Chapter 23
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Notfelle Estate, Huntingdonshire
Kitty scooped her cream soup back to front without making a sound.
Her hands trembled as they had for the last three days.
Lord Staverton sprawled next her on her right, dwarfing the dining chair and slurping his soup.
He smelled. Having been too close to him on a number of occasions, she recognized it as an odor arising from uncleanliness and the build-up of sweat in the copious folds of his belly. Her breasts were smaller than his.
Easter was a week away. Seven days of torture before her.
Julian’s nightly visits to her room were thrilling.
They explored each other’s bodies. Kissed for hours.
Whispered of their shared dreams and fell asleep in each other’s arms. But Julian had been nowhere near when Lord Staverton had caught her walking to her room and pinned her to the paneled wall.
He had tried to kiss her. She had twisted away, and he had lapped his thick tongue across her cheek.
He had breathed in her face the awful scent of fish. “I’m going to lick you all over, little chick.”
Kitty set down her soup spoon and wiped her cheek at the memory.
Nor had Julian been present when Lord Staverton had forced her to walk outside in the cold and pinched her bottom.
She had slapped his face on Julian’s advice.
To which Staverton had leered and said, “Strike me, little chick. It don’t matter.
I’m to have you this time. And I’ll soon be doing the striking if you don’t mind me. ”
How far would she have to go to repel him?
The second course was served. Lady Stockton, seated at Sir Jeffrey’s right, conversed with Mr. Delaney, but really the lady was displaying her bosom and batting her lashes while Mr. Delaney droned on about his coin collection.
Lord Stockton, on Sir Jeffrey’s left listened to Sir Jeffrey relate the Babbington’s esteemed history and the Protestant trickery which lowered it.
Her brother, Shelley, sat mum at the foot of the table staring like a puppy at Lady Barbara Stockton while she and Mrs. Delaney babbled on fashion with Father Dunlevy stuck between them.
Father Dunlevy sent her a conspirative smile where Kitty sat, wedged between Lord Staverton and his skinny mother, the Dowager Lady Staverton.
“My boy says you play pianoforte well,” the dowager said.
Boy? Lord Staverton was at least sixty. “He is all kindness.”
Sir Jeffrey had agreed to sell her mother’s pianoforte to Julian’s uncle for double the price offered by the other buyer, and soon it would be gone. Or safe, Kitty amended. She forced a bite of venison with an eye to the antlers above her.
The dowager cut into her pheasant and sniffed her bulbous nose.
Her voice was haughty and thin and her accent Northern.
“Explain to me how you have improved yourself this year past. My boy says the last he visited, you displayed a troublesome nature. I counseled him to quit his suit. A Staverton wife must be obedient and beyond reproach.” She glared at Kitty, not a foot between them. “Though you are quite taking.”
Kitty set down her fork and sipped her fortified wine. Here, in the dowager’s craggy lines and thin lips, was where she might repel.
“I am the same, my lady,” she replied with a smile. “Perhaps more emboldened and independent.”
The dowager’s sparse brows rose.
“Character is fixed,” Kitty said, “well before a girl is of marrying age. That is why parents must needs guide their daughters from a tender age to learn what is righteous and accept the authority of their elders when presented with perplexing situations that may stir them to act by sentiment.”
“You seem to know well the expectations of a daughter,” the dowager said over her wine, “and yet you infer you do not aspire to them.”
“A fact.” Kitty rushed to clink her glass against the dowager’s, slopping wine on the tablecloth.
The woman blinked repeatedly. Kitty returned to her dinner.
Over dessert, Sir Jeffrey announced a donation of five hundred pounds to Father Dunlevy and the Roman Church in support of the Stuart cause.
Everyone save Kitty cheered. Father Dunlevy was asked to divulge his plans for its use.
Would the funds go to aid the Jacobites in invading England?
A hundred thousand troops were at the ready.
Surely they needed more guns and ammunition.
And Charles Stuart was rumored to have gone to France to impress upon the French the need for their assistance.
Kitty’s mood plummeted to feral depths.
Father Dunlevy, the kind, attentive man she wished was her father, smoothed down his simple black waistcoat. “Indeed, we require every farthing to ensure victory. Thank you, Sir Jeffrey, for your generous support.”
Sir Jeffrey puffed up like a rooster. Kitty expected him to crow.
“Oh, blessed day,” Mrs. Delaney exclaimed, “when we, the true believers, may all rightfully worship in public.”
“And send all heretics to the stake,” the dowager said.
Kitty looked to the diners. “But they are our friends and neighbors. England has been Protestant for 125 years.” She turned to the dowager who had gasped.
“Those you wish to burn are surely innocent of heresy. They were raised in the faith of their fathers. Just as you have been raised. Perhaps you should seek acceptance instead of mur—”
“Katherine,” Sir Jeffrey said in the stunned quiet. “That is enough.”
Father Dunlevy met her gaze across the table, his thoughts hidden behind his hazel eyes.
Sir Jeffrey chuckled and drew his napkin from his shoulder to wipe his mouth. “My daughter, always daydreaming with her sketches when she hasn’t got her nose in a book. I’ll have to speak to her further.”
Kitty could feel the slap’s sting on her cheek already. But if the Dowager Lady Staverton advised her son to quit his suit on account of her impudent speech, she would gladly take a whipping.
“Perhaps, Sir Jeffrey,” the dowager said, “you should speak to your daughter’s governess.”
Clara! Why hadn’t she thought of her before speaking?
“Well put, Mother,” Lord Staverton said. “And certainly a girl don’t know what’s best when she hasn’t been taught. She’ll come around.”
The dowager rose from the table as if it were her right to end dinner as the mistress of the house. “Ladies, shall we leave the men?”
Something sharp stripped up Kitty’s calf. She jerked her head down to peer beneath the table. Lord Staverton had slipped his gouty foot out his shoe and raked his jagged toenail up her leg.
In horror, Kitty kicked his foot away and dashed from the room. In the family chapel, she heaved over the back of a chair and circled it to drop down in relief. She prayed over her knees.
“Dear God. Holy Mother. Help me to resist murder. Fortify my soul for the beating which is sure to come. Give me strength to—”
“Katherine.”
Kitty shot up at Father Dunlevy’s entreating tone. His eyes and mouth were turned down, as if he were guilty of a crime. And he was.
“Don’t you dare speak to me,” she said. “‘We require every farthing to ensure victory?’ Do you know who requires farthings? Me! This home! Not your stupid cause. And I am independent and impudent. And I read. England will never be Catholic again. On that I would bet my life. It is over. Those who fan the flames of rebellion do it for power and money, which you have taken from Sir Jeffrey for years.”
He walked toward her, arms outstretched. Kitty skirted him, gripping a chair back and willing to use it. He dropped his arms.
“Katherine,” he said, “I wish no one to burn for their faith. I work for tolerance as well.”
“Yet you wish to smite them with an army of one hundred thousand. Do you believe those who gain power will pursue tolerance? What in history predicts this? They will slaughter my friends. Georgiana, Julian, Uncle William, Anthony. Mrs. Markel, every merchant, every farmer. That is on your head.”
“Will you sit?”
“No, I will not. Because of you, my mother’s wedding ring is gone. Her silver. Her pianoforte. Everything of value she brought to her marriage. How did you defend her? You didn’t. You stood by with your godly speeches while my father beat her. You killed her as much as he. I hate you. I hate God!”
He paled. “I tried to help her. But she…” Tears shone in his eyes. “I loved your mother, Katherine.”
Kitty scoffed. “Everyone did.”
He turned to the stone wall with the icon of Mary brought out for the season and ready to be hidden if authorities were to call. He traced the line of Mary’s head canted in sorrow.
“I do not support the Jacobite cause,” he said. “Do what you will with this information. I take Sir Jeffrey’s money, yes. But think, Katherine, of the times I have plied Sir Jeffrey for funds. What details have I provided?”
“What details are required?”
“He assumes when I speak of victory, it is the Jacobites’. But the real victory is for a far worthier cause. Yours. Your dowry.”
Kitty looked aghast. “You lie.”
“Your mother formed the scheme. She beseeched me in her last letter to continue. Her hope was to find a husband worthy of you. One you respected. And loved.” He twisted to face her.
“You will not marry Staverton. And you did well tonight. The dowager is set against you. Now you must permanently fix her disfavor.”
Reaching in his coat, he handed her a vial. “Mix this with your sherry when we return to the drawing room. It will cause violent emesis. Stay close to the dowager and ensure she is your mark.”
Kitty wrapped her fingers around the vial. “You wish me to vomit on the dowager?”
“It will not be pleasant for you. But I will bring you more doses to keep you from Lord Staverton for the duration of the holiday. It will also keep Sir Jeffrey from raising his hand to you.”