by Mary Balogh
Mrs. Pennethorne? Margaret frowned, trying to think who the lady could be. The name sounded familiar. But why would she be calling in the morning when most social calls were made in the afternoon?
Mrs. Pennethorne. Her eyes widened slightly. Had not the Earl of Sheringford introduced himself as Duncan Pennethorne? Who was this lady? His mother?
Was this whole foolish business never to end?
“Show her in, by all means,” she said.
Mrs. Pennethorne was probably younger than she was, Margaret decided as soon as the lady stepped into the room. She was fashionably clad in a pale green carriage dress with a poke bonnet to match, and she was small and slender and blond and exquisitely lovely in a fragile sort of way.
Not his mother, then, Margaret thought. His sister? But she was Mrs. Pennethorne.
“Miss Huxtable?” The lady curtsied and regarded Margaret with slightly slanted eyes, which were as green as her dress.
Margaret inclined her head.
“We have not met,” the lady said, her voice sweet and breathless, “but I felt compelled to call upon you as soon as I heard. You must not marry Lord Sheringford, Miss Huxtable. You really must not. He is the very devil and will bring you nothing but misery and ostracism from society. Do please forgive this impertinence from a complete stranger, but I had to take the risk of coming and warning you.”
Margaret rejected her first impulse, which was to offer the lady a seat. She clasped her hands at her waist and raised her eyebrows. Yes, this was an impertinence.
“Mrs. Pennethorne?” she said. “You are a relative of the Earl of Sheringford?”
“It pains me to have to admit it,” the lady said, flushing, “though fortunately he is a relative only by marriage. He is my dear husband’s second cousin.”
Margaret kept her eyebrows raised. She did not know what to say.
“You may know of me,” Mrs. Pennethorne said. “My maiden name was Turner. I came within a few hours of making the most dreadful mistake of my life. I almost married the Earl of Sheringford myself five years ago. Instead, I married my dear Mr. Pennethorne shortly after and have been blissfully happy with him ever since.”
Oh, goodness. This was the abandoned bride, the sister-in-law of the infamous Mrs. Turner, who had run off with the earl.
“Yes,” Margaret said, “I have heard of you, of course. But—”
But this was none of her business. She had no wish to listen to the whole sordid story—or any part of it, for that matter.
“I do not have an acquaintance with you,” Mrs. Pennethorne said. Clearly she had come to talk, not to listen. “But I do know you by reputation. You are very well respected as the eldest sister of the Earl of Merton and the Duchess of Moreland and Baroness Montford. I daresay it is irksome to you still to be unmarried when your younger sisters have made such brilliant matches, but believe me, Miss Huxtable, the answer does not lie in marrying Lord Sheringford. My brother was the happiest of men before Laura was seduced away by that monster. He would have taken her back and forgiven her at any time after she left. He would not divorce her, as everyone who knew him advised. He never lost hope that she would return home and beg his forgiveness—which he would freely have given. He was devastated by the news of her death. That man, Miss Huxtable, has ruined my brother’s life for all time, and he would have ruined mine too if my dear Mr. Pennethorne had not been kind and honorable enough to marry me himself.”
Margaret gazed at her in pure astonishment.
“I must thank you for your visit and your concern,” she said. “Will you forgive me if I do not offer you refreshments? I am about to go out. My sister is expecting me.”
She had decided very recently, she remembered, that she would never tell a lie again.
“Of course,” the lady said. “I will not delay you. And I do beg you to forgive me, Miss Huxtable. It has been almost unbearably painful, you must understand, to know that that man has had the effrontery to return to London. My brother suffers dreadfully from the knowledge, as do I. My dear Mr. Pennethorne is chagrined beyond words, since he must bear the shame of sharing a name with Lord Sheringford. It has been our fervent hope that we would neither see nor hear from him until we leave town at the end of the Season. We certainly had no wish to be embroiled in his business. But when I learned this morning that he had snared yet another innocent, respectable lady into his net, I found the knowledge truly unbearable. I knew I had no choice but to come to warn you, to beg you to break off the betrothal before it is too late. Promise me that you will, Miss Huxtable.”
“I appreciate your concern for my happiness,” Margaret said, crossing the room with firm steps to open the door. “And I thank you for coming. You will excuse me now?”
“Of course,” Mrs. Pennethorne said, waiting until Margaret held the door open for her. “I felt it my duty to come.”
Margaret inclined her head and stood in the doorway to watch her visitor leave.
She was still all astonishment. What had that been all about? It was perfectly understandable, of course, that the lady would hate the Earl of Sheringford, both on her own account and on that of her brother. But why would she feel it necessary to call upon the woman who was supposedly betrothed to the earl? It could not possibly be jealousy, could it? Did she secretly still love Lord Sheringford?
That was surely impossible.
This, Margaret thought, was all very bewildering indeed. For the sake of a moment’s triumphant satisfaction in telling Crispin that she was betrothed to someone else, she had set in motion all these ridiculous consequences.
Perhaps instead of going to call upon Vanessa, she should remain here and give orders for her bags to be packed. She suddenly longed for the peace and sanity of Warren Hall.
That was what she would do, in fact.
But before she could leave the doorway of the visitors’ parlor, there was yet another knock at the outer door, and a footman opened it to admit Vanessa and Katherine, come together to call upon her.
“Oh, well,” Margaret said without even trying to disguise the irritability from her voice, “you had better come in here, the both of you, and join your voices to the choir.”
“The choir?” Vanessa said after they had stepped into the parlor and the footman had closed the door from the outside.
“Of those urging me to put an end to a nonexistent betrothal,” Margaret said. “First Crispin, then Mrs. Pennethorne, and now presumably you. Whoever will be next, I wonder?”
It was a rhetorical question. But it was answered almost immediately. There was a tap at the parlor door even before they had all sat down, and it opened to admit Constantine.
“Ah,” Margaret said, throwing both hands in the air.
“I will not ask if that gesture demonstrates delight at seeing me or displeasure,” he said cheerfully as he crossed the room toward her and took one of her hands in both his own before releasing it again. “But I hope it is the former. I have just come from a vigorous sparring bout at Jackson’s and am hoping you will offer me tea or coffee.”
Stephen and Elliott arrived together before the tea tray was brought in.
Jasper followed them in before Margaret had finished pouring the tea.
Margaret wondered if she had ever felt more foolish in her life and decided that it was not possible.
And talk about storms in teacups!
She was also angry but had not decided with whom she was most annoyed. Herself, perhaps?
Crispin had told her she was stubborn and always had been. The accusation had irritated her. But he must have been right, she concluded after a few minutes.
The choir sang in perfect unison. There was not one dissenting voice. Vanessa and Katherine were incredulous and aghast that she would even think of marrying a man she had met for the first time last evening—without even a formal introduction. Normally their reason would have been that she could not possibly know a thing about him on such short acquaintance. But on this occasion just the opposite was
the case. She knew everything about him—he had even admitted it all himself—and none of it was good. And that was a massive understatement.
Stephen, with Elliott’s concurrence, had agreed to allow the Earl of Sheringford to pay a formal call at the house during the afternoon. He could hardly have refused when Margaret had introduced him to Crispin Dew last evening as her betrothed. Both men agreed, though, that he should be allowed to proceed no farther into the house than the library and to see no one there but Stephen. Meg must give him leave to inform the earl that she would not receive him, today or any other day.
“After all,” Stephen said, “you are not embroiled in any real scandal, Meg, only a great deal of silly gossip. If you are never seen with the man again, and if nothing more is said about any betrothal between you, it will be concluded soon enough that there never was any truth in the story—as is the case with most rumors.”
“Very true, Stephen,” Katherine said.
“And very sensible,” Vanessa agreed.
“And everyone knows you as the soul of propriety, Margaret,” Elliott added.
Which was perhaps a bit of a mistake on his part. Being the soul of propriety sounded to Margaret like a very dull thing to be. Did she want that written on her epitaph?
“Sherry was a friend of mine at one time,” Constantine said. “He still is, I suppose. We sparred with each other at Jackson’s this morning and then walked to White’s together. But it would be extremely unwise to ally yourself to him, Margaret. He has an undeniably wicked past, and you would not want a deservedly spotless reputation sullied by association with him.”
A deservedly spotless reputation. That would look good too on her headstone. Future generations would yawn as they read.
“Rakes would be doomed to eternal infamy if some decent lady did not fall in love with them and take a chance on them,” Jasper said, grinning at Margaret and threatening the choir’s harmony for the moment. He ought to know the truth of what he said. He had been one of London’s most infamous rakes when Kate had taken a chance on him—nudged on her way, it was true, by the eruption of scandal. “However, Sherry is not exactly a rake, is he? Justly or otherwise, he is seen as the blackest-hearted of villains. Certainly no one can deny that he did something pretty villainous five years ago—two things, actually. You would not be able to handle him, Meg—or he you, for that matter. You have lived a righteous life and deserve better.”
“Oh, that is exactly what we have all been trying to say,” Katherine said, laying a hand on his sleeve. “We want someone perfect for you, Meg. We want you to be happy. You deserve the very best life has to offer.”
You would not be able to handle him …
You have lived a righteous life …
These were the people who loved her most in the world. The people who loved her so dearly that they wanted only the very best for her that life had to offer. To them she was the soul of propriety, a woman with a spotless reputation who had lived a virtuous, righteous life. They wanted someone perfect for her—someone equally proper, blameless, virtuous, righteous … A very dull man, in fact.
He sounded a little like the Marquess of Allingham. Was that why she had hesitated so long about accepting his marriage offers? It seemed disloyal. He was all those things, and she had always liked him. She had always considered him a friend.
Friend, not lover.
The Earl of Sheringford had called him a dull dog.
She had been horribly disconcerted by the marquess’s announcement last evening. But had she also been upset? Did she feel heartbroken today? In light of everything else that had happened, she had spared him scarcely a thought.
These people wanted her to be happy. But how did they know what would make her happy?
Did she know?
Once she had thought happiness and Crispin Dew were synonymous terms. But today he had offered her marriage again, and she had refused because … Oh, there was a host of reasons.
But she realized something as her family all looked at her in love and concern and waited for her to say something.
She was ripe for rebellion.
Or else she was just stubborn.
She had such a short acquaintance with the Earl of Sheringford that she could not even remember clearly what he looked like. She knew he was tall, well built, dark-haired and dark-complexioned, with angular features and almost black eyes. She knew that her first impression of him was that he was almost ugly. She remembered too that her eyes had nevertheless been drawn to that face while they talked. There had been an intensity there, in his eyes, in the tautness of his almost morose features, that had somehow fascinated her.
He had fascinated her.
She had never held a conversation with any other man that even remotely resembled her conversation with him. His honesty had fairly taken her breath away. He had urged her to marry him in almost the same breath as he had admitted to being a wife-stealer and a man who had abandoned his bride on their wedding day. And he had not pretended to any sudden infatuation for her, Margaret. He had told her exactly why he wished her to marry him. He needed a wife before two more weeks had passed.
Surely any other man in the same circumstances would have gone out of his way to charm her with sweet talk and lies, and to keep the truth about himself from her for as long as possible—until after their marriage if he could.
He was—different. She was quite sure that if she met him again in the cold light of day and listened to his marriage proposal, she would reject him in a heartbeat. Today she would see him for the unattractive, ill-tempered villain that he was. She would see the desperation in him and be repulsed by it. What man, after all, would be prepared to marry a stranger—any stranger—merely in order to keep the house and property from which he drew an income until his grandfather died and left him a fortune?
And she was the stranger he had chosen.
It was really quite insulting.
But he had fascinated her and still did.
And she was stubborn. Her family was united in urging her against even seeing the Earl of Sheringford again. Crispin had urged her to change her mind and marry him instead. Mrs. Pennethorne had urged her to put an end to her betrothal.
The silence had become quite lengthy—and very tense.
“The Earl of Sheringford is coming here this afternoon,” she said, “to speak with me—after he has spoken with you, Stephen. It would be uncivil of me to refuse to receive him, especially when I was the one who caused all the gossip by introducing him to Crispin as my betrothed last evening. It was not he who said it, re member.”
“You were upset,” Vanessa said, “at seeing Crispin again so unexpectedly, Meg. It is understandable that—”
But Margaret held up a hand to stop her from continuing.
“It is neither understandable nor excusable,” she said, “that I would use one gentleman merely to spite another. Which, if I am to be perfectly honest with you and myself, is exactly what I did. I will speak with the earl this afternoon. I will apologize for involving him in all this foolish gossip when I daresay he hoped to slip quietly back into society after so many years as a castaway. What has happened was all my fault, and I owe it to Lord Sheringford to tell him so in person.”
“It is just like you to take all the burden of blame on your own shoulders, Meg,” Stephen said, looking troubled. “It is something you always did. Let me do something for you now in return. Let me send the fellow on his way.”
“He is not the fellow, Stephen,” she said, getting to her feet. “He is the Earl of Sheringford. And I will speak with him myself.”
“Bravo, Meg,” Jasper said.
“Oh, Meg,” Vanessa said, hurrying toward her to hug her, “you are always so noble. But I am just afraid that you will see him to apologize to him and end up betrothing yourself to him.”
“Trust me,” Margaret said as they all got up.
Trust her to do what, though?
Would she really be seeing Lord Sheringford
only to express her regrets over the consequences of her impulsive words last evening? Which he had urged upon her, by the way.
Or would she be seeing him because she wanted to bring his face into focus again?
Or because she was fascinated by her memories of him?
Or because she was thirty years old and had just come face to face with a faithless lover from her past and with the fiancée of the man she had expected to marry herself this year?
Or because she had just been called righteous and the soul of propriety and a woman of spotless virtue?
“Oh, we do trust you, Meg,” Katherine said, hugging her after Vanessa had stepped back. “Of course we do.”
Yes, of course they did. She had always been eminently trustworthy and dependable and predictable, had she not?
And dull.
7
ALMOST precisely fifty hours after his grandfather had issued his ultimatum, Duncan was standing alone in the library at Merton House, staring out through the window, waiting to make a formal marriage offer to Miss Margaret Huxtable.
It was all disorienting, to say the least. Good Lord, he did not know the woman at all. She did not know him. He could scarcely even remember what she looked like. He remembered well enough what she had felt like, pressed against his body, but the more he tried to bring her face into focus in his mind, the more he saw a blank surrounded by dark hair. He could remember only that he had thought her beautiful.
Which was some consolation, he supposed.
It had been something of a relief to find Merton alone in the library when he had been admitted more than half an hour ago. He had fully expected Moreland to be there too—and the duke was a formidable figure of a man. He had Greek blood in him, and it showed.
But Merton was no soft touch either, young as he was. Duncan would guess his age to be no more than twenty-two or three. He had made no bones about the fact that that he disliked and despised Duncan and opposed any match with his sister. He had offered a more than generous dowry with her but had insisted that every penny of it be put at her disposal and that of any children of the marriage. He had probed meticulously into Duncan’s present means and future prospects and had declared that he would call upon the Marquess of Claverbrook to confirm what he had heard—since he did not trust the word of a known villain.