The Turncoat (29 page)

He rolled to face her. “I’m sorry about that,” he said of his seed on her stomach. “Rest here a moment and I’ll bring a cloth.”

There was a washstand with a full basin, courtesy of Bachmann, who had clearly planned for all eventualities. Tremayne washed himself, then dampened a cloth and returned to the bed. “In case Angela Ferrers did not inform you, it’s terribly discourteous for a gentleman to come on a lady.”

“But they like to,” she observed shrewdly.

“Yes, we do. I suppose it’s like an animal marking his territory: this is mine.”

But she was not his. Not yet.

They lay drowsing on the soft down mattress, curled on their sides facing each other.

“I like this room,” she said, running her fingers through the fringe on the bed curtains. “Whoever lived here must miss it. I don’t think you could be unhappy in a house like this.”

He’d noted the toys beside the dressing table, the penmanship samples on the wall. “It feels like a home,” he replied. “Sancreed was too grand to have rooms like this. Too formal. I can’t imagine my mother hanging my penmanship samples on the wall.”

“Was your handwriting so poor?” she teased.

He laughed. “Perhaps. But I will wager yours was no better. I saw no proud examples of your accomplishments hanging on the walls at Grey Farm. And I looked, I assure you.”

She groaned. “That is because I have no accomplishments. I was a failure at drawing, painting, and needlework. Music is my only talent, I’m afraid.”

“And tactics,” he reminded her. “If battlefield strategy was an after-supper entertainment for ladies I am certain you would excel. In any case, I would love to hear you play. I noticed the harpsichord at Grey Farm. I had always thought Quakers rejected worldly pleasures like music.”

“Not all Quakers. It is a matter of individual conscience. My mother taught me to play. My father taught me to sing.”

“They enjoyed music together, then.”

“That, and reading. My father liked to read to my mother. Sometimes he came to the table early for meals so he could read to her while she cooked. You should know you were accorded very special treatment, taking dinner in the dining room at Grey Farm. We usually eat in the kitchen.”

Her stomach growled, and she laughed. “I’m sorry. It must be all this talk of cooking.”

“Bachmann thoughtfully brought a hamper. If I can find something to read to you, will you prepare us something to eat?”

They searched the rooms for books and descended to the kitchen like children let to play in an empty house, she in her shift and stays and he in his shirt and breeches, and dove into the hamper Bachmann had left for them.

“This is
butter
,” she said, with something halfway between suspicion and delight. “And it is fresh. How did you come by fresh butter? The navy ships aren’t even unloaded yet. Nothing has gotten through the blockade for weeks. Even the Valbys are cooking with tallow these days.”

“I am as surprised as you. But Sergeant Bachmann is an old campaigner. He forages with preternatural skill. I hope you are not too patriotic to share it with me?”

“My stomach has no scruples, I’m afraid.”

“What else is there?” he asked, imagining with a growing appetite the things fresh butter could complement.

“There are potatoes. And some ripe cheese. A package of salt.” Then she plucked out a string of sausages and examined them suspiciously. “Even the joints that reach Howe’s table are tainted. You will pardon me if I will not trust sausages.”

Tremayne laughed. “Our Hessian allies hardly recognize meat unless it is ground and stuffed into a casing. But of that humble form, they are connoisseurs. If Bachmann acquired them, they are quite safe, I promise you.”

“Very well. Now then, what have you found to read to me?”

“Our unwitting hosts have catholic tastes. We have here
A Dissertation Concerning the Nature of True Virtue
—”

“Not the best choice, considering I’ve but lately surrendered mine.”

“Regrets?” he asked.

She stood on tiptoes to kiss him, soft and fleeting. “No.”

Thank God.

“What else is there?” she asked.

“Novels.” Tremayne sorted through the small stack. “We have
The Castle of Otranto
—”

“What’s that one about?”

“Young ladies being stalked by dangerous gentlemen through a dark old house.”

She stopped, potato in hand, mid-peel, and raised a plucked eyebrow. “Perhaps a little too close to my current predicament as well.”

“I suspect our hosts took their favorite books with them. We have here the dregs of their library,” he informed her. “Your choices are sermons, ghosts, or three-month-old copies of the
Gazette
.”

“The
Gazette
,” she said, pushing a pile of cubed potatoes to the side and beginning to slice sausages. “Advertisements, please.”

“Wouldn’t you rather have a story?”

“Oh, there are stories in the advertisements. If you know how to read them.”

She was right. “‘Mr. James Wheelright,’” he read aloud, “‘farmer, begs assistance in apprehending his wife, who ran away, a month ago, on his mare. He very generously offers that she will be restored to his affections once more, if she will only bring back the horse.’ Do you always practice divorce by newspaper here?” he asked, incredulous.

“Only when circumstances warrant. The Marriage Act has been rather slow to reach the hinterlands. Has the wife responded? Check the next day’s paper.”

Tremayne scanned the next day’s edition, then the next, then found what he was looking for. “Indeed. The lady responded three days later. The horse, apparently, came with her into the marriage, and she feels it is only right that it carry her out of the marriage.”

Intrigued now, he paused and scanned farther down the page. “It seems his wife has gotten the better part of the bargain in keeping the horse. Mr. Wheelright is also advertising for the return of a bondservant, a girl of fourteen years, at least six months pregnant—no doubt courtesy of her employer—believed to have run away to the city.”

“I wish Mrs. Wheelright joy with the horse,” Kate said dryly.

“Would you like to hear about Dr. Kelley’s most efficacious cures for venereal diseases?”

“Is it likely I will be needing them?” she asked.

“Good Lord, no. I haven’t been a saint, but I have been careful. You need have no worries on that score.”

“Thank goodness. You wouldn’t like me to tell you about Mrs. Ferrers’ prescriptions. Not before we eat.” She paused, considering. “Or
ever
, really. Should I be jealous of these paramours you were so careful with?” She said it casually, but he hoped the answer mattered to her as much as it did to him.

“There is no one else but you, Kate.”

She smiled, and kissed him once more on her way to the hearth. He watched her tie the hem of her chemise up and then wet it down. She blew the dust out of a pan, set it on a stand, and kindled a small fire from the waiting coals. Everything she did was deft and efficient.

He wondered how long it had been since she’d done something as homely as cook. The sausages sizzled when she dropped them into the hot pan, the potatoes likewise when they followed a few minutes later. It was deeply satisfying to sit at the table and watch her, to know that he was going to enjoy a meal prepared by her hands.

He imagined her in the kitchen of the little cottage at Sancreed where his father had kept his mistress. Before they were old enough to understand the role of the quiet widow who lived in the gatehouse, he and Bay used to slip off to visit her. Alice made treats for them, buttered muffins and toast smothered with blackberry jam. It was warm and wonderful and a world removed from the bustling, businesslike kitchens at the main house. Those were the domain of the servants, ruled over by a tyrannical cook who knew her place in the hierarchy, and that of the young masters. He and Bay were not welcome there.

But
Alice
had welcomed them. Sometimes they went fishing and brought her their catch, or hunting and brought back a brace of game. She was always home, it seemed, and only shooed them out if they lingered too long into the evening, when they knew Tremayne’s father came to visit, although they did not understand, until they were older, why.

And by that time Tremayne understood the distance between his parents, knew something of what had happened to his mother. He’d stopped visiting Alice, but he had seen them together, his mother and his father’s mistress, sitting in companionable silence in the cottage garden, neither woman entitled to a whole happiness.

And he knew all at once that he did not want that for Kate. He didn’t want her in that cottage, a swift gallop away, with a wife, or anyone else, to come between them. Nor could he imagine her tucked away in a discreet house in London. She was not his social equal, but as Donop had pointed out, what was the point in having money and power if a man could not have what he really wanted?

And
this
, what they were sharing here, now, was what he wanted.

He caught her up in his arms as she crossed from the hearth to the press cupboard, and pulled her laughing into his lap.

There was an obvious solution to their difficulties.

“Marry me.”

Fourteen

She slid from his lap. It was like leaving a warm bed on a cold morning: wrenching, but necessary.

“No.”

She had no regard for hereditary privilege, but he had been raised with it. He was offering to lay aside the prejudices of a lifetime.
There is no one else but you, Kate.
Her chest constricted with grief, as she had felt when her mother died, for this future that would never be theirs. She held his gaze. “You do me a great honor. It is not every day that a viscount proposes to a farm girl. But marriage between us is impossible.”

“You have never been just an ordinary farm girl. Even in Orchard Valley, you were already more than that. Are you so afraid of John André? His silence can be bought.”

“For how long? He could dangle a noose over our heads for the rest of our lives. There might be no end to his blackmail.”

“Marriage would put an end to it. I am the principal witness to your actions at Grey Farm. If we married, I could not be called to testify against you.”

“I have been living under a false name since I came to Philadelphia. Everyone in your world knows me as Lydia Dare. If we married, it would be a union built on lies.” And she could barely stand the ones she was living with already.

She retreated to the safety of the hearth, but he got up from the table and followed her there.

“Do you need to hear the words? I’ve never said them to anyone before. I love you. I desire you. I want you for my wife. There has to be a way.”

There was. A way for them to marry without lies. “Come with me to the Continental lines.” There, she’d said it.

“Kate, you know I cannot.”

Of course he couldn’t. It gave her a little strength, this limitation of his; enough to push him away. “Then you do not love me enough.”

“You ask too much.”

“You ask no less.
To give up everything
.”

“It is not the same, Kate. You’re a woman. Marriage to a man with a title and fortune elevates you. But if I were to run away and play at rebellion with you, I would be dragged down. My lands and titles would be stripped from me.”

“You would still be the man whom I loved. But the reverse would not be true if I went to England and lived a lie with you. I would not be the woman you fell in love with. I’m sorry, Peter, but tonight is all we will ever have.”

“This cannot be the end.” There was something desperate and reckless in his tone now. “If I can’t have your hand, we can at least meet again—like this. It is not so difficult to arrange.”

It was the first she’d troubled to think of the arrangements he’d made. She’d become good at this life of deception. She’d mastered charm and manners and fashion. The Widow had thrown her into deep water, and she’d learned, out of necessity, to swim. But she still had difficulty thinking out all the consequences. And when she did not, men died.