Lord Jack spoke up. “I’m actually starting to feel sorry for you, brother.”
“I don’t want your pity,” Baynton answered.
“Thatwassarcasm,” Lord Jack informed him, and his dry quip startled a laugh out of Sarah... and once she started, she couldn’t stop, especially when the duke gave his brother one of his lowering looks he’d been directing at her whenever she’d dared to question his opinions.
And this whole trip had been for naught.
Yes, she was glad she was here to protect her niece... but she needn’t protect her from Lord Jack. Even a blind woman could tell he loved Char. And Sarah, whose principles had included a belief that a woman should do exactly as she wished, had come to realize she had no right to stop Char. Not from this marriage or from going to Boston. Char had had more faith in herself than Sarah ever had.
Sarah just wished she’d realized all this before having to spend days in Baynton’s insufferable company. She had probably lost her position at the Haymarket by now because she had been gone so long—and faced with her own culpability Sarah could only laugh all the more. It was all so absurd. Who wassheto tell Char whom to love?
“Are you all right?” Char asked.
Sarah tried to catch her breath, to bring herself under control, but then a burly blacksmith in his leather apron and big clopping boots walked through the room on his way to another, and she started laughing again. Only in Scotland could this happen.
Char noticed him as well and she began to chuckle. Laughter could be infectious. Then the minister and his wife started laughing and they all seemed to feed on each other.
The only ones not joining them were the brothers Whitridge.
Sarah tried to explain. “It is all so incredible,” she said, gasping for breath. “We’re in Scotland and it took days for us to arrive here and now we are here and why?Why?”
“She’s daft,” the duke said to Lord Jack. “That is what happens when women read too much, and she reads. She reads everything.”
Yesterday when the duke had said that, Sarah had been so angry she’d threatened to walk back to London. Today, right now, it struck her as hilariously funny.
And then the duke really sent her into laughter when he said to his brother, “Do you really want to marry into this madness?”
“I do,” Lord Jack answered. He shrugged as if he could not help himself and he began to laugh as well—and the duke lost his temper.
“Then the devil with all of you.” He turned on his heel and went walking out the door.
That sobered Sarah.
“Wait—” she started, but he was gone. She wouldn’t put it past him to drive away. She looked to Lord Jack. “Go talk to him. Now.Go.”
“I will not. He has ruined everything I’ve tried to build with his jealousy. He wants to claim the woman I love.”
“Do you truly love her?” Sarah asked, watching him closely.
“With all my heart,” he answered without hesitation.
“And you, Charlene. Have you thought this through? You do realize that if you marry him, we may never see each other again.” A hardness formed in her chest. “He’s been very clear to Baynton and everyone that he considers himself an American.”
“I love you for what you’ve done for me,” Charlene answered, and then added with a new maturity, “but this man has become my family. Sarah, I can’t imagine living without him. My home is with him. I would have you come with us—”
“Oh, I won’t do that. I can’t. My plays... George promised Sunday that he is thinking of staging one this summer. This is my chance. I’ve worked hard.”
“Our door will always be open to you, won’t it, Jack?”
“Absolutely.”
Sarah placed her hand on Char’s shoulder. “It hurts to give you up. My life was empty until you came into it. And now, well...”
“I love you, Sarah. I can never repay you for what you’ve done.”
“Yes, you can,” Sarah answered, realizing a truth. “You can repay me by living your own life fully and completely. You have my blessing, Char. Be happy with your life.”
Any response to her gracious words was cut off by the sound of shouting outside. It was the duke. The horses were apparently protesting being asked to move after finally reaching what they had hoped was their destination. They had been ready for a good rubdown and their dinner.
