Tangled (49 page)

"I want you to divorce me, Becka," Julian said.

She stopped walking abruptly. The world began to darken at the edges of her vision.

"What?" The word was whispered.

"Divorce is allowed now," he said. "Even I know about the new law, even though I've been away. I want you to divorce me. For adultery. I can give you grounds. You know of the one infidelity, and I admitted to others yesterday. I'll give you all the grounds you need, Becka."

"No!" She was still whispering. But she found her voice. "No, Julian. I don't care what the new law says. Divorce is wrong. There should be no such thing. To me there cannot be. We married in church. We made vows before God. For better or for worse we have to remain together.''

"I could live until I'm ninety, Becka," he said. "In all that time you would never be able to admit to loving Dave, even to yourself. You would never be able to touch him again or confide in him or laugh with him or make love with him."

"You are my husband," she said.

"And you'd see the child only for a week or two here and there," he said. "He would grow up almost a stranger to you, Becka. And he would have no brothers or sisters unless Dave gets them with another woman."

She did not intend to moan, but she heard herself do it.

"I don't think he will," he said. "You are his wife, Becka, and unlike me, Dave will never be unfaithful even if it means being celibate for the next forty or fifty years."

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"Julian, don't." She was angry suddenly and turned to walk briskly onward. "There can be no question of divorce. The very idea is unthinkable."

"It is something I need too, Beck," he said, catching up to her. But she stopped walking again. "Put yourself in my shoes. I come back expecting everyone to have been waiting for me for years, expecting to find you pining away for me. And what do I find? I find that I was reported dead and that life has continued without me and really turned out rather well for everyone. I find you and Dave married and in love and parents of a child. I know I deserve it all, but the only way I can be punished is to punish everyone else. It would be punishment to me to remain married to you, Becka, because I would know I was punishing two of the three people who mean most to me in the world—you and Dave. And the third one would suffer too—Father's heart is aching for Dave. Somehow I have to start again. Perhaps I can do better than I have thus far. But first you have to divorce me."

"No." But it was an anguished protest rather than a firm denial.

How could she divorce him? She would be breaking every rule, every moral principle, every religious scruple she had ever held dear if she divorced him. If she did so, she would never be able to marry David or anyone else. For in her own mind she would never believe that her marriage was ended and her marriage vows void.

"Think about it, Becka." He took both her hands in his and squeezed them tightly. "I know you love me, darling, and you know I love you. But it's not the sort of love that should ever have led us into marriage. The best way we can show our love is to set each other free."

She shook her head slowly. "I can't, Julian," she said. "Don't talk me into it. Don't force me into it. This is not something on which I must be obedient. You are asking me to do something that is wrong. I would not be able to live with myself."

"So four lives are to be blighted," he said. "Yours, mine, Dave's, and the child's."

"Justifying something does not make it right," she said. "There is such a thing as right and wrong, Julian. It is not just what feels good or what causes least suffer-Tangled 355

ing. Certain things are wrong regardless of the good that might come out of them."

His smile was twisted as he drew her into his arms. "You precious little fool, Becka," he said. "I am trying to do something for you for a change. I am trying to do something decent in my life. Think about it. Will you promise me that? Talk to other people about it if you wish. Let's talk again tomorrow. Agreed?"

She set her hands on his shoulders and looked into his pale face."Julian," she said. "Oh, Julian, my love. My happy, charming, handsome boy. What happened?"

"I think it is called growing up, Beck," he said, grinning at her and looked suddenly once more like the Julian she remembered. "Once this is all over we will be able to look back without pain and remember all those good times."

"Or we can go on and recapture them," she said.

He kissed her firmly on the lips and hugged her to him. "Promise me you will give it some thought and not decide finally until at least tomorrow," he said.

How could she keep an open mind when there was nothing to decide? "I promise," she said.

"Good girl." He patted the sides of her waist and put her from him. "Now back to the house. And back up to the nursery with you.

Don't you get tired of frolicking with an infant all the time?''

"No," she said.

"He is a pretty little thing, I must confess," he said. "Those blue eyes alone are going to be ladykillers when he grows up. Now, tell me all about your plans for this afternoon so that we have something to talk about between here and the house.''

"We are going on a picnic," she said.

"The details, please," he said cheerfully.

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The thought of a duel at all was dreadful so long after the provocation. One of them was going to end up dead. And then there was always the possibility that Julian would simply shoot

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Scherer right at the inn and end up hanging for murder. The very thought made David break out in a sweat.

But he recognized Julian's need to go alone. And his own need to stay away. Protecting Julian, keeping him from harm, not trusting him to do the right thing when left alone were so deeply ingrained in him from childhood that it was difficult now to break the habit. And yet it was ludicrous not to. Julian was twenty-eight now and he was thirty. Neither of them, by any stretch of the imagination, could be called a boy.

And so he schooled himself to await the outcome of the confrontation and watched glumly as Julian rode off down the driveway in the direction of the village. In the meantime he had other worries. He felt uneasy about Scherer's hanging about in the neighborhood and worried about Rebecca. She was, after all, Julian's wife. And if he could not protect Julian, then he could do something about keeping an eye on Rebecca.

The trouble was that she and Louisa had gone on a picnic to the lake, taking the children with them. They had walked there and were having the food taken by wagon.

It was ridiculous to worry. They would be on Craybourne land all afternoon. Besides, it was Julian that Scherer was really after, and he knew that Julian was coming to the inn to give him any satisfaction that he might demand. But David could not help worrying. He had had too many encounters with Sir George Scherer to take anything for granted.

He could not simply invite himself on the picnic. But he would persuade his father to take a walk with him in the direction of the lake when he returned from a call he had had to make on a tenant.

He had not expected to be long. They could walk around the lake, David decided, without disturbing the women and children. He would be happier having her in his sight until he knew exactly what had come of Julian's call at the inn.

David instructed a servant to call him as soon as his father returned and then got ready for the walk. He hesitated for a long time in front of a certain chest of drawers in his dressing room before pulling one of the drawers open and withdrawing a pistol—the same one that had

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shot Julian. It was carefully wrapped and perfectly clean,but he checked it with slow deliberation and loaded it before tucking it into the waistband of his trousers.

His legs were shaking, he found as he walked away. And he was being ridiculous. But he did not put the gun back.

There was a knock on his door a few minutes later and his valet came into his dressing room. There was a message from the earl, the man explained. A boy had been sent with it. Viscount Tavistock was to join the earl with all haste at the cottage of Paul Wiggins.

"Wiggins?" David said with a frown. "He lives miles away. What on earth is my father doing there? I thought he was on his way somewhere close."

His valet was unable to give any satisfactory answer.

"And what on earth can he want with me?" David's frown deepened. "Where is the boy?"

"He left, my lord," his man said. "It was a verbal message with no answer required. But he did stress that his lordship said the matter was urgent."

"Then I had better go," David said, striding from the room. The picnic would doubtless be long over by the time they could get back home again and walk to the lake. But it was probably just as well.

Rebecca would be able to relax and enjoy the afternoon far more without him in sight.

As he readied his horse in the stables and swung into the saddle, he turned his mind to his father and the strange summons. He also felt suddenly the weight of his pistol, which he had forgotten to put back in the drawer in his haste to be on his way. He thought of handing it to a groom, but he shrugged and rode out of the stable-yard. After all, for many years, when he had been an officer of the Guards, his pistol had been almost like an extra limb.

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Sir George and Lady Scherer had taken the second room on the right at the head of the stairs, the innkeeper's wife told Julian when he made inquiries downstairs. He climbed the stairs grimly and knocked on the door. He did not know quite what to expect, but of one thing he was certain. He was not going to let Scherer play

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games with him any longer. He had slept with the man's wife four years ago and the two men had had it out then though Dave had interrupted the final act. It was time the whole thing was put to rest.

There was no answer to his knock. Julian was furious. Another move in the game. Scherer had known he was coming and had deliberately absented himself. Well, he would wait, Julian decided, until the man and his wife returned. They had obviously not gone back to London or the innkeeper's wife would have told him. Damn it all, he would wait.

But as he turned from the door, he heard a sound. A muffled sound, but nevertheless quite distinct. It was coming from inside the room. He knocked again.

"Hello," he called. "Scherer? Are you in there?"

Again the sound. Damn it, the man had left his wife behind and trussed her up. Julian thought. That was the sound—the sound of someone who could not call out because she was gagged or come to the door because she was tied up somewhere. The door was locked.

But he was down the stairs and back again with an extra key all within a minute. The innkeeper's wife had not argued when she saw his face.

It was as Julian had thought. A chair had been tied to the leg of the bed and Cynthia Scherer to the chair. She had been gagged with one of her own stockings.

"Where is he?" he asked, removing the gag before tackling the knots that bound her. "Are you hurt?"

"No," she said, licking the dryness from her lips. "Just stiff. I think he meant for you to hear me as soon as you knocked. He just wanted the timing to be to his liking. He did not want me running to warn anyone too soon.''

"Warn them of what?" he asked, chafing one of her hands and wrists as she winced.

"She is going on a picnic this afternoon, isn't she?" she said. "To the lake on the estate with her son."

"Becka?" He jumped to his feet and paled. "He is not going after Becka, is he?"

"Yes," she said, her voice dull. "And he made sure I knew it. He intends for you to go there too, Julian."

"I'm on my way," he said, dashing toward the door.

"Julian." Her voice stayed him for a moment. "He is mad. He is quite mad. Be careful. He means to kill."

"And I am furious," he said. "I suppose that makes us even, Cynth.

Perhaps I will kill him for you and set you free."

She laughed without humor, but he did not hear her. He was rushing along the upper corridor and descending the stairs two at a time. The innkeeper's wife looked up with interest as he dashed past her.

If Scherer laid one finger on Becka, Julian thought-one single finger—he was a dead man. He thought with regret of the fact that he had no weapon, but there was no time to return to the house. His hands would have to do. He would tear the man limb from limb with his bare hands if he had to.

He swung himself up into the saddle of his horse and spurred it into a gallop even before he had left the village behind him.

Rebecca and Louisa walked to the lake, taking a considerable amount of time to get there since Katie could not walk a straight line and had to explore the hidden side of every tree within twenty feet of their route. And Charles was not willing to stay in Rebecca's arms but had to go down and walk part of the distance, both of his hands stretched above his head and held firmly by his mother. And he too insisted on seeing what was behind a few of the trees.

"Ah," Louisa said when they finally reached her favorite part of the lake—the wild, overgrown end, "peace and quiet and relaxation." She helped Rebecca spread the blankets they had brought with them and sank down onto one of them.

But both women were laughing rather ruefully no less than two minutes later when they had to step in to break up a fierce quarrel between the two children.

“We were so careful to bring two almost identical rag dolls,"

Rebecca said, laughing, "and yet they have to fight over the same one.