“What’s going on here?” He took a few steps into the room and looked from Emily to Violet, then across at Max. A frown marred his handsome features, and his lips were pressed into a tight line. Violet could feel Emily’s fear though the girl remained silent.
“Well, I need no introduction, Bainbridge, but Violet, don’t you want to introduce your sister?”
Violet flashed Max an angry look. It was all very well for him to bombard Violet’s lover with the truth when he was blithely stepping out of their lives forever. But what if Violet had been busily hatching a more creative explanation that might work better on soothing Lord Bainbridge’s sensibilities?
“Your sister?” Lord Bainbridge said angrily. “You told me she was dead.”
Violet heard the suspicion in his tone, inferring that Violet had lied to him. No doubt he’d be wondering what else she might have lied about.
He turned to Max. “What are you doing in my house?”
The sick dismay in Violet’s gut worsened. What was Max doing? How could he display such blatant disregard for Violet’s welfare when they’d parted as friends? Had she offended him in some way?
She lowered her eyes, unable to bear the scene. She had nothing to contribute. Her fate was in both their hands right now, and she could only pray that Max would handle the situation in a manner that would not incite Lord Bainbridge’s ire.
“Reuniting a homeless child with a beloved relative when both had thought the other dead.” Max sounded very calm. As if it had been nothing. Or simply all in an afternoon’s work.
And yet Violet’s life had been turned upside down. She had been delivered the greatest joy she could ever imagine by discovering Emily was alive, but her fear in the immediate moment was how she was going to look after her sister.
And no doubt that was what Lord Bainbridge was wondering. He’d outlaid a great deal of money to acquire Violet’s loving services. He was hardly going to sanction Emily living in this house with her. Not that Violet would have considered that appropriate either. Emily’s future prospects would only be tainted by an association with Violet—a kept woman.
“I had hoped for a somewhat different reception, I must say.” Lord Bainbridge directed this at Violet; his tone laced with acid.
Suddenly, she was frightened. How might he react when Max was gone? Would he insist Violet despatch Emily immediately? But where could she send her? She had so many questions she couldn’t ask. Had Grandmother died? Or had she thrown Emily out and Emily had nowhere to go?
“And what do you plan to do with this child? Your sister?” He spoke as if Emily didn’t have ears. His nostrils flared, and Violet envisaged what the next few years might be like. She’d have to pander to this man she didn’t even like. A man with no compassion.
“Lord Belvedere asked if I was brave enough to shoot a lion. And I am.” Emily thrust out her flat chest and looked combative. “He’s going to Africa. I think Africa sounds like India. Exciting. Not like here—”
She’d burst out with such bravado, but Lord Bainbridge cut into her words, “Children should not be heard. Violet, this is untenable—”
Now it was Max, interrupting him to say in his previous, measured tone, “I think Emily would do very well in Africa. We’ve had a good conversation about it during the carriage ride here. Not a very comfortable carriage ride, I must admit, for after I found the child soaking wet and bleeding from an injury inflicted, apparently, by what I would consider a completely unsatisfactory guardian, I hired the only conveyance to be had in town, which was not quite up to standard, was it, Emily?”
“No, there was a rat living in it, and it smelled horrible.” The energy had returned to Emily’s tone.
“But needs must, and so I brought Emily to you and had hoped I might see you alone in order to invite you to Africa too, Violet.” He smiled. “Unfortunately, I must now offer the invitation in company.” He glanced at Emily. “I say, Emily, would you mind seeing if you could locate a servant to make some hot chocolate. Something soothing for this cold weather would be in order, don’t you think?”
With Emily gone, Max seemed to relax. As for Violet, she didn’t know what to say.
Go to Africa with him? In what capacity? Her heart raced with the excitement of various possibilities. He was offering her a lifeline. Had he found someone who needed a companion? A governess? By making it clear that Emily could go too, he’d obviously been very creative.
She saw the roiling anger in Lord Bainbridge’s eyes, and knew she’d take her chances and whatever Max was offering her, even if it meant swapping her silks and jewels for a lifetime of servitude. An escape to a frontier where her past did not hang like a millstone around her neck was the most tantalising offer she could ever have imagined.
“On my way here, I stopped by Madame Chambon’s.” Max lowered his voice and glanced at the door through which Emily had exited. “Don’t worry, Violet. I left Emily in the carriage while I had a private audience with Madame and quickly executed the transaction that would see both your employer and you, Lord Bainbridge, adequately recompensed.”
Violet swallowed. His generosity was considerable. The sum he must have handed over would have been significant. Yet, she felt like a slave being paid for.
“This is preposterous!” Lord Bainbridge burst out. He took a menacing step towards Max; his face mottled with indignation. “I secured this house for Violet only this week.” He made a sweeping gesture with his arm. It was, indeed, a handsome house; furnished without concern for expense. Lord Bainbridge had wanted a tiny palace to accommodate his latest prized possession.
His nostrils flared. “I paid Madame Chambon a king’s ransom. Violet belongs to me.”
Violet kept her expression neutral while she waited tensely, though she cringed inwardly at the crudeness of the situation. Max was about to make an offer. As long as it included Emily, she’d jump at it. And he surely knew Violet well enough to anticipate she’d take a lowlier position if it gave her an independence with the ability to look after her sister. Why else would he have brought Emily here? Why else would he have paid Madame Chambon and recompensed Lord Bainbridge for Violet’s services? Max was tenderhearted. When he’d stumbled upon Emily, the child’s plight must have tugged at his heartstrings. He’d not have been able to abandon an eleven-year-old under the circumstances.
But with his ship sailing so soon, he’d have had to have worked quickly to make the necessary arrangements that would settle them both in order to ease his conscience.
Max inclined his head. “I think that really depends upon Violet’s wishes. Certainly, she may choose to stay with you, though I wouldn’t begin to speculate why she would wish to do so. That is between the two of you, and I am not privy to her feelings for you. However, regardless of what you are offering Violet, and in case you didn’t quite understand what I thought was very clear, I have come here, with Emily, to recompense you for the expense you have already outlaid and to make Violet a counteroffer.”
Lord Bainbridge’s eyes bulged. Max’s reasonable tone was doing nothing to soothe his ruffled sensibilities.
He squared his shoulders. “You are sailing for Cape Town tomorrow, as everyone knows. Shirking your responsibilities to go adventuring. Seeking your fortune in a new frontier.” He shrugged. “Am I to understand you want a doxy to keep you warm at night and wash your shirts by day?” He snorted. “What can you possibly offer Violet? Certainly not the comforts, the clothes, the jewels that I can.”
Violet raised one eyebrow. They meant nothing to her compared with her freedom. Nevertheless, she held her words. It was a tense moment between the two men, and she didn’t want to force Max to play his hand earlier than he intended. He’d know very well she’d place a higher value on liberty than on material things, yet she had to eat—and right now the only way she could manage that was through the protection of a man.
Lord Bainbridge was her official protector, and Max had not yet made any firm proposition other than saying he’
d paid for Violet’s release so she could look after her sister. She assumed that’s what he meant.
But Emily’s declaration that he’d invited her to Africa and Max’s vague affirmation that she was welcome to come was confusing. She doubted he’d offer her something truly demeaning, but until she knew exactly what it was, she would wait.
Nevertheless, her fingers and toes tingled with excitement. If Max wanted her to take her chances and accompany him to South Africa, he’d have come upon some ingenious way to enable her to find employment so she’d not be far away.
Her sister’s light, hurried footsteps sounded in the passage and the door burst open. A wave of sisterly love washed over her at the sight of her pretty, earnest sister, importantly and carefully bearing a tray with four steaming mugs.
For so long, she’d believed Emily dead. She still couldn’t believe her grandmother had told her such lies.
Now Max was facilitating a way for Violet to keep her sister close. That was all that was important.
Her excitement drained away. Perhaps Max’s counteroffer was to send Emily to school. It would be a kind and generous act when he had no obligation, but he’d know Violet would be resistant. Perhaps that’s why he’d not yet put his counteroffer into words.
“So, Emily, would you like me to take you both back to your grandmother’s?” Max turned to elicit the young girl’s thoughts with a smile. “Perhaps she’d be overjoyed to discover that Violet isn’t dead.”
Emily’s eyes widened, and her skin blanched. Silently she shook her head, and the mugs on the tray rattled perilously as she set it down on the sideboard. “No! Grandmama said Violet was dead! She said she wished I was too when she threw the knife at me.”
“A flesh wound, yet deep enough.” Max spoke matter-of-factly to both Violet and Lord Bainbridge. “I had it dressed when we stopped for dry clothes along the way. Yes, the last few hours in the carriage have been very illuminating. Emily’s grandmother was once quite respected in her local district. But rumours of her madness appear to be growing, according to the pharmacist who sold me bandages and liniment. Violent, too, it would appear. Increasingly so. No, I would not send Emily back there, and I would not send Violet back, either.” He made a gesture of confusion with his hands. “It resulted in quite a conundrum for me. Emily was so very believable and quite engaging, once she’d got herself warm and dry and decided I wasn’t a proxy for her wicked grandmother. Indeed, she made a very convincing case for rescuing a damsel in distress.” His forehead puckered. “Yes, very convincing. Yet how could this be reconciled by a man who, for the past three weeks, has been counting the days until he can exercise his freedom from all the constraints that make England such a stifling place to be right now.”
Emily hurried to his side and looked up at him. “But I told you, Max, that I’d help you. I’m very good at polishing. Grandmama makes me polish all the silver cutlery every week, so I can polish your boots and help you put them on. I have to help dress Grandmama so I’m sure I could help dress—”
“That’s very sweet of you!” Violet interrupted quickly, hurrying over to take Emily’s hand. “You always were the most biddable of sisters.”
“Except when I’m angry! Then, I’m Grandmama’s despair,” Emily told them all and looking quite proud about it. “But that’s better than being timid if I’m going to have to shoot lions, isn’t it, Max?”
Violet blinked. Max seemed to have made a very positive impression on her little sister in a few short hours.
“It certainly is, Emily. And that’s what decided me. In fact, it was when you angrily told the innkeeper that he’d overcharged me for the mutton roast we both so much enjoyed. His wife had quoted me a shilling, you see,” he told the others for their elucidation, “but the innkeeper saw easy coin when he looked at the cut of my gib. At least, that’s how Emily phrased it, having, I suspect, lifted the phrase from the pirate novel she’d been reading.”
Violet nodded. “Emily is a voracious reader,” she murmured. “She loves her adventure stories.”
“And I think taking her to Africa to live out a real live adventure rather than having to read about them or make them up would be just the thing.”
“You’d have to take me to Africa?” Emily worried at her lip. “You want to take me away? I thought we’d go to…the zoo.” She looked from Max to Violet, as if torn.
“I don’t mean take just you to Africa,” Max reassured her with a laugh. “I meant take you and Violet to Africa. That’s if Violet agrees to go. It’s rather a big decision for her to make considering the boat sails tomorrow.”
Lord Bainbridge looked at Violet. “No doubt Violet would have been better swayed had your proposition come from the heart,” he said. “Your boat was to have sailed yesterday but was delayed by bad weather. Rather serendipitous the way matters have unfolded, and rather curious, I can’t help feeling. I wonder what other considerations you have neglected to inform my mistress.”
Violet glared at him. She was more offended by his use of the term in front of Emily than by his casual demeaning of her.
Max, however, seemed highly affronted on her behalf. “How dare you insult the woman I love. It’s true I was to have left yesterday, though thank God for whipping up a storm and giving me the time I needed to reflect. Thank God for Emily here, who’s helped me understand what I really want. Not adventure and the unshackled freedom I’d thought I did.”
He put up a hand for silence, as Lord Bainbridge and Violet both opened their mouths to speak.
Lord Bainbridge spoke anyway. “You are really so puffed up with your own arrogance that you believe your charm will win Violet over so you can drag her across the seas with you as your—”
“Lord Bainbridge, please,” Violet murmured with a speaking look in the direction of her sister.
Max rolled his eyes and sent a despairing look at his lordship, then Emily, then finally, Violet.
“I say, Violet, I’m sorry about this. My preference would have been to have spoken in private and to have elicited your wishes, but the fact is I’m going to have to declare myself in front of a crowd, and that does not sit comfortably with me. Nevertheless, here’s my offer.”
Violet put her hand to her mouth. He was about to declare himself. To say the words that would confirm exactly what he thought of her; how much he valued her. Was she to go as his servant or someone else’s? Did he want her to be his mistress as he explored exciting new frontiers, or did he plan to engage her in some other capacity?
The pounding in her chest was so intense she thought she’d be ill. Her nerves felt frayed to breaking point with the anticipation.
She didn’t care what his offer was—she’d accept.
“You’re a fool if you think you can take him at his word.” Lord Bainbridge’s snarl sounded an ugly note in the silence.
Violet gave a short laugh. “If there’s one thing I know about Max it’s that I can take him at his word. He’s never been anything but honest and transparent.”
“I like that.” Max beamed at her, then touched his heart. “It gives me great hope, then, for a favourable answer when I ask you to throw aside everything here so you can marry me and come to South Africa.” He glanced at Emily. “Together with your sister, of course.”
“Marry you?” The world rushed at Violet like a storm engulfing her senses. She managed to remain standing, but Max’s face came in and out of focus, his smile ever more charming, while Lord Bainbridge’s expression grew increasingly malevolent.
“You believe him? A sham marriage? That’s all it would be and you’re a fool if you think otherwise, Violet. Men like Max don’t marry their—”
“Have you forgotten the company you are in,” Max said warningly, looking at Emily who stared, wide-eyed, between them. “And no, sir, it would not be a sham marriage. Violet is clever enough to know the difference. If she had any doubt, I’d be willing to do what it took to prove it to her.” He took a step forward and his fingers closed over Violet
’s. He seemed to have eyes only for her. “I feel like I’ve been given a second chance. I was supposed to have been on board the Charlotte yesterday, but when I woke up this morning, all I could think of was you and how terribly sad I was that I’d not see you again. It’s what prompted me to go to the village where your grandmother lives, and when I saw Emily, I knew in my heart I couldn’t leave you behind.” He squeezed Violet’s hand and bent over to elicit Emily’s opinion.
“Do you think Violet should say yes? She hasn’t said anything, you know, and I’m growing a little concerned that she doesn’t think my offer is a very enticing one.”
Violet swallowed. It was all too marvellous to be real. She didn’t trust herself to speak in case the act of opening her mouth to say the words would prove it was all a dream.
“You want me to be your wife?” she repeated, her voice barely a thread of sound.
“Yes; my legal, wedded, honestly acquired, wife. My beautiful bride.” Max touched Violet’s cheek lightly, then gave a self-conscious laugh. “Lord, I really didn’t think I’d have to propose in front of…of Bainbridge here.”
“But it is his house, and there isn’t much time,” Violet whispered.
Max burst out laughing. “Exactly right! You do see matters quite as they are, and I think I shall find that exceedingly refreshing in the years to come.” He frowned. “That is, if you do choose to marry me.”
He’d said it too many times now for her not to believe him. Bainbridge had opened his mouth to utter some-no-doubt-odious remark, but Violet got in first.
“I would love to marry you, Max. Whenever and wherever you think it appropriate.” An incredulous laugh escaped her. This couldn’t be real. First Emily and now…this.
“I’m so glad you said yes, Violet!” Emily was clapping her hands, her little face coloured by excitement. “For a moment I wasn’t sure, and Max is quite the nicest man. I’d much rather live with him than Grandmama.”
Lord Bainbridge grunted. “It appears I’m superfluous.” He sounded more bemused than vindictive, which was what Violet had expected. Perhaps he knew when he’d lost the fight. “And I’d prefer that you not continue this conversation in my house.” With a curt nod, he stepped aside and indicated the door. “I hadn’t thought you so credulous, my dear. Belvedere speaks of marriage, yet I have no idea how that can be achieved when there’s no time for the banns to be called, for one thing, and certainly enough family opposition to sink a ship.”
Wedding Violet (Fair Cyprians of London Book 4) Page 14