Winter Is Past

by Ruth Axtell Morren

  But Simon instructed his coachman to take him home. Since his return a fortnight ago, he’d been out every night Parliament wasn’t in session. And when the House adjourned early, he usually made his way to either Lady Eugenia’s salon or to some party for which he’d received an invitation.

  He would come home in time for his late-night watch with his daughter. He’d usually find Althea curled up, asleep on the armchair. As soon as he had roused her, she would scurry out of the room before he had a chance to so much as ask her how she was. He wondered at times whether she was fleeing him as much as he her.

  He couldn’t forget the feel of her in his arms that first night back, no matter how much he tried to dismiss it. But her warm body, the clean smell of her nightcap beneath his nostrils, the soft tendrils of hair escaping their braid, all continued to tease his memory. He hadn’t forgotten his father’s warning to him. It would do no good to let any sentimental feelings for Rebecca’s nurse influence him at this time. So, he let her run away without trying to detain her.

  In a careless moment, he had jokingly confided to Lady Eugenia his father’s plans for his second marriage. To his surprise, she had been in wholehearted agreement, reviewing his father’s candidates with him. Like a general planning a campaign, she’d listed the pros and cons of each one of the half-dozen debutantes deemed favorable, and finally settled on the top two choices. Simon had ironically thanked her for leaving him any choice in the selection at all.

  She had laughed, saying, “You shall thank me afterward for helping you make the selection. Don’t tell me you want the tedious task of courting each one of these silly little chits yourself, do you?”

  He had to admit the prospect did not entertain him.

  “I know you shall find these two candidates acceptable. They’ll make you good little wives if you house and feed them properly. Buy them some nice trinkets, give them a generous line of credit at the mantua maker, and they’ll give you no trouble at all.”

  “You make them sound like the perfect mistresses rather than wives.”

  “What is the difference? You want them to be available when you need them, yet to not interfere in your other activities.”

  Simon entered his silent house, depressed with his thoughts. Giles had left a lamp for him. Simon turned it up and proceeded to remove his wraps. He looked toward the library. It was a little past ten, still early enough to do some work. His book was not advancing very rapidly, since he’d been staying up most nights. His mornings, which used to be his most productive time, were now spent abed. He was becoming just like those fops he’d observed with contempt earlier in the evening.

  Hardly, another voice told him. No matter how like them he dressed and talked, he would never succeed in hiding his origins. He knew they tolerated him at places like White’s only because he was known for his originality and wit in the House and because of his favor with the prime minister. He’d even managed to amuse the Prince Regent the handful of times he’d been in his company.

  Lady Eugenia’s marked attention had no doubt also opened doors. She gave him an opportunity to display his wit, thanks to her salon. Because of his popularity there, other hostesses were coveting Simon’s name.

  Without any conscious decision, Simon began to climb the stairs and, reaching the top, directed his feet toward Rebecca’s room. Since it was earlier than the time he usually appeared there, he gave a light knock. Althea’s immediate reply told him that she was still awake.

  “Good evening.” He kept his hand upon the door handle, gauging her reaction to his appearance.

  “Good evening.” She looked up from her reading, displaying surprise at his presence.

  Since she made no further comment, he felt obliged to explain. “I’m home a little earlier tonight and thought I’d see how things were going.”

  She sat up straighter and closed her Bible, leaving a finger in her place.

  He advanced into the room and brought another chair over to the bed, hoping she would not leave right away as she had every other night.

  “How is Rebecca?” he asked quickly, to keep Althea engaged.

  “Sleeping quietly.” She added, “She’s still very weak and only drank a little broth this evening. I read to her some, but don’t know how much she took in.”

  Simon touched his sleeping daughter’s hand. It rested lightly on the coverlet. Her fingers were long and slim, the fingernails long ovals. He remembered the joy when she’d been born and he’d held her in his arms for the first time. She’d been a healthy, robust baby then, her vigor in sharp contrast to Hannah’s weakness after the birth. Hannah had contracted a fever in those days following the birth and died.

  But that real paternal love—fierce, tender, heartbreaking—hadn’t occurred until Rebecca was a year-and-a-half-old toddler, reaching for him, her dark curls tousled, her ruffled white pinafore crumpled, calling out “Abba” as she wrapped chubby arms about his neck and planted warm, wet kisses on his cheek.

  Rebecca had thrived despite her mother’s absence. He’d been sure she’d live to be a hundred. Now her pallor and thinness reminded him again of Hannah in those last few days of her life.

  He looked toward Althea, relieved she hadn’t left yet. Suddenly he didn’t want to be alone with his thoughts.

  “Were you ever at Almack’s during your London Seasons?” he asked abruptly.

  She fingered the lace at her collar. “Yes, once or twice, with my father—my guardian then,” she amended.

  He quirked an eyebrow upward. “I thought it was extremely difficult to get entry. Your father obtained a voucher for you despite your obscure origins?”

  She smiled faintly in the lamplight. “Yes, it surprises me, too, now that I think of it. Back then, I accepted it since I knew my father—my guardian—was admired and respected by the patronesses. I’m sure it was only as a special favor to him that I was admitted.”

  He found himself vaguely irritated that she had with such apparent ease already gone and done at the tender age of seventeen what he’d had to wait until thirty-two to achieve. He loosened his starched neck cloth, marveling at the irony of it. It was laughable, actually: she’d been there and could barely remember the experience, and he’d wanted to gloat over his triumph.

  “Why do you ask about Almack’s?” Her soft voice intruded into his thoughts.

  “I have a voucher for next Wednesday’s dance.”

  “I see. Congratulations.”

  He rested his head against the back of his chair and stretched his legs out before him. “Do you know the significance of this?” He gave a dry bark of laughter. “A Jew in the hallowed halls of Almack’s?” When she made no reply, he said, “Tonight I sat in White’s for the first time.”

  She set her Bible on the bedside table and smoothed her skirts over her knees. “Are you happy with your achievements?”

  “Do you know for how long I have had to watch my reputation most assiduously? Every word spoken, every place I went, every engagement I accepted, my mode of dress, everything down to the last detail—all carefully calculated to advance my career?” When she shook her head, he continued. “Now, for perhaps the first time in my life, I have a modicum of liberty to choose my friends and engagements. It’s quite a heady feeling.”

  She merely looked down at her hands.

  “It’s funny,” she said at last in a low tone, “your words remind me painfully of my own conduct during my only two London Seasons.”

  He raised his head towards her to hear her better. “Indeed? How is that?”

  She was looking not at him but straight ahead at the wall, and did not answer immediately.

  “I told you that my guardian did not reveal to me that he was in fact my real father until the eve of my coming up to London. In the space of an evening my entire world changed. I discovered I was the illegitimate offspring of a nobleman and a woman little more than a prostitute.” She kept her eyes firmly fixed ahead of her as she pronounced the last word. “Everyone knows
—at least in the circles that I grew up in—that women on the stage lead scandalous and immoral lives.”

  Simon realized as she continued to speak in a low monotone that her London Seasons might not be a matter of vague recollection but of painful memory.

  She gave a strangled laugh. “You said once that I had run away to hide myself in the East End because of a sense of shame about my background.” She looked across Rebecca’s sleeping form and addressed him directly. “You were only partly right. I didn’t hide in a mission—that came about much later. But I did feel vastly unworthy here among the quality, from the time my father first revealed the truth to me.”

  Simon waited patiently when she fell silent again. He could see it took great effort for her to speak. As the silence drew out, he wished he could beg her pardon, tell her he didn’t need to know the painful facts—he knew how difficult it would be to have to stir up his own humiliating past—but he didn’t say anything. He realized he needed to hear her story.

  At last she gave a sigh that seemed to come from the depths of her. “So, although my coming out had all the trappings of respectability, I knew in fact that I was nothing but an impostor. I didn’t deserve to enter the best houses of London. I had been brought up with the knowledge of my guardian’s family name and fortune and had been taught to venerate his ancient lineage. And now, here I was, a blot on that crest.

  “Do you know what my greatest fear was?”

  She smiled sadly at him, and he felt as if she knew everything he had experienced that evening at White’s. He shook his head.

  “My greatest fear was that I should be discovered.” She gave a half smile. “For someone who was shy and retiring to begin with, I became positively reclusive. At every great house, every ball, every rout, I hung back, looking for the darkest recess, trying to pass as unnoticed as possible. Just as you, I felt I had to watch every word and gesture. But mine was the fear I would reveal my sordid past by a mere look or movement. I was terrified they’d somehow see my mother’s connection to me.”

  “What finally happened?”

  She gestured with her hand and gave a choked laugh. “I was discovered, of course.”

  Simon waited, breathless.

  She put a hand to her mouth as if it was still painful to admit. After a moment she resumed her tale. “There was a man during my second Season. I shan’t call him a gentleman, because he wasn’t, although he passed for one with his family name and fortune. He was old enough to have known my father when he was in France. He put two and two together. He behaved exactly as I was afraid people would when they knew. He thought I would be just like my mother.”

  Simon leaned forward, his body tensing.

  After a moment, she continued. “The funny thing was, no one ever knew.”

  “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?” he asked in a careful tone.

  She nodded her head, looking back at the wall as if reliving the scene. “I was raped.”

  The stark words affected Simon more than tears or hysteria would have done.

  He felt as if he had been punched in the gut. He covered his face with his hands, wanting to have the words unsaid.

  “Have I shocked you, Mr. Aguilar?” The words were spoken softly across the bed.

  He removed his hands and looked at her serene face. Knowing what effort it took to overcome the events in one’s past, he could only stare at her. “What did your father do?” he asked after a moment.

  “He never knew.”

  “He never—? God, woman, what do you mean? Didn’t you ever tell him?” At the shaking of her head, rage filled him. “You know what Lord Caulfield would have done? Your brother? They would have called him out! The swine wouldn’t have survived a day. He deserved nothing less. Why in heaven’s name didn’t you tell your father the truth?” he ended in frustration.

  “I was too ashamed. The man made me feel so dirty. At first he had only tormented me with the secret of my birth. He seemed to derive some sort of…of pleasure from seeing my fear of discovery. Then he began pawing and groping me during dances—” She didn’t continue. “I was able to escape him…and I tried never to find myself alone with him, but he was obstinate and clever. He managed to lure me into an empty library or some quiet nook and begin taking liberties with me, telling me he would keep my secret in exchange for my favors. It got so I was terrified to go out, dreading to see him, yet he seemed to haunt every place I went.

  “Finally, that old, lecherous man wasn’t satisfied with a stolen kiss here or there. He—Well, he did the unthinkable.”

  She gave a hollow laugh. “You remember I told you I had only one offer of marriage during my Season? Well, it was from a younger son, of a good family. His offer was a respectable one. My father urged me to accept it. My father was ready to draw up the betrothal papers—but how could I even consider it? I was not only a prostitute’s daughter but soiled goods in my own right. I begged and pleaded with my father to take me from London. I told him I didn’t wish to marry. I told him I’d do anything as long as he’d take me from London.”

  Simon could feel the blood pounding in his temples. He didn’t want to know any more. He’d never dreamed he’d be hearing what he had heard from her lips. He had always imagined her a pure, untouched young woman who’d chosen not to marry because of her religious convictions.

  But she, like him, had her past. How she had needed a defender in those treacherous waters of society. And she had had no one.

  “Where was Tertius?” he asked curtly.

  “He had gone to the West Indies by then. As a second son, there were not many opportunities open to him here. Father sent him there, hoping it would be the making of him.”

  “Yes, I remember now. And your older brother?”

  “I couldn’t tell him, any more than I could tell my father. I was too ashamed. I had never been close to my brothers. They were so much older than I, and when they were home, were aloof. I realized afterwards they must have suspected something about my birth, and it would have been natural to resent me for their mother’s sake. I could not blame them.”

  Simon longed to cross the space that separated them and gather her in his arms. He wanted to erase all that, even the memory of it. But she spoke before he could put thought into action.

  “That’s when I left London for good. I retired to my family’s country estate in Hertfordshire after that second Season, vowing to my father that I’d take care of him for always if only he didn’t make me go back, or ever marry. Poor man, I think he believed I was suffering a broken heart over some suitor.” She smiled. “He thinks that’s why I’ve never married, that I’m still pining over some long lost love.”

  Simon wanted to tell her that not all men were dishonorable, but he stayed seated, his hands gripping the arms of his chair. If he loosed his hold, he was afraid of what might happen. That way lay only danger. He told himself that the best way to show her that not every man was like that blackguard was to prove it to her. As long as she was under his roof, she was under his protection, and he would do all in his power to see to it that no man ever hurt her in that way again.

  Without thinking, he said gently, “Not all men are so despicable. It doesn’t have to be awful…in marriage…” he ended awkwardly. What was he trying to tell her?

  She didn’t meet his eyes. Instead, she brushed off some imaginary particle from her skirt and said nothing. After a few minutes, she looked up with a smile, as if to put the past behind her. “The Lord didn’t let me continue to live in fear for long. It was not long after I returned to Hertfordshire that I had an encounter with my Lord and Savior, and my life took a completely different turn. When I came to accept Jesus as my Savior, He set me free of fear.

  “Your words tonight reminded me how I used to live in fear of what people would think of me,” she finished.

  He should have known the conversation would invariably lead to religion. Hadn’t he known that when he’d come up here? What kind of a glutton for puni
shment was he? And where had her God been when she’d needed Him?

  Chapter Fourteen

  After Althea’s revelations to him, Simon began to avoid her again, afraid more than ever of his growing attraction to her. Now compassion was added to admiration and need. Instead, he turned toward Lady Eugenia, haunting her salon almost every evening. When she invited him to call her Eugenie, he knew he had crossed an invisible line and entered into her most intimate circle.

  Nothing inappropriate had yet been spoken by either, but every look and word was fraught with meaning.

  Simon did not know what held him back from accepting the invitation in her eyes. He continued weighing every angle. He knew that he wouldn’t be the first with her, nor did he delude himself that the lady’s sentiments would be engaged. It would be a liaison of pure sensuality and mutual gratification.

  But he also took his father’s advice seriously and knew the most sensible thing to do was to fall in gracefully with the elder Aguilar’s plans and wed some nice, respectable debutante.

  Why, then, did he have this urge to cast all caution to the winds and let himself be led down this treacherous path of intrigue and vice? As the weeks went by, Simon often felt caught in a frenzy not entirely of his own making. Half his day and evening was spent in parliamentary debate, where he performed a balancing act between the rights of the workers and the interests of the owners and financiers, trying to satisfy both the demands of his conscience and the demands of his backers.

  His evenings were a series of social engagements where he’d navigate a game more hazardous than any found at White’s. Finally, when he’d had his fill, he’d go home to sit by his daughter’s bedside. Every night he seemed to wage an internal battle—whether or not to seek Miss Breton out in her sitting room. More often than not, he’d lose, drawn to her for reasons he couldn’t understand. He sometimes thought of her as his conscience, put there to torment him, and yet he couldn’t escape his need to hear what she had to say. Perhaps it was because he sensed she would always tell him what she thought, without fear of his approval or disapproval.