“I cannot believe someone of your loveliness would ever have to angle for what is surely only the truth! Perhaps if Sedgely were here . . . but you live apart from him now, do you not?” He had dropped his voice and stared intently into her eyes. Here might be an opportunity for intelligent flirtation that could reap more than just an innocent kiss under the mistletoe, he thought. Separated and widowed ladies were always the best bet for a little slap and tickle under the covers, as they didn’t expect any more than just the fun of lovemaking. He believed in variety in his bed and wouldn’t mind exploring a woman of more ample charms.
There was a hint of frost in her voice when she answered though, and he knew he had gone too far too fast. “We are separated.”
A misstep. “My apologies, my lady. I treat you as an old friend, you see, and perhaps I do not merit that privilege.”
The smile came back to her lips. “You’re forgiven.”
Miss Caroline, bored with talk that excluded her, flounced away to speak to her sister, then the two of them left the room without a word.
“How remarkably rag-mannered,” Lady Sedgely said. “However, it does give me the opportunity to speak to you more privately, so I must commend their bad manners for once.”
St. Claire looked at her inquiringly. At that moment his sister-in-law popped her head in the door and looked around inquiringly.
“Hello, Emmy. St. Claire, where are the Miss Stimsons? August and I have just finished conducting their parents on a tour of the house and wondered if you and they wished to join us in a perambulation of the gardens. Where did they go?” She looked accusingly at St. Claire.
“I really have no idea, Elizabeth. They left the room together, that is all I can say.”
The marchioness sighed and gave him a blistering look. “You were to keep them entertained, you dunderhead.”
“It was my understanding your orders encompassed all of the company, and Lady Sedgely is surely part of that?”
Lady Langlow caught her friend’s eye and rolled her own. “All right. But you could have asked them where they were going.”
“I didn’t feel the right to inquire, nor did they give me a chance.”
She sighed and departed. St. Claire turned back to Lady Sedgely, and in a caressing tone said, “Now, you were just saying that you wished to find me alone.” He moved to join her on the sofa, putting his arm over the back close to her shoulders.
“Somehow, you make it sound highly improper, you practiced scoundrel!” She smiled, but looked a little uncertain.
“I meant no such thing! You wound me, my lady!” He took her rounded, dimpled hand in his and caressed the back with his thumb.
She shook her head. “No wonder Lizbet despairs of you.” She pulled her hand away. “What I have to say does not concern me.”
“Then I am desolate,” he replied.
“What I have to say concerns my niece, Celestine Simons.”
Chapter Seven
St. Claire went still.
Emily noted how he paled, his face set in a grim expression. Was he so hardened, then, that he would try to ruin her niece and brook no interference? She had never heard that he was an unprincipled bounder, just a hardened flirt. And Celestine was not without friends, not the least of whom was herself. She might be separated from her husband, but she still had the full backing of the name Sedgely behind her. She could make things very uncomfortable for St. Claire among the ton if she so desired.
Taking a deep breath, she continued. “I love my niece very much.”
“That does you credit, ma’am, and her to have inspired that love.” His voice was polite, but frigid.
“She is my eldest sister’s daughter. I’m afraid her mother lived only a couple of years after her birth, so her upbringing was left to my brother-in-law, an older man than his wife. But he was a good man, a learned scholar, and a quiet, retiring gentleman unfortunately possessed of very little in the way of fortune, and that little entailed. My niece lived in a country village her whole life, never traveling to London or even Bath. She nursed her father through his long illness, to his death. I’m afraid she has known very little of the world.”
Emily watched St. Claire, and saw some softening of his expression.
“She seems . . . a very sweet young lady, if I might be so bold, ma’am.”
To her surprise, his words sounded genuine. But then she shouldn’t be surprised, knowing Celestine as she did. Her niece had a rare, luminous quality and quiet goodness that many people found engaging. Not that she would have expected someone like St. Claire to appreciate her kind of subdued charm.
“Not ‘ma’am,’ St. Claire. We were friends once, were we not, when you were a young sprig just down from Oxford and I was a social butterfly? Much has changed, but not that.” She tried to see below the exterior, beneath the shell with which he seemed to have covered himself in the meantime. When she had first met him as Elizabeth’s new brother-in-law he had been an open, engaging young man, full of high spirits and energy. Too many years in London had made him brittle and, according to rumor, a hardened roué.
He grinned at her. “Please don’t remind me of my callow youth, Emily. I cannot believe I was ever that young.”
“You were an entertaining sort, even then. You’ve always had the ability to enjoy the foibles of society and laugh at them.”
“Damned funny, half of it is, if you do not mind my language.”
“Don’t censor yourself for me. I lived with Baxter for too many years not to have heard all the possible curse words, and a few he invented as well.” She turned away from the memory of her husband, who was traveling somewhere in Europe, and kept her focus firmly on the task at hand. It hurt too much to think of Baxter. “I was speaking of Celestine.”
“You were. To what end, you have not said.”
“I have an end in mind, but just hear me out, first. My niece is very special. I think she is beautiful, but then, I am biased. I know the world sees her freckles and mousy brown hair, and how her hands get when she is suffering a relapse.”
St. Claire frowned and looked down at his own square, broad, strong hands. “What is wrong with her, ma’am—Emily—if I might be so bold to inquire?”
“Arthritis. She had a fever when she was young, and her joints became inflamed. Since then she occasionally gets these outbreaks; they have worsened as she has gotten older. She suffers in the cold weather so much! Some mornings I know it is pure torture for her to rise from her bed, though she would not thank me for telling anyone that. She is very private. She had an outbreak last winter as well, but I saw some improvement while she stayed with me last Christmas through my insistence on hot bathing every morning and a liniment my housekeeper swears by. But I am afraid that left alone, Celestine does not take care of herself properly.”
“Why not?”
Emily pursed her lips, frowning as she gazed unseeing at the wall. “She is accustomed to helping others, and I don’t believe she feels she should spare the time for her own needs. Perhaps I am wrong. I cannot get her to spend the time on herself that she needs. And now, as a governess, she will wear herself to a shade taking care of the little girls. No governess gets a hot bath every morning and an adequate fire in her room. She is there to serve, and Celestine will always do her duty.”
“Is she fit for the job? Why did she not stay with you, Emily, if you don’t mind my presumption? Surely she would be better off not working at all? I am sorry for my plain speaking, but it seems obvious to me.”
Emily sighed. “To me also. Do not think you have offended me, for it is exactly what I wished. I wanted her to stay with me, and I would have settled money on her if she would have allowed it, but she resisted. I think it is the lure of working with children that makes her so adamant about working as a governess. I have none and never will, or I probably could have convinced her to stay.”
“So why not arrange a suitable marriage for her?”
She made an impatient gesture. “Su
rely you are not such an innocent after all those years on the town. You are four years my junior but have the advantage on me for London seasons. You know what society is like. I am sure an eligible connection could be formed if she would allow me to settle money on her, but she will not take it and I will not force her. She has the right to self-determination. I am afraid, for the marriage mart, she has not sufficient personal attractions . . . she is not . . . that is to say, her attributes are all internal.”
“A nugget of gold wrapped in plain broadcloth.” St. Claire’s voice was quiet and his gaze averted to the window. His expression was pensive.
She stared at him curiously. Sometimes she had the feeling that there was a strong, good man within him that he did his best to ignore. It was such a waste in her estimation, but by London standards he was only doing what was expected of him. But was it possible that he really did see Celestine’s attributes and honor them?
“You do have a way with words on occasion, St. Claire. I could not have expressed it better. Her faults are all to her own detriment. She is too self-effacing. She will not consider herself when there is the welfare of others at hand. She is too modest about her accomplishments, which are numerous, and too ready to see her faults, which are few and superficial.”
“She is a paragon of virtue, in other words,” St. Claire said, with a hint of disdain in his voice. “Much like my saintly brother.”
Emily gave him a sharp glance. Something had changed in his attitude again, and the curtain of cynicism had descended and was firmly in place. She had only meant to point out the innocence of her niece, her inability to fend off advances she would not expect.
“She is not perfect. No human is. But she is kind and sweet, and I love her very much.” There was a bit of defiance in her own voice, Emily realized. She frowned. What an exasperating man St. Claire could be; sometimes quite human, and then changing like a shadow in the night into a pattern card of the frivolous London beau. Elizabeth had confessed in a long conversation the previous night that she despaired of him ever settling down, and in the meantime his escapades with widows and wives, actresses and opera dancers, were embarrassing to the marquess, who was a rising star in the House of Lords.
“Familial love; it does you credit, my dear,” St. Claire said. “But I still fail to see where all this is leading.”
“I noticed your behavior in the parlor yesterday afternoon,” Emily said, with more steel in her voice than she intended. She shifted on the sofa to look him directly in the eye. “You were flirting with her and I want to know what your intentions are.”
St. Claire’s eyes widened in incredulity. “You are asking if I intend to court your niece?”
His sarcasm was painfully obvious. Emily, afraid she had botched the whole job rather badly, hurriedly said, “No, of course not! I just want you to know that she is a complete innocent. She has no idea about flirtation and men’s ways. She has never been . . .” The growing anger on his face stopped her.
“And I taint her with my evil ways, is that it?” His voice was bitter, his well-formed mouth twisted into a scowl.
“Of course not, you idiot.” Emily sighed in exasperation and folded her plump, soft hands together in her lap. She stiffened her back. She must have her say, no matter how irritated he was getting. “But you must surely have seen how flustered she became when you merely brushed her hand with yours, or gazed at her in that way you have. You are engaging in a game with an innocent who does not know the rules. I am asking you to leave her alone.”
St. Claire rose, stiffly. Resentment was expressed in the very way he held himself. “I assure you, Lady Sedgely, that I have no intention of harming your niece or tampering with her innocence in any way! Her precious innocence will remain intact so she can die a virtuous old maid, as you clearly wish. I would not dream of seducing her into my bed and tainting her with my foul body. Now, if you will excuse me, my sister wishes me to entertain the other guests!”
St. Claire strode out of the room and through the hall, shouting at a footman to inform the grooms he wished his horse saddled. It was the outside of enough, to be virtually accused of intending to bed the woman’s sallow, plain niece! Emily Sedgely’s mind had clearly been poisoned by Elizabeth and her poor opinion of him. He needed fresh air. He needed to get out of the constraining presence of Langlow. Too many more run-ins like this and his riding would be much improved through bruising practice.
He allowed his valet, Dooley, who had appeared at his summons, to aid him with his coat, waving him away with a curt command when he was done.
Of all the idiotic . . . what did Emily think he was planning, to seduce the poor, plain, naive thing? In all his years on the London season he had never taken a young lady’s reputation away from her. He may have dallied with her affections, if young ladies of the ton had any genuine feeling in the first place, which he doubted, but he had never gone over the line. Yet now he was cast in the role of an evil seducer of pure young maidens, and even plain old spinsters.
He strode out into the brisk, frosty air, ignoring the call from his sister and brother to join them with the young Miss Stimsons. He would bolt rather than do the pretty to one of those simpering, vapid misses. He almost ran back to the stables to escape and mounted Alphonse, taking the reins from the groom and trotting away over the frozen ground.
A far hill beckoned and he leaned forward, urging Alphonse, who was fresh and eager, to gallop. It mattered not that he wasn’t dressed for riding, all that mattered was working this latest affront out of his system. Fifteen minutes of bruising riding worked out the worst of his fury, and he slowed to a canter as he crested the hill and looked out over the valley where Ellerbeck nestled, snug against the bosom of Eller Rise, as the low hill was called.
He thought of his own neglected estate not far from Langlow. To his own mind it was even prettier than his brother’s house—smaller and more intimate—but it always seemed cold and lonely when he went there to confer with his bailiff and estate manager, so he was seldom in residence.
Perhaps Elizabeth was right about one thing. Maybe he should start looking around for a wife to start populating Questmere, his home, with little Richmond offspring. Somehow the thought of children did not frighten him half so much as the notion of a wife. Children he knew how to deal with, but a woman—a wife—would require a level of intimacy he had never achieved with anyone, unless he planned to follow the usual tonnish pattern and marry a young chit, get an heir upon her, and leave her home while he returned to London.
It was not an appealing thought. Someday he would marry, but he would be damned if he would fall in with Elizabeth’s plan to consider the Stimson girls, or the van Hoffen chit, who was arriving on the morrow, as a possible spouse.
He would go to the London season this spring with the intent to look around and choose a wife, a girl with some conversation, some beauty, and no pretension. No simpering airs for him. He wanted a woman who could love him, not just his money and title and estate, but him.
Was that possible? Was there such a woman in the world? In his experience the whole mating ritual of the London season was as cold-blooded as choosing a broodmare to mate with a stallion. You examined a girl’s bloodlines, looked her over for physical flaws, made sure the seller, her family, wasn’t hiding any faults of temperament, and then you made your offer. If it wasn’t accepted, you moved on to the next.
A few of his friends had succumbed to the entreaties of their families, especially those who were eldest sons and needed to beget an heir. A couple of them seemed relatively happy, but most were carrying on much as they would have when single, only with an avidity and desperation that hinted at a home life not to be tolerated for any length of time.
With no pressing need to breed an heir, he saw no reason why he should tie himself down too early. And he would not be hen-led! He didn’t want a doormat for a wife, but he also didn’t want a harridan like his sister-in-law.
He trotted down a hill, noting that he
was heading for the church. He remembered the feelings he had in the dark two evenings before as he listened to Celestine’s beautiful voice in the chill dimness. It was like one pure, sweet moment of truth had been visited upon him in the gloomy confines of the chapel. He yearned for that susceptibility, that fragile, heart-rending instant of raw emotion he had experienced, even though it had left him feeling exposed and chafed as though by a biting wind. His wife, when he chose one, should sing like that, he thought. If she could do that, she could cut through to his very soul and lift it, as Celestine had done that night.
He dismounted and tied the horse to the gate, then strolled up the walk to the church, an old structure of gray stone covered in leafless ivy. The family had attended service just that morning, but he had not accompanied them. He went to the side door they had entered through the night of the choir practice and found himself alone in the church. He shivered.
What had he felt that night? It had been a peculiar sort of melancholy, he believed, that swept over him; that was why he had wept at the sound of the governess’s voice and it explained the odd connection he felt to her, the openness of heart he had experienced in the carriage. That was the only way he could account for the protectiveness that he had felt toward her, the desire to pull her to him and soothe her worries.
What had Emily said? That she took on other people’s burdens and never minded her own. But then, Lady Sedgely was biased; it was her own niece, after all. He had to admit, though, in light of Emily’s glowing recommendation of the girl, he was more curious about her. He had been just intent on flirting with her, amused and maybe challenged because it was so difficult. Now he was genuinely curious.
Not that he would heed Lady Sedgely’s warning to stay away. What right had she to determine his actions? Absolutely none. She was as bad as Elizabeth, or maybe worse! She acted like he was evil and would taint the saintly Celestine, or corrupt her with his attentions. Elizabeth was just worried about having to turn away another governess and find a replacement. She despised anyone or anything that challenged her absolute control in her household.
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