‘No,’ she shot back. ‘Of course I don’t. I think you are in a horribly difficult situation, and Lavinia has no intention of making it any easier. Quite the reverse, in fact. Before this, she was enjoying herself enormously. I have seen her almost preen to be the centre of attention, and yet such attention. I could shake her!’
‘I’ve told her in plain words that I will never marry her, you know. And more than once.’ It mattered to him that his sister trusted him in this.
‘But she doesn’t believe you?’
‘She doesn’t want to believe me, and so she refuses to do so. I shouldn’t discuss her with you though, Nell, tempting as it is to relieve my feelings. It isn’t honourable.’
‘It may not be, but I do not give a button for that and nor should you. After all, she is making me suffer too. It’s not precisely enjoyable for me and for poor Mama, with Ambrose dead less than eighteen months, to watch her making a cake of herself – to put it no more strongly, though I might – and of you.’
He could not deny the truth of what his sister said. ‘Perhaps this may indeed be a way to stop her, to force her to accept that whatever happens, I will not wed her. The only way that is open to me, if she refuses to believe me when I tell her so. I can’t engage myself really to marry someone just to drive Lavinia off – it would not be fair to any woman to expose her to such unpleasantness for my sake, and there is no space in my head or my heart even to consider the matter properly and find a bride for myself. How could I really think of wooing any woman, situated as I am? This pretence is all I am capable of. But itwillbe unpleasant, you know, much more unpleasant than you have any idea of yet – it cannot fail to be. I hope Lady Amelia is prepared for it.’
She tucked her hand in his arm. ‘She says she is. Well, we will all face it together.’
Marcus was surprised, and not particularly pleased, though of course it could not signify, to find his old friend Jeremy comfortably ensconced in Lord Wyverne’s house in Brook Street when he arrived there with his sister. Mr Gastrell greeted the Major with his usual amiability and glibly explained – though of course he had no need to justify his presence to anyone, least of all Marcus – that he had thought it only proper to call upon the Wyvernes directly after he had made Lady Amelia’s acquaintance the evening before.
‘Thought I should pay my respects to the Marchioness,’ he said. ‘Should have done so long before this, but she is gracious enough to forgive me for my lack of manners!’ And he kissed his fingers to the Wyverne ladies in a fashion that made Marcus suddenly itch to trip him up, or otherwise make a fool of him and shake his damnable suavity.
Lady Wyverne indeed appeared charmed by Jeremy, as women so often and so unaccountably were, and smiled on him graciously; Lady Amelia seemed no less taken with him than she had the night before. And somehow – Marcus had not the least idea how it came about, and certainly had not been consulted on the scheme, or he’d have vetoed it – they soon found themselves a party of four strolling together in the park. Marcus was aware that he was frowning, and could not seem to help it.
It was the hour of the fashionable promenade and a fine, sunny afternoon, so the place was extremely busy. Ladies took the air in barouches and landaulets, or were driven by gentlemen in dashing, high-perch phaetons; some bolder ornaments of the ton drove themselves and made a fine show, no less skilled whipsters than their male counterparts. But there were also sufficient throngs of pedestrians to make the paths almost crowded. Mr Gastrell and Lord Thornfalcon were obliged to greet many persons with whom they were acquainted, though neither Helena nor Lady Amelia had more to do than return a nod once or twice. But many more who did not speak to them watched them avidly as they passed.
They could not walk four abreast, and Marcus counted himself fortunate to outmanoeuvre his sly friend and take Lady Amelia’s arm, so that Jeremy squired Helena, whether he liked it or not. Marcus didn’t give a fig if Gastrell didn’t like it; in fact, he hoped he didn’t, because he was damned if he wanted his insinuating friend playing his flirtatious tricks on either young lady. Curse him, he was fair and far off if he thought he could trifle with either Marcus’s sister or… whatever Lady Amelia was to him. There wasn’t a word for what she was. Not yet.
He only became aware that he was still behaving like a bear with a sore head, despite his victory, when Lady Amelia said, amusement in her voice, ‘It’s perfectly true that you probably don’t need to speak to me at all to set tongues wagging about the mere fact that we are in each other’s company, sir. And certainly, I am not asking you to do anything as extreme as tosmilein my general direction, or make any sort of polite conversation. God forbid. But I had no notion that being wooed would be so excessively dull and silent, I must admit. Next time, I shall bring my sewing, or a good book.’
He looked down at her, still frowning. She was smiling at him with a most unwelcome gleam of intelligence and understanding in her fine, dark eyes. ‘Am I being dull?’ he asked. He couldn’t deny that he had been largely silent. No doubt Jeremy – in the unlikely event of being accused of such a thing – would have turned the pert words away with a quip that won his companion over. But he was not made that way.
‘Terribly dull. And your constant scowl is most off-putting. I’m sure Mr Gastrell would be a far more amusing escort. Look at him, making your sister laugh.’
Marcus gritted his teeth, observing that what she said was quite true. ‘No doubt he would! But then he is a practised cicisbeo, and I am not. Yet if I am to woo you, madam, it will scarcely serve our purpose – or do your precious reputation any good at all – if you should be seen flirting with him, or any other such light sort of fellow, day and night.’
He half-expected her to accuse him of jealousy, a claim he would have repudiated with unflattering promptness and emphasis. But no, he had underestimated her.
‘It’s true,’ she sighed. ‘I am sorry it should be so, but there it is. There is to be no flirting at all for me, since it is plain thatyouwould never engage in such an enjoyable activity. I suppose I must resign myself to tedium and your gloomy looks. Unless you should care to tell me interesting details of your military experiences, of course, and all the brave actions in battle of which we hear so much.’
‘I should not!’ he said, revolted. ‘I think you must be confusing me with the coxcomb I appear to be in the da—in the cursed public prints.’
‘It is just that I have observed – though my experience is somewhat limited, I admit – that gentlemen often do enjoy talking about themselves at great length. And you don’t seem inclined to askmeany questions, so what is to be done?’
‘I do not need to ask you any questions at all to discover that what you are, Lady Amelia, is a shameless minx.’
‘It has been said,’ she admitted, a fugitive dimple peeping for a moment in her smooth cheek. ‘But look! Here is my brother Charlie, one of the people who has said it, wandering about aimlessly. Let me present him to you, sir.’
Lord Charles Wyverne was a slight, dark young man of decidedly dandiacal leanings, and it was fortunate that his sister had appeared directly before him, because his shirt-points were so high as to render his peripheral vision almost non-existent, as if he were a horse with blinkers. Nor could he easily look down, so that it was as well the path was level and unobstructed. It seemed unfair that he should choose to inflict upon the world a startlingly garish purple and gold waistcoat that he alone was unable to see. But he was plainly an amiable young man, and seemed genuinely pleased to encounter his sibling, and delighted to be presented to Lord Thornfalcon, his sister Helena, and Mr Gastrell. When quizzed mischievously as to what he was doing alone and on the strut, so finely arrayed, he admitted naïvely that he was showing off a new coat, and had set out with a friend, but had lost sight of him. His new companions could scarcely wonder at it. ‘Do you need us to take you home, Charlie?’ his sister asked with false solicitousness. ‘You may take my arm and I shall guide you, and not let you stumble. I’m not sure you’re safe out on your own.’
He didn’t seem to take offence at being teased; presumably, he was well used to it. ‘You don’t understand fashion, Melia, that’s the thing. These shirt-points of mine are all the crack – can’t expect a mere female to appreciate the finer points of what’s the rage among the more discerning fellows.’
‘No,’ she said, ‘I don’t understand it at all, it’s perfectly true.’ But she nobly refrained from asking either of her other male companions, who could both see their own feet without any trouble, if they did either, and so Lord Charles joined the party, taking his sister’s other arm without further protest.
On the one hand, Marcus thought, since the whole of the haut ton appeared to have decided to take the air this fine afternoon, one couldn’t be enormously surprised to encounter any members of it in particular; on the other, there did seem to be some sort of malign fate in operation once again, since it was not five minutes later that they bumped, in his case literally, into his widowed sister-in-law and her small family party.
Lord Thornfalcon was fully recovered from his bayonet wound and the debilitating fever that had followed it, and restored to excellent physical condition, or he might have been knocked from his feet when he was violently accosted by a diminutive whirlwind in the shape of his niece. She must have run at him from some considerable distance, for she had picked up speed and momentum, so that when she crashed into him and seized him about the legs, he staggered at the impact, but providentially did not fall. She clung to him like a monkey and looked up, saying winsomely, ‘Uncle Marcus! I am so happy to see you! You do not come to visit us, though I wish you would, and it has been an age since we stayed with you. I hope you are quite well?’ He could hear, faintly, passing ladies who had happened to observe the scene cooing over the young Miss Thornfalcon’s adorableness, and her obvious and deeply touching affection for her uncle.
As a child about Priscilla’s age, Marcus had had an expensive mechanical toy bought for him by his fond godmother: a soldier in a red-painted metal coat, who had marched across the room and crashed satisfyingly into furniture and walls, but only, of course, if its owner had activated the mechanism and pointed it in the chosen direction. Priscilla had long since reminded him of this toy, since she seemed to have as little will of her own as the automaton, but went where her mother told her, and said exactly what her mother had primed her to say. She was an apt pupil, there could be no doubt, but she was still just a child for all her calculated tricks. Though it took a strong effort of will for him not to recoil from her whenever he met her, he tried hard to conceal it. ‘Good afternoon, Priscilla,’ he said now, unable to insert any enthusiasm into his voice, wishing she would let go of him. He would welcome her childish affection for him gladly, however difficult the circumstances, could he only credit it as genuine.
‘Priscilla!’ said Lavinia in tones of gentle indulgence, approaching in an altogether more ordered fashion and smiling up at him, a vision of silver-gilt loveliness that could still make him blink, despite everything. ‘I know you are excessively glad to see your dear uncle after so long, and I cannot blame you for it, but it is not at all ladylike to run, you know, nor to seize him in such an unmannerly fashion. I pray you, remember that your noble uncle sustained a grievous injury in his nation’s service, not long since! I am sorry, Marcus – I hope you will pardon my poor child’s natural enthusiasm. She is so very fond of you, and of course, we cannot forget that she has no papa now to love her.’
There weren’t enough passersby who could overhear to make an actual audible sensation – though it was truly surprising how Lavinia’s silvery voice carried – but Marcus felt rather than heard a stir run through those who could. There was another low sound too, which he thought was his sister, making rude gagging noises behind him. And at his side, Lady Amelia was stifling something, possibly giggles.
