Highest Stakes (60 page)

E eeeeeeeeeeh!" As Beatrix pushed for the last time, the shriek echoed thru the manor. Her birth pains had commenced with the advent of the full moon, just as the midwife predicted. After twelve hours of exhaustive labor, her final effort brought forth the firstborn of Lord and Lady Uxeter.

  "It be done now, my lady!" the midwife exclaimed, attending to the umbilical cord still attaching the babe to its mother. Lady Felicia rose from the bedside where she mopped her daughter's brow.

  "Out with it!" she demanded of the midwife. "Is all well?"

  The gray-haired woman flipped the babe upside down to clear its airway. Another shriek followed the action, and the babe's cry rang through the manor, mimicking that of its mother.

  "Aye, ma'am. All is as it should be," the midwife replied, wiping her bloodstained hands on her apron. She had barely swaddled the babe before the impatient grandmother snatched it from her hands.

  "Trixie! You have done it, my girl!" Her mother beamed. "Such blue eyes, he has! Take a look at your son, the future Earl of Hastings." She carried the shrieking infant to its bewildered mother.

  "Madam," the midwife began anxiously, interrupted by Lady Felicia before she could speak her piece. "Don't just stand there, woman! We must send immediate word to his lordship, the earl, and dispatch a messenger to Westminster to alert the proud papa!"

  "But, madam, you must—"

  "Get you hence, Mrs. Lambe! Inform his lordship that the heir is born at last!"

  "But, madam, my Lord Uxeter must be informed—" she said with great distress.

  "Indeed, Lord Uxeter must be informed without delay! Mrs. Lambe, do you attend me? Why are you standing there wringing your hands? Off with you!"

  "Aye, madam. Just as you say, madam." The harried woman left the birthing chamber.

  "Beatrix, is there aught you require?" Charlotte inquired of her cousin, leaving Lady Felicia to coo over her wailing grandchild.

  "Can't you stop its confounded wailing, Mama?" Beatrix wailed.

  "Perhaps the babe is hungry?" Charlotte suggested.

  Lady Felicia handed the vociferous infant to its mother, who looked at it askance. "What do you expect me to do with it?" Beatrix asked.

  "Why, you must put the babe to nurse at your breast, of course," her mother patiently explained.

  "Put it to my breast?" she cried in horror. "If it need nurse, then send for a wet nurse at once, Mama!"

  "But my dearest, you are the babe's mother."

  "Do you know nothing of better society, Mama? No woman of fashion would think to do such thing. I am a viscountess now and must not subject either my husband or myself to ridicule by putting a babe to my breast as if I were a common shepherd's wife. I must have a wet nurse!"

  "'Twas not the way in my day," Lady Felicia protested. "You and Charles were both upon my teat until your third year, and none the worse for it!"

  "Perhaps if you just hold the child?" Charlotte advised. "The babe will surely be comforted in its mother's loving arms."

  "Comfort! 'Tis I in need of comfort! Do you know what I have been through in squeezing this
thing
out of my body? I am exhausted, and my nerves are shattered. How shall I ever sleep with that incessant wailing? Take it away from me!"

  "Shall I inquire about the wet nurse, Lady Felicia?" Charlotte offered.

  "I shall see to it without delay, Charlotte," her aunt replied. "Perhaps you would be so kind as to hold the babe while I attend to the matter?"

  "Certainly, Aunt."

  With a questioning look to her daughter, she handed the crying infant to Charlotte, who held the babe, rocking it close to her breast. Almost instantly, the protests ceased, and the babe relaxed into slumber. Lady Felicia departed, greatly relieved.

  "Thank God for peace at last! You have no idea what I have suffered for that brat, Charlotte!" Beatrix bemoaned.

  "I confess I have little understanding."

  "It all began with the most excruciating pains. 'Twas unbearable. I thought I should die! I shall
never
bear another child. I swear it!"

  "The pain is yet new to you, but in regard to what it ultimately wrought, surely in time, you shall forget. 'Tis a beautiful babe. You should be proud," Charlotte remarked, wistfully gazing at the sleeping child.

  "Is it truly? Beautiful, that is," Beatrix asked. "It appeared like a shriveled little prune to me."

  "Nay, 'tis a lovely child."

  "Mayhap I hadn't a good look at it, then. Bring it to me, Charlotte."

  Pleased to have persuaded her cousin, Charlotte rose cautiously from her chair and brought the baby back to its mother.

  "It looks like a bundle of rags swaddled so. Pray unwrap it so I can have a proper look."

  "Do you think it a good idea? The room is rather chill."

  "I want only a quick look at the thing. I am its mother, after all," she remarked churlishly.

  Charlotte carefully laid the bundle on its mother's lap, where they proceeded to unswaddle it, slowly freeing the tiny arms, revealing chest, torso, and… Beatrix and Charlotte simultaneously gasped.

  "'Tis not a son at all! 'Tis a girl!"

Arriving alone at his family estate, Lord Uxeter stifled his repugnance for the part he must now play—proud papa to his brother's bastard. Proceeding directly to his wife's apartments, he knocked only once and entered without waiting for reply. His mother-in-law met him in the outer chamber.

  "Lord Uxeter!" she gushed. "We have awaited your arrival so expectantly. Beatrix shall be delighted to receive you."

  "Indeed?" His reply was frosty. "Then I trust my wife is well, madam?"

  "Our poor Beatrix is much in need of a husband's comfort after such an ordeal."

  "Ordeal?" His expression noted alarm. "Has she lost the child?"

  "Indeed not, my lord!" Lady Felicia beamed. "Our little Beatrix has born you a beautiful, healthy child!"

  Edmund metaphorically felt the weight of the world, or more accurately, the weight of the earldom, tumble from his shoulders. He had achieved his inheritance at long last. He even found it within himself to smile at his mother-in-law and exhibit a modicum of concern.

"Might I inquire then after the health of the mother?" he prompted.

  "They are both quite well," she assured, "but 'twas very trying, you know. Beatrix has always maintained such a delicate constitution."

  He had no interest in the details. "Where might I find the child, Lady Felicia?"

  "The babe is in the nursery with the wet nurse, my lord. Though we did no such like in my day. Regardless of what the nobility does, I maintain that a babe should suckle at its own mother's bosom. Anything aught is unnatural, if you ask me!" she insisted indignantly.

  "Then it was well advised you were not asked. Now, pray direct me to my son."

Edmund came from the nursery ashen-faced. He had made a farce of his life to guarantee his inheritance, and now the worthless cow had failed him! His first impulse had been to throttle the useless life out of her.

  Edmund burned with injustice. What right had that damnable tyrant to manipulate his life by forcing him into this marriage in the first place? He was the firstborn. The title and estates were rightfully his!

  "You think me unreasonable and my wrath unjustified, you insolent whelp?" the earl had retorted. "The marriage itself was illconceived, and now this negligence!"

  "I have taken a wife, as you wished, and she has born a healthy child," Edmund protested. "Were not your own parents blessed with daughters, my lord, before the ultimate arrival of a son?"

  "You lead me to believe you would breed an entire pack of brats, Edmund?"

  "If it is required to produce a male heir, my lord, but I am assured that the next will be a son."

  "It shall be required of you to get her again with child. Your time runs out, Edmund. Perhaps it is time I sent for Philip?"

  Edmund left the earl's chamber, agonized and unbalanced by his conflagration of emotions, bitterly resentful of his father, filled with jealousy and loathing for his brother, contemptuous and scornful of his wife, and frustrated with unrequited desire for Charles Wallace.

T h
e firstborn of Lord and Lady Uxeter, Anna Sophie Drake, was christened on a rainy and chill October day in the Hastings's family chapel, with few attending to celebrate the birth. The child's maternal grandfather, Sir Garfield Wallace, had come down from London for the joyous occasion, but notably absent was the Earl of Hastings.

  Grimly going through the motions, Lord Uxeter distastefully held the screeching infant, impatiently handing it off the instant the sacraments were completed. Beatrix, determined to play the doting mother, at least whilst in company, received the babe with smiles and coos. As the godmother, Charlotte looked anxiously on, wondering what the poor child's future would hold.

  Returning to the great house, the family dispersed, the women taking the babe to the nursery while Lord Uxeter and Sir Garfield retired to the library. Sir Garfield helped himself to a brandy and raised his glass cheerfully. "Congratulations, m'boy, on the first of the brood!" Sir Garfield waited expectantly. He cleared his throat and prompted again, "A toast to little Sophie, Lord Uxeter."

  "The devil you say!" Edmund replied contemptuously. "The earl requires a
male
heir." He snatched the bottle and filled his glass.

  "'Tis not the end of the world," his father-in-law consoled. "Beatrix was our firstborn, and is to this day the apple of my eye. Charles came along soon enough, and I must say, I appreciated the boy all the more for his late arrival." He paused with a frown. "Speaking of Charles, I wonder what the blazes has held him up? Indeed, I had thought he travelled down here with you. He left a note to that effect. 'Tis strange indeed for him to miss the christening. Most unlike Charles."

  "Perhaps he had intended to depart London with me, Sir Garfield, but I quit the city in such haste that we must have missed one another in passing. Pity. I should have much enjoyed his company." He took a long drink of his brandy.

  "Even so, he surely should have arrived long since," Sir Garfield repeated. "I begin to fear he was beset by highwaymen."

  "He is a young man, and young men are easily distracted. No doubt some harmless diversion has delayed him, but if it lessens your apprehension, I shall send an express to inquire whether he remains in London."