Page 24 of To Claim the Long-Lost Lover
“You were very brave,” Nate told her.
“Why didn’t you write?” she asked. Then, looking up at him through her lashes, she made it a question. “Did you write?”
“To my cousin. I begged my cousin to find out how you were and to let me know. I even wrote to my father when I didn’t hear from Arthur. Neither of them ever wrote back. I wrote directly to you, too, though I thought it would be useless. I assumed your father would keep any letters from you., but I still I posted letters whenever we were in port. I never got a reply.”
“He isn’t in Lesser Lechford. I rode over three years ago, after Mama and Charlotte and I retired to the dower house at Swinwood Hall. They told me he was accused of embezzling funds and corrupting minors. The bishop removed him from his post and nobody knew where he went. Nate, Grandfather must have done that to him, as revenge. Your poor cousin!”
Nate frowned. No wonder the man had never answered. He never received the letters. Then Nate had another thought. “I left our marriage lines with him for safekeeping. I wrote again last night to ask him to send them to me. I will find him, Sarah.”
“We are really married?” Sarah asked, leaning towards him, and he smiled and nodded.
Just then, someone called Nate’s title. “Bentham!” Lord Hythe, whom he’d met at White’s and again at various entertainments, crossed the room from the doorway. “Your father was looking for you, Bentham. He wants you in the ballroom for some kind of an announcement.”
Even as he spoke, they heard the music draw to a close, and someone began calling for silence. As the post-dance chatter died away, the last half of a sentence came to them, loud and clear: “...ado, I’ll hand the floor over to Lord Lechton and Lord Tremaway.”
“What is the old man up to now?” Nate wondered. He leapt to his feet and, with Sarah close behind him, hurried back into the ballroom.
11
Sarah had a bad feeling about this. Nate’s father had used one tactic after another to control the son he didn’t understand. In the long litany of tyranny, enrolling his only son in the navy in order to remove him from a marriage he had not approved was merely the last and worst example.
Sarah still didn’t understand why Nate was back in England, working as a doctor and, if not living with his father, at least on speaking terms with him. But clearly Nate expected another assault on his freedom of choice, and in any conflict between him and the earl, Sarah was on Nate’s side.
Lechton was meandering on about his pleasure in the future of his title and his family; about how the ‘fruit of his loins’ was about to make him very happy. Sarah couldn’t see him, but she could hear him, and she could just see Nate, disappearing between shoulders and skirts, making his way to the far end of the room where his father pontificated about the importance of marriage and children and impeccable reputations.
Sarah stopped, her bad feeling coalescing into a nasty suspicion. He sounded as if he was about to announce that she and Nate were married. It was too soon! Nate hadn’t told her the rest of his story. She had avoided telling him about Elias. Besides, her family needed to know before anyone else!
Charlotte came up beside her and linked an arm with hers. “Do you know what is going on?” she whispered.
Sarah shook her head. “I do not. Shh. Let us listen.”
Drew touched her arm, a silent support on the other side, and beyond him the duke her uncle. They moved as a group back towards the wall, where they could just see the tops of the two lord’s heads, and the face of Lord Framington, standing to one side.
“Here, Lechton,” said Lord Tremaway. “My turn. My ladies and my lords, gentlepersons all, I am delighted to announce the betrothal of my daughter, Miss Tremaway, to the son of the Earl of Lechton, Lord Bentham.”
Uncle James muttered something under his breath, shooting Sarah a look of alarm. “It isn’t true,” Sarah told him, her voice drowned in the response from the ball goers—clapping, chatter, and a few cheers, as footmen began to move around with glasses of wine.
Every sound in the room ceased as Nate roared, “No!” in a voice pitched to be heard above a storm. In the tense silence, he must have reached the musicians’ platform, for suddenly she could see his head across the crowd. “Miss Tremaway, Lord Tremaway, I regret to inform you that I have not consented to this betrothal. Indeed, I knew nothing of it until you, sir, announced it.”
What Sarah could see of Tremaway purpled. “Your father has made a promise, sirrah, and you shall honour it.”
“I cannot, my lord, and I will not. My word is already given elsewhere.”
Tremaway turned on Lechton, and began shouting about breach of promise, but Lord Framington moved forward and said something to the three angry men. He must have suggested that they take their dispute to a more private setting, for they followed him from the room, and in moments Lady Framington spoke from the platform, her delight at the scandalous doings at her ball only slightly disguised.
“Please let us move on to supper, my friends. It seems the Lechtons and the Tremaways were a little beforehand with their announcement.” She giggled. “One must leave them to have their conversation, and await developments!”
“We should go,” Uncle James said.
“But Nate—” Sarah protested. “I should wait... We haven’t finished our conversation. We were going to have supper together.” And she had hoped for a waltz to replace the one they’d missed in order to talk. She yearned to be held in his arms again. But she was being silly. He was unlikely to get out of the trouble his father had fomented in what remained of the evening.
Her sister, as so often, had followed her thoughts. “He will be under intense scrutiny for the rest of the night, Sarah. You know he will. Being seen with him will make you part of the story, too.”
The duke nodded, and Sarah could see their point. Until she and Nate knew whether they were married; until they decided what they wished to do about the future; they should avoid making their relationship fodder for the ton’s gossip machine.
* * *
Tremaway was justly angry. So was Nate, come to that. Miss Tremaway was in tears. Lady Tremaway held her daughter in her arms and glared at Nate. Libby sat on the other side of Miss Tremaway, watching the three men with worried eyes.
