For long silent minutes, David watched the damp, green countryside passing by; then, without looking at Letty, wrapped an arm around her shoulders. When Letty let go of the strap and snuggled up to his side, he rested his cheek against her hair, her rosy fragrance steadying him for the next words to be shared.
“I was so scared, Letty. So hopelessly, mindlessly scared.”
She cuddled closer.
“The last child I delivered,” he said very softly, “was my daughter. She came early, and neither mother nor child survived long. I’d arranged for the midwife, because my wife did not hold me or my training in great esteem—and I would not have chosen to attend her in any case—but the child arrived in the middle of a storm, another damned storm, and my wife’s buggy had overturned. I had no time to fetch help.”
Hadn’t had time even to sober up the mother before the poor little mite had come into a cold, difficult world. He’d had time to pray and curse and hold his daughter as she breathed her last.
“I am so sorry, David. So very, very sorry. I am sure, no matter who had attended your wife, no matter how skilled, the outcome would not have changed. Nobody could have done better for your wife and child, and your willingness to attend them made a difference to them both. I know it did. You did the best you could, and that is all anybody can ask of us.”
Those were the words he’d needed to hear for almost a decade: Nobody could have done better for your wife and child, and your willingness to attend them made a difference to them both. To hear the words from Letty eased a knot in David’s chest and created a lightness where rage had been.
The lightness, he realized, was sorrow—simple, common, everyday sorrow that, while painful, was somehow an improvement over years of silent rage.
***
Letty had lost her virginity in the vicarage garden on a summer night when the full moon had provided illumination nearly as brilliant as day. The better to enjoy the moonlight, she’d chosen a bench under a leafy rose arbor, a spot out of sight of the vicarage windows.
In hindsight, she could admit that a young man with whom she’d flirted on occasion, and kissed twice previously, might have convinced himself she’d been waiting for him; except she hadn’t been.
She’d been waiting for years, for life, for something beyond a bucolic congregation that gathered in a stifling church in summer and a frigid church in winter, each season bringing a particular sort of stench to the service.
Wet wool and coal smoke for winter, sweat in summer, and mud and manure for the in-between seasons, when rain and hard work were present in equal abundance.
Her handsome curate had kissed her that night, too, and at first the kisses had been sweet, if flavored with summer ale. And then the kissing had become different, accompanied by a serpent-like tongue invading Letty’s mouth, and fumbling hands insinuated under her skirt.
She’d thought she’d been committing the sin of fornication; in truth, her sin had been stupidity.
These thoughts were on her mind as she and David returned to The Pleasure House, the name of the establishment feeling ironic. No pleasure dwelled in that house. Unhappiness, rather, lived at that address, with its housemates despair, weariness, and deceit.
David handed her down from his traveling coach and did not immediately climb back inside. He was going to escort her to the door, at least, which was kind of him.
“Musette and Etienne are out of charity with each other.” His tone suggested the children were squabbling again, though Musette’s shrieks struck Letty as particularly desperate.
“Etienne flirts with all the ladies, but Musette cannot abide that he also flirts with the footmen.” Because even the chefs must serve up misery to somebody at The Pleasure House.
David offered his arm as they walked under the porte cochere. The day was warm and still in the way brought on by the season’s first few blasts of real heat, heat that caught even the bugs and birds by surprise.
“Shall I have a word with him?”
“It can’t hurt.” If David intervened in this altercation, it would mean he came inside, which on this day, Letty needed him to do.
“You’re sad, Letty-love. Is it the baby?”
Yes, it was the baby, and that David would understand that and bring it up was a comfort. “The child will suffer in this life. His parents will love him, but he’ll suffer much.”
David ushered her into the back entrance of the house and kissed her cheek, which meant they could hear Etienne’s rapid French counterpoint to Musette’s screeching. Etienne claimed Musette was impossible, an irrational, stubborn little creature, and he washed his hands of her.
Letty’s father had called her stubborn, so had the curate. “This is not one of their usual spats.”
The rest of the house was quiet, the way children knew to be silent when Papa had come home stinking of gin and spoiling for violence.
“Musette Martinique Duvallier!” David called, leading Letty into the kitchen. “What can this riot and mayhem be about?”
He’d spoken French, which had the effect of silencing the combatants for a few instants. They both began to speak at once, with the guttural and percussive diction of the French when in a temper.
Musette claimed to have gone with Etienne to market, not to enjoy his skinny, leek-scented company, but so she could steal from the kitchen accounts, because raising a child took coin. Etienne claimed the child could not possibly be his.
Which was either a lie or a Continental exaggeration.
David tossed his hat on a hook and began speaking in the soft, conciliatory tones he’d likely learned as apprentice to a ship’s surgeon, where violence was common and medical supplies limited. Nobody need fret over a few pilfered coins. Musette was to understand Etienne was upset, and Etienne was to comport himself like a gentleman, if either expected to enjoy a continued livelihood.
Letty’s sense of despair and weariness crested higher. She’d heard these same tones before, though it had been Daniel trying to “speak peace unto the heathen,” as Letty’s father had thundered without ceasing. Because she was not following the words, but rather, the tone and subject of the exchange, Letty saw what David did not.
Musette was not attired in the elaborate lace and flounces in which she plied her trade, but rather, in a white dressing gown cut in simple, elegant lines. Despite the quality of the garment, it hung on the small woman, as if she were a child parading about in her mama’s finery. Her dark hair was caught back in an off-center bun, and her brown eyes glittered with hopeless desperation.
For Musette had a knife. She held it in her right hand, so it glinted from among the folds of her dressing gown, a flash of steel amid drapes of white silk—Musette’s entire wardrobe favored virginal hues.
Fear pierced Letty’s soul, cutting through sadness, fatigue, and even despair in a keen, sharp slice. Musette would not be comforted. David’s arrival had distracted her, but clearly the woman had been upset for a long time, and with good reason.
For raising a child did, indeed, take substantial coin.
“You know nothing of this man, this overpaid, rutting cook,” Musette hissed, her gaze fixed on David. “You are the so-lovely owner of this sty of vice, and you have more than enough coin for ten lifetimes, while we women have nothing. I hate you.”
Letty knew that sentiment, knew that Musette did hate David, at least in that moment, as well as Etienne and every man who’d ever leered at her.
Mostly, though, she hated herself.
“Musette, my dear, you are upset, and understandably so,” David said. “Etienne has not behaved well, and you are concerned for your child. The child will be provided for, I promise you.”
My dear. Those were the wrong words, for they had Musette’s knife hand twitching. David should not have used passive voice on a woman spoiling for action—her child would be provided for, though Da
vid had not said by whom.
“David.” Letty spoke softly, but if David heard her, he ignored her.
“Listen to the viscount,” Etienne added, and Letty winced, because two men patronizing Musette at once would hardly placate the woman. “He is wealthy, and he keeps his word. The child shall not want. Shame on you for stealing from his lordship, Musette.”
Shame on you. The most unjust, inflammatory, stupid words to fling at a furious, heartbroken woman whose future had veered from grim to doomed.
Musette’s hand twitched again, so the length of a wicked blade flashed before Letty’s eyes. From where they stood to Musette’s left, the men would not see the weapon. In their male hubris, in their smug confidence that the angry little whore could be placated, they would not suspect their peril.
“The viscount is wealthy,” Musette spat. “Like a king, too wealthy to enjoy his own women, but he offers us to any who walk through the door. The viscount runs a livery stable, rides for hire.” She raised her arm. “I hate you worst of all, Viscount.”
As the words left Musette’s lips, Letty made a dive for David. Musette would hurt someone, anyone, because the suffering inside her—for herself, for her unborn child—had parted her from hope and reason.
As the knife flew, Letty managed to shove David hard enough to knock him from its path, and then a cool, mean dart of agony hit her high on the back of her shoulder.
“Sacre bleu!” Etienne snatched Musette into his arms as pain spread from Letty’s shoulder, down her back and arm, into her mind.
She had been pierced, again, without intending that such a fate should befall her, and again, the pain and bewilderment of it rendered her immobile and speechless. Dimly, she perceived a commotion at the back door, caught sight of Valentine Windham’s worried face, and heard David’s voice over Musette’s screaming.
“Letty’s taken a knife. Etienne, get Musette the hell out of here, Valentine get my goddamned medical kit from the coach, and, Letty, don’t you dare die on me.”
***
David walked out into the long evening twilight and turned his steps from The Pleasure House toward his home. Home, where Letty lay in uncomfortable slumber, perhaps even now suffering with the fever that could take her from him.
She, who had given him back so many wandering parts of himself… His ability to use his medical knowledge, his love of flowers, his ability to love a woman, and to be in love with her.
His willingness to become a father.
He walked along Mayfair’s shady, dusty streets, guided by instinct, mentally adding to the list. He tried to summarize the gifts she’d given him, the things she’d found in him that he hadn’t known he’d misplaced, and the word that kept cropping up was heart. Letty had put the heart back in him, the courage to love, regardless of consequences, because that was what love compelled one to do.
He considered his own needs and Letty’s needs, as far as he understood them, and he knew a reckoning was not far off. Along with the courage to love came the daunting requirement to sometimes—often—let go. David had loved his mother, and let her go when his aunt had relocated him to England. He’d loved his grandfather, to lose him to death. He’d loved the practice of medicine, he’d loved his wife for a time, and with his whole heart, he’d loved his daughter.
And once again, because he loved, the time had come to let go.
***
Two days into Letty’s convalescence, the mundane variety of infection arrived to plague her. The wound itched, throbbed, hurt, and hurt some more. David poulticed the injury with some concoction of minty herbs Letty had never encountered before.
That night the pain became a nasty, nagging beast sitting on her shoulder. David stayed with her, despite her repeated admonitions that he should not neglect his work. He played endless round of cards with her, held her hand, read to her, and wrote a letter for her to Mrs. Newcomb. At one point, he left to dash off a note, and then returned. Forty-five minutes later, Letty heard a piano lullaby drifting through the house.
“I sent for Windham,” David said. “I hope you don’t mind, but he’s been asking after you, as has his brother.”
“Westhaven?” Letty replied, incredulous. “That man…”
“Yes?” David poked up the fire, though the room was cozy.
“He has hidden depths.” For the earl, who’d dropped Lord Valentine off for an assignation with the Broadwood, had been swift to come to Letty’s aid, regardless of her station. “He’ll make an excellent duke one day.”
“He’s not in an easy position,” David said, jabbing at the logs on the hearth. “And he about fretted himself silly over you when I was stitching you up.”
“I was hoping I’d imagined him there.”
“He was more than helpful, Letty. He thanked me for giving him the names of competent physicians to treat his father, but now I am the one in his debt.”
The music drifted around them, bringing a sense of peace that Letty had been missing. All of those hours she’d smiled, chatted, and discreetly orchestrated evenings at The Pleasure House, Windham’s music had been a subtle, comforting reminder of grace, beauty, and joy. The music comforted her now too, as did the thought that Lord Valentine and his brother had assisted David in her rescue.
David wandered around the room—David who’d thought to bring Lord Valentine and his music here for her—while Letty withstood a surge of love for him, a wish that he be happy and have all his heart desired.
Tears sprang up, a common nuisance of late. David had only ever asked one thing of her—that she give him her hand—and she would not oblige him.
“Letty?” David looked up with that uncanny instinct he had where she was concerned. “Love, are you crying?”
He took a place beside her on the sofa, drew her carefully against him, and wordlessly stroked her hair. She recalled then that Westhaven had done much the same thing while she’d lain in a fog of pain and medication under David’s needle. There were good people in David’s life, people who would love him when Letty moved on.
Even as the words formed in her mind, she knew them for a lie. When a heart broke, there was no help, there was no comfort; there was only pain and time and more pain.
Twelve
The strains of Valentine Windham’s piano drifting through the house told David he still had company, and so he rose from Letty’s bed, covered her carefully, and left her door open that the music might comfort her even in sleep.
The infection could worsen, but in the past twenty-four hours, it had been content to aggravate without truly threatening. Letty was young, healthy, and she’d had good care. Moreover, she was an obedient patient, and David hoped her recovery would be uneventful.
Hoped?
He’d prayed without ceasing for nothing else. The last time he’d prayed with the same undignified, begging desperation, he’d been pleading for the life of his unborn daughter, and his prayers had been answered—for all of five hours.
Silently, he made his way to the music room at the back of the house. Windham sat at the keyboard, his only illumination a single carrying candle on a table inside the door. David suspected the composition wasn’t from memory, it was from Windham’s apparently limitless imagination, a sweet, lyrical adagio that filled the house with peace and beauty.
Music to heal by. In the dim light, David poured two brandies from the decanter on the sideboard, and left one sitting on the piano’s music rack. The other, he kept with him as he stood at the French doors overlooking the back gardens. Windham played on, giving David time to enjoy the music for himself. The moonlit garden, the pleasant heat of the brandy, and the tender lyricism of Windham’s playing washed over him, leaving him aching so miserably for Letty that had he been alone, he might have wept.
He was alone. Whenever he was away from Letty, he was alone.
Gradually, like the moon sinking to th
e horizon, Windham brought his playing to a close. The music faded into the sounds of the evening—the soft breeze, the song of a night bird, the singing of the crickets.
“How’s Letty?”
With the piano gone silent, the growl of a tomcat preparing to trounce a rival or argue a lady into submission came from the mews.
“She’s sleeping,” David said, his gaze on the garden shadows. “Thanks to you. She’s growing restless, which is good, but she still has a long way to go before we can pronounce her truly mended.”
“And her spirits?”
The first tomcat was joined by a second feline—perhaps a rival, perhaps a lover—and from the sound of their caterwauling, pitched battle was imminent.
“She is cheerful enough, to appearances, but she could have died, and that will take a toll.” A proper physician would have inquired about Letty’s spirits. David had not dared.
Windham tidied a stack of music nobody had played in ages. “And your spirits? The knife was meant for your heart.”
“Not in the sense you mean. Musette is angry at life, and I was a convenient target. Or perhaps she was homesick—she and Etienne will depart for France by week’s end and never set foot on English soil again.”
“Musette was angry at you, and one wonders if Letty might be as well.”
Letty had collected some self-appointed guardians, Windham and his brother among them, which was a fine thing. Out in the alley, the combatants—or lovers—joined battle, the hissing and yowling prodigious, until a sudden silence ensued.
“I hope,” David said softly, “Letty will always think of me as a friend.”
“But?”
“But I am undoing The Pleasure House. Owning a brothel no longer suits my interests.” Never had, and never would. Why had it taken him this long to admit that simple truth?
David Page 22
