Miss Truelove Beckons (Classic Regency Romances Book 12) Read online

  • • •

  Annie, Arabella’s maid, was combing out her long, silvery blonde tresses, when Lady Swinley marched into the room.

  “Leave us, Annie.”

  “She is not done, Mother,” Arabella said crossly. She was not in the mood for another of her mother’s lectures on what a young lady should do to entrap a man into marriage. “I like her to do one hundred strokes and she was only to eighty-three.”

  “Then she can come back and do the other seventeen later. Off with you, Annie. My dressing table needs tidying.”

  The girl curtseyed and left, quietly closing the door behind her. Arabella gave a martyred sigh and resigned herself to her fate. She flounced over to her bed and climbed up on it, using the little stool beside to mount the high mattress. Her mother followed her and stood at the bedside.

  Arabella watched her mother, waiting for the lecture to begin. What was she doing wrong now? Had she eaten too much dinner? Had she laughed too loudly at Lord Conroy’s jokes? Had she not held her back straight enough, or her nose high enough or . . . there seemed to be a never-ending stream of things she was doing wrong, all of which could be fatal errors in the calculated campaign to win Lord Drake’s attention and secure a proposal. Which was ridiculous. After all, she knew how to charm a man, and had had her share of proposals.

  But nothing was good enough for her mother, it seemed. Never did Arabella reach the height of perfection her mother sought. It was exhausting being on one’s guard all the time, never able to truly be oneself. Lady Swinley paced up and down the length of the gold and green counterpaned bed, her pinched face drawn with a harried expression.

  “What is it, Mother?” Arabella asked, feeling a stirring of dread; she was afraid some unknown disaster had her mother panicked.

  “How do you think it goes between you and Lord Drake?”

  Deciding on honesty, Arabella said, “Not well. He is polite, and kind enough, but he has those frightful moods when he just stares into space, and . . . and I have heard his nightmares at night. Have you not? His screams?” It all came spilling out, then, all the worries she had been fretting about over the past weeks. “And the servants whisper that he is not quite right in the head, that Waterloo left him damaged somehow,” she said, finally. “Mama, what if I do not want to marry him?”

  Lady Swinley stared at her daughter, her eyes staring like boiled gooseberries from her face. “None of that, Arabella. Do you want your cousin to snatch this coronet right out of your hand?”

  Arabella plucked at the bedcover. “No, I don’t want her to marry Lord Drake. She would become a viscountess, and it should not suit me to have to follow her in to dinner, nor to give way to her. And she would be presented at court! Lord, what a mull she would make of that. Can you see little True swamped in court dress and diamonds?”

  If she thought to bring a smile to her mother’s face, as a little ridicule of True usually did, it was not to be. Lady Swinley frowned, still, and patted the bedcover absently, while she stared at her daughter.

  “You must marry Lord Drake, Arabella. If you find him distasteful, then do what I did with your father; close your eyes while he has his way and count to one hundred, or fashion a new dress in your imagination, or think of new wallpaper for the dining room.”

  Arabella gasped at the indelicacy of her mother’s speech. Never had her mother spoken of the intimate side of marriage, and really Arabella knew very little, other than what ridiculous posturings she had witnessed among the animals on the farm near True’s home as they did their business. If that was what humans did, she would be hard-pressed to keep her mind on wall coverings and not burst out laughing.

  “It’s not that I find him distasteful, exactly,” Arabella said, trying to put into words her fear of being tied for life to a man of such dour moods. He wasn’t like that all the time, but occasionally he would have one of his, what she called privately “spasms,” and then he would stare off into space with no notice of the company. And his shrieks in the night! She shivered and crawled under the covers. “I don’t want to talk about it, Mother. I am doing my best, and if I do not get him, I will get someone when we go to London in the spring. I promise.”

  “There will be no Season in London next year if you do not marry Lord Drake,” Lady Swinley said harshly.

  “What do you mean?” In the flickering candlelight of her room, Arabella could see her mother’s expression, and it was terrifying to her. There was despair in her eyes, and fear. She looked quite old.

  Lady Swinley twisted her hands together and stared down at them. “We have no money,” she said. “We are well and truly in the suds.”

  Chapter Nine

  Lady Leathorne decided not to force a closeness between her son and the girl she had thought would make him a suitable bride; no more picnics or games arranged to show Arabella to her best advantage, no more planning or scheming. Though she still thought them well suited when she saw them together—both were tall, remarkably good-looking, and intelligent—she had begun to feel that perhaps Drake would make his own choice in time and be happy in a way Lady Leathorne had never considered possible in marriage. If his own choice proved to be Arabella Swinley, then all the better, but it would be his choice.

  She, herself, had married so young, at sixteen, a man her parents had chosen. It had been an adequate marriage neither very good nor very bad. Though Lord Leathorne was kind, he was not clever. Never had she been able to share with him her deepest thoughts and wishes without him frowning in perplexity and requesting her to speak in plain English. It had made for a lonely life in many ways, for she had never been fashionable enough to take a lover. But she could not repine. She was fortunate that George was kindhearted and lacking in the most distressing vices. He did not drink to excess nor gamble, and he was discreet when satisfying his sexual needs. What more could a wife of her rank expect?

  Love, perhaps? A companionship of the mind, a mate of the soul? Those things were not thought to be necessary or even desirable by parents looking for a husband for an eligible daughter in her day. And yet what could life be if one was so blessed? She thought she would leave Drake to run his life for himself. She would try to, anyway. It was so tempting to interfere, for his own good.

  The leaves were starting to turn from green to gold as the days shortened. There had been a few days of steady rain and the house party had felt dull, but finally a day dawned sunny and bright, and now, after luncheon, the young people had gone into the nearest village to visit the library there and make some frivolous purchases. Lady Leathorne had had one of the footmen drag a couple of chairs outside on the terrace and she sat facing the sun, allowing her skin, for once, the full force of sunlight.

  “You will get spots, Jessica.”

  Lady Leathorne opened her eyes to see Isabella, Lady Swinley, standing by the other chair, bonnet firmly tied and shading her white skin. “And what does that matter at my age?” she returned with a smile. “Sit with me, Isa. There is no one else here today, and I find I am enjoying the quiet.”

  Lady Swinley took the other chair but sat stiffly, as though she had never learned to relax. “I am glad to find you alone, I must confess.”

  Lady Leathorne gazed over at her old friend, at the concern on her pinched face, the worry on her brow. “What is wrong? Has anything happened?”

  “No, of course not,” Lady Swinley said. “I do have some concerns, but it is nothing that cannot be worked out.”

  “Out with it, Isa.” She had a feeling she knew what Isabella was going to say. It had been coming on over the last week, as Lady Leathorne allowed the house party to devolve into a relaxed gathering feeling strangely family-like. Of course Isabella was one of her oldest friends, and Arabella her daughter. Conroy was like a son to her, he had spent so much time in their home when Drake and he were boys. His parents were not a comfortable sort of couple, and he seemed to prefer Lea Park to home. Miss Becket she had just met a few weeks before, but there was an oddly peaceful quality a
bout her company that Lady Leathorne appreciated. In short, it was not the sort of formal “engagement party” visit Isabella had perhaps envisioned.

  “It has been weeks, Jessica. We came here, Arabella and I, to match her to your son. I expected your help—thought we had agreed on tactics, even—but you have given up!” Isabella’s voice was harsh, with an unattractive note of desperation.

  “I have not given up, I just think that perhaps, after all, the children should choose for themselves.”

  “Jessica!” The woman looked shocked. “I had thought we felt alike on this subject. We did not choose our husbands, and we did just fine.”

  “Did we?” Lady Leathorne glanced up at the house. Her husband, she knew, was writing a letter in the library, or was when last she saw him. It was half past two or thereabouts, so he would be consuming his midday port at that moment. A creature of habit was her George. Then he would look at the accounts—though he had never and would never understand them—and meet with his steward.

  They had been married for over thirty-five years, and yet never had she felt more than a kind of irritated affection for Leathorne. And she had been mightily glad when he had stopped coming to her bed, for his fumbling attentions were wearisome at best. It was rumored that he visited a plump, complaisant barmaid in the village on his rare nights out, and that was just fine with her. “Would it have hurt us to look around and decide for ourselves?”

  “That is just the kind of thinking that leads to trouble. It is what I allowed Arabella to do in London. Three Seasons, and she could not decide on anyone!”

  That was not strictly true, and Lady Leathorne knew it; Isabella forgot the letter she had written to her old friend worrying over her daughter’s apparent determination to wed Lord Sweetan, a mere younger son. Isabella had put an end to that, and considered that she was doing her duty. And yet it would not have been a bad match if the girl truly loved the young man.

  Lady Swinley continued. “We always said that if Drake came back home unwed, and if Arabella had not decided on a husband, that we would marry them off to each other.” Isabella was leaning forward in her chair, her narrow face grim. “Do you not want grandchildren?”

  There was a sharp edge to her friend’s voice that Lady Leathorne did not like. They had not in years spent this much time together, and she could not help but wonder if their friendship was just habit now. What did they have in common besides unwed children of a certain age? They rarely spoke of anything beyond fashion or London society, neither of which interested Lady Leathorne in truth. She really knew little of what her friend thought or felt. Was there something more to Isabella’s determination to see the two wed besides a wish to see her daughter comfortably settled?

  “You know I want grandchildren. More important to me, though, is Drake’s health. I had not realized how badly he was wounded at Waterloo, and it went deeper than that awful saber cut to his leg. He has been so very troubled. I want him well.”

  “He looks perfectly fine to me. Certainly, he still walks with a limp and needs that cane when he is tired, but he is fully capable of walking down the aisle and fathering a few children. He is capable of that, is he not?”

  Isabella’s inquisitive expression reminded Lady Leathorne of a ferret, nose twitching, beady eyes fixed. The frightening realization came to her that in truth, if she was ruthlessly honest, she did not like Isabella Swinley anymore. And the more time she spent with her, the more she found to criticize. And this was to be her son’s mother-in-law? All her joy in the bright and beautiful fall weather was quickly fleeing in the face of her friend’s adamant refusal to understand her.

  And so she would have to take the tone she took with subordinates and her husband. “I will not coax, cajole, trick or wheedle my son into marriage. It is a miracle of God that he is alive at all, and if he wants to spend the rest of his days as a bachelor, I will be unhappy, but it is his life. Marriage will be his own choice, and will occur when he is ready.” Lady Leathorne stood.

  “My daughter turned down perfectly good offers of marriage with the understanding that your son was hers!” Isabella Swinley leaped to her feet. “You cannot back out of our agreement, Jessica. It is not right!”

  “That is not my concern. My understanding was that if she found someone to her taste, she was to feel free to accept him. We had no agreement, or at least, I have come to think that we did not have any right to make an agreement when it concerns two young lives. Drake is his own man. I could not force him into this marriage even if I was of a mind to.” Lady Leathorne turned and walked back through the glass terrace doors and into the blue saloon.

  • • •

  The drapes were drawn in the music room against the evening darkness, and Arabella moodily leafed through the selections available. Lord Conroy, as always, was hovering nearby to lend her support if she needed anything. Lord Drake was quietly reading a paper, his gaunt, handsome face somber at some news he was reading. He had had another of his nightmares the night before, she was sure of it; she had heard screams, and then silence. His nightly perturbations were supposed to be a great secret, but Lord Conroy—Nathan, as he had begged her to call him—had told her that Lord Drake had the most frightful dreams in which he was dying on that awful battlefield.

  While one could not help respecting such a man, a man who had risen to his ranking of major-general at an astonishingly young age—there were only one or two in Wellington’s army who had attained the rank younger—it did not mean that she thought she could stomach lying with such a man as he thrashed and screamed. It gave her the cold horrors. And yet, what choice had she? Her mother’s announcement a few nights before had left her dazed, but with the knowledge that her future was plain. She either coaxed the recalcitrant viscount into marriage or dwindled into poverty-stricken old age, unmarried, unwanted.

  It was just too much! It was all very well for someone like True to be a spinster, but she, the Honorable Miss Arabella Swinley, most beautiful diamond to illuminate the ballrooms of London in years, had seemed destined for a brilliant marriage. It was all her mother’s fault! She tossed the music aside. She had been very willing to marry the gay, amusing Lord Sweetan the previous spring, but he, poor fellow, was merely the youngest son of the Duke of Brefort—a prolific papa of seven boys and four girls—and had little money, or at least little in her mother’s estimation. She did not think seven thousand a year was so very near poverty. Her mother had put a stop to it, though, with the reminder that she had very much liked Viscount Drake, and that he was hers for the asking.

  And truth to tell, Lord Sweetan’s glory paled in comparison to her memories of Lord Drake, so she had not been so very hard to persuade.

  Unfortunately, the viscount she had met the previous year had little in common with this brooding, disturbed and wounded ex-soldier. In his regimentals, and with a fund of amusing stories and dashing adventures to tell, he had seemed the perfect beau. Now he was positively frightening, or at least the thought of his nightmares was, and she could not picture being tied for life to a man like him.

  She glanced over at True, who sat in the lamplight at Lord Drake’s side and sewed. Lord, but they looked like an old married couple! He reading the paper and her sewing a hem. She tossed her blonde curls and selected a piece at random. Such boredom was not for her. Perhaps she would marry Lord Drake after all—with their financial situation she supposed she did not really have a choice—but if she did, she would make him take her to London. He would buy her jewels and a high-perch phaeton with four white ponies, and they would stay at Leathorne Place in Mayfair. If she had to marry the gloomy Lord Drake to attain her rightful place in the world, then so be it. She would do as her mother wished, and at night she would close her eyes and think of plumes for her ponies.

  • • •

  “Will you walk on the terrace with me? I have something I wish to ask you.”

  True’s heart thumped, but she put aside the first ridiculous thought that had sprung into her foolis
h brain at Drake’s whispered words. He had discarded his paper some time ago and sat gravely listening to Arabella’s dramatic performance on the piano. Her cousin was really a brilliant pianist, as good as many professionals. It was the one ability True envied Arabella but had never been able to learn. The vicarage piano was old and out of tune, and that must be her excuse for her inability. Arabella had just started another equally difficult piece, when Lord Drake had whispered his request to her. She slipped out onto the terrace after him, away from the evening gathering in the music room. All eyes were on Arabella, as Conroy turned the pages for her. The music room was next to the blue saloon, and so it opened out onto the terrace, too, through large glass doors.

  Her first thought at his words had been, He means to ask me to marry him! but of course that was impossible. Ridiculous! What could have entered her brain to think such a thing? Never, by word or gesture, had Drake given her any reason to expect that he would repeat his impetuous offer of marriage, an offer spurred only by his sense of honor and feeling that he had compromised her. It had been a week since that afternoon by the river, and in that time they had often walked together, talking about anything and everything, as Lord Conroy and Arabella amused themselves.

  True was puzzled that Arabella did not make more of a push to attach the viscount, but she seemed to almost fear him sometimes. She had confessed to True that Drake’s nightmares—his screams had awoken the household a few times in the night, including the night before—frightened her. And yet still, she seemed determined to have him. When they were together, she gave every indication of finding him fascinating and irresistible.