A Certain Latitude Read Online Free PDF Page B

either.”
    He laughed. “I’m in no position to marry, ma’am, and why should I take another man’s leavings? No—” he had noticed her look of outrage—“I merely say what most men would. There’s no offense intended, ma’am. Forgive my harshness.”
    “I am too old to become a courtesan and have neither reputation nor dowry to be considered for marriage.” She paused. “Besides, marriage, for women, is a sort of servitude, where a woman hands over her person and property and becomes less than a person. I suppose a properly drawn-up contract as a courtesan allows independence of a sort.”
    He laughed. “I’ll draw up a contract for you when you find the right gentleman, Miss Onslowe. You will pay me, of course.”
    “Of course.”
    He smiled. “There is, of course, only one problem with your plan.”
    “Indeed?”
    “An abundance of black female flesh as competition.”
    “Then an English gentlewoman of some wit and learning may appear as an exotic.”
    He gave a cynical grunt. “A man with his breeches around his ankles doesn’t care overmuch for wit and learning, Miss Onslowe.”
    There was a short, uncomfortable silence.
    “Why are you going to the island, Mr. Pendale? You’ve never said.”
    “To visit my father.” He hesitated, as though about to add something but had decided to change the subject. “I suggest, though, that if you were to consider a career as a courtesan—for you do possess some talents that might come in useful in that profession—that you ask Mrs. Blight for some advice.”
    “Mrs. Blight? Why?”
    “She was obviously a light-skirt before she married Blight. I’m sure she’ll have some advice of a practical nature regarding how not to conceive.”
    So that’s what he’d meant. Are you prepared?
    Clarissa nodded, made uncomfortable by his clipped tone, his reluctance to meet her gaze. She held out her hand. “This is somewhat awkward. We have a long voyage ahead and I should like to think we could be friends. Maybe we should forget what has passed between us tonight.”
    After a moment’s hesitation he took her hand and gave a cursory bow.
    “Ma’am.” He dropped her hand and reached into his coat for a cheroot. “If you’ll excuse me, Miss Onslowe, I’ll visit your friend Lardy Jack for a hot coal.”
    She nodded, and made her way to the hatch. She glanced back. He had made no move toward the galley, but stood staring into the darkness of the night.
    And he had not agreed to accept her offer of friendship.
    She clambered down the ladder and knocked on the door of her cabin, relieved to hear Mrs. Blight’s voice bid her enter. Mrs. Blight, hair in curling papers beneath a frilled nightcap, was already in bed.
    “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you,” Clarissa said as she undressed.
    “I’m feeling a trifle out of sorts, my dear.” Mrs. Blight gave a wan smile. “You look very flushed.”
    “Yes, it’s quite cold tonight.” Now down to her shift, Clarissa drew her brush through her hair. “Mrs. Blight, I was wondering…I’ve heard women say…well, I believe it is possible to not become pregnant, if a woman does not wish it.”
    “What a wicked suggestion, Miss Onslowe. ’Tis flying in the face of nature.”
    “So it is,” Clarissa said, calmly running her brush through her hair. “Will you tell me how to do it?”
    “Oh, Lord,” Mrs. Blight grumbled. “I suppose it’s that Mr. Pendale. Or is it Mr. Johnson? Pass me my medicine chest, there’s a good girl.”
    Clarissa placed the medicine chest next to her on the floor of the cabin.
    Mrs. Blight lurched onto one elbow to open the chest and fumbled inside. “Here, Miss Onslowe.”
    Clarissa looked at the small object that landed on her palm. “A sponge?”
    “Yes. Soak it in wine, or rum, or vinegar, or some such, and put it up your cunny. Or this—it’s tansy oil and I have an extra vial.”
    “Before I—he—”
    “Yes. Before. ’Twon’t do you much good