It took Verity nearly an hour to get ready to leave. She had to wash before she could begin to dress. She was stained with the sweat of days and nights of soul-fevered torment. Her hair was tangled and greasy. There was no time to wash it. She had Mrs Roper tie it back in a severe bun. Her face, when she looked in the mirror, seemed almost alien to her. The cheekbones were too sharp. There were lines around her eyes that had never been there before, and deep shadows beneath them. She looked ten years older than she was. She felt a hundred. But the red silk dress sheathed her like armour, and her eyes, despite the lines around them, were full of the old and familiar fire.

"Where is he?" she asked.

"Lord Albroke?" Mrs Roper put a hand on her shoulder. "Oh, no, love, you should not see him. You're better off never knowing him."

Verity raised her gaze to Mrs Roper in the reflection of the mirror. Mrs Roper's pitying expression faltered a moment.

"He should still be in the library, I believe."

He was not in the library. But in the corridor, Verity heard the sound of a knife scraping against china, and the low murmur of male voices. She walked silently to just outside the open dining room door; out of sight, but not out of hearing.

"...doesn't go for much in this part of the country, of course. It's not a bad place he picked, but I don't expect much of it. Though perhaps it's best not to sell it for a year after all. I can dismiss the male servants, and save on taxes."

The voice was deep, and soft, and surprisingly smooth. There was no hint of gravel in it.

Lord Albroke.

Verity set her shoulders, and marched through the open door.

The three men in the room looked up as she entered. Identical expressions of surprise arose to their faces, and quickly dissolved into less similar emotions: anger, confusion, guilt.

Richard Armiger pushed back his chair, and clumsily stood. The other two remained sitting. They were strangers to her. One, with his faded ginger hair, was obviously no relation to the family. The other, hazel-eyed, dark-haired, and angry, had to be Lord Albroke.

It disturbed her that he looked so much like Neil. An older, balder, and larger version of Neil, but a version of him all the same. He had the same aggressive eyebrows as Neil, the same angular bones beneath his plumping jowls.

"I had rather hoped it was his mother he had taken after," she said pleasantly, by way of introduction. "But it seems he looks very much like you. A pity. But then his character, certainly that must have been his mother's. I do not believe it could have anything to do with you."

A faint and unpleasant smirk rose to Lord Albroke's lips. "If it had, we would not be in this thankless position today. For your part, I have some more understanding now. He was always a fool for beauty. A pity he never bothered to look deeper."

"You do not think I am as beautiful inside as out? But you hardly know me." She came forward, gave a brief and mocking curtsy, and sat down in one of the chairs, uninvited. It was a relief to her. They could not have seen how her legs were beginning to shake again under her skirts, but she could feel it. The half-eaten remains of their meal on the table made her stomach twist with hunger.

"And I wish to know you no better, I can assure you." The smirk rose and faded again. "When will you leave my house?"

"Today. My things are being put in the carriage right now." She looked at him evenly. "I take it I have your permission to use the carriage to aid me in quitting?"

"If it will expedite the matter, then most certainly."

They fell into silence again. She had had no clear intentions when coming down to find him. She had only known that she could not leave without meeting the man who had done her so much harm. Facing him now, it was clear to her that he had much the same opinion of her as she did of him: arrogant, hateful obtrusion into my life. It could almost have made her laugh. Only she was too full of hatred for anything close to laughter.

Seeing that she was not going to leave, perhaps seeing in her some of that hatred, Lord Albroke said quietly,

"I am not ignorant of the cost your reputation has suffered through the annulment of your marriage to my son, and his subsequent death. In recognition of that, I am prepared to offer you an annuity of one hundred pounds, for the length of ten years, the total cost of which would be one thousand pounds. In fairness, you should know this money would be coming from a share of my son's estate. It would not be my money."

The lawyer behind Lord Albroke jumped slightly, and Richard looked surprised. But neither spoke. Verity had the impression that they were accustomed not to speaking in Lord Albroke's presence unless he allowed them.

"No," she said agreeably, "It would not be. But you need not part with it all the same. I desire no compensation for the ills you have done me – bar one, which I believe you should never give."

Lord Albroke's head tilted slightly. "What would that be?"

"An apology, of course, and a recognition of the legal deception you took part in."

There was silence, for a moment. The lawyer leaned closer.

"No," said Lord Albroke. "Don't bother, Hayworth. Miss Baker, I do not apologise, and I do not concede. I have fought, within my rights, to protect my family from humiliation. There is nothing to apologize for."

She waited a moment before replying, taking in every angle of his hateful face, every line and wrinkle and sagging pit of his flesh. She shook, not from illness, but from the effort of holding back the wave of anger sweeping over her.

When she spoke, her voice was tight with the effort to control herself. "In that case, I only ask for you and your family to never come near me again."

"We will forever agree on that. Perhaps, you can even say, we are parting on agreeable terms."

She stood. Briefly, she curtsied on her trembling legs. "No, Lord Albroke, I cannot."

"Wait!"

She paused at the door, and turned. Richard had half-risen. "Where will you go now? Do you have a place to go?"

"It is no concern of yours."

She swept from the room.

As a matter of fact, the carriage waiting out front was supposed to take her to Lady Duvalle's. Somehow, after her interview, she could not stand the thought of speaking to her grandmother. She knew her grandmother's offer of hospitality had come not from kindness, but from guilt. Perhaps even guilt was too heavy a term. Obligation might have been closer to the truth. Verity had not mentioned it to her grandmother, but she had not forgotten that it was Lady Duvalle who had persuaded, bullied, and bribed the two of them to get married in the first place. Nor, she was sure, had Lady Duvalle forgotten. No. Her grandmother, having taken responsibility for the making of the marriage, was at least in part responsible for its unmaking, and the consequences thereof. That was the only reason Verity had a place to go today. And the very reason she did not want to go there.

On the steps of the old house, she made up her mind suddenly

"George," she called to the coach driver. "You're not to take me to my grandmother's after all. There's a cottage in Lesser Hough – my father's old place. Take me there."

*   *   *

The cottage was more of a hovel than she remembered. Her storm of anger had passed by the time she arrived, and she was regretting her decision to come here. George looked doubtfully at the crooked, broken shutters and weed-strewn, muddy garden as he helped her descend from the carriage.

"Are you sure you want to stay here, m'lady?"

If he hadn't asked, she might have begged him to take her away. Her resolve stiffened.

"Yes. Yes. Just for now. I promised the landlord I would go through his things. And I must do so." She lifted up her red dress, not to ruin the hems in the mud. "Thank you. If you can carry the trunks into the dining room for me, I would be very grateful."

In the dining room, George looked more concerned than before. He eyed the falling plaster and rickety furniture with distaste. A rat ran out from the skirting, and he stamped at it, so it got scared and ran inside again.

"M'lady," he said bluntly, "They're not going to be staying at the house more than a few days. If you need the carriage, to come back there, or go anywhere else, you just send word. They'll never know."

"Thank you, George. Really, thank you. When you get back, will you tell Mrs Roper where I am? She'll want to know."

"Of course." He bowed, and left.

As soon as he was gone, Verity collapsed into a chair. She had not eaten all day, and barely at all in the week before. Coupled with emotional exhaustion, she felt ill and drained. She lay there for some time, thinking and feeling nothing, until her hunger drove her up, and to find something to eat.

Naturally, there was nothing. Not one scrap of mouldy bread remained in the house. The only thing approximating food were the two bottles of half-finished spirit on the mantelpiece. She sniffed one cautiously, and when her stomach roiled in reaction, put it back hastily.

No matter. She would do without.

Slowly, frailly, she traipsed around the small dining room, picking up all the random articles that had remained abandoned on the floor after her father's death. Bottles; papers; a wicker basket that might once have contained bread; a butter knife; a lady's fan, made of cheap linen, and stained. She did not want to know how that got there. Everything on the floor went into the wicker basket. She put it on the sideboard to sort through later. Grimly, she straightened the chairs against the table. Her father's coat, the awful new green and red check, hung over the back of one of the chairs. So he had not been buried in it. No doubt the vicar had thought it too garish a coat for a man to meet his maker in.

But it would go to the poor, along with what little else he had of service. She took it with her, upstairs to his room, to look. Something crackled in the pockets, and she searched them. A letter.

She dumped the coat on her father's bed, and then passed to the other side of the attic room to read the letter on her own bed. At one stage, there had been a curtain to separate the room into two. It now lay piled in a heap on her bed. She kicked the bed frame carefully, and when nothing but dust rose from the mess, sat down on it.

It was a letter from a bank in London.

Of course. The ten thousand pounds Lord Albroke had bribed her father with. Her heart beat a little faster. It could not all be spent yet. And her father was not the sort of man to leave a will behind.

She read the letter desperately, hoping for one, ironic chance of independence from the contents. It gave it to her. It spoke of five hundred pounds in guineas being presented to Mr Baker with receipt of the letter. It suggested, gently, the use of promissory notes and investment. It seemed to recognize that the hope of their use was not high. At the end, it conceded that the remaining nine thousand and four hundred pounds would be at Mr Baker's disposal at any time he wished to send a messenger to London – or even to come himself.

Verity put the letter down, shaking. She was saved, at the very least, poverty. She could invest the money, and live off the interest – how much would it be? Two hundred pounds? Three hundred? More than she had lived off before in either case.

She sighed with relief. Fortune from misfortune, and misfortune in fortune, she thought. Probably, indeed, her father had hidden some coins in his usual place, under the bed, if the five hundred pounds he had taken had not run him out already.

She got back to her feet, intent on checking every cranny of the house. She had taken no money with her when she left, and was acutely conscious that if she did not eat soon she would be very ill indeed. But downstairs, before she could, she heard the sound of the front door opening and creaking shut again.

Laughing, she ran down the stairs, the letter in her hand. "Mrs Ro-"

She stopped still at the bottom. Richard Armiger was standing, leaning heavily on his cane, by the door. The expression on his face was pained and confused, but she barely registered it in her own confusion and annoyance.

"Lord Landon. I thought I was clear about my feelings towards you and your family."

"You were. Eminently." He nodded a slight greeting. "And I'm sorry to trouble you again."

She peered out the window behind him. One of Neil's horses was tied to the gatepost. "You came alone? How did you even know I was here?"

"I heard the coachman telling Mrs Roper about it. He seemed very upset by the condition of the place. I understand why, now that I've seen it."

"I told you, it's no concern of yours where I am or what I do." She shook her head, and remembering the letter she still held, folded it away and slipped it inside the cuff of her sleeve. "Please, Lord Landon, do not trouble me further. If you wish to help me, I do not wish to receive it. If you have some other purpose in following me, I can only repeat that I honestly wish to have nothing to do with you."

"I know."

"Then why are you still here?"

He chewed his lip a moment. "Because..."

"Because?" she challenged.

"Because you're pregnant, aren't you?"

~~~~

A/N: I am way, way too tired to proof this chapter properly. Forgive me any rough patches or typos please.