by Jane Goodger
“Before he died, Sir George was quite ill,” Laura explained. “He was bedridden. For years. He fell from his horse shortly after the twins were born and could not walk. Sir George and his wife are both brunettes with brown eyes.”
“George junior is blond,” Lady Juliana stressed.
Melissa knew the two girls were hinting at something, but she still didn’t know what.
Laura gave her a look of exasperation. “George junior cannot be Sir George’s son.”
“Legally, he is Sir George’s heir,” Lady Juliana pointed out. “So it’s really not that much of a scandal, I suppose, even though I did hear rumors that the father was wholly unsuitable. One of their servants, I believe. But it could have been worse for poor George. It’s not as if he was born after Sir George died. Then he’d be . . .” Lady Juliana flushed.
“He’d be what?” Melissa asked.
“A bastard,” Laura whispered dramatically.
“It could have destroyed the family,” Lady Juliana said. “I doubt the twins could have married as well as they did if that were the case.”
“I know a girl whose father was a baron, but whose mother was a scullery maid. Do you know how I know her? She works in our kitchen. Papa didn’t want to hire her at all, but Mother has a soft heart and Papa relented.”
Lady Juliana looked thoughtful. “I suppose it’s not the girl’s fault her mother was that sort of woman. Though, it’s likely she’s the same way. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.”
Melissa felt herself growing hot. They could have been talking about her. She was a bastard. She was, and yet she’d never thought of herself as anything other than her father’s daughter.
“No one wants tainted blood, you see,” Laura explained. “Poor George. His father could be anyone.”
“It matters so much?” Melissa asked past a growing tightness in her throat.
“Of course it does,” Laura said. “My goodness, you have been sheltered, haven’t you? Did no one tell you these things, about fortune hunters and eligible men and such? No one would purposely marry out of their realm and certainly not someone illegitimate. It just isn’t done. It only brings heartache. That’s why a commoner cannot marry a peer. It upsets the entire order of society. It’s why we keep to our own.”
Melissa felt her cheeks flush and her stomach give a sickening twist. “What if you were to fall in love with such a person?”
“A bastard? Oh, goodness, no self-respecting person would,” Lady Juliana said. “It would never happen. No one would want that sort of blood in their line.”
Melissa knew the two girls were not being vicious or cruel, but were simply stating what they believed to be right and true. Unfortunately, every word they uttered only made Melissa cognizant for the first time in her life that she might not be who she’d always thought. She was a bastard, something to be scorned and avoided. She was someone, she realized, who wouldn’t even be in this room wearing a fine dress and speaking with these two girls if anyone knew.
“What if someone posed as a peer and you fell in love but found out later that he was . . .”
“Illegitimate?” Laura said, her eyes sparkling with excitement at this apparently lurid conversation.
Melissa swallowed. “Yes. Would you still not love that person?”
“I’d be devastated,” Lady Juliana said. “Not only because of who he was, but because he lied.” Then she giggled. “But mostly because of what he was. I cannot even imagine such a thing. No bastard would pass him or herself off as legitimate.”
Laura nodded. “I think the lie would be the worst. The deception.” She looked from one girl to the other. “Have either of you read Ruth?”
“No, you didn’t—” Lady Juliana gasped. At Melissa’s questioning look, she explained. “It’s a scandalous book about a girl who has a baby even though she’s not married! She gets her comeuppance because she dies in the end, though.”
“I thought you didn’t read it,” Laura said with a laugh.
“Oh, I didn’t. But Mary Chalsford has and told me a bit about it,” Lady Juliana said. “Did you read it?”
Laura nodded. “I actually thought it was quite horrid what happened to poor Ruth.”
“Mary said Ruth got what she deserved.”
“I don’t think you’d say that if you read the book,” Laura said.
With each word the girls uttered, Melissa felt more and more despondent. She was a bastard. Her mother was a promiscuous woman who had lain with the Duke of Waltham knowing he was married. And she was the by-product of that act. If any man knew her background, he would never marry her. He would . . .
A stunned thought came to her, a wave of realization that made her heart contract painfully and the blood drain from her face. They had lied to her. Her uncle and John had lied about the reason for her deception. It was not to save the heart of some duchess, but to make her marriageable. No one would marry her if they knew of her birth. No one would want her “tainted” blood. In a rush of humiliation, she had a vision of herself, panting and spreading her legs for John, standing up against that stone wall, her hand on his man-part, letting him touch her, like some . . . hussy. She couldn’t picture Laura or Lady Juliana acting in such a wanton way.
They had lied to her, just so they could get her off their hands, just so they could lie to others if people noticed the likeness between her and her true father. She felt sick to her stomach.
“Are you quite all right?” Lady Juliana asked.
“No,” Melissa said, shaking her head, feeling hot tears press against her eyes. “I suddenly feel quite ill. Perhaps I should retire.”
The two women stood, eyes filled with sympathy and concern—emotions they might not feel if they knew they were in the presence of a bastard.
“Good night,” Melissa said, rising and walking on shaking legs from the room. Her stomach twisting from nerves, she went directly to her uncle’s library, where the men were enjoying their cards. She stood at the open door, feeling as if her world were slowly falling apart. Would John have dared touch her the way he had if she had not been a bastard? Was that the true reason he could not marry her, because of her birth?
John noticed her at the door first, lifting his head, his eyes lighting before he lowered his gaze. He stood, and the other men, seeing her, rose as well.
Melissa looked at her uncle. “May I speak to you and John in private, please?” she asked, hating the quick look of panic that struck John’s face. No doubt he feared she would tattle about their encounter. She kept her face passive, wanting him to think that, wanting him to suffer just a little after what they had done. The two younger men excused themselves, Charles leaving only after giving Melissa a searching look. She had no patience for Charles, whom her uncle was duping into believing she was a proper matrimonial candidate. How dare they? How dare they lie not only to her but to Charles, as well? When the other men had gone, Melissa took a step toward her uncle, her throat burning with anger and unshed tears.
“You lied to me,” she said, her gaze moving from one to the other.
Her uncle smiled gently. “My dear, what are you talking about?”
“I’m a bastard,” she spat. “Shall we go into the other room and make that announcement?”
They looked from one to the other, matching wary expressions on their lying faces. She wished she could slap them both.
“No one would want me because I’m illegitimate. Who my father truly is and the sensibilities of his wife are beside the point.”
“Melissa, sit down,” her uncle said, taking a step closer to her.
“No, I will not. And I will not be patronized. Tell me that any man would want me as his wife if he knew. Tell me that is not why you lied.”
“It is why we lied,” John said. “We were only trying to protect you, Melissa. Perhaps we should not have lied, but it was only because we didn’t want you to feel the taint of illegitimacy.”
Melissa blinked, and two tears fell from he
r eyes. She dashed them away. “And if a man should come to care for me? If he should ask for my hand in marriage? Do I tell him? Do I keep my secret? Do I lie to the man who has asked me to be his wife?”
Her uncle swore beneath his breath, and John strode over to her, grasping her hand and leading her toward a set of chairs. “Sit down,” he said, and exerted a bit of pressure so that she sat.
He pulled another chair over to hers, sitting close. His father did the same. “You haven’t been in society, so you do not know the taint of illegitimacy,” John said. “It is wrong, I know that. Many people know that. But there are others who zealously defend the treatment of unmarried mothers and their illegitimate offspring. Father and I are working with a group of men to change this, but no one in power wants to listen.”
“It is rather futile, my dear,” her uncle said, his face lined with worry.
“We thought it best to shield you from that venom.”
Melissa looked from one man to the other. She was the same girl she’d always been. Was she supposed to feel ashamed of who she was? People couldn’t be that cruel. She couldn’t believe it of them, not when her father had loved her so, not when her uncle and John had been so kind. “Would it truly be so bad if people knew?” she asked, her voice small.
“Society has no sympathy toward women who bear children out of wedlock. None,” her uncle said. “It is by God’s grace alone that your mother was found by my brother. Anyone else would have cast her out, would have let the two of you starve.”
“I can’t believe that,” Melissa said.
John took a deep breath. “Have you ever heard of baby farmers?”
“No, John,” her uncle said.
John ignored his father. “Have you?”
Melissa shook her head.
“They are women who prey on those poor souls unfortunate enough to have a child out of wedlock. Our grand society gives such women nothing. Legally, the father has no obligation to aid the woman or the child. More often than not, the women are cast out. They are fired from their positions. They are forced to leave their families. And when they give birth, they are on their own. Such a woman must work to support herself and her child, but no one will hire her. Orphanages will not even take in illegitimate children. These women have no choice but to go to baby farmers.”
“John, I don’t think Melissa needs to hear all this.”
John glared at his father. “She does, Father.” He reached out and took one of Melissa’s hands. “These women offer to take illegitimate babies for twelve pounds. The mothers believe their babies are being cared for, adopted out, perhaps. But every day, we find babies floating in the Thames. . . .”
“John, for the love of God,” her uncle said. “Stop.”
“We find them in alleys, wrapped in newspaper, discarded like so much garbage,” John said, ignoring his father’s plea. “Sometimes the little babes are killed outright. Other times they are slowly starved to death. It is worse for the older children. Many times the mother, desperate to keep her baby, pays these women fifteen shillings a week, thinking her child is safe and one day she will be able to return for it. But they die, almost always. And there is nothing the mother can do.”
Tears streamed down Melissa’s face. It could have been her, thrown into an alley. Her mother had been desperate, alone, starving.
“How do people let that happen?” she whispered.
John shook his head. “I don’t know. Good Christian people turn their heads away, believing such a child is better off dead.” Melissa gasped. “Father is working with two doctors to change the laws so that babies are protected. But few people want to listen.”
“Why are you telling me this?” Melissa asked, sniffing loudly.
“I wanted you to know why my father and I did what we did. Why your father was so concerned about your well-being. He was afraid for you. My father made a promise to his brother, to protect you at all costs. And that is what we are doing. No one will know of your birth, Melissa. You shall marry a good man, a man who loves you.”
Melissa stared at John. “A man whom I must lie to,” she said dully.
John squeezed her hand. “Yes.”
“And he must never know?” It seemed so wrong. If someone loved her, truly loved her, it shouldn’t matter whether her mother was married or not when she was born.
John looked down. “I suppose that is something you must decide for yourself,” he said quietly.
“If you married a woman who was illegitimate,” she said, “would you want to know?” She stared at him and felt her stomach drop at his expression. “You wouldn’t want to know, would you? Because you would think less of her, is that it? Is that how you truly think of me, as simply a bastard to be foisted off on the first unsuspecting man?”
“Melissa, that is enough,” her uncle said.
Melissa ignored him. “I’m right, aren’t I?” she asked John.
John shook his head, but he could not meet her eyes. “It’s an unfair question as I already know who you are and who your father is. But if I’m to be perfectly honest, it is information most men could do without. You would do much better to keep your silence if you wish to marry well. Your birth should not matter, not to a man who loves you. It should not. But it will matter. Life is not fair, Melissa, no matter how we wish that it was.”
She gave her head a shaky nod, knowing he was right even as she silently railed against it. She did not know if she could marry someone with this lie in her heart. It shouldn’t matter, but Melissa, even with her limited experience of society, knew it would. She didn’t know what to do.
“I’m letting Darling out, then going to bed,” she said, suddenly so weary she could hardly stand.
“I’ll get Sandy and go with you,” John said.
“If you wish.”
Outside the library, John gave a sharp whistle, and it was only a matter of a few seconds before both puppies come bounding toward them. Darling followed behind, her ears flapping, her tail wagging excitedly, and Melissa smiled and bent down to kiss her pup’s head, a difficult task when Darling was bent on licking her mistress’s face. She laughed, and John felt his heart tug, glad that all the laughter hadn’t been taken from her.
“Come, you two,” John said, giving his own dog a hearty pat. They silently walked through the deserted kitchen and out the back door, letting the dogs bound about and do their business.
“Are you all right, then?” John asked, gazing at Melissa as she smiled faintly at the dogs’ antics. Her smile disappeared.
“No. I’m not.” She crossed her arms, whether from the cold or to shut him out, John wasn’t certain. “I had no idea the world was such a cruel and complicated place,” she said. “It seems impossible that society would allow innocent babes to die because of their unfortunate birth.”
“I couldn’t believe it either until I saw it for myself,” John said. “If it had been one madwoman, then perhaps. But there are hundreds of baby farmers throughout the kingdom.”
“It makes me feel dirty.”
John snapped his head around, shocked by her words. “No,” he said, horrified that she would think such a thing. “You are the same girl you were. It is society that is foul, not you.” He stood before her, his heart breaking at the way she kept her head down. He wanted to rail against a world that could steal her confidence, her joy. “Melissa, look at me.”
She lifted her head, and he saw nothing but despair. “Do not let petty people change your opinion of yourself.”
“I wish I could go home,” she said. “But my home is gone. Sold to someone else. Everything is gone.”
He knew she meant more than brick and mortar. All her dreams, all her memories were now tainted. “You are home,” he said, drawing her into his arms, trying to give her comfort and strength. He placed one hand at the back of her head and held her for several long moments, his cheek resting on her smooth, soft, black curls. She let out a sigh, and John pushed back, pressing a kiss upon her forehead.
“I thought we’d have no more kisses.”
He smiled down at her, glad she was able to tease him again. “That was the kiss of a first cousin,” he said.
“I like the other kind better.”
Just like that, desire washed over him, and he took a step back. “I daresay I do, too,” he said, his voice uncharacteristically gruff.
“I wish . . .” She stopped, turning her head abruptly away.
“What do you wish for, Melissa?”
She closed her eyes briefly, then gave a small shrug. “Too many things that can never come true,” she said softly.
Chapter 13
John spent a sleepless night, worrying about Melissa and wondering if it were true that he’d actually fallen in love with her. His mind was in a bloody war over the matter. He was an intelligent man who knew everything he said and did was a matter of how his brain worked. His heart was no more than an organ that pumped blood. When it stopped, he would die. It was not the place where love was born. But he couldn’t help thinking that if love had nothing to do with his heart, why did it hurt so damned much at the thought of Melissa’s marrying another?
He sat on the edge of his bed, his hands massaging his temples, as he tried to convince himself that this thing he felt was merely lust. He’d felt lust before, and this was not it. All his adult life, he’d believed that foolish men and women mistook lust for love. He’d seen men and women lose themselves to one another, only to break it off and go on with their lives. Or worse, they married and ended up loathing each other. He’d felt so superior to all those fools who truly thought they’d found love, and rather smug when everything fell apart. If love existed, why were so many people miserable with each other?
Then, the image of the Pickets and their brood of children came to him. That flower Mr. Picket had fetched for his wife, that ridiculous, wilted flower that he’d nearly killed himself to get for Mrs. Picket. Why? Because he lusted for her? Admired her? No. God, no. After fifteen years of marriage, a man only did something like that because he loved his wife. Loved her.
