Leading Lady (25 page)

God, please help me know what to do,
he prayed.

****

Joan answered the door of the Ryce house in the morning. She wore the expression of one who had been dreading the present moment. “Good morning, Lord Carey.”

“Good morning,” he said, stepping over the threshold.

As she took his hat, her eyes begged,
Am I in trouble?

Noah shook his head slightly, for the clicks of heels were growing louder.

Mrs. Ryce entered the hall trilling, “There you are, you naughty man! Olivia’s beside herself, fearing you met with some mishap.”

“Is that Noah?” came Olivia’s voice from the landing above.

“Forgive me for last night,” Noah said up to her.

“That depends on how believable your explanation will be,” she teased, floating down the stairs in a rustle of sea-green silks.

“Heh-heh,” Noah forced out through a stiff smile, because his soon-to-be-no-longer-mother-in-law-to-be was beaming at him, expecting it. He could no longer bear his own hypocrisy, the chatter so reeking of normalcy. “Olivia, may I speak with you?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“In private?” he said.

Both mother and daughter stared at him. He could hear Joan’s soft retreating footsteps. After a second, Mrs. Ryce nodded toward the sitting-room door. “There’s no one in there.”

It seemed she would follow them, but she stopped short in the hall. Noah watched the two trade perplexed looks as Olivia closed the door. Olivia turned and moved toward him. Of habit, Noah’s hands left his sides to take hers. But he lowered them again.

She noticed and looked hurt. “What is it, Noah?”

Tears burned his eyes. In spite of his righteous indignation
in the coach, he discovered that he could not bring himself to deliver the speech his mind had composed in the wee hours. So he softened it by saying, “I’m terribly sorry, Olivia. But I think it might be wise to postpone the wedding for a while.”

“Postpone? What do you mean?”

“I just need some time to think.”

His conscience burned. He was acting cowardly. Time would not change his mind. It was wrong to parcel out the pain in small doses to avoid the discomfort of a scene.

“Time to think about what, Noah?” She rested a hand upon his sleeve. “You’re not making any sense.”

This was ten times more difficult than he had imagined. He took a deep breath, braced himself mentally. “I’m sorry, Olivia. We can’t marry.”

She gaped at him. “But why?”

“I’m sorry,” he said for the third time, and he was, for having to hurt her. “I no longer feel the same way. I’ll reimburse you for your gown and any other expenses. And please keep the ring.”

“You won’t give me a reason?” Tears lustering her eyes, she shook herself as if attempting to wake from a dream. “Is this because of Friday night?”

The promise he had made to Miss Spear was a weight upon his mind. And how could he reply that Friday night’s incident was the loose pebble that escalated into an avalanche, without jeopardizing Joan’s position? He sighed, frustrated, realizing the unfairness of giving Olivia only part of the whole reason. “It was a mistake to become engaged so soon after we met. We really don’t know each other. My fault.”

She dissolved into tears, and again, he had to restrain himself from embracing her, patting her shoulder, or touching her in any way that might dilute the message he had given her. It was tough enough to say the first time. He tried to give her his handkerchief, but she shook it away.

The door
whooshed
open, and her mother hurried into the room, giving Noah a stunned look as Olivia fell into her arms.
Once she gathered the reason for her daughter’s sobs, Mrs. Ryce called Noah a rakeshame, a libertine, and scoundrel, and when Doctor Ryce entered, he added some epithets of his own. Becky and Lydia, Olivia’s youngest sisters, wandered wide-eyed into the room but were ordered out by their father. The confusion upon their faces was as painful to Noah as the anger and hurt on everyone else’s, for it drove home to him that he would no longer be a part of this family’s lives.

He left the house feeling as battered as if he had been beaten and more alone than he had felt since his father’s death. In the hired coach on the way to York Station, he tugged lose his cravat from his collar and wiped his eyes and cheeks, blew his nose. No matter what she had done, what her parents had done, no matter that he no longer could make himself love her, he hated to be the cause of so much pain.

****

Back at home he could hear his mother in the parlour, playing whist with Uncle Bertram and Aunt May and their son Ronald. Ronald was describing a Lanchester motorcar he had seen in York this morning, and fortunately no one seemed to notice Noah pass by the open doorway.

“I wish we could get one,” he heard on his way to the staircase. “Just think, no more baling hay and mucking out horse stables.”

“Nonsense.” Uncle Bertram’s voice. “They’re just a flash in the pan, I tell you. What will happen to all those automobiles when there’s no more petrol in the ground?”

Upstairs, Rhodes helped Noah out of his Wellington boots and inquired as to the whereabouts of his hat.

“I forgot it,” Noah said.

The elderly servant looked at his face and gave him a grim nod. Noah was certain he would sleep like a stone from exhaustion. But sleep mingled uneasily with wakeful memories of the scene in the Ryces’ parlour, and he tossed and turned until he had to get out of bed and tuck his sheet back under the mattress.

He threw himself into physical activity over the remainder of the week, helping the estate workers dig stones to enlarge the barn. The sweat seeping out through his pores did not drain his body of the guilt-induced queasiness, but he did sleep most nights. When he broke the news to his mother, strolling with her in the garden, she wiped away tears. She was fond of Olivia and, he suspected, had already pinned some hopes upon having grandchildren.

“Why, Noah?” she asked.

“I discovered something of her character that I couldn’t live with.”

“How did you discover this?”

“I’m afraid I’m not at liberty to share that.” He gave her a regretful look. “Not even with you, Mother. I gave my word to the person who informed me.”

“Hmm.” She started walking again, he with her. “Are you certain this person was truthful?”

“Quite sure. She took a risk by telling me.”

“And did Olivia dispute her story?”

Noah sighed. “That’s the hardest part. I couldn’t bring it to her without breaking my promise.”

“That hardly seems fair. Everyone should have a chance to defend himself . . . herself, when accused.”

“I know, Mother. I’ve said that to myself a thousand times. But there is more compelling evidence to believe the story than to not. And even if it
isn’t
true, it’s brought on enough doubts to where I just can’t marry her.”

He held his breath for the argument certain to continue, but she simply shook her graying head. “What a shame. You got on so well together.”

The fact that she would not press for any more details gave Noah more freedom to vent the feelings bottled up inside. “I had her on a pedestal. That was wrong of me. If I would have really allowed myself to get to know her, it wouldn’t have progressed this far, and people wouldn’t be hurt.”

His mother looped her arm though his. “There’s not a
person alive without regrets. Not a
sane
person anyway. What can I do to help?”

“Would you consider hiring the Ryces’ parlourmaid if she ever needs to leave her position?”

When his mother gave him a curious look, he shook his head.

“She’s not the person I made the promise to. But she did do something for me, and I’d like to let her know she has another place if she wishes.”

“Of course,” she replied.

****

The following day Noah wrote to his late father’s attorney and good friend, Mr. Gates, asking that he call on Doctor Ryce and ask the total expenditure the family had applied toward the wedding. Mr. Gates called upon Noah at Carey Hall on the last day in May with a letter from a Mr. Southworth, another York attorney, stating Olivia Ryce’s intention to sue him for breach of contract.

“How much does she want?” Noah asked after Mother left them alone in the parlour with tea.

“Ten thousand pounds, if it goes to court.”

Noah felt veins pop out against his collar. “
Ten
thousand?”

“Mr. Southworth was quite adamant.”

“I don’t
have
ten thousand pounds.”

“I realize that, Lord Carey,” Mr. Gates said, having administered Noah’s father’s will five years ago. The estate was bequeathed to Noah, but with a life-estate provision favoring his mother. As long as she lived, the income generated by wool sales and tenant farmer rents was hers to control.

It was not that Noah’s father had not trusted him to care for his own mother, Mr. Gates had explained at the reading, for he had drafted the will when Noah was an infant. His legal firm had advised it, having witnessed enough horror stories of young men gambling away entire estates or bringing in a young wife who begrudged her mother-in-law every penny.

“I’ll not borrow money from my mother,” Noah seethed, building up steam.

The attorney’s spectacle lenses magnified the gravity in his expression. “I’m compelled to inform you, Lord Carey, that unless you can provide witnesses to testify to any moral fault of Miss Ryce’s, the verdict will probably go in her favor.”

“I can’t do that,” Noah said.

“Not one witness? Are you absolutely certain?”

“Yes.”

“Pity. Justice may be blind but judges aren’t, and a heartbroken beautiful young woman on the stand is certain to evoke sympathy.”

“You said
if
it goes to court,” Noah said. “Does that mean the Ryces are open to the possibility of settling out of court?”

“They are. For four thousand pounds.”

“Four thousand,” Noah mused aloud. “After your bill, that will be almost to the penny what’s left in my personal account.” It was what remained of the five thousand his father had given him when he started at Oxford, so that Noah would not have to ask for pocket money.

“Indeed?” Mr. Gates’s brows rose above tortoiseshell frames. “Did you happen to mention that account to your former fiancée?”

“Why, yes. I told her everything.” In an instant, every nagging doubt Noah had suffered over whether he had done the right thing by breaking his engagement was silenced. He sighed, set his cup and saucer on a side table, and got to his feet. “Please excuse me for a minute. My cheques are upstairs.”

“Just like that?” the attorney said when Noah returned. “I could try negotiating them down.”

“I want this to be over. If that’s what it takes to appease them, that’s what it takes. I only ask that you have Doctor Ryce sign some sort of privacy agreement before you hand him the cheque. I’d rather not worry my mother over this.”

“Very decent of you, I must say.” Mr. Gates slipped the cheque into his satchel. “Oh, I almost forgot. . . .”

He brought out a flat shirt box tied with blue satin ribbon. “Apparently Miss Ryce is just as eager to put this unpleasantness behind her. She asked me to give you this.”

“A gift?” Feelings assaulted Noah from all sides. Relief, that Olivia apparently did not despise him. Regret, that the engagement had ended for the reason he had to end it. Guilt, that he had pursued her like an infatuated schoolboy, glossing over her true character. And a fair bit of anger toward the Ryces for seizing this as an opportunity for financial profit.

But as soon as Noah held the box in his hands and felt its lightness, dark humor swept all other emotions away.

“Aren’t you going to open it?” Mr. Gates said.

Noah gave him a dry smile. “Later.”

Upstairs, he untied the ribbon and raised the lid.

“I’m afraid it’s beyond repair, your Lordship,” said Rhodes. The valet did not ask the circumstances surrounding the bowler hat that lay flat as a pewter platter, but his raised eyebrow plowed furrows in his forehead. “It’s not even fitting for the charity box.”

“I want to save it anyway,” Noah said. After all, it was his diploma from the school of foolish actions. He only wished the tuition had not been so expensive.

****

During the days that followed, Noah felt as if he were a planet knocked out of its orbit by some giant asteroid. It was not that he grieved for Olivia, for all he had to do was imagine her slapping a servant or spending his four thousand pounds on silk dresses and, bit by bit, any lingering traces of affection seeped from his heart.

But now that courtship no longer dominated his time and emotions, now that marriage no longer waited in the foreseeable future, he realized how directionless his life was. He had no goal to set his sights upon other than improving his acting craft, and were he to become skilled enough to make Sir
Henry Irving look like a boy in a church pageant, he would continue on as before, acting in York at every opportunity, helping out on the estate between times.

When Jude’s second letter arrived on the sixth of June, Noah had to wipe his eyes every third line or so.

The eleven bedrooms are as tiny as biscuit tins and are occupied by struggling actors and musicians,
Jude wrote of the Irving Street lodging house where he had secured a room on the third floor.

Noah read on of Jude’s experiences at rehearsal, followed by: