“I wish I could buy them,” she said gravely. “But I cannot. So I must try something else.”
“What?”
“Make a speech in the town hall,” she said.
She wrote up a speech. It was a fiery one, and without Burke’s knowledge, she delivered it at the next meeting. Women had not previously been allowed to speak, but since she was the wife of the squire, she was given gracious permission. They had probably thought she would speak on flowers, or nature.
Instead, Lesley gave a strong fiery speech about the great problem of child abuse. She spoke pointedly about the town “orphanage,” which was really a factory in which children as young as two years of age were employed at no wages.
She roused strong ire in her neighbours. A few agreed with her, several elderly ladies visited the site, and clucked over the conditions. They said more food must be given to the children, they seemed to be starving. But nothing else was done about the situation.
Burke reproved her angrily in front of the Stukelys, for he had just come from a hot session of the town council. They had bawled him out for not being able to control his wife. They had stung him, thought Lesley.
She turned on him, and answered hotly. “The children are not only starving! They are denied any education, they are forced to work long hours for nothing! Nothing! Another child died yesterday, I went to the funeral conducted by Reverend Creswick. I imagine the child was glad to die, it was so terribly thin ... and its small fingers were cut to bits by the threads! Oh, Burke ... it was horrible...”
He glanced at the Stukelys, who were laughing, and Denise, who was smirking. Guy listened in silence, his lazy eyes studying them both.
Burke was trying to control his temper, Lesley could see it was an intense effort. She was glad of it. She was so hurt by the situation, by the sight of the hollow-eyed children, with thin little sticks of arms and legs, that she wanted to strike out at the world. If only Burke would help her!
“You must do nothing like this again,” he said in a very controlled voice. “If you feel the need to help, let us take food to the children, and try to alleviate their living conditions. Speeches before hostile neighbours cannot aid anything —”
“It woke them up to the conditions!” Lesley flashed. “I am glad of that. I am trying to persuade Reverend Creswick to write a sermon about this —”
Denise laughed aloud, sneering. “Oh, now she is making up to the pastor! Don’t you know he is besotted with your sister, and they go about unchaperoned all day? Are you trying to come between them?”
“Your mind runs in the gutters,” retorted Lesley, and Aunt Stukely laughed at them both.
Burke turned on her, tight of mouth and dangerously red. “Lesley, be quiet,” he said softly. “We will speak of this later in private. There are things that can be done —”
“But you cannot control your wife,” drawled Guy Janssen. “Thee isth so pretty when thee gets angry, too!” And his gaze went up and down as he laughed at them. She hated the way he stared at her.
“There is more than one way to silence a woman,” chuckled Uncle Stukely significantly. “Can’t you really silence my fiery niece, Burke?”
“Yes, I can,” snapped Burke, and he reached out and yanked Lesley to him.
His mouth closed over hers. She was rigid in his grip, feeling the heat of his anger, so wild with him she could have struck him.
Their bodies were close together, she felt the heat in his, the hard length of his legs against hers under the thin muslin dress. The men cheered. Lesley could just see over Burke’s shoulder, and she caught the full angry glare of the violet eyes of Denise Huntington.
Burke finally let her go. Lesley swayed, she felt dizzy with her anger, the heat of the day, and running about.
Burke caught her again, concerned this time. She pulled her arm from his grip, and without making an excuse she departed from the drawing room and went up the stairs to her rooms.
She did not come down again that day, not for dinner or the evening. She fumed to herself, and ordered Netta to allow no one to her rooms. Even Viola was kept out. Lesley strode up and down the rooms, paused to stare out unseeingly, only to stride again. She was so angry, she walked with fists clenched. Those starving children, and with the others, it was all a matter for fury at her, or laughter! Had they no compassion at all?
She finally went to bed, after a hot cup of tea. She lay awake restlessly before finally dropping off to sleep.
Voices had awakened her, raised voices from the next room. Burke’s bedroom! Curious, in that half-dreamy state from the first deep sleep of the night, she groped for her slippers, reached for her negligée, and slid it on. She crept to the door; the voices had lowered.
She heard Burke’s other door open, the one to the hallway. Mouth compressed, more awake now, Lesley went to her door and opened it boldly. She would not creep and peep.
She went out into the hallway and, dim though it was, she saw Denise coming from Burke’s room. Denise in a green negligée, fragile and sheer, and Burke behind her, pushing her out of the door. His hand was on her arm.
‘I’ll escort you back to your room,” he was saying, then he saw Lesley. Denise saw her also, and a slow secretive smile came to her lips.
Lesley stood dumbly. Burke glared, then pushed Denise to the outer door of the suite. Lesley followed at a safe distance. How long had Denise been in Burke’s room?
Out in the wide hallway where the stairs led up from the ground floor, Denise and Burke walked towards the other wing. Then out came Aunt Felicia, followed by Guy Janssen and Uncle Stukely.
“There, I told you I heard voices!” Aunt Stukely said, with feigned anxiety.
“Mrs Huntington,” said Uncle Stukely. “Whatever are you doing with Burke, this time of night?”
Lesley stood watching the show, dumbly, cold with fury. Burke had played right into their hands! Why couldn’t he control his desire for that woman?
Janssen stared at all the ladies. “What a bevy of fair women in the night!” he said softly. “All these lovelies, with such flimsy thin gowns, for our delectation!” And he began to laugh.
Denise stuck her nose in the air and began to retreat to her bedroom. “I have done nothing, I merely wished to — to talk to Burke — to ask his advice,” she said haughtily.
Nobody believed her, of course. Her excuse was so very feeble. She would have done better to be quiet, thought Lesley.
“I did not ask her to my room,” said Burke fiercely. He half-glanced at his wife, then away again. “As soon as I wakened, I asked her to leave —”
Uncle Stukely, frowning, seemed genuinely offended. “Do you expect us to believe such a half-wit story, Mr Penhallow? Do you think us all fools?”
“I expect you to believe,” he said rather desperately, “that I did not invite the lady to my rooms! She wakened me, and said we must talk —”
“In your room, not your wife’s room?” asked Aunt Felicia, significantly. “Of course, you two had quarrelled!”
Burke paused. “Well, I shall return to bed, and lock my door,” he said in disgust. “Wandering ladies are not in my line!”
“Are they not?” said Uncle Stukely. “Well, well, we shall discuss this further in the morning. I for one do not care to talk in this draughty hallway! Goodnight!”
He shooed them all to their rooms, and Lesley retreated towards hers. Burke caught up with her, swung her about.
“I did not invite her to my room,” he said fiercely, glaring down at Lesley.
She felt cold and numb. “But she came anyway. She must have been drawn by some very powerful emotion! How could you, Burke? You played right into their hands!”
She pulled away from him and went to her bedroom. At the door, compelled, she glanced back. Burke’s head was bent, he stood staring at the hall floor, motionless beside his door. He looked ... beaten, she thought curiously, through her anger. His shoulders drooped, his head was bent, his arms hung at his side.
&n
bsp; She went into her room and shut the door. She heard him go to his room, the door closed. The bed springs creaked as he lay down.
She lay also. Their heads would be only a few feet apart, she realized, without caring. The door and the wall between them, the headboards of their beds ... but other than those bits of wood, nothing between them. Only their anger, her rage at him for keeping up the affair with his mistress. Could he not wait until he could meet her discreetly in London?
It seemed not. Burke was a man of strong passions, and if his wife could not satisfy them, then he would have a mistress.
Lesley grimaced. All her old dislikes and distrust of men returned full force. She despised them, with their appetites and greed, their cruelty and disregard for all in the world but what they wished to grab.
Yet ... yet something else was in her heart as she turned over once more in the bed, unable to sleep. She felt ... grief, disappointment in Burke, apart from fear of the future for Sandy.
She had been on the point of believing in Burke’s goodness, his generosity, his kindness.
She had begun to like him, to wish to be with him. She had begun to enjoy his company, to like driving about with Burke. She had begun to look forward to visiting his tenants with him, listening to the problems, thinking of solutions with him.
She had enjoyed watching him play with Sandy, the confidence growing in the small boy. She had secretly dreamed about his touch on her arm, his kisses on her mouth, the hard feel of his body against hers.
Lesley bit her lips in the darkness. She put her hand to her mouth, and could feel again the hard crush of his lips on hers, the heat of his body against her limbs.
“Almost,” she whispered, “almost ... I might have come ... to ... even ... begin ... to love him!”
CHAPTER 10
Burke wakened late, he had lain awake a long time, then dropped off into an uneasy sleep. He rose, rang for his valet. He washed and dressed in silence.
He knew Denise had come to make mischief. But that all had believed he had invited her to his room ... that Lesley had so readily believed against him! That hurt. He had warned his wife the guests would make mischief. The first time it happened, she was all too quick to believe the evidence.
Of course, it had been bad. He grimaced. Denise had startled him, waking him gently by lying down beside him, kissing his mouth. He had been dreaming of Lesley ... had reached out for Denise ... then smelled her perfume, felt her and wakened.
“Oh, God, what a mess,” he muttered. His valet discreetly did not reply.
Burke walked down the stairs slowly, rather unwilling to face the day, though it was filled with bright sunshine. He was stunned to find the front doors wide open, and a small procession of carriages waiting in the lane outside. Coachmen and lackeys were running about. Uncle Stukely’s valet went past him carrying out hatboxes and cases.
“What’s going on?” he asked the valet sharply. The man gave him a curious look.
“Going up to London this morning, sir,” he said respectfully, and went on to the lead carriage.
Burke went to the dining room, where he found the assembled guests and Lesley and Viola, all eating breakfast. The guests ate heartily, silently; Lesley but sipped at her tea. Her face was completely white, no colour in it, and it set off her red-gold hair all the more.
Sandy was there, sitting up in a chair. He had been crying, and his freckles stood out on his face. He gave Burke a reproachful, desolate look.
Burke knew without asking what was going on. He sank into his chair, the butler brought tea and a plate to him. “Well, Uncle Stukely?” he said, as they all waited expectantly.
Uncle Stukely wiped his large red mouth. There was a look of satisfaction about him this morning, he looked jolly and happy. “Well, lad,” he said, and Burke could have hit him. “We have seen that you are an unfit guardian for Sandy, here. So we’re taking him back to London with the evidence. We all saw you with Mrs Huntington last night, that proves it. The courts will find for us, and we will be appointed guardians for all of Sandy’s minority.”
Aunt Felicia nodded, her feverish green eyes searching the table, lingering on Guy’s face. “Yes, yes, we will take good care of dear Sandy,” she said.
I’ll warrant it, said Burke to himself. His hands clenched under the table. “You are in a great haste,” he said mildly. “I thought you had come for the summer?”
“No, no, we cannot leave Mrs Huntington here with you! Too much scandal already, and we are responsible for her,” beamed Uncle Stukely. He attacked his sausages with great ardour. “Must get away to London, much business to get through. Solicitors to see, and all that.”
Burke gritted his teeth. He would not show his fury before that horrible man. He could not look at Lesley, or he would have shouted his rage. He had never seen her looking so beaten, so ... so whipped.
“I will not go!” said Viola suddenly. “I will not go back to London! I am almost of age, I refuse to go!”
“Now, miss, don’t you talk back to me!” said Uncle Stukely. “You’ll go with us, or you’ll be mighty sorry!”
Tears began to run down her white cheeks, but she kept shaking her head. “No, you cannot force me to depart,” she said simply. “I am not a child any longer. I love ... love Reverend Creswick, and he loves me, and we are soon to be engaged!”
Everyone looked their amazement. Reverend Edgar Creswick gazed across the table at the lady who had declared herself so, and smiled sweetly at her. “Yes, that is so,” he said quietly. “We plan to marry when she is eighteen. She shall be of great assistance to me in my parish.”
Uncle Stukely recovered the most quickly. “Yes, she and her fortune!” he cried. “I’ll not have it, we can make a much better match for her!”
“That rake Lord Ramsey and his wild ways?” asked Viola, swiftly. “No, I won’t take him, nor any of those horrible men you have shoved at me! If you persist ... I shall ... I shall get the court to forbid you to have anything to do with my marriage. I can do that. I’ll tell them of the men you made me be nice to!”
Aunt Felicia looked hunted. “You grow more disobedient every day,” she said helplessly, and looked to her husband.
“You’ll come to London with us, and no nonsense,” said Uncle Stukely heavily, his mouth full of muffin.
“No, I think not,” said Burke pleasantly. He could help Viola at least. “As she says, she can speak to the courts and tell them of the way you have tried to marry her off to someone and continue to manage her money. I think they will listen to her, she has an honest reputation.”
“She shall come to London with us! We are not going to leave her here, where you carry on shamelessly!” said Uncle Stukely.
“I do not carry on shamelessly,”, said Burke, controlling his temper. “As I tried to inform you last night, Mrs Huntington came to my bedroom uninvited last night ... and —”
“And I wished to ask his advice about something —” said Denise, looking wide-eyed and demure.
Guy Janssen gave a snort of laughter. “Thee is tho funny.” He giggled behind his lace handkerchief and wiped his eyes as he continued, “Standing there in her negligée and saying she wanted your advith! Tho funny!”
Burke could have struck him.
Uncle Stukely said, “Yes, yes, no more of that, Janssen. We’ll take your statement to court, that is sufficient. No need to go on and on about it, think of the children,” and he looked very virtuous.
Burke wondered if this was the moment to speak of Aunt Felicia’s affair with Guy. No, evidently Uncle Stukely did not know of it, and Burke was reluctant to say anything. Besides, it might not be relevant to the case. It might just put Uncle Stukely into such a rage that he would carry off Viola by force, as well as Sandy. No, best to concentrate on the cause of Sandy.
“I realize I cannot prevent you now from taking Sandy to London with you,” he began quietly.
Sandy whimpered, “But Uncle Burke, I have been good, very good! I don’t want to
go! Please ... I don’t want to go...”
Lesley gulped and got up. She went to Sandy and took him on her lap, and sat with him in a corner of the room. She was just holding him, with his head buried against her. Burke could not endure the sight of it, that pathos.
Uncle Stukely glared at them darkly. “He is coming with us, you have spoiled him badly, Lesley! He’ll have no such coddling with us, you may be sure! He needs stern discipline!”
“Two points,” said Burke, still quietly, his fists clenched beneath the table. “One is that I shall write at once to my solicitors, protesting the evidence you shall present. It is quite evident to me, and to any thoughtful person, that the incident last night was planned and plotted, that Mrs Huntington came to my room with intention of making sure we were seen together, so my reputation would be blackened.”
Lesley’s head jerked, but she did not look up. Aunt Felicia tittered nervously. “Oh, good thinking, Burke! It might convince someone who did not know you already have such a rake’s reputation!”
“Not since my engagement to Lesley and our marriage,” said Burke carefully. “I have put away my past, and I would wish others to do the same. I have no intention of wrecking my good marriage! I have found a fine woman, and I shall not lose her.” He paused, but Lesley did not gaze at him, her eyes were closed, her cheek rested on Sandy’s red hair.
“Fine words, fine words. Let’s be on our way,” said Uncle Stukely, beginning to rise.
Burke held up his hand. “Stop, sir. The other point. If you abuse Sandy, as you have done in the past ... if there are marks on him, cuts and bruises when I next see him, I shall take my riding crop to you. Is that understood?” He made his tone very forceful. It was all Stukely could understand.
“Threats, sir? Threats? You will be very sorry for that!” cried Uncle Stukely, his face turning red.
“Not threats. Promises. You will not abuse Sandy! He shall have his proper food, his books, his amusements. And he shall not be whipped by you! I have already informed my solicitors of the physical abuse he has undergone at your hands, and they have informed the courts. I hope to get Sandy back again, very soon. They will hear all the evidence! Sandy has a good home here, a fine aunt to care for him. And several persons stand ready to give evidence of the condition he was in when he arrived at Penhallow from your house! Open cuts on his legs, bruises all over his body, and very thin and undernourished.”
The Ruby Heart: A classic Regency love story Page 12
