Sweet Disorder: Lively St. Lemeston, Book 1

by Rose Lerner

  Phoebe had yet to speak with Anthony Dymond for more than a moment or two. She remembered him from Christmases at church as a beautiful young man who very much enjoyed being fussed over. But that was only to be expected when a boy had blond curls, melting blue eyes, and strong limbs in addition to being a politician and the baby of his family. “Just because Mr. Nicholas isn’t as solid as a Sparks doesn’t mean he’s frail,” she said, thwapping him lightly on the arm and trying not to think about Mr. Nicholas’s strong shoulders or long legs. “He helped drag your heavy carcass home last night.”

  “Mmm. Don’t remind me. I couldn’t keep down breakfast or lunch.”

  “That’s very sad,” she said unsympathetically. “You cast up your accounts on my best dress, you know. And embarrassed me in front of half the town.”

  “The half we don’t care for,” Jack pointed out.

  Phoebe took a deep breath. “Jack, I may be marrying Mr. Fairclough.”

  Jack dropped his pencil. “What? The man who bought the powder mill?”

  “Yes. I like him, all right? Even if he is a Tory.”

  “You like him? I should hope you feel more than that, if you’re considering marriage. You realize if you marry him, he’ll be a voter?”

  “I—Jack, you have to swear on Will’s grave you won’t repeat this. Not even to Miss Jessop.”

  He thought about it for a moment. “It doesn’t concern her or her father, does it?”

  Mr. Dymond had hesitated too, and asked her if it concerned election fraud. She felt pleased by the integrity of her friends. Not that Mr. Dymond was a friend, precisely—oh, for heaven’s sake, this wasn’t the time to dither about Mr. Dymond. “No, it concerns me and Helen.”

  “All right, then.”

  “Swear.”

  “I swear.”

  She waited.

  “On Will’s grave,” he added after a moment. “Fee, what—?”

  Jack’s apprentice Owen was having Sunday dinner with his family, but Phoebe leaned in anyway, lowering her voice. “Helen’s with child.” Jack’s jaw dropped. She hurried on. “I need someone to help cover it up, and the Dymonds and the Wheatcrofts are the only people who might want to help me. If I help them.”

  “Don’t be an idiot,” Jack said at once. “I’ll help you, of course. We’ll take her to my aunt in Lewes, we’ll find someone to take the baby—”

  Oh, how she wanted it to be true. “I can’t afford it, Jack. I barely have enough saved for two stage tickets to Lewes.”

  “I’ll pay for it. I’ll find someone to take the baby, I’ll advertise in the Intelligencer for a family if I have to—”

  Tears threatened. She knew Jack had about five pounds in the bank after his last order of stamped paper from London. “You can’t afford it either, you know that. And you mean that as a joke about advertising, I know, but—we don’t know how to go about something like this. Every person we ask about finding a family would be someone we know, someone who knows Helen. Lady Tassell can ask about among her friends and no one will ever trace it back to us, but if you do it—I won’t risk Helen being ruined over this. I won’t.”

  “But to marry. To marry a Tory—”

  “You’re marrying a Tory.”

  Jack buried his head in his hands. “Damn. Damn. I was going to.”

  “Don’t despair, Jack, we’ll work something out.”

  “I have worked something out,” Jack said heavily. “I was going to ask her to run off with me. Anthony Dymond gave me twenty quid on the sly to help us—ostensibly to pay the Whigs’ printing costs, but it was pretty clear what he meant. I was going to ask you to put out next week’s paper for me. We can’t now, of course. I can’t leave you to face this alone.”

  Phoebe sat in her chair, stunned. “Run off together?”

  “If we went Tuesday, we’d be back in time for the hustings.”

  “But, Jack, the scandal. What will your readers think?”

  “They’d think it was damned interesting and wish I’d print a story about it.”

  “People won’t receive you,” she said. “They’ll whisper and gossip, and Miss Jessop will have left all her friends—”

  “Caro isn’t you. It won’t break her heart the way it would you. She’s used to people whispering anyway. The people in this town are a regular Greek chorus, only with less Christian charity.”

  That was people everywhere. Everywhere in England anyway. Phoebe was sure of it. And they wouldn’t forget. In twenty years, people would still be saying, They ran away, you know. Spent four days on the road together before they were married. Stay away from their daughter, young lady, she’s likely no better than she should be. “Jack, you can’t.”

  He nodded. “You’re right. If I’m not here, who’s to stop you doing something stupid and martyrish like marrying Fairclough? Only what am I to tell her? He’s keeping her prisoner there, blast him. She can’t even move from one part of the room to another if he doesn’t like it. I promised her I wouldn’t let him do this.”

  Phoebe tried to imagine using a wheelchair and living with her mother. It had been bad enough in that house when she could sneak off with a book, or dawdle at the library after going to market, or run off to Martha’s after a row with her mother. If she were unable to even back away when her mother started carping, she’d be thinking about slitting her wrists inside a month.

  Besides, if Jack stayed, he’d try to stop her marrying. He’d convince her somehow that they could do this on their own, because she wanted so badly for it to be true.

  “You’re right,” she said. “You can’t leave her there. You have to go.”

  He shook his head. “I’ll wait till after the election, at least. I’ll see this business with Helen settled, and then we can go.”

  She was almost annoyed with him, that he was making her talk him into acting selfishly. “He was very clear with Mr. Dymond that he would rather see her single for the rest of her life than married to you. What if he locks her up or sends her away where you can’t get at her?”

  Phoebe had never understood the phrase “an agony of indecision” until now. Jack’s face contorted. He rubbed hard at his eyes, then grabbed a fistful of his hair as if he’d tug it out by the roots. “You’re my sister,” he said tightly. “I’m not leaving you.”

  The floor had been swept not too long ago. She knelt down beside his chair. “Jack. I’m your sister because your brother married me. Because he made an unbreakable bond between him and me, and even though he’s dead, we’re still family. That’s what marriage is supposed to do: make two people one person, make someone else bone of your bone and flesh of your flesh.”

  He half-chuckled, half-snorted. “You and Will couldn’t agree on a single damn thing. You’re about to marry a stranger to help your flesh and blood. Don’t get mystical about marriage now.”

  Drat him, he was right. But she still believed it could be something more—a sacrament, like Dorothea Honeysett said. That was what God intended, surely. “Do you think you and Miss Jessop are going to be like me and Will?”

  He shook his head.

  Phoebe hoped he was right. “If you want to marry her, you have to put her first. Always. And if you can’t do that, you’d better not marry her.”

  Jack’s mouth twisted. “Will did love you. He just—he raised me, you know, from when he wasn’t much more than a boy himself. He was used to being in charge.”

  She turned away, sitting on the floor and leaning against the wooden arm of his chair. “I didn’t mean it as a criticism of Will. We were neither of us very kind to each other. I—I’ve always wanted to apologize to you for that. You loved him, and I made him unhappy. We made your home a misery, and you’ve never held it against me.”

  His hand came down on the top of her head. “You were unhappy yourself. I remember how he used to make you cry. And you sat by him in bed without sleeping that last week. After he died, you just slumped down right there and cried yourself to sleep.”

 
She’d apologized to Will so many times that week. She would never know if he’d heard her—not in this life, anyway. “I can’t even remember it. I just remember you waking me in a panic after I’d slept dunnamany hours, sure I’d taken sick too.” She reached up and laced her fingers with his. “I know you want to help me, Jack. But you can’t. It’s enough help to know you want to.”

  There was a pause. Jack said quietly, “Fairclough won’t want you seeing me, if you’re his wife. He’ll expect you to put him first.”

  Phoebe felt a chill. Was Jack right? She knew very well that she wasn’t making a match of the kind she and Jack were speaking of. She felt terribly lonely, that she would never have someone who put her happiness first out of all the things in the world. But that was selfish. She had Helen and Jack. She was lucky. “If that’s the case, he can go hang, and I’ll marry Mr. Moon.”

  “At least he’s Orange-and-Purple,” Jack said. “And you’d never want for sweets.”

  “I don’t like sweets.”

  “Don’t you?” Jack scrubbed a hand through his hair. “You’re sure you’ll be all right?”

  “I’m sure.”

  “I’ve left you half of a column on page three for the news that comes with tomorrow’s mail, and if anything important happens locally, you can take out the second paragraph about Mr. Neale’s litter of sheepdogs and put it there…”

  Phoebe mentally wrote put out a newspaper under help Mrs. Pengilly write a letter to her son, finish the Girl’s Companion story, and get married on her list of things to do that week.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Mr. Gilchrist was there when she got home, smugly helping Helen with her quilt pattern. It wasn’t something one would think could be done smugly, but the Tory election agent was managing. The Pitt Club should nominate him for some sort of Smugness Award. She was sure they must have one. If not, a number of their members were sadly misdirecting their efforts.

  Phoebe, examining her last few thoughts, was forced to admit that she was in an absolutely foul mood.

  “Now a moss-green one,” Helen said. “No, no, that’s forest green. The moss green is directly to the left of that one.”

  “Of course, how foolish of me.” Mr. Gilchrist handed her a cotton diamond.

  “Thanks.”

  He smiled.

  Phoebe wished swearing didn’t make her so nervous, because it would have relieved her feelings wonderfully. Did Mr. Gilchrist plan to pursue her sister now? That was a complication she couldn’t begin to see how to deal with. The worst of it was that Helen looked happier than she had all week.

  Helen blushed when she saw Phoebe. Mr. Gilchrist did not. He stood politely. “Ah, Mrs. Sparks! Just the woman I wanted to see.”

  Phoebe doubted that.

  “You and Mr. Fairclough were getting along swimmingly last night, unless my eyes deceived me.”

  “Your eyes didn’t deceive you,” Phoebe said grudgingly. “I like him. But talking to him about politics makes me want to throw the sugar at his head.”

  “Then don’t talk about politics,” Mr. Gilchrist said. “Problem solved.”

  “How clever of you,” she said. “Why didn’t I think of it? Don’t worry, I’m sure he told you I’ve agreed to go driving with him tomorrow.”

  “Yes,” Mr. Gilchrist began, “and—”

  “I’ll be in the bedroom if you need me, Ships.” Phoebe went in and shut the door. Mr. Gilchrist stayed another hour and a half. Phoebe quietly tried a few obscenities. It didn’t help.

  On Tuesday, Nick dragged himself out of bed before dawn and into his clothes, examining himself in a mirror to make sure there were no dark circles under his eyes. He would see Mrs. Sparks later to help bring out the paper.

  That wasn’t a reason to want to look his best. He was trying to marry her off to Moon. But he held the candle up to the mirror anyway. He was in the clear; evidently he hadn’t gone entirely soft in the last six months.

  When Nick got there Tony was just slinking out of his room, a satchel over one arm and a rolled-up blanket under the other. Around his neck hung a set of field glasses Nick recognized as his own present, bought from the shop where he’d purchased his officer’s kit. “Shhh,” Tony said, yawning. “Ada’s still sleeping.”

  “Has Ada ever come out with you?” Nick asked when they were downstairs.

  “Ada couldn’t be quiet for five minutes if her life depended on it. This is my time to be away from all that, anyway.” He flashed Nick a grin. “We’ve yet to see if you receive a second invitation.”

  Nick resolved on the spot not to speak until spoken to. He followed Tony down the cobblestone streets in silence until they became country lanes. Tony turned off into a field and stopped within a little stand of trees, spreading the blanket and settling down on it. Nick lowered himself into a sitting position and took the sandwich Tony offered him. It was ham, which, like everything else these days, made him think of Mrs. Sparks.

  Tony pulled a leather-wrapped flask out of his satchel and poured them each a thimbleful of coffee. At first that and his wool greatcoat kept Nick warm, but as they sat, Tony sketching intermittently, the chill and damp crept in. His leg began to protest being kept in one position. At first he tried to shift every few minutes, but Tony asked, frowning, “Is your leg all right?” and after that he was too self-conscious.

  It wasn’t a problem. He was good at this. He thought about Mrs. Sparks’s warm laugh and watched Tony draw, and the chill and damp and pain faded just enough to be bearable. Every so often Tony pointed out a particularly interesting bird, whispering, “Rare vagrant,” or “I’ve never seen that sort of warbler in Sussex before.” Nick trained his field glasses on them obediently.

  They really were very pretty, birds—strangely and efficiently made. He liked it best when they took flight. That impossible moment when they went from stillness to soaring made him catch his breath every time. Beside him, Tony sighed and grumbled that he had almost captured the shape of the crest.

  After a couple of hours, Tony stood. “We’d better go back,” he said reluctantly. Nick’s leg almost gave out, but he hid it and offered to carry the blanket and satchel. To his mingled relief and humiliation, Tony wouldn’t give them over.

  “You’re my little brother. Stop coddling me.”

  “I’ll stop coddling you when you start taking care of yourself,” Tony returned sharply.

  Nick had nothing to say to that.

  “You were good company.” Tony ducked his head shyly. “If you’ve ever a mind to come again, you’d be welcome. Not that you’d probably want to, I know it’s a dashed odd way to spend one’s time, but—”

  Just like that, it was all worth it. “I’d love to,” he said, and meant it.

  When Nick arrived at the printing office Tuesday morning, Jack Sparks was nowhere in evidence. Mrs. Sparks was seated at a table going through the day’s mail, and a stocky adolescent was setting type by the window. She glanced up as the door opened, looking relieved to see him. “Oh, wonderful. It’s going to be tight getting the paper out on our own, so if you could stay for even a few hours—”

  “On your own? Where’s Sparks? Is he all right?”

  She frowned. “What do you mean, where is he? He’s gone to Scotland with Miss Jessop.”

  Nick’s jaw dropped. “He’s done what?”

  Her frown deepened. “Your brother gave him the money. He didn’t tell you?”

  “No! I was just with him—but we didn’t talk much. H—” He remembered just in time not to say hell. “The hot place. Ruination.” That didn’t do much to relieve his feelings. Nick dropped into a chair. Tony had meant well, he was sure, but…he groaned and buried his face in his hands. This was a disaster. He had been speaking to Miss Jessop and pleading the couple’s case only the day before yesterday. The Dymonds’ involvement would be suspected immediately. Not only that, the reputation of one of the most influential Orange-and-Purples in the town would be tarnished forever. Lady Tassell would be furio
us.

  “It’ll come right.” Mrs. Sparks didn’t sound at all sure. Her pencil tapped out a faint, anxious rhythm on the edge of the table.

  Nick realized this was even worse than he’d thought. “He’s left you to face the gossip alone, hasn’t he?”

  “There won’t be much about me,” she said. “He’s only my brother-in-law.”

  “Gammon. You’re here, aren’t you, covering for him? They’ll say you helped him abduct a gently reared girl from her home. They’ll say—”

  Her rosebud lips were so pale they almost disappeared into her face, but her eyes were determined. “I know what they’ll say,” she said quietly. “But they’ll forget about my part in it soon enough. It’s not an interesting enough tale.”

  “Maybe not, if you’re not here when their flight is discovered.” He stood up. “Come along, I’m taking you home.”

  She gave him a shocked look. “Someone has to put out the paper.”

  “Owen can do it.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous, there’s still days of work to be done.”

  “He’s right, ma’am,” Owen said. “I can do it. It’ll only be a few hours late.”

  “A few hours late? A few hours late?” Evidently there were some things that were unthinkable to a newspaperman’s widow. “The paper will be in enough trouble after this without being late.”

  Her conviction was charming, but Nick was unswayed. “Come along.” He yanked her out of her chair by the upper arm. “Owen will say Sparks was late, we got tired of waiting and left in a huff.” He let go of her for a moment to fish in his pocket and toss the apprentice a shilling. The young man pocketed it with a nod.

  Nick was pleased to find that Mrs. Sparks did not resist him very strongly. She needed someone to occasionally overrule her quixotic streak, that was all. Or did that make him Sancho Panza? He was still searching for a better metaphor when the front door banged open, almost taking off his nose. The bell slapped back against the door with a jangle-thunk.