She moved jerkily, selecting random canvases with barely a look, hands shaking. What a coward, to welcome this reprieve! Jack’s gaze was on her as she moved about the room, but the captain stayed, talking without pause, obsequiously praising every canvas before taking it from her hands with exaggerated care. When both men were loaded, she followed them back to the parlour.
There was no other opportunity to speak privately with Jack again. But the ordeal eventually came to a close—at least temporarily. The Ortons left, but not before giving animpossible-to-decline invitation to dine at Lady Ashburton’s that night.
Lucy sagged onto the sofa as the door closed behind them, grateful for a few minutes’ respite, Caroline having gone to speak to her housekeeper after seeing their guests to the door. Eyes closed, heels of her palms pressed against them, she breathed slowly in and out until the darkness of her vision danced with dots. But when she opened them again, nothing had changed. The cursorily inspected canvases lay stacked against the wall, and she got to her feet, taking as many as she could carry, and tiredly returned them to her studio. She’d just gone back to the parlour for another load when George Simmons walked into the room on the heels of a hurried knock.
“Mr Simmons!”
“Miss Fanshaw!”
“We have to tell Jack!”
They stopped in confusion, for they’d said that last part in unison.
George recovered first, smiling grimly. “We seem to be of one mind, at least.” He gestured to the sofa, and Lucy took a seat. “Tell me what has happened,” he said kindly, sitting near her, where the captain had lately sat. “You look sorely troubled.”
“Oh, Mr Simmons, it is awful! His mother, all of them, Nell and Nora, they all seem convinced Jack must be about to offer for me at any moment—now I’m supposedly an heiress, which I amnot. They are continually dropping hints, and it isagonyhaving them all act as though Jack is inlovewith me, of all things, and that we are as good as married! He hates it too, of course he does. And I think he will tell his mother about our engagement just to put an end to it. It’s only a matter of time. Andthenwhere we will be?”
“In a rare mess, alright,” muttered George. “And I thought things were already bad enough.”
“Why? What is it? You agree with me—but why?”
She was hardly coherent in her urgency to know what had brought George here in almost as agitated a state as her own. His normally mild countenance was tight, unhappy, and very serious.
He let out a breath. “Jack himself.”
Lucy’s heart twisted, but Caroline came into the room before George could say more.
“Excellent, the very two people I wanted to see. Yes, yes,” she smiled, coming to sit with them, amused by their woebegone expressions. “You’re both right. It’s time to tell him.” She smoothed her skirt with a brush of one hand then adjusted a hair pin, still smiling at them both. It was fair to say she was preening. “The cure has run its course. I knew he wouldn’t like the taste of the medicine, but I suppose”—she gave a laugh—“that was rather the point.”
“How you can laugh, Caroline,” began George, “when our friend—”
“George, George! One has to be cruel to be kind.”
“Not this cruel.”
“Don’t fall out with me. I’ll take all the blame. Indeed, itwasall my doing, but it was done for good reasons, you agree with that at least.”
“I believe it was hardly necessary.”
“Perhaps if you’d wanted them to wait another seven years and maybe suffer a failed marriage or two along the way.Ihave no regrets, George. I’m good, but I’m not kind. That’s the difference between us. The end justified the means.” She turned her attention to Lucy, who was entirely confused, and smiled a proud, satisfied smile. “And it has all ended well, hasn’t it?”
“I…I don’t really understand.”
Miss Sedgewick’s smile took on a cunning slant. “You will. Tonight. When you tell Jack the truth.”
Still confused, Lucy looked to George for help. He started to speak, but Caroline raised a hand, cutting him off.
“No, George. Lucy must be the one to do it.”
“Caroline,” George said, an unfamiliar note of steel in his voice. “You didn’t see Jack last night. He is suffering. He is not himself. If he is angry…I would not subject Miss Fanshaw to that.”
Caroline only laughed. “He won’t be angry, George. He’ll be anything but.”
Twenty-Eight
Jack dressed with meticulous care though he left his house for Ashburton’s with few hopes for a pleasant evening.
He’d decided to find an opportunity to speak with his mother privately before the other guests arrived. He couldn’t stand to have Lucy embarrassed by an evening of fruitless matchmaking hints. The visit to Caroline’s had been bad enough. Torture, really, for both of them, though for very different reasons.
