The Undoing Of A Lady

by Nicola Cornick

  I T WAS A VERY HOT afternoon. Four o’clock saw Nat strolling through Fortune’s Folly village with Miles Vickery, discussing the latest development in the murder case.

  “We’re very little further forward,” Miles was saying. “The murder of Spencer must surely be linked to that of his master and the gossip that he was murdered by mistake for Tom could well be true, but once again no one saw anything except for another mysterious sighting of a masked woman last night.”

  “At least we know it wasn’t Lizzie,” Nat said, lips twitching, “unless she combines murder with naked riding.”

  “Yes…” Miles cleared his throat. “Um…I hope that everything is all right between the two of you?”

  “Perfectly, I thank you,” Nat said. A few hours ago, he thought, his response might have been very different. Now, however, he had cause to hope.

  “Because every man who was there last night views Lady Waterhouse with the utmost admiration and respect,” Miles continued.

  “Doing it too brown, old fellow,” Nat said.

  “Well,” Miles said, “they view her with…ah…appreciation and admiration. She does have the best seat on a horse of any woman in the county,” he added slyly.

  “That’s more like it,” Nat said. He laughed. He found that he was looking forward to seeing Lizzie later and taking a picnic out onto the hills. They would talk. He would explain to her about Gregory Scarlet’s contribution to her dowry and he would try to understand the anger and grief that drove her and then, perhaps, their marriage might not be such an unmitigated disaster after all.

  “I wonder why all the shops are closed,” Miles said, staring around at the shuttered windows along Fortune Street.

  “I heard that Tom Fortune was taxing the shopkeepers heavily,” Nat said. “Perhaps this is their way of protesting.”

  “And what is that crowd doing on the bridge?” Miles said. “What on earth is going on?”

  “There’s a fire!” Nat said, scenting smoke on the air.

  They quickened their steps and found themselves on the bridge over the River Tune. The crowd was good-tempered and allowed them to push their way through. Miles leaned over the parapet and the breath whistled between his teeth.

  “Hell and the devil!”

  Nat was a second behind him and it took him a moment to see what was happening. On the riverbank, Mrs. Broad and Mrs. Morton were tending to a bonfire, feeding it with sheets of paper from a large folio. Meanwhile in the river it looked as though someone was doing their washing, for piles of clothes were floating on the water. They were caught on the stones of the riverbed, they adorned the overhanging branches of the willow trees and they flapped in the current like banners. Those items that broke free were floating away under the bridge and some enterprising villagers were scooping them up at the other end and making off with them.

  “Those are good-quality garments,” Nat said, spotting a gray velvet jacket and a red-and-gold embroidered waistcoat as they bobbed past. “A bit showy for my taste, but surely too good to throw in the river.”

  “That depends on why you would be destroying them,” Miles said, grinning. A piece of charred paper from the bonfire fluttered past and he made a grab for it. “I say, look at this!”

  Nat squinted at the page. It carried some lurid illustrations and some even more explicit text in French. “That…That looks like a dildo!” he spluttered, pointing at one of the pictures. Immediately someone in the crowd snatched the paper from Miles’s hands and pored over it and the pitch of excitement seemed to rise even higher.

  “Tom Fortune’s collection of pornographic writings,” Miles said, trying not to laugh. “Oh dear, I know he spent a lot of money on that folio.” He pointed. “Look. I think we have found the perpetrators of this outrage.”

  Nat looked. In the river shallows, their skirts hitched up to their waists, the water lapping about very shapely legs, stood Lizzie and Alice. They were laughing together. Lizzie’s head was thrown back and her red hair tumbled from its ribbon and she looked exhilarated and very happy. Nat’s breath caught to see the vivid excitement in her face. He glanced at Miles, who was watching Alice with a little smile playing about his mouth.

  “What are we going to do?” he asked.

  Miles cocked an eyebrow. “Join them,” he said. He pulled off his jacket, unfastened his stock, passed them to a helpful bystander and ran down to the river.

  That had not been quite what Nat had meant. Vague thoughts of reading the Riot Act, dispersing the crowd and rescuing Tom’s clothes if not the pornography, had been jostling in his mind with the thought that what Lizzie had done was very probably illegal. Then he saw Miles leap into the water and grab Alice about the waist and kiss her with a great deal of enthusiasm. The crowd cheered and Lizzie tilted her head and looked up at the bridge and her eyes met his.

  For a long moment they stared at one another and Nat could see apprehension creep into Lizzie’s eyes and all the joy seemed to drain from her and she started to wade clumsily toward the riverbank. Nat had an odd feeling inside then and it seemed of prime importance to reach Lizzie and reassure her and put that irresistible smile back in her eyes. He climbed quickly onto the parapet and the crowd gasped and Lizzie turned and stopped, looking at him wide-eyed as he teetered on the very edge of the bridge.

  And then he jumped and the last thing he thought before he fell was to wonder just how deep the river was, and that it would probably have been a good idea to check first.

  LIZZIE GRABBED NAT AS he rose, spluttering, to the surface, and dragged him into the shallow water. Her heart was pattering with a combination of nervousness and shock.

  “What are you doing?” she squeaked, anxiety for him making her sound as shrill as a fishwife. “Are you mad? You could have killed yourself!”

  Nat was laughing. “It’s a hot day and I needed to cool down.” He pushed the soaking hair back from his face and caught her about the waist, holding her close to him. She could feel the heat of his body through his drenched clothes and the beat of his heart against hers. Relief filled her that he was unhurt and with it a strange weakness that made her legs tremble. Nat tightened his grip and bent his head to kiss her. Lizzie held him off with her palms against his chest.

  “No! Remember we have an agreement!”

  Nat glanced up at the bridge where the crowd was cheering and whooping. “Damn the agreement,” he said. “You’ll disappoint our audience and they are so proud of you. I am so proud of you.” He gave her a brief, hard kiss, then drew back and looked at her, his gaze intent on her face. His eyes were blazing with triumph and possession and it made her feel weaker still.

  “Nat-” she began, but the words were lost as he kissed her again, this time with a thoroughness that had the crowd shouting approval and left Lizzie utterly shaken. She clenched her fingers in his soaking shirt and held tight as the world spun.

  “This isn’t like you,” she whispered when his lips finally left hers. “I thought you would be angry with me. I have committed an offence against the law. You do understand that, don’t you?” Her brow creased as Nat simply smiled at her. “What has happened to you?” she whispered.

  Nat silenced her, kissing her for a third time until she forgot the crowd, forgot that they were standing in a river, forgot everything except for Nat. It felt different, though she could not quite explain how, but there was excitement in it as well as gentleness, and an eager anticipation. His hands were warm on her through the drenched gown and the sun was hot and the crowd loud and Lizzie thought her head was going to burst with the blazing sensation of it. When Nat let her go he touched her cheek gently and his gaze moved over her face like a caress.

  “Remember that we are to go out riding together this evening,” he murmured. “I promise to behave.” He looked down at his soaking pantaloons and laughed. “I suppose I had better go and change.”

  He splashed off through the shallows and Alice came over to Lizzie, her blue eyes alight with amusement. “Well! If
that is what happens when you deny Nat your bed I think I might even try the same thing with Miles!”

  “I thought he would be angry that we had broken the law, but he said that he was proud of me,” Lizzie said, watching Nat as he hauled himself up onto the bank. His hair was sleek and dark with water and his clothes clung to his hard, masculine body and merely looking at him made her feel very hot and bothered.

  “Miles once said that when you deny yourself something you really want, you only end up wanting it more,” Alice said. She gave Lizzie a speculative look. “You have taken away Nat’s certainty, Lizzie. You have changed the rules. It is making Nat think, and making him work for what he wants.” She laughed. “It’s about time. Don’t give in. Bring him to his knees!”

  “I will,” Lizzie said, thinking of the evening ahead and feeling a burn of anticipation. “I won’t give up now.”

  THAT EVENING THEY RODE up onto the hills and spread their picnic on a blanket beneath an ancient oak tree that sheltered the remains of an old shepherd’s hut. They talked and Nat preserved a scrupulously respectable distance from Lizzie whilst at the same time never taking his eyes from her for a moment. There was a tense thrill in the pit of Lizzie’s stomach as they talked, a prickle of eagerness along her skin, an excitement that seemed very new and achingly sweet and that made it seem inordinately difficult for her to concentrate.

  “I have written to the Prince of Wales about the problem with the Fortune’s Folly medieval laws,” Lizzie said, as she sat looking at the view across the hills. “He was a friend of my papa and so I hope he will help our cause.” She rolled over onto her stomach on the rug and propped her chin on her hand. “I discovered a document in Laura’s library that relates to the Charter of the Forest. It was written soon after Magna Carta and it supports the rights and privileges of the common man against his lord and it struck me that if we can invoke it against Tom we might be able to overturn the Dames’ Tax and all the other taxes-” She stopped, for Nat was looking at her with a very whimsical smile on his lips.

  “What is it?” she demanded wrathfully.

  “You,” Nat said. “Now that you have a cause you are like a woman inspired-”

  Lizzie slapped at him. “Don’t laugh at me!”

  “I’m not,” Nat said. “I’ve thought for several years that you needed-” He stopped.

  “Needed what?” Lizzie said curiously.

  “Something to do, I suppose,” Nat said. He laughed. “Some focus for all that untrammeled energy and vitality you have. It is no wonder that some women have the vapors out of sheer frustration at the constrained nature of their lives.”

  “Society is so foolish in what it approves of as appropriate or not in a woman,” Lizzie agreed. “I have always found it intensely annoying.”

  “I had noticed,” Nat said wryly.

  “I had not expected you to feel like that,” Lizzie said, plucking a blade of grass and chewing it. “I mean I did not think you would want me to be occupied other than as a conventional wife and mother. I thought you had very decided notions on the role of your wife and that I do not exactly conform to them.”

  “I can change my attitude-even if I am stuffy and old-fashioned,” Nat said. He sounded rueful.

  “You are not always so conventional and proper,” Lizzie said. “Sometimes you are equally as wild as I.”

  Their gazes locked, Nat’s dark and heavy with sudden desire. The heat sizzled through Lizzie’s blood, scalding her.

  Kiss me, taste me, touch me…

  Awareness, vivid and intense flared between them. Lizzie found she had already moved closer to Nat on pure instinct and need alone, and hastily drew back. This was no way to go on if she was to stick to her resolution.

  “I suppose that when I have a home of my own I will be able to grow into the managing female I was always destined to be,” she said quickly.

  “I know that you do not like Chevrons very much,” Nat said, surprising her. “I should have consulted you about where we lived, I suppose. I confess that I did not think of it. All I could think of was that I had to marry you, save your reputation, get you away from Fortune Hall and from Tom and-” He stopped abruptly.

  “You wanted to rescue me,” Lizzie said softly. “It is what you do.”

  Nat looked at her. There was gentleness in his eyes and something else, something that looked oddly like confusion.

  “I suppose I always have done,” he said slowly, “and yet there is more to it than that, Lizzie…”

  Lizzie held her breath and waited, aware of the silence, aware of the warm breeze through the summer grass and aware of the hammering of her heart. Had Nat’s feelings for her started to change, as Laura had predicted they would? Was he beginning to see her differently, to see beyond the need to protect and defend to a love that was greater than that, all encompassing, taking heart and soul? There was certainly an arrested look in his eyes as he watched her but when he did not speak she rushed in to fill the silence, too nervous to let it lie between them.

  “I sometimes think that the Fortune family must be cursed,” she said with a little shudder. “Monty murdered and now Spencer as well, supposedly in mistake for Tom, and Tom himself only a hairsbreadth from madness…”

  “Tom isn’t mad,” Nat said, a harder tone entering his voice. “He is no more than a dangerous scoundrel who has been given too much license to misbehave.” He caught Lizzie’s hand and turned it over to press his lips against the vulnerable skin of her wrist. “I feel I owe it to you to catch Monty’s murderer, Lizzie,” he said. “And I admire you very much for what you are doing in standing up to Tom. So do the people of Fortune’s Folly. Someone had to take your brother on and who better than you?”

  “Because I am equally badly behaved?” Lizzie said.

  Nat laughed. “Because you are the only one with the nerve to match him.”

  Once again their gazes held. Lizzie’s pulse raced against the touch of Nat’s lips and his expression tautened as he felt her tremble. He leaned forward to kiss her and she rolled away from him.

  “Oh, no, you don’t. Keep back! You promised not to try to seduce me.”

  Nat laughed again, ruefully this time, and released her. “All right. You’re safe with me.”

  “I doubt it,” Lizzie said, feeling delightfully unsafe, “but I trust your honor as a gentleman.”

  Nat groaned. “A pity.”

  “We are talking,” Lizzie said. “Please, Nat.”

  Nat’s expression sobered. He turned on his side so that he could look at her properly. “I know,” he said. “There is much to talk about.” A frown touched his brow. “Last night you accused me of taking your cousin’s money as a bribe to wed you.”

  Some of the bright pleasure went out of Lizzie’s day. “Tom told me,” she said, haltingly, looking away from Nat and out across the vast bronze and green expanse of the moors. “He said that Cousin Gregory paid you to marry me because he thought I was a disgrace to the Scarlet name and wanted rid of me.”

  Nat shifted uncomfortably. “It wasn’t really like that, Lizzie.”

  “Did he give you money?” Lizzie pressed. “Did he, Nat?”

  When Nat looked up and met her eyes she already knew the answer.

  “He did,” she said tonelessly, “and you didn’t tell me.”

  “It wasn’t like that,” Nat said again. “Lizzie, sweetheart-” He reached for her, but let his hand fall to his side as she turned her head away. “Gregory suggested he should add to your dowry, that is all,” he said. “God knows, he has done nothing for you since becoming Earl of Scarlet.”

  “So he thought to make everything right with money,” Lizzie said bitterly, “and ease his conscience.” She sat up suddenly, fiery and indignant. “Did he say that I was a disgrace to the Scarlet name?” she demanded. “Did he say I was like my mother?”

  “No!” Nat said. “If Tom told you that then it was only his malice.” He caught her arm. “Don’t listen to Tom, Lizzie,” he said. �
��Whatever he tells you he is only trying to hurt you. He takes the truth and twists it with his spite. Promise me you won’t listen to him.”

  “All right,” Lizzie said. She was puzzled at the tone in Nat’s voice. For a moment he had sounded almost desperate. “I know Tom is a liar and a scoundrel,” she said. “I’ll try not to let him hurt me again.”

  She felt Nat relax. He slid his hand down her arm to entwine his fingers with hers and she did not move away this time. The evening sun poured down on them, warming Lizzie’s skin, making her sore heart ease a little and helping her feel content for the first time in weeks.

  “Nat,” she said slowly.

  “Hmm?” Her husband made a sleepy sound of enquiry.

  “If ever anything like this happens again,” Lizzie said, “will you tell me? You arranged the wedding and chose us somewhere to live and you make all these plans without reference to me but I am your wife now.” She smiled. “I know that many men do not see the need to consult their wives on any matter, but I do not take kindly to that.”

  “I had noticed,” Nat said. He sat up. There was a rueful light in his dark eyes. “I am sorry,” he said. “This is new for me, too, sweetheart.”

  Lizzie touched his cheek. “In return I promise I will try not to react so badly to things in future by gambling away a fortune or taking my clothes off in public.”

  Nat gave a strangled laugh. “Perhaps if you could discuss that with me first as well…”

  “Yes,” Lizzie said. She allowed him to draw her down into the circle of his arm and lay with her head pillowed comfortably on his shoulder.

  “You need have no fear for your virtue,” Nat whispered against her hair. “I only want to hold you.”

  “I am not sure that I have any virtue left after all the things that we have done,” Lizzie admitted softly. She wriggled closer into his embrace and lay listening to the strong beat of his heart.

  “Ah, Lizzie…” Nat’s fingers brushed the hair gently back from her face, twining the soft auburn curls about his fingers. “Don’t say that. In so many ways you are the sweetest, bravest and most admirable woman.”