Duke and His Duchess (10 page)

Esther had wanted to leave for Morelands an hour ago, but the children were being recalcitrant, and the nursery maids—one of whom was enamored of the porter—were abetting them.

And while Esther waited for this favorite pair of boots to be found and an indispensable storybook to be tucked into the coach, she thought of her husband and of the solemn, dark-haired boy who bore her husband’s eyebrows.

A man who was going to keep a mistress for all of London to see could afford to quietly support his son at some decent school in the Midlands. Winter was barely under way, and the boy’s mother had already been reduced to begging. This was perhaps the inevitable fate of a woman plying the harlot’s trade, except…

Except if Esther had been that boy’s mother, she’d do much worse than beg if it would see him fed. Thinking not as a wife, but as a mother, Esther could not leave Town without making at least a short call on Kathleen St. Just, whose direction she’d obtained at their last encounter. Knowing that the traveling coach would still take at least an hour to pack, Esther called for the town coach and dressed in her plainest cloak and boots.

Kathleen St. Just opened the door to a perfectly nondescript little house on a perfectly nondescript street. “My lady, I am surprised to see you.”

Surprised was a euphemism, likely covering shock and humiliation, as well a quantity of resentment, though Esther did not quibble over it. The freezing house, the stink of tallow rather than beeswax in the foyer, and the fact that Mrs. St. Just had opened her own door announced the situation plainly enough.

Esther swept past her hostess rather than linger on the stoop. “I will not take up much of your time, Mrs. St. Just. Is your son on the premises?”

Fear, or something close to it, flitted through Mrs. St. Just’s eyes. “He is.”

“Shall we repair to a parlor, then? What I have to say affects the boy.”

It would affect Esther’s marriage too, though she brushed that thought aside and followed Mrs. St. Just to a parlor that surely had never been used for company. Had it been warmer, the room would have been cozy. An entire flower garden was embroidered and framed on one wall, species by species, in exquisite needlework. A teacup and saucer sat on a low table near a workbasket, the saucer chipped but still serviceable.

“My lady, you will forgive the clutter, but this is the smallest parlor and the easiest to heat.”

“You need not build up the fire for me,” Esther said, and that was true, because she hadn’t surrendered her cloak at the door, and Mrs. St. Just—who was wearing two shawls herself—hadn’t offered to take it. “I will be blunt, Mrs. St. Just. My husband has banished me back to the countryside, the better to disport as a young man is wont to when in the capital. I have not informed him that you’re raising his son, but I think some provision should be made for the boy sooner rather than later.”

“You’re leaving London?”

This did seem to occasion surprise. “My husband has asked it of me, so yes.”

A shaft of anger accompanied those words, and yet, Percival had
asked
it of her, he hadn’t ordered her to go.

Mrs. St. Just squared her shoulders, which let Esther realize she and this woman were the same height—and what metaphor did that speak to? “Then you can take Devlin with you.”

And this was cause for surprise all around, because Mrs. St. Just seemed as startled by her own pronouncement as Esther was.

“I beg your pardon?”

“You either take him with you, or I’ll approach his lordship in public and make the same request. I’ll demand money. I’ll let all and sundry know Moreland’s spare has a son on the wrong side of the blanket.”

The woman was daring herself to do these things. Esther heard that in her tone and saw it in the wild uncertainty in her eyes.

“Sit down, Mrs. St. Just.” Esther managed to settle onto a sofa with no little dignity, which was at complete variance with the wobbling of her knees. “What are you saying? That you’d expose your son to avoidable scandal? That you’d disgrace yourself and embarrass my husband over a bit of coin?”

The woman got herself to a chair, but half fell onto it, as if blind with drink or great emotion. “I’m saying that, yes. Devlin’s father has obligations to him. Nobody would argue that.”

No they would not, though despite those obligations, despite the cold hearth and her obvious need, Mrs. St. Just had yet to inform Devlin’s father he even had a son.

“When was the last time you ate, Mrs. St. Just?”

She shook her head.

“I gave you a bracelet, and that bracelet should have bought a load of coal and put food in your pantry.” Esther let a bit of ire—ire for the boy—infuse her tone.

“That money is for Devlin. Where he sleeps, we keep a fire, and there’s food enough for him. I bought him a coat too, because he’s growing so quickly…”

She closed her eyes and stopped speaking. Esther watched in horror as a tear trickled down the woman’s cheek.

“Here.” Esther reached into her reticule and withdrew a shiny red apple, one of the many weapons a mother would arm herself with prior to a coach journey with children. “Eat this. Eat it right now, and we will talk about your son… about Devlin.”

And they talked, mostly about the boy. Esther let Kathleen be the one to fetch him, the one to explain that he’d be staying “for a time” with the chocolate lady and that he was to be a good boy when he met his papa.

“Papa has the horses.” To the little fellow, this was a point in Papa’s favor.

“He does,” Esther said, “and we’ve a cat too, though I’m not supposed to know she sleeps in the nursery when she’s done hunting in the mews.”

From his perch on his mother’s lap, young Devlin assayed a charming and all-too-familiar smile. “I like cats. Cats like to play.”

“They do. Tomcats in particular are fond of their diversions.” Esther rose, wanting abruptly to get on with her day and all the drama it was likely to hold. She did not doubt that she had made the right decision, though it would by no means be an easy decision to live with—for any of them. “Shall we be on our way?”

She did not reach for the child. Mrs. Just hugged him, whispered something in his ear, and let him scramble to his feet. He parted from his mother easily, secure the way every child should be secure in the idea that his mama would always be a part of his life.

Mrs. St Just rose slowly. “Fetch your new coat, Devlin, and then come right back here.”

He pelted off, his footsteps sounding to Esther exactly like Bart’s and Gayle’s… like his brothers’.

“Your ladyship is wrong about something.”

Esther regarded the other woman, seeing weariness and sadness but also peace in her gaze. “I think you are making the best decision for your son,” Esther began. “And I will of course write to you, as promised, though I wish you’d agree to write back to him.”

“A clean break is better. I don’t want him to miss me. That’s not what you’re wrong about.”

“You will enlighten me?” The defensive note was unbecoming, if understandable.

“Your husband, his lordship… he loves you. He is not disporting with anybody, though I’ll grant you the man is an accomplished flirt.”

This
, from Percival’s former mistress?

Esther jerked her mittens out of her pockets. “Mrs. St. Just, a certain sympathy of feeling between us as mothers of small boys is not an invitation for you to presume in any manner—”

A thin, cold hand touched Esther’s knuckles. “He loves you. He told me so in the king’s English when he came here to ask me about your ailments. He was beside himself with worry, risking all manner of talk just to be seen stabling his horse in the mews. He said you were stubborn, but he said it like he admired you for it, and he did not want to be asking the physicians, because they spread gossip.”

Esther abruptly sat back down. “Percival was
here
?”

“Just the once, and he went no farther than the parlor. He offered help before he left, and I did not… I did not want to take it, but then I realized my pride would not keep Devlin in boots, which was why you found me in your mews.”

The child came banging back into the parlor. “I’m ready. We can pet the horses, right?”

“We can pet every one,” Esther said, wondering where the ability to speak had come from. “Your papa can tell you their names.”

A few beats of silence went by, while Mrs. St. Just hugged her son again. He wiggled free, clearly anxious to make the acquaintance of his papa’s horses.

As they walked with him to the front hallway, Esther had to ask one more question. “What did you tell him—tell his lordship, I mean?”

The question apparently required no explanation. “I told him you were worn out from childbed and pregnancy. You needed red meat and rest, also light activity and a time to repair your health before you carried again. I trust you’re feeling somewhat better?”

“I am.” All the breakfast steaks and misplaced menus made sense, though little else did. “I truly am.”

She felt better still when she realized that presenting Percival with his son would likely generate a minor scandal. People would think they’d quarreled over the boy—which they well might—and pay less attention to the women Percival trifled with in Esther’s absence.

***

“You won’t be staying at this house,” Percival assured his daughter. “We will find you a nice accommodation and somebody to look after you who takes the job to heart. You’ll like that.”

Though Percival would not like it one bit.

“Why can’t I stay with you?” Little Maggie rode before him through the park like she’d been around horses since birth, which had to be blood telling, because her mother would not have allowed it.

“I wish you could.” He wished it with his whole heart, else how would he know she was safe from her infernal mother? And yet, if she dwelled under his roof, her mother—her legal custodian—would always know where to find her and be able to snatch her back. “This is a small house, and you would not have your own bedroom.”

“I don’t need my own bedroom. Burton used to sleep in my room, when I had a fire.”

“Maggie, you will never want for a fire again, and your soldiers will all have two legs.”

“I like Colonel George. He was very brave about losing his leg.”

She chattered on about the colonel perhaps being considered for a knighthood, though he’d rather be a general. Percival turned Comet into the alley that led to the mews, glad in his bones that Esther had already departed for Morelands. With luck, he could have Maggie situated somewhere not too far away by sundown, and then he and Cecily O’Donnell would come to whatever understandings were necessary to keep the girl safe.

***

“These are very big horses,” Devlin remarked. His tone was casual, but Esther well understood the grip the child kept on her hand as they walked past the team hitched to the traveling coach.

“They are very
nice
horses,” she said. “They particularly like little boys, because your brothers come visit them frequently.”

Small fingers seized around Esther’s hand painfully tight. “My brothers?”

“You have four, and they are capital fellows, just like you.” Except those four had never known want, never known cold, never been expected to part with their mother’s love with no possible explanation.

“That’s a pretty horse.” Devlin did not point—the boy had wonderful manners—but his gaze fixed on a chestnut stallion walking up the alley.

As the clip-clop of shod hooves grew closer, for an instant, the picture before Esther’s eyes did not make sense. She recognized Comet, she recognized Comet’s handsome rider, but she did not… A small child, a red-haired girl, sat before Percival in the saddle. The child was vaguely familiar, and Esther had seen Percival wrap his forearm around his own sons with the very same vigilant protectiveness.

The horse shuffled to a halt. “Esther. You have not yet departed for Morelands.”

His tone was so grave.

The hair on Esther’s nape and arms prickled, and beside her, the boy was unmoving. “And you, my lord, have not been to any committee meetings.”

A groom came out to take Comet, sparing them conversation while Percival swung down, handed off the reins, and hefted the child out of the saddle. She stood beside Percival, her hand in his, her gaze watchful in the way of children who grew up early.

“You’re the Viking lady,” she said to Esther.

“She’s the chocolate lady,” Devlin replied. “She’s my papa’s wife.”

A thousand questions rose in Esther’s mind while the chill breeze pushed dead leaves across the cobbles. One of the coach horses stomped its great hoof and tossed its head as if impatient with the two adults staring at each other in silence.

“Percival, who in the world…?”

“Madam, we will speak privately.”

Of course they would, because if Percival thought to move his mistress and her offspring into Esther’s house, Esther would need a great deal of privacy to disabuse her husband of such a notion.

“Devlin, ask the grooms to show you and this girl the stable cat. There’s a kitty with only one eye, and she doesn’t yet have a name.”

A commotion by the back gate had all adult eyes slewing around as Bart and Gayle came barreling into the alley. “We’re ready to board the ship!” Bart bellowed.

Gayle came to a halt beside his older brother. “Who are they?” His green eyes narrowed on the girl. “Who’s
she
?”

Bart smacked his mittened hands together. “They can be the colonials! We can play Damned Upstart Colonials, and we’ll have French and colonials both. We can slaughter them and take scalps and everything while Mama and Papa kiss each other good-bye!”

Gayle glanced at his parents as if he knew exactly how long two parents could kiss each other, and grinned. “Come on.” He took Devlin by the hand. “There’s a tiger in the stables, and we can hunt her down for our supper.”

The red-haired girl fell in with the boys. “I want to be a lion who hunts down the hunters.”

“You have to be the damned upstart colonial,” Bart said. “I’m General Bart, and that’s Colonel Gayle.”

“Then I shall be a fierce, damned upstart colonial wolf named Maggie.”