The Wedding Read online

  “Ho! My lord!” a rough man called to him. “Sorry, but she just limped in,” he said, indicating the Relentless. “We give ’er the space, seein’ as ’ow there’s been no sight nor sound…”

  “No word?” Crispin asked, but knew the answer before he saw the man’s averted eyes.

  “None,” the man said gently. “The cap’n of the Relentless come that route and said as to ’ow it couldn’t been otherwise. ’Twas a turrible time, yer lordship, ’twas somethin’ turrible to ’ear tell.”

  It was a bright and windy day, and as Crispin stood on the wharf and inhaled the sea air, he avoided the eyes of the other who waited there. People who hoped for miracles: boys who dreamed of growing old enough to leave the land, sailors who had grown old or who had lost limbs or eyes but whose souls still rode the high seas, men who had lost everything but their souls to the mighty sea. Like him, he thought, staring out at the horizon.

  It had made such good sense. There was no flaw in his reasoning. Even now he knew he had done the right thing.

  Along with his title he had inherited something terrible. Not the usual sort of noble ghost but something as frightening and twice as destructive: debt. His grandfather, the fifth Viscount West, had lost the family fortune in the South Sea bubble. His father had repaired some of their fortune, but the family still had nowhere near enough to keep their land. Without the land, the fortune would soon vanish again.

  The South Sea bubble had been a swindle, and his grandfather a rash gambler. His own father had been overcautious because of that. Crispin couldn’t afford to be either rash or cautious. When he inherited the troubled estate, he asked questions, read books, consulted experts. Money bought money, if a man invested it wisely, and foreign investment was a good idea. New lands were opening; tobacco, spices, sugar, and cotton were in demand. Nothing he could do in England could earn him such profits, so this wasn’t a gamble so much as an investment.

  He’d gone to school with rich and noble boys whose families owned plantations in the New World. Satisfied with their huge established fortunes, those boys, now grown men, were content to live on the proceeds from their holdings in the New World, and so with lazy, well-fed goodwill they offered Crispin a chance to dabble in commerce for them. Crispin didn’t deceive himself. He knew this would be a onetime venture. He would make more money than his investors would, and when they realized that, they would probably decide to cut him out. Rich men were lazy, but not foolish. But by then he would have invested his share in his own plantations and more ships.

  Crispin had raised enough money to finance three ships. He’d picked the finest captains and let them fit their ships with true and tried crews. He’d forged contracts abroad and at home and accepted some financing from his oldest friends. But most of the money was his—the last of it. It had seemed like a foolproof scheme.

  But he had forgotten about the hand of God.

  An Atlantic storm had struck, a fierce wind of the kind born in the tropics in that latitude, a full month after the season for such storms had passed. The tempest had raged through the islands and colonies he’d traded with, and still, the growers had gotten their harvest in and on his ships before the storm hit. Everything had gone as he’d planned.

  But then his ships had been lost: captains, crew, and cargo.

  One of the vessels had been seen fleeing before the wind, another was said to have foundered near the first. The last ship had not been seen since it had left safe harbor. There had been no further sign of them. Crispin had asked every captain, every sailor, if he had news of his ships, but no one ever did. They were gone, along with his future. He grieved for the loss of life, and accepted that one death had been his own. This marked the end of the life he had known, for now he would have to sell his birthright, if he could break the entail, and certainly everything else he owned, in order to pay his debts.

  His hopes were gone, Crispin thought, staring out at the wide sea, gone in one mad gamble. And until now he had not been a gambler, as Harry Meech had been. Thinking of that made him remember the one heavy coin in his pocket. He stared down at it, tempted to fling it in the sea. But the sea had taken enough from him. He would keep the coin, he decided, dropping it back into his pocket, as a reminder of how low a man could sink.

  He would not borrow any more money from his friends. They had been feeding him for weeks, deftly and discreetly. He had let them, thinking he would make it up to them when his ships came in, but now he knew they never would. He had to eat tonight, though, and he would need to pay his fare back home.

  He shrugged out of his fine jacket and rolled up his shirtsleeves. The crew of the Relentless would need help unloading.

  “Hey! Captain!” he called from the dock. “Can you use another man?”

  The captain squinted down at him. “Not afraid to get your clothes dirty, my fine fellow?” he called jovially, thinking Crispin a drunken gent or one out for a lark.

  “More afraid of starving, I think,” Crispin called back.

  “Then aye, lend a hand or a back!” the captain called, and winked to his first mate, determined to give the pretty fellow the dirtiest work and see how long he was willing to keep up the jest.

  “Thanks,” cried Crispin, as he hurried up the gangplank.

  *

  “Soak ’em in brine,” said the sailor who had been working beside Crispin, staring at Crispin’s hands. “Luckily there’s a bit o’ that about. I been served meat patties looked healthier than your hands,” he said with a low whistle as he took a better look. “You must’ve been ashore a while, laddie.”

  “So I have,” Crispin said, gazing at his torn hands.

  “Aye, it’s whiskey or salt water they’ll be needing, for sure, to stop the bleeding,” the sailor said wisely, “and brine’s cheaper this season.”

  Crispin nodded and, after bracing himself, plunged his hands into a bucket of salt water. He closed his eyes until he could hear again over the roaring in his ears, and when the cold water had blessedly numbed his hands, he withdrew them. The salt had stopped the bleeding, but he doubted that he could get his gloves on again. He shrugged, and remembered the handkerchief in his pocket.

  “Would you mind doing the honors?” he asked the sailor, as he gingerly withdrew his handkerchief.

  The man whistled at the quality of the linen handkerchief, and Crispin realized he must have filthied his shirt and trousers so much no one could tell that they had been made for a gentleman.

  “Right- or left-handed?” the sailor asked.

  “Clever fellow. Right,” Crispin said, then watched as one blistered, oozing hand was securely wrapped. He thrust the other in his pocket, and straightened as much as his aching back would permit. His shoulders, however, were beyond aching. He’d worked all afternoon unloading cargo, but he hadn’t earned much. Still, three more days of work and he might be able to afford an outside seat on the coach home. Unfortunately he would have to spend some for food and lodging. He couldn’t return to his friends’ fine London rooms for dinner, for they would see him, and know the truth. Better to spend a few of his hard-earned coins for dinner near the wharves.

  Pride had a high price, he mused, tucking his jacket under his arm before he walked on, but it was one he would gladly pay. Disgrace, he reckoned, would be costlier, at least for him.

  *

  The old man looked into his glass and sighed with pleasure.

  “A fine day’s work. I have done a good day’s work,” he repeated with contentment. He sat by himself near the hearth and congratulated himself. Since no one at the inn ever listened to him, no one would hear him now. He was certainly mad, and not even amusingly so. He didn’t endanger or offend anyone enough to be taken away and locked up, nor had he any relatives to worry about his besmirching the family name. He always seemed to have at least a coin in his pocket, so he was ignored, except when he called for more drink. Business was business, and the old man was a sponge. He might have been half sane without the gin, some thought
, when anyone bothered to think of him at all.

  He was dazed with age, and some strange process aside from the gin muddled his mind further. At times, like mist rising from the ground, his brain was swept clear of confusion, and everything became stunningly, heartbreakingly clear. And then, just as suddenly, it was all gone from him again. That was why he drank, if anyone cared. No one did.

  “He told me his name,” he said to the glass, because he was both drunk and clear at the moment, and the only thing that would listen to him was the gin, “as if he had to! I knew him when…when,” he murmured, the tears starting to course down his seamed cheeks, “when he was a babe. I knew his name at the baptismal font! I gave him his name! As if I didn’t remember him!”

  He sat still for a moment, remembering with the cruel clarity that had come to him the minute he’d laid eyes on the young bridegroom that afternoon. He remembered when he had known the viscount; he had been the respected vicar in his village. He had watched the babe grow to boy and then to youth, in those days of his own glory, when his parishioners had praised him, his wife had loved him, the bishop had promised advancement, and the world had been constantly clear to him. Before the mists and the drink and the slow progression to disgrace, dishonor, loss of livelihood and family, and finally memory itself. The road that had led him to this place in London.

  In those long gone days, when he had worn another face, the face of youth and dignity, he had known the viscount as well as he’d known him today, whatever false name the boy had given him. And so he had written down his true name quickly, before confusion could snatch it away from him again.

  In that stunning moment of clarity, he’d been happy for the young lord, and pleased and proud to unite him with such a beautiful bride. He had said the service and written everything down in a firm hand, as in the old days. When he was done, the young lord had absently scrawled his initials. He had done so quickly and thoughtlessly, no doubt anxious to get to his beautiful young bride. But he had signed his own initials.

  “Married them, oh, such a handsome couple. A beautiful couple,” he told a passing serving wench.

  She was a kind girl and paused to hear him out, because there were tears on his old face.

  “Married the dish and the spoon, the cow and the moon, the lord and his lady together,” the old man said, because the mists were closing in again.

  “Aye, you did, I’m sure you did, Grandfather,” she said, and patted his hand before she bustled back to the kitchen.

  “I did,” he whispered. “I married the seventh Viscount West, Crispin George Thomas Knightly, of Darnley Hall, to Mistress Dulcie Dawn Blessing. Before God and man, if there is nothing else I know, I know that it is so. Before man and God, it is.”

  CHAPTER 3

  Crispin waited for her in the salon. His linen was fresh, his coat pressed, his wounded hands had healed enough for him to cover them with fine soft kid gloves. He was clean shaven, and his hair was pulled back in a neat queue. He would enjoy his wardrobe and the services of his valet while he still had them. That wouldn’t be for long, for he meant to give the servants notice, but he had a more important notice to give first.

  He had arrived home late the night before. It was only early morning now, but he had to see her. Of all the things he had to do now, this was the first, the most important, and the most painful, but he had to do it before the rumors began. It would not be easy, but if he could no longer give her his love, he could at least leave her with consideration.

  He breathed in deeply as she glided through the doorway. Her every movement was so graceful that she seemed to float toward him.

  “Crispin!” she breathed, and came straight into his embrace.

  She was dressed in creamy, delicate lace. But none of it so exquisite as the fine lady who wore it. Blond, with large blue eyes and a straight nose over a small plump mouth, of small stature, with a slender, graceful figure, she was justly an acclaimed beauty. Her gown showed off her tiny waist, and the fashionable cut of it forced her small, plump breasts upward, crowding them together, like roses bunched in a sweet bouquet, their swelling tops exposed to his gaze. Once, in a garden at midnight, he’d bent his head and pressed his lips to that breast and felt that flawless petal-soft skin against his heated cheek before he’d drawn back, dizzy with desire. That one fleeting touch had nearly broken his control—and control was absolutely necessary with the lady who had promised to be his bride. She was to have been his forever, and he had known that what they would have was too valuable for him to sully with clumsy, premature desire.

  Her physical beauty was in keeping with every other thing about her. It was rare to find beauty, charm, and high birth all in one lovely woman. She was witty, high-spirited, and always charming. He’d had many women, but his desire for her was so intertwined with his desire to make her his in every way that his lust transcended anything he’d felt before. That one moment of privileged intimacy with her had meant more to him than an hour in any brothel he’d ever patronized.

  She put her cheek to his, and he smelled jasmine as he stood for a moment breathing in her scent. His hands went to her tiny waist before he remembered that he no longer had the right to hold her. He dropped his hands and kissed her cheek and then her mouth—lightly, because he was desperate to have one last taste of her. Then, trembling slightly from the effort of withholding so much, he stepped back.

  She arched one thin brow.

  “You call that a kiss? Gone an entire month, and returned with not so much as a real kiss for me? Tell me how I’ve offended you, my dear,” she teased, suspecting a jest.

  “I have offended,” he said quickly, because he had to say the thing straight out or never say it at all. “I no longer have the right to kiss you, love. I’ve lost all my money, Charlotte, every last bit of silver. I’m searching my pockets for copper now. The ships were lost at sea—all of them,” he said bluntly as she stared at him in astonishment, “with everything I owned and begged and borrowed aboard them. No fault of mine, or theirs. A great storm, heavy seas, and so I’m rolled up, love. I have my teeth and my hair and my whole skin, so the saintly would say I shouldn’t complain. But I have nothing else. I’ve lost all I own, and so I’ve lost you as well.” He concentrated on keeping his voice to its usual calm irony, and almost succeeded. He wore a small grimace as he added, “I’m sorry. You can’t know how sorry.”

  “Oh, Crispin,” she said, staring into his eyes in disbelief, her own eyes as blue and stormy as the sea. “Oh, Crispin,” she sighed, with dawning comprehension. “Truly?”

  He nodded. She stared a moment longer and then turned in a flurry of her skirts and paced to the windows, where she stood, looking out blindly. In a moment she turned back to him, shock and pity gone. It was what he had expected, and yet his heart sank when he saw it.

  “Oh, my,” she said on a long sigh. “Oh, my, oh, my, oh, my. Oh, blast. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I had so looked forward to our future together. We would have been so good for each other, wouldn’t we?”

  He couldn’t answer. His hands were fists at his sides, and though he felt like hitting something, he suddenly felt drained, too weak and tired to raise a finger. He had only enough strength to control his face and voice.

  “Is there no hope?” she asked.

  “None, for at least the next decade, I should think,” he said. “I’ll work to advance myself, but I’ll likely be starting with less than your footman. At least if he saved his wages, and didn’t send them to sea.”

  She placed her hand on his. “What’s done is done. But wait! Would a loan from my papa be of help?”

  “Perhaps,” he said, pained to see the dawning hope in her eyes, but eager to put it out, because it was not based on reality, “a sizable loan might take three or four years off my projected term of recovery. But I can’t even promise that, not really. No, the truth is that I’m sunk as surely as my ships are. I’ll have to strip the estate, sell off everything that’s not entailed, and then look for
an investment. I get to keep my title, of course,” he said with a crooked smile, “and my education. But that’s all.”

  “Oh, lord,” she sighed. And then straightened her slender shoulders. “Then there’s nothing for it?” she asked.

  “Nothing I can see,” he said lightly, hoping beyond foolish hope that she would offer to wait for him. He knew he couldn’t accept the offer, but he longed to hear it. It would warm his long exile.

  “Ah, well. So be it. What’s the sense in pining?” she murmured, before she said in more normal tones, “So. How do we go about this?”

  “Very simply,” he said with forced calm, his lips white. “You put a notice in the Times. That’s all. If friends ask, or even foes, tell them the truth.”

  “Oh, no, Crispin. How can I tell them the truth?”

  “Don’t fret, you won’t be telling tales. Everyone will know anyway. I had mortgaged the London house to the rooftop, so that will be gone when the next payment comes due. I can’t sell Darnley Hall, because of the entail, but I’m here to close it up, make it a rest home for spiders until I come about—or my heir does. That’s what I’ve come home to do. So don’t worry about being tactful or saving face,” he said with a gentle smile, though his eyes still devoured her. “The world will know soon enough.”

  “It’s not a matter of saving your face, Crispin; it’s trying to save mine from blushes. My dear, just think!” she said with a rueful look at his puzzlement. “Won’t I look like a monster saying: ‘Oh, yes, it’s been called off. I dropped Crispin the moment I heard he lost his fortune’? It will look bad, my dear. You must see that.”

  He watched as she paced the room. She was right, of course. She knew the proper thing to do—as he would have, if he’d still had his wits about him. But they seemed to have vanished with his fortune. Lady Charlotte Barrington, as clever as she was beautiful, was not a fool for love.