The Marriage Wager (8 page)

The baroness sat up straight again and stared after her daughter with a mixture of outrage and disbelief that was almost comical. Then, seeing that she was really gone, she leaned back and began to tap her fingers impatiently on the chair arm. She didn’t like being left without an audience.

Fortunately, it was only a few minutes before her dresser appeared in the doorway. “My lady?” she inquired.

“Crane. Are you back already?”

“Yes, my lady.”

“What have you found out?”

The servant looked smug. “A good deal, my lady.”

“Come in and tell me at once.” The baroness leaned forward. She had sent her spy out into the underground of the
haut
ton
, the interlaced network of servants who cared for its members. Crane maintained an extensive web of contacts in other households and always knew every disreputable piece of gossip before her mistress. The baroness did not doubt she had found out whatever this Emma Tarrant would most like to hide.

Crane stood before her, head lowered, arms crossed at the wrist. She was the picture of demure submission, but the baroness knew what she demanded. “Sit down,” she said, giving it. “You must be worn out with walking.”

Not deigning to smirk, Crane took a chair opposite her mistress. She enjoyed exacting such petty payments for her spying services. It confirmed her conviction that in asking, the baroness put herself on the same level as her dresser. “She was married to a very disreputable young gentleman,” she said.

“Ah!” The baroness looked like a cat before a bowl of cream.

“Sir Edward Tarrant,” continued Crane. “His father lost everything at Newmarket, and the son was known as a gamester almost before he was out of short coats. The whole family’s tainted with it. No one knows what has become of him, though it seems likely he’s dead.”

“How?” wondered the baroness.

Crane looked regretful at having to admit her ignorance on this point. “He is thought to have gambled her fortune away, however.”

“She had a fortune?” asked the baroness, displeased.

Crane nodded. “From her grandmother, the old Countess Lindley.”

“Countess,” sniffed Colin’s mother, not at all glad to hear this piece of information.

Crane nodded. “As the notice in the paper said, she’s the daughter of George Bellingham. He was married to Rose Gresham, of the Lincolnshire Greshams.”

The baroness pursed her lips. Much to her chagrin, she could not fault the family.

Crane, seeing her disappointment, smiled thinly. “There was something odd about her marriage,” she added. Her smile broadened slightly when her mistress looked up like a hound on the scent.

“What?”

“They were married very privately,” she said. “With no family present as far as I can discover. And no announcement until afterward.”

“An elopement?” breathed the baroness, delighted.

Crane shrugged. “It’s not known for certain. But suspected? Yes, indeed.”

Baroness St. Mawr clasped her hands together. “Wait until I tell Colin,” she exulted.

“There’s something else.”

“Yes?”

Crane paused, making her mistress wait. It was one of the small hoard of pleasures in her life.

“What?” said the baroness.

“It’s possible this woman has visited your son’s house alone, and late at night,” Crane offered triumphantly.

The baroness smiled. “I knew she must be that sort of person. There was no other explanation.”

“The thing is,” added Crane. “It isn’t certain. One can’t get anything from St. Mawr’s staff.” Her tone implied that this was an affront directed specifically at her.

“Oh, I’m sure it’s true. The wicked creature has seduced him and lured him into a proposal.”

Crane, who shared Caroline’s opinion of the baron, merely looked doubtful.

“I’ll show him she is not worthy of marriage,” continued the baroness happily. “If he wishes to take her for his mistress—well, such things are none of my affair. But I will not yield my place to a vile hussy such as that. Crane, you are a jewel.”

“Thank you, my lady.”

“You have given me just what I need to defeat this dreadful woman.”

“Happy to be of service, my lady.” Crane rose and made as if to move toward the door. “Oh, my lady?” she said casually.

“Yes, Crane?”

“I meant to tell you. That dark blue merino—it doesn’t really become your ladyship.”

“My new walking dress?” cried the baroness. “But of course it…” She stopped suddenly and bit her lip. Another part of the price was being exacted. Crane would be paid for her efforts, though only in ways she herself chose. “The blue?” The baroness’s mouth turned down at the corners. “You know, I believe you are right. There is something about it. Why don’t you take it, Crane? The color might suit you better.”

“Very well, my lady. If you insist?” replied the dresser, squeezing the final bit of satisfaction from the transaction.

“Yes… well, I do. Take it,” said Colin’s mother, with a gesture as if she were throwing something away.

“Thank you, my lady,” answered Crane, and left the room with a self-satisfied smile.

Really, she was insufferable, the baroness thought. If she weren’t so very useful, she would be impossible to tolerate.

***

“But what is going on?” said Robin Bellingham to his father. They sat together in the fine old library of the Bellingham town house, the elder man holding a glass of brandy.

“Nothing that need concern you,” he said.

“Nothing?” Briefly, Robin was speechless with exasperation. “For nearly half my life, I am not permitted to so much as mention my sister’s name. Now, without a word of warning, she reappears in London engaged to St. Mawr. What has become of her husband?”

“He is dead,” replied his father, with obvious relish.

“What happened to him?”

With an airy gesture, his father dismissed this as unimportant. “What matters is that he has been removed from the picture, and now Emma will take her rightful place in society.” His tone was highly self-satisfied.

“When did she return? How did she meet St. Mawr? What is she like?” wondered Robin.

“Don’t worry yourself over the details. It is enough that she is to be creditably established at last.” He sighed contentedly. “I had given up any hope for her, you know. This is beyond anything I expected.”

“But, Father, my friends are asking about her. They want to meet her. And let me tell you, they think it’s deuced odd that I never mentioned having a sister.”

“They will meet her soon enough. I daresay Emma will become one of the chief ornaments of society. She has kept her looks charmingly,” he finished, as if reassuring Robin on a point of concern.

“I am in society, too!” he protested, jealous of his father’s prediction of success for Emma in an area where he so wanted to excel. “And this has made me look a perfect fool.”

“Nonsense. No one expects you to be involved in such things. Don’t make a fuss over nothing, boy.”

“They expect me to know I have a sister,” Robin muttered under his breath, furious at being called “boy.”

“An unlooked-for ending indeed,” said George Bellingham, sipping his brandy meditatively. “Let it be a lesson to you, Robin. Never imagine that even the most disastrous situation cannot be mended.”

He was extremely tired of his father’s lessons, Robin thought rebelliously.

“Take your gaming, for example,” the older man continued.

Robin’s handsome face fell into mulish lines. Here it came, he thought, another lecture on his numerous failings.

“You have been heedless and fallen into debt,” his father went on pompously. “You have refused to listen to wiser heads and, inevitably, have gotten yourself into difficulties. No doubt bad company was a large part of the problem. That Jack Ripton, now—”

“Jack is my best friend!” cried Robin. “He’s a splendid fellow.”

His father shook his head. “Rather wild, I think. A care-for-nobody. And what is his family? They do not seem to be known in London.”

“His father has a small estate up north,” snapped Robin. “And I won’t hear anything against Jack, so you may as well save your breath.”

“Well, well,” responded his father genially, “loyalty is a fine thing in young men. But what I am trying to tell you is that it is by no means too late to salvage the situation. You are—”

“Can I at least go and visit her?” Robin burst out, unable to stand it any longer.

“Who?”

“Emma. My sister. I hardly remember her. I would like to make her acquaintance.”

“Oh, well, as to that…” The older man shifted in his chair. “You will meet her at the wedding, which is quite soon.”

“Where is she staying?” Robin demanded. “Why is she not with us if we are now reconciled?”

“She is, er… she preferred to find her own lodgings,” his father replied.

Robin did not blame her in the least. He had waged a fierce battle for rooms of his own at the start of the season, and lost, of course, he thought bitterly, since his father persisted in thinking of him as a child. “Where are they?” he asked again. “Surely I am allowed to call on her now?”

“I daresay she is very busy with wedding preparations,” ventured his father. “That sort of thing wholly preoccupies females, you know. Best wait until after, when she will have more time.”

“You think she cannot spare twenty minutes for her brother?” he asked, affronted.

“These matters overset the calmest of women,” his father insisted. “I remember when your mother was—”

“I will let her inform me if she is too busy,” Robin interrupted. “Where is she staying, Father?”

“Ah… er…”

A great light dawned on Robin. “You don’t know, do you?”

“Of course I do!”

“Where, then?”

“I… I am certain she does not wish to be disturbed,” answered his father gruffly.

“She didn’t tell you her direction,” marveled Robin. He was filled with awe and admiration for his newfound sister. Effortlessly, she had escaped their father’s overbearing presence. Or, could it be even more than that? “Did you even know she was in London before you saw the announcement?”

“Of course,” the older man exploded. “I was deeply involved in, er, settling the engagement.”

That had the ring of truth, Robin thought. But it was clear his father knew little more. He exulted in his long-lost sister’s defiant spirit. She had done precisely what he had longed to do for months and months. His wish to meet her grew keen. She would be his example, he thought. He would follow her lead in dealing with the old man’s rules and lectures. Together, they would rout him! Robin grinned in anticipation. He would show him that his son was not a child, but a grown man, who must be treated accordingly.

“You find something amusing in that?” demanded his father, not at all pleased by the exposure of his ignorance.

“No, Father,” replied Robin dutifully. There was no need to wrangle now. He would save his energy until Emma was on the scene. And then they would see something! Suppressing another grin, Robin rose and bid his father good night.

At nine o’clock the next morning, Colin Wareham once again knocked on the door of Arabella Tarrant’s small house in an unfashionable corner of London. The baron was immaculately turned out in sleek buff pantaloons and a long-tailed coat of olive green superfine. His tall Hessian boots gleamed like mirrors, and his black hair was brushed into a perfect Brutus. When a maidservant opened the door and ushered him in, he walked calmly to the drawing room and positioned himself beside the fireplace, his handsome face utterly composed.

Colin had spent a good part of the night thinking over the events that had swept through his life in the last few days. Alone, in the calm serenity of his own library, he had examined his motives and behavior in light of the very sensible question Emma had asked him. And he was now satisfied that he understood why he was contemplating a match that almost every person of his acquaintance saw as insane.

He could understand that it might appear, from the outside, to be an ill-considered, impulsive mistake. But that was not the case at all. It had become clear to him in the early hours of the morning that instinct—that sudden comprehensive knowledge all good military commanders learned to trust—had led him to this decision. He hadn’t seen it himself at first. He had been diverted by… irrelevancies. But fulfilling his duty by wedding a woman like Emma was exactly the ticket.

She had asked him for the reasons he wished to marry her, and he would give them to her. He had prepared very carefully for this meeting, and he was determined that it would go exactly as he had planned. He would not succumb to emotion; he would not let Emma’s vibrant beauty divert him. He would make such a compelling case that she had to agree.

It was all very simple, he told himself as he waited for her to appear. At a very young age, Emma had been overcome by a false infatuation and drawn into a disastrous match. She feared marriage as a trap, even though the situation was completely different now. He must appeal to her formidable intellect and her scrupulous principles before she would allow herself to give in.

Arabella Tarrant entered the room. “She does not wish to come down,” she told him. “She says you have nothing further to discuss.”

A spark of annoyance ignited in Colin. Ruthlessly, he suppressed it. “Please inform Lady Tarrant that that is not the case,” he said civilly.

“I don’t think—”

“Please,” he repeated in a tone that brooked no argument.

Looking doubtful, Arabella went out.

He was in complete control here, Colin told himself. There would be no outbursts, no unfortunate slips that would cause her to bolt. With studied casualness, he laid his arm along the mantelpiece, forcing his fingers to relax. He took a deep breath.

A few moments later, Arabella reappeared. “She won’t come down,” she informed him uneasily. “She said…”

“Yes?” prompted Colin when she fell silent.

“Er…”

“What the dev—that is, please tell me what she said.”

“She said if you did not go, she would send Ferik to throw you out,” blurted Arabella on one long breath.

“Did she indeed?” Dispassionately, Colin noted that his hand had balled into a fist. He consciously relaxed it again. “Tell her,” he said, his voice clipped, “that I rather think I could hold my own with Ferik. But in any case, should he injure me, he would be put in prison or hanged.” He prolonged the last word, savoring its long stretch of vowel.

“My lord,” began Arabella.

“Do me the courtesy of conveying my message,” he answered.

Looking hunted, once again, his hostess scuttled away.

His teeth were not clenched, Colin thought. Nor were his brows drawn together in a dark scowl, as the mirror seemed to imply. He was simply primed and ready to make his case as soon as he was given the opportunity to do so. All would be measured and reasonable; there would be no raised voices, no grasping her by the shoulders and shaking her until some sense made its way into that lovely, stubborn head and… Shocked at the gratification this picture held for him, Colin banished it.

Arabella peered around the door frame. “She refuses, my lord. She is quite unshakable. Indeed, I fear she is—”

Without another word, Colin strode from the room and up the narrow stairs, Arabella fluttering agitatedly behind him. In the upper corridor, he looked to her for direction, and she indicated a door on the left with shaking hands. Colin unhesitatingly threw it open and stalked into a small bedchamber hung with faded pink chintz. “You are the most infuriating woman I have ever met,” he said to Emma, who sat in the far corner at a rickety writing desk, “and possibly the most interesting I ever shall meet.”

“My lord!” she cried, springing to her feet. “How dare you burst into my room in this way?”

“I dare because you would not come down,” he said. “You left me no other choice.”

“On the contrary, I asked you to leave.”

“Well, I did not wish to do that,” Colin pointed out, as he tried to regain his careful calm. She looked particularly beautiful this morning, in a crisp gown of white muslin sprigged with blue flowers. The very air around her seemed to crackle with vitality—and anger. He must seize his chance. “You asked me the reasons I wish to marry you,” he said. “Well, that is one of the foremost among them.”

“What is?” snapped Emma.

“That you are the most interesting woman I have yet encountered,” he repeated. “I don’t believe you will ever bore me, or plague me with foolishness.”

“The same might be said for many women in London,” replied Emma.

“I have not met them,” he countered.

“It is a large city,” she replied coldly. “It must be filled with interesting women. I know it is teeming with much better matches.”

“That depends upon your requirements,” Colin said. “I have had rather too much experience of the marriage mart recently, and I can assure you that the qualities I mentioned are exceedingly rare. Indeed, I have found them nowhere else.”

“Then you have not tried, my lord.”

“Have I not?” He grimaced, remembering countless hours of insipid conversation and longing for escape. “These great matches you talk of so freely—do you know what they come down to? I am expected to marry some chit of seventeen who has just left the schoolroom.”

“Well, she needn’t be…”

“That is what my mother plots. She has been parading these girls before me since the day after I returned home, trussed up like Christmas parcels in ribbons and lace and well-schooled admiration.”

Emma suppressed a smile at the picture.

“They are polite and obedient and terribly eager to please,” he added.

“What more could a man want?” asked Emma tartly.

“And they are all dead bores,” he finished.

“Because you do not know them well,” suggested Emma, though she found she did not really wish to argue this case.

“I know them,” he replied. “I do not say it is their fault. They have had no time to develop thoughts of their own, and no encouragement to do so. But I will not be saddled with one of them.”

“Then don’t be,” exclaimed Emma, throwing up her hands. “But your preferences have nothing to do with me.”

“Yes, they do,” he said, in a tone that made her turn to look at him.

“There is another side to this, you know—the woman’s. I am not such a great catch.”

Emma started to disagree, but he silenced her with a curt gesture.

“I have spent the last eight years at war,” he continued—slowly, because this part was more difficult. “My mind is still filled with images from the battlefield. My temperament has… darkened. I am…” He groped for words. “I believe I am forever changed.”

She was watching his face as if she could see something disturbing there.

He had meant to tell her everything, but the look in her eyes made him veer off. “I have lost whatever patience I ever had with stupidity or ignorance,” he added. “I can no longer tolerate fools. I believe that you can understand this. I believe, even, that you may feel some of the same things.”

Emma met his eyes. Depths, she thought; she had been right about that.

“We have both endured much,” Colin went on. “We can offer each other the compassion that comes out of such experiences, and perhaps lighten the burden somewhat.”

He had truly caught Emma’s attention now.

“I do not wish to spend my life with someone who is constantly asking me what I mean or cajoling me for smiles that I do not feel.”

A chord of fellow feeling rang through Emma. She knew precisely what he meant. “Alone amid laughter,” she murmured.

Colin’s face lit. “You see? You do understand me.”

“Yes.” Emma looked at him with new eyes.

Encouraged, he stepped forward and took her hand. “When I was twenty, I assumed that I would one day fall head over heels in love and be swept into marriage by strong emotion. I am nearly thirty now, and I fear emotion has been burned out of me by long years of battle.” He gazed down at her. “Perhaps you understand this, too, somewhat.”

Their eyes held steadily. Emma was finding it difficult to breathe.

“I have found a great deal to admire in you,” he continued. “You are extremely intelligent. You have a great deal of integrity. I believe we could offer one another comradeship. And perhaps that is the most we can expect at this point in our lives.”

Shaken, she scanned his face. “Comradeship?”

He nodded.

“You are offering me a bargain?” she concluded.

“Yes. You can’t wish to return to the life you left. I require a wife who will not drive me to murder within a week. Our needs seem… suited.”

Emma gazed up at him. She was thinking not of the barren and precarious life she would face abroad, or even of the luxurious existence she could expect as Baroness St. Mawr. What transfixed her was his voice as he spoke of the dark days he had endured in the war and their common understanding of hardship. Something deep inside her had come awake at those words, had responded profoundly to the tone of them, to the reminiscent shadow in his eyes. She had never before met with such kinship. She had never expected it. Emma trembled with the strength of her emotion, though she wasn’t sure what it was. “I…” she began, and could not finish.

“You cannot condemn me to be surrounded by people who know nothing but sunlight,” he said. “I will not abandon you to that fate either,” he added.

A bargain, thought Emma. A clear agreement between two people who understood each other, which offered advantages to each. Not, most emphatically not, a heedless, headstrong leap into disaster. Not the risks and stupidities of a naive young girl’s illusion of true love. This was safe. It was sensible. And it did offer her many things. Comradeship, Emma thought. It was a pleasing concept. “No,” she said.

“No?” he repeated.

“No, I could not condemn you to that,” she added, conscious that it was the truth, even if she was making a serious mistake.

Arabella Tarrant, peering through a crack in the door, put her hands to her mouth to stifle a gratified squeal. This was really a splendid development. Though she hadn’t understood half of what they said, this pair had clearly come to an agreement at last. And the Baron St. Mawr and his new wife would both have reason to be grateful to her for bringing them together. Surely, she thought, as she watched Colin offer his hand, and Emma take it as if sealing a business transaction, surely they would be very grateful indeed.

A pang of envy shot through her, like a sour surge of bile. Emma would have everything now. It wasn’t fair, she thought vaguely. Nothing in her life had been fair. But perhaps she was going to make up for that at last, she thought as she crept away.

“There is one—rather delicate—thing I must ask you,” Colin said then.

Emma raised her head at his tone. “What?”

“I owe my name and title an heir,” he said evenly.

It took Emma an instant, then she understood. “I… I was with child in the first year of my marriage,” she said. “I lost the baby during a rough journey to Vienna.” She swallowed at the pain of the memory. “The doctor told me there was no reason for concern in the future. But then, after that first year, Edward spent most of his nights at the gaming houses, and drinking. He hardly ever… that is… it became obvious that his true passion was gaming.”

Colin felt a mixture of compassion for her and jealous contempt for the man who had treated her so.

A moment passed before either of them spoke again. Then Colin took a breath and contemplated the opposite wall. “First thing tomorrow, I will visit my great-aunt Celia,” he told her. “I believe I can make her our ally in this, and she has great influence in society.” He smiled slightly. “Even better, my mother is terrified of her.”

“Your mother will not be pleased,” concluded Emma.

“She will make a great fuss, but you must pay no attention. My mother has not been pleased with anything I did since I left the nursery. You should have heard her screech when I accepted a commission in the army.”

“You do not get along?” she wondered.

“I get along perfectly well,” Colin replied. “But my mother is overfond of her own way. And she will not be convinced that I have no desire for her… guidance.”

Emma sighed.

“I should go and begin to put things in motion,” he said. “Do you… need anything to help you prepare for the wedding?”

Emma stood straighter. “I shan’t take money from you. I’ll do quite well with what I have.”

“Of course.” He hesitated. “It’s just that my mother is very… susceptible to appearances.”

“Is she?” Emma’s chin came up. “I shall do my best to, er, satisfy her.”

Colin smiled slightly. “I’ll call again this afternoon,” he said. “All will be well,” he assured her.

Emma wished she could believe him.

***

Colin rang the bell at his mother’s town house and was admitted by her butler, Riggs, with a somber greeting. Moving with austere dignity, Riggs escorted his lordship to the drawing room and sent a footman to inform their mistress of her son’s arrival. Then, finding himself unobserved, the butler raced down two flights of stairs to inform the senior staff that a blowup of major proportions was about to take place. Those with the least excuse to loiter near the drawing room promptly took their places. Thus, the baroness had a gratifyingly large audience when she swept down the staircase and along the corridor, like a frigate under full sail, to confront her erring offspring.