To Wed an Heiress (11 page)

“There’s no need to make excuses. Never fear—I shall pack my things. I will not stay where I’m not wanted.”

She pulled her furs around herself more tightly and forged ahead through the fog. Haro felt a sickening feeling in the pit of his stomach. Should he hurry after her? No, let her walk back to the house alone. It was better for both of them to avoid further conversation and further flashes of temper that they would later rue and regret.

T
he walkers—all four of them—straggled into the house at different times. Arabella came in first with a crinkle between her brows and slipped quietly up to her room. Bayeux opened the door a little later, very red in the face as if the winter wind had chapped his cheeks. Eda entered third and stormed up the stairs in high dudgeon to begin gutting her wardrobe of its contents. Haro came through the door last, his movements slow and pensive. The solitary journey through the white fog had given him ample time to look inwards and reflect, and, truth be told, he did not like everything that he saw.

Later that afternoon, Haro discovered that the unpleasant scene he had acted out with Eda would need to be reenacted, this time with his mother in the opposing role.

“What is this Eda tells me?” asked Lady Anglesford, floating into the billiards room where Torin was performing the unusual feat of besting his elder brother.

“I don’t know, Mama,” said Haro, a bit untruthfully. “What is it?”

“That you are turning her out of doors into the cold?”

“What a lot of fustian! I simply said it would be best for her to leave Woldwick at present. I hoped that you could find her a suitable place.”

“But why?” demanded Torin, putting down his billiard stick and staring openmouthed at his brother.

Haro gave him a sideways glance. “I should think it would be obvious.”

“The only thing that’s obvious to me is the fact that your Miss Hastings can’t hold a candle to her. Is that why you’re sending Eda away?”

“Don’t talk rubbish!” Haro braced himself with the remembrance of Arabella’s most attractive qualities—although these fortifying thoughts were somewhat undermined by the memory of his cousin Eda…right before she’d put on his dressing gown.

“I’ll tell you what’s rub—”

“Hush, Torin,” said Lady Anglesford, her lip quivering. Haro feared, with good reason, that she was about to cry. “I daresay I could find her a place, but for how long? Did Arabella ask you to send her away?”

“Yes.” Haro walked over to the window and looked out to the bare birch trees surrounding the house. “And I don’t know for how long. A lifetime, I presume. Arabella cannot stand to be in the same house as her for a moment longer—and in truth, Eda has made herself so obnoxious, that I can hardly blame her.”

“Does she know that you and Eda were enga—”

“That we had an
understanding
?” Haro corrected her preemptively. “Yes, I believe she does. And, naturally, that is another reason to want Eda away from Woldwick. I recognize that it is hard on Eda to be sent away from what has always been her home, but Arabella has claims that cannot—and should not—be denied.” The young earl stared fixedly at the misty landscape, his duty as shadowy as the trees in the distance.

“Oh, my dear boy,” said Lady Anglesford, placing a hand on her heart. “This is a heavy burden that your father has laid upon you—that
I
have laid upon you. Perhaps we should reconsider this alliance, or rather, this
mésalliance
with the Hastings. Perhaps we should give up Woldwick, as Mr. Godwin suggested, and take our chances in Russell Square.”

Torin groaned at the mention of that awful place.

“And break the betrothal? It’s too late now, Mama. I’ve given my word.”

“Just as I’ve given my word to shelter and provide for Eda.”

It was Haro’s turn to groan.

“Let us take a week or two to think on it,” said Lady Anglesford, feeling a strong need to retire to her chamber and rest but resisting it until the matter could be settled. “Surely, the Hastings cannot wish us to turn Eda out at a moment’s notice.”

“I would not put it past them,” muttered Torin.

“I must have some time to write letters to ladies of my acquaintance. Eda would make a fine companion for an elderly widow. Perhaps I can secure her a place.”

Haro nodded. It was not exactly the happiest prospect for a girl who had, but two months ago, been enjoying her first London Season. But it was better than Ireland. It was better than nothing.

***

“Where have you been keeping yourself all afternoon?” Haro had finally found Arabella staring out the windows of the upstairs parlor. Her face held an expression of puzzlement—or was it worry?—that was papered over with a smile as soon as he spoke.

“I had some correspondence to write, so I took tea in my room.” She left the window, and walked over to take his hand. “I’m sorry to have deserted you, my darling.” She laid her lips on Haro’s cheek, and the kiss surprised him. It was warm, uncalculated, as if she actually desired his person and not just his pedigree. “Three weeks,” she said, her eyes alight with anticipation.

“Three weeks,” echoed Haro. His own excitement had paled a little since breakfast. Maybe it was from the row with Eda. Maybe it was from the talk with his mother.

Arabella had dressed for dinner, looking lavish in cloth of gold. She was as pretty a woman as a man could ask for, and prettier still when one knew the size of her father’s pocketbook. She knew how to adapt herself to the circles she found herself in. Given the chance, she even had the possibility of transcending her lowbred parentage.

But, even with all that, there was something lacking. Haro kissed her wrist. She attracted him, yes, but it was with a sweetness that seemed certain to cloy. There was no high mystery in her eyes that he must seek to unravel. There was no fire blazing between them that would always warm him inside and out.

Three weeks.

“Would you like me to send out a boy to take your letters to the post?”

“Letters?”

“You said you spent the afternoon writing correspondence.”

“Oh, yes…a letter, but it is not finished. I will send it into the village with my father tomorrow.”

“Very well.” Haro stood quietly beside her, both of them staring out the window and into the distance. She leaned against his shoulder, touching the drapes carelessly with her opposite hand. Haro reflected that by this time next year those drapes, this window, and maybe even this view would be changed for something different—something the fashionable new Lady Anglesford would find more appealing.

“Has that fellow Bayeux completed any plans yet?”

“No.” Her head lifted abruptly from his shoulder, her neck tensing like a terrier backed into a corner. “Why?”

“I just wondered…since you two seemed to be discussing the finishing touches on our walk home this morning.” Was that what they
really
had been discussing? Had their conversation continued in the same vein when he had hung back to assist Eda with her broken lace—or twisted ankle—or whatever the deuce had been wrong with her?

“Oh, yes, we were, weren’t we?” Arabella’s brow furrowed. “I believe he will need to return to London tomorrow for a meeting with another client. Perhaps he can finish up the plans and send them by courier from there.”

It seemed that his departure was to be as sudden as his arrival. Curious, Haro decided to probe a little deeper. “Perhaps he can give them to us in person when we return to London for the wedding.”

“No.” It was a firm and definite refusal. “There is no need for us to see him again.”

“As you wish,” said Haro, just as the gong for dinner sounded. He gave her his arm, and they went down the staircase together, the earl more curious than ever just what had transpired between Arabella and the architect during their tête-à-tête in the forest.

***

Uncle Harold decided to join them for dinner that night, making the acquaintance of William Hastings for the first time.

“How do you do?” said Mr. Hastings, pumping the old man’s hand vigorously just before they entered the dining room.

The family and guests took their seats around the table. Uncle Harold insisted upon seating Lady Anglesford while Torin sulkily pulled out a chair for Eda. Monsieur Bayeux’s eyes were unnaturally bright, his head bobbing a little, and Haro suspected he had been plying the bottle all afternoon.

“I daresay you’ll have heard the name Hastings before,” said the mill owner proudly, leaning back in his chair with his thumbs in his waistcoat pockets.

“What was your father’s name?” asked Uncle Harold. He was trying to place the portly guest and failing miserably.

“Robert Hastings. He was in cotton too. The ‘cotton king,’ some called him. Which, I guess, makes me the ‘cotton emperor’!” Mr. Hastings fell to laughing at his own joke.

“Dear me—an emperor! I knew several of those back in my day…although they went by other names like
tsar
. Have I told you that your daughter puts me in mind of the Countess of St. Petersburg?”

Haro rolled his eyes while Arabella sniffed.

“Does she?” Mr. Hastings’ face suffused with pleasure. “I’m not surprised. A good girl, she is. Looks every inch a countess. She’ll be one in name, too, in three weeks, don’t you know?”

Uncle Harold did know, but he had already fallen into a reverie about his long lost sweetheart. “Maria was her name. She would have run away with me, too, but her sister got wind of it and told the count. Jealous of Maria’s good fortune, I heard some say later. The ship had almost set sail when her husband arrived.”

William Hastings frowned, clearly disgusted with aristocratic views on morality and propriety.

“Goodness!” Eda broke in. This was a story she had never heard before. “And then what happened? Did you fight him?”

“How could I avoid it? It was pistols at twenty paces, on the docks, without even time to arrange a second.”

“And you
won
?” demanded Torin, his moodiness having disappeared in the thrill of adventure.

“We fired almost simultaneously. He missed. I didn’t.”

“Did you kill him?” Torin was on the edge of his seat.

“Regrettably, no. Through the shoulder, but not the heart. He bled all over his white shirt and yellow waistcoat, and Maria was so affected by the sight, that she could not go on. I fetched a doctor, and she decided to return with her husband. We said our farewells, and the ship weighed anchor.”

“And you never saw her again?” Eda’s blue eyes were wide, her spoon poised above her bowl of soup.

“Never. But I heard word of her—things I did not wish to hear. It was not two months later that she was killed.”

“Oh my!” Lady Anglesford raised her napkin to her face.

“Killed? By whom, sir?” asked Mr. Hastings.

Uncle Harold cocked his head. “I don’t remember what the verdict was. Perhaps her husband? Or her sister?”

“You don’t remember? Upon my word, that is an important detail to be forgetting!”

Uncle Harold’s shoulders stooped a little over his plate. “I’ve forgotten my manners to have even mentioned it at dinner. There, there, dear Edith,”—he patted Lady Anglesford’s hand—“we will talk of happier things.”

Dinner progressed quickly, and the ladies prepared to retire and leave the gentlemen to their port. Lady Anglesford exited first with Arabella close behind and Mrs. Rollo slipping out like a shadow that did not belong. Haro caught Eda’s eye just before she stepped out the door. “Your ankle looks much improved.”

“Yes, it’s fortunate—since I’ll soon be hobbling through Bath carrying some old dowager’s smelling salts and reticule.”

“Oh?” Haro was a little taken aback. “Did Mama find you a place so soon?”

“Of course not, you gudgeon. But I know how it will be when she does.”

“Eda.”

“Yes?”

He cleared his throat, trying to put into words exactly what he wanted to say. “Try not to judge me too harshly.”

Hellfire! That was
not
what he had meant to say at all.

She looked at him curiously. “I don’t, Haro. I never have.” And without another word, she was gone.

F
ive gentlemen were left with glasses and the decanter, but that number swiftly dwindled to three when Uncle Harold wandered out a side door into the cold darkness and Torin decided to take to his heels before Oxford could be mentioned once again.

“Your uncle, he’s not…dangerous, is he?” asked the mill owner. He undid a couple buttons on his waistcoat to ease his digestion.

“Dangerous?” Haro echoed. “How do you mean?”

Mr. Hastings snorted. “You know these old fellows with bats in the belfry—could snap at any moment and become violent. You heard him say that he almost killed that fellow in St. Petersburg, and
he
the one running off with another man’s wife!”

Haro gave a dismissive wave. “Don’t put too much stock in Uncle Harold’s tales.”

“So, it’s not true? I’m glad of that. I was almost afraid the old dotard had killed that countess himself, the way he clammed up and said he could not remember who did it.”

Haro bridled a little. “What are you insinuating?”

“There, there. No offense meant, Lord Anglesford. I suppose I can stand a few skeletons in the closet as long as the closet has a coat-of-arms painted on it, eh?” He tossed down his glass of port—much more quickly than that fine old vintage deserved—and announced that he had bookkeeping to look over. “The life of a businessman, eh? Never done, never done.”

Haro bid him a cordial goodnight and found himself alone with Bayeux. “So, you’re going up to London tomorrow?” he inquired politely.

“Is that what
she
told you?”

Yes, Haro decided, Bayeux had been drinking all afternoon. And now he was drinking again, already downing his third glass of spirits since dinner.

“Yes, she said you had another client to visit.”

“Well, it’s not so!” Bayeux’s speech was a little slurred. “I’m staying here until matters are sorted to my liking.” The corner of some paper—a letter?—had begun to peep out of his waistcoat pocket, and he tucked it back in violently.

As master of the house and fiancé to the lady in question, it behooved Haro to inquire further. “What matters are those?”

But the architect had ceased listening to him. His head was lolling back onto the side of the chair.

Haro pursed his lips and decided to ring the bell for the footman.

“Henry, will you see Monsieur Bayeux upstairs? He’s had a bit too much of the bottle, I believe.”

“Right, m’lord,” said Henry, a young dark-haired fellow who looked quite dapper in the Anglesford livery.

Bayeux came to his senses a little bit, as Henry hoisted him upright and put an arm around his waist for support.

“Hold tight, Bayeux,” said Haro, pronouncing his words clearly so even a muddled head could understand. “Henry will help you upstairs and get you to bed.”

“
Merci
.” Bayeux’s eyes cleared for a moment. “You are
un bon homme
, Anglesford. If circumstances were different, I could even like you, I think.”

“Very kind of you.” Haro grinned wryly. “And don’t forget your letter.” He bent down to retrieve the folded paper that had fallen out of Bayeux’s waistcoat.

“Mustn’t forget that, must we?” Bayeux jammed it into a clenched fist, and Haro caught sight of a flowery script filling half a page. “Lead on,
Henri
!” And with that, the inebriated Frenchman was bundled off to bed to sleep off his spirits.

***

Haro was alone, his only occupation to sit beside the fire and wait for the ladies to return. For the sake of tradition, it ought to have been the gentlemen carousing loudly while the women talked in animated voices about embroidery, children, and the domestic arts. But it seemed that neither group was inclined to conviviality tonight.

Haro was just beginning to enjoy the silence when it was broken by a high-pitched scream. In one swift motion, he dropped his glass on the table and bounded up from his chair.

Torin popped his head into the room. “What the deuce is all that noise?”

“I don’t know, but I’m going to find out.”

The two brothers crossed the hall together and shoved open the door of the drawing room. The diminutive Lady Anglesford was perched on the edge of her seat in shocked silence. Mrs. Rollo’s grim mouth had fallen open in a way that made her plain face even more grotesque than usual. And standing in the center of the room, like two dueling gladiators, were Eda and Arabella.

No blood had been drawn, but the taller, more slender woman had a bright red mark across her left cheek. By all appearances, she had just been slapped, and quite vigorously, by the sturdy, black-haired daughter of the Irish captain.

“What is happening here?” demanded Haro. He suspected that he already knew the answer to that question.

“What is happening?” repeated Arabella, her voice pitched unnaturally high. “Your cousin has just given me the greatest insult possible by striking me in the face!”

“Eda?” Haro’s tone was as hard as ebony.

“The provocation justified the offense.”

“What provocation?”

Eda’s face was as white and gray as Jenny’s coat. She declined to answer, and Arabella was not forthcoming with what had precipitated the violence. Haro cast a glance at his mother, but she only shrugged mutely. Perhaps she had not heard the argument that preceded the slap. Haro refrained from questioning Mrs. Rollo, assuming that she would have little to offer no matter what he asked.

Torin looked uneasily from one woman to the other. “Perhaps if you would both apologize—”

“I will
not
!” said Arabella before he could get any further. “Nor will I accept any apology from Miss Swanycke other than her immediate departure from this house.”

“I say, that’s rather harsh.” Torin swallowed, glad that Haro—and not he—had the unenviable responsibility of sorting out this situation.

“It is not only harsh, it is unreasonable,” said Haro.

Arabella’s eyes glittered dangerously as she heard her fiancé siding with his cousin. The color began to come back into Eda’s face, and she looked at Haro with new interest.

“Whatever trouble has arisen between you two ladies, I would be much obliged if you would—for my sake—forget it as best you can and shake hands as friends.”

Slowly, Eda stretched out her right arm. Haro could see her using all of her willpower to keep her fingers from clenching tightly into a fist.

But Arabella would not reciprocate. Leaving Eda’s hand hanging in midair, she slipped past Haro and Torin and paused with her fingers on the drawing room door. “I thought you would show better sense than this, Haro. I’m sure you will not like what my father has to say to you once he hears about this.”

Haro inclined his head a little sadly. “I’m sure I shall not, but if you knew me at all, Arabella, you would know that I cannot do otherwise than I have done. Good night, my dear.”

That last phrase was said sweetly, a white flag Haro had run up in the thick of the melee. Arabella, however, ignored it as surely as she had Eda’s hand and disappeared into the corridor without another word to be said.

***

“Who does she think she is?” exclaimed Torin, staring scornfully after Arabella. “The Prince Regent’s daughter?”

“Enough!” Haro quelled him with a word.

The whole family felt the need to frankly discuss this turn of affairs, but the alien presence of Mrs. Rollo constricted their ability to converse. “Perhaps you should see to Miss Hastings,” said Lady Anglesford, giving the dour-faced companion a gentle hint that her presence was no longer wanted. Mrs. Rollo complied with a grunt, and the room lightened like a spring landscape with a break in the rainclouds.

“I am sorry, Haro,” said Eda. “Truly, I am.” Her penitence was unfeigned. She was still angry enough to drag Arabella to the floor by the hair, but the full impact of what that slap had done to Haro had hit her across the face as soon as he entered. She had wanted, over the last few days, to cause a rift between Haro and Arabella, but now that she had done so, she feared the pain that it would cause him. She stared at him anxiously. Would he hate her for this?

“You are forgiven,” said Haro easily. He grinned. “At least a slap doesn’t leave any scars.”

His own sideburns hid the evidence of the scratch marks she had given him years ago when he had teased her mercilessly in the nursery.

“No.” Eda smiled wanly. “I think the scars from this encounter might be meted out elsewhere.”

“William Hastings is going to ring you a fine peal!” Torin whistled. “Good Lord, perhaps I
should
slip away to Oxford and take Eda with me.”

“Eda’s not going anywhere.” Haro’s feet were planted firmly on the ground, his hands clasped behind his back.

“I’m not?” Eda looked up at him with surprise. Her usual shell of cynicism cracked a little, letting her vulnerability show in her dark blue eyes.

“Certainly not. Woldwick is your home, the same as it is mine.”

“But, Arabel—”

“Is for
me
to worry about, not you.”

“But—”

“Just sit down and do some embroidery, or whatever it is you do.”

“Very well.” Eda walked over to the window seat and retrieved her sketchbook. She pulled out the torn pieces of a sketch she had started—and destroyed—back when they were in London. Piecing them together, she smiled to see Haro’s face staring back at her. Then, she pulled out her pencils and set to work on a new sketch. It was the earl again but this time with a firmness in his jaw and a command in his eye that she had never noticed before. It was true what she had said—a woman did like a man with some backbone beneath his coat from Weston’s.

“Good night, Mama,” said Haro, bestowing a kiss on Lady Anglesford’s cheek. “Good night, Torin.” He gave his brother a nod. Then, he strode out of the drawing room with all the solemnity of ascending the Mount of Olives.

“What does he mean to do?” asked Torin, a little awestruck.

“That I can’t tell you,” said Lady Anglesford, “but I’m certain that, whatever it is, we shall all be immensely proud of him.”