The Bride Sale

Chapter 12

He’d found them.

It had taken twice as long as he’d hoped, but James had finally tracked down Russell’s carriage at the Bull’s Head in the village of Alston Cross. Russell had hired a post chaise, a typical Yellow Bounder that looked like every other private coach on the road, and so it had been easy to lose track of them.

The biggest loss of time had begun at Liskeard when he had followed a false trail north toward Tavi-stock. It had been some time before he realized he’d been chasing the wrong coach, and then more hours of backtracking to discover Russell had gone south toward Plymouth. The long summer twilight had begun to fade into dark before he spotted the lone yellow coach in the yard at the Bull’s Head.

He almost hadn’t dared to hope it would actually be Russell’s hired chaise, but when the innkeeper confirmed that a Mr. and Mrs. Russell were indeed guests, James had been ready to collapse with relief. And exhaustion. He was tired to the bone. Somehow he had to garner the strength to face Russell, to fight for Verity’s freedom.

James had to bribe the innkeeper to reveal the location of Russell’s rooms. He led James through a rabbit warren of corridors and narrow stairways until finally indicating a door up two steps at the end of a hallway.

“That be the parlor,” the man said. “The bedchamber be the door just over there. They was just served a late supper, so they most likely be in the parlor. Though a young couple like that, can’t be so sure.” He gave James a lurid glance before taking his leave.

A bubble of excitement began to expand in James’s gut. Verity was behind one of those doors, and he was ready to fight for her.

It had been a long time since he’d been seized by the spirit of the fight, a long time since anything in his life had been worth fighting for. But the spirit was on him now, pumping through his veins like quicksilver. The possibility of smashing Gilbert Russell’s face into a bloody pulp inflamed him with a kind of battle fever.

He marched up the steps to the parlor and turned the door handle, prepared to kick it in if it was locked. It was not. The door swung into a small room with whitewashed walls and dark wainscoting. A fire blazed in the grate. Verity was seated at a table before the fire. Russell stood warming his hands over the flames, his back to the door.

Verity looked up and gasped, her teacup clattering to its saucer. Russell swung around. “What the devil?” He saw James and sputtered, “Oh, m-my God.” He moved behind Verity and placed his hands on the back of her chair.

James’s eyes had not left Verity’s. He read a series of emotions there—surprise, apprehension, relief, joy—that kept his gaze locked firmly to hers. His own anger and joy combined to make him want to pick her up in his arms and carry her out of there. But the fierce pride in the angle of her jaw and the set of her shoulders reminded him of all she’d been through. Much as he wished it, he would not allow himself to take control of her life for her. This time, she must be allowed a voice in her own fate. Here, at last, was something he could give her.

“Wh-what are you doing here?” Russell asked, trying his damnedest to look cocky but failing miserably. “I thought our business was completed. D-did you not find the purse I left?”

James reached inside his greatcoat and withdrew the leather pouch. He’d collected all the coins scattered over the library floor before leaving. He wanted to fling the bloody thing in Russell’s face, but the coward stood protected behind Verity. Instead, James threw it down on the table with such force the serving dishes bounced and rattled and a meat fork danced to the edge and fell clanking to the floor.

“I do not want your bloody money,” James said. He kept his temper under control as he took Russell’s measure. The young man looked like a frightened rabbit trying to stand up to a fox. There would be no sport in fighting such a man. He had all the earmarks of a sniveling coward.

“Th-then why have you come?” Russell asked. He gripped the back of Verity’s chair so tightly his knuckles flared white. “You cannot mean to j-just take her away with you, to take her by force?”

“I have no intention of forcing anyone to do anything,” James said. He put as much steel into his voice as he’d ever done in Spain. The man was so easily cowed by a sharp word and a fierce look, he wouldn’t have lasted five minutes in James’s regiment. “It would appear to be you, sir,” James said, “who is doing the forcing.”

“Wh-what?”

James turned his attention to Verity, who had not moved a muscle since he’d come into the room. He tried not to lose himself in those soft brown eyes, resolved to maintain control. “I gather from your note, madam, that it was not your choice to leave Pendurgan?”

She slanted a quick glance over her shoulder, then looked back at James with a smile in her eyes. “No, my lord,” she said, “it was not my choice.”

Exhilaration flowed through James like a shot of whiskey. He wrenched his gaze from Verity and skewered Russell with a piercing glare. “I have come, sir, to ensure this lady has a choice in what happens to her.”

“B-but she is my wife. I have the ri—”

“You gave up your rights when you sold her like a blood horse at Tattersall’s!” James’s bellow must surely have been heard throughout the inn. He could have sworn the small paned window rattled in its casement.

“I regret that wretched bit of business,” Russell said. “But you must know the transaction was not legal.”

“And neither was it moral.”

Russell deflated like a pierced bladder. His whole body took on a woeful slouch. He moved to lean heavily against the broad mantel over the fireplace, as though he did not have the strength to hold himself upright. When the young man raised his head, James thought he’d never seen eyes more full of misery, except on occasion staring back at him from a mirror.

“No, it was not moral,” Russell said in a tremulous voice. “It was vile and hateful and I have never regretted anything so much in my life. I have made my apologies to Verity, though I do not expect forgiveness. I was simply hoping that we…” He paused and slammed a fist against the wooden mantel. “Blast it all, I could never get anything right. My whole life has been a series of failures. I’m not fit to live on this earth.” His voice had trailed off into a quavering whisper. He turned his back to them, propped a forearm on the mantel, and lowered his head to rest on it. The slightest tremor shook his shoulders.

James was thoroughly taken aback. He’d come expecting to find Verity in the grip of a brutish, cocksure husband ready to reassert his rights. He would have welcomed a contest of wills against such an enemy. Russell’s anguish knocked all the fight out of James.

He studied Verity as she watched Russell, her expression a mixture of compassion and confusion.

“Verity?”

She looked up at him, and all the joy he’d seen earlier had gone out of her eyes. James suddenly found himself uncertain what he should do. But it was her choice, he reminded himself. She must decide what to do, and he must accept it. He was no longer so sure, though, what her choice would be.

“Verity, you must tell us what you want.” He spoke directly to her and kept his voice as even and unemotional as possible. “I did not come to spirit you away against your will, I assure you. But I had to make sure that Mr. Russell was not doing so, either. You have been buffeted about in all directions, dancing to everyone else’s tunes. It is time you were allowed to make your own decisions, regardless of who has legal rights to do what. We have all trampled over the law these past eight months and more. None of us has the right to call upon it now to justify our actions. Russell?” He raised his voice, instilling it with the command that had once sent troops scattering to do his bidding. “Would you agree with me on this?”

Russell did not lift his head from the mantel, but muttered his agreement.

“And so, Verity,” James continued, softening his tone once again, “disregarding the legalities, tell us what it is you would prefer to do. Do you wish to return with Russell to London, or return to Pendurgan?”

Russell raised his head. “But—”

“Let her speak!” James roared.

Verity’s gaze darted back and forth between her husband and James. She considered her words for several long moments before speaking, moments during which James’s stomach tied itself into knots. “I am sorry, Gilbert,” she said at last, “but if I am truly given the choice, I would prefer to return to Pendurgan. I have found some small measure of happiness there, you see.”

Russell turned around to look at his wife. His face wore a mask of utter despair, and it was a wonder Verity’s natural compassion could withstand such a plea.

“You must understand, Gilbert,” Verity continued, “that Lord Harkness has been a true friend to me. And, given the choice, I would rather live with him in friendship—for as you are well-aware, no man could ever desire me for anything more—than with you in marriage.”

It was a monumental effort for James to hold in check the flood of emotions brought on by her words. His heart thumped in his chest like the great steam cylinder at Wheal Devoran. He would not have to live without her after all.

But this was no time to succumb to sentimentality. He had to put his plan in action before Russell tried to assert his legal rights again and talk her out of leaving. He was going to make Russell a proposition, one that would free Verity from this sham marriage once and for all.

The sight of James bursting into the parlor had caused Verity’s heart almost to stop beating. He had looked so large and menacing framed in the narrow doorway, like a bull ready to charge. Though tall and well-muscled, James was not a particularly large man. Yet, enveloped in the capes of his greatcoat, with his black hair falling piratelike over one eye and a day’s growth of beard darkening his face, he was a powerful sight to behold. She had never been so happy to see anyone in all her life.

He had been so full of anger, she could almost feel the tension tightening his muscles like a whipcord. For a moment, she had been afraid he meant to do violence, to attack Gilbert; but his restraint had been formidable.

Everything would be all right now, though. She was going back to Pendurgan. She was going home.

“Verity will return to Pendurgan with me in the morning,” James was saying. “And I want you gone from this place tonight. But first, I must speak privately with you. Wait here, if you please. Verity, come with me.”

Keeping a firm hold of her arm, James led her silently down the parlor steps and through the labyrinth of hallways and stairs down to the taproom on the ground floor. It was noisy with the chatter of patrons and the clanking of mugs. James asked the barman if there was a private parlor nearby. He was directed to one and led Verity there. When she stepped into the empty room he did not follow, and she turned to face him.

He filled this doorway just as he had the other: large, indomitable, dear. They gazed at each other in silence for several beats of her heart.

“Verity.”

She was never sure which one of them moved first. Within another heartbeat, they had walked into each other’s arms.

Verity burrowed her head against James’s shoulder and rubbed her cheek against the wool of his greatcoat, crushing her new bonnet and not caring. They simply held each other for several long moments.

“Verity,” he said at last, still holding her tight against his chest. “I thought I’d lost you.”

She shook her head and he seemed finally to recognize the awkwardness of embracing a women in a full-brimmed bonnet. He stepped back and allowed his hands to linger over her shoulders and trail slowly down her arms until he reached her hands. He took hold of them both and gazed at her with an expression of something like desire, though she did not fool herself into thinking it was any such thing.

“Thank you for rescuing me once again, my lord,” she said. “You are very kind. I never expected—”

He stopped her words with his finger on her lips. “Kindness had nothing to do with it, my dear. It was pure selfishness. Your leaving has thrown my entire household into an uproar. Especially with the festival tomorrow. You have never seen such a hangdog, weepy group. I don’t…we would not have known how to get on without you.”

Ah. The household needed her. Not James.

“I wanted to speak with you privately, away from Russell. I want to be sure you do not feel coerced, by either of us. I must ask you one last time.” He began to stroke the edge of her jaw with the same finger that had pressed against her lips. “Are you certain, absolutely certain, this is what you want? To return to Pendurgan?”

“Yes, of course,” she said. It surprised her she could sound so normal when his touch caused her heart to flutter in her chest like a bird’s wing. “As I said earlier, I have been happy there, content. Besides, I have no wish to go anywhere at all with Gilbert Russell.”

“No, I do not imagine you do.”

“Thank you, James. For everything.”

“Verity.” He cradled her face in his hand, his thumb brushing the corner of her mouth. Then he dipped his head beneath her bonnet and kissed her.

It was not a passionate kiss, but soft and sweet and so full of tenderness it made her ache with longing.

He lifted his head and his lips twitched into a half smile. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I promised never to do that again. Forgive me.”

He released her and stepped back, leaving her bereft and wanting more. “If you are quite sure, then, I must ask you to give me a few moments alone with Russell.”

“James, you are not going to…to hurt him, are you?”

He smiled. “I wanted to. Hell, I wanted to kill him. But there is something pathetic about the man that takes the fight right out of me. No, I won’t hurt him. I just need to speak with him about something. If you will give me a few minutes alone with him, perhaps you can find the landlord and arrange to have any of your baggage still in Russell’s coach transferred to mine. And ask if he has another room available that I could have for the night. Thank you, my dear.” He kissed her hand and dashed back in the direction of the stairs.

Her head still reeling from the effects of his kiss, Verity sought out the landlord and set about arranging for the transfer of her trunk and hiring a second bedchamber for the night.

She then returned to the private parlor and ordered a pot of tea. Though she had been warmed by James’s insistence that she make her own decisions, Verity was quite sure he and Gilbert were upstairs making some decisions that involved her. She had no idea what James could possibly have to say to Gilbert that did not involve her. She had given her word, however, and would therefore allow them a few moments alone. But only a few moments.

James knew he ought not to have kissed Verity, but he could not have stopped himself if he tried. And he did not regret it. If Russell cooperated, James would ultimately do more than merely kiss her.

Refusing to dwell on that, James opened the door to the private parlor where he’d left Russell and walked in. The young man had taken Verity’s seat at the table and sat with his head bowed in an attitude of total dejection. James could almost feel sorry for him, but he was resolved to do this.

Russell looked up at James’s entrance but said nothing. James removed his greatcoat and tossed it on a settle near the window, and then did the same with his gloves. He sat down at the table opposite Russell, pulled over an empty plate, and speared a slice of ham from a serving platter.

“You will forgive me, Russell, but I find I am famished.”

Russell shrugged his indifference. James took a bite of ham and then continued. “Tell me, what made you come for her? A pang of conscience after all these months?”

Russell eyed James warily. “My conscience has plagued me for some time now, especially since I learned I had sold her to a wife murderer.”

“Ah.” James sliced off a large portion of bread from the fat loaf on the table. “So if I had been the slovenly blacksmith, Will Sykes, you would not have returned for her?”

“I would have returned.”

“Why? Why now?” James placed a thick slice of ham on the bread and took a large bite.

Russell’s response was a long time coming. “I have come in line for a minor government post, if you must know. I need this position. I need the money it pays.” He expelled a breath through puffed cheeks. “Questions were asked about my wife.”

“I see. And you were not prepared to announce that you’d sold her for two hundred pounds.”

Russell bowed his head and said nothing. His cheeks colored slightly.

“You hoped to take her to London and parade her about as your wife, in the most ordinary fashion.”

Russell still did not speak.

“The strange thing is,” James continued as he sliced off another piece of ham, “that Verity never really was a wife to you in the ordinary fashion, was she?”

Russell’s head jerked up and his eyes widened with what looked like fear. “What are you talking about?”

“I think you know very well what I am talking about. Your marriage was never consummated.”

Russell’s face turned crimson. “And how would you know that?”

James raised his brows in a look of mock incredulity.

“You bastard!”

James shrugged and reached for an apple. He began to cut it into sections with the ham knife. “You sold her, Russell. What did you think would happen?”

Russell rose so abruptly his chair went crashing to the floor. James had struck a chord of some kind. He just might get that fight he’d been spoiling for earlier, though it was not at all what he wanted now. “I knew she had not been safe with you,” Russell said. “I swear I could kill you.”

James dismissed his threat with a careless wave of the knife. “Sit down, Russell,” he said, pointing to the overturned chair with the blade. “If you will but listen, I think you will see how you can use this situation to your advantage.”

“What? What do you mean, ‘my advantage’?”

“Sit down and I shall tell you.”

He glared at James for another moment, then righted his chair and sat back down. “Well?”

James took one last bite of apple, then laid down the knife and pushed the plate away. “It is obvious that you never wanted this marriage to Verity. You never consummated it, then sold her like a prime bit of horseflesh. Clearly, you have no interest in her and in fact wish to be rid of her. I suggest that you do so, legally this time. I think you should file a divorce action against her.”

“What! You must be joking.”

“I’m perfectly serious. You have grounds for a Crim Con action. You can accuse her of adultery. With me.”

Russell looked thoroughly dumbfounded, eyes wide and mouth gaping.

“It would be a simple, uncontested suit,” James said. “Lengthy and expensive, but much less complex than a contested action.”

Russell frowned and appeared to consider the matter. “I don’t know…”

“Of course, if you prefer, I could assist Verity in filing an action against you. I have no doubt we could find witnesses to your own infidelities.”

“No!” The word exploded from Russell. All color drained from his face.

“I am certain we could find witnesses who would attest to one or another of your own liaisons. I doubt you have spent these last few years in complete celibacy.”

“No! No, please, you cannot.”

“Are you so afraid of making public your own affairs, then? I guarantee you, Russell. I have the money to track them down and—”

“No!”

“—see to it that each and every one of them is published.”

“No. No. Please, no.” To James’s utter astonishment, the man covered his face with his hands and began to cry. “You c-can’t do this to m-me. Oh, God, pl-please. No.”

James was thunderstruck. What the devil was this all about? “Give over, Russell. What is the problem? Every man in London has his paramours. Some are more discreet about it than others, but—”

“You do n-not understand.”

“No, indeed, I do not.”

“I tell you I would rather die than have any of my…my liaisons made public.”

James snorted. “A rather dramatic threat, don’t you think?”

“No.” He sniffed and made a visible effort to regain his composure. “Not so dramatic, actually. I would likely lose my life in any case, if any of it became public.”

“What are you—” James sucked in his breath. Dear God. Suddenly it all made sense. “Your lovers are…men?”

Russell leapt from his chair, turned his back to James, and braced himself against the fireplace mantel with both hands. “Don’t you see?” he said. “I could be hanged if the truth came out. And others as well.”

“Good God.” James studied the young man’s back and began to understand his misery. British society and British law were severe in the public treatment of homosexuality, though heaven knew it was widespread enough in private. No boy could go to school nor a young man go to war without some exposure to men who preferred men. It was not spoken of, of course, and men who followed that path did so in the greatest secrecy. The penalty for conviction on a charge of sodomy was death.

“So that is why you never consummated your marriage,” James said. “Does Verity know?”

“No. At least, I do not believe she does.” He kept his back turned as though unable to face James. There was still a tremor in his voice, though he appeared to have checked the tears. “I tried, you see. I just…I could not do it.”

“What happened?”

He gave a soft groan. “It does not matter.”

“Yes,” James said, “it does. For Verity’s sake. I care for her, Russell. A great deal. Tell me about the marriage.”

“It was arranged by our fathers,” Russell said, his voice flat and lifeless. “We met only briefly once or twice before the wedding. I knew I would never be…like other men, but I thought I could go through with it. Others like me do. She was a sweet enough girl, but I had never been with a woman. When I tried, on our wedding night, I was…disgusted. I tried to touch her, but it made me…I retched and retched until I thought I would die. I left her the next day, figuring she was better off without me.”

James tried to imagine the scene—this poor young man trying desperately to be something he was not, and Verity, not understanding, seeing only rejection and disgust.

Suddenly, he remembered once telling Verity that she could never know what it was like to live with pain and shame and guilt. I can probably never understand the pain you have suffered.

Ah, Verity.

Other things she’d said suddenly began to make more sense as well. Earlier tonight she had made a comment about how no man could ever desire her. Not understanding Russell’s revulsion, she must believe there was something wrong with her, something that made her sexually undesirable. His own actions during the botched attempt at lovemaking would have only further encouraged that absurd notion, the way he had cursed her and raged at her virginity. It is my fault, she had said.

Ah, Verity. Sweet, proud, beautiful, eminently desirable Verity. If only she knew how very wrong she was.

But there was more to this sorry tale. “What made you finally resort to selling her at auction?”

“Oh, God, I don’t know,” Russell said. He pushed himself away from the mantel and began to pace the room. “I left her in my father’s old house in Berkshire. Little more than a run down cottage. I’d planned to take care of her financially, even if I could never live with her as a husband. But I never did. I left her in that tumbledown house while I lived high in town. London is full of temptation, you know, and I got myself in a bad way. I’m ashamed to say I’d gone through her dowry and any other blunt I could get my hands on. I’d sold everything else I owned. Then one day I saw a small notice in the Morning Post. It told of a wife sale in Cornwall. I must have gone a little mad. I decided I had one more thing yet to sell.”

“God’s teeth, I would love to wring your bloody neck for that, Russell. I don’t gave a damn whom you prefer to sleep with, but treating your innocent wife like that is simply beyond the pale. And you think I am a villain?”

Russell stopped pacing and looked down at James, brows raised in question. “I don’t suppose it’s true that you murdered your wife, is it? Else Verity would never have agreed to return with you.”

“I am not completely without blame in the matter of my wife’s death,” James said. “But I am not a cold-blooded murderer, no.” It was the first time he had ever admitted it, even to himself.

“Then you are right,” Russell said. “I am the villain here.”

“Then I will ask again if you are willing to do the right thing by her and bring this sad marriage to an end, legally.”

“My God. You are in love with her, aren’t you?”

“I am very much afraid I am.” James smiled. It was only today, when he’d found her gone, that he had finally admitted it to himself. He loved her.

“Now look, Russell. You have grounds against her. You need not reveal the details of your own personal life. I will admit that she committed adultery with me. Verity will offer no contest. It should be a fairly simple matter.”

“Simple and expensive and horribly scandalous. No. No, I’m afraid I cannot do it.”

“Why the devil not?”

“My prospective employer, Lord Beddingfield, is a high stickler. He would never abide the slightest impropriety.”

James arched a brow and Russell blushed scarlet. “I’m sorry, the scandal would be too much. Beddingfield would turn me out.”

“Bugger Beddingfield!” James immediately regretted his words.

Russell glared at him with such hostility the room fairly crackled with it. “No. I won’t do it.”

“God’s teeth!” James leapt from his chair as though shot from a cannon. “You will do it, Russell, or I swear we will file an action against you.”

“How dare you threaten me,” Russell said through his teeth, rising to face him.

“How dare I? How dare I? I’ll tell you how. Because you have ruined the life of a perfectly innocent woman, a woman I happen to care about. If it takes airing your private peccadilloes to set her free, that and the fact that you illegally engaged in a wife sale, then by God, that is what I will do.”

“You wouldn’t!”

“Oh, yes, I would. Just try me.”

“How could you be so cruel?”

“How could you condemn Verity to a life in limbo?”

“No wonder they call you Lord Heartless.”

James took firm hold of his temper. “Enough. This is getting us nowhere. There is one other possibility we have not considered.”

“What?” Gilbert asked.

“Annulment.”

“Annulment?” Verity’s voice caused both men to look up sharply. She had waited fifteen minutes before returning, and heard the shouting as she approached. “Are you talking about annulling our marriage?” A bubble of hope swelled in her breast. “Is it possible?”

“I do not know,” James said, rising and offering her a seat. “I spoke with my solicitor about it, and it seems a difficult thing at best.”

He had spoken to his solicitor about it? How long had he been thinking of it? “How difficult?” she asked.

“Unfortunately, there are few grounds for annulment, and I’m not sure if any of them apply here. That is why I never mentioned it, Verity. I thought it was near impossible.”

Her heart swelled at the implications of his words. “What sort of grounds?”

“Frankly, I had hoped it could be a simple case of failure to consummate.”

Verity blushed at his words. So he really did know the truth after that one time.

“But only the inability to consummate can be used as grounds for annulment. Are you prepared to claim impotence, Russell?”

“No!” Gilbert exclaimed. “Dear God, no!”

“I thought not,” James said. “Can we also assume there is no close blood relation between you, or affinity by marriage?”

“No,” Gilbert said, and Verity shook her head at James’s questioning look.

“Then according to my solicitor,” James said, “the only other grounds are based on litigation. I don’t suppose either of you had a precontract of marriage with someone else?”

“No.”

“No.”

“Was either of you under age?” James asked. “Without written consent of parent or guardian?”

“I was four and twenty,” Gilbert said.

“I was only twenty,” Verity said, “but my father certainly consented. It was his arrangement, after all.”

“That does it,” Gilbert said. “We have no grounds. I’m sorry, Verity.”

“Hold on,” James said. “There is one more remote possibility. My solicitor explained about a tricky loophole in the Marriage Act. Apparently, if it can be proved that any information in regard to name or age was incorrect on the license or in the banns—even the slightest and most inadvertent misspelling or error—it can be used as grounds for nullity.”

“I have a copy of the license here,” Gilbert said and reached into his coat pocket. He gave a sheepish grin when he saw the astonished looks on their faces. “I thought you might object to my taking Verity away,” he said to James. “I wanted evidence that I had the legal right to do so.”

“Let us see it, then,” James said, and Gilbert unfolded the document and laid it on the table.

Verity bent down to read it. She remembered signing the church register after the wedding, but had never seen the license. Those details had been taken care of by her father.

What she read caused her breath to catch in her throat. “Dear God, do you see?” She stabbed her finger at the parchment. “It says I was twenty-one, but I was five months short of that age.”

Oh, Papa. For once her father’s absentmindedness had been a boon instead of a maddening eccentricity. The poor man could never remember birthdays or anniversaries or church holidays. He even had to be reminded of Christmas each year, as though it were unexpected.

He must have assumed Verity was twenty-one because she would be so at some point in 1816. He simply could not remember the precise date.

Tobias Osborne had survived his daughter’s marriage by only two months. He never knew how badly it had turned out, and she had always been grateful for that. It would have broken his heart. How perfect that it should be her dear scatterbrained Papa who just might set her free.