My Surrender (14 page)

Culholland Square, Mayfair
July 28, 1806

“M
A’AM?”
Lizette’s head popped around the bedroom door. Caught in yet another reverie where Dand kissed her in between bouts of declaring himself her devoted slave, Charlotte guiltily dropped the yellow rosebud she’d idly been twirling between her fingers and swung around.

“Yes, Lizette?” Charlotte said.

“Lady Welton is downstairs and would like a few moments of your time.”

“Lady Welton?” Charlotte repeated with pleasure. It had been days since she had heard from her onetime benefactress. She had begun to worry that something was amiss in the Welton household and decided that one of the boys must be cutting up rough or perhaps Maggie had decided to return early from her trip abroad with her new husband. “By all means, show her into the front parlor and offer her some refreshment. Tell her I shall be down directly.”

With delighted anticipation, Charlotte brushed her short curls and threaded a ribbon around her throat before hurrying downstairs. She entered the room with her hands held out in welcome. “Lady Welton! How wonderful to see you!”

The older woman, dressed in a notably subdued fashion, rose and awkwardly took Charlotte’s outstretched hands in hers, squeezing tightly as her gaze swept Charlotte from the top of her well-coiffed head to the dainty kidskin slippers peeping from beneath the hem of her white Swiss-dotted gown.

“You don’t look like a soiled dove,” Lady Welton blurted out.

“A what?” Charlotte’s pleasure vanished. She shouldn’t be surprised. Indeed, she should have realized that no outrage committed by a Welton offspring could have accounted for Lady Welton’s long absence. Perhaps, somewhere deep within, she had.

Now, Lady Welton’s gaze darted anxiously about the room as if looking for some sign of an ongoing bacchanal. Then, with a fastidiousness Charlotte had never before witnessed, she perched her rounded little rump gingerly on the edge of the divan and surveyed Charlotte with a mixture of mystification and sorrow.

“You know, Lottie. A…Woman of Easy Virtue.”

If this hadn’t been so obviously distressful for her former benefactress, Charlotte might have laughed. Thank God, Lizette arrived at that moment with a tray. She arranged the decanter of iced lemonade and glasses on the table before Charlotte, bobbed a curtsy, and left. Gratefully, Charlotte took the moments provided to prepare for this interview. If Lady Welton’s opening salvo was any indication, this meeting could only prove a most painful one.

Baroness Welton had come for a purpose. Just what that purpose was remained to be seen, but already Charlotte suspected it boded little good for the girl who’d once been sheltered in the Welton home. But for the creature she and Dand Ross had created, a budding Cyprian who would enter St. Lyon’s castle and steal a volatile missive, it would doubtless amount to a victory. She must cling to that.

It really was too bad her heart would not allow her to enjoy her triumph.

“What does a Woman of Easy Virtue look like?” she asked, pouring out the bittersweet liquid.

Lady Welton, forgetting for a moment her discomfort, squinted thoughtfully. “Abandoned. Blowsy. Feverish and…unpleasantly hungry.”

“Good Lord!” Charlotte murmured, a little repelled. “Well, perhaps I am made of a different metal?”

“I hope not,” Lady Welton answered.

Charlotte regarded her in surprise. “Why is that?”

“Because the alternative is that you have not entered into this improper liaison because of passion but because of…money.” Lady Welton said the last word as if it fouled her mouth.

“Those are my only choices?” She tried to sound offhand, but Lady Welton, the misery clear in her blue eyes, was far too dear for Charlotte to fully disguise her own distress.

“No.” Lady Welton held out her hand and at once, without considering that a hard-hearted trollop would ignore such a gesture, Charlotte reached out and took it. Lady Welton’s hand trembled.

“I understand you, Lottie,” she said. “I know you. You are so like me, unwilling to let the ponderous pronouncements of Society tell you what to do or who to know or how to act. I know you are high-spirited and flirtatious and perhaps a little too often at the mercy of your impulses.”

Impulsive.
How little this dear woman understood her. Everything she did sprang from a focused and predetermined plan. Everything except her reaction to Dand Ross. She was the least impulsive woman she knew.

“I know how a young man can turn one’s head and make any sacrifice seem worth a few minutes in”—she swallowed—“his embrace. Especially if he is handsome. Especially if he exerts…untoward pressure in gaining a hold over you.”

Dear God, Charlotte realized, Lady Welton was asking if Dand had seduced her against her will!

“Lady Welton, I am not—”

Lady Welton’s hand darted up and covered Charlotte’s lips, silencing her. “Please, Charlotte.
Think.

“You have only to tell me you are not willingly adopting this…life, that you regret your situation, and I shall find a way to make this right. Welton, for all his havey-cavey ways, is not without influence and I shall do everything in my power to see that you…do not suffer overmuch from this…misstep.”

Slowly, she lowered her hand, covering Charlotte’s and squeezing tightly. “Please.” She was desperate for reassurance, so wounded. So betrayed. “I do not know how to explain to Maggie. I do not know what to say to Welton. Please. We love you, Lottie.”

Pain swept through Charlotte, shaking her to the core. She could not speak. She had accepted that there would be distress and anguish she must bear, had never fooled herself that her life after this venture was ended would ever be anything but difficult. And she had, of course, considered her sisters’ unhappiness, telling herself that whatever hurt they endured would be assuaged with time and their husbands’ love and support.

But she had never appreciated that what she was doing would so profoundly affect those others who loved her, admirers and schoolmates and friends. Certainly she must count Lady Welton amongst them.

How could she hurt so many? How could she hurt Lady Welton, who had never shown her anything but kindness, who had sheltered her and cosseted her, treating her like a daughter of the house rather than the penniless hanger-on that she knew herself to have been?

What choice did she have?

“I am sorry, Lady Welton,” she managed, her lips rigid with her determination to keep her smile in place. “But I am quite satisfied with my present situation.”

Lady Welton’s hand fell away. “I do not believe it. You…you cannot understand what this means, child. You will be an outcast. You
are
an outcast.”

Charlotte forced a lilt to her voice. “There
are
societies besides the ton.”

Lady Welton shook her head. “No, my dear. Not for you there aren’t.

“Do not fool yourself by telling yourself such lies. You were raised amongst a certain set. You were raised to a certain manner, to have certain expectations of your life and your future.

“You are used to being lauded and courted and celebrated. To going wherever you wish with the certainty that you will be welcomed when you arrive. To meeting people who do not turn from you on the streets, but greet you with admiration and affection. To dining with friends who want nothing of you save your company.

“Charlotte, we have always been blunt, you and I. I will be blunt now. Is
this
woman, this Mrs. Mulgrew, the sort of person with whom you wish to spend the remainder of your years? Are you content with the company she represents, the women she knows who must, because of their circumstances, always stand aside for their betters? Do you want to spend every moment henceforth knowing that you are being assessed like a piece of cattle by disreputable and dissolute men?”

Charlotte turned her head, afraid that she would break down in tears and Lady Welton would misread her distress and send for the militia to wrest her from Dand’s evil clutches.

“Lud, Lady Welton,” she managed in a rush, “you seem to know an inordinate amount about the life of a lady bird.”

The earnest light abruptly died in Lady Welton’s expression, leaving her looking suddenly fragile and injured. “You are being deliberately hurtful,” she said softly. “I would not have thought you capable of such. Indeed, I do not know you.”

Charlotte looked up, chin high. She had not played the role of self-involved bon vivant for so many years only to have her skills fail her at the first inconvenient stab of conscience.

“I daresay,” she said carelessly. “And I suspect that is really the reason for this visit, is it not?”

“What?” Lady Welton asked, confused.

“So that you might tell me directly that you can no longer know me,” Charlotte said. “Most decent of you. Most honorable. Pray, consider yourself to have fulfilled whatever obligation you feel you have toward me.”

“That is unfair.” Lady Welton’s hands twisted in her lap, her expression as wounded as that of a lapdog that had been kicked.

“It is,” Charlotte agreed before she could stop herself. “But you know you really have no choice but to agree with my assessment, don’t you? You
can
no longer know me,” Charlotte said in a far softer, gentler voice than she’d intended. “I understand.”

Tears welled up in Lady Welton’s eyes. Tears of sorrow. But also relief. “I wish there was some other way. I wish—”

The door to the morning room swung open and Dand, immaculate in Ram Munro’s purloined garments, stood in the doorway, his gaze possessive and protective. A lie. Everything about this whole sordid or-deal was a lie. His ardency, her lost virtue, their relationship, his past—even down to his damn clothing. She returned his gaze knowing she was not doing a good job of masking her misery. She bit her trembling lip.

His gaze narrowed, tautness hardening his features and then he was coming into the room, straight toward where Lady Welton sat dabbing at her eyes with the handkerchief she always kept tucked in her bodice.

“Lottie, me love,” he said with a devilish grin. “You didn’t tell me we had company!”

He
couldn’t
expect her to introduce him to Lady Welton. It would be the highest insult to the poor woman. Charlotte would not do it. She wouldn’t!

As though scalded by his words and afraid that Charlotte, or at least this alien creature she’d once known as Charlotte, would do just that, Lady Welton stumbled to her feet. Then, head held high, tears streaming unchecked down her powdered cheeks, she chugged wordlessly past Dand and disappeared into the hall. A moment later they heard the front door shut.

Charlotte tried. She tried as hard as she could to find her easy cavalier manner, the trick of insincerity and casualness. She looked up, lifting one brow as she gazed into Dand’s tanned, angular face.

“Well, that went rather well, I thought,” she said.

And then he was pulling her up and into his arms, holding her close, his hand cradling her head against his broad shoulder.

And she broke down and wept.

Jermyn Street, Piccadilly
July 30, 1806

T
WO DAYS LATER,
Ginny looked up from leafing through the fashion magazines piled around her divan and upon seeing her young friend, at once put aside her contraband editions of
La Belle Assemblée.
Charlotte looked unwell.

Though she lacked the classic beauty of her sisters, Charlotte had always possessed something more, a vivacity and élan that invested her countenance with an irresistible appeal. But that animation was missing now. Violet shadows encircled her gold-flecked eyes and strain made her mouth pale and vulnerable.

With a sense of foreboding, Ginny closed the magazine on her lap, dispensing with the customary greeting and saying instead, “What is wrong, Charlotte? Where is Mr. Ross?”

Had the blackguard finally introduced Charlotte to the ways of the flesh and proved to be an ill-suited guide for that first expedition? Had he been unkind? Ungentle? Anger hummed through Ginny’s veins.

“He is otherwise occupied.”

Ginny studied Charlotte closely. No.
That
was not the problem. His name would have awakened much more of a reaction had it been. She cleared a space beside her and motioned for Charlotte to sit. With a wan smile, Charlotte complied.

“Tell me what has you looking so dour, my dear. Is it that you fear for this enterprise because of my blunt words last week? You don’t hold my harsh tone and ill-chosen words against me, my dear?” Ginny entreated. “I was thinking only of what was best for our enterprise.”

She had not quite realized how much she valued Charlotte’s company—the companionship of a woman of her own class, with an education similar to hers, who has seen things and known people she had once seen and known.

“Besides,” she went on brightly, “perhaps my words facilitated a needed impetus, for in the last few days you have pulled this masquerade off marvelously well, Lottie.

“Though I must admit to my own small part in that,” she dimpled. “A few coins in the palm of your well-paid staff convinced them to be far more forthcoming in spreading word of the goings-on in your love nest. All of Society is abuzz with talk of your indiscretions.”

Indiscretions.
The word came out flat.

“Yes,” Ginny hurried on. “Society can speak of little else.”

“My indiscretions are a triumph, in fact.”

“Yes.” With a frown, Ginny reached for the china pot sitting on the table beside her. “Let me pour you a cup of chocolate. You look undone, my darling.”

Charlotte did not reply.

“What brings you here?”

“I came because I want to know some things. I
need
to know some things.”

Calmly, Ginny poured out a stream of steaming dark liquid into one of the exquisite little porcelain cups. “Of course. What is it you want to know, Lottie? What has you so at sixes and sevens?”

Charlotte fixed Ginny with a direct gaze. “Was it hard on your family?”

The stream of chocolate stopped. “Was what hard on my family?”

“When they realized the lifestyle you had adopted. What was their reaction?”

Ah. So that was what this was about. Pity tugged at Ginny’s well-armored heart. Well, she supposed she ought to have expected this. A thing was so much easier done in conjecture than reality. But it was far too late to go back now. All she could offer this ridiculous, gallant innocent were some lies to soothe the transition from Diamond of the First Water to Pariah of the Highest Order.

“I don’t have much family to speak of. A younger sister,” who hadn’t spoken to her in a decade, “an uncle,” likewise, “and a few cousins here and there. They were not pleased, but eventually they learned to accept that over which they had no control.” By cutting off all but the barest contact with her.

She finished pouring the chocolate, hoping Charlotte did not notice the deliberation with which she did so while she searched for the right things to say. “The aristocracy is well used to scandal, Lottie. You will be a nine-day wonder. Everyone will be agog only until the next bumble broth catches their attention.”

“So as soon as another’s ruin is effected, I shall be forgotten.” Charlotte’s tone was dry.

Perhaps she owed the girl the truth. “Forgotten but never forgiven.

“Some of your family, depending on the degree of affection they hold for you, will do what they can to ease your way. But for their children’s sake, they will not be able to publicly receive you in their homes. At least those in town.”

A tremble shook Charlotte’s slender figure, but her gaze remained steady, her voice calm as she said, “I see.”

“If you find yourself a powerful enough lover, and an ardent one, he might force your company upon his acquaintances—his male acquaintances. And some of their wives might be pressed into receiving you at some of the less elite gatherings. But by and large, you will forever be outside of the circle in which you once moved.”

Ginny half expected anger, tears, a messy scene of reproach and accusation. Charlotte surprised her. Though she grew pale, she only nodded. “Thank you for your candor.”

Charlotte’s calm acceptance made Ginny feel small and guilty. They were feelings she loathed and thus instinctively struck out against. “I suppose you do not feel you were adequately warned,” she said shortly.

Charlotte’s smile broke Ginny’s heart. “You are wrong.”

Ginny closed her eyes, hating the emotions she had long thought herself rid of—self-recriminations and guilt. They bubbled up within her, unchecked and undeniable, forcing her to consider what she, in her ambition and determination to do what she deemed right, had done. What right had she ever had to embroil this…this girl in her world, condemning Charlotte to her own fate?

“There is an alternative,” she heard herself say. “You can leave London. But you would have to do so at once.

“You can go to your brother-in-law, the marquis. You will never again enjoy the prestige and admiration you once did, but you might recover some portion of it. Even the most straightlaced matron might be made to accept that you made an error, a youthful peccadillo, if you are seen to adequately—and publicly—regret it by hiding yourself away on the marquis’s country estate for a few years. In time, you might return to Society.”

Ginny could not tell if the girl heard her. She looked faraway, gazing into a future Ginny could only imagine.

“I love my sisters,” she murmured. “I have dear friends who my actions have put in untenable positions.”

“I know.”

“I dislike having them suffer on my account, because of the affection they bear me.”

“I understand.”

Charlotte shook her head, as if trying to clear her thoughts. She bit her lip and passed a trembling hand wearily over her face. “I do not know,” she whispered to herself. “I do not know.”

Ginny reached out and gently touched her arm.

With a tired smile, Charlotte stood up, her chocolate cooling untouched in its porcelain cup. “Thank you, Ginny. I must go.”

“But,” Ginny asked, “what will you do?”

“Yet another thing that I do not know,” she answered quietly and without another word left.

She had never assumed taking Ginny’s place as St. Lyon’s mistress would be easy, but she hadn’t realized it would cost so much. And, fool that she was, she had never fully appreciated that it wasn’t just her and her sisters who would have to pay the price.

No one, least of all she, had bothered to ask whether others were willing to pay the price required for her to become publicly disgraced. No, she had kept that choice for herself. The knowledge had haunted her since Lady Welton’s visit, plunging her into an abyss of doubt and self-recrimination. She hadn’t left her room in two days, pleading a headache as she tried to navigate her way to an answer. Finally, desperately, she had sought Ginny’s advice. The courtesan’s answer only left Charlotte wondering whether she had the right to continue on with her masquerade or the right to refuse the alternative Ginny had suggested. She still did not know.

She pulled off her gloves, setting them beside the silver slaver that had once held a dozen invitations a day but now held but a single letter. Sightlessly, she picked it up and carried it to the morning room, her mind on the day at the abbey two years ago when she had embarked on her exciting career.

It had seemed so noble then, so glorious, a great masquerade for the good of England undertaken in her father’s memory. What would he say if he knew what she had become…at least, what the world thought she had become? Would he be proud if he knew the reasons for her actions? Or would he only be amazed and dismayed?

Had she done only what her wild heart had wanted? Were her motives dross or fine? And most importantly, did her motives matter?

She entered the morning room, dropping her shawl on a chair as she passed. Distracted, she picked up the ivory letter opener and slit the wax seal from the envelope. Without much interest, she opened the letter. Upon seeing that it was from Kate, her heart lurched.

She read:

Carefully, Charlotte folded the letter, calm returning to her for the first time since Lady Welton’s visit two days ago.

“Miss Nash? Can I get you anything?”

Charlotte looked up to find Lizette standing in the doorway, regarding her with a worried expression. It was an expression she had grown used to in the past forty-eight hours, hours when she had declined Dand’s company and every suggestion that they go out and set Society’s tongues wagging faster still. Hours when she had shut herself away—uncertain what she would tell him when he demanded to know what was wrong.

Well, she would soon ease Lizette’s mind. And Dand’s. She was done with hand-wringing and second-guessing her course of action. Kate’s letter had reminded her that she was in the unique position to do something other than
pray
for an end to this war.

“Yes, Lizette,” she said with a smile. “You can set out my gold tissue dress. I am going out this evening. And when Monsieur Rousse returns, you must inform him that we have a play to attend tonight and that I insist he be present for the curtain fall on the first act.”

Lizette’s pert features bloomed into a smile at the saucy tone Charlotte employed. “Yes, ma’am!” she said, bobbing a curtsy.