Page 88 of Miss Delightful
“Do you know who John’s father is?”
“John Mason, a squire’s son visiting an uncle in London. The family hails from outside Aldermaston, their estate is Toftrees, of which Mr. Mason was quite loquaciously proud. I did not inform Mr. Mason that he has a son. Our arrangement was temporary. Thank God he was a generous and lusty fellow, though overly fond of drink.”
Such words in the church hall ought to seem sacrilegious. Dorcas could only marvel at Melanie’s pragmatism.
“You look horrified,” Melanie went on, while she was clearly amused. “Imagine what life with Mornebeth will be like once the children come along. You can do without reading my letters, Dorie, but what about when Mornebeth decides to send your toddling son off to old Lady Phoebe to be raised? What about when he decides your young daughters should be shipped away to one of those dreary schools where all they teach is Scripture and birchings?”
“Melanie, hush. Mornebeth can ruin my family and ruin me.”
Melanie patted Dorcas’s arm. “Take it from me, Dorie, ruin has its advantages. I am free to make a good plan for my son. I am free to join a man who loves me in Canada. I am free to slip away from all the judgment and censure polite society turns on such as me. Ruin is vastly preferable to a slow death from excesses of pious hypocrisy.”
“My situation isn’t that simple, Melanie. I made mistakes—with Mornebeth—and he will use that to his advantage.”
“Were you of age?”
“I was seventeen.” By law, a girl could consent to intimacies at age twelve, even if she did not entirely grasp what those intimacies entailed, or that conception could result from them. Isaiah was doubtless well versed in those legal niceties.
Melanie wrinkled her nose. “And you think at that age you should have somehow found a way around a man who has been cozening bishops since he went off to university. Mornebeth was a philandering disgrace, Dorcas, and if you do not see him held accountable now, then your children and grandchildren will pay for your decisions, to say nothing of the toll he’ll take on you.”
Melanie rose and went to the table beside the hearth where dozens of Mrs. Oldbach’s hot cross buns were sitting in baskets and swaddled with linen. “MacKay would deal with Mornebeth for you, if you’d let him.”
“Isaiah is not Alasdhair’s problem.” What should have been an assertion of fact felt like a tired and stupid excuse. Strictly speaking, Isaiah had been Michael’s problem, and Dorcas had allowed him to become hers as well.
“If you are carrying MacKay’s child, and that child ends up as Mornebeth’s legal issue, I daresay you will long for widowhood.” Melanie helped herself to a sweet bun. “I have missed these. A bit early in the year for them, but they are such a treat.”
Oh drat. Oh flaming perdition and hideous hellhounds. “I cannot be carrying Alasdhair MacKay’s…”
Melanie passed her a bun. “Keep telling yourself that. The whole world changes when you contemplate motherhood, Dorcas. Life is at once more wonderful and more terrifying. I could never regret John, but I will regret to my dying day leaving him, even leaving him with such a one as MacKay.”
Melanie munched her treat in silence, while Dorcas held hers and knew the bitter taste of desolation. “I have been so preoccupied with what Mornebeth could do to Papa and Michael that I did not think of any children.”
“You did not think ofyourselfeither, Dorie. Get over that. Think of yourself, and if you cannot think of yourself, think of MacKay. Come with me to Canada, and do not allow Isaiah Mornebeth to make you his victim all over again. His bullying and abuse need to end somewhere.”
Dorcas took a bite of her bun. “But he’s so good at it, so sly and convincing. I am not sly, and nobody will believe me if I told them the truth after all this time.”
“I believe you. MacKay believes you. Michael would believe you. More women than you think would believe you.”
Every woman Dorcas had met in jail would believe her. Mrs. Oldbach would likely believe her, too, though she’d still be sniffy and prim. Dorcas considered who would believe her and considered Michael’s revelations about having paid Mornebeth back with interest. She considered Melanie’s warnings about how vulnerable children could make their mother, and she considered, too, that she loved Alasdhair MacKay.
And always would.
“I take ship next week,” Melanie said. “I have the money, thanks to you, MacKay, and my own tragic death. Beauclerk wants to settle in Canada. He says it’s beautiful and full of opportunity. I know John will be safe and well cared for, but I will worry about you, Dorcas.”
Don’t go. Don’t leave me. Don’t slip away without looking back.“What of John? Is he to be told that you’re dead?”
“As if MacKay would countenance that sort of deception on an innocent child. I went to join my officer in the New World, a dangerous place, and though it broke my heart to leave John behind, I entrusted him to the best possible guardian and hope one day to send for him.”
“Do you? Hope to send for him?”
Melanie’s smile was sad. “It’s possible. Beauclerk and I have much to resolve, but we have weathered much already.”
“What do I tell our family?”
Melanie dusted her hands and brushed crumbs from her bodice. “Why tell them anything? I am not your problem to solve, just as I cannot push Mornebeth off the Strand Bridge for you, though I’d like to.” She hugged Dorcas, a good, fierce embrace. “My money’s on you, Dorie, just as you put your money on me when I ran off with Beauclerk and when John came along. MacKay’s ready, willing, and able to help, and if I can trust him with my son, you can trust him with some overdue housecleaning. Be happy. For God’s sake, let yourself be happy.”
She rustled away, calling for MacKay. Dorcas sat, holding half a hot cross bun and trying to wrap her mind around the notion that she had been going about her dealings with Isaiah Mornebeth all wrong.
Chapter Eighteen
