His Cinderella Bride

by Annie Burrows

  ‘I cannot pass such a law, if I would. It takes more than the word of one man to get a law through parliament.’

  ‘Even a marquis?’ she jeered. Then, flushing, she lowered her head, aware of muted conversations going on all around her. The rest of her family was managing to engage in the sort of polite conversation fit for a drawing room. Why couldn’t she turn aside his barbs with some innocuous remark? Why did his proximity rob her of the ability to keep a civil tongue in her head? Lord Lensborough seemed able to reduce her to the point where all she wanted to do was slap his rugged, arrogant face.

  She heard him sigh, and waited for his reproof. When it did not come, she felt even more in the wrong, which only served to make her angrier at herself. And at him.

  ‘You could do something if you wanted to, a man of your influence. Why, any charity would be glad of your patronage. People would queue up to make donations if they thought that by doing so they could curry favour with you.’

  ‘A charity,’ he mused. ‘A trust.’

  A trust, in his brother’s name, to bring relief to the dependents of his regiment. What a fitting memorial that would be. He could not imagine why he had not thought of such a thing before.

  It had taken this woman to inspire him, this remarkable woman who did not think or act like anybody else.

  ‘My brother fell at Waterloo,’ he confided quietly.

  Hester’s hand flew to her mouth, her eyes filling with mortified tears as she looked up into his grave countenance.

  ‘Oh, I am so sorry. I spoke without thinking. I did not mean to wound you…at least I did, but I would never have said quite what I said if I had known of your own loss.’

  Lord Lensborough searched her face intently. There was a remorse there that showed she knew she had touched upon a pain that nobody else had even guessed might lie concealed beneath his impenetrable façade. Hardly anybody so much as suspected there was anything but the façade.

  Determined to alleviate her distress, he explained, ‘Bertram looked on battle as an adventure. He died doing what he loved, what he believed in.’

  To finally acknowledge this truth, out loud, was like healing balm pouring over his aching soul. Much of his grief, he suddenly realised, had stemmed from regarding his brother’s death as a sinful waste. He went to grasp her hands for a second time, feeling an irresistible urge to raise them to his lips in gratitude.

  She snatched them away, shrinking back into her chair as a shadow fell over them both.

  ‘Uncle Thomas,’ she squeaked.

  ‘I saw you drop your wool, Hester.’ His voice was barely more than a growl. Lord Lensborough turned and saw that the man had painstakingly rolled the wool into a neat ball and was holding it out to his trembling niece. ‘Is anything amiss?’

  Lord Lensborough’s hackles rose. ‘Nothing is amiss here, sir. We were discussing Waterloo, and Lady Hester was making some very helpful suggestions about what might be done for the relief of war widows.’

  Sir Thomas did not even bother to turn his head in Lord Lensborough’s direction. He pointedly addressed his next remark to Lady Hester.

  ‘My dear girl, you have no need to stay here if you do not wish to. You may retire to your rooms whenever you please.’

  Without a word, Lady Hester leapt to her feet and quit her chair, scattering her knitting in all directions as she fled without so much as one backward glance. Lord Lensborough rose to his feet somewhat more slowly, his glare boring into Sir Thomas’s back as he followed his niece at a steady pace from the room.

  * * *

  ‘Hester,’ Sir Thomas called out as she began her headlong flight up the stairs.

  She turned, forcing a tremulous smile to her lips.

  Sir Thomas looked up at her, frowning. ‘You know, my dear, if that fellow makes you uncomfortable, you need not suffer his manners.’

  ‘But my aunt wishes us all to—’

  ‘Bow and scrape to him. I know.’ He made a dismissive gesture with his hand. ‘You gave us all fair warning that you objected to his coming here, and that you wanted nothing to do with him. I should have listened. My girls must put up with his overbearing ways, since they are set on marrying the fellow, but for my part you may tell him to go to the devil if you wish.’

  Hester’s smile faded altogether. ‘Oh, Uncle Thomas, I have already said the most terrible, unforgivable things to him. Now I know you will not disapprove, I think it would be as well to keep out of his way. In fact, I rather think Julia and Phoebe would do better if I kept out of sight. I appear to annoy him almost as much as he annoys me. I really do not set out to provoke him, Uncle Thomas.’

  ‘I know, I know, it’s like a red rag to a bull. The atmosphere would certainly be less fraught if you were kept apart. We are all holding our breath, waiting for the next explosion to take place.’ He smiled. ‘Why don’t you go back to Em’s after church tomorrow, and have the afternoon to yourself?’

  Hester came down one step. ‘Will Aunt Susan be able to manage without me? Dinner tomorrow is quite elaborate, and I had planned on a treasure hunt for the children.’

  ‘I am sure any domestic crises can await your return. Nor will it harm the children to remain in the charge of their nurses for one afternoon.’

  Hester looked more relaxed immediately. ‘About dinner,’ she began hesitantly.

  ‘No need to put in an appearance unless you want to. Have a tray up in your rooms, if you like. If you want a gossip with Henrietta about Barny’s progress, or whatever else it is you two girls find to talk about, you could always invite her to one of those midnight feasts you used to have when you were schoolgirls.’

  Hester shook her head. ‘Uncle Thomas, those midnight feasts were supposed to be secret.’

  ‘With everyone who was invited to them having to traipse through the servants’ hall to get to your staircase?’ he asked. ‘Stealing biscuits and jugs of lemonade from the kitchen on the way?’

  Hester felt a warm surge of affection for her uncle, for his forbearance with her prickly insistence on maintaining the complete privacy of her rooms. Nobody went into them without an express invitation, not even a maid to clean.

  She had felt at a loss when she first came to live at The Holme after her parents had died during an epidemic of typhus. They had been so demonstrably affectionate, and her uncle was rather gruff. But when she had removed up to the attics he had supported her decision, as though he sensed she needed some territory she could still call her very own. She did. Her rooms were her sanctuary.

  ‘I will give it serious consideration, Uncle Thomas. Em always manages to talk me into a more reasonable frame of mind. And entertaining my own chosen guests, in my own rooms, will certainly be preferable to being downstairs with him prowling about the place like a caged tiger.’

  What a relief. No need to dread any more confrontations with the insufferable Lord Lensborough. She went up to her rooms in a more cheerful frame of mind than she had experienced for weeks.

  Chapter Six

  ‘Of all the dull days that we’ve spent in this Godforsaken hole,’ Lord Lensborough drawled late the following evening as he tossed back his second brandy, ‘Sunday has to rank as the dullest.’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Stephen countered, stretching his legs out towards the fire, which crackled cheerfully in the grate of their shared sitting room. ‘I got a great deal of amusement from attending church this morning.’

  Lord Lensborough shot him a look of loathing.

  ‘Julia informed me over dinner,’ he remarked, barely able to keep a straight face, ‘that the congregation has not been so large since the pig-face lady passed through this district on her way to the fair at Scarborough. People attended from several adjoining parishes in the hopes of catching a glimpse of a genuine marquis.’

  ‘If you think I enjoy being trotted out like some specimen at a freak show…’

  ‘And then, of course, we must not forget the treat of coming across the divine Miss Dean, the lovely Emily.�
�� Stephen raised his glass in tribute.

  ‘Good God.’ Lord Lensborough’s eyes narrowed as he saw the lustful expression on his friend’s face. ‘You are contemplating setting up a flirtation with the vicar’s daughter.’

  ‘Well, as you yourself pointed out, what else is there to do in this neck of the woods? You have appropriated every single female within these four walls, although…’ He stared abstractedly into his brandy glass for a few seconds, before continuing, ‘I feel obliged to warn you that you are not likely to be successful if you decide on Cinderella.’ Stephen had so nicknamed Hester on account of her station in the house, her marked shabbiness in contrast with the two girls who were vying for the marriage prize, who were sisters, though not hers, nor the least bit ugly.

  ‘What? Why not?’

  ‘Well, for one thing, you are no maiden’s version of Prince Charming. You have no charm whatsoever.’

  Lord Lensborough snorted in derision. ‘I do not turn on the charm in order to seduce innocents into my bed, if that is what you mean. I have never had any taste for that sort of game.’ Then, running with the metaphor Stephen had begun, he said, ‘However, there is a certain appeal in making the attempt to rescue Cinders from her life of drudgery. Her wicked stepmother—’

  ‘Fuddled aunt,’ Stephen corrected him.

  ‘—would not even let Cinders out for meals today. She took them on a tray in her rooms.’ He neatly omitted to mention that only a few days previously he had believed that was exactly where the poor relation should take her meals. ‘Attic rooms, no less, which can only be reached by going through the servants’ quarters.’

  Stephen raised an eyebrow and grinned at his friend. ‘You have been busy. Where did you come by all this information?’

  ‘My valet,’ he said. ‘And when she wasn’t shut away up there today, she was banished to the vicarage in Beckforth on the pretext of visiting Miss Dean, who is purported to be her dearest friend in the neighbourhood.’

  ‘There. I told you I should flirt with the lovely Emily. It will help your own suit no end if we were to take to visiting the vicarage together.’

  ‘I have no need of your help.’

  ‘No, you are beyond help. But it will amuse me no end watching you make a cake of yourself. I shall always treasure the moment when Cinderella rated you below the value of her knitting. I should think everyone in the drawing room heard her berate you for making her drop a stitch.’

  ‘She has a temper.’ He shrugged. ‘And we got off on the wrong foot, that is all. There was a misunderstanding.’

  He frowned. He never had really made a decent apology for his awful behaviour during their first encounter. She might still harbour some resentment, but the prospect of the lifestyle he was offering would more than make amends for all that.

  ‘And of course her uncle has repeatedly warned her to keep away from me. He wants me for his own daughters. So she has not dared think of me in the light of a suitor. She is naturally on edge whenever I pay her a little attention in case her family think she is putting herself forward. Once I manage to declare myself, and promise her that I will prevent her family from exacting retribution, you will see a marked difference in her attitude towards me.’

  ‘You think so?’

  ‘I know so. What woman would not go instantly into raptures upon receiving a marriage proposal from a marquis?’

  * * *

  Immediately after breakfast the next morning, Hester tied her hair out of the way with a brightly embroidered cotton scarf, rounded up the children, and took them up to the long gallery for a game of indoor cricket.

  It was not long into the game when she gave thanks that all the breakables had been removed, for Harry, her twelve-year-old cousin, younger brother to Julia and Phoebe, had a powerful swing.

  She leapt as high as she could in an effort to catch the tennis ball he had just struck, but was not surprised when her fingers closed on empty air. What did surprise her was his cry of, ‘Oh, well caught, sir,’ and the smattering of spontaneous applause that rippled among the other players.

  As Harry dutifully lowered the tennis racquet he was using to guard the upturned coal scuttle which was his wicket, Lady Hester turned to see which one of the fathers had taken the unprecedented step of visiting his offspring, rather than the stables, so early in the morning.

  But it was Lord Lensborough who was striding towards them, tossing the ball and catching it nonchalantly in one hand as he came.

  ‘That means you are in bat now, sir, by our rules,’ Harry cheerfully explained while Hester’s jaw dropped.

  Lord Lensborough in bat. Not if I can help it, thought Hester, snapping her mouth closed firmly.

  ‘Make your bow to his lordship, children,’ she commanded her charges, sinking into a dutiful curtsy herself. She felt a spurt of satisfaction when his brows drew down in an expression of displeasure. He was no fool, she had to give him that. He had picked up her unspoken message that he was unwelcome.

  ‘You appear to have lost your way, my lord,’ she said, keeping her eyes fixed on the ball once he came to a halt only a few feet from her. ‘My cousins are waiting for you in the library.’ The long, strong fingers tightened perceptibly around the ball.

  ‘What you are doing looks far more interesting.’

  Hester detected a hint of a threat in his tone. She took a step back. He took one forward.

  ‘I have observed,’ he said in a voice pitched so low that nobody but she could hear it, ‘that the most interesting things seem to occur wherever you are. Do not banish me to the library just yet. It is a sentence too harsh, even for you, to condemn me to the tedium of your cousins’ conversation.’

  Hester gasped. Whatever could he mean? A scion of society would not really wish to spend time with a woman who dived into ditches, indulged in fisticuffs with his groom, spat insults at him at every available opportunity, never mind a pack of grubby children.

  ‘You will find no conversation at all here, my lord. We are simply playing a children’s game.’

  ‘I already know that it will give me more amusement than being closeted with your hen-witted aunt.’

  ‘My aunt is not…’ Hester’s head flew up as she launched into a defence of her aunt, only to falter at the twin hurdles of her aunt’s lack of intelligence, and the amused twinkle she encountered in those tiger-striped eyes. Still, to insult Aunt Susan while the children stood within hearing distance…

  ‘You have not seen my aunt at her best,’ Hester hissed between clenched teeth, taking a step nearer to prevent the children overhearing. ‘She is a little flustered at present, since we have a house full of guests.’

  ‘From what I have observed,’ his lordship cut in ruthlessly, ‘she does little more than sit on a sofa, issuing a plethora of contradictory orders while you run yourself ragged making sure the house runs smoothly in spite of her.’

  Hester clenched her teeth on the riposte she would dearly love to have given him in defence of her aunt. Was that what he was about? Taunting her, baiting her till she could not help lashing out at him? So that she would feel, as she had done after blundering into the facts of his painful bereavement, that she deserved to have her tongue cut out? Better to change the subject altogether than end up looking like a heartless shrew yet again.

  ‘Please, sir, may we have our ball back? The children grow impatient to continue their game.’

  ‘But I am in bat,’ he countered.

  ‘Oh, no, you’re not.’ She glared up at him, promptly forgetting all her resolutions to keep an even temper in his presence. ‘You shouldn’t even be here. You are supposed to be in the library.’

  ‘I think not.’ His voice dropped to little more than a growl, so threatening it sent a shiver sliding the length of Hester’s spine. She couldn’t believe she had just more or less given him an order. Lord Lensborough took orders from nobody.

  She clasped her hands together before her, an unconsciously defensive gesture, and glanced nervously over her sho
ulder at the children.

  Lord Lensborough sighed, following the direction of her gaze. Any one of these children could report back to its parent that, instead of playing with them, Lady Hester had been flirting with him. On his account she had already had her riding privileges withdrawn, and been painfully reminded of her lowly station by being forced to take her meals out of sight of the other house guests.

  This was not going at all the way he had planned. His attempt to keep things lighthearted had only succeeded in confusing her, and making her nervous. All he could now do was make the whole episode appear as innocent as possible.

  ‘Just stop arguing with me for once, madam, and explain the rules,’ he growled.

  ‘Th…the rules…’ she stuttered, backing away from him.

  ‘The rules are brilliant,’ Harry cheerfully asserted, stomping over to where they stood and handing the battered tennis racquet over to Lord Lensborough. ‘One man in bat, defending his wicket…’ he gestured towards the coal scuttle ‘…the rest fielding. To ensure fair play, Aunt Hetty has devised a system of handicaps. The bigger and stronger you are, the more handicaps you have.’

  Lord Lensborough nodded, taking in the range of ages of the assembled children. The youngest involved in the game, the little blond moppet who had crawled on to Lady Hester’s lap during that first supper in the Great Hall, looked to be scarce more than a toddler. ‘That does seem fair,’ he agreed. Glancing at Lady Hester, he couldn’t resist asking, ‘What is the handicap imposed on Lady Hester?’

  ‘Oh, she’s a female,’ Harry blithely returned.

  ‘He means,’ Hester put in, seeing the mocking twist to Lord Lensborough’s lips, ‘that my movements are sufficiently hampered by wearing skirts to render me handicapped. I should point out, though, that any catch I make only counts as an “out” if I use my left hand, and the ball has not bounced off any other surface.’