Chapter 25
Chapter Twenty-Five
The prevailing manners of an age depend more than we are aware, or are willing to allow, on the conduct of the women; this is one of the principal hinges on which the great machine of human society turns.
— HANNAH MORE, “ESSAYS ON VARIOUS SUBJECTS . . . FOR YOUNG LADIES”
Sara looked through the crowded rooms of the Merrington’s luxurious mansion.
Jordan had been right. Finding Lady Dryden in this crush was impossible.
Sara had spent the last two hours searching for the woman with no success.
Since Lady Dryden wasn’t often in society, few people knew her.
The lady was as elusive as a breath of wind in the calms.
Frustrated, she headed for the balcony to gain a moment of quiet.
Unfortunately, a woman emerged on the balcony to join her only a few moments later.
They acknowledged each other with polite nods, but respected one another’s privacy by standing in silence for several moments more.
The other woman had turned to go back into the ballroom when the pendant around her neck caught the torchlight, garnering Sara’s attention.
It was an onyx horse’s head, ringed round with diamonds. Though smaller than Gideon’s, it was a veritable copy of the one he wore as a belt buckle.
Sara’s blood pounded in her ears. “Lady Dryden?”
The woman halted, casting her a startled look. “Yes? I’m sorry, do I know you?”
Sara surveyed the woman with building excitement. It was her. It had to be. She had the same jewelry, and even her coloring was right. With midnight hair threaded with gray and eyes the color of bluebells, Lady Dryden certainly could be Gideon’s mother.
But how to begin? Sara had rehearsed this meeting a hundred times, yet now that it was here, she was at a loss. She mustn’t let the woman leave, that was for certain.
“My name is Sara Willis. I’m the Earl of Blackmore’s stepsister.” Sara swallowed. “I-I was just admiring your pendant.” Nothing like getting right to the point, she always said. “I saw a brooch very like it recently.”
The woman stiffened. “Did you? Where?” Her voice was far from nonchalant. Indeed, she seemed suddenly very interested in what Sara had to say.
“This is going to sound strange, I know, but it was worn by a pirate. He’d had it made into a belt buckle.”
“A pirate? Do you mean that to be a joke?” Lady Dryden asked, clearly disappointed.
Before Sara could protest, Lady Dryden’s expression altered and she added, “Wait, you must be the young lady who traveled aboard the Chastity. My friend in the Ladies Committee told me about you. The ship was accosted by pirates and you narrowly escaped capture.”
“Yes, that was me,” she said dryly. Jordan’s story had certainly spread widely.
But perhaps it was time that someone knew the truth, especially this someone.
“Actually, I didn’t escape capture at all.
I spent a month with the pirates on an island in the Atlantic.
I got to know them very well, especially their captain. ”
Lady Dryden looked shocked at the way a complete stranger was taking her into her confidence. “The Pirate Lord? You spent a month with the Pirate Lord himself?”
“Yes. Have you never heard his real name?”
Lady Dryden shook her head, clearly confused to have Sara ask her such a thing.
“It’s Gideon Horn.”
The blood drained from Lady Dryden’s face. She looked as if she might faint, and Sara rushed to her side. “I’m so sorry, I’ve upset you. Are you all right?”
“Did . . . did you say ‘Horn’? The man’s name was Horn? You’re certain?”
“Yes. I came to know Captain Horn quite well during my stay on his island.” She hesitated to continue, given Lady Dryden’s obvious distress.
But the woman had abandoned her son, after all, and she deserved to be upset.
Sara’s voice hardened. “Indeed, I was surprised to learn he wasn’t an American at all.
He was born English, the son of a duke’s daughter.
Apparently, his mother had run off with her tutor, an Englishman named Elias Horn, then had abandoned her child after her family asked her to return. ”
“No!” Lady Dryden protested. “That’s not the way it was at all! I never—” She broke off, tears welling in her eyes. “So that’s why my son never looked for me. He must have thought . . .” She trailed off as confusion spread over her face.
Sara shared the woman’s confusion. This wasn’t the reaction she’d expected. “Lady Dryden, are you saying that you are indeed Gideon Horn’s mother?”
The woman stared about her distractedly. “Of course! Surely you had guessed that or you wouldn’t have spoken to me of him!”
Sara’s heart thundered in her ears. She’d found Gideon’s mother. “I wasn’t sure. Elias Horn told Gideon that his mother was dead. But there was only one duke’s daughter named Eustacia in Debrett’s Peerage, and it was you. Then when I saw your pendant—”
“You were sure.” Lady Dryden gazed back into the dining room, her expression anxious.
Gone was any semblance of nonchalance or ladylike demeanor.
Tears coursed down her cheeks as she surveyed the crowded room.
She seemed almost frantic as she grabbed Sara’s arm.
“Oh, Miss Willis, we must find my husband! He must hear this at once!”
Sara felt all at sea. Lady Dryden didn’t look or act like a woman just hearing that the son she despised was a pirate. And why after all these years of not caring about him would she suddenly be so eager to hear about him? Or to tell her husband of her sordid past?
“Lady Dryden,” Sara murmured with concern as the woman tugged her toward the door, “are you sure you want to tell your husband of this without any . . . preparation?”
“Yes, of course!” Then, as if the full import of Sara’s question hit her, Lady Dryden darted a glance at her, eyes rounded in distress.
“Oh, but you must think— If my son thinks it, then you must think— Never mind. It doesn’t matter.
You’ll understand when you hear my tale.
But Miss Willis, we must find my husband first!
I assure you he’ll want to hear everything you have to say. Everything!”
“Certainly, my lady.” Sara could hardly say anything else.
But she made herself a promise as the woman dragged her into the ballroom. After the marquess heard what she’d told his wife, she was going to get some answers of her own.
Gideon paced the drawing room in Silas’s newly built cottage.
Molly was ensconced in Louisa and Silas’s bedchamber and was screaming for all she was worth.
Thank God one of the women had taken Jane off as soon as she’d seen her mother.
He wouldn’t have wanted the girl to hear her mother suffering so.
By God, he’d never dreamed that birthing babies was this awful.
He’d never had any dealings with a woman in labor before.
The few minutes he’d been in the bedchamber had almost been more than he could stand.
And when he’d hurried out as soon as Jane had been taken from the room, Louisa had mumbled something derogatory about the entire male sex.
He hadn’t taken offense. How could he? Molly was screaming her blasted head off and enduring hours and hours of pain, all to bring forth a child without her husband. At the moment, he had the utmost respect for women and nothing but contempt for himself and his kind.
Ann slipped through the bedchamber door, a worried look on her face. “The baby is in the breech position, Cap’n. That’s why Molly’s havin’ such a hard time of it.”
“Breech position?”
“When a baby comes, its head is supposed to come out first. But this one’s wee behind wants to come out first, and that won’t work. Louisa and I don’t know enough about it to make it right, and there ain’t a midwife amongst the women. We already asked.”
“Surely there’s someone who can help,” Gideon protested. “There are fifty women or more on this island.”
“That’s true. But most have as much knowledge of childbirth as I do—enough to take care of a normal birth. For somethin’ like this, we need a midwife, and we don’t have one. Ain’t you got a doctor at all on this island?”
He shook his head as guilt sliced through him. No doctor. No midwife. Eventually, of course, he’d intended to coax a doctor to the island, but he hadn’t done so yet. Still, he should have thought to bring a midwife here for the women.
Suddenly, a raucous voice came from the entrance to the cottage. “All right then, where’s the laboring mother?”
They both turned to find Queenie standing there, her sleeves rolled up and her face set.
“Queenie,” Ann said in a firm voice, “you mustn’t disturb Molly. Things aren’t goin’ so well. The baby is breech. She needs to be kept still while we figure out what to do.”
“She needs a woman who knows how to help her, that’s wot she needs,” Queenie retorted. Another scream erupted from inside the bedchamber, and Queenie headed toward it purposefully.
Ann moved to block her path, and Queenie scowled at her.
“Get out of my way, country girl. Who do you think delivered all the babies in the whorehouse? Me, that’s who.
We couldn’t risk a doctor turning us in to the magistrate, so I always done it.
I’ve birthed more babies than you probably held in yer lifetime.
And I’ll birth this one, if you’ll just let me by. ”
Ann hesitated, staring at Queenie as if she didn’t quite believe the woman.
“Let her pass,” Gideon ground out. “If she says she can do it, let her do it, by God. We’ve got no choice.”
When Ann stepped aside, Queenie sniffed, then flounced into the bedchamber, leaving the door open.
“Queenie!” Louisa exclaimed from inside the room. “What in God’s name do you think you’re doing?”
“It’s all right,” Ann said as she entered behind Queenie. “She says she used to birth babies.”
Louisa harrumphed. “She’s probably seen more things going into a woman than coming out of one.”