The Fall of a Saint

by Christine Merrill

  ‘A bastard would have proven it well enough.’ It had been what Michael had hoped for. The fear that a simple fever had destroyed the St Aldric line had turned to obsession. And from thus had come the hope that an accident with a member of the muslin set would assure him a fruitful marriage.

  To announce such a thing to his own illegitimate brother showed how far he had fallen. Now that he was sober, the plan seemed foolish and cowardly. Like father, like son. It had been Michael’s life goal to disprove the adage. He had failed.

  ‘If you wanted a by-blow, it seems you will have one now,’ Sam said, with a sad shake of his head. ‘What do you mean to do about it?’

  Michael was amazed that his half-brother did not see what was quite obvious. ‘This current situation is much better than I’d hoped for.’

  ‘You hoped to deflower a governess?’ Sam realised how loudly he’d been speaking and dropped his voice to a whisper. ‘And without her consent? Are you mad?’

  ‘No. Certainly not.’ Yet he had done just that. ‘I never meant to enter that room. I lost my way.’

  ‘Because you were too drunk to know better,’ his brother reminded him.

  He deserved the rebuke. His father had, at least, entertained himself with the willing wives of friends. But he had done worse than that. ‘The woman I was seeking that night was hardly an innocent. Had there been consequences, she’d have been paid handsomely. I’d even have acknowledged the child.’

  ‘As I assume you mean to do with this one.’ Sam was offering the faintest warning that Michael must remember his obligations when dealing with the girl and her problem.

  Sam had no reason to worry. After years of exemplary behaviour, Michael had made enough mistakes in the past few months to show him the ugliness of false pride and the lengths he must go to atone. There was no question in his mind as to what had to happen next.

  The trick would be convincing the governess of it. ‘If Miss Cranston is truly carrying my child, it need not be as an acknowledged bastard,’ he said, cautiously watching for Sam’s reaction. ‘If I marry her and legitimise the heir...’

  ‘Marry her?’ Now Sam was staring at him with an ironic smile. ‘Now I do not know whether to laugh or send you to Bedlam.’

  ‘Why should I not wed her? Is there anything about the girl that appears she will be less than suitable? She is a governess and therefore educated. She is healthy.’ And not unattractive. He was obligated to her. After what had happened, he owed her more than money. He should restore her honour.

  ‘She probably hates you,’ Sam said.

  ‘She has good reason to.’ He had seen the look in her eyes as she had confronted him with the truth. He would not have given a second thought to the woman standing in the street before his house. She was tidy to the point of primness, simply dressed in dark blue, and hair bound painfully tight, as though she feared it would do her an injury if a single curl escaped from the pins. The lips that should have been soft and kissable had been set in a determined frown and her brow had furrowed above her large brown eyes as she’d recognised him. Everything about her had announced her as just what she was: a disapproving schoolteacher.

  She’d stepped in front of him, blocking his path as no one else in London would dare to do, and said quietly, ‘I wish to speak to you about the consequences of your recent trip to Dover.’

  The coldness in her voice still lingered with the memory of the words. But none of that mattered now. ‘I will give her reason not to hate me. A hundred reasons. A thousand. I will give her everything I have. If the succession is to continue, I must have a wife and a child, Sam. There may be no better chance than this.’

  The door beside them opened suddenly and Sam’s wife, Evelyn, stepped between them, hands on hips. ‘Explain yourselves, the pair of you. Tell me what that poor girl is claiming has no basis in fact.’ She turned to her husband, growing even angrier. ‘And that you had no part in this shameful business.’

  Sam held up a hand as though to deflect his wife’s wrath. ‘I went with Michael to Dover, but only in hopes of talking some sense into him. As the Duke of St Aldric’s personal physician, it is my job to keep him in good health, is it not?’

  His wife responded with a frosty nod.

  ‘He was showing signs of what I feared was chronic inebriation and had been—’ Sam gave a delicate clearing of the throat ‘—doing things that I do not wish to discuss in mixed company.’

  ‘Consorting with whores,’ Evelyn said, refusing to be shocked. Then she stared at Michael. ‘That does not excuse what happened to Miss Cranston.’

  ‘It was all a mistake, I swear. I was on my way to visit someone else and took a wrong turning. It was dark....’ That was hardly an excuse. He should have been able to tell the difference between the buxom barmaid he’d been seeking and the diminutive Miss Cranston, even without a light. But he could have sworn, as he had come into her bed, that she was willing and expecting him....

  ‘When I realised that he was missing above stairs, I searched Michael out and heard cries of alarm,’ Sam finished. ‘By the time I found him, it was too late.’

  Evelyn gave a noise of disgust.

  ‘It grows worse,’ Sam admitted. ‘Miss Cranston, who, as I understand it, was a governess, was visiting the inn to meet with a future employer. The man arrived two steps behind me and witnessed the whole thing. She was sacked without references before she could even begin.’

  Michael winced. He had but the vaguest memories of the last half of that evening. What he’d thought had been a thoroughly delightful interlude had ended in shocked cries, tears and shouting. And he had stood swaying on his feet in the midst of it wearing nothing but a shirt, with Sam looking at him much as he was now, in disappointment.

  ‘I have been sober since that moment,’ he reminded Evelyn. ‘And I would have settled with Miss Cranston the following morning had she not fled the inn before we could speak to her again.’

  ‘It is too late to concern yourself with what might have been,’ Evelyn said with a shake of her head. ‘It is what you mean to do now that matters.’

  ‘Is what she says true?’ Michael asked, not daring to hope. ‘Is she with child?’

  ‘To the best of my knowledge, yes,’ Evelyn answered.

  Michael took care to school his face to neutrality. It was wrong of him to be excited at the thought. Even worse, he was glad of it. To have a child.... Better yet, to have a son....

  When he was gone, there would be a new St Aldric to care for the people and the land. And this boy would be raised differently from the way he had been. It was as if, despite his reprehensible behaviour, a curse had been lifted from his house.

  ‘I said, what do you mean to do about it?’ Apparently, in his distraction he had been ignoring his sister-in-law.

  So he explained his plan.

  Chapter Two

  The muffled conversation in the hall droned on. Though she knew they were talking about her, Maddie felt oddly detached from the situation. In the time before Dover, she had avoided behaviours that might incite gossip. Her expectations were modest and her future predictable. She would teach the children of strangers until they grew too old to need her. Then she would find another family in want of a governess. At the end of it, she would have a small amount of savings to retire on, or stay on in a household so fond of dear, old Miss Cranston that they kept her beyond her usefulness.

  But that seemed a lifetime ago. No decent family would have her after the scandal. It had been foolish of her to suggest that particular inn, but when her new employer had suggested meeting her stage in Dover, the temptation had been too great. She’d returned to the place several times as years had passed, knowing that, in her dreams at least, she would be young and free of the responsibilities of her oh, so ordinary life. She had gone to bed thinking of nothing but Richard and their last n
ight together in the very same room.

  The man who had come to her this time was no dream lover. It had begun sweetly enough, but it had ended in a waking nightmare. The drunken stranger had been hauled from her bed, while Mr Barker stood, framed in the doorway, shouting that no such woman should be in a decent inn, much less allowed near innocent children. The argument had moved into the hallway and she had slammed the door, thrown on her clothes and run as soon as she was sure of her safety. But not before hearing the name of her attacker, as he demanded, in a slurred voice, that this other common fellow stop raising a fuss over strapping a barmaid.

  After two months of unemployment, she’d run through most of her tiny savings. Then there had come the growing realisation that she would share her future with another: one too small and helpless to understand the predicament they were in. So she had taken the last of the money and bought a ticket for London.

  Now she was visiting the house of a peer. She glanced around her. While the decoration was as elegant as she might have expected, her presence here was beyond the limits of her imagination. Even in the parlours of the families that had employed her, she had not dared to relax. There were always children to watch and to remove to the nursery when their behaviour grew tedious.

  The same strangers were once again settling her fate in a public hallway, while she drank tea. Now that she had heard the truth, there was no sign that this Mrs Hastings would be easily silenced. There was a sharp sound of exclamation from her, as though one of the men had said something particularly shocking. Their muttered explanations sounded weak in comparison.

  When a settlement was offered, Evelyn Hastings might serve as a mediator. She would know that decent people did not raise a child in secret and on a few pounds a year. A bastard of a duke deserved a decent education and a chance for advancement.

  Maddie thought of her own childhood. The family that had taken her in had not let her forget that her origins were clouded. And the proper schools where she was boarded made no secret that she was there at the behest of an unnamed benefactor. There had been raised eyebrows, of course, but the money provided had been sufficient to silence speculation and the education had been respectable enough to set her on the path towards a career.

  Surely St Aldric could do better than that for his by-blow. There could be excellent schools, and a Season and a proper marriage for a daughter, or business connections and a respectable trade for a son. If the duke claimed his offspring, it would not be without family. One parent was better than none. Once she was sure the child’s future was secure, she might quietly disappear, change her name and begin her life anew. No one need ever know of this unfortunate incident. She might be spared the snubs and gossip of decent women and the offers of supposed gentlemen convinced that, if she had fallen once, she might give herself again to any who asked.

  It was for the best, she reminded herself, fighting down the pangs of guilt. The world would forgive St Aldric, and by association the child, but such charity would not extend to her. The door opened and Doctor and Mrs Hastings entered, followed by the duke, who shut it behind them.

  Dear lord, but he was handsome. Maddie did her best to smother what should have been a perfectly natural response to the presence of him, for what woman, when confronted with a man like St Aldric, did not feel the pull of his charms? Apparently, God had decided it was not enough to give such wealth and power to a single human. He had made a masterpiece. St Aldric was tall but not thin, and muscular without seeming stocky. The hose and breeches that he wore all but caressed muscles hardened by riding and sport. Blue was too common a word to describe the eyes that stared past her. Turquoise, aquamarine, cerulean... She could search a paintbox for ever and still not find a colour to do them justice. The blonde hair above his noble brow caught the last of the afternoon sun and the hand that would brush the waves of it from his eyes was long fingered and graceful. But the clean-shaven jaw was not the least bit feminine. The cleft chin was resolute without appearing stubborn. And his mouth...

  She remembered his mouth. And his arms bare of his coat, the fine linen of his shirt brushing her skin as they folded around her. And his body...

  Her stomach gave another nervous jump. She remembered things that no decent woman should. And what she did remember should have not pleasure for her. That night had been her undoing.

  Mrs Hastings saw her start and came quickly to her side, sharing the sofa and taking her hand. She was glaring at her husband, and at the duke as well, utterly fearless of retribution. ‘Well, Sam, what do you have to say for yourself?’

  A dark look passed between the couple, as though to prove an argument still in progress. But the doctor turned to her with the same sympathetic look he had given her in the inn as he’d led his friend away. ‘Miss Cranston, we both owe you more apologies than can be offered in this lifetime. And once again, let me assure you that you are in no danger.’

  But Maddie noticed the blocked door and lack of other exits. And the nearness of the fireplace poker, should Mrs Hastings prove unable to help her.

  The duke saw her glance to it and made a careful, calming gesture with his hands. ‘Miss Cranston,’ he said, searching for words, ‘you have nothing to fear.’

  ‘Nothing more,’ she reminded him.

  ‘Nothing more,’ he agreed. ‘The night we met—’ he began.

  She stopped him. ‘You mean, the night you entered my room uninvited, and—’

  ‘I was very drunk,’ he interrupted, as though afraid of what she might say in front of his friends. ‘Too drunk to find my own room, much less that of another. I swear, I thought you were someone else.’

  And her own arms had betrayed her, reaching out to him, even though an innocent governess could not have been expecting a lover.

  ‘You called me Polly,’ she said, almost as angry at herself as she was at him.

  ‘I had an assignation. With the barmaid. And I was drunk,’ he repeated. ‘I had been drunk for several months at that point. What was one more day?’ For a moment, he sounded almost as bitter as she felt, shaking his head in disgust at his own behaviour. ‘And in that time, I did some terrible things. But I have never forced myself on a woman.’

  ‘Other than me?’ she reminded him. It was unfair of her. There had been no force.

  But he must have seen it as such and counted her an innocent, for he looked truly pained by the memory. ‘When I realised my mistake, it was too late. The damage had been done.’ He took a deep breath. ‘The night in question was an unfortunate aberration.’

  ‘Very unfortunate,’ she agreed, giving no quarter. But why should she? It was a lame excuse.

  ‘Never before that,’ he said. ‘And never again. Since that day, I have moderated my behaviour. That night taught me the depths that one might fall to, the harm that one might do, when one is sunk in self-pity and concerned with nothing more than personal pleasure.’ He was looking at her with the earnest expression she sometimes saw on boys in the nursery, swearing that they would not repeat misdeeds that occurred as regularly as a chiming clock.

  She returned the same governess glare she might have used on them. ‘That night taught me not to trust a door lock in a busy inn.’ She needn’t have bothered with the poker. The words and tone were enough to cow him.

  ‘If there was a way, I would erase it so that you had never met me. But now I will make sure it stays in the past. Your reputation will be restored. You will never feel lack. Never suffer doubt. Everything you need shall be yours.’

  Success! He was offering even more than she wanted. She would have a new life and another chance. ‘For the child, as well?’ she asked. For this could not all be about her alone.

  ‘Of course.’ He was smiling at her, as though there could be no possibility.

  ‘We are in agreement, then? There will be a settlement?’ She gave a grateful smile to Mrs Hastings, who had d
one miracles in just a brief conversation.

  ‘The child will want for nothing. Neither will you. You need not concern yourself with a twenty-pound-a-year position in someone else’s household. You shall be the one to hire a governess. You shall have a house, as well. Or houses, if you wish.’ She did not need houses. He was becoming too agitated over a thing that could be settled simply. Perhaps there was madness in his family, as well as drunkenness.

  Doctor Hastings saw her expression and responded in a more calming tone, ‘You will be taken care of. As will the child. If the suggestions offered here tonight are not to your liking, you will have our help in refusing them.’

  Evelyn Hastings nodded in agreement and squeezed her hands.

  ‘Enough!’ St Aldric cut through the apology with a firmness that seemed to stun both doctor and wife.

  It did not shock Maddie. What could be more shocking than what had already occurred between them? The man was an admitted wastrel. It would not surprise her if he changed his mind suddenly and refused to pay, though it was quite obvious he had the funds. She raised her chin and stared at the duke, willing herself to be brave enough to see this through. Her mute accusation would be enough to break any resistance he might feel to help his own blood.

  His blue eyes sparkled as he spoke, but not from madness; the light in them was as strong as blue steel. ‘There will be no question of my acknowledging my offspring, Miss Cranston. There has been too much secrecy in my family thus far and it has caused no end of trouble. You have my word. The child you carry is mine and will have all the advantages I can offer him.’

  ‘Thank you.’ She had succeeded after all. Could it really be this easy?

  ‘But...’ he added.

  Apparently not. What conditions would he manage to put on what should be simple?

  ‘There is a complication,’ he said.

  Not as far as she was concerned. ‘I will not speak of the beginning, to the child or anyone else,’ she said, ‘as long as you admit to its existence.’