The Wyndham Legacy (24 page)

She turned slowly, unaware that there was a smudge of dirt on her cheek and that her hair was coming down, a thick plait curling over her shoulder. “Marcus,” she said only.

“What are you doing here?”

“Looking around.” She shrugged. “Come look at this etching. It's very faint, but I can still make out the lines. This is a monk's cell, I'm sure of that. Come on your knees and look.”

He didn't. He grabbed her arm and hauled her upright. “You have bloody lied to everyone, haven't you?” He shook her. “You haven't been the feminine little lady reclining on her bed napping, have you? No, you've been here, digging about and wandering around alone, damn you.” He shook her again for good measure. “Say something, anything. Shriek at me or yell. Yowl like Esmee when she's in a snit.”

Suddenly, she turned perfectly white. “Marcus,” she said, utterly disbelieving, “let me go. I'm going to be ill.”

He was so surprised, he released her immediately. He watched as she fell to her knees and wretched. Soon she was dry heaving, for she hadn't eaten much. He knelt
beside her, pulling back her hair, steadying her, for she was trembling now from the effort, weak from vomiting. He felt a shaft of guilt, sharp as an arrow. “I told you that you should be resting. Look what comes of it. Damnation, you're still ill from that blow. No wonder you didn't yell at me, or flail at me with your shrew's tongue, you were too busy swallowing your bile, and you failed.”

He took out his handkerchief and handed it to her. She wiped her mouth, then crumpled it in her hand when her body shook with more heaves that left her sweating and shaky.

He cursed even as he lifted her into his arms. He was silent as a midnight moon as he managed to mount Stanley with her in his arms. He settled her in the crook of his arm, then kicked Stanley in his fat sides. To her surprise, he didn't ride back to the Park. Instead, after some minutes, he halted his stallion beside a slender thread of a stream bordered with thick water reeds.

He lifted her down and eased her onto her knees. He cupped the water in his hands and let her wash out her mouth. She then swallowed some of the water, clear and so cold that it made her lips blue. The water hit her belly and nausea struck her again. She moaned, clutching her arms around herself.

He ripped off the hem of her petticoat, wet it, and wiped her face. He carried her to the shade of a maple tree, eased down and pulled her back against him, settling her between his legs. “Hold still. Is your belly settling now?”

“I don't know.”

“You feel weak and shaky. It's understandable. Just lie against me and keep quiet for a while. I'm tired of your damned protestations.”

She didn't remember protesting anything. She closed her eyes.

He felt her ease, heard her breathing slow and deepen. He stared over the top of her head to the stream then beyond it, realized he wasn't seeing anything at all, and tightened his
hold around her, leaning his head back against the trunk of the tree. It was warm. Bees buzzed about. He could hear larks singing.

He heard a cow mooing in the distance. Stanley was eating water reeds not many feet away, chewing noisily. He closed his eyes. When he awoke, the sun had moved a goodly distance toward the west. He must have twitched upon awakening, for she was now awake too.

“Don't move. First tell me how you feel.”

“I'm fine now, truly. Thank you for helping me, Marcus.”

“I saw you leaving the house and I followed you. Why the devil didn't you at least ride Birdie?”

“The stable lads would have told you immediately. Lambkin would probably have refused to saddle her.”

“You have done this before today?”

“Yes, for over a week now. I want to find that oak tree with the well beneath it. It should be near the abbey, but I couldn't find it. But it must be around here, Marcus, someplace close. I've been so frustrated.”

Very slowly, he lifted her onto his thighs and turned her to face him. “Listen to me. Hasn't it occurred to you that the person who struck you down in the library just might be interested in striking you down again?”

“Why? The person saw that book and I was in the way. I was struck only because of the book, Marcus.”

“You can't possibly know that. Now, we're going back to the Park. No, don't try to move yourself. I'll carry you.”

As he walked to Stanley, who was chewing vigorously, and ignored them, he said, “Are you still having headaches as well as belly nausea?”

“No, and I haven't felt ill before today, I promise you. It is odd.”

“You will climb into your bed when we get home. No, don't stiffen up like a frightened virgin or draw in your breath to scream at me for my interference like a Milanese soprano. I have no intention of climbing into your bed beside you. I will come to you tonight though, so don't
go haring off to another bedchamber. If you do, I'll search you out and I won't be pleased with you. Another thing, there will be no more lying there, wishing me dead or impotent, which would be worse.”

“Why don't you just go back to London? To Celeste? Or you could have Lisette come to you here.”

“Yes, I could, couldn't I?”

“You could try it,” she said, chin up, eyes lighting for battle, for the nausea was gone now, thank God. “I wonder if you would be so stupid.”

His eyes glinted and he was slavering to goad her but good, saying in a drawl that could match Trevor's, it was so slow and taunting in its slowness, “Do I take it that you are threatening me, woman? Are you saying that you would gullet me if I touch another woman?”

“Right now I am saying that you would be very sorry if you brought one of your women here. If you touched another woman—I will think about that and let you know. I believe a man should understand his options.”

She said not another word, but she was smiling, curse those mysterious eyes of hers. He insisted on carrying her through the entrance hall for all to see, then upstairs to her bedchamber, where he made a grand production of seeing to her care.

“I
WISH YOU WOULD
lose all your hair.”

“Huh? What did you say?” His hold around her tightened.

“I said,” the Duchess said sweetly, smiling at him, “that I wished you would call for a chair. Surely you're uncomfortable just standing there like that.”

He grinned down at her. “That wasn't bad, but you're no competition for Aunt Wilhelmina. Perhaps you simply haven't any talent for well-turned rhymes.”

“Enough talent so I didn't starve!” She stared at him, clamping her hand over her mouth. She was a fool. It was the first time in her life he'd goaded her into unwise speech. In the past two weeks, he'd not goaded her in anything. She'd said just what she'd wanted, but now. She wanted to bite her tongue off.

But he didn't understand, at least he didn't realize what she'd just let slip. “So, we're back to the mythical man who supported you at Pipwell Cottage again.”

“No, we're not. But just perhaps I was lying, as all Wyndhams lie, so you've told me. So perhaps there was a man. What do you think, Marcus?”

If he'd been a dog, he would have growled, but he got a hold on himself immediately, saying in that easy way of his that made her want to strike him and kiss him at the same time, “Well, I know he wasn't your protector. If you convinced some fool to give you money with no return with your favors, who am I to cavil? No, come on now, Duchess, I wasn't really serious.” He gave her an unrepentant grin.
“Shall I undress you? Where are your nightgowns?”

“I'll see to her, my lord,” Maggie said, coming into the room like a queen ready to fire off her troops. “You just leave the Duchess be. Look how flushed she is. You've been scolding her, haven't you, or teasing her? That can't be good for her, though, I, like everyone else, saw you bringing her in. We all believed you to be resting, Duchess. It wasn't well done of you to go off by yourself. That monster who struck you down just might have done it again.”

“From the mouths of maids,” Marcus murmured.

The Duchess closed her eyes. She wondered if she should tell Maggie that she was flushed with utter delightful anger. But she didn't. To her surprise, she felt fatigue wash over her. She was asleep within moments.

 

Marcus was true to his word. That evening after solicitously seeing her to her bedchamber and handing her over to Maggie, he took himself to his own bedchamber. He opened the adjoining door a half an hour later.

She was sitting in an overly plump chair in front of the small fireplace, staring into the sluggishly burning flames.

“Hello,” he said. “Here I am just as I promised.”

She spared him a glance. “Go away, Marcus.”

“Oh no. I only just wrote to Celeste this afternoon. She won't be arriving for another four days. I will have to make do with you until then.”

“You've been warned,” she said, nothing more, just that. Then she folded her hands in her lap and ignored him, an enraging, indifferent, aloof act that the old Duchess would have performed.

He gave a martyr's sigh, leaned down, and scooped her up in his arms. He kissed her as she turned her head and touched her neck. “You smell wonderful, but then you always do.”

“Thank you. Go away, Marcus. I will not be your vessel of the moment. I won't suffer the boredom of you in my bed. Go dream of Celeste.”

“ ‘Vessel of the moment.' That sounds mighty odd, Duchess.” He set her on her feet beside her bed, then, without fuss or more words, stripped off her dressing gown and nightgown. He set her away from him. “The good Lord constructed you quite nicely,” he said, stroking his fingertips over his chin as he looked her up and down. “He had me in mind, obviously, for the size of you, and the shape of you, is just to my liking.”

She looked indifferent, merely standing there, looking away from him, not moving. She sucked in her breath when he reached out his hand and lightly caressed her left breast. “Yes, you're made of beautiful shapes. This is very intriguing, Duchess. You are silent as the Duchess of yore, then you're not. I never know what to expect from you now.”

“You never will know, Marcus, you damned sod.”

He laughed even as his hand stroked over her ribs and her belly. She took a step back, then gave a sharp cry. She looked at him, her eyes wide and bewildered. Then she turned and ran from him.

“Duchess.” He took a step after her, then frowned himself in consternation when she dropped to her knees and retched into the chamber pot. He went down on his knees beside her, holding her steady. “This is familiar,” he said, pulling her hair back from her face. “I don't like it. You were ill this afternoon and now you're ill again. There is a physician in Darlington who has a fine reputation. I believe I will have him come here to the Park now, tonight in fact.”

She was shuddering, huddling in on herself. He rose and fetched her dressing gown, wrapping it around her. He put her in bed, then said, “You lie still. I mean it, Duchess. Just lie still until I return.”

He did return and in only five minutes. With him were Spears, Badger, and Maggie, wearing a gown of teal-blue satin with a décolletage that would send a vicar into shock. Marcus was saying as he entered the bedchamber, “She
vomited this afternoon and again now. I know of this physician in Darlington. I want you, Badger, to go fetch him.”

Badger cleared his throat and stared at his pale huddled mistress in the large bed.

Spears closely studied the small clusters of grapes carved into the edges of the mantel.

Maggie smoothed the luscious teal-blue satin over her hips.

Marcus frowned. “What the devil is going on here? Badger?”

Spears said to the Duchess, “Maggie will fetch you a biscuit to nibble on. It will help settle your stomach.”

“How the hell do you know that?”

“Now, my lord,” Spears said in an odious avuncular voice, “there is naught to worry about. We have all discussed the situation and there is nothing to concern us and therefore nothing to concern you. Her ladyship is performing a natural function.”

“What bloody natural function? Do you so conveniently forget that she was struck down not two weeks ago?”

Badger said, “The Duchess is breeding, my lord. She is carrying
the heir.
The nausea and vomiting are natural. It will pass within a short time. Mr. Spears says another three weeks and she'll be perfectly fine again. Well, perhaps longer, but we know she's superior and thus the three weeks will apply to her.”

There was utter silence in the room. From a great distance, Marcus heard the Duchess say, “I am fine, Spears. Please, Badger, Maggie, please leave now. It's important. Please leave.”

The three marched out, but their pace was slow.

Marcus very slowly closed the bedchamber door. He then turned the key in the lock. “Are you going to be ill again? Do you need something to eat?”

She shook her head.

It was then he realized that she was utterly without color, her eyes dilated, her body hunched over itself.

“Did you know?” he asked, his voice as quiet as a leaf quivering in a breeze.

“No.”

“How can I believe you?”

“You can't. You said yourself that all Wyndhams were excellent liars, myself included.”

“You are carrying my child. That isn't possible. The three meddling idiots must be wrong. You vomited because of that blow to your head.”

“Very well, it isn't possible. But for the sake of argument, let's say it's true. Now, is it to be an immaculate conception or have I cuckolded you? Ah, don't forget my generous lover at Pipwell Cottage.”

He sliced his hand through the air. He looked bewildered, disbelieving; he looked like a man who'd just been shot but didn't yet feel the pain. “I don't understand this. It's true I took you a few times, a very few times, and I didn't have the fortitude to withdraw from you as I do now, but it takes much longer to impregnate a woman, surely it must take many, many times and many, many months.”

“Evidently not.”

He began to pace. She looked at his flapping dressing gown, his black hairy legs, his bare feet. He was beautiful, this man who didn't want her to have his child. Ah, she was pregnant. Her body had accepted his seed. On their wedding night? That second night he'd come to her? She wanted to sing and shout and dance. Instead she felt a stirring of the nausea and began to breathe deeply and slowly.

“You didn't have your monthly flow after we were married in Paris?”

She shook her head.

“You're a damned woman. Didn't it occur to you that something might be different? Namely, me, the man who spilled his seed inside you?”

“I'm not always as predictable as many women.”

“You mean in that oblique way of yours that your monthly flow doesn't occur necessarily when you expect it to?”

She nodded, staring him straight in the eye.

“I don't want this child and you damn well know it!”

She held silent, though the words were near to breaking through, but she was concentrating too hard on not throwing up to speak.

“You did this on purpose.”

Ah, he'd finally swung his axe. The look on her face was bleak and accepting, then just as quickly shifted to utter red-faced rage. Even then the old Duchess peeked through as she shrugged saying, “I wondered how long it would take you to fix the blame firmly on my head. My mother told me several times that a man couldn't bear to be in the wrong. She said a man would say whatever he had to say in order to put the woman in the wrong instead.” Then, miraculously, even the rage disappeared. She actually smiled at him. “You will be a father, Marcus, and I will be a mother. I am pregnant with a child, our child.”

“I refuse to accept that your bastard father has won. Forgive me. You're the bastard, but only by birth. He is one in mind and in act. I won't accept it, Duchess. Do you hear me? I don't accept that you're pregnant.” He slapped his palm to his forehead. “I have done nothing to deserve this, nothing, dammit. I was quite happily going about my life when your father died and I had to be the heir, there was no choice for anyone. Then because he's bitter and twisted, he unleashed his venom on me. He hated me and he proved it, stripping me of all means to maintain and support all the Wyndham estates and properties, unless I married you, his precious bastard. You, the one woman in the bloody world I never wanted, or if I did want you from the time I was fourteen years old and randy as a young stoat, I wouldn't have any longer than it took him to humiliate me to my soul. And yet you forced me to take you.

“I want my life back in my control. I want you and your damned child out of it.”

He stomped toward the adjoining door, only to draw up at her quiet voice. “I see. Do you wish me to leave tomorrow, Marcus?”

“I would that you leave tonight, right this bloody instant, but that would be cruel. You would probably faint on the front steps.”

He slammed the adjoining door behind him.

She stared for a long moment at that closed door. Then, slowly, she lightly touched her stomach. She was flat, but inside her womb was her child, their child.

She was lying there, staring up at the ceiling, when there was a knock on the door. She rose and unlocked it. Badger, Spears, and Maggie stood there, Maggie with a small covered plate in her hands.

They said nothing, merely came into the bedchamber when she stepped back.

“Here, Duchess, eat there,” Maggie said as she guided her to the chair in front of the fireplace.

The three of them took position about her, saying nothing until she began to nibble on one of Badger's fresh scones.

“I made them with small apple slices,” he said. “And fresh cream. It is my Aunt Mildred's recipe.”

“They're delicious.”

“Your stomach is settling?” Maggie asked.

The Duchess nodded and continued to chew slowly as she stared into the fire.

Spears cleared his throat. “His lordship is a passionate man. He is a natural leader, a man of action. He despises dithering about. In all the battles he fought, his men trusted him above God. He protected them, drove them relentlessly, and they knew he would willingly die for any of them. They knew this and gave him their best.”

Badger continued, “He is hotheaded, always has been, Mr. Spears tells me, even as a boy. Besides a leader, he is a man who is loyal to his bones. Sometimes, however, he isn't a cool thinker, not what you would call a measured scholar of philosophy. He reacts, then thinks. He can curse
some of the most amazing composites I've ever heard. Then he's calm again and laughing.”

“They say that we women are the ones to lose our calm and spit out whatever comes into our minds,” Maggie said, hands on her silk-covered hips, “but it isn't necessarily true. Just look at you, Duchess, quiet and still as a clam. You never lose your head and scream foolishness. You're just the opposite of his lordship.” Maggie frowned, then shrugged. “At least you used to be his opposite. It's strange, you're different, all of us have noticed it.”