The Ideal Wife (13 page)

Hell and damnation, he thought as he handed his hat and cane to his butler and took the stairs two at a time. Hadn’t he married Abigail deliberately so that he would not have to worry about tiptoeing about her feelings? So that he would not feel that he had lost control of his own life?

Of course, he thought, he had woken in the night to find her curled up against him in her usual kittenlike position.

“Abby,” he said after tapping on the door of her sitting room and letting himself in. “I have come home to have tea with you. I’m glad you are not out.
Abby!
”

She set her book aside and rose to her feet, her cheeks flaming.

“Oh, Lord,” he said with a groan. “What have you done?”

“I have had it cut,” she said in that curt little voice she had used the night before and at the breakfast table, “because I wanted to.”

He crossed the room and took her hands in his. They were quite cold.

“To punish me for Jenny?” he said. “Is that why?”

“What nonsense,” she said.

He held her hands and looked closely at the cropped curls and the flushed, wide-eyed face beneath.

“It was to punish me for Jenny,” he said, smiling at her slowly. “Because I have given you only one command since our wedding and you had no choice over which one to disobey. Abby! You look like a pixie. And you have failed miserably, dear. It looks, very, very pretty.”

And she looked startlingly pretty too.

“What a bouncer,” she said, pulling her hands from his. “You need not feel obligated to pay me compliments, Miles. I am glad you came home. I wished to talk with you.”

“That sounds serious,” he said. “Will you ring for tea? Connie and Pru will come tonight, by the way, though Pru is very apprehensive about being seen puffed out with her triplets. Mother had another engagement. Have you heard from the Chartleighs and the Beauchamps? Are they coming?”

“Yes,” she said, crossing the room to pull the bell rope.

The earl watched her with some appreciation. She looked altogether daintier and prettier with the new haircut. He felt an unexpected stab of desire for her.

“Come and sit down,” he said, gesturing to a settee, “and tell me what is so important.”

She seated herself straight-backed on a chair and folded her hands in her lap. The earl sat down alone on the settee.

“It is about money,” she said abruptly, and flushed again.

“I have been meaning to talk to you about it myself,” he said. “I am sorry you have had the embarrassment of having to broach the matter to me, Abby. I cannot expect you to have to refer all bills to me, no matter how small and petty, can I? I shall settle a quarterly allowance on you so that you may feel more independent. All your larger bills, of course, you may have sent directly to me. I want you to have pretty clothes and bonnets and such. You must not feel constrained.”

“How much?” she asked.

“How much quarterly?” he said, his eyebrows raised. “I do not have experience with such matters. How does a thousand pounds a quarter sound?”

She thought for a moment. “Fifteen hundred would sound better,” she said. “And could you pay it yearly, in advance?”

He looked at her closely. Her clasped hands, which looked relaxed enough, were white-knuckled.

“You want me to give you six thousand pounds now?” he said.

“And then you would not have to worry about me for a whole year,” she said. “You can afford that much, can’t you?”

“Abby,” he said, “do you have a special need of the moment that I can help you with? A debt?”

“No,” she said, and licked her lips. “Yes. Something to do with the girls. Something I wish to . . . to buy for them before they come from Bath. They have never had a great deal, and in the past two years life has been dreary for them. I want them to have a happy life from now on. I want to take care of them. I . . .”

“What is it that you wish to buy them?” he asked. “Can it be a gift from both of us? I am their new brother-in-law, after all. You do not need to spend all of your own money.”

“No,” she said. “It is nothing. Nothing that they . . .

Nothing that you . . . Ah, here is the tea. I hope there are some scones again. I am starved. Did I tell you that I was going to teach Victor to read, Miles? The little servant boy, that is. I spent a whole hour with him this morning, only to discover that I do not know at all how to teach someone to read. It is not easy. I shall have to ask Laura how it is done. I think Victor must have thought that I was a little crazy. And perhaps he is right. I have been meaning to ask you—may we take him into the country with us when we go? He is rather pale and puny. I am sure the country air and a little more of the outdoors would help him greatly. He can even—”

“Abby,” he said. “Yes. I think it a very good idea. And it is typical of you to have thought of it. But we will need a whole cavalcade of carriages to take everyone when it comes time for us to leave. How have you spent your day apart from having your hair shorn? Tell me about it.”

She launched into a tale of having her hair cut and wandering up and down Oxford Street afterward and running into an old acquaintance of hers—companion to a friend of Mrs. Gill’s—and making arrangements to go walking to St. James’s Park with her in the afternoon. With the companion, that was, not with the friend of Mrs. Gill. There followed an account of that stroll and every strange and eccentric character they had passed on the paths.

What was it? the earl wondered, listening to her rapid speech, watching her pretty, mobile face, and sipping on his tea. What was it that had set her at a distance from him? Was it just Jenny? Was he going to have to have patience and give her time to realize that Jenny was no longer a part of his life? Or was there something else?

Why did she have a sudden need of six thousand pounds? It was an enormous sum for a woman who a few days before had been a former lady’s companion facing destitution. What sort of a gift for her half-sisters did she have in mind? And why could she not share the idea with him?

“Oh, Miles,” she said suddenly, looking up from pouring him a second cup of tea. “I don’t suppose there is a vacant steward’s position or bailiff’s position on one of your estates, is there? Or I don’t suppose you have felt the need of a secretary?”

“No to all three,” he said, looking into large and anxious gray eyes as she crossed the room with his cup and saucer. “Did you meet a beggar in St. James’s Park, Abby? Or a destitute duke on Oxford Street? Or was it the person who cut your hair?”

“You are laughing at me,” she said.

“Forgive me.” He smiled at her. “I was teasing you. Who needs a job?”

“Boris,” she said. She sat down on the edge of her chair again and leaned toward him. “Did you notice how thin he is, Miles? He used not to be so thin. We paid off as many of Papa’s debts as we could after we had sold the house and all the furnishings. But there are still some, and Boris swears he is going to pay them all. I thought it would be easier for him if he had regular employment.”

“Abby,” the earl said gently, “from my brief meeting with him last evening, I had the impression that your brother is a proud young man.”

“But if the idea came from you,” she said. “If you could plead with him to help you out of a nasty situation. If it seemed that I had not spoken to you at all about him. If it could seem that he was doing you a favor instead of the other way around.” She sat back suddenly and lifted her cup so jerkily to her lips that she spilled some tea into the saucer. “I am asking too much, am I not? I am too demanding. I have not been married to you for a week yet. I am sorry.”

“It is not that.” He set his cup and saucer down on a side table and got to his feet. “I just think your brother would not accept charity, Abby. And he would see through any of those schemes you suggest in a moment. I don’t imagine he is defective in understanding, is he?”

“No,” she said. “It was rather stupid of me, was it not?”

He took the saucer from her hand and set it on the tray. He held out a hand for one of hers and drew her to her feet.

“Concerned and loving of you,” he said. “Why did your father have so many debts?”

She stared at him. “He was sick,” she said. “For several years. There were medicines and other things.”

“It’s none of my business,” he said, seeing her discomposure. “Leave the matter of your brother with me, will you, Abby? I shall see if there is some way I can help him without his knowing it. It will have to be a devious scheme, I’m afraid. He will not accept your six thousand, by the way.”

She swallowed awkwardly. “I know,” she said.

He smiled at her. “It really is very pretty, you know,” he said, “your hair.”

“Oh, don’t mention it,” she said, “or I shall start to bawl.”

He laughed. “Abby,” he said, “did you give yourself even a moment to consider?”

“I planned it,” she said, “for all of three hours. It was not an impulsive thing at all.”

He laughed again and drew her into his arms. “I like it,” he said. “Promise me that you will not braid it tonight.”

She giggled a little nervously.

He lowered his head and kissed her, opening his mouth over hers and rubbing the tip of his tongue across the seam of her lips until she drew back her head and looked up at him a little uncertainly.

He kissed her again more briefly and firmly, and reluctantly let her go. He did not want to ruin a very precarious peace between them by committing the
faux pas
of trying to make love to her during the day.

Although at that particular moment he would have liked nothing better.

12

Y
OU AREN’T FOXED, ARE YOU, GER?” The Earl of Severn stepped past his friend’s manservant into his somewhat untidy parlor. “This early in the day?”

“Foxed?” Sir Gerald Stapleton said indignantly and nasally. “I have the devil of a cold and have been sprawled here all day feeling sorry for myself. Have a seat.”

“Thank you,” the earl said, seating himself as his friend blew his nose loudly. “I thought perhaps you had taken yourself out of the country. Haven’t seen you for almost three days.”

“That is hardly surprising,” Sir Gerald said, “when you have been tied to your wife’s apron strings all that time.”

“Jealousy, jealousy,” Lord Severn said. “You should set your face over a bowl of steaming water, Ger, and throw a towel over your head.”

“I’ve tried it,” the other said. “It doesn’t work. It did once when I had a chill and went to Priss. But this time it doesn’t.”

The earl grinned. “Still missing her?” he said. “Is that why you are like a bear at a stake?”

“Talking about getting foxed,” Sir Gerald said, “there are no drinks in here. I’ll ring.” He lurched to his feet.

“Not on my account,” the earl said, raising a hand. “I can’t stay, Ger. I am just a messenger boy this afternoon. Abby wants you to join us in a picnic to Richmond. Miss Seymour will be there too, of course. You had better come. Perhaps she will take your mind off Prissy.” He grinned.

“Absolutely and definitely no,” the other said irritably. “You might as well have married Frances Meighan, Miles. This wife has you just as firmly in tow. And Frances would have been prettier to look at.” He frowned at the fraying tassel that he had just pulled.

“Careful,” the earl said.

“And this one is like to be many times more expensive,”Sir Gerald said. “You need to take her in hand from the start, Miles, before you find that it is too . . . Oof!” His shoulder glanced off the mantel and he went crashing and sprawling across the hearth and among the fire irons. He pushed himself up into a sitting position and felt the left side of his jaw gingerly. “What the devil was that for?”

The Earl of Severn stood over him, fists clenched at his sides. “You know very well what it was for,” he said through his teeth. “You were speaking of my wife, Gerald.”

“So she is going to destroy our friendship too, is she?” Sir Gerald said, flexing his jaw and wincing. “I hope you haven’t broken it, Miles. How am I supposed to explain the bruise?”

The earl reached down a hand to help him to his feet. “If it is the new clothes and the diamonds and the pearls that have you fearing for my financial ruin,” he said, “they were all my idea, Ger. And the clothes and the jewels I buy my wife are none of your damned business. And neither is her beauty or the amount of time I choose to spend with her. If our friendship is ruined, it will be nothing to do with Abby—or with me either.”

“You should not come here quarreling with me when I have a head the size of a hot-air balloon,” Sir Gerald said, sinking into his chair again and prodding at his jaw with his fingertips. When the door opened, he directed his manservant to bring the brandy decanter and glasses. “I didn’t mean to insult Lady Severn, Miles. I’m sorry. But you yourself said you had chosen her because she was plain and would not intrude into your life. Devil take it, but I feel wretched.”

“A word of advice,” Lord Severn said. “Don’t drink any brandy, Ger. Your head will explode into the blue yonder just like a burst balloon. What did you mean when you said that Abby would be expensive?”

“Nothing,” his friend said. “Forget it.”

“What did you mean?”

“Look, Miles,” Sir Gerald said, first sniffing and then blowing his nose again, “I felt deuced miserable enough before you decided to practice one of Jackson’s best punches on my jaw. Go home to your wife, will you, and leave me alone to die? God, I wish Priss were still in town.”

“I’m leaving.” The earl got to his feet. “But tell me first what you meant.”

“Did you know she was at Mrs. Harper’s yesterday?”Sir Gerald asked.

“At Mrs. Harper’s?” The earl frowned.

“Fox saw her there,” Sir Gerald said. “Sudden wealth must have gone to her head, Miles. She will gamble your fortune away if you don’t be careful. You will be fortunate if she doesn’t start asking you for large sums of money any day. But, sorry.” He held up a hand. “You don’t need any comment from me, do you? Perhaps it was Lady Severn’s double. Or perhaps it was a social call. Maybe Mrs. Harper is her maiden aunt or something—though she would not be a
maiden
aunt, would she? Who knows? It’s none of my business. But Fox was sniggering over it. And you must know that Lady Severn’s reputation does not stand on very firm ground as it is.”

“There will be a good explanation,” Lord Severn said quietly. “Abby’s brother has been doing some gambling, I gather. Abby is probably trying to save him from the sharks. I’m on my way. Try that steaming bowl again, Ger. And leave the brandy alone. You won’t come to Richmond, then?”

“Oh, yes, I’ll come,” Sir Gerald said irritably. “You are my friend, Miles, and I had better start liking your wife, hadn’t I? I think you are growing fond of her.”

“Abby will be happy,” the earl said with a grin. “Though if she could just see beyond the end of her nose, she would have noticed a few evenings ago that her brother and Miss Seymour were exchanging more than a few appreciative glances. You may have competition for the fair little redhead, Ger.”

Sir Gerald Stapleton blew his nose loudly as his friend laughed and let himself out of the room.

His smile faded as he ran down the stairs and walked out onto the street. Abby at Mrs. Harper’s? And not a mention to him of having been there, though she had given him an exhaustive account during dinner the evening before and during their drive to the opera of all she had done during the day.

And Abby had asked him for six thousand pounds, a year’s allowance in advance.

For her brother? Had his guess been right? Or was she too gambling to try to pay off the family debts? It would be quite like her to try it and lose six thousand pounds at a sitting. Though of course, if she had asked him for the money three days before and called on Mrs. Harper yesterday, then she might have made more than one visit to the tables.

Her father must have been a gambler too. He had guessed that several days before. Was it a family weakness?

He knew so little about his wife, he thought in some frustration. In some ways it was almost impossible to believe that they had been married for only a week. In other ways it seemed that they were still total strangers, though they had been together and on intimate terms physically for a week.

And of course a week had been quite a long-enough time in which to fall in love.

A
BIGAIL HAD
had a quite happy day. She had spent part of the morning planning her picnic in Richmond and part with her husband on Bond Street, choosing a sapphire-and-diamond ring as a gift for their first anniversary.

“One week,” he had explained to her when she had looked at him in incomprehension. “We have been married for a week, Abby. Had you forgotten?”

And he had insisted on buying her the ring though she had assured him that it was a quite pointless extravagance and had reminded him that he had already given her a diamond necklace and her pearls.

“But I cannot let our first anniversary go by unheralded,”he had said with a smile.

Even after a week his smile was still turning her weak at the knees. And she still wished that he had brown or hazel eyes.

It had ended up with her buying him a matching sapphire-and-diamond pin.

“A combined wedding and anniversary gift,” she had told him.

And so a considerable dent had been made in her remaining thousand pounds, all that she had to last her for a year—or fifty-one weeks, to be exact.

She had begun the afternoon calling upon Lady Beauchamp and strolling with her in the park, having sent her husband on his way to invite Sir Gerald Stapleton to the picnic. If she threw them together often enough, perhaps he and Laura would be betrothed even before the summer came. They were very obviously perfect for each other.

In the park, they had met Lord and Lady Chartleigh and their young son, who was racing along ahead of them when he was not falling flat on the grass. The four adults strolled together for a while.

The Chartleighs must have been very young when they married, Abigail guessed. The earl in particular looked far too young to be a father. And yet despite his extreme quietness and his wife’s vivacity, there was clearly a strong bond of affection between them.

Perhaps there was hope for her, she thought. And yet the Countess of Chartleigh was very pretty. And perhaps the earl had not expected her to be quiet and to disappear into the background of his life. Perhaps he had loved her and her vivacity when he married her.

But she would not think of her problems, she had decided. Soon Rachel would be on her way to the Continent, and soon Boris would be out of his difficulties. Miles had promised to help him, and she had had an idea of how it might be done so that Boris would never know that he had been helped. By the time spring turned to summer, she would be at Severn Park with her sisters and perhaps she would be with child too. Certainly Miles must be very eager for it to happen without delay. In the week of their marriage he had coupled with her twice each night except for that one night when she had been upset at learning the brutal truth of their marriage.

She had accepted that truth. And really it was not so very dreadful. He had married her and saved her from a nasty situation, and he had not been unkind since except when he had reprimanded her over their dinner party. If she was to be taken to Severn Park and left there when he returned to town, well, then, so be it. She would think of that when the time came.

“I have been married for longer than a year,” Lady Beauchamp was telling her, “and I wept at the end of each month for eleven months before the miracle happened. I am afraid I have been a sore trial to Roger, Lady Severn. He has been foolishly assuring me that it will not wreck his life to remain childless and that of course he does not regret marrying me. And I can’t tell you how envious I have been of Georgie and Ralph, who had to wait no time at all after their marriage. But it has been worth the wait. The sun seems a little brighter each day now that I know I have new life inside me.” She squeezed Abigail’s arm. “You will know what I mean soon enough.”

“I hope so,” Abigail said.

“I am afraid you will find me a dreadful bore this spring,” her friend said contritely. “I can think of nothing but babies, Lady Severn. Roger laughs at the fact that in private I talk of nothing else, whereas in public I become very flustered if it is so much as mentioned.”

“I believe I would feel compelled to stand up and make the announcement myself at the very next social function I attended after finding out,” Abigail said, “whether it was a ball or the theater.”

Lady Beauchamp looked startled, and laughed. “You sound just like Georgie,” she said. “I do hope I have a son this first time, though Roger laughs at me when I say that, and becomes quite outrageous.” She laughed again. “He says he will tolerate daughters for the first six times, provided I get serious the seventh time and present him with his heir. I used to dislike Roger quite intensely, you know, when we were first acquainted, because he used to delight in outraging me. He still does.”

Abigail was feeling quite cheerful by the time she arrived home. The day had been pleasant, and there was another ball to attend that evening—her second.

But there was a note awaiting her. Her heart sank as she took it from the butler’s hand and made her way straight toward her sitting room. Everything had been settled the day before. What else could Rachel possibly want?

It seemed that there was a further problem. Abigail was to call at Rachel’s house the following day.

But she did not wish to go. Even though the house was in a respectable neighborhood, there was something about it that made her uneasy. And she had not gone unseen the day before. Although Rachel had taken her directly to an office, they had passed the open door of a salon, and there had been a group of gentlemen and one lady inside. One of them had called to Rachel as she passed.

There could be only one reason for Rachel’s wishing to see her again. She wanted more money. Abigail had feared it, but hoped that her stepmother was still basically decent. It seemed that perhaps she was not.

But she had very little more money to give.

And even if she had plenty, she would not give it, she decided. She would not give in to perpetual blackmail. If Rachel was not content with the five thousand pounds, well, then, they would have to see. Abigail did not believe that her stepmother had any real intention of taking her daughters into her own home.

She folded the letter hastily and slid it beneath a cushion as there was a tap on the door and her husband came inside.

“Am I in time for tea?” he asked. “Hello, Abby.”

She smiled at him and her stomach lurched in the way that was becoming quite customary with her. His dark hair was tousled from the outdoors and his hat.