The Marriage Mart (6 page)

“I shall ask after this rascal here,” Lady Gardner said toward Mary, but with an eye on John. “I cannot like leaving you unescorted in a closed vehicle together, but since it is only three blocks to Edgcombe House, I shall pretend it is acceptable.”

“My lady, she is safe as a babe with me,” John replied, but all sincerity was negated by the smile that went with the statement.

“Cad!” Lady Gardner trilled, striking him on the sleeve with her unopened fan. “Look for us at the ball. We’ll be there, though ’tis bound to be another crush, I daresay. Lord Malter does not, in my opinion, believe in moderation.”

“You will save a dance for me, won’t you, Lady Mary?” Lord Faver asked as he leaned toward her just prior to climbing down. He flushed a little at his own presumption.

“Of course. The first waltz,” Mary replied.

“Until then,” the fellow replied, and for a moment she thought he might take up her hand and kiss the back of it, but he did not.

As the carriage pulled away, John leaned forward and did what Faver had not, taking up one of her hands into his own. True to his word, he had shown little restraint about touching her these days. If she touched his arm, he took it as a signal he was free to do the same. If she reached to remove a smudge from his cheek, he then saw nothing wrong with running a finger over her own cheek, smudge or no. If her foot bumped against his boot, he saw no reason not to play silly foot dueling games with her. Now he looked at her earnestly, for all the world unaware his fingers were massaging her hand and making it tingle.

***

“Things are going well, wouldn’t you say?” he inquired, perfectly aware his fingers stroked the palm of her hand.

“Yes, I would.”

“This Faver, he’s a puppy, of course, but you could whip him into shape, I’ve no doubt. His aunt is not convinced, I think--for I would hazard a guess that you are in her mind possibly a ‘conniving older female’--but she has a soft spot for the boy. He’s her heir, you see. I think she could be brought around, for his sake, to any plans we would care to make for him.”

“After all this time with the older gentlemen, I must confess he does seem a bit of an infant,” she said, one corner of her mouth lifting. “But he is all that is kind and good, it must be said.”

“How did your evening with Hargood go? Did Mrs. Pennett care for him?” he inquired.

“Mrs. Pennett? Do you and she discuss me behind my back?”

“Not a bit of it. We discuss you to your face, but that face is often so far gone into the clouds, you take no notice of us.”

“That is not true,” she sniffed, but a look in her eyes made him think she knew it sometimes was. “Yes, I am enjoying myself, but is that wrongheaded of me?”

He shook his head once, quickly, and placed his free hand upon his chest dramatically. “You ask this of one who is dedicated to enjoying himself? More the fool, you. But you did not answer my question. What of this Lt. Hargood?”

But Mary had turned introspective. “Should I know yet?”

Her sudden question surprised him. “Pardon me?”

“Should I know yet whom it is I should be drawn to? Or is that the best way to go on? Do I target one fellow over another, or wait around to see who comes up to scratch?” A note of bitterness had crept into her voice.

“A little of both, I should think. If there is one fellow you care for over another, then of course we must plan a line of attack directly upon him. But as it stands now, I think it might be best to allow yourself to go on being seen as available and popular.”

“Popular?” she rolled the word around in her mouth. “Am I? Popular?”

“Oh yes, I would say so. You see, my dear, those fellows who have not fallen immediately into parson’s trap realize real value a little better than do the callow youths. We…they are less likely to think a pretty face always makes a pretty companion. So, now that you have become a visual commodity, yes, I should have to say you are a popular one. Oh, not with the widows and the spinsters who have no notion of how to compete, but certainly with the gentlemen.”

A glow came to life in Mary’s eyes. “How extraordinary!” she cried. “Oh, John, you cannot know how many times I have thanked heaven that we two have met.”

At that he, too, smiled, but the smile faded after a short while, and he was almost happy to see they had arrived at her home.

And worst and strangest of all, he was not at all sure why he felt that way.

Mary was tired. She had been to almost every ball, rout, musicale, concert, card party, and festivity that her household had received an invitation to in the past two weeks. Tonight she was supposed to venture out to Lady Salride’s affair--it had something to do with an evening of invocations, dances, and other worldly celebrations that supposedly had to do with stopping the fall of rain--but she had finally pled exhaustion and opted to stay home.

She had just settled before the fire, curled up with house slippers on her feet, a shawl across her shoulders, and a thick tome in her hands when a visitor was announced.

“His lordship, the Marquess of Rothayne,” Pendleton heralded, stepping aside to allow the gentleman to enter after he saw his mistress’s eager nod of approval.

“My lord,” Mary said warmly, starting to rise.

“Pray do not bother,” he motioned her to retain her seat.

“I thought you were at Salride’s tonight,” she said, setting her book aside and waving him to a chair.

“No, I had planned to be, but then when you declined my company, that so put me in the mopes that I actually went home and discovered I had some correspondence awaiting my perusal,” he said, settling in the chair opposite hers. He stretched out his long legs and shifted until he was comfortable. She watched him, as always, enjoying the poetry of his motion.

“Is it this self-same correspondence that brings you here tonight?”

“Exactly so. I came to tell you I have been summoned to the home estate. It seems this blasted rain has all but destroyed our crops this year. My steward is frantic, so you see, I must go.”

“Of course you must,” she said at once. “I hope I never made you feel beholden--”

“Such talk!” he cried, holding up a hand to cut her off. “’Tis fustian. You know I only do what I want.”

“So, you
want
to go to the country?”

He laughed then. “All right, perhaps not
always
exactly what I want to do. But, yes, in a way I should like to go and see for myself. It’s good land, I warrant, and I hate to see damage done to it. Flooding. Wash-outs. Bad business, I’m afraid. And so I must go, want or no.”

“It was good of you to come and tell me,” she said sincerely.

“I did not want you to have to receive the news in a note.” His expression turned somber, and he examined the bottom-most button of his waistcoat as he went on. “I admit I am leaving my lamb among the wolves, and am not best pleased with doing so. I suppose I came to warn you to be careful while I’m gone. Don’t accept anyone’s suit too easily. We want you to find and have the best, you know.”

She smiled softly at the top of his head, pleasure unfurling in her chest and spreading to all her limbs. For whatever reasons he had, it was true he had an affection for her. And hers for him was as a light in the darkness. “I promise I shall accept no one while you are away.”

He looked up from the perusal of his button then, and cautioned, “It may be weeks.”

She smiled, to let him know she was teasing, and said primly, “Well,
weeks.
I don’t know about that, then.”

“Imp!” he cried with a mischievous grin of his own. “For that you must pay a price. I demand a brandy and an hour of your time. I shall need to carry your sweet voice and clever repartee about in my head to sustain me while I am at my country house.” He then actually shuddered.

She raised her eyebrows, a little surprised by the obvious reluctance to return home. It was so unlike him to do what he would rather not, and she could not think it was just the flooding that disturbed his peace of mind so.

“Have they no conversation in Kent, John?” she inquired even as she rose to cross the room and pour his brandy.

“Too much, my love.
That
is the problem. There is far too much conversation.”

“You are not usually one to avoid stimulating talk,” she said, returning and handing him a snifter.

“’Stimulating talk,’ that is a kind way to put it. You see, my heart, I have a deep dark secret, a miserable secret that is forever threatening to overtake me.”

She knew that now he spoke lightly, so she was not averse to asking what he meant. “Deep and dark, you say? You must tell me.”

“Sisters,” he replied heavily. “I have eight sisters.”

“Truly?” she cried. It was well known the Rothayne clan was a large one, but such was the man’s presence that she had never thought to question him on his home life.

“And, worse yet, I am ‘the baby.’ And the only son. The beloved heir. I tell you, it is a heinous title, a terrible weight.”

She laughed, “But surely they love you?”

“They love me too well. All eight of them. Father is safe and tidy in his grave, and so you see that if you include Mother, then I have been my whole life surrounded by nine females, with nary a male sibling in sight,” he groaned. He shook his head, his eyes filled with a horror that was perhaps not all pretense, and he sipped at his brandy in a brooding manner.

“You poor soul,” she murmured, unable to keep from grinning at his discomfort.

“I am that. Could I have not had a brother or two? No, I tell you, fate loves me not. She placed me in the most awkward position.”

“But surely most of your sisters are in London during the season?” she made a half-attempt to comfort him, covering her grin by raising a hand to shield her mouth.

“They’ve all gone to the country. It is time for Georgette’s lying-in, you see. It is sure to be an hysterical event. My mother hopes for a grandson, as she already has fourteen granddaughters.” He sat up abruptly. “Oh, sweet merciful heavens! I did not even consider that most of my nieces will be there as well! I shall be
surrounded
. Swamped!”

“I wonder at our relationship,” Mary said, returning to her chair and arranging the shawl more satisfactorily about her shoulders. “I am, in case you failed to note, a female. I should think that would put me quite out of favor in your eyes.”

“But you’re not my damned sister, or my mother. And I must not be the slightest bit proper with you, as I have just proven by the language I have chosen to use in your presence.
That
makes all the difference, I assure you.”

“So you think of me as, let us say, being one of the ‘fellows?’” she asked a trifle archly, frowning just a little bit.

He raised the snifter to his lips, slumping even further into the chair’s recesses. His face lost its honesty, and returned to its more normal state of amusement. “Oh, hardly that, Mary. I’ve never wondered what it would be like to lay down with Bretwyn, or any of the other ‘fellows’, but I assure you I have wondered the same about you.”

Her breath caught in her lungs, but she forcibly ignored her own body’s traitorous reaction. She fought to smoothly recover her breathing, to make the blood begin pulsing through her veins again, but not to race to her face. She cast about in her mind for something to say, having entirely lost the ability to converse under the weight of his caressing gaze. “So your family wishes you to produce an heir?” she said, and had to fight once again to keep from blushing at the inappropriately timed remark.

“They believe I am their only hope for another male. Silly, but it is what they believe.”

Her ears were ringing, and her palms were moist, and she felt the biggest fool. He was teasing, of course, just as usual, but his intimate comment had surprised her, caught her off guard. She had not had time to steel herself against him. Or perhaps it was merely a natural response of being alone, unchaperoned, with him...or any man, she told herself fiercely.

He was looking at her, and she was supposed to be saying something, and so words fell out of her mouth haphazardly. “Have you then no offspring at all?”

Surprise registered on his face now, and then he threw back his head and shouted with laughter.

After a moment, she giggled with him, for it was an infectious laugh, and she was so flustered and embarrassed and lacking in control over herself that she could only laugh along with him, losing her battle with the blush.

“Ah, Mary, you are a pet! I am glad to see I am at last bringing you about,” he said, wiping at his eyes with a handkerchief produced from his coat pocket. “But to answer your question: no, I have none who have claimed me, nor have any females raged at me about such ‘expectations’. I admit freely that I discovered early in life it is wise to make love to women who are married, for they blithely pass the product of their sins on to their husbands.”

Still unsettled and half-giddy, she asked flippantly, “Have you no gentler feelings, my lord?”

“Indeed, I do. And now I shall shock you, by telling you that if I knew of any offspring I would not hesitate to provide for them. Ah, I see I have surprised you. But, my dearest Mary, I am but a mere mortal man, and mortal men do love to see themselves recreated, whichever side of the blanket it does occur upon.” He raised the snifter to his lips, one leg crossing over the other, his posture daring her to reproach him.

She had sobered and steadied under his truthful revelations, and it was with something more like her usual clear-headedness that she said, “Yes, you
have
surprised me. But not for the worse. I will tell you, it makes me like you even a little more than before. I did not know you had such a gentler, romantic side.”

One booted foot began to swing idly as he replied in a sly voice, “Ah, but I can be very romantic. May I demonstrate upon yourself?”

She picked up her book and tossed it at him. He ducked to one side, and it bounced harmlessly away. “Lust, my lord, is not romance,” she admonished.

“Is it not?” he asked in mock innocence.

“No.”

“Fancy that. Have you told anyone of this observation? It seems to me it is the kind of thing that ought to get about.”

“I believe I would be safe in saying that had you attended church but once you might have known this for yourself.”

“Oh well, then, you can see why I avoid the place.”

He stayed for another half an hour, making her laugh so much that her brother came down to see what all the frivolity was about. John made his farewells to them both, pledging to write to Mary, and leaving his country direction that she might do the same.

“I say, Mary, what were you doing down here all alone with that rapscallion?” Randolph asked her as soon as Rothayne had been escorted out.

“Oh, piffle, Randolph. The man means me no harm whatever.”

“There’s your reputation to see to, Mary. Servants talk, you know.”

“Not about old maids,” was Mary’s acerbic reply.

“Now, Mary, that’s no way--”

“Good night, Randolph. I am going to bed.” She gave him her back and proceeded upstairs, where she put herself to bed, desiring no one’s company, not even a maid’s, and particularly not that of the sharp-eyed Mrs. Pennett.

As usual, she lay reviewing the day, and assessing her part in it. She came quickly, though perhaps not quite easily, to a momentous decision. She knew what she must do. She knew there was a price to be paid for keeping the Marquess of Rothayne as her confederate. She knew she could be amused by him; that she could let him show her his views and unstifled opinions; that she could even allow him to warm her heart and tickle her fancy; but she must never,
ever
let him near enough to turn that warmth into fire, for she was as kindling, ready to be consumed rapidly by the merest touch of the flame that he was.

She could either go on as she had, rather like a child playing with a candle--dangerous, an accident waiting to happen--or she could change things around in her mind, let him be just like the light that illuminates the stained glass windows of a cathedral. He was the source of beauty forever beyond her reach. There must be glass between the sunlight and the observer--a window, beautiful but dividing, invisibly providing a separation from him for all the days they were to call themselves friends. There could be, then, no more errant touches, no friendly kisses on the cheek, no more time spent alone together. He must remain, forever, just remote enough that she could bask in the glow of his companionship without being rendered to ashes.

As she allowed her body to slide toward slumber, she forced her thoughts through an evaluation of the several gentlemen who had shown a measure of interest in her company, but it was not of them she dreamed when slumber at last overtook her.