by Jane Keeler
He was happy.
That was the whole point.
He was quite happy not being saddled with a wife he had had to woo through a series of balls and suppers and theatre outings, and all while under the watchful eyes of Society and other young women and mothers all jockeying for his attention and time and affection.
“Yes Mother,” he said simply and headed for the door before she could say anything else.
The tree-lined street ahead of the townhouse was a scene of utter excitement. Laden carriages rolled through the circular drive and up to the lovely stone façade of the large and impressive home next door. Servants scurried to get the carriages that held luggage and household help and items to the back and side entrances while the carriages holding the family waited patiently on the street.
Henry’s horse, housed in a stable tucked away down a back alley, waited patiently at the gate and he headed for the large roan stallion with a smile of real pleasure lighting his handsome face.
He mounted and took the reins then set his hat on his head. He walked the horse closer to the carriages bearing the Staunton crest, his eyes running over them admiringly. They were the new Phaetons, lovely and light, well-sprung and appointed.
Annalise!
He would know that cloud of red-gold hair anywhere. Her curls had been tamed into a neat style that left her long white neck bared and her face, as she turned to him, was as creamy and fine as ever.
Her dark-blue eyes lighted on his face and then swept to the horse below. He smiled and drew closer but a footman leaned off the side of the carriage and said, “Begging your pardon sir, but the young lady is ill.”
Ill?
His eyes went back to her. She sat alone in the carriage, and it was obvious that she was covered by many rugs. “Oh, I see. Thank you.”
He walked the horse back to the next carriage where Lord and Lady Staunton sat and rapped on the window. Lord Staunton opened it a bit and said, “I do say, it’s Henry, isn’t it?”
“At your service Lord Staunton. I trust your trip was not overly long or tiresome.”
“It’s always long and tiresome. I much prefer the country but the Season can’t be missed.”
Henry said, “Indeed sir. I was inquiring after the health of your niece.”
Immediately Lady Staunton spoke up, her tone far less cordial that her husband’s. “She’s quite ill I’m afraid but it shall pass soon.”
“Perhaps I could call on her…” Henry began.
Lady Staunton cut in. “When she’s no longer so poorly I will be letting her receive visitors. I shall add your name to the list of course.”
The window closed, leaving him flummoxed and a little irritated. Whatever could be the matter with her?
The carriages rolled along and he started toward the park. She’d grown up to be the beauty he had always known she would be, that he had been able to see clearly. He hadn’t been able to see much of her figure past the slender shoulders and arms but he doubted she’d grown fat. She was far too active to do that.
There’d been that same spark in her face too. She’d been so filled with life, and with joy in life, that it had often made him feel staid. Her laughter had always rung out and yes she’d been fearsomely intelligent, but that had made her all the more appealing to him.
She had been so unlike any other young woman he had ever met, and he wondered, as he cantered toward Hyde Park, if the memory of Annalise was not what had held him back from marriage all those years.
Granted she’d been too young for marriage, and she’d not been a flirt at all. She’d simply done whatever she took it into her head to do and she often left him breathless at both her daring and her willingness to try whatever pleased her.
She could rise like the devil himself, and once he’d caught her swimming in a small stream he’d hidden behind a set of bushes to keep her from seeing him and he’d watched her swim with her long skirts trailing behind her and her hair hanging in disarray.
She was a charming little liar too. When he’d run into her later, on her way back home, she’d excused her soaked gown and hair by saying she’d fallen from her horse and right into the stream.
Well, he thought, at least with Annalise around the Season might prove to be fairly lively after all.
A frown creased his handsome face as he remembered something. Annalise had sworn, more than once, that she would never engage in a Season in London, and she’d find her own husband without her aunt or mother hanging off her arm and thrusting her toward bachelors.
Could it be that she wasn’t ill at all but simply refusing to be married off?
**
Henry! Annalise sat back in the carriage, a smile lighting her face for a moment before it faded away. Once she’d fancied herself madly in love with him, and she’d been sure she’d saw something like love in his eyes when he looked at her.
Oh but that had been a long time ago, and now things were so different. She wasn’t the carefree young girl she had been, and he was one of the most eligible bachelors in London, and beyond.
He’d want a wife soon, and while he might not ever discover her terrible secret she would know, and she couldn’t bear to deceive him.
She’d have to marry eventually, of course. She had some money left to her from her father and she could support herself for some time. Her older brother Roger would, of course, allow her to stay on in the family’s country manor for as long as she liked but she knew that, with things the way that they were, that would become unacceptable eventually.
She’d hoped to see him, Henry. She’d hoped to be able to see his handsome figure riding toward and he had done exactly that and when he had he had stirred every feeling she’d ever had for him.
But those feelings had to be suppressed, for both their sakes.
The carriage went to the back of the house and she was hastily removed and hustled up the stairs, her long cloak trailing around her. The servants, all but her constant companion and maid since childhood, Lucy.
Only Lucy really knew the situation, and she would make sure nobody else knew it.
The fear eating at Annalise, the fear that had become her highest emotion as of late, came rushing back in as she was led to her bed and quickly undressed. A gown and bed jacket were placed upon her body and she hustled under the covers and surrounded by a mound of pillows.
Lucy said, “I know the trip was difficult for you Miss. I’ve already ordered you a light supper and tea. Is there anything else I can do?”
She smiled at Lucy and said, “No, thank you. I’m rather tired and I think I shall sleep for a little while after supper.”
“Yes Miss. I’ll see to your tray.”
Lucy hurried from the room, closing the door tightly behind her. Annalise waited for a few moments then stole out of the bed and crept to the windows to peer through the heavy curtains and at the Wallace townhouse. Henry, he was here and so close.
She went back to the bed and tucked herself back in. Well, she’d be up and moving for at least part of the Season but by then he might have found a wife, and even if he hadn’t she had to hold tightly to her resolve not to reciprocate any affection he might show her.
A smile came back to her mouth as she recalled how often she’d flummoxed him that long visit. She’d ridden with him nearly every day, and he was one of those rare men who not only sat a horse well but was unafraid to gallop madly along, letting the wind rush into his face and hair.
He had never scolded her for going too fast, and he had never reprimanded her or reminded her that she was a young lady, and should talk about anything but the things that they did.
Henry discussed politics with her, and business as well. Their conversations had had such a natural flow and he had never thought her silly or less then feminine for enjoying books that were challenging or for speaking her mind.
He never chided her for being exuberant, or for being a little too quick to speak whatever was in her head. In fact he seemed to appreciate it.
>
If only!
But things were the way that they were, and she could do nothing about that now.
Oh but if only…
**
Weeks passed and Henry hoped to catch sight of her at every ball, or to be given a card saying that she was receiving visitors. Lady Staunton came to call, of course, and Lord Staunton was frequently at the club but every inquiry on Annalise was met with, “she’s still very ill, poor dear, and while we hope she’ll recover speedily so far she has not yet improved very much.”
She did go out daily for a ride in the park, where she could be almost seen even if she did have her footman turn away all who tried to approach the carriage.
Henry often found himself jockeying around carriages and horse-mounted men who were as intrigued by the beautiful, and tragically ill, young woman, as he was and who were dying to get more than just the small glimpse of her beauty that they were afforded.
She often kept the windows of the carriage closed just enough that one could only get a brief glimpse of her within it. Her hair glowed like a flame in the dimness and her alabaster skin and that hair sent many a swain home to write love poems and letters to her, begging her to see them when she recovered.
To his utter shame Henry, who was practical and had a dislike of poetry, actually found himself attempting to write a few poems as well but after a few ink-splotched pages of utter nonsense he gave up and wrote a letter instead, telling her that he remembered her fondly, and that her antics had often amused him.
She didn’t write back.
Puzzled and a little vexed Henry spent a few days pacing the confines of his offices and room. How to make her notice him?
He knew he cut a good figure, and that he was the man most had set their caps for. He could hardly walk into a ballroom without being besieged by mothers dragging their daughters toward him like so much baggage and then practically tossing those young women at his feet.
The Duchess of Rivington, desperate the make a good match for her daughter to off-set some of her husband’s mounting gambling debts, was the most forceful. While Ellen, her daughter, was the toast of the city and being courted by at least a dozen young men who all declared themselves wildly in love with her but Henry’s deep pockets and his parents clear wish to have connection to such a grand title made Henry even more attractive than the others.
On that night he stood in a ballroom watching the dancing and eyeing the door, hoping the Stauntons would arrive with Annalise in tow but when they did appear they were without her.
Just as he made to approach the couple the Duchess appeared, Ellen beside her, and said, “There you are Lord Wallace. I insisted that Ellen keep a space on her dance card free for you. The last dance, perhaps?”
Her smile was quickly hidden by her fan. Ellen merely batted her lashes at him. Henry sighed inwardly. For all that she was beautiful Ellen Rivington was dull as ditchwater, and he said, “I am so sorry Your Ladyship. It seems I have been called away.”
He exited the ballroom and then the house quickly. He knew it was a terrible thing to do, and that everyone there would assume he’d run out to go to the club to gamble and raise hell but he didn’t care.
He was tired of the niceties and the dancing, and the endless conversations which were all the same in the end.
He hastened home and, restless, took a walk in the garden. The moonlight was full and bright and he was nearing the privet hedge that separated the Wallace home from the Staunton home when he heard light laughter followed by a deep sigh.
He knew that laugh! He made his way to the hedge and said, “Annalise, is that you?”
“No. Go away.”
He peered over the hedge, feeling a bit ridiculous as he did so. She was sitting on a bench, wrapped in a voluminous cloak despite the warm evening. The moonlight struck her hair, sending little sparks off gold and red flying upward and his heart nearly stopped.
“It is you. By God I had almost begun to believe you’d died.”
Her head lifted and she asked, with that gamine grin he knew so well, “Did you suspect that they propped my corpse up in the carriage every afternoon and paraded it around town too then?”
His laughter was real. “No, but I wish I had. What a great scandal that would have made.”
The light played along the curves of her cheekbones and neck. She asked, “Shouldn’t you be at the ball declaring your love for some lady or another?”
“Shouldn’t you be at the ball having men fall at your feet?” The retort was quick.
She chuckled, a slow rich chuckle that set his blood to heating. “I won’t do it. I hate the very idea of being forced into ballrooms all dressed for the slaughter. It reminds me of the cattle pens, the way they herd people into those things.”
She’d hit it on the head and put into words his exact feelings. He said, “Well, we do dress better than the cattle but I assume we have much the same experience. Unless you discount the fact we aren’t brained at the end.”
“Who says we aren’t? I imagine many a reluctant person has been brained once or twice on the road to matrimony,” she said.
Both of them laughed. He said, “Why are you out here alone?”
She said, “For the same reason you’re skulking along a privet I assume. I don’t want to go to the ball, and I like to be alone.”
He said, “I am not skulking.”
Her eyebrow lifted. “No?”
He squirmed. “No. I was walking and I heard you.”
He’d also climbed up on a bench in order to peer into the grounds of the Staunton hose. He flushed and added, “I’d like to call on you if I may.”
“You may not. Not now, anyway.”
He asked, “Is it because of your illness?”
Her head shook. “Oh it isn’t contagious.” There was a hard edge to her words. “That I assure you. But I am in no state to have callers I’m afraid. It wouldn’t…” her sigh came again, a gusty and sad thing that made him want to climb over the hedge and take her into his arms and comfort her.
He said, “Well then, as soon as you are able to receive callers.”
She spoke. “I’m sure my aunt has already begun list upon list of suitable young men who may call on me when I am well again.”
“You sound rather resigned.”
“I am.” She smiled and stood. The cloak was indeed voluminous and it covered her from throat to ankle. He could see nothing of her figure past it. “I assume you are also resigned to the fact that one day you must also marry.”
“I am told I must.” He paused the added. “I would make a good husband. I have money and lands, and I am in possession of…”
“You sound like a dowager.” There was amusement in her voice but below it there was steel.
Henry’s mouth fell open. Then he roared laughter, “You’re entirely correct. I did. Next I will be telling you how thrifty I am, or how capable of running a household.”
“Oh, and you should play the pianoforte, and embroider prettily too.” The words, normally, would have enraged him, or made him feel like she was attacking his manhood but he knew she wasn’t. She was merely stating an unsettling truth. They were of an age when they were expected to marry, and the reasons they were a good match were as ludicrous as they were necessary.
“If it matters I do not embroider or play but I can ride a horse reasonably well, although not nearly as wildly or well as you.”
Her smile was broad and wide. “You ride beyond reasonably well Lord Wallace. You must excuse me, I grow tired easily as of late.”
“I’m sorry you’ve fallen ill.”
“I’ll recover,” she said and then she walked away, the cloak swishing and floating on the ground behind her. He swallowed hard and stepped down off the bench. She was as witty and irrepressible as she had been a few years before. She had that spark of life and the ability to say things that other people would have eschewed saying because they weren’t polite.
He headed back into the house, even
more determined to win her over and even more certain that the beautiful and headstrong woman wasn’t ill at all, just not interested in marriage.
That last gave him pause.
If she had no wish to marry how could he make her want to marry?
Well, he’d never been the type to back away from a challenge, especially when the challenge was from a woman named Annalise. She’d dared him often during the time she’d spent at her aunt and uncle’s country estate and he had always risen to the occasion.
And he would now too.
**
Annalise quickly got back into her bed but the smile on her face wouldn’t fade. Henry! And he’d been just as witty and easy to talk to as she had remembered. She hugged a pillow to her chest and tried to dim her smile as Lucy entered the room, a scowl on her face.
“You mustn’t sneak out like that and you know it.”
Annalise said, “I only needed a moment of air, and exercise.”
Lucy said, “You are driven daily.”
“Yes in the hopes that will shake loose what ails me,” Annalise replied in a caustic tone. “What I really want is a good long walk but that fool doctor insisted I stop walking several months ago.”
“And with good reason. You’re very fragile whether you want to be or not you know.” Lucy plumped the pillows and then said, more softly, “I will fetch you a little tea or hot chocolate. No, milk, just warmed, to help you sleep.”
Annalise said, slightly crossly, “I don’t want any. I am starving though. Do you think it possible to sneak me in a decent tray? They keep sending me just enough to keep a bird alive and I am so very hungry.”
“You know why you cannot eat more than is really necessary,” Lucy said sternly.
Annalise sighed. “Yes. I must think of my health and my figure, all at once. Please Lucy, I am truly famished unto death. I had a good long walk and now my belly is rumbling so that I shall never sleep!”
Lucy wavered, “It’s not good for your digestion to eat so late.”
“Then I shall sleep late and miss breakfast in the morning.”
Lucy shook her head, “You’re an impudent child; do you know that?”