The Wild Baron (Baron 1)

“It is difficult.” Rohan couldn’t remember seeing George shave himself. He’d had little to shave. But he had evidently stayed in this house, had bathed in this house, had shaved in this house.

“I wish God would give me one. Did you know that my papa went to heaven?” All this was said matter-of-factly. Marianne then stuck her fingers back into her mouth and began to suck vigorously.

“I have no likeness of George, except that charcoal sketch I made of him two years ago. Marianne will forget what he looked like soon.”

“That isn’t true. The sketch is fine. She won’t forget.”

She shrugged. “I am but an amateur. It isn’t good enough. There’s no hope for it. She will forget.”

“No, she won’t.” The words were there, spoken, out of his mouth, hanging there stark in the air between them.

She said calmly, with a good deal of composure even as she lightly bounced the little girl up and down in her arms, “There is nothing for you here, my lord. Very well, it’s true that she is George’s daughter. You already guessed that. Her likeness to him is very pronounced, but surely that means little or nothing to you. She isn’t a boy. She can’t be important to you in any way.”

“When will she be four?”

“In November, the fourth of November.”

“You didn’t tell me why you didn’t come to George’s funeral, just said some nonsense about how you couldn’t. You could have come. No one would have known who you were.”

So he wanted the truth. So be it. “There wasn’t enough money for me to come. Don’t give me that supercilious sneer. I’m not pleading or begging or trying to make you feel sorry for us. We go on wonderfully well. It is only my father who occasionally loses his sense and thus his money. He is a gambler, and that is probably what he is doing right now. Gambling. It was just that at that particular time there just wasn’t enough money. The vicar—he was good enough to come and we prayed for George here.” She stopped speaking then, just held the little girl tightly against her, her head bowed.

Gently, he lifted her chin with his fingers. Tears were streaming down her face.

“At least George knew his daughter for more than two years.”

“Yes.”

“Didn’t George know his daughter?”

“Of course, but he couldn’t be here often. He was studying so very hard at Oxford.”

But wouldn’t George have been just as content studying his maps and his Latin and his history books here? Evidently not. Why hadn’t George told him about her and his daughter? It made no sense.

And then, of course, he understood.

“What last name does she carry?”

The tears dried up and the back stiffened. The little girl stirred, aware of her mother’s distress.

He watched her soothe the child, lifting her over her shoulder and lightly patting her back. She sobbed twice, three times, then heaved a deep sigh. He smiled, unable not to.

Finally, she laid the little girl back onto her bed, covered her, waited a few more minutes to make sure she slept, then motioned him away.

At the head of the stairs, he said again, “What last name does she carry?”

“Her last name is Carrington,” she said, and walked ahead of him down the stairs.

She turned at the bottom of the stairs. “George and I were married in October of 1806, at Oxford. My father gave his permission, since I was only seventeen.”

“George didn’t have my permission. No one would have allowed him to wed without my permission. I don’t blame you for maintaining this lie. You must deal with the local folk. The little girl is George’s bastard, but I will see that she doesn’t suffer for it. I will do my best to—”

They were facing each other in the dim entryway. She drew back her hand and slapped him hard.

“How dare you? No, I don’t mind that you have insulted me, but to believe your brother guilty of such infamy?” She raised her hand again. This time, he managed to catch her wrist. His head was still spinning from her first blow.

“You’re very strong,” he said finally, but he didn’t let go of her wrist.

She was panting, furious, trying to jerk free of him but unable to. “George told me again and again that you would merely laugh if he told you about us, if he told you about Marianne. He said you would send him to Australia and take Marianne away from me. He said you’d probably sell me as a bond servant in the Colonies.”