by Mary Balogh
“You will not be hearing from me,” Jasper said firmly. “Soon I will be at Cedarhurst-with Charlotte. And by next year I will have made appropriate arrangements for her come-out that will not in any way involve Lady Forester or inconvenience you.”
“God damn it all,” the old gentleman said, “I hope so. I sincerely hope so, Montford. I have no particularly avuncular feelings for Charlotte, but I would not wish any girl upon those two fools-unless there is no alternative. Good day to you.”
Jasper made his bow and left.
What must Miss Huxtable be suffering this morning?… What of her?
Charlotte’s words echoed in his head.
What, indeed?
He was, he supposed, going to find out pretty soon.
But another voice replaced Charlotte’s in his head, and try as he would he could not dislodge it as he walked. The words kept repeating themselves over and over-in the voice of Katherine Huxtable.
I want him to be very special. Heart of my heart, soul of my soul… I have never yet been able to persuade myself to settle for less.
He was about to attempt to persuade her to settle for considerably less.
To borrow a phrase from Seth Wrayburn-God damn it all to hell.
Katherine was in her bedchamber when Stephen came back home soon after noon. She was sorting through drawers. A maid would pack her things later-and Margaret’s. They were going home to Warren Hall tomorrow-back to peace and sanity. She could hardly wait.
She ought never to have come. She would certainly not come again. Not for a long, long time, anyway. The thought cheered her.
Margaret was sitting on the side of the bed, watching. They were not doing much talking. But there was comfort in being together.
Margaret too had said she wanted to go home, that she longed for it, pined for it, was only really happy when she was there, would never want to leave again once she was home.
The fact that it was Stephen’s home and that he was all but grown up and would surely take a wife and start a family within the next ten years at the longest was not spoken between them. Certain bridges were best crossed when one arrived at them.
Neither of them had yet written to Miss Wrayburn to excuse themselves from attending her house party in August. It would be done before they left tomorrow, though.
Stephen had gone with Elliott and Vanessa, doubtless to confer on what was to be done about the scandal. Katherine did not care what they decided. There really was nothing to be done. He was looking very pale when he appeared in the doorway of the bedchamber after tapping on the door and being bidden to come in.
Katherine smiled at him and continued to kneel on the floor, the contents of a lower drawer of the dressing table in piles about her.
“Monty-Montford found us rather than the other way around,” Stephen said. “He came to Elliott’s.”
Katherine sat back on her heels.
“I do not suppose he is amused by all this,” she said.
She hoped he was not. She had no illusions about him, but she did not believe he was a totally conscienceless rogue. She had had proof of that three years ago.
“It was as much as I could do,” Stephen said, his hands curling into fists at his sides, “to keep from planting him a facer, but I was at Vanessa’s house and our niece and nephew’s house and it would not have been at all the thing.”
“Besides,” Margaret said, “this was all Sir Clarence Forester’s doing, Stephen. Try as I will, I cannot be sorry that you punched him in the nose. I so hope it is still sore.”
“Apparently,” Stephen said, stepping inside the room, “it is twice its normal size, and both his eyes have turned black.”
“Good,” Margaret said fiercely. “Oh, and I always thought I was a pacifist.”
“Kate.” Stephen turned his attention on her and drew an audible breath. “He wants to call on you here this afternoon.”
“Sir Clar-?” Her eyes widened. “Lord Montford?”
“I would far prefer to plant him a facer,” he said. “And Elliott would far prefer to slap a glove in his face and run him through with a rapier. He said it to his face, too. But the thing is, Kate, that neither of those things can be done without making things ten times worse for you. It would be assumed that the lies Forester has spread were the truth. Elliott pointed that out when I had Montford by the throat, and I had to agree with him when I stopped to consider. It was strange, come to think of it, that Monty did not try to defend himself.”
Katherine got slowly to her feet and brushed out her skirt.
“Why is he coming here?” she asked. “To apologize? It is three years too late for that. It is Sir Clarence who should be apologizing, anyway, but if you ever let him come within one mile of me, Stephen, I’ll-”
She could not quite think what she would do, but it would certainly be something quite violent and quite unladylike. And she was a pacifist too.
“He is coming to make you an offer, Kate,” Stephen said.
“What?”
“Oh, no, Stephen!”
She and Margaret had spoken simultaneously.
“You are allowing him to come here-into your own home, to offer for me, Stephen?” Katherine said, her voice on the edge of hysteria. “Elliott is allowing him to come?”
His face and his voice were clouded with youthful misery.
“The thing is, Kate,” he said, “that it is the only thing that would set everything right. The gossips would be satisfied if Monty were seen to do the right and honorable thing. And they would have nothing else to say about you if you were married to him.”
Katherine inhaled sharply.
“And I am to give up my freedom,” she said, “and marry a r-rake just to satisfy the gossips? I am to win back respectability by stooping so low and ensuring my own lifelong misery? A respectability I have done nothing to forfeit? And you condone such warped reasoning?”
“Oh, Stephen,” Margaret said, “you cannot have permitted Lord Montford to call here on such an errand. Not after what he did to Kate-or tried to do-three years ago when none of us were here to defend her. You cannot. And Elliott cannot have done so. I do not believe it.”
“The thing is that he has been dangling after Kate again this year,” Stephen said. “I cannot see that there has been anything improper about it. I would have said something if I had thought so. So would you, Meg. Nessie would have said something, and Elliott certainly would. And there has been nothing improper in the way Kate has allowed him to dance with her and walk with her and sit with her. I actually thought a courtship was developing, and I was pleased about it, God help me, because Monty was my friend and I didn’t think his reputation signified if he had fallen for someone as good as Kate. But they really have been favoring each other and everyone has noticed. You noticed, Meg. But what looked innocent and even romantic before last evening suddenly looks different in light of what happened, or nearly happened three years ago.”
“You cannot believe, Stephen,” Margaret said, and she was on her feet too now, “that Kate has ever done anything whatsoever that is improper. I have spent time with the Marquess of Allingham this year because we have a former acquaintance and like each other. Is there gossip about that? Am I now expected to marry him or risk ruin and ostracism?”
“Allingham has an impeccable reputation, Meg,” he said with a sigh. “Besides, he has never made a wager that he could seduce and ruin you.”
“I do not want to see Lord Montford,” Katherine said decisively. “My answer is no. You can inform him of that, Stephen, and save him the effort of coming here. I daresay he will be vastly relieved. So will I when the carriage has left London behind tomorrow.”
He ran the fingers of one hand through his hair, leaving his curls more rumpled than ever.
“I knew you would refuse,” he said, “and I don’t blame you. I would in your place. I told Elliott you would refuse, and he said of course you would. But the thing is that perhaps you ought at least to see Monty an
d listen to what he has to say. If it is known that he made the offer but that you refused, then perhaps things will look a little better for you. I am not sure they will, but-”
“I am not interested in things looking better,” she said. “I am not interested in things at all, Stephen. And I do not care what anyone thinks. I want to go home. I want my life back. I want to forget that any of this happened.”
“But it did happen,” he said. “And I don’t think you will forget. I doubt anyone else will either.”
“Kate.” Margaret had sat back down. She was paler than ever. “Stephen and Elliott are right, you know. You have done no wrong in any of this. We know it. But the truth does not seem to matter in this new world we moved into three years ago when Stephen inherited the title. Only respectability matters. Lose that, and it seems you lose everything. Perhaps you ought to see Lord Montford and listen to his offer and then refuse it. Elliott has considerable influence. Good heavens, he is a duke. And Stephen is an earl. Together they can put it about that you behaved with the utmost propriety but that you had the courage to declare your innocence of all wrongdoing and to refuse to take the easy way out. They can put it about that you have withdrawn to the country in righteous indignation rather than that you have crept off there in disgrace. I daresay you will not ever want to come back here-I am sure I will not-but at least you will leave the door open for a return if ever you should want it.”
Katherine gazed reproachfully at her.
“Besides,” Margaret added, “if you refuse to receive Lord Montford, Kate, it might be perceived that Elliott and Stephen could not bring him up to scratch, that they were unable to defend your honor as they ought.”
“And they defend my honor by marrying me to a heartless scoundrel?” Katherine said.
She was being unfair. He was not that. It was Sir Clarence Forester who deserved that description.
But her brother and sister had said their piece, it seemed, and had nothing to add. They looked at her, both faces still pale with misery.
And all this was not just about her, Katherine realized suddenly. This was about all of them. Even if she could go slinking off back to Warren Hall, or even all the way back to Throckbridge and somehow pick up her life where she had left it off there soon after Valentine’s Day more than three years ago-and it was a big if-but even if it could be done, she would be leaving Meg and Stephen and Nessie to live with the consequences of this horrible scandal.
And she was not entirely blameless.
Her family was, though.
She still could not see quite how she could help her family by seeing Lord Montford this afternoon. She really, really did not want to do it. She never wanted to see him again.
But Stephen thought she ought. So did Elliott.
And so did Meg.
“Very well, then.” She looked defiantly from Meg to Stephen. “I will receive Lord Montford this afternoon and I will listen to what he has to say. I will say one word in reply-no! But I will see him.”
“I do think you ought,” Stephen said. “Though my knuckles still itch to go at his face.”
“Kate,” Meg said, twisting her hands in her lap. “Oh, Kate, I let you down. I ought to have stayed with you in London three years ago, and what happened then would not have happened. Neither would everything that has happened this year.”
Katherine closed the distance between them, grabbed her sister about the shoulders, and hugged her tightly.
“Meg,” she said, “you have been the best of sisters. The very best. I am not going to have you blaming yourself, even if I have to marry Lord Montford to prevent it.”
Not that it was going to come to that.
But the very idea of Meg trying to shoulder the blame, as she always did when something threatened any one of them!
13
IT had occurred to Jasper that since Merton had not yet reached his majority, it might be more to the point to speak to his guardian first. But when he had arrived at Moreland House late in the morning, he had found the two men together.
It was just as well. It had been a dashed uncomfortable interview, but at least it did not have to be repeated once it was over.
No punches had been thrown and no gauntlet dashed in his face, though both men had looked murderous enough and Merton had grabbed him by the neck when he first appeared in the ducal library and raised his fist. Jasper had expected a bulbous nose to match Clarence’s-and had had no right to defend himself, by Jove.
The ensuing interview had been brief, hostile, deuced uncomfortable, and relatively civil. And the result of it was the afternoon call he was about to make.
Was there any way he could have predicted all this twenty-four hours ago? Would that damned weasel have dared open his mouth last night if he had gone to that infernal soiree instead of leaving the field clear for Katherine Huxtable-who also had not been there?
But dash it all, there had been rumblings of gossip even before Clarence had orchestrated them to a veritable roar.
Hell and damnation! His mind followed up that mild beginning by dredging up every foul word and phrase he had ever heard or uttered. When he had covered the list, he went back through it again for good measure.
He felt not one whit better when he arrived outside Merton House.
He half expected that he would be tossed from the door by some burly footman hired for that express purpose and that that would be that-reprieve, freedom, and a guilt that would doubtless nag at him for at least the next decade or two.
Damnation!
When had he developed a conscience? At Vauxhall on a certain memorable occasion? It was a dashed uncomfortable thing. He did not like it at all.
He was not tossed from the door or even informed politely that he must go away as Miss Katherine Huxtable had decided not to see him within the next billion years or so.
He was admitted and shown into the library just as if this were any afternoon social call-the same library where he had seen her for the first time in years when she had let herself into the room to greet Con.
A fateful evening, that. If he had not accepted Merton’s invitation to come here for a drink… If she had stayed upstairs and been content to wait a day or so before seeing Con… But fate had been playing one of its fiendish little games. He might as well add that if he had not invited his friends back to his house on his twenty-fifth birthday, then he would not be here now.
And if his father had not met his mother… Or his grandfathers his grandmothers…
But there was no time to go all the way back to Adam and Eve with his reflections upon the vagaries of fate, and no time to collect his thoughts and rehearse one more time the words he must speak. He discovered in some surprise that she was in the room before him.
Alone.
She was standing in front of one of the long windows, between the desk and one of the bookcases-in almost the exact spot, in fact, where he had stood that evening, feeling rather like a rat caught in a trap. She was not even standing with her back to the room, pretending to admire the view. She was facing the door. Her eyes were fixed steadily on him.
She was dressed in white muslin, an unfortunate choice today, perhaps, as it offered no contrast to her pale complexion. Her hair had been brushed ruthlessly back from her face and twisted into a knot behind her head.
She certainly did not look like a lady preparing to receive her suitor.
She held her hands clasped loosely in front of her. She did not smile.
Of course she did not smile.
She did not say anything either.
It was all a trifle disconcerting.
He advanced farther into the room.
“One thing I have to admit about Clarence Forester,” he said, “is that he has a certain degree of intelligence. He always did. He always knew unerringly just how best to avenge himself against any insult or worse I happened to toss his way. He is, in fact, quite ruthlessly vicious.”
“Lord Montford,” she said, “let me save
you time. My answer is no-unequivocally and irreversibly.”
“Is it?” He took a couple of steps closer.
“You have done the honorable thing,” she said. “You called upon my brother and brother-in-law this morning, and now you have called upon me. A proposal of marriage is to follow, I understand. It may remain unspoken. My answer is no.”
“Ah,” he said. “You will not allow me to make amends, then.”
“There has been nothing this year for which to make amends,” she said. “I have danced with you-once. At a ball, where the whole purpose was for ladies and gentlemen to dance with each other. I have received you and your sister with my own sister and brother in my brother’s drawing room here. I have walked with you-once-in Hyde Park with our relatives. I have sat talking with you in a glass pavilion at a garden party, whose primary function was that guests converse with one another in the setting of the garden.”
She had been counting off their meetings on the fingers of one hand.
“Ah,” he said, “but there was also Vauxhall three years ago.”
“Where nothing happened,” she said, jerking her chin higher. “You need not make amends for that, Lord Montford. We both know that I was not innocent in that sordid encounter.”
“Because you would have capitulated to the practiced arts of an experienced and determined seducer?” he said. “You were as innocent as a newborn babe, Miss Huxtable. You must allow me…”
“I was twenty years old,” she said. “I knew the difference between right and wrong. I knew that what was happening was wrong. I knew you were a notorious rake. I chose to ignore what was right because I wanted the excitement and self-gratification of what was wrong. The wager was… disgusting. Naming me as its victim was more so. But I might have said no as soon as you offered me your arm when we were on the grand avenue with the others. I did not say no either then or later, and so I am as guilty as you. You do not have to make amends. You may go away now, satisfied in the knowledge that you have at least done what society demands of you today.”