A Christmas Wedding Wager (17 page)

'He loves speaking about engineering. I am sure your being here has helped with his recovery.'

'His enthusiasm is infectious. I know I caught it from him many years ago,' Jack replied.

'Now, will you give me your answer? Will you cement our new-found friendship with a trip to the pantomime?'

Friendship. She could trust him with a trip to the pantomime. Emma closed her eyes. But she could not explain about her father and his attacks. Jack still saw him as strong and vigorous.

She wanted to trust him, but first she wanted to be sure her instinct was correct. He was very different from the man she had known seven years ago. She had to think about people other than herself. It could wait a little while yet. 'That is the reason you are asking me--

friendship?'

'What other reason could there be?' His eyes searched her face, stopped at her mouth. 'I wish this war between us to end.'

'Hardly a war.'

'You appear intent on seeing the worst in me.'

'Not the worst.' Emma tightened her hand around her muff. 'I have apologised about jumping to the wrong conclusions about Davy.'

'If you have no objections to my personage and my offer of friendship, why don't you want to go?'

She was very neatly trapped. Keeping her father's illness a secret was far more important than wondering why Jack had invited her. Emma inclined her head. 'In the spirit of friendship and new starts, I will go. You have given me the assurance that I will be properly chaperoned, and it has been a while since I have seen a pantomime at Christmas.'

The dimple reappeared by Jack's mouth. 'Look on it as an educational experience, Miss Emma. A way to improve your mind. You might learn something.'

'Father, what game are you playing?' Emma asked Edward Harrison the minute they climbed in the carriage and the wheels started turning. 'Why did you leave me alone with Jack Stanton? Surely Mudge did not need you for that long? This is not another of your matchmaking schemes, is it? I have told you before, I am quite happy with my life.'

'I have no idea what you are talking about.' Her father turned his mild blue eyes towards her.

'Daughter, did you not enjoy your tour? You were gone a long time with Jack Stanton, and I waited for you, not the other way around.'

'We were looking at his experiments.' Emma laid the muff on her lap. 'He is not satisfied with some of the calculations and wants to do them himself. They may take some time.'

'He wants a reason to stay in Newcastle.' There was a smug curve to her father's lips. 'He knows I always take great care over my calculations. They have never been wrong before.'

'I fear you are right, Father. I worry that he wants to take over the bridge construction.' She had said the words, and now she waited for her father's denial.

'There are worse men I could think of,' her father replied, with maddening complacency. 'But I do not believe that is his intention at all.'

'Then what is it?'

'He means to court you, Emma.'

Emma stared in disbelief at her father, willing his eyes to twinkle or the ghost of a smile to appear. Something, anything to show he was in jest. Surely he could not have forgotten about what had happened all those years ago? But his face stayed serious.

'You must not say such things, even in jest. It is impossible. Everything is finished between Jack Stanton and I. It finished years ago.'

She willed her father to believe her. Jack Stanton was not interested in her. He had kissed her last night to prove a point. And he was inviting her to the pantomime because he thought she spent far too much time alone and was frightened of facing society, having suffered from a humiliation.

'This is no joke, nor a merry jape to make the journey home pass quicker, daughter.' Her father's hand enfolded hers. 'I am perfectly in earnest. Do you think I would have left you alone with him last night or today if I'd had the slightest suspicion that his intentions were less than honourable?'

'But he has no intentions. Business occupies his every waking thought.' Emma withdrew her hand, slid it into her muff and clenched her fist. 'Sometimes I wonder if your illness clouds your mind. Soon you will swear you hear wedding bells, when all the sound will be is the bells in St Nicholas's lantern chiming the dinner hour.'

'Daughter, what a thing to say! I can read the signs very well indeed. My mind is as strong as ever it was. You are being purposefully blind.'

Emma tried to ignore the trembling in her stomach. She had to make her father see. He should not harbour such fantasies. She was very glad he had no idea what had passed between Jack and her last night. Luckily it had not gone further.

'Mama's mind wandered at the end.'

'Shall we leave your mother alone? Her affliction was her own, and quite different from the mild chill I suffered.' Her father rapped his cane on the carriage floor. 'No, I am as sound as I ever was, and you, my daughter, are being stubborn.'

Emma looked out of the carriage window at the scene unfolding--the children sliding on the ice, the women hurrying with parcels, the men striding along. A few of the broadsheet salesmen had started their Christmas patter songs. A lump grew in her throat and she swallowed hard, forcing it down. Certain things had to be said before her father utterly ruined her life.

'Have you forgotten, Papa, Jack Stanton left seven years ago without a word?'

'Daughter--' Her father cleared his throat several times.

'Surely I meant more to him than a half-hearted proposal.' Emma turned her gaze back to the scene outside the carriage. 'It was you and Mama who counselled me to wait and see, saying that if he was serious he would send word. He never sent a letter, never gave me the chance to explain about Mama's illness.'

Her father's eyes slid away from her, and he developed a sudden interest in the carriage seat.

'Your dear mama did it for the best, Emma. Sometimes, though, I have lain and wondered what if--particularly in these later years, when you have developed such a gift for engineering. It is too bad that you were not born a man, my daughter. What a civil engineer you would have made!'

'What did my mother do?' Emma bit out each word, and resisted the urge to shake him. She would not be distracted by his civil engineering remarks. She had to know what her mother had done! How had she discouraged her unsuitable suitor? Was there far more to what had happened seven years ago than she first thought?

'Such things are best not spoken of. One never criticises the dead, Emma. Remember that.'

He reached out his hand, but Emma ignored his fingers. 'What happened is water under the bridge or grains of sand between the fingers. One can never turn back the hands of time.'

'What did she do? You must tell me!' Emma clasped her hands together in her lap. She wanted to shake her father, to get him to tell her what her mother had done.

'Emma Harrison, keep your voice down. Both the driver and the footman will hear!'

Emma closed her eyes and concentrated on her breathing. By the time she felt she could speak without raising her voice the carriage had arrived back in Jesmond, and Fackler had come out to greet them. She waited until her father had sat down in front of the drawing room fire. She began to pace.

'Emma, you seem disturbed.' Her father held out his hand. 'Did you see something amiss at the site? I must confess Jack Stanton keeps it in better order than ever I dared hope.'

'What did Mama do, Father? You will not fob me off by speaking about the bridge. I know you too well.' Emma stood in front of him and placed her hands on her hips. 'I have a right to know.'

'Her sole thought was your future happiness.' Her father did not meet her eyes. 'She had no inkling, of course, about who Jack Stanton would become. Neither of us did. She thought him a fine enough young man, but beneath her daughter. You have to remember that Claire had just married a baronet. She had high hopes for you--very high hopes. A member of the aristocracy, or failing that someone who had land and wealth. Someone who would keep our youngest in the style she should have been. Someone to appreciate you.'

'She thought of no one but herself.' Emma put her muff down on the small table. She tried to control the cold anger that flooded over her. Her father might like to pretend, but she had known her mother's faults. She had still loved her, but had known what she was like. 'You know how selfish she was, how ambitious. It was never for me or Claire, but for her own position. She wanted a title. She never forgave you for being a second son.'

'You should not speak of your mother in that way! She loved you, and wanted the best for you. Her daughters meant everything for her. The sacrifices she made...' Her father's eyes held a slight glint of tears. 'She had her faults, but she loved you.'

'We both know what a snob she was, Papa.' The words came tumbling out of a place deep within Emma, a place she had thought hidden well, but once she had begun she had to continue. 'Why try to deny it? She may have loved Claire and me, but ultimately she wanted that title. She never asked me what I wanted.'

'It is the job of parents to make sure their offspring marry the correct people--people they would be suitable for, not ones for whom they have a passing fancy.'

Emma breathed deeply. Perhaps her father was speaking the truth. She knew her parents'

marriage had been a love-match, but one that had not lived up to her mother's expectations.

'Tell me what she did, Papa. Why do you feel guilty? You know I loved my mother, but I wasn't blind to her faults. And I loved her all the more because of them.'

'I grow weary, Emma.' Her father passed a hand over his brow. 'I fear this morning's inspection took a great deal out of me. You were right earlier. I was foolish to abandon the tonic.'

'I shall get some right away.' Emma rang for the butler, obtained the tonic, and poured out the correct dose. 'You must be careful, Father. You must do as Dr Milburn says.'

'You are a good daughter, Emma.' He patted her hand. 'We shall speak no more of this. Your mother did what she felt she had to do.'

Emma gritted her teeth and allowed the conversation to drift. There had to be another way of finding out why her father felt guilty. It was something to do with Jack's proposal of seven years ago.

After her father had settled down with the day's papers, his tonic and a glass of sherry, Emma left him in the drawing room and hurried into the morning room, where her mother's old desk stood. She tapped her fingers against the rosewood. Her father was definitely hiding something--something that her mother had done.

She had gone through her mother's letters when she died, and there had been nothing about Jack Stanton there. She would have remembered. Her mother had been meticulous about noting everything down, keeping a log of correspondence. But her father felt guilty about something--guilt that Jack's return had sparked.

Had Jack sent something? A letter explaining why he'd left without waiting for her final answer, perhaps? It could explain so many things.

She made a wry face. If he had, it had vanished a long time ago. A small fire crackled in the fireplace, sending out a little bit of warmth. It would not yield up any secrets. She hated to think how long ago the ashes from any letter would have been taken out.

A surge of anger swept through her. What right had her mother had to make that sort of decision? Emma had been eighteen when Jack had made his offer. She should have trusted her.

Emma pressed her hands against her forehead. She had chosen the course of duty. Chosen it before Jack had asked. Her mother had been ill, deathly ill. They had only expected her to last a few months, but she had lingered for years. Her mother had had the right to expect a nurse, someone who loved her, and Claire had already been married.

Jack had simply not waited for an explanation, just stormed off. And if he hadn't been able to bear to wait for that, would he have waited for her? The 'few months' her mother had had left had turned into years. Long years where she had learnt the value of using her mind and thinking--something her mother had encouraged her to do, as it kept her near at hand. She might have resented her mother, and her demands, but they had grown closer, and in the end her mother had approved of her chosen path.

Emma slapped her hand against the smooth wood of the desk. She lived in the real world--

one not populated by romantic imaginings but punctuated by precise calculations.

Her hand had hit a tiny carved rosebud on the back of the desk, and Emma was sure she'd heard a distinct click. She opened the top and looked. A panel was slightly pushed out. She started to push it back, and then paused, got out a paper-knife, and pulled.

A bundle of papers fell out, tied in a blue ribbon. Like a ghost, the faint lavender scent of her mother's perfume wafted through the room, tickling her nose and making her recall the sound of her mother's laughter and her lightning-quick wit. Emma's heart constricted at the unexpectedness of the memory.

Emma's hand trembled, and she concentrated on the letters. She sorted through them quickly, searching for Jack's signature. Then smiled at her own actions. What had she expected? A letter like in some penny-blood? They were all simple correspondence between Mama and her best friend. But why had she shoved them in the secret compartment? What secret had she wanted to hide from Emma?

Emma rescanned the letters--mostly domestic happenings and crises that had once seemed insurmountable and insoluble. A single sheet of paper was dated from seven years ago. The writing was crossed to save money. Emma turned the paper to read the continuation of the letter.

Her eye stopped, and she reread the next to last paragraph.

You did the right thing, Margaret, with that letter--what the heart doesn't know, the heart doesn't grieve over. Emma will get over Jack Stanton in a few months' time. You did what you had to, my dear. Be proud of it. Your daughter will thank you, given time.

Emma rechecked the date. It was a few weeks after Jack's proposal, after she had asked for time to consider. She had had no other serious offer at the time. Jack must have sent a letter, and her mother had intercepted it.