“Lottie …” Diana tried to take her arm, but Charlotte brushed her off again.
“No, Di. Let me speak. I know that you both do not want to hear it, but it is the truth.” She shuddered, as if a cold wind had just whistled through the room. “The malady shall always be with me and I shall never be free of it.”
“Charlotte, you don’t know that.” George raised his voice slightly. “Look at everything you have been doing recently. Dancing, going to the opera, playing the piano … you have been living, Lottie. You have even incited admiration in the heart of a duke’s son. He seeks you out, sister, wherever we go. You resolved to be a new Charlotte, and it has been working.”
But Charlotte placed her hands over her ears, shaking her head from side to side. George and Diana simply stared at her. She could see their concerned eyes. Suddenly, she couldn’t bear it a second longer. She ran out of the room, racing up the stairwell, her heart racing. As soon as she reached her bedroom she collapsed across her bed in a fit of weeping.
It wasn’t fair! Diana and George would never understand what it was like. She knew they tried. They were on her side and already the biting pangs of guilt at the way she had treated them were eating away at her. But sometimes she felt so very lonely. As if they were members of an exclusive club that she could never gain entry to, no matter how hard she tried.
She sobbed louder, gripping the pillow. Poor Aunt Eliza. It was all too much. Too much to bear. Her eyelids slowly closed, and she drifted into an uneasy sleep, beset by nightmares.
***
She heard Dulcie’s footsteps in her room. She frowned, her eyes closed. Was she about to rouse her for dinner, or for breakfast? She felt disoriented, unable to discern how much time had passed. Had she slept the whole night through?
She opened her eyes slowly, watching the maid. Dulcie was standing with her hands on her hips, gazing down on her, a furrow puckering her brow.
“Dulcie?” she whispered, unable to lift her head from the pillow.
“My lady,” said Dulcie, curtseying slowly. “I heard your sad news. Your Aunt Eliza was a good lady. She is singing with the angels now.”
Charlotte tried to lift her head, but it felt dead, as though it were made of stone. She looked down at her hands. They were beset by violent tremors, and it was spreading throughout her whole body.
“Dulcie,” she hissed, through gritted teeth.
The maid flew to her side, stroking her head. “Now, now, my lady. I can see that you cannot sit up, and those awful shakes have got a hold of you again.” She sighed. “You should rest today. I fear your sad news has given you a setback.”
“She hid it,” Charlotte hissed, fear overtaking her. “My mother hid that there was something wrong with my aunt. I know it. Just like she has always hidden what is wrong with me.”
“Shh, my lady.” Dulcie’s voice was comforting, and sweet. “Do not worry about such things now. Go back to sleep. I will tell her ladyship that you cannot make it to breakfast.”
Charlotte nodded, staring at the maid. The hand on her forehead was cool. She closed her eyes, drifting away again.
***
Charlotte opened her eyes, seeing that the curtains were drawn. She was groggy still, but at least she could lift her head. She sighed, pushing back the blanket restlessly, swinging her legs onto the cold floor.
She stood up, wavering slightly. The tremors were still there. Shuddering through her body. Her vision was starting to blur as well. She stared around the room, appalled that the wardrobe next to her bed seemed to be fading before her eyes.
Slowly, she put a step forward, and then another. She hadn’t even made it halfway across the room before she staggered back to the bed, collapsing into it as though it was welcoming her with open arms.
She pulled the blanket high, burrowing beneath it. Tears ran down her face.
Her brief idyll was over. Her resolve to be a new Lady Charlotte Lumley had come crashing to a violent halt. The malady had returned, sweeping over her with such force that she could barely believe it.
She thought of everything she had done in the last few weeks since that awful Dr. Gibson had pronounced that she would eventually become bedridden, or even die. She had started playing the piano again. It had been like welcoming back an old friend. She had picked up her brushes and started to paint, just like in days of old. There had been many times that she had lost herself in her work, when it felt like time had stood still.
She sobbed harder. Then there were all the new places she had been and the things she had done. Balls. Dancing. That magical night at the opera.
She had met him. Lord Sebastian Wharton. She had been swept away. The way he had looked at her and sought her out. The feel of his arms around her as they danced. The way he watched her when she cried at the opera. She sighed, thinking about what he had said to her as they had been walking the Grand Walk at Vauxhall Gardens, staring at the fireworks exploding in the sky.
You drift through the world not seeking attention, but my eyes are drawn to you, as surely as day follows night.
She had never dreamt that a man like that would admire her. That a man like that would ever deign to notice her. But it had happened. She had not sought it, and she had been fearful of it, but it had happened. As surely as day follows night. Just as he had said.
She had forgotten, just for a little while, that she was a woman who had no right to expect such things from life.
The tremors worsened. She was remembering now. It had all been like a pleasant dream, but it was not her real life. Her real life was this: a sick woman who was a burden on her family. A sick woman who would surely only worsen with the passage of time. Just like the physician had said.
A sick woman who needed to be hidden away from the world.
There was a knock at the door, and Dulcie came in, staring at her.
“My lady.” Her voice was gentle. “Your good lady mother is wanting to know if you are well enough to leave your room. I said that I had left you sleeping, but that I would come along and check.”
Charlotte turned her face to the wall. “You can tell my good lady mother that I shall not be leaving my bed today. Or tomorrow. Quite probably I shall not be leaving it the day after, either.”
Dulcie gasped. “My lady …”
“No, Dulcie.” Charlotte’s voice was dull. “This is my wish.”
Dulcie sighed. “Your sister and brother are enquiring after you as well. Lady Diana wants to know if you feel up to seeing her if you do not wish to leave your room.”
Charlotte shook her head slowly. “I do not.”
Charlotte heard the maid sigh again, and then – mercifully – she left the room, closing the door softly behind her.
Dulcie meant well. She knew that. They all did. But it was all impossible. She would stay in her bed, for as long as she wanted to. The symptoms were upon her and, besides, she had nothing to get out of bed for anymore. Not now she had realised that it was simply all too hard.
Chapter 11
The carriage drew up slowly to the kerb. Sebastian stared at the smart townhouse on Grosvenor Square. An afternoon garden party – one of the many social engagements he was required to attend this week. Every single one he had been to he had searched for Lady Charlotte, and each had been a disappointment. She seemed to have disappeared from the social circuit entirely.
Percy stared at him, sitting in the seat opposite. “You should really be the first one out, old boy. Rank and all. You’re the heir, I’m the spare, isn’t that how it goes?”
Sebastian sighed. He didn’t feel like attending this garden party in the slightest. He knew that Miss Drake and her mother would be circling him like sharks. The only reason he hadn’t cancelled was in the vain hope that he might bump into Charlotte.
“That’s how it goes,” he replied, a bit sourly. “Perhaps you could impersonate me at the party, Percy. Take on the heir’s mantle, just for a little while. It’s starting to feel a bit heavy.”
; Percy grinned. “Shall I break out the violins, old boy?” He paused, staring at his brother. “You really are a bit down in the doldrums, aren’t you? Does it have something to do with a certain brunette, who shall remain nameless?”
Sebastian sighed heavily. “She does not need to remain nameless,” he said slowly. “You know as well as I do who she is. I have hardly made my preference for her a secret.”
“Indeed you have not,” said Percy, studying him carefully. “Lady Charlotte Lumley, I presume?”
Sebastian gritted his teeth. “I have been looking for her everywhere,” he muttered. “To no avail. Tell me, the earl and his family have not left their residence to return to the country, have they?”
“Not that I am aware of,” replied Percy. “I think I saw Castlereagh at a gambling house the other night, but I was the worse for wear after a few brandies, so I can’t be certain.”
“Drowning your sorrows, Percy?”
“Something like that.” Percy smiled faintly. “Trying to forget Miss Drake. It didn’t work, of course.”
Sebastian nodded, staring at his brother sympathetically. “It seems that we are both in the doldrums.”
He stared out of the carriage window. The footman was waiting for them to descend, almost hopping impatiently from foot to foot. Another carriage was behind them, the occupants waiting to alight. It was now or never and he didn’t think that his mother would ever forgive him if he suddenly told the carriage driver to pull back out into the street. Social ruin. She would hear about it on the grapevine, of course. There was almost nothing that happened within the London beau monde that she didn’t know about eventually.
He sighed again, turning to his brother. “Let’s do it, old chap. The wheat before the chaff, as they say.” He stepped down from the carriage, gazing wearily down the road.
***
He spotted his friend Lord Freddie Burrows almost immediately upon entering the house, hovering around the refreshments table. Freddie was just about to stuff his face with a large slice of cake when he saw him. Putting down the cake, he strode over to him, a wide grin on his face.
“Wharton,” he said. “I didn’t know you were coming.” He glanced around at the assembled company, milling in the gardens. “You shouldn’t have bothered. Rather a dull affair, I must say.”
Sebastian cast his eyes around the garden furtively, taking in the ladies in their light afternoon gowns, spinning their parasols as they sipped tea. His heart sank. She wasn’t here. Neither were her brother and her sister. Perhaps they had returned to their home in Devonshire.
But, of course, Miss Alicia Drake was here, alongside her mother. Today she was wearing a dusky rose gown, edged in white lace with a pointed Vandyke collar. Her golden ringlets shook slightly when she laughed. She spotted him and excused herself from her group, making a beeline towards him.
“Oh, Lord.” Sebastian grimaced, looking away. “Look out. I am about to be accosted.”
But then something very strange happened. Percy emerged, seemingly springing from behind a pot plant, and waylaid her. Sebastian waited for her to shake him off, as always, but curiously she did no such thing. Instead, her face softened imperceptibly as she stared up at him. Percy looked like he was about to burst with happiness.
Sebastian turned his head to the side, as if he were viewing a very odd portrait. “Well, I never. Percy’s day has been made, I should say.”
Freddie grinned. “Lucky him. What a beauty. Why were you worrying about being accosted by her?”
Sebastian sighed. “Just another in a long line of them, Burrows. Courtesy of the duchess, who is determined that I shall marry before the season is over.”
Freddie sobered a little. “I take it you are still tormented by the Lady Charlotte.”
Sebastian shrugged. What point was there in even talking about her with Freddie? He would only try to persuade him to forget about her. And he simply couldn’t. He had tried, and he had failed. He had resigned himself to the fact that he was compulsively drawn to her, like a moth to a flame.
Had he frightened her that evening in Vauxhall Gardens when he had told her how much he admired her? Was that the reason she didn’t seem to be anywhere around town, no matter how hard he searched for her? She had admitted that she was unaccustomed to the game of flirting, which was almost unheard of in fashionable London society. Most ladies picked up the skills within twelve months of their debut. But she hadn’t been in London society for a good few years, had she? By her own admission she stayed at her home in the country most of the time.
He had been sincere when he had told her he wasn’t flirting. This wasn’t a game to him. It wasn’t a light-hearted flirtation he could pick up and put down at will, as if it were a shuttlecock bat. No, this was far more than that. He had never felt this way about a woman, and he had been exposed to a lot of young ladies. More than his fair share, mostly thanks to his mother, but in the course of his own social forays as well.
Freddie was waiting for an answer, gazing at him expectantly. Sebastian forced a smile onto his face.
“Let’s forget all about the young ladies, shall we?” he said quickly. “Tell me about the latest boxing match you have seen, Burrows. I am in need of the distraction.”
***
Sebastian walked into Almack’s Assembly Room, holding his breath. Last time he had come in here, on the spur of the moment, he had run into Charlotte unexpectedly. He smiled as he stared around, remembering the night. He had swept her onto the dancefloor and luck had been on his side. The dance was a waltz, the most intimate way that a gentleman could hold a lady in public without being frowned upon. It was a genius invention, he thought slowly.
He still remembered how she had felt in his arms. Despite her obvious discomfort, it was as if she belonged there. As if his arms had been waiting for her. He gazed around the room, his blood warming at the thought of it.
Suddenly he started. Was that her? On the dancefloor he could see a small woman with dark hair, dancing a quadrille. She was slightly obscured from his vision by the dancers, so he waited patiently for her to come into his view again. His heart started to beat uncomfortably.
The music finished, and the dancers separated. His heart sank slightly. It wasn’t her. It was her sister, the Lady Diana, who bore a moderate resemblance to Charlotte. The same shade of hair colour and the same stature. But when the lady had turned towards him he had seen that the features were not the same. Nor were the eyes. Diana had blue eyes. Not the dark flashing ones that belonged to Charlotte, and which so tormented him at night when he lay in bed.
He quickly looked around the room again. She definitely wasn’t here. But he saw her brother, George, lounging against some chairs, sipping lemonade. He abruptly turned, leaving a young lady who was approaching him hanging. It was unbearably rude, of course, but he simply didn’t have time to get embroiled in social chit-chat. This was the first time he had seen any of the Lumleys since the evening at Vauxhall Gardens, and he didn’t want them to escape.
“Lord Castlereagh,” he called, as he got closer. “How are you?”
George straightened. Was that a wary look he detected in the man’s eye? But then he smiled, pleasantly enough, acknowledging the greeting.
“My lord,” he said slowly. “You are late to the assembly. My sister and I were just about to call it a night.”
Sebastian nodded. “A dinner engagement held me up, I am afraid.” He stared around the room innocently. “You mentioned your sister. I saw Lady Diana with the dancers, but not Lady Charlotte. Did she not accompany you?”
Lords to Be Enamored With: A Historical Regency Romance Collection Page 65