He took hold of a large handful of hair and cut straight across it, then did the same to the other side.
“No going back now,” he muttered.
For the next short while, the only sound to be heard in the ballroom was the clack of the scissors as they slowly reduced Kendal’s glorious head of hair to a pile of discarded clippings. He didn’t care what he looked like. If it had been good enough for Lady Caroline Lamb to cut her hair after being spurned by Lord Byron, it was good enough for the Marquess of Hartley.
He would get about town in torn clothes if it would make the slightest of difference to how he felt, or if it would get Mercy to come back to him.
“Fucking Anthony Sperry. The man runs a shop. What are you doing marrying him?”
His attention now turned to the sheets of music, both the neat pile that Mercy had given him and the short stack under the piano. His muse had rejected him. She had no need for his magic.
“Well neither do I.”
Getting to his feet, he gathered up the papers and placed them on the top of the closed piano lid. He cut the string of Mercy’s manuscripts and added them to the pile. One by one he took a sheet, ripped it into several pieces, then let it fall to the floor.
Slowly, methodically he destroyed every single piece of music he and Mercy had written.
When he was finished, Kendal surveyed the wreckage in the ballroom. Papers and hair littered the space around the piano. The only thing still intact was his priceless Cristofori.
He nodded at the piano. “If I had an axe, you would be next.”
His gaze fell on the piano stool and anger flared. How many times had Mercy sat on that very chair and sworn her devotion to him—gifted him with kisses and sweet words of love? And all of it had been a bloody lie.
Seizing the piano stool by the leg, he hoisted it in the air and threw it with all his might at the fireplace. It smashed to pieces against the stone. He gave a nod of satisfaction at his handiwork, then slumped to the floor once more.
His hand landed on the whisky bottle, his fingers gripping tight as he downed yet another mouthful in his determined bout of self-abuse.
The door of the ballroom opened; and Eliza raced into the room, followed by Lavinia and Owen’s new wife, Amy. Eliza came to his side and knelt. Kendal couldn’t muster the energy to protest when she took the mostly empty bottle of whisky out of his hand and handed it to Lavinia.
“What on earth is going on?” asked Eliza
“It’s all over. My life is at an end.” The tears he had held at bay, now fell freely. He no longer cared who saw him cry or the state he was in. He honestly didn’t give a damn.
“Why is your life over? And what happened to all your music—and your hair?”
Kendal’s head dropped once more. His shoulders shook as he sobbed. “Who gives a fuck about music? None of it matters. Nothing means anything if I can’t have her in my life. I couldn’t care less if I never played the piano again. Mercy was my muse; without her, the music means nothing.”
For the first time in his life, Kendal truly couldn’t spare a thought about his music. His love for it had always been there, but it had been Mercy who had given him back his passion for creating new melodies. With her gone, it all faded into meaningless noise.
“Callum was right you know. None of it matters,” he said.
Eliza shook her head. “Callum was not in a good place when he said that, and you don’t sound that great either. What has happened?”
“Mercy is gone. She is no longer coming here to tune my piano or write music with me. She is getting married.” He looked up at Eliza through the sheen of his tears.
She reached out and brushed her hand on his cheek. “You love her, don’t you?”
Kendal managed a nod. “And I thought she loved me. I even asked my father for permission to marry her. I don’t understand what happened. One minute we were lovers, the next she was handing back all the music we composed together and telling me she is to be the wife of a shopkeeper.”
Eliza put a hand on his shoulder. “Come on. Let’s get you up. You can’t stay here all afternoon getting drunk and destroying your music. This is not you, Kendal.”
“You are wrong. If I can’t have Mercy’s love, this is exactly who I will be from now on. In fact, I vow from this day forward to never play another note of music. I am quitting the Noble Lords.” He brushed her hand away and reached for the second bottle of whisky.
“The tour is cancelled.”
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Kendal burned the remnants of the music sheets, threatening anyone who tried to stop him with violence and dire consequences. He might have been tall and not strongly built, but he could pack a punch. None of his friends were game to tempt his ire or his fists.
In the early evening, the whisky finally got the better of him and he collapsed on the ballroom floor.
As Callum and Reid lifted him up, Callum shook his head. “I know I’ve been dragged out of here enough times, but I never thought I would live to see the day that I would be carrying you up to your room in such a disgraceful state. And what the hell did you do to your hair?”
“I cut it. Nigel can glue it back on tomorrow if he wants, but I don’t really care,” replied Kendal.
Reid sighed. “Kendal, Nigel might be a first-class valet, but I don’t think he can perform miracles.”
After they managed to carry Kendal upstairs to his room, they wisely left him to sleep. He would have a monstrous hangover to contend with come the morning. Lavinia took the whisky bottles away and returned what remained of them to the dining room.
The rest of the Noble Lords and their respective spouses then gathered in the main drawing room upstairs. The situation with Kendal and his decision to cancel the upcoming tour had to be resolved.
“Do we know what happened with Mercy Wood?” asked Owen.
“He said he had asked his father for permission to marry her,” replied Eliza, who was seated on Callum’s lap in an armchair. Her husband had one arm draped leisurely about her waist.
“When was this supposed to have happened?” asked Lavinia.
Owen and Amy exchanged a look. Amy nodded and Owen turned back to the gathering. “Just before we all headed off for our wedding. He said his father told him he was going to think about it, then give him an answer once he returned to London.”
“But obviously Kendal went to see Mercy Wood today and she told him it was all off, that she is marrying someone else,” said Lavinia.
There was silence for a moment, then Lavinia got to her feet and faced the gathering.
“We are all adults here, so I think we can have an honest discussion about the reality of Kendal and Mercy’s relationship. Of course, he hasn’t confided in any of us females, so I am asking the men in the room to divulge what they know.”
There were some awkward exchanges of looks between the members of the Noble Lords, after which Owen sighed. “Alright. I think we all had our suspicions that the relationship was more than a friendship. Kendal was fiercely possessive of Mercy from the first day she came here with her father. I don’t know exactly when the friendship became something more, but from what I gather, Kendal and Mercy became lovers soon after.”
The women grumbled their obvious disapproval at hearing this news. Eliza gave a loud tsk. “I did speak to Mercy at one juncture, but she assured me that things were all above board. I realize now I should have pressed her harder for the truth. This affair happened under my watch, and I should have stopped it.”
Callum took a hold of his wife’s hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. “As you and I both well know, if two adults wish to conduct a relationship, they will find a way. Don’t be too hard on yourself.”
Reid rose from his seat on one of the sofas and came to stand at his wife’s side. “So, what we have here is a broken romance, and a very drunk Kendal.”
“And a Noble Lords tour in jeopardy. If Kendal refuses to play, I cannot see how we can hold any of the
royal command shows,” replied Owen.
Kendal was the glue which held the musical group together; without him, they couldn’t take the stage. And with Kendal having burned or shredded most of the music he and Mercy had written together, a number of the current melodies the Noble Lords were supposed to be playing at the concerts had been lost. The only person who had any real chance of remembering them and being able to play was, of course, Kendal.
“Unlike myself, Kendal is irreplaceable,” said Callum.
Reid shook his head. “You are wrong there, Callum. If the past few months have taught me anything, it’s that the Noble Lords don’t exist without the four of us. Marco makes a great fifth member, but even he knows without the original members, none of this works.”
Eliza brushed a tear from her eye, and she and Callum shared a gentle smile. Silence hung in the room for a moment. It would take time for the scars to heal over the recent schism within the group.
“What are we going to do? The Prince of Wales is not going to take the news of us cancelling his grand royal tour at all well,” asked Owen.
“No. Prinny has his hopes for gaining the love of his people pinned very much on this tour. It has to go ahead,” replied Eliza.
“Let me talk to Kendal. I think I might know what the real problem is,” said Lavinia.
All heads turned in the direction of Reid’s wife.
“I had a private conversation with Mercy Wood a little while ago. Something happened which gave me reason to speak to her, but she was at great pains to reassure me that I was mistaken. I’m beginning to think my initial suspicions might well have been correct. Let’s leave Kendal to sleep off the whisky, and I will talk to him in the morning,” said Lavinia.
Reid’s brows furrowed. Lavinia shook her head at his questioning look. “If the truth is what I think it is, the royal command tour will be the least of Kendal’s problems.”
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Kendal turned in his bed and faced the window. He wasn’t game to open his eyes; the light was already too blinding. The pounding in his head reminded him of the shock waves that reverberated from the cannons when they fired on the battlefield, his blood going boom, boom in his temples. How could Callum have ever willingly done this to himself?
“Morning.”
Speak of the devil. Kendal lifted his pillow and stuffed it over his head, hoping that Callum would go away.
“You would be surprised how much better you will feel if you get up and move about a bit. A cup of tea also helps.”
He rolled onto his back and pushed the pillow away. He opened his eyes. Callum sat smiling in a fireside chair, the early morning sun making his pale hair gleam. Kendal winced at the brightness. And was that a cup of tea in his hand?
Callum rose from his chair and came to the bedside. He offered the cup to Kendal. “Here, get this down you. I promise you will feel better with fluids in your system.”
Kendal’s stomach roiled at the sight, but his dry as a desert mouth yearned for it. He struggled up onto his elbows and stared at his friend through the haze of a hangover. “I don’t know if I like this new sober Callum. You are making far too much sense for this hour of the morning. What happened to the good old days when you would still be unconscious on the floor of the ballroom?”
Callum shook his head. “Those days are gone. Well, I bloody well hope so. I quite like waking up and feeling human first thing in the morning. Of course, having a frisky wife in bed beside me helps.”
Kendal plopped back on the pillows, holding his arm over his face. The light of the morning was too much. If someone could just turn the sun’s brightness down a notch, he would be most grateful.
“Come on. You need to get this tea into you. Lavinia is waiting to speak to you.”
Lavinia? Oh, of course. Considering the mess, he had made of the ballroom the previous day, little wonder that Reid’s wife would be wishing to have a word with him. He would have to muster up an apology. “What is the standard wording of your sorry speech?” he asked Callum. His brain hurt too much for him to compose anything original.
The teacup rattled on its saucer as Callum held it closer to Kendal’s face. Despite Kendal’s prayers, he was not going to go away. “Lavinia does not want your apology. She wants to talk to you about Mercy.”
The mention of Mercy sent a wave of pain through him. He had been awake for only a few minutes, those precious minutes when he had not thought of her were now gone. With a heavy heart, and a still pounding head, Kendal sat up and finally took the cup from Callum’s outstretched hand.
The tea was on the tepid side, but it allowed him to down it in quick fashion. He shuddered and thrust the cup back at Callum. “It was barely warm, but I suppose I should thank you.”
Callum gave him a friendly pat on the shoulder, then headed for the door. “Your valet is outside. He is going to have a crack at doing something with your hair and trying to salvage what is left of it. I shall let Lavinia know you have rejoined the land of the living.” And with that he was gone.
Kendal put a hand to his head, gasping when he touched the short spikes. He leapt off the bed, then stopped and swayed while his brain caught up with the rest of him.
In the mirror on top of his tallboy, he surveyed the damage. All his beautiful golden locks were gone—in their place was a disaster.
“What the fuck did I do yesterday?”
An hour and a lot of tears on the part of his valet later, Kendal knocked on the door of Lavinia’s sitting room. She rose and greeted him with a hesitant smile, then pointed at his new ultra-short hair. “Nigel has done a mighty job to rescue your hairstyle. Reid and Owen were having a bet last night as to whether he would just shave it all off and let you start from scratch.”
The way Kendal was feeling, he would like to have started the whole day all over again, preferably tomorrow morning. “Callum said you wished to speak to me.”
The smile disappeared from Lavinia’s face. “Have a seat. Even if you weren’t hungover, I should think you would want to be sitting for this conversation.”
Kendal dropped onto a nearby sofa, while Lavinia made herself comfortable in the elegant armchair to one side. She might have been away from polite society for many years, but the way she held herself with such grace, it was clear Lavinia was already very much at home in Follett House. He envied her and Reid’s happiness.
“It’s about Mercy,” she said.
At hearing the name of the woman, he had loved and lost, a spear of pain stabbed Kendal in the chest. The greatest love of his life, his muse, had abandoned him. Even time would not be able to heal that deep a hurt or sense of betrayal. She was going to marry someone else.
“What about her?”
“Is she pregnant?”
Kendal’s heart stopped. The world ceased spinning on its axis.
“I mention it because the servants saw her racing out to the privy several mornings in a row. When I asked if I should speak to you regarding a personal matter, she became most agitated—denied any sort of relationship with you beyond a professional one. But from someone who has been pregnant, to me she displayed all the signs of morning sickness.”
Oh no.
Mercy had been unwell, some mornings ashen-faced when she arrived. And then there had been that morning when he found her asleep at the piano. The evidence of her condition had been right in front of him, and he had been too caught up in his grand plans for their future to see it.
What had Henry Wood said? I blame myself for this whole mess.
Kendal went to spear his fingers through his hair, but only brushed the top of his shorn locks. “Her father came yesterday and told me that they were terminating the contract. He asked me to stay away from Mercy, said I could keep my money and he would keep his daughter.”
If she was pregnant, then her sudden decision to marry Anthony Sperry made perfect sense. But why hadn’t she told Kendal about the baby?
“I expect her father has done the right thing
by Mercy and found a nice respectable man who will marry her. If this Mister Sperry doesn’t already know about the baby, then by marrying him soon she could try and pass it off as his; she wouldn’t be the first girl who found herself in trouble who had to resort to that lie,” said Lavinia.
“And because I am now the heir to the Duchy of Banfield, she decided I wouldn’t ask her to marry me or if I did, my father would not approve. Speaking of which, I was supposed to go and see my father yesterday. He was going to give me an answer on the question of Mercy and I marrying.” Kendal got to his feet, swallowing down the nausea in his throat.
He would go to Banfield House this morning, tell his father about the possibility of Mercy being pregnant, and force his hand. Make him give his blessing to his and Mercy’s marriage.
He hurried to the door, then stopped and turned to Lavinia. “Thank you. You might just have saved my entire future.”
His fuzzy head and unsettled stomach would have to make do. He had a fiancée and his child to secure.
Ophelia took one look at Kendal and frowned. “What on earth happened to you, and where is all your beautiful hair?”
“The young woman I want to marry, Mercy Wood, broke things off with me. She is going to marry someone else, but not if I can help it. I have to marry her—I think she is carrying my child,” he replied.
Ophelia took a hold of his arm and drew close. “Then you had better ready yourself for a fierce battle. I overheard Papa talking to Mama the other night. I didn’t catch everything that was said, but I definitely heard him say Mercy Wood and over his dead body.”
Anger simmered in his mind, ready to flare up and boil. His father was against the marriage; his answer would be no. “Where is father?” he asked.
She raised her finger to the heavens. “Where he always is at this hour—in his study.”
He headed upstairs, ready to go into battle. Ready to fight for his and Mercy’s love.
Kendal Page 19
