by Allie Borne
“Yet, I digress. There is no other way around it, Charles. You must come back to the manor house with me, to go over the books and introduce me to the tenants. Then, you shall be free.”
Nodding resolutely, Charles called the servant girl in and requested pen and paper. Quickly, he scratched the note.
Dearest Linnie,
Yet again, I disappoint. Please excuse my absence but business keeps me away. Look for me tomorrow evening. Lord Bonneville requires my attendance at a land owner’s meeting tonight.
On a positive note, I will now be free of my weekly visits to his estate, as tonight’s negotiation should wrap up our business. Sleep well. I dream of you.
Love Always,
Charles
Post Script,
I enclose a token as a memento of my devotion, until next we meet.
“I shall fetch the locket and include it with my wife’s note. Hopefully it will appease her. She grows suspicious of my many absences.”
“I should say so, on your honeymoon, nonetheless. I would not have stood such maltreatment from my bride groom.
“I will wait here while you see to your letter. I fancy a solitary glass of sherry, to celebrate my new found autonomy.”
“Then cheers, comrade. I shall return anon.” Bowing his head and winking, Charles stepped from the room and inn, eager to complete this phase of his life and fully commit his energy to the responsibilities of home.
~ ~ ~
The morning sun shown softly against his faded quilt, as Bernard readjusted his thin frame into a seated position. “Bring the note to me,” Bernard ordered, propped on his pillows, atop his Mistresses’ old bed. “Lindsay cannot very well open a missive she is not here to receive.” Betsy handed him the missive deferentially. Tearing open the brown paper he nodded toward the side table. “Tip the boy, Betsy.”
Reading Charles’ note, Bernard shook his head, disgusted. How could he have so misjudged the young man? What business could possibly require so much of his attention? And jewelry? A gold chain? A gift of guilt, perhaps?
Opening the delicate oval, he noted the accurate representation of his second cousin. Inclined to view the gift as the product of a pompous ass, he almost shut the locket and placed it in the bedside drawer. Yet, a slight gap between the miniature’s frame and the edge of the locket caught his eye. Carefully, with one deft fingernail, he pried open the clasp and discovered an inscription.
Reading it, he pondered over the enigma that was Charles. All behavior, other than the visits with Bonneville and his daughter, indicate an honest and dependable gentleman. The way he watched young Lindsay, with eyes that soaked up her very essence, he seemed like a man in love. Perhaps he should not write off his young heir yet.
~ ~ ~
Exhausted and yet feeling relieved of a heavy burden, Charles left the Bonneville estate with a lighter head and heart. It was late Wednesday night. Apprising Cynthia of the estate finances and procedures had proved more involved than he had previously anticipated. Charles had been engaged in visiting the banker with Lord Bonneville and his daughter, clearly stating his wishes for the unorthodox arrangement. Proposed as an issue of trust, the banker understood Wilson’s wish to have his daughter apprised of the financial holdings.
Now, Charles was free to pursue his own interests and he rode home, half comatose with exhaustion. He must see Linnie. For some reason, she had felt more distant from him, these past two days, than she had on his previous absences. That strange sensation, that invisible bond that seemed to connect him to Linnie had stretched, leaving the translucent filaments so thin that he feared they might break. He could not rest until he had her in his arms.
It was nearly eight when Charles arrived. Bobby greeted him in the stable and apprised him of John and Bernard’s accident. Concerned, Charlie rushed up the stairs and into the manor house. Relieved to find John reading in the parlor, Charles sat to join him by the merry fire.
“How goes it, John? I hear you took a fall through my roof. How does a gentleman, such as yourself, find his way into such manual labor?” John explained the leak and the following disaster, Bobby’s repairs, and the incurred bill.
Nodding, Charles grinned in relief. “It is good to know you are a competent leader, in my absence, John. I am indebted to you.”
“T’was not my leadership, Charles, t’was your wife’s. She rode for the doctor and arranged the repairs. I will be sore pressed to step into her slippers, if you are to leave again. I know that she looks forward to the London season with her sister, but she will be greatly missed around here. She already is.”
“Whatever do you mean? Is she ill?” Charles heart froze, as his awareness of the truth edged in upon him.
“Have you not been informed?” John sat up in his chair, uncomfortably.
“Of what, Man? Speak up!” Charles voice cracked, nearing panic.
“Why, of your lady wife’s departure from the manor house! Lindsay moved herself into the dowager house with Betsy two days hence.”
Quitting the study, Charles bounded up the stairs and to their guest bedroom. The bed was occupied, but by his butler! “What say you, Man?! Where is my wife?” In a rage, he kicked the post of the bed. Noting Bernard’s frail frame, splinted arm and purple, stitched forehead, his ire drained.
“Sir Charles! Still yourself! I am not your enemy, but a most loyal servant. Explain your discontent and I shall, broken as I am, do my best to appease you.”
“Bernard, please excuse my haste. I simply require information. Where is my wife? Where are her things, and mine? Left, she, a note? You are her confessor, I believe. She did tell you all, did she not?”
“In answer to your queries; your wife is at this moment tending the newly arrived pigs in the pen behind the barn. Your things are ensconced in the master suite. Hers have been moved to Betsy’s cottage. As she has not been back to visit the manor since yesterday morning, I took the liberty of reading your missive and have lit the fire and candles in readiness for your arrival. A cold repast also awaits your convenience, therein.
“As your wife was not within the manor house to receive your note, I sent her a letter, updating her on your whereabouts, and telling her of your gift and letter, which I placed in your master suit. I had thought curiosity might bring her back into the house. I hope that I have acted in your best interest, Sir.” Bernard slumped back against the pillows, his explanation having sapped him of his small reserve of strength.
“Thank you, Bernard.” Charles shoulders relaxed as he realized the old man’s frailty. “How fair ye? Are you on the mend?”
“Aye, I mend well enough. Molly has kept me well. Betsy’s attention has been focused on cooking and maintaining the home’s order.”
“I am relieved. And yet, I am resolved to demand your promise, Bernard. If, in future, My Lady ever leaves the manor, you will inform me of the event.”
“In future, if your Lady leaves, I will do as you bid.”
“Very well. Good night, Bernard.”
“Good night, M’Lord.”
Charles crossed the hall to the master chamber. Pushing open the door, he stopped short. The room smelled of white wash and lemons. The chamber was light and fresh and warm. He felt surrounded by his wife’s essence, as if she had just walked from the room. Perhaps due to his tiredness, a tear came to his eye.
The room was neat and tastefully prepared. A white embroidered blanket lay upon the bed and crisp, green curtains lined the new windows. A beautifully wrought, paneled door graced the closet. Opening it, he noted his dress attire and a lone cotton print of Lindsay’s.
Nothing else of hers remained in the manor. What had gotten into that woman? Stalking resolutely out to the barnyard, he frowned to see Lindsay leaning so far over the pig fence to spread the slops that she was likely to fall in. Rushing up behind her, he reached to pull her back, but only managed to startle her and send her head over hills into the pig pen.
Landing on her back with an, “Oomph.”
The pigs stopped their squealing and rummaging to stare cautiously at their mistress. Charles’ heart stilled. “Charles Alexander Donovan, you wretch!” Lindsay screeched. Struggling to push herself up on her forearms, she was completely unaware of the mortal danger.
Standing shakily to her knees, she picked up a pile of pig manure that had softened her fall and flung it with all her might at her husband’s head. Not pausing to dodge the malodorous projectile, Charles jumped the fence and threw Lindsay over his shoulder.
It was a near thing, getting back over the fence with a hissing, kicking Lindsay in tow. Charles’ left leg was trampled in the melee, but he heeded it not. Instead, he continued to walk with his reeking, sputtering baggage, the fifty yards down to the creek. Without missing a beat, Charles dumped his little vixen into the bubbling brook, no doubt rendering her rear end bruised and aching.
Lindsay choked on the water that rushed up her nose, but was too sore to attempt to rise. “I hate you!” she yelled, splashing great handfuls of water in Charles’ direction. “You are horrid and I loath the day I met you.”
Charles looked at this raging, spitting, creature and relaxed. This was the Linnie he knew how to handle. A raging, angry Lindsay was much preferred to a silent, removed Lindsay.
“Pigs are clever and dangerous. They will gore you as soon as look at you. Don’t lean over the pig pen like that again.”
“Do not tell me what to do.”
“It is my duty as your husband to guide and protect you. It is your duty to honor and obey me.”
“Never!”
Charles strode into the swirling water and flung Lindsay up, dropping her once more into the water. Catching her unawares, he pressed her shoulders down into the stream, wetting her slop-filled tresses.
Lindsay flung a well-placed kick between his legs, just as he was bent over and vulnerable. Releasing her to bend and grasp his stomach, Lindsay scrambled around him and nearly made it out of the water before Charles turned and grabbed her ankle. Inch by inch, he pulled his water logged Missus back towards him.
No amount of twisting and grasping at rocks could save her from him now. Charles grabbed Lindsay about the arms and shook her furiously. “What is the matter with you?! Do you wish to unman me?”
“Yes!” she screeched, completely beyond dissembling.
“Will you never grow up?” Charles roared, dragging her from the water, he sat on a fallen tree and pulled her over his lap.
“W-what are you doing?” Lindsay kicked and punched out at Charles as he lifted her sodden skirts to reveal her round backside. Beyond reasoning, Charles gave Lindsay three smart smacks as she screeched and then sobbed her loathing of his person.
Standing her back up on her own two feet, Charles ordered, “Now you will take yourself back to the manor house, remove your clothing, and climb into our bed. There will be no more nonsense about staying with Betsy. I am your husband and you will obey me!”
Lindsay slapped Charles across the face so sharply his ears rang. He lost all vestige of control. Four years of brutal living left its mark on a man. He would abide being struck by no one.
Lindsay knew that she had gone too far the moment her hand left Charles’ face. She turned and ran for the cottage. She didn’t get five feet before Charles tackled her to the ground. In the melee, Lindsay’s gown ripped from neck to waist. If fell from her person, leaving her breasts exposed.
“Do not touch me,” Lindsay screamed, wrapping her arms about her chest, tears running down her face. “Adulterer!”
Charles stilled. Looking down at his weeping wife, he did not recognize the hands of the man that handled her. What had she called him? Adulterer?
Suddenly, Charles’ world grew very small. It was at that very moment that he realized just how tiny of a space his existence encompassed. It was this small, trembling package of bewildering fury that encapsulated his very breath, his reason for living.
“Adulterer?” he whispered. Shaking his head in confusion. “Nay, Lindsay. Never.”
Charles slowly wrapped Lindsay’s ruined gown about her now silent, shivering frame. Lifting her into his arms, he carried her back to the manor house and up the stairs to the master bedroom. Deep, surging emotions roiled about Charles’ chest, causing his head to vacillate alarmingly between overwhelming feelings of shame and rage.
He felt horribly guilty for putting his hand on his wife in anger. Had he really spanked her like an errant child? Until this moment, he had not known the extent to which his time abroad had damaged him. Never, would another person have goaded him to violence, were he the man he once was. Now? He was not fit to live among civilized society, yet alone take a wife.
Then again, he had forgiven Lindsay much. Twas because of her and her impetuous behavior that he had become this broken man that she now rejected. How dare she think she could leave him, and for what? A suspicion that his absences were illicit in nature? Her motivations were flighty at best.
Dropping her wet clothes to the floor, Charles carried Lindsay to the bed, pulled back the sheets, and placed her within. “This is where you belong. This is where you will sleep, by my side. I have had enough of the dramatics, Lindsay Donovan. You will accept your place. I am resolved in this Linnie, test me at yer own peril.”
Lindsay rolled onto her side and shut her eyes. This angry, seething man above her was not her lover or her friend. She knew him not, and yet, somehow she found herself wed to him. Why did he care that she had removed herself to the cottage?
He just wanted control over her, even if he didn’t want her for herself, she supposed. Just like a man.
Charles ran his hands through his hair, aghast at his rash actions. Had he really spanked Lindsay? Had he really implied he would do so repeatedly, until she accepted his complete control over her?
He was becoming like the vile Lieutenant from the Queen Charlotte, trying desperately to hold on to what small power he might have and for what? Had he not promised himself to be the antithesis of that pathetic waste of manhood. Yet, the very moment he felt truly challenged, he had acted in the same lowly, grasping manner. He could do better; he must do better.
“Why did you leave the manor, Lindsay?” Charles asked somberly.
“I saw you with that Bonneville woman,” Lindsay answered hollowly.
“And you believed me to be having an affair?”
“Aren’t you?”
“Nay, Linnie, I am not. You had only to ask to straighten that out. Cynthia is to become her father’s estate manager and I was showing her the ropes, is all.”
“And that requires showing her how to kiss your face?”
“You were in town and saw us together? Why did you not confront me then?”
“I had to return with the doctor to help Bernard. You stayed away for two days after. What else was I to think?”
“That you have always been able to trust me and can still.”
“I have not been able to trust you since the day you left for the navy, rather than helping me protect my mother.”
“Lindsay, your father has forbidden me to speak of what happened that day, but I will now, and damn the consequences...
“As promised, I went to speak with your father on your mother’s behalf. He persuaded me to speak with him at the pub, where he proceeded to get me four sheets to the wind. I passed out and came to about a navy vessel. I was no officer. Your father did not buy me a position. Instead, he claimed I had stolen from him and had me impressed in the navy. I did four hard years of labor and suffered greatly.
Pulling off his shirt, Charles turned his back towards Lindsay and she couldn’t help but turn to look.
Gasping, Lindsay noted the many white and silver scars running across Charles’ back.
“I was beaten for defending the frailty of an old man. I nearly broke, Lindsay. It was thoughts of you and of returning to get vengeance on your Father that kept me breathing.”
“Why am I just now hearing of this?”
“Your father
warned me that if I said one word to you, he would come out and claim evidence of my illegitimacy.”
Lindsay gasped. “How does he know?”
“You knew?”
“Bernard told me everything.”
Chapter Fourteen- Candid Conversations
“Give unto me, made lowly wise,
The spirit of self-sacrifice;
The confidence of reason give;
And in the light of truth thy Bondman let me live!”
~William Wordsworth, 18th Century English Poet
Lindsay carefully ran a trembling hand along the silver lines. A bundle of scar tissue converged at the center of Charles’ back, from which thin marks branched out across both sides. The effect was that of a moonlit tree, bared by winter’s blast. To Lindsay, the tree was both terrible and beautiful. It was the outward manifestation of all Charles had endured to return to her.
Tears rolled down her face and she desperately attempted to contain her gasping breath. “I have upset you,” Charles turned and gathered Lindsay into his arms.
“The truth has pierced my heart, yet set me free,” Lindsay wheezed, fighting to suck in air through her constricting chest. “I am horrified and shame-filled and furious at what has happened to you, Charles. And, yet, I am also greatly rejoicing to learn that the Charles I knew, the Charles I have always trusted and loved, never left me.”
Breaking down into sobs upon his lap, Lindsay held tight to Charles waist, as if he might drift away, as if he were her raft in a seething ocean storm. “How could he?” she moaned through the onslaught of raw emotion. “How could my father destroy my mother and my dearest friend?”
Running his hand across her head, soothingly, Charles sighed. “Those who act only for their own self preservation, will harm many in the process. Your father is not evil. Yet, his very nature lends him to acts of evil. “I know now that he truly believes himself in the right for having your mother committed and me impressed. He believed I was molesting you the night we met to remove your mother from the household. He was acting to protect you and, most likely, his reputation.”
