Lady Farquhar's Butterfly (13 page)

She opened her
mouth to speak. To tell him she would marry him. To lie to him so
as to keep him off her back until he was gone and she could then
exorcise him out of her life.

But she could
not be so dishonourable.

‘Then I will
try to explain.’ Hunched miserably into herself she noticed his
surprised hesitancy as he cocked his head.

Yet how could
she tell him? How could she explain the myriad brutalities which
had resulted in those very actions which stood between them.

Julian.

How could she
explain Julian?

‘I’m
listening,’ he prompted after a long silence.

She swallowed,
watching the forefinger of his right hand, its silent tapping
against the crossbeam the only outward sign of his agitation.

She squeezed
shut her eyes. For so long she had acted in
re
action.
Lucien’s brutalities had prompted so many self-preserving defences.
Now, she felt exposed. Speaking the truth without it being
violently torn from her seemed an impossible feat.

All she could
do was lay the groundwork and hope that by the time she reached the
end he’d have more understanding.

‘Lucien was
desperate for an heir.’ It was feeble, but it was a start.

‘I can hardly
blame my cousin for that,’ Max said, drily. ‘Most men want an
heir.’

Oh Lord, this
was not going well.

‘Our first
child died within the hour. Lucien blamed me for the fact it was
not baptized.’ She swallowed, remembering his fury when he came
into the bedroom to find her cradling the dead newborn. ‘It was a
difficult birth,’ she went on, blocking out the pain, ‘and I’ – she
turned her head away – ‘was not ready for another, but Lucien would
not heed the doctor. After that there were two miscarriages. Lucien
blamed me.’

Glancing up at
him she saw that his expression had lost its censure. Max settled
himself beside her on the trunk and took her hands between his.

‘Go on,’ he
said gently.

‘Nathaniel
said it was God’s punishment on Lucien.’

‘I trust he
informed Lucien personally of this judgement.’

Olivia nodded.
‘It didn’t help. Lucien was even more brutal to me, though he
continued to confess all his sins to Nathaniel.’

‘An
interesting position for your intended.’

Olivia gripped
his hand and glared at him. ‘Nathaniel was the only person Lucien
allowed to show me any kindness.’ Defensiveness made her hoarse.
‘It was like a game to him. He encouraged it. He’d humiliate me in
front of his guests, then wait for Nathaniel to cover me up and
carry me away.’ It was painful just to remember. ‘Yet if any member
of the company tried secretly to come to my aid, Lucien made sure
they regretted it.’ She gulped, turning to face Max once more. ‘A
young man stayed with us for a time. From Bavaria …’

She couldn’t
go on. By the time Max’s arms were across her back she was hunched
over, sobbing silently.

‘Forgive me,’
he whispered, stroking her.

His touch was
soothing, comforting as she remembered. She wanted to enjoy it
forever. But of course, her obligation was not yet fulfilled.

‘I had
recently lost a child and Lucien was very angry. This young man and
I spent much time together. Lucien found us reading poetry and took
it into his head that we were’ – she swallowed convulsively –

‘betraying
him. He beat Pieter to a pulp before my very eyes, and then … he
punished me.’

Eventually Max
asked, gently, ‘What happened?’

‘Nathaniel
appeared and organized everything.’ She shuddered.

‘Pieter was
covered in blood, groaning, the servants too afraid to go to his
aid. Nathaniel tended to his wounds and dispatched him.’ Olivia
couldn’t meet his eye. ‘I don’t know where he went. I never saw him
again. When Nathaniel found me I was unconscious on the floor.’ She
looked at her feet, then held her arm to the candlelight. ‘My dress
was torn and I was covered in blood for his signet ring had sliced
through my wrist. Lucien came back when Nathaniel was bathing me.
He stood in the doorway and watched for a long time. Then he
laughed and said I was between the Devil and God and whom would I
choose? I told him it was a relief to me we didn’t have a son
because I couldn’t bear seeing him turn out like his father. Then I
said that while everyone believed I was unconscious I had had a
message from our first born who was burning in the fires of Hell. I
said little Lucien had informed me the Devil said he’d soon see his
father because Lucien, too, was damned. Eternally damned.’ Olivia
gave a convulsive swallow.

‘Lucien was
terrified by the prospect of eternal damnation.’ Another shiver
made her convulse. ‘I’d have said anything to stop him laying his
hands on me again.’

‘My poor
Olivia,’ murmured Max.

‘It worked.’
Olivia gulped. ‘Lucien kept away from me after that. He held fewer
parties.’

‘Were you
still required to add a … decorative touch?’

Olivia shook
her head. ‘I was with child again and quite ill throughout—’

‘Olivia! Are
you up there?’ Aunt Eunice’s voice carried up from the base of the
ladder. ‘Nathaniel has been ready for his bed this past half an
hour. Surely you must have found one of Lucien’s nightgowns by
now?’

Olivia turned
to Max as she rose. She felt panicked, her story only half told.
‘Perhaps you’d better stay here.’

‘Oh no,
skulduggery is not part of my repertoire,’ he said, as he prepared
to follow her down the stairs to greet their reception party: the
aunts and Nathaniel Kirkman.

CHAPTER SEVEN

MAX STOOD
BEFORE the casement of the little chamber he’d been allotted and
stared into the garden. Like ghostly soldiers, the poplars swayed
in the pale night and the wind emitted a thin, eerie sound.

Sleep would
elude him, he knew. There was no point even trying. Olivia’s story
appeared like an unfinished tapestry: loose threads everywhere.

She’d been
leading up to a confession, but what was her crime? Or the worst of
them? She’d been a victim for seven years. Survival would trump
morality. Is that what she was telling him? What could she have
done that was so shameful she’d chosen to keep silent and lose the
man she had, finally, openly, professed to love?

He had no
choice but to wait until the morning for answers, but would she be
as willing to divulge all after a night in which to consider the
consequences?

How would Max,
himself, feel when confronted with the truth? For he was beginning
to fear the worst.

The storm was
building. He must check on Julian as was his habit, but for the
first time his thoughts of the boy evinced a shudder.

The nursery
was in the west wing, far removed from the rest of the sleeping
quarters. Quietly, he made his way along the corridor, pausing at
the passage that intercepted it. He raised his candle high to
identify the figure which had emerged at the end. Reverend Kirkman.
Quickly, he stepped back. Hadn’t he been accommodated at the other
end of the house? he wondered, waiting for him to pass Olivia’s
bedchamber. If it were Kirkman’s intention also to visit the
nursery Max would delay his visit until later.

But he was not
going to the nursery. Max heard the faint creak of the door to the
only bedchamber along that passageway: Olivia’s.

‘Heavens, Max!
You made my heart nearly stop.’

It was
Olivia’s Aunt Eunice arriving via another corridor, though it was
hard to imagine anything had the power to make Aunt Eunice quake in
her boots.

‘You’re
checking on Julian, too, I see.’

Max forced a
smile. And forced himself not to brush past Aunt Eunice and into
Olivia’s chamber on the heels of Kirkman.

‘It’s a
habit,’ he said, distractedly, unable to drag his eyes from the
glow of candlelight that filtered from beneath Olivia’s door.
‘Julian isn’t fond of storms.’

‘Olivia always
hated them,’ Aunt Eunice remarked, taking Max’s arm and steering
him towards the nursery.

‘I know.’ Max
glanced down at her, resigned to the fact he could not play
sentinel until the other man emerged. ‘She used to be locked in her
room on such occasions.’

‘Olivia slept
with me or Catherine during thunderstorms.’ Eunice slid accusing
eyes across to Max. ‘Lucien locked her in her room.’ He should have
realized this, of course.

‘Once he
locked her in for five days on nothing but gruel and water.’

Despite what
he’d learnt of Lucien’s treatment he was still horrified. Aunt
Eunice met his dismay with a hard look. ‘Martha, Olivia’s maid told
me. She went to The Lodge with Olivia when Olivia married and
continued to pass on news even after she married the publican, Mr
Mifflin.’

‘Five days?’
Though after what Olivia had told him he’d believe anything.

‘Lucien saw
conspiracies in everything she did. If she displeased him, he
punished her. I believe on this occasion she’d walked to church
with a neighbour, a handsome young man who admired her. The young
man got a bloodied nose; Olivia got five days’ incarceration. No
doubt she learned to choose her companions carefully.’ The old
woman’s voice grew bitter. She slowed her footsteps as they
approached the nursery wing. ‘He whisked my beautiful niece off her
feet, squandered her happiness, sapped her of her spirit and
stripped her of her son. And there was nothing I could do for she
severed contact when she defied me to be with Lucien.’

She stopped,
staring at the door before them. Even in the softening glow of
candlelight the woman looked much older than she had earlier this
evening. Her grey hair hung in a thin plait over one bony shoulder
and her mouth quivered.

‘Olivia was
the child I never had.’ Her voice caught. ‘Georgiana, her mother,
was the baby of the family. The favourite, for she inherited our
Aunt Jane’s entire fortune, only to squander it on a fortune-hunter
who left her to die alone as she gave birth to Olivia.’

Max patted the
woman’s arm. ‘Olivia’s lucky to have had you, then.’

‘Perhaps it
was a mistake to protect her so much.’ There was self doubt in the
bleak look she sent him. ‘In her childhood we spoiled her, cosseted
her, turned her head with compliments.’ She sucked in a breath.
‘Then she met Lucien.’ Max saw her tremble with the force of her
hatred. ‘Lucien taught her about life’s cruelties. He had no mercy,
even in death. And now our beautiful Olivia is about to sacrifice
herself to that pompous old drone I’ve had to suffer the past
year!’

She fixed Max
with a gimlet look. Earlier he would have met it with an equally
defiant one, declaring he had no intention of allowing such a thing
to happen.

Right now he
didn’t know what to think.

His lack of
conviction must have been apparent. Disappointment kindled in her
eyes. ‘I know she loves you,’ Aunt Eunice whispered, as she gripped
his wrist with one bony hand. Her look communicated her silent hope
that Max would be Olivia’s valiant defender.

Max stared at
the floor, his resolve to be that man marred by the fear of what
he’d discover when Olivia finally confessed the truth. ‘She doesn’t
believe she deserves happiness,’ he said, as he wondered how great
her crime must be before that became indeed the truth.

*

Olivia jerked
upright at the tentative rap upon the door. A wild rush of
anticipation flooded her as she ran to it, turning the doorknob
with a smile that reflected her burgeoning hope.

Max. He was
not a man who’d let suspicions fester. Only the truth would answer
and she’d give it to him. Damn the consequences.

‘You’ll pardon
the intrusion, Olivia.’ With his trademark frown and ponderous
manner Nathaniel brushed past her, covering her hand with his own
as he gently turned the doorknob, closing the door behind them.

‘Nathaniel,
you can’t—’

Ignoring her,
he put his hand upon her shoulder and led her away from the
door.

She didn’t
like the way he was smiling at her.

Twisting out
of his semi-embrace she crossed her hands in front of her chest,
knowing the sheer fabric of her night rail left little to the
imagination.

‘So coy with
me, Olivia, when we are soon to be wed?’ he asked.

‘I’m not going
to marry you, Nathaniel.’

There. That’s
all it took. And she had said it. Now what could he do to her? She
need only scream once and the entire household would descend upon
the room in an instant.

With both
hands now upon her shoulders he steered her backwards towards the
bed. ‘So it is as I feared.’ She saw the anger in his eyes though
his voice was calm.

‘I shall
scream.’ But she could manage no more than a pathetic whisper and
she was trembling so much it was all she could do to remain
standing.

She was
trapped between the high bed and Nathaniel who was leaning over
her. In Lucien’s striped nightshirt. Nathaniel was short of stature
and more thickly set although he was by no means an unattractive
man. He could set many a feminine heart aflutter, Olivia knew. More
pious ones than hers.

‘Don’t do
this, Nathaniel,’ she pleaded. She could feel the hardness of his
desire pressing against her thigh through the fabric of her
nightgown before he pushed her upon her back.

‘What? Take
you here like a common harlot?’ His eyes shone with derision, but
at least he kept his feet on the floor. ‘Under your own roof with
your aunts down the corridor? Credit me with a little more finesse.
No, Olivia, I mean only to discuss the situation in which we find
ourselves. I think that under the circumstances it is quite proper
you would entertain your betrothed when he has concerns about your
future happiness’ – her skin crawled at his heated breath on her
neck – ‘and the happiness of your son.’