A Lady's Choice

by Donna Lea Simpson

  • • •

  The dowager Lady Haven, who had been sleeping peacefully in a chair by the parlor fire, had awoken as Colin and Rachel’s voices raised. She had thought it politic not to alert them to her presence, and besides, she wanted to eavesdrop. It was well worth it.

  Rachel had always been her least favorite grandchild. She had considered her spoiled by her great beauty and cold by nature. Not that she had always been like that; as a young girl, Rachel had been sunny and sweet-natured, a joy to have around. But at some point she had frozen into the perfectly coifed, perfectly behaved young lady so approved in society.

  She had been surprised and pleased when Rachel showed the great good sense to jilt that bore Yarnell. And now, hearing her raise her voice and stand up for herself . . . it did her old heart good, and confirmed what she had suspected for some time. Beneath her perfect behavior, Rachel was the grandchild most like herself. Within her resided all the instincts of a shrew, and it would take a strong man to stand up to her anger, once unleashed.

  But what was between her and Colin? And what was this about Rachel dressing in men’s clothes and cavorting with Andromeda Varens and Belinda de Launcey at a boxing match? What a fascinating picture that made. Oh, she could easily picture the gaunt and tall Andromeda Varens pulling off the masquerade, but the exquisitely lovely Miss Rachel Neville? What a pretty fellow she would make. She snorted with laughter.

  “Who’s there?”

  She had imagined that Colin would have followed Rachel out of the room. Clearly he had not. He had likely stayed behind to brood.

  “I said, who is there?”

  “Your conscience, lad.”

  “My lady,” he said, with a sigh of resignation and coming around to face her in her deep wing chair. “Why do you always seem to be present for my most humiliating moments?”

  “Perhaps because you have so many of them? Though I am surprised you count this among them. I would think you rather proud of yourself; mortally offended manhood, upbraiding a lady who will not toe the line of ladylike, proper behavior.”

  He acknowledged her sarcasm with a grimace. “You don’t know what I have been through in the last day.”

  “No, I don’t suppose I do.” She looked him over with interest, noting the bruises and cuts, but also the weary resignation on his face. She had once considered him a negligible character, pompous, a bore and a prude. But the last couple of months had proved there was more to Sir Colin Varens than just his rank—a baby baronet she had always called him—and his stuffy demeanor. “So, why don’t you tell me what you have been through.”

  He slumped into the chair by her and she listened as he related the tale of his boxing career, brief as it had been so far, and the match the night before and how in the middle of a very intense exchange with Sussex Sam, he had heard a voice cry out and had known instantly it was Rachel.

  “How did you know?”

  He covered his face with his gloveless hands and groaned. “I just knew,” he said, taking his hands away and staring at his companion. “I heard her and the fear in her voice, and looked up. I found her, even though she was dressed in hideous male togs. How she expected to pass as a man, I do not know. Really! She is the most beautiful and feminine lady I have ever seen in my life, and no men’s clothes and curl-brimmed beaver was going to hide that.”

  “And yet she passed, apparently, until . . . ?”

  “Until I got hit on the chin. Sam took advantage of my wandering wits and landed me a good one. I fell back, and the next thing I knew, Rachel was bent over me, her gorgeous hair streaming down over her shoulders and . . .”

  “What is it?” The dowager leaned forward, examining the young man’s face.

  His expression was suddenly thoughtful, his brow still furrowed but his gaze unfocused, as if he was looking inward for a change. “There were . . . she was . . . she was crying. Her eyes had tears in them.”

  “Tears? She wept over you, eh?” The dowager said nothing more, but examined his face with interest. Colin Varens had a bony, hard-jawed face, intensely male, vigorously plain, almost ugly. And yet his dark eyes were clear and bright, his hair glossy and curly. His plain visage did not detract from a kind of virile sensuality emanating from him. The dowager imagined that there were likely many women attracted to him who were not quite sure why, given his lack of looks. He had gained, since coming to London, a more self-assured demeanor.

  He had been silent for a few moments, as he pondered some inner question. He looked up into the dowager’s eyes. “Why would any woman come to a boxing match?” he asked, wonder in his voice.

  “It sounds as if Rachel and your sister were worried about you. Men die in matches.”

  “But I won’t,” he said.

  Shortsighted and typically male, the dowager thought. There was no arguing with that kind of blind self-assurance, and she was too old a woman to even try. “I wish I had been able to sneak into a match when I was younger. Wouldn’t have minded seeing two such muscular specimens battering each other a little.” She blatantly looked him over, judging the breadth of his shoulders and thickness of arms. She would have given much to know what Rachel’s reaction was on first sight of his body. “No shirt, I’d wager. I wouldn’t mind a look at that.” She started to laugh when she saw the shock and dismay on his face. “You must learn, Varens, that women are not delicate china figurines to keep on a shelf and take down to examine and dust once every fortnight. Rachel is a woman. Nothing more, nothing less. Remember that.”

  She felt her eyelids grow heavy, and knew that sleep would soon claim her. Sitting upright made sleep easier, since she could not breathe well when prone. But before she slept, she wanted to say one more thing. She had heard, in Rachel’s voice, something that led her to believe there was a spark, or perhaps more, of affection for Colin, if he would just treat her well and learn how to fan the flames.

  But then, as her eyes drifted closed and Colin took her hand, kissing it as he murmured his good-byes, it occurred to her that if Colin and Rachel were to find each other, it must be with no interference, or no one would ever know if it was love or expediency. They must find their way to each other on their own, if they ever were to do so.

  She stayed silent and drifted to sleep, back to the past and dreams of former lovers.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Rachel, sitting in the gloomy drawing room netting a purse for a wedding present for Pamela, looked up as the butler showed a gentleman into the room and stood as Sir Parnell Waterford approached her, hat in hand.

  “Miss Neville,” he said, bowing over her hand. He waited until the butler exited and said, “I trust you have fully recovered from your experience last night?”

  Rachel stiffened. Was he going to take her to task too? She sat and indicated a chair to the knight. “I am perfectly fine, Sir Parnell. I cannot imagine why anyone would think me injured by the experience.”

  “Indeed, I expected to find you just as I have, calm and unruffled.” He settled himself, adjusting his coattails and planting his booted feet precisely together.

  “Thank you, sir. It is gratifying to meet one gentleman who does not think I am some precious featherbrain who must be wrapped in cotton wadding.” She picked up her netting again.

  “I take it Colin has been to see you?”

  “He has.” She wadded her netting work into a messy bundle and tossed it away from her, trying to conceal her agitation. She was afraid she was not doing a very good job.

  “In his defense, he is very old-fashioned. I doubt if he has ever heard of, much less read, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman.”

  Rachel regarded the man sitting before her closely. She had assumed he would be the usual, in her admittedly limited experience, run of self-made men, shrewd rather than clever and narrow in his beliefs and thoughts. That he should be more liberal in his views should teach her never to prejudge a person based on social status or trade. “That does not excuse his behavior. Nor have I ever read . . .
whatever you just mentioned, but I would never accuse someone of . . .” She broke off, anger rising in her again like a full-moon tide.

  “Of . . . ?” His graying eyebrows lifted.

  She took a deep breath. “He berated me in my own home with . . . what did he say? Being freakish, wild, unnatural, and said he expected better of me.”

  “I assume, then, that this behavior—going to a boxing match dressed as a man—is not something you would in the normal course of things do.”

  “No,” she admitted. “I have always been the well-behaved one in our family. It is much more like my younger sister, Pamela, to have larks.” Rachel pensively examined her outstretched right hand, her baby finger adorned with the amber ring her father had given her on her twelfth birthday, the year before he died. “But why must I always be so? Will no one love me anymore if I decide to do something for once in my life? When Andromeda asked me to go with her—”

  “This was Miss Varens’s idea?”

  His hasty utterance made her look up at him; he was sitting on the edge of his seat, turning his hat around and around in his hands. “Yes,” she said, hoping she was not revealing something she should not have. But the knight did not look perturbed; on the contrary, he looked . . . invigorated, stimulated. He was trying to conceal a smile. “She is worried about Colin and said that every good general knew one must study the enemy to defeat it,” Rachel continued. “She is determined to stop your practice of the sport, and condemns pugilism as brutal and inhuman.”

  The knight looked thoughtful. The smile lingered on his lips and he shook his head. “I should have known Miss Varens was behind this. She has been a most vocal opponent to my training of her brother.” He stood and bowed. “I will not keep you longer, Miss Neville. My purpose was to make sure you had taken no harm—no physical harm—from last night’s set-to, but I can see from your blooming health that you have recovered nicely. Will we be seeing you at another fight?”

  “No,” Rachel said, standing as well. “I do not care a jot what happens to Colin in the ring, and you may tell him so when next you see him.”

  “I shall certainly tell him that he is being an idiot,” Sir Parnell said with a comic wink.

  Rachel, not certain how to interpret his words, replied, “Thank you, sir. Good day.”

  • • •

  Andromeda Varens sat at a round table by the window in the stately drawing room of the Strongwycke city manor and stared out the window, thinking ruefully of all that Belinda could tell her uncle if she chose. It would be a lengthy letter, and shocking to the reader, no doubt.

  Dear uncle, she imagined it starting.

  Great fun! Since I have been staying with Miss Varens I have been groped shockingly by a dirty stranger in a theater pit seat, only barely escaped a riot in that same theater, and saw a bully boxing match dressed as a boy; I only just escaped with my disguise intact. What larks! You were perfectly right to entrust me to such a staid and reliable lady. Hope to see you soon, etc.

  She leaned her elbows on the table and put her face in her hands. Colin had been absolutely right. She had been a complete fool to take Belinda into that atmosphere, though the girl was perfectly fine after their night out, and indeed claimed to have enjoyed the experience. From now on it would only be the safest of venues for Belinda.

  She should have gone alone. That was her great sin, talking Rachel into accompanying her and taking Belinda with them. She should have instead left the child with Rachel. If there ever was a next time, that was what she would do.

  The stiff and proper Strongwycke butler, who always made her feel faintly as if she was in the wrong with her country manners—she had always prided herself on her exquisite refinement, but things had changed since twelve years before, her come-out year, and she was not at all au courant or even comme il faut—entered, bowed and announced, in funereal tones, “Sir Parnell Waterford.”

  “Oh, Larkson, tell him I’m not home,” she said, starting up from her chair. “Or let me—”

  “You could tell me that yourself, Miss Varens,” Sir Parnell said, following the butler closely. “Or I will avert my eyes and you may make your escape undetected. I will then leave a message that I hope the lady suffered no ill effects from the shocking conclusion to the night, and that she has my unbounded admiration for daring what so few ladies would, for the sake of her brother.”

  “Are you teasing, sir?” she asked sharply, glaring up at him as she sank back down into her chair.

  “No. Not at all.”

  As always he was exquisitely dressed. Colin should go to his tailor, if he could afford him, Andromeda thought. She watched the gentleman, troubled, wondering why she could not view him as the enemy when surely she should. But he had been so kind to her. And he was so very interesting. As much as she had tried to dislike him, she found she really could not.

  “But I would like to make you an offer . . . a wager, if you will.”

  She had not invited him to sit, but he took a chair opposite hers at the round table.

  Cautiously she said, “And what might the wager be, sir?”

  “I would like you to learn what your brother has learned, to see the science behind what might look, to the untrained eye, to be savagery.”

  Taken aback, Andromeda shook her head before she had even thought it through.

  “Think about it,” he said. “Do not just dismiss it out of hand.” Then the knight leaned over, stared directly into her eyes, and said, “You said that one must know the enemy. Well, if pugilism is the enemy, I dare you to try it. To learn about it. If you do, and still consider it mere barbarism, then I will try to talk Colin out of boxing. Only try, mind, because I think it beyond my powers. But I pledge to you that I will make a concerted effort, if you just take the chance and learn more about it.”

  “Then I will,” she said, stung by his smile into replying immediately. “Where and when?”

  “Here. Tomorrow morning. I happen to know that your brother has an appointment tomorrow morning that will keep him for most of the hours between ten and one, and then he has a luncheon engagement with a friend. I have scheduled another fight for him tomorrow evening; I would not have him lose his nerve after last night’s unfortunate rout, though I do not think that likely to happen with so fierce a warrior as your brother. So, shall we say tomorrow morning, at ten thirty? Miss de Launcey may act as your second, for propriety’s sake.”

  “For propriety . . .” She shook her head. “I have gone so far beyond propriety lately that I do not know why anyone would even worry about it in relation to me.”

  “Nevertheless, I would not have you be the object of gossip among his lordship’s staff unnecessarily. Is it agreed?”

  “It is,” she said, taking his outstretched hand. Neither of them wore gloves, and his hand was warm and dry, his grip firm. What had she just gotten herself into?

  • • •

  Colin, dressed for his fight in just his breeches—no shirt was worn so no loose clothing could hinder the fighter—listened to last-minute instructions from Sir Parnell. The room was just as it had been two nights before, though warmer and even smokier.

  “This fellow is called Bristol Bob. He’s a bruiser, Colin, and will go for your stomach; he’s known for very punishing blows. Go for his chest, for he is often short of wind and you can get the advantage of him that way.”

  “I don’t need the advantage. I will beat him man to man, whatever way he wants to fight.” He knew his tone was grim, but he didn’t care.

  “Colin,” Parnell said, grabbing his shoulders.

  “What is it?”

  “You are fit to fight, are you not?”

  “Never felt better.”

  “I mean mentally, not physically. You are not brooding over anything, are you?”

  Like the fact that the woman he loved was making a blasted idiot of herself, attending a boxing match, for God’s sake? He didn’t say it, but felt the anger burn in his gut again. What was wrong with her? Why
was she acting so differently, when she had never before—

  “Colin!”

  “What?”

  “You have not been attending again. Your opponent has just stepped onto the floor.” The knight shook him by the shoulders and stared into his eyes. “Colin, if I am not convinced you are ready for this, by God I will pull you out. I swear it, I will end the fight.”

  Taking in a deep breath, Colin straightened and focused on his opponent. He was a thickset fellow, younger than Colin by several years, but likely more experienced in the ways of London fights. Parnell was right. He must focus, or he would be beaten. He glanced around and he could see that the bettors were taking Bristol Bob to win. No doubt they had all been there two nights before to see Colin beat by Sussex Sam.

  He would show them. There would be no repetition of that humiliation. This was the one thing, apart from farming, that he was good at, and no one was going to beat him without a damn good fight.

  He stepped up to the chalk mark and took his position, glaring deep into his opponent’s eyes. This he could do. He may be a damn poor man for the ladies, he may never be more than a buffoon on the ballroom dance floor, but this he could do.

  It was over in minutes and he was the victor. He took grim satisfaction in the look of surprise on many of the spectators’ faces as he stood over the prone body of his opponent. No man would doubt his abilities again.

  • • •

  June drifted on, wending its way inevitably toward its end. The Haven family party would have already left London but for Grand’s illness; they must wait until she was well enough to travel, so they remained. Rachel rather wished for an end to the Season instead of this dwindling, fading movement toward the heat of a city summer. She had never been in London for so long, and she found that though there was much to do, one did reach an end to enjoyment of balls and musicales and Venetian breakfasts.