by Amanda Scott
Darcy waved the coach on around the house and then looked down at Sarah, his gaze traveling from curls she knew must be disheveled down to her wrinkled skirts. She had lost her hat in the struggle in the coach. “Sorry you got mussed,” he muttered ruefully. “It was a pretty dress. And I daresay you’ve not got so much as a comb in your ridicule.” Her eyes widened and she turned sharply in the direction taken by the coach. “Forgot it, eh? Well, remind me later and I’ll send Beck to fetch it. He’s not taking the coach back until morning, so there’s plenty of time. But come along in. I sent word earlier to Matty to expect us for dinner—country hours here, I’m afraid. Should be ready soon. Unless she’s pickled herself in gin,” he added as an afterthought, and scarcely an encouraging one.
He started up the rough stone steps, evidently expecting Sarah to follow him, but she stayed where she was, staring after him indignantly and still finding it difficult to reconcile his present behavior with that of the rather languidly amiable young gentleman she had known in London. He turned to see what was keeping her.
“Come along, Sarah.” Stubbornly Sarah shook her head. Did he not realize that this escapade of his was very likely to ruin her even if she did marry him? She would certainly be refused tickets of admission to Almack’s Assembly Rooms once the grand patronesses of that august establishment got wind of it, because no matter how much had been forgiven her in the past, this sort of nonsense would cause a major scandal!
He moved toward her. Late afternoon sun sliding on dust-filled rays through the trees touched off auburn highlights in his dark, windblown hair. His light brown eyes narrowed against the glare, and she scowled back at him. Darcy was a well-formed but not particularly imposing figure of a man, standing slightly less than six feet tall. He dressed with an eye to style that bordered on the foppish. Today he wore a dark brown frock coat, an orange-and-yellow-striped waistcoat, an intricately tied stock, cream pantaloons, and well-polished Hessian boots with gold tassels. Although his eyes under their narrow brows were set rather too closely together for perfection and his chin was a trifle weak, high cheekbones and a straight, well-formed nose showed his aristocratic breeding.
Of course, Sarah thought ironically, one also tended to note the effects of creeping dissipation. His lordship had been playing deep, drinking too much, getting too little sleep, and generally burning the candle at both ends for quite some time, and it was beginning to tell. Reaching out now, he laid a light hand upon her shoulder and drew her toward him.
Had she been wearing slippers instead of her dark green kid boots, the top of Sarah’s head would have been no higher than the top button of his waistcoat. But she had dressed properly for her supposed shopping expedition in a light walking dress of twilled marigold sarcenet with French kid gloves to match her boots and a chip straw hat trimmed with straw flowers and green silk ribbons. The hat was gone, the dress crumpled and dusty. Her honey-bronze hair was a mass of tangles, and her tiny face was streaked with smears of dirt as well as the suspicion—though she would have denied it indignantly—of a tearstain or two, but there could still be no doubt of her beauty. Blessed with an exquisite figure, she exhibited a natural, lithe grace when she moved. Her face was heart-shaped, and from the widow’s peak of her hairline to her determined little chin, her skin was clear strawberries and cream. Her large, wide-set eyes were oval-shaped and hazel-green, deepening almost to emerald in a certain light or, as now, when she was frightened or angry.
Darcy looked down into those eyes now, and his own expression was anxious. “No need to be frightened, Sarah. Daresay I’m not much of a fellow, but … not a cad either, dash it! Got no wish to harm you. Assure you. Here, let me take that thing off.” He reached behind her head and unfastened the gag. Then he turned her so that he could reach the bonds at her wrists. A moment later she was free. She licked her lips and rubbed her wrists. There was a red streak across her cheeks from the gag.
“This will ruin me, my lord,” she muttered through still dry lips. “Whatever I have misguidedly led you to believe, I do not deserve such a fate.”
“Perfectly true,” he agreed, urging her gently toward the house. “But, ’fraid I found it necessary to adopt stringent measures to recoup the Ashton fortunes. Earl of Moreland shouldn’t be penniless. Do anything to avoid it.” He smiled down at her. “Must admit though, marriage to you is more palatable than certain other courses I’ve attempted.”
“But I simply cannot marry you this way, my lord!”
“On the contrary, m’dear. This way, you must.” She fell silent, and a few moments later, they stood in the front hall of his house. There was a feeling of chill dampness in the air, giving Sarah the sudden and rather unsettling thought that she had stepped into one of the gothic tales that she and her governess, Miss Penistone, had been so fond of reading and which would, had she known of their presence in her house, have given Lady Hartley a fit of apoplexy. The hall was large and gray and drafty with a wide, stone stairway that swooped up one side to a railed gallery. But opposite the stair, a set of tall double doors opened into a warmer, more pleasant, though shabbily furnished room—the library, decided Sarah, if book-lined walls were any indication. A fire crackling in a fireplace between two pairs of French doors nearly dispelled the gothic gloom, and a huge black dog who lay before it, nose on paws, thumping his long tail, rose lethargically to his feet, stretched, and wandered over to sniff her skirt.
“This is Erebus,” Darcy said conversationally.
Sarah only glanced at the dog. Really, she thought, this was intolerable. Darcy seemed completely indifferent to her plight. Indeed, he behaved almost as though he were merely entertaining her for an afternoon, instead of having forcibly abducted her. Perhaps, if she cried … But the notion was quickly rejected. It would not do to show such weakness. Even the little experience she had had taught her that it was always better to play from strength. Besides, she was not by any means certain that she could simply cry at will. At the moment, she felt more like screaming.
But first things first. She turned to him with melting eyes.
“I should like to tidy myself, my lord. I must look a perfect fright. And, may I please have some water?” Her throat was parched, and her voice, usually low-pitched and melodious, sounded dry and cracked.
“Of course,” he answered hastily, seeming relieved when she did not rail at him. “There is a small saloon the other side of the hall with a cheval glass. I’ll have Beck bring some water.”
“Your coachman?”
“My valet. I am afraid there are few servants here and no maidservants at all. It’s hard enough to keep them in so isolated a spot at the best of times and with money to pay their wages, but with things the way they’ve been, the wenches flat won’t come.” He shrugged. “There’s just Beck and Matty and Matty’s husband, Tom, who looks after the dog and the stables. He and Matty aren’t worth much, but they stay, and that’s what counts with me. Come along. I’ll show you the saloon. Stay, Erebus!” The big dog plopped back down, eyeing their departure with sad eyes.
Darcy took Sarah’s elbow lightly and guided her across the hall to a doorway set beneath the curve of the stair. It opened into a saloon with furnishings as shabby as those in the library. No fire burned here, but the curtains had not been closed either, and golden rivers of sunlight sprawled lazily from two tall, arched windows across the faded carpet. The cheval glass stood against the stair wall where the light was not all that she might have wished, but when she tilted the glass properly, it was adequate. She stared at herself.
“Merciful heavens!”
“It was only to be expected, m’dear,” he observed with a sad grimace.
“Please, don’t call me that,” she muttered grimly, meeting his eyes in the mirror. “After treating me so shabbily, you can scarcely expect me to believe that you truly care for me.”
“As you wish.” He bowed. “I’ll find Beck and send him with water and a hairbrush. Can you do your own hair?”
She bi
t her lip. “I don’t know. I have never tried.”
“Well, do the best you can. Have to see about finding you a maid, I suppose.” He paused as though he would say more, but then, with a shrug, he turned away and left the room.
She stared at her reflection, fighting back tears that had suddenly and against all reason decided to plague her. It would do her no good to cry. She would need her senses about her to face whatever lay ahead. What, she wondered, did he expect to accomplish by this extortionate behavior? Why, it was straight out of one of those silly novels! She had behaved quite wickedly herself, to be sure. But he! Could he really expect her to develop any of the tenderer feelings for him now, after he had treated her in such a monstrous way? Why, he had sounded much like Grandpapa—callous, unfeeling, insensitive, and perfectly selfish—as though nothing counted except his own wishes!
It was lucky, she thought suddenly, that she was not particularly missish, for if she were at all inclined to vapors, she would have been having them all over the place by now. But she was made of sterner stuff than that. She straightened her shoulders and stripped off her gloves. Darcy would simply have to learn the error of his ways. It was too bad, but there it was.
II
HER THOUGHTS WERE INTERRUPTED by Beck’s entrance with a pitcher and basin. He set these down upon the chest next to the mirror and handed her the towel he had draped over his arm. “Will there be anything else, Miss Lennox-Matthews?”
She was tempted to say that, yes, she would like the carriage brought round immediately for a return trip to London, but his expression deterred her. He was taller than his master, thin and wiry. He also looked a good deal more sinister than Darcy, and she realized, looking at Beck, that she ought to be frightened by all this. She wondered why the thought had not occurred to her before. But, of course, it was because she had thought of Darcy for so long as a harmless, gentle type, and he had done little, despite his determination to wed her, to alter that impression of him. Beck was another type entirely. The face below his dark, limp hair was a long oval with a great deal of chin, thin lips, a hooked nose, ears that stuck out, and gray eyes that were coldly penetrating under thick, peaked brows. But his clothing was neat, and he carried himself with an air of self-importance. Stoutly maintaining her dignity, she shook her head in answer to his question. He nodded stiffly, then turning to leave, bethought himself of something else.
“His lordship mentioned a comb, miss.” He extracted one made of tortoise-shell from his waistcoat pocket. “I expect I’ll find something better, but this was the best I could do on short notice.”
“Thank you, Beck. I can manage now.” He bowed and returned to the door. She raised her arms to attempt to deal with her hair and then lowered them again when she realized that he had paused at the door and was watching her. She looked at him, and he ran his tongue over his lips, staring insolently. “I said I can manage, Beck. You may go.”
“As you say, miss.” He bowed again and slipped soundlessly through the door. She did not hear his footsteps retreating, and thinking he remained outside the door, she went to look. The hall was empty. For a moment she wondered if she could run out the front door without being caught. Then she sighed. Even if she could, where would she go? She didn’t even know where she was precisely. Vaguely, she remembered Darcy mentioning his house near Finchley Common, and she supposed that was where she was, but it was not much help. She would certainly be worse off lost on the Common. Besides, now that she came to notice, the door to the library was open.
Well, Sarah, she thought with a sigh, you have certainly done it to yourself this time! It was a good deal worse than any other scrape she had gotten herself into, although since her parents’ deaths it had often seemed to her that, one way or another, she had simply tumbled from one scrape to another. But her intentions were always good, she told herself firmly. Then, even as the thought materialized, she had to retract it. Her intentions always seemed good or at least understandable, but she rarely considered that there might be side effects, and this time the side effects were proving rather overwhelming!
A sudden lump rose to her throat when she thought of Sir Nicholas. Some lesson! She had only meant to teach him to respect her individuality, to cease his eternal carping and correcting, to teach him that she must be guided, with gentleness, not dictated to. She was shrewd enough to realize that his attempts to rule her indicated, at the very least, a concern for her welfare, but something in her nature made her want to challenge him. And here was the result. Whatever cause she had given him for disapproval in the past, this was infinitely worse. Now, he would despise her, would think her a loose woman. Not that it would matter, she told herself with another sigh. Not if she were forced to marry Darcy!
But this would not do. Firmly, she forced the dismal thoughts aside and strode back to the mirror to do what she could about her appearance. Once she had moistened her lips and washed her face, she turned her attention to her hair. Knowing she could never recapture the style worked by Lizzie’s clever fingers, she simply combed the tangles out and pushed it back behind her ears to fall in a tawny velvet cloud down her back. It made her look more like a schoolroom miss than a young lady, but it would have to do.
Her dress was another matter. There was nothing at all to be done about the smudges and wrinkles in the skirt, but she could and did remove the spencer jacket. At least her bodice was clean. She pinched up the tiny puffed sleeves and shook out the skirt so that it fell more smoothly from the high, ribboned waist. The spencer had been cut high to her throat with a narrow lace ruff, but the bodice of the dress itself was low-scooped with a flat, pleated, lace edge. The plump curves of her breasts rose softly above it, and a slender green silk ribbon encircled her throat. She shook her skirts again, gave a pat to her hair, and went back to the library, prepared to do battle.
Unfortunately for her purpose, she found the cozy scene that greeted her rather daunting. Her captor was seated in a deep armchair near the fire with his feet propped carefully on the fender, the huge dog sprawled beneath his legs. Darcy looked up, nodding at her entrance. “A vast improvement, my dear. Ah … forgive me, it slipped out.” He got to his feet, skirting the sleepy Erebus, flicked a piece of lint from the skirt of his coat, and raised a wineglass in a toasting gesture. “Salutations. I like your hair like that. Hate it when females chop off their curls. Glad you haven’t.”
“Thank you, my lord.” She eyed him speculatively and made the shrewd guess that his drink was not his first nor yet his second. He noted the direction of her gaze.
“May I pour you a glass?”
“If you please, sir,” she replied with a smile. Perhaps if she seemed relaxed about the whole situation, it would be easier to reason with the man.
“Good stuff. Not so good as I shall be able to buy with the Lennox-Matthews fortune, but good enough.” He moved to a side table and poured out another glass, taking the opportunity to replenish his own.
“Thank you, my lord,” she said when he handed her her glass. She took a tiny sip. The wine was not so bad. Sarah was not particularly fond of spirits, but in a good cause…. She gazed at him across the top of her glass. Was it possible that he was a bit nervous? She remembered his unexpected strength in the carriage and the sudden fear she had had in Beck’s presence. This was indeed a pretty predicament! She took another sip. Had someone not referred to wine as Dutch courage? She wondered briefly what the Dutch thought of such a reference. But then she took herself firmly in hand. She had come in here to do battle, had she not? Well then, Sarah, she told herself sternly. Get on with it, my girl! Darcy had clearly had several glasses of Dutch courage, yet he also seemed to be at a loss for words. So much for the Dutch. With a swish of her skirt, Sarah moved purposefully to the other chair in front of the fireplace and sat down.
Once she was seated, Darcy sat down in his own chair, slumped back, and propped his feet up again. “Tom’s going to set up a table for us here. Only habitable room down here at the moment. Matty d
id our bedrooms but not much else, I’m afraid.” Sarah perched on the edge of her seat.
“My lord,” she began calmly, “we must speak of the matter at hand. There is still time to make things right, you know. My relatives will be furious, of course, there is no gainsaying that, but the rest can certainly be covered up to the point where we shall not become the latest on dit. I know you cannot look forward—”
“Not now, Sarah,” he interrupted. “We shall talk about it after we eat. Drink your wine.”
“But, sir, by then it will be too—”
“I said ‘not now’!” he growled stubbornly.
Sarah fell silent and moments later, Beck entered, followed by a grizzled and rather untidy fellow whom she assumed to be Matty’s husband, Tom. Presumably, Matty must be the housekeeper. The two men dragged a table out from the wall and began to lay covers for a tête à tête dinner. Her gaze drifted back to Darcy. What had possessed him? He said he had thought she cared for him. Then why had he sprung this business on her in such a way? Why had he not approached her before going to her uncle if he truly thought she would be agreeable to his suit? It occurred to her now that she had not given much thought before to what sort of man Darcy Ashton really was.
He had always seemed amiable, rather easily led, not one to take the initiative in much of anything. All she had ever had to do to attract his notice and bring him to her side in a crowd was to smile at him. But he had certainly not seemed ardent or passionate or lost to love. She knew those signs well enough, for many of the men who had continually surrounded her since her come-out displayed such flattering attitudes. But not Darcy. Not Sir Nicholas either, drat the man. He had never flattered her. But this was not the time to think of Sir Nicholas, she told herself sternly, forcing her thoughts back to Darcy.
He did not even follow his own lead when it came to matters of dress. He was a fop, a dandy, but not the sort who was constantly affecting outrageous styles in the hope that some fashionable quirk of his own devising would catch on and bear his name. Darcy merely followed the lead of others. When he liked a style, he took it for his own. He dressed elegantly despite his supposed lack of income, but there was nothing unique about his appearance. There had been nothing about him, in fact, to attract one’s notice, except for the simple matter of his having been in some way or other related to Sir Nicholas.
