To Claim the Long-Lost Lover

by Jude Knight

  Here, in their sanctuary, they could share their day, and enjoy the insights of the other, laughing over trials that seemed far more tolerable when shared with a dearest friend.

  Today, Sarah was silent as Charlotte made an entertaining story out of a visit to a school on the edges of the slums of St Giles. Sarah’s mind wasn’t on it. She needed to tell Charlotte what she decided, and for once, she could not predict her sister’s reaction.

  Charlotte noticed, of course. She trailed off, her changeable hazel eyes—so much more interesting than Sarah’s pale blue—sparkling gold in the candlelight as she put her head to one side. “You have something on your mind, Sarah. What is it?”

  Sarah’s huff of laughter acknowledged her twin’s insight. “I do have something to say, but it can wait until you finish your story. What did Matron say next?”

  Charlotte waved off her own punchline with an impatient gesture. “I made my point, darling, as I’m sure you already knew. Matron knows she must rethink her opinions on the superfluity of mathematics for a child from the slums, even those who are as brilliant as young Tony Tweedy. Either that, or she will be seeking another position.” She waved an expansive hand. “The stage is yours, Lady Sarah.”

  Now that the moment had come, Sarah wasn’t sure which of her rehearsed approaches to take. No. This was Charlotte. They might be different in appearance, temperament and interests, but Charlotte was her other self. The persuasive techniques she had learned to manage slum lords and society ladies had no place here.

  “I wish to marry,” she said, bluntly.

  Charlotte’s eyes widened. “I did not know you had met anyone you favoured.”

  Sarah shook her head. “I have not.” She leaned across the space between their chairs and took her sister’s hand. “I want Elias to have a father and a place in Society, Charlotte. I want...” She looked at her hands. “I want him to have brothers and sisters. I want what cousin Sophia has—to hold my own new born baby in my arms...” Her voice trailed off.

  Charlotte squeezed her hand. “I understand. And I suppose the latest family news made it worse.”

  Sarah nodded. The first time she had seen Jamie’s and Sophia’s new little girl—cuddled in the arms of her mother with her father hovering, unable to take his proud and doting eyes from the pair of them—she had wanted a painter to capture that moment. Perfect love. The kind of family Uncle James’s children had apparently enjoyed, but that she and Sarah had never known. Since then, she had been yearning to be one of the chief actors in her own family portrait.

  Not that she was unhappy with Elias. Her little boy was the sweetest and cleverest child in the world. One of the worst things about London was that the hours they enjoyed together in Oxfordshire were diminished to minutes here and there through the day in the townhouse’s nursery.

  But she wanted more.

  The determination that had been growing for months had recently been fuelled when she discovered that Sophia expected to present Jamie with another child later this year, and that cousin Ruth, married nine months ago to the Earl of Ashbury, was already expecting an interesting addition.

  “It will have to be the right sort of person. And even if you find someone who will become father to your son and keep your secret, people will talk,” Charlotte warned.

  Sarah shrugged. “As Uncle James says, people can talk all they like, but if they can’t prove anything, and if the leaders of Society accept him, the scandal will disappear.”

  There would be difficulties, finding someone the chief among them. The right person needed to be tolerant, supportive, respectful of women, understanding of a youthful mistake with consequences. If I am unable to find such a paragon in Society, I will have to look outside.

  Even once she discovered suitable candidates, she would need to audition them very carefully. If they refused what she asked of them, she could not marry them. After that, their silence and their co-operation would be imperative.

  “Darling, what of Nate?” Charlotte asked.

  “I have to believe he is dead,” Sarah said. “He has been gone seven years, Charlotte. In all that time, he has never tried to contact me. If he is still alive, he doesn’t want me. Elfingham said he took money to leave me, and at first I thought he lied, but seven years, Charlotte!”

  Charlotte nodded. She, more than anyone, knew that their brother had been unreliable. “Very well,” Charlotte said, settling herself back on her cushions and picking up her pen and the pad of paper on which she had been making notes. “Let us make a plan.”

  2

  In the end, Nate didn’t head off to London the next morning. When he went up to the nursery to say farewell to his little half-sisters, his stepmother was thrilled to hear he was intending to sample the Marriage Mart. He made no mention of Sarah Winderfield, because he didn’t want his father casting any caltrops in his way.

  Lady Lechton took his arm and left the nursery with him, rattling away as they walked with a list of reasons why he could not go straight away or alone.

  “You will need somewhere to stay—an appropriate address is essential. New clothes, Nate.”

  Nate was only half listening, but he curbed his impatience to be off. It had taken him a fortnight to convince the timid lady to call him Nate, and he’d no wish to frighten her by cutting her conversation short.

  “You dress for comfort,” she continued, “which is all very well here in the country, but will not do in Town. Introductions to the proper people, people who will send you invitations. That’s very important, Nate. They will be pleased to have you, I can assure you, once they know you are eligible. Young men are much in demand, and handsome young men who are in line for a title… well.”

  She frowned a little, opened her mouth, shot a nervous look at Nate, and closed it again.

  “Go on, Libby,” he encouraged her. “What terrible flaw have you noticed that I must needs amend to be acceptable to a suitable lady?”

  “Well…” She chewed on her lower lip, examining him with anxious eyes. “You have not been much in Society, Nate,” she offered, eventually.

  Nate was trying to work out what she was driving at when his father spoke from the door to what he misleadingly called his study—a room in which he drank brandy and slept in front of the fire. “She’s right, for once. You are too free and easy, Bentham. You’ve no idea how to go on in the Beau Monde. And you don’t have the right connections. No friends from school or that sort of thing.”

  No, because his father had tutored him at home, reneged on the promise to send him to Oxford in order to keep him as an unpaid secretary, and then when the Duke of Winshire had him abducted, signed him over to the untender mercies of the navy.

  “I was at school with some of Society’s important hostesses, Lechton,” Libby said, her soft voice meek and apologetic. “If we were to go to London with Lord Bentham—”

  Lord Lechton interrupted her with a rude snort. “I see your game,” he told his wife, scowling. “You think to jaunt up to Town, do you? And spend my money on fripperies, I suppose.” He began to shake his head, and Nate spoke quickly, before the old tyrant refused Libby what she clearly saw as a treat. Once he’d spoken, he’d not renege. So much for escaping his father’s presence. Libby’s case is worse than mine. She was stuck with the man until death did them part.

  Nate smiled broadly. “What an excellent idea, Libby. Using your connections, I should soon have invitations to places I can meet my future bride, and I’m sure you can counsel me on my manners and dress, too.”

  Lechton was purpling. Time to apply a little flattery. No, a lot of flattery—applying it with a shovel rather than a trowel would be no more than the earl considered his due. Nor would he note the barb Nate buried in the compliment.

  “My lord, I know you will agree, for you have mentioned her ladyship’s useful connections to me before. What great foresight you showed in choosing a bride who could be of such assistance to your heir, especially since I was unable to complete my
own education as a gentleman.”

  The earl’s scowl deepened. For a moment, Nate thought he had misjudged Lechton’s acuity, so he was relieved rather than annoyed when the earl grumbled, “You’d be married already, and likely have given me a grandson by now, if you’d paid more attention to your duties and less to making up to that girl. Instead, here you are, barely more than a savage, and now I have to go to the expense of a London Season for a woman who can’t even give me sons. You are a great disappointment to me, Bentham. Beyond a doubt I need to go to London to make sure you don’t marry to disoblige me.”

  He turned his glower on Libby. “Lady Lechton, you shall need to dress to reflect credit on me. You shall have a strict budget, and I shall expect an accounting.”

  Libby was glowing. Nate had considered her a dowdy sort of a creature, but her delight at the thought of a Season in London made her almost pretty. “Oh, yes, my lord. I shall be most prudent, my lord. You are very kind, my lord.” Three ‘my lord’s’ in a row, and nary a mention that the money with which Lechton planned to be parsimonious had come from Libby’s dowry. Not for the first time, Nate wondered what had made Libby and her family accept the much older and poorer Earl of Lechton as a suitor. Lust for a title? If so, she was paying a heavy price, poor lady.

  He shrugged the mystery off. None of his business, but if he could make Libby’s burden a little lighter, he would do it. “When shall we leave, then?” he asked, and resigned himself to the wait when Lord Lechton decreed another week to allow the townhouse in London to be opened, and to prepare to move the entire household, nursery, servants and all.

  * * *

  The twin’s list grew through November. Society was greeting those returning to the capital as Parliament began its sessions after the summer recess. Sarah and Charlotte attended entertainments carefully chosen to meet as many suitable gentlemen as possible. After each event, they added names, though they also crossed some out. They wrote notations against every potential candidate they encountered.

  “Hythe is probably not ready to set up his nursery,” Sarah said, after meeting the earl in question at a dinner party. She wrote this next to his name. That done, probably was not certainly. He stayed on the list.

  “Aldridge probably is ready to set up his nursery,” Charlotte noted. The cross through Aldridge’s name had been the subject of some debate. The twins agreed that the Duke of Haverford’s terminal illness meant his heir, the Marquis of Aldridge, must be in need of a bride, but otherwise disputed his suitability for Sarah.

  Charlotte argued that Sarah was not seeking a love match, and that Aldridge met all her specifications for a husband. “He would be a kind, courteous, and respectful husband, Sarah. He is not out for your money or your social position—he has more than enough of both. You get on well with his mother. And they have so much scandal of their own that they’re hardly likely to cavil at yours.”

  Sarah countered with all of the marquis’s well-known character flaws, and then won the argument with a sneak attack. “Besides, while I do not want a husband who loves me, nor do I want one who has been dangling after my sister these past four years. He wants you, Charlotte, not me. Besides, even if I was prepared for the embarrassment of being married to a man who loves my sister, I doubt if Aldridge is going to accept such a substitution.”

  Charlotte shook her head. “It is not love. It can’t be. I appear to be a suitable bride for a man of his rank. That is all. But I am not, Sarah. You know I am not.”

  “I know nothing of the kind.” Sarah enfolded her sister in an embrace. “I shall not hound you, my love. But neither shall I marry Aldridge.”

  Someone would. It should be Charlotte, but Sarah understood the reasons for her sister’s reservations, and would say no more. “What of Lord Colyford?” she asked. “I have no objection to a widower, and I have seen his little girls at the park. They appear delightful.”

  “I’ll put him on the list,” Charlotte agreed. “Hurley? He seems pleasant enough.”

  “He can go on the list,” Sarah decided, “but I remain to be convinced he has substance to go with his charm.”

  They added a couple more names and crossed out that of a man who had over-imbibed at Lady Forrest’s musical evening. Apparently, he was developing a reputation for becoming drunk and assaulting the maids.

  “What are you planning to wear tonight?” Charlotte asked.

  “I thought my blue satin-striped sarsenet with the Vandyke lace collar and cuffs.”

  Charlotte nodded. “That will go well with my green and white muslin with the satin trim.”

  The sisters usually co-ordinated their toilettes. They were well aware of managing the impact they made together. Since their cousins Ruth and Rosemary arrived in time for the 1812 Spring Season, the four of them had appeared as an ensemble: colours, designs and fabrics carefully chosen so that each complemented the others.

  They had been a sensation. Some wit had dubbed them the Four Winds—an obvious allusion to their shared surname, and the foolish swains of Society made a fashion of declaring for one Wind or another, and plying her with compliments, flowers, and charm. Nothing serious. Just frivolous fun. Sarah and Charlotte had not been looking for husbands, and Ruth and Rosemary had their mixed-blood as a counterweight to their status as daughters to a duke and their generous dowries.

  Ruth had found love last year, but not in London. With her marriage just after Christmas, they were down to three remaining Winds. Two, at the moment, since Rosemary was still in the country, and had no plans to join them until the early Spring next year. What would the wits make of that?

  Tonight was another dinner, with cards, music, and perhaps a little dancing after. “We should send for our maids,” Sarah suggested. “Drew is escorting us, which is good of him. We should not keep him waiting.” Their cousin Drew and their uncle, the Duke of Winshire, were the only other members of the family in Town so far. Drew declared himself happy to play escort. Truly, though, the two of them only needed one another. They had never had the chance to be wide-eyed debutantes, and had reached their majority two years ago.

  Indeed, they might be considered at their last prayers, except they were nieces of a duke and well-dowered. Sarah wondered if word was out that she was ready to consider offers for her hand. Perhaps she should mention it in confidence to a couple of well-known gossips.

  No. Given her specific requirements, she would continue on the course she and Charlotte had chosen.

  “You make a start, darling,” she told her sister. “I shall just pop up to the nursery to kiss Elias goodnight. I shall miss him so when we leave for the house party. We have not been apart for a whole week since he came to live with me in April, and the house party will last two.”

  “It is for a good cause, Sarah. Three of your top contenders will be in residence.”

  Sarah agreed that the house party would be ideal for getting to know three of her suitors in a relaxed atmosphere. They all appeared to be nice men, and if she had no particular enthusiasm for any one of them, the fault lay with her, surely. Her capacity to love, to even feel desire, had been destroyed before she even made her debut.

  She had to keep reminding herself that the goal was worth the sacrifice of her time and energy. This whole husband hunt was tedious, and she’d be glad when it was over and she could get down to being as good a wife as she could manage, and a loving and committed mother.

  * * *

  November was half over before the Lechtons were settled in London, in a townhouse not quite in the best part of town, with opulent public rooms, dowdy private chambers and spartan appointments in the servants’ quarters and the utility areas.

  As expected, Lechton disappeared to his club, after instructing his wife not to overspend the meagre budget she had been allowed to refurbish her wardrobe. But when Nate offered to remonstrate with the old pinchpenny, Libby stopped him.

  “Oh no, Nate. I know just what to do, you’ll see. Now, you take down these addresses and go and or
der your own new clothes.”

  Nate obeyed orders, though he drew the line when the artists she sent him to tried to impose extremes of fashion on him. He wanted a collar that would allow him to turn his head, and a jacket that did not take three men to pour him into.

  Libby demanded he display his purchases, and was pleased to approve them, assuring him she did not expect him to be part of the dandy set.

  Meanwhile, after an excursion to an emporium that sold fabric and trimmings, Libby and her maid managed to turn out several ensembles that even Nate could see were very becoming. And when he escorted her two afternoons later to leave her card at the homes of the ladies she remembered from school, several of them were pleased to receive an old friend. More than one asked how she managed to turn out dressed in the height of fashion when she had been mouldering in the wilds of Oxfordshire.

  The visits that day and the next achieved all that Nate could hope for. As Libby predicted, an earl’s heir without a wife and with all his wits and his teeth could depend upon a steady stream of invitations, even if he was quietly dressed and a little rough around the edges.

  Furthermore, without even being prompted, Libby asked who was in London, and who might be expected to be holding entertainments. Nate listened closely, but when the Duke of Winshire was mentioned, it was only to say that the ducal family had not yet arrived in Town.

  Nate had been foolish to hope that he would find Sarah this first week. Just as well to have time to practice my Society manners and find my feet in her world, he consoled himself.

  With that in mind, he dressed carefully for his first dinner invitation. He was escorting Libby yet again; the Earl having eschewed the event in favour of ‘an evening with friends’. Since the man didn’t gamble and barely drank, Nate wondered if he had found a mistress. The man claimed to be moral, but he in every other way aped the fashionable elite. Either a mistress, or he preferred the company of his cronies at his club.