At Last Comes Love

by Mary Balogh

  “No,” he said. “He has always been glad of yet another chance to give me a thorough scold on some subject or other.”

  “Then I daresay,” she said, “he will admit you today. I suppose he reads the morning papers.”

  She was quite right, of course. No sooner had Forbes disappeared from the head of the stairs than he reappeared there to make his way back down.

  “Follow me, my lord, miss,” he said when he reached the bottom instead of simply hailing them from the top. And he turned to trudge upward again. Perhaps it was his way of keeping reasonably fit, Duncan thought.

  Nothing in the drawing room had changed in five days. It would not surprise Duncan to learn that his grandfather had not moved from his chair in all that time. And he was looking in no better a temper. His eyebrows almost met over the bridge of his nose again.

  “The Earl of Sheringford, m’lord,” Forbes announced, “and Miss Huxtable.”

  “You will forgive me, Miss Huxtable,” the marquess said, both hands on the head of his cane, which was braced between his legs, “for not getting to my feet. The getting is a slow and rather painful business these days.”

  He ignored Duncan.

  “But of course, my lord,” she said. “Please do not even think of it.”

  “Step forward, young lady,” he said.

  She stepped forward.

  “Another step,” he commanded, “so that you are in the light from the window. It is infernally dark in here. I suppose it is raining outside. It usually is. Sheringford, open the curtains a little wider.”

  While Duncan went to do so, his grandfather studied Miss Huxtable in silence.

  “There has been no official announcement yet,” he said at last, addressing himself solely to her, “but the ton has believed such an announcement to be imminent for the past several days. And I suppose it is imminent if Sheringford has brought you here this afternoon. This is no mere social call, I daresay. He has brought you here for my inspection and approval before sending off the announcement to the papers.”

  “Yes, my lord,” she said. “That is correct.”

  “Are you a fool, woman?” he asked.

  Duncan took one firm step away from the window, but she did not look as if she were about to collapse in a quivering heap of vapors or hysterics.

  “I do not believe so,” she said, her voice quite calm.

  “Then why are you marrying Sheringford?” he asked her. “Eh? You are not poor. You are not without looks. And your family disapproves—at least that young puppy of a brother of yours does. He told me so in no uncertain terms when he came to pry into my financial worth. He disapproves very strongly.”

  “No longer,” she said. “But the important thing is, my lord, that I have agreed to marry the Earl of Sheringford and have come here with him in accordance with your command so that he may keep Woodbine Park as his home and its rents and farm profits as his income after we marry. I have freely agreed to marry him. He has used no coercion whatsoever. My reasons for agreeing concern no one but me—and Lord Sheringford himself.”

  Duncan took another step forward. Good Lord! Had she really just told his grandfather in so many words to mind his own damned business?

  There was a pregnant pause.

  “I daresay,” his grandfather said, “it is because of your age. The shelf you are on must have been gathering dust for a number of years. How old are you?”

  “That also is my own concern, my lord,” she said. “As is my practice of always returning courtesy for courtesy and courtesy for dis courtesy. May I have a seat? It will be more restful for you to look across at me rather than up.”

  Duncan resisted the powerful urge to laugh. Though he might be laughing on the other side of his face in a moment, after his grandfather had dismissed her in his wrath and refused to endorse Duncan’s marriage to her. But really, what a priceless setdown—my practice of always returning courtesy for … discourtesy.

  “Sit down,” his grandfather commanded gruffly. “You have a saucy tongue, Miss Huxtable.”

  “I beg to disagree, my lord,” she said, gathering her skirts about her and seating herself on the edge of a large sofa that looked as if it had not been sat upon for a decade or more. “It is merely that I do not allow myself to be browbeaten.”

  “I daresay,” he said, “you have had some practice during the past few days.”

  “They have not been easy days,” she admitted. “I am not accustomed to attracting a great deal of attention and I do not enjoy it. But I do not cower away from it either, when I have done no wrong and in no way regret anything I have done to draw that attention. The ton, I am sure, will recover its equilibrium after Lord Sheringford and I are married and living quietly and respectably at Woodbine Park. Gossip becomes tedious when there is no fresh scandal to feed it.”

  Except that Toby would be there too and the plan to pass him off as the Harrises’ orphaned grandson was to be abandoned. He had been mad to agree to that, Duncan thought. There was going to be no way of confining word of it to the neighborhood.

  “I understand,” the marquess said, “that you are the daughter of a country parson, Miss Huxtable.”

  “I am,” she said.

  There was a slight pause.

  “You are not about to rush in to remind me that he was also a descendant of a former Earl of Merton?” he asked her.

  “Since you knew about the country parson part of my heritage, my lord,” she said, “I assume that you know the rest. And since you doubtless know that my brother is the Earl of Merton, I would assume you did not even have to dig very deep to uncover the information. The village was Throckbridge in Shropshire, but I suppose you know that too. If there is anything you do not know and wish to be informed of, I will be pleased to answer your questions.”

  “Except the one concerning your age,” he said.

  “Except,” she agreed, “any personal details that cannot concern you at all.”

  “Your age does concern me,” he said, thumping his cane on the floor and looking irritable. “Sheringford is my heir, Miss Huxtable, and it is high time he produced an heir of his own. How am I to know that you are still in your breeding years?”

  Lord! Duncan felt stranded somewhere between the window and the sofa. He was rooted to the spot, if the truth were known—with a horrified sort of embarrassment. It took a great deal to embarrass him, but his grandfather had just succeeded in doing it. He had asked Miss Margaret Huxtable, sister of the Earl of Merton, if she was a breeder. Specifically if she was still young enough to breed.

  He could see only half of her face around the brim of her straw hat. But if he was not much mistaken, she was actually smiling. Her voice confirmed the fact when she spoke—there was laughter in it.

  “You are not to know any such thing, my lord,” she said.

  The marquess made a show of setting his cane against the side of his chair and moving until his spine was resting against the back and his hands were gripping the arms.

  “Sheringford,” he said without taking his eyes off Miss Huxtable, “I believe you have just done the wisest thing you have done in your entire life—or the most foolish.”

  Duncan rescued his feet and moved the short distance to the side of the sofa in order to set a reassuring hand on Margaret Huxtable’s shoulder, though she seemed to be doing very well without his support.

  “Nothing in between?” he said.

  “She will not crumble under adversity,” his grandfather said. “And there may be much adversity to test her mettle. On the other hand, you will find it impossible to ignore her or to rule her. I will expect to read an announcement of your betrothal in tomorrow’s papers—unless, that is, Miss Huxtable returns to her senses before then.”

  “And Woodbine Park?” Duncan gripped the shoulder beneath his hand.

  “It will be yours on your wedding day,” his grandfather said. “Which will be … ?” He raised his shaggy eyebrows.

  “The day before your birthday
, my lord,” Miss Huxtable replied without hesitation, though it was something they had not decided upon together. “My brother and sisters and Lady Carling are to organize a grand wedding breakfast at Merton House, which you must, of course, attend. We will be able to drink an early toast to your birthday on the same occasion.”

  “I do not leave this house under any circumstance, Miss Huxtable,” the marquess said, “having discovered long ago that there is nothing but foolishness beyond my own walls. And, lest you suddenly dream up some wild scheme, I do not entertain here either. Neither do I celebrate birthdays—least of all eightieth birthdays. Anyone who chooses to celebrate an eightieth birthday must have windmills in his head, and a few moths too.”

  “Nevertheless,” she said, “you will attend our wedding breakfast, my lord. The Earl of Sheringford is your only grandson, and I will be your only granddaughter-in-law And this birthday will be celebrated as the one on which you were reconciled to your grandson and gained a granddaughter who just might still have a few breeding years left before she withers into her dotage. You would not knowingly spoil my wedding day. I am sure of it. You would spoil it by remaining here in self-imposed isolation.”

  “Hmmph,” his grandfather said. “I have just realized who you have been reminding me of ever since you stepped through that door and opened your infernal mouth, Miss Huxtable. You are just like my late wife, God rest her soul. She was a pest, to put it mildly.”

  “But did you love her, my lord?” Miss Huxtable asked softly.

  Good God! Duncan could remember his grandmother, a small, smiling, gentle, mild-mannered lady upon whom his gruff grandfather had doted.

  “None of your business, missy,” he said. “Two can play at that game, you see.”

  She was smiling warmly when Duncan looked down at her.

  “I liked Merton,” the marquess said, changing the subject abruptly and looking at Duncan for the first time. “He is a mere puppy, though I daresay he must have reached his majority if he has donned the mantle of head of the family. But he was no groveler, by Jove. He asked his questions, and he made sure that he got his answers.”

  “I will bring him here again,” Miss Huxtable said, “and perhaps my sisters too, my lord, once all the arrangements have been made for the wedding and the breakfast. We will come in a body together and tell you all about it, and you will discover that we Huxtables do not take no for an answer when we have set our minds on something.”

  She got to her feet, and that was the end of it. Two minutes later, she and Duncan were out on the street, where a light drizzle was falling.

  “Well,” he said, “that was remarkable.”

  He could not for the moment think of any other words to describe the visit. He would be almost willing to swear that his grandfather actually liked Maggie Huxtable, though it was doubtful anyone had spoken to him as bluntly as she had for years.

  “I like him,” she said, proving that the feeling had been mutual. “He loves you, Lord Sheringford.”

  He almost laughed. That might have been true when he was a boy, though his grandfather had never given much indication of it beyond those endless shillings. But now? He very much doubted it. He struggled with his umbrella and hoisted it over her head and his own.

  “He has a strange way of showing it,” he said.

  “Not at all,” she said. “He has been hurt and angry and puzzled for five years. He must have been dreadfully disappointed in you since you did not offer him any explanation of your behavior. But instead of cutting you off, as he surely would have done if he had truly not loved you, he waited until it was possible for you to fight back, in the hope that you would do just that, that you would give him a good enough reason to continue to love you. Which you have done.”

  “By finding you,” he said, “and persuading you to marry me.”

  “He is a little afraid,” she said, “that I may be too old to present him with a great-grandson before his death, which is, of course, absurd. But yes, he is happy that you are to marry and return home. He will come to our wedding.”

  “Hell might freeze over too,” he said.

  They were almost out of the square. The drizzle was already turning into a steady rain, which was drumming on the umbrella. But instead of hurrying onward, Duncan stopped walking abruptly.

  “He adored my grandmother,” he said.

  She turned her head to look at him. How foolish she had been, choosing to wear pale blue on such a day, and a straw bonnet, when she had known they would be walking. Was she an eternal optimist? And was he up to the challenge?

  He bent his head and kissed her on the lips—and her own pressed firmly back against them and clung for a totally indecorous stretch of time.

  He felt slightly dizzy when he thought of the changes six days had wrought in his life.

  16

  MARGARET had ten days in which to prepare for her wedding and for married life. Ten days in which to have second and third and thirty-third thoughts about the wisdom of her decision to marry a stranger—who had lived with a married lady for almost five years and had had a son with her. Ten days to shop for bride clothes—sometimes with her sisters, sometimes with Lady Carling, sometimes with all three. Ten days in which to draw up a guest list and send out invitations and wait for replies and try to resist the temptation to insist upon involving herself with the planning of the wedding breakfast. That last point was one of the hardest.

  She would have been content to keep the guest list short, to have no one at her wedding, in fact, except her family and Sir Graham and Lady Carling and the Marquess of Claverbrook.

  Her sisters had other ideas. Of course.

  So did Lady Carling. Of course.

  “You must invite everyone with whom you and Lord Sheringford have even a passing acquaintance,” Vanessa told her.

  “I do agree, Meg,” Katherine said. “It is what we decided to do for my wedding, you will recall, and while it was something of an ordeal at the time, I have been so very glad since. A big wedding provides wonderful memories.”

  “But no one will come,” Margaret protested.

  Her sisters looked at each other and laughed.

  “Meg!” Katherine exclaimed. “Everyone will come. How could they possibly resist? It will be the wedding of the Season.”

  “With only nine days’ notice?” Margaret asked doubtfully.

  “Even if it was tomorrow,” Vanessa said. “Of course everyone will come, you silly goose.”

  It was an opinion with which Lady Carling concurred when she called at Merton House the same day.

  “And even if we were to invite only family,” she said, “the numbers would be quite vast, Margaret. There are your brother and sisters and Mr. Constantine Huxtable. And there are Agatha, my sister, and Wilfred, and all my nieces—there are six of them, did you know? All of them are married. And on his father’s side Duncan has four uncles and their wives and two aunts and their husbands. Not that they are actually uncles and aunts, since they were my late husband’s cousins, but that is what Duncan always called them. And they have so many children all told that I lost count years ago. There are even grandchildren who are old enough to attend a wedding without any fear that they will dash about whooping and getting under everyone’s feet. If you give me paper and pen and ink, I will write down the names and addresses of all I can remember. Most of them are in London and will certainly expect invitations. Duncan was always very close to his cousins and second cousins as a boy. Except Norman, that is. He was a dear enough boy, but he was always very good and very ready to disapprove of any brothers and cousins who were not good. That did not endear him to any of them, as you may imagine. And I suppose we cannot invite him to the wedding anyway, can we? Not when he is married to poor Caroline.”

  Margaret capitulated and invited the whole world—or so it seemed. Certainly her hand was severely cramped by the time she had finished writing all the cards.

  The whole world replied within two days, and at least nine
tenths of it was coming to the wedding at St. George’s on Hanover Square and to the breakfast at Merton House.

  The Marquess of Claverbrook was coming too. Margaret had carried through on her promise to visit him again with Stephen and her sisters, and none of them gave him any chance to say no. Of course, he did save face by declaring that he would attend only to see with his own eyes that his rogue of a grandson really did put in an appearance at his own wedding this time.

  The days passed in a blur of activity. Before Margaret knew it, her wedding day had dawned and it really was too late to change her mind even if she wanted to.

  She did not.

  Crispin caused her more than one restless night, it was true, but she knew that she would never marry him even if she were free to do so. There were too many things about him that disturbed her, and the leftover dregs of an old attachment were simply not enough.

  He was coming to the wedding, though she suspected it was only because Sir Humphrey and Lady Dew were still in London and he did not wish to arouse their curiosity by staying away. Lady Dew was delighted by the approaching nuptials, though she did admit to a little disappointment that her small attempt at matchmaking between Margaret and Crispin had been unsuccessful. She had finally heard of the scandal concerning Lord Sheringford, but she gave it as her opinion that if a lady was foolhardy enough to leave her husband in order to run off with another man, then she must have had a very good reason to do so. For her part, she would not hold it against the earl, especially as he now had the good sense to ally himself to Margaret.

  Margaret stood barefoot at the window of her bedchamber early on the morning of her wedding, gazing up at a sky that was deep blue and cloudless—a rarity so far this summer. She was not particularly enjoying the sight, though. She was fighting panic by telling herself that it was surely what every bride faced on her wedding day.

  She did not turn to look at the rumpled bed behind her. The linens would be changed after she had left for her wedding. Tonight it was to be her wedding bed. They were to leave in the morning for Warwickshire, she and Lord Sheringford, but tonight Stephen had insisted they stay at Merton House while he went to Vanessa and Elliott’s.