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He swallowed, his whiskered chin quivering. “I am,” he admitted hoarsely.

Lizzie turned to look at the boxing tent, which was clearly in full swing. Cries and shouts rang out from the rowdy patrons within. Daphne stood at the entrance, momentarily distracted by the stream of people waiting admittance. She tossed her hair and laughed uproariously at something some wag said to her.

“It looks like it will be a good while until Benedict will be finished for the evening,” Lizzie said eyeing the queue. “Should we go for some refreshment, Uncle?”

Her uncle looked frankly relieved. “I will own, I think that a good notion,” he said, unbending slightly in his rigid stance.

“I believe I saw a tea tent in this direction,” Lizzie said, leading him resolutely away from the boxing saloon. She could not imagine such a place would earn her uncle’s good opinion. Indeed, she imagined he was loathing every minute of the noisy fair. What on earth had brought him here? she wondered distractedly. Had he come to check on her welfare?

Five minutes later, they were sat looking at each other over a small table in a quieter, though still busy, tea tent. Sebastian sat at Lizzie’s knee, alert and on guard, as though he had picked up on her own tension. “Shall I pour?” Lizzie asked, when her uncle sat grave and silent. He acquiesced with a quick movement of his hands before placing them both on the tablecloth before him.

“How did you know to find us here?” Lizzie marveled. “I know Annie saw us at Greenwich, but for you to trace us here is quite another thing.”

Her uncle swallowed and seemed incapable of speech for a full minute. “I made … enquiries,” he said with effort. “And found the most likely sites for you to have moved onto were either here or Chelmsford. I traveled into Essex yesterday, fruitlessly. Today, well,” he gestured toward her. “My quest is over,” he said heavily and without joy. “For I have found you.”

Lizzie placed the teapot down and surveyed him quizzically. “You sound rather as though you had found a corpse than your living niece,” she commented wryly.

Her uncle’s cheeks turned purple. “All wrongdoing is sin, but there is sin that does not lead to death,” he intoned hollowly.

“Indeed?” Lizzie said coolly. “Is that what you sought me out to inform me?” She held out his teacup, and he could not quite meet her eyes as he took it from her.

“You are right to upbraid me,” he said after a moment’s heavy silence. “I am all too well aware of my own part in bringing you low. You were in quite desperate straits, and Mr. Toomes took despicable advantage of that fact. I can only suppose he meant to be revenged on us by ruining you. I am well aware that such a course of action would never have occurred to you, if you had not been cast out friendless and alone – ”

“Uncle – ”

He held up a forbidding hand. “No, Lizzie. I am fully sensible of my role in your downfall, and there can be no denying it is a considerable one.”

“But you see – ”

“Allow me to say my piece, my child,” he insisted.

“Only if you will allow me to respond in kind at its close!”

He blinked at this, but nodded he was willing. “I suppose that is only fair and part of my penance,” he said heavily.

Lizzie sighed and folded her arms. “Continue, then. I will hear you out however erroneous your conclusions.”

He ignored this, carrying on doggedly. “I cannot, of course, ever admit you again into my home. Not while Betsy remains there, an innocent who could be contaminated by such company. There are, however, certain worthy institutions where you could seek refuge – ”

“I’m going to have to interrupt you there, Uncle Josiah!” Lizzie put in smartly. She pulled off her left glove and brandished her hand. “I am not even remotely ruined, and Betsy need have nothing to fear from my society.” She saw his watery gaze alight and fasten on the ring there. “Until my marriage, I resided in female only lodgings with people who stood true friends to me in my hour of need. I neither require your help or that of any worthy charity, I assure you.”

His chest heaved. “Am I to understand that Mr. Toomes has made you his wife?”

“You are.”

His rheumy gaze rested on her heavily. “Annie did mention he made such a claim, but I assumed this was mere subterfuge – ” he broke off. “Well, that is something indeed, that he has given you the protection of his name. Yet, despite this mark of respect, I find he has still seen fit to bring you into this low company.”

Lizzie checked the hot words that sprang to her tongue. “His family is also part of this company,” she pointed out quietly. “I am sure you would not encourage me to look down on my husband’s own kin.”

Uncle Josiah shook his head. “When I negotiated the terms of Betsy’s marriage, Benedict Toomes told me he had fully renounced all such associations. I saw deeds to a respectable house, details of investments and savings that would assure her future. Yet you he sees fit to drag from one immoral cesspit to another.” He shook his head. “I fear you have made a bad bargain, Lizzie.”

“Well, I had no one to negotiate on my behalf, did I?” she responded tartly and saw him color. “I had no fond father to fight my corner, for your brother is dead.” That shaft, too, sank home, and her uncle’s mottled purple cheeks took on a waxy glow. Lizzie took a quick breath. “But Benedict Toomes did marry me in God’s house and our union was duly witnessed, so you need have no fear for my immortal soul, even if I am surrounded with what you deem to be low company.”

She stood and her uncle hastily leapt to his feet. “I assure you, Uncle, that my role in what happened does not trouble my conscience and neither does it keep me awake at night plagued by fears of judgement. I was always a good niece to you and my aunt and did my best by my cousin despite a lack of any true sympathy or understanding between us. As for the actions that saw me thrown from your house, I abided by the tenets and principles of the faith you raised me in. I spoke nothing but the God-given truth and refused moreover to bear false witness, something you saw fit to punish and ostracize me for.”

Her uncle’s breathing was ragged by this point, and his eyes darted anywhere they could to avoid her own. “What’s worse is that I think you must have known deep down. No one was more shocked than I by Reverend Milson’s perfidy.”

“You shall not say so,” her uncle said feebly. “The reverend must be beyond reproach. Our community has invested heavily in his cause and – ”