by Darcy, Norma
A man was bound tightly to a chair that had toppled over onto the floor. He was struggling to move the chair against the floor boards, presumably trying to break free of his bonds, making as much noise as possible in the process. He was being ruthlessly gagged by Ned, and Jack was sitting astride him to try and quell the struggles with his weight as if he were breaking in a horse. Elizabeth was standing by with a jug of water and Catherine was picking up food that had been spilled all over the floor.
“What on earth is going on here?” demanded Miss Blakelow, picking up a candle from where it sat on an old chest and holding it aloft so that she might survey the room.
Everyone froze. Ned turned to see his sister with a face of resignation, Elizabeth gaped, Catherine gulped and Marianne burst into tears.
“I bet it was Marianne,” said Jack reproachfully. “She always spoils everything.”
“Who is that man?” asked their eldest sister in a frigid voice.
She moved the candle and gasped as she recognised the face of the Earl of Marcham. He lay on the floor and turned his head to look at her as she stared back at him.
“What is he doing here?” Miss Blakelow demanded.
“We’ve kidnapped him,” said Marianne.
Ned Blakelow glared at his sister for that admission. “We’re keeping him here, until he agrees to our demands.”
Miss Blakelow moved further into the room. “What demands?”
“That he hands over Thorncote to us,” said Ned, belligerently.
“Give me strength! You foolish boy, this is not the way, surely you must see that? Untie him at once.”
“Oh, but George, you will ruin everything!”
“To be sure I will,” replied Miss Blakelow, moving into the light cast by the candelabra. “And you, young man, will not be going to stay with Uncle Charles in London unless you release him this minute!”
Lord Marcham observed this scene with mild amusement. The bluestocking had turned into a fiery termagant. He could hardly believe his eyes. Who was this woman? Surely not the prim and prudish Miss Blakelow? The voice was the same. The lips were the same. But where was the cap and glasses? Where the garb of the widow? Before him was a girl, her chestnut hair about her shoulders, her threadbare nightgown momentarily backlit by the light from a branch of candles, showing him in one heart stopping moment what he had already suspected: that Miss Blakelow had a very pretty figure.
“Release him at once,” demanded Miss Blakelow.
“But George! You don’t understand!” cried Jack.
“Untie him this instant,” she said, setting down her candle. She moved towards his lordship and crouched on the floor. “He’s been bleeding. What have you done? What can you have been thinking of? Do you wish to land us all in Newgate?”
“He was hit over the head,” said Elizabeth.
“I can see that, thank you,” replied Miss Blakelow dryly, reaching forward to untie the gag at his lordship’s mouth.
“It was Ned’s fault,” cried Marianne.
“It was your idea!” he retorted.
“Yes, but I never thought you would be stupid enough to actually go through with it!”
“Will you two stop arguing?” snapped Miss Blakelow over her shoulder.
“George?” asked Lord Marcham, once the gag was freed as he looked up at her.
She smiled apologetically down at him. “It’s a family pet name.”
“I thought…” he coughed. “I assumed that the George they spoke of was a man. Their elder brother perhaps.”
“And if you are disappointed, my lord, and think that because I am a woman that they will escape a sound chastisement, you much mistake the matter!”
Several Blakelow brothers and sisters stared sheepishly at the floor at this remark.
“I don’t doubt it,” murmured Lord Marcham, laying his head back against the floorboards.
“Lizzy, bring me that water if you please,” commanded Miss Blakelow.
Her sister hurried to obey.
“Georgie,” repeated his lordship with eyes closed. “I like it. It suits you.”
“How unhandsome of you! I think it does not suit me at all.”
“Well it suits you better than Annabel or Sophie or some other girlish name. You will allow me to say that your public persona is not entirely convincing―well, not to me anyway. Laughing with me about my peccadilloes is not the action of a bluestocking, my girl. Trust me. I’ve known plenty of them; all as dull as ditch and jealous as hell of the fun they are not having.”
Ned and Jack had untied the bindings at the earl’s hands and feet and they helped him into a chair. His lordship gingerly stretched out his legs and arms to ease his cramped muscles. He looked pale and his clothes were much creased and there was blood on his shirt.
“Jack, go and find John and have him take the bath up to William’s room. Then find a clean shirt―one of Will’s will have to do, I hope that it might be big enough―and then have Betsy bring up hot water for his lordship to wash. And some food too―oh and Jack, before you go, check that Aunt Blakelow is still in bed. We don’t want her stumbling across Lord Marcham when in her nightgown.”
“Are you intending to bathe me as well, Miss Blakelow?” asked Lord Marcham, an imp dancing in his eyes, his question spoken so softly that his words reached her ears alone.
“Be quiet,” she replied, avoiding his eyes.
“I would welcome your assistance.”
She turned away and dipped a cloth into the water. “You wouldn’t, for I would scrub you from head to toe.”
He smiled at some secret thought and the look he gave her brought the heat into her cheeks.
“Just what I was thinking, ma’am…” he replied, “but if I am not to have your ministrations at my bath, might I request a razor instead?”
“Of course. Now keep still while I bathe your head,” said Miss Blakelow. “Kitty, how came you not to tell me about this? I thought you were the sensible one.”
Catherine Blakelow hung her head. “They said they would put frogs in my dinner if I told you.”
“Well, that explains it then,” agreed Lord Marcham promptly without a moment’s hesitation. “Nobody could stand for that.”
Miss Blakelow glared down at him. “Sir, will you be quiet?”
He spread his hands. “What? I am showing remarkable consideration, under the circumstances.”
“You are not helping, so please be quiet. Ned, why is Lord Marcham here?”
“We did it for the best,” said Marianne through her tears.
“I am asking Ned,” said Miss Blakelow in such a voice that froze the blood in his lordship’s veins. He looked at her lazily while she was distracted by the task at hand, thinking that while she was not an Incomparable, she could have been said to be a very attractive woman. Her eyes were green and set under dark arched brows, her skin smooth and bronzed by the sun, her straight little nose, the firm chin and those full lips which he had seen from the beginning of their acquaintance were quite remarkable, were parted in an unconscious invitation to be kissed. He acknowledged within himself a desire to know what those lips felt like beneath his own and found that it was not a new sensation. Why, when he could have his pick of society beauties, was he fantasising about a slip of a girl without fashion, exceptionable beauty, fortune or position? In short, she had nothing that should attract him. And yet attract him she certainly did.
“We did it for Thorncote,” said the youth belligerently.
“It was Marry’s idea,” put in Catherine.
“Oh, be quiet Kitty, you snitch,” said Ned.
“It might have been my idea,” said Marianne. “But you wanted to go through with it, Ned Blakelow.”
“Well we had to do something,” he reasoned. “I could not just stand by and watch Will’s inheritance―oh, dash it all, I didn’t want to see you out on the street George. Jack and I and the girls could go and live with some relative or other; probably not together, but we would have had
a home. But you have no-one. You have no money. You would have ended up in the workhouse.”
Marianne burst into tears at this rather grim foretelling of the future.
“Well, I hope not,” said Miss Blakelow brightly. “I might have become a governess or…or something.”
“Or something,” echoed his lordship, his eyes twinkling at the very improper image that flashed into his mind.
She glared at him, knowing what he was thinking. “Or something respectable.”
“But where would be the fun in that?” he murmured.
Miss Blakelow decided there and then that Lord Marcham was every bit as disreputable as his reputation had suggested. She deliberately slapped the wet cloth around his face and had the satisfaction in hearing him gasp at the cold. “A seamstress.”
“With your eyesight? Oh, no,” said his lordship.
Miss Blakelow froze.
Her eyesight. She groped for her pocket and her glasses and suddenly remembered that she was wearing nothing but her nightgown. She folded her arms self consciously across her bosom.
“Too late to shut the stable door after the horse has bolted,” he said, smiling faintly at her obvious embarrassment.
“Ned, help his lordship downstairs. I must get dressed.”
“Must you?” murmured the Earl.
Miss Blakelow looked around for something to throw at him.
“And I am happy to say that I was right,” he continued as the lad helped him to his feet, “you are much improved without those wretched glasses. You appear to me to be able to see without them perfectly well.”
“Ned, I am perfectly sure that his lordship would prefer a cold bath after being cooped up in this hot attic all this time,” said Miss Blakelow, glaring at their noble neighbour. “Pray see to it.”
Chapter 9
His lordship, much restored by a bath and a fresh change of linen was making a hearty breakfast in the parlour with the Blakelow family looking on with varying degrees of trepidation.
He was making them await his decision, savouring every mouthful of the extremely good fare that had been placed upon the table for his enjoyment.
Miss Georgiana Blakelow was quite astonished, watching him from the other end of the room as he steadily packed away a considerable amount of cold meat and bread and washed it all down with a tankard or two of ale. Her brother, William, had a healthy appetite, but nothing at all compared with this man. She stared at him, rather wondering at his athletic physique; it was amazing to her that he was not round enough to rival the Prince Regent.
The earl leaned back in his chair and popped a grape into his mouth, watching with some amusement the faces of the Blakelow family, evidently all gathered to watch him eat as if he were a freak act in a travelling show. They all looked expectantly at him, as if fearing that the Bow Street Runners would arrive at any moment and cart them off to prison.
His eyes flicked around the room; Ned, Marianne, Catherine and Elizabeth, every one of them blonde-haired and pale-eyed, like peas in a pod. There was another brother, his lordship remembered, William. He remembered vaguely that he was like the others. Then his eyes fell upon Miss Georgiana Blakelow, her dark hair once more hidden under her thick white cap, her glasses perched upon the end of her nose and her figure, once more swathed in the black featureless mourning dress that he was fast learning to despise. Another image came all too readily to mind, the image of her in a threadbare nightgown, the curve of her waist and a breast silhouetted by the candlelight, the long slender legs moving towards him with seductive grace and her glorious hair down around her shoulders.
“I will agree to your terms,” he announced at last.
The occupants of the room let out their breaths and grins broke across their faces.
“On one condition,” continued the earl.
“Which is?” demanded Ned belligerently, still smarting from his lordship’s tongue lashing earlier that day.
“That your sister, Miss Georgiana Blakelow, will do me the honour of accepting my hand in marriage,” said the Earl of Marcham, calmly raising the tankard of ale to his lips and watching the lady in question over the rim as he drank.
Miss Blakelow was obliged to grip the back of the chair to steady her as the room spun before her eyes.
“What?” demanded Ned, surging to his feet wrathfully. “You will not!”
“I need a wife. You have deprived me of the hand of Lady Emily Holt and so I need a replacement. I find that I cannot bear the thought of going through the elimination process again and so I may as well take the nearest eligible female and have done with it.”
“The elimination process?” echoed Catherine. “Is that how you choose your wife, my lord?”
“It is as good a method as any other,” his lordship replied, putting down his tankard.
“What about love?” asked Elizabeth.
“What about it? You don’t imagine that I am in love with your sister after two hours acquaintance, do you?”
“I think that any of us would rather die than see her wedded to you!” flashed Ned, his face red with anger.
The earl pushed away his plate, his hunger apparently sated at last. “Indeed?” he said politely. “You may get your wish if I were to inform the authorities as to what has gone on here the past few days.”
“You wouldn’t!”
His lordship raised a brow. “Wouldn’t I?” he replied, very, very softly.
“You are mad,” breathed Georgiana.
“Quite possibly,” he conceded, turning his eyes at last upon her. “And so, my bluestocking, what do you say?”
“You cannot be serious. You cannot wish to marry me…do you?” she asked.
“Not in the least,” he replied with unflattering bluntness. “But I do need a wife. You seem to be the nearest unwed female of marriageable age. I can conceive of worse fates than being married to you.”
She put a hand to her head. “But every proper feeling must rebel. You…I mean…I am not of your world, my lord. Your way of life is…is so…you must see that it would not answer.”
“I see nothing of the kind.”
“And you are engaged to Lady Emily Holt,” she pointed out.
“Lady Emily married Thomas Edridge yesterday morning by special licence.”
Miss Blakelow was astonished. “Did she?”
“They had been fond of each other for some time. I…er…merely bumped their heads together and made them see sense. So you see; there is no reason for you to concern yourself with Lady Emily. But your unruly family have stopped me from informing Lord and Lady Holt that there was to be no wedding yesterday. No doubt the world thinks me a cad of the highest order.”
“Indeed, we are very sorry for it.”
“Are you? Well I am not sure that I am,” replied Lord Marcham.
“Oh,” said Miss Blakelow.
“You and your revolting family have made me realise that if I cannot have love, I will at least have laughter with the woman I marry.”
“I see,” she replied much struck by this revelation. “Then why not consider Mrs. Finch. Newly widowed and young. She’s always laughing.”
“She squints.”
“Or Miss Kate Busby. She would make you a creditable wife. Pretty as a picture and sweet natured too.”
His lordship grimaced. “And she would run a mile every time I tried to make love to her.”
Miss Blakelow’s bosom heaved and she glared at him and then at her youngest brothers and sisters. “You forget yourself, my lord. There are impressionable minds present.”
“My apologies. I mean only to say that I want fire, not ice.”
“Please let us drop this subject,” she said coldly.
“And you are most definitely fire.”
“My lord―”
“Does the thought of intimacy with me terrify you?” he asked her gently.
She could not meet his eyes. “Will you stop speaking to me in that way in front of the children?”
&n
bsp; “It needn’t,” he continued regardless.
“How romantic!” cried Marianne, her hands against her heart.
“Oh, shut up, Marry,” recommended her brother tersely at which juncture Marianne promptly burst into tears. “There is nothing romantic about it.”
“Oh, lord, there she goes again!” said young Jack, expressively rolling his eyes. “Girls!”
My lord’s lips twitched. “Exactly so. Well, Miss Blakelow, what is your answer?”
The lady primly folded her hands before her. She took a deep breath. “I should thank you for the very great honour you have done me but I do not think that you meant to say it. I think that it surprised you as much as it did me to hear yourself express those words aloud.”
The earl was mildly irritated that she had read him so unerringly. Very well, Miss Blakelow, if plain speaking is what you are after, then plain speaking you shall have. “You are not my first choice and I doubt I am yours, but we will deal tolerably well together.”
“And is that what you want of wedlock?” she demanded. “To deal tolerably well?”
He shrugged. “I am no romantic, Miss Blakelow.”
She gave a soft scornful laugh. “You do surprise me.”
He pushed back his chair away from the table. “I need a wife. I need an heir.”
“I’m sure you do,” she replied with heightened colour, “but I am unable to give them to you. I am neither of marriageable age nor inclination. I thank you for your very flattering offer―”
“My what?”
“Your very kind offer,” she corrected primly, “but I cannot accept.”
“Why not?”
“Because I don’t wish to be married.”
“Every woman wishes to be married.”
She raised her chin. “Not this one.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“I don’t care what you believe.”
“You refuse me?”
“I’m sorry my lord, but I do.”
A silence fell across the room. The younger siblings of Miss Blakelow had followed this exchange as if watching a ball thrown back and forth, their eyes alternately swinging from the face of their eldest sister to his lordship and back again.