The Amorous Education of Celia Seaton

by Miranda Neville

  “At least you have learned,” she said. “Ladies are kept in ignorance.”

  “I am not going to argue with that. But there’s a good reason for them to wait for marriage. The legitimacy of children. Getting with child is the frequent result of marital relations.”

  “If men don’t have to wait, what of the women they ‘learn’ with. Are they not in danger of getting with child?”

  “Unfortunate accidents do occur. But women of loose morals often know how to prevent them.”

  Celia knew for a fact this wasn’t always true. But she couldn’t reveal her personal acquaintance with children born out of wedlock without speaking of aspects of her past that must never be mentioned. Besides, thinking of her father’s “other” family made her sad.

  “Perhaps you have a child or two somewhere,” she said with some asperity. “But of course you will have forgotten them.”

  “It’s not my fault I can’t remember. Besides, I’m a respectable future member of the clergy. Women of loose morals,” he mimicked himself. “Sounds like a sermon. How can you abide such a staid prig?”

  That drew a chuckle. “You weren’t behaving like a staid prig a few minutes ago.”

  “No,” he said, “I was not. And don’t look at me that way or I’ll start my misbehavior again and then we’ll be in trouble.”

  Chapter 11

  A conscience is not innocent until proven guilty.

  The best cure for uncontrollable lust being, as recently discussed, cold water, Terence excused himself and returned to the stream. Were he truly betrothed to Celia he’d be pressing for an early wedding.

  Perhaps he was. His certainty that somehow the story of his background was an invention had been shaken by the realization of how deeply he was attracted to her. That he cared for her. That his falling in love and proposing marriage no longer seemed implausible.

  Yet his brain continually refused to accept the life story of Terence Fish, student of the church. The fog clouding his memory was thinning, but when he struggled to penetrate the mist it grew denser. Only when his conscious thoughts were elsewhere did he perceive glimpses of what he believed to be the truth. He needed to sneak up on it sideways, catch it by surprise. Logic informed him that were he a villain, he must somehow be involved, either as cohort or rival, with the men pursuing Celia. He needed to hear her tale again. The first time she’d described her misadventures his head had ached too much for good judgment. It wasn’t a bad idea anyway. The men and their bloodhound, balked of their prey at Bracewell, would return to Joe’s farm. It was unlikely Joe would cover for them again. It would be as well to learn as much as he could about them.

  He returned to their camp, reclined on the ground with a good five feet between them for safety, and asked her to recount the story of her dealings with the man who’d kidnapped her.

  “Three days ago . . . Was it that recently? How much has happened since then! The two younger boys and I walked over to the vicarage to fetch the older ones who have Latin lessons with Mr. Blyth.”

  “Was I there? Did we meet?”

  “No, you were not. Shall I continue?” He gestured his assent. “While I was out with my charges, a man called on Mr. Baldwin and asked for me. He introduced himself as Nicholas Constantine and said we were old friends from Lincolnshire days.”

  “But you weren’t.”

  “I had never heard of the man, and so I informed Mr. Baldwin and his sister upon my return. I now know he was the man who later kidnapped me: a dark man of about thirty with a hint of a foreign accent. I knew no one who fit his description. He declined the invitation to wait, said he had business in the neighborhood and would call again.”

  “Were you not suspicious?”

  “Puzzled rather. I wondered if the Baldwins had misunderstood him and he was acquainted with my late uncle, rather than me. Later I learned he persuaded the kitchen maid to tell him where the bedrooms were located. That night I was awakened by a noise in my room. I am not easily disturbed so it must have been a loud one. Indeed, it aroused Miss Baldwin in the next room. From my bed I sensed the presence of someone in the room. ‘Who’s there?’ I asked, not worried but thinking perhaps one of the boys wanted me. A voice called my name. ‘Celia,’ he said.”

  “A man’s voice.”

  “Yes, and not Mr. Baldwin’s. I was astonished and alarmed but before I could react the door burst open and Miss Baldwin came in carrying a candle. I hardly got a look at the intruder in the flickering light, just enough to catch him in the act of buttoning up his breeches, before he ran to the window and disappeared. As we learned, he’d come up by means of a ladder and escaped the same way.”

  “Was your window open when you retired?”

  “Wide open. You know how hot it has been. Miss Baldwin set up a screech for her brother and accused me of admitting a lover to my room.”

  “And they believed it? Even though you were betrothed to me?”

  “Mr. Baldwin would have given me the benefit of the doubt but she wouldn’t allow it. She never liked me. She insisted I be dismissed without a reference. I was told to pack my bags and leave first thing in the morning. They wouldn’t even let me say goodbye to the children.” For the first time the matter-of-fact tone of Celia’s narration became tinged with emotion. “I was fond of them. I’d been with them over a year and I’ve always enjoyed the company of little boys.”

  “I cannot believe these people. They didn’t even arrange a ride to the nearest coach stop?”

  “No. I had to walk.”

  Something struck him, an oddity that had eluded him the first time he heard the tale. “Why were you going to the coach at all? Why didn’t you come and find me at the vicarage?”

  “You were away.”

  “Away from the vicarage overnight?”

  “Yes. So I decided to leave and write to you once I reached Mrs. Stewart’s house.”

  “Did you fear I might not believe you?”

  “No, I didn’t think that.”

  Despite her denial, Terence was sure that was the reason. Poor Celia, so alone in the world. She must have felt all at sea. He wished he could have offered her comfort. Instead he’d been away on some unexplained business, and he feared it wasn’t a coincidence.

  The rest of the tale was much as he remembered it. A man in a smock—probably the very one he now wore—offered her a lift in his cart. Believing him a harmless yokel she’d accepted. “He didn’t say much but I’m used to that with the local folk. If he had I’d have known his Yorkshire speech was feigned. He turned off the high road into a lane, telling me it was a shortcut. Then he overpowered me.” A couple of hours later, bound and gagged, she was brought to the moorland cottage where she and Terence had met.

  “Why?” he asked. “Do you have any idea what the purpose of this crime might be?”

  “None at all, apart from robbery and I had so little worth stealing.”

  “You say Constantine seemed foreign. Could he be connected with your life in India?”

  She shook her head. “I never met anyone like him there. I have thought about it, but I cannot see how anything that happened half the world away could cause someone to kidnap me in Yorkshire. I am perplexed.”

  As darkness fell and Celia slept, he revisited the tale a dozen times and came to only one positive conclusion about his own role in the drama. He and the so-called Nicholas Constantine were no friends. The man had knocked him cold and robbed him of his horse, most of his clothing, and whatever else he carried.

  But one question begged—no, shouted—for an answer. How did Terence Fish, who was away from the vicarage for the night, know where to come to his fiancée’s rescue? How did he know she even needed rescuing? The most likely explanation he could come up with was that he had ridden to the cottage to meet Constantine, who was his accomplice. The robbery had been a case of thieves falling out.

  Celia had complete faith in him. It hadn’t occurred to her that his arrival at the cottage might have been fo
r nefarious rather than heroic purposes. He wished it were so, longed to find evidence that his suspicions against himself were nonsense.

  His feelings about his future bride had taken a radical turn. Not a shadow of reluctance remained, though he still had reservations about a future career in the church. He made a vow as he lay in the dark, listening to Celia’s soft breathing a few feet away. When he regained his memory he would extract himself from whatever criminal toils ensnared him. He didn’t sense that he was a man steeped in infamy, incapable of reform. He would make himself a man worthy of her and give her the protection she needed and deserved.

  “Terence . . . ?” The whisper told him she wasn’t asleep after all. “Are you cold? Would you like to share my blanket?”

  Not the best idea if he intended to retain his honor, and hers. With some misgiving, he put trust in his self-control and rolled over. It was warm. She was warm. And almost naked. He kept a couple of inches of air between them and his hands to himself.

  “Terence . . . ?”

  “What is it?”

  “Would you kiss me goodnight?”

  Five minutes later he dragged himself away and scrambled by starlight in search of cold water.

  She ought to tell him.

  She ought to confess her lie. Though lie seemed a tiny little word, inadequate for her massive deception.

  Terence Fish had turned out to be so very different from Tarquin Compton as she had known him. It was impossible to believe that the man striding at her side, unshaven and shabby, had ever been a dandy. And appearance was the least of it. Terence bore no resemblance to the haughty, critical, and reserved gentleman of the ton. He was in a wonderful mood this morning, cheerfully anticipating the end of their journey. Shared fantasies of meals, baths, and soft featherbeds kept them laughing.

  He also displayed perfect civility and thoughtfulness in the way he was ever prepared with a hand to help her over a rough patch, two hands at her waist to lift her up a steep incline. Not that she wasn’t capable of managing alone. She always had before. Even during the short period she’d lived as a proper English lady of means, she’d never been the kind of woman who inspired a man to chivalry. She enjoyed his courtesy, and his touch. Each contact gave her a little thrill. Especially once she perceived his frequent assistance was deliberate and not called for by his assessment of her needs. When he added a light kiss to her lips as he swung her over a stone wall, she was certain of it. The low hum of desire that had woken her several times in the night grew stronger. Their glances clashed in an exchange that scorched her to her toes.

  She had, she feared, fallen hard for Terence Fish.

  To try and rid herself of such an inconvenient sentiment, she replayed in her mind her various encounters with Tarquin Compton. Instead of rekindling her wrath she found excuses for his behavior. She now had to admit he wasn’t the only man in London to snub her. As a debutante she’d been a dismal failure. Her anger at his consistent inability to remember her name faded.

  But there had been that night.

  She’d anticipated the evening with some excitement. Mr. John Jocelyn, a gentleman from Devon, had asked her to dance with him at three balls in a row. He’d evinced no shock at learning she’d grown up abroad, neither was he interested in her former life. He was a little dull but he paid her attention, more than could be said for anyone else. By this time Celia had invented a nice little story, implying that her family in India had been one of total respectability and, though she was much too modest to boast of it, some social prominence. Mr. Jocelyn liked social prominence. He enjoyed instructing her about the relative importance of various members of the ton. Celia didn’t love Mr. Jocelyn, or even like him very much, but she needed to marry and he was her only prospect.

  Her chaperone, Lady Trumper, was excited too. Deciding Celia might present a better appearance if her hair was less red, she’d summoned a new hairdresser for the evening. Monsieur Alphonse combed some powder through the thick locks, guaranteed to make her look more blonde than redheaded.

  Celia’s pleasure in her improved appearance seemed justified. Mr. Jocelyn complimented her as they danced. And then the most extraordinary thing happened. The Duchess of Amesbury came up and presented her nephew, Mr. Compton. Tarquin Compton, the darling of the ton and despair of matchmaking mamas, asked Celia Seaton, whose standing was so low as to be virtually subterranean, to stand up with him. He, of course, denied all prior acquaintance but she didn’t care. She knew Mr. Jocelyn would be impressed and enjoyed envious glances from girls who’d always ignored her. She couldn’t now remember what they’d talked about. Country dances, with all the back-and-forth between partners, were never conducive to coherent conversation.

  Some time after the dance was over, she stood with some ladies next to a large potted tree when it happened. “Remind me, Jocelyn.” Mr. Compton’s arrogant voice was uistakable. “What is the name of the young lady I danced with earlier? The duchess presented us. The one with a head like a cauliflower.”

  Hateful, hateful man! Humiliation stung anew, as it had so often over the last year when she’d remembered the moment.

  She scowled at her companion who met her glare with a whimsical quirk of his brow and a quick smile, flashing white in contrast to the tan he’d acquired during two days in the sun. All at once her resentment washed away.

  After hearing the fatal words she’d rushed off to find a retiring room and a mirror. Disaster! The powder had all risen to the surface of her hair. A bubble of mirth formed low in her chest. A cauliflower was a polite way of describing it. She looked like someone whose head had been dipped in a flour sack.

  As for the architect of her mortification, look at him now! No model of elegance he, in his dusty smock and bare feet. Although, she had to admit, he also looked nothing like any species of vegetable or fruit. She laughed out loud.

  “What?” he asked.

  “Nothing,” she said. “It’s just that you look so funny.”

  “I hate to break it to you, but your own appearance is quite odd.”

  “That’s not a nice way to address a lady. Try for a little flattery.”

  “I believe in total honesty. You look odd and also beautiful.”

  A flush of pleasure suffused her chest. “Thank you. I’m not used to hearing compliments.”

  “You should be. And I intend to make sure you become so used to them you’ll shrug them off. Positively blasé as Byron put it.”

  At that moment Celia knew she’d fallen in love: certainly with Terence Fish but also, she feared, with Tarquin Compton. She no longer believed they were two separate beings. In fact it was absurd to think so. Terence was merely the true man stripped of his worldly accouterments. Her heart lurched and her breath felt thick. Ignoring a niggle of doom in her brain, she wanted to laugh with joy and throw herself into his arms.

  “Celia.” His voice grew serious. “How long have we known each other?”

  “About three months.”

  “Did you ever think I might not be the man I claimed to be?”

  She stumbled and immediately he was there with a steadying arm. “No, of course not.”

  As she spoke the words she knew she’d missed, or deliberately avoided, an opportunity to tell him who he really was. But she shied from the confession. Let her enjoy her loving, attentive fiancé for a little longer. Time enough to tell the truth when they reached Stonewick which might, if Joe’s directions were good, be only a few miles further on.

  She hoped so. Clouds had been gathering all morning, promising an end to the dry weather. The air grew muggy and oppressive. At the same time, she willed the moors to extend before them and prolong her time with Terence. Tarquin, when he learned the truth, was going to be very angry.

  She clung to his arm shamelessly, enjoying his closeness while she could. “I always knew exactly who you were,” she said.

  “Do you think I could have been on this part of the moors before?”

  “It’s possible, I suppose
,” she said cautiously. “Does the landscape seem familiar? Everywhere we’ve been looks much the same to me.”

  “Every so often I get the feeling my memory might return. As though it were pushing against a heavy curtain in my head, seeking a way out of the dark. It’s happened several times this morning, but if I try to find the opening in the curtain, it closes tight.”

  “What an interesting way of describing it.”

  “It’s happening now, looking down into this vale. Do you see that cottage there, or perhaps it’s a barn? I think I’ve seen it before. And the road beyond it. I know where it leads.”

  “Where?”

  “That’s just it. I know and I don’t know.”

  Celia had a sick feeling in her stomach. They must be close to his home, perhaps on his land already. The end of their idyll was imminent. Idyll was an odd term for two days spent under such uncomfortable conditions, but it was the right one. In all her life she couldn’t recall a happier time and she yearned to prolong it, if only for an hour or two.

  “Let us sit for a while,” she said. “If your body relaxes, your mind will be diverted and perhaps your memory will open.” And hoped for the opposite result.

  Chapter 12

  Since to err is human, it’s safer to avoid the occasion of sin.

  The presence of stone walls between fields, absence of gorse, and evidence of numerous sheep, told him the land was more intensively used for husbandry than the moors they’d crossed. Perhaps they were on land belonging to a prosperous estate. Terence noted with interest that he was able to interpret the signs. His brain quickened, asking whether he might be acquainted with the owners. He beat back the questions. Such calculations, he’d discovered, thickened the fog of his memory. Celia was right. Relax.