Sea Scoundrel (25 page)

Grant stared. He’d no more expected Patience to admit to being foolish than he expected to learn that her aunt tried to stop her.

“Patience, dear.” Her aunt reached out, then thought better of it and turned her hand to removing cups and saucers from the cupboard, but not before Grant saw the light fade from her eyes. “I’m sorry you had no money,” she said, her back to them. “If any had been left, I would have given it to you.”

Patience stil ed. “What are you saying?”

“I sold everything to pay your way. Sending you to America was my only hope of saving you from a life of poverty.”

“You sold nothing to send me. Everything was stil here when I left. Including Mama’s tea set.”

“The squire agreed not to take possession until after you’d gone.”

“No. You told me
not
to go. You named al the horrible consequences that could befal me. You insisted I stay. You said I could never succeed as the wife of a man I did not know. As any man’s wife, I believe you meant.”

“Your interpretation is not entirely accurate. I said what I did to
make
you go. Nothing sets up your back and firms your stubborn determination like being told you can’t do something, Patience. Remember how your father taught you to swim?”

From the set of Patience’s shoulders, al the fight left her as she sat, speechless.

Grant almost smiled at the aberration.

“Knowing you as I do,” her aunt said, “I feared if you knew we were down to our last farthing, practical as you are, you’d go right out and earn our bread any way you could. I didn’t want that kind of life for you. I thought I was sending you to a better one. There was nothing left here for you.”

“Left! There was nothing here for me in the first place.

Being stranded in America was stil better than remaining where I was hated.”

Harriette stepped back as if she’d been struck. “Hated?” She made to speak, sealed her lips, reached out, and let her hand fal to her side. “I don’t hate you,” she said in a ragged whisper.

Grant wished he was not witness to such an emotional scene. He was uncomfortable enough to bolt, himself. But he stayed. For Patience.

“You don’t hate me?” Patience laughed, acting like a spoiled brat. Grant wanted to shake her.

“I have much to explain, do I not?” her aunt said, gazing into a memory-fil ed distance. “Poor child. It is not you, but your father I have hated—or more correctly, been furious with,—

for so many reasons. And when your mother died, I swore I would never forgive him for bringing about her death.

Patience made to rise. Grant held her in place, his hands on her shoulders.

“Don’t bristle, Patience,” her aunt said. “It’s unbecoming. Sit stil and listen. It made absolute sense to me that if your mother died in childbed, then your father brought about her death.”

Grant saw the real Lady Belmont emerge in the woman’s stance and demeanor. She raised an imperious hand to stop Patience’s rejoinder. “But a truth has haunted me since you left. Your parents loved each other. Those baby boys who died hours before your dear mother were a result of their love, just as you are.”

The woman rose and went to the window, less regal, more beaten.

Grant wished now he had left. If Patience had been conceived in love, she was unique. If his mother had loved his father, ever, then her hate had blossomed upon his birth. Not for the first time, Grant wondered what he might have done to change that.

“I was jealous of your parents’ love for each other,” the tired woman final y said, stil looking out the window, unable to see her niece stiffen in shock. Harriette sighed. “And I was furious with the man who destroyed my sister.” She cleared her throat. “From the day they set eyes on each other, she was his, and when she was gone forever, my anger became unreasonable and unforgiving. My sister died because she was weak from birthing twins at a time when her heart had gone to the grave with her husband. Your father’s irresponsibility certainly contributed to your mother’s pain, but despite al that, my sister loved that man.”

Lady Belmont returned to stand before Patience. “You resemble her so much. Every time I looked at you, it reminded me she was gone, and how she died. I suppose, without realizing it, I took my anger out on you. I didn’t mean to, but—” She raised her chin, as Grant had seen Patience do countless times. “It wasn’t until you left for America that I looked back, real y looked, and realized the wrong I’d done you. When you are alone, you have an incredible amount of time to lament your errors.”

The woman seemed suddenly old and frail as she put her hands over Patience’s. “My mistakes loom the greater for this last and I must ask your forgiveness before I begin my confession, for I fear you wil leave after you hear it and never return.”

Patience took her hand from beneath her aunt’s as if she could not bear her touch. Her aunt’s eyes dimmed the more.

Grant knew, even if Patience did not, that she
needed
to forgive, so she could let the misery go. She was a woman now and it was time for her to put her childhood behind.

“No confession need be made,” Patience said, as if she cared not at al .

Grant knew better.

Lady Belmont sat. “I must. It’s time.” Her eyes fil ed. She took a deep breath. “Your father was the only man I ever loved.”

Patience gasped. Grant took her hands.

Her aunt nodded, almost in acceptance, as if her niece’s condemnation was her due. “Your grandparents could barely afford a little season, and then for only one of their daughters. I was the oldest, so the season was mine. A family friend chaperoned me. It was my only chance to make a match. “That was when I met your father. He made me feel so special when he smiled at me. I can stil picture him during our first waltz, such a dashing rogue, chuckling at a sil y, schoolgirl remark I’d made. You remember his smile, Patience. It could be as warm as a hearth in winter, or as refreshing as iced peaches in summer.” Harriette wiped the tears on her cheeks with her fingertips. “He paid me marked attention during those weeks in town, and I fel deeply in love.”

“I don’t want to hear this,” Patience said.

Grant squeezed her hand. “But you must.” Patience’s scowl was fit to turn him to cinders.

Her aunt took a shuddering breath. “When I invited your father home to meet my parents, he met your mother.” She smiled sadly. “You know what happened.” Lady Belmont stood and grabbed a rag to wipe an imaginary speck from her plank table with agitated strokes.

“Mark my words, Patience. Love that turns to hate is al the more caustic.” She stopped, dropped her hands to her side, and gazed at Patience with entreaty. “I understand if you can never forgive me.”

From Patience, no answer was forthcoming. “Patience?” Grant prodded.

She turned to him. “It wasn’t like my parents to be so cruel.” A proper sentiment, if slightly misplaced. She should be speaking to her aunt, not him.

“I don’t think they realized my heart was engaged,” her aunt said. “They saw only each other.”

Patience stood, walked the length of the kitchen, and back.

“It hurt to know I was unloved and unwanted. Is that how my parents made you feel?”

Aunt Harriette wiped her eyes. “However I felt as a result of their actions—which did not necessarily reflect their purpose—it was never my intent to make you suffer in return. Bitterness is a two-edged sword that can cut where and when you least expect. Don’t ever let yourself succumb to the temptation of giving in to it.” Grant thought it was time for Patience to admit she understood something of her aunt’s pain. He took it upon himself to give her a gentle nudge in her aunt’s direction, but it was like nudging a boulder. He wouldn’t be surprised if his hand formed a bruise.

“I do not deserve your forgiveness and I know it,” her aunt said. “Thank you for letting me know you are back in England.” Lady Belmont reflected the same stoic pride her niece often did. “Whether you believe it or not, I wish you a happy life, Patience.”

“Dammit!” Grant startled them both, so lost were they in each other. “You are exactly alike, the both of you, stubborn and pigheaded. Lady Belmont, you cared for Patience, yet she thought you hated her. Perhaps she had reason to think so, perhaps not. But it seems to me, that in the face of these revelations, it’s time to begin again.”

“I would like nothing more,” she said. “But I fear that for Patience it is not possible. And I understand. I truly do.” Patience gave no indication she was open to a reconciliation and Grant wanted to throttle her. “Patience your aunt reduced herself to poverty to send you to a better life in America!” He looked from one to the other and saw mirror expressions of despair. They wanted to reach out to each other, he thought, but didn’t know how. A picture of his father at their last meeting flashed in Grant’s mind; he pushed it aside. “Patience, she is your only living relative.

This is a chance to begin anew. New beginnings are rare in this life.” His father’s face intruded again; he banished it.

“Forgive your aunt and be done with it. You need each other.”

They stood like strangers, yet there was love, if they would but see it. He nudged Patience again. She stepped toward her Aunt, but as she was embraced, Patience’s arms remained by her side, her hands closing into fists.

Lady’s Belmont was ready to begin, again. Patience had a long way to go.

“Since you’ve been gone,” Harriette said, wiping her eyes, ignoring Patience’s solemnity, “I made peace with your parents. I thanked God and them for the years I had with you.”

Patience choked down a sob. Grant pul ed her against his side to tel her without words that she was not alone.

Her aunt looked at them with a question she did not voice.

“I’m sorry there was nothing in America for you, Patience. It was a mistake to send you.”

Patience wanted badly to cry. Her throat hurt so she had to swal ow to soothe it. Memories of her and Aunt Harriette here in this house, this very room, came rushing forth, many of them good, more of them than she expected. The events her aunt revealed explained so much, but the past held such pain.

If they could just go back to the beginning ... yet the true beginning had happened before her birth, so there real y was no going back. She looked at Grant, at her aunt. They were waiting. The next move was hers. She raised her chin and took a deep breath. “Neither of us could have known what would happen in America, Aunt. And practical as I am, I did manage to make my way. I have a good deal of money. I wil return what you spent on me.” Her aunt looked wounded.

“I mean, I would like to help you, if you wil al ow me.” Her aunt’s expression softened and Patience relaxed a bit.

“I could never have earned so much money had I stayed here in Sussex. Other than cleaning, I can’t imagine what else a woman—” Wisdom dawned, fast and bril iant.

Patience grinned. “Grant. I think I know what a lightskirt is!”

“Patience Kendal !” her aunt said.

Grant threw her an annoyed glance. “Wonderful. Excel ent timing.”

“I wondered for years, Aunt, about the girls at the Hoop and Barrel, and why you didn’t want me to pay attention to ‘such goings on,’ and suddenly, just now, it al fel into place. But, I’m a grown woman now, and you’ve no right to reproach me any longer. I don’t live under your roof, and I never wil do so again.”

Harriette sighed. “I’m sorry you feel that way.”

“How could I feel any other way? And you haven’t changed that much. You stil keep your hand in, do you not? Those children are learning to read from bibles. The poor things must receive your scolds now. Do you stil impose fasting for penance?”

“Much as you might think it, I am not a pompous, bible-toting old harridan.”

Patience couldn’t help her laugh. It was as if her aunt read her mind. “You were once.”

“Patience!” Grant said.

“Hush. This is between me and my aunt.” Her aunt almost smiled. “The only books Reverend Alderman would provide for my class are bibles, dear. I have changed. Losing you shocked me into looking at myself. And I didn’t like what I saw. I pray someday you wil believe me.”

“We’l see,” Patience said.

“Good,” Grant said, taking heart from those words. “Ladies, I would like to have the honor of escorting you to dinner at the Black Rabbit which, if I remember correctly, is not too far distant. Patience and I have something to discuss with you, Lady Belmont, do we not, Patience?

Patience rol ed her eyes. “I stil do not think it one of your brighter notions.”

“For the girls,” Grant said.

Patience groaned. “For the girls.” She sighed in resignation. “Wel , Aunt, the fact is that I haven’t made my way ... perfectly ... on my own.”

* * *

After a dinner of wild turkey, parsnips and roasted potatoes, mostly easy-flowing conversation, and the warmth of the huge hearth at the Black Rabbit, Grant brought Aunt Harriette back to her little house loathe to leave her behind.

Patience had no such problems.

Aunt Harriette promised she would be ready to chaperone Patience’s charges when Grant’s carriage came for her in one week’s time. She was too grateful to her employers to leave them without warning.

“Grant,” Patience said as they began their return journey.

“When you went to fetch John Coachman, Aunt said she was proud of me. She said it could not have been easy to turnabout in a foreign land and al . I kept waiting for a scold and some ‘hel and damnation’ to fal upon my head.

Mayhap she
has
changed. But I stil don’t like her al that much.”

“Do you forgive me for suggesting we seek her help?”

“I might. Someday.”

Grant was satisfied with the day, and the ride home was simply perfect.

Patience slept the whole way.

After three hours in Patience’s London house, Harriette told her that the girls were rag-mannered colonials who would never be ready to face English Society.

Patience threw her hands in the air. “I knew you would say I couldn’t do it.”

Her aunt looked stricken, then contrite. “Perhaps I spoke too soon. It wil be difficult, but we wil try.” She sighed as if bracing herself. “And we wil succeed.” Patience saw progress in the concession. Besides Aunt Harriette was right about the girls, but she would never admit it. “Aunt, I expect if anyone can teach them proper manners and repair the damage already done, ‘tis you.”