“Ah, well, Mac, I can’t rightly read our Joanna’s mind. Mayhap she thought that a child alone would be more pitied than one with her mother along to help her.”
“Mayhap,” Mac answered. Or mayhap she thought the child alone would be more welcome than she would be.
For years, Cormac had pondered the current Duke’s kindness to Joanna’s father, back when the Duke was but a young Marquess. Back then, the nobleman had saved Domnall Bagley’s life, for no apparent reason.
Mac reflected, too, on how years ago, the young Lord had mentioned Joanna’s name so familiarly in the tavern of Domesday St. Osmund, much to Domnall’s distress.
And as recently as last year, the Duke had inquired after Domnall Bagley by name, but had shown his greatest concern upon learning that Domnall’s daughter had disappeared in London.
It was a mystery, that was certain. And at the core of it, Cormac was sure, was the kind-hearted young Duke, seemingly blind to class boundaries; the stunningly beautiful Joanna, surely impossible for a young man to resist; and the fatherless child, who to Cormac’s eyes looked like a perfect blend of the physical characteristics of both.
For the sake of Domnall, his dearest friend, he vowed he would solve the mystery.
* * *
Joanna could not bear not knowing how Hannah was faring in her new home. Realizing she had barely a month before the Travellers left on their autumnal trek west, Joanna began to skulk openly around the Manor grounds, trying to catch glimpses of her daughter.
In this, she was successful. Before long, she saw Hannah skipping along merrily in the kitchen garden, accompanying a plump, pleasant old soul in a voluminous apron.
The cook, perhaps? She seems to have some authority, ordering the kitchen maids and gardening lads about in her cheerful way.
Perhaps Joanna should have felt some jealousy, but in truth she was just glad that Hannah seemed to have found yet another grandmotherly figure to look out for her and protect her.
For in truth, the cook—if that was who she was—appeared to dote on little Hannah. Joanna watched from her hiding place as the kind old lady seemed to point out various useful herbs to Hannah, then teach her how to weed gently around them. She would give Hannah little things to carry for her, but never anything heavy—it seemed more a means of making Hannah feel important, rather than truly seeking any labor from the child.
Joanna became obsessed with watching the goings-on at the Manor, as if it were a stage play that fascinated her. Every morning she showed up and scouted the grounds. She told herself she needed to know as much as possible about where her daughter was living.
Inevitably, she sighted the Duchess. Joanna recognized her at once from the church in Hanover Square. But Christopher’s wife had aged and hardened since Joanna had last seen her.
Displeasure with life had carved harsh grooves from her nose to the corners of her mouth. Where her figure had once been fashionably slim, now it was gaunt, as if bitterness had eaten away at it.
Her voice, which Joanna had only once heard eight years before, as the lady had said her wedding vows, was now even more strident and shrill. She had a bevy of ladies’ maids always in attendance, and she barked and snapped at them every moment.
For this haughty, bitter woman, you left me, Christy?
Joanna saw no evidence that the Duke and Duchess had any children. There were no nannies or governesses, no perambulators or toys to be seen. No signs of life renewing itself—just empty grandeur as its own justification for existence.
Once, Joanna saw the Duchess speak to Hannah. Just once, but it was enough to earn Joanna’s lifelong enmity, if the past history between them had not already done so.
The Duchess was out on the lawn, playing at croquet with a handful of well-dressed female guests. Footmen were spreading rugs on which the ladies might sit to take their luncheon. Kitchen staff were bustling about, silently laying out picnic fare. All the servants seemed as if they were trying to be as quiet and invisible as possible.
Hannah was there to help the rest of the kitchen staff. Ungainly and leggy as a lovely young filly, she tripped on a rock and spilled the crystal bowl of strawberry punch she was carrying.
The valuable crystal bowl did not shatter. No real harm was done. But it was clear to any onlooker that the Duchess was angered that her perfect summertime picnic tableau was marred by such incompetence.
“You. Little girl,” she hissed. “Come here.”
Hannah approached her, her lower lip trembling, as if she had been summoned by Her Majesty the Queen.
“Little girl, you are a useless little idiot. Do you realize that?”
Hannah stood stock still. She did not know what answer was called for by such a statement.
The Duchess grabbed her by her little shoulders and shook her hard. “A useless— little— idiot. Do you understand? I want to hear you say it after me. ‘I am a useless little idiot.’ Come on!”
But Hannah, even at eight years old, had something of her mother’s backbone. She sensed she was being asked to degrade herself, and she would not do it.
She stood there silently and stared stubbornly at the Duchess.
“Come on. ‘I am a useless little idiot.’ Say it!”
As Hannah remained silent, the Duchess gave her one last, violent shake and turned to the plump figure overseeing the staff. “Cook, I want her beaten for this! Ten blows on her bare back! Such insolence! I will not stand for it in my own Manor!”
It seemed to Joanna that Cook had complete control over her outward demeanor. She would have had to learn that, I suppose, if she worked here under the old Duke.
“Of course, Yer Grace,” Cook said monotonously. “As Yer Grace wishes.” She took Hannah by the hand and pulled her alongside herself.
“See that it’s done as I command, Cook! Or it will be your own old back taking the blows!” The Duchess had worked herself up into a hysterical state.
“Of course, Yer Grace. Just as Yer Grace wishes.” Cook pulled Hannah away from the gaping crowd of guests.
Joanna trailed them to the kitchen garden. Safe from view, the old lady had taken the little girl in her arms and was rocking her, while Hannah cried inconsolably. “Hush, now. Hush now, pet. No harm will come to ye while I’m around, lass, ye can be sure of that.”
* * *
Joanna did not consciously plan to encounter Christopher, or at least so she told herself. She just hoped she could keep an eye on her daughter, yet avoid being noticed by anyone in the ducal household.
Of course, given her daily visits, it was inevitable that they would eventually meet.
One morning, she had been spying on the kitchen garden from an opening in the hedgerow. When she turned to escape the hedgerow, Christopher was standing there. He put his arms up to block her escape.
“You,” he said. “What are you doing here?”
“Christy, you sound so cold and angry! I can’t believe….” You’re so different. You’re a stranger to me.
“Yes, I’m angry. Did you think you could just walk back here and find yourself welcomed, after what you did to me eight years ago? And don’t you dare call me Christy. You lost all right to call me that when you abandoned me in London years ago.”
“I abandoned you? Are you insane?”
“I may be, after all I’ve suffered because of you. Because of—what was it that happened? I was ready to marry you, to turn my back on everyone and everything else in my life. But you lost your nerve and ran. Or maybe you found you didn’t care as much as you said you did for me. Maybe you weren’t sure enough to make a commitment. However you want to explain it, you abandoned me, left me to this bitter, pointless life I’ve had to endure since then.”
It’s true, he looks bitterly unhappy. And all that life force that once seemed to radiate from him is dimmed. There’s just enough life energy left to hate me.
I was able to bear a lot these past eight years. But Christopher’s hatred. I cannot bear that.
; She had to try to tell him her side of the story. Even if he still hated her at the end of it, she had to try.
“Christy—”
“No. I told you not to call me that. Call me ‘Your Grace.’ Or nothing at all. But don’t you dare call me Christy.”
“I’ll call you nothing at all, then,” Joanna said with some spirit. She felt as if he had slapped her. She did not deserve this.
“Your father came to see me. He told me you were engaged to marry a wealthy, beautiful lady you loved, a ‘suitable match.’ He implied I was nothing more to you than a streetwalker getting paid for her services to you. He arranged with Mrs. Maywood to have me taken out of town, by force if necessary.”
“So you gave in. Just like that. You gave up on me and left.”
“No, I didn’t! I ran away and stayed with Rosie at the Empire. She helped me get a message delivered to you at Gresham House. I wrote to you that I loved you—that I loved you, do you hear me? I said I’d wait in Hanover Square every morning, in the hope we could talk. I went every single morning. I stood there in sun, rain, or snow. I never missed a day. You never showed up. You call that abandoning you, Your Grace?” Her use of his title dripped with sarcasm.
Christopher was silent for a moment. “I never got any note from you,” he said slowly.
“You must have known I would still stay in touch with Rosie! How come you never tried to contact her?”
“Because my loving father swore he had made you leave town—that you left immediately, and quite willingly. He made it sound like he had paid you off.”
“And you believed that horrible man? That man who would have hanged my father, who hanged two of my family’s closest friends—”
“Yes, I hated him, too, Joanna. I still hate his memory. But I had no reason not to believe him. You were gone. You had left me. And I was not at liberty to go searching for you.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“Just what I say. He locked me up at Gresham House. He had guards at every door, every window, to prevent me from escaping. I could not go looking for you. I was imprisoned. He only set me free when I finally agreed to marry Dorothy Coleman.”
So which of us was the weak one, then? Which of us gave in and abandoned the other under pressure? I didn’t do this to him—he did it to me!
Joanna had never been so angry in her life.
“Oh, yes, your wedding. On Boxing Day. Quite the social event of the season, I recall,” Joanna jibed.
“You knew—?”
“I was there, you weak, faithless bastard. It was on a morning when I was waiting in Hanover Square, hoping to see you. I saw you, all right. And I heard your make your vows to her. ‘Forsaking all others,’ I seem to remember you saying to her. That meant me, I guess.”
Christopher ran his hands through his hair, then buried his face in his hands. “It’s not possible. Oh, Joanna, how did we manage to ruin everything like this?”
We? He actually thinks the blame is equal here?
Joanna was speechless with fury.
Christopher pressed her. “You didn’t go home to your people, then? You stayed in London?”
“Yes, I stayed in London. I had no money for traveling by coach out to the West Country. I was stranded,” she hissed.
“What did you do—how did you manage?”
At least he looks shamefaced. Well, I’m not going to let him off the hook.
“I stayed with Rosie for as long as I dared. But then Mrs. Hartnell was insisting that I start ‘working’ for her, to reimburse her for my keep….”
“Joanna! You didn’t—!”
“No, I didn’t, you fool. I have some self-respect, you know. I had to escape from the Empire. I worked for a couple of years at a public house behind Covent Garden. Then for a few more years, I worked in a tea shop, dressing up as a gypsy and telling ladies’ fortunes. Then the old lady who ran the tea shop got kicked out onto the streets by her own son, and Hannah and me with her. I tried to survive on the streets, but eventually it was the workhouse for all of us. Clerkenwell. That’s how Hannah got so sick.”
Joanna recited this history in a mechanical, unemotional manner, as if telling the story of people she didn’t know. Emotion enough for both of them was on Christopher’s face. He was white with shock.
“The workhouse, Joanna? Clerkenwell? Good God….”
“Don’t feel sorry for us. We’re fine now. I’m all right, I’m home with my people. And your Cook has apparently nursed Hannah back to health. I’ll forever be grateful—to her—for that.”
“Joanna—please don’t misunderstand me—anything I can do to help you or your child, I want to do. You have been through so much since last we met. And I’m truly sorry if you somehow see the sad events of your life these past eight years as being my fault. But would you answer me one thing? A child has two parents. You seem to have had to carry all these burdens alone. When Hannah became so sick, why didn’t you approach the little girl’s father for help?”
Joanna smiled sadly. “That’s what I was doing. When I brought her here.”
Chapter 30
Joanna at the Manor House
“Joanna, are you sure?” Christopher looked as if he might fall over if he didn’t keep a firm grip on the hedge branches.
“Am I sure? You bastard. There was never anyone before you, and there’s been no other man since. I stayed faithful, even if you didn’t. And by the way, I’ve had a little child to care for all these years. No gallivanting around for me. Hannah is yours. She was conceived that one time, at Stonehenge. On the morning of the equinox, by the feet of the Sarsen stones.”
“But Joanna—this is wonderful!” In truth, a new fire seemed to have ignited in him. There was the flame of new life in his eyes, all of a sudden.
“She’s so beautiful, so intelligent and spirited. Even just talking to her a few times has made me happy, although I could not have explained why. If you only knew—how much I’ve longed for a child all these years—someone to live for, to love—”
“Oh, has Her Grace the Duchess failed in that department? I’m so sorry to hear it,” Joanna said. She felt she deserved to be a little bitter, and to show it.
“Her Grace the Duchess.” Christopher’s face twisted into an ugly sneer. “Joanna, I have lain with her as little as possible. And even when I’ve had to do that, out of duty, I’ve made sure the act wouldn’t result in a child. To tell the truth, Joanna, on the rare times I’ve had to be with her, I could only get through it by squeezing my eyes shut, by pretending it was you….”
“Don’t say things like that,” Joanna begged. “Don’t, don’t, don’t.” Suddenly, she was in danger of losing the icy front she had been showing Christopher, and it frightened her.
I cannot let things start up again with him. I can’t make myself that vulnerable again. If he loved me and let me down again, I do not think I could survive it.
“Christopher—” She risked using his name, although not his precious nickname. “We once loved each other. Whatever we once had, it’s over now, we can’t pretend otherwise. Too much has happened. There is nothing between us anymore.”
“There’s Hannah, Joanna. We can’t forget that. We have a child, a precious child. And even if we hated each other, we need to—I need to—do everything that can be done for her. Particularly now that I know she exists, that she’s mine.”
“Ours. Not yours.”
“Yes. Ours.”
* * *
Christopher warned himself not to move too fast. But he needed to see Joanna, to know she was near him, even if nothing could come of it between them.
“Joanna, she’s doing well here. Cook loves her like a grandmother. With healthy food, good medical care, she’s almost recovered from the acute phase of her illness. But she has consumption, Joanna. The physician told Cook that. There’s no cure for consumption. When you have it, you have it for life. It lies dormant in your lungs, and elsewhere. You don’t suffer when your overall health
is good. When you encounter rough living conditions, though, it will come racing back and take hold again. With every health crisis, the lungs weaken, and the consumption gets harder and harder to fight. That’s when people die of it.”
Christopher paused. Here is where I can make my strongest argument for Joanna and Hannah staying here with me. But Joanna will take flight if she thinks I’m trying to clip her wings. I have to take this slowly, slowly….
“Joanna, when do the Travellers leave for the West?”
Joanna was thoughtful. “About two weeks,” she replied.
“You must know Hannah’s not fit to make that journey, particularly as the autumn weather grows colder. Breaking camp and moving every day, being exposed to the elements—she’s sure to have another attack.”
“Maggie Mae cares for Hannah devotedly, just as Cook does here.”
“I don’t doubt it. She raised you, and from everything you’ve told me, Maggie Mae is a fine woman. But this is a serious, potentially fatal illness. Maggie Mae is an accomplished herbalist, but she’s at the outer limits of her medical knowledge in this. So would Cook be. But in the event Hannah has a crisis, Cook can send to town and have a good doctor here in twenty minutes. The longer Hannah stays here, the stronger she will get. The more likely the consumption will stay in remission.”
Joanna was silent. She seemed to accept his arguments, but something still held her back.
“What is it, Joanna? What are you afraid of?” he asked gently.
“More than a warm place to live, more than a doctor—a child needs a mother,” she said finally. She seemed to think Christopher would challenge this.
“I couldn’t agree more,” he said.
“And don’t try to tell me that Her Grace will be like a mother to her! Please. I’ve seen her in action—I wouldn’t want her anywhere near my child.”
“The Duchess? I wouldn’t trust a stray dog to that vicious woman’s care. Believe me. What I was thinking of….” Carefully, now. Don’t spook her. “Well, what would you think about staying here with her for a while? Not going west with the Travellers in a couple of weeks.”
Tamed By The Marquess (Steamy Historical Regency) Page 20
