Seduction of a Proper Gentleman (Last Man Standing)

by Victoria Alexander

  Kathleen sat down, untied the ribbon, and started to read. It wasn’t long before she was immersed in the long and varied history of the Leighton family and the earls of Norcroft. It was most annoying that nothing was in a chronological order but that, Kathleen decided in a no-nonsense manner, only made it more of a challenge.

  For the rest of the day and all of the next and a good part of the day after that, Kathleen pored over yellowed documents and fragile letters and journals falling apart with age. As a strictly scholarly pursuit, it was fascinating to catch glimpses of one family through generations and centuries. She went through three more trunks without finding a single reference to the curse.

  On the third day, she noticed the sun was at last shining. It scarcely mattered. Her attention, her very future, was confined to this room and these papers. She refused to give up, still it was disheartening. If the bridge was repaired and she was able to leave before she found something of worth, she didn’t have much choice but to go.

  Kathleen paged through a diary, brittle with age and a passage caught her eye. Dated 1632, it wasn’t exactly what she’d been looking for. She had to read it three times before she realized what it meant.

  Victory.

  Chapter 22

  “Hollinger?” Kathleen tried to maintain a sedate pace even though she could scarce contain her excitement. “Do you know where Lord Norcroft is?”

  “I have apparently misplaced him, my lady,” Hollinger said. “However, Lady Norcroft was in the parlor but—”

  “Excellent.” Kate cast the butler her most radiant smile, turned toward the parlor and fairly burst into the room. “Aunt Edwina!” She stopped short and sucked in a hard breath. “Grandmother?”

  “Good afternoon, my dear.” Her grandmother, tall and stately and every inch the Countess of Dumleavy, chuckled. “I gather you did not expect to see me.”

  “No.” Kathleen stared. “You’re the last person I expected to see. What are you doing here?”

  “Malcolm sent word when he discovered you weren’t in London. I thought you might need our help.”

  “Our help?”

  “Good day, Kathleen,” a familiar voice said absently.

  Kathleen’s attention jerked to the woman standing by the window. She narrowed her gaze. “Hannah.”

  Hannah stared out the window. “That gardener is carrying a potted tree. And he’s the second I’ve seen. How very odd.”

  “I don’t care about the gardeners.” Kathleen approached her aunt. “Do you have any idea what you did to me?”

  “I daresay I do.” Hannah turned from the window and smiled in a satisfied manner. “I took your overly practical and far too sensible nature and replaced it with—”

  “You replaced it with nothing! You took my memories, my history! You stole my life!”

  “Nonsense,” Hannah shrugged. “I simply made it possible for you to follow your heart.”

  “Follow my heart?” Kathleen stared with disbelief. “It was a dreadful thing to do to me. You’re not even sorry are you?”

  “First of all, Kathleen, I had no idea if it would work at all let alone work so well. As for being sorry,” Hannah thought for a moment. “No. I’m actually rather proud.”

  “Proud?” Kathleen turned to her grandmother. “Do you have any idea what she did to me?”

  “We’ve been here for a good half an hour,” Grandmother said, “and Lady Norcroft has told us everything. She’s gone to find Malcolm.” Grandmother chuckled. “That is something I didn’t expect but a lovely turn of events nonetheless. I understand you’ve had an interesting time of it.”

  “Interesting?” Kathleen nearly choked on the word.

  “If you’re going to repeat everything we say we shall never get anywhere,” Hannah said in a lofty manner.

  “Aren’t you going to chastise her?” Kathleen stared at her grandmother. “Or shall you leave it to me to strangle her?”

  “It’s extremely difficult to chastise a woman in her fifty-second year as if she were a child. But if it makes you feel better.” Grandmother fixed Hannah with a firm look. “It was not at all right of you, in a moral sense, to do what you did to Kathleen.” Grandmother paused. “Although I should like to know exactly how you did it.”

  Hannah smirked.

  “Grandmother!” Kathleen snapped. “It scarcely matters how she did it only that she did.”

  “Yes, of course. I lost my head for a moment in the excitement of realizing that a spell might actually have worked. It’s a first you know. Although I suppose that’s neither here nor there at the moment.” Grandmother shrugged. “However, all’s well that end’s well as Shakespeare said.”

  “It hasn’t ended well. Surely Lady Norcroft has told you—” Kathleen stopped. “Did Lady Norcroft tell you everything?”

  Grandmother nodded. “It seems to me she left nothing out.”

  “We heard every interesting detail I would say,” Hannah added.

  “I see.” Kathleen considered her grandmother thoughtfully. As far as Lady Norcroft knew, Kathleen intended to save Oliver from the curse by refusing to marry him. If her grandmother was aware of that, and certainly Lady Norcroft would not have left out such an important point, why wasn’t her grandmother concerned? Unless of course, she already knew what Kathleen had just discovered. “Grandmother.”

  “I believe you and I should have a long talk, child,” Grandmother said coolly.

  “Yes, I believe we should.”

  “In the garden perhaps?” Grandmother smiled. “It’s a lovely day and I understand the gardens here are quite extensive. It is nearly autumn after all, and who knows how many more pleasant days there will be.”

  “Excellent idea.” Kathleen’s cool tone matched the older woman’s.

  A few minutes later they strolled side by side along the main garden pathway flanked by tall hedges.

  “Well?” Grandmother began. “What do you wish to ask?”

  “How do you know I want to ask anything?”

  Grandmother chuckled. “I raised you, girl. I know when there is something on your mind.”

  “It’s about the curse.”

  “Ah, yes it would be wouldn’t it?”

  “You believe in it don’t you?”

  “You know the answer to that.”

  “Nonetheless—”

  “It would be foolish not to believe in it.” Grandmother paused. “Life is full of all sorts of tragedy, Kathleen. Accidents happen, clumsy men tumble off roofs or drown when one wouldn’t think it possible. People one loves die too young, others one hopes to love are never born. It’s a comfort to believe in a reason, even as unpleasant a reason as a curse, rather than accept the random nature of life.” She sighed. “I’ve never been good at acceptance.”

  Kathleen chose her words with care. “Then you’re saying—”

  “Nothing of any particular significance,” Grandmother said in a brisk manner and shifted her parasol. “Now then, what do you wish to know?”

  “I have been looking through some old papers, documents, diaries, that sort of thing, that have been in Oliver’s family for generations.” She studied her grandmother closely. “I found an interesting passage in a very old diary.”

  “About the curse?”

  “Not exactly. It appears that in 1632, the illegitimate son of a Leighton married the widowed daughter of an Armstrong. Wouldn’t that satisfy the curse?”

  “Why yes, I suppose it would.”

  “Did you know about this?”

  “I imagine if he wasn’t acknowledged by his family his name would not have been Leighton and, as she was a widow, her name wouldn’t have been Armstrong.” Grandmother shrugged. “They could have been easily overlooked. In terms of the curse that is.”

  Kathleen widened her eyes. “You did know about this didn’t you?”

  “I really can’t say. I’m getting very old and my mind…” The older woman heaved an overly dramatic sigh. “Wanders.”

  “Hah! You
r mind is as sharp as a tack.”

  “Don’t forget wise,” Grandmother murmured.

  “If indeed you did know—”

  “And I can’t remember one way or the other.”

  Kathleen ignored her. “Then tell me why you encouraged me to believe in it? If it was simply a plot to find me a good match—”

  “A match five hundred years in the making,” Grandmother said pointedly.

  “Don’t say that!”

  Grandmother smiled in a satisfied manner. “I understand you let him call you Kate.”

  “That’s not the least bit significant.” Kathleen waved away the comment.

  “When you were nine years old you announced Kate no longer suited and your name was Kathleen. You’ve permitted no one to call you Kate since except your husband.” Grandmother chuckled. “As I said, this is a match five hundred years in the making.”

  “The only thing that is years in the making is this plot of yours!”

  Grandmother shrugged. “One does what one must for those one loves.”

  Kathleen shook her head. “I still don’t understand.”

  “Nor do you need to.” The countess stopped and stared her granddaughter straight in the eye. “Shall we simply say there was a curse and perhaps now there isn’t.”

  “What do you mean perhaps?”

  “It seems to me, marriage between our families some two hundred or so years ago would certainly have ended the curse unless of course you are right.”

  “Right?”

  “In that it didn’t take marriage itself to end the curse but a sacrifice. As you are willing to sacrifice both your family’s future and love to save Oliver, I would think any curse worth the name would be satisfied by that.”

  “Do you?”

  “I do indeed.” She nodded firmly. “At this point, if we take the curse as we know it—that simply marriage between families would satisfy it—then it no doubt ended with the bastard son marrying the widowed daughter and you can safely marry Oliver. If you’re right—and true sacrifice is required—then again your sacrifice is enough to end it and again you can marry.”

  “But we don’t know.”

  “Kathleen.” Grandmother sighed in exasperation. “In spite of my best efforts, you have grown up to be a practical, sensible, intelligent woman with a good head on your shoulders. You are exactly like your mother and I am very, very proud of you.” Grandmother cupped Kathleen’s chin, exactly as she had done when Kathleen was a small girl, and stared into her eyes. “There are no assurances in life, my dear child. Hope and love are the only things that can sustain us.” She released Kathleen, readjusted her parasol, and continued. “Of course a sign is always nice.”

  “A sign? What kind of sign?”

  “I don’t know, it could be anything. That’s the awkward thing about signs but we shall surely know it when we see it.” They reached the intersection of two pathways and Grandmother stopped and glanced around. “That’s what the curse says. There shall be a sign.” Grandmother folded her parasol and pointed down the path to the right. “And that, my girl, is a sign.”

  Kathleen’s gaze followed the parasol and she caught her breath.

  At the end of the hedge, where only a few days ago, the last blossoms of the season were fading, now flowers bloomed in profusion. There was no rhyme or reason to their arrangement, it was simply a glorious explosion of color, blues and yellows and pinks, all the hues of spring. And all most familiar.

  “Imagine that. Spring flowers blooming when it’s nearly autumn.” Grandmother nodded approvingly. “A sign if ever I saw one.”

  “Grandmother.” Kathleen leaned closer to the older woman and lowered her voice. “Those flowers are all from the greenhouse.”

  “Yes, well there are signs that a curse has been broken and signs of a man willing to do whatever is necessary for the woman he loves. If I were you, I would accept this as both.” She smiled with satisfaction. “And I suspect he’s waiting for you.”

  Kathleen took a step down the path then hesitated. “Do you really think he’ll be safe?”

  “I do.” Grandmother nodded. “Now go.”

  Kathleen started toward the flowers, the pace of her step increasing with the beat of her heart. There were tulips and hyacinths, daffodils and jonquils and anemones. It looked and smelled like spring, like a beginning, and was nothing short of enchanting. This, indeed, was magic. She spotted a few small flowering trees, a cherry and a dwarf apple. There was probably nothing left in the greenhouse at all. Kathleen noted even a rhododendron in bloom and caught her breath at the wonder of it.

  In the midst of it all, Oliver stood studying the display as if trying to decide if it was sufficient. He didn’t hear her approach.

  She paused. She could certainly tell him she was well aware that he was behind this outbreak of spring. Or not.

  “Oliver?”

  “Kate!” His face lit at the sight of her and that too was magic. “Look at all this.” He waved in a grand gesture. “Why it’s amazing.”

  She bit back a smile. “It is indeed.”

  “Spring flowers blooming at this time of year?” Astonishment rang in his voice. He was very good. “Why it’s—”

  “A miracle?”

  “Well, yes, that.” He paused. “But what I think it really is is…a sign.”

  “A sign?” She adopted an innocent tone. “That we will skip over autumn and winter altogether and go directly to spring?”

  “No, no that would be absurd.” He chose his words with care. “I think it’s a sign that the curse is ended.”

  “Why would you think that?”

  “We found references to the curse in papers in the attic that said there would be a sign when the curse was at end.” He shook his head in a somber manner. “I think this is definitely a sign.”

  “Do you?”

  “I do indeed.” He nodded firmly. “What do you think?”

  “Oh, well.” She glanced around. “It is most unusual.”

  “Yes?”

  “And I would say there is no other rational explanation.”

  “No,” he said quickly. “None that I can think of.”

  “Therefore, it simply stands to reason that this must mean”—her gaze met his—“the curse has indeed ended.”

  He stared at her for a long moment. “Then there’s no longer any reason why you won’t marry me?”

  Her heart thudded. “None that I can think of.”

  Relief washed across his face and then joy and he swept her into his arms. “Are you sure?”

  She swallowed hard and gazed into his blue eyes. “There isn’t a doubt in my mind. Or in my heart.”

  He grinned. “I love you, Kate.”

  “And I love you, Oliver.”

  “And I shall love you every day for the rest of our very long and happy lives.” His words were reflected in his eyes and she thought her heart might burst with the joy of it. “I think I loved you from the moment I first saw you lying unconscious in the manor.”

  She laughed. “And I might well have loved you the moment you gave four shillings to a woman you thought needed them with a wish that they would bring her better luck than they did you.”

  He narrowed his eyes. “How did you know—”

  She grinned. “I really must get a new cloak.”

  He raised a brow. “You?”

  She nodded.

  “And did they bring you luck?”

  “Indeed they did.” She brushed her lips across his. “They brought me you.”

  With that his lips met hers and she knew without question or doubt that the curse was indeed at an end. And was grateful that it had, in one way or another, whether it had anything to do with her grandmother or whether it was truly fate, brought her to him. And she knew she would live the rest of her days and never tell him that she was certain this sign, this spring, this magic that surrounded them was his doing.

  And knew as well, she need never tell this sensible, practical ma
n who didn’t believe in silly things like magic or curses, who would surely find a rational explanation, that there had never been rhododendrons in the greenhouse.

  Epilogue

  Spring 1884

  “This is excellent cognac.” Warton studied the liquor in his glass in an appreciative manner. “I can’t believe you’ve waited all these years to drink it.”

  “What I can’t believe is that it’s taken us this long to be in the same place at the same time,” Cavendish said wryly.

  Sinclair chuckled. “It does seem whenever I have been in England one or more of you have been out of the country.”

  “It didn’t seem right to open it without you here. Apparently, gentlemen,” Oliver raised his glass, “there is indeed a time and place for everything.”

  At long last, the four old friends sat together again in their favorite chairs in their favorite club. The facility was little changed, although past due for refurbishing. One might even be able to believe, if only for a moment, that it had been no time at all since they had formed the tontine and had wagered a handful of shillings and this fine bottle of cognac. That it was scarcely longer than yesterday since Oliver had been the last one of them to marry, the last man standing. If, of course, one squinted one’s eyes and ignored that there was among them a few more pounds and a bit less hair.

  “There never seemed to be an occasion important enough to warrant opening the bottle until now,” Oliver said.

  “I would say the joining of two of our children in marriage is certainly an occasion.” Sinclair nodded. “That too is something I never imagined.”

  “Life, my friends,” Cavendish said in a sage manner that had only come with age, “is full of the unexpected.”

  “Not to mention adventure.” Warton saluted with his glass.

  Between them, they had certainly had their share of both adventures and the unexpected. All four were successful as the world judged such things. Indeed, they had all known triumph in business or politics or both. The three Englishmen had all made their mark in Parliament and Sinclair had truly become a captain of American industry. And in the process of building his own fortune, had endowed the rest of them, his investment partners, with considerable wealth. In their private lives, each and every one of them had known great happiness and great sorrow, great loss and great love. Such was the way of life.