Midnight Pleasures (25 page)

Down in the cabin, Sophie was also wrestling with despair. Obviously, her mother was correct about male dislike of bluestockings. Patrick had never stayed above for a whole day before. He was disgusted with her. And it seemed that he was more top-lofty than she had thought—the very idea of her spending time with the laundry woman seemed to rattle him, let alone the question of her knowledge of Welsh.

Without a second thought, Sophie opened the porthole and tossed out her precious Turkish grammar. Patrick must never, never learn that she spoke seven languages.

By the time shadows began to steal across the polished wood floor of the master cabin, Sophie was utterly miserable. The worst thing was that she had secretly wanted Patrick to know about her fluency. If the truth be known, she had relished showing off her Welsh in front of him. Inside I was proud, Sophie thought. Well, pride goeth before a fall.

Ruthlessly she tamped down the seeds of disappointment. Patrick was her husband. The fact that he was a man just like any other was not significant. One lesson she could take from her parents’ situation was that disappointment in one’s spouse could not be allowed to fester.

One has to accept, and then forget, Sophie told herself. The lesson applies to little facts and large ones, to languages and mistresses.

Patrick finally appeared at the cabin door at supper time, feeling faintly ashamed of himself. The
Lark
was sweetly rocking at its moorings, ready for him to inspect a messy pile of half-built fortifications the next morning. But Sophie hadn’t ventured from the cabin all day.

He had steered the ship, admired Henri’s new skill at tying knots, reviewed the captain’s log, and looked again and again at the staircase leading to the master cabin, hoping that Sophie would appear. But she hadn’t. And he’d missed her.

None of the crewmen twitched an eyebrow when the master finally gave up and dashed down the stairs to the main cabin. They had become inured to such goings-on, especially after Captain Hibbert warned them to turn a blind eye to any irregular activity or it would be the worse for them.

But Sophie wasn’t waiting for him. She was tucked into their marriage bed, fast asleep. With some surprise, Patrick saw traces of tears on her face. Somehow he’d thought she would simply appear if she wished to come above board. Now he really felt ashamed. Why hadn’t he fetched her?

Sophie woke up as Patrick stroked her hair.

“What’s this about?” Patrick’s finger trailed over her cheeks, his voice slightly rough.

Sophie smiled. “I had a blue afternoon, that’s all. You know, it’s a woman’s privilege to cry.”

Patrick brushed her lips with his. “Were you crying because I didn’t issue a formal invitation to join me on the deck for backgammon?”

“No,” Sophie said.

“I missed you.” His warm breath sent shivers down Sophie’s spine. “I kept hoping you would appear, O wife of many languages.”

Sophie looked at Patrick intently, but his dark eyes gave nothing away.

“Do you dislike it that I speak Welsh?”

“Lord, why on earth would I dislike it?”

His voice sounds genuinely surprised, Sophie thought.

“I was shocked,” Patrick said, “not so much by your Welsh—that was a delightful surprise—but by what you said about your childhood. It cannot have been easy, growing up with your parents.”

Sophie didn’t see any point in discussing it further. “What about your parents? Did they argue?”

“I have no idea,” Patrick replied, lying down on the bed beside her, propped up on one elbow. “I saw my father only on formal occasions. They must have dealt tolerably well together. I never heard anything to the contrary.” He didn’t need to add that Sophie’s parents’ incompatibility was known far and wide among the
ton
.

“What was your mother like?” Sophie asked, her eyes curious.

Patrick bent forward and traced a finger across her cheekbone. “She was rather like you,” he said. “Small and delicate. I remember our nanny scolding because whenever mother came into the nursery, Alex and I would climb up on her lap and wrinkle her clothing. She was always very elegant, but she never minded it when we crushed her dresses. She used to wear hoops, I remember that. And she smelled like bluebells.”

“How old were you when she died?” Sophie asked.

Patrick’s hand dropped from his wife’s face. “We were seven. She died giving birth to a boy who did not live either.”

Sophie picked up Patrick’s hand and cradled it against her cheek, wriggling over a trifle so that her body fit warmly against his.

“I’m sorry, Patrick. I’m so sorry.”

Patrick turned his head in surprise. He had been staring at the wall, thinking back to those days. “It was a long time ago,” he said, smiling down at her. One could become addicted to a wife who snuggled under one’s chest like a chick going to nest, he thought.

“So, have you any other grand surprises for me, wife? Perhaps you speak Norwegian? Swedish?”

There was a heartbeat’s worth of silence in the cabin.

“No, oh no,” Sophie assured him, shaking her head vehemently. “No more surprises, Patrick.”

He rolled over on his back, pulling her across his chest. “It’s splendid to have such a knowledgeable wife,” he said dreamily. “Tomorrow we’ll dock the boat for a week or so. We will go to an inn and you can order all the food and argue with the innkeeper.”

Sophie’s cheek was resting against Patrick’s linen shirt. “Did you miss your mother dreadfully when she was gone?” She was suspiciously close to tears again.

“Oh yes,” Patrick said matter-of-factly. “I was rather a mama’s boy, I think. Alex used to be summoned to sessions with my father, since he was the heir, and then I would have Mother all to myself. It was supposed to be a consolation, since I wasn’t the heir, but in fact Alex would have given anything to be able to stay with Mother, and we both knew it.”

A tear rolled down Sophie’s cheek and disappeared into the creamy whiteness of Patrick’s shirt. She couldn’t bear thinking of a small Patrick missing his mother. She couldn’t bear it.

“Did you cry?” Her voice was suspiciously high, but Patrick didn’t notice. He was thrown back to the nightmarish week of his mother’s death.

“Cry? I cried and cried. Unfortunately, I had misbehaved the day before she died. I told some fibs, actually, and she had, quite rightly, reprimanded me. But no one had any idea that the birth would be perilous since Mother had had no trouble with Alex and me. I waited for her that night. She always came to kiss us good night, and I knew she wouldn’t be angry with me anymore. But she never came.”

More of Sophie’s tears soaked into Patrick’s shirt. “Oh Patrick!” Her voice cracked, but Patrick was still deep in memories he had almost forgotten.

“So I got up. I got up and I crept through the halls, in my nightshirt, because she always came. But I hadn’t got far when—”

“What happened, Patrick?”

His arm convulsively drew Sophie closer to his body. “I heard her screaming,” he said. “I ran back to bed and hid my head under the covers. The next morning, I thought it had been a dream, but she had died.”

“Oh, Patrick, that’s so sad!”

He reared up on his elbow and looked at her in shock. His elegant wife was sobbing uncontrollably.

“What on earth? Sophie! Don’t cry, sweetheart; it wasn’t so terrible.”

Sophie only wept harder, burying her head in his shirt. Patrick kissed the edge of her forehead, which was all he could see of her face. Finally she stopped, and allowed Patrick to dry her face with his handkerchief.

“I’m sorry,” she said sheepishly. “I’m rather melancholic this afternoon.” Then she blushed a little, thinking of all the fibs she was telling him. She knew exactly why she was melancholic.

Patrick looked at her blush and had a sudden thought. “Your fit of melancholy has nothing to do with my staying above board all day?”

“It has nothing to do with that,” Sophie said, her voice wavering a bit as he traced a line of kisses down her neck. “I feel weepy, that’s all.” Her tone was just slightly defensive.

Aha, Patrick realized. Sophie is at that point of the month. Well, it was nice to know that his wife reacted with tears rather than by throwing things, as Arabella had done. Arabella was like clockwork. Every month she demolished a piece of crockery by tossing it at his head. What Sophie doesn’t yet realize, Patrick thought, is that there is no disguising that particular event from one’s husband.

“Are you regular?” he asked.

Sophie looked confused. “Regular at what?”

A small blush crept up Patrick’s bronzed neck. “Regular … in the womanly way,” he said, gesturing awkwardly with his hand.

Sophie noticed with fascination that Patrick seemed to be gesturing toward her waist. Finally she grasped his meaning, and then
she
blushed.

“Ah, yes, more or less … well, not particularly.”

“Oh, irregular.” Patrick’s tone was smug. “That is likely because you were a maiden, and now that you’re married, everything will steady down.”

Sophie looked at him in horror. “How do you know such things?”

Patrick evaded the question. “We need to speak openly, Sophie, because regularity is the key to preventing the birth of a child.”

Sophie gaped. “What are you talking about?”

“There are certain times of the month when a couple can make love without danger of conceiving children,” he explained. “And then there are things one can do to prevent conception during the rest of the month. None of which I have been attending to,” he added, a shadow of a frown crossing his face. “It must be you, Sophie.”

“Me!”

“Your body,” Patrick said, his mouth hovering just above hers. “I have been intoxicated for the last month or so. But we mustn’t continue to act like feckless lovers, Sophie. As soon as your next monthly flux appears, tell me and we can determine a schedule.”

“I have never shared this information with anyone,” Sophie said, with just a bit of an edge in her voice. “Nor has anyone ever demanded schedules or information of any kind.”

“You were never married before,” Patrick pointed out. He was taking little nips around her chin. “We’ve been very lucky so far. Do you think it will start tomorrow?”

Sophie’s voice was definitely stiff. “I have no idea.

Well, I do, Patrick thought to himself. But there was no point in throwing his intimate knowledge of women’s moods in his wife’s face. She already thought of him as kin to Don Juan.

“Let’s have supper in bed,” Patrick said, his tone persuasive. “I’ll feed you.”

Sophie’s eyes widened. “You’ll feed me?” Patrick’s smile was devilish, irresistible. “You’ll like it. I promise.”

In fact, Sophie was enthralled by the experience of eating in bed. She took to having lemon mousse nibbled from parts of her body with such entrancing eagerness that mundane thoughts of schedules, conception, and the like flew from both their minds.

Faced with the choice of losing his daughter to the great American wilderness or allowing her to pretend to be a French aristocrat for a few weeks, Madeleine’s father did not hesitate.

“Do you love this galumph?” he asked Madeleine, in swift French, as Braddon stood politely by her side.

“Oui, Papa,”
Madeleine replied, with maidenly docility. “But he is not a galumph, Papa!”

“He is a galumph,” her father said heavily. “However, he is also an earl, and you could make a worse match.

“Do you have a good estate?” Heavy gray eyebrows frowned at Braddon, who started, having lost track of the conversation once it shifted into French. He’d never been any good at languages.

“Yes,” Braddon responded hastily, prodded by Madeleine’s elbow. “I have twenty-five thousand pounds a year. My estate is in Leicestershire, and I have houses in Delbington and London. I have good stables in Leicestershire,” he added, “thirty-four horses at last count.”

“Thirty-four! No great house has fewer than fifty horses,” Vincent Garnier snapped. Then he looked keenly at his future son-in-law. Too much inbreeding among English aristocrats. That was Slaslow’s problem. “And which earl are you?”

Braddon gaped. What on earth did the old fellow mean? “The Earl of Slaslow,” he stammered.