A Rogue for All Seasons (Weston Family) (43 page)

He paced outside the birthing stall, more agitated than Penelope, until Diana guided him to sit beside her on an overturned wooden crate. While the mare was arguably the most valuable horse in their stables, Diana knew monetary concerns were the furthest thing from her husband’s mind. While he felt responsibility for the well-being of all their horses, he and Penelope had formed a special bond.

“Her water has broken.” Kingsley spoke quietly so as not to disturb the mare, but Henry heard him all the same and hurried back over, tugging Diana with him.

“Claire will be so disappointed to have missed this,” she murmured. Her sister would arrive in a few days to spend her summer holiday with them. “If it weren’t for the possibility of seeing Penelope foal, I think she would have begged to spend her holiday with
your
family.” Claire had met Henry’s twin sisters, and they had immediately become the best of friends. Henry swore he had nightmares that the three of them were going to try to rule the world.

“Given the choice,
I
would miss this,” Henry muttered. “Your sister will have all the fun of playing with the foal with none of the worry beforehand.” He turned his attention back to the mare. “You can do this, Pen. That’s my brave girl. I’ll see you have extra oats for a year.”

Henry kept up his encouraging monologue until the foal’s tiny hooves came into view, followed by the muzzle. Everyone was silent as Kingsley entered the birthing stall and approached the foal. When he stepped back, Diana sighed in relief at the sight of the small, flaring nostrils and watched in wonder as the mare strained and pushed to finish delivering her foal.

Kingsley moved to make a quick check of the foal. “A beautiful, healthy colt,” he announced, a wide grin splitting his face. Diana’s heart swelled as the little foal struggled to his feet and approached his mother with wobbling steps, settling in next to her. The exhausted mare nuzzled her son contentedly.

Diana turned to Henry and found him looking at her, a tender smile on his face. She could no more have stopped returning that smile than she could have stopped the stars from shining. “I hope you don’t intend to offer me extra oats when the time comes,” she warned him.

At his insistence, after they’d returned from Swallowsdale, she’d begun drinking the wild carrot seed infusion that Mrs. Timms suggested. Henry said he wanted her to himself for a while before he had to share her, and he wanted her to be sure she was ready. Diana suffered none of the ill effects she had with the pennyroyal, and she appreciated his concern for her, but she’d finally insisted they let nature take its course.

“No oats for you. I’ll remember that… when the time comes.” He chuckled, as he slid an arm around her waist. “Just don’t put me through that again anytime soon.”

She canted her head to look into those stunning blue eyes. “What do you consider
soon
?”

As understanding dawned, a dazzling expression of joy broke over his face. “Are you certain?” he demanded.

“I don’t think there’s any doubt. You go off to the stables after breakfast. I head back upstairs to cast up my accounts.”

“You should have told me.”

“You were already a mess over Penelope. I didn’t want to worry you more.” She batted his hand away from her forehead. “I feel fine once it’s over. I’m not ill. I’m having a baby.
We’re
having a baby.”

He caught her up in his arms and spun her around until she felt light-headed. Or perhaps she was just giddy with happiness. “I guess you’re not so reluctant to go through this again as you thought,” she said as he set her back on her feet.

He cast a glance in the direction of the mare and her foal and shook his head, one hand sliding down to rest against her still-flat abdomen. “I have time to prepare myself.”

“Are you truly happy?”

His eyes twinkled. “Did I not say I wished you to bear me at least a dozen babes?”

“Why does that number keep getting larger?”

“Then again, I’m not certain my heart could survive two dozen nights like tonight, especially given the strenuous exercise my lusty wife requires of me nightly.”

“Henry,” she warned.

“And sometimes before noon.”

“Oh, you are impossible.” She hovered between laughter and the urge to strangle him.

Kingsley saved him from bodily harm, coughing and clearing his throat half a dozen times before saying, “Beg pardon, but I’ll be updating the record book tonight. What name should I put for the foal?”

“What do you think of Telemachus?” Diana asked Henry. “That is the name of Penelope’s son in the
Odyssey
.”

Henry shook his head. “He may be a horse, but he doesn’t deserve a name like that. As it happens, I’ve given this some thought, and you know I’m not fond of that particular form of exertion. We will call him Rogue, Kingsley, since my wife has a fondness for them.”

He placed an arm around Diana’s shoulders and murmured, “I will leave the naming of all our future foals in your very capable”—he took her hand and pressed a kiss to her palm.—”very beautiful”—a nip—”very
talented
hands.”

Kingsley muttered something about marriage making a man soft and walked off.

Diana giggled. “Should I inform him not to worry on that account?”

“Dear God,” Henry groaned. “You’ll be worse than my sisters soon.”

“How could I be otherwise with such a husband?” She looped her arms around his neck. “So, our champion is another rogue, is he?”

He nodded. “In my experience, rogues carry the day.”

Her heart swelled at the love in his eyes.

“I thought you were reformed.”

“Where you are concerned, my dearest, darling, delightful Miss Merriwether”—he punctuated his words with a succession of light, lingering kisses—”I will always be a rogue.”

“I prefer Mrs. Weston,” she informed him breathlessly, “and I’m glad.”

“Diana.” His voice was low, heated now. Her name on his lips an intimate caress.

“Henry,” she responded in turn.

As one, they turned and raced through the early morning light, laughing as they chased each other into the house. He closed his eyes and counted loudly as she scurried off in search of her hiding place. She grinned in anticipation as she heard his footsteps on the stairs. A lump beneath the quilts might be obvious, but she didn’t want him to waste time looking. Her breath caught as he whisked away the covers, and she laughed in sheer joy as he pounced.

He’d found her, and she would never let him go.

AUTHOR'S NOTE

Anyone who knows me is aware that I like to talk. A lot. I also adore alliteration, as you have probably noticed, and I enjoy researching minutiae entirely too much. I always have more to share after I’ve finished writing a book, which is why some higher power created the Author’s Note…

O
N
L
ONDON’S
P
ALLADIAN
P
ALACE

W
HEN
I
WAS REVISING
Tempting the Marquess
, the second book in the Weston series, I threw in a reference to Thomas and Linnet’s scandalous pairing, mentioning them only as the stable master and the Duke of Lansdowne’s daughter. Why or how I settled on ‘Lansdowne,’ I don’t know, but I did, and
Tempting the Marquess
went to print. I was finishing graduate school in New York while working on
A Rogue for All Seasons
, and one of my final classes was Museum and Library Research at the Watson Library, which just so happens to be in the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

For two glorious weeks, going to school meant showing up at the Met every day. In my free time, I continually found myself drawn back to the period rooms, especially the ones from the Georgian era. I imagined my characters inhabiting these spaces. The cheery yellow room from Kirtlington Park became a drawing room at Weston Manor. The magnificent green dining room from Lansdowne House— I stopped to reread the label. Yes, it said Lansdowne House.

After learning that there was indeed a Lansdowne House in London in 1800—and it was the epitome of extravagance—I couldn’t allow Diana’s grandparents to live anywhere else. So, while the Duke and Duchess of Lansdowne are fictional, their house in Berkeley Square is real. Work on Lansdowne House began in 1761 for the prime minister, John Stuart (1713–1792), third Earl of Bute. Just two years later, Bute left office in disgrace, and two years following that, the earl sold the still-unfinished house to William Petty Fitzmaurice (1737-1805), second Earl of Shelburne, who was created the first Marquess of Lansdowne in 1784.

Lansdowne served as foreign secretary, then first lord of the Treasury, and finally for a brief eight months as prime minister (1782-83). His support of free speech, free trade, and American independence made him wildly unpopular with George III, but he counted Benjamin Franklin and Samuel Johnson among his friends. Lansdowne House became one of the leading centers for liberal, sophisticated society in London.

Robert Adam (1728-1792), the leading architect of the day, designed Lansdowne House in the popular Neoclassical style, and it is seen as his finest London house. The house survived largely intact—despite being leased to Gordon Selfridge, the department store magnate, who installed his lovers, the Hungarian Vaudeville performers known as ‘The Dolly Sisters,’ and hosted wild dancing parties. Sadly, however, in 1929, Lansdowne House was sold, and within a few years, it was partially demolished to make way for a new street. The dining room and first drawing room were shipped to America and installed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Lansdowne House (or what remains of it) became home to the Lansdowne Club, which opened in 1935 and is still in existence today.

O
N
P
ENNYROYAL

S
INCE ANCIENT
E
GYPTIAN TIMES
, herbal medicines have been used to prevent conception and to induce miscarriage. The use of pennyroyal as an emmenagogue (substance that hastens or induces menstruation) and, if taken in sufficient quantities, an abortifacient, dates back at least to ancient Greece. Aristophanes mentioned the herb in his play,
Lysistrata
, in which the women of Greece plot to withhold sex until the men agree sign a peace treaty ending the Peloponnesian War.

In Europe, midwives and female healers collected knowledge of herbs that helped—or helped prevent—reproduction. Women shared this information with each other and passed it down from generation to generation. During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, however, the field of obstetrics emerged, and male surgeons gradually replaced midwives. With men in charge of the birthing process, much of the information about the use of herbal medicine with regard to reproduction, especially for contraception, was lost.

Printed sources, such as Nicholas Culpeper’s seventeenth century herbals, suggest that a number of common herbs were recognized and utilized as antifertility agents. Pennyroyal, rue, savin (juniper), tansy, thyme, and vervain (verbena) were seen frequently in kitchen gardens, having both culinary and medicinal applications. In 1800, the year in which
A Rogue for All Seasons
is set, doctors used pennyroyal to treat illnesses ranging from digestive disorders to gout to bronchitis to menstrual cramps. Prepared correctly and taken in limited quantities, these herbs can be very effective, but in high concentrations, they are toxic; the essential oils should never be taken internally.

The other plant Diana employs, wild carrot (Queen Anne’s lace), also has a long history as a contraceptive. Scribonius Largus, court physician to the Roman emperor Claudius, was the earliest medical writer to explore its antifertility properties, but women around the globe have used wild carrot seeds at least as long as they have used pennyroyal. Whereas extended use of pennyroyal can be taxing on the kidneys and liver, wild carrot seeds are safe for regular use. For more information on this subject, I recommend John Riddle’s
Eve’s Herbs
(Harvard University Press, 1997). Anyone interested in the modern applications of herbal medicine to reproductive health is encouraged to check out the books and/or visit the websites of herbalists Susun Weed and Robin Rose Bennett.

O
N
S
ELF
-P
UBLISHING

I
’VE ALWAYS KNOWN
D
IANA
was Henry’s match. He sealed his fate when he complained about dancing with her in
Promise Me Tonight
, the first book in the Weston series. Having been through two books with Hal, I had a firm grip on his character; I knew about his family, about where he’d grown up and gone to school, and about his quirks, his strengths, and his flaws. As I attempted to learn more about Diana, Thomas and Linnet’s story emerged, and, through them, I began to understand the girl Diana had been and the woman she became.

Many of the characters in
A Rogue for All Seasons
are struggling to figure out their place. As this is a romance novel, we know they belong with each other, but in order to accept each other’s love, they must first love themselves. This book took me on a similar journey. Disagreements with the publisher of the first two Weston novels led them to cancel the series, and I discovered that traditional publishers aren’t inclined to pick up a book mid-series. There were discussions about revising
Rogue
so that it was no longer a Weston novel, but I wasn’t willing to make that compromise.