Unforgiven (The Horsemen Trilogy) (11 page)

“Arrogance suits you,” she said. “You have the looks for it and of course the rank for it. You must have made a wonderfully effective officer.”

“My men learned that obedience to my commands was the best way to deal with me,” he said.

She smiled and even succeeded in looking amused. “Oh, but I am not one of your men, Kenneth,” she said.

He had a startling memory of just how much she was unlike any of his men. But he did not want to remember how he had desired her as he warmed her—and even before that. That memory could only complicate the issue. “I will grant you your wish,” he said, “since a week of reflection appears not to have brought you to your senses. I will grant it because it suits my inclination as well as yours. But only if there are no consequences to our coupling, Moira. If there are, you are to send for me—without delay. I will hear your agreement to this.”

“You are so very Gothic, Kenneth,” she said. “This and the horse whip. Would I be expected to snap to attention every time you cracked it?”

Unexpectedly and quite alarmingly he felt amused. So much so that he sat back in his chair and smiled slowly at her. “I doubt I would need a whip,” he said and immediately felt the doubt he had just denied.

“Oh, famous.” She rolled her eyes ceilingward. “Please do not complete that thought—I have just eaten. You are about to tell me that you would master me with your charm.”

He laughed outright. But he leaned toward her again before getting to his feet and offering his escort back into the ballroom. “You will marry me if there is a child, Moira,” he said. “For the child’s sake even if not for your own. And, by God, you will know something of the force of my anger if you try to do otherwise.”

She did not stand up. Even on the minor point of his escort she was determined to set her will against his. “I shall join Harriet Lincoln,” she said, nodding in the direction of a table nearby. “Thank you for escorting me to supper, my lord, and giving me the pleasure of your company. It has been a great honor.”

He made her his most formal bow. “The pleasure has been all mine, Miss Hayes,” he said, and made his way back into the adjoining room, smiling and nodding at people as he went, his pulse hammering audibly in his ears. He wanted to commit murder, he thought. Failing that, he wanted to give someone two black eyes and a broken nose and smashed teeth. Since neither option was appropriate to the occasion, he went to ask the very young Miss Penallen to dance.

*   *   *

MOIRA
drew some steadying breaths. She hoped it had not been obvious to anyone else in the room that they had been doing anything more than engaging in light social chitchat. Whenever she had thought to do so, she had smiled. He had smiled most of the time. It had been rather disconcerting to quarrel with a smiling man.

She would rather marry a toad, she thought, but the uncharitable and rather silly thought succeeded only in raising her irritability level again. She smiled determinedly preparatory to getting up and joining Harriet and Mr. Meeson at their table nearby. But someone sat down swiftly in the place the Earl of Haverford had just vacated. Someone who was also smiling.

“Stay away from him,” the Viscountess Ainsleigh said breathlessly.

Moira raised her eyebrows.

“You have done very well for yourself,” Helen said. “With Papa dead, you have contrived to be on visiting terms with my brother no more than a few weeks after his return here. Of course, that happy effect had nothing to do with you, did it? It was all the doing of Sir Edwin Baillie. Doubtless you did nothing whatsoever to encourage him.” There was sarcasm in her voice.

“Sir Edwin Baillie is now the owner of Penwith,” Moira said steadily, “and exercises his authority as he sees fit. But you were once prepared to defy that old feud, Helen. I would have expected you to be glad enough that it is over.”

Helen glared for a moment, but she remembered to smile again. “How opportune it was for you,” she said, “that Sir Edwin decided, quite without any prompting from you, of course, that he must leave for home in the middle of Kenneth’s ball, and that Kenneth insisted upon dancing with you for a second time and then escorting you home personally when you were too concerned for your mother to accept his hospitality at Dunbarton. How opportune that he could not return but was forced to remain at Penwith for the night. One might almost think it had all been
planned
.”

“You believe I planned the snowstorm?” Moira asked scornfully. She had not expected either Helen’s hostility at the Dunbarton ball or her controlled fury now.

“I suppose next,” Helen said, “we will be hearing of the unfortunate ending of your betrothal. I wonder who will end it. It would be humiliating for you if Sir Edwin did it but shameful for you if you did. You have a difficult decision to make,
Miss Hayes
. Of
course, all will be worthwhile if you can win the greater prize. My brother is temptingly eligible, is he not?”

Moira frowned and looked down to rearrange her napkin next to her plate. She could not quite understand this tirade. Unlike their brothers, she and Lady Helen Woodfall had had few dealings with each other as children. They had obediently avoided each other.

“Are you bitter over what happened with Sean?” she asked.

“Bitter?” Helen leaned forward in her chair. “Because he loved me and would have married me and was forcibly prevented from doing so? You may say if you wish that it was my father and my brother who did the preventing, but do not imagine for one moment that I do not know who betrayed us. Whom did you tell? Kenneth? Were you trying to win his favor even in those days? I have always suspected that you were. But you were not very successful, were you?”

“I thought he would be pleased,” Moira said. “I thought he would try to help. I . . .” She had been very naive. She had believed Kenneth when he told her he loved her. She had thought he meant to marry her, to fight his father and her own to win her hand. She had thought he would be pleased to know that Sean and Helen would join their fight. It had not occurred to her that the prospect of Sean’s
marrying
Helen would prompt Kenneth into such actions as he had taken and such lies as he had told. Even thinking about it now made her feel ill again.

Helen was smiling and watching her. “I expected you to be more quick-witted,” she said disdainfully. “I expected you to have a dozen denials and explanations and excuses at your fingertips. Perhaps you have a conscience, after all. Stay away from Kenneth.
He is to marry Juliana Wishart, and his family is
very
happy about it.”

“You have nothing to fear from me, then, do you?” Moira said sharply. She was feeling very angry again. Had she thought to lift her spirits by coming to this assembly? She thought suddenly of that afternoon early in December—less than a month ago—when she had stolen an hour to herself and gone up to the hollow on the cliffs. She had looked forward during that hour with calm good sense to the changes that were about to be wrought in her life. And then Kenneth had appeared on the skyline. How much had happened since then! Her life had been permanently ruined since then.

All because he had broken a promise and come home.

“Stay away from him,” Helen said again, and she smiled once more, rose to her feet, and disappeared through the doorway into the ballroom.

And Kenneth, Earl of Haverford, wished her to marry him? Moira thought. To make Helen into her sister-in-law and the countess into her mother-in-law? The very thought was frankly terrifying.

She wished suddenly that she had not eaten.
Had
she eaten? There was still food on her plate, she found when she looked down at it, but perhaps less than there had been. How foolish that she could not remember whether she had eaten or not. She had drunk half her tea. She felt thoroughly nauseated—and then felt blank terror when she thought of the implications of nausea.

She was being utterly foolish, she thought, giving herself a firm mental shake. She got to her feet and crossed to Harriet’s table, smiling and ignoring the feeling of queasiness.

S
UNSHINE
beyond the morning room window promised well for the new day and the new year. The snow had all disappeared, leaving the grass somewhat pale. It would be at least a month before the first shoots of spring pushed through the soil. The bare branches of the trees were spread against a blue sky.

Moira gazed through the window, one elbow resting on the top of the small escritoire at which she had been writing, her chin in her hand. A completed letter lay on the desk in front of her, the ink drying.
The
letter—the most difficult one she had written in her life. It was fitting, perhaps, that it should be written on the first day of the new year.

What would become of her? she wondered. What would become of her mother? Sir Basil Hayes had been able to leave them very little in his will. They were almost entirely at the mercy
of Sir Edwin Baillie. Yet how could they expect any great generosity from him now when she had humiliated him by ending her betrothal to him? It was something that was just not done. It was enough, if they moved in higher circles, to have her ostracized for life. Even here in Tawmouth she would find it difficult for a while to hold up her head and be sure of her welcome at the homes of their friends.

She folded the letter carefully. She would not fall into self-pity. She had no one but herself to blame for the predicament in which she now found herself. She got to her feet. It was time to send the letter. She would walk into Tawmouth. The exercise would do her good. She still felt queasy this morning. The feeling would go once she had done what needed to be done. It was the indecision, the guilt that had made her feel ill for a whole week. As soon as she returned home, she would speak with Mama.

But her mother came hurrying into the room before she could reach the door. Lady Hayes was carrying an open letter in one hand.

“Oh, my dear Moira,” she said, “here is a letter from Christobel Baillie and it appears that we have been doing Sir Edwin an injustice. We have thought him oversolicitous for his mother’s health. But she is on her deathbed. They are Christobel’s own words. You may read for yourself. The physician has warned them all that her demise is imminent. Poor Sir Edwin is distraught with anxiety and grief and is quite unable to write himself.”

Moira took the letter from her mother’s hand and read it. It was quite true, it seemed. Mrs. Baillie was dying. Perhaps she had already passed on.

“It is only the assurance my brother feels that you, ma’am, and his dearly betrothed are as anguished as we are,” Christobel had written, “that will sustain him through the coming days. We will all have a dear mother to take the place of the dearest of mothers, Edwin tells us, and a new sister too. There is light beyond the darkness, as of course there always is.”

Moira bit her upper lip hard and was surprised to find that the page had blurred before her vision.
You were prepared to marry Baillie, who is an ass by even the kindest estimation
. And so a man had been callously dismissed last evening. And she had wronged him in one of the worst imaginable ways. Yet he was a man who loved his mother and his sisters and who, in his own way, perhaps, even loved her and her mother. Was that so very asinine?

“Yes, dear.” Her own tears had provoked her mother’s too. “We will dry our eyes and drink a cup of tea and then each write a letter. I shall write to Christobel and her sisters. I think it would not be amiss if you wrote to Sir Edwin. It will be quite proper under the circumstances, especially as he is your betrothed.” Only then did she notice the folded paper in her daughter’s free hand. “But you have written already?”

Moira crumpled the page into a ball. “But it is not appropriate now,” she said. “I shall write another, Mama. Poor Sir Edwin. I was inclined to make light of his anxiety, but it has proved to be well-founded. I feel very guilty.”

“I am just as guilty, Moira,” her mother said, pulling on the bell rope to order the tea tray. “We must learn to value that young man. He is fussy in his ways and a little tedious in his conversation, but I have come to believe that he will make an excellent and a loyal
husband and son-in-law.” She smiled and dabbed firmly at her eyes with her handkerchief. “Poor Cousin Gertrude.”

She should have written six days ago, Moira thought. As soon as the Earl of Haverford had taken his leave the morning after the ball and as soon as she had washed and changed and had a hot drink, she should have written instead of making excuses. Now it was more difficult to send such a letter. It was almost impossible to do so, in fact—and would become even more so if and when news arrived that Mrs. Baillie had died. She would have to wait a suitable interval. How long? A week? A month? Longer? Sir Edwin would wish to postpone the wedding, of course, she realized suddenly, perhaps for a whole year of mourning. It felt like a reprieve—or a license for further procrastination.

She sat down hastily on the nearest chair, bowed her head, closed her eyes, and swallowed repeatedly. By a sheer effort of will she kept herself from vomiting. What if—? But she quelled the feeling of blank terror that threatened to wash over her. It was guilt pure and simple that was making her feel ill. Oh, how she
wished
she had written that letter five days ago.

*   *   *

BY
the end of January, Kenneth was alone at Dunbarton again. His mother had been the last to leave. She had gone to spend a month or two with her sister before returning to Norfolk.

It felt good to be alone. He was able to concentrate on work. He knew very little about farming and the running of a large estate, he had realized over Christmas. But it was knowledge he was determined to acquire, and so he threw himself into weeks
of intensive study, both indoors while he pored over the books and outdoors while he tramped about fields and meadows and spoke endlessly with farmers and consulted with his steward. Spring would be coming soon and he wished to be able to make most of the decisions concerning his own farms for himself.

The temptation to go away was not entirely absent. Although he was well received by his neighbors and never lacked for invitations to dine or to join an evening of cards or to go out shooting, he became aware, too, that he could not expect to make any close friends here. He was too well regarded, too highly respected. Perhaps he would not have felt the need of close peer friendships if he had not known them during his years with the cavalry—but he had known them.

Nat and Eden were both going to Stratton Park in Kent to spend some time with Rex. Both had run into trouble—entirely predictable—in town over Christmas. Eden had had the misfortune to be caught in bed with a married woman—by her husband, of whose existence he had not known. Nat had felt the noose tighten about his neck after he had kissed a certain young lady beneath the mistletoe and raised expectations in her family. Kenneth could relate to that situation, at least. So both had decided to rusticate for a while as the wisest course—and along with Rex, they wanted Kenneth to join them at Stratton.

The temptation to do so was strong. It would undoubtedly be good to see the three of them again. But he knew very well what would happen after the first few days. He would feel restless and idle again. Besides . . .

Besides, he thought with a certain gritting of the teeth a few
days after his mother’s departure, a feud had been ended more than a month before, and the two families concerned had put themselves on visiting terms once more. Yet he had not been near Penwith Manor since the morning after his ball. And he had seen neither Lady Hayes nor Moira since the New Year’s assembly. He owed them a call—unpalatable as the thought was to him and unwelcome as the visit doubtless would be to them. Besides, he had learned something during a visit from the Reverend Finley-Evans the day before that made the courtesy of a visit quite necessary.

He rode down to Penwith the following afternoon, Nelson loping along beside his horse. It was a particularly sunny, deceptively springlike day. Perhaps, he thought, the weather had taken the ladies from home. He almost hoped it was so until he realized that he would only have to do this all over again tomorrow.

Lady Hayes was at home; Miss Hayes had walked into Tawmouth, the servant who answered the door informed him. He felt a certain relief, but it was short-lived. He spent an awkward fifteen minutes conversing with Lady Hayes, expressing his condolences on the recent death of Sir Edwin Baillie’s mother. She did not say a great deal and was easily as uncomfortable as he was, but she did make one significant comment. Sir Edwin had thought it only proper to postpone his nuptials until at least the autumn, perhaps for the full year of his mourning.

Moira Hayes had still not ended the betrothal, then.

He took his leave after declining the invitation to take tea and rode slowly back along the valley. He was trying to make up his mind whether to cross the bridge above the falls when he came to it and take the road to the hilltop on the other side or whether
to ride right down the valley to Tawmouth. Even then he might miss her. And what purpose would be served by seeing her? He had left a message of sympathy for her with her mother. And if she chose to marry Baillie despite everything, who was he to interfere? He doubted Baillie had a great deal of sexual experience. Perhaps he would not even notice that he had a less-than-virgin bride. Perhaps she would get away with her deception.

He would not even try to see her, he decided when he reached the bridge. He turned his horse onto it and whistled to Nelson, who had run ahead. And yet he found himself stopping and dismounting when he came to the middle of the bridge. It really was a beautiful day. One might even imagine that there was warmth in the sun. The sunlight was sparkling off the water as it fell over the short waterfall and continued on its way to the sea. This was surely one of the most beautiful spots in all England. Heavy ferns overhung the banks on either side of the river. The baptistry was up on the hill above the trees, overlooking it all. He turned his head and looked up at it after leaning his arms along the mossy stone wall of the bridge.

He could not remember how many times he had met her in all, after that first unplanned encounter in the cove when he was a boy. Ten times? A dozen? Certainly not many more than that. It was not easy for gently bred young ladies to get away on their own, to escape from the close chaperonage of mothers and maids and governesses. And he had had a strong conscience—stronger than hers. She had used to laugh at him when he became nervous about what would happen to her if she was caught. She had used to pull the pins from her hair and shake it free. If they were on
the beach, she would pull off her shoes and stockings and toss them aside before running barefoot over the sand. In her naïveté she had not realized, perhaps, how such actions had inflamed his passion for her. But in all essential ways he had been a proper young gentleman. A few stolen kisses . . .

Nelson was barking joyfully and racing down the wrong bank of the river—racing to meet someone. She was wearing the gray cloak and bonnet he had seen before. She was quite alone. He drew breath to bellow at Nelson, but his dog had recognized her and had clearly abandoned any idea of her as a possible enemy. His tail was waving gleefully. She stood very still for a moment, but she dropped her hand to pat the dog’s head when he halted in front of her and nudged his nose at her in greeting. She looked up and ahead to the bridge.

He did not go to meet her as she walked closer. He stayed where he was and watched her. She moved with her customary grace. She also, he thought as she reached the end of the bridge and stopped, looked very pale. Quite ill, in fact.

“Hello, Moira,” he said.

“My lord.” She regarded him with steady, unsmiling eyes.

“I have been calling on Lady Hayes,” he said.

She raised her eyebrows but did not reply.

“With my condolences,” he said. “I understand that Sir Edwin Baillie lost his mother less than a week ago.”

“She had been ill since before Christmas,” she said, “severely so since just after. But despite the fact that Sir Edwin was expecting this outcome, it has been a severe blow to him. He is very close to his family.”

“And you,” he said. “Are you still planning to marry him?”

“That is my concern, my lord,” she said, “and his.”

He was still leaning on the wall of the bridge, looking at her sideways. Even her lips were pale. “You have been ill,” he said.

“Not ill so much as housebound by the inclement weather for most of this month,” she said. “Fortunately, spring is coming.”

His eyes had been moving assessingly down her body. But if anything, she was slimmer than usual. He asked the question anyway. “Are you with child, Moira?” he asked.

Her chin jerked up a notch. “Of course not,” she said. “What a ridiculous notion.”

“Ridiculous?” he said. “Have you never been told about the birds and the bees?”

“If you still worry that you will be called upon to make the supreme sacrifice,” she said, “allow me to reassure you. I am not increasing. You are under no obligation to me. You are quite free to go in pursuit of Miss Wishart and make her your offer. I suppose that I have delayed it. Delay no longer. Spring is said to be a good time for a wedding.”