Puritan Bride

by Anne O'Brien

  And yet the marriage would happen because it was necessary and he was committed to it. He would wed his Puritan bride and care for her and give her children to fill her heart and life—and she would never know. In those dark days he vowed that he would never allow her to realise that he wished he had never made the contract.

  And any feelings for Viola would fade with time. It was, after all, mere infatuation at the novelty of the situation.

  But his argument did not convince him. He rode across the park in black mood, to return cold, wet and mud-spattered, furious with himself and his sudden inexplicable inability to control his life.

  Katherine was not unattractive, of course. They would do well enough together. He cast his mind back to Downham Hall with some difficulty. A slim figure, pale complexion, dark hair. But no matter how hard he tried, he could not remember the colour of her eyes. Viola’s eyes were violet blue, the blue of delphiniums, of heart’s-ease, of dew-drenched bluebells … Marlbrooke groaned and buried himself in estate papers, dry enough to quench any thoughts of passion.

  ‘Marcus. I wish that you would—’ Lady Elizabeth ran him to earth in the library and pushed a pile of bills and receipts across the desk.

  ‘Not now, Mother. I am busy.’

  ‘But I need—’

  ‘Not now!’

  Lady Elizabeth retreated with raised brows but no further comment. Marlbrooke never snarled at her in ill temper. Her lips curved in a little smile that held more than a hint of sadness and her heart ached for him. She had noted his lengthy absences from her company and believed that she knew the reason for them. Now she was sure. What could she say to him in such an impossible situation? But how ironic that he should have fallen into love with a girl whom he could not, in all honour and duty, touch or claim as his own.

  Viola noted the Viscount’s absence too. Quite simply, she missed him. She looked for his presence and was disappointed. When they met, which was of course inevitable, he was as charming as ever, always pleasant. But cool, rather reserved, his smile rarely evident. And she had the strongest impression that he never actually looked at her. He certainly never touched her! Unlike the early days, when he had put himself out to reassure and entertain. She wondered what she could have possibly done to annoy him. Marlbrooke saw the puzzlement in her eyes and could do nothing to alleviate it. He realised the consequences, if she did not. So he continued to keep his distance.

  Chapter Six

  ‘Good morning, Verzons. How lovely to see the sun again. Perhaps I shall walk in the garden this afternoon.’

  ‘Yes, my lady.’ The steward bowed and placed a small dish of sweetmeats on a low stool beside Elizabeth. ‘It is good to see you able to take advantage of the warmer weather, my lady.’

  The ladies had taken themselves to the front parlour to absorb the warmth and appreciate a view of the swathe of snowdrops beneath the beech trees along the drive.

  ‘Mistress Neale asks if you wish her to begin an inventory of the household linen. She deems much of it to be so old as to be beyond repair.’

  ‘Yes, of course. Spring weather always makes you think of investigating dark corners. Pray tell Mistress Neale that I will come and discuss it with her—in about an hour, if you please, Master Verzons.’

  As Verzons made to draw a curtain a little to shade her ladyship’s face from the direct rays of the sun, she enquired, ‘Has his lordship gone down to the stables? I know he intended to ride out to the home wood to see if there are fallen trees to be dealt with after the storms.’

  ‘I believe so, my lady. He has sent one of the grooms back to the house with a message for Mistress Viola.’ He inclined his head in her direction.

  ‘For me?’ Viola looked up sharply from the book of flower illustrations open on her lap.

  ‘Yes, mistress. Your horse has been found. It apparently found its way to the Stamford estate, beyond the village. Mr Stamford received my lord’s enquiry and has returned the horse with, I believe, its saddle-bags intact. I have had them taken to your room.’

  ‘Saddlebags! Perhaps they contain …’ She looked across at Elizabeth, her eyes very bright, an uneasy mixture of excitement and anxiety on her face.

  ‘Then go, my dear. See what treasure they hold.’ She put out a restraining hand as Viola leapt to her feet and would have followed Verzons from the room. ‘But don’t be too disappointed if they hold nothing of value … or help in restoring your memory.’

  ‘No, of course not.’ She smiled reassuringly. ‘But I must know.’

  Viola almost ran from the room, up the great staircase and into her bedchamber. She closed the door and leaned against it, her breathing heightened, hands pressed against her beating heart, her eyes fixed on the worn saddle-bags that had been placed beside her bed. Don’t be too hopeful. What could possibly be in there to be of any use in solving the mystery? She swallowed against the dryness in her throat, but her heart refused to settle.

  She approached them and lifted them on to the bed. Not very heavy. With almost reluctant fingers she unfastened the leather ties and lifted the flap of one compartment. She pulled out some rolled and creased items of clothing, damp and mildewy now, which meant nothing to her. She shivered, with no desire to wear them next to her skin. A plain, unadorned skirt and bodice in dark blue woollen cloth. An equally plain linen chemise, stockings. She shook her head. Nothing of note here. They could have belonged to anyone. Beneath the clothes she found a pair of shoes. Black leather with silver buckles. At least, if they were hers, she would be able to wear shoes that would actually fit and not rub her toes into blisters. She opened the other compartment, but any remaining hopes fell. A heel of bread, now hard and stale with a suspicion of mould, and an apple, which was brown and bruised. She sat down on the bed as a tide of disappointment washed over her. The saddle-bags had really been her only hope. And they had yielded so little. She battled to prevent the tears that gathered in her eyes from spilling over down her cheeks.

  Well, she must make the best of it. With her fingers she wiped them away. Then she slid off the shoes that Felicity had lent her—with ill grace, of course—and picked up the pair from the saddle-bag. Presumably they would fit. She rubbed her fingers over the polished leather and the silver buckle, both a little cloudy from the damp, and slid her right foot into the shoe. It fit like a comfortable, well-worn glove, so at least it must be hers! Then the left. Ouch! She took off the offending shoe, turned it and shook it. On to the bed beside her fell a small package wrapped in cloth.

  She swallowed against the quickened beat of her heart as she unwrapped the cloth with unsteady but urgent fingers to discover a small box. Opened it. Inside on a bed of worn velvet was a ring. The tiny sapphires and pearls formed the shape of a delicate flower, mounted on a gold band.

  She rose to her feet and carried it to the window to study the intricate detail in the sunlight glinting through the glass. The blue stones glittered as their facets caught the light, the milky pearls gleamed. She slid it on to her hand and admired the effect of the dark stones against her pale skin. It was exceedingly pretty. Was it hers? Had she worn this pretty ring? Perhaps it was a family piece, which had been given to her as the only or eldest daughter. Whatever its origin, presumably it was a jewel that she loved, which was precious to her if she had found the need to hide it in her shoe and bring it on this journey with all its risks and dangers. Why had she not left it at home? In safety? But if she owned something of such value, did it not prove that she indeed had a family who might be searching for her at this very moment?

  As she studied the workmanship, her attention was caught by the sound of hooves on the gravel of the main drive below her window. She lifted her head. A horseman, dark-haired, broad-shouldered, agile, elegant. Riding a bay thoroughbred in a controlled canter down the drive away from her vision towards the main gate. She looked down at the sapphires and then back at the diminishing figure on the cantering horse.

  It was as if a door suddenly opened on to a sunlit room.
Or a curtain was drawn back to allow a view of a well-known scene. Detailed, vivid, familiar. And she remembered. Oh, yes, in that instant she remembered every aspect of the past in bright focus. Her name. Her childhood. What had driven her to undertake her masquerade in boy’s clothes and why she had cut her hair so drastically. The surge of memory initially swamped her with relief—only to be overlaid with a thick coating of anger and disbelief as she assimilated her past with her present position. She was at Winteringham Priory, of all places, of all times, although she had no recognition of it. And the man who had ridden from her, out of her sight, was Marcus Oxenden, Viscount Marlbrooke. She sank to the floor below the window, regardless of her borrowed finery, her back against the panelling, the ring removed from her finger and now clutched in one hand, a frown drawing her brows together into a black line above troubled eyes. She needed to think, to allow her mind to grasp the realities now laid out before her.

  And remembering more, she reached for the folded linen chemise from the saddle-bag. She shook it out to discover within its protective wrapping the single folded sheet of paper that she knew she had hidden there.

  She was waiting for him when he returned from the stables. She knew he would eventually go to the library and he found her there, sitting on a window seat to look out over the parkland. Her hands were empty, clasped loosely in her lap, her face turned away from him. He did not know how long she had been there, but the impression was, perhaps in the set of her shoulders, that she had been waiting for some little time. She made an attractive picture, her rose velvet gown, the lace collar and cuffs glowing softly against the dark wood and rich leather bindings of the many volumes, the sun gilding her with a bright halo around her dark hair. He smiled as he approached, touched with unexpected pleasure, and against all his better judgement, that she should come to him. He had no intimation of the imminent storm.

  ‘Well, Mistress Viola. Were you waiting for me?’ She heard the smile in his voice.

  She stood and turned. She had enjoyed many hours in which to build her rage against him. The range of emotion in her eyes forced him to halt and drop his outstretched hand. Anger, yes, but, far more, a deep underlying bitterness. And without doubt it was directed at him.

  ‘What is it?’ His brows snapped together.

  ‘I remember! Everything! My name, my background, where I was going. And I remember who you are. You are my enemy, Lord Marlbrooke.’ Her voice was low, furiously controlled, but that did not disguise the venom in her words, fuelled by bitter humiliation from the knowledge that she had come to enjoy his presence in recent days.

  She stalked past him to his desk, her skirts sweeping the oaken floor, picked up a small velvet-covered box and held it out to him, palm upward. He knew what it was immediately. Not taking his eyes from her face, he took the box and opened it. He looked down at the ring and then once again at the girl standing before him.

  Katherine Harley.

  ‘Oh, yes.’ She saw the recognition in his eyes even though his face remained austere and expressionless. The disdain in her voice coated him from head to foot, slick and cold. ‘I am Katherine Harley! Your betrothed! Your intended wife! And you did not even recognise me!’ She laughed, but without humour, rather a touch of hysteria that she quickly suppressed. ‘You could not even put a name to my face.’ She turned her back on him again, returning to the window to stare out over the gardens as if she did not trust herself to preserve her composure in the face of such betrayal.

  ‘Apparently not.’ How could he deny it? If she had looked back at him, she would have seen the dawning recognition replaced by intense regret and contempt for his blind selfishness in his handling of her. But she was too angry to look at him and it would have been too revealing of her own state of mind.

  ‘Can you understand how humiliating, how shaming this is for me?’

  He heard the hurt in her voice, saw it in her rigid spine, and blamed himself. Anger would be better, certainly easier for her to bear, and he deserved that it be directed at him. With that in mind, he took hold of her arm and pulled her in spite of her resistance across the width of the room to stand before a mirror on the wall.

  ‘Look at yourself.’ He stood behind her. ‘Really look. Apart from the fact that I would not expect to find my betrothed riding round the country without protection and in boys’ clothes, would I really have matched you with the lady I saw for one short meeting at Downham Hall? I barely saw you. When I took my leave of you, you stood with your back against the light, masking your features most effectively. And I remember long dark hair, which curled onto your shoulders and around your face. No, of course I did not recognise you!’

  She looked at the image that stared back at her. Short curls. The shadow of fading bruises. No, she did not look like Katherine Harley. But she would not forgive him. She would not allow his excuse. She fanned her anger as he had intended.

  ‘If I was beautiful, you would have remembered me.’ She made no attempt to hide the resentment. ‘But I clearly do not come up to the standards of the ladies whose company you frequent at Court, in spite of the flattering words that I recall when you requested my hand in marriage. You even told me that I was beautiful! It has certainly taught me a hard lesson in honesty and the reliability of men!’ And how a man could seduce a woman into believing that he cared a little for her.

  She dragged herself out of his grasp and put space between them.

  Marlbrooke took refuge from the truth in chill formality and in attack. His voice was cold. ‘Perhaps you could explain, Mistress Harley, what you were doing on the night I found you. Riding unescorted, miles from home, in the dead of night. Presumably you were not making your way here to me.’

  ‘Hardly, my lord. I would never come to you! And you exaggerate—it was not the dead of night. I was going to Widemarsh Manor and I would have been there within the hour. What a terrible quirk of fate that I should have been thrown from my horse at your feet!’

  ‘Widemarsh? The Dower House? But for what reason?’

  ‘My great-aunt lives there. Mistress Gilliver Adams.’

  ‘What? The old witch who was firmly ensconced here when I came to take possession—and apparently had been for years?’

  ‘Aunt Gilliver stayed here throughout the years of the Interregnum when the house would otherwise have been empty,’ Kate explained with icy contempt. ‘My mother had no desire to return here and my uncle had no interest in the house. So Aunt Gilliver moved in. She kept the house with the help of Verzons and Mistress Neale. They had both been servants to my family before my father’s death and chose to stay on in the hope that one day the Harley family would be restored.’ She frowned at him. ‘And I intend that they shall!’

  Marlbrooke decided that it was politic to refuse the final challenge of the angry lady before him. ‘I remember Mistress Adams very well,’ he reminisced. ‘She called down all the curses of heaven and hell on our heads and refused my invitation to stay here, before taking herself off to the Dower House even though she has no right to it. But that does not explain why you would come all this way to see her and presumably in such haste and secrecy.’

  ‘She sent me this.’ Kate held out the folded document, which had been wrapped in her chemise. It was now curled and smeared with the effects of travel. ‘It is a letter. You should read it.’

  He took it from her and spread the page. And read.

  It was a letter, short and to the point, the handwriting small and neat with idiosyncratic loops and curls.

  My dearest Katherine,

  It has come to my notice that Sir Henry has given his blessing for your marriage to Marcus Oxenden. It is hard to believe such insensitivity exists, but I have found that men often act without thought or logic when compelled by greed or avarice. I have some information that may be to your advantage concerning your inheritance of Winteringham Priory. Your father made his wishes plain and the document may be of use in your campaign to oust the Marlbrooke family from your legitimate home. If you wi
sh to know more, you will find me, as ever, at Widemarsh Manor. If you have any of the Harley spirit in you, unlike your Lady Mother, you will find your way here sooner rather than later.

  Gilliver Adams

  ‘I see. Does this really mean so much to you? The prospect of finding your father’s will?’

  She laughed softly. ‘Of course it does. I have lived on charity all my life. This is my home and I have no wish to return to it simply through your dubious ownership. I need this chance of possession in my own name, my own legal right. If a will exists, I will fight you through the courts for possession. The King may have granted it to you, but I will have the legal claim. Besides …’ her chin took on an aggressive tilt ‘… why should I not visit and speak with Mistress Gilliver?’

  ‘Because she is a vindictive and bitter old woman. If she has a copy of your father’s will, why has she kept silent so long?’

  ‘I don’t yet know the answer to that. But Richard thought I had nothing to lose by agreeing to talk to her.’ She met and held his gaze.

  ‘And who is Richard?’ he demanded, the glacial glint in his grey eyes leaving her in no doubt of his proprietary concern.

  ‘My cousin. Richard Hotham.’

  ‘Ah. I begin to understand.’ Marlbrooke looked down at the ring box, which he still held clenched in his hand, with a speculative gleam in his eye. ‘He also would have a legal claim to Winteringham Priory, I presume. Perhaps he also believes he has a claim on you?’

  She raised her chin further at this, but refused to answer.

  ‘Tell me, Mistress Kate. Was your cousin aware that you intended to ride to Widemarsh alone, without protection, on a journey that could easily have taken you more than one day? A journey full of danger and hazards in these lawless times?’

  ‘He knew that I had received a letter from Gilliver.’

  ‘I see. Which does not quite answer my question. I find that I cannot admire his sentiments towards you. And I suppose your unorthodox appearance was intended to protect you from any untoward attention. Did Richard also know about that?’