“But I don’t really feel as bigoted as I appeared. I’m generally an easy-going, live and let live sort of man.”
“You’ll have to prove that,” Fletcher said, “if you can.”
“That’s it!” Colin sat up, his head spinning, but now he knew what to do.
Bridget had to make a plan for the future, but she found it increasingly difficult to do so.
Colin didn’t keep his promise. Oh, strictly speaking, he did. He didn’t send poems or love letters or bouquets. He didn’t try to kiss Bridget or go down on one knee. He merely came to visit his daughter.
The whole village arrayed itself on his side, just as they had with Martin—but in this case, Bridget couldn’t deny that Colin was Sylvie’s father. Nor did she want to. It was the truth, and to hell with respectability. She would not be forced into marriage.
No one understood why she wasn’t falling all over herself to marry Colin. “Rich, handsome, a bit of a rake to be sure, but such a charming one” was how the villagers put it—and she could hardly explain.
So she brooded, slept poorly, and watched Colin work his way into Sylvie’s heart. He brought one of his geldings and spent a great deal of time teaching her to ride it. Sylvie showed him how to tend the herb garden and called him Papa now. He read her stories from a book of children’s tales that had once belonged to Emma. He promised to teach her to swim, come summer; he wouldn’t risk another drowning in the family. He even took her to tea with Mr. McCrumb. Bridget, suspecting she’d been invited only as an afterthought, politely declined to accompany them.
Yes, Colin had even charmed Mr. McCrumb, who stayed out of it for the first few weeks and then intervened with a sigh.
“Why not marry him? He’s a pleasant lad, a good father, it’s obvious he loves you—and he’s wasting away.”
“He is not wasting away,” Bridget scoffed—or tried to. Surely her neighbor was jesting. “He’s perfectly hale and hearty.”
“You’ve not seen his face when he thinks no one is looking,” Mr. McCrumb said. “He maintains a cheerful front with you and Sylvie, but the minute he’s out of your sight…” He tsked and shook his head.
Fine, but Colin wasn’t the only one putting on a cheerful front while shriveling inside. Her longing for him was so acute that she positively ached. She wanted to marry him, no doubt about that, but every time she brought his ultimatum to mind, she trembled deep inside. She couldn’t help it. She no longer feared he would try to impose it on her, but it was what he truly felt. How could she bear that?
“If you must know, he’s a bigot,” Bridget said at last. “He’s prejudiced against the Irish. And the Scots too, by the way.”
Mr. McCrumb snorted. “That’s what’s bothering you? Come now, my dear. He can’t help it. If anything, he’s a little afraid of us Celts—most of the English are. But he means well.”
“What do you mean, he can’t help it?”
“We all have ingrained prejudices—I’m sure you’ll discover some of your own if you look—but we’ll never get rid of them if we shun each other.”
That evening, Colin dined with her and Sylvie—she could hardly refuse to let him stay when Sylvie invited him—and then, without so much as a by-your-leave, he played at being nursemaid and bundled his giggling daughter off to bed. Since Bridget hadn’t hired a new nurse, she could hardly object to that either.
What was taking them so long? Even when Bridget read bedtime stories and made Sylvie recite her prayers, it didn’t take forever. She sat forlornly in the kitchen, wondering for the thousandth time what to do, and suddenly she’d had enough. She went purposefully up the stairs and down the corridor…then stopped.
Colin was singing. She listened, enchanted. He was singing “My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean” in a rich tenor voice—not only the refrain, but all the verses.
The song ended, and Colin murmured something to Sylvie. Bridget caught only the tail end his sentence: “ . . . write it down and bring it tomorrow.”
“I shall draw pictures,” Sylvie said. “All the best books have pictures.”
Goodnight kisses followed, and then Colin emerged.
Bridget was still standing frozen in the corridor. “I didn’t know you knew that song.”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
“I—I suppose there’s no reason,” she admitted.
“My nurse sang it to me as a child. She’s Fletcher’s mother—a fierce old Scottish lady. Her father died on Culloden battlefield.” He paused. “She’s retired now, but she may have a young niece or granddaughter who could care for Sylvie. Would you like me to ask?”
“I would appreciate that,” Bridget said. He’d been nursed by a Scot? He sang Scottish songs to his daughter? Then why the prejudice? “Do you know Irish lullabies, too?”
“Not that I’m aware.” Weariness in his voice, he answered her unspoken question. “I don’t know where my prejudices originated, and I don’t really care. Getting rid of them is what matters, but I can’t do better than my best.” He nodded farewell and clattered down the stairs. A few moments later the sound of the front door shutting told her Colin had gone.
The house felt empty without him.
He was doing his best; was she also doing hers? For the first time since that dreadful night, she wasn’t sure.
She went into the bedchamber and kissed her sleepy daughter. “Good night, dearest.”
“Goodnight, Mama,” she murmured. “Papa and I are writing happy endings.”
Happy endings? “To what?”
“The swans.” Sylvie yawned. “In the morning, I shall draw the swans.” She turned over, closed her eyes, and within seconds was asleep. Bridget had no idea what she meant, but tomorrow would have to do.
She prepared for bed, but it was hours before she finally slept. For Colin’s sake and hers, she had to make a decision. She tossed and turned. She tried to justify marrying him. She tried to justify not marrying him. She even considered getting out of bed, finding some dice, and deciding her life’s course on the basis of a single throw. Fortunately, she wasn’t such an idiot as that.
She tossed and turned some more, dozed a little, and gave up on getting to sleep. She got out of bed, lit a candle, and went downstairs. She stirred up the embers in the stove, made herself a pot of tea, and brought it to the drawing room.
On the table next to the settee lay Colin’s book, Myths of the Irish. Idly, she picked it up; perhaps a few minutes’ reading would make her drowsy. A folded sheet of paper marked his place—a letter. She removed it, taking note of the page, and set it down.
And picked it up again. The broken seal presented Bridget with a great temptation. One shouldn’t read another’s private correspondence.
It probably wasn’t anything interesting.
And yet . . . She gave up on resisting, opened the letter, and read it.
She might not be a complete idiot, but far too close. Instead of dwelling on his one fault—to which he admitted—she should remind herself of all his good qualities.
Particularly the one of which she’d now seen proof of once again: his astonishing generosity.
She should also remind herself, every single day, that she loved him.
Why hadn’t she thought of that before?
We won’t get rid of our prejudices if we shun one another, Mr. McCrumb had told her—and what was love for, if not to overcome them?
She set the letter down, poured herself some tea, opened the book of myths, and began to read. She was still reading when Sylvie padded downstairs for breakfast.
“That’s Papa’s book,” she said.
“I know, dearest. I’ve been reading it much of the night.”
“All the stories are sad, so we’re writing happy endings. Papa says happy endings are best.”
It was time to say goodbye. Colin would continue to see Sylvie when he could, but the proximity to Bridget was slowly killing him.
It had seemed such a good plan. Mrs. Fletcher’s punishment, all those years ago, had been to oblige him to sing that Scottish lullaby to his little sisters, night after night after night. It wasn’t until much later that he learned it was a Jacobite song—a good jest to both Fletcher and his mother, but he’d never held it against them. Fletcher remained his friend, and Mrs. Fletcher, bless her, had treated him far better than his own mother.
But the grand plan—conceived while drunk, so perhaps he shouldn’t be surprised—hadn’t worked. With a heavy heart, he dismounted, retrieved the story he’d written out last night, passed the reins to Bridget’s groom, and went into the house. Maybe he could survive on desperate hope for another day or two . . .
Or maybe he should just end it now.
Bridget and Sylvie were seated at the dining table, discussing The Children of Lir. “The swans,” Sylvie was saying, “suffer for nine hundred years, and then they die. Isn’t it horrid?”
“Definitely horrid,” Bridget was facing away from Colin, so didn’t notice him in the doorway. Beside her on the table was his book of myths. The letter marking his place was gone.
“The evil stepmother turns into a raven with blood in its mouth,” Sylvie went on, her full concentration on the drawing. “I like that part. She gets her just desserts. See my raven? There’s the blood.” She raised her head and broke into a smile. “Papa!”
Bridget started, slewed round in her chair, and caught Colin’s eye. She looked as exhausted as he felt. She waved him toward the sideboard. “Help yourself to coffee.”
He set the sheaf of papers on the table, poured himself coffee, and came over to look at the drawing, but he didn’t sit. “I can’t stay long.”
Bridget glanced at him and away again. “It’s a beautifully bloody raven,” she said to Sylvie. “Tell me the happy ending.”
“The children like being swans at first, because they can sing and fly, but they want to go home to their family, not live all alone on the freezing cold sea, so Robin Hood borrows a ship from Mrs. O’Malley, the pirate queen, and rescues them. She’s too busy being a pirate, but she and Robin Hood are great friends, so she trusts him with the job.”
“Robin Hood?”
“And his band of merry men,” Sylvie said. “Everyone finds out how evil the stepmother is, and the swans turn into children again. Did you write it all down, Papa?”
“I did.” Colin indicated the papers.
“That’s wonderful.” Bridget smiled, her lip trembling a little. “A good ending.”
“Papa says happy endings are best. Oh, my pencil broke!”
“Indeed they are,” Bridget said. Sylvie ran off to the kitchen to have her pencil sharpened, and Colin and Bridget were alone.
Bridget stood, facing Colin. He set down his coffee cup. He was unshaven, she noticed, not his usual well-kept self. Had she done this to him? She probably didn’t look much better.
“I have a confession to make,” she said. “I read your private correspondence.” When he said nothing, she added, “Did you leave it in the book on purpose?”
“Maybe.” His voice was bleak.
“You loathed Martin Fallow, and yet you wrote offering to patronize his orphanage.”
He shrugged. “The man is dead. Sooner or later his disappearance will make that clear. I don’t know what provision he has made in his will, so it seemed the appropriate step to take.”
“That’s—that’s most generous of you.”
He shrugged again. “I can easily afford it.”
“I appreciate your effort,” she said, “to demonstrate to me how well you can overcome your prejudice—but you needn’t do it anymore.”
“I shan’t.” His stance was stiff, his hands behind his back. “I shall spend much less time here from now on. I—it’s not healthy for either of us.” He bowed his head. “I shall stay in contact with Sylvie, needless to say, and hire an excellent nursemaid for her. And I’ll help you find someplace to start again, if that’s your wish.”
“But that’s not a happy ending,” Bridget said, “is it?”
“No.” He raised his eyes. “I was rather hoping for one of those.”
“If the story doesn’t have one, we must fix it so that it does.” She swallowed and clasped her hands tightly together. “Thank you for showing me that. For showing me that we must choose the ending. That we must make it happen.”
Colin’s gaze burned into her. “There’s only one happy ending to this story.”
“I know,” Bridget whispered. “I love you, and you love me. That’s what truly matters.”
He held out his hands, and she placed hers in them. His fingers closed warmly about hers, and a dimple wavered in his cheek. “Will you marry me, Bridget O’Shaughnessy Black?”
“Yes, Colin Warren, I will.”
Epilogue
More than a year later
Bridget cuddled three-month-old Simon closer to her breast and gazed anxiously at the rolling seas ahead. They had just left the shelter of Liverpool Harbor in a ship that seemed big from the shore but frightfully small in the vastness of the sea. Thank heavens Ireland wasn’t far away. They would spend the summer there and return home in the autumn.
“Do you suppose babies get seasick?” she asked.
“I dinna know, ma’am,” said Fiona. She was a cheerfully stoic Scottish girl, a cousin of Fletcher’s, and had been nursemaid to Sylvie for almost a year. “Nae doubt we’ll soon find out.”
Sylvie, who had yet to anticipate seasickness, was at the rail with Colin, dancing with excitement while clinging to her adored Papa’s hand. She’d taken the news that the new baby was only a boy rather well, although she insisted that she must have a sister next time.
At the moment, she looked forward to thirty-three new friends in Ireland.
“Perhaps not all of them will be your friends,” Colin was saying. “Some of them are big boys, ready to be apprenticed out, and big boys don’t usually play with little girls.”
“I’m not little anymore,” Sylvie retorted.
“Compared to the boys you are,” Colin said. “Some of the orphans are girls your age, and some are still babies. Perhaps you can help with caring for them, as you do so very well with Simon.”
Gulls wheeled around the ship, eager for the scraps the lad who helped in the galley tossed overboard. The sails billowed and the ship ploughed eagerly forward. Bridget breathed deeply of the fresh, invigorating sea air.
When Colin had first proposed this journey to Ireland, Bridget had wondered if he was still trying to show her he’d overcome his prejudices. “Colin, you needn’t prove yourself to me anymore,” she’d said.
“It’s not that, love,” he said. “I have to make sure they’re being treated well.”
“There’s no reason to suppose otherwise,” she said. “The inspector you sent says the children are healthy and the expenditures appropriate.”
“Nevertheless, they’re my responsibility,” Colin said, “so I must see for myself.”
She’d hugged him and said of course they would all go. From a man who didn’t want children, he’d become the best husband and father in existence. Now he intended to do his utmost for the orphans he’d taken over from Martin Fallow.
“I have to make certain they’re apprenticed to worthy tradespeople,” he said, “and that the girls don’t find themselves in households where they’ll be subjected to improper advances.”
Bridget agreed wholeheartedly, but said, “There’s only so much you can do to protect them. Some things are not under your control.”
“I know that,” he said ruefully. “I can only do my best.”
H
e didn’t dream of Emma often anymore, but Bridget knew he still spoke to her in times of both happiness and trouble. He came over and put his arm around Bridget, while Fiona took Sylvie and baby Simon to their cabin.
“Emma would approve of this venture,” Bridget said.
Colin’s dimples peeped out. “I think she predicted it.”
Bridget blinked in surprise. “She did?”
“It was when we were haring north to retrieve Sylvie,” he said. “I had nightmares in which I was responsible for a horde of mischievous brats. I feared they were my own future children, but now I wonder if they were the orphans.”
Who were doubtless full of Irish mischief, Bridget thought—and Irish pride and resentment, too. The gap to be bridged was more like a chasm—but love would find the way.
If anyone could begin to build that bridge, it was Colin.
“You and I,” he said, as if he’d heard her thought. “You and I will do it together.”
The ship surged forward across the Irish Sea.
Author’s Note
The Irish rebellions of 1798 and 1803 actually took place, as did the atrocities mentioned in this story. The rebellion planned for 1804 is my invention.
The rifles mentioned in this novel are Baker rifles, which were used by the British Army during the Napoleonic Wars. For the purpose of this story, I have anticipated the Baker rifle by several years. It wasn’t chosen by the British Board of Ordnance until 1800, while the theft of unfinished rifles in this novel took place a few years earlier. It is true, however, that the finishing of rifles was often contracted out.
The Rake's Irish Lady (Scandalous Kisses Book 2) Page 25
