Candice Hern (16 page)

“Ah, Prudence. How lovely to see you.”

A middle-aged female blessed with one of the more beaky versions of the nose had joined them. Nick was sure he’d met her before, but could not remember which Armitage she was. Her eyes darted quizzically between him and Pru.

“Good evening, Gertrude. Nicholas, you remember my cousin, Lady Stockton?”

“Yes, of course.” He took her outstretched hand.

They engaged in small talk for a few minutes before Her Ladyship was hailed by another turbaned matron.

“I declare, Nicholas,” Pru said, working her fan vigorously, “I have never been noticed quite so much as I have been since marrying you. It is rather marvelous what a handsome husband can do for one’s consequence.”

She stopped fanning, brought the open fan up to her face, and poked herself in the eye.

“My dear, are you all right?” Nick kept his hand at her elbow while she blinked rapidly and dabbed at the corner of her eye.

“I’m fine,” she said. “I’m fine. It is nothing, really.”

After a moment, she looked up and smiled, then brought the closed fan to rest on her right cheek. He wondered if she knew that it was a signal, and a rather suggestive one at that. No, Pru
was not the sort of woman to know anything about flirting with fans. And even if she was, he could not imagine she would ever flirt with a man she had been trapped into marrying against her will. No, it was simply a natural gesture, more shy than provocative. And utterly charming. With her eyes still a bit watery, they seemed more blue than ever. He wanted to drown in them.

“You look very pretty tonight, Pru.” It was not mere flattery, he realized. He meant it. She could hold her own tonight with any of her more stylish relatives. Her hair was dressed with a large gold comb in the back, over which spilled carefully arranged cascades of apricot curls. She wore a short blue tunic over a white petticoat, and for once the neckline was not smothered in lace. There was a hint of cleavage on display. Only the merest hint—nothing anywhere near as daring as most every other woman in attendance, some of whom wore bodices so low-cut there was little left to the imagination—but enough to make Nick anxious to see more. It was definitely a welcome change. And the color perfectly matched her eyes. The eyes that looked up at him, drawing him, making him want to kiss her then and there.

It seemed ever since he’d promised not to impose upon her, he’d thought of nothing
but
imposing. This surprisingly powerful lust he’d developed for his wife, the lust that he was honor-bound to keep in check, was driving him to distraction.

Her eyebrows lifted slightly. Did she know what he was thinking? Was she, for once, not going to shy away like a frightened little mouse? She snapped her wrist to open the fan.

And it flew out of her hand across the room, smack into the head of a footman carrying a tray of glasses.

The fellow bobbled the tray precariously, but righted himself quickly before disappearing into the crowd.

Nick chuckled softly as he crossed the room to retrieve the fan. By the time he found it on the floor, it had been trampled upon more than once.

“I’m sorry, Pru,” he said when he returned to her side and held out the broken remains. “I hope this was not a favorite fan. Every stick is broken.”

“Oh, dear.”

She was flushed pink all the way to her ears. His mother would have loved that rosy hue, would have known just how to capture it on canvas. Lord, he was close to being well and truly lost. Even Pru’s blushes had become an object of desire.

“How mortifying,” she said. “Did anyone see?”

Nick could not help but smile. She was so charmingly embarrassed. “I don’t think so. And if they did see a fan in flight, they would not have known who launched it. No harm done, my dear. Except, of course, to the poor fan.”

He would buy her a new one. When the
Ulysses
came in, he would buy her a dozen new ones.

“Perhaps a glass of champagne would be in order,” he said. “Shall I hail a footman?”

“So long as it is not one with a suspicious lump on his head.”

Nick grinned, gave her a wink, and turned to find a footman. He was pleased that Pru hadn’t shriveled up like a hedgehog in her embarrassment. But then, she never did. She was quiet and shy, to be sure, but never immobilized with fright. Except on occasion with him. But that was a different matter. And, heaven be praised, he sensed a slight loosening of her guard in that respect. There was hope for him yet.

He located two glasses of champagne and passed one to Pru. “To what shall we toast? The
Cabinet
’s new offices?”

“Yes. To a new beginning.” She clinked her glass against his and took a dainty sip.

Should he dare to hope there was more meaning to her words? He saluted her with his glass and swallowed the contents in a single gulp. It was a very small glass.

Another cousin stopped to greet them and pulled Pru into conversation. Nick was looking about when he was approached by a slightly tipsy Viking. After an awkward moment of trying to sort through all the names and titles he’d learned and match one to this particular face, the Viking helped him out.

“Christopher Gordon, Prudence’s cousin,” he said, then gave a loud bark of laughter. “That isn’t much help, is it? I am the son of Jane, Lady Gordon, sister to Prudence’s father.”

“Of course. How do you do?”

The man waved a limp hand as though dismissing the polite question. “Glad you married Prudence,” he said. “Put my sister Alison’s nose quite out of joint, you know. One less spinster in the family. And since Prudence was the youngest among their ranks, it ain’t as though her marriage is encouraging to the rest of ’em. Ha! Poor old Alison’s been scowling since she heard the news. Well done, old boy.”

The fellow wandered off chuckling to himself. Nick shook his head in disbelief. If Pru had never been noticed before, she was certainly getting her fair share of attention now, for all sorts of reasons. All because she’d married him. He liked to think he’d done her a favor, but he wasn’t entirely sure that was true.

He returned to Pru, who was speaking with her elderly aunt Mary, the Countess of Walsham. After exchanging a few polite words with Nick, she walked on. He turned to Pru. She was looking at him over the rim of her champagne glass. Her eyes were blinking strangely, as though trying to dislodge a piece of grit. Then he remembered the fan.

“Is your eye still smarting from being poked with a fan stick? Poor girl. That must have hurt. Do you have your spectacles in your reticule? Perhaps they would help.”

She rolled her gaze to the ceiling—there really must be something wrong with her eye—and uttered a little groan. Maybe it wasn’t her eyes at all.

“Are you feeling ill?” he asked. “It is excessively crowded in here. Perhaps we should find our way to the terrace and get some fresh air.”

“Yes,” she said and gave a weary sigh. “Let’s do that.”

She took his arm and he maneuvered them through the crowd. He acknowledged greetings, but did not stop to chat with anyone. He really was a bit concerned about Pru. She did not seem at all herself tonight.

“Ah, Prudence.”

Damn. The one person who would not be content with a mere nod of greeting.

“Lady Daine,” Nick said.

“Hullo, Margaret,” Pru said.

“I am looking for Arabella,” her sister said without acknowledging their greetings. “Have you seen her?”

“We saw Arabella earlier and she looked quite beautiful. I do believe Sir Leonard Gedney is showing a marked interest. You must be very pleased. He is quite a charming young man.”

“She can do better. The Season is still young. And I must say, Prudence, that you are looking remarkably well yourself.” She slanted a glance in Nick’s direction. “Remarkably well.”

“Oh. Thank you.” Pru beamed a smile at her sister, obviously pleased to be complimented. From
what little Nick knew of Margaret, it was likely a rare occurrence.

“I do like that tunic you’re wearing,” Margaret said. “Who is your modiste?”

Pru looked down at her dress, fluffed the tunic, and straightened the train. “Madame Lanchester made this one.”

Margaret’s fair brows shot up to the edge of her exotic turban. “Indeed? She is rather exclusive, is she not? Well, I can see Aunt Elizabeth’s legacy is finally being put to good use.”

So, Pru’s new fashionable look was apparently an expensive one. And it would not, of course, occur to anyone that her husband could afford to dress her in such style. They would all know that she used her own money, that she was forced to do so since she had married so far beneath her.

Damn them all.

“If you will excuse us, Lady Daine, I am taking Pru out to the terrace. She is in need of fresh air.”

She narrowed her eyes as she studied Pru. “Are you? Do not tell me you are increasing already?”

Pru sucked in a sharp breath, then blushed all the way down to that provocative little swell of bosom. Frankly, Nick would not be surprised if his own face were as red as a lobster. Leave it to Margaret to hone in on the one thing certain to embarrass both of them. But at least he could feel comfort in the thought that Pru’s family was not privy to the secrets of their marriage.

Even so, the thought of Pru increasing led to thoughts of getting her in that state. He wondered how much longer it would be before she was ready, and how the devil he was to bear the wait.

H
ow the devil was she ever to let her husband know she was
ready
if she couldn’t even manage to flirt properly? Pru stopped staring at the closed bedchamber door and pulled the covers over her head.

What an unmitigated disaster the evening had been. It was bad enough that Nicholas did not even notice her pathetic attempts at flirtation. He must now think her squint-eyed and clumsy as well. That was the last time she would try to be something she was not, lessons or no lessons. It was too dangerous. She might truly injure someone next time. The image of her fan sailing across the room made her burrow deeper beneath the covers. How thoroughly and completely mortifying.

How had she ever thought she could pull it off? She had never been flirtatious in all her life. Quite the contrary, in fact. She’d always been twitchy and uncertain around men. She remembered her one Season with painful humiliation. The whole marriage mart business where young girls paraded themselves before the entire population of eligible bachelors for inspection, like horses at Tattersall’s, was simply embarrassing.

She had not fared well. It had been a thousand times more disastrous than tonight’s disgraceful ineptitude. At least Nicholas had not run as far away as possible, as had every gentleman presented to her during her Season. Of course, Nicholas could not run away. He was stuck with her.

He had been charming and solicitous, and he had laughed. Not
at
her, though, which made all the difference. He was still fond of her, she knew, if in a brotherly sort of way.

Perhaps friendship was all they could ever share. It would be enough. Or almost. Pru wished they could return to the camaraderie they had once shared, before he was forced to think of her as anything but a friend and colleague. There had always been a certain amount of pain on her part, because she had secretly loved him. But he had been ignorant of her feelings, and so he had been completely at ease in her company.

Now, however, there was this great
thing
between them, this incomplete marriage that changed everything. Pru fell asleep wondering how she might recapture that friendship, at least, so they
might go on more comfortably together.

The next morning, just as she was leaving for the office, a letter arrived from Edwina. She took off her bonnet and stepped into the disconcertingly empty library to read it in private. Knowing Edwina must be responding to the news of Pru’s marriage to her brother, Pru was a bit slow to break the seal. She was not certain how her friend would react, and was anxious that she not be too disappointed. Pru had been quite frank in her own letter about how the marriage had come about.

She sat down behind the desk, broke the seal, and unfolded the pages. “My dearest Pru,” it began, and she breathed a sigh of relief.

How extraordinary. In all that had happened, Pru had never even thought of that. Her closest friend was now her sister. What a wonderful notion. Her own sister, Margaret, was a trial at best. Edwina would make a much better sister. Pru adored her, and admired her more than any other woman of her acquaintance.

Oh, dear. Pru was suddenly reminded of every extra expense incurred on her behalf. Yes, she had taken on many of the household expenses herself, but only inconsequential things that were easily hidden from him. There were so many other expenses he’d taken on—the additional scullery maid to help Mrs. Gibb, and more recently an additional housemaid to assist Lucy, and all four servants requiring room and board. Then there were all those social functions he was forced to attend requiring hired carriages or hackneys. He always dressed beautifully when he accompanied her, and she had no idea if that meant he had had to expand his own wardrobe.

In any case, Pru knew she had cost him a great deal by falling asleep in the downstairs office. And all of it eating away at Nicholas’s savings for his project. She wished he wasn’t too proud to take her money. She would gladly give it to him. She knew something of his factory project and certainly supported his efforts. Even knowing she shared his ideals, he would not take her money, and that was the source of a great deal of heartache. She was hurt—foolishly so, but there it was—that he preferred to keep their capital separate, with no partnership between them.

Perhaps it would have been different if theirs had been a love match. He might have been more willing to share everything, to make his wife a true partner in his enterprise, if he had loved her.

But of course, money was simply one more thing they did not share. Theirs was not a true marriage in any sense of the word.

On the other hand, she had never told him that she, too, had plans for a project. Nothing as grand as his, but it had been a nice project to dream about. She had never told anyone about it, though, and now probably never would. She would much prefer to spend Aunt Elizabeth’s legacy in helping Nicholas achieve his goal. If she could only figure out how.

He had married her out of honor, and he refused her money for the same reason. But there must be other ways she could help, without giving him the money outright. She needed to understand more about the factory project before she could decide what to do.

She picked up Edwina’s letter and read on. There were more good wishes about the marriage, about Pru’s future with Nicholas, followed by reports of Edwina’s own happy union. Pru tucked the letter in her reticule, retrieved her bonnet, and set off for the
Cabinet
offices. Once inside the hackney, she began to ponder how she could find out more about her husband’s project and his investments.

“Ready, Pru?”

She gave him such an odd look, he checked to
see if he’d forgotten to button his waistcoat or tie his neckcloth.

“Yes, I am ready.”

“Come along, then.” Nick turned to leave her office, but was stopped at the door by her next words.

“Oh. Just a moment. I want to finish logging these expenses in the account book, if you don’t mind waiting.”

“I thought you said you were ready to go?”

She blushed scarlet and looked down at the open ledger on her desk. “I b-beg your pardon. I m-misunderstood. I will only be about fifteen minutes, probably less. Do you mind?”

“Not at all. I’ll just see if the jarvey will keep the hackney waiting. If not, I’ll send him on his way and call another when you’re finished.”

Nick popped outside to talk with the hackney driver. For an extra shilling, he would wait, he said. Nick told him it would be at least a half hour or so, since women generally had no sense of time. He tossed the extra shilling to the jarvey and told him to go have a pint of ale, so long as he was back in half an hour.

Nick wandered about the new offices, amazed at how easily, and quickly, they had filled up a space several times the size of the office at home. Edwina would be so pleased. He had wondered what she planned to do when she returned from Europe, if she would want to continue working out of the Golden Square house or move the of
fices to her new home with Morehouse. This new arrangement was by far the best solution.

He trusted his father had not gone into debt to finance the lease. Though he had the manor house in Derbyshire and the town house in London, he was not a rich man. Nick had a feeling that Edwina, who was now married to a very rich man, would secretly pay back their father when she returned. The business belonged to her, after all.

Nick peeked his head in the door of Pru’s office, only to find her closing the ledger and replacing her pen in the stand. “You’re finished? Already?”

“I told you I only needed a few minutes. We can leave now.”

“Actually, we can’t. I sent the jarvey away to have a pint. He’ll be back in half an hour.”

“Half an hour? You thought I’d be that long?”

Nick gave a sheepish shrug. “If I’d thought about it long enough, I would have remembered you are always on time. Unlike Edwina and every other woman I’ve known. It’s just another one of those things I need to learn about you, is it not?”

Pru smiled. “Sit down, Nicholas, and be comfortable. Since you mention it, and since we have a bit of time to kill, there is something about you I’d like to know better.”

Nick pulled the guest chair close to the desk, turned it around, and sat on it backward, his arms resting on the back rail. “What would you like to know?”

“Tell me about your Grand Scheme.”

“The factory project?”

“Yes. I know about it only in the most general way. I’d like to know more. It is to be a sort of utopian factory, is it not?”

“Yes. A factory complex, to be precise. A textile factory with decent working conditions, an adjacent village for the workers with clean housing, a school for the children, and a resident doctor as well. Everything to make the workers’ lives comfortable and productive.”

“Because a happy worker is a more productive worker?”

“Precisely. And since I believe the future of our economy lies with industrial rather than farm products, we must not allow the current horrendous work conditions to continue. The inhumane conditions of some of our factories are costing workers their lives, especially the children. How can we be a productive economy if we’re killing our workers?”

“You are quite right, of course,” Pru said. “We cannot allow the current factory situation to continue.”

Nick smiled. “You have an excellent understanding, my dear.”

“For a woman, you mean?”

“For a woman of such aristocratic lineage.”

“Are you mocking my background, sir?”

He grinned. “I would not dream of doing so. I have no wish to find another angry Viking horde on my doorstep.”

“Actually,” she said, “I believe my ’aristocratic
lineage’ allows me a better understanding of what you propose.”

“Oh? How so?”

“You would set up your own industrial community, and see that the workers and their families are treated well. Correct?”

“Yes, that is my hope.”

Pru cocked her head to one side in a quizzical manner. “Then what you are saying is that you wish to set yourself up to emulate the great landowners.”

Nick flinched. “Not at all. My enlightened community will be a republican utopia, with no connection to the old ways of the grand estates.”

“But those grand estate holders—like my own family, the dukes of Norwich—have always taken responsibility for the people who work their land and depend on their largess. It is actually very clever of you, Nicholas, to use the landed gentry as a model for the new industrial complexes. It was the old estate system, after all, that made England a strong country. It makes sense that the same methods could keep us strong in an industrial economy.”

Nick gazed at her in wonder. By Jove, she had a point. “My dear, you have rendered me speechless. I have no argument against your wisdom.”

She smiled in triumph. And looked very pretty for it. “I’ve always been appalled to think of young children in some of the textile mills I’ve heard about. But at least there is talk of a factory bill in the House, one that would not allow chil
dren of a very young age to be employed. And to reduce the hours of older children. My cousin, Lord Caldecott, has spoken in favor of it in Lords.”

“Yes, I know. One day, if I ever have the opportunity to meet him in something other than a purely social situation, I should like to discuss it with him. We need all the support we can rally for that bill.”

“Will it make a difference to your plans if it passes?” she asked.

“Whether it passes or not, there will be no young children at my factory. We will build them a school to attend instead. Even the older children will be required to attend part of each day.”

“Has anyone ever tried this sort of utopian factory before?” Pru asked.

“Yes, Robert Owen did, with New Lanark Village. In fact, it is his humane model that I strive to emulate. But if I am to succeed where he did not, I must be the solitary investor. He failed because his investors did not trust his progressive labor ideas and feared loss of profits.”

“And so you have been trying to increase your capital through investments?”

“Yes.”

“How far along is the project? You have the land?”

“Yes, I own a large area of land outside of Derby, as well as one large warehouse waiting to be fitted up as the first factory. And that is one of the primary expenses. The latest equipment will cost a
small fortune. Then we have to build the cottages or other housing for the workers. We need a school and a market and a church. There is much to be done.”

“It sounds like a life’s work.”

“It might be. But I have investments that are due to pay off soon. That will give me the capital to purchase the machinery.”

“And you do not wish to solicit investors,” she said, “so you are not funding it all on your own?”

“No. I want to retain full control, otherwise I cannot be certain things would be done exactly as I wished. Look at what happened to Owen. He had to buy out his investors when they disagreed with him. If I decided to rely on outside funding in order to get this project off the ground, I would likely never be able to buy out anyone if necessary. I will have sunk all my capital into my portion of the partnership. No, I do not want to take on investors who would try to tell me what to do.”

“I would not.”

He sighed. “Pru.”

A frown creased her forehead. “I would be happy to invest my inheritance in your project, Nicholas. But you would not accept it, would you?”

“No, as I have told you. It belongs to you, Pru. I shall not allow you to sink it into a project that may fail. I do not wish to be responsible for bankrupting both of us, if it comes to that.”