Many people, including women, had confided all sorts of things to Dr. Seaton with very little embarrassment and no shame, Victoria knew. And if she was ever going to understand Jason, she had to talk to Captain Farrell.
“Very well,” she said, and was relieved when he was thoughtful enough to turn his back and busy himself with the preparations for tea. It was easier to talk to his back. “Actually, I came here to ask you if you were certain you told me everything you knew about Jason. But to answer your question, Jason stayed home last night for the first time since I last saw you. He’s been going to London, you see, to visit his ... ah ...” She drew a long breath and said firmly, “His paramour.”
Captain Farrell’s back stiffened, but he did not turn around. “What makes you think a thing like that?” he said, slowly taking down a bowl of sugar.
“Oh, I’m certain of it. The papers hinted at it yesterday morning. Jason was gone all night, but when he returned I was at breakfast and I’d just read the paper. I was upset—”
“I can imagine.”
“And I nearly lost my temper, but I tried to be reasonable. I told him I realized that considerate husbands kept mistresses, but that I thought he ought to be discreet and—”
Captain Farrell lurched around, gaping at her with a bowl of sugar in one hand and a pitcher of milk in the other. “You told him that you thought it was considerate of him to keep a mistress, but that he ought to be discreet?”
“Yes. Shouldn’t I have said that?”
“More importantly, why did you say it? Why did you even think it?”
Victoria heard the criticism in his voice and stiffened slightly. “Miss Wilson—Flossie Wilson explained that in England it is the custom for considerate husbands to have—”
“Flossie Wilson?” he burst out in appalled disbelief. “Flossie Wilson?” he repeated as if he couldn’t believe his ears. “Flossie Wilson is a spinster, not to mention a complete henwit! An utter peagoose! Jason used to keep her at Wakefield to help look after Jamie so that when he was away, Jamie would have a loving female with him. Flossie was loving, all right, but the ninnyhammer actually misplaced the baby one day. You asked a woman like that for advice on keeping a husband?”
“I didn’t ask her, she offered the information,” Victoria replied defensively, flushing.
“I’m sorry for shouting at you, child,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck. “In Ireland a wife takes a skillet to her husband’s head if he goes to another woman! It’s much simpler, more direct, and far more effective, I’m sure. Please go on with what you were trying to tell me. You said you confronted Jason—”
“I’d really rather not continue,” Victoria said warily. “I don’t think I should have come. Actually, it was a dreadful idea. I only hoped you could explain to me why Jason has become so distant since our wedding—”
“What,” Captain Farrell said tensely, “do you mean by ‘distant’?”
“I don’t know how to explain it.”
He poured tea into two cups and picked them up. “Victoria,” he said, frowning as he turned, “are you trying to tell me he doesn’t come to your bed very often?”
Victoria blushed and stared at her hands. “Actually, he hasn’t been there since our wedding night—although I greatly feared that, after he broke the door down the next morning when I locked it—”
Without a word, Captain Farrell turned back to the cupboard, put down the teacups, and filled two glasses with whiskey.
He walked over and thrust one at her. “Drink this,” he ordered firmly. “It will make it easier to talk, and I intend to hear the rest of this tale.”
“Do you know, before I came to England I’d never tasted spirits of any kind, except wine after my parents died,” she said, shuddering at the contents of the glass and then looking at him as he sat down. “But ever since I came here, people have been giving me wine and brandy and champagne and telling me to drink it because I’ll feel better. It doesn’t make me feel better in the least.”
“Try it,” he ordered.
“I did try it. You see, I was so nervous the day we got married that I tried to pull away from Jason at the altar. So when we arrived at Wakefield, I thought some wine might help me face the rest of the night. I drank five glasses at our wedding celebration, but all it did was make me sick when we—I went to bed that night.”
“Am I to understand that you nearly left Jason at the altar in front of a churchful of his acquaintances?”
“Yes, but they didn’t realize it. Jason did, though.”
“Good God,” he whispered.
“And on our wedding night I nearly threw up.”
“Good God,” he whispered again. “And the next morning you locked Jason out of your room?”
Victoria nodded, feeling miserable.
“And then you told him yesterday that you thought it was considerate of him to go to his mistress?” When Victoria nodded again, Captain Farrell stared at her in mute fascination.
“I did try to make up for it last night,” she informed him defensively.
“I’m relieved to hear that.”
“Yes, I offered to do anything he would like.”
“That should have improved his disposition immensely,” Captain Farrell predicted with a faint smile.
“Well, for a moment it seemed to. But when I said we could play chess or cards, he became—”
“You suggested he play chess? For God’s sake, why chess?”
Victoria looked at him in quiet hurt. “I tried to think of the things my mother and father used to do together. I would have suggested a walk, but it was a little chilly.”
Visibly torn between laughter and distress, Captain Farrell shook his head. “Poor Jason,” he said in a laughing underbreath. When he looked at her again, though, he was in deadly earnest. “I can assure you that your parents did ... er.. . other things.”
“Such as what?” Victoria said, thinking of the nights her parents had sat across from each other before the fire, reading books. Her mother cooked her father’s favorite dishes for him, too, and she kept his house neat and his clothes mended, but Jason had an army of people to perform those wifely tasks for him, and they did it to perfection. She glanced at Captain Farrell, who had lapsed into uneasy silence. “What sort of things are you referring to?”