Quinn had been offered marriage on a few occasions, and he’d been propositioned many times, but he’d never asked a woman to be his wife. Based on Miss Winston’s worried gaze, he’d made a bad job of his first and only proposal.
“I can leave you enough to live comfortably,” he said, returning the cat to the bed, “you and the child. My only condition is that you not squander the money on your father’s unholy schemes. The child will be considered my legitimate offspring in name, because I’ll leave a witnessed letter with my man of business attesting to same. I assume you’ve been in London for most of the past year?”
Miss Winston unfastened the frogs of her cloak and let the collar fall open. “I’ve spent my whole life in London. Are you sure of that part about the child being your legitimate offspring?”
No, Quinn was not, not with a prior marriage that had ended only months ago.
“I’m sure the law complicates the whole business, or barristers and solicitors would go hungry. If you are my widow at the time of the child’s birth and you have the means to provide for your offspring, then who will even raise the issue?” Quinn moved his chair, so he sat at Miss Winston’s elbow rather than across from her. “Your goal should be to gain security and independence, which marriage to me will accomplish easily.”
Was she paler than she’d been five minutes ago?
“If you’re feeling charitable, Mr. Wentworth, why not simply hand me a banknote?”
Her question was valid, in light of the fact that Quinn would be giving the child a convicted killer for a father.
“Banknotes can be stolen, and as long as your status is simply a disgraced daughter rather than a widow or a wife, your money all but belongs to your father. I have sisters. I know what machinations are necessary to guard their independence, and we haven’t time to pursue those.”
She arranged the folds of her cloak, which did nothing to shake the dirty straw free. “I came to dislike being married the first time, and I like being widowed even less.”
“I won’t relish making a widow of you again. Think, though: How will your child fare as an orphan without means? I can tell you from experience, such a fate isn’t pleasant. I was lucky—York is tiny, compared to London, and people knew me to be a hard worker. What assets will your child have if you fall prey to jail fever?”
She gazed at him for a long moment, while birds flitted through the bars and stole the last crumbs from the windowsill. Beyond the door, two of the whores were in a shrieking altercation about a garter.
Where was Ned, and why wouldn’t Jane Winston accept an offer of help?
“Why me?” she said. “This entire jail is full of misery. I’m better off than all of them, and yet, you choose to assist me.”
Her greatest asset by far was her caution, earned, as most caution was, at high cost.
“You are a victim of misfortune. I know what that’s like. I also know what it’s like to be a child upon whom fate has turned an unrelenting frown. To my great surprise, my experiences now include the perspective of a man facing ignominious death. Perhaps I’m arguing with the Almighty in mitigation. A convicted killer I might be, but I’m capable of protecting innocent life as well.”
Jane spread her hands on the table. They were clean and feminine, though where was her wedding ring?
“I am not innocent,” she said. “I am willful, reckless, ungrateful, stupid, and pregnant.”
Quinn tore off a corner of gingerbread and crumbled it over the windowsill, then remained by the window, gazing out at the bare courtyard where his life would end.
“My mother was no different from you,” he said. “Marrying in haste, for reasons that seemed paltry in hindsight but mattered very much to a sixteen-year-old girl. We do the best we can.”
The birds would not come back as long as Quinn remained by the window, so he took a seat on the bed, jostling the cat, whom he appeased with a scratch behind the ears. Plato was a mouser. He enjoyed frightening the birds, but mostly left them to their crumbs.
“Where is your mother now?” Miss Winston asked.
Her name was not Miss Winston. Like almost everybody else in this armpit of the king’s justice, she was traveling under false colors.
“In a pauper’s grave in Yorkshire. She was gone shortly after I turned five.” Few people knew that.
“I had my mother until three years ago. She caught a fever, and even as her health waned, she insisted on accompanying Papa to visit the less fortunate here and at the Magdalen houses.”
The birds came again: a crow, a sparrow, a little wren, always one at a time, never staying for more than a moment.
“What would your mother tell you to do, Jane?”
The whores fell silent, though somebody else was ranting, gibberish punctuated by profanity.
“I’m not saying yes,” Miss Winston replied, “though how do we procure a special license?”
“That part’s easy, but I’ll not put my man of business through the aggravation unless you agree to marry me. Five thousand pounds ought to see you comfortably established without setting the fortune hunters on you.”
She touched her forehead to the table, as if felled by an excess of spirits, then sat up. “Five…Five thousand pounds? Five thousand pounds? You can toss that at me as a casual gesture on your way to the gallows?”
He could toss her ten times that amount and have nobody the wiser.
“If you invest at five percent, that gives you 250 pounds a year to make a home for yourself and the child. Not a princely sum, but many clergy make do on less. My business partner, Mr. Joshua Penrose, will see to your finances if you have nobody else in mind for that role.”
“Five thousand pounds,” she muttered, looking about as if to make sure she hadn’t been magically transported to a different realm. “I cannot fathom…”
Her expression had gone from cautious to anxious.
Quinn grasped her dilemma. Money always came with conditions, with complications. Instead of struggling against her father’s incompetence, Miss Winston would have to deal with being a murderer’s widow. She would figure prominently in the broadsheets and tattlers in the coming weeks, and ten years hence, somebody would considerately wave those horrors in the child’s face.
Miss Winston would have to draw firm lines between her household and the prying public.
She’d have to sort out what to tell pious Uncle Dermott, if anything.
She’d have to explain to the child how a condemned felon had stepped into the legal role of father.
Quinn could help her with none of it. “Money changes everything. It changes how you’re perceived and treated, how you approach others. The changes aren’t always for the better, but not having money can be fatal.”
In his case, having money had proved equally dangerous.
“A child must eat,” Miss Winston said, linking her fingers on the table before her, as if somebody was about to bind her wrists. “I must eat, if my child is to be born healthy.”
Quinn held his peace, because the lady had apparently come to a decision. She’d take his money, she’d let him make one gesture in defiance of the court’s judgment of him. Althea and Constance would grasp his logic, and Joshua would see to the funds.
Stephen…Quinn could not bear to think about Stephen. Thank God that Duncan was on hand to think about Stephen.
Miss Winston scooted to the edge of her chair. “Get that special license, Mr. Wentworth, and prepare to become my lawfully wedded husband.”
She pushed to her feet, then swayed. Quinn was off the bed and had his arms around her in the next instant.
* * *
“I’ll go next week,” Ned said, keeping his voice down.
Newgate was the epicenter of tragedy in London, as full of despair and hard luck as the sewers were full of waste. Of all the prison’s horrors—the stink, the sickness, the violence, the graft—the plight of the children appalled Jane most.
Papa’s response was the predictable mumbling about God’s will, which only confirmed that Jane wanted no part of her father’s God.
And yet, who but the Almighty could have inspired Ned to remain captive?
“We might not have a next week,” Jane replied. “The charwoman might lose her job, the warden might decide that wheelbarrows will replace the muck carts, the wagon that picks up the straw might be delayed by a lame horse.”
Ned hopped down from the common room’s windowsill. “All of that might have happened this week, but it didn’t, Miss Jane. I don’t want him to die alone.”
“We all die alone, Ned. That can’t be helped.”
He kicked at the straw, doubtless disturbing a legion of fleas. “I’ve seen other men hang. He’ll go quick ’cause he’s so big.”
Mr. Wentworth was tall and strong. Jane had had occasion to appreciate that strength when she’d nearly fainted several days earlier. He’d gathered her in his arms, his warmth and scent enveloping her. He was a killer—Jane had never once heard him protest his innocence—and yet, his embrace had been a comfort.
He’d held her as if he had all the time in the world to humor her wayward biology, as if she weighed nothing. He knew how to shelter a woman against his body without awkwardness or impropriety intruding.
Gordie hadn’t known that, and he’d legally taken on the role of protecting Jane. His embraces had been exclusively carnal from the first, and Jane hadn’t realized a man might offer her any other sort of intimacy.
“Next week,” Jane said, “I want you to go, Ned. I’ll make you promise Mr. Wentworth if you won’t promise me.” Because Mr. Wentworth could make the boy do anything—except abandon him.
“Next week you’ll be a missus. You won’t have to come here ever again.”
Jane didn’t want to visit Newgate again. Mama’s stubborn devotion to charitable work had resulted in her death. Jane wanted to get the wedding ceremony over with, leave, and never, ever come back. Mr. Wentworth’s generosity made that dream possible, even as eternal damnation awaited him.
In a few minutes, Jane would become a wife for the second time. She was waiting for Davies, Mr. Wentworth’s self-appointed footman, to let her know the preacher had arrived. The license had been obtained only that morning, and on Monday—the day after tomorrow—she’d become a widow once again.
She’d considered telling Papa about the wedding and decided against it. He’d never approve, and he’d meddle, and a great ruckus would ensue, and then Jane would be sick, poor, and unwed.
Davies emerged from Mr. Wentworth’s quarters—they hardly qualified as a cell—and beckoned.
“The parson’s in the warden’s room. You look a right treat, Miss Winston.”
Davies was at the awkward age when boyhood refused to entirely part with the emerging man. His voice hadn’t settled, his muscles hadn’t caught up with his bones, and he hadn’t learned to hide his emotions.
Though he was trying. Pity lurked in his pale blue eyes, for all he smiled at Jane and offered his arm.
The polite gesture was ridiculous, as was Davies’s compliment. Jane had sewn this dress in haste, hoping against all the evidence that she’d never need it.
“Come along, Ned,” Jane said. “Mr. Wentworth will expect you to join us.”
Papa was elsewhere in the prison this morning, thank goodness, likely hearing the confession of somebody bound for New South Wales. Penny, one of the whores, had told Jane that Mr. Wentworth would be the only convict sent to his reward on Monday.
The thought was horrid. In the abstract, capital punishment brought a violent symmetry to justice. A life for a life. All good Christians ought to consider that approach outdated, but on a human level, the formula was logical. When the execution involved a man who fed wild birds and arranged for a child to regain his liberty, the logic failed.
There was good in Mr. Wentworth. There might have been a murderous impulse, a bad moment, a misjudgment, but there was also good.
“Miss Winston,” Mr. Wentworth said, bowing when Jane entered his quarters. “Any second thoughts?”
He was resplendent in morning attire, which must have cost him significantly. The fine tailoring turned blinding good looks into male perfection, and—most perfect of all—he seemed unaware of his own attractiveness.
“No second thoughts, Mr. Wentworth.” Jane had misgivings, doubts, and regrets in quantity, but she and her child needed to eat.
He extended a hand to her. “May I introduce Mr. Perkins? He has the honor of joining us in holy matrimony. Davies and Penny have agreed to stand as witnesses. We’ve room for a few more, if you’d like any other guests to join us.”
His tone skirted the edge between jocular and ironic, and his grip on Jane’s hand was warm.
That grip was all that prevented her from fleeing. She’d married Gordie in haste, and within months, Gordie had died. At least in this case, Mr. Wentworth’s fate was a foregone conclusion rather than a damnable surprise. Cold comfort, but comfort nonetheless.
“Sophie and Susie would enjoy the ceremony,” Jane said. They were good women, doing what they could to keep the children safe and to look after the older inmates. What they did for the guards was none of Jane’s business.
“Ned, if you’d usher the ladies here?”
Ned took off like one of the birds stealing crumbs from the windowsill.
The minister offered Jane an awkward greeting, then went back to paging through his prayer book. The cat sat upon the bed, looking the most dignified of anybody present, and a crow strutted back and forth on the windowsill.
“Not what you envisioned when your girlish fancies turned to marriage, is it?” Mr. Wentworth asked.
“Nor you,” Jane replied, “when you thought about taking a bride.”
When Susie and Sophie crowded in behind Ned, Penny, Davies, and the preacher, the ceremony got under way. The words were beautiful, or would have been had not Mr. Perkins been in such a great rush. Midway through Jane’s vows, a commotion erupted behind the witnesses.
“Jane Hester Winston, what is the meaning of this?”
Papa had used his Wrath of God voice, of course, and genuine consternation shone in his eyes. Had he been merely raging, Jane might have stood firm, but that doubt, that glimmer of fear, had her slipping her hand from Mr. Wentworth’s.
Jane was half-turned toward the door—whether to flee the premises or cast up her accounts in the common, she could not have said—when the groom spoke up.
“Reverend Winston, I am so glad you could join us. The circumstances are unusual, but a father’s presence at a wedding is always welcome.”
Mr. Wentworth’s fingers closed around Jane’s hand as Papa’s outrage faltered.
“A wedding? To you?”
“In order that I might leave your daughter provided for, and minimally ease the conscience of a man soon to face his Maker.”
Provided for—that mattered. That did matter a very great deal. Jane studied the carpet, which bore a worn pattern of peacocks and doves amid lotus blossoms.
“Shall we proceed?” Perkins asked.
“No you shall not!” Papa thundered. “This is beyond irregular, and I see plainly that my daughter is again failing to heed the guidance of a loving parent. The minds of women are easily disordered, and I have no doubt this scoundrel, this murderer, this, this—”
Jane’s belly threatened rebellion, as if even the babe objected to Papa’s dramatics. “Hush, Papa. You’ve no need to shout.”
“I have every need to shout. This is a travesty, a mockery of the holy union God intended. Will you shame me once again, Jane Hester?”
Mr. Wentworth wrapped his free hand over Jane’s knuckles. “I see no shame here, sir. We contemplate a union between consenting adults who have made sensible choices. My hope is that you will stay and give your blessing to your daughter’s decision. She is marrying a wealthy man, at a time when both she and you have few resources. Taking me as a husband, even for the few days I’ll fulfill that office, cannot be easy for her. Your support would mean much to her.”
Not support. Papa was incapable of supporting his only child. The best Jane could hope for from her father was fuming tolerance.
“Jane?” Papa no longer shouted. “Does this wretched man speak the truth? You do this of your own free will?”
Wealth had been mentioned. Very shrewd on Mr. Wentworth’s part. Now Papa would turn up reasonable—wounded and bewildered but reasonable. Jane wished dear Papa were anywhere else; she wished she were anywhere else.
She also, sincerely and to her surprise, wished Mr. Wentworth were anywhere else. When this ceremony concluded, Jane could leave, taking Mr. Wentworth’s name and a portion of his means with her.
Mr. Wentworth would leave Newgate in a shroud.
“Marriage to Mr. Wentworth is very much of my own free will, Papa. He does me a great courtesy when I am much in need of same.”
“Mr. Perkins, please resume the service,” Mr. Wentworth said.
“But this is…” Papa began, clutching his Book of Common Prayer to his heart. “I fail to see…”
A circle of tired, resentful faces turned on him, every expression impatient and annoyed. Ned’s little hands were balled into fists. Penny, Susie, and Sophie looked ready to add to the list of murderers incarcerated at Newgate. Davies had a hand on Ned’s bony shoulder.
Mr. Perkins cleared his throat.
“I, Jane…” Mr. Wentworth helpfully supplied.
Right. “I, Jane Hester Winston…Jane Hester Winston MacGowan, do take this man.…”
With no interruption or hesitation whatsoever, Mr. Wentworth completed his part of the service. They were pronounced man and wife, and gingerbread was served to all present, including the birds.
The ceremony could not have been stranger, and yet, when everybody had partaken of their gingerbread and left the new couple some privacy, Jane’s relief was enormous. She hadn’t fled, hadn’t run off, and thus she would have five thousand pounds.
“I might have capitulated to Papa.” She’d nearly done just that. “I would have let him lecture me back into my corner because I pity him. He has no congregation to respect him anymore, no wife to raise his spirits, no bishop to debate theology with.” Why was Jane explaining this to a man who’d soon be dead? “I’m glad you were able to make him see reason.”
Mr. Wentworth loosened his neckcloth. “So am I. The old boy has prodigious volume, but I gather he’s not altogether what you’d wish for in a parent.”
He was all Jane had—as a parent, as family, as a provider. “He used to be stern but reasonable. Mama could jolly him out of his excesses of piety. When he lost her…”
Mr. Wentworth folded the cravat and set it on a shelf in the wardrobe across the room from the bed. He hung his coat inside the wardrobe and then took the sleeve buttons from his cuffs.
“I won’t be needing any neckwear on Monday,” he said. “Ned and Davies are to divide my effects, though you should have this ring.” He wiggled a gold signet ring off his smallest finger and set it on the table. “You’re pale, Mrs. Wentworth. Shall I cut you another slice of gingerbread?”
Mrs. Wentworth. Mrs. Wentworth. Jane had wanted out of the prison before, because it was a prison, because a place very like this had made Mama ill, because marrying Quinn Wentworth was even more out of character for her than eloping to Gretna Green with a handsome Scottish officer.
Now panic beat hard against her ribs. “We are alone, Mr. Wentworth, and you are disrobing. Might I inquire as to why?”