After she had taken her tea, Nora went ahead of her father and waited in his study. She wondered if it was the same room where Gerard had met with him the night before, and the thought made her feel a little more at home with the coming interrogation. When her father entered, he closed the door behind him and took a seat in one of the two chairs by the fireside, motioning her to take the second.
“Thank you for making time for me in your morning,” he said with a kind smile. He was always so kind. It hurt Nora to imagine him disapproving of her decisions in any way, when he had always proven himself to be understanding of her situation. “I imagine you, being the clever daughter I raised, can imagine the subject of today’s conversation.”
“You wish to speak with me about Lord Colbourne, Father?” she asked tentatively.
He pursed his lips together and nodded curtly. “You guess rightly. I know that he found you after our discussion last night and spoke with you. I don’t know what he told you, but I think it only fair that you should know he sought you out against my express orders for him to leave the premises immediately.”
“You mean, after you failed to invite him to the dinner party in the first place,” Nora said quietly.
Mr Pembroke leaned forward, a frown wrinkling his forehead. “Do I detect in your voice a tone of disapproval, Nora? It was for your own sake that I omitted his name from our guest list, to spare you contact with a man who was willingly leading you on whilst entertaining other young women at his country estate.”
“Lord Colbourne was doing no such thing,” Nora responded, hoping her voice sounded calmer than she felt. “I imagine, as eloquent as he is, that he communicated as much to you last night.”
“Are you not taken aback that a man who claims to have such an interest in propriety and societal uprightness should appear at a place where he was not invited in the dead of night and demand an audience with the father of a girl he has slighted?”
“I am not surprised, for he did not slight me and needed to come and speak with you face-to-face. He is a man of courage and honour, and I would expect nothing less.” Nora twisted her hands around the handkerchief in her lap, unable to escape the feeling of rising tension in her chest at the evidence that she had been right all along about her father’s disapproval of her suitor. “I am more surprised,” she went on, “at your behaviour in this matter, Father. You are a wise and level-headed man. Why, then, would you stoop to Lady Colbourne’s methods in this feud?”
“Do not be over-dramatic, daughter,” Mr Pembroke said coldly. “It is not a feud, it is a little slight. And it is precisely because I am level-headed that I set about making my feelings clear. It was in defence of your honour, Nora, and your future that I did this thing. The fact that you choose to take offense in the face of my care and kindness is beyond my understanding or ability to control.”
Nora shook her head, feeling a pressing hopelessness all about her. Her father was many things, but chief amongst them was the loyalty to his family and the stubbornness in situations where he was required to make apology, both qualities that would make reconciliation difficult in this case.
“Father, I hope you will allow me to speak my mind.”
“You have always done so in the past, and I wouldn’t have you stop now.”
“I fear that in this matter you are seeing through a glass darkly, influenced by your own pride as one of the landed gentry and your opinions about the House of Lords and some of the preposterous rules to which they adhere. Lord Colbourne is a good man, and he has good intentions as regards myself. I am sure of it.”
Mr Pembroke stood and walked to the window, standing with his back to Nora and his hands clasped behind his back. He assumed this posture for a few minutes in utter silence, and then turned and looked at Nora, who had been waiting behind him with bated breath.
“I believe that he has fooled you, daughter, into thinking that his intentions are pure, but I am not so easily convinced. I have seen too much of the world to believe that a man of such standing would pursue you for your intellect and beauty alone.”
Nora blinked, hurt. She knew that her father was right, that Gerard would ordinarily be better suited with another sort of woman – Lady Katherine, perhaps – but it was strange to hear such a thing from her father.
“He swears that he is true,” she said softly.
Her father came to her then, crossing the room in a few steps and taking her hands in his own. “Do not mistake me, Nora,” he said gently. “You are well worth such a man – more worth him than he is worth you – but I cannot account for the morality and wisdom of the aristocracy, and I doubt that he fully sees your worth. I demand that you break this courtship off at once. I will provide you pen and paper, and though I know that the separation will be difficult, I believe that you will have a chance at a happy life when at last this matter is buried and behind you.”
She looked into her father’s eyes. “Father, is this because you learned about the original ruse element in our arrangement? I imagine that it wounds you to think that your daughter would need such assistance, but it is true that I did and Lord Colbourne gallantly offered to assist me.”
“Gallantly, yes,” he retorted, dropping her hands but still staying nearby. “I’m certain he saw no personal gain at all in wooing the daughter of a man as wealthy as I.”
She shook her head. “This situation calls for many things, Father, but sarcasm is not one of them. I wish that I had a way to show you how genuinely in love with Lord Colbourne I am, and how I feel he loves me in return. I am not one to think much of myself, however brave I may seem outwardly, and so you must believe me when I tell you that I am convinced of Lord Colbourne’s steadfast affection, and I need no further examples of his faithfulness.”
Mr Pembroke shook his head as well, taking a step away from Nora. “You have always been a bright girl, Nora, and I can hardly imagine that one man, no matter his title, was able to take that away from you. I am not a tyrant, but I also cannot stand by and let this happen.” He sank back into his chair and dropped his head into his hands for a moment, looking suddenly small and weary. Nora still felt the frustration boiling inside her, but at the sight of her father sitting there before her, she realised anew how difficult it must be for him to see his only daughter embroiled in such an uncertain affair. She rose and sat beside him, laying a hand on his arm.
“I cannot let something as beautiful as this go,” she said, so softly she wondered if he could really hear her.
He looked up and patted her hand gently. “Then I will not ask you to,” he said. “If you insist that he loves you for yourself and not for the money that is attached to your name, you may continue your courtship. Tell this man of yours that he has my blessing…” he paused, and pursed his lips together, “…but he will not have your dowry.”
Nora frowned. “Father, what do you mean?”
“He can marry you, if he really does love you for your own sake, but he won’t have the Pembroke money to flush out the troubles in his estate. I won’t stand for it.”
Nora stood up, shocked and dismayed. She had thought often, while walking the deteriorating grounds at Holcombe, how happy she would be to see her dowry helping Gerard to restore the property and estate to the glory days it had seen during his father’s time, and now her own father was taking that hope away from her in one swoop.
“This seems extreme, Father. If you are to give me your blessing, why not the dowry as well?”
“Consider it my surest way of making certain that this man marries you for the right reasons. You do believe that he will continue to pursue you, even without your fortune?” He peered at her closely.
Nora swallowed hard and stared back at him. “If this is your final decision, Father, I will accept it. I do not know what the future holds, but I do have confidence that Lord Colbourne will do what is right and treat me fairly in the interim.”
She turned and slipped from the room, but in the hallway outside she leaned against
the wall, tears beginning to blind her eyes. It wasn’t that she doubted Gerard’s sincerity or kindness, but she also knew the state of affairs at Holcombe, and the pressures under which he laboured. He had a responsibility to his family, his tenants, and his estate, and she would understand if and when those responsibilities overcame the desires of his own heart.
Her father would crow to himself that he had weeded out an unworthy gentleman in pursuit of Nora’s money, but Nora knew the truth. If Gerard was forced to choose a match for practical and financial reasons he would be doing so with a shattered conscience, for the sake of the greater good. It made her love him all the more, even as her body shook with the force of her sobs.
Chapter 33
Lady Colbourne stood stiffly from her seat near the window at Holcombe, where she’d been looking out on the beautiful fields below and rang the bell for the maid to lay tea.
“My lady,” the girl said, curtsying deeply. “I’m sorry for the delay, but we are still airing out Lord Colbourne’s chambers. Do you know when he might be expected back?”
“I do not. Please lay tea in the garden outside and let Lady Diana know that I will expect her in attendance.”
Left to herself again, Lady Colbourne thought about her son, who had ridden away early the morning before to ride to Dearbrooke. He had not, at the time, given her any indication of why he was going, and until this morning she had assumed it was only to see that little Pembroke woman that he seemed so strangely taken with. For her own part, Lady Colbourne saw no real wickedness in Nora Pembroke, only a certain lack of tact and potential that she knew would cause problems when Nora became the next Lady Colbourne. She had heard stories over the years about the wild Pembroke daughter.
One time, when she was 16 years old, she had told a young man from the seaside that he looked like a toad in front of a roomful of his peers. The evening she showed up for a dinner party in her walking gown, hair loose around her shoulders, because she’d been caught in a rainstorm and unable to change before the engagement. And of course the incident at the beginning of the season with the insulted gentleman.
The list went on and on, and as much as Lady Colbourne wanted to like the lass for her son’s sake, she really couldn’t imagine someone as stately and careful as Gerard spending the rest of his life tied to such a woman. She had thought herself entirely justified, that is, until the letter had come this morning from an old friend of hers who had been invited to a dinner party at Dearbrooke.
Lady Colbourne, it had read, with what she couldn’t help interpreting as a bit of crowing pride, I am simply glowing this morning from my evening at Dearbrooke last night. The party was absolutely brimming with fine names and personas, such that I was primarily surprised to see that you were not in attendance. I was further astonished when the hosts made no mention of your absence, either to excuse it or to express regret, which leads me to ask – has some slight been given you, or are you perhaps planning a sudden trip out of the country to which the Pembrokes were privy but I am not?
The letter went on with rambling nonsense, but Lady Colbourne could process little of it, feeling as she did the smarting insult that she had been excluded from a dinner party thrown by a member of the landed gentry such as Mr Pembroke. In truth, she had always been rather fond of Mr and Mrs Pembroke, even when she found their child-rearing skills to be rather too lenient, and she had encouraged her late husband to spend time around them.
It was, at the time, a business arrangement as well as a proper friendship, for Mr Pembroke’s finances were renowned in the area, and she wanted her family to be well-connected with a gentleman who owned most of the land in the county and a good amount of money as well. Now, the letter lying open on the table seemed to be mocking her.
You can’t afford to make enemies right now, it said coldly.
“They’ve no right to treat me this way,” she answered it aloud, her voice shaking a little. “If they want to make a point, they should come out and make it.”
But they had. She could see it as clearly as they’d meant it – as a retribution to her act of inviting Lady Katherine to Holcombe when her son was already courting Miss Pembroke quite publicly. Lady Katherine…the very thought of her made Lady Colbourne both sad and winsome at the same time. There was the sort of woman that she could see really supporting her son, standing up for what was right, addressing society as she ought, and representing the Colbourne name.
Lady Colbourne sighed at the thought. She loved her son and had no desire to meddle or be a tyrant in the art of his affections. But she hadn’t chosen an ogre of a woman, or someone unkind. She’d chosen someone beautiful and graceful and everything that a man could want. She didn’t understand why he stubbornly persisted in his current path rather than taking the clear and easy one that was before him.
“Tea has been laid outside, my lady,” the maid said, reappearing. “And Lady Diana is there to take it alongside you.”
Lady Colbourne nodded and moved outside. She could see Diana from across the garden, already sitting under the arbour at the tea table. Diana was such a pretty thing, with dark hair bound up elegantly even though she was still so girlish, and a pretty pink gown. She had taken a fancy to this Miss Pembroke as well, mysteriously enough.
Lady Colbourne wondered what exactly it was that drew her children to this enigma of a woman, and as the thought crossed her mind it coupled at once with another idea, a way to perhaps leverage Diana’s friendship with Nora Pembroke to better understand her adversary. Adversary was perhaps too strong a word, but Lady Colbourne knew that when her son’s happiness was at stake, she could brook no quarter.
“Diana, dear,” she said, sailing into the arbour and sitting down at her daughter’s side. “How has your morning been thus far?”
Diana looked up, her dewy eyes far away. “Brief, mother.”
“You seem as though in the last few days you have gone back to your rather quiet ways. I saw you blossoming this last London season, and now you are again answering in short sentences with little to commend your conversation to the listening ear.” Lady Colbourne waited a moment, and then allowed her voice to become a bit more tender. “Do you miss Lady Katherine’s company so very much?”
“Not Lady Katherine,” Diana said, looking up for the first time to meet her mother’s gaze. “And I think you know that well enough. It is Miss Pembroke that I pine for, and I have not received any letters from her as of yet. She said she would write to me regularly, and yet there has been nothing.”
“It has not been that long since she left, and I imagine a woman with as many interests as Miss Pembroke does not have time to respond on time and with due diligence to her correspondence,” Lady Colbourne said. She reached across the table and poured Diana some of the warm, amber tea.
“You are always viewing her at a deficit, Mother,” Diana said quietly. “If she is late to respond to her correspondence, then she is not giving due diligence. And yet, if she is prompt then she is over-eager and has little to keep her occupied.”
Lady Colbourne bit back the retort that leapt to her lips. She had to remind herself that Diana was not the enemy. Miss Pembroke wasn’t even the enemy – bad connections and inopportune matches were the thing to be avoided at all cost, and this could only happen through co-operation. She softened her tone yet again.
“Perhaps I have been a bit too harsh on Miss Pembroke,” she said after a short while. “I do not know that I am always as ready as I ought to be to recognise the worth in other people. If you will promise to be patient with me, then I shall promise to consider her in a more favourable light. Tell me, Diana, about this friend of yours. You used to speak with me about your childhood friends all the time, and yet you rarely speak about Miss Pembroke unless your brother is in the room.”
“That is because,” Diana answered slowly, clearly confused, “you have never before seemed particularly interested in Miss Pembroke. I confess I am surprised that you are interested now, in fact.”
&nbs
p; “She is a well-connected lady, and a friend of the family,” Lady Colbourne said, shrugging with an affected nonchalance. “I do not see that it is so very strange that I should be interested in her history.”
A Baron Worth Loving: A Historical Regency Romance Book Page 20