Page 91 of The Danger of Desire

“God, no,” Hart said. “But he’s reform-minded like her. Always intent upon feeding the poor, healing the sick, providing clothes for little mill-worker children.”

“That’s a good thing, isn’t it?” she said.

“It is when Stephen does it,” Warren said genially. “He doesn’t offer his charity with a strong dose of religion, the way our mother did.”

“Yes, I can see why that wouldn’t sit well with you,” she teased. “Given your choice of enjoyments.”

“All of which I’ve given up, now that I’ve married.”

“Surely notall,” his brother put in. “You’re still drinking fine brandy, I see.”

“And going to his club for half the night,” Delia added.

Hart eyed his brother. “That’s only because Warren hates the darkness. He needs lots of light and activity around him.”

“Enough, Hart,” Warren said with a warning glance.

“What? Have you not told her about Mr. Pickering and the cellar?”

She ignored Warren’s muttered oath. “Who is Mr. Pickering?”

“WhowasMr. Pickering,” Hart said. “I heard he’s dead now, the bastard. When we were boys he was our Methodist tutor, stricter even than Mother. ‘Spare the rod and spoil the child,’ and all that rot.”

“No worse than what we got at Eton,” Warren said. “Remember old Chilton?”

“The cellar,” Delia prompted, determined not to let Warren change the subject. “What happened there?”

“Can’t believe he hasn’t told you this.” Hart settled back against his chair. “One time, when Warren was nine and the rest of us were at our grandmother’s while Mother was away in London, Pickering locked Warren up in an old unused cellar to try to, as he liked to put it, ‘purge the wickedness from him.’ ”

“It didn’t work,” Warren clipped out. “And this is a wholly inappropriate subject.”

“I don’t see why,” Delia said hotly. “I’m your wife.”

“And if anyone should hear such things,” Hart said, “it’s one’s wife, don’t you think, brother?”

Warren’s glare spoke volumes.

Delia turned to Hart. “How long was he in the cellar?”

When Hart hesitated, Warren took a long swig of brandy, then said tersely, “Five days.”

He wouldn’t look at her. Which was just as well, or he might have seen the abject shock on her face. Delia could hardly breathe for thinking of the nine-year-old boy locked in a cellar for days. Alone. In the dark.

Oh, Lord, the nightmares! Of course. It all made sense now.

“What about your father?” she asked. “Didn’theput a stop to it?”

“He was in London with Mother,” Hart said. “Though I doubt he would have even known if he’d been there, much less done anything. He wasn’t what you’d call the coddling type.”

“So he was Methodist, too?”

“No,” Warren said, his face carved in stone. “Just a cold fish in general.”

“Then what about the servants?” she asked. “Why didn’ttheyprotest it?”

Warren poured himself more brandy. “Pickering told them I’d changed my mind and wanted to go with my brothers to my grandmother’s, and that he’d walked me over to the village and sent me off by coach to her house. They took him at his word.”

“Of course they did!” Delia said. “Methodists aren’t supposed to lie.”