all out. “You love Lord Bonnington—”
“I truly am not a loose woman, for all my reputation,” Esme interrupted. “I spent one night with Sebastian, only one. But it happened to be the night before Miles and I reconciled due to our decision to have a child. My husband said he needed to speak to Lady Childe first—” She peered at Henrietta through swollen eyes. “Do you know about Lady Childe?”
At Henrietta’s nod, she said, “You must think that we’re a most degenerate group of people. But we’re not, truly. Miles and I married in error, and then years later he found some happiness with Lady Childe. Except that he desperately wanted an heir, and so obviously he had to inform her…” She trailed off.
“And the previous night you and the marquess, ah—”
“Exactly,” Esme said miserably.
“The marquess has left for the Continent, has he not?” Henrietta had a vague memory of Imogen excitedly recounting the entire sordid tale of the Bonnington scandal as culled from The Daily Recorder’s News from Town.
“Yes. And I don’t know whether the baby is his, or whether the baby is Miles’s.”
“Then you do not have a problem at all,” Henrietta said, smiling brilliantly at Esme. “Because this baby is yours, not anyone else’s.”
“Well, I suppose that is true, but—”
Henrietta put a hand on her arm. “I truly mean it, Lady Rawlings—Esme. This child is yours. When he is born, he will be a blotchy little thing whom no one but yourself could love. Have you ever seen a newborn?”
Esme shook her head.
“They’re quite homely. And from what I’ve heard, you have a devilish time getting them into the world, and then there they are, without a hair to their name, and all splotchy in the bargain. But he’ll be yours. If you want him, that is.”
Esme wrapped her arms around her stomach. “Oh, I do, I do! I want him. Or her.”
“Then I fail to see the problem. The child is born under the aegis of your marriage.”
“If it was just me, I wouldn’t feel so hideously guilty,” Esme said. “But there’s Darby as well.”
“Darby is a grown man,” Henrietta said crisply.
“Yes, but you don’t understand. Darby was quite wealthy until around a year ago. And then his father died, and Darby became the guardian of his two small sisters. But he was Miles’s heir—”
“Heir apparent. I have very little sympathy for a perfectly healthy gentleman like Mr. Darby. His way is clear, and I have every expectation that he will take it. He needs must marry an heiress. Luckily enough for him, he has the face and figure to carry it off.”
“But it’s so unfair,” Esme protested.
“I don’t see anything unfair about it.”
“But don’t you see—”
“No. I would give anything to be Mr. Darby, with two beautiful children to raise. He can marry someone—anyone!”
There was a moment’s silence. “I’m so sorry,” Esme said. “I knew, of course, that you cannot have children of your own. But I didn’t hesitate to burden you with my dismal tale. It was unforgivably rude of me.”
Henrietta smiled at her a bit wanly. “There’s nothing to forgive.”
“Yes, there is. I’ve been nattering on about matters that must seem trivial in relation to your circumstances.”
“It is true that I would love to be in your shoes.”
A short laugh escaped Esme. “Don’t you understand what sort of a scandal I’m in? What an awful wife to Miles I was? That I’m practically responsible for his death!”
“That seems an irrational conclusion. According to all accounts that I heard, Lord Rawlings’s heart gave out. Unfortunately, his death could have occurred at any moment. As it is, he has the heir he wanted, and you are going to have a baby. You’re going to have a beautiful, miraculous baby.” She hesitated, and then said, “I wouldn’t give a fig if I had no father for my child at all!”
Esme reached out and took Henrietta’s delicate hand in hers. “Are you absolutely certain that you cannot bear a child?”
“Yes. But I should not want you to think that I feel heartache, for I do not, most of the time. However, if someone gave me a babe, I would not quibble too much over the circumstances of its birth.”
“Well,” Esme said thoughtfully, “I think you were probably the best person on earth to whom I could have confided my sordid little secret.”
“I’m afraid that one of the things about having a condition such as I have is that one grows ruthless. I spend a great deal of time watching people, and it has caused me to become rather eccentric in my opinions. My sister complains constantly that I am becoming peculiar.”
“Certainly most woman I know would regard me as a monster for what I have confessed to you,” Esme said, looking curiously at Henrietta. “To be frank, I can’t quite believe that I told you at all.”
“I shan’t tell a soul. And I do beg you not to give further thought to Mr. Darby’s possible disinheritance. He is a grown man, after all.”
“You should marry him,” Esme said suddenly. “He has the children you want, and you—you are remarkably beautiful, Henrietta, which is of paramount importance to him.”
“Now why would I want to marry a man with lace cuffs and an obsession with beauty?”
Now that Esme was paying attention, she saw that Henrietta’s smile was astonishingly lovely. “He really isn’t like that. I know he has a reputation for being finicky, and he does dress carefully. But Darby is quite sensible. Please at least consider marrying him!”
“He hasn’t asked me,” Henrietta pointed out. “And he won’t. Men want their own children. I shall not marry.”
“Not Darby! Darby loathes children. You should have heard him on the subject before he took responsibility for his sisters. Can you imagine Darby being truly interested in one of those spotty, hairless objects, as you described them?”
“It is difficult to imagine,” Henrietta said with a chuckle.
Esme turned her head quickly. “And here he comes! Darby, do t
ell me what you think of children?”
In the morning light Darby was actually more elegant than he had been the night before, if that was possible. His waistcoat had embroidery all down the front and smooth scallops of lace adorned his wrists.
He paused and bowed. Even his smallest gesture had a studied elegance. “If I inform you that this is my second suit of clothing of the day, due to Anabel’s unfortunate propensity to spray her breakfast in all directions, would that suffice to answer your inquiry? Good day to you, Lady Henrietta.” He bowed before Esme, and Henrietta saw him register her tear-stained face.
“Perhaps if Anabel were your own daughter, you wouldn’t feel the same,” Esme suggested.
Darby shuddered. “I believe not. I want neither the responsibility nor the drudgery associated with children.” He looked truly pained.
Henrietta couldn’t help smiling. “Children needn’t be such hard work. Most fathers rarely see their offspring and have no qualms about their upbringing.”
“No,” he said firmly. “I am quite happy to say that I have no interest in reproducing myself.”
If he didn’t have such a clearly defined chin, Henrietta would have thought he was nothing but a fribble. As it was, she felt a prickly awareness of the leashed strength of his legs. Trousers didn’t look that handsome on Wiltshire gentlemen!
Esme started to rise, and Darby immediately moved to her side and helped her up. “Are you feeling quite well?” he asked.
Esme looked a little embarrassed. “I’m afraid I’ve been pouring my tedious tale into Henrietta’s ear. And I did the same to you last night. I did warn you.” She gave Darby a lopsided smile. “I’m a terrible wet blanket these days.”
He had a sweet smile, to Henrietta’s mind.
Esme was fussing about with her shawl. “I believe I shall visit my chambers for a moment. No, please do not bother to accompany me. I shall return directly because we are expecting the nursemaids within minutes, are we not? Not only that, but the employment agency promised to send along at least one candidate for gardener as well. Please excuse me, Henrietta. I shall leave you unchaperoned for only a minute or two.” Then she bent down and whispered in her ear. “You see? No children!” And she left.