by Norma Darcy
“Very.”
“Who’s here?” asked Emma again, having not received an answer to her question at the first time of asking.
“Malvern, silly, who else?”
“Oh…Malvern, yes,” said Emma absently. “I had quite forgotten he was coming.”
“Forgotten?” repeated Louisa scornfully turning around from the window. “Forgotten the Duke of Malvern?”
“Well we are not all fixated with the movements of the Duke as you are, my love, however agreeable he may be,” replied Emma with a faint smile.
“I am not fixated with him at all,” said Louisa loftily, turning back to the window again to press her forehead against the painted window frame. “And he is dressed in a smart blue coat with silver buttons and a very rakish hat and quite the glossiest pair of Hessian boots I have ever seen…one never sees Malvern looking shabby, does one? He always looks just the thing.”
“And that is why he requires three carriages for his baggage,” murmured Emma.
“Come away from the window, Louisa,” said Lady Garbey, turning a page of her book. “His grace will see you.”
“No he won’t, for I am hidden behind the curtain. Not that he is so very fashionable, not like Mr Nicholas Ashworth, nor so handsome, but he does have a certain air about him. Do you not think so Aunt?”
“Very elegant,” agreed her ladyship without looking up from her book.
“You do not appear to be very interested,” remarked her youngest niece reproachfully.
“I hope I am always interested in Malvern, for he is a very creditable young man,” said her ladyship, fixing her niece with a penetrating stare over the top of her book. “But as you and he are now not going to make a match of it, I don’t see why I should pay him any more or less attention than any other gentlemen of my acquaintance.”
“But he is a Duke, Aunt,” said Louisa.
“So he is.”
“And he has been excessively kind to us.”
“So he has,” agreed her ladyship, “and he has been very attentive to you, Louisa, although I am sure you do not deserve such notice from him.”
Her youngest niece turned back to the window in stony silence.
“Have you quite given it up then, ma’am?” Emma asked her aunt quietly.
Lady Garbey lowered her book. “Louisa has told me in no uncertain terms that she does not care for Malvern. I hope that I am not so unfeeling as to force her into a marriage she does not want.”
“And Papa?” asked Emma doubtfully, snipping the pink silk thread neatly at the back of her tambour frame.
“Your father is still coming around to my way of thinking.”
Emma smiled, pointed her needle safely through the canvas and set aside her embroidery. “You mean you are still persuading him that he should.”
“Precisely,” said her ladyship. “And if your sister can have such disregard for her own future, then I do not see why your Papa, Mama and I should send ourselves to an early grave worrying over it.”
“You needn’t talk about me as if I were not here. I am not deaf, you know,” said Louisa pointedly from the window.
“I won’t say anything behind your back that I am not prepared to say to your face,” said her ladyship. “You have taken Malvern in dislike without giving the poor man a chance. And in throwing away such an advantageous match, Louisa, I am afraid that I lose my interest. I wash my hands of you. As far as I am concerned, you may marry whom you wish, whether they be rich or poor, handsome or not. I care not.”
“I have not taken against Malvern…” Louisa said defensively, her colour mounting. “Indeed, I like him very well. It is just that I do not wish to be his wife.”
“This is old and tedious ground, Louisa. Do let us speak of something else.”
The young lady’s bosom heaved. “You care not whom I marry? Aren’t you going to tell me what is due my name, what I owe to my father? That is what you usually say.”
“I have said all that and more any number of times. For all the good it did me I should have held my breath,” replied Lady Garbey.
“And now that Malvern is not to be my husband you wish him at Jericho? Such fine treatment, Aunt! I say that he is lucky not to be associated with a family such as mine.”
“So do I say it, for he would be ill served to take you as his wife. I would not wish such unhappiness upon a man I like so well.”
Louisa gasped as if she had been slapped. “How can you speak to me so? You who married for love! You who waited for Uncle John for all those years. Yet you would have me enter a loveless marriage.”
“I would have you enter a marriage that would be the making of you. But you wish to throw it all away. And for what? A mere Mister Ashworth?”
Emma felt the colour rush into her cheeks; she put out her hands in a placating gesture that was lost upon the other two. “Aunt, Louisa…pray don’t―”
Louisa drew herself up to her full height. “The Ashworths may not be your idea of the perfect match but I can assure you, in these parts they are considered quite a catch.”
“To squire’s daughters and penniless widows, I am sure they may be,” muttered the Lady Garbey.
“Mr Ashworth is a gentleman,” Louisa flashed.
“A gentlemen? Oh yes, he’s a gentlemen. All the Mr Ashworths are gentlemen, every last one of them.” She broke off with a bitter laugh.
“Please Aunt,” whispered Emma.
“Their father was as handsome as they come and rich to boot. He stole the heart of every young female of my acquaintance; me included. Oh yes, you may well stare, but I too fell for a mister Ashworth. Much good did it do me.” Lady Garbey paused and flung her book down upon the settle beside her. “He all but ruined me. Do you think me happy to see you throw yourself away on William Ashworth’s son? Do you think I would not cry to see you ally yourself with such a man?”
“I must ask you to stop this,” said Emma, her face pale. “The gentlemen will be upon as at any moment.”
Their aunt folded her hands in her lap. “Ask his mother what married life was like with a Mr Ashworth if you don’t believe me.”
“Aunt, enough,” said Emma sharply, rising to her feet.
But the lady was too incensed to heed the pleas of her niece. “William Ashworth was a scoundrel and a rake and led his wife a merry dance. His sons are no doubt the same. Do you aspire to such a life?”
“How can you say such things?” cried Louisa. “Do you have no feelings at all?”
“I would not see you unhappy for all the world,” said her ladyship, her bosom heaving, her eyes crackling with anger. “Do you not see what Nicholas Ashworth is? Do you wish to end up married to a penniless younger son? The elder at least has Stoneacre but you will have nothing.”
“I don’t want anything,” said Louisa.
“No? And what will you live on? Where will you make your home? Do you expect your father to set you up with an establishment of your own? Well, I will tell you now, young lady, he cannot afford it.”
“I love him, something you seem to have forgotten!”
“Love! Why is it the young think they were the only generation ever to be in love?” cried Lady Garbey throwing up her hands.
“You laugh at my feelings. I never thought that you could be so cruel.”
“You do not know your own heart. You have been bewitched by a handsome face, that’s all. I am glad you have not taken Malvern for he is a good deal better off without someone so fickle.”
Louisa moved into the middle of the room, her bright blue eyes spitting fire. “I don’t want Malvern! He cannot feel love or emotion or passion. You may tell him that I have the headache for I do not wish to see him,” she declared hotly.
There was a silence, for the Duke of Malvern was standing in the open doorway, a tight smile pinned to his lips, his hands clasped behind his back, and a scowling Mr Ashworth at his side. Mr King stood smiling behind them, apparently oblivious to the awkward atmosphere. How much any of them
had heard, Emma knew not. She could not raise her eyes from the carpet.
Louisa looked in confusion from her aunt to her sister and then spun around. Colour flew into her cheeks as she met the cool gaze of the Duke. Tears started in her eyes and she fled from the room.
* * *
Louisa dreaded the arrival of the gentlemen after dinner that evening. They lingered long over their port and cigars, and her nerves were torn to shreds waiting for them to appear. She was mid way through her third cup of coffee by the time they came in. She kept her eyes on her book as Malvern came close; he looked as if he might approach her and then appeared to change his mind. He settled himself eventually by her sister and was soon chatting away to her as he would a close confidante.
Louisa strained to catch every word he uttered, was jealous of every smile he gave Emma and wished that he might look at her just once. She felt such a cloud of dejection settle upon her that her book held no interest and the words before her swam and blurred together on the page.
He was ignoring her. He was punishing her. She had never thought that she would ever be in a situation as to lose his friendship; it had seemed impossible. And yet here it was.
And he really was the most agreeable man, she thought wistfully as she watched him through her lashes. So kind and gentle, she had never known him lose his temper in all the years that she had known him until that fateful night at Vauxhall Gardens.
She saw that he was elegantly dressed, that his coat fitted his shoulders to perfection, and that he had a dimple when he smiled on the left side of his face but not the right, that his dark hair shone under the candlelight and that he used his hands to express himself when talking. His hands were large and well shaped and masculine.
Why had she never noticed that before? She had seen him any number of times, and if anyone had asked her what his hands were like she would have stared at them blankly. But now here she was, observing that his hands were strong and gentle, and she wondered what it might feel like to be touched by them…
Her face flooded with a sudden rush of colour; what was she thinking of? Her mind traitorously conjured up the vision of her father’s stable hand and the milkmaid she had seen embracing in the stables. She remembered the sight of pale flesh and hastily torn off clothing, she remembered the haste with which she had left the scene, the image of Jem’s rounded buttocks going up and down forever branded in her memory. She began to feel hot.
Malvern was ten years her senior and he liked to visit ruins―yes, this was better! This was safer territory! He was too old for her, too tame and dull. He collected sculpture and went to art galleries and read dry dull books such as the one she was trying to read at that moment, just to impress him. No, she amended hastily, not to impress him, merely to improve herself. Nicholas, by contrast, was young and handsome and was never happier than when riding hell for leather across the fields, jumping fences and risking his neck in the pursuit of pleasure. Really, there could be no comparison for any romantically minded young woman.
Louisa shifted her gaze to Nicholas and by so doing missed the look that Malvern cast in her direction. Nicholas had informed her that he would stay away from her in company so as not to arouse suspicion. So the two secretly betrothed lovers sat in miserable silence as the occupants of the room chatted and laughed around them.
She sipped her coffee and her eyes fell to the floor and she floated off into a world of her own.
“You have dropped your book, my lady,” a voice said.
Louisa looked up suddenly and her heart knocked against her ribs as she saw the Duke smiling down at her, her book in one of the hands she had been admiring but only a moment ago.
“Oh…thank you,” she murmured, blushing.
“Is this seat taken?”
“N―no, your grace.”
“Would you mind if I joined you?”
She shook her head, and forced a smile, wondering why her heart felt as if it was trying to escape from her breast. He took the seat next to her and examined the cover of her book. “Jermyn’s History of the Reformation. I had no notion you were interested in the Reformation, my lady.”
She coloured faintly. “A little.”
“And have you made it beyond the introduction?” he asked smiling. “And that was not meant as a patronising comment I assure you, but merely as an observation on the book. I found it so intolerably dull that I gave up at page thirty.”
Louisa, who had manfully struggled to page thirty-two, gave out an almost audible sigh of relief. “Really?”
“Really. He’s a pompous bore,” he declared. “I shall have to lend you another much better one if you are interested?”
“Yes…thank you.”
“Then let us set aside Mr Jermyn and talk of something else.”
“How is your sister, Duke?” Louisa blurted and then bit her lip. Hardly a conversation designed to enthral a gentleman.
He paused. “She is well, I thank you. She was disappointed to learn that you had left town so suddenly, but I daresay she has written as much to you since.”
Louisa coloured up to the roots of her hair. “I―I was unwell and came here to stay with my uncle.”
“I am sorry to hear that you have been unwell. It must be an unhappy woman indeed who deserts London halfway through the season; such balls and parties and routs as there are, I wonder that you could bear to tear yourself away,” he observed gently.
Louisa, recalling the last time she had seen him at Vauxhall Gardens, with such an expression of reproachful anger on his face, hardly knew where to look. Surely he must have known that it was he who had precipitated her hasty fight from London? Was he teasing her? Or punishing her by reminding her of it? “I―I hope that your sister recovered from her influenza?” she stammered.
“Oh yes, quite recovered thank you. You know Jane, quite the stoutest of all of us. I am sure she will outlive us all. But she will be distraught to think that she had made you ill too. Especially as she had expressly gone out of her way not to give it to you.”
“Oh, but I did not have the influenza,” said Louisa quickly and then cursed her unruly tongue.
“No? But I thought you said that you had been unwell?”
She coloured once more. “Yes, but it was not influenza. It was a stomach upset illness…thing.”
His lips twitched but ever so slightly. “I see.”
“I had been in bed two weeks with it before we decided to visit my uncle here.”
“Well, I wonder that they should risk travelling with you all that distance if you were so very ill,” murmured the Duke.
“I was better by then.”
“Oh…but if you were better then why did you need to leave London at all?”
The coffee cup clattered against the saucer as she set it down.
“My dear Lady Louisa,” said he laughing softly. “Am I so very terrifying?”
She blushed scarlet. “No! Of course not.”
“You didn’t need to run all the way from London to be rid of me, you know.”
“How…how is your mother, your grace?” she stammered.
“Very subtle change of subject.”
“It was not a change of subject…and will you stop referring to that event which you must realise is uncomfortable for both of us,” said Louisa, her words hissing beneath her breath. “I believe we were discussing the health of your mother, your grace.”
“Were we? I thought we were discussing your very sudden departure from town, the timing of which I have to say was very curious.”
“If you have come here just to be odiously provoking I wish you will go away!”
He inclined his head in acquiescence but his eyes shone with amusement. “The Dowager Duchess is in very good health, I thank you. My brother John has just become a father for the first time and so is in tolerable health although a trifle tired. Richard is always to be found in the boxing ring so he is busy ruining everyone else’s health, and my father has been dead these ten years or mor
e so I think we may safely say that his health is poor. My excellent uncle has the gout but has probably another twenty years left in him yet, my cousins I have not seen for many a year so I cannot report on the condition of their health, my aunt has a violent twitch and my dog has an unfortunate propensity to try and mount anything that comes in his way; trees, fence railings and my leg included. There, we may now summarily dispense with any further investigations into the health of my family.”
Louisa was obliged to turn her face away to stop herself from laughing.
“And now at least you are smiling,” he murmured. “I was very much afraid you were set on scowling at me across the room the entire evening.”
“I was not scowling,” she replied.
“No, indeed, you had probably an eyelash in your eye which made you squint so violently.”
“I was not squinting.”
“Or perhaps a raspberry seed stuck between your teeth?”
“My lord Duke, will you stop roasting me?”
“Then smile at me and tell me that I am forgiven,” he said softly, his eyes filled with earnest entreaty.
“There is nothing to forgive,” she all but whispered.
“It seems that I upset you and I assure you that I should not have done so for all the world―”
“Please let us speak of something else.”
“Louisa, please―”
“No,” she said in a sharper voice which drew the glances of others around the room. “No,” she said again in a calmer tone. “I don’t wish to speak of it.”
The Duke sat still for a moment and then stood up abruptly. “Very well, my lady. I will rid you of my presence which is so obviously causing you distress.” He bowed and moved away and Louisa felt the strongest urge to burst into tears.
“What did he want?” Nicholas asked suddenly at her elbow, offering his empty coffee cup to her to be refilled.
She jumped visibly. “Nothing.”
“It didn’t look like nothing to me. Was that fellow trying to make love to you?”
“Keep your voice down,” she hissed as she poured him another cup of coffee.
