Someone to Care
Page 38

He wondered if it was going to be pistols at dawn tomorrow, and which of the two men would claim the honor. What a disaster it would be to put a bullet through the heart of one of Viola’s kinsmen or wing him in the right arm the day after the ending of the affair. Or perhaps the kinsman would kill him. Perhaps this was about to turn into a romantic tragedy—with comic elements.
The young lady had stepped off the terrace to stand knee deep among the ferns. She was all willowy slenderness and big eyes and pale complexion with two spots of color in her cheeks and anxious vulnerability. No, she was not like her mother except in coloring and a certain similarity of features. Even from the back view he had of her he knew that Viola had donned the mantle of her habitual cool dignity. There was a moment when they might have rushed into each other’s arms, but the girl hesitated and Viola did not press it, and they ended up merely clasping hands for a few moments.
“Mama?” the young woman said. Her voice was high pitched and slightly trembling. Probably not her usual voice.
“Abby,” Viola said. “My dear. I was about to scold you for coming alone with Alexander and Joel. Or, rather, I was about to scold them for bringing you. But I see that Elizabeth had the good sense to come too.”
Another somewhat older lady had stepped out from behind the carriage. She must have just come out of the house. She looked vaguely familiar, though he could not recall her name at the moment. Elizabeth Somebody.
“Viola,” she said with a warm smile. “How good it is to see you. And you are looking well. What a breathtakingly beautiful place this is.” A sensible lady, trying to create some normalcy out of this situation, as though she and her companions had merely called in for tea as they were passing.
The men had not taken their eyes off Marcel.
“And so the mystery is solved,” the Earl of Riverdale said, his voice stiff and cold. “Dorchester. The Marquess of Dorchester,” he explained to the man beside him.
Viola turned her head sharply and regarded Marcel with wide, surprised eyes. He shrugged. “Riverdale?” he said. “What kept you so long?”
“Mama,” the young lady said—she was Abigail, the younger daughter, then. “Whatever happened? Why did you not go home? Why did you come here? Why did you come with . . . him? Why did you not write to us? We have been worried out of our minds. The whole family has.”
“I ought to have written again,” Viola said, “to explain that I was quite safe at the home of a friend. It was remiss of me not to do so, Abby. But . . . to come after me like this? However did you find me?”
“Again?” Abigail asked. “What do you mean by again?”
“Well.” Viola sounded a bit puzzled. “You must have received the note I sent you and Camille. And Mrs. Sullivan must have received hers.”
The color had receded from the young lady’s cheeks to leave her face uniformly pale. “No,” she said, her voice little more than a whisper. “None of us did.”
Riverdale had not been distracted. He had not removed his eyes from Marcel. Neither had the other man. They looked like two avenging angels if ever Marcel had seen any. And sure enough—
“I will want satisfaction for this, Dorchester,” Riverdale said softly.
“Then you will have to stand in line behind me,” the other man said. “You may be head of the Westcott family, Alexander, but the lady is Camille’s mother. My mother-in-law.”
They had drawn the attention of the ladies. “That is nonsense, Joel,” Viola said. “You too, Alexander. I was not abducted. I came here of my own free will. And I am no green girl to be cosseted by the family men. I am forty-two years old.”
Riverdale turned his cold gaze upon her.
“Oh, Mama,” Abigail said. “How could you?”
“I suggest we all step inside and see if the very pleasant housekeeper is willing to make a pot of tea for all of us,” the woman called Elizabeth said. “There is a very welcome- looking fire burning in the parlor.”
Everyone ignored her.
“It is not nonsense, Mama,” Viola’s son-in-law said. Marcel could not recall his name. Had he ever heard it? “What you have done has hurt Camille. And Abby. And Winifred, who is old enough to understand a few things. And your mother and your brother, who is a clergyman. And the whole of the Westcott family, who consider you one of their own even though you behave sometimes as though you would rather they did not. It is not nonsense to wish to punish the man who led you astray.”
“Joel,” Viola began, and her voice was cold now too.
“I believe,” Marcel said in the rather soft voice that he knew always commanded attention. It did not fail him now. Everyone stopped talking, and everyone turned their attention upon him. Hostile attention, perhaps, but attention nonetheless. “I believe everyone is under a misapprehension, Viola. You must introduce me to your family in a moment, but first we really must explain that we are betrothed, that we were betrothed even before we began our journey here.”
For a few moments the scene outside the cottage must have looked like a well-contrived tableau. No one moved or said a thing. Before Viola could break free of the spell his words had cast, he moved up beside her, took her hand in his, laced their fingers rather tightly, and raised her hand to his lips.
“Ours has been an attachment of long standing,” he said. “To use the vulgar parlance, we fell in love at a time when honor would permit neither of us to admit it—or to see each other again. We did see each other again, however, at a certain country inn a few weeks ago when each of us had been stranded by carriage woes. It took no longer than one exchange of glances to rekindle a passion that had never really died. Before that day ended we had decided not to spend a day more of our lives apart. We were betrothed. We made the impulsive though perhaps rash decision to run away here to celebrate our happiness alone together for a short while before beginning the lengthy process of informing our families and making the necessary announcements and planning a wedding. Is that not the way it was, my love?”
He looked into her face at last. It was as pale as her daughter’s. Pale and utterly expressionless. Her eyes met his. She gazed and then . . . smiled.
“I cannot even blame you for the rashness of it all, Marcel,” she said. “I am the one who first suggested that we run away.”
“Ah, but I did not put up a single argument to the contrary, did I?” he said. “We will accept mutual responsibility, then. Introduce me, my love.”
Her daughter was Abigail Westcott. The older lady—though she was still younger than he and Viola—was Lady Overfield, Riverdale’s sister. And yes, he had seen her a few times in London, though he did not believe they had ever been formally introduced until now. He had known her late husband. The son-in-law was Joel Cunningham.
“Mama,” Abigail said, “you are going to marry the Marquess of Dorchester?”
“Viola—” Riverdale began.
“Elizabeth is the most sensible one among us,” Viola said in the firm, cool voice of the former Countess of Riverdale. “Let us go inside and have some tea. It is chilly out here. We may all talk as much as we wish once we are settled about the fire.”
She withdrew her hand from Marcel’s and gave him a cool, blank look, which did not deceive him for a moment. Beneath the practiced layers of gracious dignity, she was seething.