First Comes Marriage

by Mary Balogh

  For some reason it was a ghastly thought—Meg and Viscount Lyngate. Vanessa tried to picture them together—at the altar during their nuptials, sitting on either side of a winter hearth in a domestic setting, and … No! She would not even try to picture that. She gave her head a little shake.

  Margaret stopped beside the fountain. She set a hand on the edge of the stone basin, as if to steady herself.

  “Nessie,” she said, “you cannot be serious.”

  “The question is,” Vanessa said, “whether she is serious. And whether she can persuade the viscount to be serious about it too.”

  “But would she even have dropped that less-than-subtle hint,” Margaret asked, “if he knew nothing about it? And why would she even have thought of such a thing if he had not somehow mentioned it to her as a possibility? She had never set eyes on us before this afternoon. Is it not likely that she came here today to take a look at his proposed bride? The fact that she said what she just did would surely indicate that she approves of his choice. But how could she? I look positively rustic. And how could he have considered such a thing? He has never given even the smallest indication that he is interested in making a match with me. Have I walked into some bizarre nightmare, Nessie?”

  Vanessa realized that Margaret must be right. Viscount Lyngate had known from the start that their coming to Warren Hall with Stephen was going to pose a problem. It was altogether possible that he had thought to solve at least part of the problem by marrying Margaret. And according to his mother he had already decided that he must marry this year.

  “But even if he offers,” she said, “you can say no, Meg. Would you wish to, though?”

  “To say no?” Margaret frowned and said nothing for a long time.

  … have I walked into some bizarre nightmare?

  “Is it Crispin?” Vanessa asked softly.

  It was the first time his name had been spoken between them for a long, long time.

  Margaret looked sharply at her and then away again, but not before Vanessa had seen tears well into her eyes.

  “Who?” Meg asked. “Do I know anyone of that name?”

  There was such pain and such bitterness in her voice that Vanessa could think of no answer to give. Obviously the questions were rhetorical anyway.

  “If I once did,” Margaret said eventually, “I know him no longer.”

  Vanessa swallowed. She felt close to tears herself.

  “If I were to marry,” Margaret said, “if Viscount Lyngate were to ask, that is, I would be able to make life considerably easier for Kate, would I not? And for you. And for Stephen.”

  “But you cannot marry just for our sakes,” Vanessa said, aghast.

  “Why not?” Margaret looked at her with bleak, empty eyes. “I love you all. You are everything to me, the three of you. You are my reason for living.”

  Vanessa was appalled. She had never heard Margaret speak with such despair before now. She was always calm and cheerful, the anchor upon whom they all depended. But then Vanessa had always known about her broken heart. She had just not had the imagination to understand quite how it had emptied out her sister’s very soul. She ought to have understood.

  “But now your obligation to us has been considerably eased,” she said. “Stephen is in a position to care for us and provide for us. All we need from you is your love, Meg—and your happiness. Do not do this. Please.”

  Margaret smiled.

  “Such a Cheltenham tragedy,” she said, “though we do not even know for sure that Lady Lyngate has picked me out as the viscount’s prospective bride. We do not know how he feels about the idea, or even if it has occurred to him. How lowering now, Nessie, if he does not come here offering for me.”

  She laughed lightly, but her eyes were still bleak.

  As they made their way into the house and into the library, where the fire had been built up again and was giving off a welcome warmth, Vanessa felt a heavy sense of foreboding.

  Crispin would surely never come for Margaret. But if she married Viscount Lyngate, entirely for the sake of her sisters and brother, life would lose all meaning for her.

  They were not Margaret’s reason for living. Hope was that, even if it had all but been snuffed out over the four years of Crispin’s absence.

  Hope was what gave meaning to all lives.

  Margaret could not be allowed to marry Viscount Lyngate. Perhaps he would not even offer, of course, but Vanessa was dreadfully afraid that he would. And if he did, she feared that Margaret would say yes.

  Feared for Margaret’s sake.

  Only Margaret’s?

  But the question, verbalized in her mind, took her by surprise and shook her somewhat. What possible personal objection could she have to his marrying Meg? Or anyone else for that matter? It was true that she had al-most fallen in love with him at the Valentine’s assembly, but even then she had realized that there was far more in him to repel her than there was to attract.

  It just was not fair that he was so very, very good-looking.

  But even if she were in love with him—which she certainly was not— she must surely be the very last woman he would ever think of marrying.

  He must not be allowed to offer for Meg, though— she might accept him.

  There must be a way of stopping him. She was just going to have to think what it was before it was too late, Vanessa decided.

  Though she was already convinced that there was only one possible way.

  An impossible way more like.

  9

  ELLIOTT had made a firm decision.

  He was going to marry Miss Huxtable. If she would have him, that was, but he really could not see any reason why she would not.

  It made a great deal of sense that they marry each other. And his mother approved of her. She had liked all the Huxtables, in fact. She had found them amiable and unaffected.

  “One thing I am sure you could count on if you were to marry Miss Huxtable, Elliott,” she had said, “is her loyalty and devotion. And those two qualities almost invariably deepen into affection and love. I see nothing but a bright future for you.”

  She had looked hopefully at him. She had meant, of course, that his wife’s loyalty and devotion would provoke affection and love in him.

  “I am in total agreement with you, Mama,” he had said.

  But love? He had never been in love—whatever that term meant. He was not in love with Miss Huxtable. Or with Anna, for that matter, or any of the mistresses who had preceded her or any of the ladies who had occasionally taken his fancy At least, he did not think he had been. If he sometimes dreamed of finding that elusive magic something that might after all make marriage appealing to him, he did not expect it. It was never going to happen. But of course there had never been any question of his not marrying when the time came. It was one of his primary duties to do so.

  The time had come, that was all.

  And he would do his duty. And he would be sensible at the same time.

  He rode again to Warren Hall the day after his mother’s visit there, but this time he went to pay his addresses to Miss Huxtable. He was feeling damnably depressed, if the truth were known. Really, he scarcely knew her, did he? What if… ?

  But he had never been one to indulge in what-ifs. He could only deal with present reality.

  His decision had been made, so here he was.

  By the time he rode into the stable yard and turned over his horse to a groom’s care, he was feeling decidedly grim, which was not the way one would wish to feel when about to make a marriage offer. He turned his steps resolutely in the direction of the house. He was not going to allow himself to get cold feet at this late stage of the game.

  He rounded the corner of the yard and ran almost headlong into Mrs. Dew—of all people to meet when he was feeling irritable. They both stopped abruptly, and he took a step back so that there might be more than three inches of space separating them.

  “Oh!” she said.

  “I do beg your pa
rdon, ma’am.”

  They spoke simultaneously.

  “I saw you riding up the driveway,” she said. “I came to meet you.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “I am flattered,” he said. “Or am I? Has something happened? You look agitated.”

  “Not at all.” She smiled—and looked even more so. “I was wondering if I might have a private word with you.”

  To deliver another scold? To enumerate more of his shortcomings? To ruffle more of his feathers? To worsen his mood even further?

  “Of course.” He cupped her elbow in one hand and drew her away from the stables and the house. They began to walk across the wide lawn that led to the lake.

  “Thank you,” she said.

  She was wearing a pale blue dress with a matching cloak, he noticed. Her bonnet was a darker blue. It was the first time he had seen her out of mourning. She looked marginally more attractive than usual.

  “How may I be of service to you, ma’am?” he asked curtly when they were out of earshot of anyone at the stables.

  “Well,” she said after drawing an audible breath, “I was wondering if you would be willing to marry me.”

  He had already released his hold on her elbow— which was probably a good thing. He might have broken a few bones there when his hands clenched involuntarily into fists. But—could he have heard her correctly?

  “Marry you?” he asked in what sounded shockingly like his normal voice.

  “Yes,” she said. She sounded breathless —as if she had just run five miles without stopping. “If you would not mind terribly, that is. I believe your primary concern is to marry someone eligible, and I do qualify on that count. I am an earl’s sister and the widow of a baronet’s son. And I think your secondary concern is to marry one of us so that you may more easily deal with the problem of bringing us out into society I know you think you would prefer Meg. I know you do not even like me because I have quarreled with you on more than one occasion. But really I am not quarrelsome by nature. Quite the contrary—I am usually the one who makes people cheerful. And I do not mind …”

  Her speech, hastily delivered with hardly a pause for breath, trailed off and there was a moment of silence.

  No, he had not misheard. Or misunderstood.

  He had stopped walking abruptly and turned to face her. She stopped too and looked up at him, directly into his eyes, her own wide. Her face was flushed.

  As well it might be.

  He could not think of anyone else who had such power to render him speechless.

  “Please say something,” she said when he had not responded within ten seconds or so. “I know this must be a shock to you. You could not have expected it. But think about it. You cannot really love Meg, can you? You scarcely know her. You have chosen her because she is the eldest—and because she is beautiful. You do not know me either, of course, though you may think you do. But really it cannot make much difference to you which of us you marry, can it?”

  I know this must be a shock to you. Had there ever been more of an understatement? Marry her? Mrs. Dew?” Was the woman quite, quite mad?

  She bit her lip, and her eyes seemed to grow even larger as she waited for him to speak.

  “Let me get one thing straight, Mrs. Dew,” he said, frowning. “Do I interpret your flattering proposal correctly? Are you by any chance offering yourself as the sacrificial lamb?”

  “Oh, dear.” She looked away from him for a moment. “No, not really. It would be no sacrifice. I believe I would like to be married again, and I might as well marry for convenience, as you would be doing. It really would be convenient if we were to marry each other, would it not? It would make things far easier for Meg and Kate—and for Stephen too. And maybe your mother will not mind too too much if it is not Meg, though of course I am not as beautiful as she—or beautiful at all, in fact. But I should do my best to see that she approved of me once she had accustomed herself to the idea.”

  “My mother?” he asked faintly.

  “She clearly indicated yesterday,” Mrs. Dew said, “that she approved of Meg as a potential daughter-in-law She did not say so openly, of course, because that was for you to do. But we understood her nevertheless.”

  Damnation!

  “Mrs. Dew.” He clasped his hands behind him and leaned a little closer to her. “Is this by any chance how you came to marry Dew?”

  He had the sensation for a moment that he was falling into her eyes. And then she lowered her lids over them, shutting her soul from his sight. He frowned at the top of her bonnet.

  “Oh,” she said. “Yes, as a matter of fact it was. He was dying, you see. But he was very young and there was so much he had wanted to do with his life—including marrying me. He loved me. He wanted me. I knew that. And so I insisted that he marry me though he was not willing to trap me, as he put it.” Her eyelids came up again, and her eyes looked back into his own. “I made his last year a very, very happy one. I do not deceive myself about that. I know how to make a man happy.”

  Good Lord! Was this a frisson of sexual awareness he was feeling? Impossible! Except that he did not know what else it could be.

  He shook his head slightly and turned away from her to stride onward in the direction of the lake. She fell into step beside him.

  “I am sorry.” She sounded dejected. “I have made a mess of this, have I not? Or perhaps there was no other way I might have approached you or explained myself.”

  “A m I to understand,” he said testily, “that Miss Huxtable will not be disappointed if she discovers that you have stolen me from under her nose?”

  “Oh, no, not at all,” she assured him. “Meg does not want to marry you, but I am afraid she will if you ask because she has a fearful sense of duty and she will insist upon doing what she thinks is right for the rest of us even though there is no real need for her to do so any longer.”

  “I see,” he said, quelling the urge to bellow with rage—or perhaps with laughter. “And she does not wish to marry me because … ?”

  He slowed his steps and turned his head to look down at her again. He began to wonder if he would perhaps wake up at any moment now to find that he had dreamed this whole bizarre encounter. It surely could not be real.

  “Because she is dreadfully in love with Crispin,” she said.

  “Crispin?” He believed he had heard the name before.

  “Crispin Dew,” she told him. “Hedley’s elder brother. She would have married him four years ago when he purchased a commission and joined his regiment, but she would not leave us. They had an understanding, though.”

  “If they are betrothed,” he said, “why would you fear that she might accept an offer from me?”

  “But they are not,” she said, “and he has not been home or sent any message to Meg in almost four years.”

  “Is there something I am not grasping here?” he asked after a few moments of silence. They had arrived at the bank of the lake and stopped walking again. The sun was shining. Its rays were sparkling on the water.

  “Yes,” she said. “The female heart. Meg’s is bruised, perhaps even broken. She knows he will never come back to her, but while she is single there is always hope. Hope is all she has left. I would really rather you did not make her an offer. She would probably accept, and she would make you a good and dutiful wife for the rest of both your lives. But there would never be a spark of anything else between you.”

  He leaned a little toward her again.

  “And there would be between you and me?” he asked her. He was still not sure if it was anger or a bizarre sort of hilarity he felt at this whole ridiculous conversation. But he suspected that one or the other was about to erupt at any moment.

  She flushed a rosy red again as she stared back into his eyes.

  “I know how to please a man,” she said almost in a whisper and sank her teeth into her lower lip.

  He would have thought them the words and gesture of a practiced coquette if it had not been for her blush and her wid
e eyes. Good God, she was probably as innocent as a babe despite her short-lived marriage to a dying man. Did she really know what she was saying? Did she know she was playing with fire?

  “In bed?” he asked her very deliberately.

  She licked her lips, another provocative gesture that he guessed was unconscious.

  “Yes,” she said. “I am not a virgin, if that is what you were wondering. Hedley was capable— Well, never mind. Yes, I would know how to please you in bed. And out of it too. I know how to make people cheerful. I know how to make them laugh.”

  “And I need to be cheered up and to laugh?” he said, narrowing his eyes on her. “And you can make it happen even though I have no sense of humor?”

  “Oh, that.” She looked away from him to gaze out at the lake. “I hurt you, did I not? Somehow that seems to be the worst insult one can cast upon anyone. People will admit to all sorts of vices and shortcomings except a lack of humor. And I did not actually say that you had none, did I? I merely said that you never smile. I meant that you take life too seriously.”

  “Life is serious,” he said.

  “No, it is not.” She looked back at him. “Not always or even frequently. There is always something to marvel over. There is always joy to be found. There is always the possibility of laughter in almost any situation.”

  “And yet,” he said, “you lost a husband in a particularly cruel manner. Was not that serious?”

  “Not a day passed,” she told him, her eyes suddenly bright, “in which we did not marvel at the wonder of our world and our life together. There was not a day without laughter. Except the last. But even then he smiled. It was the last expression on his face as he died.”

  Lord! He did not need this. He waited with some impatience to wake up and find it still early morning with himself still safely in his own bed—preparing to pay his addresses to Miss Huxtable.

  “But we have strayed from the point,” she said. “Will you marry me instead of Meg?”