Page 21 of To Marry and to Meddle
“I was born in June. Frances was born in December. It’s seven and a half years, so we round up, to eight.”
“Wedon’t do anything of the sort,” Frances said indignantly. “It could just as easily be rounded down, to seven, which is of course the sensible way to approach it. Don’t you agree, Emily?”
Emily was unprepared to be called on to arbitrate this dispute, which she suspected was long-running. “I really couldn’t say,” she murmured, which was always the safest reply a lady could make in any sort of situation—and, truly, the only one that seemed to be desired of her half the time, anyway.
“I believe Emily’s birthday is in May, so our ages work out quite neatly,” Julian said with a dash of smugness that Emily personally felt was a bit unreasonable; none of them had the slightest bit of control over their birthdays, after all.
“This does not seem like a very productive line of debate,” she said diplomatically, then paused, his words belatedly registering. “How do you know when my birthday is?” she asked her husband. She was quite certain it had never come up in any of their conversations.
Julian suddenly seemed exceptionally interested in the contents of his teacup. “I asked Lady Templeton.” He glanced up briefly to meet her eyes, his expression inscrutable.
Emily frowned. “But why would you ask Diana?”
“I was concerned that it was coming up soon, and you wouldn’t tell me, and I didn’t want to miss it. But I didn’t wish to ask you, because if it was next week and you admitted to that, I thought you’d feel as though I only bought you a gift because you’d told me, and—” He broke off with an awkward sort of cough, and Emily thought it was easily the most uncomfortable she had ever seen him look. She quickly raised her teacup to her lips, to hide whatever expression was on her face at that moment.
They were interrupted by the sudden appearance of the earl, a tall, lanky man. She had met him before but had never exchanged more than a few words with him, perhaps a dance here or there. He was handsome, Emily thought, in a rather unprepossessing way—he had hair of a middling brown and eyes of a similar shade, but he was nowhere near as striking as Julian, or Frances herself, for that matter. Emily had no doubt, watching Frances’s gaze soften the minute it landed on his face, that theirs was a love match; the earl crossed the room with long strides to stand behind her, resting a hand on her shoulder, as she tipped her head up to look at him.
“Is your interrogation complete, my love?” he asked, his voice mock-stern and full of affection.
“I’ve not the faintest idea what you’re talking about.” His wifefeigned ignorance, lowering her face to look at her guests once more. “Julian’s here!”
“I gathered,” the earl said, crossing to shake Julian’s hand; Julian rose to meet him, using his free hand to clap the earl on the shoulder. He seemed at ease around his sister and brother-in-law in a way that Emily had not expected, given what she knew of his family history—clearly, his supposed estrangement from his parents did not extend to his sister.
“And I knew,” the earl continued, “that when Graves told me that Belfry was here with a mysterious new wife in tow, I must come at once to save them from whatever torture you were subjecting them to.”
“Risedale, my wife,” Julian said, his hand at the small of Emily’s back.
“Lady Emily,” the earl said, bowing over her hand. “Or Lady Julian now, I suppose.”
“Emily will do fine,” she said, smiling at him, her attention distracted by the feeling of the faint, gentle pressure of Julian’s hand at her back. “As I suppose we are family of a sort, now.” As she spoke the words, she felt Julian’s hand sliding down to the slight curve of her waist, resting lightly there. She felt a strange pang as she uttered the wordfamily; for so long—as long as she could remember, really—hers had not been a terribly great comfort to her. Her brother had scorned her company when he was alive, and her parents had been more concerned with the depth of her curtsey and the rosiness of her cheeks than with anything that actually made her herself—a daughter was a burden, in their eyes, someone to make use of as best as possible, to make up for the bother and expense of raising her. She loved her parents, in her own fashion—but, as she sometimes admitted to herself in the darkest part of the night, the occasions on which shelikedthem were fleeting.
Marrying Julian, knowing of his distance from his own family in the years following his decision not just to purchase a theater but to take an active role in its operation—to appear onstage, to spend his days in an office at the Belfry rubbing elbows with actors rather than at his club among his peers—she had not expected much to change in regard to her familial ties, and yet this afternoon had presented a picture of a vastly different relationship than she had expected. Here were a sister-in-law, a brother-in-law, both of whom seemed like the sort of people Julian liked. The idea of having a family that was not the one she had carved out for herself—for Violet and Diana were sisters to her at this point, and dearer than any of her blood relatives—was startling, and unexpectedly comforting.
“I expect Frannie has been weaseling all the details out of you about the circumstances that led to such a sudden union?” the earl asked, his eyebrow quirked, and Emily felt her cheeks warm slightly as she considered the thoroughly scandalous reason that many marriages took place with great speed—and the fact that Risedale and Frances might well assume that that was the reason for her hasty marriage, too.
“She has been… very enthusiastic about our marriage,” Emily said diplomatically. Next to her, Julian let out a snort of laughter, and the earl’s mouth twitched.
“She’s been hoping Belfry would marry for years now—she and I first met because she wished to introduce my younger sister to Belfry, which of course I wouldn’t—” He broke off abruptly, seeming to suddenly recall that he was speaking to the woman who had, in fact, married his brother-in-law. Emily felt Julian’s hand tighten at her waist for the merest instant before loosening again, and she cast a quick glance sideways, seeing the faint lines that had formed at the sides of his mouth, though these soon eased.
“You wouldn’t allow it?” she guessed, smiling at the earl to show that she hadn’t taken offense. “I can’t say I blame you, my lord—as I understand it, Julian had never given any indication that he was the marrying sort.”
“I always knew he was merely waiting for the right woman,” Frances insisted, with a self-satisfied tone that Emily did not feel was entirely deserved, considering she had not been aware of the union in question until approximately an hour earlier. “You know.” She waved a hand vaguely. “Cupid’s arrow, with its unerring aim—”
“What are you quoting?” her husband asked, amused.
“Myself,” she replied, with great dignity. “Why quote a dead man when I can make up my own poetic sayings?”
“Fair enough,” he concurred, and Emily had the distinct impression that he had long since learned caution when sparring with his wife. Violet and Diana, she thought, would like Frances immensely—perhaps in London, they could all come to dinner….
“In any case, I have indeed succumbed to the parson’s mousetrap at last,” Julian said, and Emily shot him an irritated look. She had always disliked that expression, since the implication was that the lady in question was conspiring with the parson to catch the mouse.
“I believe thatyouwere the one who was particularly eager for our marriage, my lord,” she said sweetly, giving him her best wide-eyed stare. “Perhaps it is I who should claim to have been caught.”
“How did he convince you, then?” Frances asked, looking fascinated. “I’ve never heard so much as a whiff of scandal about you—”
“Merely about my family?” Emily interrupted, the words out of her mouth before she entirely realized she was speaking them. She sometimes formulated replies like this in her mind, rejoinders that were sharp or witty (or, ideally, both). It was a habit she had adopted theyear she made her debut, when she was subject to a never-ending litany of reminders about appropriate behavior at home, and a never-ending series of tiresome conversations with potential suitors each evening. Coming up with these replies was a way to pass the time—a way to keep herself from going mad. She never said themaloud, however.
Until now, apparently.
