by Vincy, Mia
“You must tell people, Mama. I promised to say nothing, but you must. Whisper it to the other ladies, so that no one ever lets Sculthorpe near another woman. Let him die a miserable old bachelor and never know why.”
So what if she double-crossed Sculthorpe? He did not deserve her honor. She was disinherited anyway, and she would be disinherited a thousand times over before she let him do this to another bride. She wasn’t good for much, in the end, but she could be good for that. It was excruciating for society to know of her weakness, but of course, they would Not Mention it, and her pride would suffer in silence.
“Is this all?” Mama asked.
The image of that little beetle swam before her eyes, the memory of the jarring thud. She could not admit to such helplessness, not even to Mama. She could hardly admit it to herself.
“Isn’t that enough?”
Mama slid the sleeves back down and set about unfastening all of Arabella’s dress. The help made her feel young and weak, and she hated that too. Yet she longed to have someone’s arms around her. Mama never hugged her; that was not their way.
“And so I am cast out.”
Arabella clutched her unfastened gown to keep it from falling down. Falling to the grass. Fallen lady.
“We will find a solution. Have a bath now. Take your supper in your room. Tomorrow, you must face the world with your head held high and let everyone say what they please.”
“I suppose I should be grateful Papa left me that.”
Mama considered. “After the ball, you can go home with my parents. They’ll help you find someone suitable to marry. When you have a son, your father will relent.”
Arabella already knew of someone suitable to marry, but no doubt that plan too would fail. Perhaps when Hadrian Bell had received her letter, her proposition had made him roll laughing on the floor.
“Is there a man left who would take me? The promise of a great inheritance and dowry covers a multitude of sins, but now those sins are all I have.”
“Do not become bitter, Arabella. I have raised you to be stronger than that.”
Then she was failing her mother too. Only to be expected, of a woman whom no one could love.
“I am tired, Mama.”
“Rest now. We will discuss this tomorrow.”
Alone again, Arabella stripped off all her clothes and twisted before the large mirror to inspect the purple mark blossoming over her ribs.
This was meant to be her body, but only in small moments could she experience it as her own: during a hot bath in winter, a cool bath in summer, riding her horse, sliding between clean linens, donning a silk petticoat, an intimate touch.
When she was younger and her attitude unformed, gentlemen took it upon themselves to comment. “You’re too tall, Miss Larke,” they would say, as if being short were something she could accomplish, if only she practiced more. A woman should not be that tall, they said. But she was this tall and she was a woman, so surely she was exactly as she ought to be, the same as every other woman was exactly as she ought to be, simply because she was how she was.
Sculthorpe thought her body had belonged to him. When Arabella had tried to claim it for her own, he sought to destroy it in response.
But with Guy, it was different. By some odd alchemy, when she gave him her body, he gave it right back to her.
She provoked Guy too. Their entire relationship consisted of them provoking each other. He did not seem to mind; an eager glint entered his eye. For her part, she rather enjoyed it when he provoked her. It made her feel more alive, more herself.
The door opened and Holly came in. Arabella did not move, watching the maid’s approach in the mirror. Her eyes were on Arabella’s ribs, which were beginning to throb.
“Oh, miss,” Holly said. “Her ladyship never said about your side. And him a war hero too.”
“Please don’t tell her about that one.”
Holly bustled about, mercifully unsentimental. “We’ll pretend it was a horse that did this. You’ve had worse from a horse, you recall, and you survived that.”
Arabella would rather have been kicked by a horse. A horse was not malicious. It did not seek to own or diminish or control.
“We’ve a fresh batch of your orange-blossom water for your bath, and how about some nice hot chocolate with a bit of orange grated in, you like that. And some supper.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“A quick egg and some hot buttered toast.”
Holly’s practical busy-ness was soothing. Arabella sought something else to think about, to force her mind off the ache starting in her muscles, as though they had just received news of their own abuse and wished to lodge a complaint.
“How fares the search of Sir Walter’s room?” she asked.
“Slowly, miss. It has to be Joan or Ernest, because they read well enough to pick anything with Lady Frederica’s name. They can only search a bit each time. If he’s got something, he’s hidden it well.”
So either Sir Walter knew he was up to no good, or Arabella was seeing schemes where there were none.
“Tell them to keep searching. And reassure them they’ll suffer no consequences if caught. But we must look after Freddie.”
“You can’t be worrying about Lady Frederica right now,” Holly said.
“Don’t be absurd. I never worry. I merely plan for every possible outcome.”
“Right you do. Worrying about Liza when her babe came, and old Mr. Niles when they tried to take his house, and the head gardener’s boys when their ma was sick. You stop worrying about others and let someone look after you.”
Arabella was too tired to pretend anymore, so she let herself be coddled and bathed and fed until finally, finally, she was allowed to slide into bed and close her eyes on the world.
* * *
The next morning, after a maid lit the fire and opened the curtains, Arabella rose to use the chamber pot and wash, but then she stood in the middle of her bedroom and could not think of anything to do.
Outside the windows, the world had dissolved into nothing but gray fog. Perhaps her room was floating in the middle of nowhere. Perhaps her room no longer existed. Perhaps she no longer existed. Maybe Sculthorpe had murdered her after all, but she was too proud to admit it.
She opened a drawer for a kerchief, but her fingers fell on her miniature of Oliver. She traced the frame, recalling one of their squabbles, when he had pushed her and she’d landed on her rump, only to trip him so he fell too. They’d wrestled, then, until someone had intervened. Only Arabella had received a scolding, because she was a girl, but Oliver had insisted on sharing the punishment.
She shoved the miniature back in the drawer, closed the curtains on the fog, and went back to bed.
Mama came in and sat on the side of Arabella’s bed. Mama knew Arabella was not ill. She never was. The last time she was ill, she had risen from her sickbed to learn that Oliver had died, leaving a hole inside her and their family forever changed. Better to not get ill again.
“Do you need help with the guests?” Arabella asked, though she did not care. She meant to stay in her floating room forever. “The final preparations for the ball.”
“Mrs. DeWitt has agreed to help.”
Her neighbor at Sunne Park, amiable Cassandra DeWitt. Cassandra would be kind to Arabella, and Arabella did not know if she could bear that. Her pride would take over, make her mouth say horrid things; she would be unkind to Cassandra, who was the kindest person she knew. Arabella would hate herself for that, but Cassandra would never hate her, and that would make it even worse.
“You will not tell her,” Arabella said. “Everyone must know, but not yet.”
“Of course not.” Mama squeezed her hand and stood. “You must pull yourself together, Arabella. It was ghastly, I know, but you cannot indulge your misery forever. We fall over and then we get back up and face the world as though nothing is amiss.”
“I shall be better tomorrow.”
She slept all day as if
she truly were ill. At one point, she awoke and lay staring at nothing, her mind also invaded by gray fog. Eventually, she realized someone was sitting by the fire.
Arabella propped herself up on her elbows. “Freddie?”
Freddie looked up. “You don’t mind I’m here?”
“Not at all. Why are you here?”
“They won’t look for me here. If they find me, they’ll take away my sewing.”
Arabella sat up further. A mass of teal fabric was spread over Freddie’s lap. “What are you sewing?”
“One of the German ornithologists described the Turkish trousers his niece wears to ride en cavalier.” Freddie stood and shook them out. “You see, they are a kind of pantaloon, which means I can ride astride, but because they billow, they are modest. He told me it is not uncommon for ladies on the Continent to ride en cavalier. But Lady Treadgold insists it is not becoming.”
“That is an excellent solution. I recall a portrait of Marie Antoinette dressed and mounted thus.”
“Indeed!” Freddie dropped back into her chair and arranged her sewing over her lap. “I told Lady Treadgold that, but she pointed out that Marie Antoinette was guillotined.”
“It is safe to say that the reasons for her beheading were more complex than the way she rode a horse.”
“I don’t know,” Freddie said glumly. “I feel that I shall be beheaded if I do not behave as they say I should.”
Arabella had no response to that. She was hardly in a position to offer reassurances. How abhorrent to think that dreamy, original Freddie might face a similar dilemma to her own! Not if she could prevent it.
“Do you know if Sir Walter has found someone for you to marry?” she asked.
Freddie resumed sewing. She was silent so long Arabella wondered if she had forgotten their conversation.
“I’m nineteen,” Freddie finally said. “Lady Treadgold says it’s time now we’re out of mourning. She says I’m an heiress and my brother is a marquess, so it doesn’t matter that I’m not pretty or good with people.”
“But have they suggested any names?” Arabella persisted. “Held parties with suitable gentlemen? Made a point of introducing anyone to you?”
“No, I don’t think so.”
That was suspicious. One would expect Sir Walter and Lady Treadgold to be seeking a suitable husband for their ward. Sir Walter would not miss an opportunity to forge new connections by parading the wealthy sister of a marquess about like a prize ewe.
The fact that they were not encouraging Freddie to wed strengthened Arabella’s theory about their scheme. If only she—or rather, the servants—could find the proof.
“What about spring?” she asked. “Are they planning to take you to London for the Season?”
“No. I mean, they said they might. I don’t know. I don’t care. It isn’t as though anyone will ever court me properly. Men like Matilda. They like my money.” She stared at the ceiling. “I wonder what it is like, to be admired and flattered, to have a man whisper sweet nothings and make one feel special.”
“I wouldn’t know. Men never whisper sweet nothings to me.”
Except Guy, mocking her, that night in London, tenderly tucking a flower behind her ear, his eyes intent, her surprised lips still tingling from their first kiss. She walks in beauty like the night…
Longing throbbed through her. Immediately after their lovemaking, when her body was still trembling with erotic sensations, he had wrapped his arms around her and held her against his hot skin, his fast-beating heart. By some miracle, that had made her feel complete. As though in gathering her to him, he had gathered her together, merging her familiar parts with those parts she kept secret, even from herself.
Don’t be ridiculous, she scolded herself. After the pain and indignity she had suffered at the hands of one man, how could she possibly crave the embrace of another? Maybe it wasn’t about Guy. Maybe she simply longed to feel someone’s arms around her again.
“I imagine it would depend on whether he meant the words and whether he values you,” Arabella added. “I shouldn’t be in a hurry for it.”
“I just wonder what it would be like, that’s all.”
Arabella had no answer for that either, so she dropped back onto the pillows and once more closed her eyes.
Chapter 11
The female voices coming from the hallway bore that tense, overly controlled quality of women engaging in polite argument when at least one of them longed to scream.
“You can have them back when we return home,” said one of the women; Guy identified the voice as belonging to Lady Treadgold. “You may ride astride in the privacy of our estate, not here amid this fine company.”
Bouncing a chortling Ursula on his hip, Guy rounded the corner to see Lady Treadgold with Freddie, who wore a green riding habit and a mutinous glare.
“Why,” Lady Treadgold added, her tone brightening, “whatever will your brother the marquess think?”
Freddie flicked him a scornful glance. “I don’t care what he thinks.”
“What I think about what?” Guy asked, absently unhooking Ursula’s fingers from his cravat before she choked him.
“I was making Turkish trousers so I could ride astride, but Lady Treadgold took them away.”
“Not in this company,” Lady Treadgold repeated. “Riding astride is not becoming in a fine English lady.”
“I’m a good rider and I want to ride fast.” Freddie turned her scowl on Guy. “You remember. You let me go fast before.”
At first, he had no idea what she meant. Then a memory arose, of tobogganing through the snow with little Freddie between his knees as they sped down a hill. Freddie had shrieked with delight and demanded they go faster; Guy had happily obliged.
“But you were a child then,” he said. “You oughtn’t behave like that now, should she, Ursula?”
Ursula’s lively response sounded like “Marcus Aurelius would not approve,” but probably wasn’t. At first, her babble left Guy feeling awkward. He could barely decipher one word in five, and his interpretations were impossible. But in the end, her words didn’t matter nearly as much as their games.
“Arabella doesn’t care,” Freddie argued. “She thought it a brilliant idea.”
“You’ve seen Arabella? How is she?”
Ignoring him, Freddie pushed into the front hall to grab her gloves and hat. “Never mind, I’ll wear this,” she muttered, and marched out the door.
Lady Treadgold also left before Guy could offload Ursula, so he carried her outside and fell into step beside Freddie, as they headed for the stables. If Freddie had spoken to Arabella, he needed to know more.
Guy had not seen Arabella since the afternoon before, at the abbey ruins, when the wind had swept away his vows to avoid her, and he’d fed her a blackberry and nearly kissed her again. When he had finally come back to the house, it was to learn that Sculthorpe had ridden off in a rush, the engagement was over, and Arabella was nowhere to be seen.
Freddie set a brisk pace, but Ursula seemed to enjoy it, judging by the way she squealed and slapped Guy’s bare head.
“What are you doing with Ursula?” Freddie asked.
“We were about to visit the aviaries. Look, I tied this ribbon in her hair,” he added proudly.
Freddie rolled her eyes and kept walking.
“Have you talked to Arabella? Since yesterday?” Guy asked.
“Yes.”
He waited. She added nothing more. “And what did she say?”
“Who?”
“Arabella.”
“I don’t know.”
What the devil had happened with Sculthorpe? Perhaps Sculthorpe had learned about London, but if the truth had emerged, Guy would have suffered a close encounter with the pointy end of a gun.
And why was Arabella in hiding? Surely her pride, at least, would demand she show her face. If Arabella wasn’t sweeping through the world and glaring it into submission, then something had to be wrong.
“Yes
, but how was she?” he tried again. “Freddie?”
“Who?”
Guy gritted his teeth. “Arabella.”
“Same as usual. She kept asking questions. But she was… You know.”
Freddie jumped over a stone and skipped on.
“No, Freddie, I don’t know. She was what?”
“In bed.”
Bloody hell. Getting information out of Freddie was like getting a dragonfly to play chess, and no one else would say anything at all.
A courteous inquiry of Lady Belinda had resulted in “How thoughtful of you to ask, my lord. She has simply overtired herself, with the ball.”
And Lady Belinda kept loyal servants, every one of whom had given the same bland response of “Miss Arabella is merely tired.”
And Mrs. DeWitt and Miss Bell, the neighbors who’d arrived to take over Arabella’s duties, had brightly said, “She’s worn herself out. She does so much. Look, it took two of us to replace her!”
Vibrant, demanding Arabella? Tired? Not a chance.
Half the night he’d lain awake debating whether to sneak into her room, to make sure she was all right, wondering whether he should offer to marry her after all, if he was the cause of the rift. Only to punch the pillow and remind himself that he owed her nothing.
“So she is ill,” he said, as they arrived at the stables and waited for the groom to finish saddling Freddie’s horse.
“When Matilda was ill, men sent her flowers,” Freddie volunteered. “Of course, they send her flowers when she’s not ill, too.”
“I can’t give Arabella flowers.”
Everyone would talk, and she would mock him horribly. Tempting, actually. He would present her with a bouquet and she would deliver some sharp set-down that would make him laugh. Perhaps he would even compose a poem for her. It would be terrible, naturally, and he would tease lines out of her so outrageously arrogant that even she would have to laugh.
She had not laughed in London, when he slid that flower behind her ear and likened her beauty to starry skies. Even that feigned intimacy and tenderness had unsettled her. She was not as invincible as she wanted to appear.
