The Bride Ship

“I must confess, madam, I have no idea who you are or what has brought you to my colony.” He wanted to find out, though. Her identity in particular. Hard as he tried to maintain his accustomed indifference to such matters, his mind fairly itched with curiosity.

A look of dismay tightened her delicate features and quenched some of the sparkle in her eyes. Sir Robert found himself wanting very much to spare her any distress.

“Something must have happened to the letter.” She glanced back at the ship. “I suppose we should have waited for an answer before setting out, but the time was growing late. Besides, I felt certain the gentlemen of Nova Scotia would extend us a warm welcome. And you have—far beyond my expectations.”

Those words rekindled her luminous smile, which sent a rush of warmth through Sir Robert.

“I am Mrs. Finch.” She performed an elegant curtsy. “Mrs. Jocelyn Finch.”

The discovery that she was married flooded Sir Robert’s belly with a cold heaviness, as though it were the hold of a ship smashed by a stray cannonball and rapidly taking on water.

Mrs. Finch raised her voice to carry over the muted murmur of the crowd. “It is my pleasure to bring the men of your fine colony a shipload of charming ladies to assuage their loneliness.”

The murmuring around them gained force and volume, like a breaker gathering itself to dash against the rocks.

For a moment the governor stood mute, too stunned by Mrs. Finch’s brazen declaration to reply. If she had upended a chamber pot over his head, Sir Robert could not have felt more sullied or humiliated.

Ever since assuming his position in the colony, he had waged a strenuous campaign against the evil of prostitution, so rampant in garrison towns like Halifax. His efforts had met with scant support. Everyone from the admiral to the Colonial Office back in London seemed to look on the contemptible trade as an unfortunate but necessary support for the soldiers and sailors on duty in the colonies. Rather like the armorers or the quartermaster corps. Even the bishop was tepid in his condemnation of the Barrack Street brothels.

Sir Robert could not share their casual endorsement of a trade that fostered disease, disorder and degradation. If that qualified him as the “stiff-rumped prude” some of his enemies called him behind his back, he made no apology for it. Until now, he had managed to ignore the slights and subtle challenges to his authority mounted by those who opposed him. But he could not ignore this brazen invasion by a shipload of harlots, flouncing into the city under his very nose!

Had the comely Mrs. Finch been meant as a bribe to secure his compliance? The degree to which she tempted him to abandon his scruples outraged Sir Robert.

“Madam.” He fairly trembled with the effort to contain his indignation. “The men of my colony would be better off to suffer a little loneliness than the ills they are likely to incur by consorting with your ladies.”

It gave him a rush of bitter satisfaction to watch her dainty jaw fall slack. No doubt the little vixen had believed him quite smitten with her charms. Instead, she had given him more reason than ever to keep his distance from the fair sex.

“I suggest you get back aboard your vessel.” Sir Robert stabbed his forefinger toward the ship and spoke in a ringing tone of righteous authority. “Then set sail with your cargo of strumpets for some other lonely colony, where that manner of vice is tolerated. You, and they, are not welcome in Nova Scotia!”

The dazed look fled Jocelyn Finch’s attractive features. An indignant glare took its place. Unfortunately, it did nothing to detract from her beauty.

Sir Robert wished it had.

“How dare you?” Mrs. Finch wrenched the glove off her impossibly delicate fingers.

Before Sir Robert could anticipate what she meant to do, she surged up on the tips of her toes and struck him across the cheek with the glove. For such a small scrap of soft kid leather, it stung like the very devil.

“I demand satisfaction for that vile insult, sir!” she cried. “How dare you sully the reputation of me and my charges with your disgusting accusations? How dare you order us away from this colony?”

Before Sir Robert could rally his composure sufficiently to answer, she fired off a final question that struck him dumb again. “And, pray, when did the estate of holy matrimony become a vice in Nova Scotia?”

Her words rocked Sir Robert back on his heels with far greater force than the blow from her tiny glove had done. “Matrimony?”

Mrs. Finch gave a nod of grim, defiant triumph.

“Ma-tri-mony.” She spoke the word again, her tongue and lush lips lingering over each syllable with provocative enjoyment. “Perhaps you have heard of it? A man and woman living together in the state of holy wedlock, having vowed their mutual lifelong devotion?”

Oh, he knew about matrimony. Had he not studied to avoid it ever since he’d grown old enough to contract such an alliance? Marriage distracted a man from his duty while saddling him with further responsibilities. Sir Robert told himself he did not envy Mister Finch his singular distraction of a wife.

Jocelyn savored the bewildered air of the odious man before her. To think her first glimpse of him had made her question whether her heart had truly died upon the battlefield with her darling Ned! The man’s dark good looks and air of distinction had drawn her to him immediately. The modest gallantry of his initial addresses had quickened something inside her that had long lain fallow.

That very favorable first impression had only made his subsequent behavior all the more vexing. She’d been buoyant with pride to proclaim her mission in the colony, foolishly hoping her announcement might provoke a smile from him.

Instead, he’d stared at her as if she were a bit of filth he was anxious to scrape off the bottom of his immaculate boots. No man had looked at her with such contempt since the day her father had cut her off without a farthing for marrying against his wishes.

Then, in front of half the male population of the town, he had denounced her as a bawd-mistress! Recalling the strenuous efforts she had made to protect Vita Sykes’s virtue during their voyage, Jocelyn might have laughed of that preposterous accusation. If she had not been boiling with indignant fury, instead!

Her glove came off almost before she knew what she was doing. If she’d had a male escort with any gumption, he would have called her slanderer out for such an insult. Since she had vowed to make her own way in the world, without the assistance or hinderance of any man, she would have to defend her own honor—and, more importantly, that of her charges.

Just then, she could have cheerfully put a bullet through…

Who was this man, anyway? It seemed indecent, somehow, that he should inflame her emotions to such a pitch in so short a time, without bothering to introduce himself.

While he stood there, momentarily stunned by her counterattack, Jocelyn seized the opportunity to press her advantage. “Furthermore, what gives you the right to declare our ship is not welcome in Nova Scotia?”

Before he could answer, an anxious-looking young man detached himself from the crowd on the quay.

“Begging your pardon, ma’am.” He bowed to her. “This gentleman is His Excellency, Governor Sir Robert Kerr. He does have the authority to order your ship out of Halifax Harbor if he chooses.”

The governor? Jocelyn stared at Sir Robert Kerr in horror. She had just challenged the governor of Nova Scotia to a duel. Could her mission to the colony possibly have gotten off to a worse start?

Chapter Two

S ir Robert’s dream was rapidly turning into a nightmare!

He had publicly slandered Mrs. Finch and all the young women in her charge with the worst insult a man could make regarding a lady’s honor. She had responded by slapping his face and challenging him to a duel in front of half the town. The ugly gossip would set tongues wagging all over Halifax before the town clock up the hill struck another hour!

Would there be any other topic of conversation over local tea tables that afternoon? Sir Robert could picture his opponents consuming such morsels of damaging tattle as though they were rich little cakes iced with gleeful malice.

Worst of all, while the crowd gawked and snickered behind his back, and Mrs. Finch regarded him with a mixture of dismay and disdain, he froze in a way he had never done in the heat of battle.

Had he been a fool to take up this post? The Duke of Wellington’s personal recommendation had touched and flattered him. He wanted to acquit himself well to justify the duke’s faith in him. And to confound certain Whitehall factions who carped at the number of “Wellington’s Waterloo Warriors” being given plum colonial appointments.

But he was a military man, not a diplomat.

Fortunately, young Duckworth rallied to his support. “It would seem explanations are in order, Mrs. Finch, but this is hardly the proper time or place for them. Is it, Your Excellency?”

That was all the prompting Sir Robert needed. “No, indeed,” he snapped. “This is not a matter to be debated on a public wharf.”

He turned to the sentry he’d brought from Government House. “Disperse this crowd at once. Surely some of them have duties they ought to be attending.”

How Sir Robert wished he’d issued that order the moment he had arrived!

Under cover of the soldier’s enthusiastic bellows for everyone to move along and their buzz of annoyance at being deprived of an amusing spectacle, Sir Robert addressed himself to Mrs. Finch. “I think you had better come along with me to Government House, madam, where we may review your situation in private.”

His invitation came out sounding like an order, which he was far more accustomed to issuing.

Mrs. Finch turned back toward the ship. “May I bring the girls along? After the rigors of our voyage, they are anxious to get dry land under their feet again, poor dears.”