Poetic Justice, a Traditional Regency Romance (Regency Escapades)

by Alicia Rasley

  John's most fervent vow was the next one, "With my body I thee worship." Jessica looked up to see that disorienting flash of desire in his eyes, and though her heart tumbled in confusion, she smiled at him. It was a marriage of true minds, she knew that, but bodies could worship too.

  Twelve hours later, though, as dusk fell around them and John showed no signs of tiring, Jessica realized that he had forgotten all about that vow. A bridegroom in the grip of an obsession was a most frustrating companion.

  As they approached an inn yard bright with lanterns, she put her hand on his gripping the reins, and tugged at it. He murmured something to calm the startled horses, and reined them in just before the inn drive. "What is it, sweetheart?"

  "John, do let's stop for the night. Or at least part of the night."

  "But, Jessie, we must be in London as early as we can in the morning, before Wiley can get his hands on the play! You know that."

  "All I know is this is my wedding night, and I am spending it squinting into the darkness at a horse!" She didn't mean to sound plaintive, but weariness and frustration had taken a toll on her self-control. John's curricle was well-sprung, and she found his lean form beside her a welcome support, but not nearly so welcome as it would be in a bed.

  She raised her hand to touch his face. She could hardly see him in the dark, but under her fingers his jaw was tense with the conflict she had posed for him. He was vulnerable, and she knew just how to take advantage of it. She edged a little closer so that their legs touched from hip to knee, trailed her fingers to his mouth, and gentled her voice. "We are already past Basingstoke. We can leave before the first light, and be to Berkeley Square by nine. You said my uncle would delay the transfer. We will be there in plenty of time."

  He closed his teeth gently on her thumb, then pulled her hand away only to tug it back so that he could kiss her knuckles. "It's just that I've had little rest this past week. I think if I close my eyes, I will sleep the clock round."

  She leaned closer, so that her lips were only a fraction of an inch from his. "I think I can contrive some way to keep you awake."

  "Another test?" His kiss brushed her mouth longingly then drew away. "This is one I hope I can help you pass."

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Soul of the Age!

  The Applause, delight! the wonder of our stage!

  My Shakespeare, rise.

  Ben Jonson, "To the Memory of My Beloved, The Author, Mr. William Shakespeare"

  She didn't pass the test. It was a valiant effort, but they fell asleep just before dawn, still tangled together. John woke an hour late when the full morning light streamed through the window. He knew a moment of panic, then forced it down as he calculated from the sun's angle that it wasn't yet five o'clock. He subsided again next to Jessica, his chest pressed against her naked back, his mouth against the sweet curve of her neck.

  There was some simple, profound wonder in this, that he could wake up beside her, see her nakedness glowing golden in the morning light, and know that this moment would be his every day of his life. And it was only that knowledge, that after another night he would have this moment again, that got him up and washed and shaved before she woke.

  He pulled on his breeches, though he knew they would prove only an inadequate guard against temptation. Breakfast ordered from a chambermaid in the hallway, John returned to sit on the bed beside his wife. Even as he bent to kiss her cheek, he regretted the necessity of awakening her. It was for her own good, he reminded himself, and the good of the collection, and the good of English literature. Were the stakes less exalted, he would crawl back into bed with her and let the sun run away with time.

  Instead, he waited till her eyes opened and closed and finally opened again. In their drowsy blue depths he saw incomprehension, surprise, and finally remembrance. "John," she whispered.

  "Happy birthday, my darling. I wish I'd had time to find something to give you."

  "You have. My happiness." She frowned, and used his arm to leverage herself into a sitting position. The sheet fell to her waist, but she didn't seem to notice. He did. "And my collection. Is it very late?"

  "No. We have time." He had come prepared to wake her up. He gave her a drink of water, then took a cool damp cloth from the basin on the washstand and applied it to her sleep-flushed face, then down along her shoulders and arms. When he drew it back up her side, she seized it, color rising in her cheeks, and said with asperity, "I shall see to the rest myself. And I think I can manage to dress myself too, if you can locate my—my undergarments."

  So he turned to find her shift tangled in the bedclothes. She touched the healing slashes on his back with a gentle finger. "I'm sorry they hurt you."

  "Believe me, the anticipation was worse than the reality. And solitary confinement was worse than either."

  He rolled the silk garment up and fitted the neckline over her head, helping her find the sleeves with each arm. There was a moment's remorse when her breasts disappeared from view, but he reminded himself that they were married for life, and he would surely see them again.

  She wriggled the shift into place around her hips—a surprisingly erotic process, one that he would like to see done in reverse—and slanted one of those inquisitive glances at him. "You do hate confinement, don't you? You said you didn't want marriage, because it would restrict your freedom. I took a shirt out of your bag for you last night, by the way, to let the wrinkles hang out."

  It was a most wifely sort of comment, and John cherished it, though he regretted its premise that their wedding night was truly over. He found the clean shirt hanging on the bedpost and pulled it on. "That was when I thought I couldn't marry you. When I was truly confined, the freedom I craved was to come back to you."

  "I suppose it isn't solitary confinement, if we share it together."

  "It isn't confinement at all. We are choosing to share our lives, aren't we?"

  She sighed happily, coming into his arms, warm and inviting and all too appealing. "What a lovely thought. All of our lives to share. Starting today."

  They lingered that way, not speaking except with kisses, until a knock signalled the arrival of their breakfast. Reluctantly he released her and rose to retrieve the tray of food from the hallway. She took advantage of his distraction to dash into the dressing room to finish washing and dressing, and he was reduced to applying jam to toast and speculating whether she would sugar her coffee or salt her eggs. This morning he would find out; for tomorrow's breakfast he would know.

  When she emerged dressed for the day, he could tell from her shadowed expression that she too was contemplating the immediate future. She ate sparingly and abstractedly, stirring her coffee long after the sugar lump had dissolved. "I hope my uncle persuades the solicitors to wait until we arrive before they try to transfer the library. They will wait, don't you think?"

  "We will be there by nine. If I know solicitors, they will just be finishing their breakfast then. And we will present our marriage lines." He felt in the pocket of his coat, and the crackle of paper assured him they were still there—"and your uncle will present his consent, and they will have no choice but to turn over the collection to you."

  He made sure to smile as he said it, so that he sounded more confident than he felt. They had made the mistake of underestimating Wiley once, and so now John was prepared for anything. He searched through his bag and brought out another document. "Here, sweetheart, keep this with you today. I had Devlyn write up an affidavit that he witnessed our marriage. That at least should stall them if something happens to the official paper."

  Obligingly she took the page and glanced at it before fetching her gold-chained reticule. "What could happen to our marriage lines?"

  "I don't know. But in my experience, if there's an important document about, it's sure to vanish just when it becomes essential." He watched her maneuver the affidavit into the book that filled most of her valise-shaped reticule. When she finally accomplished this task, she looked up suspiciously a
t him.

  "Why are you laughing?"

  "I am just wondering how I managed to get a wife who brings along something to read on her wedding night."

  She settled the reticule's chain on her shoulder and replied coolly, "I always bring something to read, to ward off boredom and wasted hours."

  The reticule, slipping down her arm, banged into him as he caught her up in an embrace. He pushed it back up on her shoulder and then trailed kisses up her neck till he reached her ear. "By the time I'm done with you, my love, you'll have forgotten how to read. But I don't think you'll consider them wasted hours."

  Once they emerged into the daylight, John and Jessica crossed the final forty miles in a bare three hours, thanks to the fresh horses he had arranged at every post stop. But when they ran up the stairs into Parham House, never pausing to gratify the butler's curiosity, they found that Alfred Wiley had been even more beforehand.

  Though it lacked a few minutes till nine, they heard an unprecendented amount of noise emerging from the reading room of the library. Petrus, John's chief guard, was blocking the door, but stepped aside with some relief. "Almost lost hope for you, Captain. They been arguing out in the hallway, and Lord Parham finally agreed to let them into this room. No further, though. And I ain't let nobody leave." He pointed back the way they came. "Don't know if you saw him, but Wilbur's out by the door to the main hall. And I got another man stationed outside the house, just in case."

  John let Jessica slip into the room, but stayed to give some last directions to the guard. "I don't know if Wiley will try to take anything with him. But don't let him leave without searching him thoroughly, no matter how he protests. And no one else enters, is that clear? He might be planning to pass something to a confederate." Petrus nodded and planted himself in the doorway, his broad back blocking the exit.

  The reading room was crowded with bodies, but he located Jessica's right away. She was tugging at her uncle's sleeve, but Parham was too preoccupied to notice her. He stood before the great vestry table, making his case for a postponement like the most accomplished barrister. "We don't know if my niece has fulfilled the requirements of the trust, and until we do, we would remiss in making any transfer. She must marry by July 23, and in this case I think it fair to assume that 'by' means 'by the end of.' And the end of July 23—" he pulled out his watch with a flourish and consulted it—"is yet fifteen hours removed."

  Three solicitors, distinguishable by their old-fashioned bagwigs, sat in a line behind the table exchanging judicious nods as they listened to this. In front of them was a wooden casket of papers, with a hefty ring of keys on top. Their clerk, a scrawny young man with too-long hair, stood behind them with an inkpot and quill, looking bored.

  With enormous relief, John saw Wiley squeezed between the table corner and the wall, trying without much success to shout Lord Parham down. Their eyes met, and Wiley's widened with shock, evidence enough of his involvement in John's disappearance. His expression changed from surprise to despair, and John knew he was witnessing the death of a man's hopes.

  So be it. He stepped forward, pulling out the all-important document that proved Jessica's right to the Parham collection. "Lord Parham."

  This succeeded where Jessica's increasingly vehement tugs had failed. Parham's voice faltered and he turned. "Dryden! And—" He glanced down at his arm, and for the first time noticed his niece. "And Jessica! You are here! And—and wed?"

  "Yesterday."

  Wiley made a grab for the license, but John yanked it away and handed it to the solicitor in the center. "Lord Parham is here to give evidence to his consent."

  "Just a moment, now, young man. We must examine this more closely."

  In unison, the solicitors reached into their breast pockets for spectacles. John glanced over to make sure Jessica still held her reticule, with its confirmatory affidavit, then kept his gaze locked on the marriage lines lying on the table. The assault he expected came, Wiley's hand snaking out under the solicitors' faces.

  "Let me see that."

  "Not on your life." John planted his fist on the marriage license and slowly, sullenly, Wiley withdrew his hand.

  "Our marriage is entirely official," Jessica put in defiantly, as the central solicitor picked up the license to peer at it. John waited for her to add that it had been duly consummated also. But she must have felt his amusement, for she turned to him with a challenging glance that suggested such revelations were the husband's job.

  Apparently consummation wasn't an issue; the vicar's signature was. It was an angry, incomprehensible scrawl, only halfway set on the appropriate line, and the solicitor on the end claimed it didn't say Jeremiah Tooley after all, but Joseph O'Toole, and no one named O'Toole could be an Anglican vicar. John resolved that the supply of Burgundy wine to the vicar's table would be cut off immediately, and had almost decided to resume his childhood pastime of stomping melons from the vicarage garden, when Lord Parham resumed his barrister act at an even higher volume.

  "Even if this is an O'Toole," he proclaimed, "and a Papist priest to boot, it matters naught. Clergy is clergy! Surely Mr. Wiley can't claim that every Papist couple in Britain lives in sin?"

  "Mr. Wiley?" With a whispered gasp, Jessica escaped from John's side and through the door to the main collection room.

  John cursed his new wife's predilection for independent action. But a glance at the wooden casket of papers told him what she hadn't taken the time to explain. The ring of keys had vanished, and with it the magician-handed librarian. With a muttered oath, he jerked at Parham's arm, then took off after Jessica before he could determine if her uncle understood his warning.

  John wasn't quick enough, however. By the time he raced up the stairs and along the mezzanine to reach the back storage room, the door to the vault was open and the trunk pulled out into the middle of the floor. Over to the left, Jessica was over by the window, half-hidden by the corner of the long worktable. She struggled in the grasp of the solicitor's clerk, who had his hand clamped over her mouth and her arm wrenched behind her.

  In two steps, John crossed the room and seized the clerk by the neck, his fingers tightening on the meager set of bones. "Let her go or I'll kill you."

  "No, no, Captain Dryden." Mr. Wiley came out of the vault, a pistol in his hand. He pointed it at Jessica's chest. "Let him go, or I'll kill her."

  Immediately John loosed his hands and stepped back, every sense on alert for an opening. He thought he saw one when the clerk, coughing, let go of Jessica's arm so that he could rub at his neck. But Mr. Wiley's aim was still sure, and the clerk's hand still covered her mouth. Above it, her eyes were wild as she looked from the pistol to John.

  Mr. Wiley smiled. "I gather, Captain Dryden, that I've found something that matters more to you than whatever we'll find in that trunk. I shan't forget that."

  "I shan't forget this either, Wiley. You can't expect to survive this. The others will be along in a moment."

  "Oh, I don't know if they will find us in time. Parham has never been back here, nor the solicitors, and it's not easy to find. But no matter what, my work will survive. I've filed a copy of my monograph with the Royal Society's secretary, who will open it in one week, whether I live or die."

  "Don't do it. You will just ruin yourself, don't you know that? It's naught but folly, what you believe."

  John might have been arguing with a saint, so unworldy was the gaze turned on him. The eyes were almost unfocused behind the thick lenses, the voice abstract. But the hand that aimed the gun at Jessica never wavered. "You will know it's not folly when the St. Germaine trunk reveals its treasure. Let her go, Meeker. She knows better than to shout as long as I hold this pistol."

  The clerk let her go, and Jessica shook her head frantically, loosing her golden hair from its braid. She scrubbed at her mouth with her palm and shot a venomous look at Meeker. "I hope your hand falls off," she told him.

  Always defiant, Jessica moved slowly away from the window towards John. Wiley didn't p
rotest, but kept the gun trained on her and the table between himself and them. Never looking away from him, John held out his hand. Jessica took it, then almost immediately let it go. They needed the contact, both of them, but not the confinement, if they were to escape this trap of Wiley's devising.

  Following Wiley's gentle-voiced directions, Meeker shut the door and wedged a chair under the knob. John exchanged a despairing glance with Jessica. Now the storage room would be less noticeable than ever, a closed door hidden away in the stacks of shelves, in the gloomy heights above the remotest room. If he knew Parham, their rescuers would be headed in the opposite direction.

  Meeker took the key ring and, stooping, found one that fit the padlock on the black leather trunk. With a snap it sprung open, and he pushed up the lid. "Now what, guv'nor?"

  Wiley kept the gun trained on Jessica, but backed up a few feet so that he could see over the lid of the trunk.

  "Show me what's in it. Take out each item and read out to me what it is. Then hold it up so I can see it."

  Meeker did as he was bid, reading off the titles of a half-dozen volumes that earlier John would have given an arm to possess. But now all he could concentrate on was that gun, pointed at Jessica. He had to draw it to himself somehow, to give her a chance to escape. The door was just behind them, and help not far beyond that. Meeker might chase her, but in a fair fight, John would lay odds she could lay the clerk out, and he was determined to give her the chance.

  Finally Meeker read out in a bored voice, "Sir T-H More. By Anthony Munday." He held up a gray pasteboard box about the size of a folio volume.

  John felt Jessica standing tense and silent beside him, and blessed her stoicism. That part of him that still cared about such things went still, hoping that Wiley would wave the box over to the pile of unimportant treasures.

  But Wiley smiled peacefully. "That's it. Bring it to me."