An Exquisite Marriage

by Darcie Wilde

  Most annoying, however, was the awareness that while she meant to be looking about for Madelene, her eyes kept being distracted by every fair-haired gentleman. She was looking for Lord Windford, and she couldn’t seem to stop herself.

  Ridiculous. It was one dance. And one conversation, months ago, while she was trying to get him out of the library before he discovered his sister and her soon-to-be lover concealed behind the curtains of the window alcove.

  Helene sighed. Why did Marcus have to be such a good dancer? She loved to dance. After the scene that had made her so notorious, the gentlemen had simply stopped asking her. Well, not simply. There had usually been a few jests and insults involved. It was one of the things she most blamed her former fiancé for. Which was odd, since his other outrages were far more infamous. But she missed the dancing. She missed the immersion into the music, the precision and complexity of the movements, the atmosphere of celebration and enjoyment to be found in the midst of the crowd of other dancers.

  But with Lord Windford, while she had been aware of all these pleasant details, she had been even more aware of her partner. She had talked to him, bantered with him, which was enjoyable, but there had also been an unusually intense consciousness of his hand holding hers, of his palm against the small of her back. His warmth had wrapped around her like a velvet cloak. He had a scent about him, of soap and leather and brandy, that was . . . distinctive. Enticing.

  Stop this at once, Helene. You cannot afford to be attracted to the Duke of Windford, certainly not now when you have this entire season to plan and manage.

  “Well, well, Lady Helene. However do you do?”

  The voice touched her like a dull blade raking across her skin. Helene swung around. Behind her stood Charles Greenall, Marquis of Broadheathe. She knew him at once, as well she should. They had once been engaged.

  Calm. Be calm, Helene instructed herself. You knew this moment must come.

  Broadheathe was not alone. The woman on his arm tonight was heavily rouged but lightly clad in a creation of green gauze and flimsy net.

  “How wonderful to see you again, and looking so very well.” Broadheathe’s odious eyes surveyed her from head to toe. “That’s a new dress, is it not? Things must be improving for your family, eh?”

  I must not make a scene. We are being watched. “I thank you. You must excuse me.”

  “But I do not excuse you.” He stepped directly into her path.

  “Oh, really, Broadheathe,” said the woman. “This is so dull. Take me to the refreshment room. There’s champagne and I’m parched.”

  Broadheathe did not seem to hear. His smile was entirely for Helene. “But it has been so long. I am quite determined to catch up with you, Lady Helene. And you must meet your replacement.” He laughed. “Oh, I’m sorry, that was indiscreet, was it not? My dear, do meet Lady Helene. But not too close. We must not alarm her into hysterics.”

  The rouged woman laughed, and Broadheathe’s eyes grew cold and harsh.

  Helene turned her back. The cut direct. It was all she had left. Her wits had deserted her. The insults he hurled were contemptible and vulgar. If it had been anyone else—from the Prince Regent to Beau Brummel to a chimney sweep—she would have had an answer. But this was Broadheathe, and all she could make herself do was walk away.

  “How are your parents, Helene?” said Broadheathe to her back. “Have they determined which of your sisters they’re going to sell off next?”

  Helene spun to face him. Her hand curled into a fist around her far-too-dainty fan. “You, sir,” she hissed, “will not ever speak of my family!”

  “Or what?” Broadheathe laughed. “You’ll strike me? I think you’re rather out of things to throw. All gone to the bailiffs, have they?”

  The blood was draining from Helene’s cheeks. Her throat and stomach constricted, and yet her heart thundered out of control. He was laughing at her. She, this new creature of his, was laughing, at her and about her, about her sisters and her parents. People who had been praising her a moment before were turning to stare. This evening, the beginning of a new season, a new life, was cracking beneath her.

  “Why are you doing this?” Helene heard herself croak.

  Broadheathe smiled, and the blade she’d felt against her skin when he first spoke now plunged into her heart. “You humiliated me in public, and now you seem to think that can all be forgotten? Did you believe I would ever allow that?”

  Her breath was gone. Wit and sense was gone. Anger smothered it up—anger and the memory of the last time she’d seen that sickening smile and heard that mocking voice.

  She was shaking. She was going to strangle him with her bare hands. She was going to die on the spot. Someone was approaching. She must turn. She must compose her face to a suitable expression.

  She couldn’t move.

  “Lady Helene,” said Lord Windford. “There you are. This is our dance, I believe. Broadheathe. Madame. You’ll excuse us, of course?”

  Marcus’s arm was underneath hers, and he was turning her away. Her feet moved of their own accord. She had sunken so far in her own anger, control of her body had deserted her.

  “What did that man say to you?” Marcus whispered as he steered them around the edges of the room.

  “I can’t,” she gasped. “I can’t.”

  Memory rose up, unbidden but unstoppable. It was dark, a garden. Broadheathe was smiling at her, shrugging and laughing. You’ll have my name and my money. What right have you to complain?

  “Let me get you out of here,” Marcus was saying, but his words seemed to come from a very long way away, which couldn’t be, because she was holding his arm. Clutching it. She couldn’t let go. She couldn’t breathe.

  “Helene?” Madelene’s voice drifted out of the blur.

  I paid for you. A pretty sum it is, too, and I expect the women I pay for to know their place.

  “I need air,” she murmured. “I can’t breathe. I can’t . . .”

  She could not see, either. Neither could she stand. She could, it seemed, feel Marcus’s rock-hard arms close about her as she fainted dead away.

  III

  Helene waved farewell to the carriage, turned, and started up the steps of Anandale House, reflexively avoiding the worst of the gaps in the stones to save the toes of her half boots.

  A whole day and the better part of an evening had passed since Helene had been forced to retreat from the Wrexford party. Fortunately, she, Adele, and Madelene had planned in advance to spend the night at Miss Sewell’s, so there had been no need to write home.

  The plan had been for them to share a delightful sort of after-party, all bundled together like children in one bed, talking about the ball and how it had gone. The reality, unfortunately, had been far different. Unable to get over her encounter with Broadheathe, or her humiliating faint afterward, Helene spent the night with her face turned toward the wall. She tried her best not to talk, or think, or do much of anything else except forget Broadheathe’s cruelty and Lord Windford’s intervention.

  Most of all, she wanted to forget the comfort and safety that she felt as Marcus’s arms closed about her.

  But even the luxury of one night of sulks had been denied her. There had come that awful business with Madelene’s drunken brother, and Adele was tied up in knots over James Beauclaire. Helene knew she really ought to be setting aside her own trivial upsets to pay attention to that. What mattered to her friends mattered to her, if for no other reason than any affair between Adele and James would surely affect their ability to carry their current success further into the season.

  Because despite Broadheathe’s best efforts, the Wrexford party had been a success for Helene and the others. In fact, it had been all she could have hoped for. She must concentrate on that. Anything else could be dealt with in its turn.

  Helene pulled the key from her reticule and unlocked the door.
No welcoming lantern hung beside the threshold, which may have been just as well. The darkness concealed the dull brass and the chipped paint.

  Pausing the briefest moment to brace herself, Helene stepped inside her father’s house.

  The entrance hall was entirely dark and very chill. She did not expect any servant to greet her. If the staff was awake, they would be minding their own business in the kitchen. That is, if they hadn’t been fired or packed off during the day. Mother could complain for hours about how difficult it was to find good servants. The truth was, however, that with the meager and irregular wages the Fitzgeralds paid, it was a wonder they found any at all.

  A thin thread of firelight seeped out from under the door at the end of the hall. That and the light from the street outside was just enough to show Helene that a candle and the means to light it had been left on the round table.

  “Helene?” called her mother’s shrill voice. “Is that you?”

  Who else would it be?

  Helene considered ignoring Mother and simply starting up the stairs. Her near sleepless night combined with the encounter with Broadheathe, not to mention her humiliating reaction to leave her exhausted. She also had a great deal of thinking to do. She’d been seen to faint. There would be gossip about that, and she must devise a means to counter it, or at least ensure there was soon something more entertaining to talk about.

  “Helene? You will come here at once!”

  Helene sighed. She must go. Mother would add at least fifteen minutes to the coming lecture if she had to chase her daughter down in order to deliver it.

  Helene squared her shoulders and schooled her features into an attitude of calm. Picking up her candle, she walked into the back parlor and instantly blanched.

  For it wasn’t just Mother waiting up for her tonight. Her father, the Right Honorable Hubert Fitzgerald, Viscount Anandale, stood in front of the meager fire, which was made to look even smaller by the broad expanse of the hearth.

  The claret parlor of Anandale house was a room of graceful proportions, all of them spoiled by the number of movables that had been crammed into it. Faded chairs in need of repair clustered around tables in need of cleaning and refinishing in arrangements that made no sense. Neither did the cabinets stuffed full of ornaments and partial sets of china, and even one or two pieces of plate. Helene’s mother, Lady Anandale, spent most of her time in this room, pretending she was at home to callers, and she was determined to keep her eye on as many of her remaining possessions as possible.

  At one point, Lady Anandale had been a statuesque beauty. Her appearance and seemingly unaffected manner had made her the toast of society when she came out. Her marriage to the handsome and charming viscount was regarded with approbation by the ton’s hostesses, and all the predictions of a sparkling future for them both were taken as certainties.

  But those predictions had entirely failed to come true, and Lady Anandale had proved unable to adjust to adversity. To be fair, her lord and master had only one response to his troubles, and that was to borrow more money. Here, then, was the result: one warehouse of a room in the London house that they managed to hold on to by the skin of their teeth.

  “Well, you’ve been gone long enough,” declared Lady Anandale as Helene set her candle down on the table nearest the door.

  “I tried.”

  “You will keep a civil tongue when you speak to your mother,” growled her father.

  “I suppose we should be grateful that you deigned to come home at all,” Mother added. “By this time, I was expecting a note to say that you had decided to reside permanently with your excellent friend, Miss Sewell.”

  “It’s a wonder you should wait up, then. I’m sure the comfort of being spared the expense of my future upkeep would have allowed you to sleep quite soundly.”

  Helene folded her hands in front of her and faced her mother’s sputterings of fury directly and quietly. Seeing that, once again, she’d failed to discomfort her oldest daughter, Lady Anandale changed tactics.

  “I don’t suppose you accomplished anything worthwhile by staying out to all hours, again?” she demanded.

  Before her waltz with Marcus, and of course, before Broadheathe forced her to leave, Helene had held a profitable conversation with Mrs. Pollerton. She’d also obtained permission to call on Lady Fairbrace to discuss her new enterprise for providing clean water sources to some of the poorer neighborhoods. Further, she had collected useful information about the staffing of assembly rooms for a large party, not to mention a suggestion as to where one might find a chef able to provide a supper for over five hundred that was not just credible, but magnificent.

  That was, of course, not what Mother meant.

  “You will be pleased to learn I danced with the Duke of Windford.”

  “You did not!” snapped Mother.

  “I did. A waltz. He is surprisingly musical.”

  “Why on earth would a man such as Windford waltz with you?” demanded Father.

  Helene took the verbal blow without batting an eye. To do anything else would only cause her father to expand upon his remark.

  “You would have to ask him that.”

  Father snorted. “I know you can’t have done anything intelligent like thank him properly.”

  “I must have done something, because he indicated some desire to repeat the exercise.” At least until I sent him on his way.

  Stop. Stop. Stop. They do not need to hear any of this. What on earth can it matter to you what they think?

  And yet she couldn’t help it. She wanted to surprise them. She wanted them to look at her differently, even if it was only the way they used to when she was still the most prized ornament in their house.

  At least that had been a kind of love.

  “It will all come to nothing, Anandale,” said her mother sagely to her father. “We must not nourish any hopes on her.”

  “No, indeed, Lady Anandale,” Father agreed. “We have ample evidence that she forgot her duty to her family long ago, if indeed she ever knew it.”

  “May I be excused?” asked Helene. “I’m sure you have a number of complaints yet to voice, but I am very tired. Perhaps you could write them down for me to review at breakfast?”

  She did not wait for an answer but picked up her candle and took her leave to the sound of her parents seething with outrage.

  The stairs creaked underfoot. The carpet on the landing had a new tear. The hallway smelled of damp. They’d have to find some way to afford repairs to the roof, or it would come down on them before next fall. That was assuming her father was able to hold on to the house through the rest of the season.

  And if he doesn’t, what then? Helene bit her lip. He must. She needed time. Just a few more weeks should do. By then she would have proven herself to be sensible enough and competent enough to complete her real plans, the ones she had not even confessed to her friends or Miss Sewell.

  Helene paused at the first door on the left and eased it gently open. The hinges creaked, but the boys on the other side did not stir as she peeked in at them. They were huddled together for warmth in the iron-framed bed, and the quilts—mended but clean—were piled thickly over them. Arthur was snoring, a long, loud dragging sound. Edward rolled over and swatted him without waking up, and Colin snorted and muttered and burrowed further under the quilts.

  Helene smiled at her sleeping brothers and closed the door.

  The next door opened onto the apartments Helene shared with her two sisters. Of all the rooms in the house, these and her brothers’ remained neat and orderly. The blue paint on the walls was faded, but at least it was free of the marks of damp and soot. There was a fire in the hearth, but it had been banked for the night, so only a trace of warmth remained. There were two dressing tables, and their mirrors were whole. One corner had been turned into a sort of nursery with a toy box and a trunk of old cl
othes for dressing up and paint and coloring boxes all neatly put away, waiting for their owner to return. There was even a good Turkey carpet on the floor.

  Every so often Mama would order one of the newer servants to remove the best furnishings to her own apartment, and then Helene would have to make the offender put them back. Usually all it took was a clear explanation of who was really going to make sure they got paid on the quarter day.

  “Helene?” said a small voice.

  Standing in the doorway was Anna, her youngest sister, rubbing one eye with the back of her hand. The other clutched her ruffled nightcap.

  “Anna!” Helene whispered, holding her arms open. The little girl hurried up to be hugged and kissed. “What are you doing up? You get yourself back under the quilts, pet. I’ll be there in a just minute.”

  But Anna just looked up at her, her wide eyes deeply serious. Too serious. A child so young should not have to wear such an expression.

  “Helene, when am I old enough to get married?”

  “Not for a long time, Annie-bun.” Helene crouched down so she could brush back the wisps of Anna’s pale gold hair that had come loose from her braids. Her nightdress was too short, again. She’d have to see if there was an old one of Susannah’s left, or hers, that could be cut down to fit . . .

  “Thirteen?”

  Helene frowned. “Why do you ask?”

  “’Cuz Mother told Suza she better hurry and make up her mind to get married and that Lord Crispin was her best chance and Suza cried for a long time . . .”

  Helene’s hands froze. “No.”

  “I’m not lying,” insisted Anna.

  “I know you’re not, pet.” Helene took both her sister’s hands and leaned close, trying to speak, and think calmly. “But I do want you to think carefully, Anna. Did Mother really say Lord Crispin? Lord Abelard Crispin?”

  Anna nodded. “But Suza said she didn’t want to get married, especially since she isn’t even supposed to come out really until next year, and I thought maybe I could promise to marry him, if he didn’t have to wait too long . . .” She pushed out her lower lip. “I shouldn’t’a said, should I?”