Lord Haversham Takes Command (16 page)

Another shot rang in the air, and Mira’s momentary bliss was shattered. She lifted her head to risk a peek at the shore and saw that it was lined with men who fired upon them relentlessly, their faces illuminated by the sparking of their guns. Most of the bullets landed in the water, but a few bit into the upper prow of the dinghy with an unnerving thunk followed by a vibration Mira could feel through the soles of her feet. Contrary to her fears, Harry was an expert with the oars and he plied them with a strength and urgency she could only admire, until, at long last, it became clear no bullet could possibly reach them and the crisis was over.

Suddenly, Harry tossed down the oars, knelt in the bottom of the boat, and dragged her into his arms. “Mira, my darling Mira, how selfish I am!” he cried, his breath coming in great gasps as he attempted to fill his punished lungs with air. The waves were choppier than ever, and Mira wondered at his enormous strength that kept them both balanced on their knees in the heaving dinghy.

“I couldn’t bear to leave you, but I had my orders. Besides, it wasn’t safe —
you
weren’t safe when you were near me. And then, when you followed me onto the beach … perhaps I should have sent you off with George but when faced, once again, with the prospect of leaving you, I simply could not.”

With a start, Mira realized he expected a reply to this somewhat confusing speech, however, the moment she opened her mouth, he covered it with his own with a passion entirely new to her. She responded with an answering intensity that shook her to the core while it thrilled her to no end. This was the man she had hungered for, one who could reveal his every feeling and need with trust that she would view his transparency not as weakness, but as a strength, one which she might add to with her own with no fear of rebuff.

“Oh, Harry,” she breathed between kisses. “I thought you would never come back to me.”

“I never left you,” he murmured as he rained kisses to the top of her head. “You were all I thought of.”

“But why, Harry? You did come back, but it wasn’t
you
. I thought I should die!”

With a groan, he kissed her with lips that were soft, warm, and lingering, and that called to her in ways the demanding kisses hadn’t. In spite of the icy rain from above, she felt a glow of warmth spread from her center that radiated out to enclose her entire being with heat. She wanted nothing more than to go on this way forever, but a sliver of rationality remained, one that insisted she ask her questions whilst Harry was inclined to answer them.

“We have wasted so much time!” she professed, pummeling his chest with her fists. “Why did you not come home after Eton?”

It was too dark to read his expression, but the way he released her and slid from his knees to the bottom of the boat told her that the answer pained him. As it was impossible to stay aloft without his support, she took her seat again as well and waited for his voice to come out of the darkness.

“It was the accident, the one at Eton. I … I was torn up … destroyed, really. And Mother, well … the state I was in, I knew I shouldn’t have any patience for her. As for my father, he should have proved intolerable.”

“But I don’t understand; it was just an accident, was it not? What could they have said that would not have been a comfort?”

“My mother and father are never a comfort, no matter the occasion.” A brief break in the clouds allowed enough moonlight for her to see the bleakness in his eyes. “Besides, it was my fault,” he said in a rush, as if his resolve threatened to desert him, “my fault entirely!”

“Yours!” Mira heard herself exclaim.

“How was I to tell them?” he demanded in a voice that wavered just a little. “They would not have understood how I, their perfect son, could do anything so utterly irresponsible, so foolish, and most of all, so unheroic! It would have served them better had I died attempting to rescue poor Edwin.”

“But you did rescue him, and he was quite all right, was he not?”

“He … was not,” Harry answered, his voice breaking. “He drowned.”

“Oh, Harry, I’m so sorry!” she cried, aghast. “But you did
try
to save him.”

“Of course I did! Only … I failed. That was not the worst of it, however. He was far bigger than I — a veritable giant of a boy — none could blame me for not having the strength to pull him out of the water. Though I tried, Mira, I
did
try!”

“Of course you did!” Mira cried, stretching out her hand in the darkness to touch him in reassurance. “Of course you did!”

“It doesn’t matter though. I should never have taken him out on the water. He couldn’t swim. I knew that. I
knew
that!” He slammed his fist into the side of the boat.

“Whatever it was that went wrong, it weren’t as if you meant for him to drown. It was just an accident.”

“Edwin couldn’t swim,” he repeated with a harsh laugh, “he couldn’t row, and he outweighed me by nearly six stone. I had no right to take him out on the water. It was against the rules! It was after vespers and it was dark. God forgive me, it was so dark!”

Mira dreaded to ask but sensed that Harry would not feel absolved until he told her all. “Why
did
you go out on the water at night?”

He covered her hand on his knee with his own. It trembled a little and she felt suddenly cold. Getting to her knees, she crawled to find a place at his side and was gratified when he sighed and put his arm around her shoulders.

“There were these two young ladies,” he said in a faint voice, “the nieces of a German prince visiting at Windsor.” His head fell back against the edge of the dinghy, and Mira could feel him struggle to control the onset of dry sobs in his chest. She laid her head against his heart which brought his arms instantly around her and his head against hers. “You must believe me, Mira, when I say there was never anyone for me but you! But,” he continued after a short silence, “these girls, they were just across the Thames. One day they toured Eton, and Edwin became thoroughly besotted with one of them. Things rather took off from there.”

Mira backed her hand into the palm of his, rolled his fingers firm within her own, and pulled them tight beneath her chin. “Surely you were as besotted as he,” she prompted, surprised at how much she hurt at the question even as she wondered how she would abide the answer.

Harry reached for her other hand and drew it to his lips, kissing it with sincere fervency. “Not with her; her sister, the one with the long, red curls. She put me so much in mind of you,” he said, his voice shaking. “I missed you so much. I missed Prospero Park, your brothers, your parents. I missed being known, truly
known
, rather than treated as a chess piece on a board. In point of fact,” he said, his voice stronger now, “I was unutterably lonely, and Edwin was my only friend. When these girls managed to get a message to us, it was so unexpected and terribly clever; I never did learn how they pulled it off.”

“So it was Edwin’s idea to go out after dark and row across the Thames to Windsor Castle,” Mira supplied.

“No, it was mine. Forgive me, Mira, it was mine!”

She was astonished by how much his admission pained her. “But why? Surely you hadn’t expected to enter Windsor Castle and find these girls without being discovered!”

“We were young. We were determined. And now you know why I couldn’t come back, not to my parents and not to … not to
you
.”

Mira thought of how he must have felt, alone on the water at night, on an elicit errand, his friend drowned, his entire future hanging in the balance. “Oh, Harry,” she breathed, “however did you manage?”

“I lied,” he said matter-of-factly, “about why we were out. As for the rest, there are benefits to being a seventeen-year-old lord. The authorities made sure my dear
pere et mere
never knew the more unsavory details, and, come the end of term a fortnight later, I was advised to put as much time and distance as possible between myself and the consequences of my actions. Naturally, I did just that but, oh, how I longed for a
tete-a-tete
with your good father. I should have liked to have had his wise advice.”

“And what of me?” Mira asked in a voice faint with dread. “Did you not long to see me?”

She felt his answer as he shook his head against hers. “I couldn’t. It wasn’t a matter of wanting or not wanting — I simply couldn’t.”

Harry’s pain along with her own was almost too much to bear. Her heart felt as if it were breaking, but she knew she hadn’t the whole of it as of yet. “But, Harry, why so long? Shouldn’t a mere six months or a year have served as well?”

He drew a deep breath, as if he had been without air for quite some time, followed by a small sob as he caught her more tightly in his arms. “That?
That
is what you wish to know?” he asked, his voice full of awed disbelief. “Are you to say that you forgive me?”

“Forgive you? For what? For pulling a school-boy prank that went awry? For being lonely? For wishing to feel happy when you were so miserable? No,” she said and attempted to shake her head under the weight of his. “There is nothing to forgive in that.”

He made no response and was silent so long she began to wonder if perhaps she had said something terribly wrong. “Harry, what is it? What would you have me say?”

He drew a ragged breath, and his arms trembled as he pulled her closer. “That you regard me as more than the friend of your girlhood, or even a man who should make you a suitable husband, but as the very one essential to your happiness.”

Mira pulled back to look him in the face as fully as the fluctuating moonlight would allow. “Harry Haversham! When I stepped into this boat, I thought I would as likely drown as not. I followed you down that jagged, craggy, treacherous path in the first place so as to beg you not to leave me! How can you possibly doubt that I would rather die than be without you?”

“My dearest girl,” he breathed as he once again pulled her close. To her consternation, he began to shake; she thought perhaps it was from the cold until his tears fell hot against her icy head. “What can I have done to deserve such love?” he murmured. “But will your parents so forgive my sins? Might they, in good conscience, give you into my care? And, if not, will your love of me outlast their displeasure?”

“Yes! Oh, Harry, yes! When we return and explain it all to them, both about the accident and why you have been behaving so strangely, they will understand, if you but tell the truth. Perhaps you do not wish to tell me all your secrets but surely you might trust Papa! Let us return to Cedars this very minute, and you will see for yourself how very kind he will be.”

“No, Mira,” he said as he took her by the shoulders and turned her to face him. The storm had abated, and the clouds parted so as to reveal the gravity of his expression. “Neither of us can go back just yet. You have seen those men, seen their faces. You have the power to send them to the gallows. Should we return before they are apprehended, your life would not be worth a farthing, which is about what mine has been worth since my return to England.”

“Oh,” Mira breathed as the truth of his words bore down on her. “Those men — all this time you have been trying to stop them. But from what?”

“I am not free to tell you,” he said as he smoothed the wet hair from her brow. “For now all I can say is that I must deliver an important letter.”

Mira was reminded of what Harry had almost said back at the inn, about his being in service to the Queen. From Mira’s vantage point in the boat in the middle of the ocean, it seemed quite plausible indeed. “Of course, Harry, I will wait and promise not to pester you with any more questions pertaining to such things. But what of my family? Are they safe? What if they heard the commotion and ran outside? Will those terrible men not shoot at any who try to stop them?”

“I’m afraid there is naught we can do, Mira. We must leave their fates in George’s hands for the present.”

“George? You can’t be serious!”

“Indeed, quite serious. Did he not inform us he had alerted the authorities in order to prevent our supposed elopement? With any luck, they have long since arrived on the scene. When we have gained land, we shall seek word that it is so, and your duke will doubtless be lauded as a great hero.

“Not my duke. My Viscount Haversham!” she insisted, smiling into his eyes.

He favored her with an intent look in response, one so like the heated gaze she remembered from the drawing room at Prospero Park only a week and a lifetime ago. Without any warning, he put his hands around her waist and lifted her from the bottom of the boat to sit on the bench. Removing his jacket, he put it around her shoulders to ward off the chill air, knelt before her, and took her hands in his.

Chapter Sixteen

The moment had arrived, the one which would determine Harry’s fate for all the years to come. He had dreamed about it many times since he had departed for the Continent, even as far back as Eton, but never truly believed he deserved her enough to petition her with such a request. But now he knew she loved him —
loved
him! — just as he loved her. It was nothing short of a miracle.

“Mira,” he said, renewing his grip on her hands. “I now must ask of you my own question. I confess, I do not deserve a favorable answer, not when I have concealed the truth from you with regard to a great many things.”

“Oh, but Harry, it is not your fault!” Mira cried.

“Isn’t it? I might have chosen to come home long before I swore my allegiance to any other than you. I should have trusted in you, in your generosity, in the capacity of your enormous heart. We might have been together, at Prospero Park, while I waited on you to become of age rather than you being compelled to wait on me. I might,” he added, his voice wavering, “have given you the opportunity to be true to me, even if I have not always been entirely true to you.”

She made no reply in his defense. As her eyes grew wide and filled with tears, he felt as if the wind had been knocked out of him, yet he knew he deserved far more censure than she had offered. There was naught left to do but ask; perhaps she would be merciful.

“So,” he said, taking a deep breath. “I beg of you the answer to a question I have longed to ask every minute of every hour of every day since my return to England. Will you, Miss Miranda Crenshaw, make this wretched man happier than he deserves and agree to be my wife?”

“Yes!” she cried without a moment’s hesitation. “Oh, Harry, I thought you would never ask!”

Harry resisted the impulse to jump to his feet and whoop for joy; he would have her think about her choice before he accepted her answer. “Despite how I have wronged you?”

“It is in the past,” she said, shaking her head vehemently. “We need never speak of it again.”

“And what of the weakness of my father and the foolishness of my mother?” he pressed.

To his great surprise, Mira laughed. “I will have you know I’ve been thinking on how to sort her out ever since we arrived at Cedars. Did you realize she left your father at home so as to make a grand entrance in the arms of another man?”

“I fail to find anything promising in that speech,” he said with a moan.

“I must confess I had thought you would take her in hand. I believe you made a heroic attempt,” she rushed to assure him. “Yet I eventually concluded the matter required a woman’s mind to anticipate what would deter her from her folly.”

“Pray tell!” Harry demanded, doubtful, but amused.

“You
will
laugh at me, Harry, but I am persuaded she will prove most easily managed when we have a babe we might hold over her head. She will not dare displease us if we keep her grandchild from her. And when the novelty wears off, well … ,” she hesitated, suddenly shy, “there will be another for her to dote upon.”

“A babe,” he mused, both awed by her wisdom and humbled by her optimism. “I do believe you are correct! How utterly perspicacious of you!” he said with a squeeze to her fingers. “To claim you as mine feels like a boon too big to take in, but children … I had not thought that far, but, yes, a babe will do very nicely and the sooner the better!”

Despite the fickle moonlight, he fancied her cheeks burned under his ardent gaze and he marveled yet again that she would find it in her heart to love him. It made it so much more difficult to ask his next question. “What of your parents’ objections? They will suffer much when you don’t return. They might be less inclined to look favorably upon me when they learn what has happened.”

Mira’s smile vanished and she lowered her eyes. “Yes, it is as you say. But they shall eventually see that it is for the best as there are bound to be rumors. Who knows when we shall be free to return, and there will be those who say we have run off together. There will also be others, perhaps George and his mother, who will claim you were forced to marry me against your will.”

She withdrew her hands from his and placed them on either side of his face. “If you have only offered for me out of duty, you must pick up those oars and take me to shore this very instant for I would rather be shot dead by that traitorous butler than make you unhappy.”

“Mira, my love, I wished to wring your neck when you ran onto that beach; I wanted you safe, out of harm’s way. But now I must confess that you were the wiser of us two. It doesn’t matter to me if we marry in haste or at leisure, at home or abroad, as long as I am in no danger of losing you, I have nothing of which to complain.”

“Well, now that we are agreed on that score,” Mira said brightly, “what can be done about the fact that we are far from shore in a dinghy, wet, cold, hungry, and tired?”

“Never fear,” he said with a smile of delight, that, try as he might, he could not hold back. “You must merely turn about.”

Mira looked doubtful but turned around to fill her vision with what Harry could already see: a man in military dress stood at the prow of a large ship, holding aloft the only onboard point of light as it slipped towards them through the misty night.

“Is that for us?” Mira asked in suitable awe.

“Yes, indeed. What do you think?”

“I think it marvelous! Where are we going?”

“Wherever you wish as long as it is outside of England. At least for the present,” he said, his foolish grin growing wider and wider every moment. He could hardly believe his life was headed in exactly the direction he desired most, in spite of all that might have happened to prevent it.

“It doesn’t matter to me where,” Mira urged. “As long as we can get a message to Mama and Papa assuring them of my safety, I am most happy to follow you anywhere — but only as your wife. How long before we may be married?”

Harry looked into her eager face and felt his heart turn over. “Just as soon as we have landed somewhere safe, notified your parents, procured a license, and acquired suitable attire in which to be wed,” he outlined. “Is that soon enough for you?” he gently chided.

“I suppose it will have to do,” she said with a tiny frown. “Though I am persuaded the captain of that ship might marry us in a trice.”

Harry thought it a brilliant notion and was surprised to hear himself object. “Mira, you can’t mean it. If we wait, your parents should be able to join us. You wish them to attend your wedding, do you not?”

“It is not my mama and papa who concern me. If only you knew what your mother has planned for your wedding day, you would quake in your boots! It is best you marry me this very night. What say you to that, Harry Haversham?”

“I say, I could kiss you!” Harry cried, words being the furthest thing from his mind.

Mira glanced back at the ship as it tacked steadily closer. “How long before they catch up to us?” she asked.

“Long enough for as many kisses as you wish,” Harry murmured, his lips already in her hair and poised for travel.

“Oh, Harry, you
have
come back to me,” she sighed as she melted into his arms and surrendered to his advance.