by R. G. Winter
Her skin was reddened from work and slightly tanned from sun and wind.
Not at all a good thing in a time and place where pale skin that allowed the thin blue veins below to contrast nicely was the benchmark of nobility and beauty.
She sighed as she paced the floor yet again, her body crying out for movement and excitement. She had grown accustomed to hard work, and the forced idleness weighed heavily upon her.
“I shall go mad.” Another few paces fetched her up at the wall. She turned and walked in the other direction only to land in front of the pretty dressing table. “Stark raving mad.” Her feet carried her to the window than the armoire. “I must get out of here and soon or they will not have to worry about giving me laudanum to make me marry. They’ll have to worry about placing me in the madhouse.”
What was Jonathon doing? Did he miss her as terribly as she missed him? Had her rather uncharitable thoughts of the day before been on the mark? Did he no longer care for her or had he decided that the whole thing was just far too much trouble? Did he want her still?
Could they really force her to marry Reginald, the boring duke?
The answer to that last she knew, at least.
Of course they could.
They would.
She was all but married to him already.
Winston swung through the window, a grin on his face. Madelaine, pacing the room, stopped and gawked as he entered. “Are you mad? If Mother and Father catch you…”
Winston shrugged. “I supposed you would be happy for the company.”
She slumped onto the velvet-covered chaise. “I am. Oh Winston, how can they be so cruel? They have no regard at all for what I want! I’m merely a fatted calf, trotted out to be sold in the marriage market.”
Winston chuckled and arranged his long frame on the chair. “I daresay if you were truly fatted you would not have caught the eye of the duke at all.”
She glared at him, “How can you make a jest of this? Now, at this moment?”
He shrugged, “It’s not a jest. It’s a suggestion. Eat well, bribe your maid to bring you sweets. Refuse to exercise even in the slightest. The, after you’re bursting from the seams of your gowns and barely able to move about…”
“They’ll just lace me more tightly.” Her impatience and irritation swelled and she stood, pacing the confines of the room once more. “Truly it isn’t to be borne! Why must I be sold into what amounts to slavery?”
“Because you were born a female. That’s your fate.” Winston heaved a sigh and added, “But it isn’t just you. Eventually they’ll lock me into matrimony as well. Probably with some hideous creature who is too busy congratulating herself on landing me to even care about me as a person too.”
Madelaine flapped her hands at him, “Oh pish! You’re a man! You get to travel and have fun! You get to do what you want…”
“Only for a little while. Sometimes I think that is the more cruel fate. Most of you females have no idea of what you will be missing—because you have never had it. Men though, we are encouraged to run a bit wild so we can buckle down and become good husbands. That just means that we, then, know exactly how harsh our fate is.”
She’d never considered that. Instantly she was contrite. “Oh but Winston, there is hope for you! You may very well find a woman you can love, and who will love you back!”
“When? And where? In between waltzes and polite dinner conversation? Am I supposed to fall in love during a chaperoned walk in some stodgy garden? Oh it’s ridiculous!” He ran his hands through his hair then subsided. “You’d think by now—given how unhappy so many of the married people are—that they would know this is the worst way to marry! All these arrangements and boring redundancies!
“But never mind. I came to hear of your grand and unfettered adventures!”
Madelaine plopped back onto the chaise, her fingers picking at the lovely fabric of her skirt. Her body tensed. Where to begin? There was so much to tell—and so much she absolutely could not say. Winston was her brother, after all, and he would consider what she and Jonathan had done to be a case of Jonathan taking advantage of her. Ruining her. Even though that was far from the case.
“I hardly know where to start. As you know, I stole out into the night, saddled Persephone and rode away. Oh I wasn’t even frightened! I was…excited! It was so thrilling Winston! I suppose I should have been frightened, and now, looking back at it I can see where I was in grave danger but do you know I never even thought of that?”
Soon she was talking about the inn, and the fun she had had riding the towering cliffs, the scent of the ocean, and the sight of the waves breaking upon the shore.
And Jonathan. She slowed her speech.
Winston said, “You care for him a great deal then?”
“I love him! Oh he is the man I wish to marry not poor plodding Reginald! Oh I know Reginald is a good man and will provide well for me but…but he is so dull! I didn’t chose him either! Nobody asked me!”
Winston stood. “It’s possible that they did not ask him either, you know.”
Madelaine blinked. She had not considered that. “Do you suppose he might be just as disagreeable to the idea as I am?”
Winston headed for the window. “Oh I have no doubt that he might be. I just doubt he is the type to stray off the path of what is expected. You, my dear, are undoubtedly stuck with him now.”
Then he vanished through the window, leaving her flummoxed and vexed.
“Stuck with him indeed! I shall steal away again if I must! This time I shall never come back!”
She tossed herself onto the bed in what was, she had to admit, a rather melodramatic fashion.
It would be nice to escape but, unlike Winston, she could not clamber in and out of the windows. If the gown didn’t hamper her, and if she didn’t fall the many stories to the ground below, she might be able to escape. But unlike Winston she had not the daring to try it—nor, as much as she hated to admit it—the upper body strength he must have used to climb the distance between her window and his own.
Perhaps she could make a rope of her sheets! She gave the bed a skeptical glance. The sheets were muslin, and very thin, edged with lace and embroidery. Made to look nice, not hold a fleeing young woman’s weight. She’d likely break her neck trying.
That was one escape she was not willing to be part of!
No matter what, as long as she was alive there was a chance that she might be reunited with Jonathan. Dead—no chance at all.
Madelaine crawled off the bed. Her sheepish grin and face was reflected in the mirror over her dressing table.
“I am being quite the idiot,” she told the young woman in the mirror. “There must be a way, even if I am being held prisoner.”
That was the worst part of it. She longed for movement and exercise, for a long walk or just a good long ride on Persephone. She was not at all likely to get that—and she knew it.
That was, unless she convinced her parents that she could be trusted. What better way to do that than to go for a ride with Reginald? True it would likely be a plodding walk that barely made her heart pound much less race but she could do it.
And it would be nice to get out and get some air on her face and hands.
She composed herself, checked her appearance in the mirror and straightened a few seams and her hair. She rang for a maid and when one came she asked, politely, for tea. Almost as an afterthought she also asked the maid to relay the message that she would like an audience with her mother.
The maid left. Madelaine forced herself to stop pacing as the door opened and quickly sit in a chair, posing herself prettily.
It was only the maid but she knew the maid would report to her mother. The maid brought in a small tray laden with a tea pot, a single cup, milk and honey, as well as few small tea cakes.
“Why that looks delightful! Oh how I have missed the civility of a properly prepared tea!” She smiled and let a rather spoiled look cross her face before smiling again. “S
o bothersome to not have good tea!”
The maid nodded and left. Madelaine felt her heart sink. The single cup said no as nothing else could. It was one of those little secret signals within a household, and society as a whole. It was not quite a rebuff, but it most certainly meant she had not gained her mother’s trust just yet.
Well the maid could not report any bad behavior back, at least that was something.
CHAPTER SIX
By the end of the very long day Madelaine was ready to scream, gnash her teeth, and pull every one of her chocolate-hued curls right from her head. Nobody had come near her, nobody except the maid, who had delivered a light supper and departed, and all without speaking.
“She’s probably afraid I’ll tarnish her character,” Madelaine muttered, “Or they’ve given her orders not to talk to me. Either way it is just unbearable!”
She huffed and puffed for a few more moments. It was better than crying, anyway.
The time pulled out longer and longer. The boredom was so intense she was almost tempted to ring and ask for embroidery tools. If she did they would likely rush upstairs, demanding to know who the imposter in their midst was, or assume she was going to try to commit suicide by stabbing herself with the needles.
The door opened. She quickly stilled her body and put a smile on her face. Victoria entered. Her pretty face held a wary expression and her blonde hair glinted and shone in the candlelit dimness.
Madelaine stood. “Victoria! It is so good to see you! I wish I had seen you earlier when we arrived…Mother only said that you were out.”
She hurried to her sister. Victoria looked so…so grown up! Her hair was arranged slightly differently, its’ length coiled in intricate loops that held tiny wonderfully carved pins. The jet that the pins were carved from was not precisely precious, but it was a very adult thing to wear.
Victoria’s gown was a lovely soft-pink, as befitted her age, but she should have worn ribbons of the same color in her hair—not those pins.
That made Madelaine a trifle uneasy. Victoria was always looking forward to the day when she could wed, and the moment she could make her debut, which would lead her one step closer to the wedding she dreamed of so excitedly. Were the pins just one more sign that Victoria was impatient for that day?
Madelaine set those things aside and hugged her sister—hard. Victoria stood stiff and unrelenting for a long few moments, making Madelaine’s heart fall to her feet.
“I didn’t mean to worry you, or hurt your chances for marriage. Or anything else Victoria.” She loosened her grip and stepped back. “Please tell me you see that.”
The expression on Madelaine’s face said she was angry but she quickly put a pleasant expression, a polite mask, over her features. “I know. Mother won’t come. She can’t. You upset her so greatly that her nerves are all in a bundle. You should be ashamed of yourself Madelaine!”
She stepped back. They were so unalike that’s he would never be able to make Victoria understand how she felt. “I am.”
She wasn’t. She just wanted a promise that she could get out of the stifling room soon.
Victoria didn’t seem mollified though. She was just as stiff as ever, and distant. She’d never been distant before and Madelaine suddenly understood the ramifications of her actions. She held out her hands in an unconsciously pleading gesture. “I’ll do it. I’ll marry the duke. I don’t want to, oh Victoria I don’t want to!
“I am so madly in love with Jonathan but I will bend to whatever duty they set forth.”
Victoria’s pretty face crumpled. “We must all do our duty.”
“Mine is to marry the duke. Oh Victoria I never meant to hurt your chances to marry…”
“Yet you have,” the words came out of Victoria’s mouth with real rancor clinging to them.
She left, without a single other word. Madelaine crumpled onto her bed, weeping silently. She had hurt Victoria, even though she had not meant to. She had only wanted freedom from the awfulness that was being forced to marry someone she did not want to—and did not feel anything for!
Marriage.
To the duke.
She closed her eyes and curled up into a tiny miserable ball. It had all gone wrong! Oh why, why, had she been so vain? She had needed those gowns yes but she could have done anything but write to her mother requesting them!
That had been her undoing.
Gowns.
The one thing in the world she cared the least about.
Now, due to her desire to wear gowns befitting her station, gowns that would make certain those at Jonathan’s estate would recognize her station—even if she had only thought to make him proud and cast a good reflection upon him—had been their downfall.
The whole weight of the situation settled in. She was to be married to a man who, while kind and very handsome in his own way, was not Jonathan, could never be Jonathan.
She could never love him.
Regard him with some affection yes, but never truly love him.
There were other things to worry about as well.
She was ruined!
She refused to regret that. She had enjoyed every moment of the time she had spent alone with Jonathan, but how would her groom react when he realized the truth?
Her father and mother would never let them wed, not even if they knew. What was more they might even decide she needed to wed even sooner just in case she was with child.
It was a nightmare, a true nightmare.
Feeling dull and limp she lay there. The darkness gathered in the corners of her room but she ignored them. It was growing late. Soon the maid would come and undress her and she would have to go to bed, alone, and lie there in the dark and pray that tomorrow might—might!—bring a respite from the imprisonment she was suffering so painfully under.
Eventually the maid did come. Madelaine let her undress her and help her into her gown. She washed her face thoroughly and used the soft cloths and mint-flavored water to clean her teeth and rinse her mouth then lay down, staring up at the ceiling just as she had known that she would.
Her eyes turned to the window, now hidden behind the curtains. She got up and stole to it. She threw it open then leaned out. She would not risk climbing out of it but she stood for a long time, her eyes resting on the far horizon, waiting and praying for the sight of a man on the horse rushing toward the house.
The wind blew in, chilling her. Rain, light and misty, began to fall and yet still she stood. There was a slight hint of something in the rain that reminded her of the sea and more tears soaked her face. She was desperate to see the face of her beloved again, but he would not come. Could not come.
They had both been buried alive in the decorum of the lives that they had to live now.
He had been forbidden to see her. Jonathan had been warned away. If he came to her now he would wreck not only her parent’s plans for her wedding but he would set a scandal in motion that would stain them both forever.
Madelaine crawled back into her bed, pulling the covers tightly around herself. She’d left the window open and she lay there, drowsing. Hoping to hear those hoof beats she knew would never come.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Madelaine woke slowly. The sun shone through the open window and she sat up slowly. Her face felt stiff from crying and a quick glance in the mirror showed her that her eyes were reddened and swollen.
She got up and stood by the window, looking forlornly down. She was so absorbed in looking out she did not hear the door open.
The maid entered and said, “I’ve brought you tea and breakfast Miss. I’ll help you dress now if you are up.”
Madelaine turned from the window. So, today was to be spent locked away too then? “Thank you. Yes, I’m ready to dress,”
She wasn’t. She would have given anything just to crawl back into the bed and stay there. She let herself be dressed in a perfectly correct day gown in a soft blue color. The corset was pulled so tightly she could barely breathe, and the shoes pinche
d her feet.
The numerous petticoats were heavy, and the gown, while lovely, made her feel wide and cumbersome.
She sat to her breakfast. The tea had grown slightly cool but was not yet cold. The toast was hard and rubbery at the same time. She nibbled at an edge of it then shoved it away, appetite gone. Not even the plump cheese on her dish could make her feel hungry.
The door opened again and her mother swept in. Madelaine stood, weariness making her want to sink back into her seat immediately.
“Mother.”
Lady De Winter said, “Madelaine, Victoria had informed me that you have agreed to marry the duke.”
What choice do I have? She managed a smile but it didn’t quite meet her eyes. “Yes Mother.”
“Mother.” Lady De Winter’s pretty face wore a sad smile. “You always call me Mother when you are unhappy with something I have declared and Mama when you are happy.”
Madelaine blinked. “I had not realized…”
“Of course you haven’t. You are like all young girls—well, you aren’t a young girl anymore, are you?”
She crossed the room. Pain made her face look pale and tired. “Oh dearest one! I’m your mother and I love you! Your father loves you as well. We only want what is best for you, can you not see that?”
Madelaine’s heart nearly broke. “Of course I can. I do. It’s just…what if what you want for me is not what I want for myself? Even if I agree to it? What if it is the last thing I want?”
Lady de Winter shook her head. Her blonde hair sported a few more silver strands than it had before and Madelaine felt remorse strike her again. Was it her fault that those strands were there? She was sure it was.
“You’re young,” Lady de Winter said softly. “How could you possibly know what you want? None of us know what we want, that is why it is all done for us.
“Imagine what havoc it would create if young women were allowed to choose their husbands with no guidance! Why just last year, during her first Season, Lady Cecilia Adams was the toast of the entire town! She was sought by most of the eligible bachelors but who did she want to court her but that dreadful rogue Lord Hawthorne!