When Charles invited Louisa to take a stroll with him the next morning after breakfast, she feared he meant to mistreat her. To avoid being alone with him, she looked across the table at Georgie, who was sopping up the egg yolk on her plate with a piece of toast. “Why do you not come with us, sister dear? It is very fine out today…and the fresh air and exercise will do us both a world of good.”
Georgie swallowed her food and opened her mouth to say something, but before she could get the words out, Aunt Hildegarde interjected with a painted-on smile, “I have plans for Georgianna this morning, so she is quite unable to accept your kind invitation.”
“Who, then, shall go with us?” Louisa asked, forcing the question through her thickening throat. “For you know as well as I that we shall raise eyebrows if seen walking out of doors unchaperoned.”
“While I applaud your concern for the proprieties,” her aunt replied, “seeing as your wedding date is so near, I cannot imagine any real harm will be done.”
Not to my reputation, perhaps, but very likely to my person!
“What about Miss Nicholson? Cannot you spare her long enough to accompany us?”
Yes, the tension would be as thick as the porridge in front of her, but she would gladly endure any level of awkwardness to avoid being at her cousin’s mercy.
“Miss Nicholson has work to do,” was the Dowager’s succinct and definitive reply.
“My Dear Louisa,” Charles smarmily inserted, “I am beginning to suspect you disfavor my company—which, I shall not scruple to assert, wounds me deeply.”
Louisa met his gaze across the table. “How perceptive you are. Have you also discerned that I would rather be burned alive than be your wife?”
Charles nearly choked on his bacon. When she smiled at his distress, her aunt brought her fist down on the table with a force that rattled the dishes.
“Insolent girl! How dare you speak to my son—and your future husband—with such disrespect! You will marry him—and accept his invitation—whether you like it or not. Do I make myself clear?”
“Yes, aunt.” Louisa lowered her gaze to her porridge, which was growing colder, thicker, and more unappetizing by the moment.
“Good,” the Dowager returned in triumph. “Now, apologize to your betrothed this minute.”
With poison in her heart, Louisa looked across at Charles. As their gazes collided, she could see the spite burning in his eyes. She opened her mouth to say what she must, but could not bring herself to speak against her convictions. After a few silent moments spent constructing an apology acceptable to her and her aunt, she said to him, “Forgive my rudeness. It was impolite of me to speak to you so frankly.”
With a leaden heart, she lifted a spoonful of porridge to her mouth and forced herself to swallow. Although she felt no hunger, she needed to do something to hide her distress. Elsewise, he would see the power he held over her and use it to his advantage—the same way her father did.
As soon as the meal was finished, Louisa left the table. Charles wasted no time bringing her bonnet and cape, which she miserably put on before taking his arm. Without delay, he whisked her out of the house and onto the cobbled sidewalk fronting the building.
They walked past the stately homes occupying the several blocks from Paragon Street to the Royal Crescent and across the road to the Gravel Walk. All the while, they made insipid small talk Louisa could scarcely bear.
The footpath was sheltered by garden walls on one side and tall trees on the other. After a time, she gathered the courage to ask Charles something she’d wonder about for some time past. “Why do you want to marry a woman who holds you in contempt? You obviously have no more affection for me than I have for you, so what compelled you to make the match?”
He put his gloved hand on hers. “Since you asked, I chose you to be my wife for three different reasons. Firstly, you are beautiful, and having a beautiful wife will make me the envy of other men. Secondly, having mastery over someone who despises me excites me more than I can say. And lastly, though by no means leastly, my mother desires me to marry you for the benefit of your family. And, since I pride myself upon being a dutiful son, I could not disregard her wishes as easily as you ignored your father’s.”
Appalled by his remarks, she jerked her arm from his and turned back toward Paragon Street. Before she got above three steps away, he grabbed her, spun her around, and greeted her startled look with a threatening grin. “None of that now, darling, or I shall be forced to bring you to heel.”
Gripping her upper arm with painful force, he dragged her back toward the path. Seething with anger, she fought in vain against his pull. “Why have you brought me on this walk? What do you mean to do to me?”
“I will confess no more than this: I have given more thought to what we discussed last night and have made a new plan.”
Louisa did not know what he meant, nor did she wish to. Digging in her heels, she halted his progress and, as he turned to berate her, she slapped his face with all the force she could muster.
Eyes wide with shock and rage, he brought his free hand to the pink handprint she’d left on his cheek. Then, his eyes darkened, his jaw clenched, and his lips flattened into a puckered line.
“You bitch,” he hissed like the snake he was. “You will pay dearly for that little act of defiance.”
Rather than hit her as expected, he lifted her off her feet and threw her over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. The ease with which he did this struck fear into her heart. She was vastly outmatched in strength. If he tried to force himself on her, she would never be able to fight him off.
Still, she would not surrender without a fight. She kicked her legs wildly and pounded her fists on his back. This, to her dismay, only provoked him to spank her hard enough to bring tears to her eyes. He swatted her again as he carried her toward a thicket of trees.
Finding a secluded spot, he set her on her feet and pinned her back against the trunk of a large tree. As he loomed over her, his forced kiss flashed through her mind. She tried to free herself from his grip, but could not break his hold on her. Then, with a dastardly laugh, he stepped back and drove his fist into her abdomen.
“That was for good measure,” was all he said before seating himself on a nearby bench.
As she watched him, loathing bubbled up inside her like trapped air in a stagnant pond. On the surface, a swan flapped about in the struggle for flight. That swan was her hope that Theo would save her from a lifetime in hell with this spawn of the devil.
* * * *
Upon returning from her outing with Charles, Louisa ran upstairs to her room, glad for once her sister was not within. She was in no mood to be interrogated about why she was so upset. Even if she did feel like talking, she could not explain what happened without revealing that she might be carrying the Captain’s child.
As usual, the bed is piled with pillows. In a fit of despair, she threw them all at the wall. She was livid with everyone: Charles for trying to abort her unborn child; Aunt Hildegarde for giving him the opportunity to abuse her; her father for bullying her into marrying that pig; and herself for leaving Greystone Hall after Theo asked her to stay.
He said he had a bad feeling. Why did she not listen? If she had, she would be happy now instead of more miserable than she’d ever been in her life.
She picked up one of the pillows and hugged it to her. She felt barren inside. Barren, broken, and bleak. When tears welled in her eyes, she forbade them to fall. If she swallowed her pain, as she had all her life, the bitterness would gradually lessen. Eventually, it would become no more than the unpleasant aftertaste of a poison she’d been forced to ingest, yet had miraculously survived.
The thought engendered another even darker one. She would kill herself. If Theo did not come before the wedding, she would put on her gown, as expected. But, instead of going to the church to marry Charles, she would drink a cup of tea laced with Arsenic. There was a bottle in the pantry the servants used to kill rodents.
She could see it all now. They would find her in her on the bed in her wedding gown. She would leave a note, explaining why she’d done it. That way, her father would know he’d driven her to suicide by refusing to take her love for Theo seriously!
There were, of course, other options less dramatic than killing herself. She could run away and look for work, for instance. Not that it would be easy to support herself and a child on the pittances earned by waitrettes, laundresses, and shop girls—or that any respectable establishment would hire a single woman in the family way.
Would a disrespectable one take her on? Not a common brothel, but a pleasure-house patronized by wealthy and discerning clients. Like the one run by Mrs. Cole in Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure.
After enduring her father’s beatings so stoically, she ought to be able to bear the physical affections of a few gentlemen of means. And while she might be prevailed upon to whip some of them from time to time (as Fanny Hill was), they would not be allowed to strike her without prior consent (which she would of course withhold, as she found no pleasure in being beaten).
Yes, the idea was a bit irregular, but her situation was desperate. And being a high-class whore could not be half as humiliating as living with Charles. Moreover, her baby would be safe from her cousin’s threats, and she could raise the child in higher style as a prostitute than as a shop girl or serving wench.
The hardest parts would be getting away from here and finding an upscale house of ill-repute like the one described in the book. And she could always write to Theo first, on the off-chance he still wanted her. Would he write her back? As desperately as she wanted to believe he still loved her, she could not shake the terrible fear he saw her sudden removal as a narrow escape. She had, after all, put a lot of pressure on him to elope with her. Perhaps he’d had a change of heart—or had proposed on an impulse he now regretted.
The final option was to confess the truth and face the consequences. For she could not imagine Charles would want her if he knew for a fact she was carrying Theo’s child. Her father would, of course, pack her off to a House for Fallen Women and, to protect the family from scandal, force her to give up her baby.
The thought broke open the floodgates holding back all her pent-up pain. Her situation now seemed hopeless. If she did not exercise one of these undesirable options, she would be made to marry Charles, who would kill the child she carried. Not that she could be certain she was indeed pregnant. For the lateness of her courses might owe to some other cause, like the long carriage ride to Bath…or her chronic anxieties over her situation.
A small cough sounded and Louisa whirled around to see who’d come in. It was only Georgie, God be thanked, for she could not face Aunt Hildegarde or Miss Nicholson at the moment. And she most assuredly could not bear the sight of Charles.
Georgie took a moment to study her sister before saying, “You look as if you’ve been crying. Did something dreadful happen on your walk with our cousin?”
Unable to answer, Louisa attempted to change the subject. “Did our aunt really have plans for you this morning?”
“She did. We called upon a fine lady with a son who is to inherit his father’s estate.”
Louisa forced a smile. “Did you find him at all pleasing?”
“I wish I could say that I did.” Georgie drew nearer and tilted her head. “Oh, Louisa. It breaks my heart to see you looking so forlorn.”
“I look forlorn because I am forlorn,” Louisa cried in anguish. “And will be even more wretched if Capt. Raynalds disappoints me. But, if he should, I always have the option of killing myself—or going to work as a prostitute.”
Georgie’s jaw dropped. “You cannot seriously be thinking…”
Louisa sniffed and looked up at her sister through her tears. “Do you remember when Mama said she would rather see me dead than married to Charles?”
Georgie grimly nodded.
“Well, I would rather be dead than suffer our cousin’s cruelties for the rest of my life.”
“Oh, Louisa, do consider what you’re saying,” her sister pleaded.
“Give me one good reason why I should.”
There were tears in Georgie’s eyes as she said, “I’ll give you two: the first is that you will not go to Heaven if you do either of those things. And the second is that I will not be able to bear my life without you in it.”
As Louisa considered her sister’s objections, another idea entered her head. Smiling sardonically, she said, “I could always marry Charles, I suppose, and then poison him on our honeymoon.”