At supper, he managed to stay with his last partner, a girl from a village to the south of Brinchester, who had a large, noisy family to wrap him in their merriment and, he devoutly hoped, protect him from the Merrington ladies. After that, he felt himself free to hide away in the card room, and on the journey back to Staineybank, he was able to find a place in the duke’s carriage.
“Denny, what am I to do?” he said, as his valet readied him for bed in the small hours of the morning. “All my efforts to avoid Charlotte are for nought with such determined sisters pushing me towards her.”
“No one can force you to marry her,” Denny said, with a lift of one shoulder. “Besides, one dance at a public assembly is hardly sufficient for the girl to be ordering her wedding clothes.”
“But it was the first dance, which is always more significant, and there is clearly some expectation there.”
“You could always bolt back to the Metropolis,” Denny said.
“That would look as if I am avoiding her.”
“Which you are. I know why you stay here, my friend, but—”
“Do you?”
“Of course. Your rough sketch book, the one you never show anyone, is full of her face, and a very lovely face it is too.”
Lance sighed and shook his head. “There are no secrets from one’s valet, are there?”
“None at all, my friend. But do not agonise over this. The woman you love is entirely out of your reach, but you could have a perfectly contented marriage with an amiable woman who devotes herself to making you happy. Look at Payne, with little Sophia — a most ordinary girl, yet he is ecstatic over her. And Richard Merrington, who apparently offered for the impoverished vicar’s daughter on a whim, now thinks the sun rises and sets at her command.”
“You think I should marry Charlotte?”
“You could do worse — alotworse. But if you truly hate the idea, then run away. That can work, too. I speak with some authority on the subject, after all.”
Lance laughed. “Very well. Running away it is. Not tomorrow… I mean today. That would look too particular, and then it is the Sabbath, but Monday… we shall leave on Monday.”
***
This happy plan lasted for no longer than a few hours. Lance had taken his sketchbook and charcoals to the Music Room, where he hoped the painted ceiling would give him inspiration for his own designs for the new ballroom. Mrs Merringtonwas there, practising on the pianoforte, which made a pleasant background for his work.
After a while, he became aware that the music had stopped. When he looked up from his sketchbook, Mrs Merrington had turned on the music stool to watch him, her head tipped a little to one side, as if considering a problem.
“Madam?” he said politely. “Am I disturbing you? I can work elsewhere, if so, but the music is so—”
“You puzzle me exceedingly, Mr Chamberlain,” she said in her soft voice. “I cannot make you out at all, and so I am forced to address the matter directly. It is not what I would choose, since it is for Richard to take responsibility, but as he will not stir himself, it falls to me to do so.”
“I see,” he said, although having no idea what she meant.
“You like Charlotte, I think, Mr Chamberlain?”
Ah. So that was the matter to be addressed directly. This was going to be difficult.
“Who could not?” he said lightly.
“Quite so. And you… well, you flirt with her a great deal, do you not? You have always flirted with her, even when you were engaged to another woman, which was not quite proper. However, I say nothing about that. But then your engagement was broken, and ever since then, you have veered from your old flirtatious ways to treating poor Charlotte with the utmost coldness, and leaving her in a torment of uncertainty. Her hopes are raised one minute, only to be dashed down the next, so that she hardly knows whether she is coming or going. She is a good girl and makes no fuss, so perhaps you are not aware how much of her affection has already been bestowed upon you, but I do not scruple to tell you that it breaksmyheart to see her in such distress. I would not have her made unhappy by any man’s thoughtlessness, so I feel it only proper to give you a hint.”
“Thank you,” he said in a low voice. “I… I was not aware…”
“Precisely,” she said crisply, rising from the stool and shaking out her skirts. “Are now that you have been made aware, you will know how to act, I am sure.”
She swept regally out of the room, leaving Lance shaking from the fierceness of the assault. He knew precisely how she expected him to act… how a gentleman should act, when the expectation of marriage has been raised. Yet every fibre of his being rebelled, screaming at him not to do it. Yet he must. However little he wanted to, he must marry Charlotte.
He could not tell how long he sat, unmoving, his elbows on his knees, head low. He heard nothing, but he knew the instant she entered the room.
Lifting his head, he said warily, “Lily.”
She pulled forward a footstool and sat at his feet. “Mrs Merrington told us all about it. Not Charlotte… she is in the basement somewhere, seeing about the dinner, and we are forbidden from saying anything to her, but her mother is so much in alt that she told the rest of us. She has‘resolved poor Charlotte’s situation’, as she put it. But tell me, Lance, has Charlotte given you any indication that she is expecting your addresses? For it seems to me that she is remarkably calm in your presence for a woman supposedly deep in love.”
