A Woman of True Honor: True Gentlemen Book Eight Read online

  The silence from Briggs had been more awkward still. Emily had had to endure no reproachful looks, no muttered asides. Briggs had retreated into a vast, unreadable quiet, the very boon Emily had so often wished for. Perhaps Briggs, who had lost at least one sibling to debtor’s prison, realized that parting from Emily on good terms was more likely to result in a generous pension than would an acrimonious end to their relationship.

  Valerian emerged onto the terrace, his stride brisk and confident. Emily waited by the fountain, both so she could enjoy the sight of him in the late morning sun and because—if the interview with Papa had gone poorly—there was no need to hasten the bad news.

  “My dear.” Valerian took her hands and kissed her knuckles, the right hand then the left. She’d forgotten her gloves—she’d nearly forgotten her hat and parasol too—and his lips brushing over her bare skin sent sensation rippling through her.

  His romantic gesture had doubtless been seen by anybody spying from the house, and being Valerian, he would have known that.

  She curtseyed. “Mr. Dorning, good day. You’ve been in discussion with Papa.”

  Valerian bowed and offered his arm. “More like a verbal brawl, but you will be pleased to know that Osgood approves of our union. He will attend the wedding and lend what he called his paternal imprimatur to the nuptials.”

  Emily sagged against her escort. “I am relieved. I ought not to admit that, but Papa can be so very set in his ways, and once his pride is offended, he’s more arrogant than a duke.”

  “That determination has served him well in commercial matters.”

  Valerian slipped his arm around Emily’s waist, which would have been a shocking intimacy except that they were an engaged couple, and Emily was honestly feeling a touch unsteady.

  “Let’s have a seat in the shade, shall we?” Valerian suggested.

  He would always be like this—steady, considerate, sensible. How she treasured those qualities. He led her to a wrought-iron bench among a grouping under the laburnum alley. Most of the bloom was over, but a few golden clusters yet cascaded from the greenery overhead.

  “The flowers remind me of lanterns,” Emily said, closing her parasol and leaning it against the bench, then taking a seat. “Margaret claims they are poisonous to people and animals alike. Does Papa know about the special license?” She untied the bow at her chin and removed her straw hat, perching it atop the handle of her parasol. “I am babbling.”

  Valerian took the place beside her and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. “Are you about to cry? My handkerchief is available for the purpose, if so.”

  He brandished his linen, and Emily did feel a tear trickle down her cheek. “I have no idea why I’m being such a goose.”

  Valerian dabbed at her cheek and passed her the handkerchief. “It’s not every day a lady’s engagement becomes official. Osgood made a few remarks that led me to believe he’s meddled with your romantic choices on a previous occasion.”

  How delicate, how tactful that inquiry. Not even a question, really. “I fancied myself in love with the second coachman.” In this peaceful garden, with Valerian’s arm around her shoulders, that confession felt merely foolish, not the great scandal Briggs insisted it had been. “Papa would send the coach to fetch me home from school and so forth, and Edward and I developed a flirtation.”

  Valerian’s silence was patient and untroubled.

  “More than a flirtation,” Emily went on. “I was seventeen and wanted very much to come home from school for good. Papa insisted on another year, and Edward was so very understanding.”

  “He understood his way right under your skirts, I take it?”

  No censure colored that remark, no ire. “He did. Edward loved me beyond telling, and I was the dearest, the wisest, the most beautiful, the smartest… I was an idiot. Papa paid him off, and he emigrated to Philadelphia with a pretty widow. I went back to school a sadder and wiser heiress.”

  “You had a narrow escape. I fell in love with a tavern maid at Oxford. I proposed to her at least twice a week. We planned to run away to Ireland, where my talents as a dancing master or tutor would support us in fine style. That my true love asked for money regularly and laughed off my earnest entreaties escaped my lovesick notice. I was sixteen. No use to talk sense to me.”

  “You aren’t ashamed of that sixteen-year-old?”

  Valerian hugged her a little with the arm around her shoulders. “Of course not. He was innocent of the world, terribly lonely, and trying to be a man in somebody’s eyes, but without a man’s abilities or perspective. The tavern maid earned a tidy sum entertaining the lovelorn scholars, and I, too, had my narrow escape.”

  At Abbotsford, Emily had rejoiced to become intimate with Valerian. He was a demon between the sheets, tender, patient, passionate, and inventive. But this sharing of past follies, this letting go of regrets… such confidences were in their own way more intimate than a physical coupling.

  “I was terribly lonely too,” she said, the realization coming only as the words formed. “Briggs was no sort of company either. She made the loneliness worse. Papa hired her when I finished school, and then I had no solitude, unless I was in my very bed.”

  “I take it Briggs will not accompany us to Abbotsford?”

  “God, no.”

  “Good. Newlyweds are entitled to some privacy, though we’ll be married for several months by the time Abbotsford is vacant.”

  Emily left off sniffing his handkerchief. “We will?”

  “Abbotsford is an agricultural property. The lease expires after the harvest is in.”

  This did not appear to trouble Valerian. “So you’ll live with me here at Pepper Ridge?” Meals would certainly become livelier, and Tobias and Caleb would have to polish up their manners considerably.

  Valerian lifted his arm from about Emily’s shoulders. “I’d planned on you joining me on the grounds at Dorning Hall. The cottage is humble, but there’s only the two of us, and it will be for a mere few months. Weeks, really.”

  Emily folded up his handkerchief and passed it back to him. “What cottage? I thought you lived at Dorning Hall?” The question sounded more querulous than she’d intended, but where they lived mattered.

  “I live at the Hall; I do not live in the Hall. Casriel and his countess need privacy, and I have my own modest dwelling elsewhere on the grounds. Is this a problem?”

  His tone suggested it had better not be.

  “How modest?”

  “Very. I have a cook-housekeeper who does not live in, and for any other tasks, I request assistance from the Hall.”

  “No maids? No footmen?”

  He refolded his handkerchief into precise eighths and tucked it away. “I don’t need them, and servants cost money.”

  Emily rose, snatching up her hat and parasol. “If that’s the problem, then we’ll use my money, just until we get on our feet at Abbotsford. We haven’t chosen a date yet. Wednesdays are said to be good luck for weddings.”

  Valerian got to his feet more slowly. “As it happens, you have no money. Osgood will bless the union, but he had two conditions. The first was that he make no contribution to your dowry.”

  Emily abruptly dropped back onto the bench. “He what?”

  “Your father agreed to approve our marriage, but on condition that he make no contribution to your settlements. You won’t be penniless in the event of my death.” Valerian paced before the bench, hands behind his back. “I will leave Abbotsford to you, and my share of the family business as well. I have some cash, more than enough to keep the property out of debt through a bad year, and my brother Hawthorne suggested I sell some mature timber from my home wood. Then too, my book—”

  “Papa is refusing to release my settlements? Can he do that?”

  Valerian remained three paces away. “What does it matter? I did not intend that we live on your settlements, Emily. I thought you approved of me in part because I’m not a fortune hunter.”

  Some element
of masculine pride had entered the discussion, in addition to whatever high-handed game Papa was playing.

  “Those settlements are mine, Valerian. I earned them, one French conversation, one deportment lecture, one formal ball at a time. I understand that you expect us to live within our means, but should I be widowed, those settlements are for me and our children.” For their daughters, especially.

  Valerian gazed off down the laburnum alley, a pretty, shady path curving beneath poisonous trees.

  “Who was it that said she’d rather be a farmer’s wife than the lady of ten manors, provided she could be married to me? Who warned me that our families would be difficult? Who accused Osgood Pepper of being overly proud and stubborn?”

  Emily plunked her hat onto her head. “I did, blast you.”

  “Will you let Osgood’s pride and stubbornness win, Emily? If you cry off, I will wish you well and keep you in my prayers. It’s one thing to be told your suitor has only modest means, it’s quite another to face the reality. Osgood is doubtless counting on you stumbling over that distinction.”

  The recent altercation with Tobias had been unsettling. The conflict with Briggs was unsettling. Papa’s latest ploy was worse than both of those upsets combined, but as Emily’s intended stood at his ease, tall, handsome, and self-possessed, her emotions calmed.

  Papa was simply up to his usual tricks. She ought to have expected as much.

  “You are quite right,” she said, going to Valerian and taking his hand. “Papa must have his little games, and that’s all they are. At least he didn’t try to buy you off.”

  Valerian drew her close. “He did, actually. Offered me a grand sum to decamp for parts unknown. I do believe Osgood is terrified of losing you, for all he makes noises about marrying you into some family awash in wool money and blood stock.”

  Emily went into Valerian’s embrace with a sense of having crossed the threshold that separated a girl’s dependence on her father from a woman’s loyalty to her mate. “I will kill Papa. He had no business offending you like that. Was it a very great sum?”

  “A pittance compared to the joy I will own when I speak my vows with you.”

  A very great sum indeed, then. “I love you, Valerian Dorning. I love you more than I can say.”

  He kissed her, a brief, fierce reminder of their joining at Abbotsford. “I will never give you cause to regret your choice, Emily. That, I vow.”

  A perfect moment ensued, full of hope and determination and not a little desire. Emily stepped back before the desire became unmanageable. She moved off down the alley, hand in hand with her fiancé, wanting to gain distance from the house.

  “You said Papa had two conditions. What was the second?”

  Valerian ambled along at her side, ducking the occasional cluster of fading blossoms. “Nothing of any great significance. He insisted you tell me about your brother.”

  Emily stumbled, catching her toe on a rock. She would have gone down to her knees or worse, but for Valerian taking a stout hold of her arm.

  * * *

  “Let me retrieve your parasol,” Valerian said, mostly to give Emily an opportunity to compose herself. Mention of her brother had put an uneasiness in her eyes, and she’d clutched Valerian’s arm like a woman tottering on the brink of a sea cliff in a high wind.

  Then too, parasols cost money. Frilly, lacy parasols dyed to match the color of a lady’s gloves and reticule cost a great deal of money. The idea that this particular parasol might be left out in a passing shower weighed on Valerian. He could replace it, but he’d rather not spend his limited coin on a frippery.

  And most of all, he dreaded explaining that reasoning to his bride. He’d also prefer he and Emily did not spend their honey month at Pepper Ridge, and he most assuredly would never ask Osgood Pepper to relent about the settlements.

  Valerian fetched the parasol, rejoined Emily, and offered his arm. “Would you like to see where I’m living now? As a lovers’ retreat, I think it has potential.”

  “I’m sure it will be fine.”

  Truly, something had the lady upset. “You might prefer to rearrange the bedroom.” And if he showed her that bedroom on Sunday, the cook-housekeeper would not be on the premises.

  “We won’t be living there for long, so what matters… oh. Well, yes, I’d like to see your cottage. And your bedroom.”

  Emily clearly didn’t give a hearty heigh-ho about the cottage, much less the bedroom where they’d embark on married life.

  “Emily, what’s wrong? At Abbotsford, you couldn’t get my clothes off me fast enough. Now, my naughtiest flirtation only annoys you.”

  “I’m fine.”

  Like hell she was. Valerian examined the clasp on her parasol. The mechanism was flimsy. The handle looked to be stained pine rather than a sturdy hardwood. Pretty, but not a high-quality product after all.

  “I am anxious.” Emily tromped a few paces away, then back to his side, then away again. “My brother’s name is Adam. He’s five years older than me, which is a perfect age difference for a big brother.”

  Sycamore might argue with that characterization. “Where is this Adam?”

  Emily huffed out a sigh. She twiddled the ribbons of her straw hat. She gazed past Valerian’s shoulder. “Botany Bay, or somewhere thereabouts. He works for the governor’s secretariat.”

  A position in a colonial government was often a stepping stone to solid wealth and influence—for those who had no other means of gaining them.

  “He didn’t want to work for your father?”

  Now she stared at Valerian’s cravat pin. “Adam did work for my father and was quite good at it, but then he was accused of stealing from the business, and charges were brought.”

  Charges were never a good thing. “Brought by whom?”

  Emily stomped off again. “By my idiot, stupid, infernal, bloody-minded father. He brought charges against his own son. Thievery is a capital crime, and Adam would never steal. Never. Why take money when you have more than enough of your own, and the penalty for your crime would be so very severe?”

  Rich people took money all the time. Some of them delighted in their swindles and wagers, confident that their wealth was sufficient to spare them legal repercussions.

  “Osgood accused his own son of a capital crime?” Some distant day, Valerian might be impressed with Pepper’s integrity—assuming Adam was the guilty party. The Hanoverian dynasty was rife with fathers who’d done everything possible to sabotage their sons, and conversely. For the present, Valerian was appalled at the dilemma Emily had faced.

  “Adam didn’t do it,” she said. “He’s not like that. He’s not stupid enough to commit such a crime and get caught at it, and he had no motive. Nobody has ever explained to me why a man in line to inherit a thriving business—and I do mean thriving, Valerian—would risk his life over a few hundred pounds. Adam loved the business, and he was far better liked by the staff and the customers than Papa will ever be.”

  A few hundred pounds was a fortune to most. “Did Adam have debts?”

  “No. Did I? Yes. Did my father? Of course, as do most people. Not Adam.”

  Innocent or not, a convicted felon in the family was a problem, but at least in this case he was a problem many thousands of miles away.

  “Your father thought I’d abandon you over this situation.” Many men would have. The fellow was never supposed to withdraw his offer of marriage, but given the circumstances, nobody would blame Valerian if he done just that.

  “Adam is a person,” Emily said, “not a situation. I meant to tell you, but Papa stole a march on me. I would never have married you without disclosing the facts, Valerian. Besides, Adam is innocent.”

  Valerian passed her the parasol. “I applaud your loyalty, Emily, but I’ve sat through enough parlor sessions to know that virtually every person ever charged with a crime protested his or her innocence.”

  She grabbed the parasol, and the light in her eyes suggested she’d like to wallop him wi
th it. “You don’t know my brother. You don’t know the details. Somebody put Papa’s signature on that bank draft, but it wasn’t Adam. I saw the trial, Valerian, and the only evidence supporting conviction was a signature on a bearer bank draft that Papa claimed he didn’t sign.”

  Worse and worse. “You think your own father arranged for his son to be tried and convicted of a hanging offense?” Casriel would take a very dim view of a scandal of these proportions. For that matter, Valerian took a very dim view of it.

  “Adam did not steal,” Emily said, snapping open her parasol. “Papa did not connive, but each is convinced of the other’s wrongdoing. For the past five years, I have been silently railing at them both. Adam will earn his ticket of leave in less than twenty-four months, and then they will have to confront one another. For now, Papa refuses to speak Adam’s name, and Adam’s letters contain not even a polite inquiry about Papa’s health. I told him Papa was failing, and even then, Adam would not relent.”

  To return to England after a sentence of transportation was rare, but it did happen. To return prior to the end of the stated sentence was another capital offense.

  “Who knows about this?” Valerian asked, already composing his half of the discussion he must have with Casriel.

  “Here in Dorset? Nobody outside my father’s staff and you. The case was heard all the way up in Durham, and most of the gossip was confined to mercantile circles. When I was in London, I listened for any hint that the scandal had become common knowledge. I gave the tabbies so much else to criticize me for, they apparently didn’t bother hunting through my past for more ammunition.”

  They hadn’t yet. No wonder Osgood was distraught at the idea of Emily marrying into a titled family. Had she snagged a titled heir, the sniping would have turned into a full-on cannonade.

  “I am compelled to disclose these particulars to my siblings.”

  Emily marched off in the direction of the fountain. “Why? This is old news and will soon be no news at all.”

  Valerian fell in step beside her and did not offer his arm. “Because I have agreed to become the magistrate, Emily. A magistrate with a convicted felon for an in-law will be a novelty at least.”