A Baron for Becky

Chapter eleven

It was worse this time. Twice before, Hugh had run away to London to escape the anniversary of his wife's suicide, and spent the time drinking and raking with Aldridge. This time, the sour taste of three weeks of excess lingered, even after five weeks under his own roof.

Physical exercise—productive, necessary work—helped. He'd thrown himself into the harvest. This was the last farm, and they'd scythed and cocked more than half the tenant's grain today.

Hugh stopped at the end of the row. How much progress had they made? The sun would be down soon; they had perhaps another hour of light.

"Reckon we'll finish this field tonight, my lord," said Beckham, whose barley crop they were getting in. Hugh nodded as he took a tankard of ale from the man's wife. "I reckon we will, Beckham," he agreed.

He downed half the tankard in a huge swallow, relishing the sensation of the liquid seeping into his parched flesh. They'd done well. They'd finish scything tomorrow, and then they'd join the teams who'd already begun collecting and stacking sheaves from previous days, dried enough for the next stage in the harvest.

The weather looked like it would hold dry for another week. They could count it a good year.

With another couple of swallows, he finished the tankard and returned it to Mrs Beckham with his thanks.

"Come on then, men," he said, picking up his scythe again. "Let's finish this field."

On the first anniversary, he and Aldridge had met by chance at an inn a day outside Town, and Aldridge's flirtation with a servant girl had led to an invitation for her to bring a friend and join them. Hugh had bedded a scant handful of women since the shrapnel burst that scarred him, and none but his reluctant wife in four years. He enjoyed himself thoroughly.

But on the ride to London, when Aldridge laughingly teased him about the girl's admiration of his performance, he attributed her compliments to his lavish payment. "Look at me, Aldridge. Who would want this monster in her bed if she had a choice?" That was a direct quote from Polyphemia—one of the many things she'd screamed at him that last, awful day.

Aldridge laughed. "A few scars is nothing, Hugh. You're just as pretty as you once were on the other side and, in any case, it is men that are shallow about good looks. Women'll look past that, if you pleasure them well." Then he proposed proving his case by introducing Hugh to some of the women he knew in London. "You haven't lost the skill you had when we were lads, Hugh. That girl had the glow. You gave her a night she'll never forget. Get a reputation for that in London, and your bed need never be empty."

He was right. Hugh went home the first year sated and satisfied. He rode up to London the second year looking forward to his holiday rather than backward to his guilt and grief, eager to renew his acquaintance with at least some of the widows he had enjoyed the year before.

The second year was even wilder. In certain circles, the story of the scarred baron's three weeks had made the rounds, and Hugh found himself propositioned endlessly. Though three of the five widows he'd known the previous year were now married again, and one was out of town, he had no difficulty finding a bed partner.

His conscience troubled him when he discovered some of the ladies who approached him had living, if neglectful, husbands. He couldn't understand being so casual about a solemn vow, made before God. He consoled himself that he wasn't party to the vows strangers made. And he only tupped women whose husbands were unfaithful. He wasn't doing to another man what the unknown John had done to him.

Still, he was saddened by it, and besmirched, too. Riding home that second year, he decided he'd show more discretion in future, avoid the worst of the debauchery.