Harlequin Historical September 2021--Box Set 2 of 2

by Annie Burrows

  ‘Well, I certainly feel like a worm,’ said Ben gloomily.

  ‘You are a worm,’ Gem growled. And then surged to his feet and rushed at Ben, who didn’t even have time to mount a defence.

  Although, as it turned out, he didn’t need it. Far from attempting to hit him again, Gem flung his arms round Ben, hugging him and slapping him on the back at the same time.

  ‘Daisy told me what happened,’ he said. ‘That it wasn’t deliberate. Sort of thing that could happen to any chap after dipping a bit too deep.’

  How like Daisy, to be so generous. To step in and explain how they’d come to be in such an awkward situation. To prevent Gem from thinking the worst of him. When she had nothing to gain from it.

  Gem drew back, grinning. ‘Welcome to the family.’

  CHAPTER SIX

  Marguerite had watched Ben riding down the main drive not long after breakfast, his ramrod straight back set resolutely against Wattlesham Priory and all its inhabitants.

  It was rotten of Father to have thrown him out. Even though she hated the place when it was swarming with her brothers and all their friends, she knew that Ben had always loved it here. And he’d only just reconnected with Jasper after all his years away abroad with the army. It had been his first visit since...she cast her mind back...that year after the summer of the broken collar bone.

  Although, perhaps exile from the Priory was not such a dreadful penance for him, if it meant escaping a whole lifetime leg shackled to her.

  She sighed and turned from the window as he dwindled into a faint, dark smudge that merged in with the ironwork of the front gate. Ben may well have escaped that dire fate, but she still had Horace and Walter to fend off. Unless, after last night, Jasper had come to his senses and would call them off? She could but hope.

  A soft knock at her door interrupted her before she could really start planning any defensive strategies. When she opened it, she saw Vale, one of their junior footmen, standing there.

  ‘His Lordship requests your presence in his study, my lady,’ he said. Then gave her a sympathetic look before adding, ‘At once.’ He shifted his weight from one foot to the other. ‘I am to escort you there myself.’

  In other words, Father was not going to give her the chance to run off and hide somewhere and avoid the dressing down he clearly meant to give her.

  ‘Very well,’ she said. Because it would be Vale who got into trouble if she didn’t comply. And, while she wouldn’t have willingly answered such a summons, neither did she want to bring down Father’s wrath on anyone else today. It was bad enough that Ben had suffered for the episode last night.

  Perhaps once Father had vented the worst of his displeasure she might be able to get him to listen to the truth about what had happened last night. That might not only solve the problem of Horace and Walter but it might also result in him forgiving Ben for the part he’d played. For it really didn’t seem fair that Ben should pay such a heavy price for the escapade.

  Only...when had Father ever listened to anything she had to say?

  He would listen to Mother, though. Except...oh, dear, it really was too bad that she was in Mother’s black books too.

  She gave up all hope of taking that course when she reached the study and found not only Father but also Mother waiting for her. She had absolutely no chance of pleading her case to Mother in the hope she might soften Father’s heart, not now. The fact that they were both here meant they’d already discussed the matter and had reached a unanimous decision.

  She bowed her head and clasped her hands at her waist, waiting for the onslaught to begin. There was no point in making any excuses. Ben had warned her that they ought not to have got in the boat, and she hadn’t listened, and her brothers, and then her father, had punished him for what had been, essentially, her misdemeanour. She deserved whatever punishment her parents decreed.

  ‘Captain Lord Flinders,’ said Father, ‘has agreed to all my terms. You will marry him when he returns with the special licence.’

  Marguerite looked up in shock. Ben had gone to get a special licence? He was coming back? ‘M-marry him? B-but...’

  ‘He agreed with me that there is no other way to salvage your reputation.’

  Mother fumbled for a handkerchief. ‘When I think of the brilliant matches you could have made, if only you hadn’t behaved so...with such...coldness...’ she said, on a sob.

  ‘Yes,’ said Father bitterly, ‘it is a great pity, if you had to end up marrying one of your brothers’ school friends, that you couldn’t have organised it so that I hadn’t had to waste so much money on your come-out.’

  ‘Oh, no,’ said Mother plaintively. ‘It wasn’t a waste. For once I had the pleasure of showing off one of the most beautiful women in the room. It was my proudest moment to think I had produced something so lovely,’ she said, waving her damp handkerchief in Marguerite’s direction, ‘when I am so plain and ordinary. And I so enjoyed dressing her up in all that finery, and seeing her look so marvellous in everything I bought her when I never managed to look like anything more than a bag pudding with frills, no matter how expensive the silk.’

  That had been the one thing about her Season that Marguerite had enjoyed—bringing her mother so much untrammelled pleasure. And having not only her undivided attention for once but also being her first priority. Oh, she’d always known that Mother loved her. It was just that she never seemed to have much time for her, when one of the boys was always falling off something and breaking a limb or catching some nasty disease. Mother had always liked the fact that Marguerite was happy to sit quietly with a book somewhere, and not add to her worries. But it meant that they’d never spent much time together.

  ‘She’s a beauty, I grant you,’ said Father repressively.

  ‘Yes, I have always been so glad she took after you in looks, rather than me,’ said Mother, gazing up at the husband she still adored, after so many years of marriage and bearing him so many children. ‘And it doesn’t matter, does it, that the boys take after my side of the family?’

  Marguerite waited, as she always did, for Father to say something kind about Mother’s appearance. Mother was no beauty, it was true, but she had kind eyes, set in that square face, and a loving expression. Instead, he said, as he always did, ‘Not at all. Your features, set in a masculine frame, make them all look rugged and strong. Which is a good trait for a man.’

  Which made Marguerite want to slap him. And yet Mother smiled at him, with gratitude. Gratitude!

  ‘So,’ said Mother, ‘you won’t berate her any more about her Season, will you?’

  ‘It wasn’t just the expense,’ he retorted. ‘I wouldn’t have minded it if it had come to something. But when I consider how much of my time I wasted, going to balls and parties, for which you know I have absolutely no taste. And picnics!’ He shut his eyes as though he’d suffered a sharp pain. Which was a bit de trop. Everyone knew Father’s views on what he considered women’s pastimes. He never even allowed Mother to stay in London during the Season for much more than a fortnight, and then only if he happened to have some business of his own to transact.

  ‘If you had taken a firmer hand with her,’ said Father to Mother, with more than a touch of irritation, ‘she might at least have done her duty by the family. And then there would have been no need for any of this!’ He waved his arm in a broad sweep, denoting, Marguerite supposed, the present situation.

  ‘But Daisy has always been such a good, quiet girl,’ Mother protested. ‘I never needed to do more than just drop her a hint...’

  ‘Well that was clearly your mistake. You should have used the birch occasionally.’

  Mother gasped. And then something happened that Marguerite had never witnessed before. Mother got a militant look in her eye. ‘You never used the birch on the boys,’ she pointed out. ‘And sometimes—’

  ‘They never did more than indulge i
n youthful high spirits. I have never needed to do more than give them a stern talking-to if I ever thought they were getting close to crossing the line. They listen to me. They know their duty. The only thing I ever expected of her,’ he said, jabbing a finger in Marguerite’s direction, without taking his eyes off Mother, ‘was to marry well. And look what she’s done instead!’

  Marguerite tried not to wince. She was used to hearing Father’s opinion of her worth within the family. Which was well below that of his sons. He had never valued her for herself but only for how she might benefit his much-loved sons one day, by marrying well. He’d even once explained to her that although he might tell her brothers to beware of falling for a pretty face, he did not hold her looks against her, as long as she put them to good use. It was not her fault that she’d taken after his side of the family, which tended to be tall and slender, with very fair hair and attractive features, after all, was it? ‘In the eyes of the world,’ he’d even gone so far as to say just before they’d gone to London, ‘you will do me credit.’

  In the eyes of the world? Yes, which implied that he didn’t think she was, or could ever be, a credit to the family. Not in any way. And now she’d lived down to all his worst assumptions about her, hadn’t she, by not marrying well?

  ‘I am sure she couldn’t help it,’ said Mother. ‘Attracting so much attention from so many eligible gentlemen when she is used to living such a quiet life must have been dreadfully confusing.’

  Confusing? Revolting, more like. She’d started to feel like a cow who’d been fattened up for market, with all the drunken lords eyeing her up the way she’d seen fat farmers do at auction before making their bids. With Father standing in the place of the auctioneer.

  ‘No wonder she couldn’t make up her mind,’ Mother was persisting, screwing her handkerchief up into a ball between her agitated fingers.

  ‘She had,’ Father snapped, ‘a perfectly respectable offer. From a man I wouldn’t have been ashamed to call son-in-law...’

  ‘But Ben isn’t so bad, dearest,’ said Mother, holding out her hands to Father in entreaty. ‘He has always been a good boy. We know him well, don’t we? Far better than we could have hoped to know Lord Martlesham. Who went to Harrow,’ she said, lowering her voice as though speaking of some great crime, ‘don’t forget.’

  ‘Yes, there is that. It is what I told him, myself.’

  ‘So, then...’ Mother turned to Marguerite with a hopeful smile. ‘You aren’t going to be silly any more, are you? About marrying Ben, I mean. I know you said last night that it was all the result of one of their silly pranks, and I believe you, but still...’ She spread her hands wide.

  ‘I still don’t see why I have to marry him,’ Marguerite began.

  ‘How about,’ said Father, icily, ‘because I have said so?’ He turned on Mother. ‘You have spoiled her, that’s what you have done. Cosseting and pampering her, instead of teaching her the value of obedience.’

  ‘B-but choosing a husband, dearest, that is such a big decision for a girl. Perhaps it isn’t a question of being disobedient, but just—’

  ‘It is rank disobedience!’ He strode over to where Mother was sitting and glared down at her. ‘You should have taught her to behave the way all the other girls in London seemed to behave. Not once did she make any attempt to flatter or please a man. Instead she turned up her nose at them when she thought nobody was looking. And did you reprimand her? Even once, for her hoity-toity manners?’

  Marguerite had always been extremely grateful that Mother hadn’t done any such thing. Or at least, although she’d given Marguerite lots of hints about how she could use her charms to fascinate a man, she had never taken her to task for not doing so. On the contrary, once or twice she’d said she was pleased by her modest, refined, ladylike behaviour, because Father would hate to think she might be a flirt.

  Marguerite almost groaned. She just couldn’t win. She would have earned Father’s wrath in London if she had flirted the way other girls did, she was sure of it. But now he was saying that he didn’t like her displaying the modesty he kept on saying he prized so much in her own mother.

  Nothing she did, or said, was ever good enough.

  Mother’s shoulders drooped. ‘I confess,’ she said penitently, ‘I was too busy enjoying myself, seeing her attract so many admiring looks. It was like reliving my own disappointing season all over again, only this time being noticed...’

  Father’s mouth pulled into a grim line. ‘Disappointing? How can you possibly have found your own season disappointing when I sought you out? Made you an offer?’

  Marguerite watched, in horror, as Mother’s eyes darted all over the room as though searching for an answer that would deflect his anger. But there wasn’t one. Poor Mother had tried to defend her, and all that had achieved was to bring Father’s wrath down upon her. Which wasn’t fair. Marguerite was the one at fault. The one to cause her parents to come to the brink of an argument when they never fought with each other. About anything.

  It looked as though the only way to stop them, before they really got going, was to create a distraction.

  ‘Mother, Father, please, don’t...’

  They both turned on her with identical expressions of surprise, almost as though they’d forgotten she was there.

  ‘If...if you really think I ought to marry Ben, then I suppose...’ Now it was her turn to twist her hands together at her waist. ‘I mean, it isn’t as if I met anyone I like better.’ And she had liked him rather a lot, at one point in her life. ‘And,’ she added glumly, ‘I’m not likely to, am I?’ Her brothers had brought dozens of friends to stay, over the years, and they were all the same.

  Males, from her observation, were basically pack animals, who enjoyed nothing better than bounding around the place, wreaking as much havoc as they could. When you got them into a ballroom, they could pretend to be civilised, for an hour or so, but the moment they’d dropped their female relatives at home off they went to some mill, or tavern, or some other revolting, low place where they could revert to type. At least with Ben she knew exactly what she would be getting.

  ‘It just seems a shame,’ she continued, ‘to push him into it, when I’m sure it isn’t what he wants...’

  ‘You see?’ Mother beamed up at Father. ‘She isn’t being rebellious for the sake of it. She is just thinking of poor Ben’s feelings.’

  Yes, poor Ben, having to take her off her family’s hands.

  Father’s expression softened a touch. He no longer looked furious. Just irritated. ‘Well, if that is all that it is, then it’s all settled. And, look, Daisy,’ he said to Marguerite, ‘Captain Lord Flinders doesn’t mind marrying you at all, not now I’ve told him how much wealth you will bring to the union.’

  He might as well have thrashed her. Nothing could have hurt her more than hearing him tell her how he’d managed to get Ben to comply with his edict to marry her by reminding him how rich that would make him.

  Why couldn’t Ben have just wanted to marry her, to save her reputation? Not that it needed saving. Not over a stupid incident that nobody outside the family would ever hear about.

  This felt as if Father was seizing on the whole episode to force Ben to get Marguerite out of his hair for good. Dangled a big, fat dowry in his face as a sweetener. Because he’d never known what to do with her, had he? She just...wasn’t a boy.

  And every time he’d warned her brothers to beware of pretty women, she’d felt it like a slap to the face...the face that he so often said was pretty. Even though he said he didn’t hold that prettiness against her...

  Mother leapt to her feet. ‘We will have so much to do in so little time. I had so hoped we could have a big society wedding, but there.’ She blew her nose. ‘A private ceremony, in our own chapel, will be...well, far more romantic,’ she said hopefully. ‘Now,’ she said, going over to Father’s desk, and picking up his pen, ‘I need
to make a list...’

  Romantic? What was romantic about being pushed into marrying a man who didn’t want to marry her?

  Although... Father was smiling down at Mother, with his usual air of complacency. And Mother was enjoying herself. They were both pleased with her for once. Which was...a strange feeling. And one that she may as well make the most of because it wouldn’t last long. She had only two, or perhaps three days before the ceremony. And then...

  Her stomach swooped. She would leave Wattlesham Priory with Ben, to go to his estate, about which, she suddenly realised, she knew nothing, and start on a whole new life.

  She wasn’t ready.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Three days later, and she still wasn’t ready.

  Oh, her trunks had all been packed and loaded onto wagons, and she was wearing a beautiful carriage dress, so that they could set off immediately after the ceremony. The chapel was decked out with the most glorious flowers that the gardeners had gleaned from the hothouses as well as greenery from the furthest corners of the estate. Yes, everything looked perfect.

  But her heart knew better.

  She hadn’t seen Ben since her brothers had flattened him into the gravel at the side of the lake, well, except through the window when he’d ridden away the next morning. She’d heard that he’d come back with the licence. She’d also heard the celebrations that had gone on until the early hours of the morning as all her brothers had banded together to toast the groom.

  Not that she’d have been able to sleep anyway, not after what Mother had told her would happen on her wedding night. Oh, she’d couched it in glowing terms, saying that it was the most marvellous thing, and would lead to her having babies. But it had not sounded at all marvellous. It had sounded undignified, and uncomfortable, and, well, frankly a bit humiliating.