"There, sir," Alan said, flinging the gutta-percha walking stick to the parqueted floor at Hugh Beauman's feet. "If you feel the need to use that on me, feel free. Should you wish it occur in the main plaza, we may go there, and I shall be completely at your disposal. I shall not defend myself."
His boldness disarmed them, as he thought it might, allowing him to present his case before they dredged their thoughts back into order.
"Mister Beauman, Master Hugh, I have been a complete, callow fool, and I humbly beg your forgiveness for any taint of scandal that might have touched your family. But I assure you as God's my witness Mistress Anne Beauman is completely blameless. If you will indulge me?"
"Um, yes, little privacy, what?" Beauman, Sr., stammered, waving his hand towards a small parlor or study off the main hall. Once the doors were shut, Alan took the offensive once more.
"I would take a public whipping to settle this if that is what it takes," he repeated.
"You squired my wife about the town, sir," Hugh began, working up his anger once more, now that they were in private. "You were seen fondling her, sir. What manner of man would expose a proper lady to that, dragging her into a public-house, sir?"
"Because I needed warning, sir, and she took the risk to her reputation to repair a greater risk to the Beauman family reputation. You should be thanking her, as I do."
"Warnin'?" the older man scoffed. "About what?"
"About Betty Hillwood, sir," Alan replied. "That's what I was a fool about. I was visiting her, to work off the humors of the blood."
"Ah," Mr. Beauman coughed. "I see. You an'… at clicket, eh?"
"Like foxes, sir," Alan admitted with a worldly smile. "Better her than a public-house whore-less chance of the pox."
There was a chance they would understand: the Beaumans were an earthy lot. From what he had heard of them, they could empathize.
"Being in the company of such a beautiful young lady as your Lucy raised my humors to the boiling point, and I thought it best to release that tension, sirs. And if my suit was to be a long one-and you note I use the past tense, sirs, since my foolish behavior has raised such a tempest I doubt you could entertain my hopes further-I feared the frustration would cause me to do something untoward."
"Damme, you're a bold 'un!" Mr. Beauman gaped. "You sport with another woman to avoid rapin' my daughter if your… bloody humors… get outa hand, and I suppose you think we should be thankin' ya?"
It was the longest and most complete sentence Mr. Beauman had ever uttered, and it stopped Alan cold in his tracks for a moment.
"What man, faced with a long courtship of a sweet and proper young lady, could do otherwise, sir, and retain his sanity?" Alan asked them. "In your own courting days, Mister Beauman, was there no release for you? Did not the long delay of hoped for satisfaction drive you to distraction?"
"Well, there was a tavern wench'r two…" the older man began to maunder.
"Father, that's not the bloody point! He's ruined Anne's good name, and I want satisfaction," Hugh barked, bringing them back to the meat of the matter.
"But Mrs. Hillwood is the point, sir," Alan doggedly went on. "Who do you think started the rumor in the first place? Her and her friend Mrs. Howard, sending their servants to peep and pry and report back with gossip to liven their lives, or give them an advantage. I met Anne as I was leaving Mrs. Hillwood's. She would have warned me off with a letter, but she took the risk to accost me, then and there. I rode in her carriage down to the dress-maker's and went inside with her. I stood by the door, feeling like a damned fool to even be in the place. Not a word, not a gesture of anything improper occurred, sir. We then went for something cool to drink to revive her as she was wilting in the heat, and to find a place where she could impart her timely warning that I should best stop visiting the woman, not only for the good of the Beauman family name, but for mine own. To stress how important it was, as she spoke of her fondness for Lucy and the Beauman family, she touched my wrist once. And as I poured out my own problem with Mrs. Hillwood, I admit to taking her hand and beseeching her what to do about the mess I had made. That is all that passed between us, Master Hugh. I did not think that an establishment so seemingly refined as the Frenchman's… what you may call it… a restaurant… would be looked upon as a public place. Back in London, it has become the custom that ladies may frequent eating establishments, as long as they do not contain rooms to let. All the quality do so, and I didn't know it was any different here on Jamaica."
When in doubt, trot out the aristocracy as an example, he told himself. No one wants to appear out of the latest fashion.
"You swear on your honor?" Hugh Beauman demanded, unready to relent.
"For a gentleman to say it is to swear to its truth, sir," Alan shot back, a little high-handed at the slight of his honor, though he sometimes doubted if he truly had any to slight or get huffy about. "If you demand more, then I swear on my honor as an English gentleman and as a commission Sea Officer that events happened as I said."
"What problem with Betty… Mrs. Hillwood, sir?" the older man asked.
Thank bloody Christ for you, Alan though gratefully. "The lady became a bother, Mister Beauman. She took a greater fancy to me than I thought was good. She gave me this chain and fob, and promised more of the same, if I became her kept man and topped her regular. When I told her no, she vowed to get even, no matter who got hurt. If not by this rumor she spread about me and Anne, then by another means, a letter I was foolish enough to write her."
"What sort o' letter?" Mr. Beauman asked, fetching out a squat brandy decanter and beginning to pour himself a drink.
"A rather risquй… no, I don't think risquй does it justice. Pornographic, would be more like, sir," Alan confessed, putting on his best shame-face and hoping they would eat this up like plum duff. "She dictated it, I wrote it. As a game, you see. Between bouts."
"Ah?"
"In her bed, sir."
"Aha!"
"With her belly for a writing desk, sir," Alan finished with a shrug of the truly sheepishly guilty, a gesture he had practically taken patent on in his school days.
"God's teeth!" Mr. Beauman, Sr, exclaimed, settling down into a chair with a look of perplexity creasing his heavy features. "With her belly… on her belly, sir? Well, stap me! Don't see how it can be done, damme if I can. 'Course, I never tried writin' down there."
"It's a rather firm belly, sir," Alan commented.
"Aye, that'd help, I suppose," the man nodded, beginning to grin slightly at the mental picture.
"Father, for God's sake!" Hugh exploded. "Whatever the reasons, no matter how innocent they were, people have taken a tar-brush to our family's good name and reputation, our social standing!"
"Start some gossip of your own, sir," Alan suggested.
"Damn you, sir!" Hugh Beauman snarled. "We'll decide what's best for this family, not you. You've done enough."
"And I would be willing to do anything to assist you, sir."
"What sort o' rumor?" the father asked, slopping back a large swig of brandy and waving the bottle at them in invitation, which Alan agreed to readily; he was dry as dust from nerves, and three men drinking together and consorting on how to solve something were not three men who would be trying to stick sharp objects into each other.
"It was Mrs. Hillwood's pride and vanity that brought this about when I rejected her offer," Alan said, taking a pew on the corner of a desk with glass in hand, though Hugh Beauman was still averse to showing him any leniency. "She didn't want me paying any attention to Lucy. I think the woman was jealous of anyone younger or prettier. Not so much that she was truly in love with me, but she disliked losing, d'ye see. And I don't think she cares much for the Beauman family in general, if you can believe the things she told me, trying to destroy my respect for the lot of you. Terrible things best left unsaid."