The Last Bachelor

by Betina Krahn

  “His second? Good Lord—he’s challenging me to a duel?” she said.

  “No.” Constance winced. “He is insisting that you make good your half of the wager.”

  “What?” Antonia blinked, unable to take it in.

  “You do remember, surely,” Constance prompted, then repeated it for her. “You agreed that if you didn’t change his mind about women’s work in a fortnight, that you would do men’s work for the same length of time.”

  “The scurrilous wretch,” Antonia said in a disbelieving whisper. Her eyes widened. “The unthinkable deceit of that man! I did change his mind—he told me so. He ceded me that cursed wager!”

  “He did?” Constance looked puzzled. “When? Where? I thought you agreed you would announce the results at my party.”

  “Here, in my house, not three days ago,” she declared furiously. “We were upstairs, in—” She jerked her pointing finger down, hiding that hand in the other, and wishing she could hide the rest of her, as well, from Constance’s avid stare.

  “Did anyone else hear him say it?” Constance asked, hanging on her every word. “Do you have witnesses?”

  Antonia turned slightly on the settee to avoid Constance’s curiosity. “No. I didn’t think witnesses would be necessary—I assumed that the earl was a man of honor and decency. But then, this is not the first time I’ve been proved wrong on that account.” She struggled internally for a moment. “It’s nothing short of blackmail. God knows what he intends, but if he thinks he can force me to—” She glanced at Constance’s tense and eager form and left the settee to pace. “I’ll not do it. You may go straight back to him and tell him so.”

  Constance pursed her lips, seeming momentarily at a loss. “Well, he anticipated some resistance. He instructed me to tell you that he is prepared to go to the papers with the story, if you refuse to honor your part of the wager.”

  The story? Which story? Antonia’s head reeled. About her matchmaking? The revenge plot gone awry? What happened and didn’t happen in his bed? Or the fact that he had gallantly offered her his name as “protection” and she refused it? Dearest heaven, she had never guessed he could be so ruthless.

  “So the beast finally shows his fangs,” she said, visibly shaken. She closed her eyes briefly to compose herself, then took a deep breath. “I refuse to give in to such coercion. I won’t do it.”

  “Antonia, dear.” Constance hurried to her chair and knelt beside it, taking hold of her hands. “I don’t think you have a choice. If you refuse and he goes to the newspapers— You’ve narrowly escaped a fatal blow to your reputation, as it is. Only the fact that the story was printed in that scurrilous Gaflinger’s gives you any hope at all. Prolonging the scandal by allowing him to resurrect this wager and publicly declare you’ve defaulted on it could have devastating consequences.”

  It was the second time in as many days that Antonia had been told she had no choice, and the opinion did not sit any better with her now than it had the night before. It wasn’t enough for Remington that he had romanced and seduced and betrayed her, she realized. Now he was determined to bend her to his male pride and “honor,” regardless of the consequences.

  “Despicable man,” she said through gritted teeth. “I’ve held my head up this far. I’ll just go on doing it. Besides, who is to say that wretched Gaflinger’s didn’t just make it all up?”

  “Antonia, please.” Constance appraised the stubbornness in her face and began to worry. “Gaflinger’s may be a vile, sensational rag—but a lot of people read it, all the same. And if Remington Carr begins giving interviews, the rest of London’s newspapers will be gouging and elbowing each other for the chance to print whatever he says. You saw what they did with the idea of an earl doing women’s work. You can bet they’re all green with envy at Gaflinger’s over this last story and are itching for an exclusive themselves. And none of them are above embellishing a bit, here and there. You could find yourself without a decent social acquaintance or financial contact in all of London.” She squeezed Antonia’s hands and engaged her eyes.

  “Antonia, I have only your interests at heart when I say go … get it over with. Settle whatever has to be settled between you and the earl, once and for all.” With a look of genuine concern she held out a card bearing the earl’s business address.

  Antonia felt her stomach contract. Settle it? She had been foolish enough to think she had already done that. She took the card and stared at it as if trying to set both it and its sender aflame. She would go and settle it, all right. And when she was done, Remington Carr would know he had indeed tangled with a dragon.

  The City, London’s financial district, was bustling the next morning. The massive stone columns and soaring brick and granite walls of the banks, exchanges, and brokerages loomed over the narrow streets and cast long shadows over the less pretentious blocks of homes, shops, markets, and pubs squeezed between them. The streets were thick with carriages and cabs picking their way along through the hordes of clerks, brokers, and civil servants hurrying to and from their offices. Vendor calls, newsies crying out stock prices on street corners, the creaks of lorries, and the droning thuds of building construction filled the air. All around were the sights and sounds of the lifeblood of the nation: commerce.

  Antonia watched it all from the window of her cab, feeling some part wonder, some part anxiety. She had never visited the financial district before; her banker, broker, and solicitors always called on her at home to conduct business, as they were wont to do for their more genteel or lucrative clientele. As she studied the pedestrians hurrying along, she was struck by the number of top hats and similarly cut dark suit coats in the crowd—an angularity and colorlessness unrelieved by bright silks, lively patterns, and curved lines. This was a world of men, those stark lines and somber tones said. And that visual declaration brought Antonia to the edge of her nerves.

  “Not exactly neutral ground,” she muttered. “It will be like walking right into the lion’s den.”

  Aunt Hermione, seated beside her, reached over to squeeze her hand reassuringly. “You will do fine, Toni dear.”

  “I intend to give him a sizable piece of my mind,” she said irritably.

  “Of course you do.”

  “I’ll show him that I won’t be intimidated or coerced.”

  “Absolutely.”

  “And you’re not to let me out of your sight,” Antonia said, betraying the dread she felt at the prospect of seeing him again.

  She had scarcely slept the night before, thinking of what she would say to him and trying hard not to think of or remember anything else about him. It simply hurt too much. When she told her ladies about Remington’s demands, they were shocked that he was behaving in so reprehensible a manner. When she mentioned taking a chaperon, they thought it seemed prudent and suggested Aunt Hermione accompany her.

  Antonia and Hermione alighted from the cab before the south entrance to the ornate Mappin and Webb Building, the location Remington had designated on the card he sent with Constance. Soon they had climbed the stairs to the third floor and located the suite of offices bearing the name “Carr Enterprises, Ltd.” in gold letters on the door.

  The large outer office was plainly but prestigiously appointed, furnished with several handsome chairs, a large mahogany desk, a set of cubbyholes filled with packages and documents, and a small cloakroom. Three doors opened onto the outer office, and a hallway extended to the left, along which several doors leading to inner offices and workrooms stood ajar. A drone of voices and the sound of a mechanical clicking drifted back through the waiting area. When Antonia identified herself and stated she was there to see the earl, faces appeared in the doorways, and there was a noticeable drop in the noise level.

  “Yes, madam.” The clerkish, middle-aged man at the front desk shot up. “We’ve been expecting you. This way, please.” He escorted them down the short hallway, through a gauntlet of curious stares and a pair of massive doors.

  Remington greeted them
from behind a huge mahogany desk, in the midst of paneled walls, thick Persian rugs, and leather-upholstered furnishings, looking every bit as elegant and self-possessed as his surroundings. Seeing him like this, face-to-face and on his ground, was even more intimidating than she had imagined. She suffered a craven impulse to run, not walk, to the nearest exit.

  “Welcome, Antonia, Mrs. Fielding.” He nodded to her, then to Aunt Hermione, a smile unrolling across his too-handsome mouth. “I hope the ride into the City—”

  “Please do not insult us by pretending you are concerned for our comfort, Lord Carr,” Antonia said, with all the force she could summon. “If my well-being truly meant anything to you, I would not be here at all.”

  “Not so, Antonia.” His smile dimmed. “I am intensely concerned for your welfare. So concerned, in fact, that I am willing to brave your anger and—”

  “And threaten me with God-knows-what exactions if I refuse to give you your pound of flesh,” she declared, her emotions rising at an alarming rate. “I would think you had taken enough revenge on me to last a lifetime.”

  “This has nothing to do with revenge, Antonia,” he said, rounding the desk and sending her back a step, where she bumped into Aunt Hermione.

  “Oh, dear, I can see I’m in the way.” Aunt Hermione was out the door before Antonia could stop her.

  “If it isn’t revenge, then it’s your accursed pride at work,” she declared, holding her parasol defensively in both hands. “I won our wretched wager and you know it. You admitted it to me not three days ago. But apparently you cannot bear to see a woman win fairly and honorably. How typically male of you. If a man sees he cannot win, he changes the rules or tilts the playing field … does whatever it takes to secure victory, no matter how low-minded or loathsome it is.”

  He grabbed her arm as she turned to go, then caught her parasol in his other hand as she brought it up between them. He searched her veiled face as the full impact of her charge struck him. Typically male. Low-minded and loathsome. The anger that vibrated in her words was not for him alone.

  “God above—you’re angry. And not just at me,” he said, studying her with new perspective. “You were furious at those poor bastards you trapped into marriages, weren’t you? Why? What is it that makes you despise men so?”

  “I did not come here to discuss my feelings about your sex, Remington Carr.” She tried to pull away, but he wouldn’t release her. “I came to tell you I will have nothing more to do with you or with a wager I have already won. And if you feel compelled to go running to the papers, you would do well to recall that there are two sides to every story.”

  “Was it your husband?” he demanded, reeling her closer, refusing to let it go. “What did he do to you, to make you detest every man you meet?”

  “You still don’t understand, do you?” she said furiously.

  “Something is responsible for your anger …”

  “You are responsible for my anger!” she shouted, then took advantage of his momentary shock to pull away from him. “You and every other arrogant, insufferable man in the world. You want to know why I detest men? It is because of what you do to us women!

  “You belittle and dismiss and demean us,” she charged, halting in the middle of the floor. “You command and control and constrain us as if we are troublesome children with no sense of decency or responsibility of our own. You mistake our emotions for a lack of logic, our patience for passivity, and our softness of heart for weakness of character.”

  She watched him approach, focusing fiercely on her every word. Taking a step backward, then another, she willed herself not to look at his eyes. Little by little, bruised feeling crept into her heated words.

  “You treat us as if we are commodities—goods that must be disposed of before we go bad on the shelf … as things that may be ruined or soiled or cheapened by even the suggestion of use … as objects that must prove both decorative and useful to you, in order to have any worth.” Her voice caught as she bumped into the desk behind her. “And you refer to us as surplus, when you don’t consider us decorative enough or useful enough to enhance your lives. Surplus women.”

  Remington stopped an arm’s length from her as her words—his words, spoken from her hurt—went straight to the core of him. She was no longer speaking of men, she was speaking of Remington Carr, bachelor, social observer, detractor of women. For the first time he glimpsed the full, personal meaning of the caustic term he had coined. Surplus. Women of no intrinsic worth. Expendable females.

  “The women of my household are surplus, just as I am. Women without men—whether fathers or husbands—are surplus in your wretched scheme of things. And that is exactly what I have always been … surplus.” She watched the troubling of his eyes, and felt powerful, conflicting urges both to wound and to comfort him.

  “Worst of all, you make us the quarry in your games of conquest. You seduce and cosset and tempt us, then blame us and brand us as ‘ruined’ if we succumb to you.” Her voice dropped to a pained whisper. “And even when you decide to ‘rescue’ us, you do it on your own terms … to satisfy your needs, not ours.”

  Seduction, duplicity, selfishness, betrayal—he was guilty of all that and more toward her. He stood for a moment with his ears burning, being tried and convicted by his own conscience. Her experiences with him had only confirmed her opinion that men were opportunistic, arrogant, and callous. Worse—they had forged a link between her feelings toward him and the rest of the male gender. Unless her views of men changed, he stood little chance of making her see him in a positive light, much less agree to marry him.

  There was now a gulf between them that would not be spanned by a few soft words or stolen caresses. It was the kind of chasm that required a bridge. And bridges took time to construct. He had to keep her near him and let her experiences, her passions, and whatever feeling she might still have for him change her mind about him.

  “You sound exactly as I did when I came to your house, Antonia—angry, suspicious, and resentful of a whole sex. And it serves only to point up the wisdom of my course of action.” The straightening of her spine warned that his next words had better be well chosen. In desperation he seized ones she couldn’t help but welcome.

  “You won your part of the wager. I was and still am perfectly willing to concede that.” He paused, delaying his next breath to gauge her reaction. She came alert, listening with open suspicion. “But you have yet to fulfill your part of the bargain.”

  “My part?”

  “I did your ‘women’s work’ and it did change my thoughts and feelings about women. As a result, I am preparing a letter to the PM and the Liberal party, registering my support for the Sister Bill, as we agreed. Now it is time for you to make good your pledge to do ‘men’s work’ for two weeks.”

  “That is absurd!” she declared, her eyes widening as she scrambled to make sense of his concession and his unexpected demand. “I was to do men’s work only if I failed to change your attitude toward women and their work.”

  “You did your work well, Antonia.” He forged ahead, adamantly ignoring her protest. “You taught me there was more to women than dependence, emotionalism, and vanity. Thus it is only right that I be given the chance to show you there is a good bit more to men than the callous, brutal, and self-centered behavior you have just described.”

  “D-don’t be ridiculous,” she stammered, trying to sort out what he had in mind. Two weeks of men’s work meant … good Lord … two weeks of being at his mercy, two weeks of having to see him and deal with him and her feelings for him each day!

  “It’s not ridiculous, Antonia. It’s reasonable. You’ve gone to great lengths to convince me of women’s honor, decency, and fairness. Now show some of it. Do a man’s work for a while and learn something from it. Spend time with real men, outside your narrow, all-female world.”

  “My nar—? My world is anything but narrow, and you know it,” she ground out, scarcely able to believe he was turning the charges she
had made against him to his own treacherous purpose.

  “Oh? Then perhaps you can tell me what sort of backing is required to keep a financial enterprise thriving, or what the Bank of London requires as collateral when making a loan, or what it feels like to have the livelihood of hundreds of families riding on each decision you make. If you intend to start your own business concern someday, you certainly must know all that and more.” He could see her outrage rising and plunged ahead.

  “Or perhaps you would rather start with something simpler—like what happens to your money when you put it in a bank, how goods are imported to this country, or the latest advances in woolen knitting mills.” She was caught flat-footed, unable to respond. He produced a superior smile. “No? Then at very least you can show me how to operate a typewriter machine or how to balance a five-column ledger—”

  “For your information, I can balance a five-column ledger!” she declared hotly.

  “Well, well. Can you indeed?” He looked inordinately pleased with himself. “We shall just have to see about that.”

  Seizing her by the hand, he pulled her out the door and down the hall. Shortly, she found herself being hauled up before a tall clerk’s desk, in a large room filled with other desks and lined with bookshelves and paper cabinets.

  “This is my head clerk, Aldous Bexley.” Remington introduced a short, wiry man with hunched shoulders, long, nimble fingers, and a very heavy pair of spectacles. “Bexley,” he addressed the fellow with a proprietary tone, “Lady Antonia, here, has just informed me that she has more than a passing acquaintance with ledgers. And I would like to give her a chance to prove it.”

  Before Antonia could think how to extricate herself from his bullying, she was plunged, wholesale, into receipts and debits and credits and endless, exhausting columns of numbers.