A Marriage of Inconvenience (7 page)

“What is Miss Wright-Gordon’s fortune?” A rare hint of sharpness tinged Aunt Arrington’s voice, normally so vague and abstracted.

“One hundred thousand pounds.”

Lucy gasped at the monstrous sum.

“One hundred thousand?” Aunt Arrington’s voice was now so faint Lucy could barely make it out.

“I don’t know what her father was about, leaving so much to a daughter. It’s a miracle some fortune hunter hasn’t abducted her and spirited her off to Gretna Green will she, nil she, before now.”

“One hundred thousand,” Aunt Arrington repeated.

“Yes.” Lady Marpool chuckled. “She’d be an even finer thing for your son than Ned Cathcart would be for your niece.”

Lucy decided she wasn’t very hungry after all and sought sanctuary in the library.

When they walked together in the garden that afternoon, Sebastian was as attentive as Lucy could wish. She had brought her sketchbook along, though at first they simply walked back and forth among the rose-lined paths. They talked quietly of their plans for the future when they were sure no gardeners were within earshot.

After about a quarter hour, Sebastian began to limp noticeably. “Lucy, shall we sit on that bench there? I could look at your sketches, if you’d like.”

He indicated the same bench where she had sat with Lord Selsley the night before. She couldn’t quite fathom why, but the sight of it gave her a guilty start. Had she betrayed her betrothal to Sebastian by telling her deepest secrets to Lord Selsley? Or was she betraying her friendship with
him
by sitting on that same bench for a perfectly commonplace conversation with Sebastian, who would certainly not tell her how brave she was or offer to touch her hair?

She looked about and found another bench. “May we sit in the shade instead? It’s a rather warm day.”

“Of course.”

They made their way to the shaded seat, Lucy slowing her pace because of Sebastian’s limp. She handed him her sketchbook and waited while he paged through. He spent less time on each drawing than Lord Selsley had, at least till he found a rough sketch she had drawn from memory the previous afternoon. She ground her teeth together when he lingered over it. She’d forgotten all about that one.

It was a sketch of Lord Selsley and his sister, the latter waiting on her bay mare while the former prepared to mount his beautiful dappled gray. To Lucy’s mind, Miss Wright-Gordon was incidental to the composition, though she had done her best to capture the other young lady’s good-humored smile, not to mention her confidence in the saddle and the excellent cut of her riding habit. Lucy always tried to draw accurately, and at the time she had made the sketch she’d had no reason to envy Miss Wright-Gordon. But her purpose in taking up her pencil had been to see if she could do justice to the horses’ beauty and to try to reflect something of Lord Selsley’s energy. She thought she had done rather well on both counts—at least, it was good for a hasty sketch done entirely from memory—but she didn’t think Sebastian lingered over it to admire the horses.

She wouldn’t do anything so blatant as clear her throat, but she fidgeted slightly, and Sebastian turned the page. Next she had drawn Portia waiting with Lord Almont in the receiving line—the marquess’s round ruddy face glowing with pride, Portia even more cool and aloof than her usual wont.

Sebastian shook his head. “I don’t think Portia would like this one very much.”

“I’m certain she would not.”

“You should destroy it before she sees it.”

Lucy sat up straighter. But—the drawing was
good.
“I’ll certainly burn it if you think it wise,” she said reluctantly. “But Portia never looks at my sketchbook.”

“I do think you should. I’d hate to see a true quarrel develop between you, now that you’re to be sisters.”

He was right. As much as she hated to admit it—it was such a very good drawing—he was right. “Very well,” she said. “I’ll be rid of it as soon as I can. But, Sebastian, I’m not sure Portia and I can ever be friends. I hope I’ve never done anything to deserve her antagonism, but…”

“I know, Lucy. She never welcomed you as she ought, even from the beginning, and I do not expect her to begin now. All I ask is that you continue to act in such a way that none of the blame can be placed on you.”

“Very well.” She studied the offending sketch. “Do you think it possible that they can be happy together?”

He shook his head. “I cannot think my mother was wise to agree to the match. But Portia has a most unwomanly stubbornness to her nature—I must say, I’m glad you’ve never taken her as your model—and Mother has always given way to her too readily.”

It crossed Lucy’s mind that Portia might have been better off had her mother not been so very feminine and yielding. Aunt Arrington had been widowed four years after Lucy came to live at Swallowfield. Even at thirteen or fourteen, Lucy had been able to see that her aunt had been far too dependent on her husband for everything, that she scarcely knew how to think for herself or make simple decisions without his guidance. Lucy thought that she and Sebastian had turned out well enough—Sebastian because he was already in the army, and she because she relied upon him and her governess for guidance. But Hal was an utter rakehell and Portia too proud and ambitious, and their mother never lifted her hand to check either. Now Lucy thought it was too late to change either of them.

“I cannot imagine agreeing to marry a man I did not even like,” she said, “not unless I was very desperate. Even then, it would be for my brothers’ sake, and I would feel it as a sacrifice.”

“You think just as you ought,” he said. “But perhaps it will turn out well in Portia’s case. I cannot imagine her being the sort who would easily fall into a romantic entanglement leading her to betray her husband, since she is so very cool and proud.”

“I hope you’re right. Only…” She shuddered. “It seems such a very cold, unhappy existence.”

He smiled benignly upon her. “One
we
shall never have to fear. Now, show me what else you’ve drawn.”

He paged through the sketchbook, offering occasional questions and compliments, and Lucy tried to ignore the disloyal thought that Lord Selsley would never have asked her to destroy the sketch of Portia and Lord Almont, and that
he
would’ve seen the humor in the drawing of a kilted Earl of Dunmalcolm executing a sweeping bow before a primly dismayed Lady Marpool.

That evening Portia rode with Lord Almont and Lady Marpool in the Almont carriage while Lucy, her aunt and Sebastian followed in the Arringtons’ for the twenty-minute journey to Squire Cathcart’s home. It was a fine, well-proportioned stone house, not quite as big as Swallowfield but with an air of great prosperity and warmth throughout.

As the same group of local nobility and gentry made their gradual arrivals, Lucy found herself seated between the eldest Miss Cathcart, a girl of seventeen very newly out in society whom Lucy found relaxing company because of their shared inexperience, and her oldest brother, who had been so kind to her the night before. Sebastian stayed by his mother’s side, though he gave her regular encouraging smiles.

On the whole, Lucy was very happy until the Selsley party arrived. Miss Wright-Gordon sailed in on her brother’s arm, looking beautiful in a simple pale blue gown—whatever Lady Marpool said, Lucy thought she
was
beautiful. She smiled at Sebastian, her green eyes sparkling. Within a minute, he was at her side, and when play began, they were partnered at whist, while Lucy found herself in a noisy game of lottery tickets with most of the younger guests. She did her best to match Miss Cathcart’s enthusiasm and energy, though she was almost certain she failed.

Once as she was waiting for Ned Cathcart to deal the cards, she happened to catch her aunt’s eye. Aunt Arrington frowned at her, then looked at Sebastian and Miss Wright-Gordon with a wistful sigh.

Lucy sighed, too. She knew what she must do in the morning.

James reined Ghost down to a walk beside the stone wall dividing his lands from Lord Almont’s and frowned. There was no one there.

“What is it, James?” Anna guided Shade alongside Ghost. “You look disappointed.”

Did he? While he’d half expected to meet Miss Jones again,
disappointed
was a strong word.

“You were hoping to find your Miss Jones here, weren’t you?”

Sometimes Anna was cursedly insightful. “Not at all,” he lied. “Why should she come to the same place at the same time to draw, day in and day out? I’m sure she prefers fresh subjects.”

“Hmph. You want her to prefer
you.
”

“I want nothing of the sort.” He lightly touched his heels to Ghost’s flanks and guided her back down the hill, Anna and Shade at their side. “I’m not seeking a wife, and I wouldn’t dream of dallying with a young girl of good character if my intentions were anything less than marriage.”

“Is that so?”

“Of course it is. Surely you don’t accuse me of being the sort of man who’d raise expectations I’d no intentions of fulfilling.”

“Not deliberately, no. But you’ve been paying her marked attentions.”

“That’s rich, coming from you. I hardly spoke to her last night at the Cathcarts’.”

“No, but you looked at her often enough.” She reached up with one hand to adjust her shako. “Curse this silly hat.”

“I can’t believe you noticed where anyone else was looking, given how fixed your eyes were on Lieutenant Arrington.”

“I like him,” she said simply.

“That much is clear—and clearly an understatement. You mean to marry him, don’t you?”

“I’ve only known him two days. And he hasn’t offered for me.” A flock of sheep slowly scattered at their approach as they rode through the valley toward Orchard Park.

“If I’m any judge, it’s a matter of time,” he said. “He’s obviously mad for you.”

Anna contrived to look smug while blushing with maiden modesty.

“Have a care, Anna. I never like these whirlwind courtships, and I don’t like
him.
”

She sniffed indignantly and held her head higher. “I should think you’d be pleased. You’re the one who said I should marry soon and that I’d make such a fine officer’s wife.”

“I didn’t mean for you to throw yourself at the first one who happened to cross your path.”

“I haven’t thrown myself at anyone,” she snapped. “Surely you cannot accuse me of any impropriety.”

“No, I suppose not,” he said. Though Anna and Arrington’s mutual attachment was obvious, none of her behavior could be called rude or fast. “But the point remains. He isn’t good enough for you, and I don’t want to see you throw yourself away.”

“Now you sound like Aunt Lilias. ‘A younger son of a baronet, Anna, my dear child?’” she said, imitating their aunt’s tone and accent perfectly.

“That isn’t what I mean,” James said irritably. “You know I wouldn’t mind such a trifling difference in rank if I thought you otherwise well suited.”

“Then what
do
you mean? I cannot understand why you’ve taken him in such dislike.”

“I don’t like the way he looks at you.”

She raised an incredulous eyebrow. “You don’t like the way he
looks
at me? Would you rather I marry someone who didn’t especially admire me?”

How could he explain the chill he got every time he saw Arrington look at Anna? “A good husband,” he said haltingly, “should show you respect as well as ardor.”

“But he treats me with perfect respect.”

He shook his head. “You don’t understand why I dislike him. Well, I don’t understand why you’re so drawn to him. Why Arrington? He isn’t even clever.”

“Just because he isn’t as witty and quick-spoken as you are, you think him unintelligent.”

“Well…yes.”

“James Wright-Gordon, you are a very arrogant man.” Responding to her mistress’s mood, Shade snorted and danced restively.

“I don’t deny it,” he said. “But the fact remains that you are an intelligent woman, and one accustomed to the company of intelligent men—and, yes, witty and quick-spoken men. Don’t you think you’d grow a little bored with a man who’s not up to the Gordon standard?”

“You
are
like Aunt Lilias. She’s vain of Gordon blood, and you’re vain of Gordon brains.”

“Well, they’re very good brains—especially the Wright-Gordon ones.”

“Really? You certainly seem to be questioning
my
intelligence.”

“Oh, you’re clever as can be, sister dear, but sometimes I doubt your good sense. Now, you haven’t answered my question. Why Arrington, of all the men who’ve ever courted you?”

“Because he’s not like the other men who’ve courted me. Because he’s not like the men in our family, if it comes to that. He’s different—he’s so serious. And I think you’re wrong about him not being clever. He’s simply more deliberate than we are.”

James shook his head. “You’d be bored with him within a fortnight, and he’d never quite know what to make of you.”

“James,” Anna said, her voice low but thrumming with anger. “You are not my guardian. Uncle Robert is. It is not your place to interfere, and forgive me if I question the judgment of a brother who spent most of the Season shut up in his townhouse when Parliament wasn’t in session because he’d been disappointed by Eleanor Talbot!”

“Eleanor was better for me than Arrington could possibly be for you.” How did she even know about Eleanor?

“Truly? It seems she disagreed, or she’d be wed to you and not Lord Langley.”

James gritted his teeth. “My dealings with her are none of your concern.”

“In that case, neither are
my
dealings with Sebastian Arrington.”

He didn’t quite agree. Anna was younger and in danger of making a very foolish mistake. He had at least known Eleanor for well over a year before he thought of marrying her. But his sister wore her most mulish look. Knowing further attempts at persuasion would be useless, he proposed a race as a peace offering.

Lucy wanted to take up her sketchbook again that morning and escape for some time alone—and, perhaps, another friendly encounter with Lord Selsley—but what she needed to say to Sebastian would grow no easier by being deferred. So she asked him to walk with her after breakfast. She avoided the rose garden, which she wanted to keep sacred for more pleasant memories, but instead suggested they walk along a little path alongside the castle’s ancient moat.

She couldn’t bring herself to speak at first, to say the words that might unmake all her dreams, and Sebastian frowned down at her in concern.

“What is it, Lucy? You seem troubled.”

She swallowed hard. “Miss Wright-Gordon is a great heiress,” she said slowly.

“So I understand,” he said. “But what of it?”

He wasn’t making this any easier for her. “Well…she seems to like you, and, forgive me, but I cannot help but see that you like her as well.” Her heart was pounding, and her voice shook a little, but she made herself go on. “If you wish to court her instead, if you wish to end our engagement, I will not hold you to it.”

“Why, Lucy!” He laughed, but Lucy thought he was more anxious than amused. “You’re making too much of a trifle. I’m very happy with our betrothal, and in any case I would never be so dishonorable as to cry off. Surely you did not think I would do such a thing.”

“I know you wouldn’t, but that’s why I’m offering to end it myself. I don’t want you to marry me if you’d always be longing for her.” She shuddered at the thought of years, decades, in a loveless marriage while Sebastian dreamed of another.

“Lucy.” He stopped and took her hands. “Lucy, look at me.” Obediently, she tilted her chin up until she could meet his pale blue eyes.

“You are the one I want to marry. I cannot imagine any woman who would make a more suitable wife.”

“Are you certain? Miss Wright-Gordon is so very beautiful, and with her fortune…”

“It truly doesn’t matter. I wish to marry
you.
”

If only she could be sure he meant it. “But you continue to pay her such marked attentions!” Lucy regretted the words the instant she spoke them. She sounded so petty, so jealous.

“It means nothing, truly,” he said impatiently, “only friendliness during a country visit.”

“But what if she thinks it means something? What if she expects you to offer for her?”

Sebastian shook his head and laughed gently. “I assure you she expects nothing of the kind. As you say, she is an heiress. As such I’m certain she means to marry someone whose claims are much greater than my own. Ladies with a hundred thousand pounds to their names do not marry younger sons with hardly any expectations beyond what their commissions and the fortunes of war might bring them.”

Lucy supposed he was right in the general course of things, but Miss Wright-Gordon seemed so very besotted. Still, she felt a modicum of reassurance. “Very well,” she said.

“Don’t worry, Lucy. ’Tis less than a fortnight now till Portia’s wedding, and we’ll be married a few days later. Then we will leave this place behind and forget about it.”

Would it truly be possible to forget? Lucy doubted it—but then, Lord Selsley had reckoned his sister and Sebastian were simply caught in a temporary enchantment, and perhaps it was truly so. “I’ll be glad,” she said.

“So will I,” he said, so fervently that Lucy blinked at him in surprise. “So will I.”

After a moment he tucked her hand into the crook of his elbow and began walking again. “So,” he said deliberately. “I know you wish for a home of our own once the war is over. What would you say to the Ibbotson cottage, should it happen to be offered to let? We’d be near Swallowfield and the vicarage, so you’d see Owen often once he’s ordained.”

Mollified by his thoughtfulness, Lucy tried to will away her fears and view the future with happy anticipation again.

The next morning James rode out alone, since Anna and Aunt Lilias had planned an expedition into Alston to buy such trifles as ribbons and shoe-roses for the coming ball at Almont Castle. He couldn’t fathom why two ladies with extensive wardrobes created by London modistes needed anything new for this country entertainment, but such were the mysterious ways of women.

It was a beautiful morning, and James surveyed his lands with satisfaction as Ghost cantered up the slope to the edge of the Almont estate. While his rents and the produce of the Orchard Park home farm were the least of his fortune—he had what his aunt and uncle considered a most common and tradesmanlike interest in investment and speculation—he thought it only right to take good care of the land for the sake of those who depended upon him. Much as he enjoyed seeing an investment pay off, there was nothing quite like the domestic satisfaction of watching a flock of sheep grazing in his pastures, or drinking the cider pressed from his own apples, or, for that matter, taking his morning ride on a horse he’d bred himself.

He grinned as he caught sight of a slight figure in a white dress perched on the stone wall with her sketchbook in her lap.

He slowed Ghost to a walk as they approached. “Good morning, Miss Jones. I’m glad to see you’ve come back.”

She set her pencil down and smiled at him. “Come back?”

“You weren’t here yesterday.”

Her eyebrows lifted. “Do you ride this way every morning?”

He hadn’t until this week, but he didn’t intend to tell her that. He realized he was acting like a callow, infatuated schoolboy, and he looked away from her in sudden confusion. “It’s an ideal spot from which to survey the valley,” he said, glad he’d been able to think of a plausible explanation for his presence so quickly.

“And you are the lord of all you survey.” She clapped her hand over her mouth. “Oh, dear, that was dreadfully impertinent of me.”

He laughed and swung down from the saddle. “Not at all.” As he led Ghost to a nearby tree and tied her reins to a low-hanging branch, he turned to grin at Miss Jones. “Now, if I had said it, it would’ve been ridiculously grandiose.”

“But true,” she pointed out.

He sat down beside her. “Yes. But it would hardly be good form to boast about it. After all, what merit is it of mine that these are my lands? My father is the one who gained them. I merely inherited them.”

“Wouldn’t most people take the opposite attitude, and take more pride in having inherited their lands? I know Lady Marpool would.”

“I’m certain most people would, but I’ve never seen the logic in it. Surely one’s own accomplishments matter more than those of one’s ancestors, wouldn’t you agree?”

She pondered, and James found himself charmed by the way her eyes narrowed when she was deep in thought. “When you put it so baldly as that, yes, I would,” she said after a moment.

“Lady Marpool would undoubtedly think that very common of us,” he said, drawing a reluctant-sounding laugh from Miss Jones. “My uncle would agree with her—one of a very few things upon which Lady Marpool and Lord Dunmalcolm could ever come to agreement, I assure you.”

Now her laugh came more easily. “I certainly got the impression they’re hardly the dearest of friends.”

“That’s an understatement.”

“Lady Marpool said some shocking things about the Scots on our first morning here—though I suppose I shouldn’t tell you that.”

“It’s hardly a great secret that she doesn’t like us—or I suppose I should say ‘them.’ My father was English, after all. Why do you think my uncle wore his kilt to dinner that night, if not to shock her ladyship?”

“I thought that was the reason!”

“He’s already plotting how best to continue baiting her when you come to dinner at Orchard Park tomorrow evening. I believe he plans a recitation of Robert Burns as part of the entertainment.”

“Robert Burns?”

“Have you ever read his poetry?”

“I have not.”

She looked embarrassed at her ignorance, and he hastened to reassure her. “Well, it’s hardly a normal part of an Essex gentleman’s library.”

“It’s too Scottish?”

“Much too Scottish. I believe my uncle is planning to recite
 
“March to Bannockburn,” which is something of a hymn to throwing off the shackles of English tyranny.”