Page 3 of To Claim the Long-Lost Lover
“Go on, Libby,” he encouraged her. “What terrible flaw have you noticed that I must needs amend to be acceptable to a suitable lady?”
“Well…” She chewed on her lower lip, examining him with anxious eyes. “You have not been much in Society, Nate,” she offered, eventually.
Nate was trying to work out what she was driving at when his father spoke from the door to what he misleadingly called his study—a room in which he drank brandy and slept in front of the fire. “She’s right, for once. You are too free and easy, Bentham. You’ve no idea how to go on in theBeau Monde. And you don’t have the right connections. No friends from school or that sort of thing.”
No, because his father had tutored him at home, reneged on the promise to send him to Oxford in order to keep him as an unpaid secretary, and then when the Duke of Winshire had him abducted, signed him over to the untender mercies of the navy.
“I was at school with some of Society’s important hostesses, Lechton,” Libby said, her soft voice meek and apologetic. “If we were to go to London with Lord Bentham—”
Lord Lechton interrupted her with a rude snort. “I see your game,” he told his wife, scowling. “You think to jaunt up to Town, do you? And spend my money on fripperies, I suppose.” He began to shake his head, and Nate spoke quickly, before the old tyrant refused Libby what she clearly saw as a treat. Once he’d spoken, he’d not renege. So much for escaping his father’s presence.Libby’s case is worse than mine. She was stuck with the man until death did them part.
Nate smiled broadly. “What an excellent idea, Libby. Using your connections, I should soon have invitations to places I can meet my future bride, and I’m sure you can counsel me on my manners and dress, too.”
Lechton was purpling. Time to apply a little flattery. No, a lot of flattery—applying it with a shovel rather than a trowel would be no more than the earl considered his due. Nor would he note the barb Nate buried in the compliment.
“My lord, I know you will agree, for you have mentioned her ladyship’s useful connections to me before. What great foresight you showed in choosing a bride who could be of such assistance to your heir, especially since I was unable to complete my own education as a gentleman.”
The earl’s scowl deepened. For a moment, Nate thought he had misjudged Lechton’s acuity, so he was relieved rather than annoyed when the earl grumbled, “You’d be married already, and likely have given me a grandson by now, if you’d paid more attention to your duties and less to making up to that girl. Instead, here you are, barely more than a savage, and now I have to go to the expense of a London Season for a woman who can’t even give me sons. You are a great disappointment to me, Bentham. Beyond a doubt I need to go to London to make sure you don’t marry to disoblige me.”
He turned his glower on Libby. “Lady Lechton, you shall need to dress to reflect credit on me. You shall have a strict budget, and I shall expect an accounting.”
Libby was glowing. Nate had considered her a dowdy sort of a creature, but her delight at the thought of a Season in London made her almost pretty. “Oh, yes, my lord. I shall be most prudent, my lord. You are very kind, my lord.” Three ‘my lord’s’ in a row, and nary a mention that the money with which Lechton planned to be parsimonious had come from Libby’s dowry. Not for the first time, Nate wondered what had made Libby and her family accept the much older and poorer Earl of Lechton as a suitor. Lust for a title? If so, she was paying a heavy price, poor lady.
He shrugged the mystery off. None of his business, but if he could make Libby’s burden a little lighter, he would do it. “When shall we leave, then?” he asked, and resigned himself to the wait when Lord Lechton decreed another week to allow the townhouse in London to be opened, and to prepare to move the entire household, nursery, servants and all.
* * *
The twin’s list grew through November. Society was greeting those returning to the capital as Parliament began its sessions after the summer recess. Sarah and Charlotte attended entertainments carefully chosen to meet as many suitable gentlemen as possible. After each event, they added names, though they also crossed some out. They wrote notations against every potential candidate they encountered.
“Hythe is probably not ready to set up his nursery,” Sarah said, after meeting the earl in question at a dinner party. She wrote this next to his name. That done,probablywas notcertainly. He stayed on the list.
“Aldridge probably is ready to set up his nursery,” Charlotte noted. The cross through Aldridge’s name had been the subject of some debate. The twins agreed that the Duke of Haverford’s terminal illness meant his heir, the Marquis of Aldridge, must be in need of a bride, but otherwise disputed his suitability for Sarah.
Charlotte argued that Sarah was not seeking a love match, and that Aldridge met all her specifications for a husband. “He would be a kind, courteous, and respectful husband, Sarah. He is not out for your money or your social position—he has more than enough of both. You get on well with his mother. And they have so much scandal of their own that they’re hardly likely to cavil at yours.”
Sarah countered with all of the marquis’s well-known character flaws, and then won the argument with a sneak attack. “Besides, while I do not want a husband who loves me, nor do I want one who has been dangling after my sister these past four years. He wants you, Charlotte, not me. Besides, even if I was prepared for the embarrassment of being married to a man who loves my sister, I doubt if Aldridge is going to accept such a substitution.”
Charlotte shook her head. “It is not love. It can’t be. I appear to be a suitable bride for a man of his rank. That is all. But I am not, Sarah. You know I am not.”
“I know nothing of the kind.” Sarah enfolded her sister in an embrace. “I shall not hound you, my love. But neither shall I marry Aldridge.”
Someone would. It should be Charlotte, but Sarah understood the reasons for her sister’s reservations, and would say no more. “What of Lord Colyford?” she asked. “I have no objection to a widower, and I have seen his little girls at the park. They appear delightful.”
“I’ll put him on the list,” Charlotte agreed. “Hurley? He seems pleasant enough.”
“He can go on the list,” Sarah decided, “but I remain to be convinced he has substance to go with his charm.”
They added a couple more names and crossed out that of a man who had over-imbibed at Lady Forrest’s musical evening. Apparently, he was developing a reputation for becoming drunk and assaulting the maids.
“What are you planning to wear tonight?” Charlotte asked.
“I thought my blue satin-striped sarsenet with the Vandyke lace collar and cuffs.”
Charlotte nodded. “That will go well with my green and white muslin with the satin trim.”
The sisters usually co-ordinated their toilettes. They were well aware of managing the impact they made together. Since their cousins Ruth and Rosemary arrived in time for the 1812 Spring Season, the four of them had appeared as an ensemble: colours, designs and fabrics carefully chosen so that each complemented the others.
They had been a sensation. Some wit had dubbed them the Four Winds—an obvious allusion to their shared surname, and the foolish swains of Society made a fashion of declaring for one Wind or another, and plying her with compliments, flowers, and charm. Nothing serious. Just frivolous fun. Sarah and Charlotte had not been looking for husbands, and Ruth and Rosemary had their mixed-blood as a counterweight to their status as daughters to a duke and their generous dowries.
