Someone to Care

by Mary Balogh

  But every hour was going to seem an eternity. She had not thought ahead to this. When she had thought of the end of their affair, she had envisaged herself back at home, alone and lonely and picking up the threads of her life. She had not thought of the actual getting from here to there. She wondered if she should suggest traveling by stagecoach from the town on the far side of the valley.

  But it would seem like an insult on her part.

  He stopped walking suddenly and uttered an oath so startling that she stopped too and looked at him in surprise. But he was not looking at her. He was gazing, narrow-eyed, upward to the cottage, which had just come into sight. She looked up there too and froze.

  There was a carriage drawn up on the dirt terrace before the door. Not his carriage. And nothing local either, surely. It was altogether too grand. They were still too far away to see any detail, but . . .

  “We have company,” he said, the words coming from between his teeth and sounding savage.

  “Who?” she asked foolishly. How could he be expected to know any more than she did? But even as she asked the question, three figures stepped into view—two men and one woman.

  One of the men was Alexander.

  The other—Joel?—was pointing in their direction.

  The woman was Abigail.

  Marcel swore viciously again—and again did not apologize.

  * * *

  • • •

  He swore silently to himself as they climbed the hillside toward the cottage. How the devil had they found this place? Viola had admitted to writing to her daughters while he was out purchasing the carriage that had brought them here, but she had assured him she had said only that she was going away for a week or two—and he had believed her. He had recognized the crest on the door of Riverdale’s carriage before he recognized the man himself. Head of the Westcott family, no less. And he did not doubt that the young lady was one of her daughters. His eyes confirmed the suspicion as they drew closer. She looked a bit like Viola. He had never seen the other man before, but he would wager upon his being the schoolteacher artist son-in-law.

  His considerable arsenal of profane language had been exhausted. He began repeating himself. This hill seemed to grow steeper and longer every time he climbed it. Viola had gone a little way ahead of him. Her question—Who?—of a couple of minutes ago was the only word she had spoken since they left the beach.

  He wondered if it was going to be pistols at dawn tomorrow, and which of the two men would claim the honor. What a disaster it would be to put a bullet through the heart of one of Viola’s kinsmen or wing him in the right arm the day after the ending of the affair. Or perhaps the kinsman would kill him. Perhaps this was about to turn into a romantic tragedy—with comic elements.

  The young lady had stepped off the terrace to stand knee deep among the ferns. She was all willowy slenderness and big eyes and pale complexion with two spots of color in her cheeks and anxious vulnerability. No, she was not like her mother except in coloring and a certain similarity of features. Even from the back view he had of her he knew that Viola had donned the mantle of her habitual cool dignity. There was a moment when they might have rushed into each other’s arms, but the girl hesitated and Viola did not press it, and they ended up merely clasping hands for a few moments.

  “Mama?” the young woman said. Her voice was high pitched and slightly trembling. Probably not her usual voice.

  “Abby,” Viola said. “My dear. I was about to scold you for coming alone with Alexander and Joel. Or, rather, I was about to scold them for bringing you. But I see that Elizabeth had the good sense to come too.”

  Another somewhat older lady had stepped out from behind the carriage. She must have just come out of the house. She looked vaguely familiar, though he could not recall her name at the moment. Elizabeth Somebody.

  “Viola,” she said with a warm smile. “How good it is to see you. And you are looking well. What a breathtakingly beautiful place this is.” A sensible lady, trying to create some normalcy out of this situation, as though she and her companions had merely called in for tea as they were passing.

  The men had not taken their eyes off Marcel.

  “And so the mystery is solved,” the Earl of Riverdale said, his voice stiff and cold. “Dorchester. The Marquess of Dorchester,” he explained to the man beside him.

  Viola turned her head sharply and regarded Marcel with wide, surprised eyes. He shrugged. “Riverdale?” he said. “What kept you so long?”

  “Mama,” the young lady said—she was Abigail, the younger daughter, then. “Whatever happened? Why did you not go home? Why did you come here? Why did you come with . . . him? Why did you not write to us? We have been worried out of our minds. The whole family has.”

  “I ought to have written again,” Viola said, “to explain that I was quite safe at the home of a friend. It was remiss of me not to do so, Abby. But . . . to come after me like this? However did you find me?”

  “Again?” Abigail asked. “What do you mean by again?”

  “Well.” Viola sounded a bit puzzled. “You must have received the note I sent you and Camille. And Mrs. Sullivan must have received hers.”

  The color had receded from the young lady’s cheeks to leave her face uniformly pale. “No,” she said, her voice little more than a whisper. “None of us did.”

  Riverdale had not been distracted. He had not removed his eyes from Marcel. Neither had the other man. They looked like two avenging angels if ever Marcel had seen any. And sure enough—

  “I will want satisfaction for this, Dorchester,” Riverdale said softly.

  “Then you will have to stand in line behind me,” the other man said. “You may be head of the Westcott family, Alexander, but the lady is Camille’s mother. My mother-in-law.”

  They had drawn the attention of the ladies. “That is nonsense, Joel,” Viola said. “You too, Alexander. I was not abducted. I came here of my own free will. And I am no green girl to be cosseted by the family men. I am forty-two years old.”

  Riverdale turned his cold gaze upon her.

  “Oh, Mama,” Abigail said. “How could you?”

  “I suggest we all step inside and see if the very pleasant housekeeper is willing to make a pot of tea for all of us,” the woman called Elizabeth said. “There is a very welcome- looking fire burning in the parlor.”

  Everyone ignored her.

  “It is not nonsense, Mama,” Viola’s son-in-law said. Marcel could not recall his name. Had he ever heard it? “What you have done has hurt Camille. And Abby. And Winifred, who is old enough to understand a few things. And your mother and your brother, who is a clergyman. And the whole of the Westcott family, who consider you one of their own even though you behave sometimes as though you would rather they did not. It is not nonsense to wish to punish the man who led you astray.”

  “Joel,” Viola began, and her voice was cold now too.

  “I believe,” Marcel said in the rather soft voice that he knew always commanded attention. It did not fail him now. Everyone stopped talking, and everyone turned their attention upon him. Hostile attention, perhaps, but attention nonetheless. “I believe everyone is under a misapprehension, Viola. You must introduce me to your family in a moment, but first we really must explain that we are betrothed, that we were betrothed even before we began our journey here.”

  For a few moments the scene outside the cottage must have looked like a well-contrived tableau. No one moved or said a thing. Before Viola could break free of the spell his words had cast, he moved up beside her, took her hand in his, laced their fingers rather tightly, and raised her hand to his lips.

  “Ours has been an attachment of long standing,” he said. “To use the vulgar parlance, we fell in love at a time when honor would permit neither of us to admit it—or to see each other again. We did see each other again, however, at a certain country inn a f
ew weeks ago when each of us had been stranded by carriage woes. It took no longer than one exchange of glances to rekindle a passion that had never really died. Before that day ended we had decided not to spend a day more of our lives apart. We were betrothed. We made the impulsive though perhaps rash decision to run away here to celebrate our happiness alone together for a short while before beginning the lengthy process of informing our families and making the necessary announcements and planning a wedding. Is that not the way it was, my love?”

  He looked into her face at last. It was as pale as her daughter’s. Pale and utterly expressionless. Her eyes met his. She gazed and then . . . smiled.

  “I cannot even blame you for the rashness of it all, Marcel,” she said. “I am the one who first suggested that we run away.”

  “Ah, but I did not put up a single argument to the contrary, did I?” he said. “We will accept mutual responsibility, then. Introduce me, my love.”

  Her daughter was Abigail Westcott. The older lady—though she was still younger than he and Viola—was Lady Overfield, Riverdale’s sister. And yes, he had seen her a few times in London, though he did not believe they had ever been formally introduced until now. He had known her late husband. The son-in-law was Joel Cunningham.

  “Mama,” Abigail said, “you are going to marry the Marquess of Dorchester?”

  “Viola—” Riverdale began.

  “Elizabeth is the most sensible one among us,” Viola said in the firm, cool voice of the former Countess of Riverdale. “Let us go inside and have some tea. It is chilly out here. We may all talk as much as we wish once we are settled about the fire.”

  She withdrew her hand from Marcel’s and gave him a cool, blank look, which did not deceive him for a moment. Beneath the practiced layers of gracious dignity, she was seething.

  Did she think he was not?

  He had rarely been angrier in his life. Perhaps never.

  * * *

  • • •

  Marcel did not immediately follow everyone else into the parlor. He went upstairs, presumably to remove his hat and greatcoat. Viola followed him up, making the excuse that she needed to wash her hands and comb her hair and change her shoes. She followed him into his bedchamber and shut the door behind her. He turned to face her, his raised eyebrows and half-lowered eyelids giving his face an arrogant, almost sneering appearance. It was the look he usually presented to society.

  “Marquess of Dorchester?” she said. Of all the things with which she might have begun, it was the detail that somehow stung the most. Who was this man with whom she had been having an affair? Did she know him at all?

  He shrugged again as he had shrugged outside. “My uncle died two years ago,” he said. “He was a very old man. I daresay he could not help it. I happened to be next in the line of fire since in all his long years he had produced only daughters. I have always considered the title a cumbersome appendage, but what was I to do? I do not believe I would have convinced anyone that my brother was older than I.”

  She let it go. There was so much else. So much.

  “What did you mean,” she said, “by announcing that we are betrothed? The very idea is laughable.”

  “Laughable?” He was speaking softly in that way he always had in public, even though she was the only other person in the room. “You wound me, Viola. Am I no more than a figure of fun in your eyes?”

  “Alexander must know it is laughable,” she said. “Elizabeth must know. Everyone, the whole world will know it if word ever gets out.”

  “Word will surely get out, my love,” he said. “The marriage of an aristocrat always does. There is little privacy when one is the Marquess of Dorchester. Or the marchioness.”

  “You cannot be serious,” she said. “You could hardly wait until tomorrow to be rid of me.”

  “Did I say that, Viola?” he replied in a pained way that came across as mocking. “How very ungallant of me. I would call you a liar, but that would be equally ungallant. What am I to say?”

  “You do not want to marry me,” she said.

  The mocking look disappeared to be replaced by something more grim. “What I want is no longer of any significance,” he said. “Neither is what you want. We embarked upon a great indiscretion a few weeks ago, Viola, and we have been caught out and must pay the price.”

  “That is nonsense,” she said, “and you must know it. Alexander will not breathe a word of any of this. Neither will the others.”

  “Let me see,” he said. “Riverdale will whisper it to his wife. Cunningham will tell his wife, and she and Miss Abigail Westcott will inform your mother in the strictest confidence. Your mother will inform your brother. All the Westcotts, who are so worried about you, will have to have their minds set at rest, and my guess is that they will not be told lies and that, even if they are, they will see through them in a moment. Servants will hear the story, as servants inevitably do. And servants will tell it in the strictest confidence to other servants, who will pass it on to their employers. Is my point becoming clear? Your virtue has been compromised, Viola, and I am the compromiser. I must, then, as I occasionally manage, do the honorable thing and marry you. You have no cause for complaint. I did not write to my family. My family has not put in an appearance here, breathing fire and brimstone, have they?”

  They both heard it at the same moment. It would have been hard not to despite the fact that the window was closed. The valley was normally so very quiet. Viola hurried to look out, expecting to see that it was just Alexander’s carriage being moved out of the way. But it was still outside the doors of the house, no orders having been given for its disposal. No, what they had heard was the arrival of another carriage. It came to a halt on the driveway, still partially on the slope. Marcel had stepped up beside her. He swore, as he had down in the valley.

  The coachman descended from the box to open the door and set down the steps. A familiar figure stepped down and looked out over the valley. He was the young gentleman who had been with Marcel at that inn. His brother. But he was not alone. A much younger man, really no more than a boy, tall, slender, dark, with all the promise of heartbreaking good looks, got out after him and turned back to hand out an older lady and then a mere girl, whose face was hidden by the brim of her bonnet.

  “Sometimes,” Marcel said, “the farce at the end of a play is overdone and loses any amusing quality it might otherwise have had. Have you observed that, Viola?”

  My family has not put in an appearance here, breathing fire and brimstone, have they?

  Apparently, they had.

  Thirteen

  What in thunder had got into André that he had come here—and brought Estelle and Bertrand of all people? And Jane. Had the world gone mad? Marcel turned from the window, strode downstairs, and stepped onto the terrace.

  “I say,” he heard André say, “there is not another building in sight. This must be the loneliest place on earth. I could not see myself wanting to spend much time here.”

  “Fortunately perhaps,” Marcel said, “you have not been invited to do so, André.”

  “Oh, I say.” His brother swung about to face him. “You are here, Marc.”

  The others had turned in his direction too. Jane was tight-lipped and ramrod straight, a look and posture she surely reserved for him. She made no pretense of either liking or approving of him and never had from the moment of his announcing his intention of marrying Adeline. Bertrand, slender and very tall after a sudden growth spurt a couple of years ago, took a few steps toward him. Estelle, smaller but just as slender, narrow faced, big eyed, not really pretty but with the potential for extraordinary beauty, came striding toward him in a manner that was surely forbidden in Jane’s rules for the proper conduct and deportment of young ladies.

  “Father,” she cried, and he realized in some surprise that she was furiously angry. “You have ruined everything. You said you were coming hom
e, and I believed you, fool that I was. I ought to know by now that you never do what you say you are going to do. I believed you because it was going to be your special birthday, and I thought you would want to spend it with us. I organized a party to surprise you—my first ever. I planned everything down to the finest detail. I made long lists so I would not forget anything. And you did not come. You sent Uncle André home in your carriage, which showed that you had no intention of coming at all. Which was fine, but you ought not to have said you were coming in the first place. I came to find you because I wanted you to know that I will never believe another word you say—ever. But that is all right because I do not care.”

  Marcel was too taken aback even to reach for his quizzing glass. He had just heard possibly more words from his daughter than he had in all the almost eighteen years since she was born.

  “My sister is upset, sir,” Bertrand told him. “She put her heart and soul into planning that party to surprise you.”

  “Estelle, my love,” Jane was saying, “that is hardly the way a genteel young lady speaks to her f—”

  “Silence,” Marcel said softly, and she stopped abruptly.

  André was clearing his throat. “Good day, Miss Kingsley,” he said, and in a glance over his shoulder Marcel could see that she had indeed stepped outside, though she was keeping her distance.

  “Who—” Estelle was looking even more stormy as her eyes went beyond him to Viola, but he had held up a hand and she too fell silent.

  He turned and extended one arm toward Viola and watched her approach, all cool marble dignity. “My family too has found us,” he said to her, “just as we were about to set off to find them. Mrs. Morrow is my late wife’s sister and has had the chief care of my children since her passing. André is my brother. Estelle and Bertrand are my daughter and son.”