First Comes Marriage (19 page)

Margaret looked openly dismayed—as if she expected a public declaration right there and then. Stephen looked interested, and Katherine looked up from the fashion plate she had been studying.

“Mrs. Dew,” the viscount said, “has just done me the great honor of accepting my hand in marriage.”

Vanessa wished she had sat down as soon as she was inside the room. But it was too late now. She could only stand where she was on legs that felt distinctly wobbly.

There was a horrible silence that seemed to stretch forever, though it was probably no longer than a second or two.

“I say.” Stephen was the first to find his tongue. “Oh, I say, this
is
a surprise.”

And he took the viscount’s hand in his and pumped it up and down and then caught Vanessa up in a bear hug, grinning at her as he did so.

Katherine jumped to her feet and came hurrying across the room.

“Oh,” she cried, “this really
is
splendid. But I did not suspect a
thing
. Ought I to have? Neither of you has given the smallest sign that you have a tendre for each other. But of course—you danced together at the assembly. And you, my lord, danced with no one else
but
Nessie.”

She looked for a moment as if she might rush into his arms, but if she had intended that, she thought better of it and rushed into Vanessa’s instead after Stephen had released her.

Margaret remained standing behind the tea tray. Vanessa met her eyes over Katherine’s shoulder and saw an expression in them that was impossible to read.

“Nessie?” she said. She did not even look at Viscount Lyngate.

Vanessa crossed the room to her, her hands outstretched.

“Meg,” she said, “wish me happy. Wish
us
happy?”

The expression—whatever it had been—was gone, to be replaced by a strained smile.

“But of course I do,” she said, taking Vanessa’s hands and squeezing them tightly. “I wish you all the happiness in the world. And you too, my lord.”

He bowed to her—to the woman he had come here to offer for today.

And then, the announcement having been made and the first outburst of surprise and excitement over with, they all sat and sipped their tea and bit into their cakes as if this were any ordinary afternoon.

Except that the conversation was far from ordinary. Viscount Lyngate told them that he would have a word with his mother, who was intending to leave for London within the week in order to get his sister properly outfitted for the coming Season. She would surely be pleased to take his betrothed too and help her choose her bride clothes and prepare her for her presentation at court after the marriage. In the meanwhile, he would see that the banns were called in both her parish and his own without further delay so that all could be accomplished within the month and in plenty of time before the Season began in earnest.

. . . within the month . . .

They all sat politely listening to him—even Vanessa. And they all showed an interest in his plans and made appropriate comments and asked pertinent questions—except Vanessa.

Within half an hour Viscount Lyngate was taking his leave of them all, bowing to each of them in turn, and then taking Vanessa’s hand in his and raising it to his lips.

“If I may,” he said, “I will come and fetch you tomorrow afternoon and take you to Finchley Park to call on my mother. She will wish it.”

“I should enjoy that,” she said, stretching the truth so thin that really there was nothing of it left.

And he was gone, taking Stephen to ride a way with him.

Katherine left the room too after another few minutes of excited chatter and several impulsive hugs. She was going to write to her friends in Throckbridge and tell them the news.

Which reminded Vanessa that
she
must write without delay to the Dews. She hoped the news would not upset them too much.

But she would think of that later. She was suddenly alone with Margaret, who was still seated on the same chair though the tea tray had been removed. Vanessa was a few feet away.

Margaret broke the silence.

“Nessie,” she said, “what have you done?”

Vanessa smiled cheerfully. “I have affianced myself to a handsome, rich, influential man,” she said. “He asked and I said yes.”

“Are you sure that is the way it was?” Margaret asked, her gaze uncomfortably direct. “Or did
you
ask
him
?”

“That would be very improper,” Vanessa said.

“But not something you have not done before,” Margaret reminded her.

“I was happy with Hedley,” Vanessa protested.

“Yes, I know.” Her sister frowned. “But will you be happy with Lord Lyngate? I have been under the impression that you do not even like him very well.”

“I will be happy,” Vanessa said, smoothing one hand over the blue fabric of her dress.

“You did it for me, did you not?” Margaret asked.

“I did it because I
wanted
to,” Vanessa said, looking at her again. “Do you mind awfully, Meg? Did you really want him for yourself? Now that it is too late, I fear that perhaps you do. Or did.”

“You
did
do it for me,” Margaret said, clasping her hands so tightly in her lap that Vanessa could see her knuckles turn white. “You did it for
us
. Oh, Nessie, must you make yourself a martyr for our sakes?”

“
You
always do,” Vanessa told her.

“That is different,” Margaret said. “It is my lot in life to protect you all, to make sure you all have a chance for the best life possible. I so want you all to be happy. You married Hedley for his sake, and now you will marry Lord Lyngate for ours. You
must
not, Nessie. I will not allow it. I will write him a letter and have it taken over to Finchley without delay. I will—”

“You will do no such thing,” Vanessa said. “I am twenty-four years old, Meg. I am a widow. You cannot live my life for me. Neither can you live Kate’s or Stephen’s. It is
not
your lot in life to give up your own dreams and chances of happiness for us. We are all almost grown up. Kate will have all sorts of chances with my sponsorship. And Stephen will be helped to maturity by Viscount Lyngate and Mr. Samson and the tutors who are being hired for him before he goes up to Oxford. It is time you looked ahead to your life on your own account.”

Margaret looked stricken. If
only
Crispin had gone off to join his regiment without saying anything to Meg except good-bye, Vanessa thought. She would be over her feelings for him by now.

“Oh, Meg,” she said, “it is not that we do not need you any longer. Of course we do. We always will. We need you as our eldest sister. We need your love. But we do not need your
life
. You want us to be happy. Well, we want the same for you.”

“I dreamed of you finding love again,” Margaret said, tears welling in her eyes. “But a love that could last a lifetime this time. You deserve a happily-ever-after more than anyone else I know.”

“And I am not to have it?” Vanessa asked. “Meg, he is heir to a
duke’s
title. He told me that earlier. I had
no
idea. Could anything be more dazzling? How could I
not
be happy for the rest of my life? I am going to be a
duchess
one day.”

“A
duke
?” Margaret said. “Oh, Nessie, I had no idea either. However will you cope? But of course you will. You are grown up, as you have just pointed out to me. Of course you will cope—and very well too. I wonder if Viscount Lyngate knows yet how fortunate he is to have you.”

“I suspect not,” Vanessa said, her eyes twinkling. “But he will. I intend to be happy with him, Meg.
Blissfully
happy.”

Her sister set her head to one side and regarded her steadily.

“Oh, Nessie,” she said.

And then they were both on their feet and in each other’s arms, and for some inexplicable reason they were both weeping.

She had just become betrothed, Vanessa thought. Hers were tears of happiness.

Of course they were.

She was going to be married again.

To Viscount Lyngate.

Who could never in a million years love her.

Not that she loved him either, of course, But even so...

“What did she say?” Vanessa asked.

She was seated inside Viscount Lyngate’s traveling carriage again, but this time she had him for a companion rather than her sisters. They were on their way to Finchley Park, almost twenty-four hours after their engagement. A heavy drizzle misted the windows. She was being taken to call upon his mother.

“She is eager to meet you,” he told her.

“But I asked what she
said
.” She turned her head to look at him. “She expected you to offer for Meg, did she not? And then you went home and told her you had offered for me instead. What did she say?”

“She was a little surprised,” he admitted, “but she was happy after I had informed her that you were the lady I wished to marry.”

“Did you really say that?” she asked him. “And did she believe you? I would wager she did not. And I would wager she was not happy at all.”

“Ladies,” he said, “do not wager.”

“Oh, fiddle,” she said. “She is unhappy, is she not? I would rather know now before I meet her again.”

He clucked his tongue.

“Very well, then,” he said. “She is unhappy—or uneasy, at least. You are not the eldest sister, and you have been married before.”

“And I am no beauty,” she said.

“What am I to say to that?” he asked, clearly exasperated. “You are not ugly. You are not an antidote.”

Loverlike words indeed!

“I will make her like me,” she said. “I promise I will. She will like me when she sees that I can make you comfortable.”

“Ah,” he said. “It is only
comfortable
today, is it? Yesterday you knew how to
please
me and how to make me
happy
.”

He was looking at her sidelong. His eyelids were drooped over his eyes again in that disconcertingly slumberous expression she remembered from the assembly.

“And comfortable too,” she said firmly.

“Well, then,” he said, “I am to be a fortunate man.”

“You are,” she agreed—and laughed.

“And I would like to have been a spider crawling across the carpet in your drawing room after I left yesterday,” he said. “Especially after you and your elder sister were alone together, as I suppose you were eventually.”

“She was not upset, if that is what you mean,” she said. “At least, not upset that you had offered for me rather than her.”

“I am crushed,” he said.

“She wishes us well,” she told him.

“Now
that,
” he said, “I can believe. She is inordinately fond of you. She was not happy, though, was she, to learn that you had offered yourself as the sacrificial lamb for the family.”

“I have no intention of being any such thing,” she told him. “I am going to be your wife—your viscountess. I am going to learn to do the job well—you will see.”

“I am going to be thirty before the year is out,” he said. “My primary motive in deciding to marry this year has been to set up my nursery without further delay. There is the need for an heir.”

He was looking directly at her from beneath those drooped lids—deliberately trying to discompose her, of course.

“Oh,” she said, and knew she was blushing. Her toes curled up inside her half-boots. “But of course. That is perfectly understandable. Especially as you expect to be a duke one day.”

“Was there any question,” he asked, “of children with Dew?”

She shook her head and bit her lip.

“You told me,” he said, “that you are not a virgin and I believed you. But are you perhaps an
almost
virgin?”

She turned her head away sharply. She could not trust her voice. She watched two streams of water snake their way down the side window of the carriage.

It had happened three times in all—
it
being nuptial relations. And after two of them Hedley had wept.

“My apologies,” Viscount Lyngate said, setting his gloved hand on her sleeve. “I did not intend to upset you.”

“It is quite understandable,” she said, “that you would want to know if I am capable of bearing children. As far as I know, I am. I
hope
I am.”

“We are almost at Finchley,” he said. “You will see it around the next bend.”

He leaned across her to wipe the steam off the window with the sleeve of his greatcoat.

It was another gray stone mansion, but this one was older than Warren Hall. It was solidly square with balustrades and statues around the roof and ivy on parts of the walls. It was surrounded by lawns dotted with ancient trees, still bare of leaves. Sheep grazed some distance from the house, probably below a ha-ha. There was another house—it was too large to be called a cottage—some distance away, on the banks of a lake.

There was none of the new splendor of Warren Hall here, but to Vanessa it looked stately and peaceful and welcoming—though that last word reminded her of what she was facing inside its walls within the next few minutes. She sat back in her seat.

“It looks better in the sunshine,” he said.

“It looks lovely now,” she told him.

She drew a deep breath when the carriage drew to a halt outside the double front doors of the house and let it out on a sigh that was unfortunately audible.

“I suppose,” she said after he had descended the steps and turned to offer her a hand, “I ought to have looked beyond the mere request that you marry me to what came next.”

“Yes,” he agreed as she stepped down, “perhaps you ought. But you did not, did you?”

“And what-ifs are pointless,” she said. “You said so yourself the day we arrived at Warren Hall.”

“Precisely,” he said. “You are stuck with me, Mrs. Dew. And I—”

He stopped abruptly.

“And you are stuck with me.”

She often found amusement in the strangest things. She laughed.

It was better for both her spirits and her pride than weeping.