The Makeshift Marriage (25 page)

“You’ve
what?”
breathed Augustine.

“I believe you heard me. There will be no masquerade, no foolishly extravagant summer ball, and no guests who expect to wallow in King’s Cliffs lavish hospitality. The belt, in short, has been tightened more than a mere notch or two; it has been drawn in a very great deal.”

“How dare you speak to me like that,” whispered Augustine, not trusting herself to speak louder her fury was so great.

“Oh, I dare, Miss Townsend, I dare. My only concern is Nicholas, and I intend to see that his plans are carried out. I don’t much care for you, and I certainly do not care what you feel or think. I find you quite odious, Miss Townsend, as odious as the noble earl here, and that is odious indeed.”

James Grenville snatched up his hat and strode from the room
.
When he was gone, Augustine’s lips curled into a snarl as she looked at Laura with all the venom she could muster.

“You’ll pay for this, you’ll pay for every word! Nicholas has done this to outwit James, and that is his only reason! You mean nothing to him, for he is in love with me! What little trust there may be between you now will soon be shattered, that I promise you!”

“Because you will tell him lies?”

“Because he will believe what I say.”

The poisonous hatred was chilling and Laura could all but feel it reaching out to touch her. Her own smile did not falter, however. “I think this disagreeable interview is at an end, Miss Townsend, for I have no desire to be dragged into a low demeaning contest of words with you. Good day to you.” With a slight inclination of her head, she walked past both mother and daughter.

Augustine watched her. Soon that smile would be gone forever from the lips of Laura, Lady Grenville. Augustine looked at her mother. “Do you think the rumors I so providently set in motion have spread sufficiently far yet?”

“That she and Daniel Tregarron are lovers? Yes, I would imagine that they had spread the length and breadth of the county by the end of the first day.”

Augustine smiled. “They are about to reach Nicholas’s ears. I’ll destroy her for her impudence. I swear that I will trample her so low that she will never again claw her way up. He’s mine, and this house is mine; nothing and no one is ever going to alter that!”

* * *

Augustine’s skirts whispered coolly as she entered Nicholas’s room, and her beautiful face was a study of anxious concern. She hurried to the bedside, taking his hand and raising it softly to her lips, kissing the palm. “I have missed you so,” she whispered. “Each moment I was away seemed like an hour.”

“How is your nurse?”

“I am more concerned to know how you are.”

“Better, as you can see.”

Her fingers moved against his face, their touch gossamer light and full of aching love. “I love you so, Nicholas. I love you with all my heart.”

“Augustine, I wish to speak to you
—”

“And I with you.” She stood abruptly. “I don’t know how to tell you this, Nicholas, but I feel that someone has to and the unpleasant task seems to have fallen to me.”

“Tell me what?”

“About your wife and
—and….” Her voice shook as if she could not go on.

His eyes sharpened. “And what?” he demanded.

“It isn’t what, my dearest, it’s who.” Augustine exuded unhappy consternation as she turned reluctantly toward the bed again. “She and Daniel Tregarron are lovers, Nicholas. Oh, I know yours is a marriage of convenience, that there is no love, but it is still not something I willingly impart to you. The whole of Langford rattles about them, they have been seen riding together almost every day. They go to Langford Woods.” She paused to allow the implication of this information to have full effect. “Ask anyone. Ask Henderson.” This last was her trump, for Henderson, so faithful and trusted, could only confirm the carefully orchestrated rumors. But she did not expect Nicholas’s reply.

“Leave me, Augustine.”

“But
—but you wished to speak with me!”

“No, not anymore. Please leave me for a while.”

“Do you blame me for telling you?” She had expected his anger, but not somehow quite like this. He was obviously much affected by what he had been told.

“In God’s name will you go away?” he cried then.

She flinched a little and hurried out of the room. In the passage she paused. A marriage of convenience it might be, but it meant a little too much to Nicholas for Augustine’s comfort. But it was over now. She had driven the final wedge between husband and wife, for Nicholas was not a man to tolerate his wife’s infidelity, least of all with his best friend.

Nicholas closed his eyes, and in spite of the warmth of the day, a shiver passed through him. Laura. How pliable and honey sweet her lips had been when he had kissed her the night before the duel. And how that kiss lingered with him even now.

* * *

Henderson came as soon as he was sent for. A coal boy was busy stoking up a roaring fire and the windows were tightly closed. Soon the room would be unbearably hot, but Nicholas only felt the cold. The valet saw with dismay that his master no longer looked quite as well, and yet only that morning before breakfast he had seemed to be making excellent progress. The shadows beneath his eyes were once again pronounced and he was oddly restless as he beckoned the valet toward the bed.

“Come here, Henderson, and I want the truth now.”

“The truth?” Uneasiness began to spread through the valet.

“About my wife and Dr. Tregarron.” Nicholas suddenly remembered the coal boy. “Get out of here!” he snapped.

The boy dropped his shovel and ran out. Henderson glanced in surprise at his master, for it was not like him to be short with a mere child. “Sir Nicholas?”

“How close are my wife and Daniel Tregarron?”

“Th-they know each other, how could it be otherwise when until today the doctor was a guest here.”

“That isn’t what I mean.”

“I don’t know anything more, Sir Nicholas.”

“Are they lovers?”

The valet’s eyes widened. “I don’t know, Sir Nicholas,” he muttered unconvincingly.

“But you have heard rumors?”

Miserably Henderson nodded. “I’ve heard them, Sir Nicholas, but I don’t believe them. I don’t think that her ladyship would ever
—”

“You aren’t certain, though, are you?”

“How can I be, Sir Nicholas? Everyone’s talking about it; it’s the constant topic belowstairs and everywhere else.”

“Have you ever known there to be so much smoke before without there being a fire to cause it?”

The valet slowly shook his head. “No.”

Nicholas looked away. It must be true. What else could he believe? “That is all, Henderson.”

The valet went to the door, pausing there. “I don’t in my heart believe any of it, Sir Nicholas. Not of her.”

Nicholas said nothing, and the door closed slowly behind the valet. The new fire crackled in the silence, but Nicholas was aware only of the empty cold that was setting over him. In Venice he had thought he had found the only woman he could ever know true happiness with, but it was quite evident now that she had not felt the same. The marriage was meaningless, for already someone else enjoyed her embraces, someone he had thought he could trust above all others…Daniel Tregarron.

A burst of glittering sparks spiraled up the chimney. Nicholas closed his eyes. He had come so close to confessing his love to her, so very close that had she remained in the room after telling him of the sale of the jewels, he would have told her. The words had remained unspoken, and now he could salve his shattered pride by pretending he felt nothing for her.

Dear God, how cold it was. He was conscious of an uncontrollable urge to shiver again. As before.

Daniel was preparing to visit Nicholas at King’s Cliff when his housekeeper came to see him. She entered the clean, white-washed room where he kept his medicines, and she smoothed her hands nervously on her starched apron.

“Yes, Mrs. Thompson? What is it?”

She said nothing at first and he turned to look at her. Her plump, country face, usually so ruddy, was a little on the pale side, and he noticed how her tongue passed swiftly over her lips. “Mrs. Thompson?”

“Sir, I don’t know how to begin…
.
”

He smiled, closing his leather bag and crossing to gently take her arm and usher her into the room’s only chair. He leaned on the edge of a table, his arms folded. “Now then, what’s all this about?”

“Dr. Tregarron, you know that I’ve served you well for some time now.”

“Exceedingly well.”

“And I’ve no wish to cause trouble, but I reckon as how someone’s got to tell you what’s being said.”

“Being said? About what?”

“About you and Lady Grenville.”

His smile faded and he unfolded his arms. “And what exactly is being said?”

A swift flush stained her cheeks then. “Please, I don’t like to say it outright
—”

“Then how am I to know?”

She clasped and unclasped her hands, and then the words came out in a rush. “It’s all over Langford that you are Lady Grenville’s lover.”

“Is it, be damned?” He straightened then. “And how did this wondrous tale come about?”

“Oh, I don’t know, Doctor, how does any rumor start? It just seems to appear from nowhere. Anyway, I thought I had to tell you, for
everyone’s
talking about it. I’ve not known a rumor so strong for a goodly time now.”

“Thank you for telling me, Mrs. Thompson.”

Slowly she stood. “I didn’t want to say anything, Dr. Tregarron.” She searched his face for a moment, wondering how much truth there was in the tale, for he had not denied it.

He smiled then, knowing what she was thinking. “My dear Mrs. Thompson, I only wish the tale was true, but unfortunately it is not. I am not Lady Grenville’s lover.”

She smiled with relief. “I’m sorry, Doctor, I didn’t mean
—”

“I know, Mrs. Thompson. I know.”

When she had gone, he thoughtfully drew on his gloves. Rumors like this could only damage Laura’s fragile marriage if they should reach Nicholas’s ears, but it was not consideration of this that had prompted Daniel to be honest with his housekeeper. The only reason he had denied anything was a fear that at some time in the future Laura might discover that he had been guilty of aiding the rumors to gain strength. That, and only that, swayed him now.

* * *

As Daniel was preparing to leave his house, Laura heard for the first time that there was beginning to be concern over Nicholas’s condition, that as before when he had had malaria, he was complaining of feeling cold when it was obvious that if anything he had a temperature. In some alarm, and still totally unaware of the rumors that had mushroomed all around her, she hurried to Nicholas’s room.

Augustine was already there. She had been patiently waiting for the first confrontation between Nicholas and Laura since he had been apprised of his wife’s alleged
affaire de coeur,
and now at last the moment had come. A little gloating smile of anticipation lightened Augustine’s face as she sat neatly by the bedside.

Laura went to him. “Nicholas, is it true that you are less well?” It was a foolish question, for she could see for herself that there had been a deterioration since earlier in the day. Thank goodness Daniel would soon be here…
.
Instinctively she reached out to touch Nicholas’s hand, but he pointedly moved it away.

“I am only fractionally less well,” he said coldly, “and it is certainly nothing which warrants your presence.”

She stared at him. “Is something wrong?” she asked slowly.

“Nothing of importance.”

Augustine slipped her hand into his and this time he did not move away. “Nicholas,” she murmured, “I think it long overdue that Laura should meet the ladies of consequence in the neighborhood. It does not look well that she apparently snubs them.”

“
I
snub
them!”
gasped Laura, staggered that such a complete reversal of the facts should be presented as the truth.

Augustine ignored the outburst. “She should take tea with them here at King’s Cliff, as propriety and custom demand. The Countess of Bawton in particular
—”

“No,” said Laura. “No, I will not meet them.”

“You will do as I tell you,” snapped Nicholas, holding her face.

“Nicholas, why are you like this? What has happened?”

“Is the onus always to be on me to be pleasant, madam? Augustine is right; you have a duty to receive the ladies here and that is exactly what you will do.”

Numb with dismay, she met his cold gaze. For Augustine it was the sweetest of moments, but for Laura it was humiliating and painful. He was a stranger suddenly, changed and remote, and she did not know him at all. And the change, she sensed, had not solely to do with the setback in his health. There was more to it than that. Far more.

Nicholas was relentless. “You may go,” he said.

She was trembling as she turned to go, and the tears were very close. She hurried blindly along the passage and down the staircase to the hall, ignoring Hawkins’s startled gaze as she passed him without a word. Thankfully she emerged from the front door and breathed deeply of the fresh air.

The sun had faded behind a cloud and the breeze had risen a little in that way that presages a shower, but she went down the steps, holding her shawl tightly around her shoulders. She had to escape from the house for a while, escape from the pain Nicholas had so deliberately inflicted.

She halted at the foot of the steps, for Daniel Tregarron was riding toward her. He reined in by her, his capricious horse dancing impatiently around as he dismounted. His cloak flapped wildly in the wind, and his dark hair was ruffled as he removed his hat. “Laura?”

“Daniel.”

His smile faded. “What is it?”

“I don’t know, and that is the truth.”

“Tell me.”

She gave him a wan smile. “Burden you with my problems again?”

“If that is the way you wish to put it.” He handed the reins to a groom who hurried out, and then he drew Laura’s hand through his arm. “Come, we will walk together for a little while, and you shall tell me all about it.”