When the servants had served the baked capons, asparagus, and pickled beets, they left the room. “Jack,” Kate asked. “Did Ned say anything to you about offering for Caro last night?”
Her husband jerked his head up. His eyelids veiled his eyes. “Yes. As a matter of fact, he did. He said he intended to call upon your father this morning, Caro. I assume he did not?”
“What is it you are not telling us, Jack?” Kate asked. “I can always sense when you are hiding something from me.”
For just a moment, he drummed his fingers on the table. Then, leaning forward, he said, “Caro, this pains me more than I can say, but you must prepare yourself for a shock.”
Stunned, she could only stare. “A shock?”
From his inside breast pocket, he pulled what appeared to be a crumpled piece of woman’s stationery. “I found this in the otherwise empty grate of the breakfast room, where it had obviously been balled up and pitched in what I am guessing was anger.”
“Are you going to let me read it?”
“Under normal circumstances, I would not show you Ned’s private correspondence. But in view of your expectations, your very normal and proper expectations, I feel that you are entitled to know with what you are dealing.”
“Do not keep her in suspense while you pontificate!” Kate said. “Give it to her!”
“I am dashed sorry, Caro,” he said, passing her the letter.
Though her mouth was dry, she set her teeth and swallowed hard as she took the crushed missive from his hands. The phrases ran at her like galloping horses.
Cast off fiancée. . . shocked to find my poor, dear friend is increasing . . .seduce and desert a woman of quality . . . You, sir, are a monster!
Caro handed the letter to Kate, her mind scrambling to make some sort of sense of the words. “This woman is obviously mistaken. I know for a fact that Beverley was heartbroken when Lady Sarah cast him off. He did not even know the reason. She may indeed be increasing, but I am not widgeon enough to believe that Ned is responsible. He idolized the woman. Elise can tell you. She thought he had her on a pedestal of perfection that was unrealistic. It seems she had the right of it.”
Kate had finished reading. “Jack? What is your view?”
“If what Caro says is true, why did the man not simply ignore the letter?”
Caro’s eyes filled with tears. “I imagine he is going to offer for her. He will give her child his name.” A sob escaped her throat. Pulling a handkerchief from her sleeve, she covered her mouth with it and rose unsteadily. “Excuse me.”
She could feel Kate and Jack’s sympathetic gaze on her back as she rushed out of the dining room. Escaping down the stairs and out the front door, she forgot even to collect her bonnet. It was a full mile to her home. Caro was hardly aware of walking, consumed by the news she had heard, but still unable to comprehend it in her heart. If she could ever come to believe it, she knew she would never recover. Surely, at any moment, she would find it was all a mistake, and Ned would come up, riding behind her, and catch her up before him on his horse.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
IN WHICH OUR HERO RIDES NORTH
At first, as Ned rode neck or nothing to Oxfordshire and the Randolph family seat, his mind seethed with such anger, it blotted out every other thought. His only aim was to get to Randolph Castle and confront his former fiancée. Soon, his mental discipline asserted itself and he reviewed all the events since he had met Lady Sarah standing abandoned on the Great North Road.
She was not a beauty, but had a comely countenance that could be lit into something quite special when she smiled. Of course, he did not know this when he stopped his racing curricle to offer assistance. Her black velvet evening cloak had proclaimed her to be someone of consequence, but had a very strange appearance at midday.
“Oh, thank you for stopping, your grace,” she said, her eyes clouded with anxiety. “I find myself in a very difficult circumstance.”
“You have no servant with you,” he stated.
“Your grace, I was abducted. I escaped.”
He marveled at her calm as she stood there, clutching nothing but a reticule in her black-gloved hands. Ned had been glad today’s race from London to Hemel Hempsted had him in his racing curricle, for it would do the lady more harm to her reputation than she had already endured were he to rescue her in a closed carriage, or even on the back of his horse.
Without a second thought, he abandoned the race and, alighting, lifted her by her surprisingly tiny waist up into the sporting equipage. When he was seated beside her, he said, “You seem to know who I am. I have a shocking memory. Have we been introduced?”
“Yes. But I do not expect you to remember anyone as ordinary as I am. You are a member of Caro Braithwaite’s court, are you not?”
He had resented this attribution for some reason. “I dance with her from time to time. Now tell me. Who are you, and what has brought you to such a pass?”
Her cheeks flamed and for a moment, he was not certain that she would answer. “I wish I could remain anonymous, but I must not be missish.”
Ned waited.
“I am Lady Sarah Randolph. I am probably the most considerable heiress on the market this Season.”
“Ah . . . I begin to see.”
“I was at the ball at Lord and Lady Hemingford’s last evening.”
He looked down at her. She was plying the stuff of her reticule between her fingers, twisting it this way and that.
“A man—I thought he was a gentleman—took me out on the terrace, supposedly for a breath of air. It was dreadfully warm and stuffy.”
“Yes. I was there also. It was uncommonly close.”
“I should have objected when he walked me down into the gardens. But . . . well you see . . "
“You had a tendre for him?”
“Not to put too fine a point on it, I did.”
“I suppose he had a carriage waiting in the mews lane behind Hemingford’s townhouse to which he whisked you and carried you off.”
“Exactly.”
“And you do not intend to tell me the name of this blackguard?”
“No. You would not mean to do so, but you could unconsciously betray me when you met him in society. I am attempting to maintain my reputation if I possibly can.”
Her little chin went up. Her determination endeared her to him. She was not even remotely intent on revenge, but on protecting the culprit.
“I will do everything I possibly can to see that you are successful in that effort. Is there a relation out of Town that you might possibly be visiting because you were taken ill suddenly last evening?”
She considered. “I am staying in Town with my brother and his wife. My parents are both deceased. Hence my fortune.”
“Surely you must have some other friend or relative.”
“An aunt in Buckinghamshire. My mother’s sister. But my brother is very proper. I do not think he would believe for a second that I had dashed off to her in the middle of the night.”
Her plight moved him. What a devilish time females had in society! They were blamed for such incidents as Lady Sarah had suffered, often by their own family.
“I will tend to your brother.”
“No!” She looked up at him with worried, large blue eyes, her brow puckered. “You must not, or he would think you the author of my ruin! He would challenge you to a duel!”
“What then? I confess I do not know how we are to contrive this.”
“We?” she asked. Then she smiled for the first time. It was a tremulous smile, tugging at the chivalry he had always possessed.
From that point on, he had made it his business to help her. He had delivered her to the aunt, who had shown her gratitude by trading on that chivalry. Before the end of the day, he found himself affianced to Lady Sarah. From what he could tell, her aunt was a stiff, cruel woman. It seemed that the poor debutante was replete with harsh relations. She was so tiny and so brave that he felt it his job to stand between h
er and the world. She had never known any kind of love. Next to Lady Sarah, Caro Braithwaite had seemed a petted and spoiled debutante.
So, not understanding the distinction between chivalry and love, he had devoted himself to Sarah’s happiness. She seemed pathetically grateful. Her unilateral breaking of their engagement, retreat to her family estate, and subsequent refusal to see him had hurt and baffled him. It seemed impossible to him now that he actually had thought himself in love with her.
Now, at last he had the explanation for her behavior. Lady Sarah had discovered she was increasing. The child was obviously that of her kidnapper. She had been ravished. And she had never told him. He did not even know who the bounder was. Sarah obviously did not wish to foist this child on him, her so-obliging fiancé. So, because she intended to be noble, she was going to bring upon herself the disgrace of an unwed mother and condemn her child to the horrible stigma of being a bastard.
Examining his anger, he found that it was directed at her stubborn selflessness, which had the perhaps-unintended consequence of inflicting lifelong suffering on an innocent child. How could she defend her despoiler at her child’s expense?
And now, some damned viscountess he didn’t even know was determined to drag his own name into the business in a most reprehensible way. He must convince the woman to marry him. There was really no other course.
As his thoughts distilled and his rage lessened, thoughts of Caro returned and wound themselves like vines around his heart. She would never understand. She would, like the rest of the world, believe that the child Lady Sarah was carrying was his. Caro would think him the veriest reprobate. When he did not show himself in her father’s library today, when she found that he had virtually fled, it would hurt her abominably.
Visions of her doing the carefree jig with her father, her form in the firelight as they performed the Scottish reel, and her face upturned to him in joy after their first kiss tormented him. And, now that his anger had left him, he found that he was experiencing very real physical pain in his chest.
Memories of their fevered longing for one another coupled with visions of her holding their child, conceived out of that passion they shared, now carved out a hollow in his chest. A great, vast hollow that a chivalric marriage and a bastard child of some profligate could never be expected to fill.
In addition, the idea of hurting the woman he now knew he truly loved was hateful to him. His feelings for her were not those of a protective swain, but of a man in love both body and soul. Unlike Lady Sarah, Caro would never have loved a rogue, and would certainly never have protected him at the expense of a child.
Oh, Caro, my love. Were an innocent child’s happiness not at stake, we could have had such a happy life together.
Worst of all, without betraying Lady Sarah and her child, he could never explain his actions to Caro. She would go to her grave thinking him a blackguard.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
IN WHICH OUR HEROINE
CONTEMPLATES HER FUTURE
Even by the time Caro reached home, the onslaught of Ned’s desertion and all that it meant was too fresh. She was still running from it.
Sitting in the yellow and white morning room, she stared at nothing for an hour or more, keeping the news at bay with memories of the night before. Ned loved her. Surely he did. It was all some muddle. He would return to her. She knew it.
Her father found her. “I say, Caro. Get into your riding habit. Let’s go for a bruising ride upon the downs.”
“Papa, you are a dear. That is just what I need.”
For the next week, she still managed to dodge the sad truth as she and Lord Jonathan fell into a routine of riding in the morning, dining at midday, and visiting tenants in the afternoon. Their children provided an outlet for Caro’s need to love and be loved. In the evenings, she made rag dolls and stitched tiny ensembles of clothing for them. Her father showed her how to craft sailboats for the little boys. Working with her hands was soothing, especially when it meant that she would make some children happy. The time spent with her father filled a need to be reassured of her value as a person. The world was an ordered place. A powerful love such as Ned had for her did not suddenly disappear like dew in the sun.
At the end of the week, she was just getting up from luncheon when Lord William called to say good-bye.
“I wanted to be certain you were not too cast down,” he said, facing her over an arrangement of yellow roses in the downstairs parlor.
“Cast down?” she repeated. “Whyever should I be cast down?”
“You must know that I asked your father for permission to pay my addresses.”
“Yes. I was flattered, my lord.”
“He told me that your affections were engaged elsewhere. I think I am right in assuming that they were pinned on the duke?”
She looked down and picked at the stuff of her turquoise riding habit.
“As his departure was very sudden, and he has now requested his carriage to be sent on with his portmanteaux, I gather he does not expect to return.”
Whatever kernel of hope remained that Lady Sarah would spurn Ned’s offer died within Caro at that moment. Pain sawed through her with a serrated blade, suddenly taking her breath. She hung her head, unable to speak. The lump in her throat was so large that if she opened her mouth, the long-pent-up sob would escape. She had not hurt this badly since her brother had died.
In a moment, Lord William came to her and knelt in front of her chair. Taking her hands in his, he asked, “Could you not learn to love me? I know I am not dashing like Beverley, but I have a steady heart. It is yours, Miss Braithwaite.”
Caro scarcely heard him. Her misery overwhelmed her. Biting her lip to keep the sobs inside, she put her hands to her face and pressed hard against her eyelids.
The vicar sprang to his feet. “Forgive me, forgive me, please. I am thinking only of myself. I should not be importuning you at such a time.”
Her tears could no longer be stayed. Sitting there in the morning room with her suitor standing above her, she at last wept her heart out. Marriage to anyone else was an impossibility. The entire idea filled Caro with woe as her loss fully struck her. She would never marry Ned. She must endure the remainder of her life knowing he belonged to someone else, but at the same time knowing that he had loved her once. That they had shared an exquisite joy that, for her at least, could never come again. She would not allow herself to ever care for another with such a whole heart, for to allow it would be to allow again the possibility of this shattering heartbreak.
Could she but cease to exist from this very moment, so she would cease to feel? How could a person be expected to endure such anguish and live through it?
Despite repeated attempts, she failed to restrain her outpouring of grief. The tears, as they formed and fell, represented to her the death of all her desires.
Finally, the vicar ceased to loom over her, and she was vaguely conscious that he had pulled the bell rope for a servant. When the door opened, she heard him tell Hitchens to send for one of her parents.
Moments later, Papa was raising her from her chair and clasping her in his arms. “Thank you, my lord. I can take care of this now. Godspeed.”
Caro clung to her father’s lapels as she gave vent to the audible sobs that had been building behind her unrestrained weeping. What am I to do with my life? I cannot foresee myself ever marrying anyone else. . . sharing his bed . . . having his children . . .
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
IN WHICH OUR HERO CONFRONTS LADY SARAH
Randolph Castle was large—having been originally built during Queen Elizabeth’s reign and added upon during the Restoration and Georgian periods. The different styles of architecture did not sit together happily. In addition, the present earl, Lady Sarah’s brother, was too often absent. The gravel drive was studded with weeds, the moat was full of scum, and the brass knocker on the door unpolished.
The servant who answered was dressed in frayed livery. Taking the duke’s
calling card on a tarnished salver, he ushered him into a small, low-ceilinged parlor on the ground floor. All about Ned were evidences of neglect. The grate had not been swept, the red furniture was faded, the carpet was threadbare.
What a dismal place.
He fully expected his request for an interview with Lady Sarah to be declined, and was therefore surprised when his former fiancée came upon him frowning into the grate, remembering the feel of Caro Braithwaite in his arms.
Rising, he said, “Lady Sarah.” He bowed.
“The viscountess wrote to you,” she said. Everything about her seemed to wilt. Her eyes drooped, her skin was entirely without color. She could not even seem to manage a smile.
“You told her that I was the father of your child,” he said.
“I am sorry, Ned. I did not tell her that, but I did not correct her false assumption. It was wrong of me.”
“You are still protecting the blackguard? At my expense? At the expense of your unborn child?”
She said nothing.
Looking around him, he gestured with his arm. “It would seem that you misrepresented the amount of your fortune, as well.”
“No. That I did not do. My fortune comes to me from my mother. It did not pass to my brother with the estate. I am afraid my father was a gambler and left nothing but debts.”
She sat, folding her hands in her lap. He began pacing the room.
“What is to be done? You must marry. Whatever your personal scruples, it is not fair to assume them at the expense of your child.”
She was quiet, kneading the ends of her shawl between her fingers.
“I know your plight is not your fault,” he said, trying for more gentleness.
Two big tears were sliding down her cheeks as she looked up at him. “Nor is it yours,” she said. “It was very wrong of me to allow the viscountess to come to that conclusion.”
“If you will not marry me, she intends to spread the word throughout the ton. The child would grow up thinking I was his father and that I declined to acknowledge him.”
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