A Notorious Countess Confesses: Pennyroyal Green Series

by Julie Anne Long

  Or at least he told himself that much.

  “Is the vicar in? Mrs. Dalrymple made free to let me, given that I’m a relative.”

  Ian stood in the doorway of his office.

  “The vicar’s in to you. Did you bring me any jam or embroidered pillows?”

  “I need to bring offerings to get an audience with you these days? Very well, how about this: I did bring a bit of news that might interest you. John O’Flaherty was seen in the Pig & Thistle last night.”

  Adam leaned back in his chair. And then sighed at length.

  “I prefer jam,” he said.

  “Sorry, old man. But I knew you’d been doing some work on their home, and I thought you’d like to know what you may need to contend with.”

  “Was he drinking?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “Ned Hawthorne served him?”

  “It seems he’d brought in his own flask.”

  Adam dropped his quill and stood immediately. A reflex, an instinct. He wasn’t due to round up his volunteers to go out to the O’Flahertys’ for a few hours yet, but something told him he should go now. He kept a horse at the vicarage.

  He reached for the coat he’d draped over the back of his chair and shoved his arms in.

  And then paused. He hated to ask it. But he couldn’t help it.

  “Ian … by the way, do you know anything about Lord Haynesworth?”

  “Haynesworth … well, he’s land rich and cash poor. Describes a lot of aristocrats, doesn’t it? Likes to gamble. I don’t know him very well but don’t care for what I do know. Seems a bit too polished, if you know what I mean, and when you’re that polished, all that reflection is usually for the purposes of hiding something.”

  Which is what Ian was doing at the moment: hiding something. Adam sensed it.

  “What aren’t you telling me?”

  Ian stared at him, hesitating. And then he sighed. “I do believe he fought a duel over Evie—sorry, Lady Wareham—some years ago. But then fighting duels over Evie was all the rage at one time.”

  Adam’s expression must have been eloquent.

  “Sorry, old man,” Ian said gruffly.

  “For what?” Adam’s voice had gone taut.

  “For whatever it is you’re feeling right now. Because judging from your expression, you’re not enjoying it.”

  Adam gave a short, humorless laugh. “Have you been talking to Colin?”

  “I always talk to Colin,” Ian said innocently. “And the most advice I’m qualified to give is keep your head down. You’re a grown man. If you want to know more about Haynesworth, there’s a bloke called Mr. Bartholomew who lives a few miles outside town who had some business dealings with Haynesworth, if you’d like to know more. He’s a barrister, and I think there was a good deal of trouble there. And now I’m off to see a man about a horse, and I’m late. Au revoir, cousin. Good luck with O’Flaherty and … everything else.”

  Chapter 16

  “HENNY, YOU’VE HAD that sniffle a good long time now.”

  Evie was in the kitchen packing a basket with a few things for the O’Flahertys before she departed—some seedcakes freshly baked by Mrs. Wilberforce, a few old London broadsheets for fresh admiral hats, a quarter of a wheel of cheese—while together with Mrs. Wilberforce they planned a shopping list of things to purchase in town.

  Henny was busy grinding her nose into a large handkerchief, so it was a moment before she could speak.

  “ ’Tis all this greenery here in Sussex. Me lungs are fit only to inhale coal smut.”

  “Speaking of filth and unpleasant things … you’ll never believe who appeared at the Assembly last night. Lord Haynesworth.”

  Henny froze and stared at her over the wads of her handkerchief. And then revulsion shimmied over her face.

  “Shall I snap his neck like a chicken for you?” Henny said idly. “Rotten git.”

  “He has his eye on Miss Pitney.”

  Henny was alarmed. “That poor girl with the fortune and the eyebrows? You’ll tell her about him, aye?”

  “I’ll have to, won’t I?”

  “Can ye see that on your conscience? I think ye may have enough trouble getting past St. Peter at the gates as it is. Ye must tell her.”

  Eve sighed. She knew she did. She didn’t look forward to it in the least. But if Haynesworth intended to speak to Miss Pitney’s father this week, there could be no postponing it.

  “And speaking of things that are lovely … did ye dance wi’ the vicar?”

  She had danced with the vicar. All night in fact. In her dreams. As if she was a green girl after a first dance, who’d never once awakened next to a nude, snoring, portly MP.

  Evie noticed Mrs. Wilberforce freeze alertly in her writing. And she remembered that her sister worked for the Pitneys, and though she was likely trustworthy enough, why feed grist into the gossip mill?

  Instead of answering, she asked Henny, “Have we any mail?

  “Aye. You’ve another letter, too.”

  Eve eyed it, her heart sinking. Yet another.

  And Cora typically only wrote if the news was very good, very new, or very bad.

  She hesitated, then took a deep breath and broke the seal.

  He’s been gone a week now. Little Tommy is teething. The baby looks a bit like you Aoife!

  Much love,

  Cora

  Evie lay that letter down and stared at it.

  An anvil seemed to take up residence on her chest.

  “Not beef this week, Mrs. Wilberforce,” she said suddenly, just as Mrs. Wilberforce wrote “beef” on her list of items to buy in town.

  It was just too costly, when there was only herself and the servants to feed.

  Cora, all of her nieces and nephews … how on earth they would all survive if their father never returned. For Eve could only just pay for her household as it was. There was the bit of land that could be worked outside the manor, but she hadn’t the staff to do it, and wouldn’t know to whom to rent it.

  Mrs. Wilberforce looked up from her list.

  “Very well, m’lady,” she said kindly. “No beef this week.”

  SINCE MRS. WILBERFORCE was going into town anyway, Eve rode with her atop their wagon. She would walk the rest of the way to the O’Flahertys’ from outside the cheese shop; they’d agreed that Mrs. Wilberforce would come to fetch her home in an hour or two.

  “And Mrs. Wilberforce … will you stop in at the doctor’s surgery and see about some herbs for Henny’s cough? Unless you have a tisane or a posset or some such for it?”

  “I do have a tisane for it. But I’ll see to it, m’lady. It never hurts to have a number of options, now, does it?”

  A philosophy to live by, to be certain.

  Evie embarked on the short remainder of the walk to the O’Flaherty household, singing softly to herself , swinging the basket, enjoying the weather, cold as it was. It was nearly clear, with enough breeze to carry a hint of the sea across the downs.

  But she slowed as she approached the O’Flaherty land.

  Something was amiss.

  There was an air of hush about it. As if the house itself was a frightened, crouching creature. No Molly the dog roared out the door to greet her. Even the chickens looked more subdued, but then they’d been fed more often lately. They eyed her basket with more idle curiosity than anything else. They left her toes alone as she approached the door.

  She walked slowly, her senses so heightened the very sound of her own footsteps against the earth made her feel pursued.

  Halfway across the yard a voice reached her through the ajar door. A man’s voice, raised and slurred with drink. Trampling over the conciliatory, desperately placating murmur of a woman’s voice.

  She didn’t hear the children at all.

  Eve stopped. Held herself perfectly still, like a cornered animal. The slurred cadences were too familiar. Her heart hurling itself against the walls of her chest, she forced herself forward through air that suddenly seemed
thick and threatening as lava.

  “And I want to know who ye’ve been letting into this house in me absence!”

  Eve pushed the door farther open, gently, gently, so quietly. Just a few inches.

  Straightaway, she saw the children, cowering in a corner. Molly the dog was crouched before them, shivering. The baby was behind them in its cradle, making soft, fussing noises.

  No one noticed her.

  And a man, stocky, his face the color of brick, his hair likely once dazzling and now faded to an anemic shade of rust, stood in the center of the room.

  He’d lowered his face until it was inches from Mary Flaherty’s, and snarling and swaying. Likely Mary’s face was hardly in focus for him. For Eve could smell John O’Flaherty—alcohol and layers of unwashed sweat—from where she stood.

  “What did I tell ye, Mary, about accepting charity? This—”He plucked a hunk of bread and flung it down on the table, where it bounced onto the floor. Molly the dog eyed it wistfully. “Charity bread! And you and everyone in town saying I canna provide for ye! Is that what you tell them? Ye like makin’ a mockery of me, now, don’t ye? Don’t ye?”

  “No, John,” Mary said dully, soothingly. “Not at all. I promise you. It’s just that with the new baby—”

  And time slowed then, as John O’Flaherty stepped back raised a hand good and high.

  The better to swing it across his wife’s face.

  And Eve shrieked like a banshee and flew through the door at him.

  And Adam, just a few feet behind her, saw her do it. In two long strides, he was inside. He lunged for her and seized her about the waist. She thrashed and kicked to be free, so he tucked her under her arm and hurled her toward the door.

  And it was he who stepped between John O’Flaherty and his wife, and took the fist to the jaw.

  Evie gasped when his head snapped back, and he went down on one knee.

  But when O’Flaherty reflexively tried again—like a windmill that had no choice but to keep going around—Adam’s hand shot up and seized his wrist in midair. For a moment, their two arms locked, straining against each other. And then in one swift deft motion Adam twisted O’Flaherty’s arm around his back and yanked it up good and high.

  O’Flaherty yelped; his face bunched in pain and darkened to the color of brick.

  The roar of breathing, his and Adam’s, was all anyone heard in the room. Not one sound came from the children huddling in the corner.

  “Now, John.” Adam’s voice was calm. Conversational. “You and I both know if you move at all, this will hurt worse for you. And like as no you’ve gauged my size and yours and, well, let’s be reasonable, I’m sober and you’re not and the odds are against you. Very against you.”

  John O’Flaherty seemed to take this in. He nodded, almost reasonably, though the cords of his neck were still taut with fury. He gave a token struggle. Apparently confirming precisely what Adam had just said, because he gasped.

  “I’m not going to let you hit your wife. And I’m not going to let go of you until you’re out of this house. We’re going to walk like this to the door, then I’m going to walk you through the door, then you’re going to keep walking down the hill, through the town, past the pub, out of the town, and you won’t turn around, and you won’t come back. If you turn around,” he said almost apologetically, “I’ll flatten you. I will take you down very quickly. What I do to you, in fact, will hurt considerably worse than a hangover, and last considerably longer. I invite you to test me.”

  Again, very reasonably.

  John O’Flaherty mulled this. “Sounds fair,” he conceded. Wisely.

  “Shall we now?”

  In a peculiarly mutated form of waltz, they shuffled, Adam maintaining his hold so tightly his knuckles were white, the muscles of his forearms bulging. John O’Flaherty cooperating, as though he knew he’d done something wrong.

  A few feet outside the door, Adam released him abruptly. John staggered, then righted himself. He gave his head a shake and looked back at the house.

  “Keep walking , John.”

  Adam watched as John O’Flaherty trudged up the road.

  And then he touched his face. It had been a glancing blow only, just enough to knock him off balance. He’d likely have a bruise. But, then, he’d had bruises before. He could accommodate them better than Mrs. O’Flaherty could.

  Mary O’Flaherty was scarlet with shame. “I’m so sorry, Reverend Sylvaine. He seldom … that is … only with the drink. Almost never … almost never in front of the children. I …”

  She turned and hurried to her children. And they were so accustomed to it that not even the little one cried.

  Captain Katharine was in the corner, one protective arm looped about her huddled brothers and her sister. Molly the dog, nearly as tall as the youngest girl, sat among them. The baby was waking, fussing softly in her crib. With her other hand, Katharine held on for dear life to her St. Christopher’s medal.

  “It worked, Mama,” she said. “Lady Wareham’s captain’s medal worked. Da is gone!”

  Eve made a small sound of pain. As though something had snapped inside her.

  She turned on her heel and walked out of the house.

  Mary O’Flaherty had ceased noticing him, busy with the children, and she was safe for now. So he followed Eve.

  She’d walked as far as the big oak tree and stopped. She flung her body back against it and stared up through the stripped branches.

  He leaned against the tree alongside her; there was room enough for the two of them, even a third person, to lean. The tree had been there for centuries and had likely seen worse than the O’Flahertys. And better.

  “ ‘Almost never,’ ” she quoted bitterly.

  He had nothing to say to that. They leaned in silence for a time.

  “Why are they like that?” she asked finally. Listlessly.

  “They?”

  “Men. Some men,” she corrected.

  He moved just an inch or so, until his shoulder just barely brushed hers, and he could feel her ease just slightly into the comfort. He remained as still as if a butterfly had lighted on his hand.

  “Sometimes it’s poverty,” he began softly. “A man gets to feeling helpless, so tortured by the fact that he can’t support his family. There’s nothing most men like less than to feel helpless.”

  “You’re not rich.”

  “Oh, how I love to be reminded of it.”

  She half smiled. She reached up to touch her throat, but dropped her hand again. Remembering again that her St. Christopher’s medal was now hanging around the neck of Captain Katharine.

  “I wish I had a cheroot,” she admitted. “I smoked now and again, when I was in London. Very calming, cheroots.”

  “And here I was thinking there was a vice you’d somehow missed.”

  Another small smile. “You arrived just in time. My cousin Ian warned me John O’Flaherty had been seen. Instinct made me come ahead of the volunteers.” He gestured to where his horse was tethered.

  She was lost in thought. In memories, no doubt.

  “Do you ever feel helpless, Reverend Sylvaine? Utterly at the mercy of circumstances?”

  He wasn’t about to admit to that particular word: “helpless.” Neither that, or to being at the mercy of circumstances, because his current circumstances involved the complicated, glorious ways he felt about Evie Duggan.

  “I meant it when I said my work involved a lot of guessing.”

  “Well, then. I’d say you’ve a knack,” she said dryly.

  He blew out a breath. “Your father drank?” He asked this question as if they were continuing a conversation.

  She turned her face slowly up to him. At first incredulous, then indignant, then pinched with pain.

  “Evidence of your knack.” She said it ironically, almost bitterly amused. “There was naught I could do to stop it, you know, when I was young. Da drank, and he hit Mum when he did. I did try to stop it.”

  He could fee
l every muscle in his body tightening, bracing himself for the next question.

  “Did he hit you?”

  But he was certain he already knew the answer. He imagined a man raining blows on a little girl, and fury was acrid in the back of his throat. His head went light from it. And he thought: I will turn back time. In that moment, he felt he really could do it, such was the force of his fury. I will undo whatever harm came to her.

  She must have felt his tension in the arm that just barely brushed hers. She stirred a little.

  “Only a few times,” she said distantly. “It was Mum who stepped in, like you stepped in today. She wouldn’t let him get near us. It was always Mum who bore the brunt. And then he left and never came back; and then she died.”

  Such a succinct, brutal way to summarize a childhood, he thought.

  “And do you know … I swore then that I would never be at the mercy of any man. Ever. I would always choose when to begin and when to end with a man.”

  He heard this as a confession and a warning.

  And thus more and more of the mosaic of her life shifted into place. Being born into chaos was why she’d planned her life so carefully. And why she remained so desperate to protect her family—because she’d never been able to protect her mother as a child.

  And her family was all she had. But some of her puzzle was still missing.

  “How did you come to be in London?’

  “A tinker passing through our village told me I was so pretty I could make my living on the stage.” She slid him an ironically flirtatious look. “I managed to persuade him to take all of us there in his wagon. All the little Duggans.”

  “Ah, the advantages of being pretty. And persuasive.”

  She gave a short laugh. “Mind you, all he got was a kiss for his trouble. My brothers and sisters were small, but we would have torn him to pieces if he’d tried anything else, but the tinker was decent, for all of that. He gave me my St. Christopher’s medal. Bit of tin, but he said it was for luck. And I might have been pretty, but I was a peasant, and there are only a few choices for a girl like me who needed to make a good deal of money in order to keep her family from the workhouse or the hulks. Fortunately, I was directed to the Green Apple Theater. You see, I’ve a bit of a knack, too,” she added with a quirk of her mouth. “Or so I discovered. I could entertain. Or entertain sufficiently.”