The Savage Miss Saxon (12 page)

“Blister me,” Sir Alexander commented from his position at the bottom of the stairwell, “Matilda would have made a great general. Now she’s taken possession, it will be nigh impossible to nudge her out again.”

“You think it’s all a hum too, Grandfather?” Alexandra asked.

“Sink me, of course it is,” he shot back testily, “and sure as check Linton knows it too. I cannot understand why he allowed it unless he’s running some rig of his own.”

Alexandra looked up toward the now empty landing, a thoughtful frown puckering her brow. “Do you think he means to make me jealous? If so, the man’s more of a fool than I thought him to be. If you ask me, I think he doesn’t want either one of us and only hopes we will kill each other off fighting over him and leave him in peace. Not that I give a tinker’s curse if he does marry the chit—although he’s much too good for that brainless widget—but he knows you’ll try to hold him to your bargain.”

“I by damn will! Let the Anselm woman take the young sprout—it’s the Earl for you, my girl,” Sir Alexander blustered, blithely settling the fate of both the Mannering men.

“Jeremy?” Alexandra questioned, taken aback. “But he’s just a child. That odious Anselm woman would serve him up for dinner. Besides, if ever I saw a person out for the main chance, it is Mrs. Anselm. No,” she shook her head thoughtfully, “it’s Linton himself she’s after. Something must have happened to make her rethink the engagement.”

Sir Alexander gave a disdainful snort. “Something happened all right. The daughter ran out of beaux and the mother ran out of funds.” He laughed aloud. “What she didn’t count on was Nicholas’s finding himself another bride.”

“Who wants no part of him,” Alexandra added mendaciously. “Don’t forget
that
, Grandfather.”

“Blast it, gel, how can I forget it, with you blabbering it about constantly for all to hear? Matilda saw her chance and took it, no thanks to you. Now that she’s got the girl entrenched upstairs, it will take an earthquake to shift her. And stop grinning like the village idiot. Anyone would think whistling Earls down the wind was no more than a lark to you.”

From his position at the head of the stairs, Nicholas could not help overhearing the conversation taking place below him. The plan that had begun to glimmer in his brain just before Helene had enacted her dramatic swoon was now rapidly taking shape. He would pretend to play along with Mrs. Anselm’s little game—keeping Helene on the scene—and try to use the girl’s presence to his own advantage. Alix may not think she wants to marry me, he told himself, but her reaction to my kiss was not one of repugnance—not by a long chalk.

No, Alix wasn’t as adverse to him as she pretended to be, he was sure. Perhaps a gentle nudge in the right direction was all that she needed.

Not that he was in love with her, he clarified mentally. He had tried that emotion once and found it fleeting, fickle, and decidedly unreliable. After all, he had for a time truly believed he was in love with Helene—an outstanding example of why men should choose their mates with their heads rather than their hearts if ever there was one.

Alexandra suited him. She was beautiful, intelligent, and spirited—not to mention heir to all Sir Alexander’s considerable worldly goods. It was true the Saxon and Mannering holdings did not, as the saying went, “march together,” but they were close enough as to make no difference and went a long way toward sweetening the pot—although Nicholas wasn’t by nature a mercenary man.

He might not have planned to marry so soon after his lucky escape from Helene’s clutches, but now his reasons for pushing Alexandra into matrimony seemed even more valid. At first he had only wrestled with his sense of honor, and being a gentleman (and in no little awe of Sir Alexander’s power to make his life a living hell if he refused to do the honorable thing), he had quickly seen the good sense of offering Alexandra the protection of his name.

Also weighing in favor of the match was Jeremy’s nerve-shredding, mother-hen protectiveness ever since Helene’s defection—clearly the boy wouldn’t rest until his big brother was, in Jeremy’s mind at least, happily ensnared in parson’s mousetrap. If it came to a choice between wedding Alexandra or putting up with Cuffy and Billy forevermore underfoot, besides having Jeremy hanging around him as if he were about to put a period to his existence as a result of his sad disappointment, Alexandra won hands down.

Of course—the Earl was honest enough to admit to himself at least—marrying a beauty like Alexandra, rich or poor, wasn’t exactly a hardship. Bedding her, in fact, should prove to be a true joy.

Nicholas looked down the staircase and sighed. Alexandra herself was proving the one real fly in the ointment—stubborn little baggage that she was showing herself to be.

If only he had already sent the notice of their engagement to the
Gazette
. But no, he had thought it might look more than a shade havey-cavey—the girl having only arrived in England a sennight earlier. A quiet wedding right after the New Year, that was the ticket, with a vaguely worded announcement inserted in the papers after the fact. Besides, Alexandra was proving difficult with her oft-repeated refusals to behave like a sensible puss and accept his offer gracefully.
Two
retractions in the
Gazette
in less than a year just might serve to really send him into a sad decline.

He had thought he was wearing down her resistance—he and Sir Alexander—but even earlier today in the morning room (and in front of the Anselms, no less) she had repudiated him yet again.

Helene’s presence at Linton Hall did make things deuced awkward, but her visit just might be worked to advantage by a man clever enough to correctly play the cards dealt him, Nicholas mused as he continued to watch Alexandra. Before giving himself any time to reflect overmuch on what he was about to do, he descended the staircase to have a few words with his recalcitrant fiancée.

“You’ll be happy to hear that all seems to be under control upstairs. Helene is resting comfortably with a cloth dampened in
eau de cologne
bathing her forehead whilst her dear mother has requisitioned three chambers for herself and her offspring and is at this very moment giving my poor staff fits with her orders,” he told them.

“By Jupiter, you’re in for it now, my boy,” Sir Alexander warned, stabbing a pudgy finger at Linton’s chest. “Mark my words—you’ll not budge that one ’til spring now she’s got her carcass upstairs. A conniving, devious woman if ever one was made, that Matilda, as was her mother before her. German, you know,” he added as if this explained everything. “Came over from Hanover with the first George, took one gander at our fair island, and never looked back. Greedy buggers too, all of ’em—went back to Hanover for their brides just to keep the money in the family.

“Matilda’s father-in-law liked the cards though, and nearly ran them all aground with his gaming debts. It’s my guess Matilda used up the last of the blunt to try and marry herself a new fortune with that widget of a daughter. Her own kind don’t seem to want her, now that she’s pockets to let.” The old man shook his head in disgust. “Looks like you’re it, lad, since the gel couldn’t bring down any bigger game. But Matilda’s been outfoxed this time, by Jupiter, because it’s my granddaughter you’ll be wedding, not Widow Anselm’s die-away daughter.”

Seeing a militant look registering again on Alexandra’s face, Nicholas decided it was time to throw out a lure or two and see if his “fish” would take the bait. Arranging his face into a suitably sorrowful expression, he told Sir Alexander, “I doubt even my fortune is inducement enough to bring Helene to the altar, no matter what her mother intends. She threw me over once you know—on account of my,” he paused and hung his head before sighing, “my
disfigurement
.”

Manfully trying to hide his very obvious distress, he went on mournfully, “Just now, upstairs, Helene chanced to open her eyes as I was reaching out my hand to touch her forehead—only to ascertain whether or not she was feverish, you understand—and she—she
flinched
away from my hand. The poor child was clearly frightened half out of her wits.”

“Why that miserable, unfeeling, insensitive—” Alexandra struggled to find a suitable word, finally settling on— “
ninnyhammer!
How dare she do such a thing?” Even if Nicholas didn’t care a rap for Miss Anselm, it still must be painful to have someone be so obviously repelled by his patch. She lifted the hem of her skirt in preparation of ascending the staircase to give Miss Helene Anselm a piece of her mind before Nicholas stopped her cold with his next words.

“Don’t be so harsh on her, Alix,” Nicholas intoned fatalistically. “It’s no different with you. Oh, I know you say you don’t believe yourself compromised—although you know all your disclaimers to be nothing more than self-deception—but I am cognizant of your true reason. You can’t stand the sight of me either. You’re just too kindhearted to say so.”

Alexandra whirled back to confront this calumny. “How dare you?
How dare you!
I could stand in this spot from now until noon tomorrow cataloging the multitude of things I dislike about you, Nicholas Mannering, and all without ever once repeating myself, but your wound has absolutely nothing to do with it. Besides,” her voice softened marginally, “personally, I think it makes you look rather dashing, although I am sure it is quite an inconvenience and must even pain you at times. Still, it’s not as if you had lost an arm or a leg like so many others have done.”

“Well put, by Gadfrey,” her grandfather commended, gifting her with a hearty slap on the back that nearly sent her cannoning smack into Nicholas’s broad chest.

“Your granddaughter does have away with words, sir, but the fact remains that I am in a sad dilemma. Helene probably would bring herself to go through with the marriage, now that I think on it, as her fear of her mother outstrips even her repugnance at my appearance. But what kind of life would that be, I ask you, to have a wife who recoils from my slightest touch? On the other hand,” he said, pressing home his advantage, “I have offered myself to your granddaughter here, who also rebuffs me. Although,” he added facetiously, “we have heard it from her own lips that she does not find my
appearance
repulsive—only the rest of me.

“Much as you may demand it, and much as I agree with you, Alix refuses to become my wife. With no other avenue left open to me, I fear Mrs. Anselm will yet get me in the end. I am a sad case indeed, and I despair of finding a solution to my problem any time soon.”

Sir Alexander, uncomfortable in the face of Linton’s show of emotion, coughed and blustered but said little of anything to the point in the way of furnishing aid or comfort to the dejected Earl. While Sir Alexander allowed his tongue to tie itself into knots, Mannering kept his gaze glued on the black-and-white tiled floor of the entrance hall and wondered if his hasty plan was to prove brilliant or merely a waste of his theatrical talents. He had shot his bolt and was now relying on Alexandra to come to the only conclusion he had left open for a woman of sensitivity to make. Yet she remained silent.

Just as Nicholas was about to drop his lost soul posture and have an end to the farce, Alexandra finally spoke. “I think I have an idea, Nicholas,” she began slowly. “If Grandfather is correct, and since he knows Mrs. Anselm I can only suppose he is, it will take drastic measures to remove her from Linton Hall as long as she believes there’s any chance she can get you and Helene to the altar. Therefore, the only solution I can see,” she sighed in submission, “is for us to formally announce our engagement—only here at the Hall, mind you, as none of us will wish to go through the retraction later in the newspapers.”

Nicholas ruthlessly overrode an almost overpowering urge to throw back his head and crow his delight. His plan had succeeded exactly as he had envisioned it, with Alexandra reacting just as he had hoped she would!

“Thanks to my rather violent disclaimer earlier in the morning room,” Alexandra went on hurriedly, in the way of someone wishing to get over rough ground as quickly as possible, “I believe we cannot make even this quiet announcement immediately—not, that is, with any hope of being believed. I suggest we wait until a few days have passed, during which time we will supposedly have made up our little differences.”

Ah, Nicholas could not help complimenting himself, it is just as Shakespeare said. I had only to “Bait the hook well: this fish will bite.” Savoring his advantage, he giddily pushed for even greater leverage. “A mere announcement won’t be enough for Mrs. Anselm, Alix. I’m afraid we’ll have to act the loving couple for at least a week or more before that determined lady admits defeat and departs.”

Alexandra sighed again and raised her eyes heavenward in exasperation before voicing her reluctant agreement (denying herself a glimpse at Nicholas’s face and its unable to be suppressed although rapidly erased expression of irrepressible glee). “A week only, Nicholas,” she added warningly, “and not a minute longer. This scheme had just better work.”

“Never fear for my end, Alix, my dear, as I tell you now I plan to put on a very convincing performance. It is my doubts of
your
abilities at play acting that make me wonder about the dependability of your scheme, no matter if you wish it to go on for a week or a month—knowing as I do how thoroughly you dislike me. Besides,” he added with a hint of sadness once again creeping into his voice, “if truth be served, I still am of the opinion my patch offends you.”

“Oh, cut line,” Alexandra demanded hotly. “You don’t appear to me to be going into any major decline because of that damned patch. You’ll not cozen me with those die-away airs and deep sighs. Really, Nicholas, did you think that for one minute I
fell
for that ridiculous claptrap you’ve been spouting? It just amused me to see how far you would go. You had a lucky escape once from Miss Anselm, and now you’re using her to your own ends—else you’d have sent her packing an hour ago. Please, don’t go laboring under the delusion I am helping you out of the goodness of my heart!