The Secret Pearl (30 page)

He had been unfaithful to his wife only once, he had told her at one time. She had been almost inclined to believe him. She was almost inclined now to believe that she really had seen that vulnerability in his face and heard it in his voice. She wanted to deceive herself. She did not want to see their encounter as the sordid thing that it had really been.

She had allowed a married man, her employer, to take incredible liberties with her person. And the encounter had not been all one-sided. She had wanted him too.

It was from herself she had fled. But she had brought herself right inside her room, behind its locked door.

T
HE DUKE OF RIDGEWAY HAD NO IDEA IF FLEUR had gone to the music room the next morning for her early practice. He was out for a long and reckless gallop on Hannibal.

He did seriously consider not returning to the house again. There were numerous things to be done on his own land that he had somewhat neglected for the sake of the entertainment of his guests. There were crops to check on and newborn livestock to be viewed. And of course there were always tenants and laborers to talk to, to convince that he was interested in their well-being and concerned about their complaints.

Or he could ride beyond his lands. He could spend the morning with Chamberlain. He had scarcely spoken with his friend since his return from London. Visiting guests had a tendency to cut one off from one’s neighbors and usual habits.

But he resisted both temptations. There were two matters of particular importance to be dealt with at home—two equally unpleasant matters.

He came in limping and barking at his valet to get him some decent clothes so that he would not have to go to breakfast smelling like a horse.

“I just hope you didn’t punish poor Hannibal as much as you have punished yourself,” Sidney said, “or you will have some unhappy
grooms to glare at you next time you go to the stables. I’ll help you out of the horsy clothes, sir, and give you a brisk rubbing before I worry about the other clothes. Lie down.”

“Keep your infernal impudence to yourself,” his grace said. “I have no time for rubdowns.”

“If you walk around in that pain all day,” Sidney said, unperturbed, “you’ll be barking at all the servants, not only at me, sir, and they’ll all blame me for it, too, as they always do. Lie down.”

“Confound it,” the duke said, “I always treat my servants with courtesy.”

Sidney gave him a speaking glance and his grace lay down. He groaned as his man set firm hands against his aching side. And he rubbed at his left eye.

“There,” Sidney said, so much as if he were talking to soothe a child that the duke smiled despite himself. “It will feel better in a minute. Tight as a coiled spring you are, sir.”

Fleur was not in the schoolroom. She was not in the nursery either, as the duke found when he went in there. But Pamela was up and brightened at the unexpected treat of having him with her as she ate her breakfast. She fed the crusts of her toast to the puppy, who sat on the floor beside her, panting and looking hopeful. The day before, the dog had been pronounced house-safe at last and allowed indoors—under certain strict conditions.

“I thought we agreed that Tiny was not to eat food from the table,” he said. “She has her own special food, does she not?”

“But I don’t give her any of my good food, Papa,” his daughter protested. She lowered her voice. “Nanny was furious this morning. Tiny wet the bed.”

The duke closed his eyes briefly. “I thought it was also agreed that Tiny not sleep on the bed, but beside it or under it,” he said.

“But, Papa,” she said, “she was crying and pulling at the blankets with her little teeth. It would have been cruel to make her stay down.”

“One word of complaint from Nanny to your mama,” he said, “and Tiny will be back in the stables. You realize that, don’t you?”

“Nanny won’t complain,” she said. “I wiped the wet spot with my own handkerchief. And I admired Nanny’s new cap.”

The duke closed his eyes again. But Mrs. Clement was bustling over from the other side of the room.

“I wish to have a word with Miss Hamilton before morning classes begin, Nanny,” he said, getting to his feet. “You will keep Pamela here until she is sent for?”

“Certainly, your grace,” she said, curtsying. “We had a little accident with the dog last night. Did Lady Pamela tell you?”

“Yes, she did,” he said. “And I believe we have decided that it will not happen again.”

Fleur was still not in the schoolroom. He twirled the globe with agitated fingers and picked out a tune with one finger on the harpsichord. He looked at a painting of one of the follies that Pamela had made and one that Fleur herself must have painted. She was talented as a painter too, he thought, picking it up.

He set it down again when the door opened behind him, and wished that he had rehearsed some speech. He deliberately had not done so. He hated rehearsed speeches. They only tended to tongue-tie him completely. He turned to look at her.

Her lip still looked a little swollen. Shadows beneath her eyes suggested that she had not slept well. But she was prettily clothed in her green dress, and her hair was in its usual neat coil at her neck. She stood very straight, tall and slender, with pleasing feminine curves. She was easily the most beautiful woman he had ever known.

It was hard to remember the first impression he had had of her—a thin whore with lusterless hair, pale skin, heavy shadows below her eyes, and dry, cracked lips. And that limp and crumpled blue silk dress. It was hard to realize that she was the same person.

“Miss Hamilton,” he said, “I owe you an apology.”

“No,” she said, staying where she was, just inside the door. “It is unnecessary.”

“Why?” he asked.

“You told me last night,” she said, “that you were not sorry. You told me that you would apologize to me today. They would be empty words, your grace.”

He looked at her and knew that she was right. He was not sorry. At least, in one way he was not sorry. Those moments had given him another brief taste of happiness, like the minutes of their wild ride together. And he knew that, however wrong, he would live on the memory of that embrace for a long time.

“I am sorry,” he said, “for the disrespect I showed you, Miss Hamilton, and for the distress I must have caused you. And I am sorry for dishonoring my wife and my marriage. I beg that you will accept my apology.”

Her chin was high, her face very calm. She looked as she had looked when he had sat down and ordered her to remove her clothes. And she had removed them with quiet dignity, folding them neatly and laying them beside her.

Fleur!

He closed his eyes briefly. “Will you?”

She hesitated. “Yes, your grace,” she said.

Adam
, he wanted to tell her.
My name is Adam
. He wanted to hear her say it.

“I will not keep you, then,” he said, striding across the room toward her. “I will have Pamela sent to you.”

She stood to one side, away from the door. “Thank you, your grace,” she said.

Her eyes strayed downward. He was still limping, he realized. He closed the door of the schoolroom quietly behind him. That damned Sidney! Was he losing his touch? The pain in his side and leg was like a gnawing toothache. He made an effort to control his pain as he called at the nursery and bent to
kiss his daughter, and as he went downstairs to keep another appointment.

Lord Thomas Kent was already in the library, sitting with a drink in his hand despite the early hour, one booted ankle crossed over the other knee.

“That was another thing Papa used to do,” he said with a grin, holding up his glass in a salute as his brother entered the room. “Do you remember, Adam? He would have us summoned here and then keep us waiting for perhaps an hour. We dared not stand anywhere but directly in front of his desk, and we dared not move a muscle or speak to each other because we never knew the exact moment when the door would come crashing open. It was almost worse than the thrashing we knew very well would come at the end of it, wasn’t it?” He laughed.

The duke went to sit behind the very desk before which he and Thomas had quailed as children.

“Tell me,” Lord Thomas said, “are you going to bend me over the desk, Adam? And are you going to use a cane?”

“She is in love with you,” his grace said, looking at the desktop. “She always has been. She bore your child, Thomas. And must you now come back to play games with her and with me?”

“Ah,” his brother said, raising his glass to his eye. “This is not to be chastisement, is it, but a serious talking-to. How dreary. And do you still dote on her, Adam?”

“I married her,” the duke said. “She is my wife. I owe her my care and protection.”

Lord Thomas laughed. “She hates you,” he said. “You know that, don’t you?”

“Are you sleeping with her?” his grace asked, looking very directly at his brother.

“With my brother’s wife?” Lord Thomas raised his eyebrows. “You surely cannot believe me capable of such perfidy and, ah, poor taste, can you, Adam?”

“Are you?”

His brother shrugged.

“Are you in love with her?”

“A foolish question,” Lord Thomas said, getting to his feet and examining the mosaic above the mantel. “How can I be in love with my brother’s wife?”

“If you are,” the duke said, “perhaps I can begin to forgive you. Perhaps you made as much of a mistake in fleeing more than five years ago as I made in not insisting that Sybil listen to the truth. We all act hastily at times and must live forever after with the consequences. But then, nothing is written in stone either.”

His brother turned in surprise and grinned at him. “Are you offering to exchange bedchambers with me for the duration of my stay?” he said. “Very sporting of you, I must say, Adam.”

“If you truly love her as she loves you,” the duke said, ignoring his brother’s tone, “then something must be arranged.”

“You are considering a divorce?” Lord Thomas continued to grin. “Imagine the scandal, Adam. Could you live with it?”

“There can be no question of divorce,” his grace said. “I would not do that to Sybil.” He paused and drew a deep breath. “There may be the possibility of an annulment. I would have to make inquiries.”

His brother came across the room to set both hands on the desk and lean across it. He looked closely at the duke. “An annulment?” he said. “There is only one really viable ground for an annulment, is there not?”

“Yes,” the duke said.

“Am I to understand …?” The grin was back on Lord Thomas’ face. “Am I to understand that in more than five years you have never enjoyed Sybil’s favors, Adam?” He laughed. “It’s true, isn’t it? Good Lord. Did you play the part of noble lover to the end as she pined for me? Or did she reject you? You weren’t unwise enough to display your wounds to her, were you?” He laughed again.

“Do you love her?” the duke asked.

“I have always had a soft spot for Sybil,” Lord Thomas said. “She is lovelier than almost any other woman I have clapped eyes on.”

“That is not what I asked,” his brother said. “Would you marry her if you had the chance to do so?”

Lord Thomas stood up and looked down at his brother assessingly. “You would do that for her sake?” he said. “Or would it be for your own?”

“I would do it,” the duke said, “or at least inquire into the possibility of doing it, if I were convinced that Sybil would have the happiness that you and I between us have deprived her of.”

“And Pamela?” Lord Thomas said. “If there were an annulment, the world would know that Pamela is not your child.”

His grace spread his hands palm-down on the desk and looked down at them. “Yes,” he said. “Could I have your answer?”

“This is sudden.” Lord Thomas strolled back to the fireplace and resumed his examination of the mosaic lion. “I will need some time to consider.”

“Of course,” his grace said. “Take it. But as long as you are in this house under present circumstances, Thomas, Sybil is my wife and I will punish any disrespect shown her.”

“Bent over the desk with the cane on the backside after all?” Lord Thomas said. “Have you perfected the art of swishing it in the air before bringing it down on target, Adam? That used to make me almost lose control of my bladder.”

“I will expect your answer within the next week,” the duke said. “If it is no, I will expect you to leave immediately—and forever.”

“I take it I am dismissed,” Lord Thomas said, turning to look in some amusement at his brother again. “Very well, Adam, I will take myself from your presence. I believe I am being awaited for a fishing trip anyway.”

The duke continued to stare at his hands after the door had
closed behind his brother. And he was being seduced by his own bluff, he thought a few minutes later.

In his imagination he was living through the events that his words to his brother had seemed to make possible—a speedy annulment, Sybil gone, himself free. Free to explore his attraction to Fleur. He closed his eyes and clenched his hands on the desk.

It had been bluff, pure and simple. Never in a million years would Thomas agree to marry Sybil. Had he thought for one moment that Thomas would, his grace thought, then of course he would not even have made the mad suggestion that he had just made. For though such an arrangement would undoubtedly be as satisfactory to Sybil as it would be to himself, there was Pamela to consider. And Pamela must always come first, before her mother’s happiness and before his own. She was an innocent and defenseless child.