Chapter 97

Papa always said, tell the truth and shame the devil. She took a deep breath. "Very well. Yesterday, losing that competition, not getting the money, when it's not like me to lose, was the worst thing that could happen to me. So when the earl offered me another chance, I agreed. But now ... Well, now you're right, you were right from the start, he is a despicable man, whose help I never should have taken, even if it did mean staying in the tournament."
"You're certainly right about that."
Starkadder and his namesake snake she had to feed with a house mouse every week, thank God for that. To think she had thought Gabe might be difficult. That he would moan, complain, and dig his heels in. But now that he had proved agreeable, she would be too.
"Yes. I see that now. Especially now he's-" She paused. Despite this amiability, wanting to spend one night with me, was still not quite the thing to say. "-blackmailing me."
"Whoa ...You whoa, right there, Splen. Are you sayin' you saw him yesterday after the competition? Are you sayin' what I think?"
Oh, thank the stars in the sky above. He understood, without her having to empty the entire sack of beans into the pot. She nodded, the noise she made like these same mice she'd fed to Starkadder's pet snake, the floor something she dug her heels into to keep from sinking into it.
"Yes."
"You mean he's goin' to tell everyone you were Nathan after all?"
She squirmed. Was his head made of planks? Who would have thought shaming the devil was so hard? "Well ... "
Yet actually, what Gabe said was better than nothing. Why shouldn't the earl tell that? It made this far simpler. And truth? Truth was a moveable line.
"Something like that. Yes. You see, last night I was supposed to win the ten thousand he put up. But for whatever reason, probably because he cheated, I lost. So now ... Well, I can't go to prison, Gabriel. Surely you see that? I've been there. And you have no idea how awful it is."
"What? Jeez, Splen. So you want me to call the bastard out?"
She almost swallowed the rickety table. My God, no. Because then that bastard wouldn't just want to know what for, he'd get a huge surprise when he found out.
Already it was bad enough the bastard wanted her at his disposal for a night. What if that turned to two? Ten? What if he killed Gabe, who couldn't fire a shot?
"No, don't call him out. I just want you to marry me. Today. Even if it means going to Gretna Green."
He flicked the long peak of ash onto the floorboards. "What?"
"I am sure you heard, Gabriel. It is the only thing that will save me now from ... from prison. You will do this for me, won't you?"
"Marry you now?"
He drew on his cigar as if his life depended on it. "But ...but how, Splen?"
"It's quite simple. Let me show you. You put a ring on my finger. This finger here. I will even buy it for you with the remains of the prize money from being second in the tourna-"
"I mean why would he blow the gaff just because you lost to him at chess? And why do I need to marry you right now? Can you tell me that? Can't you just leave town till this blows over?"
"No, Gabriel, I can't."
"Well, it's just-"
"What?"
For the merest second his gaze held hers, all shadowed eyes and strange emptiness. It was a Gabe she had never seen before, but then the room was dark, lit only by a broken skylight and the glow that came from the end of his cigar.
"It just don't seem right to me. All that fanciness, all them dances, them theater trips. And now you need me to marry you to stop him openin' his big mouth and squawkin'? How's that?"
"As I have already explained to you, several times, these were to help me get better acquainted-"
"Well, I don't care what they were for, I ain't doin' it for that. Jeezo, Splen, how can you think so?"
Her heart plummeted so far down her rib cage it bounced off her churning stomach and shot back up again, joining the family of albatrosses wedged in her gullet. As for this perpetual taking of the Lord's name in vain when he wanted to enter the ministry, her ears had seldom been so affronted. In fact, it was a close run thing what affronted them more: that or the fact he was being awkward and puffing on his cigar like a pair of bellows. Her ears weren't the only thing affronted. Her nose was too.
"But Gabe, you-you have to."
"Like you thought you had to enter that stupid competition. I can do it and win the ten thousand."
His mimicking of her caused her jaw to drop open.
"But you never won it, so whatever this is about between you and that-that fudge-faced-"
"Nothing. There is nothing between us. How can you think so?"
"Quite easily, knowin' you. So what's he really after if it ain't you locked up with your nabber friends?"
"My what?"
"You heard. What you lot always was."
"I never, ever stole. You know that."
"You cleaned for them though."
"I had to. Starkadder paid Papa's debts. The ones I would still be behind bars for if he hadn't."
"Saint Starkadder now is it?"
Unless ... unless Gabe was jealous? The sense that made was perfect. After witnessing the lengths Stillmore had gone to over that Langley woman, hadn't she longed for just such a display?
He squared his thin shoulders. "So? Spill it. Go on. What's the real story here?"
"Very well. You're right. The earl wouldn't blackmail me over being Nathan.
The wager-"
"Wager? What do you mean wager? You said competition."
"Well, it was that. Sort of."
"What wager?"
Oh God, please give her the strength to say the words she was about to say, calmly, without falling on the floor. For a vicar's wife to be, she was becoming nicely religious. Surely that would stand her in good stead.
"The one for the ten thousand pounds. The earl's terms ... his terms were one night if I lost. This is about as bad as it gets. I see that now. But if you marry me, then, well ... then, that way ... Don't you see?" The thing was, in that second she didn't know what she saw herself, so it was hard to make him see. Still, she plowed on, saying words that felt like mushy unsalted soup in her mouth. "How happy we can be."
"So? You lost then?"
"Oh, for heaven's sake, I was never going to do what he wanted. How can you think I would? I just said I would to get the ten thousand pounds, which I thought I was certain to win. What other collateral did I have? And it was vital, that in addition to my getting the money for us, that we kept Lady Kertouche's patronage."
"So the old bat exists then?"
"Of course she exists, and on our return, I am going straight to her to explain about you wanting to take the cloth and how ... how we plan on benefiting the poor. She will help us even if we don't have the money. In fact, now that we don't, it's even more vital that she does help us."
His eyes darkened, He threw the cigar onto the floor and stomped it into oblivion, and then he hauled the door open.
"You know what Splen; you're on your own."
"I'm sorry?" She rubbed the back of her neck where the fine hairs scorched. She couldn't be on her own. Even if she was used to it in many ways, in others, she was totally unprepared. There had always been something to fight for, someone to do for. "Gabriel..."
She didn't care that impatience lashed her voice. She hadn't made these trips through choice, although, with the exception of the theater one, there was no denying part of her had thrilled to certain aspects of them. The crystal chandeliers, the champagne, the fine food, the earl. No. Not the earl. The earl did not come into it when Gabe stood there chalk white against the chipped doorjamb.
"Well, you got yourself into this mess, so I reckon you can get yourself out it."
"But, we're engaged. You said so yourself. All that time in Lanthorne Street."
"You've got a funny way of showin' it, I must say."
"But I-I-"
"Do you think a parson's wife can go throwin' herself at every passin' Tom, Dick, and Harry's head-"
"For God's sake, he isn't every Tom, Dick, and Harry, he's the-"
"Whatever he is, will you just damn well listen to yourself, for once in your life?"
She thought she had been. She bit her tongue to stop herself saying so. "I am listen-"
He tilted his jaw. "All of this is assumin' it's what I want."
"But isn't it, Gabe? Why, only the other week-"
"Right now that's the past. It's what belongs back in Lanthorne Street. And you ... you just ain't seen it."
My God, he couldn't not want to marry her. He'd come round tomorrow or the next day. Her breath shortened to the faintest huff. She didn't have a tomorrow or the next day. The earl had been very specific. As specific as Gabe standing against the door jamb of this horribly dismal room, staring at his cigar-induced torpor.
For the first time, the future she had held to as solidly as she had gripped her broom back at Starkadder's shrank to a speck of dust. Her first step toward whatever new one beckoned involved walking out of this room.
She couldn't do it. Not to save her life. But for the time being, at least until she had time to sort this, she might have to.