The Bridal Season (27 page)

“She’s miserable,” Merry said.

Eglantyne turned her head and studied Lady Agatha standing
across the room. There was no arguing there. The strain of the last days was
clearly written on her remarkable face. Dark shadows bruised the flesh beneath
her eyes and her complexion looked waxen. A tendril of hair had escaped her
heavy chignon and she looked thinner, as though she’d lost a bit of weight.

“She’s been working too hard,” Eglantyne murmured.

“Fingers to the bone,” agreed Grace Poole.

“Burning the midnight oil,” Merry nodded.

“Maybe that is why she’s been unable to find a single moment
to give my son,” Atticus said quietly from behind them. All three women jumped.
“I hadn’t realized you were such a slave-driver, Eglantyne.”

Merry and Grace didn’t bother refuting such nonsense. Everyone
in Little Bidewell knew Eglantyne Bigglesworth was the kindest soul alive.

“Oh!” said Eglantyne in mortification. “How awful you must
think us, Professor March, gossiping like this. You must believe that we are
interested in Elliot and Lady Agatha only because of the affection we bear
them.”

Atticus waved aside her agitation. “No need for you to
apologize
or
abandon your current fascinating topic of conversation,” he
reassured her. “You might say I have a vested interest. And I hope you will not
think me too terrible if I admit that we share a mutual ambition.”

The three women regarded him in surprise.

He nodded. “It’s true. I’ve spent the last few days singing
Lady Agatha’s praises to Elliot until I’ve half convinced myself to marry her.”

Eglantyne giggled, but Merry shook her head. “She won’t have
you. She wants Sir Elliot.”

“Then why doesn’t she
have
him?” Atticus asked in an
exasperated stage whisper. “Elliot became so tired of hearing my paeans of
praise that he finally told me—and please forgive the use of hard language, but
I quote my son in order to illustrate the extent to which he has been pressed—’If
I knew what the hell to do, don’t you imagine I would have done it by now? The
lady will not see me!’ “

“He’s right,” Eglantyne agreed forlornly. “She won’t see him.
If he arrives by the front door, she scurries out the back. If we have him for
lunch, she’s too busy to come down. She only came here today because I told her
Elliot had been called away on his magisterial duties.”

“But he hasn’t. He isn’t,” Atticus said. “He’s in the front
hall talking to Anton.”

“I know,” Eglantyne replied placidly.

It took a full minute for the import of her statement to sink
in.

“Why, Miss Eglantyne, I never!” breathed Grace Poole. Atticus
chuckled and Merry beamed approvingly.

“Here he comes,” Merry suddenly whispered.

Elliot had entered the room, his head bent as he listened
attentively to Anton, his dark brows drawn together. As Eglantyne watched, he
raised his head and saw Lady Agatha. His eyes narrowed, became focused, more
intense.

Eglantyne’s gaze swung to Lady Agatha. She, too, had seen
Elliot enter. For a heartbeat, she froze where she stood. Her dark eyes grew
darker and more lustrous, her lips parted, and then her gaze abruptly snapped
around, as if gauging her distance from the various doors. She moved back. As
if on cue, he paced her, moving forward, his gaze never wavering from her.

There was nowhere for her to escape. She moved quickly toward
the open door leading to the garden, but Colonel Vance, who’d dropped his cane
at her feet, barred her path. She had no choice but to retrieve it, and by the
time she’d returned it to his gnarled hand, Elliot was beside her.

The guests had quieted, as if aware of a drama unfolding in
their midst. Even at this distance, Eglantyne could see what little color
remained ebb from Lady Agatha’s cheeks, the defensive adjustment of her
posture, and the anxious tension at the corners of her eyes. By contrast,
Elliot was a study in composure. He took possession of the hand she reflexively
offered. He bent his dark head over her hand and raised it to his lips and
slowly, deliberately, pressed upon her trembling fingers the most ardent kiss
Little Bidewell Society had ever witnessed.

The watching ladies reacted variously and tellingly. Most
looked a trifle wistful, some were amused, some shocked, but only one looked
like she was on the verge of fainting: Lady Agatha.

“Dinner!” Grace loudly prompted Atticus.

“What?” Atticus asked.

“Announce that it’s time for dinner!” Grace said urgently. “He’ll
offer her his arm. She’ll have no choice but to accept, and then...”

“Ah!” Atticus nodded. He stepped forward, clearing his throat.
“My dear friends,” he announced, “may I invite you in to dinner?”

Elliot was smiling wolfishly down at Lady Agatha. Her chin
tilted upright, acknowledging the challenge. Though Eglantyne could not hear
him, clearly he was asking Lady Agatha to dine. She saw Lady Agatha hesitate.
Then she touched her fingertips to her temples, shaking her head. Elliot
stiffened.

Lady Agatha fled. Elliot took one betraying, uncontrollable
step after her, and stopped. His face smoothed of expression, only his
stiffness betrayed his heightened emotions. Eglantyne’s heart twisted with
pity.

“Something has upset you, Miss Eglantyne?” Catherine Bunting,
moving with a group entering the dining room, paused beside Eglantyne.

Before she considered her words, Eglantyne replied. “I fear
Elliot is much affected by Lady Agatha’s avoidance of him.”

“Affected? Elliot? I doubt it.” Catherine smiled sanguinely. “Perhaps
his pride has been pricked. Elliot is a most proud man. With every reason to
be, of course,” she added.

“Catherine, my dear, you’d best have a care lest people think
you unfeeling,” Atticus said in a low, cool voice. He had overheard her dismiss
his son’s pain and it made him impatient with her.

She swung on him, color like flags in her pretty cheeks. “I
assure you,
I
am not the unfeeling one.”

Her eyes were bright. Gads, she was on the point of tears.
Hurriedly, Atticus offered her his arm. “Catherine,” he said loudly, “before
dinner, might I ask you to take a peek at my heliotrope? It looks a bit leggy.”

She hesitated a second, but then allowed him to draw her out
the door to the garden where they could be alone. “I am sorry, my dear,” he
said. “I did not realize until just now.”

She did not pretend to misunderstand. It was past that.
“Please, don’t be sorry,” she said. “It’s really not necessary. I am quite
content with my life and Paul.”

She took a deep breath, hoping that in voicing these things
she could finally purge them from her mind. “For years, Elliot has nurtured the
idea that he stood bravely by while I married his best friend. I suppose I
should be grateful. I would rather people think I broke his heart than have
them pity me.” She gave a brief laugh when she saw Atticus’s expression. “Apparently
he did not even allow you into his confidence. How like him.”

Atticus regarded her soberly.

“I broke things off between us, yes. And have since comforted
myself with the conviction that war changed him into a man I could not love.
The truth is somewhat less palatable. You see,
I
am a woman
he
could
not love.”

“My dear,” Atticus said sympathetically, “I know without
question that Elliot loved you once.”

“Yes,” she said, “he did. But even then, even when he was
young—you remember how passionate he seemed when he spoke of certain things,
the delight he seemed to draw from the simplest acts? It was just his manner.
There was no basis for it.”

“My dear,” Atticus said, reaching out to pat her hand. She
snatched it away.

“I know. Because he never... He was never carried away by his
love for me.”

Before he had left for the Sudan she’d gone to him, knowing
she would find in his arms the thing that had always eluded her, the passion
that he hoarded, that she’d never tasted and wanted so much. He’d told her he respected
her too much, that there were consequences he could not allow her to risk.

“When he returned so changed, I was glad. Do you understand,
Atticus?” She’d never called him Atticus before; they’d never been close
despite their proximity and having shared such important places in Elliot’s
life.

“I think so.”

“The man I had loved never existed except in my imagination. I
will not accept that I was unable to make him...” She broke off. “And that she
can succeed where I failed.” How she hated Lady Agatha, with her laughter and
her brilliant eyes and her casual manner.

“But of course, I never really tried.” She lifted her chin.
“By the time Elliot had returned, Paul and I had grown close. He loved me with
all the ardency I had wanted from Elliot.”

She gazed at him proudly. “There were tears in Paul’s eyes
when he confessed he loved me. Tears.” Her expression was challenging. “Can you
imagine Elliot crying? For anything? For anyone?”

Atticus stared at her mutely and she had her answer. She’d
made a mistake; she should not have confessed these things after all.

“He has been so very alone, Catherine. He has spent his
lifetime searching for a woman he can love as ardently and wholly as Paul loves
you,” Atticus said gently.

Paul. She had never doubted his love. He was there for her.
Always. Supportive and admiring and adoring.

“Perhaps, it is time to let old admirers go,” Atticus said and
she saw in his careful wording the same respectful consideration his son had
always shown her when she had wanted his fire.

Let Elliot go? She’d never had him. But she did have her
pride. And she had Paul.

What the devil was Lady Agatha thinking? And what was she
doing? Before she realized her own intent, Eglantyne found herself at Elliot’s
side. For a moment she thought he might excuse himself, but his manners were
far too deeply ingrained.

She did not bother with subtlety. She had watched him take his
first fence and had rapped his knuckles for stealing apples from her larder.
She loved him.

“Lady Agatha has been working so very hard to complete the
preparations for the wedding party,” she explained. “Every day she receives
dozens of telegrams, orders and arrangements. She personally has overseen the
sewing of a hundred little silk fans as wedding favors.”

“She has reason to be exhausted,” Elliot concurred politely.

“Oh, yes!” Eglantyne exclaimed hurriedly. “And there are the
floral designs she’s made, and she’s drawn up plans for the seating
arrangements. Very modern, I admit, but most practical, when she explains how
the best seats in the house, the ones with a full frontal view of the wedding
ceremony, ought to be reserved for the marquis’s family. And ours, of course.”

“I can see she’s been very busy.”

“I am sure she would not leave your father’s party unless she
felt an overwhelming need to do so.”

“I am sure you are correct.”

There now, Eglantyne thought with satisfaction. He didn’t look
quite so tense anymore. His usual impeccable manners were standing him in good
stead. He even smiled at her, once more the polite gentleman she’d known since
his return from the Sudan, fully in command of the situation and himself.

“Will you excuse me, Miss Eglantyne?” he asked and she nodded.

He strolled casually but directly from the nearly empty
drawing room. He did not turn into the dining room as Eglantyne expected, but
instead walked into the hall and turned to close the door carefully behind him.

A sudden loud crash made her jump. She hurried to the hall
door and opened it, looking outside. No one was there. But the large porcelain
vase that generally stood on the hall table lay on the floor, shattered into a
thousand pieces.

As if someone had hurled it against the wall.

An hour later, Letty sat in the library at The Hollies. She
heard one of the maids speaking to someone who sounded very like Elliot. She
rose swiftly, and the silk fan she’d been listlessly embroidering fell to her
feet. For a moment, panic and pleasure vied for precedence until logic took
hold. Elliot would never leave his guests. She stooped to retrieve the fan.

“Letty.”

She bolted upright, clutching the fan like a talisman to her
chest. He looked so handsome and severe. He searched her face, and she wished
she knew what he read there, wished she could adequately hide the ache in her
heart.

She wanted to run to him, she wanted to feel him enfold her in
his arms. All she had ever desired reposed there. It made standing motionless
the hardest thing she’d ever done.

But the knowledge that whatever joy she might know in his arms
could only be temporary stayed her. The world would not vanish, the past would
reach out and rip her from his embrace. And the longer she stayed in Little
Bidewell, the more likely the wound caused by that rending would be mortal...
to both of them.

He was a knight, soon to be a baron. He had a family name to
honor and a position of trust and responsibility to uphold.

“This can’t go on any longer.” His voice brooked no argument.
“This is absurd.”

He was right; this couldn’t go on. Every day she’d tried
vainly to find a happy ending for them. There should be a way. In all the
popular plays, the poor girl managed against all odds to gain the handsome
aristocrat’s heart. But this was not musical farce, and the happy ending she so
desperately sought refused to materialize.

He moved cautiously closer. “Letty. You can’t tell me you have
no feelings for me. I won’t believe that.”

She wouldn’t deny it. Or him. He held one hand out. She shook
her head, fearful that if he came closer all her resolve to spare them both
would vanish.

“Don’t back away from me, Letty. I couldn’t stand that. I won’t
press myself on you,” he said. “I have done this poorly. I understand. And I
know that a woman like you expects a certain standard—” He broke off abruptly
and raked his hand through his hair, looking away.