The Honourable Earl

by Mary Nichols

  ‘How dare you!’ she exclaimed in a strangled whisper.

  ‘Now, I would have expected you to be thanking me…’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘For saving you from making a terrible mistake.’

  ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘Oh, I think you do. Sir Arthur is not your father, that much we established long ago, but he is conducting you about with a proprietorial air which, added to the rumour that he is thinking of marrying again, I find very disturbing.’

  ‘Why should you be disturbed? It is none of your business.’

  ‘Do you mean to tell me you want to be married to that…that… Words fail me.’

  She laughed, in spite of herself. ‘Then it must be the very first time.’

  ‘Do you?’ he asked quietly.

  She made the mistake of looking up into his face and saw those deep, dark eyes, looking down at her with a softness that completely unnerved her. Her heart began to beat uncomfortably in her throat and it was difficult to get any words out. ‘Do I what?’ she managed, at last.

  ‘Do you want to marry Sir Arthur?’

  ‘He has yet to ask me.’

  ‘Good. I arrived in the nick of time.’

  ‘But I believe he will do so before the evening is out.’

  ‘That is not an answer to my question. Do you want to marry him?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said defiantly.

  He leaned forward to put his mouth close to her ear, so that his warm breath sent shivers tingling through her abdomen and down her legs almost to her toes and, for the second time that evening, she stumbled over her own feet. ‘Liar!’ he whispered.

  She hated him, she told herself, hated him with every fibre of her and the tingling sensation coursing through her body was fury. But she could not forget what he was like before she found out who he was. Which was his real self? The devil or the handsome nabob? But this devil did not have horns and a tail, this devil had a smooth tongue and searching eyes and it could see right into her heart and make it beat faster or slower at will. What had gone through his mind when he discovered who she was? When had he made that discovery? Had he known her identity all along? Had he been playing with her, as he was playing with her now?

  But each of their meetings had been by chance. He could not have known she would be at that lecture or have foreseen her coming out of Sir Arthur’s house, or expected her to be walking through the woods on a wet day. He had not engineered the encounters; they had all been the hand of a cruel fate. Cruel because she could not get him out of her head; her brain simmered with angry thoughts of him, mixed inexplicably with a kind of longing she could not understand and would not allow her to settle.

  He could see her uncertainty in her hazel eyes. What was she thinking? He was prepared to swear it was not of Sir Arthur. Was she reliving that encounter in the wood? It was one he would dearly like to forget. But he could not. He had only to shut his eyes and he could see again her creamy breasts rising and falling, and what he had so nearly done choked him and filled him with shame. He must have been mad. If only he could put the clock back ten years, ten days even. But ten days would make no difference. She was still who she was and you did not fall in love with your mortal enemy. But who had made her his enemy? She had. He did not want her for an enemy. Was she really going to marry Sir Arthur?

  He found himself, against his will, feeling sorry for her. Her father’s death and her brother’s banishment must have hit her very hard at a time when she was not old enough to understand what had happened. And now she was being promised to a man of middle years with a gaggle of daughters. Why was Mrs Fostyn allowing it? That shot, that single shot from a duelling pistol had ruined so many lives. How could he maintain the feelings of hate and resentment he had harboured for so long?

  His punishment had been nothing compared with what she and her mother had suffered. He did not know what it was like to be poor and to lose the one who provided. His father had been able to send him money and he had been in a position to make it grow. But for that one thing, his life had been tolerable, if not happy. She was not happy. But what could he do about it? How could he right the wrongs perpetrated so many years ago? How could he extend her suffering by his awful behaviour?

  ‘Don’t do it,’ he said, surprising himself. ‘Don’t marry Sir Arthur Thomas-Smith.’

  She looked at him in astonishment. ‘Why not?’

  ‘He is not the man for you.’

  ‘Oh? I should have thought you would be the last person to advise me against it. After all, the sooner I am wed, the sooner you will be rid of the Fostyns from your land and will no longer be plagued by guilt every time you see one of us—’

  ‘I? Plagued by guilt?’

  ‘No, of course not,’ she amended swiftly. ‘I cannot imagine you allowing anything like guilt to creep into your heart.’

  ‘Nor compassion in yours,’ he retorted.

  The dance came to an end before she could think of a fitting reply. He bowed to her with a flourish and she sank into the deepest of curtsies, her golden gown billowing around her, and then, as he held out his hand to raise her, he realised everyone was moving into the supper room and surprised himself a second time by saying, ‘Will you do me the honour of allowing me to escort you into supper, Miss Fostyn?’

  She was taken aback and tilted her head to look at him. His face and voice were so gentle, she could almost imagine he was her umbrella man again. But he wasn’t. He was ‘that man’, her enemy. She was about to refuse when he added, ‘Please, Lydia, I must speak to you.’

  ‘What about?’ She pulled herself together sufficiently to regain her dignity, at least on the surface. ‘And I do not remember giving you permission to address me by my given name.’

  ‘Do I need permission?’ he asked softly.

  ‘If you think that what you did entitles you to familiarity, then I suggest you think again, my lord,’ she said. It was easier to be angry with him than answer his softly spoken words with politeness.

  ‘What I did?’

  ‘You know very well what I mean.’

  ‘A kiss?’

  ‘That is what you call it, is it? I call it an assault.’

  ‘It is about that I wish to speak to you. In private.’

  ‘Oh, no, you will not catch me out like that.’

  ‘Catch you out?’

  ‘Yes, if you are thinking of repeating your effrontery…’

  ‘No.’ His smile was almost a grimace. ‘I would not dream of doing so.’

  ‘Then you are worried about what I told Mama when I arrived home and whether you have to face another scandal.’

  ‘Oh.’ Now she had mentioned it, he did begin to wonder. Had she cried rape? ‘What did you tell her?’

  ‘Wouldn’t you like to know?’

  ‘If it makes any difference, I am very sorry for what happened.’

  ‘It doesn’t. Now, I think I shall let you simmer in your own evil, for a while. If you will excuse me…’ She looked round her for a way of escape because what he was doing to her peace of mind must never be allowed. She was melting, slowly dissolving under the power of those searching eyes, which were asking, almost pleading with her, for understanding, for that compassion he had said she lacked. No, that was all a sham. He did not have a sorry bone in his body or he would not have come tonight and forced her into dancing with him when it was the last thing she wanted, nor would he have made her mother humiliate herself before him in order to have a few weeks’ grace in the house they had lived in unmolested for ten years.

  Sir Arthur was bearing down on them to reclaim her. She turned to Ralph and smiled at him, a watery smile which did not reach her eyes. ‘I am sorry, my lord, but my mother and sister and I are engaged to join Sir Arthur and his sister for supper.’ She smiled at Sir Arthur and refused to look at Ralph as she was borne away.

  It was a lively crowd that gathered for a supper of capon and ham and meat pies, bread and salad, junket and fruit tarts, w
ashed down with punch. Annabelle was as happy as a lark because Anne and the Baverstocks had agreed that Peregrine might call on her and, properly chaperoned, she might attend one or two social functions with him, although they were both too young to put it on a formal footing. Even her mother was looking brighter than she had been for weeks, chatting away to Sir Arthur, for all the world as if they were already related. If her mother liked him so much, why didn’t she marry him herself? She was only a few years older than he was and she had many more years of life ahead of her.

  Oh, Lydia knew the reason well enough; Sir Arthur wanted someone young, someone who might give him the son he craved. Daughters were not enough. She, Lydia Fostyn, eighteen years old, was to be the sacrificial lamb or, more crudely, the breeding cow. She shuddered at the thought. She could not marry him, she really could not. She looked at her mother, wondering how she could tell her, and then at Annabelle, happy with her love, and knew she was going to have to go through with it.

  Sir Arthur, sitting beside her, helping her to food, was as complacent as ever. ‘My dear, tonight has not gone quite to plan,’ he said. ‘On such an occasion as this it is not possible to control events. At first I thought Lord Blackwater’s arrival was fortuitous, but now I realise it was ill-timed from our point of view; it quite threw me off my stride.’

  ‘You will regain it, I am sure,’ she murmured.

  ‘I had some further conversation with your dear mama while you were dancing with his lordship,’ he went on. ‘You are still very young and perhaps I have been a little impatient.’

  She turned to face him, her spirits suddenly lifting; was he offering a reprieve? ‘Oh, if Mama said that I am sure she did not mean that as a criticism.’

  ‘Mrs Fostyn offered no censure at all—the opposite, in fact. She said you were a little overawed by the honour I wish to bestow on you and that you needed a little more time to accustom yourself to the idea of becoming Lady Thomas-Smith.’

  Lydia was so annoyed that she felt like slapping him and telling him in tones that would leave him in no doubt that she did not view it as an honour at all, but a dire necessity, but good sense prevailed; it would hurt her mother and Annabelle if she made a scene and there would be yet another scandal to live down. ‘You are too kind,’ she murmured.

  He reached out and patted the back of her hand. ‘In view of that, I will not press you tonight. It is not a suitably romantic occasion, after all. We are here to celebrate the end of a war.’ He waved a be-ringed hand in the general direction of the company who seemed to be trying to outdo each other in jollity. ‘It is too crowded and noisy and there is nowhere where we might be private.’

  She could find no answer which would not give away her immense feeling of relief and confined herself to, ‘Thank you, sir.’

  He laughed as if it were a load off his mind, making her wonder if he had had second thoughts about her. Half of her rejoiced at the idea, the other half was dismayed because it could only mean he had found out something against her, or her family. Had he heard the story of what had happened ten years before, enhanced by repetition as it was bound to be? Or worse, gossip about her mother and the late Earl of Blackwater?

  ‘Now, my dear, do not look so melancholy,’ he said to her. ‘We may have started off on the wrong foot, but it is nothing we cannot put right. Young ladies like romantic proposals and declarations of undying love, I understand that…’

  ‘Is that what my mother said?’ Now she was fighting laughter and it was all she could do to hide it behind her fan, pretending the room was excessively hot.

  ‘Did you think I could not work that out for myself?’ he said, sounding hurt.

  ‘No, of course not, Sir Arthur. You are, I am sure, a very sensitive man.’ Her efforts to remain serious received a jolt as she looked up over her fan and saw the Earl of Blackwater regarding her with amused brown eyes from across the other side of the table where he was tackling a chicken leg. Had he heard?

  ‘We will devise another occasion,’ Sir Arthur bumbled on. ‘I will hold a musical evening and supper at my house for a select gathering of the people of Colston and Malden who have been so kind to me since my arrival in a strange town and that will be a more appropriate occasion to make an announcement.’

  ‘Sir Arthur,’ she said, with a light laugh, afraid he might detect her relief and deciding to tease him. ‘You have not yet asked for my hand…’

  ‘No, because I have been given no opportunity,’ he said solemnly. ‘But it will be done on a suitable occasion before the evening in question.’

  ‘Then I will look forward to it,’ she said, wondering if he had any sense of humour at all. ‘You shall have my answer then.’

  Supper over, he escorted her back to the ballroom for the next dance, and after that relinquished her to others. Knowing there would be no announcement that evening, she was suddenly light-hearted and she danced with several young men, including the Comte de Carlemont, the young Frenchman that Annabelle had mentioned as an alternative to Sir Arthur as a suitor.

  He was certainly handsome in his yellow coat and lace ruffles, and very charming, but she detected a certain falseness and wondered aloud what he was doing in Malden, a sleepy little town with no pretensions at all. She would have expected him to have gone to court to celebrate the end of the war.

  ‘Court gives me the ennui,’ he said airily. ‘So much ceremony and so much intrigue…’

  ‘Is there? Intrigue, I mean.’

  ‘Naturellement. So many stabbings in the back, so many assignations. It is more dangerous than war.’

  ‘In France, perhaps, but not in England, surely?’

  ‘France, England, it makes no difference.’

  ‘Have you met King George?’

  ‘Oui.’

  ‘And yet you prefer to live here?’

  ‘I ’ave what you call the connections,’ he said airily. ‘English cousins who gave me ’ospitality when I was exiled from my ’omeland on account of the war. I was staying with them and could not return.’

  ‘Will you go back now?’

  ‘Soon, perhaps. I must look after my estates.’

  ‘Where are they? Are they very extensive?’

  ‘They are in the south, where it is warm and the vines grow excellent grapes for the wines. But you will see them for yourself before the year is out. Sir Arthur ’as promised to bring you on a visit during your wedding tour.’

  ‘Has he?’ she asked in surprise. ‘I did not know you knew him well.’

  ‘Oh, we have been acquainted for some time. Business, you understand.’

  The dance came to an end and she was claimed by her next partner, but she was puzzled and intrigued. There was so much she did not know about Sir Arthur, so much she needed to know. Had he told her mother all about himself or had he held some things back, secrets he would rather keep hidden?

  ‘You know you are wasted on Sir Arthur,’ her partner said. ‘And I will happily step into the breach should you have second thoughts.’

  She laughed, knowing he didn’t mean it, but she allowed him to flirt a little and cheer her up. She was laughing at some joke he had made when she saw Ralph watching her from the doorway. His eyes seemed to bore into her, to be asking what she thought she was about. She deliberately turned her head away and whispered something to the young man, making him throw back his head and laugh aloud. Sickened, Ralph turned away, but he did not go far because the dance had come to an end and the Master of Ceremonies called for a drum roll.

  ‘My lords, ladies and gentleman,’ he said as the sound died away and everyone fell silent and turned towards him. ‘This is indeed a happy occasion. Not only are we celebrating the end of the war which has taken so many of our young men, both on land and at sea, but we give thanks for the safe return of the Squire of Colston, the Earl of Blackwater.’ He paused while everyone applauded and Ralph squirmed, wondering what the man was going to say next.

  ‘We offer our condolences in his sad bereavement,’ he went
on. ‘The late Earl was dearly loved and respected by everyone who had the privilege to know him, but we also give thanks that his son is back among us and has condescended to grace us with his presence tonight. My lords, ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Earl of Blackwater.’ He raised his glass while the company raised theirs and echoed his toast.

  Ralph, who had only intended to put in a token appearance and had changed his mind when he saw Lydia, felt obliged to answer. He stepped up on the dais on which the orchestra played so that he could look round the company and make himself heard. A sea of faces was turned up to him, all smiling, even Lydia’s, though he sensed hers was a little forced. If only he could make her smile at him in genuine pleasure… He pulled himself together to address them.

  ‘My lords, ladies and gentlemen, I thank you for your expressions of loyalty to my late parents and for your kindness to me, though to many of you I am a stranger. I am very glad to be home again and I am ready to take on the mantle of my late lamented father. I shall do my best to execute those tasks expected of me and I hope that if anyone has any problems which I can solve, he or she will not hesitate to come to me.’

  He waited for the applause to die down, then went on. ‘Finally, let me thank everyone who had a hand in making tonight such a successful occasion. I do not intend to bore you with any more speech, except to ask you to raise your glasses in a toast to peace and prosperity, the end of conflict and the beginning of forgiveness and understanding, and continuing friendship.’ He raised his glass and looked directly at Lydia as he spoke. She felt her face beneath its mask flame with such heat that she thought she would faint. Was he trying to humiliate her again? Was he telling everyone she hadn’t a forgiving bone in her body?

  ‘Why did you not tell me your gentleman was the Earl?’ Annabelle whispered beside her. ‘I nearly fainted away when he arrived and Perry told me who he was.’

  ‘He is not my gentleman.’

  ‘You gave me your fan to stop me telling Mama about him and that makes me wonder what you are trying to hide. I do believe you are only pretending to hate him.’