Gwen stared at him. Even now he had no idea. “That wasn’t whoring,” she said to Vaughn. “Men and women keep company all the time outside of marital relations, and not in criminal conversation. Unless he’s forced a girl against her will—”
Vaughn flushed at the accusation. “It’s whoring even if there’s no money involved! And you’ve done it before.”
Daron, beside him, grew rigid. He must have said something to Vaughn about their past relationship. He’d dug a hole for himself now; he couldn’t take her hand or her supposed inheritance if Vaughn dragged her name through the mud in a court of law.
The thread around her heart tightened. What she’d shared with Pen was beautiful. It came near to being holy, the highest design of their Maker, two human hearts ennobled and bound together in adoration, in service, and in love. For her, it was love.
She’d wager no woman had ever known that sense of wholeness and completion in Calvin Vaughn’s arms. And not Daron Sutton’s, either.
“All this to the effect,” the clerk went on in a strained voice, “that the neighbors were vexed and disquieted and grieved.”
“What neighbors?” Gwen laughed, a short, bitter sound. “Our land abuts the St. Woolos churchyard, a ditch, and marshland owned by the Morgans. There’s nothing but empty land between us and Maes-n-Gaer, the old hillfort.”
Sir Roger glowered at the plaintiffs. “Mr. Vaughn, you led us to believe that this St. Sefin’s was a rowdy pub filled with all manner of debauchery.”
Vaughn swung on Gwen. “It is!”
“Your Worship,” Gwen said. “Let me acquaint you with the present inhabitants of St. Sefin’s. A young boy left blind as a babe who earns his keep as our goatherd. A young man who is a natural, an innocent, whose parents could not afford to keep him. A widow turned out of her house by her children and a grandmother turned off her land when her sons died. A veteran of the British Army maimed in the siege on Gibraltar. A young widow who lost her husband in the service of the Dutch Navy. And a young maid recently in service at Greenfield—”
Here Calvin Vaughn cleared his throat loudly, drowning out what she might say next. Gwen knotted her fingers in the lace apron she had worn instead of her shawl, because Dovey insisted it looked more English.
“All of these souls would have nowhere to go if we did not give them a home at St. Sefin’s, Your Worship,” Gwen said.
“I should say not,” said Sir Robert. “Good Lord, they’d be in the workhouse, or demanding outdoor relief from the parish.”
Gwen nodded. This was a tactic that might yield fruit. “I believe you were supplied a letter from Mr. Stanley, the vicar of St. Woolos? He attests that St. Sefin’s has been a great relief on the poor rates around Newport. We rely on donations and our own earnings, you see. Not taxes.”
The clerk handed over a letter. Sir Robert’s eyebrows rose as he read it.
“Housing for indigent—foreigners—that is concerning—young mothers giving birth out of wedlock? Hmm. Taking all manner of ill and diseased—asking no fee or surety for their care—but you are not a religious institution.” He peered at Gwen over the paper.
“No, Your Worship. St. Sefin’s was a priory of the Carmelite nuns, and then passed into private hands at the Dissolution. We are a secular community. Our only rule—”
She hesitated. This was not the place to discuss her superstition about death. A hollow ache pierced her womb, an old memory. She’d borne and buried a daughter, and not two yards away stood the man who had fathered the babe, planted his seed and never thought again of the infant or its mother. He had walked free and unburdened in his life of luxury, spending coin as it came, while Gwen wore her fingers to bone to feed herself and Dovey and Cerys. She trembled with wrath, alight with it.
“None of this matters,” Vaughn butted in. “Miss Ewyas owns the place and is therefore responsible for the goings on there. Charge her, threaten her with imprisonment, and let her throw herself on the mercy of her—friends.” His pale eyes, red-rimmed, glimmered with malice. This was the next step in his blackmail, to make her cave to his demands to marry one of them.
She could protest no longer that she was worth nothing. Just that morning she’d received the letter from her father’s solicitor in North Wales. She was worth more than Greenfield and Vine Court put together, and she was daughter to a man knighted for service to the Crown.
She lifted her chin. “I do not own St. Sefin’s.”
“She can still be charged,” Daron said. “The law says she does not have to be owner to be held accountable.”
“What an odd law for you to be so intimately acquainted with, Mr. Sutton,” Gwen said.
Sir Robert frowned. “I know what the law says. But in my court the owner is answerable for what takes place on his property.” He peered at Gwen. “Who owns St. Sefin’s?”
“I do.”
Pen stepped through the door. Every gaze in the room swiveled to him as if they were iron shavings and he the magnet that drew them all in a line.
He was overpoweringly elegant in a double-breasted tailcoat of blue wool over a waistcoat embroidered with red. Instead of breeches he wore buff pantaloons and a pair of gleaming tall boots. The well-tailored, expensive clothes showed every powerful line of his frame, and he swept off his black wool hat as he entered, transferring it to the hand holding a bronze-tipped cane. Gwen wondered if he needed the stick to walk, but his confident stride into the room suggested it was merely an accessory. This man had no weaknesses.
“Rhydian Price, The Right Honourable Viscount Penrydd,” Ross announced from behind him. Ross too was well-dressed but wore a harried expression, while Penrydd was every inch the haughty lord. He nodded in acknowledgement to Sir Robert, who half-rose in respect at the title before recalling that, as presiding judge, he owned the room.
“How did my family come by a Carmelite priory? An interesting story,” Pen said, though no one had asked. “My ancestor, Gereint ap Rhys, was a Welsh knight and great friend to Jasper Tudor. He supported Henry Tudor’s troops at Bosworth and earned a barony for it. At the Dissolution, Henry VIII gave St. Sefin’s to the family, by then calling themselves Price, and it’s been bound up with the Penrydd estate ever since, though I regret to say that not much care was taken of it. Miss Ewyas, happily, has rectified that oversight.”
At last his eyes moved to her, and a rush of air filled Gwen’s body like the fuel of a hot-air balloon. The shifting world settled. Pen was here. He was here to witness her disgrace, the last thing she wanted, and yet his being here made everything hurt less.
