Page 9 of To Claim the Long-Lost Lover
“Come back tomorrow, if you can,” Blythe suggested, as they parted. “It’s a clinic day, and you might like to meet some of the others.”
Nate agreed. He’d tell Libby that he wouldn’t be available for afternoon calls, but he would escort her to the theatre that night. For the first time since leaving Edinburgh, he was looking forward to the next day.
5
After three days at the house party, Sarah was fighting the urge to order her carriage and escape. Charlotte had not arrived, instead sending a message to say that something had come up concerning the school and she would be there as soon as she could.
Some of the more disreputable house guests had taken Charlotte’s absence to mean Sarah would be susceptible to their charms, which was more than a little insulting. Jeremy Parkswick was typical. He found her on her own in the stables when she lingered to feed an apple to her mount. “I am pleased to see you here without your twin, lovely Sarah,” he said in a husky voice that she presumed she was meant to find appealing.
As if Sarah, without Charlotte, would not have the brains to see that Parkswick was all glitter and no substance! She moved away from the corner to which he was trying to herd her. “And why is that, Mr Parkswick?”
He shifted to block her exit. “I mean no offense, dear lady. Lady Charlotte is very worthy, I suppose. But she is a bluestocking and a prude, and out to spoil a man’s fun.”
In their first year as debutantes, Society had dubbed Sarah the Diamond and Charlotte the Saint. They seemed to think Sarah’s fashionable colouring and figure were the sum total of her person, and being beautiful must necessarily mean being stupid. Charlotte’s preference for a quieter social life and her dedication to educational causes meant, in their eyes, she was some kind of a religious fanatic, determined to spoil their fun.
Parkswick’s fun, in this case, fetched him sore toes from Sarah’s riding boot. The fool did not take the hint, spreading his legs to move his feet away from her stamp and wrapping her in an embrace that stank of an over-floral cologne, male perspiration, and brandy. “Clumsy, clumsy, my pet. If you want to play, I have some better ideas.”
“Release me immediately, Mr Parkswick, or I shall ask my cousin Drew to teach you some manners,” Sarah informed him. The threat would provoke less gossip, if a lower degree of personal satisfaction, than a sound punch to his mating equipment.
Drew’s marksmanship had become legendary in his first months in England, when he had shot the buttons off an opponent’s jacket in a duel, then repeated the feat at Manton’s with a succession of volunteers. He was equally skilled with a sword and with his fists. Parkswick let her go and slunk off muttering that he only meant to steal a kiss, and she was as cold as her sister.
Sarah hadn’t, in fact, told her cousin. Drew presented as an affable easy-going young man, slow to take offence and always ready with a joke to diffuse a tense situation. But scratch that surface, and the warrior lurked beneath. As her escort, Drew would take any threat to her seriously, and—while Parkswick probably deserved to be thrashed—any such intervention would itself generate gossip. Sarah had no wish to become an object of pity or, for that matter, the villainess of the piece, luring hapless rakes into fights with her formidable relative.
Besides, on their way to the house party, she had asked Drew to give her space to get to know the three gentleman guests who were on her husband shortlist, and she hated to have to admit that was a mistake.However, if the rakes and scoundrels refuse to take my ‘no’ for an answer, I shall have to enlist Drew to have a quiet word with them.
Sarah sighed. Her husband list was shrinking, too. Out of three candidates at this party, two had disqualified themselves already. Drew had taken her aside after dinner on the second day. “Lord Hurley is a dedicated gambler, cousin. Most of the men here will not play with him, as he is falling further and further into debt, and has already sold the estate he inherited and much of his other property. He needs a wealthy wife to fund his habit.”
Sarah had no objection to a man marrying her for her dowry, but not if he was likely to wager it away and leave her and Elias penniless.
Lord Colyford had seemed promising. He wanted a wife to mother his little girls and provide a son or two. Since Sarah wanted a father for her son and more children, it would be an even bargain. He was pleasant to talk to, treated her as if her opinions had value, and showed no signs of descending into sentiment. This was to be a practical marriage, with respect and affection certainly, but Sarah had done with love.
The twinge when she thought of Nate was a scarred-over wound, mostly sound but subject to the occasional phantom pain. That was what she had been telling herself, trying not to build anything on the visit her sister had written about, or his expressed desire to explain himself.
Then, yesterday, she had been out for a walk with Colyford and several other guests. They had rounded a hedge and come across the nursery party. Elias had run to meet Sarah, his face alight with pleasure. What a far cry from the nervous little creature Mrs Wakefield had brought her just eight months ago. Sarah returned the child’s bow, then crouched to present her cheek for a kiss.
“Ladies, gentlemen, may I make known to you my ward, Master Elias Winderfield?”
Several of the ladies bent for a word with the little boy. Some of the gentleman, too, bestowed a smile on him from their various heights. Not, Sarah noted, Colyford.
“What are you up to today,” Jessica Grenford asked Elias. Jessica was one of the Duchess of Haverford’s three wards. They were all, though the ton pretended not to notice, base-born daughters of the Duke of Haverford, and therefore half-sisters to one another and to the Marquis of Aldridge.
Jessica’s attention proved too much for Elias, who muttered something unintelligible.
“Oh, he is shy,” one of the other ladies cooed. “How sweet.”
Sarah stood and claimed the child’s hand. “Time to return to nurse, dearest,” she suggested, and led Elias a few paces away to where the nurse waited. Another kiss, and the child and nurse re-joined the rest of their group, Elias recovering enough to turn to wave to Sarah.
As they continued on their walk, the ladies chatted about how handsome Elias was, and how sweetly he bowed. “You haven’t had him for long, have you?” commented one of the silliest debutantes. “I thought he would be rougher. Because of...” she trailed off, as one of her friends poked her.
Sarah thought it kinder to ignore the remark, and the whispered aside to the helpful friend. “Well, everyone knows that she took him out of a workhouse.”
Jessica, bless her, said, “I believe we are to have dancing after tea tonight, and a picnic at the ruins tomorrow, if the weather holds.”
The distraction worked, the rest of the party more than happy to talk about their own entertainment rather than the dubious origins of the newest chick in the Winderfield nest. Elias wasn’t mentioned again until they were returning to the house. The party had spread out by then, and Sarah was walking on Colyford’s arm.
Colyford’s voice was stiff and cold when he said, “I had been told that you’d taken guardianship of your brother’s er—love child. Or is he your father’s?”
Sarah shrugged. Few people had asked her outright, but she had developed an answer that avoided lying. “It does not matter, Lord Colyford. He is a Winderfield, as anyone can see by looking him.”
