A Christmas Bride / A Christmas Beau (11 page)

“Good,” Cora said when the girl had replied that indeed she did. “Then you will have a marvelous time.” She reacted quite in character when she realized that she had opened her mouth and stuffed her rather large slipper inside, Edgar noticed, wishing rather uncharitably that she might choke on it. She blushed and talked and
laughed. “That is, if it snows. If it snows where you happen to be spending Christmas, that is. That is, if … Oh dear. Hartley, do tell me what I am trying to say.”

“You are hoping there will be snow to make Christmas a more festive occasion, Cora,” the Marquess of Carew said kindly. “And that it will fall all over England for everyone’s delight.”

“Yes,” she said. “Thank you. That is exactly what I meant. How warm it is in here.” She opened her fan and plied it vigorously before her face.

Sir Webster and Lady Grainger, Edgar saw, were looking very smug indeed.

A
ND THEN AT
the very end of November, when the noose seemed to have settled quite firmly about his neck, he discovered the existence of the ineligible lover—the one Lady Stapleton had mentioned.

Edgar was walking along Oxford Street, huddled inside his heavy greatcoat, avoiding the puddles left by the rain that had just stopped, wondering if the sun would ever shine again and if he would ever find suitable gifts for everyone on his list—he had expected London to make for easier shopping than Bristol—when he ran almost headlong into Miss Grainger, who was standing quite still in the middle of the pavement, impeding pedestrian traffic.

“I do beg your pardon,” he said, his hand going to the brim of his hat even before he recognized her. “Ah, Miss Grainger. Your servant.” He made her a slight bow and realized two things. Neither of her parents was with her—but a young man was.

She did not behave with any wisdom. Her eyes grew wide with horror, she opened her mouth and held it open before snapping it shut again. Then she smiled
broadly, though she forgot to adjust her eyes accordingly, and proceeded to chatter.

“Mr. Downes,” she said. “Oh, good morning. Fancy meeting you here. Is it not a beautiful morning? I have come to change my book at the library. Mama could not come with me, but I have brought my maid—you see?” She gestured behind her with one hand to the young person standing a short distance away. “How lovely it is to see you. By a very strange coincidence I have run into another acquaintance, too. Mr. Sperling. May I present you? Mr. Sperling, sir. Jack, this is Mr. Downes. I-I m-mean
Mr. Sperling
, this is Mr. Downes.”

Edgar inclined his head to the slender, good-looking, very young man, who was looking back coldly. “Sperling?” he said.

A few things were clear. This particular spot on Oxford Street was not between the Grainger lodgings and the library. The doorway to a coffee shop that sported high-backed seats and secluded booths was just to their right. The maid was not doing a very good job as watchdog. Jack Sperling was more than a chance acquaintance and the meeting between him and Miss Grainger was no coincidence. Sperling knew who he was and would put a dagger through his heart if he dared—and if he had one about his person. Miss Grainger herself was terrified. And he, Edgar, felt at least a century old.

He would have moved on and left his prospective bride to her clandestine half hour or so—he doubted they would allow themselves longer—with the slight acquaintance she happened to call by his first name. But she forestalled him.

“Jack,” she said. She was still flustered. “I m-mean
Mr. Sperling
, it was pleasant to meet you. G-good morning.”

And Jack Sperling, pale and murderous of countenance, had no choice but to bow, touch the brim of his
hat, bid them a good morning, and continue on his way down the street as if he had never so much as heard of coffee shops.

Fanny Grainger smiled dazzlingly at Edgar—with terrified eyes. “Was not that a happy chance?” she said. “He is a neighbor of ours. I have not seen him for years.” Edgar guessed that beneath the rosy glow the cold had whipped into her cheeks she was blushing just as rosily.

“May I offer my escort?” he asked her. “Are you on your way to or from the library?”

“Oh,” she said. “To.” She indicated her maid, who held a book clasped against her bosom. “Y-yes, please, Mr. Downes, if it is not too much trouble.”

He felt like apologizing to her. But of course he could not do so. He should be feeling sternly disapproving. He should be feeling injured proprietorship. He felt—still—a century old. She took his arm.

“Mr. Downes,” she said before he had decided upon a topic of conversation, “p-please, will you—? That is, could I ask you please— Please, sir—”

He wanted to set a reassuring hand over hers. He wanted to pat it. He wanted to tell her that it was nothing to him if she chose to arrange clandestine meetings with her lover. But of course it
was
something to him. There was one month to Christmas and he had every intention—he had thought it through finally just last evening and had come to a firm decision—of inviting her and her parents to Mobley Abbey for the holiday, though he had thought he would not make his offer until they had all been there for a few days and he could be quite sure before taking the final step.

“I believe, my dear,” he said, and then wished he had not called her that, as if she were a favored niece, “my size and demeanor and—age sometimes inspire awe or even fear in those who do not know me well. At least, I
have been told as much by those who do know me. I have no wish either to hurt or distress you. What is it?”

He noticed that she closed her eyes briefly before answering. “Please,” she said, “will you refrain from mentioning to Mama and Papa that I ran into Mr. Sperling by chance this morning? They do not like him, you see, and perhaps would scold me for not giving him the cut direct. I could not do that. Or at least I did not think of doing it until it was too late.”

“Of course,” he said. “I have already forgotten the young man’s name and indeed his very existence.”

“Thank you.” Some of the terror had waned from her eyes when she looked up at him. “Though I w-wish I had done so. It was disagreeable to have to acknowledge him. I was very relieved when you came along.”

“It is a quite impossible situation?” he found himself asking when he should have been content to play along with her game.

There was fright in her eyes again. She bit her lip and tears sprang to her eyes. “I am sorry,” she whispered. “Please do not be angry with me. It was the last time. That is—It will not happen again. Oh, please do not be angry with me. I am so frightened of you.” And then the fright escalated to terror once more when she realized what she had said, what she had admitted, both about him and about Jack Sperling.

This time he did set his hand over hers—quite firmly. “That at least you need not be,” he said. “What is the objection? Lack of fortune?”

But she was biting hard on her upper lip and fighting both tears and terror—despite his words. The library was before them.

“I shall leave you to your maid’s chaperonage,” he said, stopping on the pavement outside it and relinquishing her arm. “We will forget about this morning, Miss Grainger. It never happened.”

But she did not immediately scurry away, as he rather expected she would. She looked earnestly into his face. “I have always been obedient to Mama and Papa,” she said, “except in very little things. I will be obedient—I would be obedient to a husband, sir. I would never need to be beaten. I—Good morning.” And she turned to hurry into the library, her maid behind her.

Good Lord! Did she imagine—? Did he look that formidable? And what a coil, he thought. He could not possibly marry her now, of course. But perhaps it would appear that he had gone rather too far to retreat without good cause. There was excellent cause, but nothing he could express to another living soul. He could not marry a young lady who loved another man. Or one who feared him so much that she imagined he would be a wife-beater.

Whatever was he going to do?

But he was not fated to think of an answer while he stood there on the pavement, staring at the library doors. They opened and Lady Stapleton stepped out with Mrs. Cross.

He forgot about his problem—the one that concerned Miss Grainger, anyway. He always forgot about everything and everyone whenever his eyes alighted on Lady Stapleton. They had avoided each other for the past month. They attended almost all the same social events and it was frequently necessary to be part of the same group and even to exchange a few words. But they had not been alone together since that evening when they had waltzed and then taken supper together. The evening when he had told her they could be nothing to each other because there had been that night.

That night. It stayed stubbornly in his memory, it wove itself into his dreams as none other like it had ever done. Not that there had been another night like that. Perhaps, he thought sometimes, he would forget it
sooner if he tried less hard to do so. He did not want to remember. The memories disturbed him. He was not a man of passion but one of cool reason. He had been rather alarmed at the passionate self that had emerged during that particular encounter. He looked forward to returning to Mobley and then Bristol. After that, he hoped, he would never see her again. The memories would fade.

He made his bow and would have hastened away, but Mrs. Cross called to him.

“Mr. Downes,” she cried. “Oh, Mr. Downes, might we impose upon you for a few minutes, I wonder? My niece is unwell.”

He could see when he looked more closely at Lady Stapleton that she was leaning rather heavily on her aunt’s arm and that her face and even her lips were ashen pale and her eyes half closed—and that until her aunt spoke his name, she had been quite unaware of his presence.

Her eyes jolted open and her glance locked with his.

T
HE
P
OVISES HAD
already left for the Continent with a group of friends and acquaintances. They intended to wander south at a leisurely pace and spend Christmas in Italy. Helena might have gone with them. Indeed, they had urged her to do so, and so had Mr. Crutchley, who had had designs on her for a number of years past, though she had never given him any encouragement. It was sure to be a gay party. She would have enjoyed herself immensely if she had gone along. She would have avoided this dreariest of dreary winters in England—and it was still only November. She could have stayed away until spring or even longer. Perhaps she could even have persuaded her aunt to go with her if she had set her mind to it.

But she had not gone.

She did not know why. She was certainly not enjoying London. There were almost daily entertainments, and she attended most of them for her aunt’s sake. The company, though sparse, was congenial. She was treated with respect and even with warmth wherever she went—even on that evening when she had worn her bronze satin and Lady Francis Kneller had quite frankly and quite sincerely commended her bravery. Being in one comfortable home was certainly preferable to moving from one inn to another. And coach travel day after day could be tedious and even downright uncomfortable. She should be happy. Or since happiness was not a possible state for her, contented. She should be contented.

She felt lethargic and even ill. Her aunt had a bad cold soon after returning to town, but Helena did not catch it from her. It would have been better if she had, she thought. She would have suffered for a few days and then recovered. As it was, she felt constantly unwell without any specific symptoms that she might treat. Even getting out of bed in the mornings—her favorite time of day—had become a chore. Sometimes she lay late in bed, awake and bored and uncomfortable, but lacking the energy to get up, only to feel faintly nauseated and unable to eat any breakfast when she did make the effort.

She knew why she felt that way, of course. She was living through an obsession—and it was no new thing. If it had been, perhaps she would have been better able to deal with it. But it was not new. She had been obsessed once before and just the memory of it—long suppressed but never quite hidden below consciousness—could have her poised with her head hanging over the close stool, fighting to keep the last meal down.

Now she was obsessed again. Not in any way she could explain clearly to herself. Although she saw him
almost daily, she never again felt the urge to seduce him—though the knowledge that it would not be an easy thing to do a second time was almost a temptation in itself. She just could not keep her eyes off him when he was in a room with her. Though that was not strictly accurate. She rarely looked directly at him. She would scorn to do so. He would surely notice. Other people would. She kept her eyes off him. But every other part of her being was drawn to him as if to a powerful magnet.

She was not even sure that it was just a sexual awareness. She imagined sometimes being in bed with him again, doing with him the things they had done on that one night they had spent together. But though the thoughts were undeniably arousing, she always knew that it was not that she wanted. Not just that anyway. She did not know what she wanted.

She wanted to forget him. That was what she wanted. She hated him. Those words they had spoken while waltzing would not fade from her mind.

Are we nothing, then? Nothing at all to each other?

We are nothing. We cannot be. Because there was that night
.

There was a deep pit of emptiness in her stomach every time she heard the echo of those words of his—and she heard it almost constantly.

She should go away. She should have gone with the Povises. She had stayed for her aunt’s sake, she had told herself. But when had she ever considered anyone’s feelings except her own? When had she ever had a selfless motive for anything she had ever done—or not done? She should go away. She should go to Scotland for Christmas—horrid thought. But
he
would be going away for Christmas. He would be going to his father’s estate near Bristol. She had heard Lady Francis Kneller talking about it. The Grainger girl would doubtless be going there, too. They would be betrothed—and married
by the spring. Perhaps then she would know some peace.