A Regency Charade (15 page)

But Craymore, the butler, opened the door at that moment, and it was too late to escape. The aging butler had known Alec since childhood (when both his parents were alive and occupied this very house), and the warmth of his greeting shone through his butlerish impassivity. In fact, Craymore permitted himself the liberty of pumping his lordship’s hand enthusiastically and remarking how very glad he was to see him back. “Her ladyship’s expecting you, my lord,” he said as soon as the greetings were exchanged. “If you’ll just step this way to the drawing room …”

Chapter Eleven

Alec could see, in the butler’s prompt closing of the drawing room doors behind him and the absence of anyone else in the room but Priss, who was standing in the window embrasure, that his wife had taken pains to ensure their privacy. She had evidently been watching for him, for she turned from the window with a smile of relief. “I was beginning to fear you wouldn’t come,” she said, crossing to him and holding out her hand.

He bowed over it with formal remoteness. “I
am
late. I’m sorry.”

She withdrew her hand with nervous haste. “I did not m-mean to reproach you,” she offered timidly. “You are not so
very
late, after all.”

Her painful shyness was not the sort of response he’d expected. She had always been such a spirited, self-assured creature that this unwonted meekness startled him. He peered at her intently.

He had not really seen her closely in six years (having been too unsteady in body and mind and too bemused by the circumstances of their last meeting to have taken a proper look), and the change in her struck him profoundly. It was not that she’d lost her looks—if anything, she was more beautiful than he remembered. But she’d changed in a way he had not expected: the years seemed to have somehow … his mind struggled for a word …
refined
her. Her face had a chiseled look—the hollows and planes more pronounced, the lines on the forehead and round the mouth a little darker. Her hair, bound in the back in a simple knot, had lost some of its vibrancy and seemed paler than before. Her skin, too, had lost the golden quality he remembered and was now almost as white as an alabaster sculpture. But what he found most surprising in her appearance was not that she’d lost her bloom but that she’d gained (in appearance at least) what so few of the women he’d met in society seemed to possess—character.

Balderdash
, he thought, steeling himself against the penetration of any vestige of tenderness or admiration for her,
appearances are always said to be deceiving
. She was probably still too young for her corruption to have left its marks upon her face. And how many stories had been told about women who
appeared
to be as pure as saints and yet were as faithless as Satan?

Priss blushed under his intense scrutiny. “I think you find me much changed,” she murmured, her hand flying to her hair as if she feared a strand had become loose.

“Time has not been unkind to you, ma’am, if that is what you’re asking.”

At the sound of the repulsive “ma’am” her back became rigid, and she frowned. “I was not asking for flattery, sir,” she said with a touch of her old spirit, “and if you think time has been
kind
to me, you much mistake the matter.”

She turned and walked away from him, her hands tightly clenched at her sides. When she reached the table that stood between the tall windows at the far side of the room, she stopped, leaned her hands upon it and lowered her head. “I promised myself that I would n-not behave missishly today. Forgive me.” She tried, by means of a couple of deep breaths to gather herself together, and she turned round to face him with a small, strained smile. “Please, Alec, do sit down. Would you care for a glass of Madeira?”

“No, thank you. I hope this business will not be long. I know you have something to say to me, and I’m here to listen, but we neither of us need to waste our time with these social niceties.”

“Very well, we’ll dispense with the Madeira,” she said dispiritedly and took a seat on the sofa. Indicating the wing chair facing her, she asked with the slightest touch of asperity, “Is taking a seat too much of a social nicety as well?”

Without responding, he placed his hat and cane on a small table near the sofa and sat down.

She raised her eyes to his face. Studying him with a brave directness, her mouth curved up again in an unwitting smile. “
You
certainly have changed, Alec. I never dreamed you’d turn yourself into a Corinthian. I don’t think I’ve ever laid eyes on such a dashing coat.”

He had a sudden, vivid recollection of the coat he’d worn the night he’d offered for her, from which his wrists had hung down so awkwardly from the too-short sleeves, and he couldn’t help smiling himself. “Not much like the coats I wore in my younger days, is it?” he admitted.

“I would never have surmised that you’d turn into a Dandy. Do you have a valet who polishes your Hessians with champagne and spends hours tying your neck-cloths?” she asked, letting her eyes roam over his finery with amused appreciation.

“I have my former batman who fusses over me like a mother hen, but he’d be more likely to
drink
the champagne than to use it on my boots.”

Her smile broadened. “Remember that evening in Paris when you remarked to the Compte d’Estegrize that you saw no need for valets when almost any fool could manage to dress himself after the age of five—?”

Alec, who had for so many years strictly prevented himself from indulging in reminiscences of his honeymoon tour, was drawn into the memory before he had time to set up his defenses. He burst into an unwitting guffaw and nodded in quick recollection. “And the Compte stiffened up, looked at me through his quizzing glass and said, ‘Zat, milor’ Braeburn, is because you Eengleesh, you dress for ze warmth, but we French, we dress for
le style
!’”

For the first time that day, Priss laughed out loud. It was not the humor of the story but the release from the tension of the day that brought it out. She was so delighted that she’d managed to shake Alec from the sullen stiffness of his earlier manner that her reaction was a bit extravagant.

He, of course, noticed and immediately froze. What had gotten into him to so forget himself? he wondered. “Yes …” he said quickly, “but perhaps we should get down to business, ma’am. What is it you wish to say to me?”

Her face clouded over. “I’ve gone over in my mind a thousand times … just how I should explain …” She looked at his face, as if searching for a sign of interest or warmth, but there was only an impenetrable impassivity. Her eyes flickered down uncertainly to the hands folded in her lap, and she went bravely on. “But I’m no longer clear about what it is that troubles you. Surely you must have realized by this time that the cause for which you left this house six years ago was something more imaginary than real.”

His right eyebrow shot up, and he gave her a disdainful smile. “I don’t know anything of the sort, ma’am.”

“What do you
mean
?” she asked incredulously. “You don’t
still
believe I was in love with Blake?”

“Why not? You told me so yourself.”

She leaned forward and looked at him with earnest intensity. “I told you I
had
loved him. I never said I loved him when we married. You surely can
not
believe I cared for him after we’d been wed!”

Alec jumped up from his seat in acute discomfort. “I find speaking of these matters deucedly awkward, ma’am. What good does it do to rake up all this again?”

“We
must
talk about it, Alec! I want you back again. I want to be your
wife
!”

He wheeled on her. “Your
wants
no longer concern me, don’t you understand? You’ve had what you want for too long.”

The vehemence of his tone startled her. “How can you
say
that? I’ve waited six interminable
years
for what I want …”

“Spare me, please, from any more lies. I’m no longer the green boy I was when you wheedled me into marriage.”

“
Wheedled
you!” She stared at him, aghast. “What sort of … of
coxcomb
have you become?”

“If I
am
a coxcomb, I don’t see why you wish to have me as a husband,” he retorted coldly.

She started to utter a rejoinder but found herself speechless. Putting her hands to her mouth, she shut her eyes, drew in her breath and endeavored to gain control of herself again. After a moment, she straightened up, lifted her head, folded her hands in her lap again and looked up at him. “We mustn’t let this meeting degenerate into a silly quarrel, my dear. Please sit down again. Let me try to understand you. Will you answer a few questions for me?”

“Yes, I suppose so,” he said reluctantly and took his seat again.

“Are you telling me, by these terribly …
unexpected
responses you’ve been making, that you believe I really
was
in love with Blake when you married me?”

His jaw tensed. “Yes. Why else would I have left?”

“And you still believe it?”

“Yes. I see no reason why I should change my mind.”

“And you will not take my word that you are mistaken?”

“Why should I take your word?” he asked icily. “You were not, as I remember, a model of truthfulness, were you?”

She winced in real pain. “I might have indulged in some girlish deceits, yes, but I would never lie about something as important as
that
!”

“Wouldn’t you?” He stood up and looked down at her in scorn, his mouth twisted, his jaw set, his eyes hard. “I think you are quite like most ladies in society. You say whatever will bring you what you want, whether it’s the truth or not. Perhaps you don’t consider it lying. Perhaps you and your kind don’t understand what truth is at all.”

Her face, turned up to him, expressed sheer astonishment. Alec had never, as long as she’d known him, spoken with such unfeeling cynicism. She could barely believe this was the man she had been waiting for. Slowly, without her being aware of it, the corners of her eyes filled, and two tears spilled over and ran unheeded down her cheeks. “Oh, my dear Alec,” she murmured, “what has
happened
to you?”

“Whatever it is, ma’am,” he answered, completely unmoved, “it keeps me from succumbing to tears and deceits as easily as I did before.”

For a long moment, she couldn’t move. This icy stranger that Alec had become had numbed her to the core. She didn’t know what to do, or what to say to him. “Do you honestly mean,” she asked helplessly, “that nothing I can say would move you to reconsider—?”

“Nothing. You needn’t look at me with that horrified stare. I
did
warn you …”

She lowered her eyes, but the horror remained inside her. She felt empty and too frozen to know quite what was happening. Later, she supposed, she would be able to understand, to sort it all out, to cry. Now she only knew that everything was over … all hope for her marriage, her happiness, her future. The love she’d carried in her breast unnourished for so long … even
that
was at an end. She felt nothing. “What is it Mr. Newkirk wants me to sign?” she asked at last, her voice flat and emotionless.

He hesitated for a moment, struck by the unfathomable look in her eyes. Then he pulled the envelope from his inner coat pocket and unfolded the contents. “As I understand it, the document merely vouches for the fact that you and Edmonds had agreed to wed each other before you married me,” he explained briefly.

“But …” She blinked as if awakening from a stupor. “But that’s not
true
!”

He stiffened up again. “Now, see
here
! I thought we’d finished with this lying game of yours.”

She put her chin up in angry defiance. “I
never
agreed to marry Blake. It’s
you
, with your documents, who are engaged in playing lying games!”

“But Edmonds stood right here in this room and
told
me—!”

“I don’t care
what
he told you! I never agreed to marry him, and I will not sign anything that says I did!”

Alec felt a tidal wave of rage start from his knotted stomach, swell up into his chest and flood into his head. He grasped Priss by the shoulders in a grip so painful she cried out. “Damn it, woman, haven’t you put me through
enough
? I’m no longer such a fool that I don’t know why you are continuing to perpetrate this pretense of a marriage. If my blasted fortune means so much to you, tell me your price for your signature. Well, don’t gape at me! What is the price you’ll take for my freedom?”

“
Price
?” With a sudden wrench of her body, she broke free of his hold, and without quite realizing what she was doing, she swung her arm with all the force at her command and slapped his face.

Alec reeled back a couple of steps, put out a hand to steady himself against a chair and stared at her. He could feel his cheek burning, but, strangely, his fiery anger seemed to have died down. He had to admit to a grudging admiration for her. When pressed, she was still a woman of considerable spirit.

Priss, seeing the growing red mark on his cheek, recoiled in horror. “I’m …
sorry
!” she whispered, holding out a trembling hand. “I didn’t mean …” Then, bursting into tears, she put her face in her hands and dropped down on the sofa. Her shoulders shook as she gave way to the flood of sobs that had been threatening all through the interview to overwhelm her.

Alec stood watching her, his insides torn with conflicting desires. Something in him seemed to be almost physically compelling him to move to the sofa and take the weeping girl in his arms. But the rules he’d established in six years of rigid control over the sentimental yearnings of his nature pulled him to remain aloof. Twice he found himself taking a step toward her and twice he stopped himself, Finally, he forced himself to go to the window where he stood staring out into the street until her wracking sobs had abated. When at last he could hear the deep gasps subsiding to weak sniffles muffled by her handkerchief, he forced himself to speak. “I was
afraid
that a discussion of this sort would come to this—meaningless at best and ugly and bitter at worst,” he said quietly.