She had been horrified to see him again a couple of weeks ago. He had been equally aghast when he had realized who she was and what she had once overheard him say of her. He was the last manon earth she could ever think of marrying, she had told herself repeatedly. Yet she was doing just that. She was the last woman on earthhewould ever dream of marrying. Yet he was coming to Stratton House on a formal call, presumably to make her an offer.
The autocratic nature of the Duke of Wilby was no excuse for either of them, especially her. They were thinking, reasonably intelligent adults, she and the Marquess of Roath. If he must marry and she wished to marry, there was no reason on earth why it should be to each other. He was extremely eligible, probably more so than any other single gentleman in London this spring. The same might be said of her among the ladies, though therewasthat duke’s daughter, Lady Morgan Bedwyn. Why did the Duke of Wilby not insist that he marryher? The success of her own debut had assured Philippa that she would almost certainly have marriage offers, some of them eligible, one or two of them—surely—attractive to her.
But the marquess was coming to confer with Devlin, to make an offer for her hand—though Dev had suggested that he kill him for her instead. Not quite literally, of course, but as near as he lawfully could. At the very least he had wanted to send the Marquess of Roath on his way with a flea in his ear and perhaps a boot to his backside.
She had told him that no, it would not do. She would not have her brother fight her battles, literally or otherwise. She had a few things of her own to say to Lord Roath beforeshesent him away. She would make it clear to him that he must never come back, never again broach the subject of marriage with her, never deliberately seek her out at any social event they were both attending. And this time she would make it clear that she meant it. If necessary, she would have a similar conversation with the Duke of Wilby. If he felt it imperative that his grandson marry soon, then he must look elsewhere.Shewas not going to marry him, in haste or at leisure.
So there had been her restless night. And there had been the six different dresses she had tried on and rejected after breakfast before fixing upon one she had had for three years and had always considered rather plain even for the country. It was one in which she felt comfortable, however. Hence the fact that it had been packed and brought to town with her. Her maid had looked a bit dubious but had held her tongue after one glance at Philippa’s face. Shehadsuggested leaving some tendrils of hair loose, though, and curling them becomingly about Lady Philippa’s face and along her neck after she had been instructed to confine the hair in a simple knot at the back of her head.
“That would be anunsimple knot, Madeline,” Philippa had told her. “It is not what I asked for.”
All the servants, of course, down to the lowliest scullery maid and boot boy, would know that she was in expectation of a marriage offer this morning. They would know too who was to make that offer. How servants found out such things was a mystery, since one never actually saw any of them with an ear pressed to a keyhole.
Mama and Gwyneth and even Stephanie—ought she not to be in the schoolroom with Miss Field?—had looked her over critically when she joined them in the morning room.
“I have always loved that dress on you,” Stephanie had said, beaming. “It is the perfect color for you, and you absolutely do not need any fussiness to enhance your beauty.”
“My mother would agree with you, Steph,” Gwyneth had said. “She once observed that Pippa could wear a brown sack and still outshine every other woman in a room. I begin to think she was right.”
“But you do have some very smart and pretty new dresses,” her mother had said ruefully.
The three of them had returned to their various activitieswithout saying anything more. They must have realized that Philippa was not in the mood to talk. Perhaps they thought she was just nervous. They had looked at her again only when the butler came to ask her to join his lordship in the library.
“Just remember, Pippa,” her mother had said, “that no woman is under an obligation to accept the first proposal of marriage that comes her way. Or the second or twenty-second for that matter.”
“Go with your heart, Pippa,” Gwyneth had said with a radiant smile. “Somehow nothing else seems to work.”
Gwyneth had been almost betrothed last year to a Welshman, a rather famous musician, who had seemed suited to her in every possible way. She had broken off the connection in order to marry Devlin. No one doubted that it was a love match on both their parts.
“Pippa will do the right thing,” Stephanie had said, closing her book with a snap—it looked like the eight-hundred-page one. She had beamed again at her sister.
Pippa will do the right thing,Philippa thought as she made her way downstairs behind the butler. Butwouldshe? Perhaps it would help if she knew what the right thingwas.Well, shedidknow. At least, the sane, rational part of her did. Alas, there were other, more unruly parts of herself that did not react rationally to anything. It was all very confusing.Go with your heart...
He was dressed with immaculate elegance, she saw as soon as she stepped into the library. He was standing to one side of the fireplace while Devlin was seated at the other side. His dark green tailed coat, surely made by the famous Weston himself, molded his powerful frame. His shirt points beneath it were crisply starched and fashionably high, cupping his cheekbones but not threatening to poke out his eyeballs, as they did on some of the more ridiculous dandies, who took fashion to extremes. His neckcloth had been tiedwith artistic but not ostentatious precision. Buff breeches hugged his muscled thighs. His boots were of supple black leather and were highly polished. His dark red hair was shining and fashionably disheveled.
Well, she had never doubted that he was perfect to look upon, had she? His outer appearance had nothing to say to anything, however, except that villainy really ought not to look like that.
And then, just a minute or so later, she was alone with him and seated on the chair from which Devlin had just risen. She would not be put at a disadvantage of height, though, and have him looming over her while they talked.
“Please sit down, Lord Roath,” she said.
He sat across from her and they gazed at each other. Neither rushed into speech. She was the first to break the silence.
“I loved my father very dearly,” she heard herself say. She had not even tried to plan ahead of time what she would say to him. She would have forgotten the thread of any rehearsed speech and got herself all tied up in knots. She had not even been sure she would sayanythinguntil he did, and then she would merely respond to his lead.
“Yes,” he said.
“He always seemed wonderful and perfect to me,” she said. “Perhaps all daughters feel that way about their fathers. But everyone appeared to think the same of mine. You have said you did not know him. He was large and handsome and always cheerful and smiling and generous. He was... charming, though that is not quite a strong enough word. He drew people to him like a magnet. He talked to everyone. He visited everyone. Not just people of our own class, buteveryone.He loved to talk and he loved to entertain. It seemed to me that everyone loved him in return. We were a very happy family. We were a happy neighborhood, very largely due tohim. I realize that my memories are those of a child and young girl. There are things a child does not see or understand or think about critically. But I believe even the adults of our acquaintance would have largely agreed with me.”
“I believe you,” he said.
She frowned. “He had a strong sense of duty and responsibility,” she said. “He always came here to London in the spring to attend Parliament as a member of the House of Lords. He came even though Mama chose to stay at Ravenswood with us. He often wept as he hugged us all goodbye and wept again with happiness as he hugged us on his return. I never doubted his sincerity. I still do not.”
He did not say anything though she paused. His eyes searched her face and she wondered if she was about to dissolve into tears herself. But she would not allow it. Goodness, there was nothing new about this story. She had lived with it all her life.
“And then, when I was fifteen,” she said, “he brought a... woman with him from London and set her up in a cottage in Boscombe. Oh, not openly, of course. They did not arrive together. She was a supposed widow whose husband, a military man, had been killed in some skirmish in India. She had chosen Boscombe sight unseen because she had heard it was a quiet place where she could do her mourning in peace. Except that she did not dress or behave like a grief-stricken widow. Inevitably the truth came out that she was no random stranger who had arrived out of the blue in our midst. Devlin caught her and my father alone together in a temple pavilion close to our house while a ball for the whole neighborhood was in progress. He made a very public fuss about it. The bubble of our happiness burst, and life changed for all of us in various ways. Even for our neighbors. Ravenswood had always been the center of the universe for people for miles around—or so Ibelieved. It was the focus of numerous grand social events and innumerable more minor ones throughout the year. They all came to an abrupt end. And my brothers went away to war. All except Owen, who went off to school.”
She paused for a few moments, her eyes upon her hands in her lap.
