Reluctant Bride (2 page)

I felt strangely as though I were looking at someone other than myself, some—
queen
. It was likely Queen Elizabeth’s gift to my ancestor that called this caprice to mind. I had not realized how proudly I held my head, till that very moment. Some folks call me proud, though I do not think I am anything of the sort, you may be sure. I might accept the term assertive. I do not hesitate to speak up for my rights. At the ripe old age of twenty-five, a lady loses her girlish hesitation. I went on looking at the queen, assessing her appearance. She had rather handsome eyes, I thought. Dark and widely spaced. Her imperfect nose was concealed at the distance at which I sat from her. Her mouth looked sulky.

“Well, have you?” Maisie repeated.

“No,” I answered. “Have you?”

“Yes, I was, once.”

“Maisie! You have been holding out on me all these years! I did not think there was much about you I did not know. Who was the lucky man?”

“Lucky he didn’t get stuck with me, you mean?”

“No, lucky he earned your love.”

“Oh he didn’t
earn
it. I don’t think love
can
be earned. For myself, I never cared much for anyone who deserved me. Love is a gift, not always welcome either.”

“Was it Reverend Simms?” I asked, naming an old cleric who used to call more often than his ecclesiastical business warranted. She shook her head firmly, giving me a malevolent glare from her sharp green eyes. I named a few more gentlemen of the same kidney—dry old sticks actually.

“You have an odd idea of my taste in men!” she declared, miffed with me.

“Who was he then? I shan’t tell a soul. Promise.”

“Beattie,” she answered, with a challenging lift of her chin, as though to say, “What of it?”

“Lord
Beattie—
old
Lord Beattie?” I gasped.

“Not his rakeshame son. Yes, it was why I stared and then laughed like a hyena when you told me he had offered for
you.
Remember, when you told me in the carriage on the way home from the concert that he had offered, I laughed till the tears streamed down my face. In the end, I didn’t know whether I was laughing or crying.”

“You are the slyest woman in the parish, Maisie Belmont! I never had a single suspicion you were sweet on him. I don’t think I approve of your taste, incidentally.”

“Neither do I,” she answered quickly. “I never did
approve
of him; I just loved him. I thought he was finally warming up to
me
that day, you see. He asked a dozen personal questions, but I realized then, when you told me, he was only quizzing to see if I would be staying here, or would expect to go with you to Eastgate. I had a wicked crush on that man twenty years ago, around the time Jeremy was born. Used to ride toward Eastgate, hoping just for a sight of him. He looked like something in those days, Liz, I can tell you.”

“But he was married at the time!”

“I know. Then when his wife died ten years later, I had another flare-up of my grand passion. I let it molder on till you told me that day he had offered for you. Laughing and making a joke of it. I wanted to strangle you—or him. Ah, well, it quenched the last of the embers for me. I gave up on him for good then.”

“Why did you decide to tell me now?” I asked. Her shoulders had slumped forward as she spoke. She looked old, not aging—old. It was about a year ago, when Beattie made me his ridiculous offer, that she had begun to change. If quenching the embers had done this to her, I think she would have done better to go on hoping, however futile the hope.

“I don’t know why I told you,” she said, crumbling a piece of bread with her fingers, while a faraway look came into her eyes. “You look so handsome tonight, in your diamonds, I just wondered—I mean, it is odd you never bothered to get married. Don’t you ever mean to?”

“Of course not,” I said gruffly, with a last look at the queen in the mirror. Then my gaze turned back to Maisie, to see her looking just as usual—plain, settled. I found it totally incredible she should have been attracted to an outright rake and philanderer such as Beattie had been in his youth. His son was such another ne’er-do-well; he had never caused me so much as a single moment’s anguish. I despised him very thoroughly. My only emotion when he married a few years ago was pity for his wife.

The storm broke as we finished our dinner. We had tea in the Rose Saloon, while the rain beat against the windowpanes, and the wind whistled down the flue. The subject of Maisie’s unrequited love did not come up again. I felt she was sorry she had told me, and meant never to say another word on the subject.

When I went up to my room, I removed the magic necklace, laid it with great ceremony in the green leather box with the green silk lining, bearing the little silver plaque, “with our extreme gratitude for your loving aid.” Was it possible the queen had one of those unrequited passions for my ancestor? If so, the historians over the centuries had missed out on it. It was mentioned in no history book I ever read. I felt cheated, somehow, that I had never had even an unrequited love. A sense of urgency amounting almost to panic consumed me. Had God forgotten all about me?

When I arose next morning, all such foolish fancies were dissipated, like the storm. I was back to my normal, assertive, sensible self, giving Booty orders how to proceed during my absence, and Berrigan a good tongue-lashing to hold him in line till I returned. I would turn him off after I got back home. A few days was not sufficient time to find a good replacement.

Three days later I had an answer from Uncle Weston, claiming an interest in the diamond necklace, but stipulating that he was short of funds and could only offer thirty-five hundred. I wrote back asserting I would take four thousand, and that I would leave the next day.

“Do you come with me or not, Maisie?” I asked as I wrote the letter. “I should tell Weston how many of us are going.”

“I might as well,” she decided. “It will be dull here alone. There has been no word from Jeremy. I’ll write him we are going, in case he planned to come home.”

“We take more pains for the comfort of our menfolk than they take for ours.”

“I knew how it would be!” she flared up in Jeremy’s defense. She fancies herself quite a mother to him.

“What in the world are you talking about?”

“You’re mad at him because of selling your diamonds, and the poor boy doesn’t even know you are doing it. You should tell him. He’d prefer to sell Westgate.”

“He couldn’t care less. I’m not doing it for him, but for us. I was talking about his never writing to us.”

“How many times have you written to
him?”

“Once, and he didn’t bother to answer. You write every week. So you are coming with me, then?”

“Yes, I’ll go.”

I included her name, finished up my letter and sealed it for posting. “There, the demmed thing is done,” I said crossly.

“It is not proper for a lady to say ‘demmed.’ That is fitter talk for a guttersnipe,” she called after me as I went into the hall to place my letter on the mail tray, timing her jibe so I would be sure to hear it, but not consider it worthwhile returning to retaliate. If this fit of crankiness kept up, I would be happier without her company.

Chapter 2

Our
traveling carriage was not one of those dashing vehicles that ornament the roads of England. We did not hope to make eighty miles a day, or anything like it. As the crow flies, we are not more than eighty miles from Uncle Weston, but as the road meanders, it is more like a hundred. We would spend one night at an inn. We set upon Salisbury, a little more than half way, which would land us at Rusholme at midafternoon of the next day. We took our own old gray mare and brown bay for the first lap, not an elegant team, but they match the various hues of our carriage well enough. Its black has faded to gray, and would be brown before we had gone far, after the recent downpours we had been experiencing.

We left at a good hour in the morning, about nine, when the air was still fresh and not too warm. Maisie wore her second-best suit, saving her better outfits for the visit at Rusholme. I, the peacock, was unwise enough to wear my new jonquil muslin with a matching spencer that could be removed if the day became too warm. I had my diamonds tucked into my reticule, determined the bag would not leave my fingers till we reached our destination.

I swear we had not been on the road more than two hours, were not yet at Devizes, when it happened. The road was sparsely traveled, but some jackanapes of a fellow came roaring up at us from behind, going fifteen or sixteen miles an hour. I assumed he was one of those Corinthians whose pleasure it is to hunt the squirrel, as he was dressed like a gentleman and not a coachman. Hunting the squirrel is a pastime much indulged in by postboys, mail drivers and other low types. The point of the game is to drive much too closely behind another carriage for half a mile or so, till the driver is vexed and angry, then suddenly surge out fast, to pass so close he brushes your wheel. Your proper hunter preys mainly on females. If he can elicit a shriek or put you into the ditch, his entertainment is complete.

Our hunter achieved both of these noble aims. Maisie and I shrieked our heads off, while John Groom drove smack into the ditch. The green bank coming up at me from the window was the last sight I saw before I was knocked out cold. When I opened my eyes some moments later, I was stretched out in an ungainly position in the ditch with a large, dark man bending over me, shaking me back to consciousness. I felt as though my skull bone had been splintered into a hundred pieces, and was rattling around inside my skin. Looking past the man’s shoulder, I saw our carriage had got thrown on its side. The door must have flown open as we flipped, tossing me out by the force of it.

“Are you all right? Can you hear me?” the man asked.

I could see and hear it was a man, could distinguish vaguely a curled beaver on top of his head, and a blur of face. If only he would stop shaking my broken skull, I thought my vision might focus. I closed my eyes, trying to remember where I was, and what had happened. When I opened them, the face had assumed features. A pair of dark, worried, but mostly angry eyes stared at me intently. A great beak of a nose jutted forth beneath the eyes. There was something vaguely hawk-like in the face. You know the angry look a hawk has. There were lines etched from nose to lips—full, sensuous lips that were out of place on that predatory countenance. The forehead was also etched with lines. Mitzi came whining up to me, too rattled to spit, as I am sure she felt like doing. I know I did.

“Cracker, go for a sawbones. She’s bleeding,” the man called over his shoulder, then reached down and brushed my hair from my temple. When his fingers came away, they were smeared with my blood. It was sufficient to send me off into another bout of vapors. I am annihilated by the sight of blood, especially my own.

The next time I got my eyes and ears open, the man had discovered there was more than one passenger in our carriage and was in the process of lifting Maisie out the door. She hung like a rag doll in his arms. I struggled to my feet, staggered to the closest tree, till the ground ceased rotating beneath me, turned from black and blue to green, then I went falteringly toward them. Mitzi dragged along behind me. I was petrified to see poor Maisie looking entirely lifeless.

“You’ve
killed
her!” I said, in a whisper.

“Rubbish! She’s unconscious,” the man answered roughly, though he looked extremely worried. He placed her on the ground. “Watch her,” he ordered me, as he jumped up and ran to the road.

There was a frisky gig coming toward us, pulled by a single nag. He hailed it, and another gentleman hopped down to offer his aid. The newcomer had the air of a bumptious squire. You can spot them a mile away, with their self-important manner, their provincial accents and their poor tailoring.

“These women are hurt. Are you from around here? Where can I take them to be seen to?” our accident-prone friend asked, in the most overbearing way imaginable, as though the whole affair were a great imposition on his time and patience.

“My own place is just two miles down the road. I would be happy to help,” the squire offered.

“Two miles? Christ, they’ll have bled to death before they are taken half that distance. Is there nowhere closer? An inn, a farm house . .” He looked around as he spoke, but there was no building in sight.

“Devizes is only half a mile yonder,” the squire told him.

“Help me get them into my rig, will you?” he asked, but in an imperative tone. “The younger one is conscious. She can walk to it. The old lady will have to be hauled.”

I was kneeling over Maisie, chaffing her hands, trying to rouse her, while this genteel conversation went forth. “Hauled” as if she were a load of rubbish. The two men came forward, elbowing me aside to lift Maisie from the ground. The squirrel hunter’s carriage was not in the ditch, but resting on the shoulder of the road. They were about to place Maisie on a banquette, when suddenly the carriage leaned sharply to the left. A wheel had been broken, but had not fallen till the weight was placed on it. An accomplished curse rent the air. I am happy to say Mitzi had recovered, and took offense at the offender. She has no great love for men. She behaves well with females, but will often take to spitting at loud gentlemen. I usually try to curb her, but let her hiss away on this occasion.

“We’ll have to use your rig,” the dark man told the squire. “We won’t all be able to fit in it. You take the ladies to Devizes. I’ll stay here and send the doctor on to the inn when he comes, if he comes. I’ve sent a boy off for him.”

The squire agreed. “I'll take them to the Rose and Thistle, if you think my rig can hold three of us.”

“Of course it can. The girl will have to hold the old lady. Miss,” he said, glancing toward me.

I was still too dazed to object to his arrogant manner, and too worried for Maisie’s life. I was helped into the gig, Maisie was lifted up to be propped between the squire and myself. She was beginning to return to consciousness.

“Lizzie, you’re hurt!” was her first speech. The blood from my temple was trickling down the side of my face. The man, not the squire, handed me a handkerchief, which I took without a word and held against my aching temple.