by Carla Kelly
‘I hope to be,’ she said quietly. ‘One takes the hand dealt and plays it, or so Davey used to tell me.’
‘Good for you,’ he said and never meant anything more.
He touched his sutures, wishing they did not itch, but she noticed the gesture.
‘You know, I could remove those,’ she said. ‘You look like you want to scratch them, which suggests that they have pulled tight and done their job. Or you could do it yourself. I have a pair of small scissors.’
‘I’m squeamish,’ Joe said and couldn’t help a laugh. ‘Good God, I’ve seen men cut in two by cannon fire and I don’t want to take scissors to a simple stitch.’
She took a deep breath at his clumsy comment and he could have slapped his forehead.
‘Beg pardon. That was indelicate.’
‘No, it was honest,’ Verity replied. She reached out and turned his cheek to one side. ‘I need some tweezers. Perhaps I can find a pair downstairs. I’ll send the maid up for the dishes, too.’
She left the room before he could protest or agree. He listened for footsteps, but heard none. She must be standing there, perhaps gathering herself together after his stupid comment. He wanted to fling open the door, apologise and hold her close.
In a moment he heard her steps on the stairs. A few minutes later the maid came to retrieve the dishes. After she left with a shy smile at the additional coin he gave her, Verity returned. She held up the tweezers.
‘Your fate is in my hands, Captain,’ she said. ‘Sit down.’
He sat, slightly apprehensive, which must have showed in his eyes because she chuckled.
‘Coward,’ she remarked. She bent over and then straightened up. ‘Will you think me unbearably forward if I ask you to lie down on the bed?’
‘Heavens, no,’ he said. ‘We’ve discussed politics and custard and laughed about that silent fellow in the coach. Do with me what you will.’
She laughed, as Joe hoped she would, even as he wondered deep down in that place no one had ever touched before, if he didn’t mean it.
Chapter Fourteen
He lay down and slid over to accommodate her. There was no denying her high colour. He knew she had never done anything like this before with a man nearly a stranger, except he did not feel like a stranger.
It was more than that. Certainly in his lengthy naval career he had stretched out on a bed with a woman nearby, but never like this. It touched him, mainly because her care seemed so homely, almost as if she truly were his wife. He knew he was in good hands.
He closed his eyes when she started to snip through the centre of each suture. Six snips. He opened one eye.
‘See here, I am being brave.’
‘You are marvellous,’ she replied. She set down the scissors. ‘Hopefully this won’t curl your toes.’
She carefully teased out each suture, a frown of concentration on her face. The knot required a little tug, which made him wince, because the whole matter did terrify him.
‘I have a scar on my neck from a Barbary pirate who thought to remove my head.’
‘I see it. We have lived different lives, Captain Everard. Hold still.’
She gave another tug and nodded in satisfaction. ‘Done.’ She sat back. ‘Have you any ointment?’
‘Look in the drawstring bag inside my duffel. Jar right on top.’
Obviously embarrassed to be fumbling in his duffel, she found the jar, returned to the bed and applied a dab of goose grease. ‘It’s an honourable scar.’
Joe sat up and touched his cheek gingerly. ‘I won’t frighten babies, will I?’ he asked, thinking it was in jest, but not entirely certain. Suppose, just suppose, he ever married and returned to port after a voyage to a new baby in his theoretical wife’s arms? Would he frighten babies seemed like a good question.
Well, damn him if she didn’t take him seriously. ‘Neither yours nor anyone else’s,’ she said.
And damn him again if she didn’t go right to the meat of their next problem. She looked around the room elaborately—which reminded him forcefully of her brother, about to announce some misdeed—and plainly stated, ‘There is no room for one of us to be gallant and sleep anywhere but on this bed.’
He returned some vapid remark, which earned him a frown—my God, but the woman had a way about her!—and the comment, ‘The issue remains, sir: how are we going to accomplish this?’
There she stood, hands folded so ladylike, face charming, but not a woman to be bamboozled, gulled or otherwise suckered into anything not of her choice. She radiated independence in a manner that he found more than admirable. Verity Newsome was an utter original, a woman who could stand her ground.
‘How, indeed?’ he teased. ‘I like you a lot, Verity Newsome, but I would never dream of shenanigans.’
Her eyes lively, she dipped a little curtsy that made him laugh. ‘I like you, too, Captain Everard, but your virtue is safe with me.’
They both laughed at that and suddenly, improbably, maybe against his own personal counsel, he loved her.
The idea jolted him and he immediately thought of all manner of reasons why it was foolish: the war, the times, the tides, the mere logistics. He brushed them all aside and decided on the spot to see what he could engineer in Hipworth Hall to change matters in his favour. As for right now, he was and would remain a gentleman, especially since he had no idea how Verity felt and knew better than to enquire.
But he was used to solving everyone’s problems. He had a solution for the current dilemma. ‘Simple. I will lie down on top of the coverlets, wrapped in a blanket, and you will get between the sheets. We will line up back to back. We will probably pretend all night that we are sleeping.’
She laughed and agreed. She went first to the necessary on the bottom floor and did whatever it was ladies did to prepare for bed. He left the room when she returned. When he came back after a decent interval, she was under the covers, her eyes resolutely closed.
So far, so good. He went into the tiny closet, struggled into his nightshirt and wrapped a blanket around himself.
She had taken the side of the bed near the door, which he took exception to.
‘It will not do, Verity,’ he said, after he doused the lamp. ‘I realise this is a temporary arrangement, but I insist on being closest to the door.’
‘Why?’ she asked, even as she obligingly moved over to the side of the bed closer to the window.
‘God rest his soul, my father told me once, “Lad, if you ever marry, always keep yourself in bed between your wife and the door.”’
‘But we’re not married,’ Verity pointed out.
‘He was still right. Hush now and let us pretend to be asleep.’
She was close enough that he could feel as well as hear her chuckle.
He had to test the waters, simply because he knew they would be in Hipworth tomorrow and his own intentions had changed. ‘Do we look married?’ he asked into the darkness.
‘We’re of that age,’ she said. ‘I’m not going to see twenty again...’
‘Horrors,’ he teased and she thumped him.
‘You are somewhat older,’ she said, getting her dig in and making him smile.
‘I am not a day over forty,’ he told her.
‘Maybe not a day, but how about a thousand or so days?’ she asked.
He rose up on one elbow, ready to turn around, then thought better of it. ‘I really am forty. War tends to age one. Imagine.’ He thought of fleet actions and young men dead, and sighed.
When she spoke, she seemed subdued. ‘I should have thought of that, sir. We are of an age to fool anyone on a mail coach, without even meaning to.’
He could tell she briefly rose up on one elbow and thought better of it. ‘We do have a certain camaraderie, do we not?’
He smiled in the dark. ‘I believe we do. I’ve enjoye
d it. Go to sleep.’
‘Not yet,’ she said, surprising him. ‘I have to tell you that Davey spoke highly of you in his letters.’
‘He got his fair share of scolds and dressings down from me, I assure you,’ Joe replied.
‘He wrote about those, too,’ she said. ‘In his last letter, he mentioned a regular fierce jobation from you about letting a midshipman get away with some minor misdeed.’
‘I remember it well,’ Joe said as he turned on to his back and put his hands behind his head, forgetting the rules they had established. ‘I told him in no uncertain terms never to slack off with a midshipman, else how would they learn the rigour of life in a warship? Lives depend on it, Verity.’ He smiled at the memory. ‘Davey stood there and took it like a champion.’
‘Do you know what else? At the end of his letter he added a postscript.’
‘About how he could barely wait to transfer to a different frigate?’
‘No. He wrote, “Some day, I want to be the commander Captain Everard is right now.”’
She was in tears. Joe pulled her close as she wept.
‘I wish to God he could have done precisely that,’ Joe said softly as he held her close. ‘I hate war.’
When her tears subsided, she turned from him, which hurt his heart. She must have been looking for a handkerchief, because soon enough he heard her blow her nose.
What should he do? He wanted to hold her close until she fell asleep. He imagined lonely nights as she lay in bed at home and cried for a beloved brother. He also knew he needed to turn his back. It was the sensible thing.
He didn’t care. ‘Come close, Verity. Don’t be sad by yourself. I’ll hold you.’
She went into his arms. He held her close until she felt heavy against him and slept. He never wanted to move again, even as he knew dawn would come, as it always did. Thank goodness they both had plans for their futures that did not involve each other.
Easy to think; harder to believe. He lay there in silence, cradling Verity Newsome to his chest as she slept. When the strangeness of the experience turned into ineffable sweetness, he slept, too.
Chapter Fifteen
When Verity woke, the captain was gone. She hoped she hadn’t snored or drooled in her sleep, and then laughed at herself, imagining what her mother would think of this admittedly odd situation.
That was the virtue of being nearly thirty: no one in the Newsome family need ever know.
She dressed quickly, but took longer with her hair than usual. She thought of all the years when she hadn’t cared about her hair. It mattered now, because someone she more than admired had seen it spread out on a pillow.
More than admired. Could last night have been any more awkward? As she brushed and combed, Verity realised it had been anything but that.
She had always been the family member to decorate for Christmas. This year of Trafalgar had proved too difficult, except for the ivy she and Captain Everard had gathered and which she had strung on the banister, her tardy gift to the season.
But as she stood there, brush in hand, she felt the peace of the season nestle into her heart, much as she had nestled so close to a man generous enough to let her mourn a little longer. She knew she would never forget Davey. She hoped she was not being a traitor to want to remember him less relentlessly. Time would work on the raw spots.
She took heart, knowing soon the mail coach would let her off in Hipworth, and she could continue doing what she loved so well, teaching children. If she made a creditable showing, perhaps there would be good letters of reference to move her into a position at a young ladies’ school, as she had told Captain Everard.
Verity stuffed a few hairpins here and there to complete her efforts. She would have managed quite well, if she hadn’t stood there one moment too long, looking into her reflection and deep into her eyes.
Don’t leave me in Hipworth, Captain Everard, she told her reflection. I don’t care how dangerous your life is. Let me share it with you.
Where that little revelation had come from, she couldn’t have said. Hadn’t she told the man only last night of her ambitions and seen his smile of approval? He was kindness itself and she knew he wished her well, but probably nothing more.
Ah well. Maybe it was enough to wander into his orbit, much as Davey had done. In her brother’s eight months aboard the Ulysses, his letters had shown her a new maturity, the kind that comes from hard work and good leadership. If only there had been more time.
Knowing what everyone in the Noah’s Ark supposed about their night together at the inn, she should have felt more reluctant to go downstairs. She didn’t because she decided to embrace the falsehood, honestly devised, for a few more hours, and resolve to remember it forever. It was harmless enough, and she needed to store up memories against the winter of her spinsterhood.
Joe had been working his magic below stairs. When she came into the public room, the captain was holding his small audience of the innkeeper and his wife and two daughters captive with a tale of sea life on the far side of the world. She stood in the hall and listened, wanting to hear his stories, too.
A person can only stand in a hall and eavesdrop so long. She entered the room and was waved in by her supposed husband. His gesture was so informal and probably precisely something a husband would do. He didn’t rise; he generously allowed her into his seafaring world, too.
‘Everyone thinks my life is glamorous, Verity,’ he told her as she sat down beside him. ‘You know it is not.’
‘We still think it is glamorous, Mrs Everard,’ the keep’s wife said. ‘Eggs and bacon, dear?’
As she ate—he had already eaten, but made her smile by filching a piece of bacon from her plate—he continued his narrative. The scattering of guests in the dining room also listened, including the round little fellow who had been their coach companion for much of yesterday.
The arrival of the mail coach ended the lopsided conversation. As the travellers prepared to leave, Joe took her aside in the hall and helped her into her cloak.
‘You are quite the entertainer,’ she said.
‘I did it for you,’ he told her quietly. ‘How else could I let you know of Davey’s life, those incidents that never made it into letters home? Was it enough?’
Touched to her heart’s core, she leaned forward and rested her forehead against his chest. ‘Thank you,’ seemed fearsomely inadequate, but it was all she could manage.
The snow had lessoned and they continued their journey. This time, the silent man sat across from them. Feeling remarkably forward, Verity caught his attention.
‘I do beg your pardon, sir, but you’ve been so silent on this journey.’
The fellow nodded to her and permitted himself a tiny smile. ‘I come from a large, noisy and vulgar family,’ he said. ‘Imagine my delight to be able to ride and read in silence.’ With that, he returned to his book.
* * *
They arrived at Sudbury in late afternoon, everyone in the crowded mail coach ready for the journey to end, if frowns and exasperated sighs were any indication. The trip should have ended closer to noon, but snow began to fall more heavily with every hour.
The greatest relief Verity felt came when they were the only two travellers who disembarked. The silent man stayed on the coach.
‘I intend to consider that a Christmas miracle,’ she told Joe as they stood with their baggage by the entrance to the inn. She couldn’t help a laugh. ‘After his comments, do you suppose he is one of those men who contrives travel so he can read in blissful silence?’
‘Who could blame him?’ the captain joked. ‘I am relieved, too. Think of our imaginary dirty linen he could have waved about, were you to be introduced to the probably censorious citizens of Sudbury as Miss Newsome.’
She rolled her eyes. ‘It doesn’t bear thinking about and you know it!’
She
took his arm as they walked towards the inn. ‘All’s well that ends well, I suppose. I will advise Mama never to create an engagement of convenience again.’
‘Wise of you.’
The innkeeper inside only shrugged when she enquired if a conveyance had arrived earlier in the day from Hipworth Hall.
‘Nothing’s stirring, m’um,’ he said.
‘I’m the new teacher for Sir Percy Hipworth,’ she told the man. ‘I know he is expecting me.’
‘That may be, m’um, but ’tween you and me, Sir Tight Pursey never much concerns himself about the comforts of others.’
Oh, dear. ‘Perhaps he forgot,’ she said, wishing the best of her new employer because she had to.
He shrugged again and leaned closer in a conspiratorial manner. ‘A teacher, you say? That’ll be a first for Hip-worthless Hall.’
He would have said more, but Captain Everard had fixed him with a scowl she suspected as coin of the realm for a naval officer demanding silence.
‘Then acquaint us with someone who can convey us to Hipworth Hall, if you will,’ Joe said. ‘I am Miss Verity’s escort and this is my last duty to discharge.’
The innkeeper hurried into the gathering darkness, likely in search of a carter. The words ‘my last duty’ sounded in her ears and she felt lower than at any point in the journey.
‘“A first for Hipworth Hall”?’ the captain said. ‘What kind of port are you headed into? It’s starting to sound like a lee shore to me, Verity.’
This was no time to bare her own uncertainties. ‘When he made this arrangement, Lord Blankenship assured me I would be teaching,’ she said. ‘I have to trust he knows Sir Percy well.’
Her disquiet increased when the keep returned with a carter in tow, a cheerful fellow who assured them that if they didn’t mind a little weather, he could get them to Hipworth Hall, which wasn’t far.
‘A little weather?’ was Joe’s comment as he helped her into the narrow seat directly behind the carter and saw to the arrangements of her luggage and his solitary duffel before he climbed in.
