A Scandalous Marriage by Cathy Maxwell

a cotton rag. It was a mean bed for a child.
    “On the morrow, when the weather lets up a bit, I’ll walk to the church,” she said. “They have a clothes box for the poor. There should be something for such a small bit.” She rubbed the babe’s soft head as she said those words. “Poor wee thing. It will not be easy for him.”
    “Life isn’t always easy,” Devon said cautiously.
    “I know that,” she answered and pulled a straw-stuffed pallet from behind the cupboard. “The lass’s bed,” she explained. “I’ll sleep here in front of the fire… if you don’t mind.”
    “It’s fine.”
    “You can put the bairn in the drawer when you are tired of holding him, my lord.”
    Devon nodded. She stretched out on the pallet.
    “I’m more tired than if I hadn’t slept for a month of Sundays. What is the rhyme? ”Sunday’s child is fair of face.“ The bairn is lucky. Another hour later, he’d have been Monday’s child. The one who has to work hard for his living.”
    She crossed her arms and closed her eyes, but if Devon thought she was going to sleep, he was wrong.
    Instead, she started talking. “You should have seen Leah the day Adam Pitney hired her at the Limton fair. He’s apprenticed to the miller, you know. His mother plans on him marrying the miller’s daughter, but I don’t know if it will come to naught. Adam is better at caring for living things than grinding seeds into flour. He was always bringing me birds with broken wings or a fox pup that had been orphaned. A good heart that boy has.”
    Devon wasn’t certain he wanted to hear a list of Adam Pitney’s virtues.
    “He brought Leah directly to me,” Old Edith continued. “She was half starved, her belly already overlarge, but her face was clean and she had pride.”
    Yes, Leah would always have her pride.

    The midwife smiled sleepily. “I fed her and told Adam to bring her here. We both knew his mother had extra room even if the Widow Pitney hasn’t heard one word the Lord says about charity throughout all her years of churchgoing. I reasoned it would be good for Adam to have the girl close to him. He never had a taste for the miller’s daughter. That was all in his mother’s head. For her part, Leah worked hard… even though we all could see she wasn’t accustomed to it.” She sighed contentedly.
    Devon waited for her to continue her story, interested in spite of himself. It wasn’t until she started snoring that he realized she had nodded off.
    He sat in the chair, the baby still tucked in his arm. He could put the baby down in the drawer… but he didn’t want to. Instead, he studied the child, watching it breathe, marveling at its sweet perfection.
    Already the baby was changing. His color was better and his features more relaxed. Then, to Devon’s wonder, the baby opened his eyes and yawned.
    It was such a charming gesture. It made Devon want to laugh. But the child closed his eyes, seemingly content to be held close.
    For the first time in a long while, Devon experienced a sense of peace. He ran his fingers gently back and forth along the child’s arm.
    Words stirred in his memory. Leah’s words. I will never forgive you. I will hate you as long as I live.
    With the words came memories of the dueling field, of Julian spewing hate, of Julian bleeding. Devon had promised Leah that no harm would come to her brother, but in the end he hadn’t been able to keep that promise. Julian had lived, but he was crippled.
    The memory shivered through Devon. He’d left London the day of the duel and had not returned since.
    He cradled the baby closer. The unnamed child slept, trusting him to make everything right—just as Leah had once trusted him to do the same.

Chapter 7
    Leah woke. For several minutes, she lay still in the dark, completely disoriented. She believed herself safely in her bed in London, but she’d had the strangest dream. She’d dreamed she’d been pregnant and life had been unbearable, but then she’d