by Balogh, Mary
“Mama,” he said quite late in the evening, when a number of the guests, especially those who were not family, had retired after a long day, “may I have a word with you?”
“Of course, Harry.” She looked up at him with an expectant smile and raised eyebrows. Wren and Alexander and Bertrand Lamarr, with whom she was conversing, looked at him with interest.
“In private?” he said.
“But of course.” She got to her feet.
He might as well have stood in the middle of the drawing room blowing a bugle, he thought ruefully as he opened the drawing room door to allow her to precede him out. A sort of hush had fallen upon the occupants, who had all been chattering merrily in their own groups a moment ago.
So much for quiet discretion.
Fifteen
Lydia was preparing to go out late the following morning. She was going to walk into the village to buy a few items she did not really need. She was not going to hide away at home, she had decided overnight. Nor was she going to hang her head and hurry along the street and hope no one noticed her. She had certainly had plenty of time to make her decision, for she had scarcely slept. If people had anything to say, they could say it to her rather than just about her. That would be a nice change for them. If people wished to shun her or give her the cut direct, then she would give them the opportunity to do it today. In the meanwhile she was going to carry on with her life as usual.
She had started the day by throwing wide every curtain in the house. And when she let Snowball outside, she went too and even played the stick game for ten minutes, though admittedly she did so in the back garden rather than the front.
She really had no idea just how bad it was going to be. Denise had been a bit vague about it when she called earlier. She had fully supported Lydia’s decision to go out and face the whole thing down, however, and had even offered her company. Lydia had said no. This was something she must do alone. There was going to be no more hiding behind or clinging to anyone, not even another woman. What she had begun doing on the evening of the assembly, despite the rather disastrous results, she was going to continue doing.
She would not retreat back into her shell.
Perhaps the village would be talking today about the new arrivals at Hinsford Manor. Lydia had not counted the number of carriages yesterday, but it had been considerable. Where had all the people been put? And all the horses and carriages? Had anyone been expecting them? Had Harry? Lydia’s guess was that the whole of the Westcott family had come to stay, and they were an illustrious lot, to say the least. Surely it was not too much to hope that the pathetic gossip that had erupted yesterday into near scandal over the silly fact that Major Westcott had kissed her in her doorway would be superseded today by all the excitement of knowing that a good chunk of the English aristocracy was virtually on their doorstep?
There was a knock upon her front door just as she was getting up her courage to don her pelisse and bonnet. It would be Hannah this time or Mrs. Bailey, she supposed. But when she opened the door, she discovered that it was neither.
“Oh,” she said while Snowball went into an ecstasy of yipping and bouncing and tail waving. Harry Westcott was removing his hat, his expression surely as grim as it must have been when he was facing a regiment of enemy soldiers charging into battle. He was not alone. There was an older lady of aristocratic bearing and elegant appearance with him. Her eyes, steady and grave, were leveled upon Lydia.
“Lydia,” Harry said, “may I have the honor of presenting my mother, the Marchioness of Dorchester?”
“It is too late to ask permission, Harry,” his mother said. “The deed has already been done. How do you do, Mrs. Tavernor? May we step inside? Or are we interrupting something?”
“I was about to go out,” Lydia said none too graciously. “But it can wait.”
She stood reluctantly to one side while the Marchioness of Dorchester stepped into her cottage, filling it, dwarfing it with her aristocratic presence and the faint smell of some expensive perfume. Lydia would have scooped up Snowball and held her out of the way, but Harry had already done it himself. The dog was trying to lick his face and was wriggling with what looked very like sheer joy.
Lydia had not felt kindly disposed toward Major Harry Westcott during the night, imagining as she had that he was reveling in the company of his family, untouched by scandal, contemptuous of gossip, and sparing not a single thought for what she might be enduring. She had known that she was being unfair, but sometimes it was hard to ward off self-pity and an accompanying irritability. Sometimes it was hard to admit that one was almost entirely and solely to blame for the ills that came into one’s life. For he would not have kissed her forehead the night before last if she had not asked him some time ago if he was ever lonely. He would not have chopped her wood or any of the rest of it. By his own admission he had hardly known she existed.
The marchioness had moved right into the living room, but only, apparently, to make more room in the porch. She turned to look steadily at Lydia again.
“I believe I had an acquaintance with your mother,” she said. “She was Julia Winterbourne? Your father is Mr. Jason Winterbourne?”
“Yes.” Lydia raised her eyebrows. “You knew her well, ma’am?”
“Not very, I am afraid,” the marchioness admitted. “But I do recall that she was quite pretty and seemed amiable and sweet-tempered. However, I believe she is about to become a very dear friend from my younger years. And I am about to be transported with delight at the discovery that her daughter is living in the very village where I spent so many years with my children during their growing years.”
Lydia stared mutely at her. She was very aware of Harry standing silently just behind her. At the edge of her vision she could see his arm moving as he petted Snowball. “But I do not suppose,” she said, “you can be feeling any great delight at the way my name has been coupled with your son’s in local gossip since yesterday.”
“Lydia—”
But his mother cut Harry off with a look and a lifting of her eyebrows. “It is being said, apparently, that you exchanged a good-night kiss with him on your doorstep a couple of evenings ago when you had every reason to believe yourself to be unobserved,” she said. “Is that what happened, Mrs. Tavernor? Harry says not quite. He says he kissed your forehead, but you did not return the kiss in any way. I believe him, unless he is being chivalrous and is lying to shield your good name. But even if you contradict him and say it was a mutually shared, even passionate, embrace, it would seem hardly deserving of being spoken of as though there were something sordid about it. I do not remember Mrs. Piper, though I do recall her husband’s family. Vaguely, however. They never worked on the Hinsford estate. I understand she feels a particular obligation to honor the memory of your late husband, who died saving her son’s life. That is understandable, but it is no excuse for spreading unsubstantiated and doubtless exaggerated rumors in a deliberate attempt to cause embarrassment, even trouble, for his widow. According to Harry, her son appears to have been spying on you for some time.”
“I will not apologize for what happens in my own home,” Lydia said. “Or try to explain or justify. But to you, ma’am, since you are his mother and have been civil to me, I will say that I am not ashamed of anything that has happened between Major Westcott and me. And until the evening of the assembly there had not been any contact at all between us for a couple of weeks. I was away visiting my father and brothers and sister-in-law. Your son and I are not close friends. We are friendly acquaintances.”
She heard Harry inhale sharply behind her as though he was about to say something, but his mother looked at him again and he held his peace.
“I believe you, Mrs. Tavernor,” she said. “This is a particularly lovely morning after a bit of a dull start. There is not a cloud in the sky, and there is scarcely a breath of wind. Your front garden is a glory of spring color. Is your back garden just as pretty?”
“Not quite,” Lydia said, frownin
g at the sudden change of subject. “The woodpile is back there, and there is a shed. They take up almost half the garden.”
“I will take a look out there anyway, if I may,” the marchioness said. “Perhaps your little dog would like to accompany me. I will find a back door in your kitchen, I presume?”
“Yes,” Lydia said, taking a step toward the kitchen. “I will show you—”
“Oh, I think it very unlikely I will get lost,” the marchioness said, taking Snowball from Harry’s arms and laughing as the dog first yipped at her and then licked her hand and tried to do the same to her chin. “No, little dog. Manners, please. I like you well enough, but I do draw the line at having my face washed.”
And she stepped past Lydia, made her way through the kitchen, and let herself out into the garden. She shut the door behind her with an audible click.
Lydia turned a frowning face upon Harry. “What—?”
“She has deliberately left us alone,” he explained.
Her frown deepened.
“Lydia,” Harry said, “this is all absurd and bizarre and a number of other things. But it has happened. I walked over to Tom Corning’s earlier this morning, and he told me that Mrs. Piper has had some success in whipping up indignation in that segment of the population that believes you are not entitled to a life of your own but ought to commit the whole of it to grieving for your husband. They are the people who followed him with fervent devotion while he lived and have revered him as a martyr since his passing. They set you on a pedestal along with him when he was vicar here and elevated you even higher after he was gone. You became to them the model of the perfectly devout and virtuous widow. Your behavior in the year or so following his passing confirmed them in that opinion. They may not have appeared to pay you much attention, but your quiet modesty was a comfort to them, I suppose. They did not expect that the time would come when you would wish to start living again.”
Lydia sighed and went to stand behind the sofa so she could cling to the back of it and put some distance between them. That was one way of explaining what was happening, she supposed. Her own interpretation was another. It all amounted to the same thing.
“I thought that by remaining invisible to all but a few close acquaintances, I would be shielded until I found myself,” she said. “I made the conscious decision to become fully myself in time for the assembly. I wore a pink gown that I suppose some are now describing as garish, even vulgar. I danced and talked with almost everyone and smiled and laughed. I was proud of myself, and everyone seemed to be kind. And then the Wickends sent for the Reverend Bailey and you offered to take Mrs. Bailey and me home in your carriage. Jeremy Piper came after us with the plate I had left behind with cakes for Mrs. Piper to take home for her children. And finally—disaster. I invited you over the threshold out of the rain while I fetched your scarf, and you—” She stopped and sighed again. “As you just observed, it is all utterly absurd and bizarre and I intend simply to ignore it all. People will forget eventually. They always do. And I do not suppose everyone will treat me as a pariah.”
“I think you had better marry me, Lydia,” he said.
She laughed softly but entirely without humor as she turned her head to look into his face. He was still looking grim. Also very pale. He appeared as if he had slept as little as she had.
“That was not the best of proposals, was it?” he said, taking a step toward her. “And there is no excuse. I have been practicing a speech since last night. I cannot recall a single word of it. Though yes, I can. The word ardent was in there somewhere. Oh, and the phrase the happiest of men.”
Incredibly, they both laughed. And seemingly with genuine amusement. But only for a moment.
“Lydia,” he said. “It is the only thing that will silence the gossip. A man walks home with the woman he is courting. He chops wood for her. He can be excused for calling upon her in the evenings, even if it is not quite the thing if she lives all alone. He dances with her at a village assembly. He kisses her good night when he brings her home. The gossip will turn to understanding and congratulation from most people once our betrothal is announced.”
“No, Harry.” Lydia grabbed one of the cushions from the sofa and held it to her with both arms. “I will not be bullied—”
“I am very fond of you, Lydia,” he said. “I understand your fear of giving up your freedom to yet another possessive man just when you have begun to enjoy it. But I beg you to believe that it would never occur to me to try to exert dominance over you based upon the single fact that I am a man and you are a woman. Or upon any other fact, for that matter. As my wife you would be my equal. I believe we would be able to offer each other companionship and affection. I would certainly offer them to you, and I am in hope that you would give them in return. You would always be free to be yourself just as I would be free to be myself. But there could be an added sense of togetherness that perhaps we both crave even though both of us have been a bit afraid to risk giving up our single state. Dash it—all this is mere verbiage. I am massively bungling the whole thing, am I not? I am not bullying you, but I really think you should marry me. Will you?”
It was a strange marriage proposal and obviously not the one he had rehearsed. That very fact touched her. She felt tears well in her eyes and blinked them determinedly away.
“I did not mean you were bullying me,” she said. “I meant that if I were to agree to marry you, I would have been bullied into it by public opinion. Oh, Harry, you are very kind. Indeed you are. But, no. It would be wrong—for you, for me, for the situation in which we find ourselves. Why should we be forced into marriage simply because of a spying child, a hysterically pious mother, and a segment of the community, albeit a rather large and vocal one, that is all too ready to believe the worst of me? We should not give in to it. Does your mother know you are offering me marriage? But of course she must. Why else would she have decided that she wanted to see the back garden—alone?”
“She does know,” he said. “Lydia, was it so very bad that night?”
“It?” She felt her cheeks heating even as she asked the question.
“You dreamed of a lover,” he said. “Of me. You had both. Was it so very bad?”
“Oh, Harry.” The tears sprang again, and his face blurred before her eyes. “You know it was not.”
“Well, then?” he asked.
“I cannot marry you just for that,” she said. “I cannot marry. I will not.”
“But circumstances have changed,” he said, “as we knew they would if word got out that we were seeing each other privately. Damage has been done to your reputation and your ability to go on living in peace here. You must allow me to make amends. No, scrap that, please. There is no must about it, of course. But …” He paused and sighed deeply. “Dash it all, Lydia. Please marry me.”
Ah, did he not see that it was the very last thing she could do? Not because she did not like him. She did. Not because she did not love him. She did, God help her. Certainly not because she had not enjoyed making love with him. Not even entirely because of her coveted freedom and independence. She could not marry him just because a village was gossiping about her and making a loose woman out of her. She would not. It would be a terrible basis for a marriage.
“You do not trust me,” he said.
She blinked back her tears so she could see him clearly.
It would be easy to voice an instant denial. But really that was at the root of everything upon which she had based her life and her plans for the past year and a half, was it not? She could trust herself. But could she trust someone—a man—to have legal ownership of her again, to do with her as he chose? For that was what being married meant. She had loved and trusted Isaiah with her whole heart. Who could have been more apparently trustworthy than he?
“You cannot answer,” Harry said. “Because you do not want to lie, I suppose, and hurt me. Your life will be difficult from now on.”
“Only if I allow it to be,” she said.
He gazed at her in obvious exasperation before turning sharply away to look out through the window. “Do you regret that you remained here at Fairfield, knowing as you do now that the widow of the Reverend Tavernor would be held to a higher standard of behavior than anyone else?” he asked her.
She gazed at his back—tall, straight, military— and thought about it. “Regrets are pointless,” she said. “They do not change whatever that thing is that one may regret if one allows oneself to do so. That one thing for me would be asking you if you are ever lonely. I ought never to have asked. But there have been positive results as well as negative. I had a lot of wood chopped for me all at once.”
He looked at her over his shoulder and came very close to smiling before turning away again.
“I am still using the wood,” she said. “I will be forgetting how to wield the axe myself. Has all your family come, Harry? Hannah says it is probably because you have an important birthday very soon. Your thirtieth. You must be enjoying their company.”
“A pointed change of subject,” he said, turning from the window and drawing breath to say more. But before he could do so the back door opened with more noise than was necessary. Snowball trotted into the room, hesitated, and went to sniff Harry’s boots. The marchioness cleared her throat before coming to stand in the archway to the living room. She looked from one to the other of them.
“Well?” she asked, addressing Harry.
“She has said no,” he replied curtly.
“I would have been surprised,” she said, “if it had been otherwise. A bit of silly outrage over a kiss that was apparently hardly even worthy of the name is a poor reason for two people to marry if there is no other. You do not wish to marry my son, Mrs. Tavernor?”