Page 72 of A Devilish Element
“Oh,” Jane remarked, a tad more brightly than one might have expected given the rather tumultuous nature of their conversation and prior relationship. “Only if it was, then—”
He cut her off with the slash of his hand. “Madam.” He shook his head most insistently. “I intend to have my goujat attend me while at the task. That is all I am trying to say.”
“Your goujat?” Jane repeated dubiously, her confusion now mirroring Eliza’s own. She had never heard of such a thing. Well, not outside of whispered stories of the olden days when the marital act was to be witnessed so that all parties knew the couple were truly man and wife, but then all were invited in to observe, not merely one figure.
Jane followed her husband’s agitated waddle across the hearth rug with her nose screwed up in perplexity. “Linfield, do you mean to say you wish a servant to witness us?”
“Witness? No. He will attend me. And no, not a servant. Why the devil would I wish that?”
“But you said your valet.”
“I did not.” He turned and reared, positively aggrieved, then stared down his nose at her, lips aquiver, while two ruby spots bloomed on his cheeks. “Perish the thought. My valet, indeed. That would hardly inspire anyone to the act. Be like doing it with your father watching.” He shuddered. “No, Mr Whistler will attend me.”
It was all Eliza could do to stop herself blurting out Jem’s name as Jane did.
“Mr Whistler!” she cried, her whole-body forced into stillness from the shock of it. “Linfield, you cannot seriously mean that. I do not understand. Why should it be necessary for him to watch us?”
Eliza could no more fathom a reason than Jane. If Linfield had perhaps said he wished Doctor Bell to observe them… Well, it would still have been most strange, but might be ascribed to some medical matter he did not wish to reveal, but Jem? To have Jem present made no sense at all. Why?
Meanwhile, Linfield gave a taciturn sniff, as if Jane’s reticence were the confounding part and not his intentions. “He shan’t be lingering about like some twit at the opera,” he said. As if that were a foremost concern. “He’ll participate.”
If it were possible for someone to look more aghast, Eliza could not imagine it, although perhaps seeing her own reflection might have countered that notion.
“Not that he’ll touch you. No, of course not. That would be entirely unacceptable. He’ll be myaide de chambre.”
Jane worried her head from side to side. “Forgive me, husband, but I do not understand.”
That made two of them, unless Linfield was really so hopeless, he couldn’t manage to find his own cock well enough to put it in his wife’s cunny and actually needed someone to do it for him. In which case, surely, he could have simply asked Jane to help line them up.
“It’s entirely normal,” Linfield said in such a reedy voice as to make it obvious he was lying. “Just isn’t talked about. Trifle awkward. Not the subject for polite circles.”
Eliza did not understand why he was insisting on this, or why he was lying to Jane’s face to convince her of its convention. Why on earth would Linfield wish Jem to attend him while he was bedding his wife? Did Jem know? Had he agreed to it? There was no rationality to it. None. Except…
She reeled back in horror and clapped her hand to her mouth to stop herself from blurting a reaction to her thoughts. Following the incident of Pennerley being shot in the leg, certain rumours had circulated, many of which persisted even now Bella and Pennerley were wed, about the nature of the marquis’s attachment to Lord Marlinscar. Of course, men formed fast friendships. Plenty idled away days together engaged in gentlemanly pursuits, but for some, it was suggested, the attachment was deeper than one of platonic love. That they did things that they really ought only to have been done with a member of the opposite sex when connected by the bounds of marriage. Was this demand of Linfield’s thus a declaration of such an attachment between him and Jem?
Surely not… She could not believe it to be so. Not when Jem had made such declarations of love to her.
Yet, she could also hear him as clearly as if he were standing by her now insisting,I’m not the man you suppose me to be.Was he in truth bound to Linfield faster and in more ways than she’d supposed? That they were—dare she even think it—lovers? Lovers in the way that she and Jane had stupidly supposed Linfield and Henrietta to be.
Had they got everything hopelessly wrong?
Was this the reason for Linfield’s reluctance to bed his wife? He was in love with another… with Jem? Her Jem?
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Eliza
Her agitation was too great for Eliza to remain to hear out the remainder of Jane and Linfield’s discourse. She slipped from the little room via the other exit, and thus back through the various rooms and chambers she and Jane had passed through to avoid the hallway. Her mind was awhirl, and no doubt Jane would need her. She would wish to discuss this development, for Eliza to state opinions, and alleviate her mind. To say, yes, I’ve heard tell of such a thing, it’s nothing to be alarmed by. Not that it would matter either way. Jane would not refuse Linfield’s demands, no matter how strange or unconventional they were. She would go along with practically anything at this point to ensure, rightly or wrongly, that Linfield believed the child she was carrying to be his.
Eliza, though… She could not find any bright sparks in this request. Indeed, she wished she could cut what she’d overheard from her memory. She’d been so sure of Jem’s affections. So certain of him. Surely it was not possible that Linfield had concocted this plan without Jem’s accord. Linfield would not tell Jane he intended to bring another man into their bed without the other fellow being aware of and amenable to the prospect.
Would he?
The obvious thing to do was to seek Jem out and ask him straight out what he knew of the matter. Yet, how would she even broach the topic?
Jem, I’ve overheard the most curious thing. Linfield and Jane were talking, and I’m not rightly sure how to even ask this, but is it true you are to attend him while he…while he tups his wife?
How would she compose herself if he said yes? Would he even be truthful about the matter? How could she trust anything he said?
