Читать книгу Regency Surrender: Passion And Rebellion - Энни Берроуз, Louise Allen - Страница 42

Chapter Fourteen

The sooner she left this place and rejoined Fenella and her family in Southampton, the better.

When he’d come in to collect the tea tray, Adams had interrupted her informing her aunt’s chair that she thought Fenella was jolly lucky to have found a man like Monsieur-le-Compte-de-Somewhere-Brown. ‘Fenella brought nothing to the marriage but a whole pile of obligations,’ she’d been insisting. ‘But not only did he not seem to mind, he’d actually fought for her. And Sophie, too. You should have seen his face the first time she called him Papa. He loves that little girl. He really does.’

Adams had looked round the room, as though searching for whomever she’d been talking to, though he must have known Mrs Podmore had left, or he wouldn’t have come in to clear away.

He’d probably come to the conclusion that she was well on the way to becoming as odd as her aunt had been, walking round the room haranguing the furniture.

No, she sighed, her aunt’s house was not a healthy place for her to live. She’d already begun to talk to herself. What next would she do?

Well, it wouldn’t come to that. She walked briskly back to her study, drew out a fresh sheet of paper, trimmed her pen and set the process of the move in motion.

* * *

There had been many decisions to make. What to sell? What to put away in storage? What to take with her? And how was she going to implement her plan to improve the lot of her workforce from Southampton? Without anyone knowing that she was the one doing it? Practical issues such as these had kept her fully occupied for the next couple of days. During the hours of daylight, at least. But at night, as she had lain in bed, she could not ignore the creeping sense of loneliness and failure that only frenetic activity could keep at bay.

By the end of the week she’d begun to suspect Adams was developing a sort of fatherly concern for her. Or perhaps fatherly was not the right word, she grimaced as she tied up the ribbons of her Sunday bonnet. Her father had never shown concern when she’d been downcast. He’d always berated her for not displaying proper Christian gratitude, for not always giving thanks in everything. He’d never brought her tea and biscuits at regular intervals, which Adams now did if she lost track of time whilst working her way through the backlog of reports stacked on her desk. Or looked at her with such grave concern when she sat staring into space during meal times, forgetting to keep on raising the fork to her mouth, then nudged a favourite dish towards her, suggesting that cook would be disappointed if she didn’t at least try it.

‘Adams,’ she said as she tugged on her gloves, ‘I’ve come to a decision. I shall be leaving Stanton Basset as soon as I possibly can. But I wondered if you would like to carry on working for me.’

He opened the door for her without betraying any emotion whatever.

‘It will be a bigger house, more responsibility, better wages,’ she said as she preceded him out of the house.

‘And to where, may I ask, are you planning to move?’

Did he have good reason for wanting to stay in the area? She frowned. She had never wondered about his private life before. Or considered he had a right to one. He’d always just been there. A servant. Not a real person.

She’d slipped into the habit of treating him exactly the same as her aunt had always done.

Well, those days were over.

‘Somewhere near Southampton. To be close to Fenella.’

‘And Miss Sophie,’ said Adams, his face softening in what looked like sympathy.

‘Yes. Of course, I will understand if you have...ties to this place and do not wish to move away. But I shall be sorry.’

He gave her a nod as he opened the garden gate for her. ‘I shall give the matter serious consideration,’ was all he would say.

Well, it was a big decision for anyone to make. He’d been here ever since she could remember. And not everyone liked change. Particularly not when they got to his age.

‘If you don’t come with me and would rather retire,’ she said, ‘I will make sure you have a decent pension.’

‘That is...generous of you,’ he acknowledged. ‘I had hoped, when your aunt passed, that she might have...’ He trailed away. But he had no need to elaborate. Her aunt had not left any of the servants anything.

She shook her head at the slavish way she’d moulded her behaviour to please her aunt. More evidence of her desperate need for approval, she sighed. Well, it had to stop. She wasn’t going to live to please anyone else, ever again. She would live by her own beliefs, act according to her own principles and stand on her own two feet.

* * *

Her own two feet carried her all the way to church without her mind having to direct their way. They carried her to the pew where she’d always sat without her having to think about that either.

The service commenced. She got to her feet, then dropped to her knees in all the appropriate places, but she was only going through the motions.

Because she couldn’t get over the fact that she’d been such a fool. She’d lost Nathan because she’d listened to her aunt’s warped views, rather than her own heart.

She’d been happy, in Paris, with him, she sighed. He’d helped her to unfurl, like a tightly defensive blossom in the warmth of spring sunshine. He hadn’t tried to dominate her, or change her. He’d just made her feel...first beautiful, then intelligent, and then as though she had an interesting personality. Oh, why hadn’t she remembered any of that when he’d said he loved her? Why hadn’t she been brave enough to take that leap of faith? Why had she listened to the nasty, suspicious voice in her head telling her he was only interested in her wealth?

She screwed her eyes shut as she repressed a groan. The whole point of travelling to Paris in the first place had been an attempt to...to break free. Hiring Fenella had been her first act of independence and defying her father over the will had been her second.

It was harder to break free from patterns of thought, she realised, than outward behaviour. She could leave Stanton Basset, buy fine clothes and even take a lover. But inside she was still the bewildered child who’d been denied unquestioning love so often that she’d grown the equivalent of a hedge of thorns round her heart.

She sank on to the pew, shutting her hymn book with a chill certainty. She was going to shrivel up and die alone because there would never be, had never been, any other man for her but Nathan.

Even now she knew the very worst of him, it made no difference. As soon as she’d calmed down and had time to reflect, she could see exactly why he’d done every bad thing he’d done. He’d tried, for years, to please his exacting father and then to maintain his honour whilst chained to a woman who despised him. Until he’d got to breaking point and lashed out in rage and pain. Just as she’d done when her own father had demonstrated his lack of faith in her.

But when he’d come to make a clean breast of it, to ask if they could make a fresh start, instead of reaching out to grasp at the chance of happiness, she’d scuttled back behind her hedge of thorns. Which no man could penetrate, without risking getting cut to ribbons.

There wasn’t a man alive who could possibly love her enough to do it.

The congregation was stirring, moving towards the door. She could scarcely believe that the service was over without her having taken in one word of it. But everyone else was already streaming out into the churchyard where they would mill about and gossip for at least half an hour.

She fumbled in her reticule for a handkerchief to blow her nose as tears stung her eyes. How on earth was she going to be able to endure the collective inquisition the citizens of Stanton Basset were bound to subject her to, when she was so raw she felt as though someone had been scouring her insides with a scrubbing brush?

The same way she always had, she supposed. With a series of terse, cutting words that would make them all retreat lest she turn the rapier sharpness of her tongue in their direction.

Oh, God—she deserved to end up alone!

‘My dear Miss Dalby, do excuse me, but there is someone I would love you to meet.’

All but thick-skinned Mrs Podmore, she sighed. Her unshakeable belief in herself rendered her impervious to even Amethyst’s barbs.

She stuffed her handkerchief back in her reticule and prepared herself to meet the poor woman Mrs Podmore had no doubt cajoled and bullied into applying for the post of her companion. She didn’t want to frighten the poor creature by unleashing her own pain in a display of venom.

Besides, it was herself she was cross with. If she’d had her wits about her she would have been first out of the door and marched straight down the path for home before anyone could waylay her. But it was too late now. She was well and truly trapped, with only herself to blame.

‘I did not have time to tell you our most interesting news,’ panted Mrs Podmore, ‘when I visited you the other day. But now I should like to introduce you to the newest resident of Stanton Basset.’ She stepped aside and waved her hand to summon the person who’d been hovering behind her, rather in the manner of a conjuror producing coins from thin air.

‘Allow me to present Mr Brown,’ she said, as Nathan stepped forwards.

Nathan? Here in Stanton Basset? Amethyst could not have been more stunned if Mrs Podmore had conjured up a unicorn from behind her velvet-and-bombazine bulk. She was glad she was still seated or her legs might have given way.

‘I am pleased to meet you, Miss Dalby,’ said Nathan suavely. ‘I have heard so much about you.’

‘Mr...Brown?’ She gazed at him in bewilderment. And excitement that warred with trepidation.

‘Mr Brown is an artist,’ said Mrs Podmore, completely oblivious, as usual, to the effect she was creating in her current victim’s breast. She was far more interested in having just trumped Amethyst’s foreign count, who nobody would ever see, with a genuine, visible, novelty. ‘He declares he has fallen in love with the charm of the place and intends to make a stay of some months, capturing it all on canvas.’

‘An artist,’ said Amethyst weakly. So he wasn’t trying to conceal everything about himself.

‘Oh, you need not be alarmed. Mr Brown is quite the gentleman. He has taken a lease on old Murdoch’s place.’

‘Indeed?’

Amethyst’s brain finally emerged from the state of shock that seeing Nathan standing in the aisle of St Gregory’s had induced, and started coming up with questions. Why had he hired such a massive old mausoleum? How had he been able to afford it? And why was he going by the name of Brown?

And, more importantly, why was he here?

Her heart skipped a beat. Monsieur Le Brun had declared that he would have followed Fenella to England, to continue courting her. Was this what Nathan was doing?

Or was she clutching at straws?

‘How...how long have you been here?’ It was the one question she could safely ask. The kind of thing one stranger might say to another upon their first introduction. For if he was going by the name of Brown, and getting Mrs Podmore to introduce him to her, then he clearly didn’t want anyone to guess they already knew each other.

‘Almost a month, now,’ said Nathan.

A month? That meant he must have left Paris almost immediately after she’d turned down his proposal. No wonder he hadn’t called on her. He’d been on his way here.

But why? Not that she could ask him that, not here.

Nor could she sit staring at him like this. It wasn’t seemly.

‘If you will excuse me,’ she said, getting to her feet. ‘I really must be getting home.’

‘Perhaps you will do me the honour of permitting me to call on you some time,’ said Nathan. And then, with a swift sideways glance at Mrs Podmore, continued, ‘You have a very interesting face. I should like to paint you.’

‘And I have told him that if anyone in this town is likely to be able to afford such an extravagance, it is you, Miss Dalby. From what I hear,’ said Mrs Podmore with a twitch of her brows.

Her stomach roiled in reaction. The whole town had buzzed with the tale of her father fighting the lawyer over her inheritance. And though nobody knew for sure how much was at stake, they’d definitely overheard him prophesying she’d fritter her entire fortune away within a twelvemonth and have to crawl back to him for forgiveness. Because he’d done so in the voice he normally employed for booming hellfire sermons from the pulpit.

‘And I am sure you will agree that we should do what we can to support burgeoning talent, the kind that Mr Brown possesses.’ Mrs Podmore leaned forwards and confided, ‘He is a most interesting addition to our town, my dear. Quite the gentleman. Much more preferable as a tenant of the Murdoch place than some we might be unfortunate enough to get.’

‘Yes, yes, of course,’ she said, making for the door as fast as she could.

She didn’t feel as if she could breathe properly, even once she’d got outside. She wasn’t going to let Mrs Podmore’s assumptions spoil whatever chance there might be with Nathan. He couldn’t have known about her wealth before he’d come here. He’d come here because he’d meant what he said.

He had.

And anyway, even if he had since found out about her money, hadn’t she already decided she didn’t care? If Nathan had come here to try to win her, then she wasn’t going to let any consideration keep them apart. She’d just spent the most miserable weeks of her life berating herself for not accepting any of his proposals. She most certainly wasn’t going to turn down any more.

If he’d really come here to propose again.

Yet why else would he be here, if not to offer for her hand again?

A cold, suspicious voice, that sounded very much like her aunt, whispered, He could be planning to blackmail you.

She bowed her head into the sleet, which had started some time during the service, and marched doggedly on, though every breath she took made her chest ache, it had gone so cold.

No—she wasn’t going to believe Nathan would do such a thing. Why, he’d had her portrait, which he could have used to attempt to coerce her into marriage, or even blackmail her for money, but he hadn’t. He’d just handed it over without making any demands at all.

He’d had the chance to blacken her name ten years ago, too, and hadn’t taken it. He was too decent.

Nathan Harcourt? The man whose career was punctuated by scandal and failure?

Yes, him. He was a decent man. Deep down, where it mattered. He’d had good reasons for acting so badly. He’d been devastated by the lies they’d told him. He’d drifted into a career he hadn’t wanted and a marriage that had been like a prison. No wonder he’d broken free the only way he could.

You’re making excuses for him.

Perhaps she was. And perhaps that made her a foolish, lovestruck woman.

But she didn’t care. She was done with assuming the worst of everyone.

She would wait until he’d called, before deciding anything. Hear what he had to say, and then...

Then what?

She didn’t know, God help her. She’d just spent the week deciding how she was going to cope without him. Made all sorts of resolutions about striking out in a new direction.

If he really was here to make her another offer, she would gladly toss every single one of her plans out of the window.

And if he wasn’t...

If he wasn’t, then she’d just have to deal with it.

* * *

She barely slept a wink that night.

And it took her an age to dress the following morning. She’d never found her choice of clothing so important before. Pride wouldn’t let her wear something that would make her look too eager, just in case he hadn’t come here to propose again. But she didn’t want to dress so soberly that he would take one look at her and think she was going to turn him down, again, either.

In the end, she donned the gown she’d bought for Fenella’s wedding. Since he had never seen her in it, it wouldn’t have any associations which might put ideas into his head. And it was both suitable for the current weather, being made of fine merino wool, and having long sleeves, yet pretty enough, with its scalloped hem and embroidered detail round the neckline, to make her seem approachable. She hoped.

* * *

She had barely nibbled on her toast at the breakfast table, yet she’d managed to bite her nails to the quick by the time Adams came to her study—where she’d been pacing up and down rather than making even a token pretence at shuffling papers round her desk—to inform her that she had a visitor.

‘A gentleman,’ he said, with a slight inflection on the word which suggested he very much doubted it. ‘He claims to have made an appointment. And says his name is Mr Brown.’

How perceptive Adams was. No wonder her aunt had kept him on when she could have saved a fortune by hiring a female as housekeeper to do more or less the same job.

‘You are correct upon all counts,’ she said, causing one of his eyebrows to quirk, just a fraction. ‘He was introduced to me, at church yesterday, as Mr Brown and I did agree to see him.’

The eyebrow rose just a fraction more.

‘And, no, I do not think he is a gentleman either.’

His face returned to its proper state of butlerish blandness.

‘Shall I bring refreshments to the morning room? I took the liberty of showing him in there, rather than leaving him cluttering up the hall.’

In spite of her nerves, Amethyst couldn’t help smiling at this restrained display of humour.

‘Yes, please,’ she said. ‘Tea would be most welcome.’

Her mouth had gone very dry. And going through all the ceremony of pouring and serving would at least give her something to do if the interview didn’t go the way she hoped.

‘Tea. Of course, miss. He looks just the sort of man,’ said Adams with a perfectly straight face, ‘to enjoy drinking tea in the middle of the day.’

And with that last caustic comment upon the character of a man who had come calling upon a single lady when everyone knew she didn’t have a chaperon, he bowed himself out of the room.

And then, since there was no mirror in the study she hastily checked her fractured reflection in the multiple panes of the glass-fronted bookshelves, one last time, before going to meet Nathan. Although she’d checked it every few turns of the room, so knew exactly what she looked like. It was just that it was hard to credit she looked so neat and tidy when inside she felt as though she was coming unravelled.

He’d dressed with great care too, she noted the moment she entered the morning room, in immaculate breeches and topcoat, his pristine neckcloth foaming from a damask silk waistcoat. He truly was a sight for sore eyes.

He got to his feet and took a step towards her, then stopped, as though unsure of his welcome.

She smiled, or at least tried to. She was so nervous that it felt a little wobbly and yet tight at the same time.

‘Please, won’t you sit down?’ she said, waving to the seat on the other side of the fireplace as she took her aunt’s chair.

Some of the stiffness left his face at her tentative gesture of welcome.

‘I wasn’t sure if you would even let me in,’ he said, resting his arms on the arm of the chair and leaning forwards.

‘I shouldn’t have done,’ she replied. ‘It is not the thing to receive a single gentleman when I am without a chaperon. The whole town will be scandalised.’

A frown flickered across his face.

‘The last thing I want to do is plunge you into a scandal. That is why I decided it would be better if I got here well before you came back, so it wouldn’t look as if there was already anything between us. You made it so obvious that my notoriety would be an issue, here in this little town, that I have done all I can to prevent anyone knowing exactly who, and what, I am.’

Oh. That made perfect sense.

And was incredibly sweet of him.

‘That is why you are using an assumed name?’

‘Of course. You made it so clear you weren’t interested in marrying a man of my notoriety, that I was sure you wouldn’t want anyone knowing you’d had a liaison with the notorious Nathan Harcourt. So I took a leaf out of your courier’s book. He successfully managed to court your companion under the name of Brown. I hoped it might be as lucky for me.’

‘C-courting?’ Her breath hitched in her throat. He’d come all this way to court her. In spite of the way they’d parted, her conviction she’d driven him away for good. He must have meant every one of those proposals which she’d discounted, for varying reasons.

‘Yes. Courting.’ He gave a wry smile. ‘And I’d better warn you that I’ve spent my time in this town learning as much as I could about you—surreptitiously, of course—in the hopes that I might find a chink in your armour.’

‘B-but you love Paris. You were so happy there...’

‘It would have been a wasteland without you in it. Don’t you realise, yet, that I cannot be happy anywhere, unless you are with me?’

He did love her, then. Enough to abandon the work he loved and the home he’d made for himself. Assume a false identity and put up with Mrs Podmore taking him under her wing.

Nobody had ever exerted themselves to such an extent on her account.

‘Y-yes. Actually, I think I do,’ she admitted shyly. ‘Because I have been utterly miserable since our last meeting. I was such an idiot to drive you away.’ Tears sprang to her eyes. ‘I was so scared I’d driven you away for good.’

He left his chair to kneel at her feet. He seized her hands.

‘Does this mean what I hope it means? I’ve been telling myself that once your temper had cooled and you could think things over rationally, you would be able to forgive me. And give me another chance.’

‘I will give you as many chances as you want, so long as you are able to forgive me for being so...’ She screwed up her face in disgust as she thought of how narrow-minded and judgemental she’d been. ‘For being such a...’

He placed one finger over her lips.

‘I’ve no right to condemn you for anything you’ve done, or thought. Not with my record.’

He tugged at her hands and drew her to her feet.

‘Miss Dalby, once and for all, will you forget all the past mistakes we’ve both made and marry me?’

‘Oh, yes.’ She sighed. And then, because her legs went limp, she leaned forwards, rested her head on his chest and said, ‘Yes, please.’

‘Thank God,’ he muttered fervently, putting both arms round her and hugging her tight.

And it felt like coming home. No, better than any home she’d ever known. He was the only person who’d ever accepted her, liked her, loved her, just as she was. Everyone else had tried to change her. Sway her opinions to match their own. But not Nathan.

And then just hugging him wasn’t enough. Amethyst raised her face hopefully and he obliged her by meeting her halfway in a kiss. A kiss that went on and on, as though they both needed to drink the other in.

It was only Adams, scuffling against the door as he prepared to bring in the tea tray, that made them break apart, smiling ruefully.

By the time he placed the tray on the table, they were both seated in the chairs that flanked the fireplace, looking perfectly respectable, if a little flushed and breathless.

Adams glanced from one to the other. His face went more wooden than usual and, without a word, he made a swift exit.

Amethyst’s hand was shaking too much to pour the tea.

‘Never mind that,’ said Nathan with a smile. ‘It wasn’t to drink tea that I came here today. I had this great long speech planned.’

She darted him a shy smile. ‘Should I apologise for stopping you making it?’

He grinned back at her. ‘Not in the least. It was just...well, I have a few things I do need to tell you, before I make an honest woman of you. I’d thought I would need to prove to you that I could at least appear respectable if I stood a chance of persuading you that I was husband material, rather than only being good enough for a temporary liaison...’

A pang of guilt shot through her. Had she really made him feel like that? It was so typical of the way she’d been—never giving a thought to what her actions might make other people feel like.

‘Which is one reason why I hired the biggest house I could find to rent in this area. Which, coincidentally, happens to be the nearest one to yours. I wanted to demonstrate, you see, that I have the means to support you. I realised, in Paris, that I might have given you the impression that I haven’t a feather to fly with—’

‘Oh, that doesn’t matter one bit, Nathan, you see—’

‘Please, hear me out. I need to explain why I was living the way I was when you found me. I was doing it to prove a point. I wanted to demonstrate that I was good enough to make a living from my work alone. And I did. But I have independent means, as well. I can keep you in tolerable comfort, Amy. You don’t need to fear that we’ll ever have to worry about where the rent will come from.’

‘No, we won’t. Because I have money, too. Quite a lot of it, actually. Which was one of the reasons I was so suspicious of all the proposals you made to me before. I thought you must have found out about it somehow and was trying to...’

His face froze. ‘Yes? Trying to what?’

‘I’m so very, very sorry. I know it was nothing of the sort, now. It is just that my aunt, the one who took me in and left me this house, would keep on about how important it was to keep the extent of our fortune a secret, or we’d become targets for fortune hunters. I was convinced that no man would ever show an interest in me unless it was because he wanted to get his hands on my money. It became second nature to me to conceal the fact that I’m a wealthy woman.’

‘A wealthy woman.’ He frowned. ‘Exactly how large is this fortune?’

She cleared her throat and then, in a matter-of-fact tone, told him exactly how large, and in what it consisted, and that moreover she had plans to expand into France now trading there was legal again.

By the time she had finished he was looking at her as though she’d become a total stranger.

‘So you are not some simple country girl, eking out your existence on a modest little windfall from the spinster aunt you cared for in her last days. And what of Mrs Mountsorrel? Was she really just a widowed friend with whom you threw in your lot?’ He flung the words at her as though he was accusing her of something.

Amethyst shook her head. ‘I hired her as my companion so that I could continue living in this house and run the business interests my aunt had taught me how to govern. Nathan, why are you looking at me like that?’

‘Can you not imagine?’

She shook her head again, her insides turning into a cold, solid lump as his gaze turned downright scornful.

‘I thought I knew you. I thought that in spite of the hard veneer you’d acquired, deep down you were still that girl who so enchanted me with her simple, direct approach to life. But you’re not her at all, are you?’

‘Yes, I am. Just because I’m rich, too—’

He got to his feet, his eyes suddenly blazing with contempt. ‘It’s not just being rich that is the problem though, is it? You run businesses. You own factories and mills and mines and God knows what else. And you sit here, in this stuffy little town, hidden away like some...spider, spinning a web. Aye, an invisible web, at that. For nobody is supposed to know that it is a woman at the heart of all this enterprise. I never saw it before, but the whole purpose is to make fools of men, isn’t it? You delight in making fools of us all. Well, you’ve certainly made a fool of me.’

‘No, I haven’t. Truly I haven’t. I’ve explained why I didn’t want you to know about it, at first.’

‘Not just at first. Even after we’d become lovers. Even when you spurned me, you never admitted the true reason. And it is what you thought, isn’t it? That I’m some contemptible fortune hunter. Little things you said to me, your attitude whenever I touched on making our relationship permanent, they should have warned me.’

‘Yes, but—’

‘Do you think I could want to marry a woman for her money, again? After what I went through last time? Do you know what it does to a man’s pride to be labelled a fortune hunter?’

She hadn’t. But she was beginning to get an idea.

‘The last thing I want is to get leg-shackled to another woman who sees nothing wrong with telling lies to get what she wants. Who has so little integrity she has to buy friends and can only keep them with promise of advancement.’

What?

‘Nathan, you don’t mean that,’ she managed to gasp through the fingers of dread that were squeezing her throat. ‘I wasn’t lying to you...’ His face shuttered.

‘Not exactly...’

With a muttered oath he turned and strode for the door.

‘You were right all along,’ he said coldly, as he set his hand to the door latch. ‘We can’t go back. We aren’t the same people we were when we first met. I...’ His face twisted. ‘I thought I’d fallen in love with you, all over again, in Paris. I thought you’d got over the pain I put you through and had grown into a strong, admirable woman. A woman I would have been proud to call my wife, and bear my children. I thought...’

He closed his eyes, and shook his head.

‘I might have known it was too good to be true. It wasn’t real, was it? None of it was real. I’ve been chasing after a dream. Like some...’

He straightened up and opened his eyes. Eyes which had gone dead and hard.

‘Forgive me for taking up your valuable time. I will leave you now. And will not bother you again.’

‘Nathan...’ She tried to tell him to stop, but her words got tangled up in a sob. She slumped down on to her chair, all strength gone from her legs, as she heard the front door slam behind him.

Oh, why hadn’t she said yes, when she had the chance? If she’d said yes to him in Paris, and then explained about her money, he wouldn’t have flown into a rage like this, would he?

Would he?