Thirty-Five

When Pigs Take Flight

“The Countess of Hastings to see you, my lady.” The maid bobbed to her mistress.

“Lady Hastings, you say? How extraordinary.” Sukey’s brows pulled together at the unexpectedness of her quondam friend’s arrival. “Pray show her in.”

Although once close, she and Charlotte had over the past few years done little more than nod to one another in passing, their respective relationships to the Earl of Hastings presenting an insurmountable social barrier.

The servant returned, escorting a woman who, though nearing thirty, maintained the figure and fresh appearance of youth. She was dressed simply in a light wool traveling gown, styled much akin to the riding habits she had adopted years ago as her trademark. Though frequently remarked upon for her self-possession, the countess approached tentatively, as if unsure of her welcome. “Sukey?”

Without hesitation, Lady Messingham rushed to enfold the younger woman in her arms. “Charlotte, dearest. You are in good health? All is well, I trust?”

“I don’t remember when I have been better.” The countess’s eyes sparkled with excitement and she spoke with a breathless quality.

Sukey breathed her relief. “I am so very glad. I had the worst premonition when you arrived. I feared… Philip…”

“No. No. Nothing like that.” Lady Hastings emphatically shook her head. She answered cynically, “When I saw him last, he was assuredly the worse for drink, but otherwise robust. It is actually on Philip’s account that I have come. Might I entrust a letter to you? It is of particular import that he receives it.”

“But of course,” Sukey replied. Noting the countess’s traveling clothes, she asked, “Are you going somewhere?”

Charlotte, Lady Hastings, answered in a distracted manner. “I am indeed! As soon as I have settled some important matters, I’m leaving… for the seaside. This letter was among my most pressing concerns.” She handed Sukey the sealed missive. “I am pleased you relieve me of the burden of seeking him out.”

Susannah knew that the estranged Earl and Countess of Hastings barely spoke to one another and only appeared together for the spring and autumn races. Their marriage, like many others in their class, had been forged by arrangement, or in their case perhaps better said by coercion. Neither would ever have entertained the union otherwise.

Philip had wed Charlotte solely for financial gain, and Charlotte, whose antipathy for her husband was only surpassed by that for her Machiavellian uncle, had conceded only to get out from under that guardian’s thumb.

On their very wedding day, with his departure for the Flanders campaign imminent, Philip had delivered his young bride to Sukey’s door, initially passing Charlotte off as his ward. While deeply shaken by his reappearance in her life after years of silence, Sukey experienced a pang of hope that in time old wounds might heal. As a favor to him, and with the secret hope of reconciliation, she had taken the girl under her wing and a fast friendship had formed between the two women.

Philip, however, continued to maintain a cool and distant reserve from her, hardened by bitterness and jealousy from the continued illusion she had sacrificed his love for a life of comfort as Weston’s mistress.

When she finally learned Charlotte was in truth Philip’s wife, her heart had wrenched at the painful irony: When Philip would have once had her, she would not be had; and then, when she would have fallen willingly and unconditionally into his arms, the arms held another—who didn’t want him!

The turning point in the seeming ménage à trois had come following Philip’s return from war and his unexpected ascent to the earldom of Hastings. Although he desired to fulfill his responsibilities and needed an heir to claim his full patrimony, Charlotte had remained intractable in her refusal to fulfill her conjugal duty. Desolate and disconsolate, Philip had sought succor from his former lover.

Although six years had passed, that fateful night was still vividly etched in her memory.

***

September 1745

10 Bedford Street, Westminster

Sukey hadn’t known if it was late night or early morning when the terrified maid had awoken her from her bed.

“There be someone pounding on the kitchen door, ma’am.”

In irritation, Sukey had snatched on her dressing gown and grabbed the dagger she kept in the drawer of the bedside table. She had then accompanied the trembling maid downstairs. “Philip! What are you about at this hour? Are you inebriated?” she asked, rattled to recognize the source of the tumult.

“Foxed quite to the gills, actually, but you needn’t fret. I have come by the servants’ entrance. None should see me.”

“Mayhap not see you, but few have not heard your incessant hammering!”

Philip’s voice was low and surprisingly sober. “I need you, Sukey. Let me in.”

I need you. She’d only hesitated a moment before opening the door.

Leading him to the salon, she’d patiently watched his progression as he broodingly paced, waiting for him to express whatever he was so loath to put into words.

“It appears I am to become the Earl of Hastings,” he stated emptily. “Though I never have wished it. The earl and Edmund are both dead, and the title is now mine by default. I suppose I should be elated, jubilant even, but instead I have this void… this emptiness.”

With a pained look, he thumped his chest. “Why do I feel this way, Sukey, when I have achieved an earldom and presumably have the world at my feet?”

It was not a rhetorical question. He had come seeking succor to a pain he’d never before acknowledged. Her own heart lurched at the angst he had been trying to bury for the past decade.

“Philip, my love,” she began softly, the endearment slipping thoughtlessly over her tongue, “you have yet to truly know yourself. Though you claimed no love for your family, you feel this way because you never had the love and acceptance that should have been your due. And now, any possibility has died with them.”

He stood at the window, staring silently into the blackness, digesting her words. When he spoke again, his voice was hoarse with emotion. “Why did you refuse me?”

The question came so unexpectedly she had no breath to respond. She was glad he still faced away, for her expression in that moment would have given away every secret of her heart.

“You dismissed me out of hand,” he said. “I vowed to completely eradicate you from my mind, but here I am drawn back again—like the proverbial moth to the flame.”

“Like the moth to the flame?” She laughed bitterly. “You don’t trouble yourself with even a pretension of sensibility for my feelings in dredging up the past.”

“No, I have no particular sensitivity for your feelings… if you indeed have any.”

“You really want to know why I refused you? Six years ago, I was a woman of nine-and-twenty and you had yet to grow fully into manhood. You were living by your wits and estranged from your family. On top of that, I was your first real lover and knew I would not be your last. Moreover, I was deeply in debt. I would have done neither of us a favor by accepting your proposal. But even after I drove you away, I have never loved another. The greater jest is that now you have become exactly the man I once envisaged, you are callous and indifferent to me.”

He turned to face her with burning eyes. “You believe me callous and indifferent, Sukey?”

“When you have rebuffed me at every turn, and even brought a young woman to my home who is legally your wife? You do not consider these actions cruel and callous?”

“You have hardly languished for want of me.”

She had initially prickled at the barb. “No, Philip. I have no respect for martyrs… though I have never loved but you.” Her look of entreaty reached far deeper inside, endeavoring with all her heart to answer his need.

He stared at her a long moment, his incredulous expression revealing that her confession, so long in coming, had touched a raw, vulnerable place, appeasing some of his bitterness and hurt. When he came to her at last, he engulfed her in a crushing embrace that selfishly demanded all she could give, and for the first time in their relationship she had given all without reservation.

***

Sukey studied Charlotte with mixed emotions. Out of love and respect for the younger woman, Sukey had endeavored to maintain the utmost discretion in her liaison with Philip, even forgoing his escort in any public setting lest scandal be spoken against Charlotte. This, in part, assuaged her guilt and was the condition upon which she had agreed to become his mistress, yet by consequence their friendship had ended. There was still so much she wanted to say, but it had been years since she and Charlotte had actually spoken; six years in fact since she had become Philip’s mistress.

While she fully understood the source of Charlotte’s hostility toward Philip, she nevertheless wished Charlotte could let go of the past and forgive the wrongs that could never be righted but only pardoned.

“I have known Philip intimately for a very long time, Charlotte. He’s a complicated man, comprised of many shades of gray, and not always what he seems. I wish you could see he is not half the villain you think him.”

“On that account, you and I will forever differ. Philip has been a fiend of the worst kind. He knowingly destroyed the man I loved, and in so doing crushed any chance I might have for happiness.”

“But people change, dearest. You don’t know how wretched and miserable he was after all that transpired. If given the chance, he would undoubtedly act differently.”

“But he is still responsible. Time does not change that, don’t you see? He was the one to rob us of any chance when we were so close. So very, very close…” Her voice dropped off as if lost in the reverie.

“Then you would allow one incident of poor judgment to define a man for life?”

“It was more than one incident, Sukey. He showed himself a betrayer of trust, a self-promoting opportunist, and a scoundrel of the vilest kind.”

“Be fair, Charlotte. He has tried to make amends. How many husbands would have allowed you the freedom to go your own way as he has?”

“He acts out of guilt, as rightly he should!”

“Mayhap that’s part of it, but he has never demanded of you what every husband has a right to claim from his wife. Instead, he has held you with an open hand and protected you with his name. Despite your animosity, he has not only provided for you but has even given you the means to pursue your dreams.”

Charlotte had the good grace to look away.

She’d knowingly given him every justification to divorce her, even going out of her way to provoke and needle, yet he had failed to do so. Even when Philip had unexpectedly gained the title and estates and needed an heir to claim his full patrimony, she’d remained intractable in her refusal to allow him into her bed. Certain he would then put her aside as most any other man would have done, she was confounded when he did not.

Whether out of guilt, pride, or a misplaced sense of honor, Philip had let her go her own way, but Charlotte remained staunch in her condemnation.

“Allowing me the run of the racing stud has been to his advantage. He would never have permitted it otherwise.”

“I don’t believe that’s completely true. Nor deep down do you truly believe it either. Yes, you have achieved success with the Hastings stud by the sweat of your brow, but horse racing is a man’s domain. How far do you think you would have gotten without his name and his credibility attached to the stud?”

“Philip always has and always will think only of Philip.”

“That’s not true!” Sukey cried. “I have known him to be self-sacrificing. There is so much more to him than what you care to see.”

“My dear, dear Sukey, I fear your eyes are completely blind to his defective character.”

“Mayhap you are right and I am a besotted fool, but I love him despite his flaws, or mayhap because of them, and even more desperately for the man he so earnestly wants to be. If you would only soften your heart just a little, the two of you might find peace. It wrenches my heart that you have it within your power to give him what I can’t.”

“I’m very sorry for that, Sukey. You are too good for him, you know.”

After a silent moment, she offered up an enigmatic smile. “I promise to forgive Philip Drake when my lost love returns from the dead.”

Sukey sighed with a fatal gesture. “Then there’s naught more to say. As to your missive, I expect his return soon and will be sure he receives it directly.”

“Thank you, Sukey.” Charlotte paused. “Though I would wish your affections placed with another, with a better man, I’m glad for Philip that he has you.”

They clasped hands for a brief moment, exchanged a look of wistful regret, and Lady Hastings departed.