The Bachelor's Bargain (35 page)

The gentleman took a step closer to her and lowered his voice. “If the duke disavows his responsibility to you, madame, have no fear. I believe our industry here in Calais will grow beyond our dreams. You may be assured of financial comfort, and it is possible that together we may grow wealthy.”

“
Mercí
, Monsieur Robidoux.” Anne dipped a curtsy. How could she explain to him that she had never wanted wealth or security? Her father’s health and freedom had been uppermost in her heart for so many years that she had hardly been able to think beyond it. Anne would never be content until she was certain that her family was together and safe. But even then, she knew she could never wish for material possessions. She had tasted the joy of human communion, and she could never forget the man who had held her in his arms. More than that, she had learned the dire consequences of heedless action. God asked for submission, and Anne now longed to be as compliant as a wisp of lace thread woven into something beautiful by His loving workmanship.

“I am an honorable man, madame,” Robidoux continued, tugging at his lapels. “I will see to your care. No matter the contents of this letter, you have no need for concern.”

“
Bien entendu. Mercí beaucoup, monsieur,
” she said softly. As the Frenchman walked down the lane to his carriage, Anne scanned Miss Pickworth’s column. Though translated into French, the words were clear enough. Anne shut the door behind her and slipped to a chair beside the fire. “Sir Alexander is to be married in London,” she said. “As his brother’s widow, I should go.”

Prudence took the newspaper and scowled as she tried to make out the information. “It is true!” she said. “A wedding. Oh, London at last!”

“But I cannot go.”

“Whyever not? Monsieur Robidoux will not deny us the money for our travel. I want to go home, and you must be at the wedding.”

“Alexander Chouteau will not want me there, and seeing his father will only remind me of Ruel. I shall have to answer a thousand questions and try to explain what we were doing at Waterloo. I shall be forced to relive everything. I cannot bear it.”

“You must go, Anne. You have no choice. You must represent your husband at his brother’s marriage. If you do not attend, everyone will believe you have something to be ashamed of, hiding away here in France.”

“I am not hiding!”

“Are you not? You go nowhere but to the warehouse and the lace school. You wear nothing but black dresses day after day. You never attend teas or receptions, though you have been invited to go with me many times. You will not pay calls, and you are reluctant to receive visitors. You might as well be invisible, for all the lightness you display.”

“I cannot deny my lack of liveliness, Prudence. These past weeks have been difficult. You lost a friend, but you know what Ruel and I . . . you know we had become more deeply attached toward the end. We were more than partners in a marriage bargain. More even than companions. When Ruel died, I lost my husband.”

“Then go to London and sit in the chapel with the Duke of Marston and his wife. Take your place in the family, or they will cut you out of everything you are owed.”

“I am owed nothing, Prudence, and you know it. Ruel and I were hardly married under normal circumstances. Everyone hoped I would die soon after the wedding, and when I failed to do so, I was little more than an embarrassment to the family.”

“All the same, you must attend the wedding, Anne. It is time for us both to go home to London.”

Dropping into her chair, Anne stared at the fire. “Do you want to know something strange, Prudence? At this very moment, I have everything I believed I might have wanted in life. I possess my faith in God. I can take enough money to ensure the release of my father in England. Even this house . . . a little stone house. Do you know . . .” She stopped, struggling against tears. “Do you know, I always wanted a lace school . . . and now I have one. I even . . . I believe Monsieur Robidoux wishes to marry me.”

“Marry you? Anne, I am all astonishment!”

She gave a laugh that was half a sob. “He informed me yesterday at the warehouse that he has been thinking we should wed. Oh, Prudence, I shall have my stone house and my lace school and even . . . even my weaver.”

“You make it sound like a death sentence. But perhaps such a future for you is not so bad. You could go to London, reestablish your valuable connections in Society there, and then return to marry Monsieur Robidoux. He can hardly be called handsome, but he is a good man. He treats you fairly, and he respects your skills. Why not marry him?”

“I do not love him.”

“Nor does he love you. But look what love brought us, Anne. You are the widow of a man who left you nothing but memories. And I . . . I am utterly bereft.”

Prudence stood and tossed her knitting into her chair. The ball of yarn tumbled to the floor and rolled toward the hearth.

“Better to marry for security and comfort than for love,” she went on. “Wed Monsieur Robidoux, Anne. You will have a home of your own and a husband who will not go plunging across bloody battlefields and getting himself killed. That should be happiness enough. Surely it is a wiser course than the one I chose.”

Anne brushed a tear to keep it from rolling down her cheek. “I am sorry, Prudence. I know your grieving for Mr. Walker is very great.”

“Everyone says that I am silly, and now I see how right they are. I had to fall in love with Mr. Walker, had to sink into his arms, had to melt at the sound of his voice. I thought him magical, and he was. He was so magical, he vanished. My sisters would laugh at my foolishness.”

“Oh, Prudence,” Anne rose from her chair and embraced her friend. “Prudence, never say such a thing again. Your sisters adore you, and they want only your happiness. Had they any idea of the depth of your feeling for Mr. Walker, I am sure they would have supported you.”

Tears trickled down Prudence’s cheeks. “I adored him, Anne.”

“I know you did.” Unable to hold back her own sorrow, Anne held her friend close. “I loved Ruel so much, and I shall never see him again. I love him still—and I am angry with him, too, for dying and leaving me alone. That night in Brussels, when I knew beyond all doubt that I wanted to be his wife, I believed my life had just begun. I had never known such happiness. Such peace. And then . . . oh, Prudence, how can I go on without him? What shall I do?”

“We are truly undone!”

Anne lifted her head and stared at the bare white ceiling. Hearing her own despair echoed in Prudence’s sobs, she suddenly saw a path laid out before her. As clearly as she could picture the proper placement for every one of a thousand pins on a parchment pattern of bobbin lace, she understood how it must be.

“We shall travel to London together, Prudence.” She drew in a deep breath. “Before the wedding, I shall request a tête-à-tête with the Duke of Marston. I shall put my affairs in order with the Chouteau family and ask that I be given some recompense for my title. I believe the duke may settle as much as four or five thousand pounds on me.”

“Four or five thousand pounds? But that is nothing! How could you agree to such a small amount?”

“Quite easily. I need only enough to ensure my father’s freedom and my family’s welfare. As the wife of Monsieur Robidoux, I shall be quite comfortable. When I return from London, I shall marry the weaver.”

“Anne, you cannot marry Monsieur Robidoux! Truly, I did not mean what I said before about him.” Prudence’s eyes filled with tears again. “He is far too old for you, and he is hardly as tall as your shoulder. You cannot possibly learn to love him, no matter how decent and respectable he is. Be his partner in business, but not his wife.”

“Now you
are
being silly, Prudence. Men form partnerships only with other men. Monsieur Robidoux respects my talents, but he will never view me as an equal with him in the lace business. I must marry him to safeguard my interests.”

“But, Anne, you are perfectly good and kind, and your way with lace is pure genius.”

“How little you know. My value to Monsieur Robidoux cannot last forever. The women of Calais have lace-making talents as laudable as the most skilled in Nottingham. Yesterday, one of the elderly ladies showed me a length of magnificent
point d’ Alençon
she had helped to make, and I was truly astonished at its complexity. The blonde laces from Chantilly are superb, and even the Lille and Arras laces evidence great skill.”

“Perhaps other women can create fine patterns, but it was you who smuggled in the loom. And it was you who set up a school to teach the women how to turn Robidoux’s dull machine-made net into beautiful lace. You are invaluable not only to him but to the entire lace industry in France.”

“Prudence, your loyalty touches my heart, but you must learn to face the facts. Now that the king rules again, it will not be many months before other Englishmen arrive in France with lace machines of their own. Others will set up lace schools, and the competition for skilled labor will be fierce. Calais promises one day to be the center of French lace manufacturing.”

“And Monsieur Robidoux its emperor.”

“Shall I not be his empress?”

“Oh, Anne, you have never wanted fame or fortune.”

“No, but I mean to ensure security for my family. With the settlement I receive from the duke, I shall have enough money to pay the barrister Ruel engaged to free my father. But, Prudence, he will never again be allowed to minister in a church. You know that as well as I. His association with the Luddites and his imprisonment have ruined his reputation forever. No, I must bring my parents to France and make certain they never endure the ignominy of poverty.”

“You would marry Monsieur Robidoux for your family?”

“I married Lord Blackthorne for them,” Anne replied. “I believed that was by far the worst thing I possibly could do. But God permitted me moments of great happiness despite my rash behavior. Will He not reward me even more for an action much more sensible?”

“But you will never love the weaver as you loved Lord Blackthorne.”

“No.” Anne shook her head. Before she could start to cry again, she touched her friend’s arm. “Now, pick up your knitting wool before it rolls into the fire. You had better start packing those French bonnets you purchased, or you will never get them all back to London.”

“London! Oh, joy!”

With a shriek of delight, Prudence flew upstairs as Anne walked to the window. The last fingers of sunset threaded through the trees on the hillside. A wisp of black smoke drifted across the evening, and once again she knew the ache of memory.

Perhaps it was only her gift of seeing patterns where others viewed only the common objects of life. Perhaps it was her tendency to envision lace where others saw nothing. All the same, she was certain she saw in that breath of smoke the curl of a man’s black hair.

In the rustle of leaves against the windowpane in the evening breeze, she heard the whisper of his voice. In the dark pearl of the sky, she saw the gray of his eyes. And she was quite sure, at that moment, he was looking into her soul.

“‘The wedding of the Duke of Marston’s younger son to the daughter of the Comte de la Roche promises to be everything his elder brother’s should have been.’” With a snort of disgust at what she had just read aloud, Prudence dropped
The
Tattler
into her lap.

Flanked by her sisters, she studied Anne, who sat across the afternoon tea table at Trenton House. The two friends had been back in England for only three days, enjoying the comfort and warmth of the home that Sarah and Charles Locke’s happy marriage had created. Upon arrival, Anne had sent a message to the duke, but she had heard nothing in reply— clearly a social snub, as Prudence had helpfully pointed out. Anne preferred to think the family were consumed with wedding preparations and would acknowledge her in time.

“What does Miss Pickworth know of anything?” Prudence asked. “She did not witness your wedding, and she has no idea how lovely you looked despite your wounded leg and pale complexion.”

Anne had to smile. “My wedding had nothing of the pomp and pageantry now taking place across Cranleigh Crescent at Marston House.”

“One would think France had invaded England!” Mary exclaimed. More harried than usual, she had joined her sisters only for an hour. Her dear husband, Mr. John Heathhill, was ill with influenza. She fanned herself as she spoke. “It appears as though the French aristocracy view this marriage as a symbol of their happy alliance with England, and thus they all have descended upon us.”

“We
did
restore their beloved monarchy,” Sarah reminded her. “Why should they not make Sir Alexander’s wedding a cause for celebration?”

Mary gave a sniff of distaste. “The ceremony should be English at its essence. The Comte de la Roche and his French friends are using it as a grand opportunity to display everything they had stashed away during the years of war, to unfurl every yard of lace that had been hidden, to flaunt every diamond and emerald in the realm. Shocking!”

“The shock is our dear friend’s sad demeanor,” Sarah said, reaching to lay her hand on Anne’s. “You wear black as though certain of your husband’s death at Waterloo. But in England, we hear he may not have perished. Miss Pickworth reports sightings of your husband in Brighton and in Devon.”

“Miss Pickworth is an idiot!” Prudence declared. “Anne and I were on that battlefield, and the men would never have abandoned us in such a desperate place. They are dead, both of them, and Anne is right to wear black.”