The Misbegotten Read Online Free PDF

eyes. For you, Alice , she pledged silently, as she knocked smartly at the door, and went in.
    Sir Arthur’s generosity extended to loaning the barouche to Rachel and her new husband for the drive into Bath for the wedding breakfast. As soon as they’d climbed down outside the Moor’s Head inn, the carriage pulled away, and her connection with Hartford ended to the sound of iron-shod hooves clattering on cobblestones. The wind funnelling down Walcot Street was brisk. Richard tipped two strong lads to carry Rachel’s trunk south to the house on Abbeygate Street, then he held out his hand to her.
    ‘Come, my dear. Come in out of this breeze,’ he said, wrapping her hand around the crook of his elbow. Just then, the abbey bells began to strike the hour, and Rachel paused.
    ‘Wait,’ she said. ‘It’s been many years since I heard those bells.’ She looked down the street into the thick of the city, where pale stone buildings clustered in all around, and the cobbled streets ran with carts and carriages, donkey traps, servants hurrying on their masters’ business. There were dowdy maids with laundry bundles, scuffing their feet along in the wooden pattens that kept their shoes out of the muck. There were housekeepers and cooks with baskets full of fresh meat and vegetables; sweating bearers carrying the wealthy uphill in smart sedan chairs; street hawkers and urchins and fashionable ladies with their pelisses buttoned tight against the weather. Rachel took a deep breath and smelled the dankness of the river; the sweet reek of rubbish in the gutter; freshly baked bread and roasting meat; a cloud of beery fumes and tobacco smoke from the inn. A mixture of smells she’d grown unused to, living in the sterile calm of Hartford Hall. ‘Not since I came here with my parents in the season. My little brother too, before we lost him.’ It was a fond memory, but Richard mistook her, and thought her sad.
    ‘Forget all that, Mrs Weekes.’ He squeezed her hand, pulling her towards the door of the inn. ‘I’m your family now, and this is a new beginning. For sure, Bath is much changed since you were last here – new buildings are finished all the time; and new folk come in. Fine people too, the right sort,’ Richard said, and Rachel smiled at him, not caring to explain herself.
    The Moor’s Head had low ceilings heavy with beams and a red brick floor worn smooth from long years of use. There was a racket of voices and laughter already, in spite of it being just five in the afternoon, and cheering broke out when Richard appeared. He grinned and clasped hands with several men who were already well soused, judging by their red cheeks and heavy eyes. Rachel smiled uncomfortably as they toasted her with tankards of ale and shook her hand more roughly than she was used to. The smoke made her eyes sting, so she blinked frequently. Richard wore a grin from ear to ear until he glanced at Rachel and saw her discomfort. His smile faltered.
    ‘Sadie, is our table ready?’ he called out to the girl behind the bar, who was moon-faced, with deep brown curls, abundant bosom and apples in her cheeks.
    ‘Aye, Mr Weekes, just as you asked. Go on up as it please you,’ said Sadie. Just then a man came to stand in front of them; portly, with a lined face and a filthy grey wig that had slipped down over one ear. He patted Rachel’s hand clumsily.
    ‘Well, young sir, I declare you have done mighty well for yourself. You told us she was a beauty, but we none of us expected you could ensnare such a fine creature as this, hmm?’ said the man, slurring slightly. His breath was sour with brandy but his face was kindly, and Rachel inclined her head graciously at the compliment. Her new husband scowled.
    ‘Of course she is fine. Finer than me, certainly. But I hope to raise myself up, and to deserve her,’ he said stiffly.
    ‘You are too kind to me, and do yourself a disservice, Mr Weekes,’ Rachel told him.
    ‘Well, I never saw a bride so