An hour's drive brought him to Selby, and after a few inquiries, Charles found himself at the door of the gaol.
The warden, he found, was a man who took his calling seriously. None of Charles's representations could persuade him to free Louisa immediately. It appeared that unless Miss Conisbrough could be brought to drop her charges, and the magistrate's approval could be obtained, Louisa would spend Christmas in gaol.
The warden would, however, permit Charles to see her; so, after a futile and heated argument, Charles followed him through the heavy portal to the cell where she had been placed.
When the door opened, he saw her-sitting primly on the edge of a bed.
Two other women shared her quarters: a dark, filthy room with no more furniture than the cot on which she sat. A foul odour testified to the fact that no consideration had been given to the conveniences.
The sight of Louisa amidst such squalour brought a lump to Charles's throat.
She glanced up, and in that moment, their eyes met. Charles was almost certain he saw a flash of deep relief. She rose slowly and came to greet him.
“Hello, Charles,” she said contritely.
For one minute, he was robbed of speech. He wanted to take her hand in his and kiss it, apologize to her for letting this terrible thing happen. But the presence of the warden and the other prisoners made words impossible. He clasped her hand and pressed it.
Then his pent-up feelings found relief in rage.
“Warden-” he felt like punching the fellow “-this is intolerable! What do you mean by placing a lady in here?"
“Do not blame him, Charles,” Louisa said gently. “When he brought me here, I had no money and could not promise to pay my room and board. He had no choice but to place me with these women."
“You should have told him-"
Louisa's smile cut him off. “Yes, I should have known you would come as soon as possible.” Her eyes filled with grateful tears that wrung his heart. But she blinked them away, saying determinedly, “But this unfortunate experience has been quite educational! I shall have much to say about the condition of our prisons!"
“Yes, I am certain you will. But that can wait. Warden, you will show us to a private cell! And please arrange to have refreshment brought to my cousin."
He took Louisa by the arm and started to lead her from the cell, but she stopped him. “But, Charles, what about my companions?"
“What about them?"
“Should we not invite them to join us?"
Charles gave a startled laugh and then smothered it. Her two companions were more than likely women of the night. But he was glad to see that Louisa had not been grievously altered by her experience.
“No, Louisa, we cannot ask them to join us, but I shall be happy to have tea sent in to them."
She spoke softly into his ear, “And cannot they each have a bed? If you had not come today, I should have had to share one with the two women. And now that I am to be gone, they will still have but one between them."
Charles smiled and lightly touched her cheek. “As you wish."
Then he was obliged to cut short her leave-taking from the other women, doing so with the information that she was not to be released yet.
“I am afraid,” he said, when they were alone, “that I shall have to ride back to Snaithby and make Miss Conisbrough drop her charges, then find the magistrate and get him to sign for your release."
Louisa took the news with great composure. “That is quite all right, Charles. If it takes no more than today, I cannot really complain.” She smiled, but he fancied it was somewhat forced. “That is much less than I might have waited. The warden informed me that the next assizes will not take place for six months."
Charles took her hands and held them to his chest. Louisa's eyes fell.
“Did you think I would not come to get you out?"
She looked up, startled. “Oh, no, it wasn't you! It was just that I was so ashamed for having caused you more trouble! You told me I should wait inside and you were right! Can you forgive me?"
“But this wasn't your fault, after all, now was it?"
Her expression turned hopeful. “Don't you think so?"
Charles felt a surge of remorse. “Damn Ned!” he said again, and then, “And damn myself! No, this time, Louisa, you will not take the blame! I should have known not to rely on Ned. He left his manor without ever confiding in his sister-probably meant to serve her some trick and did not think of all the possible consequences."
Louisa smiled, and Charles felt her hand tremble in his. He released it slowly and reluctantly.
“Why didn't you send a message for me?” he said when he had found his voice.
“But I did! I told Jim to tell you, you must go on!"
“That-” Charles frowned at her. “I disregarded that, of course. But why didn't you send for me, or give the bailiff my name? Something to delay his taking you until I arrived?"
Louisa coloured. He could see he had injured her pride.
“Did you think I would use your name and risk embarrassing you?"
Charles was touched. That she should consider both him and his name so much as to endure imprisonment alone made him admire her beyond belief. Her selfless actions made him begin to question his own worth-and not for the first time since he had met her. He was relieved, at least, that his suspicions about her had resolved themselves before he knew the whole story. In doubting her at all, even for a moment, he had grotesquely wronged her. He felt ashamed.
“You place too high a value upon my reputation,” he said, “and not enough on your own safety."
But Louisa's spirits had lifted. The knowledge that she was not to pass six months, or even one night, in this gaol seemed to have cleared them, and she no longer needed his comfort. Charles had found her subdued, but now she was ready to take advantage of her experience to further her knowledge.
He prepared to start the long drive back to Snaithby to make his explanations to Miss Conisbrough. By the time he had left, lost in his own sober reflections, Louisa, with pen and paper borrowed from the warden, had started writing down her ideas for reform of prison life.
Because of the season, it took all day for Charles to complete his mission. Miss Conisbrough was at home, and after listening to his carefully edited story, was eager to be of assistance. She thought the whole episode a great joke, however, and delayed Charles needlessly with all her teasing. Knowing Ned and his propensity for inappropriate hilarity, Charles could not have been surprised. But he chafed inwardly throughout what seemed an interminable time for Ned's sister to write a letter to the magistrate withdrawing her charges.
Next, he was obliged to wait for the magistrate, a local squire, to return from his round of afternoon calls. After Charles explained the misunderstanding, however, the man still hesitated. He seemed to think some impropriety must have been attached to the affair, and he questioned Charles in an uncomfortable manner. Only Charles's rank, and the indisputable evidence of Miss Conisbrough's letter, finally persuaded him to issue a release.
Charles hastened from there to the gaol in Selby and presented the warden with the signed papers. But, by now, it was far past dinnertime and growing dark.
Somehow, after he had handed Louisa into the carriage, he so far forgot himself that he sat beside her on the bench.
Louisa regaled him with all her observations on prison life, and Charles listened, conscious all the while of her presence next to him, of her delicate scent, and of her leg brushing lightly against his.
As she chatted on, stopping only to yawn, he smiled to himself in the dark, thinking that only Louisa would come away from such an experience eager to challenge the world. But even she eventually felt the toll of such an emotional day. When he said little in response to her ideas, she soon fell silent, as well. After a while, her head began to bob, and Charles gently put one arm about her and drew her nearer to rest against his shoulder.
They came to the inn, and after all the bustle and confusion of their arrival, he did not see her again. Nan and Sammy seemed to have erased all memory of the suspicions they had harboured. Nan swept Louisa up to her room with promises of warming pans and a hot dinner sent up if she wished.
Knowing she was tired, feeling wrung out himself, and perhaps seeing the wisdom of these arrangements after their recent intimacy, Charles made no attempt to change them. He ate a lonely meal beside the fire in his room with only Eliza for company. But in spite of his dog's most hearty efforts, she could draw little from him other than a few absent-minded strokes.
He went to bed to the sound of the Old Lad's Passing Bell, the tenor bell in the parish church, tolling once for every year since Christ was born. Its final knell was timed to ring in Christmas Day, to keep Satan away from the Snaithby fold for one more year.
Charles fell asleep, relaxed and comforted by the knowledge that Louisa was safe.
The next day, Charles slept late and then came down the stairs with an anticipation he had not known in years. It was Christmas morning. Nothing for him to do today, when all travel was forbidden, except to enjoy the warmth of the inn, the embellishments he and Louisa had made to their own parlour, Mrs. Spadger's good food and her family's high spirits, and… Louisa.
Eliza tumbled head over heels down the steps in front of him. Charles reached the ground floor, then he peered into their private parlour and received a shock.
Louisa was standing on her tiptoes, fully square under the mistletoe, her hand in Jim Spadger's, his eyes open and eager.
An angry “Louisa!” escaped Charles's lips.
She jerked her hand from Jim's with a startled glance. The boy, too, looked anxious. Jim bowed himself quickly from the room.
Charles closed the door after him, his blood churning heatedly, and to a degree he had never known.
“Whatever's the matter, Charles?"
He whirled on her. “What's the matter! I lecture you over and over again about propriety, and you ask me what's wrong? Louisa-how could you encourage that boy? Have you no proper feelings?"
She went pale. “I am afraid,” she said quietly, “I do not know your meaning."
Charles took a hasty turn about the room and then stopped in front of her. “Louisa,” he said, taking her by the shoulders to shake her, “has it entirely missed your notice that that boy is nursing a tendre for you? You were standing here, right under the mistletoe! If that is not an open invitation, I do not know what is!"
Louisa flushed. Her fair skin was infused with a rosy colour, whether from anger or embarrassment, he did not know.
“Do you think that Jim-” She could hardly go on. Tears formed in her eyes, and disgusted with himself, Charles drew back his hands.
He stared at the floor and growled, “Heathen custom! Why it should be observed, I cannot imagine!"
Louisa was silent. Charles refused to look at her. As he stood there, not saying a word, his anger quickly ebbed.
When it had passed, he began to wonder at himself. What could have possessed him to react so strongly? He attributed it to-he had to attribute it to-all the grief she had caused him. But still, that gave him no right to lay hands upon her.
With painful courage, he ventured one look at her face. Louisa appeared collected, but the red rims of her eyes belied her composure.
“You blame me,” she said quietly.
Charles started to open his mouth to apologize, but she surprised him and said, “Perhaps you should."
He stared at her intently. “Louisa, I didn't mean-"
“You thought that I was shamelessly encouraging Jim. Well, perhaps you should when you consider my elopement. After all, I certainly encouraged Geoffrey. If he had ever attempted to kiss me, I am certain I should not have shied away. But he did not, and so I discovered he did not love me. And how are you to know that I would not encourage anyone, when the truth of the matter is that it distresses me to think that perhaps I am incapable of inspiring affection in a gentleman."
Charles gaped at her. “Do you mean to say you think you are undesirable?"
She raised her chin. “It is possible, is it not?
“No, it's not possible."
They were still standing under the kissing bough, but Charles was completely unaware of that when he took her in his arms. He knew only a deep longing to prove her wrong, a desire that had built up inside him until it begged to be released.
He lowered his lips to hers. He could feel them respond beneath his gentle touch. Louisa wrapped her arms about his neck and clung to him.
Lost and floating… yet somehow vividly conscious of every inch of her… Charles discovered the curve of her waist beneath his hands, the taste of her sweet mouth-like berries with sugar-the satisfying warmth of soft breasts pressed to his chest.
He gave in to temptation and explored deeply inside her mouth. Louisa gasped, and they fell apart.
They stared at each other for a split second, and then Charles said huskily, “You are damnably desirable, if that answers you!"
Louisa nodded, open-mouthed, her eyes as round as pools. “Damn!” Charles said. He had fought the attraction as hard as he could, but he blamed himself for giving in. And still-he had to fight it. It would be harder now, he knew, to keep his hands off her.
Louisa had blushed, appearing to understand at least some of his frustration. He had left her trembling, and the knowledge exhilarated him.
“Charles,” she said shyly, casting her eyelashes down in a most provocative way, “you shouldn't swear on Christmas."
“No, I shouldn't, but you make it damnably hard not to!"
He might have reached for her again, but for Eliza, who jumped against his trouser leg and raked him with her claws.
Thankful for the reminder, he bent to pet her and collected himself with difficulty. “Louisa-” he straightened “-Miss Davenport, you have placed yourself under my protection. It would be the height of dishonour for me to abuse your trust in me… to give in to the temptation which is certain to exist between a man and such a beautiful woman…"
While he stammered, she had been watching him with a questioning look. Now, a glint lit her eyes, and she said with false brightness, “Was that what it was? How kind of you to explain."
She pointed to the kissing bough above her head. “I merely thought you were observing that heathen custom you referred to."
Charles felt a flush of shame sweep through him, but he did not apologize. It would be wiser to forget their kiss, to make it a bone of contention between them. Much better that than let it lead to more liberties while she was in his charge.
At least, he thought, Louisa was willing to excuse him-even to provide him with an excuse, when she might have made claims upon him. The mistletoe would provide his reason, even though that had been no mistletoe kiss…
Louisa surprised him then, by standing on her tiptoes and reaching for a scroll which hung from one of the ribbons of the kissing bough. On entering the room, he had somehow missed it.
She handed it to him. It was a simple piece of paper, tied with red ribbon.
“A Christmas piece,” she said with emphasis. “I wrote it for you after we came in last night."
Charles looked up at her, and then stared at the paper in his hands. For a moment, he could not speak.
“This is what-"
Louisa nodded. Her lips were drawn in a tight smile. “Yes. That's what I was doing under the mistletoe. Jim was giving me a hand."
Charles took a deep breath. “Forgive me, Louisa, I should have known-I can't imagine what possessed me-"
She laughed. “Let us forget it, shall we? We must not let it spoil our day."
Charles answered her with a feeble smile. Perhaps, she could forget it, but how was he to forget he had made such a cake of himself? How could he forget he had kissed her, when she looked so beautiful this morning?
Among Miss Conisbrough's dresses, she had found one in a deep green velvet, low across the bosom, which set off the fairness of her skin and the flame of her hair to perfection. He remembered the feel of the velvet beneath his fingertips, the warmth of her body underneath. Her taste still lingered on his tongue. Even now, he had to swallow to drive the memory from his mind.
Louisa reached up again. “I could remove the mistletoe if you wish."
Charles caught her arm. “No need,” he said. “I promise to behave myself from now on."
She let it fall, then returned his sudden grin with a shy smile.
“Perhaps it is not such a heathen custom, after all,” he said quietly.
The remark seemed to please her; but true to their truce, she moved away and acted as if he had not made it.
Grateful, Charles sighed. They would never make it through the next two days if she continued to bat her eyelashes at him…
Charles tucked the Christmas piece she had written into his pocket. He had nothing to give her, so he judged it best to read it when he was alone.
Louisa, it seemed, had planned their day. She called to him from the doorway, “Come along, Charles. It is time to stir the Spadgers’ pudding."
“Whatever for?"
“For luck, of course."
He followed her to the kitchen, where Nan stood working at her stove. Eliza, who had leapt and scurried at their heels the whole way, fell quickly upon the meal Jim had set out for her.
Charles said, “You must tie up her ears, Jim, before she dips them in."
It was too late. Both her ears were already a few inches deep in food scraps. But Charles's comment had caused a grin to replace Jim's anxious look, just as he had intended.
Bob was sitting on a stool near the hearth, eating steadily. Thanks to Louisa and to Nan Spadger's cooking, the boy seemed to have gained a few pounds already and had lost that pinched look. He promised to be a fair charge on the Spadgers’ larder.
“It's good tha's come,” Nan said. “I be about ta put pudding in oven."
She had already added the egg yolks, cream and brandy. A delicious smell rose from the pot.
She handed the spoon to Louisa first, who closed her eyes tightly to make a wish. Her lashes, like pale feathers, brushed the ridge of her cheekbones. Charles watched her appreciatively until she gave the pot a stir and opened them again.
“What did you wish?"
She tilted her head indignantly. “I'm astonished at you, Charles. You know I mustn't tell or it won't come true.” She held out the spoon. “Now, it's your turn."
Charles retreated. “No, let someone else."
“Everyone's already had a turn, and Nan is waiting for us, so you must hurry!"
She forced the spoon into his hands, and he stepped forward. Of all the foolish customs-
Charles tried to think of a wish, but the aroma from the pudding and Louisa's warmth right next to him assailed his senses. All he could think of was how much he would love to kiss her again-and he mustn't wish for that.
He closed his eyes to her, to try to concentrate, but still was aware of some great yearning he had yet to define. His feelings were in confusion: the delicious smells in the kitchen, the heat from the fire, the tension from knowing their eyes were upon him. And underlying all, the fearsome aftermath of kissing Louisa.
In the end, he did the responsible thing and wished for Boney to be captured, which left him feeling deeply unsatisfied. To wish at all was childish and foolish, but as the day wore on Charles never lost the feeling that he had wasted a precious chance.
From stirring the pudding, they went to church for Morning Prayer. Then, before their dinner was ready, they took a stroll to see the garlands in the village. The day was clear and beautiful and not so cold that he needed to hold her hand to warm it. But even bundled in his greatcoat, Charles felt a glow from Louisa at his side.
Her cheerfulness drew him into her schemes for the day and made him smile. She entertained him through their dinner, suspending all her good works and projects during the meal so he could experience some leisure before returning to work. For the first time ever, the thought of going back to Whitehall made him sigh, but he was warmly grateful he had been spared Christmas Day there.
Dinner was a feast. Nearly as sumptuous as he would have got at Wroxton Hall, though much more intimate. He and Louisa alone shared the goose, roast beef and Yorkshire pudding, the Christmas pudding and mincemeat in pastry coffins. They no sooner finished with one delight than Sammy brought them another, until they could hold no more. There seemed nothing to do after that but sit by the fire, fold their hands over their stomachs and groan about how much they had eaten.
Louisa's groaning, unladylike though it was, tickled Charles's funny-bone and made him want to tease her. He questioned her again about her wish, and when she was not forthcoming said, “I know what you wished for-to be married soon."
“Not necessarily,” she said. “I may have decided not ever to be married. You don't know."
He was strangely disappointed. And surprised.
“But I thought you wished to be married above all things."
Louisa's chin was in the air. “Perhaps-but I shall not tell you. I might have wished for something quite different entirely. I might have wished, for instance, for a life sufficiently long to see all my projects brought to fruition!"
“That would be impossible,” Charles told her, grinning. “You would no sooner finish one than think of another, so you could never reach the end."
She smiled wistfully. “True. But are they so terrible?"
He stared back at her, and felt warmth invading his outstretched limbs. “No. Not so terrible at all."
The evening passed, and they stayed together in the parlour, talking in this languid fashion. Charles felt drugged by the heavy meal, the Spadgers’ brandy and the heat from the fire. He sensed a tingling in his limbs that would not go away-not while they sat like this together. A movement from Louisa, a smile or a pout, and the tingle surged to a pulse and the pulse to a throb.
Only the languor brought on by Sammy's brandy kept him firmly in his chair, and for this reason, he indulged himself far more than usual. When the time came for Louisa to withdraw, he struggled to his feet, made her a careful bow and subsided into his chair once again.
He hardly knew whether he had touched her hand to his lips, as he had intended, or whether the taste of her still lingered from their kiss.