Miss Armistead Makes Her Choice

by Heidi Ashworth

  “I . . I can not rightly say,” he replied, removing his own gloves in anticipation of his meal. He would have every one if it should please her, but he could not be certain that was her design. She perplexed him every bit as much as did Miss Katherine and yet it did not displease him, nor did he find it the least unsavory. In fact, he found it to be somewhat divine. Soon he would invite her to walk with him along the river and he would speak to her of his feelings if she proved willing to hear them.

  “I find that I quite adore peaches,” Miss Katherine began but Colin shot to his feet before she could complete her thought, as thoughtless as it would prove to be.

  “I find that I tire of sitting. Miss Elizabeth, would you be kind enough to accompany me for a walk along the river?”

  Three sets of eyes looked up at him in some consternation, but Miss Elizabeth rose to her feet and took his arm without the slightest sign of trepidation. Miss Katherine made an attempt to rise, as well, but Analisa very sensibly placed the entire blancmange in Miss Katherine’s lap, effectively pinning her to the ground. He made another note to procure a fitting gift for his most excellent sister, a resolve he forgot entirely the moment he turned his back.

  Determined that they should walk to where they should not be overheard, Colin at first refrained from speaking. He headed for the edge of the river with its masses of greenery and promised privacy. He would not end the day without opening his budget on the state of his heart. Whether or not Miss Elizabeth wished to hear what he had to say was a question he longed to be answered.

  So it was that she was the first to break the silence. “Mr. Lloyd-Jones, I must thank you for this outing. What a pleasure it has been! India is either too hot or too rainy to venture out of doors more than rarely. But here . . ” She spread wide her free arm and looked into the sky. “It is such a beautiful, mild, sunny day and I find myself quite content.”

  Colin caught sight of only her dimpled chin and red mouth from under her bonnet, but he was persuaded he had never before seen a more fascinating dimple or a more enticing red. Before he said what he most fervently wished to say, he must arrange matters so that he would be allowed to gaze into her face of an entirety; there was much to learn from her countenance and he would know it all. The fear that she would not like his words and that it might be the last time he would be allowed to gaze upon that face was one he barely allowed himself to feel.

  “I have heard it said that it rains in Scotland, every single day.” He knew it was a mistake before the words were out, but he could not seem to refrain from adding upon it. “And that is summer only. The other seasons of the year offer far worse.”

  She turned to look at him, but the shadow made by her infernal bonnet rendered her eyes impossible to read. “Mr. Lloyd-Jones, if I did not know better, I should think you felt it your duty to make apparent the errors in my thinking.”

  “What errors would those be?” he asked with a bald-faced innocence that rang false in his own ears.

  She looked down and he was robbed of all but the sight of her chin. “Mr. Lloyd-Jones, I had believed myself safe in your company; that you comprehended my circumstances; that your honor would not allow you to place me in a position that should compromise my character.”

  He thought perhaps her voice shook with tears and he wished to tell her how very remorseful he was. He wished to speak words of approbation for the very character of which she spoke. More than anything he wished to pull her behind the nearest privet and rid her face of that abhorrent bonnet.

  To his wonder, she did not object and they stood gazing raptly into one another’s eyes, the bonnet wedged between them.

  “Miss Elizabeth,” he breathed. “I cannot ask you to do or say anything that should force you to compromise your integrity. It is that very integrity at which I stand in considerable awe. I should be a fool to mar what is one of your most admirable qualities. And yet I cannot let this opportunity pass without telling you it is far from the only quality in which I most ardently delight.”

  “Mr. Lloyd-Jones, I must beg you to stop!”

  “Why?” he asked as he tossed the hat to the ground and took her hands in his. “Are my attentions so unwelcome?”

  “No!” she said so quickly that he felt he had reason to hope. “That is to say, there is naught in your manner or your character that I find in the least unwelcome. If I were but free,” she said, shaking her head, her eyes wet with tears, “but it is of no use. I have made my choice and I must abide by it.”

  “Then it is not that you cannot love me?” he asked, his feelings a painful mixture of hope and resignation.

  “It is not a matter of my capacity to love you, nor is it an event to look for in future,” she said, gathering his hand to her face. “It is because I cannot stop that I am torn in two.”

  It was then that he knew the full tragedy of his position. “What sort of madness is this?” he begged as he attempted to consign every aspect of her beloved face to memory. “What madness that I would not wish changed about you the very quality that frustrates my desires? I wish to add to my own your strength, your resolve, your determination to abide by what is right and true. And yet, in so doing, I should destroy your very essence. Is there no way to make you mine without making you somehow . . less?”

  To his astonishment, she fell against his chest and began to weep. He put his arms around her and held her tight, far tighter than he ought, and wondered at how perfectly natural it felt to hold her, her cheek against his coat, his own against her hair. He closed his eyes and prayed that she would not soon be shed of all her tears. He prayed that when she proved to be, he should know what it was he ought to say. Lastly, he prayed that she would raise her head to look at him in such a way that he would find it impossible to resist the intense yearning to cover her mouth with his own.

  It seemed an eternity, yet sooner than he hoped, when she lifted her face to his, a glossy ringlet pressed to her face like a flower between the pages of a book and her jewel-like eyes sparkling with tears. “How could you make me less?” she murmured. “I have traveled all the way from India only to find that it is you who makes me whole.”

  He could not say how his hands found their way to her face, one to each cheek, his thumbs just brushing the boundaries of her mouth. The cast of her eyes implored him to kiss her even as her hands came up to pull his away, but he was stronger than she. He ran one hand across her face and into her hair and dropped the other to her waist, pulling her against him until he could feel the pounding of her heart in tandem with his own.

  As she dropped her arms to her side, she closed her eyes and waited, her long, black lashes swimming in tears. Lowering his face to hers, he drew his nose along her cheek, willing her to grant him one last look into her eyes so he might read in them her desires. Instead, tears beaded under her lashes and ran down the creamy perfection of her skin. He rubbed them away with his cheek against hers and then, when he could resist no longer, he brushed his lips very lightly along hers, undemanding and soft as a whisper.

  When she still did not respond he knew that his prayer had not been granted. With a shuddering sigh, he loosened his grip and rested his forehead against hers, her mouth still tantalizingly near. “Say something,” he begged. “Please? Will you not say something?”

  She did not, but she put her hands around his neck, her fingers twisting in his hair. A tremor went through him at her touch and he marveled that he could have ever thought he loved anyone, wanted anyone, cherished anyone but her. When she pulled her head back, exposing the heated skin of his forehead to the cool breeze, he knew that he had felt her last caress. As such, it came as a shock when she leaned in and placed a lingering kiss upon his cheek, one full of the same longing he had seen in her eyes.

  When she pulled away, he saw that she still could not look at him. He bent to retrieve her hat from the grass and placed it on her head to cover the shambles he had made of her coiffure. He tied the bow under her chin and wiped away the last of her tears wi
th trembling hands, and still she would not meet his gaze. Finally, he took her hand, so small in his, and pressed it in his own.

  “I have no right. You are soon to be another man’s wife,” he said, though his throat ached and his tongue stumbled over the agonizing words. “And yet I find I cannot part from you without saying what is in my heart. Miss Armistead … my dearest Elizabeth … I admire and love you more than I ever imagined possible to love anyone.”

  She raised her head at the words, but she did not profess her love in return, in spite of the wealth of emotion in her eyes. Thoroughly thwarted, he released her hand and ran his own through his hair. “I know not what you think of love as a predictor of a successful marriage. There are those, rather I should say many, if I am honest, who believe the sensibility of love to be of the least use in a marriage. I cannot agree. It is ironic, is it not?” he asked with a rueful laugh. “The tragedy of my life will not be that I was used by a woman who was never worthy of my love, but that I love, with all of my heart, a woman far worthier than I can ever hope to be.”

  Finally, she opened her mouth to speak but the words that came to his ears were not hers.

  “I cannot imagine what the two of you have been about here in these bushes,” came the voice of Miss Katherine from somewhere behind him.

  Elizabeth’s eyes grew very wide. She bit her lip, but she said nothing. It was as if her voice had been stolen away.

  “Please,” Miss Katherine said as she stepped around him and put her arm through his. “Have no anxiety on my account. It is not as if I suspect you of any wrong-doing; quite the contrary. Elizabeth is well known at home for her prudishness. Even her betrothed has had naught from her but one brief kiss at their parting.”

  Elizabeth’s gaze flew to Colin’s with this admission and her face bloomed with color. He wondered at her capacity to feel such shame when it was her very virtue that was among those qualities he most treasured. “Miss Hale, whatever it is you are about, you shall catch cold at it. Miss Armistead and I are only discussing architecture. We find that we agree on how things ought to be built,” he said, watching her eyes in hopes that the shadows soon departed. “Foundations are of particular interest to me and she has been so kind as to listen to my theories on the subject.”

  Miss Katherine made a face. “I cannot conceive of anything more tiresome! Do say you will rejoin us. We ladies on our own have grown quite restless. Elizabeth’s mother, in particular, feels the possible loss of our outing to Gunter’s quite keenly.”

  “But of course we shall go to Gunter’s,” Elizabeth said quietly. “It is a lovely day such that I am not likely to see for years to come. I wish to make the most of it.”

  “Will you take my arm then, Miss Elizabeth?” Colin asked through his surprise at this return of her equilibrium.

  “I think not,” she demurred as she untied the ribbons of her bonnet and retied them in what Colin could only assume to be a more expertly placed bow, whereupon she stepped round him, still refusing to meet his gaze, and led the way back to the others.

  “How I dislike it so when she gets in one of her moods,” Miss Katherine asserted as they followed along. “It is as if she believes herself to be the only one entitled to her own opinion whilst the rest of us must agree or be forever in the wrong.”

  “Have you ever known her to be mistaken, Miss Katherine?” Colin asked, his heart twisting within his chest with apprehension.

  “Why? Do you question her choice of husband?” she asked with another of her coy smiles. “It isn’t as if you are the only one to do so. No one is happy about it, least of all she. It was said that her father was enraged when he learned of their betrothal, that Mr. Cruikshank was only after her money, that he had rather see her married to a native than to one such as Mr. Cruikshank.”

  Colin slowed his pace so as to put more distance between Elizabeth and his words. “Pray tell, what sort of man might Mr. Cruikshank be? I must confess I have been yearning to know this age.”

  Miss Katherine tilted her head to one side. “For one thing he is a commoner. Then, of course, so is Elizabeth. Only, as I have learned, commoners with money are somehow more acceptable, are they not?”

  Colin ignored her question and pressed on with his own. “Then it is not a love match? It is only her money that he is after?”

  “She believes him to love her well though who can say? Mr. Cruikshank had offered for me and my considerable dowry not many weeks before Elizabeth found him under the bridge.”

  “How can that be?” Colin asked with more than a little astonishment. “That is to say, any man would be honored to have you as his wife. And yet, how could Miss Armistead fail to discern his intentions when he had so recently offered for another?”

  “By that I am persuaded you mean another young lady with a dowry that could rescue even the Prince Regent from the river tick,” Miss Katherine suggested.

  “You are not wrong.” Colin fastened his gaze to the rapidly receding figure of his beloved and considered his next question. “If there was one fact you might share with me about Mr. Cruikshank, which would be the most illuminating?”

  “Oh, no, that I shall not do,” Miss Katherine said with a wag of her finger. “I am afraid you shall have to form your opinion of Mr. Cruikshank independently from mine. However, once he has arrived, I believe it shall prove vastly entertaining.”

  “Vastly entertaining for whom?” Colin demanded.

  “For me!” she replied and with a laugh she let go of his arm and danced to Elizabeth’s side.

  Colin found no pleasure in the remainder of the outing. Not only did Elizabeth refuse to look at him, let alone speak to him, he found that Analisa was singularly quiet, as well. This left him with the task of entertaining Miss Katherine and Mrs. Armistead all on his own. To add insult to injury, the afternoon was not to be salvaged by the promised sweet at Gunter’s as the establishment was not supplied with his favorite flavor of ice, that of pistachio.

  The drive home was a misery; Elizabeth was once again seated where he could least see her and Miss Katherine was making the most of her place at his side. Somehow he doubted he should be as eager to forestall the physical advances Miss Katherine insisted on making if it had been Elizabeth who attempted to rub her leg against his. At the same time, he could not imagine that it was an activity in which Elizabeth would engage in the first place.

  Once they arrived at Lady Augusta’s establishment, Colin exited his side of the coach in hopes that he should at least be allowed to escort Elizabeth to her front door. However, by the time he had appeared on the other side of the coach, Elizabeth was already rapping on the door for the butler to admit her. The final blow to his equanimity was that she failed to so much as turn her head to acknowledge either himself or Analisa before she was swallowed up into the house.

  Their return journey to Lloyd-Jones House was spent in utter silence. Rather than enter his father’s home, he saw his sister safely inside, then waited out front whilst his curricle was brought round. Upon arrival, he went directly to his bedchamber where he stayed for the remainder of the evening.

  His butler disturbed him only once, to ascertain when and where he desired his dinner, a meal for which Colin had no appetite, and to leave him a letter on a silver tray. Colin thought he would not bother with it until morning but decided there was no news that could deepen his despair.

  In that he was wrong.

  Jonesy,

  It would seem that I am betrothed to an empty-headed goose who uses me to accomplish some sinister plot of her own. Additionally, I am to fight a duel with Lord Avery over her honor. It is not a duel I can win as I mustn’t do away with the only man who has the slightest inclination to take the baggage off of my hands, and yet, I am too fond of my shirt to allow him even a single shot. How I shall come about I know not, but do not despair!

  Tony

  P.S. How much can change in so short a span!

  “How much, indeed,” Colin murmured as he balled the lett
er in his fist and tossed it into the fire.

  Chapter Twelve

  Elizabeth dragged herself through the front door of her aunt’s townhouse and was immediately presented with a piece of correspondence by the butler.

  “Here ‘tis, Miss,” he said, beaming. “I know how very much this has been looked for.”

  “Thank you, Andrews.” She took the small, neatly folded square of vellum and wondered at her utter lack of gladness. She had anticipated this moment since almost before she had boarded ship for England and had yearned for the communication that signaled Mr. Cruikshank’s reappearance in her life nearly every day since. However, as she looked down at the neat copperplate, all she could think on was that she did not recognize his handwriting. This reflection was followed by the realization that he must have had someone else write it for him; that she, at any rate, knew nothing of his handwriting, knew nothing of so many things about him. How could she have agreed to marry him?

  With trembling fingers, she spread wide the vellum and confirmed the news that his ship had docked, that he was only awaiting her return correspondence before he presented himself at her Aunt’s house. How he was to arrive on his own, she could only guess. Certainly it would be more convenient should she send Aunt Augusta’s carriage to retrieve him. Elizabeth knew she ought to immediately respond with the news that they would call on him at his lodgings without delay, and yet, she could not bring herself to write.

  She told no one of the letter, though she knew they all had guessed based on the expressions of apprehension that ringed the table at the evening meal. After a listless rubber of whist after dinner and a valiant attempt to read Sense and Sensibility, a story altogether too discerning for her current tastes, she blew out the candle and tried to sleep. After a number of hours abed spent tossing and turning, she could put off her correspondence no longer. However, the first letter she wrote was not for Mr. Cruikshank.