Fortune's Bride

by Roberta Gellis

  Esmeralda stood quite frozen through this exchange. She heard it, of course, but it made little impression on her mind. All she knew was that Sabrina’s eyes had flicked over her once, and from that moment all of her attention had been given to Sir Charles. It seemed Robert was wrong. She was not welcome to Lady Kevern. She heard Sabrina say something about sending the footman out with Sir Charles for the baggage.

  “I have no baggage,” Esmeralda said.

  Sabrina had started to accompany Sir Charles to the door, but something in Esmeralda’s voice stopped her. She turned, and her eyes met Esmeralda’s. “My dear,” she cried, “I didn’t mean to overlook you. I thought he was hurt. Perce was with the Russian army at Eylau… Oh, that can’t mean anything to you, but when I saw the blood on his coat… But Mrs. Moreton—Esmeralda—you are welcome. I cannot tell you how welcome you are.”

  “Robert calls me Merry,” Esmeralda said, her voice shaking.

  “My darling Merry,” Sabrina murmured, putting her arms around her. “My darling Merry, you have come home.”

  Those words were the last thing Esmeralda remembered. When she opened her eyes, she was totally bewildered. She was in the middle of a huge bed hung with the most elaborate curtains she had ever seen. She lay for a while looking at them, but no amount of staring brought the slightest familiarity. Nor was there anything else, when she began to examine the remainder of her surroundings, that was in the least familiar. Never in her life had she slept on silk sheets, nor been covered by so intricately embroidered a feather quilt, nor worn a nightgown of sinfully expensive lace, tucked and pleated to display the body beneath it so provocatively.

  Eventually she remembered arriving at Stour House, and the amenities explained themselves. She remembered, too, the oddly erratic greeting, so seemingly cold in the beginning and then so warm. Vaguely it seemed to her that she had been given a reason, but she could not remember what. In any case, she thought, she had better get up at once. She realized she must have fainted. It would never do to confirm the impression that she was weak and sickly. Someone might tell Robert. She reached for the bedcurtains.

  They were instantly pulled back, and a pleasant-looking woman smiled at her warmly and said, “Dinna ye move a bit. Brina’ll be here in a minnit, and yer breakfast on her heels. Ach, ye’ll be wonderin’ who’m I. I’m Katy.”

  The manner indicated a very privileged old servant, probably Lady Kevern’s nurse, although she did not call herself “Nanny”, as most of them did. Esmeralda smiled in response, feeling more confident. If Lady Kevern had sent her own nurse rather than just any maid to watch by her, it must mean that those arms around her had not been an impulse that soon passed.

  “There isn’t anything wrong with me,” Esmeralda said. “I’m so sorry to have made such a dramatic entrance. It was the post chaise. We only stopped to change horses, and that was done so quickly there was no time to get out—”

  “Of course there isn’t anything wrong with you,” Sabrina’s voice interrupted, “but why didn’t you tell Sir Charles you couldn’t travel at such a pace?”

  “I couldn’t do that,” Esmeralda protested, her eyes large. “He was a courier on army business. It was only that I am not accustomed to riding in a carriage—” She stopped abruptly, realizing she had made a faux pas from the astonishment on Sabrina’s face. Ladies always traveled in carriages. But, Esmeralda thought, not army wives who followed the drum, and she pushed herself upright and went on defiantly, “I have always ridden Boa Viagem and accompanied the army on its marches.” Then her mare’s name reminded her of the carriage following. “My servants,” she said, “are also suitable to the wife of a military man. Molly is a soldier’s wife, not refined, perhaps, but strong and willing, and Carlos, though young, is clever.”

  “My dear;” Sabrina said softly with tears in her eyes, “you do not need to defend yourself. I admire you more than I can say. You are a heroine. You must love Robert very much to have given up so much, to have endured so much, to be with him.”

  “Well, I do adore him,” Esmeralda admitted, her spirits rising mercurially at the evidence of Sabrina’s sympathy and understanding, “but I’m no heroine. I was quite accustomed to riding horseback because Papa was such a nip cheese—”

  She stopped again, this time putting her hands to her mouth. It was “not done” to say such things, and she would not have slipped up except that she was so accustomed to speaking freely to Robert about her father and, of course, there had never been any occasion to speak of him to anyone else. However, Sabrina laughed heartily.

  “You are a refreshment to the spirit, Merry. I wondered whether it would be necessary to avoid discussing your father. Papa Moreton was appalled—now don’t start to look like a lost waif again. I assure you he does not associate you with your father’s peculiarities, and Mama Moreton does not even know about them. In fact, if you feel strong enough, they are very, very eager to meet you.”

  Esmeralda drew a deep breath. “Of course, but I cannot go to Cornwall at this moment. Please. I must wait for Robert.” Her voice started to shake, but she added another, “I must,” appealingly.

  “Naturally you must wait for Robert,” Sabrina said. “Dear Merry, there’s no question of you going to Cornwall. The Moretons are here. Perce didn’t know they were coming when he wrote to Robert. You were equally invited to Moreton House, and I thought you would go there, which is why I was just a little surprised—”

  “Oh gracious, I hope the Earl and Countess of Moreton won’t be offended,” Esmeralda exclaimed. “I just did what Robert told me. I didn’t even know Robert had written to them—or to your husband.”

  “Oh, that Robert!” Sabrina exclaimed, laughing. “If I know him, he never read his father’s or mother’s letters. Anything longer than five lines is too much bother for him. Perce was perfectly right, and I should not have scolded him about the note he wrote.”

  “No,” Esmeralda protested, ready to leap to Robert’s defense, but she paused as a maid carried in a tray, which she prepared to set over Esmeralda’s thighs. Esmeralda shook her head. “I would prefer to get up,” she said firmly.

  Sabrina waved the maid toward a table, and Katy brought an exquisite peignoir, which fit Esmeralda very well. “I thought Meg’s things would fit her,” Sabrina said to Katy with satisfaction. “What a relief. That means we can shop at leisure.” And when Esmeralda protested faintly at the notion of borrowing some unknown person’s clothing without permission, Sabrina laughed, said, “It’s only tit for tat,” and explained how Megaera had also arrived without a stitch except what she was wearing and had worn Sabrina’s clothes. “And, you know, Leonie came to England without any clothing, too. Well, neither had I any, but I was only nine. Still, it’s becoming a family tradition. Really, I begin to think one of us will have to write a book. We seem to be very adventurous females. How did you happen to be all alone in Lisbon when Robert married you?”

  Esmeralda almost dropped the cup she was lifting to her lips and stared at Sabrina. “Robert did not marry me in Lisbon,” she said. “Did he not explain…? Oh, heaven, what did he say?”

  “Merry—” Sabrina put her hand over Esmeralda’s and squeezed it gently. “Don’t be so frightened. We are all very eager to love you, and I can see that you well deserve that love for yourself. I will not deny that Perce and I were a little concerned when we first heard about it. It seemed so unlike Robert to marry for money—”

  “Money?” Esmeralda squeaked. “How do you know about the money?”

  Sabrina looked a trifle self-conscious. “Well, of course, when Robert simply announced that he had married a woman named Esmeralda Mary Louisa Talbot whom he had met in India, Papa Moreton began to move heaven and earth to discover who you were, and when the Earl of Moreton and Roger St. Eyre start to move heaven and earth, believe me, it moves. Your bankers were as clay in their hands. Merry, what is wrong?”

  “Robert doesn’t know,” Esmeralda wailed. “Oh,
he will be so angry. He will never understand why I did not tell him.”

  “No one can be angry about half a million pounds,” Sabrina said, laughing, and then the first sentence Esmeralda had said hit her. “Robert doesn’t know!” she repeated, stunned. “But why… Oh, Merry, forgive me, I don’t mean to offend you, but I know Robert did not carry a broken heart home from India, and he was always so determined not to marry. So why—”

  Esmeralda picked up her cup, sipped her tea, took a deep breath, and said, “Because he is the kindest, most chivalrous man in the entire world,” and began at the beginning and told the story of her life.

  Naturally, it did not take five minutes. There were questions, and pauses while Sabrina whooped with laughter, and other pauses when both women wept, and there were interruptions when emotions became too intense and Katy insisted Esmeralda must dress to give her a chance to calm down. However, before noon the whole tale was told—all of it, even including Esmeralda’s pregnancy, at which Sabrina exclaimed with intense joy and reported she was in the same condition herself.

  “And I was growing afraid that I never would be,” Sabrina said. “Because, you know, Perce and I have been lovers for more than a year, but right after we were married—in September because William was killed a year ago August and it seemed wrong to marry virtually the day the official mourning was over—” Sabrina stopped, aware from Esmeralda’s stunned expression that she had heard nothing of this before. “Robert never told you,” she said. And then asked, “What in the world do you talk about?”

  “The army,” Esmeralda said simply.

  Sabrina whooped with laughter again. “I should have known,” she gasped, and embarked on the story of her life, which brought in Leonie and Megaera and their experiences.

  By the time Sabrina was finished, Esmeralda was as lighthearted as she could be, considering that Robert was still in Spain and might be in danger. She was no longer in the least troubled by any irregularity in her background. “I’m awfully glad to know I am not the only one who has seduced an innocent husband,” she said laughing.

  Nor did her meeting with Robert’s parents later in the day do anything to dampen her happiness. It was clear that the countess was utterly delighted with her new daughter-in-law. She was as kind as her son and would have loved any woman Robert was willing to marry. That Esmeralda was also gentle and most eager to be loved filled her cup of joy. She had never believed that Robert married for the money and now put it out of her mind. The earl was less simplistic in his response, but he knew Esmeralda was from a decent family. The earl had, naturally, applied to Robert’s commanding officer for information and had received rather more than he expected, but it was good news.

  Thus it was her father-in-law who told Esmeralda that Sir Arthur had not forgotten his promise to try to discover her relatives in Ireland. He had been successful and had traced both her Connor and her Talbot relations. Both had immediately offered her a home or any other help they could give her. And this, the earl said dryly, must be out of disinterested kindness, because Sir Arthur had no idea she was an heiress and could not have passed the information to them.

  All the while he had been talking and listening, the earl had also been judging, and before he parted from Esmeralda, he made it plain that he would have approved Robert’s choice even without what Esmeralda brought.

  “Not that I have any objection to an Indian heiress as a daughter,” he said, bending down to kiss her brow, “but I am very glad to know that my opinion that Robert is an idiot need not be revised. I hate to revise an opinion.”

  “Robert is not an idiot,” Esmeralda protested, smiling impishly. “After all, he did not marry me for love, either.”

  “That is what I said,” the earl pointed out, with a teasing grin. “Any man who did not love you on sight is an idiot, my dear.”

  Thus Esmeralda’s homecoming was truly a homecoming. She remained with Sabrina, not because she was not pressed most lovingly to live at Moreton House but, she explained, because Robert had told her to go to Stour House and would expect to find her there. However, she saw almost as much of the occupants of Moreton House as if she had lived there. Her days were very busy. There were arrangements to make with her bankers, there were long letters to write to her relatives in Ireland, there was an apartment in a neighboring mews to fit out for Molly and Carlos, above the stable where Boa Viagem and Luisa would live, there was her own shopping to do, for when the Season began, all of the Moretons’ and the St. Eyres’ social connections would wish to meet her.

  However, despite the steady and absorbing occupation and the kindness of her new relations, Esmeralda’s eyes grew more and more haunted as each day passed. No one remarked on her growing fear. They were all afraid themselves. Perce spent half his time at the Horse Guards prying for information, but no one had any news more recent than that brought by Sir Charles. Roger St. Eyre came down from Stour himself to speak to Lord Castlereagh, but even Roger could not obtain information that was not available. They did learn, from Philip via the smuggler Pierre Restoir, that Bonaparte himself had left Spain before the English had reached Corunna, but that gave no assurance the embarkation had been successful.

  Esmeralda cried herself to sleep every night, and the only thing that could make her smile by January 26 was little Kevin, who was growing like a weed in summer. At teatime the next afternoon, the whole family had gathered in Sabrina’s parlor. The conversation was strained and disjointed, and there were frequent silences. The last of these was broken by the sound of horses trotting down the street. Everyone burst into talk at once, frantically denying the need to listen in the hope that the carriage would stop, but Esmeralda could not pretend. She rose to her feet with a gasp and ran to the window. Silence fell again like a pall until she turned and ran out of the room.

  Into that silence, her voice came, high and terrified. “Major Colborne, oh, no!”

  And then a man’s voice, but no one heard what he said because there was a concerted rush to the door. Naturally, the jam there prevented anyone from getting out for a minute. Chivalry was forgotten. The stronger males pushed out in front of the women and went racing down the stairs then out the open door, but there they all stopped, effectively blocking the view of their anxious womenfolk so that the countess began to weep aloud until her husband turned and said joyfully, “It’s all right, Emma. He’s just getting out of the carriage slowly.”

  Then Robert was shaking off Colborne’s steadying grip, catching Esmeralda to him, and saying, “Don’t cry, love, don’t. I’m quite all right.”

  “You would be,” Colborne snapped, “if you hadn’t insisted driving at such a pace.” And then to Esmeralda, “He’s had a nasty knock on the head and lost a bit of skin on his ribs, that’s all. When he’s had some sleep, he’ll be fine.”

  “I’m fine now,” Robert insisted. “You’re all making a fuss.”

  “I never make a fuss,” Esmeralda said firmly, “but you are not fit to be seen or smelled, Robert. Your appearance is frightening your mother. She is not accustomed to filthy rags. Come to my room, and I will make you decent.”

  She did no such thing, of course. He barely made it up the stairs, although he stubbornly refused any assistance, and when Esmeralda tumbled him into bed, boots, and all, he fell asleep in the middle of a mumbled protest. Tactfully, no one disturbed them. Truthfully, no one wished to do so. Now that his family knew Robert was alive and not seriously hurt or ill, everyone was more interested in Colborne’s news than in Robert himself. Even Robert’s mother was content to leave him to Esmeralda. Robert was not easy to nurse.

  Fortunately, he did not need nursing. He had been suffering from no more than a recurrence of the dizziness and raging headache, caused originally by his concussion and brought on again by the jostling of the carriage. About ten o’clock Robert sighed and opened his eyes. He, too, looked at the elaborate bedcurtains, but he guessed at once where he was and said, “Merry?”

&nbs
p; She was there before the sound died, bending over the bed, kissing him, murmuring disjointed ejaculations of love and joy, and then pulling away a little to say, “You must be starved. I’ll ring for the maid to bring up some supper.”

  “A bath first,” he said, smiling. “We did get food along the road.” Then he frowned. “What happened to M’Guire?”

  “Oh, I am so glad he is safe, too. I didn’t see him. I didn’t know he was with you. But don’t worry about him. I’m sure someone will have taken him to Molly’s rooms.”

  “I hope you’ve done well by her,” Robert said soberly. “I owe M’Guire my life.”

  Esmeralda’s breath caught. “What happened?” she whispered.

  “I haven’t the faintest idea.” Robert shrugged, but his voice was cheerful. “You know M’Guire isn’t the greatest of talkers. From what I made out, I must have been hit on the head during the action and left for dead. When the French were rolled back and I didn’t show up, M’Guire started to ask questions, found Hermes, and came looking for me.”

  “You mean no one else noticed you were missing?” Esmeralda said in a tight voice.

  “Well, they had a lot to think about,” Robert replied, the lightness gone from his voice. “Sir John’s dead. He was struck by a cannonball.” He blinked back tears. “It took him such a long time to die.” But then he sighed and said, “Maybe it was worth it to him. He knew that we had beaten the French before he died. We buried him there, at Corunna.”

  “Oh, I am so sorry, Robert.”

  He looked at her steadily for a minute and then dropped his eyes. “I am, too—I think. But you know, Merry, the government would have made him a scapegoat. They would have torn him apart for this campaign, even with the victory at Corunna and despite the fact that I believe he has saved Spain. He was a sensitive man. He never had the resilience Sir Arthur has. I think that partly caused the mistakes he made. He felt he couldn’t take a chance, that they’d be down on him like dogs on a rat if he was defeated.”