Candice Hern (14 page)

Sally did so, looking at him warily through long lashes. She appeared to be about eleven or twelve and was not as pretty as her mother had been as a girl, though the fine bones of her face would serve her well through the years.

Rochdale acknowledged her with a curt nod. He did not want this awkward reunion. He would allow Jane to introduce her children, then he'd get the bloody hell out of there.

"And this is Toby." The fair-haired boy had been hiding behind his mother. Rochdale had been so stunned by the sight of Jane, he'd barely noticed him. Jane pushed the boy forward now, and Rochdale almost gasped aloud. He was the very image of Martin Fletcher, the man who was surely his father, the man who had once been Rochdale's closest friend. As a young boy, Martin had looked exactly like the child staring up at him now.

Rochdale glanced at Jane, who smiled and said, "He's very like him, is he not?"

"The spit and image. Hullo, Toby. I am pleased to meet you."

"Yes, sir. Me, too, sir."

As Rochdale gazed at the boy with the face of Martin Fletcher, it suddenly dawned on him why Jane and her children must be here at Marlowe House. A knot of pain lodged itself in the area of his heart. He looked at Jane. "Martin is ...?"

Sadness gathered in her dark eyes. "Yes. He died at Albuerra, two years ago now."

Rochdale closed his eyes briefly and fought back a lump that had lodged itself in the back of his throat. God, he did not want to hear this. Finally, he said, "I'm so sorry, Jane. I wish I'd known. I wish I'd kept in touch. I wish ..." He wished he'd never learned of what became of Martin. And he wished he did not feel so damned responsible for his death. True, it was likely a French bullet or blade that had taken the life of his old friend, but if the tenant farms at home had not been allowed to fall into near ruin, Martin would never have felt obliged to join the army. He was a farmer, not a soldier. He ought to have died in his bed many years from now, with his grandchildren at his side and his cows grazing in the pasture.

"There was nothing you could have done, John."

He shook his head, rejecting that notion. But what could he say? Forgive me for living a life of dissipation while Martin marched across Spain and his family was forced to come to a charity house?

"Toby? Sally? Would you show me the new plantings you have been working on this week?" Grace stepped forward and placed a hand on the shoulder of each child, steering them toward a patch of garden several yards away. Funny, he had almost forgotten about her. She must have assumed that he and Jane had things to say in private, things that might be painful for the children to hear. She could not know that there was nothing he wanted less than to hear of Jane and Martin's life after Bettisfont. "I can see the hyssop from here," Grace said. "And smell it, too. Let's go have a look, shall we?"

"She is a very kind lady, Mrs. Marlowe is," Jane said as she watched Grace herd her children away. "A great lady. This place is all her doing, you know. I cannot imagine what would have become of us without her help."

There was a long moment of silence during which Jane watched him with a glint of expectation in her brown eyes, surely hoping he would ask about all those lost years. Dear God, how he wanted to bolt. But he supposed he should simply get it over with. Besides, if he did not ask about her life, she'd very likely ask about his.

"What happened, Jane? The last I recall, you were with Martin and his regiment."

"Yes, I followed the drum for several years. It was a good life, an interesting one. His regiment took him all over the world, you know. Sally, she was born in Ireland and Toby in Germany. But when things got rough in Portugal, Martin insisted that I take the children back to England, to keep them safe. He had a small amount of prize money and used it to secure us a one-room cottage in Kensington. It was odd being in town, or nearly so, instead of the country, but the landlord was a cousin to one of the other soldiers, and so we were able to get the cottage for a reasonable price. And he sent what he could every few months, Martin did, for food and shoes for the children. But when he died, almost two years later, there was no more money coming in, and it was up to me to support the three of us."

She sent him a look full of apology and regret, as though it had somehow been her fault that she was left alone. Rochdale said nothing — what could he say? — but the despair in her voice twisted like a knife in his gut.

"I took in laundry and sewing," she said, "but it was hard, real hard, to make do for three. The landlord turned us out when I could no longer pay the rent. I found another, smaller place for us, but work was hard to come by. Finally, we were reduced to sharing a tiny room in St. Giles, and I collected rags and unpicked clothing, but I never made enough to feed us regularly. I was worried that the children would get caught up in that world, on the streets, victim to God knows what. I became desperate, I did. Ready to ... to do anything to support my children."

Rochdale closed his eyes again and choked back a groan. She had been ready to prostitute herself for her children. Perhaps had done so. That sweet freckle-faced girl he'd once known, selling her body on the streets. Bile rose in his throat.

"And then someone told me about this place," she continued, "and how, as a war widow, I would be welcome. I thank the good Lord every day for Marlowe House, I do. I hate to think what would have become of us if we had not come here."

So did he. God. Now he truly understood what Grace was doing here. She was quite literally saving lives.

Rochdale decided in that moment to double the amount he had planned to give her. But he would not come back again to see how she spent it.

"We try not to think about those bad times, or what might have been. They teach us here to look forward to a better future, and bless me, they make it seem like it could be true."

"Do you have someplace to go when you leave here?" he asked. "Have they found potential employment for you? Something? Anything?"

"Not yet, but there are possibilities. They don't let a family leave Marlowe House until they are confident that a safe situation is settled. I've seen many families leave with excellent prospects. Our time will come."

"I ... I will find a place for you and the children, Jane." The words were out before he could stop them. What was he thinking? He had no wish to become entangled with someone from the old days. Someone to remind him of how far he'd fallen from the life he'd once known. But there were ways of doing things without getting personally involved. He could hand over the project to his man of affairs and stay out of it.

"Bettisfont is gone," he said, "but I have other interests. I will find something. I promise you."

She reached out and tentatively laid her hand upon his sleeve, then pulled it back. "John, you do not have to do that. You are not responsible for us."

"Let me do this, Jane. I owe it to Martin. To you and the children." His gaze followed the boy as he stood by Grace, obviously bored with the garden and fidgety with contained energy. He kept sneaking looks at Rochdale over his shoulder, but turned away, embarrassed, when Rochdale caught his eye. "God, looking at Toby is like seeing Martin again."

She smiled. "I know. And I'm grateful for that. I will never forget Martin's face, for I see it every day in Toby."

"I will send him to school. And Sally, too." Again, the words were out before he knew he was going to say them. It seemed he'd been so stunned by seeing Jane again, and Martin in the face of his son, that all rational thought had deserted him. He had no desire to get involved with the Fletcher family. But Rochdale was a man of means, even if most of his fortune came from gambling, and it seemed wrong not to help these people, this woman he'd known as a girl and who'd been married to his closest friend.

"I would like to see that Martin's children are taken care of," he said. "With a proper education, they will be able to find work and support themselves. Let me do this, Jane. I will make up to all of you what my father's irresponsibility put you through. Damn it all, I wish I could send you back to Bettisfont, but I never rebuilt the house or the home farms. Just the stables."

"I know."

He lifted his eyebrows in surprise. "You do?"

"Yes, of course. We kept in touch with some of the other families for a while. And since we've been back, one cannot help but hear of the exploits of the famous Lord Rochdale."

He winced. "Infamous, I should say."

"Perhaps. But seeing you here today, with Mrs. Marlowe ... does that mean you are mending your ways?" She glanced over at Grace, who was laughing with the children. "She is an angel from heaven, as far as I'm concerned. And she is very beautiful, is she not?"

"Yes, she is, but do not get the wrong impression. I have agreed to fund a new wing here, but that is the extent of it. And whatever I can do for you, of course. I am no do-gooder, Jane. Far from it. And I am afraid it is much too late for me to change my stripes. I am too deeply sunk in dissipation to crawl my way out at this stage of my life."

She frowned. "It's not at all the life I expected from you, John. When I first heard your name associated with ... a certain scandal ..."

"Serena Underwood."

"Yes. When I heard that, and then other tales, I did not believe it could be the same John Grayston I once knew. I thought you would be —"

"Yes, well, things change."

She blinked at the brittle, sharp tone of his voice, and a wary expression gathered in her dark eyes.

"People change," he continued in the same tone, hoping that look in her eye meant she understood that he wanted distance between them and not renewed friendship. "I'm no longer an idealistic young fool. But I do have money now. Quite a lot of it. And I will help you, Jane. I promise. It is the least I can do."

"Bless you, John. I cannot thank you enough."

"As soon as I have arranged something, I will send word to Mrs. Marlowe or Mrs. Chalk."

"Oh. All right. But will we see you ag—"

"Sir?" Young Toby had come running to stand beside his mother. Grace and Sally were approaching at a more ladylike pace.

Rochdale scowled at the boy, even though he was relieved at the interruption. "Yes?"

Toby swallowed hard but held his ground against Rochdale's fierce glare. His eyes were wide and wary, but with a glint of Fletcher stubbornness that was all too familiar. There was a hint of something more, too, a certain toughness of spirit that must have been forged in these last few years of hard times. Had he, too, been forced into a life on the streets before coming to Marlowe House? While his mother had picked the stitches out of old bits of clothing in order to sell the fabric, had Toby taken to picking pockets, or worse?

"Is it true you knew my papa?"

The question, and the keen anticipation in its tone, dispelled any notion of an artful street urchin. He may have lifted a watch or two in his time, but at the moment he was simply a little boy who missed his father. Rochdale's expression involuntarily softened, and though he would not realize it until much later, a tiny corner of his heart softened as well. The boy was so like Martin Fletcher that it was almost unbearable, but it was the look in his eyes that did Rochdale in.

He knelt down on his haunches in order to be at eye level with the boy. "I did indeed. I knew him when he was your age and even younger. He could be quite the little devil. Always into mischief." He reached out and tousled the boy's hair. "Just like you, I'll wager. His hair used to fall over his eyes, just like yours, too."

The boy shrugged. "I don't remember him much. I was only four when we came to England."

"Ah, but I remember him very well. He was fun and funny, full of laughter. But he was strong, too, and brave. I remember one time when one of the other children on the estate fell into a well. Your father pulled her to safety all by himself. He was a good man, your father."

Toby's eyes lit with excitement. "He pulled the girl out all by hisself?"

"He did indeed." Rochdale didn't think it worth mentioning that he and another boy held tight on to Martin's feet as they lowered him into the well. It was, after all, Martin who'd reached the girl and pulled her free.

"I figured he musta been brave," Toby said, "to go and fight old Boney and all. Do you have other stories about him, sir? Mama's told me a lot, but ... well, she's a female and you know how they are. Please, sir, could you tell me more about my papa?"

In that moment, Rochdale knew he'd been reeled in like a trout to face a past he'd sooner forget, helpless against this boy with the familiar face and devilishly plaintive eyes. "Of course, Toby. What would you like to know?"

"Would you look at that?" Jane's hand was splayed against her breast as she watched Toby and Rochdale seated side-by-side on a stone bench, heads together, the occasional burst of laughter splitting the silence of the garden. "I haven't seen him so animated since we moved from Kensington. How fortunate to have run into John ... Lord Rochdale, that is. Toby has had so few men in his life since we left the army."

Grace was confounded by what had taken place between the Fletcher family and Rochdale. He was the last person she'd have expected to be acquainted with Jane, and certainly not the type to have ever been friends with her. Jane had told her she'd grown up in the country before following the drum, and Grace's first thought when she saw that Jane knew Rochdale was that she had been one of his early conquests. It was a common enough situation — a village girl who'd been seduced by the lord of the manor's son. But it seemed Rochdale had been a friend to Jane's husband, so perhaps Grace was wrong about a seduction.

"You do know who he is, don't you, Jane? What he is, I should say, since you obviously know him. I'm not sure he's the sort of man you want in Toby's life. He has something of a reputation, you know."

Jane lifted her brows. "I do know. But he is here with you. He told me it was because of a large donation, but you wouldn't allow him here if he was so bad."