Convenient Christmas Brides: The Captain's Christmas Journey ; The Viscount's Yuletide Betrothal ; One Night Under the Mistletoe

by Carla Kelly

  She got out of bed quietly and padded to the door. She removed the chair she had propped there and opened it a crack.

  Good heavens, there was mousey Miss Hipworth, tapping on Captain Everard’s door. Verity’s indignation gave way almost immediately to pity. Sir Percy must have ordered his daughter to do such a shocking thing, in the hopes that the captain would open the door so Miss Mouse could compromise the man and demand marriage.

  She knew she would not put anything past Sir Percy. She hoped Captain Everard had the good sense she suspected, as long as he didn’t think it was her and open the door.

  The moment called for action and she did not hesitate, considering all Joe had done for her. She crossed the hall quietly and touched Clarinda Hipworth on the shoulder. The girl jumped, then ran down the stairs.

  ‘Verity?’ she heard at the closed door. ‘Is that you?’

  ‘It was Clarinda Hipworth before it was me,’ she whispered back. ‘I just saved you from a monumentally compromising situation.’

  ‘So my virtue is intact?’ she heard next, which made her laugh.

  ‘I suppose as intact as it is ever going to be, considering you claim to be forty and have been a man of the world for a voyage or two,’ she said when she could talk without giggling.

  ‘Verity, remind me to put all of my funds in your name when I return to Plymouth,’ he teased. ‘Goodnight. Do consider leaving with me in the morning.’

  Chapter Eighteen

  No one was going anywhere in the morning. One glance out the window assured Joe of that. After negotiating with a servant girl to bring him enough hot water to shave, Joe managed to scrape his face and wonder if he could find his way back to Sudbury through mounds of snow.

  Thank you, Verity Newsome, he thought again.

  He had been about to open the door last night, thinking, perhaps wishfully, that the person on the other side was Verity. Her warning had probably saved him from utter ruin. He wondered if Papa Hipworth had planted himself somewhere close by in the dark to register shock and dismay at finding his only daughter in a room with an unmarried man wealthy enough to make everyone rejoice, then demand marriage and overlook such evil.

  Joe looked out the window again, certain he could shoulder his duffel and escape, if the snow let up even a little. Getting Verity to come along might require more effort, but he had to try. It was a dilemma. He knew he loved her, but she seemed determined to make her own way in the world.

  ‘You have no idea, Verity,’ he told his shaving mirror. ‘You are independent, stubborn and eminently qualified to make your own way without a man nearby. You are the perfect wife for a captain in the fleet.’

  She was. She was also lovely to look at and kind. He had no doubt that he could return from sea a battered man, be resuscitated by her love and goodness, and return to the fight a better captain than he left it. If they were fortunate enough to make babies when he was briefly on land, their children would be independent and strong, too. What more could a seafaring man want?

  It would help if she loved him. Such wooing, delivered mainly through correspondence, might require patience, but he was not afraid of the attempt. He was also something he had rarely been of late: he was hopeful.

  So it was with a spring in his step that he went downstairs in search of something for breakfast. The dining room was precisely where he had left it and there sat the horrible Hipworths and someone else, who looked equally surprised to see him.

  It was the little man from the mail coach, the chap who had hunched himself into the corner, slept and read, and kept entirely to himself. It was the man he had hoped only yesterday never to see again, when he wanted to shelter Verity from rumour and falsehood.

  But Joe was a fast thinker. The man’s presence made Joe realise he had an ally in Father Christmas, who governed the holiday, up to and including doing a kindness to folk who didn’t expect it.

  He gave a short prayer of gratitude consisting of a mere, Thank You, Lord, and said, ‘What a surprise, sir.’

  ‘You know Captain Everard?’ Sir Percy said.

  ‘A brief acquaintance on the mail coach,’ the man said. ‘How is your wife, Captain?’

  ‘I have no wife,’ Joe replied. ‘You made an assumption that I suppose was logical. Who, sir, are you?’

  The mail coach companion stared. Joe looked from the little man to Sir Percy and had his answer. ‘Ah, you two must be brothers. And here I had assumed you were travelling on, after we were dropped off at Sudbury.’

  ‘I did travel on, but only to Quarle,’ the man said, sputtering scrambled eggs around the table, which confirmed him as a Hipworth, to Joe’s amusement. ‘It’s nearer to my residence. What do you possibly mean, you have no wife? You two were cosy enough sharing a room at Chittering Corner.’

  Lady Hipworth leaped to her feet and clapped her hands over her daughter’s ears, which made the poor thing wince. ‘What is this outrage, sir? Have we been about to nourish a viper in our bosom?’

  Joe wanted to point out that she was amazingly flat chested and no viper could possibly find nourishment, but he had more sense than that. He shrugged. ‘I can obviously tell you the truth and you wouldn’t believe it. An earlier traveller on the coach had assumed, for no particular reason, that Miss Newsome and I were married. Being a kind-hearted lady, and not wanting to embarrass the woman, Miss Newsome said nothing.’

  ‘But the inn! The inn!’ the man exclaimed.

  ‘Same thing,’ Joe said, enjoying himself hugely. ‘There is something about the two of us that makes people assume we are married. We were offered the only remaining room. If you recall, I suggested that considering the circumstances, another lady could share the room with Miss Newsome and I would happily have managed in the commons with the rest of you. But no one would hear of that, would they? There you have it.’

  He went to the sideboard and dished up some cold eggs and congealing bacon. He ate because he was hungry and used to bad food.

  The silence around him felt like a veritable presence. Lady Hipworth removed her hands from her daughter’s ears and fumed at him. Joe regarded the daughter and felt nothing but sorry for her, trapped with odious parents. And there was Sir Percy, ready to pounce.

  Joe followed nautical tactics, knowing it was always wisest to attack first, if the wind was right. He pushed away his plate, ready to turn serious.

  ‘Sir Percy, did you send your daughter upstairs to knock on my door last night?’ he asked.

  His unwilling host’s guilty look was clearly evident. Joe glanced at the brother and saw that open-mouthed stare again, but directed at Sir Percy, as if the man knew his brother was entirely capable of such devilment.

  Lady Hipworth’s gasp sounded theatrical in the extreme, but there was no denying the tears in her eyes. They looked genuine enough; so did the way she pulled her weeping daughter to her skinny chest.

  ‘I would never do that,’ Sir Percy declared after a moment, as if he had needed to consider all the other comments—precious few—available to him.

  Coward to the bone, Sir Percy turned his attention to his defeated, terrified daughter. ‘Tell them the truth, Clarinda.’

  After an excruciating moment that made Joe cringe inside for her, the girl shook her head. ‘The captain imagined it,’ she mumbled.

  ‘He was probably going across the hall to that woman’s room, wasn’t he?’ Sir Percy demanded further.

  She nodded. ‘Miss Newsome was in the hall.’

  ‘She was,’ Joe agreed, even as he looked up and saw the lady in question standing in the door of the dining room, her eyes troubled. She must have heard the whole exchange and no one had noticed her. ‘She heard your daughter tapping on my door and came to warn me not to open it.’

  Tired of present company, Joe stood up. ‘Assumptions and lies. Hurry up and fire Miss Newsome so we can shake the dust of this place of
f our feet.’

  ‘You’re fired!’ Sir Percy exclaimed, pointing his finger at the love of Joe’s life, even if she didn’t know it.

  ‘I was going to resign this morning,’ she told him. ‘Do not make your daughter suffer because she had to lie for you.’

  ‘I would never do such a thing,’ the baronet declared.

  Sir Percy looked around the room. His wife couldn’t meet his eyes. His daughter turned away. His brother shook his head.

  ‘You’re fired,’ he repeated. ‘If you attempt to seek another teaching position I will scotch you at every turn.’

  Verity turned pale, but her attention went to Clarinda Hipworth. ‘I wish I could take you with me,’ she said, ‘but I cannot. Perhaps your uncle might help you.’

  ‘We don’t need help,’ Lady Hipworth said. Joe saw nothing but trouble ahead for this wife saddled with a supremely unscrupulous husband, a son about to become as useless as his father, a daughter who would always be victimised, with no relief in sight.

  ‘Very well,’ Joe said. He smiled at Verity, who looked nearly as troubled as Lady Hipworth, because he knew she had a soft heart. ‘I’ll return you to your home in Kent.’

  ‘I think that best,’ she said. ‘I never unpacked. I came down here to resign, before I heard any of this.’

  ‘It’s snowing to beat all hell outside,’ Joe reminded her.

  ‘The village is close and my baggage is not that heavy,’ she said. ‘If you can carry one valise, I can certainly manage the other. Now where is my cloak?’

  Without another word, she turned on her heel. He followed her into the hall.

  ‘I had no idea the little man was Sir Percy’s brother,’ he said by way of apology. ‘He painted rather a lurid picture for everyone, as you can imagine.’

  He saw no tears in her eyes, so he knew the whole sordid business had not ruined her. He saw sympathy instead.

  ‘I would never treat my children that way, had I any,’ she said as she took her cloak from the maid.

  ‘I know you would not. Neither would I,’ he replied, accepting his heavier cloak and bicorn and leaving a large coin. ‘Let us see how tough we are in a Norfolk snowstorm.’

  Chapter Nineteen

  They were destined to travel no farther than Sudbury that night. The roads were closed and the inn full. Verity told the innkeeper’s wife that she’d decided not to accept the position after all.

  Verity had seen no more than a passing glance from the woman yesterday, but there was no mistaking the relief on her face. ‘It’s a terrible place,’ the keep’s wife told her. ‘Any day now, I think Sir Percy’s younger brother will own the manor and all the land. You’re wise to go away.’

  ‘I owe that to Captain Everard,’ she said. ‘He minced no words in finding a way to end my brief stay there.’

  ‘He likes you, dearie,’ the keep’s wife said. ‘I can see it in his eyes. Surely you can, too.’

  ‘I never looked,’ Verity said honestly. ‘You must be mistaken. He has squandered far too much time helping me, when I know he has far more pressing matters on his mind.’

  ‘I doubt it,’ the keep’s wife said. ‘No man is that busy and I know something about men. More’n you, anyway. Maybe you should look a little closer yourself.’

  Verity was spared the spectacle of groping around for a suitable reply because the woman hurried off to the kitchen. She followed the woman, which seemed terribly forward of her, but she had a question.

  Verity stopped her. ‘I know you’re busy, but answer me this: Do Captain Everard and I seem like a married couple to you?’

  ‘Aye, you do,’ she said. ‘That’s what I thought, anyway, until my husband said you were here about employment and the captain was your escort.’ She laughed. ‘You fooled us all!’

  ‘But why? How?’

  The woman set down the bowl, her expression thoughtful. ‘It’s the way he teased you and you laughed,’ she said. ‘I think you even argued a little about something. That’s what married folk of some years do.’

  * * *

  Verity spent the afternoon sitting in the ladies’ parlour with a clergyman’s wife and a miss fretting over this delay in her return home from St Clare’s Female Academy in Cambridge. It was a place Verity knew of, the sort of school where she wanted to teach some day. The girl’s companion, a desiccated-looking lady, was a teacher there, if the conversations she overheard were accurate.

  She listened on the sly, well aware as the afternoon advanced that perhaps she did not want to spend her holidays that way, escorting spoiled pupils home and living on the edge of everything. Better she stay at home. She could find some work on the estate or in the village—nothing exalted, but there might be an opportunity to flourish in a modest way that didn’t leave her at the beck and call of others.

  She wandered into the commons area once or twice. Captain Everard stood at the window, rocking back and forth, even pacing a bit, as she imagined he paced on his quarterdeck. He winked at her, but continued his pacing until she stopped him.

  She watched his eyes. It began to dawn on her that perhaps an innkeeper’s wife was right. She saw kindness and something else. Why not brazen it out? She put her hand on his arm. ‘I hope you are not distressed that we’re stuck in an inn, it is Christmas Eve and you’re worried about me.’

  ‘That’s precisely what I am,’ he said. ‘You deserve better. I set out to do a good turn for Davey Newsome and I have muddled it.’

  ‘How, exactly?’

  She watched high colour arrive at his face, which would have made her smile, because she doubted that a post captain blushed overmuch.

  ‘Do you really want to know?’

  ‘I rather think I do.’

  He looked around. ‘This is not the right place,’ he muttered. ‘Oh, bother it, is anyone busy in the kitchen?’

  ‘I’ll look.’

  Sure of herself now, she went into the kitchen, where the innkeeper’s wife was chatting with her husband. The afternoon lull before dinner had turned the room quiet. Might as well continue brazening her way through, considering that her life and heart hung in the balance, whether Captain Everard knew it or not.

  ‘Would you mind terribly if the Captain and I had a few moments of privacy in here?’ she began. ‘You’re crowded and busy, but I believe he has something to say to me.’

  The husband and wife exchanged glances. ‘We can do better than a kitchen, if you don’t mind bundling up a little,’ the keep said. ‘There’s a wee summer porch this way.’

  They showed her where, and she peeked into a pleasant room with tables and chairs that must be delightful in the summer. Perfect.

  She returned to the commons, where the captain had resumed his solitary post at the window. She looked at his back, humbled by how many burdens he already bore. He had told her parents this was a nasty war that wasn’t going to end any time soon.

  She knew his first responsibility lay with the fleet. She also knew she would do nothing to ever change that: no tears, no demands, no ultimatums that would deter him from the service he had pledged to King and country. She knew he would likely be absent at times when she needed him. She also knew she loved him.

  ‘Joe, come with me, will you?’

  He turned around, his face troubled. As she watched and held her breath with the loveliness of it, his expression changed to one that suggested she was not wrong.

  She had put on her cloak and held his out to him. He grinned like a little boy and put it on.

  ‘Where away, Miss Newsome?’ he asked in proper shipside fashion.

  ‘There is a summer porch.’

  He took her hand. ‘Better than the kitchen, you think?’

  ‘You can decide for yourself, Captain Everard.’

  ‘Now that frightens me,’ he teased.

  They sat close together in
the summer porch. She looked her man square in the eye. If she was wrong, then she was wrong, but she had to try.

  ‘I love you, Captain,’ she said, casting away all propriety because it mattered. ‘Everyone at every stage of this bizarre journey has assumed that we are an old married couple. Why is that?’

  He sat back in his chair, a silly grin on his face. He never took his eyes from hers, which would have unnerved her, had she not cared so deeply for him. How many moments would they have like this?

  ‘Let me draw a decent breath,’ he said finally. ‘I’ve been stewing and second guessing and havering about, convinced that you were far too intelligent to bind yourself to a man who will not be around much.’

  ‘I accept that.’

  ‘I never knew what I needed until I met you,’ he said and took her hands. ‘You are independent and perfectly able to function on your own. Have you any idea how intoxicating that is to a man who needs a wife with precisely those attributes?’

  She laughed out loud. ‘You don’t mind curly hair and an ordinary face?’

  ‘I think you are beautiful and I have discovered I like curly hair. Tall women are probably handier than short ones, since you’ll need to reach top shelves when I am far away at sea. Who knew?’

  They both laughed at that. She sobered first. ‘It’s a matter of pride, but I have no money.’

  ‘Hardly matters,’ he said, sliding closer. ‘That odious Hipworth spawn hit the mark, which I am certain propelled his even more odious father to force that poor girl to attempt heaven knows what last night. I have a decent fortune percolating in a clever counting house. It’s enough for both of us.’

  ‘Well then, sir?’

  ‘Marry me, if you dare,’ he said. ‘I love you and everyone seems to think we already look married.’

  ‘That is not a very romantic proposal,’ she said.

  ‘How about this?’

  He stood up, pulled her up with him, hauled her close and kissed her. She hadn’t reached the ripe age of almost thirty without being kissed, but Verity Newsome knew she was in the hands of a master. Wherever he had learned to kiss—Spain, Portugal, England, Italy, the Antipodes, God help us, France—he had been an apt pupil. His lips were warm and searching and the only thing that made her finally pull away was the urgent need to breathe.