“I’m not dashing. Babies should not die of exposure when London boasts ten thousand fires. I’m also concerned that a desperate beggar might steal the infants and use them for illicit sympathy.”
“Until the child starves to death. Some of us take that business about being lower than the angels to the extreme.”
And Papa did not judge anybody for resorting to desperate measures, though he clearly judged Arbuckle. “Some angels dwell in hell,” Michael said, the brandy warming his insides. “The arrogant ones.”
“Lambeth has been a predictably dreary influence on your theology. Where do matters stand between you and Arbuckle?”
Michael summarized the situation as best he could. “He expects me to turn Bea over to him the day after tomorrow.”
“I dearly hope that was a lie, Michael.”
“I hope it was too.”
Papa finished his drink and returned the glass to the sideboard. “Your mother insisted that she and I have our own residence, a safe harbor against the day when vicaring exceeded my energies. I’ve rented the place out all these years. A mere cottage in Berkshire. You are welcome to bide there with the children. In the alternative, I can bide there with the children should you take a notion to travel—the good ladies of St. Mildred’s can run this parish blindfolded without any help from me, God knows. Failing that, I’m sure MacKay would send you and your offspring to his relatives in Scotland, and that might be the wisest course.”
Michael wanted to linger on the old sofa, to have another brandy and bask in his father’s kindness. Instead, he rose and passed Papa his half-finished drink.
“Thank you. I came here prepared to be disowned. I would die for Bea and Thad, but I’m no good to them dead. I can’t trust Arbuckle to stop short of criminal charges, though.”
Papa took a spill from a jar on the mantel and began a circuit of the room, lighting sconces and tapers. “Wretched weather. We always pay for those early glimpses of spring. I doubt Arbuckle will embroil himself in the scandal of criminal charges. He’s a bad fit with the avenging-angel role, and like most creatures who survive on low cunning, he knows when to slink away.”
“He’ll take charge of Bea, though, and make her life hell. I cannot accept that.”
Papa blew out the taper, the smoke drifting about his face. “Then don’t. If the Church would rather hide the evil Arbuckle has done than take pride in your good works, the Church doesn’t deserve you. Shake the dust of Lambeth from your feet and court that pretty Mrs. Fremont. She’s keen on you, according to Dorcas, though you must never let on that I tattled.”
This little excursion into family gossip, offered side by side with what amounted to blasphemy, warmed Michael’s heart as the finest brandy never would.
“Papa, I love you.”
Papa tossed the smoking taper onto the fire. “And I love you, but one wishes you were a bit more proficient at loving yourself. You are doubtless determined to go out into this miserable weather. Don’t blame me if you come down with a lung fever. I will wait until the deluge lets up to pay a call on Ophelia Oldbach.”
Michael had more calls to pay, and dear Mrs. Oldbach was not on that list. Still, he was reluctant to part from his father.
“Shall I join you calling on Mrs. O?”
“I think not. You have weighty matters to attend to, and the old guard must be allowed to plot our maneuvers in private. I meant what I said about the strongbox and a fast horse, Michael. No son of mine will be sacrificed for the bishops’ vanity, nor will my grandchildren. Arbuckle is a plague, a pestilence, and a blight, while I could not be more proud of you.”
“I came here to explain and apologize, Papa. I did not come here to be…”
Vicar Delancey perched a hip on his desk, every inch the spry older gent. “To be appreciated? To be seen for the wonderful fellow you are?”
“I’m not always wonderful.”
“Who is? But you are my son, and I am a devoted father and grandfather, much to my delight. I will send a note along to Dorcas acquainting her with the situation, unless you have time to do that yourself?”
“I honestly do not.”
“Then be off with you, and don’t worry.” He clapped Michael a stout blow on the shoulder. “Arbuckle is respected, but you are respected, too, and loved.”
Papa was utterly certain that good would triumph. Either that, or he was making a damned fine show of false confidence. As Michael donned his greatcoat and hat and splashed out into the muzzling sleet, he wondered if Psyche Fremont believed herself to be loved too.
He’d told her he loved her, but did she believe it? She would not love a man who turned his child over to the devil, and Michael wouldn’t have much respect for such a fellow either.
He turned up his collar and bent into the gathering wind.
Chapter Fifteen
“Come along,” Dorcas MacKay said, taking her husband by the sleeve.
The major, who had faced down French patrols, Spanish bandits, rioting British infantry, and London streetwalkers en masse, came along.
“Where are you taking me, darling wife?” he asked, allowing a note of hope to lace his question.
“Not upstairs,” Dorcas said, though many a marital nap had enlivened their winter afternoons—also their spring, summer, and autumn afternoons. “Mrs. Fremont and Mrs. Buckthorn have asked that you join us for a chat over the teapot, though they are not, in fact, asking.”
Hence the anxiety in Dorcas’s eyes.
“I’m to be court-martialed?” MacKay tried to recall any offenses he might have committed involving these two widows, to no avail.
Dorcas stopped outside the door to the family parlor. “Don’t sound so pleased, Husband. The ladies are worried, and I fear Michael’s adventures have inspired them to call.”
“You will not go adventuring with him, Dorcas. Not unless I go with you.”
“I have adventures enough with you right here in our home,” Dorcas said, keeping her voice down.
MacKay studied his wife, who had been raised in a vicarage and doubtless witnessed many an anxious call and many a prayer vigil.
“Our Michael doesn’t do anything illegal when he collects babies from church steps, Dorcas. He does what any passing Samaritan—any decent person—ought to do.”
“You know that, and I know that, but he shames his superiors with his zeal. I am so afraid for him.” She leaned close, and MacKay obliged with a hug. Dorcas presented a relentlessly cheerful, competent face to the world—Ophelia Oldbach in her younger days would not have been a match for Dorcas when it came to poise—but MacKay knew better.
“Michael is family,” he said, pressing his lips to Dorcas’s temple. “We will not allow him to fight a battle with the bishops alone. Let’s hear what the ladies have to say.”
Dorcas remained right where she was. “You won’t tell me not to meddle?”
MacKay wanted to. He wanted to tell her to stand aside and let her husband do the meddling, while she cheered him—and a few stalwart cousins and in-laws—on from a safe distance.
“Michael is your brother, and you feel as if you failed him once before. I could not stop you from taking his part if I commanded four Highland regiments, two rummage-sale committees, and all the game girls in London.”