Home for the Holidays (18 page)
Read Home for the Holidays Online
Authors: Johanna Lindsey
A
LBERT WASN’T DEAD.
It took a while for Vincent to assimilate that fact. He thought hoax. He thought cruel joke. He even thought of George Ascot. After all, how better for Ascot to completely absolve himself of any wrongdoing than by imparting the information contained in the letter that was delivered to Vincent, which painted Ascot as innocent? And it was hand-delivered by a sailor. There was no proof that Albert had written the letter; even his signature could have been a copy.
That thought didn’t last long. The letter was from Albert.
The tone in it was his, impossible to duplicate without knowing him well. And references were made that Ascot couldn’t have been aware of, without seeing the first letter.
Albert wasn’t dead.
It should have been elating news and just that, instead of the incredible shock it was. But then it came with a confession that just about everything in Albert’s first letter had been lies and excuses. He placed all blame now where it belonged, on himself. No apologies, not even for giving the wrong impression about his death. Albert hadn’t realized he had done so, so he had no idea that Vincent might have picked up the gauntlet for him.
I know you were probably expecting to never hear from me again. I was rather foxed when I wrote you that farewell letter, but I do vaguely recall saying I would never be back. That hasn’t changed. I have no desire to ever return to England, where I feel so inadequate to my peers. Where I live now, everything
is
on an equal footing. Even a beggar can pick himself up by his bootstraps and start over. Which is what I’ve done.
I did think you might like to hear of my progress, in getting my life in order. And perhaps a better explanation is due, at least a sober one this time, of what brought me to complete failure.
It was so hard to compete with you, brother. You were such a bloody success. Everything you touched turned to gold. I know I shouldn’t have felt a need to compete with that, but I did, and that was where I went wrong. Success didn’t come to me quick enough, so I tried to rush it. And when that didn’t work, I turned more and more to drink, which was truly my downfall.
It got to where I didn’t know what I was doing half the time. I hired captains who were less than honest. One was rumored to have been a pirate in his younger years, but since he promised to make me rich, I ignored the rumors. I let them advise me. Everything they told me sounded reasonable; at least when I was foxed it did. But they were under the mistaken impression, which I gave them, of course, that I had an endless supply of blunt backing me. Well you might imagine how some business strategies might work in that case, where they wouldn’t otherwise.
I’m not making excuses. I’ve done that all my life, but no more. My failure was the culmination of a lot of bad decisions, all of them mine. I never should have started something that I had no experience in, and when it began to turn sour, I wallowed in self-pity and drink instead of seeking proper help. I was blaming everyone else at the time, including other shippers, because
I simply couldn’t own up to the fact that I didn’t know what I was doing. So someone else had to be the culprit, not I. Childish, I know, but at least I can recognize that now.
I left England in a panic, of course. My letter to you then might have indicated that, though I confess I don’t recall everything I said to you in it. Ironic that neither of my two ships was in port at this moment of desertion, so I stowed away on another ship—and was discovered the first day out to sea and put to work scrubbing decks. At least they didn’t boot me off the ship in the middle of the ocean.
I haven’t had a drink since I left England, nor do I want one. Being completely broke on my arrival in America, I had the choice of begging or getting a job. Pride notwithstanding—that had been completely crushed when I was on my knees swabbing decks—I found a job as a baker’s helper. Really nice chap, the baker. He’s taken me under his wing, teaching me his craft, and is even talking about expanding, now that I’ve become so adept with the ovens. I don’t mind saying my muffins are good enough to drool over.
I don’t expect to become rich here. I no longer have a burning desire to do so. I find satisfaction now in a simple day’s work and wage. Even my pride has returned, due to the praise of our customers.
I hope this letter reaches you before Christmas, and leaves you with a smile and the assurance that you no longer need to worry on my account. My gift to you is that baby brother has finally grown up. Do keep in touch, Vince. The only thing that I miss about England is you.
The letter was a nice gift, would have been even nicer if it had arrived before Christmas as intended, before Vincent confronted George Ascot with what he had thought to be the truth. He wasn’t going to make excuses for himself either. He’d been wrong in his beliefs, and wrong to seek revenge of any sort, particularly when, as Ascot had said, a little investigation would have pointed out some of the discrepancies in his brother’s false accusations.
Once more he was mired in guilt, and not just for failing his brother. Albert had managed to land on his feet and was getting on admirably with his life, while Vincent now had to deal with his own shortcomings. He had wronged an innocent family, severely wronged them, and he wasn’t sure how to make amends for that, if he even could. Returning what he had taken from them wouldn’t be enough, not to satisfy him. Nothing was going to help there, when in his rash undertaking he had ended up hurting the woman he had come to love.
Chapter Twenty-FourG
EORGE
A
SCOT WAS FINALLY FOUND
. T
WO DAYS BEFORE
the New Year arrived, he showed up at his company office in London. He even spent the night there, giving Vincent ample time to arrange around the clock surveillance so that he could be followed when he left. It also gave him the opportunity to speak privately with Ascot himself.
Apologies were owed, whether they would be accepted or not. He at least wanted to assure the man that the vendetta was over. He didn’t expect the visit to assuage his guilt. Not even complete forgiveness or understanding
would do that, when he couldn’t manage to forgive himself.
The office was locked when he arrived. He chose the earliest hour possible just after dawn, well before Ascot’s clerk was due. He was aware he might catch Ascot still sleeping, but they would at least be assured of privacy at that hour.
George hadn’t been sleeping. But he certainly wasn’t receptive to his visitor either. Having opened the door, he took one look at Vincent and began to close it again.
“A moment is all I ask,” Vincent said.
“When it’s all I can do to keep from bloodying your face, a moment is too long.”
George’s expression said he wasn’t exaggerating. He looked absolutely furious. And he was a big man. He might well be able to do considerable “bloodying” even if Vincent defended himself. Of course, Vincent’s guilt wouldn’t let him defend himself, but neither would a beating help him to get rid of it, so he would prefer discourse to violence.
“I am here to offer apologies and an explanation, though the latter is more for my benefit than yours.”
“An apology when you think me guilty? Or have you found out that I’m not the villain you took me for?”
“I set out to ruin you. An eye for a eye. I make no excuses for that, other than I really did think you indirectly responsible
in contributing to my brother’s death. But you were correct that I was lax in not verifying the facts. I have since learned the truth.”
“Not from me, you didn’t,” George said bitterly. “You refused to believe me.”
“Would you have taken the word of a stranger over that of your brother?”
“If I had such a weak-kneed brother, I just might,” George said.
It was the contempt in the tone, rather than the actual words, that caused Vincent to flush with embarrassment. “He was weak, yes, but he wasn’t known to lie. However, he was also foxed when he wrote his parting letter, doesn’t even recall much of what he said in it, and to give him his due, he didn’t suspect that I might mistake his intentions and seek revenge on his behalf.”
“Doesn’t recall? Are you saying he didn’t kill himself after all?”
“I have only just received another letter from him, a sober one this time. He has settled in America. He now takes all blame onto himself for his failure here.”
“Which leaves you having pursued vengeance against an innocent party.”
“Given the information I had, in my mind, it wasn’t fair that you would escape without any consequences at all, when you had set out to ruin a competitor and had
succeeded, perhaps more than you had planned, but succeeded nonetheless. But my original information was wrong, so yes, I have myself become the villain in this whole debacle, due to my mistaken beliefs. For this I do humbly apologize and will make amends as you see fit. I begin with these.”
“What is this?” George asked skeptically, accepting the packet of documents.
“The deed to your home, in your name, all debt satisfied. The address is also there, where your furnishings are stored. I have also set about correcting the rumors about your financial straits. Your presence again in England confirms the falseness of the original rumors. If you have any further difficulty over this matter—”
“I will see to it myself.”
“As you wish,” Vincent replied, realizing he was insulting the man in implying that he couldn’t handle the situation on his own. “I merely didn’t want you to have to be bothered correcting what I set in motion, if I have overlooked any other effects it might have had.”
“If you wish to make amends, do so by staying away from me and my family, so we can forget that you exist. What you did to me is moot, even somewhat understandable. What you did to my daughter—”
“Had nothing to do with this.”
“Do you really expect me to believe that?”
“It’s true only that had I not begun this, I wouldn’t have met Larissa. But from the moment I saw her, I was smitten beyond anything in my experience. I’ll admit I lied to myself. She was off-limits to me by normal means. I couldn’t marry her because she was your daughter, the daughter of an enemy. Yet I couldn’t not try to make her mine. So revenge became merely an excuse for me to ignore my own conscience in the matter.”
“You’re talking about an innocent child that you took advantage of!”
“I’m talking about the
woman
I love. She’s a child only in your mind, sir. And had you not returned when you did, I would have tossed all my efforts to the wind to obtain the only goal that has any meaning for me now—I would have begged her to marry me.”
George snorted his skepticism. “Convenient to say when you know she won’t have you, that she despises you for what you did to her.”
Vincent sighed. “Not convenient, merely late in the discovery. Even on Christmas eve, I hadn’t yet realized just how much I love her. I had done everything possible to keep her in my house. I lied to her, misled her, just to keep her from leaving me.”
“You
admit
that?”
“Yes. I was still convinced that marriage was out of the
question, a betrayal, as it were, to my brother. But on Christmas morning she finally demanded to know if my intentions were honorable as she’d assumed or not, and if not, she was leaving me. I knew then that revenge was meaningless in comparison to losing her. But before I could let her know that, you arrived.”
“You hardly sounded as if you had just come to that realization during our discourse.”
“My anger with you got in the way.”
“I will consider that fortunate for my family,” George replied stiffly. “Now if you are finished, Lord Everett, I don’t believe we have anything further to say.”
“Will you allow me to see your daughter? She is owed an apology as well—”
“She is owed some peace over this matter, or don’t you realize how devastated she was by your revelations. She is only just beginning to recover. Stay away from her.”
