Whisper To Me of Love

by Shirlee Busbee

  It had never occurred to Hester that it might be God’s will that she would die within weeks of her twenty-first birthday, within hours of giving birth to her daughter. She had only known that in spite of her joy at the prospect of bearing Andrew’s child, during these past weeks she had grown weaker and paler with every passing day. She had tried to keep her strength up, eating the nourishing meals prepared by her excellent cook, taking gentle walks in the spring air, and making certain that she got plenty of rest, but still she continued to waste away. And now it appeared that her one great unspoken fear was about to come true—she was dying, leaving her newborn daughter, Morgana, an orphan.

  Despairingly she gazed at the small cradle near the side of her bed, wishing desperately that she had the strength to go on living, that this terrible numbness which was spreading inexorably through her body would cease. There was so much love that she would have lavished on her little daughter, so much laughter they would have shared, so much that she wanted to tell Morgana about her father ... so much that she wanted to protect her small daughter from—especially the lies and gossip about Andrew’s death. But there was nothing she could do; she was dying, and she hadn’t needed the grave expression on the physician’s face, nor the pain in Stephen’s gray eyes, to tell her that the time left to her in this world was to be measured in minutes.

  It eased Hester’s mind somewhat to know that at least Morgana would be well provided for—Stephen would be her guardian, and Hester had no doubt that he would prove to be a kind and loving one. She worried about Lucinda, though, fearful that Stephen’s wife would resent and bully her little daughter and make Morgana’s early years unpleasant. But then she reminded herself that Stephen would not allow Lucinda to mistreat Morgana. And as for material things—upon her twenty-first birthday, or upon her marriage, whichever happened first, Morgana would come into the vast fortune that Hester had willed to her, a fortune that Stephen would manage during the years of her minority.

  Materially, Morgana would want for nothing, but Hester, having grown up without a mother herself, knew that objects could never take the place of a loving parent, and she was conscious of a great sadness that she would not be there to watch her daughter grow into adulthood.

  While Hester did not look forward to dying, if it weren’t for Lucinda’s unaccountable antipathy toward her, she might have faced her own death more peacefully and with less fear for her infant daughter’s future. The situation with Lucinda worried her immensely; she had never quite understood why Lucinda had taken such an immediate dislike to her and been unwilling to meet her many overtures of friendship. It had been months before she had learned from the squire’s wife that Andrew’s name had once been connected with Lucinda’s. “It caused quite a bit of talk, I can tell you!” the squire’s wife had said forthrightly. “Lucinda had met Stephen first, you see, and they were already engaged when Andrew came on the scene. Andrew seemed quite enchanted with her and paid her marked attention for several weeks before the wedding. She certainly did not discourage his attentions either! I personally think that Lucinda decided she might prefer being a Countess instead of the wife of a penniless younger son—no matter how charming and handsome the younger son might be! But nothing came of it, of course.” Adding with a kind glance at Hester, “I wouldn’t dwell on it, my dear—it happened years before the Earl met you!”

  Even telling herself that Lucinda’s dislike might simply be based on the fact that she had been jealous of the woman Andrew had eventually married did not quite explain to Hester why Lucinda acted as she did—after all, she had presumably married the man of her choice, Stephen. So why did she now so obviously resent Andrew’s wife? Her open malice had not bothered Hester overmuch in the beginning, and she had assumed that eventually she would be able to dispel Lucinda’s animosity and that, in time, they might even become friends. But now that she was dying and the unpleasant realization that Lucinda would be rearing her daughter passed through her brain, Hester was filled with foreboding.

  Desperately she tried to rally her fading strength, the driving need to speak to Stephen, to beg him to watch over her daughter, making her more aware of what was happening around her. Rousing herself, she became conscious now of the soft crying of her newborn daughter, and a wave of love flooded through her as she looked at the cradle and caught a glimpse of the infant’s surprisingly full head of black hair. Morgana Devlin, her daughter. Andrew’s daughter.

  Hester’s face softened, and it was at that moment that the conversation taking place between the two men at the foot of her bed suddenly impinged upon her brain. Stephen was one of the men, but the other one, she did not recognize, and for the first time, she thought it odd that a stranger should be in her room at all and especially under these circumstances. But it was Stephen’s words that made her blood run cold and stilled the urge to call him to her side.

  With growing horror and disbelief she listened as Stephen muttered, “I don’t give a damn what you do with the brat—just get rid of it and make certain that she is never found!”

  “And how do you intend to explain her disappearance, milord?” the stranger asked. “A great heiress like that doesn’t just disappear.”

  Stephen glanced around the room, mercifully not noticing Hester’s increased awareness. “I’ll take care of that; don’t you worry. No one needs to see the infant’s body—a pile of rags wrapped in a blanket and placed in the coffin should take care of everything.”

  “Why don’t I just smother the little thing now?” the stranger asked. “It won’t be the first time you’ve called upon me to do murder... .”

  “Shut up, you fool!” Stephen growled. “I don’t have to explain myself to you, but it is simply that even I cavil at infanticide. Just take her away!”

  The stranger laughed cynically. “Oh, I understand you very well, indeed. You don’t really care if I slay the brat the instant we are out of sight; you are just too squeamish to watch me do it!”

  Stephen’s face whitened. “I am not paying you a huge sum of gold to listen to your speculations about my motives. Just get rid of the child!”

  The man jerked his head in Hester’s direction. “And what about her? Are you certain you don’t need my help with her?”

  For a brief moment, some expression of regret passed across Stephen’s handsome face. His voice softer, he murmured, “No. She is dying and there is no reason for anyone to hasten her death. The physician has told me that she will be dead before dawn.”

  Frighteningly aware that she must act quickly if she was to save her little daughter, Hester gave a small moan as if she were just becoming conscious. When Stephen reached her side, she hid the loathing and fear she felt for him, and said weakly, “Dear Stephen! Are you still keeping watch over me? How kind of you!” Then, hoping he would detect no change in her voice, she asked, “Is the physician still about? I would like to speak to him.”

  The two men exchanged glances. “I’m sorry, my dear,” Stephen said smoothly, “but he has left. Is there anything that I may do for you?”

  Instantly she realized that though they could not be sure that she had overheard them, they were taking no chances. Unless someone entered the room by mistake, Hester knew that she would be allowed to speak to no one. Feverishly she tried to think of some way to outwit them. If not Morgana’s life, then Morgana’s entire future was at stake, and despite her weakened state, despite the knowledge that she might die at any moment, Hester was determined to find a way to thwart their evil plans.

  “My baby!” she cried softly. “Let me hold my baby before I die.”

  Reluctantly Stephen picked up the infant and placed it in Hester’s outstretched arms. Looking at him through tear-filled green eyes, Hester murmured, “Will you give me a few moments alone with her? You will have her a lifetime, while I will have only these precious minutes.”

  It was apparent that Stephen did not wish to leave her alone, but after a tense moment, he bowed and said quietly, “Of course, my dear. We sha
ll leave you now. I will be in the antechamber—call me if you need me.”

  Hester nodded weakly, wondering frantically how she could best use the scant time she would have to insure her daughter’s safety. Clutching the baby protectively to her breast, she gazed distractedly about the room, seeking some way to save Morgana from the fate the stranger and the man she had thought her dearest friend had planned for the child.

  She realized with a sickening lurch of her heart that there was little she could do, but as her gaze fell upon her Bible and the writing paraphernalia that lay on the table next to her bed, a desperate plan occurred to her. Knowing she was helpless to stop them from carrying out their villainous deed unless there was some miraculous interference, she could only hope to leave a record of what she had overheard and some indelible way of identifying the child ... should Morgana live.

  Laying the infant down with almost the last bit of strength she possessed, Hester painfully sat up and reached for the quill and paper. Her movements were clumsy, and she spilled some ink as she laboriously wrote out precisely what she had overheard ... and what she planned to do. Then, folding the paper, with trembling fingers she quickly hid it in the spine of her Bible.

  Nearly exhausted from these efforts, she fell back onto the bed, but driven by the age-old instinct of a mother to protect her young, she gently unwrapped her baby, turning Morgana so that the tiny buttocks were exposed, and reached once again for an object on the table. With a shaking hand, she heated the small seal of the Dowager Countess of St. Audries over the candle flame and then, tears filling her eyes, she murmured, “Dear, dear child, forgive me for what I must do to you.” And deliberately she branded her daughter on the side of the right buttock.

  The baby shrieked, but the distress Morgana suffered in that instant was nothing compared to the agony in her mother’s heart for having had to inflict such pain. Tears sliding down her pale cheeks, Hester swiftly examined the brand she had made upon the smooth, tender flesh. Satisfied that it was clearly recognizable as her seal, and fearful that the baby’s cry would bring Stephen into the room, she dropped the seal and hastily rewrapped the baby.

  She had barely finished when Stephen strode quickly into the room. “What is wrong? I heard the child cry out.”

  “I think that she is merely hungry and is letting us know that she wishes to be fed,” Hester replied, her voice noticeably weaker than it had been.

  Stephen gave Hester a sharp look, his eyes taking in the increased pallor of her skin. “You are worn out!” he scolded, reaching for the baby. “I have already seen to a wet nurse for her. Do not trouble yourself, Hester, I beg you. You will only make yourself worse.”

  Hating him, yet forced to appear as if all were normal, she smiled faintly, albeit with bitterness, and said cynically, “How can I make myself worse? Dying is the worst that can happen to someone!”

  Stephen’s eyes closed, and she thought that he might actually be suffering. But then his gray eyes met hers and he said quietly, “No, there are worse things than dying—sometimes living is the worst that can happen to you.”

  Worn out from her exertions, her lifeblood draining away with every second, Hester made no demur as Stephen lifted the baby and placed her in the cradle. Tiredly Hester said, “Will you see to it that my old nanny, Mrs. Gray, is given my Bible? She has been like a mother to me, and I know that she will cherish it and I hope someday give it to Morgana.” Her eyes locking with Stephen’s, knowing now that everything he said was a lie, she asked softly, “You do intend to keep Mrs. Gray on and let her help with Morgana’s raising?”

  His eyes averted from hers, Stephen said gruffly, “Of course. You know I will do my best by the child.”

  Wishing she had the strength to call him the liar and villain that he was, Hester glanced away, her eyes widening as they fell upon the stranger who had entered the room behind Stephen. The stranger was about medium height and build, but what caught Hester’s gaze was the oddity of his clothes—he was garbed all in black. Even the hat he wore pulled down low over one side of his face was black, and it was only when he turned and the light fell fully upon him that she saw the black patch that covered one eye.

  The one-eyed man glanced thoroughly around the room, hardly sparing a look at Hester, who had swiftly closed her eyes as he had moved nearer. A frown marred his forehead when he noticed the spot of freshly spilled ink and saw that the tip of the quill was still damp. Suspicion sharpening his features, he carefully scrutinized every object on the table, his one eye lingering on the small Bible. Almost idly he picked up the Bible and slipped it into the pocket of his shabby greatcoat. “She won’t be needing this anymore.”

  “Will you shut up? She might hear you,” Stephen snapped, his eyes on Hester’s still form.

  The one-eyed man grinned mirthlessly. “She’s dead or near enough. She’ll never hear anything again. Now let me have the child and I’ll be off.”

  Hester tried frenziedly to rouse herself, tried to rise up and condemn Stephen for what he was about to do, but her body would not obey her; even her eyelids now seemed too heavy to lift. Though she fought gallantly to live, the hemorrhaging that had accompanied Morgana’s birth had drained her life away. As the numbing lassitude continued to spread into every part of her body, with death only seconds away, her last thought was of her baby, of the brand she had marked the child with and of the letter she had written. One day, she thought drowsily, one day my baby will regain her rightful place. Morgana will survive, and the villainy done this night will not go unpunished!

  PART ONE

  The Pickpocket

  LONDON, ENGLAND

  SUMMER, 1815

  We know what we are, but know not what we may be.

  SHAKESPEARE, Hamlet

  CHAPTER 1

  Newton and Dyot Streets in the Parish of St. Giles were well-known as the headquarters for most of the thieves and pickpockets to be found in London, and so it wasn’t surprising that the three inhabitants of a seedy set of rooms in a dilapidated building just a few streets away made their living, such as it was, by thievery. Actually, by the standards of St. Giles Parish, the Fowler siblings lived very well—they had a roof over their heads and seldom went hungry—unlike the majority of those unfortunate wretches who inhabited this part of London. Not for the Fowler family the indignity of sleeping in filthy gutters at the mercy of every cutthroat around—and there were many—nor for them the gin-sodden relief to be found at the various rough taverns that abounded in the area, or the dangers that lurked in every dark alley. Whores, beggars, thieves, and murderers abounded in the narrow, mean streets of St. Giles, but the Fowlers gave it little thought. This was home to them; they knew every twisted street, every squalid gin house, every master criminal in their parish ... and the ones to avoid.

  Which wasn’t to say that the Fowlers lived a charmed life; they suffered much of the same misery and had the same fears as most of their fellow miscreants, although there were those envious souls who would swear that Jacko Fowler, at twenty-five, the eldest of the trio, certainly had been smiled upon by Lady Luck. Hadn’t he outsmarted and escaped the watch on occasions too numerous to mention? And when finally caught that one disastrous time, hadn’t he escaped from the very steps of Newgate? Ah, Jacko was a rum cove, he was! And handsome too, the, er, ladies of the parish agreed, with his brown, wavy hair and dancing blue eyes.

  Not that Ben, three years younger than Jacko, was any less clever in his escapades or his attractiveness; it was merely that Jacko was the obvious leader of the trio and possessed a brazen charm that overshadowed Ben’s quiet intensity. As for Pip, well, the youngest Fowler, beyond being an outrageous scamp, ever ready with a sharp tongue or an equally keen blade, was considered, at nineteen, too young to have yet made a mark in the world.

  The previous summer had been very good for the Fowlers. With the long war with France finally over and Napoleon safely interned on Elba, England had been in a festive mood, and scores of famous visitors had flocked
to London—the Czar of Russia and his sister, the Grand Duchess Catherine of Oldenburg, King Frederick of Prussia, and General Blücher, to name just a few of the notables who had graced London that summer of 1814. Not only had London been filled with the victorious heroes of the seemingly interminable war with Napoleon, but there had been a surfeit of fetes and amusements for the public—celebrations had been held in Hyde Park and Green Park with balloon ascents and grand fireworks, amusements that had seen the Fowlers very busy as they had ambled through the excited crowds, their nimble fingers filching a gold pocket watch here, a silken handkerchief there, and whatever other valuable came their way. Oh, it had been a grand summer!

  But the year of 1815 was not proving to be as profitable, nor as pleasant, as the past year for the Fowlers. In January they had suffered a most grievous personal tragedy; their mother, Jane Fowler, had died from the consumption that had racked her slender body for as long as her three children could remember. They had been stunned, unable to believe that Jane, who had been the guiding light of their universe, was gone. Gamely, but with far less enthusiasm, they had carried on with their lives, trying to keep the precepts she had drilled into them alive, and coping as best as they were able with the pain of their loss. It wasn’t easy, and they viewed the future rather gloomily. Certainly with Napoleon’s escape from Elba on the twenty-sixth of February and the reopening of hostilities with France, there was little for anyone to celebrate. The Fowlers’ difficulties, however, had nothing to do with Napoleon or the imminent resumption of war on the continent....

  “Bloody eyes, Jacko! We’re no ’ousebreakers! We do right well enough as it is! Just yesterday, didn’t Pip draw a rare thimble from the swell’s pit? Why the ’ell do you want to risk our bloody necks this way?” Ben growled, the bright blue eyes that he and Jacko had inherited from their mother snapping with anger.