And she was not entirely blameless.
Her family was, though.
She still could not see quite how she could help her family by seeing Lord Montford this afternoon. She really, really did not want to do it. She never wanted to see him again.
But Stephen thought she ought. So did Elliott.
And so did Meg.
“Very well, then.” She looked defiantly from Meg to Stephen. “I will receive Lord Montford this afternoon and I will listen to what he has to say. I will say one word in reply-no! But I will see him.”
“I do think you ought,” Stephen said. “Though my knuckles still itch to go at his face.”
“Kate,” Meg said, twisting her hands in her lap. “Oh, Kate, I let you down. I ought to have stayed with you in London three years ago, and what happened then would not have happened. Neither would everything that has happened this year.”
Katherine closed the distance between them, grabbed her sister about the shoulders, and hugged her tightly.
“Meg,” she said, “you have been the best of sisters. The very best. I am not going to have you blaming yourself, even if I have to marry Lord Montford to prevent it.”
Not that it was going to come to that.
But the very idea of Meg trying to shoulder the blame, as she always did when something threatened any one of them!
13
IT had occurred to Jasper that since Merton had not yet reached his majority, it might be more to the point to speak to his guardian first. But when he had arrived at Moreland House late in the morning, he had found the two men together.
It was just as well. It had been a dashed uncomfortable interview, but at least it did not have to be repeated once it was over.
No punches had been thrown and no gauntlet dashed in his face, though both men had looked murderous enough and Merton had grabbed him by the neck when he first appeared in the ducal library and raised his fist. Jasper had expected a bulbous nose to match Clarence’s-and had had no right to defend himself, by Jove.
The ensuing interview had been brief, hostile, deuced uncomfortable, and relatively civil. And the result of it was the afternoon call he was about to make.
Was there any way he could have predicted all this twenty-four hours ago? Would that damned weasel have dared open his mouth last night if he had gone to that infernal soiree instead of leaving the field clear for Katherine Huxtable-who also had not been there?
But dash it all, there had been rumblings of gossip even before Clarence had orchestrated them to a veritable roar.
Hell and damnation! His mind followed up that mild beginning by dredging up every foul word and phrase he had ever heard or uttered. When he had covered the list, he went back through it again for good measure.
He felt not one whit better when he arrived outside Merton House.
He half expected that he would be tossed from the door by some burly footman hired for that express purpose and that that would be that-reprieve, freedom, and a guilt that would doubtless nag at him for at least the next decade or two.
Damnation!
When had he developed a conscience? At Vauxhall on a certain memorable occasion? It was a dashed uncomfortable thing. He did not like it at all.
He was not tossed from the door or even informed politely that he must go away as Miss Katherine Huxtable had decided not to see him within the next billion years or so.
He was admitted and shown into the library just as if this were any afternoon social call-the same library where he had seen her for the first time in years when she had let herself into the room to greet Con.
A fateful evening, that. If he had not accepted Merton’s invitation to come here for a drink… If she had stayed upstairs and been content to wait a day or so before seeing Con… But fate had been playing one of its fiendish little games. He might as well add that if he had not invited his friends back to his house on his twenty-fifth birthday, then he would not be here now.
And if his father had not met his mother… Or his grandfathers his grandmothers…
But there was no time to go all the way back to Adam and Eve with his reflections upon the vagaries of fate, and no time to collect his thoughts and rehearse one more time the words he must speak. He discovered in some surprise that she was in the room before him.
Alone.
She was standing in front of one of the long windows, between the desk and one of the bookcases-in almost the exact spot, in fact, where he had stood that evening, feeling rather like a rat caught in a trap. She was not even standing with her back to the room, pretending to admire the view. She was facing the door. Her eyes were fixed steadily on him.
She was dressed in white muslin, an unfortunate choice today, perhaps, as it offered no contrast to her pale complexion. Her hair had been brushed ruthlessly back from her face and twisted into a knot behind her head.
She certainly did not look like a lady preparing to receive her suitor.
She held her hands clasped loosely in front of her. She did not smile.
Of course she did not smile.
She did not say anything either.
It was all a trifle disconcerting.
He advanced farther into the room.
“One thing I have to admit about Clarence Forester,” he said, “is that he has a certain degree of intelligence. He always did. He always knew unerringly just how best to avenge himself against any insult or worse I happened to toss his way. He is, in fact, quite ruthlessly vicious.”
“Lord Montford,” she said, “let me save you time. My answer is no-unequivocally and irreversibly.”
“Is it?” He took a couple of steps closer.
“You have done the honorable thing,” she said. “You called upon my brother and brother-in-law this morning, and now you have called upon me. A proposal of marriage is to follow, I understand. It may remain unspoken. My answer is no.”
“Ah,” he said. “You will not allow me to make amends, then.”
“There has been nothing this year for which to make amends,” she said. “I have danced with you-once. At a ball, where the whole purpose was for ladies and gentlemen to dance with each other. I have received you and your sister with my own sister and brother in my brother’s drawing room here. I have walked with you-once-in Hyde Park with our relatives. I have sat talking with you in a glass pavilion at a garden party, whose primary function was that guests converse with one another in the setting of the garden.”
She had been counting off their meetings on the fingers of one hand.
“Ah,” he said, “but there was also Vauxhall three years ago.”
“Where nothing happened,” she said, jerking her chin higher. “You need not make amends for that, Lord Montford. We both know that I was not innocent in that sordid encounter.”
“Because you would have capitulated to the practiced arts of an experienced and determined seducer?” he said. “You were as innocent as a newborn babe, Miss Huxtable. You must allow me…”
“I was twenty years old,” she said. “I knew the difference between right and wrong. I knew that what was happening was wrong. I knew you were a notorious rake. I chose to ignore what was right because I wanted the excitement and self-gratification of what was wrong. The wager was… disgusting. Naming me as its victim was more so. But I might have said no as soon as you offered me your arm when we were on the grand avenue with the others. I did not say no either then or later, and so I am as guilty as you. You do not have to make amends. You may go away now, satisfied in the knowledge that you have at least done what society demands of you today.”