by Mary Balogh
“Alex is at the House of Lords this morning,” Mrs. Westcott told her. “But everything is arranged. He will go to stay with his cousin—my brother’s son—and will enjoy the excuse to be a carefree young bachelor about town again in company with another. He spoke with Sidney last night and is expected. They have always been close friends. Oh, the mischief they used to get up to while they thought my sister-in-law and I were quite ignorant of it.”
“I daresay you did not know the half of it even so, Mama,” Lady Overfield said, laughing.
And while they spoke lightly and cheerfully, they were taking Wren upstairs and along a wide corridor to a guest room. “It will be lovely having you here, Miss Heyden. We can go with you, if you wish, to see what you hope to see in London. We can introduce you to some people and take you with us to some entertainments—or not. We will put no pressure whatsoever upon you just because you are staying here.”
It seemed that everything had been decided for her, Wren thought, without her having to make the decision for herself. Here she was in a pretty room at the back of the house, overlooking what appeared to be a colorful, well-tended garden, and it was too late to say no. And she was feeling too weary to argue anyway. She was here, and Lady Overfield was her friend and Mrs. Westcott was her . . . mother? And the Earl of Riverdale had already made other living arrangements for himself. Perhaps she would not even have to see him again. It would be very much more comfortable if that were so.
Liar. The inner voice spoke up despite her weariness.
“Thank you,” she said. “You are both extraordinarily kind.”
Aunt Megan, then, was not the only kind lady the world had ever produced. Had she really believed she was?
Nine
Ever since Miss Heyden said goodbye to him on Easter Sunday, Alexander had been telling himself what a fortunate escape he had had from what would surely have been a gloomy, troubled marriage. Perhaps the fact that he had thought it every single day since ought to have alerted him to the fact that perhaps he was not as happy about it as he thought he was.
Today he had gone to the House of Lords since there was an important debate in which he wanted to participate, but all morning he wondered if she had called upon his mother and Elizabeth and wondered what he would do if she had not. At the first opportunity, around noon, he sent off a brief note and waited impatiently for a reply. When it finally arrived, he learned she had indeed called and been persuaded to stay.
He took himself off to Sidney’s rooms later, wondering what it was all going to mean. Must their courtship be considered to have resumed? Had it ever been a courtship? Did he want it to be? Was it too late now to ask himself such a question? He wondered if he ought to go immediately to pay his respects to her or if he ought to leave it until later. Perhaps they were not even at home.
It troubled him that she had come. She had left him with ruffled emotions, the chief of which had been relief that he no longer had to contend with them and try to sort them out. He wanted to be able to choose a bride with his head. The heart was too unpredictable and too capable of feeling pain and doubt and a host of other things. It was his heart that had sent him in pursuit of her in the park when it might have been wiser to let her go.
Dash it all.
The decision of what to do next was taken out of his hands. Sidney was not at home—he worked in the diplomatic service and often put in long hours. But there was a note from his mother awaiting him. Cousin Louise, the Dowager Duchess of Netherby, had called a Westcott family conference at Archer House on Hanover Square, town house of the duke, her stepson, and her own home too. Such meetings had been rare until last year. There had been a number of them after what the family collectively referred to as the great catastrophe, and then a lull. Now the summons had been sent out again, and the meeting was for this afternoon. Alexander glanced at a clock. Less than one hour from now, in fact. And, like it or not, he was head of the family.
Cousin Louise had a tendency to be overly dramatic. Alexander wondered as he left Sid’s rooms again what sort of dire emergency had arisen now to necessitate the whole family’s gathering together. He hoped it was nothing to do with Harry. Harry Westcott, who had been the earl for a brief time until the truth about his birth came out, was fighting out in the Peninsula and was a constant source of worry to them all. Not that they were unique in that. Innumerable families, both rich and poor, all over Britain must live with a similar anxiety. One never knew when a letter might arrive with the worst news anyone could ever receive. He hoped no such letter had come. God, he hoped not.
There must be something wrong, though, unless Cousin Louise simply wished to announce the betrothal of Jessica, her daughter, who was making her come-out this year at the age of eighteen. She had been much sought after at all the myriad entertainments of the Season so far. Alexander had seen it for himself. She was a duke’s daughter, after all, with a handsome dowry. She was also pretty and vivacious. He had neither seen nor heard about any particular suitor, but one never knew.
He was the last to arrive. Cousin Louise had a mother still living—the Dowager Countess of Riverdale—and two sisters. The elder, Cousin Matilda, who had never married, lived with her mother. The younger, Cousin Mildred, was married to Thomas, Lord Molenor, and had three sons still at school. They were all there, except the boys. The Duke of Netherby was there with his duchess. Anna was the daughter born of the first, secret marriage of Cousin Humphrey, the late earl, to a lady called Alice Snow and was his only legitimate child, as it had turned out. Jessica was there. So were Alexander’s mother and his sister, Elizabeth. Absent were Cousin Viola, the former Countess of Riverdale, now going by her maiden name of Kingsley, and her two daughters, Camille, now married to Joel Cunningham and living in Bath, and Abigail. And Harry, of course.
Alexander greeted everyone and took up his stand before the fireplace, a habit of his, though he had once realized that it might be construed as an attempt on his part to assert his seniority in the family. He declined Cousin Louise’s offer of a cup of tea, and conversation resumed around him. Netherby, he could see, was lounging in a chair in the far corner of the room beside a window, as he tended to do in any room, just as Alexander gravitated toward fireplaces. Perhaps he liked to observe what went on before him without having to turn his head a great deal or feel the obligation to participate. Perhaps it was an acknowledgment of the fact that he had no tie of blood to the Westcott family. He was the son of the Duke of Netherby, who had taken Cousin Louise as his second wife and fathered Jessica.
Netherby was looking as exquisitely gorgeous as ever, Alexander noticed with slight irritation, his blond hair immaculately cut into its longish style, his tailoring bordering upon the dandyish but not quite spilling over to the other side, his perfectly manicured fingers bedecked with rings. The chains and fobs and jeweled watchcase and quizzing glass that always adorned his waist were invisible today, however. He was holding a fat-cheeked, bald-headed babe nestled beneath his chin. She was sucking on her fist and—if Alexander was not much mistaken—one fold of her father’s neckcloth. And if that was not an incongruous sight, Alexander did not know what was. Was Netherby not terrified of getting a spot of . . . drool upon his spotless linen? But it was an unkind thought, for Alexander had learned during the past year that despite appearances, there was nothing either weak or effeminate—or petulant—about Avery Archer, Duke of Netherby. Quite the contrary.
Alexander turned his attention to Elizabeth, who was seated close by. “She did come, then?” he asked unnecessarily.
“She did indeed,” his sister told him. “It took some effort from both Mama and me to persuade her to stay with us. But she is all settled in. I believe she was quite happy at the prospect of a quiet hour to herself after we left to come here.”
Why had they made that effort? he wondered. Why had he suggested it last evening? Why had he thought of little else today? Until this moment he had not tho
ught even once today about Miss Littlewood. Or about any of the other young ladies whose mamas were aggressively pursuing him either. If he never saw any of them ever again he would really not notice. But Miss Heyden . . .
“I went to St. Paul’s Cathedral with her after luncheon,” Elizabeth said. “She sat on a pew close to the back, Alex, and did not move for half an hour. She did not wander about to gape at everything, as other first-time visitors invariably do. She gazed about from where she sat, and she looked rapt, though I could not see her face clearly, it is true. She wore a veil.”
“Yes,” he said, “she would.”
“Tomorrow morning we are going to look at some of the glassware from her workshops,” she said. “I vastly look forward to that.”
But Cousin Louise was signaling with a clearing of the throat that the time had come for the business of the afternoon to begin. Everyone fell silent and looked expectantly at her.
“We need to decide what to do about Viola and Abigail,” she said.
“Are they not still at Hinsford Manor?” Cousin Mildred asked. “When I heard from Viola a month or two ago she sounded quite cheerful about being back there. Their return home was well received by their neighbors, I understand.”
The late earl and his family had made their country home at Hinsford in Hampshire rather than at Brambledean, but last year Anna had inherited it and Cousin Viola had fled with Camille and Abigail to Bath, where her daughters had stayed with their maternal grandmother while she went to live with her brother at the vicarage in Dorsetshire. Anna had persuaded them months later to move back home. She had offered to give them the property, just as she had offered to give Westcott House to Alexander, and when she had been refused she had apparently informed them that she was willing Hinsford to Harry and his descendants and Westcott House to Alexander and his. Camille had remained in Bath, of course, to marry Cunningham.
“Yes, they are definitely there, Mildred,” the dowager countess said. “I had a letter just last week. Viola did not sound discontented.”
“It is not Viola who is my main concern,” Cousin Louise said. “It is Abigail. She is nineteen years old. One wonders how many eligible gentlemen she will meet in the country.”
“Well, there is the problem of her birth, Louise,” Cousin Matilda pointed out. “It is unfortunate, but her illegitimacy is one of those realities that cannot be ignored. It is unlikely she will meet any eligible gentleman no matter where she is. Perhaps she will be as content to remain with her mama as I have been to remain with mine.”
“I have tried to persuade her to come here,” Anna said, sounding unhappy. “She is my half sister, after all, and I would do all in my power to see that she was well received by all the people who really matter. Kind people, I mean. And sensible people. Abigail has done nothing to deserve ostracism. Avery would do all in his power too, and that is considerable. I am sure we all would, just as we did in Bath last summer when we went to celebrate Grandmama’s birthday. Perhaps we should all try to persuade her to come.”
“We could invite her to stay with us,” Alexander’s mother said. “Westcott House was always her home when she was in town, after all. It would be familiar to her. Perhaps Viola would come with her. She and I have always been on the best of terms.”
“One would hate to expose either one of them to possible unkindness, though, Althea,” Cousin Mildred said. “And we all know how many high sticklers there are in the ton and how much influence they wield. We would all rally around them, of course, because they are our family and we love them, but—”
“I hate the ton,” Jessica blurted out from her perch on the window seat close to Netherby. She had her knees drawn up before her, her arms wrapped about them. “I hate people, and I hate this place. I hate London and the stupid, stupid Season. I want to go home, but no one will take me.”
“Jessica.” Cousin Louise’s voice was both stern and strained. “There is no call for such an outburst.”
“There is every call. I hate, hate, hate everything,” Jessica said, pressing her forehead to her knees.
“If hatred would solve all the world’s hurts and injustices, Jess,” Netherby said on a languid sigh, “they would all have been solved long ago. Unfortunately, it only seems to make matters worse. Your mother has called the family together in an effort to see if any workable solution can be found.”
“Well,” she said, looking up and glaring over her shoulder at her half brother, “is there a solution, Avery? The world in its oh-so-righteous wisdom has chosen to call Abby a bastard—and no, Mama, I will not avoid the word just because it is ungenteel. That is what she is called, just because Uncle Humphrey was mean and selfish and I am glad I never liked him and always felt sorry for Aunt Viola. I am glad she was never really married to him—though that, of course, means Abby and Harry and Camille are bastards. Don’t tell me it is pointless to hate. Do you think I do not know that?”
Netherby looked at Anna, who bent over him and took the baby from him, leaving behind a noticeable wet patch on the lapel of his coat. He got up, swung Jessica’s legs off the window seat, sat beside her, and wrapped one arm about her shoulders.
“This is the problem, you see,” Cousin Louise said, indicating her daughter. “Abigail was to make her come-out last year but had to postpone it when Humphrey died. Jessica was overjoyed at the prospect of the two of them making their come-out together this year. But it was not to be. And now Jessica is unable to enjoy her own. She has become more and more unhappy in the past few weeks until it has come to this in the past day or two. She demands to go home to Morland Abbey.”
“She is young, Louise,” the dowager countess said. “The young believe they can make the world a perfect place merely by wishing it or by expecting that justice will always be done. It is rather sad that as we grow older we come to understand that it can never happen. Perhaps you should do as she wishes and take her home. Invite Viola and Abigail to come and visit you there. Let the girls enjoy each other’s company where the world of the ton is not constantly threatening them. They are both very young.”
“I would have to agree with Mama,” Cousin Mildred said. “There will be time enough for Jessica to find a husband, Louise. She is only eighteen. She is also very pretty. And even if she were not, she is the daughter and sister of a Duke of Netherby. There will be no lack of suitors when she is ready for them.”
“I will never be ready,” Jessica said into the side of Netherby’s neck. “Not without Abby.”
“Perhaps we do need to consider some sort of solution for Abigail,” Alexander said. “It is too easy, perhaps, to assume that she must be happy now that she is back in her old home with her mother. Jessica is the only one among us honest enough to confront a problem we need to help solve together, as a family. Perhaps they will agree to come for a visit to Westcott House, and perhaps we can arrange some social functions at which they will be welcomed and made to feel comfortable. Illegitimacy surely does not fall into the same category as smallpox or the plague. Collectively we wield a great deal of influence. Shall Mama write? And Elizabeth too? Shall I?”
Jessica was gazing mutely at him.
“They will probably not come,” Cousin Matilda said. “You might as well save yourself the effort, Althea.”
“I can be very persuasive, Matilda,” Alexander’s mother said, a twinkle in her eye.
“In the meanwhile,” Elizabeth said, “why do you not come to Westcott House with us for some air and exercise, Jessica? We have a guest staying with us, a neighbor of Alex’s at Brambledean. She is a rather lonely lady who lost both her aunt and her uncle, her only relatives, within a few days of each other a little over a year ago. Alex will be coming too, I daresay, to pay his respects to her, though he will be staying with Sidney Radley while she is here. He will walk you home later.”
Cousin Louise was looking at Elizabeth with obvious gratitude. Jessica was frowning
. “Is she young?” she asked. “Or is she old? Not that it matters. I will come anyway.”
“She is about Alex’s age,” Elizabeth said. “Is that horribly old, Jessica? I beg you not to say yes, for I am older than Alex.”
“Not horribly old,” Jessica conceded.
“Just old,” Alexander murmured.
Five minutes later they were on their way to South Audley Street, Alexander’s mother on his arm, Elizabeth and Jessica walking ahead of them.
“Poor Jessica,” his mother murmured. “And poor Abigail. I have been trying not to think about her. I do hope I can persuade Viola to bring her to us.”
Alexander was wondering how Miss Heyden would receive him. And how would she react to meeting yet another member of his family?
• • •
Wren was indeed enjoying her time alone. She was sitting in her room, a book open on her lap. It was a spacious, light-filled chamber, the perfect place in which to relax. She was not really reading. She was thinking about the wonder that was St. Paul’s Cathedral and the even greater wonder of the fact that she had gone there in the company of a friend. And she thought of her embarrassingly lengthy weeping spell this morning, the first and only time she had wept over Aunt Megan’s and Uncle Reggie’s deaths. But it was not of the actual weeping she thought but of the way Mrs. Westcott had been transformed into a mother figure almost as endearing as Aunt Megan herself.
She refused to feel guilty either about being here or about forcing the Earl of Riverdale out. He had asked her to come, and Lady Overfield had asked. He had met her in the park yesterday and repeated the invitation. It was as simple as that. She would stay, perhaps for a week, and see everything on her list, and then she would go home. And she would write to both ladies afterward. Friends were too precious to be squandered.
Her thoughts were interrupted by a light tap on the door. Lady Overfield answered the summons to come in.
