by Mary Balogh
She yearned to be trusted. To be loved. But she would bear with him for this week. She did not doubt he would far prefer to be facing a thousand battles than the one that actually awaited him in the form of Judge Burroughs within the next few days.
And she wondered what would happen if he lost the battle. What would his life become? What would hers become? What would happen to them?
Oh, it was a very unhappy week. It seemed to crawl by and gallop by. And yes, it did both simultaneously even though the hands of the clock probably ticked by at exactly the same pace as they had done last month and last year and would do next month and next year. And there was no comfort—not from her family, in whom she would not confide, not from Gil, who was locked in his own tortured world, and not from herself.
She did not know what would happen. And she hardly dared hope even though there was hope. Of course there was. She had married him to give him more of it.
She awoke from a broken sleep very early on the morning of the hearing. Dawn was graying the window, and she could see it because the curtains had been drawn back. Gil was standing there silently, gazing out.
“Gil?” she said.
He turned toward her, a silhouette against the early light. “I am sorry, Abby,” he said. “I have woken you.”
The window was open. The room was chilly, though the bedcovers were warm about her.
“No, no,” she said, moving over to one side of the bed. “You must be cold, standing there. Come and warm yourself.”
He continued to stand there for a few moments, but then he came toward the bed, shedding his dressing gown as he came. He was indeed cold. She drew the covers about him, wriggled closer, and held him against her. He was naked.
“You could not sleep?” she asked.
“It occurred to me,” he said, “that I might be able to get to sleep here. But then I was afraid of waking you. It seemed selfish. It seems selfish. I am sorry.”
“Oh, Gil,” she said. “I have missed you.”
“I am making you cold,” he said, his teeth chattering slightly.
But she would not let him pull away. “I have missed you,” she said again.
He sighed and she felt some of the tension go from his body. “Abby,” he said, “no matter what happens . . . today I promise to spend the rest of my life making you happy. I have been neglecting you, have I not? No, do not answer. I have been neglecting you. Because my head has been all abuzz and I have not wanted to infect you. A poor excuse. But it will not happen any longer. I will not give up the treasure I have because I may not be able to get the one I want. The other one. I—” His teeth chattered again even though his body had begun to warm.
“Gil,” she said, “I am your wife. I understand. We will do this together—this living, no matter what the future holds in store for us. The future is the one thing we can never plan for even though we are always trying. Are we not foolish? We will deal with it.”
“Together,” he said.
“Yes.” The most beautiful word in the English language. “Together.”
He repositioned himself so that he could set one arm about her shoulders and beneath her neck, and he held her close to him. They lay together, relaxed and comfortable, and he kissed her, his mouth soft and warm and lovely. And they did not even need to make love for the pleasure to be felt. He slid into sleep, his breathing becoming slower and deeper. Abigail smoothed a finger over the seam of the scar across his shoulder and followed him within minutes.
* * *
• • •
They would go together the short distance to Judge Burroughs’s chambers, Grimes had told Gil during a brief meeting they had had the day before. It was a pity there would be no one there to speak personally to the lieutenant colonel’s character, and it was regrettable that there had not been time enough for an answer to have come in reply to the letter that had been sent Major Westcott. It was a shame too that there had been insufficient time to write to any of the servants at Rose Cottage. But it was to be hoped they had a strong enough case to contrive without.
Grimes had written to the Horse Guards awhile ago and then sent a clerk there to bring the dispatches from both India and the Peninsula in which the lieutenant colonel had been singled out for special commendation. Those would surely help. The financial papers Grimes had received from his client’s agent here in London demonstrated that he had carefully husbanded his resources for a number of years and was well able to keep his child in a manner worthy of the granddaughter of General and Lady Pascoe. And Lieutenant Colonel Bennington was in the process of retiring from active service and had a new wife, a mother for his daughter, and she was a sensible and eminently genteel young lady even if it was a pity about her birth.
All the while Gil was listening to him he had wondered why the man had not arranged for character witnesses either in person or by written statement a great deal sooner than he had. He had been Gil’s lawyer for several months. Had he been taken by surprise at the speed with which the case had come before a judge? The twinge of doubt he had been feeling ever since he hired the man had become a raging flood of suspicion that he was incompetent. Yet the whole of Gil’s life and Katy’s depended upon his being competent.
It was too late now, however, to do anything differently.
He asked Abby at a breakfast neither of them ate whether she thought he ought to wear his uniform as Grimes had urged him to do or regular clothes. He was very nearly a retired officer rather than an active one, after all, and the whole point of retiring was that he would be living permanently at home, to be a father to his daughter throughout her growing years. Nevertheless, the uniform might make him look more impressive. In what way, though? Did he want to impress as a soldier? Or as a man?
She tipped her head to one side, the crease of a slight frown between her brows. “Not the uniform, I think,” she said. “If General Pascoe wears his, then you will appear more . . . paternal in contrast.”
Did it really matter, though? Would Judge Burroughs make his decision based upon looks? How would he decide?
“It was my thought too,” he said. “Though I do not believe I could look paternal if I tried from now until eternity.”
He wore a dark green coat tailored by Weston over a gray waistcoat and paler gray pantaloons with Hessian boots and white linen—all of which items he had purchased since his arrival in London. He tied his neckcloth without any fancy folds or frills. He wore no jewels, adding only his pocket watch and chain. He brushed his hair, willing that one errant lock to stay back, and looked critically at his image in the glass, something he was not in the habit of doing.
He did not look even remotely paternal. He looked like a soldier in disguise. Perhaps if he slouched his shoulders a little . . . And wore a mask over one half of his face . . . Perhaps if he had bought gold rings and a diamond cravat pin and fobs and other taradiddles for his waist. And a quizzing glass with a jewel-encrusted handle. If he had had his hair cut à la Brutus. Bought a smart cane. Bought those Hessians with the gold tassels instead of these plain ones. Arranged for shirt points so high and stiffly starched they would almost have pierced his eyeballs and made it impossible to turn his head.
He shared a rueful smile with his image and turned away from the glass.
Abby, he saw when he stepped into the sitting room of their suite, was dressed smartly and soberly in a walking dress of silver gray trimmed with black. The silk ribbons that trimmed the crown of the matching bonnet and were tied in a bow to one side of her chin saved her from looking as though she were in half mourning, however. They were boldly striped in black and white and sunshine yellow. The shoes that peeped from beneath the hem of her dress were also yellow. Her hair was brushed smooth beneath the bonnet.
So this is it, he thought as he watched her draw on a pair of black gloves and then offered her his arm. And he wondered in what direction his life would have t
urned by the time they came back here.
Less than an hour later they entered the hearing room that was part of the chambers of the judge, a little less formal than a public courtroom but not by much. It was a big square room with a door in each side, a long desk upon a slightly raised dais at one end, two oblong tables below it with three chairs set behind each, facing the dais. Behind the tables, there were rows of chairs, presumably for witnesses or spectators important enough to be allowed in to observe the proceedings. The chairs behind one of the tables were empty, Gil saw with a single glance as he followed Grimes into the room with Abby. The chairs behind the other table, three rows of them, were filled.
In that first moment and at that first glance his heart sank. The Pascoes clearly had been able to amass numerous character witnesses.
But then Abby’s hand tightened convulsively about his arm and Gil’s eyes focused upon General and Lady Pascoe, already seated at one of the tables with the man who was presumably their lawyer. The chairs behind their table were the empty ones. He looked more closely at the people filling the rows of chairs behind the still-empty table. They were not strangers. They were the Westcotts.
“Oh dear God,” Abby murmured.
Including Joel Cunningham, who was supposedly in Bath with Abby’s sister, his wife, and their family.
Gil had no time to react. His lawyer led them behind the empty table and seated himself with them before leaning toward Gil. “Is that blond gentleman with all the jewels the Duke of Netherby?” he asked in a hoarse whisper, his eyes fairly popping from his head.
“He is married to a Westcott,” Gil whispered back. “And his stepmother is a Westcott.”
“Dear me,” Grimes said. “Yes, I knew that. Dear me.”
A door beside the dais opened at that moment and a bailiff stepped through. “All rise for His Honor, Judge Burroughs,” he said.
And Gil, Westcotts or no Westcotts, rose to his feet while the imposingly robed and wigged figure of the judge swept into the room and ascended the dais. Gil felt the bottom fall out of his stomach. Abby’s hand was in his, he realized. He clutched it tightly enough to break bones.
Twenty-one
No one had breathed a word about this during the past week. The aunts had, of course, talked at Elizabeth’s tea about putting their heads together to form a plan. They always did that whenever they perceived a need within the family. Rarely did their plans come to fruition.
But today the family had come in force. To offer moral support. To—
Abigail’s thoughts paused for a moment while she turned her head sharply as the judge settled behind his desk and everyone else sat down. Her mind had just caught up to her eyes. Joel was here. When had he come up from Bath? And for what purpose? Just for this? But why?
Fleetingly, before she turned her head back to face the judge, she noted that there was a stranger seated on a chair behind the back row. Perhaps he had sat in the wrong place. Perhaps he had come for the Pascoes.
General Pascoe, seated at the other table—at least Abigail supposed it must be he—was resplendent in his dress uniform. Perhaps after all it would have been better if Gil—
But the proceedings were beginning, and the judge announced that this was an informal hearing in which he sincerely hoped an amicable arrangement could be made for the future care of Miss Katherine Mary Bennington. But what was informal about it?
He then called upon General Sir Edward and Lady Pascoe’s lawyer to make his case for the child’s remaining with her grandparents and for excluding Lieutenant Colonel Bennington from having any and all access to her.
The general, his medals clinking against one another as he moved in his chair, looked formidable as well as resplendent. Lady Pascoe looked no less forbidding. She was younger than Abigail had expected. She looked elegant and haughty and had a commanding presence. It seemed doubtful that she allowed her will to be thwarted very often.
And then, just as their lawyer was getting to his feet and clearing his throat while thrusting his hands beneath his robe to clasp them behind his back, a door opened abruptly. Abigail turned to look behind her and there was a panting and a woofing and a scrabbling of nails upon uncarpeted floor and a joyful bark—and Beauty came galloping into sight, to stop beside their table, waving her tail and trailing a leather leash.
“Oh, I say. I am most dreadfully sorry.” It was Harry’s voice. “She was no trouble at all until she spotted Gil. Lieutenant Colonel Bennington, that is.”
“Sit, Beauty,” Gil commanded before she could jump up on him or decide to do an exuberant dash about the judge’s dais.
Beauty sat and looked adoringly up at her master before transferring her attention to the judge as though granting him permission to proceed.
Harry?
And in full military uniform, Abigail saw when she darted a glance over her shoulder. There was a buzz of sound from her family before the judge banged his gavel on his desk. He looked far from pleased.
And surely, Abigail thought—oh, please, please God—she was going to awaken from this bizarre dream now. Gil beside her was looking like granite. And surely, since this was clearly not a dream, everything was ruined.
Disaster had struck.
“And who,” the judge asked, glaring ferociously back toward the rows of chairs, presumably at Harry, “might you be, young man? And who in thunder gave you leave to bring a—that is a dog, I presume?—into my courtroom?”
Gil, Abigail was aware as she set a hand on his arm, was taking slow, deep breaths. His eyes were closed. Beauty was panting happily.
“Major Harry Westcott, Your Honor,” Harry said. “Mrs. Bennington’s brother and Lieutenant Colonel Bennington’s friend and fellow officer. I sincerely apologize for the interruption. There was a spot of bother with one of the carriage wheels just five miles outside of London, and by the time I got to the Pulteney Hotel Gil and Abby were no longer in their rooms and Beauty was not in her stall. One of the grooms was walking her. Then there was a bit of a delay getting her in here. I had to explain that she is to be a character witness for my brother-in-law.”
The judge gazed steadily at him for a few silent moments. “I am almost sorry I asked,” he said at last, and Abigail felt the first faint glimmering of hope. Judge Burroughs had a sense of humor, did he? “Be seated, Major, and let me not hear another word from you until or unless you are called upon to testify. And keep that canine seated and quiet and that leash in your hand, Lieutenant Colonel Bennington, if you do not wish to have it ejected.”
Gil bent over to pick up the leash. “Stay!” he commanded when it seemed Beauty was about to scramble to her feet on the assumption there was a walk in the offing.
She stayed.
“Your Honor,” General Pascoe’s lawyer said, outrage in his voice. “I must—”
“If you are about to lodge an objection,” His Honor said, “it is overruled. For now. Proceed, if you will. I am rather hoping to be out of here before dark. My hopes for an early luncheon have already faded. Or, indeed, for any luncheon at all. I do not intend to stop until this thing is settled. It is my fondest wish that no one plans to be long-winded.”
The general’s lawyer proceeded with an eloquent recounting of facts and opinions, none of which came as any great surprise to Abigail. Mrs. Bennington—the first Mrs. Bennington, that was—had been snared by the innocence of youth into marrying a man of low birth and no connections to speak of during the Peninsular Wars and found herself settled in a cottage in the remote English countryside that was far inferior to what her birth had accustomed her to. There she was abused by an autocratic and bad-tempered husband and abandoned with her newborn child when he went off to join the Duke of Wellington’s forces gathering in Belgium. Fearing his return for both herself and her daughter, Mrs. Bennington placed the child in the safekeeping of her mother, Lady Pascoe, before fleeing to take refuge with dear friend
s. Not long after, she met her unfortunate demise, a tragedy that would never have occurred if she had not felt compelled to run from her own home.
And so it continued with an account of Gil’s behavior when he had arrived unannounced at the general’s home while Lady Pascoe was there alone and undefended. The lawyer made much of Gil’s second visit there and of Lady Pascoe’s courage in keeping him from her granddaughter, who was shrieking with terror. Parts of the two letters Gil had written not long after from St. Helena were read aloud and both missives were offered into evidence.
A final plea was made to leave the child with her grandparents, who could raise her in a manner appropriate to her mother’s birth and in a place where she would be safe and well cared for. And loved. The lawyer wound up his argument with an affecting description of the maternal love her ladyship lavished upon her granddaughter now that her only daughter had been snatched from her as a result of the abuse she had suffered at Lieutenant Colonel Bennington’s hands. His behavior from the outset had, in fact, shown him to be a man of brutish upbringing and unbridled passions. Not only was he unfit to have the care of a child, even with the acquisition of a new wife—whose own birth was not without blemish—but he was also unfit to visit his daughter at her grandparents’ home or to have any dealings with her whatsoever. And on the subject of the new Mrs. Bennington’s birth—
“Thank you for keeping your case brief,” the judge said, interrupting, though it was not clear if he spoke ironically. “There are no character witnesses to support General Sir Edward and Lady Pascoe’s claim to be suitable guardians for their daughter’s child, who is not yet even three years old?”
“Your Honor.” Their lawyer sounded shocked. “General Pascoe’s military reputation is well known and above reproach, and Lady Pascoe, as the whole of the fashionable world is well aware, is the sister of—”
