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  "MY LOVE WILL DESTROY YOU. . . ."

  "Force me from you. Fight to be away. If you have an ounce of self-preservation, you will do this, Brienne."

  "I cannot," she pleaded, wanting him with every inch of her body and soul.

  "If you stay here tonight, my mark will be permanent. I'll have it no other way." He took her face into his powerful hands, searching for her answer.

  And she gave it, not with words but with her lips. Deep inside him she heard a moan, and soon she felt her laces being severed one by one with the sharp edge of his knife. His hands slid the dress apart, and it fell in satin folds around them as they both half-sat and half-lay on the floor. He kissed her as he took off her green satin slippers and then pulled down her silk hose from her creamy thighs. He paused only to instruct her to untie his sash, then stood, leading her to the state bedcham­ber—and his ornately domed bed.

  "NO CHOICE BUT SURRENDER is highly entertaining. . . . It captures your heart with a poignancy reminiscent of Judith McNaught's romances."

  —Romantic Times

  Published by

  Dell Publishing Co., Inc.

  1 Dag Hammarskjold Plaza

  New York, New York 10017

  Copyright © 1987 by Ruth Goodman

  All rights reserved. No pan of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the Publisher, except where permitted by law.

  Dell ®TM 681510, Dell Publishing Co., Inc.

  ISBN: 0-440-16412-5

  Printed in the United States of America

  October 1987

  CLS 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  For my two best friends:

  Thomas Young Roberson,

  my husband, and

  Richard John Goodman,

  my father.

  I love you both.

  AUTHOR'S NOTE:

  All the houses depicted herein actually exist.

  Osterley Park, Satterlee Plantation (Sotterley),

  and Number One The Crescent are open to the public.

  Resurrection Manor, circa 1650, the house depicted

  in the Prologue, sits in dereliction by the roadside

  in Tidewater, Maryland.

  All characters except for Gainsborough

  are purely fictitious.

  PROLOGUE

  St. Mary Parish, Maryland

  Dinbych-y-pysgod

  I

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  II

  Bath

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  III

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  EPILOGUE

  PROLOGUE

  He loved England

  as an Athenian loved the city of the violet crown,

  as a Roman loved the city of the seven hills.

  —Lord Macaulay

  St. Mary Parish, Maryland

  November 1780

  The house was considered old, even though the United States had declared its freedom only four years before. It stood up from the Patuxent River, and its tall roof and gothic dormers gave its exterior an appearance of grandeur that the modest rooms inside could not attain.

  Robert Staples sat discontentedly by the keeping-room fire. Being a boy of thirteen, he couldn't help but peek now and .again into the next room, where his father and four men had gathered. There was an air of secrecy about these four men. They sat around a small table playing cards.

  It was odd that they were gambling at the run-down manor when they could have been playing more comfortably at Sat- terlee Mansion, where there were many ornate rooms with fine Georgian carvings and elaborate card tables made by the finest cabinetmakers in Salem.

  But there they sat, four strangers at a small cherry butterfly table, while the owner and his son watched anxiously from the side.

  "I say, Avenel," one of the younger gamblers commented as he gazed about the small wainscoted room, "it's a rather dismal place you've brought us to."

  The dark, bearded man with the medieval-sounding name merely glanced at the young lord; that was enough to quiet him completely. But Avenel added, "Would you have us play at the Satterlee Harbor house and be recognized for the Tories we are?"

  "I have no opinions on this silly war! I need not be labeled a Tory! My only hope is to leave this rustic land behind and never return. The lure of tobacco fortunes is not great enough to withstand the sacrifice of my position." The young man wiped his brow.

  "Perhaps you do not take sides. But one look at that vermil­ion satin waistcoat leaves no doubt that you are of the British nobility." Avenel looked at the young lord in disgust. "And need I remind you that there is no nobility here in America? 'Tis one of the things the damned war is about."

  "Well, for one who was born here in America, you don't seem particularly enthusiastic about your freedom. What say you, Avenel? Are you a Tory sympathizer?" Squire Justice spoke up. That older man was annoyed that he was losing, but he found some consolation in the fact that the young lord and the ill-fated Lord Oliver were even doing worse than he was. They were betting way over their means—especially Lord Oli­ver, who had wagered his estate, Osterley Park. He had to admit that he was shocked that anyone could gamble so com­pulsively. But he'd seen it before. Unfortunately, it was a com­mon practice among the peerage, one that had ruined more families than he could name.

  "I shall be leaving for England tomorrow, so I have forced myself to remain uninvolved in politics." Avenel Slane shook himself, seemingly to ease his fatigue, and then finished, "But enough of this. We must continue." He looked straight at the man across from him, Oliver Morrow, who had yet to speak since the game began. He was about Avenel's size and stature, but the resemblance ended there. Where Avenel was dead calm yet bold in his approach, Morrow was nervous; his hand shook as he shifted around the five cards in his possession. And the cautiousness about Lord Oliver said only one thing: He had a lot to lose.

  "Besides," Avenel added enigmatically, "I have my own war to fight."

  "I think 'tis time we called it a draw, gentlemen." The young lord wiped his brow with a heavily scented hanky. "There's too much at stake here. Of course, I can afford to cover my losses," he said, and then he coughed as he remem­bered the sizable sum he owed already—and mostly to that bastard Avenel Slane, he thought, feeling bitterly emasculated. "But I think we should see that this is bordering on the ab­surd. After all, Lord Oliver is the Earl of Laborde. Surely you cannot let him gamble away his very estate. It's outright crimi­nal!"

  "This is no fops' diversion, my lord," Avenel said, each syllable hanging disdainfully on his tongue. "You all came here knowing this was a man's game."

  "But the stakes are getting to be too high. You have taken adv
antage of us in our boredom and fear. This wait for the ship to arrive at Satterlee Harbor to take us back to England has been hellish. Why," he exclaimed, "every time some Whig bluecoat stops at the mansion for tea or to inform the supposed supporters of the Revolution how the war is coming along, we've had to play hide and seek among the wall panels. I say, you took advantage of us. You knew we'd jump at the chance to ride out to the neighboring estate for a game of cards. Inhumane circumstance is what we've been put through. And now this—it's too much!"

  "There would have been no need to hide if you had re­nounced your social standing—at least until you were on the ship for England." Avenel closed the fan of cards in his hand and placed them facedown onto the nicked surface of the ta­ble. "All that would have involved is a mere change of clothes."

  "I was not born to dress as a peasant like you Americans!" The young lord put his cards down on the table and straight­ened his heavily greased and powdered wig. After preening himself, he looked at Avenel and felt suddenly quite superior. He noticed every detail of the man's dress, from the plain doeskin breeches to the dark blue worsted waistcoat. The man sported not one ruffle on his white cambric shirt; not an inch of expensive lace edged his cravat. Nor did he wear anything on his head. He relied instead on the appearance of his neatly tied queue of natural dark hair.

  "'Tis your choice," Avenel said, and then added slowly, "my lord."

  Now the young lord felt the man was laughing at him. His air of superiority started to dissipate. "I'll not continue with this charade any longer! Man, you will take me back to Satter­lee now." He motioned to Robert's father as he would to a servant.

  "Surely, my lord, you don't mean to stop in the middle of the hand." Master Staples tried to reason with him. He moved forward and then looked back at Robert in the confines of the keeping room. "Nob," he said, using the boy's nickname, "be a good boy and quit gaping. Go fetch the men some of that ham cured at the mansion and some more spirits."

  Quickly the young fellow left for the keeping room, where he made up a large tray with ham, apples, and bread. Stepping humbly from the dirt and straw floors of the keeping room up to the new pine boards that had just been fitted into the parlor, Nob brought the tray to his father. After placing it on an ancient walnut William and Mary lowboy, the boy stepped back from the men, heeding the warning in his father's eyes. The men were playing the last hand now, and he knew there were to be no disturbances.

  "I'll bring the ale now, Bather," Nob whispered in the same semi-British accent as his father, which proved his Maryland ancestry. But instead of giving him an approving nod, his fa­ther shook his head forebodingly and gave him a look that said to go back to the keeping room. Before the young boy could turn around and retreat, there was a terrible banging sound as the cherry table crashed to the ground. All its contents scat­tered over the immaculate knotty pine boards.

  "I warn you, Avenel, if you insist on taking Osterley Park, there will be no end to my vindictiveness!" shouted the Earl of Laborde. That older man with the tall build suddenly stood over the mess. His long, bloodless white hands were balled into fists, and his face became red in contrast to his finely groomed dark gray hair.

  Secretly Nob was glad Oliver Morrow had lost. There was something about the earl that he had instandy disliked.

  "In fact," the earl continued ominously, "I'll see you dead before you walk about my home!" With that, the man reached for a knife in the waistband of his breeches. Suddenly he lurched toward Avenel, which made Nob scream in terror.

  As the fight escalated, the other men stood about watching stupidly from the perimeter of the room. Nob and his father tried to stop Oliver Morrow, but he was so quick, they floundered about; each tried to control the earl without mak­ing himself a target for the steel blade. Finally they, too, stood back and watched as Avenel swiftly moved out of the way of the knife. He kicked out at the earl's arm, and the knife flew out of the older man's grasp, skidding along the floor out of reach.

  "If you think I am afraid of a knife, then think again. I have experienced its sharpness before, and I daresay my hide is too thick to be cut further." Avenel looked at the earl and reveled in the frightened look of recognition in the man's visage. The earl gasped in horror.

  "I should have known you from your eyes, gelding! But I'll keep you down, Slane. You'll not ruin me! I've always fdund a way in the past. I have never been defeated—"

  "Say no more!" Avenel laughed and picked up the cream- colored vellum that had fallen off the overturned table. "All your threats are meaningless now. You face the consequences of carelessly wagering a magnificent house. Your greed has gotten the better of you. Your very desire to win at all costs has been your downfall. Now I own Osterley Park. And I have won it fairly. Tis back where it belongs, and in better hands than yours." He placed the heavy paper in the inside pocket of his blue waistcoat. "If I'm not mistaken, you haven't the coin to get off this continent, let alone to buy Osterley back from me. So set your mind to other matters than re­venge."

  Avenel walked over to the cherry table and righted it. He smiled at Nob, whose thin adolescent body was quaking from excitement and fear. The boy immediately knew to bring him his coat and the three-cornered hat that had been placed on a chair. Avenel slipped on his coat and started out the door to his waiting horse. Nob stared after him, hero worship lighting up his face. His father started out the door, too, ignoring for the moment his other guests.

  "Slane! Have you not forgotten your winnings?" He ran to where Avenel was mounting his horse.

  "I have what I want." He turned to look at Staples. "You've done more than I could have asked for," Avenel said grate­fully.

  "I couldn't have done less. I wouldn't have a roof over my head if you hadn't given me the land to build on."

  "My father was returning to England. He had no use for the land."

  "Perhaps. But where tobacco can be grown, there's money to be made."

  Avenel mounted the finely bred animal and bent down to shake Staples's hand. He laughed and said, "Watch your tongue! You speak too kindly of a Tory!"

  "I suppose we shall always be speaking kindly of Tories, now that you are determined to go back to London."

  "When the war is over, perhaps I'll come back." Avenel turned thoughtful and looked ahead to the blue Patuxent River as it wound its way through the glorious ambers and burgundies of the fall foliage. "I've been here all my life. I admit 'twill be difficult to be an Englishman." A slow smile twisted on his lips suddenly. "But you should see Cumber­land! He's already planning his new wardrobe—dressing gowns and all!"

  Both men laughed this time. Avenel took the reins in his hands and began a slow trot to Satterlee Harbor.

  "You'd best return to the house, lest you find all my win­nings back in their pockets!" he called over his shoulder.

  "Godspeed, Avenel!" said Staples, watching him take off at a canter. He left behind a most pleased man.

  Dinbych-y-pysgod

  Tenby, Wales

  December 1780

  The auburn-haired girl took one last glimpse of her empty house as her coach drove by it, headed for London. Several pigs squealed and ran from the road into another abandoned Tudor home nearby. This one, however, stood roofless; its jettied-out top floors were now filled with rainsoaked debris.

  Her homeplace, the small fortressed medieval town of Tenby, was not the least bit fashionable. Not for hundreds of years had the town flourished. But it had made a perfect home for her and her mother. In Tenby, people hadn't cast probing looks at a husbandless woman, nor at her daughter, the beauti­ful dark-haired girl. No one had ever bluntly put questions to them—questions the mother and daughter would have been loath to answer, such as where had they come from years be­fore, and who they were.

  The old distressed town welcomed all who came there. It unconditionally offered a beautiful view of Carmarthen Bay from its embatdements and fresh prawns and oysters from the Llangwm fish sellers, as if in thanks for the pleasure of th
e company.

  But now yet another home was being left empty. A new lease seemed doubtful in light of the town's dwindling popula­tion. The girl's old home setded back quietly, accepting its fate. The scurries of small gray mice running across the dirt floor in the design-painted merchant's room would soon drown out the echoes of past laughter.

  The girl was one of the town's own. She had played there as a child and had dreamed there as a young woman. Now she stared off to St. Catherine's Island and Casde Hill. She was now lost to Tenby. And as if mourning her departure, the town looked sadder than usual—a bit more squalid and a litde more deserted. Not a soul was in attendance to see the girl off. But still, she looked back at the small coastal town from her worn leather seat in the coach and curled her fingers as if waving good-bye to an old friend, one that had protected her and helped her make her way. How she would miss it! She turned back in the coach, as if not wanting the fragile old place to see tears of homesickness already welling up in her soft violet-blue eyes.

  Crossing her arms in front of her, she seemed a dismal litde creature. There was no one to divert her sad thoughts—she was the coach's only passenger. They would pick up others on the way to London, but not until they reached the larger town of Carmarthen.

  Sitting back in her seat, she looked out the dirty window of the coach at the hilly Welsh countryside. For the time being, she allowed herself to fret and imagine what life would be like where she was going.

  I

  OSTERLEY PARK

  . . . worthy of Eve before the Fall

  —Horace Walpole

  CHAPTER ONE

  Osterley Park

  January 1781

  Brienne Morrow recalled the sight of Osterley as she'd seen it when she walked past its brick gatehouse a month ago. The great portico was alive with white griffons plastered on the pediment. Large stone eagles, each holding an adder in its beak, loomed fearlessly over the steps; their gray granite eyes forever watchful.