Page 66 of Miss Delancey’s Tragicomedy

“We Brits are an unjust people. It infuriates me. Sir George can sue for divorce based on a single act of adultery—”

“Not even that,” he said, a knot of anger rising inside him.

“I’m speaking hypothetically. A man can be granted a divorce if his wife is unfaithful once. But he can sow his seed widely, and a wife has no recourse to the law. Unless he is unfaithful and also commits ‘bigamy, incest, or excessive cruelty’.”

“Yes, yes.” He didn’t need Lynch on his high horse speechifying right now.

“Sir George is a well-known philanderer—and he is excessively cruel.” Lynch let that sink in.

“Wait. You can’t be saying she should divorce him!” Aghast, his voice dropped low. “The notoriety—”

“Would be no worse for her than having to sit in court and listen to a steward lie about finding her in flagrante delicto with a viscount of an age with her sons.”

Trentham felt his blood drain down to his feet. “You’ve heard that?”

“No. Not yet. But I can imagine what Sir George would stoop to saying. If he has threatened Felicity with divorce, he must have invented a witness.” Lynch gestured to a chair near an unlit coal stove. “Sit down, Robin. And try not to protest until I’ve made my case.”

He walked stiffly to the seat. This was why he had come to Lynch, wasn’t it? His quick mind. His preternatural calm. No doubt he’d present an excellent plan in theory. But this was Felicity. Not some test case for his cause. He sat. “Go on.”

“This will raise a lot of prurient interest. No one who knows Felicity will believe her guilty. But those who don’t know her well, hearing this gossip repeated, will start to think there must be something to it. She should act first.”

“Speaking out will make her a martyr throwing herself onto the pyre.”

“Don’t interrupt.” He waited for Trentham’s nod, then went on. “I know the right solicitor for this.”

“Why not Cavanaugh? I trust him. And the Wormsleys have been using his firm for decades.”

“For financial matters. Not divorce. You need Michael Derry. He’s young, but smart. He’ll move quickly to put Sir George on the back foot. It will make the blackguard’s countersuit look like retaliation.”

Despite the slew of protests he wanted to make, Trentham bit his tongue and nodded.

“Felicity is strong, Robin. She can do this.”

“I fear the Wormsley name will count against her,” Trentham confessed. A name that had once been a bulwark against any suspicion of impropriety was now a detriment.

“I think that is more of a threat if Sir George gets in first with accusations of wanton behavior.”

Lynch stood and moved to the window. Trentham thought this must be his defense against direct eye-to-eye confrontation. They needn’t repeat the argument they’d had last night. He’d claimed the mistakes of his past were an albatross around his neck, and Lynch had said that was only because he let it be so.

“Robin, I can’t deny that there are echoes here of what you went through. But it isn’t the same thing. And that was a decade ago.” Lynch returned his focus to Trentham. “You need to keep your mouth shut. Felicity needs to speak up.”

“A lawsuit will require proof of cruelty. Witnesses. I don’t know that there are any.”

“We may be able to build a case regardless. Surely friends of hers can confirm they’ve seen her bruised. Perhaps she required a doctor at some point?”

Trentham groaned. If so, he should have known. Somehow, he should have.

“Moreover, she isn’t his only victim,” Lynch said.

“No decent woman will confess to having been his paramour. And the court won’t care about the testimony of an indecent woman.”

“Not one woman. Several. Strength in numbers.”

“And where will you find these women? The only memorable names from old gossip are the ladies least likely to volunteer to become involved in a scandal.”

“No, you’re right,” Lynch said, the first crack appearing in his certainty. “We’ll have to rely on his non-aristocratic doxies. But there may be direct witnesses. Servants who used to be in his household would be a good place to start. If we can locate them.”

“We can’t.” He felt a spark of hope. You should ask more of me than you do. “But Eli can.”