Chapter Thirty-Seven

Thirty-seven

R ain drummed against the roof of the ramshackle IV building, but not even the downpour could keep the curious away from the courthouse in the heart of Elsdon. It was packed shoulder to shoulder with the assorted denizens of Northumberland and the surrounding counties. Steam rose from damp cloaks. Earls rubbed elbows with farmers, satin vied with wool, as they flocked in, all determined to witness the dissolution of the marriage of the notorious Duchess of Winton.

Reporters from both the London Observer and the Times shoved their way through the crowd, collecting opinions and gossip. Sympathies were divided. An old farm woman with a face shriveled like a dried apple pronounced the duchess a poor unfortunate girl, carried off by a scoundrel and forced to marry at gunpoint. The young Miss Devony Blake would later be quoted as accusing Prudence Walker of being a "nefarious hedonist" who "dared to abscond" with her own aunt's fiancé. Her honorable father gleefully pronounced the entire affair as "simply rife with intrigue," then struck a noble pose and asked if they might include a sketch of him with their article.

The murmuring of the crowd rose to a low roar as the door of the courthouse swung open, admitting in a blast of rain the object of their fascination. Women lifted fans to muffle their whispers. The men nudged each other, leering.

The Times reporter hid his disappointment as one of the local gentry explained to him that the duchess was not the flamboyant creature in the towering wig and dipping dress, but the bespectacled woman behind her.

There was certainly nothing in the young duchess's appearance to invite criticism, the reporter mused. She was dressed in simple black, her dark hair caught in a chignon at the nape of her neck. He cursed himself for not bringing his inkpot. God, how he wanted to sketch her! Lines etched with such clarity were always fuzzed by time and memory.

Thunder rumbled through the courthouse as Prudence walked forward and took her seat in the front. Tricia left Old Fish at the door to shake out her umbrella on the grumbling few who had arrived too late to find seats. Tricia's new beau marched after her with a swirl of his cape—a Corsican count, his pristine frock coat dripping with ribbons and medals.

Prudence folded her hands in her lap. The noise of the crowd seemed to her only the roar of a distant ocean. She could not feel the lash of their whispers, the sting of their leers. She could not feel anything. A terrible numbness washed through her, dulling everything in its path.

One month. Thirty days and no word. Not one note. Not one message. Nothing to indicate Sebastian didn't want her to go through with the dissolution she had allowed Tricia to schedule. Prudence didn't need to hear the buzz of gossip around her to know that Sebastian had been released from a London jail almost a week ago. Old Fish had been pleased enough to inform her of that.

Sir Arlo had wisely decided that he would have a difficult, if not impossible, task convicting Sebastian Kerr, since the scene of his arrest had been crawling with Dreadful Scot Bandits, including a Scottish lord, a duchess, and a carrot-topped minister's son. There was also the matter of a mysterious disappearing pardon and the fact that Killian MacKay, one of the most powerful dukes in Scotland, had publicly claimed Sebastian as his son, illegitimate or not. To save face and stifle questions, it was announced the Dreadful Bandit had perished in the blast that had destroyed the crofter's hut. D'Artan's corpse was buried with suitable aplomb.

Prudence pulled off her gloves, wadding them into a ball. Sebastian was probably on his way back to the Highlands by now, she thought. He was the heir to one of the richest estates in Scotland. He could have his Dunkirk and anything else he was willing to accept from his father. He no longer required a plain duchess of moderate means to buy his respectability.

She stiffened as the judge entered the courtroom. His robes were dusty and his wig looked as if something had been nesting in it. Surveying the crowd, he heaved a tremendous sigh. He wasn't accustomed to such scenes. His most important judgment last year had involved the theft of a pregnant sow.

He pounded on his bench, dulling the murmurs to whispers. Prudence stared into her lap, letting Tricia answer his questions in her tinkling falsetto. Perhaps now Sebastian could escape the battered legacy of Brendan Kerr, she mused. He would always bear the scars, but in time the wounds might heal. She wished she could believe the same for herself.

"Your Grace!" The words boomed out like thunder.

Prudence started in her chair to discover the judge glowering at her. The nervous titters of the crowd faded to silence. "Yes, sir?"

"Your guardian has been kind enough to answer my questions about your abduction. I would appreciate the same courtesy from you. I will repeat my question again. Was this travesty of a marriage consummated?"

Travesty? Pelting hand in hand through a sun-drenched meadow. Quibbling over who would name the goat. Sharing a kiss at dawn, clothed only in the morning's first rays of sunlight. She opened her mouth to lie, fighting to speak past the hard knot in her throat.

A voice rang out from the back of the courtroom. "Aye, sir, that it was."

Prudence stood, gripping the banister for support. Turning, she saw a man standing in the doorway of the courthouse.

His lips curved in a naughty grin. "And with great pleasure, I might add."

Prudence went scarlet, then white. The court exploded with cries of shock. The judge hammered on his bench.

Sebastian Kerr stood with his father behind him, both garbed in full Highland splendor. Killian MacKay beamed proudly. Tiny and Jamie flanked them, each wearing crisp new garments. A fat cigar hung from Jamie's lips.

As Sebastian strode down the aisle toward her, Prudence sank back down, her knuckles ashen against the banister. She couldn't look at him. It hurt too much. It was like looking into the sun.

The crowd held its collective breath as Sebastian knelt beside her. He drew an engraved box from his plaid and handed it to her. "I thought to buy you a ring, but Jamie suggested you might appreciate this more."

She opened the box with trembling fingers. A tiny gold matchlock pistol nestled in folds of velvet.

Sebastian stood back, a resigned expression on his handsome face. "Do your worst. I deserve it."

The crowd gasped as she leveled the tiny pistol straight at his heart and pulled the trigger.

A jeweled bird burst from the muzzle, tinkling the first chiming notes of Bach's "Sleepers, Wake." Prudence moved to stifle her laugh, but Sebastian caught her hand before she could. Her rich ripples of laughter spilled through the courtroom.

All traces of humor disappeared from Sebastian's eyes. "I was afraid of implicating you. I couldn't come back until I knew I was truly free." He knelt beside her again and folded her hand in his. "I'm still a bastard, you know."

She primly adjusted her spectacles. "You always have been. But that never stopped me from loving you."

The crowd roared as Sebastian scooped her up in his arms. Tricia fell back in a dead swoon, knocking her wig into the count's lap.

As the crowd parted before them, Sebastian's lips brushed her cheek, her nose, her brow. His hand raked through her chignon, scattering the pins until her hair fell soft and loose around her face.

Tiny and Jamie flung open the doors. He carried her into the falling rain, tenderly tucking his plaid over her head.

"Where I come from," she said, her voice husky, "when a man gives a woman his plaid, it means only one thing."

He paused on the steps of the courthouse, smiling tenderly at her. "Show me."

She did. Their lips met as she clung to him. The crowd bellowed its approval. Killian MacKay turned and gave them a proper English bow. Tiny threw back his head with a roar of laughter.

Jamie wiped his streaming eyes and blew his nose on the sleeve of his new coat. "Don't no one dare say Jamie Graham ain't a sentimental, God-fearin' lad," he muttered to himself.

He tucked his smoking cigar between Old Fish's puckered lips before leaping down the steps, bounding after Prudence and Sebastian in the sweet English rain.