“Even if you had refused to take my arm that evening and made it quite impossible for me to win my wager,” he said, “the wager would still have existed, Miss Huxtable. It would still stand in the books. Clarence would still have found out about it and told the whole world with the implication, of course, that we became lovers that night and resumed the liaison this year.”
“I cannot control what people choose to believe,” she said, color in her cheeks at last. “I do not care what they believe. I am going home to Warren Hall tomorrow-where I belong and where I am happy.”
He could turn and leave. He had come. He had made an effort to set things right. Good Lord, he had been prepared to take on a leg shackle for the sake of her reputation. She did not want him-hardly surprising. She would not have him-for which she was to be commended. He had even tried adding a little persuasion, but she was still adamant.
He could leave.
He could be free.
And perhaps things would not be too drastically bad for her after all. Merton and Moreland would put it about that he had offered and she had refused. Perhaps the ton would assume that she must be innocent if she was prepared to do something as foolhardy as refuse him. Perhaps they would forget in a year or two or ten and she could return.
He could be free.
If he did not marry, though, Charlotte would suffer. She would have to go to Lady Forester. Seth Wrayburn had made it clear that he would have no option but to give his vote to Clarence and Jasper’s vote would count for nothing.
And if he did not marry Katherine Huxtable, she would be permanently ruined. He was fooling himself if he chose to believe otherwise just because he wanted to. The ton, with its rather peculiar notions of morality, would take back to its collective bosom a lady who had lost her virtue to one of its wildest rakehells provided she married him when caught out. It would never forgive a lady who was courageous enough to declare her innocence by saying no to the said rakehell and thumbing her nose at society’s opinion.
“Are you quite sure scandal will not follow you even to Warren Hall?” he asked her.
“If it does,” she said, “it will be my problem to deal with, Lord Montford, not yours.”
“And your sister’s problem too?” he asked her. “And your brother’s? Are you sure the scandal will not touch them also?”
Those large eyes of hers grew luminous and she turned pale again. He knew he had touched a weak point.
“This is all so ridiculous,” she said then, her voice somewhat thinner and higher pitched though she still had not moved. “So ridiculous! Why should my freedom be curtailed by the ton? Why should yours? Why should my family be affected by what I have done-or not done?”
“Welcome to the beau monde, Miss Huxtable,” he said softly, raising one eyebrow. “Are you only now discovering for yourself what I told you not so long ago? That there might be wealth and comfort and pleasure in privilege, but that there is precious little freedom?”
“Will Meg suffer?” she asked, looking very directly at him. She had moved at last. Her arms had fallen to her sides. And her hands were fidgeting with the sides of her skirt. “And Nessie? And the children? And Stephen? Oh, surely not. It would be so absurd. And so unfair.”
He clasped his own hands loosely behind his back.
“Will Miss Wrayburn suffer?” Her eyes widened.
He pursed his lips but did not answer. There was nothing to say that she did not already know.
“Your aunt wants to have Miss Wrayburn under her own roof,” she said. “She wants to prepare her for her come-out next year. She thinks you an unsuitable guardian. But are you not her guardian? Can your aunt take her away even after this scandal?”
“Charlotte’s father appointed three guardians,” he explained to her. “Clarence’s father, now Clarence himself, me, and Mr. Seth Wrayburn, Charlotte’s great-uncle. Her fate on any matter can be decided by any two of the three of us.”
“And where is Mr. Wrayburn?” she asked.
He pointed downward.
“Here in London,” he said. “He is a recluse. He is not amused at the flurry of activity in which he has been involved during the past week. He does not like either Clarence or his mother, and has always preferred to leave things as they are with Charlotte living with me. But he is annoyed with me today. He gave me an ultimatum when I called on him this morning.”
It did not take her long to understand.
“Miss Wrayburn can remain with you,” she said, “provided you squash the scandal and silence the gossips by marrying me. Is that the ultimatum?”
“More or less,” he said.
“More or less?”
“More rather than less,” he admitted. “He did suggest a few days ago that if I do not want Lady Forester in charge of Charlotte’s come-out next year I had better marry so that my wife can sponsor and chaperone her instead. Today, though, he indicated that my choice of bride has been narrowed to one candidate.”
“Me.”
He pursed his lips again.
“This is why he did it, then, is it not?” she said. “Sir Clarence Forester, I mean. He did it so that Mr. Wrayburn would have no choice but to grant custody of Miss Wrayburn to his mother.”
“Charlotte is very rich,” he said, “or will be on her marriage. And Clarrie is very poor and very single.”
“He means to marry her.” Her voice was flat. And then she laughed suddenly, though there was no hint of amusement in the sound. “I always imagined that when I finally gave serious consideration to a marriage proposal, I would have only myself to consider-and the man who was making the proposal. Did I like and respect him? Did I have an affection for him? Did he like and respect and have an affection for me? Would I have a reasonable expectation that we could be happy together for the rest of our lives? Was there-oh, was there that extra spark of… of what? Of romance, of magic, of… of… of love?”
“And you cannot answer any of those questions in the affirmative now?” he asked her. “None of them?”
She shook her head slowly.
Double damnation! He did not need this. But then, neither did she.
“I am being asked,” she said, “to think of what other people will think of me-some of them people I do not even know, all of them people I do not even care about. I am being asked to think about the good name of my sisters and brother, of my niece and nephew. I am being asked to save your sister from a fate that seems quite unthinkable. I am being asked to marry, not for something, but to prevent a whole lot of things. Marriage ought to be about only the two people concerned and their feelings for each other. Instead it is about a whole society. Society does not care if we will be happy or miserable, does it? It does not care that we will certainly be miserable.”
Will be? As opposed to would be?
“Are you so sure,” he asked her, “that we would be miserable together, Miss Huxtable?”
Suddenly she was hurrying across the room toward him. She stopped when she was no more than a foot away and glared directly into his eyes. Her hands, he noticed, had balled into fists at her sides.
“It is a mask,” she said. “It is how you hide from the world. Open your eyes. Look fully at me. And tell me we would be happy together-for a lifetime.”