In halting speech, Olivia told him what she had learned earlier. “So you see,” she concluded, in a constricted voice, regarding him wistfully, “my life has changed forever. You think yourself unworthy of me, but your situation cannot compare to mine. As Miss Olivia Sloane of Ludstone Hall, I may have been unhappy and downtrodden, but at least I enjoyed some prospects. As the illegitimate daughter of a lowly governess and half-sister to a thief and a scoundrel, I have none. Who will want to marry me? I have no money, no family, and no expectation of being welcomed in society. Where am I to go? What am I to do? There is nothing to recommend me.” She dipped her head and a sob rose in her throat. “E-Even before I knew who you really are, I accepted I could never marry you, Luc, not because I don’t love you—I do, with all my heart and soul—but because whatever your financial situation and way of life, you are still a gentleman of respectable birth and breeding. I’m not fit to inhabit your world. Not anymore. And I love you too well to drag you down to my level.”
Jumping to his feet, he crossed the distance between them in two swift strides and pulled her into his arms. “Don’t say that! Never say that! You are above and beyond me in every way.”
She shook her head, saying into his chest in a muffled voice, “Someday you will find a lady more suited to your status.”
“My status!” he almost bellowed, gripping her shoulders hard. He pulled back to search her face with a searing glance. “Olivia, do you imagine such a consideration would weigh with me? You must know I don’t give a fig about your parentage. That is not why I cannot marry you! You deserve all that is good in life— fine clothes, a comfortable home and a husband who can afford to keep you in the manner you deserve—and the devil of it is I can’t promise you any of those things.”
She was silent. At length she made a queer little sound, somewhere between a sob and a laugh. “It seems for different reasons neither of us believes we are good enough for the other.” Tentatively, she raised her hand to his cheek and whispered, “Perhaps, then, we should agree to fly in the face of our principles and confound our expectations.”
“My darling girl,” he muttered thickly, his hand slowly moving to cover hers. “This is madness. Would you really marry me after all I have told you?”
“Yes, if only you will ask me.”
“You are certain you wouldn’t regret it?”
“No! For pity’s sake, Luc, I don’t care about finery, I never h-have!” she cried, a catch in her voice. “I’m not afraid of hardship. I don’t mind being poor. I don’t mind living in a house that is falling down—”
“What, even one with mice?” he asked, the corner of his mouth twitching.
“Well, they will have to go,” she admitted, smiling through her tears, “but nothing else matters as long as you are there. Home will be wherever you are. If you truly still want me, knowing who and what I am, I will always be yours.”
“I can scarce believe it,” he murmured. “I love you so much yet I never dared to hope—”
Suddenly, he went down on one knee, took her hand in his and kissed it. “In that case, my dearest love,” he said, gazing up at her, “will you do me the immeasurable honour of becoming my wife?”
The expression in his eyes brought the colour rushing to Olivia’s cheeks and took her breath away. With a tremulous smile on her lips, she gave him her answer.
Then he gathered her into his embrace and took her breath away again—first, with a ruthless, searching kiss, and then with words, as he whispered the myriad ways he intended to love her and promised her a future filled with delight.
Later Sir Seymour, magnificent in a gold brocade dressing gown, came into Harriet’s bedchamber. She was seated alone at her dressing table, plaiting her hair and he bent to bestow a kiss on her cheek.
“Well, my dear,” he ventured, “are matters resolved to your satisfaction?”
“Indeed they are,” she replied warmly. “Two weddings!
What could be more agreeable?”
He laughed. “Nothing in your opinion, to be sure.”
An affectionate mocking light gleamed in her eyes as she regarded his reflection in the mirror. “My love, don’t try to gammon me. You are every bit as delighted as I am! You are a romantic at heart and well you know it.”
“That is your doing,” he observed, smiling. “To think I did not know what love was until I found you.”
Harriet stood up and, threading her arm through his, led him over to a small chaise. “We are lucky, are we not? Dinny, I’m so pleased about Theo and Sophie. She is not the sort of girl I expected him to marry, but they will deal extremely well together. Have you noticed the look on his face when he watches her, and how he seems to glow with happiness?”
“Glow? He’s positively luminous!” grumbled Sir Seymour. “Why, he’s so besotted he paid no attention at all to the celebratory bottle of burgundy I opened earlier—too busy listing Miss Devereux’s virtues to give an opinion on it!”
“A sure sign he is love,” said Harriet, with a little laugh. “May I ask what you said to Luc? Were you surprised to learn he had offered for Olivia?”
“Indeed I was. Oh, I had guessed he admired her, but I had no idea how deeply he felt. I felt obliged to warn him that marriage and his current role won’t sit easily together, but he is already aware of it.”
“Ah, yes. Can you help at all?” she asked, her expression one of studied innocence.
His eyes twinkled at her perception. “I already have. Luc is going to consider my offer to find him a less perilous role. As I pointed out, there are other ways of serving your country. Men of his calibre are always needed in the Home Office. Daresay he won’t want to sit at a desk, but if he has a mind to pursue it, he has the ability to hold a position in government someday.”
“It’s clear he loves Olivia very much,” mused Harriet. “Thank goodness she has his support. This has been a traumatic day for her and if Luc had not proposed...” She shook her head and then added in a lighter tone, “I’ve grown very fond of her, Dinny. After the life she has led, the child deserves to be happy and I’m certain she will find it with Luc. He will give her the love and attention she is worthy of, and she will help him find true contentment. I could not have wished for a better match.”
Sir Seymour quirked a humourous eyebrow at his wife. “Are there any other young men you would like to see pierced by Cupid’s arrow, my love? Your influence certainly seems beneficial in this area.”
She considered for a moment. “There is Luc’s reclusive brother.”
“The Secret Duke?” Dinny uttered a crack of laughter. “A lost cause if ever there was one!”
“So were you, my love,” Harriet pointed out, giving him a wry look.
In the saloon, Theo was bidding Sophie good night. Cradled in his arms, he kissed her thoroughly before saying, “I’ll be back first thing in the morning. Have you sent word to Verney yet?”
She nodded. “I wrote to him earlier. Lady Verney would have been concerned by my absence, and I thought it right to let them know what had happened. I’ll call on them in a few days but in the meantime I’ve asked for my things to be sent here.”
“At least that’s dealt with.” He smiled down at her. “Now to more important matters: where would you like to get married?”
“Wherever you will be waiting for me at the altar,” she replied candidly.
“Then I’ll post down to Chenning and arrange for us to be wed there.”
“Sounds wonderful. Theo?”
“Hmm?” he murmured, after planting another long, languorous kiss on her mouth.
“What happened to the Star? I meant to ask you earlier when you returned to the inn after the accident but, for some reason,” she said, a wicked dimple appearing, “it went out of my mind afterward.”
He grinned. “Guilty as charged,” he admitted. Then, more soberly, he added, “I’m sorry to say there was no sign of it. We checked Peregrine’s pockets, and his remaining boot, and Luc went back to
search around the canal and along the route, but it was nowhere to be seen. Must have been lost during the mêlée. There’s little chance of it turning up now.”
She bit her lip. “I suppose it could not be helped.”
“I’m afraid not. No doubt you’ll mourn its loss because of its connection to your family.”
“It’s not only that,” she admitted, sliding her arms around him. “In some ways, it’s for the best that it has gone. Turmoil and unhappiness has followed the Star through the years, but it also formed most of my inheritance. I have little money otherwise.”
“Do you think that matters?” His breath stirred the silky tendrils of hair against her neck.
“Only in as much as I could have sold the Star and used the proceeds to set up your stud farm.”
“Deuce take the proceeds!” muttered Theo, in a voice like rough velvet. “I want to achieve that through my own efforts—our efforts—and not by selling an heirloom.” His hold on her tightened as his lips drifted over her forehead. “Sophie, I don’t care if you’re as poor as a church mouse, we’re getting married, and soon. You are my bright particular star not some dashed sapphire. Now, kiss me again.”
Epilogue
FROM THE MORNING CHRONICLE
LONDON, THURSDAY 21st MAY, 1818
An extraordinary incident occurred last Friday at the Regent’s Canal. During final work on the Islington Tunnel, a navigation man employed by the Regent’s Canal Company, Josiah Dadderidge, retrieved an article from the mud near the east portal of the tunnel. Mr Dadderidge, being a respectable man of good character, at once informed the Clerk of the Regent’s Canal Company, Mr Edwards, of his discovery. Mr Edwards took possession of said article and upon closer inspection, ascertained that it was a hat pin belonging to A Lady.
Since he had no means of discerning its value or the identity of the owner, the pin clearly having lain undiscovered for some time, Mr Edwards conveyed the item to Bow Street, in the hope rather than expectation that it be restored to its rightful owner, who, he feared, might have suffered great distress at its loss, it being most certainly unique. The pin was indeed of a most unusual design, being fashioned in the style of cornflowers, and whether due to this circumstance or some other, a gentleman from the Home Office, of whom we have no record of his name but who was, by various accounts, a most distinguished man of military bearing, called in Bow Street upon hearing news of the pin. Although he could offer no explanation as to how the pin had been lost, he professed to know the true owner and described it in such intimate detail as to convince the Chief Magistrate of the veracity of his assertion.
In a further astonishing development, we understand that when the gentleman informed the Lady of the pin’s recovery, and offered to return it into her keeping, she expressed her surprise and pleasure at its retrieval, but instructed him to place the pin for sale at auction, it being, in fact, the setting for a valuable and extremely handsome jewel, and to donate the proceeds of said auction to the Governors of the Foundling Hospital, to use as they saw fit. The Unknown Lady further instructed that Mr. Dadderidge and Mr. Edwards each receive a reward of £50 for their honesty and consideration.
The gem will be therefore placed for sale by auction in due course, and because of its rarity, is expected to realize a considerable sum. It has been remarked that the extraordinary benevolence of this Lady and the strange circumstances surrounding the loss and discovery of this valuable gem have no equal and, whilst we cannot but wonder at the secrets that remain around this singular event, it is to be hoped the sale funds will bring forward beneficial effects for the unfortunate, deserted children at the Foundling Hospital.
THE END
Author’s Note
Dear Friends,
I hope you’ve enjoyed Theo and Sophie’s story. Here are a few behind-the-scenes facts you may find interesting…
The Bath Road was one of the great main roads in England. The road came into existence casually, on no determined plan and encroaching only here and there on the ancient Roman way to Bath. Only when turnpike tolls and road improvements began in the early 18th century did it really resemble a road. By late Georgian and Regency periods, the coaching age was at its peak and the Bath Road was busy with mail coaches, stage coaches, private post chaises, gigs, farm carts and travellers on horseback.
Bath was then the most fashionable place outside London. Every sick person, invalid and hypochondriac who could afford it also went to Bath to drink or bathe in the famous waters. Turnpike gates (or pikes as they were known) were private trusts set up to collect road tolls to pay for maintenance. They were more frequent nearer to towns. Posting houses and coaching inns sprang up along the route to cater for travellers, as did smaller ale-houses and inns.
Some of these coaching inns feature in Three Secrets and a Scandal. The White Hart no longer exists but in 1817 it was one of the main inns in Bath and had most of the coaching traffic. The Castle Inn in Marlborough is now part of Marlborough College, but in previous years it was the home of the Earl of Hertford. It was one of the largest and most fashionable inns on the Bath Road. The Pelican Inn at Speenhamland, just outside Newbury, was perhaps the most celebrated inn on the route. It was well known to every traveller.
Portions of the original Bath road still exist, updated and improved of course. It was renamed the A4 in 1922. Much of the route is now paralleled by the M4 motorway which carries the bulk of long distance traffic from London to the west of England and back, leaving the A4 primarily for local traffic.
The Angel Inn at Islington was situated on the outskirts of London, at the start of the Great North Road. The original Angel was built in 1639, on the site of Islington High Street. Replaced in 1819, and again at the turn of the 20th century, it remained an inn until 1921, when it opened as a restaurant and café. In 1998 it once again became an inn and continues to the present day.
The Regent’s canal runs across an area just north of central London. It links the Paddington arm of the Grand Union canal in the west of the city to the Limehouse Basin and the River Thames in east London. Work began in October 1812 and the first section opened in 1816. The section containing the 886 metre (969 yard) long Islington tunnel opened four years later in 1820. Originally built to transport goods from the River Thames to the larger canal network, the Regent’s canal is used today for pleasure cruising and the towpath has become a busy cycle route for commuters into London.
All the characters in Three Secrets and a Scandal are fictitious and the product of my imagination, but Luc Grey is loosely based on an intelligence officer, also heir to a barony, who fought a very unusual war in the Peninsular. He often worked exclusively for Wellington behind enemy lines and on one occasion with the safety of the whole army dependent on his expertise. His diaries display him as a modest man of tremendous courage and vision, as well as thoughtful, enterprising and intelligent.
With warmest wishes,
Elizabeth
Thank You
Thank you for reading!
For the story of how Darius meets his match, read book 3 in the Regency Secrets and Scandals series – The Secret Duke (coming soon)
If you’d like to know when my next book will be available, check out my website at www.elizabethhanbury.com
Find me on line at:
@Liz_Hanbury
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Three Secrets and a Scandal (Regency Secrets and Scandals Book 2) Page 24