Valentine

Chapter Eight

The Black Dog in Spitalfields was an unwholesome establishment, generally frequented by cutpurses and villains of various trades. It was well-known to the Bow Street Runners, who, more often than not, were indistinguishable in appearance from their quarry on the other side of the law.

On the evening of the day the Gazette carried the news of Sylvester Gilbraith's engagement to Theodora Belmont, a man stepped out of a hackney carriage outside the tavern and stood on the mired cobbles, his aquiline nose twitching at the stench of rotten garbage and human waste flowing in the open kennels running alongside the filthy lane.

A ragged urchin seemed to stumble against him, but before he could regain his footing, Captain Neil Gerard of His Majesty's Third Dragoans had collared him. The lad, no more than seven or eight, stared in wild-eyed terror at his captor, who pried open the boy's clenched fist with fingers of steel.

"Thief." the captain declared with cold dispassion as he retrieved his watch from the grimy palm. He raised his silver-handled cane as the child screamed. No one took any notice of the scene or the child's cries as he fell to his knees beneath the relentless blows. Such violence was relatively mild by the standards of this part of London, and even the urchin knew, as he lay sniveling in the gutter, that he'd escaped lightly. If the gent had handed him over the beadles, he'd have faced the hangman's noose in Newgate Yard or the transportation hulks lying in the Thames estuary.

Captain Gerard kicked at the skinny huddled body by way of parting and strode into the inn, ducking his head beneath the low lintel.

His eyes streamed from the thick smoke rising from a dozen clay pipes and the noxious stench of the sea coal burning in the great hearth, despite the warm summer evening. Men glanced up from their tankards or their dice and then looked down again. Jud's tavern was a flash house – a place where a man could do business of a certain kind without drawing attention to himself.

A man could find a prizefighter, a murderer, an arsonist, a lock breaker, a highwayman, if he knew who and how to ask and had the right currency.

The man behind the bar counter had the brutally disfigured countenance of one who lived by violence. A scarlet cicatrix slashed his cheek where a French sword had cut to the bone, his nose had been broken in so many fights that he could no longer breathe through it, and his mouth was permanently open, revealing one black front tooth. A stained patch covered the empty socket of his left eye.

"Well, well, if it ain't the cap'n." He greeted the newcomer with what might have been a smile but was more of a sneer. "It's that day agin, is it? Amazin' 'ow the time passes." He drew a tankard of ale and drank deeply, wiping the froth off his mouth with the back of a filthy hand.

"What can I offer ye, then, sir?" His sneer broadened. He knew the captain wouldn't touch anything in this house.

Captain Gerard didn't deign to reply. This weekly ordeal of humiliation grew harder each occasion, but he had no choice. And most particularly not now. He drew a heavy leather pouch from his pocket and dropped it onto the counter with a clunk.

"Oh, what 'ave we 'ere, then?" Jud opened the pouch and shook the golden guineas onto the counter, where they gleamed dully against the stained planking.

"Only four, sir?" His voice took on a mocking whine. "An' there was I thinkin' we'd agreed on a bit extra… now just 'cause me memory's gettin' better by the day… Unusual that, innit?" He wiped the counter with his sleeve, his one eye glittering with malice. "Most people forgets things as they get on… but not me… not Jud O'Flannery."

Neil Gerard felt the familiar fury mingling with the humiliation of his helplessness. This man had him. He held in the palm of one massive filthy hand the captain's reputation, his social standing, possibly even his life – a firing squad was the penalty for cowardice in the face of the enemy.

"That Major Gilbraith, now, 'e was a good sort," Jud mused. "A brave man… everyone says as 'ow 'e was one o' the best officers they 'ad in the Peninsula. Even old Nosey thought so."

The Duke of Wellington, so familiarly referred to, had indeed thought highly of Sylvester Gilbraith. It was that opinion that had saved the major from the conviction for cowardice that as easily as acquittal could have resulted from the hazy facts. But the duke had insisted that his old favorite be given the benefit of the doubt.

And that left Neil Gerard with an insoluble problem that would stay with him for as long as both Sylvester Gilbraith and Jud O'Flannery existed together on earth.

But Jud didn't know that his old captain's problem had suddenly worsened. Sylvester was now the Earl of Stoneridge, about to make an excellent marriage. He would be bound to reenter Society. The old story would be resurrected, there would be whispers – but Society forgave quickly, particularly when it was only a rumor and the subject had such impeccable entrees to the secluded world of privilege inhabited by the ton.

Reopening the story was the last thing Captain Gerard wanted. People would ask questions, maybe increasingly searching questions, and what if Sylvester began to probe? What if his own memory of those moments before the bayonet thrust began to clear? What if he decided to defend himself vigorously in the clubs of St. James's? Defense of Sylvester Gilbraith would inevitably lead to fingers pointing at Neil Gerard, who should have come up in support of the beleaguered outpost… and unaccountably failed to do so.

Neil reached into his pocket and dropped another guinea on the counter. He stared at his nemesis with loathing, and Jud laughed, sweeping the coins into the palm of one hand.

Sergeant O'Flannery had witnessed the moment when his captain decided to abandon Major Gilbraith's small force to the enemy. Sergeant O'Flannery had received the order to withdraw the men, while his captain had galloped back behind the safety of the picket line.

Only Sergeant O'Flannery had known what lay behind the order to withdraw, and Sergeant O'Flannery's grasp grew ever greedier and tighter.

Neil glanced around the taproom, peering through the stinging smoke beneath the blackened beams. Among the drinkers there would be a man who would rid him of Sylvester Gilbraith, for a price. But if word got back to Jud of such a scheme to rob him of his golden goose, then Captain Gerard's own life wouldn't be worth a day's purchase. Jud O'Flannery was the unquestioned king of London's underworld; there wasn't a purse fat enough to tempt a thief or a murderer to cross swords with him. And he had his spies in every malodorous hole in the city.

He swung on his heel and strode out of the fetid room without another word. The sergeant spat contemptuously in the sawdust at his feet as the elegant figure stepped out into the street.

Gerard climbed back into the waiting hackney. The removal of the now Earl of Stoneridge would mean he'd never again have to make these mortifying visits to Spitalfields – visits that Jud insisted he make in person. So Gerard had to crawl into that den of thieves to pay his blackmail, and that humiliation seemed to afford the vile Sergeant O'Flannery even greater satisfaction than the money itself.

There were flash houses other than Jud's tavern where a man could find a hired assassin. Not one who'd be willing to take on Jud O'Flannery, of course, but one who'd see no harm in doing away with some unknown gentleman. One who'd ask no questions if the price was right.

Neil frowned in the dim light of the hackney, hanging on to the strap as the iron-wheeled vehicle rattled over the cobbles, swerving to avoid a mangy mongrel. If he could get rid of Stoneridge while he was still in the country… an accident of some kind… then all his troubles would be over. There was no reason why he'd have to identify himself to a potential murderer, and if he chose his man from a neighborhood away from Jud's immediate vicinity, it was unlikely Jud would hear of it. It was a risk worth taking.

But if that failed, if Sylvester did reenter Society, what then? They'd been friends before Vimiera. True, he'd been the first to ostracize Gilbraith. Everyone had been watching to see what attitude he would take, and he'd known they would follow his lead. Once he'd cut Gilbraith, it was assumed he'd known the truth but had been unwilling for the sake of old friendship to tell a tale that would condemn the major. Society had turned its shoulder against Sylvester Gilbraith, and he'd slipped out of sight, taking his shame with him. It would take a lot to bring him back to face that mortification again.

Society didn't know of Jud O'Flannery, who had been required, as the only noncommissioned officer present at the events in question, to attend the court-martial. Jud had threatened to produce his own version of those events if his captain condemned Gilbraith out of hand. And the sergeant had thus ensured for himself a tidy little income that he could increase at will.

But supposing, if Sylvester did return to London, Gerard was the first to welcome him back into Society's fold? Supposing he extended the hand of friendship, generously prepared to put suspicion behind him? Society would surely follow his lead, and the old scandal would die. Sylvester would be a fool to reopen it.

But Sylvester was a fiercely proud man, capable of acts of desperate courage if his loyalties or principles were involved. If he believed there was reason to clear his name, he'd do it at whatever personal cost. He'd certainly face Society's censure to prove his point.

No, the best plan was to arrange by proxy a neat accident in Dorset. Somewhere in this grim world of murder and thievery, he'd be able to go incognito and recruit a man willing and able to arrange such an accident.

The thoughts and plans of a desperate man swirled in the captain's head as the hackney bore him back through the mean streets of London's East End to the broad, elegant thoroughfares of the few square miles occupied by his own kind.

While his erstwhile friend was thus occupied, Sylvester Gilbraith was coming to the end of an awkward dinner in the company of his betrothed and her family. Theo's silence cast a pall over any attempt at conversation. If it had been a sullen silence, it would have been easier to ignore, but her preoccupation was so clearly painful that all conversational sallies sounded irrelevant and trivial.

Finally, Sylvester could endure it no longer. He tossed his napkin onto the table and rose to his feet. "Forgive me, Lady Belmont, but I'm afraid we're all going to suffer from indigestion if Theo doesn't unburden herself soon." He strode round the table to where Theo sat, staring at a strawberry on her plate as if she'd never seen such a thing before.

"Come along, cousin." He pulled back her chair. "Let's get this over with."

"Get what over with?" She looked up at him over her shoulder, startled out of her absorption.

"I'm hoping you're going to tell me," he said dryly, taking her elbow and drawing her to her feet. "Excuse us, ma'am."

"Certainly," Elinor said with relief.

A footman jumped to open the door for them, and Sylvester hustled Theo out into the hall.

"Now, shall we have this discussion in the library, or would you prefer to go for a walk?"

"There's nothing to discuss." The words tumbled free. "I can't marry you, Stoneridge, that's all."

"It seems to me we have a great deal to discuss," he said coolly. "Or do you consider it sufficient simply to make such a statement out of the blue? A woman's prerogative to change her mind… is that it?"

Theo flushed. She'd expected him to put her in the wrong, and God knows, he was entitled to, but it was horrible to see herself in such a light. "You don't understand -"

"No, I don't," he said curtly. "But you're going to explain it to me. Now, do you wish to go into the library, or shall we go for a walk?" If the stakes hadn't been so high, he would have felt compassion for her. Her eyes were stricken, and she pushed a hand distractedly through the wispy fringe on her forehead. But he couldn't afford sympathy. She was at a disadvantage, and he was going to exploit that to its limit.

"Which is it to be?"

Theo felt stifled. His eyes were devoid of understanding, his mouth a taut line, and she felt as if a great stone was pressing down on her.

"Outside," she said, turning on her heel and almost running out the front door.

Sylvester followed in more leisurely fashion as she made off down the lawn toward the stone bridge at the bottom of the hill. She stopped on the bridge and leaned against the low parapet, gazing down into the clear brown stream flowing sluggishly beneath. Two swallows dived among the clouds of midges hovering over the surface of the water.

Sylvester stepped onto the bridge, his feet loud in the stillness. He leaned against the stonework beside her. Theo said nothing, but he felt the little tremor run through her as his arm brushed hers.

"I trust you're not being missish, gypsy," he commented.

"Of course I'm not!" She turned angrily toward him. No one had ever accused her of such a thing before.

"Then what the hell's the matter with you?"

"I'm frightened!" she cried with the same anger. She hadn't meant to tell him, but the words had spoken themselves.

Whatever he'd been expecting, it hadn't been that. "Frightened? My dear girl, of what?"

"You!" The admission was a ferocious whisper.

"Me?" Sylvester was astounded. "What have I done to warrant your fear?"

Theo picked at a piece of loose stone on the parapet and tossed it into the stream.

"It's not so much what you've done, as what I'm afraid you'll do," she said in a low voice.

Sylvester frowned. "What do you think I'm going to do to you, you silly goose?"

"I am not a silly goose," she said, recovering some of her sangfroid. "I'm afraid you'll swallow me up… take over."

"I still don't understand." He searched now for patience. This was obviously a much more complex issue than he'd thought.

"I'm afraid I'll lose myself if I marry you," she said. "You'll take control and I'll be swept up." She stared straight ahead of her across the river, aware that her cheeks were hot, knowing that she was failing lamentably to express herself, but it was so damnably embarrassing to explain.

"Let's move out of sight of the house," Sylvester said abruptly, conscious of the manor's sparkling windows like so many shining eyes looking down at them from the top of the hill. Taking her arm, he chivied her across the bridge and a few yards along the bank toward the stand of oak trees from where he'd first laid eyes on his cousin.

"Now… I'll see what I can do to calm your fears." He was smiling as he stood her against an oak tree, his eyes somewhat amused. He thought he understood. "Perhaps this will help…"

It was no good. The minute his lips touched hers, Theo was lost. There was nothing her mind could do to control her responses. Her hands slid inside his coat, on their own voyage of exploration, feeling the warmth of his skin beneath his shirt, the ripple of muscle down his back, and then the hard, muscled tautness of his buttocks.

Her teeth nipped at his lower lip as their tongues plunged and warred, and her legs twined and twisted around his, her loins pressing urgently against his. She moved a hand round his body to mold the hard shaft of flesh straining against the skintight knit of his pantaloons, and as she felt the flesh jumping against her caressing hand, she was filled with a wild exultation, knowing that he was as lost in lust as she was.

She went down to the grass beneath the urgent pressure of his hand on her shoulder and fell back, the grass beneath her damp with early-evening dew. Lifting her against him for a brief moment, he unfastened the hooks at the back of her dress, then let her fall back onto the grass. She twisted and lifted her body to help him as he pulled the dress away from her. He unbuttoned her chemise, baring her breasts to the cool air, and his tongue flickered over the rosy crowns, one finger delicately stroking the satin swell.

Theo felt herself to be a burning brand of desire. She had no modesty, no ability to restrain her movements as her thighs opened, exposing the aching cleft of her body to the hand that moved downward, slipped into the waist of her drawers, and flattened over her belly. Fretfully, she scrabbled at her undergarments, pushing them away from her body, kicking them off her feet.

Her hips arched as she reached for him to pull him down to her, her own hands trying to find a way to touch his skin, to reach the turgid flesh that her body knew in its every crevice would bring her ultimate joy.

And then suddenly, with a harsh exclamation, Sylvester pulled back from her. He looked down at the half-naked girl, lying open and expectant, her eyes wild with passion, her arms still raised as if waiting for him to return to their embrace.

"God in heaven!" he whispered, running a hand through his hair, fighting for control. He took a deep, shuddering breath and reached for her discarded drawers. "Put these back on."

It was taking Theo longer to return to sanity. "Why?" she drawled, her eyes narrowing. "Come back."

Sylvester bent, caught her inviting hands, and hauled her to her feet. Lust was well under control now, and he was torn between laughter and exasperation as he held up her undergarment. "Lift up your foot."

"But why?"

"Because, my passionate baggage, I have no intention of siring an heir before my wedding night. Now, lift up." He slapped her calf in emphatic punctuation.

Theo obeyed, but her heated blood was taking a long time to cool. She fumbled with the buttons of her chemise as he pulled up her drawers with a businesslike efficiency. Then she said in a low voice, "Now do you understand what I'm frightened of? You swallow me up… I lose myself. I don't know what I'm doing."

He stroked her disheveled hair away from her face. "Tell me the truth, now. Are you frightened or disappointed at the moment?"

Theo thought. "Disappointed," she said finally, a rueful smile hovering on her own lips.

Sylvester laughed. "So am I." Then he spoke gravely. "There's nothing to be afraid of. I feel what you feel. If you lose yourself in me, so will I lose myself in you. Lovemaking is the ultimate partnership. It's not a weakness, little gypsy. Not something to be taken advantage of. I promise you that never, never will I take advantage of your passion. Do you understand that?"

Never again, he amended silently, squashing a surge of self-disgust.

Slowly, Theo nodded. But she was still frightened by the power of those feelings, by the wild surgings of her body. It would be the most potent weapon if anyone chose to use it. She bent to pick up her dress, slipping it over her head.

Sylvester leaned back against a tree, arms folded, watching her with a half smile. "So am I going to be obliged to send another notice to the Gazette, or does our engagement still stand?"

"I suppose so," she said, accepting defeat. "You want my knowledge of the estate. I want the estate. We both get something that we want out of it."

"That's certainly one way of putting it," he said wryly, pushing himself off the tree. "Come, let's go back to the house and put everyone's mind at rest."

Elinor went to bed that night a peaceful woman for the first time since her father-in-law's death. Her daughters were now provided for; even Rosie would be assured of a respectable dowry when the time came; and her most troubled and troublesome child was consigned to the care of a man Elinor was willing to wager would make Theo the only kind of husband who would suit her. She wasn't entirely sure she could describe the kind of a man that was, but some maternal instinct told her that Theo would discover it soon enough.

Sylvester rode into Dorchester the following day on an important errand, unaware that his betrothed was also out and about on a matrimonial errand of her own.

Theo rode through Lulworth village and turned off toward Castle Corfe. Just before the castle ruins, she stopped at a small cottage, more an outhouse than a proper dwelling. Dulcie had been here before and grazed contentedly on the grass verge at the end of her tether as Theo disappeared into the gloom of the low thatched-roof cottage.

"I give you good day, Dame Merriweather." She set a cloth-wrapped parcel on the table without comment.

"Aye, good day to ye, girlie." An old woman – so old it seemed hard to imagine that life spurted beneath the wrinkled skin hanging on her like an overlarge cloak – sat on a three-legged stool by the hearth. But the old eyes were sharp as they noted the parcel that she knew contained meat and cheese from the manor kitchens, and there'd be a few coins too. Enough to eke out the livelihood she made as herbalist to the village folk in the Dorsetshire countryside.

She turned her gaze on her visitor, whom she'd known from Theo's childhood, when on one of her country rambles the ten-year-old girl had stumbled upon the cottage, weeping with fury, carrying a rabbit, its foot severed by a trap, her own knee bleeding from a deep gash where she'd knelt on a razor sharp stone as she'd struggled to free the wounded animal.

The old dame had bound up the gash, given the child a drink of rose-hip syrup and a piece of lardy cake, and sent her on her way, promising to care for the rabbit.

The rabbit had gone in the pot that night, and the dame had lived off it for a week, but when the child returned, she told her that it had hopped off on its three legs, perfectly able to survive in the wild.

Since then Theo had visited regularly, always bringing something with her, even if it was only half a loaf from the breakfast table. Once she'd grown into adulthood, the gifts had been more substantial and always carefully chosen. Meat and cheese were in short supply on the old herbalist's table.

"So what can us do for ye, girlie?" The dame knew this was no purely social visit. There was a tension in the slender frame that told its own story.

"You've ways of preventing a woman conceiving a child," Theo said directly, leaning against the rickery table.

"Aye, and ways of stopping a birth, if that's what ye need." The dame heaved herself to her feet. "A sup of elderberry wine, m'dear?" She took a bottle from a shelf beside the hearth, unstoppered it, and poured a generous measure into a tin cup.

"My thanks, dame." Theo took the welcoming cup and drank, handing it back to her hostess, who refilled it and drank for herself.

"So which is it ye want, girlie?" The old herbalist turned back to her shelves.

"I've no desire to conceive as yet," Theo said.

"That's easily seen to." A wrinkled claw scrabbled among the bottles and pouches on the shelf. "This'll do it for ye."

She pulled out the stopper and sniffed at the contents, her nose wrinkling like a pig's searching out truffles.

"A lover, 'ave ye, girlie?"

"No," Theo said. "Not precisely. But a husband in a few weeks."

"Ah." The dame nodded. "Best to look after the lovin' before ye starts breedin', m'dear. If ye don't get it right afore, it'll never come right after, mark my words."

"That's rather what I thought," Theo said. "How should I take this?"

She received precise instructions and was on her way five minutes later. When the time came to give the Gilbraith an heir, it would be of her own choosing.

Sylvester entered the drawing room before dinner that evening with a smile in his eyes. He was feeling immensely pleased with himself, and his smile broadened when he saw that Theo had made an effort with her appearance and was wearing a relatively fashionable gown of dark-blue silk that matched her eyes, and her hair, instead of hanging down her back in its uncompromising rope, was looped in two braids over her ears, the fringe a soft wisp on her broad forehead.

"Ma'am." He bowed to Lady Belmont. "Cousins. I trust you spent a pleasant day."

"Not really," Rosie said. "I lost a dragonfly that I was trying to catch and tore my net on a tree branch."

"I'm sorry to hear it, Rosie," he said. The child was not usually in evidence in the evening, but since she was dressed in a crisp muslin gown with a broad sash, her hair demurely confined in a velvet ribbon, and her hands and face seemed unusually clean, he assumed she was to join them at the dinner table.

"It's very exasperating," Rosie said, sipping lemonade. "What did you do today?"

"Ah, well, I did some interesting shopping." He drew from his pocket a small square box.

"Cousin." He approached Theo, taking her left hand in his. "Permit me."

Theo stared at her finger, at the delicate circle of diamonds and seed pearls slipping over it. It was exquisitely simple. The man who had chosen it for her must know more about her tastes than she'd given him credit for.

Her eyes lifted to meet his. There was a question in the earl's, a touch of hesitancy. He wanted her to be pleased with his choice.

"It's lovely," she said, and his smile crinkled the skin around his eyes.

Raising her hand, he kissed her fingers, and then, when she looked completely astonished at such a reverent salute, he kissed the tip of her nose.

"The banns will be read for the next three Sundays, gypsy; and we'll be married the following Monday."