Playing to Win (34 page)

Mr. Henry raked the hair off his
forehead again. "You are so noble!" he exclaimed fervently. "I
suppose I ought to have waited—I
meant
to wait—but I could
not contain myself any longer! And besides, I shall attain my
majority in another week or so."

"Oh!"

His shy smile returned. "Yes, that is
what I meant to explain to you. I shall turn one-and-twenty on
Christmas Eve."

"H-how nice." It was an idiotic thing
to say, but Mr. Henry did not seem to notice. His cowlike eyes were
filled with adoration.

"I know I should have spoken with your
guardian before addressing you, to be quite correct, but I—" he
gulped. "I hardly liked to do so. I mean, there seemed no point in
it, unless—"

It occurred to her how extremely
formidable Mr. Whitlatch must appear to a sensitive lad like
Eustace Henry, and despite the extremity of the moment she almost
had to bite back a smile. "No," she agreed. "I understand
perfectly."

The farmer’s cart had passed, and Mr.
Henry’s hand fumbled for hers once again. "But now—may I speak to
him? Oh, please, Miss Feeney—Clarissa—say yes!"

She stole a nervous glance at him. The
poor boy looked so eager, so vulnerable, his eyes shining with hope
and anxiety. It was written all over his transparent face that this
moment was the pinnacle of his life. How could she turn him
down?

Clarissa steeled herself by thinking
what it would mean to spend her life alone. She remembered how
dreadful it was for a lady to live unprotected. She thought of
washing dishes for pennies, or spending her life dusting other
people’s furniture and making other people’s beds. She reminded
herself that she liked Mr. Henry, and if she married him none of
those fates would befall her. He would be a kind and faithful
husband. And she might have children.

She forced a wavering smile. "Yes," she
said. "Of course."

Chapter 23

What a damnable evening! What a stupid,
senseless, insipid, crashing
bore
of an evening!

Trevor flung himself with savage
carelessness onto his sister’s chaise longue. The springs whined in
protest, but no ominous cracking sound emerged. Scowling, he ripped
at the starched cravat that had been choking him for the past four
hours.

The door to the morning room flew open
with an inelegant bang and Augusta marched in, candle held high. "I
knew I would find you here," she said severely. "Really, Trevor!
You are quite impossible!"

"This is the only comfortable room in
the house."

"It’s the room where my guests are
least likely to appear!"

"Yes! That’s a large part of its
charm."

"Well!"
Augusta flounced over to
a chair opposite her brother and plopped into it, slamming the
candle onto a nearby table with a fine disregard for flying wax.
"Of all the ungrateful remarks I ever heard, that one bears the
palm! Why the
dickens
did you badger me into inviting all
these high-toned people to dinner? When I think of the time I
wasted, and the care I took, and the money I spent—"

"Never mind that! Give the bills to
me."

"Why, so I will! But pray do not hoax
yourself into believing that makes all right, for it doesn’t!
Trevor, there isn’t enough money in England to buy your way into
the
ton.
You can’t, you simply
can’t,
adopt the
manners of a barbarian and expect the aristocracy to welcome you
into its midst! What on earth is the matter with you?"

"Nothing! I have never been any good at
parties."

"Yes, but I never saw anything to equal
your behavior tonight! Whatever possessed you to utter that crack
about Miss Marsden’s hair? I was ready to
sink!"

Having freed himself from his cravat,
Trevor tossed it aside and crossed his arms belligerently. "I have
never understood why women torture their hair into curls!" he
announced.
"Curls,
for God’s sake! What’s so confounded
attractive about a halo of frizz?"

"I daresay the poor girl had burnt it a
trifle with the irons. Most unhandsome of you to point it out to
the entire company!"

Trevor hunched one shoulder pettishly.
"I made amends. I took her in to dinner on my arm, didn’t
I?"

Augusta clapped one hand to her
forehead and collapsed back into her chair with a moan. "Pray do
not remind me! What a disaster!"

"Why? What was wrong with that? I
thought I showed extraordinary civility."

"Yes, but only to Miss Marsden! She had
no claim to be led in to dinner by you. And by doing so, you
slighted Lady Winnifred!"

Trevor gave a shout of laughter. "Good!
She needed it."

Augusta glared at her unrepentant
brother. "Lady Winnifred’s manners are not conciliatory, but she
did me a great favor in accepting my invitation."

"Rubbish!" he said flippantly. "You did
her a great favor in issuing it. And why the devil shouldn’t her
manners be conciliatory? Her family’s ready to sell her to the
highest bidder!"

Augusta gave a little shriek of
vexation. "I declare, I could
shake
you! Isn’t that the very
type of female you specifically asked me to find? An aristocrat,
you said, who was willing to make a
mesalliance!
"

Damn. That’s exactly what he had said.
Nonplussed, Trevor rose and began prowling restlessly round the
room. "Well, find me another!" he barked.

"I will have to!" snapped Augusta. "You
did everything imaginable to cause Lady Winnifred to regret her
condescension. I daresay she will never set foot in my house
again."

Trevor raked his hands through his
hair. "Fiend seize it! What should I do? Must I go downstairs and
apologize?"

"Everyone has gone. Thank Heaven! It
would be just like you, to rush downstairs with your hair askew and
your cravat torn off!"

He halted in his pacing and favored
Augusta with a crooked grin. "They might have ascribed my shocking
manners to drink, and viewed me a little more
charitably."

Augusta’s lips twitched. "Hm! If you
think Society will embrace a drunkard more willingly than a churl,
by all means, start the rumor! But my hope is that we can pass you
off as an entertaining eccentric."

Trevor pursed his lips thoughtfully.
"Not bad!" he approved. "I might easily pass for that."

Augusta uttered a little peal of
laughter. "Trevor, that is what you
are!"

"Am I?" Unmoved, he dropped back onto
the chaise longue and gave a prodigious yawn. "Good. The
haut
ton
is full of eccentrics. Lord, what a fatiguing way to spend
an evening! Are all well-bred women so dull?"

She opened her eyes at him. "Did you
think them all dull? Hannah Chesterton is thought to be quite
witty. I thought you liked her; you laughed at several of her
remarks."

"I laughed at that Harlequin we saw at
St. Ives, but I wouldn’t want to marry him."

"My word! How difficult you are! Were
none of the ladies to your taste? Lady Winnifred is an elegant
creature. Not that that will matter now, since the only notice you
took of her was to stare her out of countenance before walking off
with Miss Marsden."

He snorted. "Faugh! Lady Winnifred is a
self-important snob. Miss Hamilton has no chin, Miss Marsden is a
frizzy-haired zero—and what was the redhead’s name
again?"

"Fairchild."

"Hah! She may have been a fair child,
but she’s grown into a hideous woman! Why did you invite
her?"

Augusta’s eyes flashed. "I invited her,
you obstinate booberkin, because she is connected to nearly every
important family in England! I thought you wanted to advance
yourself. For Heaven’s sake, make up your mind! Are you seeking a
bride, or aren’t you?"

The bluntness of her question was like
a dash of cold water. A sudden vision of himself drearily attending
dinner party after dinner party, in monotonous succession, and
winding up at the altar with some faceless, simpering nonentity
rose up in all its nauseating horror. An involuntary shudder
wracked Trevor Whitlatch.

Augusta saw the shudder, and her
brother’s sudden expression of bleak dismay. She sat up, her jaw
dropping. "Oh!" she exclaimed. "You are no more seeking a bride
than I am! You
wretch!
If you only knew the trouble I’ve
gone to—"

He raised one hand hastily, as if to
ward her off. "Now, Gussie, don’t fly out at me! I appreciate
everything you’ve done. And I do mean to marry one day."

"One day soon?" He did not immediately
reply, and Augusta’s eyes narrowed in sudden suspicion. "Trevor, do
you have some high-flyer in keeping?"

"No, I do not!" He left the chaise
longue with violent haste, and began pacing the room again. "And a
lady shouldn’t mention such things!" he added, as an
afterthought.

"Fiddle! If that is not it, what is it?
Oh!" She jumped up, seizing her brother’s sleeve as he went by. "Is
it the
schoolteacher?"

Trevor stared down at her, rattled.
"What?"

"You told me—a month ago, or more—that
you had some creature in your keeping. A schoolteacher, she told
you she was." As Trevor appeared frozen in place, she shook his
sleeve impatiently. "Surely you remember! You tried to palm her off
onto me. Tried to wheedle me into hiring her as a nursemaid or some
such. You sounded vastly taken with her, I thought, and whenever
you are in one of your fits of admiration there’s no doing anything
with you! I have always believed that if I could only catch you
between infatuations, I might succeed in marrying you off! But I
haven’t, have I? You’re still enamored of the nursemaid
chit."

He flushed darkly, and pulled his
sleeve out of her insistent grasp. "No such thing!" he
muttered.

"Well, if she’s not your mistress, who
is? For I can’t think of any other reason why none of these women
would appeal to you!"

"Oh, for God’s sake! I’ve changed my
mind, that’s all. For the time being! There’s nothing mysterious
about it. What difference does it make, whether I make my bows this
Season or the next? I’m going to bed!"

He slammed out of the room and tore
upstairs as if the devil were chasing him. Once alone, he surveyed
his sister’s guest chamber gloomily. His own gear was stacked
neatly on a bench near the bed, but the floor was crowded with
boxes and parcels, all bearing the stamp of Bond Street shops.
Earlier today, as happened far too often lately, he had found
himself unable to concentrate on his work and had soon given up.
Instead, he had spent the day like a man possessed, compulsively
prowling through shop after shop, poring over merchandise and
buying, buying, buying. These were today’s purchases. Silk chosen
to match the blue of Clarissa’s eyes, a hat that would look well
perched on glossy black hair, a velvet pelisse to keep a girl rosy
and warm, dainty dancing slippers—had he ever seen her
dance?

He passed a hand over his eyes, shaken.
Gussie was right, of course. Marriage was unthinkable, out of the
question. Until he recovered from this mania, it would be
impossible to court the ladies of the
ton.
He was no
stranger to infatuation, but this was like nothing he had ever
experienced. Every woman he met, he unconsciously compared to
Clarissa. And they all fell short.

He remembered Clarissa as he had last
seen her, standing forlornly in the hall at Morecroft Cottage. He
could hardly bear to spend three minutes in her company anymore;
the overwhelming urge to sweep her into his arms was more than a
man could stand. So he had kept his distance, standing by the door,
yanking his gloves on while he told her curtly that he would not
return until the morrow. She had looked absolutely stricken.
Recalling it now, standing in a London bedchamber in the wee hours
of the morning, he swore, long and softly. It was all he could do
to keep from calling for his curricle and racing home to comfort
her!

In the morning, he promised himself.
Even if he could only spend a few minutes with her, at least he
would see her. Tomorrow. Vague specters of important tasks he had
neglected, orders he needed to issue, and decisions he needed to
make flitted briefly through his mind. He dismissed them
impatiently. His business could wait. The staff could carry on
without him. That’s what he paid them for! Whatever silly mistakes
they made, he could correct. Later.

He swiftly removed his clothing,
tossing it all on the floor, then pulled on a nightshirt and hurled
himself into bed, where he glared at the ceiling and thought ugly
thoughts about Eustace Henry. Trevor was convinced he had been in a
fair way to winning, until the entrance of Eustace Henry. His
carte blanche
was a generous offer; anyone could see that it
was preferable to employment as a governess! But the unworldly Mr.
Henry might be prepared to offer Clarissa the one thing Mr.
Whitlatch was not: marriage. And an offer of marriage, to a girl
like Clarissa, would outshine mere riches.

Trevor punched his pillow and cursed
under his breath. He could almost feel the crisis
coming.