Chapter One: Not Fair

The murmuring of voices and the movement of bodies filtered through James Redwood’s senses for some time before he realized he was awake and not alone. He tried to open his eyes and found them gummed together. Then his ears, in better condition, discerned one of the murmuring voices to be his mother’s, and he lay very, very still.

“If no permanent damage is done, then we have something to be grateful for. Perhaps this will even knock some sense into him.”

“Judging by his injuries, whatever happened could hardly be his fault.” A deeper, masculine voice, unfamiliar to James.

“I find where James is concerned, it is always his fault.”

There was a brief, awkward silence. There often was, after Mrs Redwood had spoken.

“Assigning blame will not help him recover,” the stranger said tentatively.

“Nor will it hinder. But come, Doctor, your carriage is ready, so I will see you out.”

The voices faded away and James relaxed. He crawled one hand painfully over the blankets to his face and rubbed. That hurt, but he managed to get one eye ungummed and found himself looking at the ceiling of his old bedroom in his parents’ house. The constellation of ink-stains still marked the ceiling from the time he had occupied himself in punitive detention by playing darts with his quill. He had earned another punishment from his mother for that. He propped himself up on shaking elbows and squinted around the room. The plain oak furniture and white-linen dressings his mother favoured were exactly as he had left them five years ago. What on earth was he doing here?

Pain snaked hotly down the back of his skull and memory returned to him: the men approaching him on Kew Bridge, blocking his curricle from passing. How many had there been? Four? Five? Too many for him to resist when they had dragged him down onto the damp, cold stones. Too many for him to do anything but attempt to crawl away as they had thrashed him with cudgels and whips until he could not move. Then they had gone, and left him whimpering on the ground until unconsciousness had claimed him.

At least, James told himself, he was alive.

On the other hand, judging by his mother’s tone, death might have been preferable.

He slid his feet tentatively to the floor and tested his weight on them. It took two tries before he could stand, but evidently no limbs were broken. He thought his ribs might be though, and the throbbing ache about his nose did not bode well.

He limped to the dresser and peered at his reflection. Even with one eye shut and his vision blurred, it was only slightly less than monstrous. His fine, regular features were lumpy and misshapen. A plaster was pasted over his nose, which was at least twice the size he remembered it having been. The flesh around his right eye was purple and swollen shut. His left was merely puffy and red, weeping slightly from a cut that cleaved his eyebrow and ran down onto his cheek. He bared his teeth and counted them anxiously. They were all still there, very white and neat. One faint mercy.

Above that misfortunate vision, his fair hair was matted with mud and blood and sweat. James opened the top drawer of the dresser, found an old hairbrush, and set gingerly to work. With only one eye and his limbs stiff with pain, it was hard going. He was trying to reach the hair at the back of his head when there was a sharp footstep in the passage and his mother opened the door — as always, without knocking. She stopped in the doorway and gaped at him. James ignored her.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Mrs Redwood demanded.

“Brushing my hair, Mother.”

“Go back to bed this instant!”

“But my hair!” James patted at his forelock. It was rather good hair, thick and glossy and very fair. Women were fond of it. He was glad the men had not thought to rip it out when they had attacked him.

“Bed, James!”

James eyed his mother warily. As long as he kept her at a distance, he was able to remain quite fond of her. But he wished she would learn not to give him orders in that tone, as though she were talking to a misbehaving dog or a truculent nag rather than a full-grown man of twenty-seven with an intelligence of his own.

However, his limbs were trembling and fragility might give him an excuse to escape a confrontation with his mother. He limped back to bed and slumped onto the mattress, pulling the covers over his face so he could not meet his mother’s eyes.

Mrs Redwood took no notice. “Do you know who did this to you?” she barked. “Your father’s going to sue.”

“I am not in the habit of maintaining acquaintances with highway men.”

“They stole nothing. Ergo, they were not highway men.”

“Perhaps they were unskilled at their profession.”

“Don’t be silly, James.” Her voice curled with familiar contempt. “It was clearly personal. And I can’t imagine there’s short supply of men with grudges against you.”

James could name at least three without stopping to think. A darker possibility was that it had been no man at all. Henrietta had sworn revenge on him when he had ended their affair. He had been properly in love with her for at least a week. He did not wish to believe she was capable of hiring thugs to beat him.

“James?”

“I don’t know who it was. And if I did, you know I wouldn’t tell you.” He wrested his head above the covers and opened his one good eye. “Whoever it was, I think they must be satisfied and won’t do it again.”

Mrs Redwood’s eyes narrowed to snake-like slits. “This is not over, James. We are not satisfied.”

“You never are,” James muttered. “Now let me sleep.”

James was at his parents’ house for a week before he could think of returning home to his London townhouse. Over the course of that week, his face returned mostly to its normal shape and colour, though his nose, he thought, would always veer to the left now. His parents had not brought up his beating once. He suspected his mother was giving him the cold treatment, which was far more preferable than her direct criticisms, and as for his father, James assumed the absence of his usual biting witticisms signified a silent sympathy.

At dinner, he announced that he intended to take his curricle back to London the next morning. His father, spare and scholarly-looking, once tall but now hunched with age, looked up from inspecting the contents of his soup bowl.

“You cannot.”

“I did not ask permission,” James said.

“I was not denying it. It was a statement of possibility.” Mr Redwood trailed his spoon through his soup, found it satisfactory, and took a minute sip. “You cannot take the curricle because it has been sold.”

James stared at his father. “It’s my curricle!”

“No more.”

“Then I’ll bloody well walk.”

“James! Language!”

“Sorry, Mother.” James breathed out slowly. “You have no right to sell my things, and you know it.”

Mr Redwood raised one hunched shoulder in a lopsided shrug. “It seems you have forgotten, James, that it is my income which grants your allowance and your independence. If you are content to indulge in the privileges of being the only son and heir, you must likewise uphold the responsibilities.”

It was a not unfamiliar lecture. James swigged his wine and suppressed the urge to sigh. He knew very well the depth of feeling underlying his father’s dry speech. Three sons and a daughter had been born before him, and all had died in their infancy. James, born last, born very unexpectedly when Mrs Redwood had thought she was past the age of childbearing, carried the weight of all past hopes and all past sorrows.

His being thrashed on the street would have caused his parents more than the expected distress. It would have brought their old anxieties — quelled in recent years by James’s robust good health — bubbling back up. He set down his wine and waited for his father to finish his lecture.

“…passed the age where flitting about town gambling and drinking and flirting can be considered a mere indulgence. Indeed, you seem to have taken up flirting as an occupation, with the natural tax for such income seen in the bruises on your face.”

“I’m not such a libertine as that,” James protested. “I indulge no more than anybody else my age, and a good deal less than many. And I don’t think selling my curricle is very fair.”

“Nothing in this world is fair,” Mr Redwood said. “Certainly, it is not fair that for the past four years you have enjoyed an independence in town at my expense and done nothing to earn it.”

“You are very generous to me and I am very grateful, Father.”

“I was generous.”

James waited, but his father said no more, instead sifting through his soup for morsels of chicken to swallow. His digestion had troubled him for as long as James could remember. Warily, James looked to his mother. She, stout and healthy despite her advancing years, had already finished her soup and was waiting patiently for Mr Redwood to be ready to carve the fowl. James speared a boiled potato from the dish in front of him and ate it off his fork. His mother narrowed her eyes.

“Your father and I have been talking lately,” she said. “We see now that we have been too generous to you. We have imposed too few restrictions.”

James, remembering his mother’s exacting discipline during his childhood, did not think that was quite correct. Her strictness had only made him more inclined to rebellion. If she forbade him from trying to ride Farmer Perry’s lazy draught horses bareback, he was sure to attempt his father’s hunter instead. If the village alehouse was barred to him, he was sure to sample the brandy in his father’s cellar. There had been constant arguments, devolving far too often into loud, savage fights. Only after he had left for university and later inveigled his father into allowing him the use of the London townhouse had relations eased between him and his mother. Absence did make the heart grow fonder, it seemed.

“Where is this conversation going?” James asked. “You have sold my curricle. What else have you done?”

“We have decided to cut off your allowance.” Mr Redwood set his spoon in his half-finished soup and pushed it aside. At that signal, the maid stepped forward and cleared the soup plates from the table. The clatter of dishes and spoons gave James time to compose himself.

“You have?” he said lightly, as though it did not matter at all.

“We have. What you received midsummer is to be your last.”

It was midway through September now. James was getting to the last of his quarterly hundred pounds. He smiled through the pain of the equations running through his mind. That new coat — he would have to cancel the order and incur the wrath of his tailor. The visit to Brighton he had planned for the winter — that could not go ahead. His servants’ wages, due at Michaelmas — that would take the bulk of what he had left.

“Am I to be so restricted forever?” he enquired as his father made the first cut in the roast goose and then handed the carving knife to the footman to take over.

“When we are convinced of your commitment to your own future, we will reconsider matters,” Mrs Redwood said. “The wing please, Jason. My son will have the wing.”

The footman, who had been carving the breast of the bird, turned the knife to the wing. James suppressed his irritation and with it his appetite.

“What would such a commitment entail?” he asked when his plate was back in front of him. He piled it high with potatoes. “Good behaviour for three months?”

“Terms as vague as that would not make for a proper contract. Besides, you would no doubt regress once your three months were up. No. You need a more permanent inducement.” Mr Redwood picked at a sliver of goose breast. “And there is only one inducement of absolute permanency for a man: a good wife. Upon your marriage, we will naturally help set up you and your wife in perfect comfort in London. But, until that day, you will live at home and receive nothing.”

That made James’s appetite disappear altogether. He liked women — perhaps more than he ought — but the idea of marriage made his blood run cold. He had seen his best friend, Anthony Locke, suffer for five years under a cruel and unfaithful wife. He had seen his own father suffer his mother’s cold, hard temper. And his lovers had all been perfectly complacent about their infidelity to their husbands. No. Marriage was yoke James was not prepared to bear. He hid his feelings with a smile.

“In such circumstances, I might be tempted to run off with the serving maid.” He glanced up at Jenny, the faithful maid who had been with the family since James was a boy. “What do you think, Jenny dearest? Shall we make a go of it?”

Jenny glared at him as though she wished she could whack him with the serving spoon.

“Don’t be stupid, James!” Mrs Redwood said sharply. “Any woman might take you at your fickle word.”

“And if any woman may rescue me from penury — or at least the threat of having to wear three-year-old suits — I might let her.”

“Any woman might not,” Mr Redwood said. “It is Grace Follet whom you must marry.”

Cold surprise curbed the growing heat of James’s temper. He stared at his father. Mr Redwood was calmly dissecting his goose breast. It was not one of his strange, dry little jokes that nobody ever understood but him. The almost imperceptible grin in his eyes was absent. No. He was serious. It had been a statement of plain fact.

James rubbed his temples. “Who is Grace Follet?”

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A/N 

2021-24-04

: I was not planning on releasing this story on Wattpad til I’d finished it completely, but honestly… I’m stuck! And you guys have always been so helpful in the past at getting me unstuck (by bugging me for updates) that I figure it’s worth a try to get this one completed.

For the curious, this is a sequel to An Impossible Deception, which is about the Anthony Locke James mentions a few paragraphs up, but as it’s about separate characters you don’t need to read that one to enjoy this one :)

Chapter Two: A Compelling Hypothesis

Grace Follet was, at that moment, standing on the Turkish carpet in her father’s study and wondering if she was in trouble. Mr Follet never called any of his daughters to his study unless they were, and Grace, the most prudent of the five sisters, had not had cause to be called here in six years. She had forgotten how severe and depressing the study was. No paintings adorned the mahogany-panelled walls, bar the severe portrait of her grandmother and grandfather scowling down upon her from above the fireplace. A single case of books always remained locked. The only ornament in the room was a human skull entombed under a glass dome on her father’s desk. As children, Grace and her sisters had whispered stories to each other of whom the skull had once belonged to — an enemy of their father’s, a highwayman he had shot, a servant who had displeased him. As an adult, Grace still did not know why her father had such a strange object on display.

At his desk, her father signed the letter he had been writing and set it aside to dry. He looked up and examined her through ever-unsmiling eyes. Grace noted indifferently that the thick creases beneath them were deeper than usual.

“You are twenty-five,” Mr Follet said.

“Yes, sir.”

“You are almost of an age to be unmarriageable.”

“I am not getting younger.”

“I would not like you to grow old unwed,” Mr Follet said. “Aged spinsterhood is an unhappy state of being. And you would be a burden to your sisters. A burden to their husbands.”

“I have no wish to be a burden upon anyone.”

“I know you don’t.” Mr Follet’s thin lips tightened in what might have been a smile. “You are an industrious young woman.”

That was unexpected. Mr Follet hardly ever praised his daughters. The flutter of pride Grace felt was instantly followed by damping suspicion. She was not in trouble. So why had her father called her here?

Mr Follet looked idly at the skull, as though holding a silent conversation with it. “I received a visit from an old friend of mine last week,” he said. “Mr Redwood — you remember him?”

“Yes, sir.” Ancient. Cadaverous. Intimidating. Like most of her father’s friends. “I remember Mr Redwood very well.”

“He is a great philosopher,” Mr Follet continued. “He has many interesting ideas about science and religion. Last week, however, he brought up a compelling hypothesis about a matter closer to hand.”

Was it possible that her father had brought her to his study merely for idle conversation?

“He believes that your sedate, well-governed nature and his son’s spirited one would form two complementary parts.”

No. It was not possible. Of course not.

“You look offended.” Mr Follet raised a querying eyebrow. “Is his hypothesis of such revulsion to you?”

“His hypothesis?” Grace shook her head. “It doesn’t bear consideration, I’m afraid.”

“But I am asking you to consider it.” There was steel in Mr Follet’s voice.

“The hypothesis being…” Not love, it could not be love if her father suggested it. “…Marriage?”

“Yes.”

“To James Redwood?”

“Indeed.”

Grace tried to look as though she really was considering it. She counted to fifty before she answered. “I don’t think James Redwood and I would suit, Father.”

Mr Follet nodded. “That was my first thought too. He is such a boisterous, happy-go-lucky young man. You do not have much in common. But I did not pause on my first thought, Grace, and nor should you. There are material and social advantages to such a match. James Redwood will be a wealthy man one day. His family is of very good standing in the community. People respect the Redwood name.”

“Not when prefaced by James, Sir. Not after the incident a few weeks ago at Lady Dainburgh’s ball.”

“A most unfortunate to-do,” Mr Follet said. “The woman in question must have been quite hysterical.”

“I imagine you would have to be, to attempt to murder your husband in the middle of the minuet,” Grace said. “But in the midst of hysteria she likely spoke the truth. James Redwood is the only man she ever loved. And since then, I cannot hear the name James Redwood without also hearing whispered the names of other women who might have loved him. It does not help that he was a witness in that awful divorce case last summer. Nor that he is handsome and flirtatious. I suppose that is why his father wants him to get married. To fix his reputation.”

A smile crossed Mr Follet’s face, though it did not reach his eyes. “A not inaccurate judgement. What of it?”

“It seems a rather mercantile transaction.”

“If it is, it is one in which you gain more than you lose. James Redwood is the sole heir to a substantial fortune. In the meantime, he is privileged with the use of a generous income and a London townhouse. He is not, like so many other young man, dependent on his wife’s dowry for his income. He is not a fortune hunter.”

The familiar cold burn of resentment lit in Grace’s belly, but all the words she had to say had been said years ago so she remained silent.

Her father must have understood her silence anyway. “I would be very unhappy, Grace, if in two or three years you were to look back at this moment and regret not considering the idea. A woman of twenty-five is in no position to be overparticular. I have been asking myself: are you likely to find, at your age and in your circumstances, a better prospect than James Redwood?”

A face and the name that belonged to it flashed before Grace’s eyes. Even if he were— had he been? —a fortune hunter, George Benson had never blackened his own reputation by allowing married women to fall in love with him. But it was six years too late to consider him a prospect.

“I have considered it. And I do not like the idea,” she said. “I had sooner never marry at all.”

The crease under Mr Follet’s right eye twitched. He lifted the glass dome from the skull and carefully dusted it with a small feather-brush he kept on his desk to the purpose. Grace knew very well that she was not dismissed and that the argument was not over. This was merely an interregnum. Mr Follet always made sure to never let an argument be over until he had won it.

She looked wistfully at the two hard-backed chairs her father reserved for visitors. Her father ought to have invited her to sit down. Perhaps if she remained standing he would remember his own bad manners. Perhaps he would only get a crick in his neck from looking up at her.

He finished dusting the skull and replaced the glass dome again.

“There are some ladies, I understand, who are happier without husbands,” Mr Follet said, as though describing a peculiar species of insect. “In those cases, I suppose, they must be unnaturally absent of the normal womanly ambition to raise children.”

“I’m not—”

“I would not, of course, force you into any arrangement you found intolerable,” Mr Follet said, “but I am not convinced that you have given the matter due thought. How well do you know James Redwood?”

“I know him by acquaintance.” He was one of a type of men that Grace thought of as very Tonnish . Always over-dressed, always talking too fast and laughing too loud, and always being so very busy about doing so much nothing-in-particular. “The idea of an arranged marriage to a man like him…”

“Not quite arranged,” Mr Follet said. “Facilitated, shall we say? Your own weak endeavours in the area have not borne fruit. I think, after what happened, that you’re just too shy to find a husband on your own. Perhaps you will like James more than you think.”

“I am not shy. I’m merely not ready to agree to marry a man without talking to him about it.”

Mr Follet smiled thinly. “Then it is a good thing I have invited the Redwoods to dinner tomorrow, is it not? You will have the opportunity to talk to James as much as you please.”

And now she was dismissed. Grace opened her mouth to argue further, realized it would be futile, and turned and left the room.

The next morning before breakfast, Grace’s mother came to her room and confessed to Grace that she knew of Mr Follet’s plan and was not entirely sure about it. Mrs Follet was never entirely sure about anything, but Grace’s mind was already made: she would not marry James Redwood. The whole notion was ridiculous. With that decided, she could approach the impending dinner with complete composure. She dressed with no more care than usual, and when her hair refused to curl she simply instructed the maid to pull it back smooth and tie a ribbon through it. When the Redwoods arrived, Grace thought privately that even that had been too much effort. Mr Redwood was pleasant enough, with a kindly smile that showed about the eyes, and Mrs Redwood wielded heavy, formal manners, but James slouched in after them with his hands in his pockets and a resentful set to his mouth. He greeted her father with a soggy bow, gave her mother what amounted to a handwobble rather than a handshake, and then scanned Grace and her two unmarried sisters with surly blue eyes that were all too clearly making a mental account of their figures and faces.

“Which one is Grace?” he said.

Emma giggled. “Why do you wish to know, Mr James?”

“Maybe it’s her,” Alice said, jogging Emma with her elbow.

James turned on his heel and in three long strides made the front door.

“James!” Mrs Redwood said sharply. “James, come back here!”

With an audible sigh, James turned back.

“This,” Mr Redwood said, taking Grace’s elbow and bringing her forward, “is Miss Grace Follet.”

James jerked his head at her, in what seemed to be a greeting. Grace curtseyed in response. After, he remained glowering at her. She had rather the impression that he expected her to blush or look away, so she did neither, merely meeting his eyes and thinking to herself that it did not seem likely that he had been lovers with half as many women as rumour whispered.

“Shall we to the drawing room?” Mr Follet said, passing in front of Grace and averting what was threatening to become a staring match between her and James. “Perhaps you would like a sherry, Mrs Redwood?”

They moved to the drawing room where James thumped down into a chair without waiting for the ladies to be seated first. Mr Follet disapproved of his daughters drinking before dinner, so Grace had no opportunity to avail herself of the sherry he pressed upon Mrs Redwood. It would have been nice. James kept shooting unhappy glances at her, and Alice was watching him and nudging Emma to watch too. Mr Redwood and Mr Follet carried the conversation between them with little regard for the others in the room. A chapel had been discovered in the excavation of Hastings Castle, which was to Mr Follet a matter of great interest and excitement.

“Several coffins unearthed,” he exclaimed. “Can you imagine the people who lived there, Redwood? Kings, princesses, knights, buried for centuries only to come to light now, and almost by accident.”

“Disturbed in their rest,” Mr Redwood said.

“They were not sleeping,” Mr Follet said. “They were dead. What stories they could tell! What history is buried beneath our feet!”

James looked at the drawing-room carpet. “It’s probably a midden,” he said dolefully. “I understand it generally is.”

Emma burst into giggles, but when Mr Follet shot her a sharp glance she clapped her hands over her mouth to suppress them.

“James,” Mrs Redwood said, in a voice that could have driven a nail through stone. “Be polite.”

Mr Follet ignored James altogether and turned back to Mr Redwood. “It makes one think,” he said, “what history will come of us when we are dead. When there is no one to remember our names, what anonymous legacy will we leave?”

“That is not what I think,” Mr Redwood said. “I had much rather not think of that. The time may be closer at hand than I like to imagine.”

Grace thought that was a joke, but she stilled the smile that rose to her lips when nobody laughed.

Mrs Follet said timidly, “Now, Mr Redwood, I am sure that is not so.”

“It is a great deal of nonsense,” Mr Follet said. “Redwood never did have any sense of romance.”

“I don’t think it’s very romantic to think about being dead,” said James. “Worms and maggots and—”

“James,” Mrs Redwood said. “You will be quiet now.”

They all fell quiet, except for Emma who was struggling to control another fit of giggles. After a moment, Mr Follet resumed the conversation and Mr Redwood joined him. Until the footman came to call them for dinner, the two men carried the conversation alone. In the dining room, conversation once more died. Mr Redwood took his soup in minute, concentrated sips. James only ran his spoon lethargically around the rim of his bowl. Mrs Redwood ate precisely and neatly, with such regular movements that one might have used them as a metronome. She finished her soup first and looked around the table.

“Talk to Miss Follet, James,” Mrs Redwood ordered. “Why are you not speaking?”

“I am being quiet.” James cast an injured glance at his mother. “Like you told me to be.”

“And now you may talk.”

James frowned across the table at Grace. He seemed to be at a loss for words. Grace wondered again if it could be true that he had been the lover of so many women. He had the looks for it, but he did not seem to have much else. Still, she ought to talk to him, if only to make her father believe she had made an effort.

“Are you interested in history, like your father is?” she ventured.

“No,” James said.

“Perhaps science is more to your taste?”

“Not really.”

“Do you like the arts then? Poetry, perhaps?”

“No.” He tilted his head back and looked down his nose at her. “I take it you do, Miss Follet?”

“No,” Grace said. “I don’t really see the point in poetry.”

“Then why do you ask about it?”

“I was wondering what your academic interests are.”

“I don’t have any,” James said.

He was probably, Grace thought, not very bright. She smiled politely and looked away on the excuse of rearranging her napkin. Next to her, Emma dropped her spoon into her soup bowl.

“Cook has really kicked our fun tonight,” she announced. “Gallons of this tomato soup and hardly anyone here can swallow it. We must apologize. Oh!” Emma blushed. “That is, I suppose it is my mother who must apologize.”

“The soup was perfectly adequate,” Mrs Redwood said. “There was nothing wrong with it.”

“Emma,” Mr Follet said, in the hard, cold tone he so often used with his two youngest daughters. “How many times have I told you not to use the language of those beneath you? And even if you do not like your soup, you must eat it.”

“She did eat her soup,” James said. “I don’t know quite how, but her bowl is empty.”

Alice laughed. “Emma never has any trouble finishing a meal, Mr James. Can you not tell?”

Emma’s plump cheeks flushed red, and she made a movement under the table that was, judging by Alice’s suppressed yelp, a pinch of the thigh.

“I envy Miss Emma’s healthy appetite,” James said with a heavy sigh. “I am in a black mood, Miss Alice, and I cannot bring myself to eat. I fear I will waste away.”

Grace ran her eyes over James’s fair, glowing skin, firm jaw, and full, sun-blond mop of hair. He did not look as though he was wasting away. And the soup was truly not very good tonight. Mrs Follet had trouble managing her servants and the cook often took advantage of her.

“James is a healthy and thriving young man,” Mr Redwood said, “who enjoys feeling sorry for himself.”

James looked hurt. Emma giggled again. Mr Follet caught her eye and she meekly looked at her lap.

Interruption came as the servants removed the soup bowls and Mr Follet stood to carve the mutton.

“I know you won’t have any, Redwood,” he said, “your digestion being what it is, but your son will no doubt find enjoyment in this.”

“I find enjoyment in nothing,” James said.

“Then there is little purpose in giving him meat,” Mr Redwood said. “James may confine his suffering to the boiled beans and carrots.”

A look of abject horror fell over James’s face. “A little… a little trout would… do me no harm.”

“But no good either, if you have no enjoyment in it.”

Grace thought the narrowing at the corners of Mr Redwood’s eyes was a smile, but she could not be sure.

“Perhaps Mr James would like to try the croquettes,” Mrs Follet offered. “I am afraid that the soup was really not very good, but our cook has never spoiled a croquette yet.” She looked anxiously at Mrs Redwood. “I have such trouble managing the dinners. Do you not find it difficult?”

“No,” Mrs Redwood said. “I do not.”

There was something about the way Mrs Redwood spoke that seemed to leave conversation cold and dead in her wake. After a while, Mr Follet started up again about the excavation at Hastings, and conversation then moved on to Egypt, and Greece, and other places none of the women had ever been. As the two men were at opposite ends of the table, this made it awkward for the women to talk amongst themselves. Mrs Follet tried on occasion to make conversation with Mrs Redwood, but they had, it seemed, no common ground. Mrs Redwood was everything Grace’s mother was not: cold, sharp, competent, and determined. It was a relief when, as the women retired to the drawing room, she went to the washroom and left them alone for a few minutes.

“James!” Alice mimicked. “James, do not slouch! James, talk to Miss Follet! James, eat the broccoli!”

There was no Mr Follet to suppress Emma now. She burst into a fit of unconstrained, full-bodied laughter. “You could not be a man and stand being spoken to thus! But how rude he is! Why on earth did father invite them?”

“You are far ruder than he is,” Grace said. “You would both of you do well to mind your manners about our guests.”

“You are only saying that because he asked who you were,” Alice said. “It was not encouragement, Grace. It was quite the opposite. When a man sees a woman and asks her name, it means he is interested in her. When a man asks which woman belongs to a name, it means he’s heard something dreadfully embarrassing about you, like that time your garter fell off in church and the vicar held it up and asked if any of the ladies had lost a hair ribbon.”

“I am telling you to be polite because you are being far ruder than James.”

Alice shrugged. “I see no purpose in cultivating the good opinion of Father’s friends. Or, for that matter, Father.”

“Alice,” Mrs Follet said. “You should not say such things. Not of your father, nor of a guest in our house.”

Alice, who could be shouted at by Mr Follet for an hour and emerge from his study still grinning, coloured at this mild reproof. “But I do not like Mr James, Mother,” she said. “He is so very offensive.”

Mrs Follet looked at Grace, her brow twisted with concern. “Perhaps he improves upon acquaintance.”

“Upon acquaintance with Alice, nobody improves,” Grace said. And as Mrs Redwood returned at that moment and prevented further conversation on the topic, she had the rare triumph of getting the last word.

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A/N 2021-05-25: And the female love interest is introduced.

Chapter Three: Not Very Romantic

The dinner had confirmed Grace’s opinion that James was not even worth consideration, but Mr Follet was not so easily satisfied. Soon after Mrs Follet had pressed her daughters to take out their embroidery and Mrs Redwood had offered her thin praise of it, a maid came to summon Grace back to the dining room on the excuse that her father wanted something read to him and needed her young eyes. When she entered, there was neither book nor newspaper in sight, only empty brandy glasses.

“Ah, it’s Grace,” Mr Follet said, as though she had taken him by surprise. “Why don’t you take Mr James to see the garden? Two old men must be dull company for such a bright young man.”

Grace looked at James slouching in his chair. There was a particular, petulant twist to his mouth, not unlike the glower her five-year-old niece displayed just before throwing a tantrum. A dose of damp night air might do him good.

“Of course,” she said. “Mr James?”

James hauled himself to his feet. “Alright, alright.”

They went down the hallway and into the back garden where the box hedges were crinkling in a splintery breeze. Grace shivered but had the satisfaction of seeing James shiver likewise. They took one turn of the walk in silence, bar for the crunching of the gravel beneath their feet. Judging by the frown on his face, James was thinking, and Grace did not wish to disturb him. She suspected he found thinking difficult.

At last, his thoughts drew to a conclusion and he uttered it: “This is not very romantic.”

“What do you mean?”

“As a first meeting, for a pair who are to be married.”

Were they to be married? He sounded very sure of that. “It is not the first time we have met. We have met several times. The Tempest, last year at the Theatre Royale. We shared a box. I remember well.”

“With Martha Bainbridge and Lady Howell?”

“No, Sir. It was the Daltons and the Albrights.”

James cleared his throat. “You were there?”

“I was.” And she had not failed to notice the tender attention James had paid to Mrs Albright. “Then there have been balls, routs, picnics where our paths have crossed. It seems we have many mutual friends. I do not recall when we first met, Mr Redwood, but it must have been some years ago.”

“I really can’t remember you at all.”

They made another turn of the walk. When they once more reached the stairs leading to the house, James stopped and regarded her. “Aren’t you cold in this wind?”

“I’ll warm up.”

“We can just as easily maintain an uncomfortable silence indoors.”

“My sisters will eavesdrop. Emma will giggle. It won’t be silent.”

James shuddered. “Then outside we remain.”

“If you’re really concerned, you might offer me your coat.”

“If I give it to you, then I will be cold.” James started around the walk again. “Come on. You’ll warm up faster if we’re moving.”

Grace stared at him in disbelief. She could not recall ever meeting such a selfish man — except perhaps her father.

She trotted after James to catch him up. “It doesn’t signify if you think this is unromantic,” she said. “I might as well tell you now that—”

“I just can’t believe my father would put me up for this,” James interrupted, turning on her. “Why on earth would he think I’d ever want to marry you?”

She had been about to tell him that she had no intention of marrying him. Instead, she folded her arms across her chest and said nothing. Let him have his tantrum. He deserved it.

“We’re not at all suited,” James grumbled. “You’re so…” He waggled a hand at her. “…plainly dressed.”

“I suspect your father thinks my plain dressing might improve your colourful reputation,” Grace said drily.

“And yours, I suppose, thinks I’m going to save you from spinsterhood.”

“You forget the influence your wealth has upon him. If it were merely spinsterhood he wished to save me from, the dustman would do.”

“I’ve always dreaded fortune hunters.” James kicked at a piece of gravel, sending it flying into the hedges. “Unfeeling women who marry for the sake of a large income or a grand house, and damn all other happiness in the pursuit of material comfort.”

“I’m not the fortune hunter, Mr Redwood. My father is.”

“What other reason could you possibly have to marry me?” James’s eyes widened. “You’re not in love with me, are you? All those times our paths have crossed… hidden feelings might have developed…?” He smoothed the forelock that fell artistically across his forehead. “It wouldn’t be the first time.”

Grace wondered if he had any idea how very ridiculous he was. Surely that should have prevented any sensible woman ever falling in love with him — but the company he kept, no doubt, was anything but sensible. “No hidden feelings,” she said. “But I ought to marry if I can. An unmarried woman is a burden on her family.”

“And a married one is only a burden on her husband.”

“Ideally.”

“You don’t have to marry me.”

“There isn’t anybody else who has offered. And even if there were, I still might prefer you.”

He looked hurt. “You might?”

“As long as your rival were not just a little taller,” Grace said. “I think most men are.”

James straightened his posture. “You’re a damn cold fish, Miss Follet.”

It was not the first time Grace had been accused of it. But emotions were so very difficult, so very cumbersome. And when you did display them, they were so very often obviously unwelcome.

“That’s probably why my father likes you,” James continued. “He was full of what he calls compliments for you — wise, prudent, sensible. He thinks you will tame my wild ways and improve my behaviour.”

Grace had not been aware that Mr Redwood knew her well enough to have an opinion of her, let alone a positive one. Of course she was polite to him, she said hello and how-do-you-do when he came to visit her father, but that was not exactly indicative of anything other than good manners. She wondered where his opinion had come from.

“Meanwhile, he’s always been ready to believe the worst of me,” James said. “Now that everyone else believes it too, he simply thinks he’s been proved right.”

“And is everyone wrong?”.

James shot her a disgruntled glance. “I’ve had my… intrigues over the years. Lady Mosrow was a good friend three years ago. There’s no lie in that.”

“Only a euphemism.”

“If that’s what you want to call it.” James sank down upon the edge of a raised garden bed. “We were friends. No one would ever have known we had been more if she hadn’t… lost her head and announced it to the world. And now everybody knows, and that starts them thinking that every halfway pretty woman I’ve ever met has been my mistress.”

Grace regarded him skeptically, recalling how often he had found cause to touch Mrs Albright’s hand or whisper in her ear during The Tempest.

He rolled his eyes. “Well it wasn’t every halfway pretty woman, Miss Follet. It was only a discreet handful of them. And they weren’t my mistresses. A mistress is a financial transaction. I’ve never done that. My… love affairs were exactly that. I fell in love. I’ve got a bad habit of falling into love and then tumbling out of it again.”

“Once we’re married it won’t be so easy to tumble out of it.”

“You assume I’ll fall in love with you in the first place.” He snorted. “I won’t.”

Grace had been thinking it was time to tell James she no more wished to marry him than he did her, but that derisive snort demanded further punishing. She settled herself companionably down on the wall next to him, despite the chill of the brick sinking through her dress. “I’m not likely to fall in love with you either. So at least we’ll have that in common.”

“Oh, that’s balm to the soul.” James hunched over his knees, resting his chin in his hands. “What are two people to do when they’ll never love each other and have to be married for the rest of their lives?”

“I’m sure we’ll get along well enough,” she said. “I’m quite agreeable. I never make trouble.”

“I make more than enough trouble for the both of us, I assure you.”

“And it would, after all, improve both our situations to be married. You would restore your reputation. I would have a future.”

“A black one.”

“A lighter shade of grey than the alternative. Remaining a spinster til the end of my days does not appeal.”

“Spending the rest of your days with me can’t appeal either. You have no idea what bad company I can be.”

“Even bad company is better than being alone. Besides, I suppose we’ll have babies. That’ll be good company of a kind.”

“Babies!? You would— I can’t believe you’re not horrified by the whole idea.”

“I’m not horrified by you,” Grace said. “And you are the whole idea.”

James dropped his head into his hands and groaned. “I give up,” he said. “Let us be married. Let us be married and let love have no part in it.”

Grace smiled to herself. He was a vain, selfish, rude young man, and it amused her to have taken him down a peg. Now, she would turn him down and go back to her father, who was a vain, selfish, rude old man, and… Her smile faded.

“There’s no reason you should not marry me, is there?” she asked. “No other woman you have given your heart to?”

“Only about a dozen, but it was more of a loan, and I’ve got it back now.”

“No promises you have made someone? No moral obligations?”

“None that would prevent me marrying you.”

“I see.” Grace shivered, this time not from cold. “Do you mind if we stay out here a little longer? I want to think.”

“You were a long time in the garden with James,” Mr Follet said later that night as he was locking up after the Redwoods left.

“We had a great deal to talk about,” Grace said.

“You have decided then.”

“I have.” She ignored the frisson of doubt that rose over her; being James’s wife could not be worse than being Mr Follet’s daughter. “I will marry James Redwood.”

The creases below Mr Follet’s eyes deepened as he smiled. “I knew you would say yes. You are such a sensible girl that you could hardly do otherwise. It is a very good, practical choice.”

“I do not always do as you think, Father.”

“You could never surprise me, Grace. I know you far too well. Now take my blessing—” he kissed her cheek “—and go and tell your sisters the good news.”

Telling herself that her father did not know her half as well as he thought, Grace went upstairs to the bedroom that Alice and Emma shared. They were both in their nightgowns already, preparing for bed. Emma was helping Alice twist curling papers into her hair. Alice glanced through the mirror at Grace as she entered.

“Grace darling, do give us a smile occasionally. You’ll put me in the megrims.”

“Nothing could,” Grace said. “Now come here. I’ve something important to tell you both.”

“Oh? What is it?” Emma abandoned Alice’s hair and settled herself down on her bed. Alice pouted and stayed at the dressing table with the comb and curling papers.

“It is the reason Mr Redwood and his family were invited to dinner tonight.” Grace took a shallow breath. “James and I are to be married.”

The shocked silence that Grace expected to follow that statement lasted only a moment before Alice broke it with a shriek of laughter. “Goodness, Grace, that is a fine joke!”

“But… Grace doesn’t joke,” Emma said, confused.

“It is not a joke,” Grace said. “I am of an age where I should be married, and Mr Redwood would benefit from a wife. This answers for us both.”

Alice hiccuped into silence. Emma stared at Grace.

“No wonder he wanted to know who you were,” Emma said. “I am glad it is not me!”

“I suppose that I should wish you happy,” Alice said. “But I don’t think I will waste my breath. You are sure not to be.”

“I have thought it over and decided that I will be very happy in new circumstances.”

“Decided! As though that has anything to do with happiness!”

“He is handsome at least,” Emma said, scratching a spot on her chin. “But goodness, he is so very rude!”

“And he has a terrible reputation!”

“Neither his manners nor his reputation are worse than most men’s,” Grace said.

“I heard he was the Duchess of Longford’s lover,” Alice said.

“That is very unlikely to be at all true.”

Alice shrugged. “Nevertheless, he is a terrible flirt. I saw him with Mrs Williams at the assembly ball last Christmas. It was disgraceful, the way they were behaving. Mr Williams was quite purple watching them.”

“Mr Williams goes purple bending over to smooth his stockings,” Emma pointed out. “And Mr James did not flirt with us tonight.”

“Oh, he is one of those men who only goes for married women,” Alice said with a toss of head — and a subsequent shriek as several curl papers were lost. “Bother!”

She fell to her hands and knees to retrieve them. Emma leaned forward to speak to Grace in a low whisper.

“Do you think you will really be happy with him? Harriet and Ellen seem happy enough, though Mr Underton is so pompous and Mr Montague so old, but you… well, Mr James is neither pompous nor old but he is very rude. I think he would be upsetting to live with.”

Alice had heard the whispers and was listening. “He is only upset because he is to marry Grace,” she said. “Quite understandable really.”

“Alice,” Grace snapped. “You will hold your tongue now.”

“I shan’t. I must speak.” Alice collected the last of her curling papers and tossed them on the dressing table. “I must caution you, for you are about to make a terrible mistake. Mr Redwood is worse than a mere lady-killer.” Her eyes sparkled with malicious glee. “You must have heard of what happened to Catherine Balley — everybody has been whispering about it—”

“What happened to Miss Balley was unfortunate,” Grace said sharply. “And unless you wish to add to her misfortune, you won’t listen to those whispers or repeat them.”

“No, listen! Miss Dalton told me that her mother knows Lady Balley and that Lady Balley said that if there ever was a man she could murder it would be that blackguard James Redwood. And what do you think that means? What else could it mean?” The glee in Alice’s eyes darkened. “You could never be happy married to such a man.”

“James is not such a man,” Grace said. “And you will never speak of such gossip again.”

It could not be true. Certainly, it could not. James had confessed to having taken lovers, but he had also told her that there were no obligations to prevent him marrying Grace, and an unborn baby was quite definitely an obligation.

An awkward silence fell over the room.

“What about Mr Benson?” Emma said timidly.

“What about him?” Grace said.

“Well. You were so very much in love with him. And he so very much in love with you.”

A grain of doubt inside Grace crystallized, but she shook her head. “That was years ago. Mr Benson is of no importance to me now.”

Emma screwed up her mouth. “I hope James feels the same way, when he hears of it.”

“I don’t see why he shouldn’t,” Alice said. “If James has a dozen Mrs Smiths and Mrs Browns, Grace is entitled to at least one George Benson.”

“There is nothing for James to hear of,” Grace said. “My conduct has always been impeccable.”

“Yes,” Alice said with a sigh, “and you never could understand that was the problem!”

__

A/N 2021-05-26: Honestly, I’m just gonna say it, Grace has daddy issues. Also, she’s not nearly as sensible as everyone thinks.

Chapter Four: Sympathetic Company

A week after the dinner at the Follets’ house, James went to London with his father and Mr Follet to sign a betrothal contract. It was the first time James had been to London since the night he had been set upon and attacked. As their coach slowed through the crowded city streets, the discontent that had overshadowed James since his engagement darkened into resentment. This was where he belonged, amidst the crowds and excitement and happening, not in the staidness and respectability of Richmond. And Miss Follet certainly did not belong here — no, she was of the Richmond style, as over-pruned and orderly as the box hedges amongst which she had said to him, “James — may I call you James? I think we should marry.”

He had no power to refuse. His father had seen to that. Even as he signed the contract in the dingy solicitor’s office in Chancery Lane, James thought to himself that it might as well have been his father’s hand and his father’s signature. Angry, offended, and sorry for himself, as soon as they stepped outside into the dirty London air, James took off down the street without even knowing where he was going, except that it was not back to Richmond, not back to Miss Follet.

“What are you doing, James?” Mr Redwood called.

James turned back. “I’m… going to my club. Give me a bob for a drink?”

He did not expect his father to say yes, and so was not disappointed when Mr Redwood only scowled and hobbled to the carriage. Mr Follet, however, laughed and tossed a glittering object towards James who caught it one-handed. Not a shilling, a crown.

James stared at it in surprise. He had not suspected Mr Follet of generosity, nor, in fact, did he wish for generosity from such a quarter. Mr Follet was as much his enemy as his father and Miss Follet. James had asked for money because he knew it would antagonize his father, and the only reward he had wished for was the scowl on his father’s face. Before he could protest, however, Mr Follet followed Mr Redwood into the carriage and the groom nudged the horses into a trot. There was nothing for James to do but keep the money.

Instead of going to his club, he walked to his Percy Street townhouse, which he had left in the care of his housekeeper-cook and her husband, having had to send away the maid-of-all-work when his father had cut his allowance. His housekeeper, Mrs Pollard, pressed him for details about his future and was relieved to find that James was to return to his townhouse by winter with his full allowance — and a bride.

“Your wife now, sir,” she said, “she will be wanting to change things around, I suppose? Bring in new maids? Entertain?”

“I’m not really sure. I suppose so.” He did not wish to think of it. “At the very least, Mrs Pollard, I promise you that your job is sacrosanct. Nobody can roast a beef neck the way you do. I would sooner not marry at all than lose you.”

“Get on with you.” Mrs Pollard grinned. “Your wife would not be pleased to hear you say that.”

“I should hope she would have the good sense to see herself cautioned,” James replied. “But we will make Miss Follet see her place.”

“I’d think the woman who could make you marry her is quite the kind that can never be put in her place.”

“Ah, but it is not the woman who makes me. It is my father.”

Doubt crossed Mrs Pollard’s face. “I hope you haven’t been up to anything untoward.”

“I am always up to many things untoward,” James said. “However, as it happens, for once I am entirely innocent of all wrongdoing. I am the one wronged.”

Mrs Pollard suppressed a faint noise in the back of her throat.

“No, really. I shan’t bore you with the details, but I am the victim of persecution. And my father believes that Grace Follet shall be my protectress.”

Mrs Pollard considered this carefully. “That sounds worse than untoward.”

James sighed. “It is, it is, but not the way you think. You will understand when you meet her.”

“Hmm.” Mrs Pollard looked skeptical. “Well I wish you happy, Mr Redwood. And I’m sure she’s a nice young lady, despite all your grumping. Now, I’ve got letters for you.”

They were mostly bills, which James pocketed gloomily, but the last was from Locke, his best friend, who had, following a vicious divorce, fled to France with his new wife to hide from the scandal. Locke was yet another reason James feared marriage. The first Mrs Locke had been a cruel, avaricious woman who had hated Locke and made him suffer every day of his marriage to her. But the letter James read now spoke of nothing but happiness: lovely weather in France, a lovelier wife, and no intentions to return to England for a year or more. At any other time, James would have been happy to hear it. Now, he only wished that Locke was here so he could ask him for advice.

James stuffed the letter in his pocket and headed back out into the damp London streets, wondering what to do next. His usual confidante, when Locke was not around, was a certain Mrs Fortescue, who had once or twice been his lover. He might call upon her — she would have more sympathy for his complaints than Mrs Pollard — but something about having just signed his betrothal contract made him uneasy at the thought. Listlessly, he headed towards his club instead.

It was a shabby, unpretentious building on Piccadilly, little more than a dressed up inn. Here, James and other young men of his ilk gathered to pass the idle hours of their days. Sometimes they played cards or billiards, but only for the most unfashionably low sums. This early in the day, most of James’s friends were still at home sleeping off the aftereffects of last night. He meandered through the parlours of the club, looking for a friend, but found none. Everyone was a stranger to him — or an enemy. Feeling more sorry for himself than ever, James sat down with an ale at a lonely table in the darkest corner of the dining parlour to dwell in his misery.

He was not alone long. A few moments after he sat, one of the men he considered an enemy, Herbert Oliver, came sidling in from the billiard room and crossed the room directly to James, the way a stray cat crosses an alley to the butcher’s back door.

“Don’t suppose you’ll buy me a drink?” Oliver said lightly, insinuating himself into a chair.

“You suppose right,” James said. “Run out of money again, have you?”

“Unlike you, we do not all have wealthy parents to pay our way in the world.”

“Then we are more alike than you know. My father’s cut me off.”

Oliver’s black eyebrows rose until his narrow brow almost disappeared into his hairline. “But really?” A smile spread over his face. “That is a tale. Go on. Tell me.”

Ordinarily, James never had anything to say to Oliver that could not be said in two short, eloquent words. He hesitated, then, the need for sympathetic company getting the better of him, said, “Father wants me to marry. He has taken away my allowance until I do.”

“Then there’s a simple solution.” Oliver bit his lip. “By the way, Redwood, are you aware that I have a sister? They tell me she’s not unpretty, though I can’t see it myself.”

“I am aware,” James said. “But you are too late. I am already engaged. Because a man must have new coats and other such pleasantnesses.”

“So a man must.” Oliver plucked at the fraying sleeve of his shirt with a sigh. “Who is the lucky lady?”

“Grace Follet.” James glowered into his glass. “My father picked her out for me.”

“Follet? I know her — in such a fashion as I am sure you will not believe.”

“If I’m not going to believe it, then you might as well save your breath and not tell it.”

Oliver was as unsquashable as oil and only shrugged. “Please yourself.” He traced an ancient cup-stain on the table. “How old is Miss Follet anyway? Nearing thirty?”

“Twenty-five,” James said. “I’ve no argument with her age.”

“Then it’s her looks that displease you. Not what I’d call attractive either. I never did like dark women.”

“I’ve heard tell you’ll like them any way they’ll have you.”

“If I cannot have champagne, I will not refuse wine.”

James grimaced at the analogy and turned away. Oliver ignored the hint and remained in his chair as James sipped his ale and ruminated glumly on his circumstances. Eventually, his thoughts came to a conclusion which demanded utterance.

“She’s just so dull. I can’t imagine anyone wanting to marry her.”

Oliver gave a long, low chuckle. “Your imagination is lacking. I know a man who was once engaged to her.”

James twisted back towards Oliver. “You’re joking.”

“As I said, you would not believe how I know her.”

James narrowed his eyes. He would not put it past Oliver to invent false rumours just to cause trouble. On the other hand, Oliver was a prodigious gossip with an uncanny ability for knowing things about people that they would rather he not. “I might believe you if you gave me evidence.”

“I’ve none — but the matter was never a secret. The man in question is George Benson, vicar down in, oh, Somerset I think. I was at Oxford with him, until I was sent down.” Oliver shrugged. “The church would not have suited me.”

“I’ll bet it wouldn’t,” James said. “Tell me about Benson. Was he really engaged to Grace?”

“Certainly. It was just after he was ordained. He could not get a living and so took up a curacy, which happened to be in Miss Follet’s parish in Richmond. She and he were drawn to each other. They became engaged. It was to be true love. And then it didn’t come off.”

“When was this?”

“Some time ago. Five, six years I would say.”

On balance, James thought it must be true. It did not seem sordid enough to be a lie, and Miss Follet was exactly the sort of woman curates did fall in love with. “I wonder what went wrong.”

“Her father did not approve, and so Miss Follet backed out.”

“That wouldn’t stop you if you were really in love,” James said thoughtfully. “Not unless you were very, very cold.”

“Was she really in love? I know old Benson was. You know how bad those milksop men get it when they finally find a woman who’ll give them the time of day. Over heels and under water. He was in the pits when she cried off.”

“Tragic,” James said without caring. He had never been in the pits for any woman. “I would like to know if she was in love. On balance, I think she can’t have been. She has that air.”

“What air?”

“Like she’s so sure of herself. So without doubts. So uncaring of what I think.”

Oliver raised one long dark eyebrow. “How very singular.”

“You’re not telling me they’re always like that, are you?” James tried to look sorry for Oliver. “Dear me. I didn’t know.”

Oliver cleared his throat. “Not always, Redwood. Not always.”

At those words, James remembered that he hated Oliver, and why. He swallowed the rest of his ale and made to leave the table.

“I doubt she was in love,” Oliver said carelessly. “Benson said…”

Slowly, James sat down again. “What did he say?”

“Oh, not much. Just, when he was weeping in my arms about the woman who scorned him, he did mention that she was very… proper about her feelings. Didn’t express more passion than would be polite. You know?”

“I can imagine.”

“And then there was the whole story with his aunt.”

“What story?”

“The very common story. He had expectations of an elderly aunt who was very ill. And the aunt died, and the expectations did not come off. Everything went to a cousin. That was a week before Grace sent him off. But it could just be a coincidence. Certainly, the only reason she gave Benson was that her father said no.”

“And now she’s marrying me because her father said yes,” James said glumly. “Benson’s better off for it.”

“I think he must be,” Oliver said. “He married another woman shortly after Grace; he was very eager to be in love. Her father got him the living in — was it Somerset? It might have been Surrey. I can’t recall. I haven’t seen old Benson in years, and never would have thought of him at all if you hadn’t mentioned Miss Follet.”

“It’s rare for a wedding to not come off though…” James mused. “There was that woman, wasn’t there, left London in a hurry about a month ago? The baby not her future husband’s. Damned scandal that one.” He frowned. “What was her name? Beale?”

“Oh, her,” Oliver said lazily. “I know the story, though I can’t recall the name. And then there’s the Duke of Dayton’s daughter — dug her heels in at the church door and refused to walk down the aisle because her groom wore a pink hat and she didn’t like it. If that’s even half the story, I’ll eat my own.”

Hope dawned within James. “Yes, not all engagements come off. And if Miss Follet has broken one engagement before, she’s capable of breaking a second. I might not end up married to her after all.”

“I don’t think Miss Follet would cry off so easily now,” Oliver said. “At her age, she’d have to have strong motivation to do so.”

“Perhaps I can give it to her.” James smiled to himself, a plan beginning to formulate. “I can’t turn her down, or my father will never give my allowance back, but if she refuses to marry me, well… he’ll have to admit I held up my end of the bargain.”

“And how are you going to make her do that? It’ll take more than pink hats.” Oliver’s eyes sparked with sudden glee. “I know! Flirt with other women in front of her.”

James shot Oliver a dirty look. “No.”

“It will definitely do the trick.”

“It’s not decent. I’m not going to do anything indecent. I’m merely going to make myself absolutely insufferable.” He grinned. “She won’t last a week.”

__

A/N 2021-05-27: For those of you who haven’t read An Impossible Deception, Oliver is one of the minor villains in it. Actually, if I write more sequels, he’ll be the central villain in all of them. I quite enjoy him.

Chapter Five: Anchovy Sandwich

James’s courtship of Grace began at eleven-thirty on Wednesday morning in the Follets’ drawing room. Mrs Follet was writing letters by the window, at just enough distance that she could pretend not to overhear anything intimate, and Alice and Emma sat together on the couch, making no effort to conceal that they fully intended to eavesdrop. Grace did not know what her mother or sisters thought they might hear. At this stage in courtship, she and James could have nothing to talk of but the most general topics. She expected they would trade opinions on their preferred weather or plays or walks, and hopefully they would discover some compatibility in their preferences.

It began, however, in silence. James slouched in and flung himself down into the chair opposite Grace without saying a word at all. She waited for him to say good morning or to acknowledge the presence of anyone in the room. He did not.

“It’s a lovely day,” Grace said at last.

James picked at a stray thread on his waistcoat.

“James?”

“Oh?” He shook himself. “Was that addressed to me?”

“Yes.”

“I thought you might be talking to your sisters.”

Alice whispered something to Emma, who giggled.

“No, I was talking to you,” said Grace.

James swung his leg idly over the arm of his chair. “It’s not very romantic, to speak of the weather, so I didn’t think you would.”

“But we’re not—”

“I can’t abide how English women always talk of the weather,” he continued as if she had not spoken. “Given what it usually is, we had all much better stay silent. But I suppose there is so very much unmentionable for ladies and so very little they truly have any knowledge of that they must suffice with the weather.” He glanced outside. “Let us not fill the air with such banality; it will bring on rain.”

“Very well,” Grace said. “We won’t.”

And, annoyed by his rudeness, she said nothing at all. She watched him with her hands clasped neatly in her lap, waiting for him to supply a more interesting avenue of conversation. He could not keep her gaze. He kept having to look away, frowning as though confused.

Three minutes, thought Grace. Three minutes and he’ll say something, no doubt banal.

At two minutes and fifty seconds, Mrs Follet spoke, her voice trilling with anxiousness to please. “I am going to call for tea. Does anybody want tea?”

Grace sighed. “Alright then. If you are.”

“Whiskey would be better,” James muttered in undertone, but thankfully Mrs Follet did not hear, or she might have taken him at his word.

When tea came, they all moved to the table by the window. James sat down in one chair, then stood up and sat down in another, then stood up and sat down in the first again, which Grace had been just about to claim for herself. Before anyone could offer him a plate, he took a slice of orange cake from the platter and stuffed it in his mouth.

“Sugar and milk,” he said, powdered sugar puffing over his lips.

Mrs Follet was far too timid to do anything but pour his tea and put a lump of sugar and some milk in it. Alice narrowed her eyes.

“Mr James has a sweet tooth,” she observed. “Just like a little girl. Be careful, Grace, he will be fat before you know it. He is already getting chubby. His chin is doubling.”

James anxiously fondled his chin. “It is not.”

“Perhaps it is just the lighting,” Alice said sweetly. “I have noticed that this bright morning light is unflattering to anaemic types.”

“It is sometimes too bright in here in the mornings.” Mrs Follet cast a warning look at Alice. “I have wondered about shading the windows — perhaps a little light lace. But then, I do like a nice, bright light to do my writing by. I am not sure—”

“It is a very good amount of light,” Grace said, forestalling her mother’s faltering soliloquy.

James had not been listening anyway. He got up and went to the fireplace to look in the mirror hanging above it. “I don’t think I look anaemic.”

“You look quite well,” Grace said. She believed it too. He was very pale for a man, but it was a paleness in accord with the sun-fairness of his hair and well-ornamented by a healthy tint of pinkness to his cheeks.

He caught her watching him and flattened his hair. “Well anyway,” he said, coming back to the table and taking two more slices of cake at once. “Women are supposed to dress up and be pretty, but men may do as they please. Particularly once they are married. I am sure I will gain three stone by our wedding day.”

“Then have more cake,” Alice said. “And, Grace, don’t you dare eat that sandwich. You must remain slender. You are the lady.”

Grace put the sandwich back on her plate. “I do not believe you could gain three stone before our wedding, Mr Redwood.”

“I might try.” James took the sandwich she had abandoned and bit into it. “Yuck! Anchovies!”

Emma giggled. “Do you not like them?”

“Anybody who likes anchovies shows a distinct lack of taste and self-respect,” James said firmly. “It puts a nasty fishy smell on the breath. You must not eat anchovies, Grace, not ever. I could not abide a wife who eats anchovies.”

“Alright,” Grace said, taking another sandwich. “It’s a small price to pay. I don’t think anybody really loves anchovies.”

James narrowed his eyes at her sandwich.

“This is cucumber,” she added.

“I’m not overly fond of cucumber either,” said James. “Nasty, slimy stuff.”

Grace did not think that deserved a response and so did not give it one.

“What other opinions on food do you have?” Alice asked, shooting a sly glance at Emma. “You seem quite the… gourmet, Mr Redwood.”

James took a sip of tea, frowning. “I won’t get into the strawberry affair. That’s a very long story. But I will say that my wife must know how to plan a dinner for my friends. The right foods must be on the right plates, and the wrong ones kept off the table altogether.”

“I never could plan a dinner,” Mrs Follet mourned. “I wish I could teach you, Grace, but I’m afraid… perhaps a book of housekeeping for a wedding gift.”

“That’s a lovely idea,” Grace said, hoping to keep her mother from speaking further. “Thank you.”

“I’ll take care of the wines,” James said. “None of this Quakerish temperance nonsense in my house. I hope you’re a good drinker.”

“Oh goodness,” Emma said. “Grace starts swaying after half a glass of wine.”

James looked reproachfully at Grace. “You will have to do better, Miss Follet. You may study from me.”

“I have no wish to study inebriation from anybody,” Grace said. “It is not good manners for a lady to overindulge. Besides, I find it very unpleasant.”

“I can see you would say that.” James reached over the table for the teapot and started pouring himself another cup of tea. “Oh dear. It spilled.”

He had, in fact, spilled it himself, and very clumsily, but he made no movement to clean it, only slurping at his cup of tea and setting it back in the puddle he had made.

Mrs Follet, who saw every domestic upset as an emergency, got to her feet and stumbled to clean it up with her apron. Emma lent her handkerchief to the cause before following Alice from the room to get napkins. James leaned back in his chair and watched Mrs Follet clean. Grace felt a sliver of annoyance at her mother’s “oh dears” and “isn’t it wets”.

“So sorry,” Mrs Follet said, lifting James’s teacup to wipe beneath. “Goodness, what a lot of tea. Oh dear! The carpet, it is getting on the carpet!”

She fell to her knees and pressed Emma’s sodden handkerchief to the carpet at James’s feet. James made no move to get out of her way. He met Grace’s eyes.

“Shouldn’t you be helping your mother?” he said.

Suppressing a scowl, Grace knelt, but Mrs Follet shook her head. “Do talk with Mr Redwood. This will only take a moment.”

Grace straightened, but James shook his head and pointed at the floor. “I insist you help your mother. It is only good manners for a lady.”

With a sigh, Grace crawled back under the table. Unlike Emma, who was always sniffly in autumn, the only handkerchief she had on her was a delicate lace affair quite unsuited to anything more than patting at imaginary tears. She made no attempt to ruin it by soaking it with tea.

“I wish I had known about the anchovies,” Mrs Follet whispered. “I shouldn’t have ordered them.”

“He doesn’t need to eat them if he doesn’t like them,” Grace said. “Though while we’re on the topic, Mother, you needn’t order anchovy sandwiches just because Cook has a fancy for the fishmonger.”

“Oh!” Mrs Follet looked surprised. “Is that what it is? She said she gets a very good price.”

“I doubt there’s ever such a thing as a good price on anchovies,” Grace said. “At least you could encourage her towards whiting.”

“I’m not sure I like the idea of a whiting sandwich.”

“Do you like anchovies?”

“Not particularly.” The thin line between Mrs Follet’s brows creased. “But I won’t order them again when Mr Redwood is here.”

It was useless. Mrs Follet would forever be at the whim of her domestics. Thankfully, at that moment, Emma and Alice returned with napkins to attend to the spilt tea, so Grace crawled out from under the table and stood up. She stared at the plate of biscuits. Nothing was left but crumbs. James lounged back in his chair with powdered sugar down the front of his vest.

It would be very, very bad manners to mention his appetite. Very bad indeed. Grace ran her eyes down the row of buttons on his waistcoat and decided they were not in danger of popping. Mr Redwood must be one of those lucky men who could eat a great deal and yet never show it in his figure.

Emma finished mopping up the tea and stared at the plate.

“Where did all the biscuits go?” she asked.

James cleared his throat. “The sandwiches weren’t up to much. And I was hungry.”

Emma opened her mouth wide. “But you… it wasn’t even five minutes! And they’re all gone!”

“It won’t do you any harm,” Alice said. “No, all the harm has gone to Mr James, I fear. Look, his chin is fattening as we speak.”

James shrugged. “I am preparing for the wedded state. Like a bear preparing for winter, only in my case, there’s not going to be a spring again.”

“Poor Grace,” Alice said.

“It is for the best,” said James. “If I’m too good looking, we might end up having a dozen children, and that would be very hard on her.”

Emma let out a sputter of nervous giggles and Mrs Follet turned bright scarlet. Even Alice looked taken aback.

“I think we can talk about this after we are married,” Grace said. “Are you sure you won’t try another sandwich, Mr Redwood?”

James shook his head. “We ought to talk about it beforehand. But perhaps you don’t even understand what I’m talking of. I understand that I will be the more educated, when it comes to the acts of marriage, and I can take my part as teacher, but I refuse to play the part of nursery maid.” He looked directly at Mrs Follet, who was busy looking anywhere but at James. “You haven’t raised your daughter under the misconception that babies are found under cabbages, have you?”

“No,” Mrs Follet said in a whisper-thin voice. “I have not.”

“Nor that the stork brings them?”

“Oh no.”

“Then she knows the truth?”

“Oh yes.”

James crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair. “In theory only, of course?”

Mrs Follet hiccupped. Even Emma didn’t dare giggle. Grace thought it was time to change the topic of conversation. Her eyes fell upon James’s waistcoat, which was of a very loud pink and decorated with a profusion of scarlet frogging.

“That’s a very interesting waistcoat you have, Mr Redwood,” she said. “The colour is very lively.”

“Ah,” James said. “In theory only. I see.” He drummed his fingers on the table. “That was very clumsy flirting, Miss Follet. You’ll have to do better.”

“I wasn’t flirting.”

“Oh, I see.” James frowned at her. “Do you know, your right front tooth is bigger than your left front tooth.”

Nobody had any reply for that, except perhaps Alice, but she had been shocked into rare silence by the earlier turn of conversation and had not yet recovered from it. The clock over the mantelpiece ticked loudly. James looked at it.

“Just on noon,” he said. “That means our time is up for the day. Mother said not to overstay my welcome. But I’ll come again tomorrow, Miss Follet. In my absence, you can practice pining after me. I think that would be a suitable beginning.”

“Farewell,” Grace said.

“And goodbye,” Alice added pointedly.

James pushed himself up off his chair and slouched from the room without bothering to say goodbye to Emma or Mrs Follet. As the door shut behind him, Grace took up an anchovy sandwich.

“Are you sure about this, Grace dear?” Mrs Follet asked. “Oh, he is a strange, strange man.”

“I have no doubts.”

“He’s incredibly vain,” Emma said. “And that was a nasty waistcoat.”

“The first thing I will do as his wife is arrange an accident to it. I’m quite looking forward to being in charge of the laundry.”

Mrs Follet raised her eyebrows over her teacup. “The novelty wears thin.”

“I don’t see what you see in him.” Emma cut herself another slice of cake. “He says the most uncomfortable things. I can’t stop looking at your teeth now. I’m not sure he isn’t wrong about them.”

Grace ran the tip of her tongue over her front teeth. They felt the same size to her.

“It’s a release from spinsterhood she sees in him,” Alice said. “From the frying pan into the fire. There is nothing redeemable about Mr Redwood.”

Grace felt the need to defend that. She sought for a compliment to pay James and could come up with only one. “His looks are pleasing.”

“Oh yes,” said Alice. “He is almost as handsome as he believes. Now if he only could become part of the furniture and not talk or move, I fancy he would be quite tolerable to live with.”

“He at least has the advantage of being pleasant scenery.”

“Oh!” Alice put her hand over her mouth as she laughed. “That was rather clever, Grace darling. Do try that one on Mr Redwood. He might like it.”

There was no winning with Alice. Grace finished her sandwich and left the room.

---

At the end of the Follet’s street, James paused to remove half a squashed cake and two handfuls of biscuits from the pockets of his coat where he had stowed them. He scattered them carefully into the bushes, making sure they were too well-hidden for anyone to discover them. The birds and mice would dispose of them overnight. For a first meeting, he thought, matters had gone quite well. There were several times when he must have really offended Grace. Nor had he impressed her mother or sisters. A few more meetings like this, and there would be no doubt she would decide she

could not marry him, and he would be free.

Satisfied with himself, James headed home.

__

A/N 2021-05-28: I think neither James nor Grace come off particularly well just yet, but they will improve.

Chapter Six: Being Handled

Mrs Redwood and Mr Follet had together laid out a scheme for the courtship. For the first three days, James visited Grace every morning promptly at eleven-thirty and left by twelve o’clock. On the fourth day, Sunday, Grace walked home with him from church, ten feet in front of her giggling sisters. By the next Wednesday, Mrs Redwood considered it appropriate for the Follets to dine at their house and for Grace and James to spend interminable hours afterwards playing cribbage. Cribbage, James explained to Grace, was exactly a game suited to courtship because only two people could play it at once. But as James proved incapable of counting his points accurately, it became more as though Grace was playing against herself with two unhelpful commentators on her choices (for Alice, of course, insisted upon watching).

On Thursday morning, it began to rain during James’s visit, and he became stranded at the Follets’ on account of not wanting to get his new boots wet. This meant he spent two and a half hours regaling Grace with a detailed history of the commission and purchase of the boots. The history was still not finished when Mrs Follet’s usual visiting hours began and the first callers arrived. It was Mrs Dalton and her daughter Eliza, old friends of the family. Upon their entrance, James found the manners to swing his boots off the couch and stand up.

“Why, it’s young Mister Redwood,” Mrs Dalton said, raising her fine dark eyebrows. “No, you needn’t introduce us, Mrs Follet; we know him already.”

“Of course,” Mrs Follet said. “And how is Mr Dalton?”

“Fair, though his gout is troubling him again. How is Mr Follet?”

“Very well, as usual. Nothing ever seems to ail him.”

There followed a minute discussion of the health of various friends and relations. Grace sat down with Eliza and James on a sofa some distance from her mother and Mrs Dalton. Eliza’s dark, clever eyes ran over James like ants swarming a nest. Even James seemed uncomfortable. He shifted in his seat and rubbed the heel of one new boot over the toe of the other.

“Those are new boots, Mr Redwood?” Eliza said.

“Yes. They are. How did you know?”

“Your feet are too wide for them. The leather is straining, but it is not yet stretched. I do not think your cobbler did a good job.”

The polite, blank look on James’s face lit up with comprehension. “The Tempest!” he said.

“Indeed,” Eliza said. “That was where we last encountered each other. How kind of you to remember.”

“You are very hard to forget.”

“You know you shouldn’t flirt with me, Mr Redwood, not now that you’re engaged to Grace.”

“He’s not flirting with you,” Grace said.

James leaned admiringly forward in his chair. “I’m not. How did you know we are engaged?”

Eliza twisted a corkscrew curl around her index finger and looked very superior. “One need only be observant.”

“Yes, yes, yes. But what did you observe?” James turned for a moment to Grace. “Your friend fascinates me.”

“You must stop him this habit of flirting,” Eliza said.

“He’s not flirting,” said Grace. “How did you know? We haven’t really let it get about yet.”

Eliza gave a one-sided shrug. “It was obvious. Mr Redwood’s reputation is at current very black. I told myself when the gossip came out, ‘Now, Mr Redwood will marry or he will go somewhere boring and out of sight like Tunbridge Wells until everybody has forgotten about him.’ As he is not in Tunbridge Wells, but in your drawing room, he must be getting married. And as it is your drawing room, it can only be you he is getting married to. The waistcoat and new shoes confirm my suspicions. Only a courting man would dare wear such a waistcoat. Oh. I forgot. My felicitations on your engagement.”

“Thank you,” said James. “Though it might be Emma or Alice I’m marrying, you know.”

Eliza looked around the room. “Emma and Alice are not here. I suppose Alice got annoyed at James’s love-making and ran off in a huff, and Emma followed her.”

“I don’t know how she does it,” James said. “What an intelligence to behold.”

“He’s not flirting,” Grace said, before Eliza could say it once more. She was beginning to see she would need a distraction. One ridiculous person she could suffer, but not two, not at the same time. “I think we have time for a game of chess, Eliza.”

“That won’t do,” Eliza objected. “It would leave Mr Redwood out. Besides, it’s no fun playing someone who always loses.” She smiled. “But I do know a new riddle. A very easy one that I think you might get.”

Eliza had a fascination with riddles. Grace resigned herself to ten minutes’ polite suffering. “Go on then.”

Eliza sat up straight. “My first is endowed with the power, to give both a relish and a zest; my second’s connected with flour; my whole for my first is a nest.”

“Ah, well. Obviously it’s something to do with food,” Grace said.

“Yes, yes, keep going!”

“Limebread,” James said. “It’s obvious.”

Eliza’s shoulders slumped. “There’s no such thing as limebread.”

“Gingerbread then.”

“That’s three syllables. The whole thing can only be two. Besides, how is gingerbread a nest for ginger?”

“The ginger is in the bread.”

“And I’ve never heard of ginger relish.”

“I’m sure I’ve had orange and ginger relish.”

“That’s not the same… the answer was saltbox, Mr Redwood. Saltbox.”

“Now that’s just silly. Salt is no more a relish than ginger is. And how is box connected with flour?”

“It’s a box for keeping bread flour in.”

“Why not a box for hairpins or buttons or false teeth?”

“Because they don’t rhyme with power!”

“I think it’s a very bad riddle. I know much cleverer ones.”

“Oh, do you?” The light of battle entered Eliza’s clever eyes. “Go on then?”

James frowned and thought for a moment. “What’s something that has two hands and a face, and it… does not walk…”

“A clock,” Eliza said contemptuously. “Everybody knows that one. And you said it wrong. It’s—”

“In which month do women talk the least?” James said.

Eliza faltered. “I beg your pardon?”

“In which month do women talk the least?”

“It doesn’t rhyme.”

“It doesn’t have to.”

There was silence then, while Eliza tried to puzzle it through. Grace could see that riddles had been a bad idea. She wondered if it was too late to insist on chess.

In a cold, distant voice, Eliza said, “February.”

James clapped. “Very well done.”

“I do not like that riddle.”

“I’ve another that you’ll like better. Why is an umbrella like a woman?”

“I don’t think I’m going to like this one either.” Eliza sucked her teeth. “Why don’t you just tell me, Mr Redwood?”

“Because her best use is in being handled.”

It took a moment for Grace to understand, and when she did a steely dislike came over her.

Eliza remained frowning. “I don’t understand.”

“You see—” James stopped, his expression clouding with sudden chagrin. Grace understood the expression very well: he could not explain such a joke to a young, unmarried woman, particularly not one as obviously naive as Eliza.

“But do explain, James,” Grace said sweetly. “I don’t understand either. What does it mean?”

James’s cheeks were turning pink. “You see… handling a woman…”

“I’m not sure what you mean by handling,” Grace said. “Managing? Ordering about?”

“Ah… yes.”

“Do you order your umbrellas about?”

“W-we manage them.”

“How, exactly?”

“We… we fold them in and out.”

“And you manage women the same way?”

The tips of James’s ears were now red. “We-well… not exactly.”

“The riddle doesn’t make any sense,” Grace said. “I imagine it’s the sort of thing you gentlemen say in your clubs over far too many cups of ale. In that state of mind, everything seems clever.”

“Perhaps.” James rubbed his ears and rose to look out the window. “You know, I think it’s dry enough to walk back now.”

It was, in fact, still raining, but Grace was not going to stop him if he wished to leave. She stood up while he said his goodbyes and then moved with Eliza to the table by the window, where they could talk with more privacy from their mothers. Eliza seemed disgruntled.

“I did not like those riddles,” she said. “They were very rude.”

“Yes, James sometimes is,” Grace said.

“I fancy he’s not very bright.”

The suspicion had occurred not infrequently to Grace over the past week, but she shook her head now. “You mustn’t judge everybody by your own standards.”

“I mean, that wasn’t even a riddle you know.”

“It wasn’t a very good one.”

“No, it wasn’t one at all. It was a conundrum. A riddle rhymes and has verses.”

“I’ll tell him that.”

“And it didn’t even make sense — handle a wom— oh.” Eliza’s pale cheeks burned scarlet. “Oh.”

“Indeed,” Grace said dryly.

The blood slowly drained from Eliza’s face until she was her normal pallid tone again. “It seems Mr Redwood has earned his reputation.”

“I don’t wish to encourage gossip about him. I am to marry him.”

“It was merely an observation. A man who can make that kind of joke could quite easily do the other things Mr Redwood has been rumoured to do.”

Grace bit back a smile. “All men can make that kind of joke. It’s only men like Mr Redwood who are fool enough to do it in the company of women. But I think it is a habit I can break him of.”

“Hm.” Eliza narrowed her eyes. “You’re not in love with him. It’s a marriage of convenience, through and through.”

There was something about the way she said it that offended Grace. “Is there something wrong in being motivated by practical concerns?”

“Not at all. In fact, I think you have done very well for yourself. He is an only child, and I believe his father is very wealthy. You will be rich one day.”

“I am not marrying him for his money.”

“Not alone, I am sure. There is, after all, his looks. I am not as affected by these things as other women are, but I do believe most would find him handsome. Perhaps you do.”

“He’s not unbearable to look at,” Grace said.

Eliza laughed. “There. You have looks that please you, and a rich husband. The burdens of marriage cannot sit too heavily on you.”

“You make it sound like I am utterly mercenary.”

“No, no. I am impressed. Few women could be as clear-headed as you are being when it comes to the matter of their marriage. So many are moved by their hearts — and our hearts can lead us so falsely. It’s far better to not let them be involved.”

There were many things on which Grace recognized Eliza was something of an expert. Things like the history of Greece, or the use of a telescope, or the conjugation of French verbs. But when it came to personal relationships and love, Grace suspected that Eliza was something less than even an amateur. To be told that she was doing the right thing by Eliza made her wonder if she really was.

“There are other reasons,” she said. “I have no desire to end up a spinster and be a burden on my sisters or mother. And James and I do, I believe, get on tolerably well.”

“But of course you do. There is no one in the world with whom you do not get on tolerably well, Grace. You have such a patient nature, such phlegm. Even a man like Mr Redwood could not disturb it. I must say, where most women are bound for unhappiness in marriage eventually, I do believe that you, at least, will be happy. You ask so little.”

It was not high praise for either James or Grace, but the earnest, approving look on Eliza’s face showed she meant it to be.

Grace smiled weakly. “Thank you.”

__

A/N 2021-05-30: The riddle in this chapter is a real one from a real book of the time, and James’s two dirty little conundrums are from a book that was published in I think the mid-Victorian era but they probably would have been around in the Regency too. I have to confess, though, that I couldn’t find any real evidence for connecting ‘flour’ with ‘box’ in any logical way. I’m not quite sure how the riddle was meant to be worked out. I would never have guessed it if the answers weren’t listed in the back.

Chapter Seven: Kiss and Tell

As the days passed into weeks, James realized he had underestimated Miss Follet. He had noticed very frequently a particular, scornful look to her eyes, but as far as he could tell even his best efforts had done no more than irritate her. She was always cool and composed, no matter how rude or embarrassing he was. He began to see that he would need a change of tactics. Mere bad manners would not dissuade her. It would take something deeper.

It was his mother who gave him both the idea and the opportunity. At breakfast one morning, just as James was about to take his first sip of coffee, Mrs Redwood barked, “Have you kissed Grace yet?”

James spilled coffee all over his plate. “I beg your pardon!”

“It was a simple question, James.”

“Grammatically it may have been, but morally it is not!”

“I do not see why. You have been engaged three weeks. There would be nothing immoral in a kiss.”

“I did not know morality was simply a question of time. If I must know a woman one minute to dance, and two days to walk, and three weeks to kiss, then I suppose after I have known her four months I may take all manner of liberties with no regard at all for notions of fondness or marriage.”

“Do not be flippant, James! And answer the question. Your avoidance is suspicious.”

James felt his cheeks heating, which was an extremely novel and unpleasant sensation for him. He busied himself in mopping up the spilt coffee with a napkin.

“James?” Mrs Redwood said icily.

“No,” James said. “I have not.”

Mr Redwood laughed wheezily. “The boy has come over shy, Margaret. Look, he is blushing.”

“I am not blushing!”

“He has no need to be shy,” Mrs Redwood said. “He is engaged to the girl. Besides, having had a dozen or more indecent dalliances, he certainly cannot claim to be naive. He must take the part of teacher, and help ready her for what is to come later.”

James breathed in through his teeth. “Mother. This is not a good conversation.”

“On the contrary,” Mr Redwood said, “I find it a capital one. Look up, boy. Look up. Hah! Your cheeks are scarlet!”

James hastily gulped down his coffee. “I am feverish. Unwell. I cannot see Miss Follet today. I might give her a cold and she might die.”

“That would be a tragedy,” Mr Redwood said cheerfully, “but I fancy it would do you good to be unwell in front of her. It might encourage her to be more tender towards you.”

“They do not get on as warmly as they should,” Mrs Redwood said. “The girl must be shy. You must make more effort to attract her, James. I know you know how.”

James ripped his bread roll to pieces. “There is to be no question of my being attracted, is there?”

“You have in the past proven yourself capable of being attracted to women,” Mrs Redwood said. “I don’t see why Grace should be any different.”

There was no way for James to explain to his mother exactly why Miss Follet was certainly very different. He remained silent, focused upon ripping his bread roll to pieces.

“Anyway,” his mother said. “You will make more effort with Grace. It would not be fair for her to be entirely surprised on her wedding night.”

“Mother!”

“I am only being practical about this, James. Her mother certainly has not prepared her as she should.”

“I’ve never known Mrs Follet to hold any concern closer to heart than that of her daughters’ comfort. I think we can trust in her preparations.” James rubbed his cheeks, trying to dispel some of the heat lingering in them. “And I will say and hear no more on this subject!”

Unfortunately, Mrs Redwood was not (of course) to be so easily put off. That very afternoon, she summoned Miss Follet to the house on the excuse of wanting to teach her to play piquet. James made flaccid conversation with Miss Follet while she floundered through two deals and lost nearly every trick. At the beginning of the third, Mrs Redwood stood abruptly and said, “Excuse me, both of you, I have suddenly recalled a matter I must attend to.”

On the way out she shut the door behind her, which, James thought, was quite unnecessary.

The room fell into silence. Miss Follet seemed to feel no need to fill it. She sat at the card table, running one finger idly back and forth along the edge where the baize met the wood trim. James could have come up with any number of topics to talk about, if he so pleased, but he did not.

“Is your mother coming back?” Miss Follet asked after a while.

“I fancy she is not,” James said. “I believe she has determined that for our courtship to progress towards intimacy we are in need of a certain amount of privacy.”

Miss Follet shot him an uneasy glance. James understood it too well. He went to the door and opened it wide. The hallway outside was empty, which gave him the relief of knowing that his mother was not obtuse enough to stay and eavesdrop to make sure he was kissing Miss Follet. He left the door open and returned to the card table.

“In case you feel the need to flee my passionate advances,” he said, dragging his chair another two feet away from her and sitting back down.

“But you’re not…” She looked doubtful. “That’s not an advance.”

“That’s very observant of you.” James crossed his legs and tilted his chair back. “We are not married and I would never dare be improper with an unmarried lady.”

Miss Follet let out a small sigh of relief. “Thank you.”

It irked James that she would thank him. He was just as uncomfortable with the situation as she was, but he did not wish to admit it. And he certainly did not want her to feel grateful to him. From gratitude it was but a short step to affection, and she deceived herself into believing she had any affection for him, he was quite lost.

“I mean I can be improper,” he said slowly, another idea coming to him. “You have heard some of the rumours.”

“I pay little heed to rumour.”

“Then I suppose I should inform you. Hardly appropriate for you to come into our marriage not knowing who I really am.”

“I know you well enough.”

“You cannot. In the course of our acquaintance, stretching back, you say, some years, but as far as I remember, only three weeks, we have not spent more than a full day together. The depths of my character, be you ever so perceptive, cannot be plumbed in a mere twenty-four hours.”

The corners of Miss Follet’s mouth turned up slightly, aggravatingly, as though she did not believe it. “Perhaps not. But I do not need to know every thing about you, James, before our marriage. Nor even, I expect, after.”

“There are some things you must know. I would be taking advantage of you if I left you ignorant. You see, Miss Follet, I have taken lovers.”

Her half-smile faded. “I am aware of the rumours surrounding Lady Mowbray and of your general reputation.”

“The rumours that you pay little heed to?”

She sucked her bottom lip.

James righted his chair and leaned closer so he could speak in a low voice. “Five.”

“Pardon?”

“The number of my lovers, real lovers, not mere flirtations.”

Her eyes widened, then she gave an almost imperceptible sigh, which might just have been relief. Had she thought the number higher?

“And my flirtations are numberless,” he added.

“Now I know then.”

James examined her fingers, loosely clasped and untrembling in her lap, her lips, slightly pressed but not tight, and her cheeks, quite the usual bloodless whiteness. She was not shocked, not hurt, seemingly not affected by his confession at all.

He looked at the door. From what he could see of the hallway, it was still empty. Nor had he heard any footsteps. His mother had probably gone to her sitting room to plot more evil deeds. Well, let the biter be bit. He would take advantage of the enforced privacy to say things he would dare not in others’ presence.

“My history of debauchery began when I was twenty,” he said. “With the charming Mrs— but I must not kiss and tell. Let us call her Mrs P. Poor woman. Married to the most terrible old bore, the sort of man who thought women weren’t worth talking to. But I talked to her, and I listened to her, and she…” James laughed softly to himself at the memory of an old joke. “She had the most wonderful sense of humour. She could make me laugh for hours on end. I felt so sorry for her, for being married to such a man.”

“You did not feel sorry for the man, for having married such a woman?”

“My dear Miss Follet, she was worth her weight in gold and he hadn’t the wit to see it. I feel sorry for him not at all. If a man is stupid enough not to know a good woman when he meets one, he deserves everything he gets.”

Miss Follet’s eyes widened in surprise. “Did you love her?”

“Yes. I hope that doesn’t bother you, not being the first woman I’ve loved. Not even, I should guess, the tenth.”

He hoped it did bother her, but she shook her head. Then again, he thought cynically, it was not as though her heart was involved. Only her purse.

“Men have a certain nature,” she said distantly. “Or so I have heard.”

James snorted. “You haven’t heard the least of it. Mrs P… educated me. The way, I suppose, I will have to educate you. After we parted ways — she broke my heart in sending me away — I found I could not return to what I had been. Flirtations might sustain my soul, but not my body. In a state of starvation, I was rescued by Mrs F.”

“I do not need to know the details of your love affairs, Mr Redwood.”

“These are not the details. This is merely the table of contents. Mrs F was my second chapter. She was my own age, but married to a man old enough to be her father. Dreadful idea — May-December marriages, I mean.”

“My sister Ellen married a man fifteen years her senior.”

“That’s May-September at best. Though still not ideal. I suppose your father arranged the thing for money, like he did with you.”

“You suppose quite wrong. He lost three thousand pounds in the bargain.”

From anybody else, James would have thought that a joke. From Miss Follet, in her flat, unsmiling tone, it only confused him. Perhaps she was getting angry, and meant it in the way of a witticism.

“Anyway,” James said after a minute. “It was only natural that Mrs F would seek affection and understanding outside her marriage, if she could not get it within. And I was… well I was there. And she was very pretty.”

He waited some time to see if Miss Follet would comment upon this, but she said nothing, intent, it seemed, on examining the tricks she had lost in piquet.

“Mrs F and I parted ways after a few months,” James said. “I thought it prudent to quit before our affections could be engaged too deeply.”

“More prudent not to have started.”

James shrugged. “We are not all blessed with your wisdom, Miss Follet. Now, Chapter Three brings us to… Mrs O, it would be. I was twenty-three by then, and I believed myself a deal more knowledgeable about the world than I truly was. In my ignorance, Mrs O took advantage of me.”

“Took advantage of you?”

“Indeed. She attracted, beguiled, seduced me for no reason other than to hurt her husband.” Even four years later, it still stung his pride. Now, too, with the benefit of hindsight, it pricked his conscience. James should have known better. “And hurt him she did.”

Miss Follet’s fingers froze on the cards. “I don’t want to hear any more of this, James.”

“No, no. This is to be a full accounting of my sins. You must know who it is you are marrying.”

“I know enough. I don’t need to know these… ugly histories.”

“Not even the truth about Lady Mowbray? Aren’t you curious about the rumours?”

Miss Follet shook her head.

“I’m curious. I can’t imagine what possessed her to blazon our folly in front of hundreds at a ball. Three years ago we were madly in love. Three years ago. I’ve hardly seen her since, and only by accident. Yet out of the blue…” James bit back his anger; whatever the consequences, Lucy had not done it for the purpose of wounding him. “I’d like to know why she did it. That’s all.”

Miss Follet was very quiet for some time. James thought she was reflecting with some disgust upon his history and remained quiet so as to let her.

“Madly in love?” she said at last.

“You doubt me,” James said reprovingly. “Do you think that I have loved many women makes me incapable of loving? I think it quite the opposite. It is the heart that has never loved that is incapable of it. Which is why,” he said with a heavy sigh, “I fear you never shall love me.”

“Not your kind of love, no,” Miss Follet said. “I have not that in me. But I am sure, with time, I will grow accustomed to you.”

“That is quite possible,” James said. “But growing accustomed hardly makes one love. In fact, I think it is quite the opposite. I know far too many couples who find they have grown too accustomed to one another, and seek novelty outside their marriage.”

Miss Follet’s upper lip curled. “I can assure you that I am not like that.”

“You believe you are not, but I am still a novelty to you. No, I believe most people would be much happier if nobody married at all, or if we all married whomever we liked whenever we liked and quit the bond when it started to chafe.”

“I would not be happier. I quite like marriage the way it is.”

James laughed. “Yet you know nothing of it.”

“I know as many married people as you do.”

“But not as many marriage beds.”

Miss Follet flushed and stood up abruptly. She took three paces to the door then stopped. James watched her carefully, wondering if he had broken her, but instead of leaving the room, she turned back and went to the window to look out at the garden, one palm resting against the glass, trembling slightly.

“That must be true,” she said. “I think it must always be true when a spinster marries. But your quarter of experience as ill-qualifies you for judging the merits of marriage as my inexperience does me. You have only seen the black side of marriage. It has prejudiced you against the matter altogether.”

“Not altogether. I did consider marriage once, properly,” James said. “Not to you, I mean. Last year, I fell in love with a young lady, a girl, really, in but her first season in London. It was the gentlest of flirtations, not even a kiss on the cheek, and yet I was more in love with her than I’d ever been in my life.”

“Why did you decide against her?” Miss Follet asked, still facing away from him.

“One day, I realized that she had a very affected laugh. And after that… I could never feel the same way about her. Now imagine if I had discovered that after I had married her? Imagine what I will discover about you or what you will discover about me after we are married.”

“In our case, James, we have no illusions to begin with.”

“You never know it’s an illusion until it breaks, Miss Follet.” James could see that she was recovering from her earlier shock and was annoyed. “Mrs N — who I was in love with for all of a week — was under the illusion that me being in love with her meant I was ready to run away with her. I only wanted to go to bed with her. When I shattered her illusion, she took it very badly. She did not go to bed with me, and I did not run away with her, though I confess that I did run away. A woman brandishing her husband’s duelling pistols has that effect upon me.”

Miss Follet remained by the window, silent.

“That,” James added, “was three weeks before I became engaged to you.”

“Disgusting,” she said under her breath. “Have you no shame?”

“None.” James watched her closely. It was the first time she had expressed such open disgust in him; he was close to pushing her over her limit of tolerance. “I doubt I will learn shame after our marriage either, my dear. My trouble is, I do get bored

of women, and you’re not the most, shall we say, vivacious to begin with. I should think a few months—“

“—Stop it! I don’t want to hear it. None of this. I don’t need to hear it. Do whatever it is that men like you do, but don’t tell me of it! I don’t want to know.” She turned to him at last, her face white and pleading. “You will be the man you are. I will not attempt to change you. When we are married no doubt you will continue your misadventures. I just beg of you, Mr Redwood, don’t tell me about them. I would much rather remain ignorant.”

James stared at her. She was clearly disgusted by him yet still she was resigned to marrying him. Had she no pride? No sense of self-preservation?

“But your ignorance—”

“Don’t! Enough!”

James bit his tongue to suppress the apology that rose automatically to his lips. Miss Follet’s hands were clutched to her throat, trembling. Two high spots of colour had risen on her cheeks, giving sudden unexpected animation to her face. James wondered if her eyes ever went that bright with laughter. Had she been any other woman, he would have been tempted to find out.

There was a sound at the door and James turned to see his father standing there, brows knit. “I heard raised voices,” he said. “Are you alright, Grace? Did he hurt you?”

“No.” Miss Follet’s flush deepened. “I am sorry, Sir, I… We were talking.”

“There is no need for you to apologize. It is most certainly James’s fault.” Mr Redwood raised his eyebrows at James. “James?”

James bit his lip. If his father developed even a whisper of suspicion about his plan, it would not matter if he succeeded in it; his income would never be returned. “I apologize, Miss Follet. My tongue ran away with me.”

“Your apology is accepted,” she said stiffly.

“Perhaps it is time for Grace to go home for the day,” Mr Redwood said. “I will call for the carriage; it is beginning to rain.”

He left again. James met Miss Follet’s eyes, wondering if he had pushed her over the edge. She was emotional, certainly, her cheeks were white and her foot was rubbing back and forth on the carpet like she was trying not to flee. There might even be tears in her eyes. There were. She was blinking them back, trying to swallow them down.

James felt it then, against his will, the heavy, uncertain feeling in his belly. Guilt.

“Miss Follet— Grace…” He patted in his pockets for a handkerchief. “I didn’t mean to shock you—”

“You did.” Her voice trembled. “You meant to, and you succeeded.”

He found the handkerchief and held it out to her. “Very well. I did. But you must know that I am not… the sort of man you deserve to marry. You deserve much better, Grace.”

She ignored his handkerchief and wiped her arms on her sleeve. “Then you’ll have to learn to be better, James. Because you’re the only man I’ve got.”

__

A/N 2021-06-01: Updates will now be one every two days rather than one every day. This was another of the chapters I had trouble with. I did, in fact, have trouble with most of the chapters of this story.

Chapter Eight: Quoth Cassandra

Grace returned home that afternoon in an unsettled state. She had known very well what James was rumoured to be — a flirt, a seducer, a lover of married women — but in her innocence she had not quite comprehended the full scope of the word lover. There was something very ugly about the world James had described, a world where the vows of marriage were so easily broken, and something frightening too. She had no wish for own marriage to be part of that world. Even if she never came to love James, any betrayal would hurt her, humiliate her.

Her anxiety was not aided by Mr Follet’s mood at dinner that night. Normally, when there were no guests at the table, he took little part in the conversation except to censure Emma or Alice as needed. Tonight, however, he was in a cheerful mood (Cook had, for once, produced an extremely good dinner, even if all the main dishes were fish-based) and, after making humorous observations about Emma’s hair and Alice’s dress, complimented Grace on her looks and began to gloat about the upcoming wedding.

“Three weeks’ courtship!” he said. “The couple must be nearly in love by now. In my day, a courtship lasted only as long as it took to read the Banns.”

The thought of the Banns being read startled Grace. “I did not think James and I were to marry so quickly.”

Alice looked up from her plate of scalloped oysters. “Last week you were complaining it was too long.”

Mr Follet ignored them both “But then Grace always has been a creature of slow-moving passions.” He gave a bark of laughter. “You take after your mother.”

A rare thread of anger unfurled inside Grace at the comparison. She was not like her mother.

“I dare say a girl like you, Grace, needs to be told she’s in love in order to be in it. I said the same to your mother, you know. A week before our wedding I told her she loved me and so she did. I will tell young Redwood to say the same to you.”

For a moment, Grace could almost hear James saying the words in her ear, in that self-satisfied, butter-in-the-mouth way of his. Her hands clenched involuntarily on her cutlery and an oyster shell shot off her plate and rolled into the centre of the table.

Emma laughed. Even Mr Follet, in his cheerful mood, gave a thin smile.

“Perhaps I won’t tell him to tell you that then.”

“Please, Mr Follet,” Mrs Follet said, “don’t tease her.”

“I’m not teasing, Nell. Just a bit of fun.” Mr Follet’s smile broadened. “I’m happy for Grace. This is going to be very good for her. James is just the sort of young man she needs. Of good family, of solid independence, and no legions of unmarried sisters to weigh down his purse strings. All that remains is for her to realize it, and fall in love.”

“Is it James she needs,” Alice inquired, “or his family and his purse strings?”

“There can come no good of marrying a man without means or family,” Mr Follet said. “And Grace really has excelled Ellen and Harriet in this matter. Mr Underton has means enough, but he has no family worth speaking of. Mr Montague has family enough — perhaps even too many, with all his aunts and sisters — but his fortune is dreadfully encumbered by that difficult estate. But young Redwood comes of exactly the right sort of family, and his fortune, when he inherits it, is tied up in nothing.”

“I hope he doesn’t mismanage it,” Mrs Follet said anxiously. “These young men…”

“I will be around to advise him, no doubt,” Mr Follet said.

“I’m not sure James would like that,” said Grace.

Mr Follet raised his eyebrows. “He will listen to good advice for the sake of his wife.”

Grace was not sure James would do anything for her sake. She also had a suspicion he would not like being given advice by her father. She had noticed the tense set of his jaw whenever his mother gave him orders. At times, she even sympathized with it.

“And what did the two of you talk about today?” Mr Follet asked. “How did your courtship go?”

Grace looked down to hide the hot stain that rushed to her cheeks. “I played piquet with his mother.”

“But James was there?”

“He was.”

“Then you must have talked with him.”

“Yes. A little.”

“You’re coming over all shy,” Mr Follet observed. “I shall take that to mean that things are progressing very well.”

“What did you talk about?” Alice demanded. “Was it his new boots again? Heaven knows how a man can spend so much time thinking about his clothes to such poor effect!”

“We had a private conversation, Alice. I don’t wish to repeat it.”

The denial — or perhaps it had been the quaver in her voice — was too much. Alice propped her elbows on the table and stared suspiciously at Grace.

“But the topic of such a conversation could surely not be private information?”

“Now, Alice,” Mrs Follet said. “They are courting. It very well could be.”

“No,” said Alice. “Not with Grace. She doesn’t know how to flirt. What happened today? What trouble did he give you now?”

“James gave me no trouble,” Grace said. “Absolutely none. We talked of commonplace matters.”

“Which happen to be private?” Alice raised her eyebrows. “Grace, Grace, you must watch your contradictions.”

“I suppose he was polite?” Mrs Follet said. “Sometimes, I fear, he is a little… gauche.”

“Nonsense,” Mr Follet said. “You are far too delicate, Nell, far too nice in your expectations. You do not understand a man in his youth, or what might be expected of a courtship.”

That was enough to shut Mrs Follet up, but not Alice.

“I do not think Mother is over-nice,” Alice said. “I think James Redwood is less nice than he should be. Really, Grace, what was it he did today? Put his boots on the couch? Chew with his mouth open? Play dolls with the chessmen?”

“Nothing,” Grace said. “He did nothing.”

Mr Follet had decided that the conversation was over. “You have talked enough for the night, Alice,” he said. “A young woman cannot be expected to dominate a dinner table conversation. And if we are to talk of manners, your elbows are on the table and you are slouching.”

Alice rolled her eyes but kept silent for the rest of the meal. Without her chatter, neither Emma nor Mrs Follet dared talk much either, and Grace had not the spirit for it. The table fell into its usual moribund silence.

When there were no guests to entertain, Mr Follet never joined his wife and daughters in the drawing room after dinner, instead spending the evenings alone in his study. After dinner, Grace spent several minutes lingering outside the study door before she had the courage to knock. When she came in, Mr Follet was drinking port and reading a newspaper at his desk. He looked at her over the edge of his newspaper.

“What is it, Grace?”

The impatience Grace thought she detected in his tone gave her a surge of defiant determination. “It’s about James.”

“Ah. Young Master Redwood.” Her father unbent enough to put his paper down on his desk. “What is it?”

“I said at dinner that nothing was wrong today, but I was not entirely truthful. He is very uncouth, father. His manner. His behaviour. His—”

“He is a lively young man. Even I was lively too, once upon a time, you know.” Mr Follet winked at her. “I suppose he’s tried to kiss you and you didn’t like it. But you did agree to marry him, Grace. You can hardly be surprised.”

Only anger allowed Grace to speak over the embarrassment she felt. “He has not tried to kiss me,” she said stiffly. “I would not be offended if that were what he had done. No, Sir. This morning he told me about other women he has kissed. He said that I must have a full account of his sins, Sir. It was a long account.”

Mr Follet fingered the pages of his newspaper as though he wanted to take it up again and end the conversation. “Now you have it.”

“Now I do.”

“I think you might appreciate the young man’s honesty. He could have lied to you, Grace.”

“But the way he said it—”

“It’s a difficult conversation. There is no way he could have said it that would have been pleasing to your ears.”

“He need not have said it at all, Father.”

“Let us look at it in a more positive light. The young man is making an effort, Grace, to be open with you.”

“That was not his object. I think he was teasing me, and it was a kind of teasing I greatly dislike. It was wicked.”

Mr Follet narrowed his eyes thoughtfully then shook his head. “He’s only pulling at the bit. He needs a bit of taking in hand, that’s all. He’s young. It’s to be expected.”

“I’m younger than he is—”

“—but considerably wiser.” Mr Follet raised a single finger. “Of all my children, you are the most sensible. You always have been. You do know that?”

Grace was determined not to be distracted by flattery. “Father, how well do you really know James?”

“I know his father, and that is enough.”

“But he is nothing like his father.”

“No, no, no. Hereditary cannot be denied. As you are like your mother, James is like his father. Now Redwood was quite the sport when he was younger, you know. There wasn’t a hedge he wouldn’t dare jump on his hunter. And I can tell you—” Mr Follet chuckled “—he was very fond of pranks. Played all manner of tricks upon his friends. Why, one time he dressed up as an old woman and… but that story is not fit for your ears, my dear.” The smile lingered on Mr Follet’s face. “Yes, yes,” he said, taking up his newspaper again. “They really are two peas in a pod.”

“Father, I fear you have been mistaken in James. The more I know him, the more I become convinced that he is a thoroughly indecent man.”

Mr Follet slowly lowered his newspaper. “Stop fretting, Grace. You worry far too much. I assure you, James will behave with absolute decency towards you as his wife.”

Grace opened her mouth to argue.

“I assure you,” Mr Follet repeated emphatically. “Now do be a good girl and let me read my paper.”

It was useless. She should have known better than to try. Grace bit back the protest on her lips and went to the drawing room. When she opened the door, her mother and sisters fell into a silence so sudden she knew they had been talking about her.

“Well then?” Grace said sharply. “What is it?”

“Wh-why nothing,” Emma stammered. “What would it be?”

“You were obviously talking about me before I came in. What were you saying?”

Mrs Follet never could maintain a deception. She went pink. “We were just wondering, my dear, if you aren’t a little unhappy?”

“We can’t be happy all the time,” Grace said. “I’m adequately felicitous.”

“Anyone who uses a word like felicitous isn’t,” Alice said. “What were you talking about with Father?”

“Private matters.”

“It was James,” Alice said. “I bet you told him — or came as close as you could — that you can’t stand the sight of the odious man. And he ignored it, of course, trampled right over you, patted you on the head and said it was nothing to worry about. Well I’m worried. We’re all worried. You’ve always been a sourpuss, but lately — well lately you’ve been worse.”

That Alice could so accurately diagnose what had gone on in her father’s study only made Grace angrier. “It’s fortunate my sourness won’t be inflicted upon you much longer then.”

“I don’t mind if you inflict it on me even more,” Alice said generously. “You don’t have to marry him.”

“We are engaged.”

“Engagements are broken every day. You’ve broken one before.”

For a moment, Grace was almost tempted, but Alice spoke again too soon:

“I mean, really, what we’ve all been saying — that is, not mother, but me and Emma — is that you shouldn’t marry him.”

“Yes,” Emma added. “It’s so obviously a disaster waiting to happen.”

“Quoth Cassandra,” Grace said dryly.

The thin line appeared between Mrs Follet’s brows. “It’s just that you look so very unhappy, my dear. Which isn’t to say that it should all be thrown up and abandoned, but it’s much easier to know what to do about these things when you talk about them with people.” She tried to smile. “You can talk about James to me, you know.”

“There is nothing to talk about.” Grace took up her mending basket and went over to the fire where the light was best. “I’m not going to be one of those women — like Harriet — who never speaks of her husband but to complain about him.”

“In that case,” Alice said, “I can’t imagine you’ll ever have a single word to say about James at all.”

__

A/N 2021-07-03: Part of the reason it took me so long to write this story was that I struggled to make Grace an interesting character. At one point, I actually considered making one of her sisters the love interest, but it would have been a very different kind of story.

Chapter Nine: The Left-Hand Part

James was no great sportsman, but he had a keen appreciation for his figure, and in his pursuit of maintaining it was in the habit of riding through the park every afternoon. The next afternoon, he heard a rider draw up beside him on the bridle path and, on turning, was surprised to discover it was Mr Follet, sitting very correctly but stiffly in the saddle.

“Good day,” Mr Follet called above the canter of the horses’ hooves.

“Good day,” James said, expecting Mr Follet to pass him.

“You are,” Mr Follet called, “a decent young man.”

James’s gelding shied away from Mr Follet’s horse, and James was prevented replying.

“I know you are,” Mr Follet shouted, “for your father has often spoken of your better qualities.”

James could see that Mr Follet had accosted him not merely for a greeting but to have a conversation. He debated galloping away before deciding it would be futile and slowed his horse to a walk. Mr Follet kept pace beside him.

“Do keep away,” James said irritably. “Your mare has a nippy look in her eye, and my gelding is shy.”

Mr Follet obligingly drew his horse a little further away but did not fall back. “When your father first came to me about you marrying Grace,” he said, “he was keen to stress your better qualities. You’ve an amiable temper. You are loyal to your friends. Loyal to your family too. He knows how your mother gets on your nerves, yet you’ve never raised your voice against her. And he told me how, when he was very sick when you were eight years old, you spent days by his bedside keeping him company even though he was senseless most of the time.”

“There is a formidable but coming, isn’t there?” James said, made uncomfortable by the sudden recollection of distant and unhappy memories.

“I am not happy with the way you are treating Grace.”

“It is possible that my father does not know me as well as he believes,” James said. “I’m not convinced I do have an amiable temper. As for what I did when I was eight — well that was twenty years ago.”

“Men don’t change,” Mr Follet said. “What one is as a child, one will be as a man. Besides, your father did not hesitate to mention that you are also childish, possessed of fits of destructive energy, a hedonist, and — worst of all — mistakenly believe yourself to be in possession of what you call wit and wiser men call impertinence.”

That was a much more comfortable accusation. James could quite well imagine his father saying that.

“I do not expect you to give Grace a false idol to worship,” Mr Follet said. “I should not like for her to worship a false idol to begin with — she has done so before. She has a certain romantic twist to her nature that makes her susceptible to it. But she is an innocent young woman, Redwood, quite ignorant of the reality of a man’s world. She is to be protected from it.” His voice became chilly. “Not to be dashed up against it in one of your fits of destruction or impertinence.”

Then Grace had told her father about what he had said yesterday. Perhaps James shouldn’t be surprised. But if Mr Follet talked to his father about it, James’s plan would be ruined. Mr Redwood would never return James’s allowance if he suspected that James was trying to use Grace to weasel out of the arrangement.

“I didn’t mean to hurt her feelings,” James said. “I thought she ought to understand the kind of man I am. Better for her to find out before we marry than after.”

“Whatever she does find out, let her find out gently,” Mr Follet said. “She has delicate sensibilities, Redwood, and I will not see them violated.”

James bowed his head in acknowledgement. “I will be more careful, Sir.”

They rode a little way in silence, coming out of the wooded bridle path into an open field. The day was chill but sunny, and James would have found it very pleasant were it not for his companion, who seemed to have no intention of leaving him.

“Until now,” Mr Follet said after a while, “I have been thinking my wife’s concerns about the match to be baseless. She speaks of your ill manners, of a certain uncouthness. I have taken it that there is a certain reluctance on your part to be bridled.”

It had not occurred to James that Mrs Follet might be reporting back to Mr Follet about their courtship. Not that she had ever abandoned her duties, or left James and Grace unchaperoned as his mother had. She had merely sat some distance away from them, working on useless bits of embroidery or carpet work and occasionally interposing fluttery, uncertain suggestions for tea or observations on the weather, chiefly in regard to whether Grace might want a shawl fetched or whether James might need a screen adjusted against a draught. From the quickness of Grace’s replies to those inquiries, James had gathered that Grace was irritated, perhaps even embarrassed, by her mother’s solicitude. It was another mark against Grace, for James found Mrs Follet’s shy, earnest consideration for others’ comfort endearing. But it should have warned him that Mrs Follet would not stand idly by while he teased Grace out of the engagement. He should have guessed Mrs Follet would apply to her husband. And if Mr Follet spoke to his father about it, all would be lost.

“It was my choice to put on the bridle,” said James.

“But I know the terms your father set you. It could have been no easy choice, not for a young man about town accustomed to his independence.”

That sounded dangerously like sympathy. James cast Mr Follet a suspicious glance, but there was no hint of sarcasm in his expression or his tone.

“It wasn’t easy,” James agreed gruffly. “To be frank, I did not like it!”

“Then the incivility, the discourtesy that my wife describes arises, I think, not from any personal defect in your character, but from a certain, prolonged, shall we say… bad mood?”

It was as good an excuse as anything else. James nodded. To his surprise, Mr Follet laughed — a low, coarse chuckle in the back of the throat.

“Your father did say that you were childish,” he explained. “That is very like a child.”

James shifted uneasily in his saddle and his horse took the opportunity to snatch at a wisp of grass from the verge of the path. “I’ll try to do better,” he said.

“I know you will.” The laughter disappeared from Mr Follet’s voice. “You will contain your bad mood to yourself in future. And certainly, young Mr Redwood, you will not speak to Grace of matters you must know will disturb her. When it comes to women, they are best left in happy ignorance.”

James stared at the back of his horse’s neck.

“Mr Redwood?”

“Yes, Sir. I will, Sir.”

“Good.”

James thought the conversation was over, but Mr Follet kept pace with him in silence until they came to the end of the meadow and entered once more into a wooded path. It was cool, almost cold, in the shade, and James shivered and wished he could canter his horse.

“You should come to dinner this evening,” Mr Follet said. “My brother and his family are visiting, so we shall be quite a party. I am sure Grace’s cousins would like to meet her betrothed.”

It did not sound like an enlivening evening, but at least with such a crowd, James need not be thrown together much with Grace. “Alright then. I will.”

“Good day then.”

“Good day.”

Mr Follet spurred his horse into a trot and moved away. James waited until he was out of sight then turned his horse around and urged it into a gallop, back over the field they had come through.

James discovered that night that the party was not as large as he had expected. Mrs Follet had taken Emma and Alice to a card party, leaving Grace at home to play host to her uncle and two male cousins. The dinner was a dull one: Bernard Follet, a solicitor, dominated the conversation with jocular tales of the miseries of his clients. His two sons, both younger than James, were weedy and soft-voiced, and kept interrupting their father to argue over the legal details of the stories he told. Mr Follet seemed able to keep up with the tales, but James found most of it went over his head, even though he had read law at Cambridge. Grace, he thought, would be able to understand none of it. Indeed, she sat mute throughout the dinner, excepting to occasionally offer the men try one of the various dishes.

After the meal, Grace left the room and Mr Follet poured the port. While the glasses were being passed around, Uncle Bernard paused in his tales and looked at James.

“So,” he barked, “you’re the boy little Gracie’s going to marry.”

“I’m the man she is betrothed to,” James corrected.

Uncle Bernard laughed. “I don’t mean to condescend. You can’t be more than thirty.” A speculative look entered his eye. “Archie tells me it’s a good match for Grace.”

“I’m glad to know Mr Follet appreciates my virtues,” James said.

“Ah, what he means is that it’s good money. It’s very hard when you’ve got five daughters and no sons to get them all married off well, but Archie always did have a canny mind.” Uncle Bernard jogged his eldest son with his elbow. “I thought Harry would be a good match for one of them, but Archie doesn’t believe in cousin marriages.”

James looked politely at Bernard’s chinless, fustian sons. It was difficult to want to inflict them even upon Grace, and Emma certainly did not deserve them, but he thought it would be rather fun to let Alice loose upon them in the name of courtship. “What a shame.”

“The legality of cousin marriages may one day be called into question,” the elder son said. “It would be prudent—”

“Pish!” Uncle Bernard said. “Now, young James, where will you live after your marriage?”

“In London.”

“No, under your wife’s thumb!” Uncle Bernard laughed at his own joke. His sons joined in. James took a deep draught of his port. Down the other end of the table, Mr Follet sipped his own with a smile.

Uncle Bernard wheezed into sobriety. “No, no, it’ll be alright. Gracie’s a good girl. Quiet. Does what she’s told. Not like my wife.” He winked at James. “I tell you, boy, never marry a Welsh. Stubborn as donkeys, the lot of ’em.”

“Grace isn’t Welsh,” said the younger son.

Uncle Bernard ignored him. “And I hope you’ll be good to Grace, boy.”

“I certainly hope so too.”

“After all, what’s the penalty for bigamy?”

“I believe it’s imprisonment.”

“No, two wives! Hah!”

James eyed the bottle of port in front of Mr Follet as Bernard’s sons broke out in laughter again. He did not know how Mr Follet could bear the jokes, but Mr Follet was even smiling.

Uncle Bernard wiped a tear from the corner of his eye. “And why does a woman take her husband’s name?”

“I dread to imagine.”

“Because everything that was his is now hers!”

James sank the rest of his port while Uncle Bernard and his sons were still cackling. When their laughter quietened, James stood.

“If you’ll excuse me, I’ll beg leave,” he said. “I’ve got a bit of a headache tonight.”

“A headache — now that’s a wife’s malady if ever there was one,” said Uncle Bernard.

“You may go, James,” Mr Follet said. “Grace will be in the drawing room.”

The two young cousins stood to follow, but Mr Follet waved them back down. “No, no. James can be trusted to behave himself with Grace.” He shot James a meaningful look. “And I’d love to hear your opinion on the St John legacy, Harry — a very interesting will indeed.”

In the drawing room, James found Grace sitting at the piano playing out a one-handed dirge. She looked up when he entered, her brow creasing in worry.

“Does my father need me?”

“No. I come seeking refuge.”

“Oh.” She looked relieved. “Yes, Uncle Bernard can be… dominating.”

“As can your father.”

She shrugged and resumed her tune. It was the same set of a dozen or so notes played over and over, little more than a scale. For a while, James all but ignored her, kicking his heels on the fire-grate and mulling sulkily on Uncle Bernard’s jokes. Then the tune began to get to him. He moved closer to the piano.

“You don’t play?”

“A little. Not well.”

“Nor I.” He leaned on the piano, watching her fingers move delicately across the keys. “Play a song.”

“I am.”

“With two hands.”

“I cannot.”

“You can’t?”

“Not at all. I can play the left, or I can play the right, but if I try to play them together I end up muddled. I’ve tried to fix it. Sometimes I can keep my left going where it should for a bar or two, but eventually…” She shrugged. “I’m not musically gifted. Emma got all the talent in the family, I’m afraid.”

“And I never suspected her of any talent at all.”

Grace smiled doubtfully. “Don’t be cruel. She is my sister.”

There was something in that doubt that gave James a sudden flash of hope. Grace had never seemed wary of him before. What he had said yesterday had affected her. It was not impossible to dissuade Grace from marrying him. He could not repeat yesterday’s taunting, not after Mr Follet’s warning, nor could he escalate his rudeness under Mrs Follet’s watchful eye, but at least he had an edge on Grace now, leverage. His libertine side had shocked her. Very well, he would show her more of it. Not today, not with her father downstairs, but at the first opportunity. She knew already about his womanizing, so he would show her other rakish sins next — drinking and gambling, to begin with.

For now though, a little music would be an excellent diversion to an otherwise painful evening. He rather enjoyed making noise at the piano, but there was none at his parents’ house for Mrs Redwood had no ability.

He sat down on the piano seat next to her. “I’ll play the left-hand part. You do the right. We might be able to muddle it out together.”

__

A/N 2021-06-06: I think everyone has an uncle like Uncle Bernard.

Chapter Ten: A Trifle Nuisanced

For a week, James was prevented from exposing his libertine side to Grace by the constant presence of Mrs Follet. His resistance was confined to lesser bad behaviour: dull conversation, garish waistcoats, and poor table manners. He bided his time and told himself that as soon as he had the chance to behave really badly, he would take it. The chance came: Mrs Partridge, an old friend of Mrs Redwood’s, was hosting a musicale, complete with a professional opera singer hired from London. Mrs Redwood had been invited, but she had no ear for music. It seemed far better that James should go instead and take Emma and Grace with him. It would give Grace and James the opportunity to attend an event together at last and let the world know that they were courting, and Emma was enough of a chaperone at such a staid gathering in the house of such an old friend.

James laid his plans well in advance. For thirty minutes before he was to leave for the Follet’s, he occupied himself with steadily drinking his way through half a flask of brandy. The drive to the Follet’s, in his father’s coach, was a precarious one, but he reached their house without accident and, by speaking very little as he waited with Mr Follet in the hall for the girls to come down, managed to hide his inebriation. Grace gave James a sharp, suspicious look as he unsteadily handed her into the coach but said nothing. On the drive to Mrs Partridge’s house, James managed to sneak a few more swigs of brandy, and by the time they arrived the world was swaying pleasantly before his gaze. As they walked up the stairs to the house, James stumbled slightly and caught himself on Grace’s arm.

“Have you been drinking, James?” Grace asked.

“I came prepared,” James answered giddily. “Antidote against boredom.”

“You shouldn’t—” Grace cut herself short and shrugged. “The receiving line runs halfway down the stairs. Be careful.”

James had not anticipated the effect of the brandy upon Mrs Partridge’s spiralling staircase. He kept one arm pressed tightly through Grace’s as they slowly mounted the stairs. At the end of the line, James reacquainted himself with Mrs Partridge, introduced Grace and Emma, and then took them into the salon. A piano was set up at one end of the room and Mrs Partridge’s eldest daughter sat at it, playing a funeral dirge and singing along in a flat, nasal voice.

“And now you understand,” James said giddily, “why I am drunk tonight.”

Grace surprised him by laughing. “You might have warned us.”

Emma scowled. “I knew there was something wrong when Mrs Redwood wouldn’t chaperone us.”

“If it gets any worse, I will begin a headache and James can take us home.”

That would not do at all. This might be the only chance James had for weeks to be unattended with Grace. “We must wait,” James said. “Emma looks hungry, and refreshments will be served at ten.”

Emma looked hurt. “That is a great deal of implication from a man who can eat an entire cake in five minutes, Mr Redwood.”

“It was your inference.” James flagged down a footman with a tray of champagne and took a glass for each lady and another for himself. “Here, this will make the music better.”

As he handed Grace the champagne, she stiffened. He followed her gaze. A morose young man dressed all in black stood apart from the crowds, head tilted to one side, eyes half-closed, as though listening deeply to the music. James frowned. He did not look like the sort of man worthy of catching Grace’s attention.

Emma was looking now too. Her jaw dropped. “Is that Mr Benson?” she said.

Benson. The man Oliver had said Grace was in love with. James watched her keenly.

“It appears to be so,” Grace said. “He… he always did like music.”

She appeared to be trying — and not quite succeeding — to suppress a strong emotion. Her pulse fluttered at her pale throat like a butterfly buried beneath her skin. James was suddenly aware of a sharpening of his senses towards her, an awareness of the rapidity of her breathing, of her heartbeat, of the trembling of her lips. He shook himself to dispel it; he had drunk too much.

“I have heard of this Benson,” he said, thinking slowly and carefully through his haze of brandy. “It is true, is it, that you were once engaged to him?”

Grace drained her champagne and did not answer. James raised an eyebrow at Emma. It gave him a good excuse to keep his eyes away from the quavering of Grace’s lips.

“Is it true?” James pressed when Emma did not reply.

“They were engaged,” Emma said reluctantly. “But my father did not approve.”

Then that was confirmation of why Grace had broken the engagement: Mr Follet had said no. Clarity, and with it a prick of anger, came to James: Grace was being so resistant now because this was what her father wanted. How pathetic she was, James thought, to allow her father’s desires in this matter to outweigh her own feelings. It was her life to live, her heart to lose. How could she sacrifice it so easily?

He found that he was looking at her again, tracing the shape of the curl that fell over her cheek, tracing the curve of her cheek itself. She was pretty, prettier still for the brightness emotion had lent to her eyes and cheeks. She deserved more than to be bullied into a mercantile marriage with a man who would never appreciate her.

She flushed under his gaze. “It is true. We were engaged only for a week.”

James recovered his senses at the guarded stiffness in her tone. He put a hand over his heart. “And your father would have me marry you and say nothing of it! Heavens! But, Grace, look at you. You can hardly take your eyes off the man. You can’t still be in love with him, can you? My heart will break!”

“I fancy when the port, or gin, or whatever it was that you drank tonight has worn off, your heart will find itself quite healed again. Though not, perhaps, your head.”

James sipped his champagne with dignity. “It was brandy. I never drink gin. Anyway, as your husband-to-be, I can hardly be happy about the way you look at a man like Benson. There is avarice in your eyes, my dear.”

“Don’t speak so loudly,” Grace said, darting a glance at a couple standing near them. “It was a long time ago. It matters nothing now.”

“But it certainly does. I thought I was marrying an innocent. Instead, I find that your eyes are capable of hunger — for someone else. It puts me at a disadvantage. What if my heart is caught? Most certainly it will be broken.” James wiped away an imaginary tear. “It is fraying already.”

Emma giggled uncertainly. “It is not like that, Mr Redwood. You could not think such a thing of Grace.”

“I am equal to thinking any thing of any woman, where love is concerned,” James said. “When you have been as long as I have in the world, young Emma, you will understand. The best of intentions, the best of principles, may so easily be undermined by the most fleeting impression of love — be it vivid enough.”

“Perhaps the women you have been previously acquainted with have convinced you of such,” Grace said, “but they may not have had the best of principles or intentions to begin with. Besides, I’m certainly not in love with Mr Benson.” She tilted her chin and met his eyes. “I’m not in love with anyone.”

“Not even me?” James placed his hand over his heart in mock horror. “It breaks, it breaks.   But you have not forgotten Mr Benson. I can see by the look in your eyes that no matter how long it has been, you still feel strong emotions for him.”

Grace turned away. “You speak nonsense. You are drunk. I am going to sit down and wait for the opera singer to begin.”

“But no, you will not.” James caught her hand. “Stay. Mr Benson is coming over. He has seen you. And I must know if his memories are as strong as yours.”

With her hand in his, he felt her pulse leap into acceleration.

“Oh no,” Grace said. “No, no, no.”

It was too late for her to flee. Benson was weaving between the crowds with his eyes fixed upon them. He bowed to Grace and Emma. “Good evening, Miss Follet, Miss Emma.”

“Good evening,” Grace said faintly. “Mr Benson. It. It has been a long time.” Suddenly, her pulse calmed under James’s touch and she drew herself straighter. “How do you do?”

My god, James thought in disgust, she was like some medieval martyr who, while being turned on a spit, could yet wish her torturers well. So proper, so mannered, so constrained. It would be impressive were it not so cold.

“I endure,” Benson said. “I endure.”

There was a long silence after this. Emma and Grace exchanged glances. Benson seemed expectant.

“What do you endure?” James asked helpfully.

Benson patted the black velvet band around his left arm. “My poor dear wife died this last summer. I feel her absence every day.”

Again, Emma and Grace exchanged glances. Grace looked almost guilty. “My sympathies,” she said.

“Thank you,” Benson said. “As I said, I endure.” After everybody observed the correct dramatic pause, he continued, “You and your sister look well. And your father? Your mother?”

“My parents are very well,” Grace said.

“Nothing ever ails Mr Follet,” James said. “Though young Alice is suffering a sniffle tonight. You did forget to enquire about Alice. One often does, with Alice. One would often rather not know.”

Emma hiccuped out a giggle. Benson eyed James without amusement. His gaze drifted down to the hand James held in his and then up to Grace with a polite question in them. Grace met his eyes and said nothing.

“I’ve never met your friend,” Benson said. “Will you introduce us?”

“My apologies. Have you not? This is James Redwood.”

It was not a very polite introduction on Grace’s part, but Benson made up for it by bowing very low.

“How do you do?” he asked, straightening.

“I’m foxed, thank you.” James grinned. “Grace and I are engaged.”

Some dark emotion flickered in Benson’s dark eyes. “Then I must congratulate you, Miss Follet.”

“Thank you,” said Grace.

“She has told me a great deal about you,” James added. “She swears I have no reason to be jealous, but I am, you know. A man must be, in such a position.”

Hauteur stiffened Benson’s spine. “Jealousy is an unChristian emotion.”

“But not an unnatural one. Her heart, I fear, may never be entirely my own, Mr Benson. You have stolen a piece of it from me. But, there, a man who marries a woman not in her first bloom of youth must not expect a virgin heart.”

Grace’s hand, still in James’s, tightened suddenly. Then she tugged her hand from his. He watched her carefully for any outward sign of discomposure; she was angry, certainly, she could not be otherwise after such an implication, but would she show it?

She only lowered her gaze so that all he could see of her eyes were her long lashes, dark against her cheeks. “Mr Redwood is foxed indeed tonight.”

“Pray excuse me,” Benson said. “I see a friend of mine.”

He exited the conversation, neatly, politely, and crossed the room. Any man of true feeling, James thought cynically, would have at least some hard words to say, if not a punch to throw. Perhaps that was why he and Grace had fallen in love — they were so similarly unfeeling.

Behind them, Miss Partridge ceased her caterwauling and relinquished the piano seat to the hired musician.

“We must take our seats,” Grace said, as though nothing out of the ordinary had happened.

As they sat down, James leaned across to speak low in Grace’s ear. “It occurs to me now,” he said, “that you perhaps are not a virgin of body. You ought to know, dearest, that it would not prejudice me against you. After all, neither am I.”

He had the rare pleasure of seeing her turn brilliant scarlet, and laughed to himself as the music began.

Some hour later there was a pause in the music to allow the opera singer to rest her lungs. James had tried to annoy Grace throughout the music by whispering to her and sneaking gulps of brandy from the flask in his coat, but he doubted he had had much success. Indeed, by the fixed expression Grace had given the opera singer, and the monotone replies she had given him, he suspected — through the thickening fog of inebriation — that she was brooding upon the matter of Benson.

Indeed, Benson had aroused James’s curiosity. He very frequently found himself glancing across the room to where Benson sat in rapt attention to the opera singer. He wanted to know if Grace was thinking of him. What she was thinking of him. And what was Benson thinking of Grace?

As the opera singer left the stage, Mrs Partridge called out that there would be biscuits and wine in the next room. Through the general moving of bodies and chairs, James saw Benson leave the salon through the passage door, rather than the drawing room door where the refreshments were.

“I’m going to get some air,” James said. “Excuse me, ladies.”

He left the two girls there, knowing full well that Emma had opened her mouth to ask for champagne. Well, she could get it herself. James walked hastily to the door Benson had left by and went through. He found himself in an unlit passage. A breeze carried with it the scent of tobacco and James followed it. He came to an open door and, going through, found himself on a small roof-terrace overlooking a service lane running between Mrs Partridge’s house and her neighbour’s. Here, Benson leaned against the railing smoking a cigar. When he saw James, he scowled, and the cigar wobbled precariously between his teeth.

“You look mournful,” James said. “Are you mourning Grace?”

“I came here seeking solitude,” Benson said.

“Sotilude… Solitude for mourning Grace?” James took out his brandy flask and took a deep swig. “Did you love her?”

A faint, ugly stiffness came over Benson’s face. “I think you should leave, Mr Redwood.”

“I’m just curious about the man who had my beloved’s heart before mine.” James frowned at the brandy flask. “Before I did, I mean.”

“Please, leave,” Mr Benson repeated.

Instead, James leaned against the railing. “But I want—”

He broke off as someone else stepped out onto the terrace. The opera singer. Her eyes went first to Benson, then to James with surprise, and then back to Benson. With a flash of drunken intuition, James realized he had interrupted a rendezvous.

“Well,” he said. “I suppose you don’t need that sotil— silot— thing for mourning Grace. How nice to know I have not a rival.”

“I’m sorry,” the singer said. “I did not know the terrace would be occupied. I was only looking for a breath of fresh air.”

“He’s rather stale-looking, if you ask me,” James said.

The singer looked offended. “I do not understand you, Sir. Never mind, I will take a few minutes’ rest in the sitting room downstairs.”

She fixed her gaze meaningfully upon Benson at the last words and stepped back into the house. Benson took a last, deep inhale of his cigar and stubbed it against the terrace wall. James coughed.

“If you go after her right away, I’ll know it’s an agiss— assingation,” he said. “I know anyway, of course, but you do make it obvious.”

Benson looked annoyed. “I’m not going to an assignation. I’m leaving because you are here.”

“Does the sight of me pain you that much? The man Grace is to marry? Perhaps the opera singer is merely your con— consolation?”

“These baseless accusations might do a great deal of harm to many good people, Mr Redwood. I am a man of the cloth.”

“Even men of the cloth are capable of taking it off,” James said, drinking more brandy. “Are you going to try to win Grace back?”

It would be one solution to the problem, of course, if Grace were to fall in love with Benson and run off and marry him. But somehow James didn’t like the idea. Somehow James didn’t like Benson. He was pompous, stiff, self-righteous. A liar.

“Not at all in Grace’s class,” James said.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Oh? Did I speak out loud? You’re not in Grace’s class.” James frowned, trying to regather his train of thought. “Are you going to try to win her back?”

“She is engaged to you,” Benson said. “For better or worse.”

“By your tone, you judge it worse. Perhaps you are right. You might try to win her back. But if you do…” James tried to drink more brandy and found to his annoyance that there was no more to drink. “…You’re welcome to her, if you can get her. But I won’t let you get her. Not that I’ll have to try too hard. She did tell me she likes them tall, but I think she forgot to mention handsome. And I rather fancy she’ll find the opera singer an impediment.”

Benson drew himself up to his full height, some four inches greater than James. “I have nothing to say to you, Sir. I am leaving.”

“But you haven’t answered my question!” James caught his arm as Benson tried to leave. “Do you still love Grace? Did you ever love her? Am I to be the first? Shall she never then be loved?”

Benson shook him off. “You, Sir, are a drunk nuisance.”

James wobbled from being shaken off and clutched at the terrace railing for support. “A trifle nuisanced, but not a drunk.”

“Drunk,” Benson repeated.

“Answer my question.”

“The propriety you have ignored in asking keeps me from answering,” Benson said loftily, going to the door.

James pushed himself off the railing and caught Benson by the sleeve of his coat. “No, answer me, man. Did you ever love her?”

Benson turned and shoved James away. James staggered backwards and grasped at the railing again. For a moment, he thought it was going to be a fight, and he could not quite understand why, but he did think that if he got Benson just once on the nose it would make up for everything else. Then Benson lowered his hands and sadly shook his head.

“Did you drive the girls here?” Benson asked in a soft, reproachful voice.

“What?”

“Did you drive the girls here?”

“I did.”

“Are you driving them home?”

“I am.”

“But you are drunk, sir. You cannot even stand straight. I would say nothing if it were only your own safety that you risked, but you risk the Misses Follets’ safety too. What if there were to be a carriage accident?”

James blinked. This was not a fight, and he was more confused now that it was not than he had been a moment ago when he thought it was going to be.

Benson shook his head again. “You must sober up. I suggest you stay out here in the cold air and reflect upon your actions tonight. How would you feel if your over-indulgence led to Miss Follet’s hurt? How would Miss Follet feel if she could hear what you have said tonight?”

It was rather a pity Grace had missed it, James thought. But Benson was not wrong about him being too drunk to drive the coach. He had not realized how drunk he had become, sitting down in the salon. Now that he was standing — more or less — the alcohol was hitting him. His stomach was rather wobbly and his head was spinning. He lowered himself to a squat on the terrace and stared at the sky. The stars spun dizzily before his eyes. Yes, he should sober up before he drove the girls home. Too dangerous to drive them when he couldn’t see straight. Stupid of him not to have thought of that beforehand. Didn’t want to bring them to any real hurt. Grace hadn’t seemed bothered by his drunkenness anyhow…

Somewhere in the distance, a door shut and footsteps receded.

…Benson was not good enough for Grace. That was clear. Grace should never have been in love with such a pompous hypocrite. A feeling of strange unease came over James. It was none of his business who was good enough for Grace or not. He was not going to marry her. He could not.

But it would be a shame if she ended up with a man like Benson.

Slowly the stars stopped spinning. James heard the music start up again from indoors. Time to go in. Another bare hour of Grace’s company, and then bed. He swayed to the door and tried it. The knob jiggled in his hand but did not move. He tried it the other way. Still, the door did not move. Just to make sure, James tried it again both ways. The door was held tight.

Benson had locked him out.

__

A/N 2021-06-08: A lot of bad things happen to James in this story. He deserves some of them. I’m not sure he deserved this though.

Chapter Eleven: Unwanted and Unwise

Grace watched James leave the salon, swiftly, with purpose. It was a relief he was gone. If he had stayed another minute, she might have been tempted to slap him.

“What was he whispering about all this time?” Emma asked.

“Nothing,” Grace said. “Come, let’s find something to eat.”

She stood, and as she did so, the movement of the opera singer — hard to miss in her peacock-blue gown — caught her eye. The opera singer was going out through the same door James had gone through. She moved as swiftly as he had, with the same sense of purpose. Alarm bolted through Grace.

“Grace?” Emma said.

“I’m not hungry,” Grace said. “You go. I’ll stay here.”

She stayed in her seat, watching the door. After twenty minutes or so, the opera singer returned, her peacock-blue gown looking somewhat ruffled. Grace turned away and fixed her gaze upon her lap. She was leaping to conclusions. She must be. James would be here soon. He had said he needed air. He had been drunk. It might have been true.

Emma sat down, leaving the seat between them empty. “James isn’t back yet.”

“Shut up, Emma,” Grace said. “The music is to begin again.”

The seat between them, where James had been, remained empty for a long time. Grace expected James to come back any moment, but he did not. She kept flicking her gaze at the drab brown servant door, thinking of what she would say to him when he did return, fearing that she would dare say nothing. She never found out, for James did not return.

The music ended without Grace having heard a syllable of it. The people began to disperse, breaking into little crowds to converse. Slowly, the crowds thinned as the guests said goodbye to Mrs Partridge and left. Still, Grace could not see James. Emma hovered by her side, bleating every few minutes, “Where is Mr Redwood? Should we not be leaving soon?”

When the room was empty but for a handful of lingering guests, Grace realized they had been abandoned. The humiliation of it brought tears to her eyes.

“Miss Follet?” Mrs Partridge came bustling over. “But you are still here! Were you that fond of the music?”

There was, in that question, the open hint of ‘When are you leaving my house?’ Grace looked at the clock. It was half-past midnight.

“It was wonderful music,” Emma said. “But we, um…”

“It seems that Mr Redwood has… has had to attend to an emergency,” Grace said.

“Really! And left you here! That will not do! How are you to get home?”

Mrs Partridge had the grace to look embarrassed herself. It was a very awkward situation, to be stranded in the house of a host you had met only that evening — or, Grace supposed, to have guests stranded upon you. If Mrs Partridge had said, ‘How awkward! How embarrassing!’ Grace would have felt much better about it, but Mrs Partridge was very clearly trying to look as though it wasn’t embarrassing at all, and that only made it all worse.

“What emer—”

Grace stepped on Emma’s foot. “It seems that we’ll have to walk. But it’s not far.”

“Oh, no, I can’t let you do that. I’ll send for my coach — but I cannot. I have already sent it for the Bells, and they live miles away. What will we do?” Mrs Partridge looked helplessly around the room, as though expecting James to return. “Oh dear. What on earth are we to do?”

“I think we’d best walk.”

“We can’t walk!” Emma said, rubbing her foot on her ankle. “It’s dark and cold. I’m wearing slippers!”

Grace did not see what else they could do. They could hardly wait in Mrs Partridge’s house until the coach returned. And it was not very far from home, not more than one or two miles. It was well worth the price of ruined slippers to avoid the embarrassment of obliging yourself to a new acquaintance.

A soft voice intruded upon their conversation: “Is something the matter, Miss Follet?”

Grace turned, startled, to see Benson hovering behind her. He had lingered after the other guests left to talk earnestly to Miss Partridge by the piano. Now, with a pair of riding gloves in one hand, he looked as though he was at last about to leave.

“There’s nothing—”

“Mr Redwood has gone away for an emergency and we cannot get home,” said Emma.

Benson looked surprised. “How very troublesome.”

“And my coach has already been sent out for the Bells,” Mrs Partridge said. “Whatever shall we do?”

“I don’t suppose I could be of assistance, Madam?” Benson sounded very hesitant and uncertain. “I have but a curricle. It might be a tight squeeze, but I could see the young ladies home.”

Mrs Partridge looked relieved. “Well, I am not sure that it is right — a stranger…”

“He is no stranger to us,” Emma said. “We know him quite well. Oh, please, Mr Benson. I can’t possibly walk.”

“Oh, no, Emma.” Grace felt her cheeks burn. “We… we might wait for the coach to return.”

Mrs Partridge shook her head. “The Bells live in Cheapside. Your parents will be worried if you do not arrive home soon, girls. And Mr Benson can be trusted. He is a man of the cloth.”

Trust was not the issue. Grace simply didn’t want to be near him. To trespass upon Mrs Partridge’s hospitality was embarrassing. To have to ask a favour of Benson was mortifying.

“Grace, I’m tired.” Emma tugged at her arm. “Let’s just go home. Please.”

Benson gave Grace a doubtful look. “Miss Follet?”

Grace took in a deep breath. Emma had a delicate constitution. The roads were dangerous at night. They could not stay at Mrs Partridge’s all night. It would be very selfish to prioritize her pride over the practical considerations. She gave a small nod. “It is for the best, I believe.”

“Very well then. My curricle should be at the door, if you are ready to leave now.”

They were. They said their goodbyes to Mrs Partridge and a few minutes later Benson was handing Grace up into his curricle. He sat between her and Emma. It was far closer than they had been before, far closer than they had been allowed to be. Six years ago, Grace might have welcomed the heat of his thigh against. Now, she could only feel supremely awkward. She kept trying to shift away from Benson, pressing herself against the edge of the seat, holding her breath with the effort to make herself small.

“It was very unfortunate for Mr Redwood to leave you for the emergency,” Mr Benson said. “I hope nothing is wrong.”

“Nothing much.”

“Where’d he go?” Emma asked innocently. “You didn’t tell me it was— oh.” She went quiet very suddenly. “I’m sure he has a good reason.”

Benson took his eyes off the road for a moment to look at Grace. Grace stared away from him, at the houses they were passing, an acute ache in her heart. If it had been anyone but Benson to take them home! And where on earth had James gone?

“I do not wish to intrude,” Benson said quietly, “but there was no emergency, was there?”

“Do not intrude then,” Grace said.

They drove a little way in silence, the breeze cooling Grace’s cheeks and the chill night air helping calm the lump in her throat.

“Have you known Mr Redwood long?” Benson asked after a while.

“Yes.”

“But not very well,” Emma said. “We’ve only come to know him well in recent weeks.”

“I have known James some years,” Grace said. “Emma has not known him as long.”

“I see.” Benson sounded pained. “And you are engaged to him?”

“As he told you before.”

“It is somewhat difficult to believe.”

The words were spoken gently, but they hurt nonetheless for it.

“We were all surprised at first,” Emma said, “but Grace is very sure about it.”

Benson was quiet for a long time and allowed his horses to slow to a walk. Grace wished he would urge them on faster.

“As a vicar,” he said eventually, “I’ve had to marry many couples. And men of Mr Redwood’s type… Not that I want to give you any concern, Miss Follet, but men of Mr Redwood’s type do not often make good husbands.”

“You know nothing of him,” Grace said.

“My profession has granted me a certain insight into the world, Miss Follet. In the shepherding of my flock, I have learned how to spot the wolves of our kind. Were you my sister, I would say the same.”

“I am not your sister. And if I were, your advice would be as unwanted and as unwise. You know nothing of James Redwood.”

Instantly, Benson was apologetic. “My apologies, Miss Follet. My apologies. I do not mean to offend. I only dare speak in the hope of helping you avoid what I feel must be a mistake. If it is your advancing age that impels you to marry a man against your inclination, then I can only urge you to trust your natural inclinations, as they rarely lead us astray in this regard. But if it is your…” He coughed. “…attraction, then I can only urge you to think of Eve and the Apple. Do not listen to the serpent, Miss Follet.”

“For somebody who means not to offend,” Grace said acidly, “you are doing an awful lot of it.”

Benson shook his head. “Ah, I have said too much. I had better have held my tongue — I can only assure you, Miss Follet, that I spoke with the best of intentions. My tongue was not moved by jealousy or spite, but only by concern for one who once allowed me to call her dear to me.”

There was a hint of woundedness to his tone. Did he still have feelings for her? Had he ever?

It was not worth thinking of. Thankfully, despite the slow pace of the horses, they were approaching the Follet’s house. Grace’s relief drained away when she saw the figure standing at the front gate with a lamp in his hand: her father. She could not jump from the curricle in time — no, the idea was ludicrous. It would make her father more suspicious. There was nothing to do but wait as the curricle slowly drew up in front of their front gate.

“You are late,” Mr Follet said, coming forward, and then he stopped as the light of his lamp fell upon Benson. “What is this? Where is young Redwood?”

Emma jumped down from the coach. “Father, we had—”

“Grace, where is Redwood? Why has this other man brought you home?”

Grace could not speak. She climbed down from the coach without touching the arm Benson held out to her. Her cheeks were burning and her heart was racing with a painful mixture of fury and humiliation.

“Father,” Emma tried again.

“Go inside, Emma. It is your sister I will speak to.”

Emma shot Grace a sympathetic look and disappeared into the house. Grace met her father’s eyes.

“Tell me exactly what is going on, Grace.”

“Sir, if you will let me,” Benson began.

“I will not let you. Grace!”

“Mr Redwood had to go home abruptly — I… I believe there was some emergency,” Grace stammered. “He had not time to think of Emma and me. Mr Benson drove us home.”

“Why did Mrs Partridge not send her carriage? Why were the two of you left to the care of this man?”

“Mrs Partridge’s carriage was already occupied in sending home the Bells.”

“And was there no one else?”

“No, Sir. No one else could take us home.”

Mr Follet breathed a gust of air out his nose, like a displeased bull. “Very well then. Sir, you may leave.”

Grace thought that someone ought to thank Benson for driving them home, but she could not bring herself to and her father certainly would not. Benson was waiting, indeed, like he expected something more to be said.

“You may leave, sir,” Mr Follet repeated. “Grace. Let us go inside.”

He took her by the elbow and half-dragged her down the garden path.

“You should never have been near him,” her father hissed when they were out of earshot of the departing carriage. “You, in his carriage? What was Redwood thinking? Why did he leave you?”

“I don’t know, sir. He… he had to go.”

“I will have it out with him. Fool boy.” Mr Follet stopped on the front step before the open door. “Do you still hope he loved you?”

Grace drew back. “I— I…”

“He never did.” Mr Follet’s eyes glittered under the lamplight. “You will marry James Redwood. None other. No silly little curate—”

“He is a vicar now.”

“Don’t interrupt! I will not see you imperil your engagement with James for a man like Benson! You must forget Benson. Entirely.”

“You must not think because of tonight that—”

“Will you forget him?”

“If you are right, there is nothing to remember.”

“Answer the question, Grace.”

“There is nothing to remember!”

Mr Follet remained staring into her eyes, as though trying to discern the truth in them. “Very well. Now go to bed. It is late.”

Grace went inside and up the stairs. In the darkness of the hall, she realized that the warm damp on her cheek was tears.

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A/N 2021-06-14: This is late. I was a bit busy lately and this chapter needed more editing than some others. Actually I still haven’t finished editing it, but it ought to be enough for you guys to enjoy. I want to polish Benson’s dialogue. He was one of the characters who changed quite a bit from draft 1 to the finished thing, so I want the way he speaks to reflect his character a bit more than it does now.

Chapter Twelve: A Weasel

The terrace was too far away from the salon for James to make himself heard by yelling or knocking at the door. After a few minutes experimenting, he determined he could neither climb down to the service lane below, nor slip through a window. There was nothing for it but to wait.

It was a long, long wait. Some two, perhaps three hours later, when James was chilly and tired and sober enough to feel very sorry for himself, a servant entered into the lane below, and he managed to persuade her to rouse Mrs Partridge, who rescued him. When he heard that Benson had driven Emma and Grace home, he knew he had lost a battle, and knowing that, realized he was at war. He took the sleepy horses and his father’s coach home and crawled into bed, chill and shivering. Somehow he could not sleep.

Benson’s actions meant that he had another possible manner of ridding himself of Grace. Benson, it seemed, was still interested in Grace. Encourage his rivalry, and perhaps they would start it up again and Grace would turn James down. All the same, James did not like the idea. Even if he had been drunk when he met him, he was sure that his impression of Benson as a pompous prat was an accurate one. Besides, Benson had been meeting the opera singer on a balcony — that was low. It was one thing for a man to have a mistress — if the opera singer even merited the title — but it was quite another to meet her during an event under a female friend’s roof. An if she were not his mistress, but a mere opportunity — well that was worse.

“I’m not jealous,” James told himself. “I don’t like Grace, so I’ve nothing to be jealous of. But the man simply isn’t right for her.”

He fell asleep to that consoling thought and was woken not many hours later by his mother. He stared blurrily at her through the fog of sleep. Dawn had hardly lightened the room. “What time is it? Is something wrong?”

“I thought you might know,” Mrs Redwood said. “Mr Follett sent his coach over. He wants you and your father to attend him immediately.” Her upper lip curled in distaste. “It is not yet breakfast.”

It was only Mr Follet. Then nothing much was wrong after all, though no doubt James would have some explaining to do about last night.

“That’s very bad manners of him,” James said soothingly. “I suppose I’d better get dressed then.”

He waited for his mother to leave the room, but instead she fixed him with a suspicious glare. James waited.

“Well?” Mrs Redwood demanded, losing patience first, as always, when they played this game.

“Well what?” James asked.

“What on earth is this all about?”

James carefully fixed his blandest look on his face. “I can’t imagine.”

Mrs Redwood’s eyes narrowed but she said nothing and swept from the room. James breathed a sigh of relief; he could not forever put off the consequences of last night, but a cowardly, foolish streak inside him whispered that it was much better to put them off as long as he could.

He dressed and went down to the hall where his father was waiting, dressed in a cloak and carrying his stick. When they got in the carriage, Mr Redwood said drily, “Do you know what this is about, boy?” and James meekly lied, “No, Sir, I don’t.”

His father could not be kept in ignorance long. When they arrived at the Follett’s house, the butler took them directly to Mr Follett’s study. James just had time to register with surprise a skull standing in pride of place on the desk before Mr Follett snapped at his father, “What in the blazes have you let your son do?”

That was not how James had expected it to begin. He had not thought Mr Follet would be so angry; indeed, he had had no notion that Mr Follet had a temper.

Mr Redwood gave James a narrow look. “What has he done, Follett? What did he do?”

“He left Grace and Emma alone at Mrs Partridge’s musicale last night. He went home — or who knows where — without them. George Benson brought the girls home in his curricle at one in the morning. On no account would I trust any of my daughters with a weasel like Benson! And last night, he had them completely alone with him for a quarter of an hour. Well, Redwood. Why’d he do it?”

Mr Redwood turned to James. “Is this true? Did you leave the musicale last night, and leave the girls alone?”

“No,” James said. “It’s all rather a…” he trailed off. Exposing that he had followed Benson, interrupted a rendezvous, and then been locked out on the balcony by him would certainly confirm Mr Follet’s view that Benson was a weasel, but it would also prove James to be a terrible fool. And besides, even if he had every reason to loathe Benson, it simply wasn’t done to expose another man’s affairs, let alone besmirch the reputations of the women he had them with.

“James?” prompted Mr Redwood.

“The truth is it’s all rather embarrassing,” James said. “I went out for some air in the intermission, and somehow the door shut behind me and I couldn’t get back in the house again. I was locked out half the night. I didn’t mean to put the women in such a position.”

Mr Follet narrowed his eyes. “I never suspected you of stupidity before, boy.”

“I may have had had a little too much to drink,” James said.

“Too much to drink?” Mr Redwood turned on James. “That would explain it! How dare you, young man, get drunk with two young women under your care?”

Too late, James realized he had exposed part of his ruse to his father. He hastily tried to recover. “I… I did not mean to. There was champagne at the musicale and… well, I had a brandy beforehand. Somehow, it got to me.”

“Drunk!” Mr Redwood repeated scornfully. “By God, you are my only son, my only living child, and there are times, James, when I am ashamed to say so. And I could be so proud— I want to be proud of you.”

Bringing up the ghosts of siblings past always made James feel more resentful than guilty. He set his jaw. “Both girls reached home safely. Did they not, Sir?”

Mr Follett shrugged. “I believe a great deal of harm has been done.”

“What?” Alarm intensified the queasiness in James’s belly. “But nothing could happen to them in Mrs Partridge’s house. And Benson was there to take them home—”

“Exactly the harm,” Mr Follet said. “You may not know this, young Redwood, but Grace and that curate were engaged, once upon a time. It was a silly little love affair, conducted by the silly little girl she was at the time. There is yet the danger that she could once more imagine herself in love with him, particularly if you do not treat her the way a woman expects to be treated — to humour her whims, to defer to her temper, to shelter her from the dangers of the world.”

“If Grace were to fall in love with Benson, then I’d wish her happy,” James said. “Much better that than she marries me without loving.”

Some primitive emotion flared in Mr Follet’s dark eyes. “It would be the very worst thing that could happen to her.”

“Why? What’s so weaselly about Benson anyway?” James was quite prepared to accept that Benson was a weasel, after last night, but he did wish to know why Mr Follet thought so too. “I’ve no reason to like the man, but I’d like to know why he’s so odious to you.”

“His character is lacking,” Mr Follet said primly. “But that is by the by. It is your part, as her future husband, to make sure that she develops a proper affection for you before your marriage. That means remaining by her side when you are together in public. It means not giving men like Benson the opportunity to accost her.”

James could see his curiosity was not to be answered. “Well, I see no harm in Benson taking them home last night. They both arrived safely, so the matter, as far as I can see, is over.”

“It is not over,” Mr Follet said. “I see now that there is a need for Grace to leave Richmond, far from Benson and anything that might remind her of him. She is going to her sister’s house in Gloucestershire for the week. You will go with her. Mr Montague is having a hunting party. You will join it.”

“Gloucestershire? Sir, I do not hunt.”

“You will learn. Besides, in the solitude of the country, Grace will have no distractions from falling in love with you. You will play your part, and make it happen.”

James was too taken aback to respond.

Mr Redwood frowned. “When did you come up with this idea, Follet?”

“Last night, when Grace came home with that weasel.”

“Leaving James alone with Grace for such a time could be dangerous.”

“Not alone. Ellen will let nothing untoward happen. And Mr Montague always has been a very reasonable and staid gentleman. Grace will be quite safe in their company.”

“That’s not what I mean,” Mr Redwood said. “After last night, I’m not sure Grace should be put in a position where she might have to rely upon James. He has proven himself unreliable.”

“Grace will have her sister,” Mr Follet repeated. “No harm will come to her. And I tell you — she must not be near that man. If he is in London, he may very well attempt to run into her again. For all I know, last night was no coincidence.”

Mr Redwood looked doubtful but nodded. “Very well then. And you will apologize to Grace and her sister for your actions last night, James.”

“Grace is waiting in the drawing room,” Mr Follet said. “I will relay the apology to Emma myself.”

It was not much of an apology then, James thought, but he shrugged went downstairs into the drawing room. Grace was sitting by the fire, looking pale and irritable. Perhaps it was meeting Benson that had done it to her. James kicked at the carpet.

“I heard Benson drove you home?” he said.

“Yes.” Grace spared him the briefest of glances. “My father has told you about Gloucestershire?”

“He has. I dislike the idea.” James could not understand the coldness of her tone. “You arrived home safely? Benson didn’t… do anything?”

A thin line appeared between Grace’s eyebrows. “A man like Mr Benson does not do things.”

James could have told her otherwise, but slandering Benson would only make him look jealous — and besides, it would only needlessly hurt Grace’s feelings to hear that about a man she had once been in love with.

“I’m glad you’re home safe. I’m really very sorry about last night. I— I made a stupid mistake and—”

“It doesn’t matter, Mr Redwood,” Grace said icily. “I am busy. I must pack for Gloucestershire. So, I imagine, must you.”

She passed him on her way to the door. James caught her hand, surprised. “Grace?”

She shook him off. “Don’t talk to me. Don’t.”

And then she left. James shook his head in bewilderment. After all his efforts over the last few weeks, he had hardly won more than a repressed frown from her. But last night, for something that was not even his fault — not entirely, anyway — she was angry.

Perhaps he would get what he wished after all. Only he did not want to have Benson to thank for it.

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A/N 2021-06-16: Does James’s reactions and what he says this chapter make sense? This is another chapter that, thanks to subsequent edits, ended up a bit patchwork and I’m not sure I quite got him right here.

Chapter Thirteen: Lover’s Quarrel

It was a full day’s journey to Ashdown Hall, the rambling, old-fashioned farming estate where Grace’s eldest sister Ellen lived with her husband Mr Montague and their four children. As James rode along behind the coach, Grace was spared all but the thought of his company except for the intervals when they baited the horses or stopped for a meal at an inn. And at those intervals, she managed to avoid talking to him, except in monosyllables to answer his inquiries of tiredness or hunger.

By the time they arrived, it was getting dark. Before the groom could even knock on the door, it opened and a stout child came running out, shouting, “Mama! They’re here!”

Grace recognized the child as her nephew Benjamin, some six inches taller than when she had seen him last. He peered at her through the dim light.

“Are you getting married?” he demanded. Before she could answer, he turned his gaze to James who was just swinging down from his horse. “Are you marrying her?”

“And a good evening to you too,” James said.

Ben stuck out his tongue. “Are you marrying her?”

“You’re astoundingly rude,” James said admiringly. “Is it just the vicissitudes of the day, or are you always like this?”

“It’s rude not to answer my question.”

“So it is. We are the pot and the kettle.”

“Well? Are you marrying her?”

“I’m in wonderful health, thank you,” James said. “And how about you?”

Ben scowled and turned on his heel to run back indoors as Ellen and Mr Montague came out, already in evening dress.

“You’re dreadfully spontaneous,” Ellen said, swooping down on Grace and kissing her cheek. “We only got Father’s express this morning. And this must be Mr Redwood!”

James politely shook her hand. “It is.”

“This is my sister, Ellen Montague,” Grace said, before presenting her cheek to Mr Montague for a scratchy, whiskery kiss.

“Wonderful to see you, young Grace,” he said. “Do introduce me to the young man.”

With some stiffness, Grace introduced James to Mr Montague. Immediately, Mr Montague began a loud inquisition into the parentage of James’s horse, whose reins James was still holding.

“Don’t keep the poor boy,” Ellen said, putting her hand on Grace’s arm and leading her inside. “We’ve dinner in half-an-hour and he needs to get dressed.” She turned to Grace. “You need to get dressed. Come. I’ll take you to your room.”

In the bedroom, Ellen sent Grace’s maid away to deal with the trunks and set about helping Grace dress. It was almost like old times again, before she had married, when she and Grace had been the closest of friends.

“You must tell me all about your engagement,” Ellen said, helping Grace out of her travelling cloak. “You are very lucky.”

Right now, Grace did not feel lucky at all. She shrugged. “It is is not a love match.”

“Love matches are often a great deal of trouble.” Ellen started undoing the buttons at the back of Grace’s dress. “What I mean, dear, is that he is a nice-looking young man with a not inconsiderable fortune, and that at your stage in life you could do very worse indeed.”

“Yes,” said Grace. “At my age, I could continue unmarried. I must console myself with that.”

“You sound bitter.” Ellen looked perplexed. “I should think you, of all of us, Grace, would not be too proud to be thankful for your situation.”

“I am not proud. It is James I find it difficult to be thankful for, not my situation. He—” She was cut off by Ellen pulling the dress over her shoulders. A brief struggle ensued — the dress had been made for Alice, who was slighter than Grace, but had rejected it on the grounds of it being too dowdy. Grace emerged from the folds of the dress very suddenly and rather breathless.

Ellen tossed the dress on the bed and started rifling through an open trunk of gowns. “What do you wish to wear? This white one is very pretty. What did he do?”

“Not the white one. Alice said it makes me look—”

“Alice doesn’t know chintz from cheesecloth.”

“Not the white one, all the same.” Grace looked doubtfully at Ellen’s over-ruffled cream dress, straining at the high waist and ungenerous in the bust. Once, Ellen had been the prettiest and best-dressed of the sisters, but ten years of country living and four children had left her out of date and overweight. “Alice is very fashionable these days.”

“Is she?” Ellen pulled out an indigo gown, very new, that Grace had not yet worn and very much wished to. “Too dark! You will look like you are in mourning. What did Redwood do, dear?”

“He…” A sudden caution came to Grace. The Ellen who had been able to advise Grace on fashion was left somewhere in the past eight or ten years ago. Who knew how else she had changed? Confiding everything might not be wise. “He drank too much last night and embarrassed me.”

“Mr Montague has sometimes embarrassed me in the same way. But he is a very good husband in other regards.” Ellen pulled out another pale, dated gown. “How about this? No?” She returned to her rummaging. “When we do not have company at home, Mr Montague always spends his evenings with me and the children in the drawing room. Whenever he goes into town, he makes sure to bring me back some small present. And even though the rents never bring in what he wishes they would, he is very careful in the management of his money. No, I have a great deal to be grateful for in Mr Montague, even if he does sometimes drink too much or talk too loud or snore in church. No doubt you will discover Redwood’s virtues too.”

“I’m not sure he has any, or that I’d consider Mr Montague’s habits great virtues either. That red gown, please. I will wear that one.”

“When you have been married ten years, you will be grateful for a good deal less.” Ellen picked up the red dress. “Goodness, this is a daring colour! Mr Montague has in every way satisfied me as a husband. He has provided a hearth and home and my three dear children. And Benjamin.”

Grace was prevented from replying by the effort of getting into the red dress, which was a very delicate gauze affair with gold-thread trimming and demanded much care. When Ellen was working on the ties at the back, she said, “And what of romance?”

“I never expected much of that to begin with. For that, my dear sister, we have poetry.” Ellen cocked her head to the side and examined the dress. “You know, over your shift, it’s almost pink, which is not so loud, though it is still rather daring. I suppose these deep colours are coming into fashion. But it is a very pretty effect. Your hair just needs a little rearranging. Sit down.” She set about with the brush and comb. “For that matter, I never saw you as romantic. Surely you will not let such weak notions prevent you from making what is such a good match. I should fancy, you know, that even if you were eighteen, you would be let down on the romantic front. Most women are.”

“I will not let it prevent me,” Grace said. “But I am beginning to think I am a great deal more romantic than I knew.”

“You ought to read poetry,” Ellen said. “In fact, you ought to get Redwood to read poetry to you.”

The idea of James reading poetry made Grace burst out laughing. Then, to her surprise, she recalled that Benson had read poetry to her when they were courting, quoting from a slender book of Cowper’s most religious poems. Had she really enjoyed it, Grace wondered, or had she only enjoyed the idea of a man reading poetry to her? It had felt like the sort of thing people were meant to do when they were courting.

“Well you don’t have to,” Ellen said, miffed.

“No, no it’s not that. It’s just that James wouldn’t— couldn’t read poetry. He’s not the type.”

“Then you’d best stop hoping for romance from him,” Ellen said decidedly. “And really, with the practical advantages of the match, you won’t need romance anyway.”

“Are there really so many advantages? I will have to leave Richmond and live in London. My husband will continue to embarrass me with his manners and behaviour. We do not love each other. We perhaps never will.”

“Those are not practical matters,” Ellen said. “He will have an independent fortune. He is young and healthy. Our family approves the match.”

“I’m beginning to wonder if I approve,” Grace said, tears coming to her eyes. “Last night… It was so humiliating.”

Emma patted her on the shoulder. “It will pass. Besides, you always have been a rather anxious creature, Grace, you do tend to fret about things. I suppose you get it from Mother. I’m not sure you’ve ever really been happy, truly happy. Redwood is unlikely to change that, but he will make you rich. Far better to be rich and fretful than poor and fretful.”

Grace set her jaw. “I’m not fretful. I’m not like Mother.”

“Rubbish, of course you are,” Ellen said. “You and Emma and Harriet all take very much after mother, you know. I take after father. And Alice, well, she’s a black sheep in the making if ever there was one.”

“And I have been happy. I was very happy when… when I was engaged to Benson.”

“Not a practical choice,” Ellen said, shaking her head. “No money, that one.”

“He is wealthy now.”

“Now that he married a rich wife.” Ellen looked thoughtful. “You’re not still in love with him, are you?”

“No,” Grace said flatly. “Not at all.” After what he had said in the curricle last night, she felt nothing for him but anger and a strange, confused shame. “But as a comparison—”

“There’s no point comparing men,” Ellen said decisively. “You must learn to be content with the one you have, rather than dream after one you do not.” She gave one last pat to Grace’s smooth hair. “And Mr Redwood will be a very foolish man indeed if he is not content with you.”

When Grace and Ellen came downstairs, she discovered that the party was a great deal smaller than she had expected. Some five strange men, all Mr Montague’s age or older, sat in the drawing room awaiting them. There were no women; Ellen explained that it was to be a hunting party proper, and Grace was only here to keep Ellen company while Mr Montague was busy with his guests. James was late, still, Grace guessed, trying to squeeze himself into one of his gaudy waistcoats. Introductions were given and a glass of sherry was pressed into Grace’s hand. She sipped it slowly, feeling very out of place in a room full of so many middle-aged men and her sister Ellen seeming very middle-aged in the midst of them. And she’s only five years older than me, Grace thought despairingly. When I’m thirty, will I be the same way?

One of the men, a stout, heavily whiskered man of about forty-five, by the name of Blythe, seemed to take pity on Grace. He came over to her and said, “You look a little lost, Miss Follet.”

“Do I?” Grace sipped her sherry.

“I would have had my daughter come with me, if I had known there was to be female company,” Mr Blythe continued. “She’s about your age.”

“I’m twenty-five,” Grace said.

“You don’t look it.” A somewhat keener light appeared in Mr Blythe’s eye. “My daughter is a little younger than you then. She is nineteen. My only child. I am a widower.”

“I’m very sorry for your loss,” Grace said, trying to catch Ellen’s eye. Ellen, however, was too busy talking with one of Mr Montague’s friends. “How very sad.”

“It was fifteen years ago. I’m quite recovered. I assure you.” There was a long pause, as though Mr Blythe expected Grace to speak. When she did not, he continued hopefully, “Of course my daughter is at a delicate age, when she needs the guiding hand of an older woman — not too much older, of course. And I always do regret that my property — Avenden Manor — Is not to go to a son but a weak sort of nephew of mine.”

“Is the property entailed then?” Grace asked. “A great pity when properties cannot go to daughters. I have only sisters myself, you see, but we are lucky in that there is no entail on our father’s property — then again, it is but a townhouse and there are no rents to manage.”

She rather hoped that Mr Blythe would be put off by the implication of small fortune, but Mr Blythe only coughed. “Not entailed, no. Poor Catherine would not have the ability to manage Avenden Manor. Nor does my nephew, come to that. No, no, I have been thinking that — for Catherine’s sake — I had much better remarry so I might have a son.”

He was becoming more odious and more obvious by the minute, but Ellen, now talking with her housekeeper by the service door, was oblivious to it. Grace sighed.

“I think it’s almost time for dinner,” Mr Blythe said, holding out his arm. “May I take you in?”

There was a polite cough from behind them. Grace turned, expecting to see James in his loudest, tightest waistcoat, but instead she saw another of Mr Montague’s guests. She struggled to recall the name — Devan? Demont? Demery! And he was younger than she had thought at first, perhaps in his early thirties, but seeming older by the weariness of his expression.

“I think you should know, Mr Blythe, that Miss Follet is engaged,” Demery said in a low, quiet voice.

And then, saying nothing more, he moved away again.

A dull flush suffused Mr Blythe’s face behind his whiskers. “Are you really?”

“Yes.”

“You ought to have said something.”

“Why?” Grace saw James enter the room at last, dressed indeed in that awful pink waistcoat she hated so much. Mr Montague called him over and began to introduce him to his friends. “Why should I have said something, Mr Blythe?”

“It’s a little deceptive, isn’t it? To be engaged and not say anything of it?”

James was sidling away from the introductions with one eye upon Grace.

“I made no attempt to deceive. I had not the chance.”

“Take a little friendly advice from an older and wiser man, that it would be wise to be more open about your circumstances. To talk so readily with one man, while secretly engaged to another, might be seen as, well, as fast, Miss Follet.”

James arrived to hear the last of this. He ignored Mr Blythe entirely and turned to Grace.

“Sorry I’m late. Is—”

“The only fast person here is you, Mr Blythe,” Grace interrupted. “Your mind leaps so rapidly to such very odd conclusions. I am afraid I cannot follow you at all.”

A dull flush suffused the flesh behind Mr Blythe’s whiskers. He turned stiffly and walked away. James looked curiously at Grace.

“That was not half the dressing-down he deserved, and yet quite twice the dressing down I expected from you,” he said.

“I don’t need your rescuing from that old fool,” she snapped.

“No.” He took the claret glass carefully from her hands. “I’m very glad you do not.”

“And I’m not drunk.” Grace took the glass back. “I’m only angry.”

“With me?” There was a teasing, infuriating smile on James’s face. “What have I done to displease you, my dear?”

Grace raised her chin. “The musicale.”

The smile faded. “It was an unfortunate mistake. I’m sorry. I didn’t think you’d be so offended by it.”

Grace scoffed. “You didn’t think I’d be offended? What did you think? That I wouldn’t notice?”

“Notice that I didn’t come back? I was rather hoping you would, actually.”

“Hoping I would?”

James frowned. “Yes, because… Grace, I’m not sure we’re not talking at cross purposes here. Can we—”

Ellen rang the bell. “Dinner,” she said. “Dinner at last.”

As the only female guest, it was Grace who was to go first into the dining room. James offered her his arm and she could not refuse it. They sat up the head of the table, leaving Grace between Mr Montague and James. After a few disinterested enquiries about her parents, Mr Montague returned his attention to the rest of the table and his favourite topic of hunting, horses, and hounds. This left Grace with no company but James, as the man opposite her was Mr Blythe and he would not look her in the eyes. Grace picked at her food in silence. At intervals, James attempted to talk to her, but she rebuffed his efforts so coldly that he gave up by the second remove. That gave Grace the chance to realize that she and James were being observed. Mr Demery, down the other end of the table, kept his gaze fixed upon them, something cold and daggerlike in his expression. Only when Ellen spoke to him — kindly and over-friendly — did he turn away, and then only to answer her with polite reserve. Grace wondered if Demery knew her from somewhere. He had known she was engaged, but she could not recall meeting him before in her life.

When the women rose to leave the men to their port, Demery stood too.

“I’m going for a walk,” he announced. “Excuse me.” Then he left without further word.

“Poor chap,” Mr Montague muttered. “Still feeling it.”

A pitying hush followed that. Grace wondered what had happened to Demery.

“Grace?” Ellen said by the door.

“Yes. Coming.” She moved to go, but James took her hand and pulled her back.

“Come to my room after dinner,” he whispered in her ear. “Please. I want to talk.”

Grace glared at him and turned away.

“Lover’s quarrel?” Ellen remarked when they were out in the hall.

“Not quite.”

“He seems fond of you.”

“He is not.” Grace sought to turn the conversation away from James. “That Demery is a strange, strange man.”

“Oh!” Ellen pushed open the drawing room door. “Yes… I do pity him. Such a tragedy.”

“Really?” They sat down on the couch and Grace curled up close to Ellen. “Tell me about it.”

“You might have heard — he was engaged, but the engagement was broken on his wedding morning when his bride-to-be was discovered to be with child.” Ellen lowered her voice, though there was no one to overhear. “Not his, you see. Terrible scandal. Broke his heart.”

“Oh.” A pang of shock and pity came over Grace. “I have heard. The man whom Catherine Balley had been meant to marry. I didn’t know his name.”

“Now you do.” Ellen shook her head. “He was very much in love with her, silly woman. She didn’t know what she was losing when she played the fool for someone else.”

__

A/N 2021-06-18: The next update will be Monday, not Sunday, because I need my weekend. I’m looking forward to the next few chapters. There’s some good stuff in them.

Chapter Fourteen: Prelude to a Kiss

As soon as it was polite, James made his excuses to leave the rest of the men at the table and went to the drawing room to see if he could catch a moment to speak to Grace. It had been his object for many weeks to make her really angry with him, and he had finally succeeded, but his victory was dulled by the confusion he felt as to how he had succeeded. He wanted to know why she was so angry with him now when he’d done so much worse before to no effect. Something must have happened at the musicale that he was not aware of. James could not imagine what, but he was fairly sure he knew who. Grace, however, was not in the drawing room. Ellen sat alone there reading a novel. In response to James’s inquiry, she said that Grace had gone to bed with a headache. Then she patted the seat beside her.

“Do sit down and tell me about you,” she said. “Grace has not been forthcoming.”

James could not say no. He sat down reluctantly. “What do you want to know? I can tell you, I’m no huntsman. Your husband will be disappointed.”

“I’m sure you are only being humble.”

“I wish I were, but I can assure you, my marksmanship is unparalleled by all but blind drunks.”

Ellen giggled in a manner reminiscent of Emma. “How very droll!”

With an inward sigh, James realized that Ellen was stupid. The week ahead looked suddenly very grim: hunting and the company of hunting men like Mr Montague, or society at home with the company of a giggling, stupid woman and a silent, angry one.

Ellen twiddled the tassel of a cushion around her plump forefinger. “Do tell me, Mr Redwood, are you and Grace having a little tiff?”

“In a manner of speaking.”

“How dreadful.” Ellen looked shocked. “She told me, you know, that you drank too much last night and embarrassed her. Poor Gracie. She hates more than anything else to be embarrassed, you know. Such a proud little creature, she always was. Like a cat.”

“I never much liked cats. Nasty little hissy things.”

Ellen shot James a narrow look then smiled. “But you do like Grace. You can’t mean you don’t like Grace. You’re going to marry her.”

James cleared his throat. “Um, yes. But, you know, Mrs Montague, I’m not sure Grace likes me at all.”

“I can’t imagine why,” Ellen murmured. “You seem such a nice young man. No, I’m sure you’ve only made her feel embarrassed. You must make up to her. I’m sure I won’t tell if you cut some flowers from the garden for her — not that we’ve got many right now.” She bit her lip. “Mr Montague gave me a cabbage once, but I don’t think it would do for Grace.”

“I doubt the entire farm could do it,” James said.

“No, no. She’s afraid of cows.” Ellen shook her head. “Maybe you could buy her a new hat ribbon?”

“I’m not sure a hat ribbon could do it either. To be blunt, Mrs Montague, I suspect your sister is marrying me despite the fact that she dislikes me very much indeed.”

Ellen blinked. “She couldn’t possibly dislike you. She really is a very pleasant creature, Mr Redwood. She never makes trouble, or loses her temper. She is always tolerant and sweet.”

James thought back to the way Grace had dealt with Mr Blythe earlier that night. She had been close to losing her temper then. “…Is she?”

“Oh yes. Ever since she was a child, you know, she’s been this way.”

“I’ve always thought her less tolerant than… a little cold-hearted.”

“No, no. Not at all. You can’t mistake her patience for coldness. She’s merely slow to express her feelings. Would you prefer a virago?”

“They have their attractions.”

“Only in small doses. Whereas a woman like Grace is so… permanently inoffensive.” Ellen smiled. “And she looked very well in that dress tonight. Did you notice?”

James had noticed, and he had noticed that he was not the only man to notice either. “I don’t pay much attention to women’s dress,” he said. “Only my own.”

Ellen looked at his waistcoat with surprise. “Oh.”

James shifted uneasily in his seat. He was beginning to loathe the pink waistcoat too, but as long as Grace’s eyes kept narrowing in distaste when she saw it, he was going to continue wearing it in her presence.

“If you don’t mind,” he said, “I think I’m ready for bed. I’m very tired after all the travel today.”

“Of course, of course.” Ellen waved him away and picked up her novel again. “Do let me say, though, Mr Redwood, that I’m very happy about you and Grace. I think it’s a wonderful match.”

James made an indeterminable grunt, which he supposed she would take as a thank you, and got up and left. He did not dare go to Grace’s room, in case she really did have a headache, but he went to his own and hoped she would come and meet him as he had asked. The headache may just have been an excuse.

In his room, he took off his coat, without which the waistcoat seemed less vile, and helped himself to a generous swig of the brandy flask he had secreted in his trunk just in case. He felt like he needed it, after the day he had had.

While he was debating the merits of a second swig, he heard a knock at the door. Thinking it was Grace, he opened it. It was not Grace. Instead, a tall dark man scowled at him and barged into the room. James recognized him as one of the other guests and belatedly recalled his name: Demery.

“After the day I’ve had,” James said, “I suppose I ought to have expected something like this. What’s the matter?”

“I’m challenging you to a duel,” Demery said. “Dawn, tomorrow, in the woods behind the house.”

James blinked. “I beg your pardon.”

“Dawn. Tomorrow. The woods. First blood.” Demery’s dark eyes glimmered. “And last, Sir.”

“I see.” James considered this information carefully. “No, thank you.”

“What?”

“I do not duel.” James turned at a noise at the door. This time, it was Grace, peering in through the doorway, still in the very pretty red dress, and looking like she really might have a headache.

“You’re not going to duel,” she said.

“We are not,” James answered. “A duel is an activity requiring two fools, and in this room there is only one.”

Demery’s pale face flushed. “You seduced my betrothed, sir, you got her with child, you abandoned her. That crime demands recompense.”

James stared at Demery. “I did what?”

For an instant, James even felt guilt, Demery was so serious. But certainly, it was absurd. He had never met Demery before in his life. Yet Demery was glaring daggers at him. Pure fury. And behind him Grace was looking anxiously at James as though she too believed it. Remorse and hope warred together inside James. Hope won out.

“Did I really?” James said. “Goodness. I have been bad. But, no, sir, I will not duel you. The slight must go unavenged.”

The first punch caught him on the chin, as he had expected. The second was faster, and got him in the neck, winding him. James gasped for air and let Demery have at it, raising his arms only to defend from the blows. He had been on the receiving end of this kind of anger before. He understood it. Sometimes a man needed to let it out. And besides, he thought he deserved it. Not for Demery, but as general repayment for the bad deeds of many years.

“Please, stop!” Grace tugged at Demery’s tailcoats. “Please!”

“Grace, get out!” James grunted.

Instead, she tried to get between them. One of Demery’s blows caught her in the ribs and she stumbled. James pulled her into his arms and twisted to cradle her against the wall behind him.

“Hey!” he said. “Don’t touch her!”

But Demery had already drawn back, his chest heaving.

“Leave, Miss Follet,” he said. “Please.”

“No!” James said. “You hit her, you stupid oaf! You leave.”

Demery trembled where he stood, as though trying to hold back the force of his anger. “I will have this out with you, Redwood. You have no right to marry anybody after what you did to Catherine. I will make you pay for it.”

“Don’t—” Grace said. “Please—” She sounded near to tears. James couldn’t tell if it was emotions alone or pain.

“We’ll continue this conversation another time,” James said. “When Grace is not present.”

Demery made no move.

“Get out,” James said. “Go.”

What James would do if Demery didn’t leave, he didn’t know. Demery was much taller than he was, too big to throw out, and sooner or later their scuffling would draw attention from below. But Demery only stood scowling at him for a moment before abruptly turning and leaving the room. James let out a long breath. His chest and belly ached from where Demery had hit him and he wanted nothing more than to sink to the floor and rest there, but he thought that would only worry Grace, who was trembling in his arms.

“You alright, Grace?” he muttered, pushing himself away to give her space to breathe. “Are you hurt?”

“I’m fine.” Tears glittered in her eyes. She took a deep, shaking breath. “What about you?”

“Fine.” He stepped away from her but kept one hand on the wall to support himself. His vision was spinning. “Just a bit of exercise.”

“You’re swaying.” Grace slipped her hand around his arm to help guide him. “Why didn’t you tell him you aren’t the father? Why didn’t you stand up for yourself?”

“How do you know I’m not?” James countered dizzily. “In deepest dyed black… sin…” The floor rollicked beneath his feet and he clutched at Grace for support. “You understand what I mean, don’t you?”

“No, I don’t,” Grace said. “But really, James, you can’t be the father. You told me about your lovers. Mrs X. Mrs Y. Never a Miss B for Catherine Balley.”

James laughed and then winced. “Clever girl. Is that her name? Catherine Balley? I recall the gossip now. I don’t know why Demery thinks I’m the baby’s father. I’ve never even met the poor girl.”

“You should have told him that.”

The walls were slowing in their spinning. James no longer needed to clutch at Grace to remain upright, but the warmth and roundness of her shoulders was pleasant beneath his hands. He slid his grip downwards, over the silk puff of her dress, the smooth length of her arms, onto the gauze folds of her skirts and the curve of her hips beneath them. There was more curve than he had imagined — not that he had imagined, but if he had, he wouldn’t have imagined this. How very curious. It made him wonder what else—

“You should have told him that,” Grace repeated, scattering James’s chain of thought.

James shook himself but did not drop his grip on her waist. “He needed to let his anger out. Better me than the unfortunate woman.”

“Men are stupid.”

“Men are simple animals,” James agreed. He met her eyes, bright with tears. “Don’t cry, Grace.”

“I’m not crying.”

But she was, even if she wasn’t letting the tears fall down her cheeks. And there was something so strangely endearing about it. And his hands were still at her waist and still liking being there.

James leaned in and brushed his lips against hers, the prelude to a kiss. The muscles of her waist tensed abruptly under his hands and he drew back. Her eyes were wide and startled. He let her go and stepped backwards.

“I’m sorry. I… I’m sorry.”

“There is no need to apologise,” Grace said primly. “We are engaged. You may kiss me if you please.”

“But you don’t want me to.”

He didn’t even know why he had tried to kiss her now. The temptation of having her in his arms, he supposed. Or Demery had hit him one too many times and knocked the sense right out of him. Or just old habits, very hard dying. Or all three.

“If you want to kiss me, I will not protest,” Grace said. “You have that right.”

“Grace….” James moved away from her and carefully took two steps and dropped down upon the bed. He felt embarrassed, worse than that, guilty. His relationships with women thus far, though illicit, had always been received with utmost enthusiasm. He had never seen a woman look frightened at his touch before. That Grace had given him permission to kiss her anyway only made him feel worse.

She was watching him anxiously, as though she feared he would accept her offer.

“Grace dear, would you go and get me a nice slab of cold meat from the kitchen for this black eye I’m getting?”

Relief flooded her face. “I… well, a cold poultice would be better. Best not to let people know about what happened.”

“Thank you.” James gave her a small smile. “You’re right.”

She left the room. James got to his feet and examined himself in the mirror. It was going to be a black eye, and quite a nice one too. He scowled at himself.

“Why did you try to kiss her, you dolt?” he said. “Why? That’s not in your plan. That’s quite the opposite of what you’re supposed to be doing.”

His reflection leered back at him laughingly.

“And yes,” James added. “I know so far it’s the only thing that seemed to work. But I’m not going to do it again.”

__

A/N 2021-06-21: I feel like this is where James starts to act like a decent guy. Finally.

Chapter Fifteen: No Indifference

When Grace came down to breakfast the next morning she discovered to her relief that Demery was absent from the table. James was already innocently eating fried eggs. Despite the poultice she had given him last night, his left eye was purple and swollen.

“Will you look at what happened to Mr Redwood!” Ellen said to Grace. “It’s horrible!”

“Oh dear,” Grace said, trying to look shocked. “What did happen? How did you do it, James?”

James was engaged in a mouthful of egg and made mute gestures with his head.

“Your heart must flutter to look at him! I certainly should not like Mr Montague to look like that! Like he’s been in a brawl!”

James managed to swallow his mouthful. “Mrs Montague,” he said reproachfully. “You know I would countenance no such thuggery. Of all things, violence is quite the anathema to me.”

“I cannot doubt you,” said Ellen. “I must put an extra candle in your room tonight so that you do not walk into the bedpost again.”

Then that was how he had spun it. It was not, thought Grace, very believable.

“Though I am having my lady-friends to tea today,” Ellen continued, “and I’m scared that Mr Redwood’s face will frighten them all away.”

“Now, my dear,” Mr Montague said through a large mouthful of pork chop, “Mr Redwood will be hunting with us all day. The ladies will not see him.”

“Yes,” James said reluctantly. “And I daresay we’ll be all bloody and muddy by the time we come back, and in no fit state to see you either, Mrs Montague.”

Hunting did seem at odds with James’s neat, rather over-groomed character. Grace could not imagine him pulling a dying partridge from the bloody mouth of a terrier or spurring a horse through muddy forest paths after a fox. That rather appealed to her; she had always had some sympathy for the fox.

“A pity Demery had to go off like that,” Montague added musingly. “He’s a damn good shot — beg pardon, Mrs Montague, a very good shot. Those military men always are.”

“He has gone away?” Grace said quickly.

“Mr Demery left us abruptly this morning,” Ellen said. “Said he had no heart for hunting after all. A very odd man, Mr Montague, a very odd friend of yours indeed. I do not like guests who make such abrupt changes to their plans.”

“Now, now, dear,” Mr Montague soothed. “You need not worry. None of our other guests will desert us, I am sure.”

Ellen pouted. “But even one is enough to put me out. I am quite harassed.”

Mr Montague abandoned gnawing at a pork chop for just long enough to pat Ellen’s hand. “Do not fret about it, dear. We have company enough to make for a very good party.”

Ellen seemed to want to fret. She bit her bottom lip. “And with Mr Redwood’s face — everything is conspiring to upset me today!”

“There, there,” Mr Montague said, turning his attention back to his pork chops. “It will be quite alright, you’ll see.”

Ellen’s pouts and complaints lasted throughout breakfast, interspersed with Mr Montague’s uninterested words of comfort. As soon as the men left for their shooting, however, Ellen’s infantile manner dissolved and her usual composed matter-of-factness returned.

“I do not suppose Mr Redwood really walked into a door,” she said, starting to clear up the breakfast things. “Someone must have hit him. My money is on Mr Demery.”

Grace had not expected the truth to be uncovered so quickly. “Oh no.” She shook her head. “No, that is not what happened.”

“Then you do know how he got that black eye.”

Grace opened and shut her mouth.

“It is obvious that somebody hit him.” Ellen narrowed her eyes. “And Mr Demery did leave very abruptly this morning.”

“It was not Mr Demery.” Grace flushed at the magnitude of the lie she was about to tell. “It was me.”

Ellen’s brows rose, wrinkling her broad forehead. “You.”

“Yes.”

“But why?”

“Because…” Grace sought for a reason. “He tried to kiss me.”

“Oh.” Ellen looked disappointed. “You are engaged to him, Grace.”

“It caught me by surprise. I…” Grace bit her lip. “I was not overly pleased by it.”

“What do you mean?”

Grace hesitated; there had been something oddly appealing about James’s vulnerability as he had held onto her, swaying, and something pleasant too in being held. When he had been about to kiss her, however, the sudden, bitter thought had come to her that he must have kissed dozens of women, might have kissed the opera singer, that a kiss probably meant nothing to him, and the woman he was kissing even less.

“It wasn’t… it didn’t feel like his heart was in it.”

“That’s how it is sometimes.” Ellen sighed. “Women have to put up with a great deal in that department.”

“…Do we?”

“Oh, yes. I suppose since you’re engaged now, I might as well be frank with you. It’s not all bad, you know, on the odd occasion breeding is something of a diversion, but most of the time, it’s rather dull, really. And probably a great deal messier than you would like. I know I wasn’t expecting it to be so damp.”

Grace blinked at this new information.

“Mr Montague seems to enjoy it though,” Ellen said. “And the rewards are very worth it.” She paused. “You and Mr Redwood will make handsome children.”

“I can’t imagine James as a father. Someone so childish could not.”

“The men don’t have to be involved very much,” Ellen said. “At least not when they’re young. A few pats on the head, a few pennies slipped into the hand, and the rare, really nice present, and a child will idolize his father, no matter what little else they do.”

“None of us ever idolized Father.”

“Yes, well, he never did even that. But Mr Montague does. Whereas I spend the majority of my hours with my children and in consequence, you know, they never idolize me.” She grinned, an expression Grace was sure never showed itself in Montague’s presence. “Though I think I prefer it this way. When you idolize someone, you’re not quite on the same level, are you?”

“Perhaps.”

“Anyway,” Ellen said. “You have nothing to be afraid of in James’s kisses, though perhaps it is a little disappointing to discover that there is less to hope for than you once believed. Never mind. You will grow used to it in time.”

The rest of the day was spent with Ellen in the nursery room, teaching the eldest daughter Sophia and playing with the younger two, who were little more than babies yet. Ben had a private tutor, which meant they were spared his energetic bad manners for the morning. In the afternoon, Ellen had some friends over for tea and biscuits, all some years older than Grace, and the conversation revolved rather tediously around their husbands, some of whom were shooting with Mr Montague today. They all had complaints, some delivered laughingly, others with bitter notes or weary sighs. Grace wanted to know if they were bored by their husbands’ love-making too. If they thought she would be bored by James’s. There was just the faintest possibility, she told herself, that Ellen was wrong about everything. After all, Ellen’s only reference was Mr Montague.

The men came back in the evening after Ellen’s friends had left, clattering into the hall in their boots and leaving braces of partridges bleeding on the floor. Grace, coming out into the hall, saw that James was not amongst them.

“One of the dogs stepped on a trap,” Mr Montague said in response to her question. “Redwood took it to the village for the cattle-doctor. It’s a long walk. I doubt he’ll back until after supper.” That thought distracted Mr Montague from any further consideration of James or the dog. He turned to Ellen. “How soon is supper, Mrs Montague?”

“Just as soon as you’ve all washed up and got the birds out of the hall,” Ellen said. “What a pity about Mr Redwood! I will have a plate put aside for him.”

It was a rather miserable supper for Grace, with the men talking loudly about how many birds they had shot and how well they had shot them and how their dogs had fetched them and whose dog was best. Even Ellen did not give her company. She fawned attention upon the men, very correctly admiring their boasts and making the right noises of astonishment at their prowess. Grace knew very well that Ellen did not care about hunting, except in as much as it meant something for the eating, and was annoyed to see her pretending to. As much as Mr Montague pandered to Ellen’s fake pouts and infantility, Ellen pandered to Mr Montague’s boasts and gloating. It struck Grace that the pleasant, kindly accord she had always admired between them was perhaps little more than good manners between two people who had very little in common and did not care that they did not.

But perhaps, she argued with herself, she was being too romantic again. Both Ellen and Mr Montague seemed very satisfied with their marriage.

James was not back after supper. Grace stayed in the drawing room quite late that night, growing worried for him and wishing she dared suggest that Mr Montague sent someone to the cattle-doctor to ask after him. She was just trailing up the stairs to bed when the door knocker sounded and James appeared in the hallway, unusually dishevelled, muddy, and still carrying his rifle over his shoulder. He saw Grace and started for her, but Mr Montague came out of the dining first and intercepted him.

“How’s the dog?” he said.

“Stitched up and sleeping in the stable,” James answered.

“Rollins say when he’d be back to scratch?”

“No, he wasn’t sure.”

“Pity. Though he wasn’t a great dog to be sure. His dam had a lot of promise but…”

That signified the beginning of one of Montague’s long segues into his dogs’ lineages. Grace, satisfied that James was well, turned away and continued to her room. Behind her, she heard James give a hasty excuse, then he bounded up the stairs after her and met her on the landing. He smelled of gunpowder and wet earth, and his coat was rumpled and his face streaked with dirt. He looked tired and annoyed, and in that moment Grace suddenly and inexplicably liked him better than she ever had before.

“I want to talk to you,” he said.

“What is it?”

“It’s about last night.” He glanced down over the stair-rail to the hall below, where Montague was holding James’s gun and looking up at them impatiently. James drew Grace a little further down the hall and walked with her towards her room, speaking in a low voice. “You could have been hurt, Grace. Perhaps it was my fault for provoking Demery while you were there, but you should not have tried to come between us.”

“I couldn’t just watch you get thrashed by him,” she said. “You were doing nothing to stop him.”

“Now—”

“No!” She lifted her chin. “If you’re allowed to tell me that I can’t try to stop you getting hurt then you’ve no right to tell me not to get hurt myself.”

“That logic—”

“I’m not going to have my logic questioned by a man who thinks it’s a good idea to be beaten up by another man rather than tell him the simple truth.”

James looked taken aback. Then he gave a small, guilty laugh. “Grace dear, I might have been in the wrong too, but, please, don’t put yourself at risk for my sake.”

He had called her ‘Grace dear’ last night too. And both times, he had sounded like he meant it. But then, Grace thought, he’s probably called a lot of women his dear. “If that’s all, I’m going to bed.”

“It’s not all.” James followed her to her bedroom door. “There’s something else we need to talk about, Grace. Two things, actually.” He lowered his voice, though there was no around to hear them. “I’m sorry I tried to kiss you like that. I won’t do it again.”

Grace leaned against the door. “We’re engaged, James.”

“But I could tell you didn’t want me to kiss you.”

“You can kiss me if you want,” Grace said. She fumbled with the door handle behind her back. There was one way to find out if Ellen was right about love-making. And it might keep James from chasing after opera singers. “If you want, you can come in.”

“Come in?” James frowned. “For… Grace!”

He looked scandalized, which confused Grace. “It doesn’t make a difference to me if we start now or after we are married,” she explained. “If you want to kiss me, or do more, then you may. I won’t stop you.”

A cold, hard light came into James’s eyes. “You won’t stop me.”

“No. As I said, it really doesn’t matter to me.”

James raised an eyebrow. “My dear Grace, what an invitation, I can hardly contain myself and my desires. I shall ravish you right here in the hallway.”

He did not move. Grace opened the door wide and stepped into her room. “Very well then.”

“Grace.” James stopped just short of crossing the threshold of her room. “Grace. I was being very sarcastic just now.”

“I thought so, but as I said, if you want to kiss me or more, I won’t stop you.”

“I don’t think you understand.” His voice was like ice. “Your offer just now was the least enticing thing a woman has ever said to me. When— no, if we make love, there will be no indifference about it.”

He stepped into her room and came closer, not dropping his gaze from her eyes, until he was within a hair’s breadth of touching her. The scent of gunpowder and dirt and pine leaves washed over her. She felt an instinctive urge to back away but was paralyzed by the fire in his eyes.

“If we make love, I will make you beg me for it,” he whispered. “I will touch you, tease you, torment you, until you ache to have me inside you. And then I’ll touch you, tease you, torment you more, until you beg me for mercy.” He dropped his lips to her ear, his breath warm against her cheek. “And when I finally give you what you beg for, you will scream in ecstacy until you’ve no breath left to scream with and can only whimper wordless joy.” His voice was barely louder than a heartbeat. “And after, you will lie senseless in my arms, quivering with sated desire and desire growing again.”

Still paralyzed, Grace could not speak. There was a hot, dizzy, weightless feeling over her entire body.

James withdrew to look her in the eyes. “If I kissed you now, you’d like it, wouldn’t you?”

A shiver of unbidden want ran down Grace’s spine. She tilted her face towards James.

He took her chin in his hand and ran his thumb lightly over her lips. “But I’m not going to kiss you, Grace.”

A wordless protest escaped her lips unbidden. James smiled and stepped away.

“Goodnight, Grace,” he said. “Sleep well.”

He shut the door on her and she stumbled to the bed and sat down. How could she sleep at all after that!?

__

A/N 2021-06-24: I’ve revised this chapter so much it’s stopped seeming sexy to me, lol. Also, poor Ellen.

Chapter Sixteen: Well Shot

It was difficult for Grace to meet James’s eye at the breakfast table the next morning. The words he had whispered to her last night had given her strange, restless dreams, dreams which she hardly dared recall without blushing. This morning, she found herself acutely aware of his physical presence in a way she had not been before. The movements of his wrists and hands on his cutlery were, she noted, incredibly deft, soft, deliberate. The waistcoat he wore — today a quite ordinary brown — folded so very neatly around his narrow waist. And something about his shoulders in their well-fitting coat made her want to rub her face against them and bury it into the crook of his neck.

Despite all that, her primary conclusion was that she could understand, now, why the opera singer had chased after James.

It was a relief when James left with the other men to go hunting, leaving her and Ellen alone at the breakfast table. The first thing Ellen said, however, was, “So you’ve made it up with Mr Redwood?”

“What makes you think that?”

“You’ve been making eyes at him all morning.”

“I have not!”

“Yes, you have.” Ellen began to flick through the letters. “Bills, bills, this is from Harriet… If you bring out the red dress again, he’ll be making eyes at you. I’ve an idea it effects him.”

Grace’s heartbeat quickened. “You’re speaking nonsense. Besides, I can’t wear the same dress twice in one week. I’ll wear that white one.”

“Really?” Ellen frowned. “What does Alice say you look like in it anyway?”

“A marble pillar,” Grace said stiffly.

“I have an idea that’s supposed to be the point.”

Had a man ever made love to a pillar? It did not seem likely. If only James had worn the pink waistcoat today, instead of the plain one. She was sure she would not be so effected if he was in pink. “Perhaps I’ll wear it then,” she said. “Alice may have meant it as a compliment.”

“Unlikely.” Ellen laughed as she slit a letter open with a dirty butter knife. “You know that’s one good thing about being married, Grace, you won’t have to put up with Alice. Or Mother. I was so relieved when I could set up my own household and make sure the cooking was done right every night, rather than just when the cook felt like it.”

That made Grace feel guilty, for she had been secretly looking forward to the same situation and expressed out loud the sentiment seemed ungrateful. “Is there anything good in the letter?” she asked.

“An invitation,” Ellen said. “Mrs Sharp — the vicar’s wife, if you remember her — wants Benjamin to come to dinner tomorrow. She’s getting up a proper little dinner party for some children of the neighbourhood with music afterwards so they can practice their dancing.”

“That sounds lovely,” Grace said. “And I’m sure very good for Ben to learn a little about dancing.”

“I’m inclined to agree with you, except Mrs Sharp insists I don’t send Ben alone. I suppose she remembers what happened last time.”

“What did happen last time?”

“He locked the vicar in the pig’s shed and the pig in the vicar’s study.”

“But why?”

“When your son turns nine,” Ellen said, “you’ll stop asking that question.” She tossed the letter aside and picked up another. “I’ll have to refuse. I can’t take Ben myself because I’ve got to superintend the plucking of all those game birds so I can get the feathers for pillows… unless you would like to take him?”

Grace opened her mouth to refuse.

“It’s that or game birds,” Ellen added.

“I’d love to,” Grace said.

Ellen smiled broadly. “How wonderful. You’ll have to wear something special, of course, a nice evening gown, to make it seem like it really is a proper little dinner party.”

Grace had the vague suspicion that Ellen was conducting one of her schemes. Ellen was like that. She was very clever, though she would be horrified if you ever suggested it.

The next day the scheme became clear to Grace. First — unaccountably — James’s pink waistcoat turned up that morning with a large, iron-shaped burn on the front. He accused Ellen of interference on the issue at breakfast, while once more wearing the drab brown one that fitted so neatly around the waist. Ellen meekly admitted that she had ironed the vest, for she had seen it was crushed when she was overseeing the cleaning of Mr Redwood’s bedroom, but that an accident of distraction had occurred and she had burned it. She apologized so profusely and with such a bold threat of tears that James immediately backed down and assured her it did not matter, he had his doubts about the colour and he may be very well shot of the thing anyhow. Grace hid a smile and told herself she would thank Ellen later.

After breakfast, a second accident occurred. Mr Montague, while preparing his guns, discovered that there was a deficiency with one — Grace could not understand a word of his explanation and was sure James could not either — and that as that left the party one gun short, he would stay home and let his guests shoot alone. James immediately protested that he should stay home in Mr Montague’s place: he was such a poor shot himself that to send him off with one gun and leave Mr Montague behind was like losing two guns altogether. Besides, he was weary of hunting, for he was forever shooting at things and not hitting them.

At first, Grace did not suspect Ellen’s hand in this matter, but as they were just going inside after seeing the other men off, Ellen said brightly, “And now I suppose, Mr Redwood, this means that you can attend a little dinner party with Grace this afternoon.”

James, when the matter was explained to him, seemed rather impressed with the tale of the pig and vicar and keen to attend. The more Grace tried to protest it would bore him, the more he insisted on coming. A spirited boy like Ben needed a spirited man like James to keep an eye on him, he said. An ambitious boy like Ben would never rest on his laurels, re the pig in the study, but was sure to come up with a bolder, better jape. James would be on hand to stop it, and the dinner party would be saved. Eventually, Grace gave in.

The fourth and final part of Ellen’s plan was not revealed until that afternoon, when she was helping Grace dress for the dinner. The white dress did indeed make Grace appear rather like a marble column, very cold and tall and narrow. Ellen cast a doubtful eye upon it and said that she was not sure she disagreed with Alice, for once.

“It doesn’t matter,” Grace said. “It’s only a children’s party.”

“But James will be there. Do give the red dress a second run — it doesn’t matter if he’s seen it before if he likes it.”

“I am satisfied with the white. I am not dressing up for James’s sake.”

“Very well then. Let me tighten the laces. They’re a little loose.”

Ellen pulled at the laces at the back of the dress. Grace gasped as the dress compressed her ribs. Then there was a sudden snap and Grace felt everything coming very loose around her neck.

“I’m so sorry,” Ellen murmured. “It just came off in my hand.”

Grace turned around and snatched the broken tie from her. “Stop interfering! I am not dressing up for James.”

“Why on earth not?”

“Because…” Grace sniffed. “He… Ellen, he has an opera singer.”

“Oh.” Ellen looked surprised. “Well, in that case, dear Grace, you are certainly not going to wear white.”

That Ellen could take it so mildly sent Grace over the edge. She sank down into a chair and cried bitter tears for a good five minutes while Ellen put her arms around her and comforted her. When she was done crying, she felt much better for it. Somehow, it felt like she could treat Ellen like the confidante she always had been — Ellen hadn’t changed, not really. She still had that same sly, secretive cleverness and that same matter-of-fact manner that disguised it. And even on the day of her marriage, she had never seemed very much in love with Mr Montague, but she was happy with the life they had made together.

“He warned me when we first got engaged what he was like,” Grace said wearily, “but I didn’t think… I didn’t think I would feel so… humiliated when I saw him… I didn’t think I would see him. I thought he’d… have the sense to keep it hidden.”

Ellen squeezed her shoulder. “Grace dear, forgive me for asking, but what exactly did you see?”

Grace wiped her eyes on the sleeve of the white gown. “We were at a musicale, Emma and James and I. It was in the intermission. He left the salon, and a moment later the opera singer followed him. Some half-an-hour later, the opera singer came back alone, and her dress was all… rumpled. James never came back.”

“He never came back?”

“No. He abandoned Emma and me at night in the house of a woman we’d only just met. Without a word of warning.”

Ellen frowned. “That is very bad of him indeed. But I’m not sure you’re right about the opera singer. You don’t know that it was he who rumpled her dress.”

Grace shook her head. “It was… the way he looked. He moved with purpose.”

“He may have been going to the necessary.”

“But then why did she follow him? And why did he not come back?”

“Has he explained why?”

Grace flushed.

“Have you asked him, dearest?”

“How can I? Either he will tell me the truth and I will hate him for it, or he will lie and I will hate him for that.”

Ellen fixed Grace with a steady eye and said not a word. Grace’s cheeks warmed.

“He’s undoubtedly an ass of a man — they all are, I think — but that’s no call for you to go behaving like an ass of a woman.” Ellen poked Grace in the ribs. “You must confront him, and you must listen to what he has to say, and if he has done what you think… why, break the engagement at once. But if he has not done what you think, then you’ve made a terrible mistake.”

“But… the way he moved… the way she moved… something strange was going on.”

“But perhaps not what you think. You may not owe James your trust, but you at least owe it to yourself to ask him, Grace, and know.” Ellen put an arm around Grace’s shoulders. “And I do believe it unlikely. It’s such an absurdly villainous thing for a man to do, and James is absurd, dear, but he’s not a villain.”

Grace rested her head on Ellen’s shoulder. “Are you sure he’s not?”

“He carried that hurt dog to the cattle doctor, didn’t he? And he would have rescued you from Blythe, if you’d let him.”

“Blythe!” Grace sat up. “You saw how he was accosting me?”

“I did. I also saw how Demery put a spoke in it — the man is not all to the bad, though he is a queer one — and how you dressed Blythe down very neatly and how James arrived too late to rescue you, which rather dashed my scheme for him to play the hero. But never mind, there will be other chances, once we’ve suitably punished him for abandoning you at the musicale.”

“You might have rescued me,” Grace said. “It was very uncomfortable.”

“You didn’t need rescuing. Not then. You do now.” Ellen pressed her handkerchief into Grace’s hands. “Dry your eyes. You’re going to dress in red, and I’m going to do your hair, and James is going to take one look at you and forget all other women ever existed.”

“I don’t want him to.”

“Nonsense.” Ellen turned Grace around to face the mirror. “He’s an ass of a man, I agree, but it’s a very good match, and on top of all that I’m beginning to think there’s a real chance the two of you might actually fall in love — once we’ve got you both dressing properly.”

Grace still felt doubtful.

“Besides,” Ellen added, “if he really does have an opera singer, that’s all the more reason to dress up. You must make him regret it.”

__

A/N 2021-06-25: RIP pink waistcoat. Next chapter Monday.

Chapter Seventeen: Poisoned Orgeat

Ellen was right about the dress. When Grace came down to the hall later that afternoon, she found some satisfaction in the distracted, appreciative expression on James’s face when he saw her. It pleased her to ignore the arm he offered her and instead take Ben’s.

“It’s practice for when I’m grown up,” Ben said to James. “You don’t need the practice. You’re old already.”

“How observant,” James said. “You look very charming, Grace.”

“I know,” Grace said. “Shall we go?”

James looked surprised but opened the door for them without a word. In the coach, Ben sat like a bulwark between them.

“I’m your chaperone,” he said. “A man and a woman should not be left alone in a coach, you know.”

“Very effective,” James said. “If you weren’t here I’d be doing all manner of unspeakable things to Grace.”

Grace thought it was a joke but her heart leapt anyway. James had changed his waistcoat again, and now wore cream embroidered with delicate olive and gold fern leaves. It went very well against the forest green coat that fitted so neatly around his flared chest and narrow waist. He looked, for once, as fashionable as he so frequently claimed to be.

“What are those unspeakable things?” Ben asked curiously. “No one will tell me.”

“When you’re old, you’ll find out,” James said.

Ben glowered. “That’s not fair.”

“Little in life is.”

“You sound just like my mother.”

James looked offended. Grace hid a smile; she must, as Ellen had suggested, be cool to James.

“There are many things that children are not allowed to know,” James said. “That’s why you will be drinking orgeat and we—” he fished a familiar silver flask from his coat pocket “—will be having the good stuff.”

“You did not bring that!” Grace said.

“As I told you, it’s my antidote against boredom.”

“James!”

“What is it?” Ben asked. “Can I try some?”

“Absolutely not.” James slipped it back in his pocket. “When you’re old, you may drink brandy. Not before.”

Ben glowered. “I knew Aunt Grace would marry someone boring.”

“Ben,” Grace said, in the warning tone of voice that never did any good with him.

“Aunt Grace,” Ben mimicked. “Uncle James.”

“Oh? I’m your uncle already, am I?” James pinched Ben’s ribs. “That gives me certain liberties, you realize?”

Ben squawked. “I’ll fight you! I’ll win!”

“We’ll arm wrestle,” James promised. “But I won’t take it easy on you. And if you’re any good, I’ll give you a shot at boxing tomorrow.”

“Is that how you got the black eye?” Ben asked. “Boxing?”

“It is.”

“You can’t be much good then.”

“Oh, I think I can take you on. You’re not very tall.”

“I’m fifty-six inches!”

“And I’m sixty-eight.”

“Which,” Grace added, thinking that this conversation was going far too well for James, “is a good half-foot shorter than you can expect to be when you are fully grown, Ben.” She smiled at James. “His father is six foot four.”

“A giant,” James said carelessly. “Should I wear heels, Grace? Would that please you?” He grinned at her. “Or do I have no hope of pleasing you unless I look like Mr Montague?”

The thought of James adopting Mr Montague’s greying whiskers and growing paunch made Grace shudder.

“I think,” James whispered to Ben, “that she’s really quite pleased with me as I am.”

“You’re not that bad,” Ben said loftily.

Grace realized that James had, in the space of a bare few minutes, turned her wayward, truculent nephew into an admirer. Had she not been furious with James, she might have admired him for it. As it was, she felt only a jealous twist of resentment towards him and maintained a cool silence for the rest of the journey.

When they arrived, Ben leapt down from the coach and ran on into the house. As James handed Grace down from the coach, she said, “How on earth do you do that? For three years, I haven’t been able to get Ben to listen to a single word I say, but in the space of ten minutes you made an ally of him.”

“Don’t worry,” James said. “He’s not going to listen to a single word I say either. He’s just going to like me a little better when he disobeys me.”

“How did you do it?” she repeated. “Ben’s impossible.”

“He’s merely improbable. I was impossible, when I was his age. That’s how I know how to do it.”

“You’re still impossible,” Grace said, sweeping into the vicarage.

James hurried after her. “Have I done something wrong?”

Grace ignored him, for she had spotted her host through the open door to the dining room. “Good afternoon, Mrs Sharp.”

Mrs Sharp, a spare, tall woman who always looked perpetually tired, came out into the hall to shake Grace’s hand. “Good afternoon, Miss Follet. You look very well.” Her tired gaze turned to James. “Your husband-to-be, Mr Redwood, I take it?”

“Just so,” James said, pressing her hand.

“Well met,” Mrs Sharp said. “But where is Ben? I hear screaming.”

“I’ll find him,” James said, and went down the hallway towards the screams.

“I’ve got one of my headaches coming on,” Mrs Sharp said to Grace, rubbing her temples. “And the children have already arrived. I hate to be an imposition, but would you mind looking after them while they eat, so I can lie down for a while? The maids have everything ready for their dinner. You would just need to settle them down in the drawing room to drink orgeat and encourage a little conversation, then take them down and the food will occupy them.”

It was an imposition, to be asked to play host in a house that was not her own, but Mrs Sharp did look pale. Grace smiled politely. “Of course. I’m sure it will be no trouble.”

“You’re a dear,” Mrs Sharp said, squeezing Grace’s arm. “I’ll be in my sitting room if you need me.”

Grace followed the sound of thuds and squeals into the back of the house, where she found a schoolroom. The thuds and squeals were explained: James, Ben, and another boy were wrestling on the ground, while a third boy looked on piously and three girls squealed at intervals behind white-gloved hands. A pile of coats on the school table showed that James had at the least the sense not to ruin the boys’ best suits. Even as Grace entered, however, a button came flying from the wriggling pile of bodies.

“James!” Grace said. “Really!”

James sat up, dislodging the boy who’d been sitting on him and pummelling his chest. “Oh no. She caught us.”

“I would not join in,” the pious boy said. “Fighting is not nice.”

Ben, who was pinning James’s arms to his side, snorted. “Shut up, Fred.”

It was going badly already. “All of you get up and put your coats on,” Grace said. “We’re going to go upstairs and have some nice drinks.”

“Orgeat,” Ben said contemptuously.

James slipped free of Ben and scrambled to his feet. “Come on. After the drinks, we get to eat.” His hair was mussed, and the gaping of his waistcoat showed that he was the one who had lost the button. Grace bent and picked it up.

“I’ll take the children to have drinks,” she said. “You can find a maidservant to sew this back on and make yourself look half-way decent.”

James gasped in horror and snatched up the button. “That’s the second one today!’

“It’s just a button, James.” Grace eyed the puff of white shirt escaping his gaping waistcoat. “You’re not setting a good example for the children. Go tidy yourself up, please. Mrs Sharp has a headache, so I’m going to supervise the children until after their dinner. I don’t want to have to supervise you as well.”

James left the schoolroom in his gaping waistcoat. Grace looked at the six children. They looked back at her.

“I told them not to fight,” Fred said.

“No one is in trouble,” Grace said. “But put on your coats, boys, and we’ll go upstairs.”

“What about Uncle James’s coat?” Ben asked. “He left it behind. Should I take it upstairs for him?”

“I suppose so.”

The boys wriggled into their coats and Grace led the way upstairs to the drawing room where a tray of wine glasses and a jug of orgeat had been laid out in preparation for the children. Fortunately, Ben seemed to have taken into his head to be good today. He insisted that Grace sit down while he carried the drinks tray from the sideboard to the table and even helped Mrs Sharp’s daughter Jenny pour the drinks and handed one to Grace. Then, with determined politeness, he complimented the taste of the orgeat (Grace thought it was rather peculiar and unpleasant) and the pleasantness of the weather (it had started to rain) and the prettiness of the girls’ dresses (Grace could see he would be even more trouble when he grew up). Some half-an-hour passed. With the rain outside and the fire within and the children behaving so well, Grace began to feel cozy and content. Even the orgeat was tasting less peculiar the more she drank of it. To be sure, the children were getting somewhat boisterous and loud, particularly their laughter, but at least they were all getting along.

James appeared in the doorway, his waistcoat mended. He looked around the room, saw his coat hanging over the back of a chair, and went and squeezed himself into it. When he was done, he came over and leaned on the back of Grace’s armchair. She fixed her gaze steadily upon the children. The girls were laughing at some secret joke, while Fred and the other boy were engaged in trying to out-boast each other about their sporting prowess. Grace was quite certain that Fred was lying through his teeth, but thought it best not to interfere. Ben had fallen into a contemplative silence, and she wished not to provoke him.

“They’re getting along, aren’t they?” James observed.

Grace kept her gaze steadily upon the children and sipped her second glass of orgeat. Peculiar, how the flavour seemed to grow upon one, and what a pleasant warmth it brought to the belly. It was a most comforting drink after all.

“Grace?”

Grace ignored him. She had to show him his place, yes, that was what she had to do.

“Have I done something wrong? It was only a little wrestling. I was just trying to get them to like me.”

Grace took another slow sip of her orgeat. The girls shrieked with laughter. Fred claimed to be able to walk on his hands. Ben gave a single hiccup and looked surprised.

James leaned over the back of her chair to speak in her ear. “You’re giving me the cold treatment.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

James clicked his tongue. “For God’s—” he broke off. “Come with me.”

He put his hand in hers and pulled her up and out into the hallway. She did not resist. She might have, except that the warmth that had stolen over her with the orgeat seemed to particularly concentrate in her hand where it was held by him. She was angry with James for that, and angry with her hand too.

“We’re going to talk,” James said, dropping her hand. That brought sense back to Grace.

“We have to watch the children.”

“They can’t do anything in five minutes.”

“I assure you, Ben can.”

“Then let him.” James’s eyes glittered with irritation. “I don’t mind a good quarrel, but I’m not going to play guessing games. What have I done to offend you?”

Grace took a long drink of the orgeat, heat rising to her cheeks. Ellen had told her to ask him. She was going to ask him.

“Grace?”

“It was the musicale,” she blurted. “What you did at the musicale.”

“I told you I was sorry. I meant it. It was never my intention to leave you and Emma alone.” He twitched his nose in distaste. “Certainly, I never meant to put you in a position where you had no one to rely upon but Benson.”

“That was embarrassing,” Grace said, “but it wasn’t humiliating.”

“What was so humiliating then? Tell me.”

“The opera singer!”

It was out, at last, but James only looked confused.

“The opera singer?” he said. “What about her?”

“I saw her follow you from the room.”

James stared blankly at her. “What? You saw her… oh. Grace! No!” He ran a hand through his hair. “You saw me leave the room. You saw her leave after me. Of course, she would have…” He shook his head. “She was not following me, and if she had been, I wouldn’t…” He actually looked hurt, which confounded Grace. “I wouldn’t do that, Grace. I am not a saint, but I did not do that.”

Tears pricked Grace’s eyes. “Why didn’t you come back then?”

“I got locked out on a balcony while I was trying to sober up so I could drive you and Emma home safely. I kept hoping you would think to look for me. Now I understand why you didn’t.”

The walls were spinning rather. Grace twisted her hand through James’s cravat to steady herself. “I want to believe you.”

“Then why are you trying to strangle me?”

“I’m not. I’m just wobbly.” She sipped more orgeat, and the hot dizziness swamped further over her. “This orgeat is a little powerful.”

With a frown, James took the glass from Grace and sipped it. A horrified expression rose over his face. He patted at his pockets.

“God damn it,” he muttered. “The little rat stole it.”

“Stole what?” Grace demanded dizzily.

“My brandy.”

---

James’s first instinct was to laugh. He overcame it. If the brandy was enough to get Grace tipsy, it was certainly going to get the children drunk. And it was his fault. He should never have brought it with him, nor showed it to a precocious trouble-maker like Ben. He pushed Grace down into a chair.

“Be a darling,” he said, “and sit here and don’t talk to anyone. I’m afraid you’re drunk.”

“I’m quite sober,” Grace said. “It’s only orgeat.”

“Laced with an entire flask of brandy.” James pressed the glass into her hands. “Drink it if you wish, but sit here and be quiet.”

He left her and went into the drawing room. In their brief absence, chaos had taken reign. One little girl was doing somersaults on the couch, giggling madly, as another cheered her on. The third was prone on the floor looking mildly perplexed. Fred and the other boy were throwing wobbly punches at each other. Ben was green-faced in his chair, staring at a nearly empty glass of orgeat as though trying to convince himself to finish it off. James snatched it out of his hands.

“Hey!” Ben shouted, trying to stagger to his feet, only to reach them and be unable to stop staggering. “Hey!”

He bounced to the floor, where his green cheeks went suddenly white. James thrust the coal scuttle under his face in time.

“Better out than in,” James muttered. “I suppose you poured the whole flask into the orgeat?”

Ben heaved.

“Very clever, Ben.” James rubbed the boy’s back. “Go on then, let it out. You’ll feel better when you have.”

He left Ben on the floor with the coal scuttle and went around the room, quickly gathering up the cups of orgeat and dumping them back into the jug. There was not much left. He left the room, taking the jug with him. In the hallway, he stopped a passing maid, informed her that the children were ill and would need buckets, then went downstairs to find Mrs Sharp. She was lying on a couch in the sitting room with her eyes closed.

“No,” she said, when he came in. “Can’t I have a headache in peace?”

“I’m sorry,” James said. “I’ve made a terrible mistake. I think you might want to call the doctor.”

She opened her eyes. “Has someone broken a bone? I thought I heard fighting.”

“Worse. Ben poured brandy in the orgeat. The children are all drunk.”

She sat up with a very unladylike curse.

“I’m sorry,” James added. “It’s my fault.”

“Why on earth didn’t Miss Follet realize? This is the last time I invite Ben to anything — that boy is trouble.”

“He certainly is. Look, you can have your headache and I’ll—”

“No, no.” Mrs Sharp got up, rubbing her temples. “I can’t have a headache. Not now.”

“I’m sorry.” James gave her his arm. “I’ll help you upstairs. At least Ben’s got the worst of it. The others seem quite cheerful by comparison.”

“That is a silver lining,” Mrs Sharp grumbled. They started up the stairs. “You’d better take Ben home, if he can travel. Do you think the doctor is needed?”

“The apothecary might be better. He probably has a nasty tonic to bring it all up.”

“I’ve got that myself. A bit of tartar, or chalk and magnesia. I’ll tell the children it’s all Ben’s fault.”

“It’s mine really,” James said. “It was my brandy. I’m so sorry.”

Mrs Sharp gave him an unimpressed look. James sighed; he seemed forever to be apologizing lately, and it never seemed to be doing him any good.

They reached the first floor, and James guided Mrs Sharp hastily past Grace into the drawing room. One maid was struggling to keep the fighting boys apart, while another was mopping up after Ben, who had managed to miss the coal scuttle. The somersaulting girl had ceased somersaulting and was looking as though she needed a coal scuttle too. The perplexed girl still looked perplexed.

“Tartar,” Mrs Sharp said decisively. “Lucy, go fetch my medicine box. Mr Redwood will look after Ben.” She grabbed an empty vase from the mantlepiece and marched up to the somersaulting girl. “Here, Jenny, you’re going to be sick.”

Jenny was. James kneeled next to Ben and patted his face with a handkerchief.

“Feeling better?”

Ben’s eyes glittered with tears

“Do you need water?”

Ben shook his head.

“More coming up?”

Ben nodded. James marshalled the coal scuttle just in time.

“I don’t think Ben needs tartar,” James said. “I think it’s coming up already.”

“I’m giving him some anyway,” Mrs Sharp said grimly. “He deserves it.”

The maid returned with the medicine box and tartar was given to all the children, with predictable and messy results. Mrs Sharp’s children were put to their beds, the neighbours’ children were put to Mrs Sharp’s bed, and Ben was carried into the coach with the coal scuttle in attendance. To James’s relief, Mrs Sharp never looked too closely at Grace, who accepted these developments with passive confusion and only protested when the jolting of the coach set Ben off again. Thankfully, after that, Ben seemed cleaned out and fell into a stupor. When they got home, James had to carry him indoors. Ellen, coming to meet them, was predictably furious to hear the story. She hauled Ben into her arms and half-dragged him up the stairs.

James turned to Grace, who was flushed and wobbly. “You ought to go to bed.”

“I’m not at all tired,” she said, rather tearily.

Then she was a sad drunk. He ought to have expected that. He took her hand gently. “Come on. You’ll feel much better after a rest.”

She stumbled up the stairs behind him, quite content, it seemed, to go wherever he led her by the hand. When they reached her room, she sat down on the bed and rested her head in her hands.

“My stomach hurts.”

“Should I get you something? Tea? Soda water?”

“No.” She ran her hands through her hair. “James. Did you mean it? You were locked out?”

“Yes. I spent ages banging on the door but no one heard me.”

“How did you get locked out?”

James considered telling Grace that he had followed Benson but decided it was too risky. She would put together Benson and the opera singer if he did. “I’m not sure. I was drunk.”

“And you weren’t with the opera singer?”

“No, Grace. Never.” James sat down beside her and patted her knee. “Think what you’re accusing me of: running off in the middle of a concert to rut with an opera singer in some dark corner of my hostess’s house. I may be a bad man, but I am not grotesque, and that is grotesque behaviour.”

She looked at him with wide, hurt eyes. “But one day… you would… you said you would… betray me.”

There was something about those wide, hurt eyes that made James want to kiss her better. He looked away. “I said that?”

“When you told me about your lovers.”

He had, hadn’t he? And he had meant it then, perhaps. But Grace had looked so plain and unanimated that day, like a statue. She certainly didn’t look like a statue now, with her trembling lips and flushed cheeks. He could imagine making love to her — if she would only look like she wanted him to. If she wasn’t an unmarried virgin.

If she was his virgin bride.

Very, very carefully, James shifted away from her, putting six inches of bedspread between their thighs. Slowly, he stood up and took one long step away from the bed. There he stood, waiting for his heart to slow, looking down upon Grace and telling himself that she was not to be his bride.

“James?”

“I have no wish to betray my wife,” he said. “No wish to be betrayed by a wife. But from what I know of marriage, it is a system that engenders betrayal. That’s why I said what I said that day. But, Grace… I have not betrayed you.”

Naked relief entered her eyes. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s alright. We’ve set things straight now.” Besides, James was relieved too. Grace believed him. Somehow, that mattered. He could not marry her. He would not. But he would not see her turn him down for an infidelity he had not committed. “You’d better take a rest, Grace. Let the brandy wear off.”

Her lips wobbled. “I don’t think I like brandy.”

“She’s a fickle friend.” He ruffled her hair. “I’ll see you at dinner.”

She flopped down onto the bed and rolled onto her side. James left the room and went to find Ellen. She was in Ben’s room, watching the boy sleep. When she saw him, she pressed her lips together thinly.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I had the brandy and I didn’t realize he stole it.”

“I can’t believe this,” Ellen said furiously. “What on earth was Grace doing?”

“I’m afraid she, too, drank of the poisoned orgeat. I persuaded her to bed.”

“She never could hold her wine,” Ellen said. “But you ought to have been more careful! Ben’s — well, he’s exactly the sort of boy you were as a child, I imagine.”

“He’s—” James stopped on a thought. Ellen’s usual fluttery inanity was suspiciously absent in her anger. “For that matter, you should be more careful about your ironing. You deliberately destroyed my waistcoat, didn’t you?”

“It was an eyesore.”

There was a cold, angry challenge in Ellen’s voice. An angry reply rose to James’s lips, then the humour of it occurred to him and he laughed instead. That had Ellen reluctantly smiling too.

“I will forgive you,” she said. “Once Ben recovers.”

“I’ll forgive you now,” James said. “And I’m dreadfully sorry, really. I underestimated Ben.”

The smile was still pressing at Ellen’s lips but not quite coming through, like the expression Grace sometimes wore. “You know, I think you’re going to be my favourite brother-in-law.”

That had a dampening effect upon James’s spirits. He looked away. “Well. Maybe.”

__

A/N 2021-06-28: Long chapter. Short A/N.

Chapter Eighteen: Still Waters

After the orgeat incident, James realized that he had gone astray in his quest to rid himself of Grace. He was growing attracted to her, and worse still, he suspected she was growing attracted to him. If she started to harbour feelings for him, she would never break the engagement. Besides, it was one thing to rid himself of a Grace who did not care one way or the other for him. It would be quite another to break her heart.

To preserve them both, he sought refuge in good manners and distance over the remainder of their visit at Ellen’s. He spent most of his time with Mr Montague, feigning interest in Montague’s horses and hounds. It seemed to have its effect: Grace’s manner cooled towards him and she withdrew into Ellen’s company. When James returned to his parents’ house a week later, the first thing he told his father was that he did not believe Grace was in love with him yet.

“Has she forgiven you for leaving her at the ball?” Mr Redwood asked.

“I don’t know that she ever held a grudge. Her feelings are very lukewarm, Father. Love and hate might both be beyond her.”

“Still waters run deep,” Mr Redwood warned.

“There is always time after the wedding for her to develop feelings,” Mrs Redwood said. “I should not wait around on that account. The banns must be read soon. You should marry before Christmas.”

James faltered. “Before… Christmas? That’s sooner than I expected.”

“You’ve been engaged over a month already. Two or three months is quite adequate, particularly when all other matters are in such agreement.”

“I’m not ready for it.”

“It is quite normal for a man to feel that way before his wedding,” Mr Redwood said with one of his almost smiles.

“James must conquer his cowardice,” Mrs Redwood said. “Grace has more reason to be nervous than he does, yet she would never say such a thing.”

Mr Redwood’s smile faded about the eyes. “I will have a talk with Mr Follet about reading the Banns,” he said. “You maybe be right; it may be time.”

James’s heart fluttered unpleasantly. Mr Follet would certainly agree to the Banns being read, and it would be extremely scandalous to break the engagement after they had been. He had to get Grace to turn him down before then.

By Saturday evening, James had still not managed to escape his engagement, and the next morning the Banns were to be read in church for the first time. He was not in a state of desperation. The desperation had come and gone, and left in its wake a sort of self-pitying, crotchety despair. Grace, of course, was neither offended nor sympathetic to his bad mood, which only made it worse.

That evening, they were to attend a ball at the local assembly rooms with the Daltons. At eight, James walked to Grace’s house and waited with her in the drawing room for the Daltons to arrive. Mr Follet waited with them too, in as bad a mood, it seemed, as James was. He complained that autumn balls were stupid, faddish affairs and criticized Grace for the way she had done her hair and dress.

“An unmarried woman should wear white to a ball,” he said. “What on earth were you thinking, dressing in indigo?”

“It was Mother’s choice. She saw something like it in a fashion plate.”

“Then what on earth was she thinking?” Mr Follet scoffed. “The woman has nothing but wool in her skull.”

“She was probably thinking,” James said irritably, “that Grace looks excessively pretty in indigo.”

That made both Mr Follet and Grace’s cheeks turn pink, though for very different reasons. James cursed himself for saying it and did his best to convert the compliment to Grace into one for her mother.

“I have always thought that Mrs Follet displays unusual creativity and charm in her choice of fashion,” he said. “In a sea of white and pink and cream, Grace will stand out like a sapphire set amongst diamonds. You will give my compliments to Mrs Follet, sir, for the way she dressed Grace tonight.”

Mr Follet subsided into a fit of twitchy silent irritation for some minutes. At last he said peevishly, “I’ve a spot of indigestion tonight, Redwood. It gives me a temper.”

“Is this a temper?” James asked. “I thought it was just general fussiness. My mistake.”

Grace looked from one to the other, her lips pressed tight. James, accustomed now to her subtle expressions, saw that she was displeased with them both. But perhaps she was embarrassed by her father’s criticisms.

They sat in silence for several minutes. At last, the doorbell rang and the footman came to say the Daltons’ carriage was waiting for them. As James led Grace out to the carriage, he expected her to offer some apology for her father’s bad mood, but she said nothing. Further conversation was prevented by the presence of Mr and Mrs Dalton and their two daughters, Eliza and Bridget. When they arrived at the assembly rooms, they were well in time for James to take the first dance with Grace. His mind was still upon the earlier conversation. Grace was in every way a dutiful, obedient daughter, despite Mr Follet’s ungentle treatment of her, but she was not insensible of his cavilling, James thought; she had been embarrassed, or uncomfortable, by what her father had said earlier. If he could drive a wedge between her and her father, give her a reason to rebel against him, then perhaps that would be motive enough for her to break the engagement — tonight.

To that end, he continued their discussion in a low voice in the quiet moments in the dance, as they were standing back and waiting for their turn to move.

“Your father was in a temper tonight,” he began.

“Some men are prone to them,” Grace said. “Most women forgive them for it.”

James ignored the veiled insult. “I could forgive any man for a temper,” he said. “I find it harder to forgive what your father said about his wife.”

“Mother often makes Father impatient.”

“No. Your father often loses patience with your Mother.”

The movement of the dance parted them for a few moments and allowed James to carefully compose his next sentences.

“It occurs to me now that tonight was the first time I have ever heard your father say a word about Mrs Follet. And it was an extremely ungracious one.”

“He is not usually unkind.”

“I think he is very good at knowing when he crossed a line, and very quick to jump back over it. Once or twice, I have been about to lose my temper with him when, with a quick word and a smile, he has twisted things until I don’t know what I feel at all.”

“He understands people.”

“He knows how to manage them.” James met Grace’s eyes. “He manages you.”

The dance separated them again and across the floor James could see Grace’s face rumpling with discontent. When they met up again, they had to hold hands as they sashayed down the line of dancers, and she held his like it was a dead rat.

“You admire your father too much,” James said. “You allow him to manage you. You allowed him to manage you right out of your engagement to Benson.”

Her hand tightened on his until it hurt. “You know not of what you talk.”

“I know enough. You should have heard what he said about your engagement with Benson — he called it a silly little love affair, conducted by a silly little girl. He never considered that he had broken your heart. He doesn’t know women have hearts to break.”

“Stop it!”

“I cannot!” The music brought them face to face as they formed a circle with another couple. “You sacrificed your own happiness for your father’s good opinion once. Now you do it twice, in marrying me. You love him too much, Grace.”

The other couple shot each other surprised, amused glances. Grace’s cheeks burned scarlet. They broke apart from the other couple and made their way back down the line, hand in hand. Even through her gloves, Grace’s nails dug into the back of his hand.

“You know nothing!” Grace hissed. “Love him!? Never!”

The heat and poison of her tone surprised James. Her wooden, pale face was alight with fury.

“Then why do you do as he tells you?” he asked. “Why leave Benson? Why marry me?”

She snatched her hand away from him as they reached their place in the line again. The fury of her expression was rapidly cooling. “Your jealousy amuses me, James.”

For some moments, there was nothing for them to do but stand opposite each other in their spots. Grace glared at him, her eyes bright, her chin high, her cheeks white and pink. Then they met in the middle of the floor to hold hands with the other couples as the dance came to a close.

“Why didn’t you marry Benson?” James asked in a low voice.

“I’m not going to tell you.”

“It was because of your father.”

“I’m not going to tell you.”

“You cannot hate him. I don’t believe it.”

She glared at him and said not a word.

The dances slowed and the music ended. James bowed to Grace, who turned away without curtsying. James took a step after her.

“We’re engaged for the set. The next dance begins soon.”

“I’m tired. I don’t want to dance.”

“Let me get you lemonade.”

“I’m not thirsty.”

She turned away from him and pushed through the crowd. James let her go and drifted away to the other side of the salon, as far away from Grace as he could get. There was something about the way she had said she never loved her father that unnerved him. It had been very feeling. If she had been hiding that deep down, what else had she been hiding? If that was what she felt for her father, what did she feel for him?

James went outside into the courtyard. It was damp and cold, which afforded him the solitude he needed to be truly angry with both his father and Grace’s. He paced up and down, kicking at the ground and cursing them both for having arranged the foul matter. It was not just cruel, it was stupid. Surely his father could not believe it was for the best to shackle him to a woman he could never love. Surely Mr Follet could not be so callous as to force Grace into this arrangement despite her so obviously caring nothing for James. And surely Grace had more integrity than to agree to marry him despite all — but she had not. Nor would she. And the more he had tried to rid himself of her, the crueller he had been, the more he had hurt her. And none of it had worked.

James leaned against a cool brick wall and thought things through. He should never have agreed to marry Grace in the first place, no matter what his father said. His ruse to get her to break the engagement had only made things worse. He had hurt her, and to no cause. No. It was not too late. He would break the engagement himself and damn the consequences. They would both be better off for it.

He stayed outside until he felt courageous enough to do it. He would take Grace aside somewhere private and tell her he could not marry her. Then he would walk home and leave her with the Daltons. It would have been better to do it at home, but the farce had dragged on long enough. Besides, if anybody could control their emotions in public, it was Grace.

He returned to the dance hall and scanned the crowd for Grace. The crush of people would have made it hard to spot her, but he spotted the brilliance of her indigo dress amidst the crowds of white, over near the entrance door, talking to a footman.

Even from thirty yards away, the strange stillness of her posture gave James a flash of conviction that something was wrong. He crossed the room, heedless of the dancers he was walking through, and went to her side. She turned to him.

“I’m leaving,” she said. “I have to go.”

“Where do you have to go?” James asked. “Home?”

“Yes. My mother sent a message.” Her voice trembled slightly and she was very pale. “I must go.”

James looked at the footman, whom he recognized now as one of the Follet’s. “What has happened?”

“Mr Follet has been taken ill. Mrs Follet sent me to fetch Miss Follet.”

“Do you have the carriage?”

“I rode my horse. Figured it would be quicker.”

“But we don’t have a carriage.” James twisted to scan the room for the Daltons, but unlike Grace, Mrs Dalton and her daughters had dressed in acceptable white and cream and were lost in the crowd. Mr Dalton was probably in the card room. “I’ll find Mr Dalton.”

Grace shook her head. “I must leave now.”

She was more worried than the matter seemed to deserve. James hesitated, then decided it would be best to get her home. Mrs Follet had sent for her, and it would get them both out of this stupid ball. “I’ll take you. We’ll walk. If we cut across the fields, it’ll be quicker than waiting for the carriage anyway.” He looked at the footman. “Ask around for the Daltons and tell them where we’ve gone, please.”

Grace barely waited for him to finish speaking before she slipped out into the hall. James followed her.

“Now just wait—”

Grace ignored him, crossing the hall and slipping out through the great doors into the street. James muttered a curse under his breath and went after her. He only caught her up half-way down the street, but she shook off the hand he laid on her arm.

“Grace, even if you’re angry with me, I’m not letting you walk home alone.”

She splashed through a puddle of mud. “We should hurry.”

She was too worried to be angry with him, it seemed. James lengthened his stride to match her trot. Damp was seeping through the seams of his dancing slippers. He could only imagine that Grace’s feet were already soaked. “We are going as fast as we can. It will not take us long.”

Grace trotted onwards, stumbling over the ruts in the road. “Long said my father was very bad. He didn’t want them to send for me, but Mother did anyway. We must hurry.”

Her voice and shoulders shook. Too late, James remembered that she had a shawl and cloak back at the assembly rooms. He shrugged off his coat and draped it over her shoulders. She did not even seem to register his touch.

“Grace dear, it’s your mother. She’s a sweet woman, but a worrier. Mr Follet probably only ate too many of the cook’s pickled herrings.”

She shook her head. “But he said not to send for me. Mother would never dare cross him if she did not think it dire.”

“And she may yet be mistaken.”

They rounded a corner onto the main road. Grace showed no sign of slowing her pace.

“Did he seem ill to you before we came?” she asked breathlessly. “He said he had indigestion — he never has indigestion.”

“Which is a wonder, considering your cook. But indigestion is no reason to worry.”

“I told you, Mother wouldn’t cross him un—” Grace tripped over a rut in the road.

James caught her arm to keep her from falling. “Ease up, Grace. No good you spraining your ankle.”

She looked at him, then down at his coat around her shoulders, and slowly slipped her arms through the sleeves, shivering. “Can we hurry, please?”

“Yes. Just not so much that we fall.”

For the rest of the main street, she kept to a brisk walk. When they reached the Follet’s road, however, she started to trot again and, as soon as they were in sight of the Follet’s house, broke into a run James decided that he had assisted as much as he could and only walked after her. When he reached the house, she had disappeared, and the hall was cold and empty. James went into the dining room where a dying fire lingered to wait for Grace to return. She still had his coat, and he wanted it back before he went home.

Ten minutes passed, and Grace did not return. James could hear people moving about above stairs, but thought he would be intruding if he went up to ask for his coat. Another fifteen minutes passed, and the clock struck eleven. Then half an hour. An hour. James began to wonder if everybody had fallen asleep. The dining room fire was almost out and he was cold.

At last, a footstep sounded coming down the stairs and he went to the door to look out. It was not Grace. Nor was it any of the Follets, nor even the doctor. It was the vicar. When he saw James, he shook his head.

James had never seriously considered Mr Follet to be in any danger. He stared at the vicar, acid dizziness sinking through his veins. No. Surely not.

The vicar bowed silently and went out through the front door. The house was silent and dark. James wondered if he should leave. Perhaps he should not be here, not now. But then there was another footstep on the stairs, a lighter, more feminine one.

“James.”

It was Grace. She no longer wore his coat. She came down the stairs towards him, very slowly, clumsily, almost falling from step to step

“You stayed.”

He could not tell her why. He only watched her come down the stairs and wondered what on earth he was meant to say. Their earlier conversation seemed suddenly so cruel, so poorly timed. But how could either of them possibly have known?

It seemed Grace had forgotten it anyway. She reached the bottom of the stairs and looked at him.

“I don’t know—” she said. Then tears ran down her face and she fell towards him and pressed her face against his shoulder. Hot tears ran through the silk of his shirt to his flesh. James, who had held a dozen women in his arms before, was at a loss for what to do. He swallowed the lump in his throat and let her cry before it occurred to him to hold her close, so he did so, holding her very tight. It didn’t seem to have any effect on her crying, but he thought it was the right thing to do.

There was a motion at the top of the stairs and he looked up. Mrs Follet was standing there, looking weary under the light of a single candle. She held James’s coat over one arm. For one moment she seemed about to speak, then she shook her head, hung the coat over the stair newel, and turned away.

__

A/N 2021-07-08: x_x

Chapter Nineteen: Strong Incentive

They held Mr Follet’s funeral three days later. It was a relief to Grace that her father’s corpse was gone at last, the coffin nailed shut, carried from the black-draped bedroom on the shoulders of black-draped men. James was one of the pall-bearers, standing in for his father. Grace could hardly meet his eyes, haunted by the argument they had had at the ball as her father was dying. In the urgency of rushing home, of waiting hopelessly by her father’s bedside, she had forgotten how much James had hurt her. It had come back the next day when James visited with his parents to see what they could do to help and had made her very cold towards him.

Perhaps what made her coldest of all were the things she had said herself. They had felt so very true then. Even now, she was not sure they had been a lie. She was shocked her father was dead, yes, but she was not saddened, she did not think she was grieving. After the first bout of ferocious tears, she had found herself quite calm. The next morning, she had woken up and eaten a full breakfast and felt ashamed of herself for it, for her mother and sisters only nibbled at toast. To make up for it, she had thrown herself into the funeral preparations, doing whatever she could to take the most pressing tasks off her mother’s hands. She had been frustrated to find that Mr Redwood, as the executor of the will, was responsible for the funeral arrangements, and almost angry when Uncle Bernard had visited to offer his services as well. They left her with little to do but dress the house and her sisters in black, write letters to relatives informing them of Mr Follet’s death, and prepare stalks of rosemary wrapped in black silk as favours for the funeral goers. Such mindless chores could be no distraction from her feelings, and by the time the coffin was carried from the house she was in a state of restless irritability. She paced the floor of the drawing room while Emma and Alice curled up together on the sofa wishing she had something — anything — to do.

In the early evening, the men returned from the church and descended upon the funeral supper at the Follet house. Mrs Follet was very anxious about the supper. Cook had tested her again by refusing to make game birds into pie, so Mrs Follet had had to persuade the cook around to fish and fruit pies instead. She was not sure that was entirely correct for a funeral, but she thought it must be better than several baked pheasants, served hot, when there was no longer a man of the house to carve them.

The men had too much of an appetite to complain about anything, however. They crowded around the Follet’s dining room table talking loudly of what a good man old Follet had been and reminiscing about the times they had had together.

“Such a cerebral fellow,” one man said. “He once told me he read two newspapers a day.”

“A bright mind,” another man agreed, shaking his head. “A great loss.”

“To his family particularly,” Grace’s Uncle Bernard said. “We are all so, so very shocked.”

But Uncle Bernard did not look particularly shocked. He looked, thought Grace, like he was enjoying the fish pie a great deal.

After the supper, Mr Follet’s old friends milled around the house continuing their sad compliments to his character. At intervals, they would draw Mrs Follet or Grace or her sisters aside and offer more personal condolences. Grace fought the urge to squirm whenever anyone touched her shoulder or pressed her hand. She swallowed her feelings and forced herself to be polite, to thank them very nicely for their condolences, even gauche old Uncle Bernard, to try to smile at them, to make sure they were not crowding her mother, who was far too meek-mannered to ever leave a conversation that was paining her. Alice and Emma needed guiding too, direction to speak to this and that cousin or to a friend of their father’s, to give out the funeral favours to departing guests, to not cower by themselves in the window seat and avoid their visitors.

When the crowd was thinning, when it was mostly relatives and close friends remaining, Grace felt a faint touch at her wrist and turned to see James behind her. She had been trying to avoid him.

“Are you leaving?” she asked. “Did you receive a favour yet?”

“I’m not leaving, and yes, your mother gave it to me. I’ve got something for you, actually.”

“What?” She stared at him and he gestured to a table by the fire on which a pot of tea and a teacup stood. “Oh. Tea.”

She made her way to the chair — the most comfortable chair in the room — and plopped down into it. James sat down next to her and poured her a cup of tea, adding a generous amount of milk and sugar.

“You should have sent for more than one cup,” she said.

“If I had, you’d be offering tea to everyone in the room.” A wry smile pressed at the corners of his lips before fading. “You’ve been looking after everybody else. You will sit down and drink tea and the others, I assure you, will manage without you for a quarter of an hour.”

“Did Mr Redwood put you up to this?” she asked, sipping her tea.

“No, I just thought… you look harassed.”

She curled her fingers around the warmth of her teacup, not willing to admit that she was harassed and have to thank him for his kindness. “It seems more like something your father would do. He is always so very kind to everybody.”

James twisted to look at his father, who was standing by Mrs Follet and gently disengaging her from a rather obnoxious conversation with Bernard Follet about what she ought to do now that Mr Follet was dead.

“I suppose he is,” James said. “I never really… thought about that. He gets severe with me.” He winced. “I probably deserve it.”

He did, Grace thought, and she wished that she could be severe with him, but she dared not bring up what they had said at the ball, for what she had said had been just as bad as what he had. She drained her cup, unwilling to meet his eyes, and started to stand, but he took her hand and stopped her.

“Fifteen minutes,” he said. “I will leave if you wish, but you will spend fifteen minutes sitting down and looking after no one but yourself.”

She sat down again, not entirely reluctantly, and poured herself another cup of tea.

“Should I go?”

“No.” She stared resentfully at her steaming cup of tea. “What happened at the funeral?”

“The usual.”

“Describe it.”

James breathed out slowly. “Uh, we followed the hearse to the church. Then we stood and we listened as the vicar read from the bible. It was… ‘The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want…’”

“Psalm twenty-three,” said Grace.

“Yes. It’s… it’s a nice one. We listened to the vicar read that, and it was very… comforting. Then a few men came forward — your uncle, my father — and read their own passages from the bible or talked about your father… mostly they talked about him. They shared their memories of him.”

“What sort of memories?”

“Um. Mostly, you know, witticisms he had once said. A few of them talked about how clever he had been when he was practicing law. I didn’t even know he had practiced.”

“Years ago. He quit the law to take up being a gentleman, as he called it.”

“Yes. That was one of the witticisms they brought up.”

“He used to say it a lot,” Grace said bitterly. “It didn’t amuse me the first time.”

James smiled sadly. “Well, after all those memories, we… we took him for committal. My father told me to slip away once I’d helped carry the coffin to the graveyard. I walked back with some friends of your father who traded more stories about him. There were many stories.”

Grace nodded. “We sat at home waiting. It’s not quite the same.”

James took her hand in his, with a touch that spoke far more kindness than any mere words could have. Grace leaned unconsciously towards him, the same way she had the night her father had died, before catching herself and drawing sharply back, slipping her hand away from under his.

“I don’t need that,” she said. “That doesn’t help.”

“I’m sorry.”

“You can go now,” she added. “I’ll drink my tea on my own.”

James left without another word, though he did, Grace saw, go to Emma and Alice and speak gently to them. Emma gave him a look of haughty distrust, which with another word or two on his part dissolved into anguish. When he took her hand, she did not object. She even clutched at it as he spoke. Alice was more composed, shaking hands with him quite cordially.

When Grace finished her tea, Mr Redwood announced that the will-reading was to be held and asked that everybody who was not family bid their goodbyes. Grace was stirred from her peace then, to say polite goodbyes to the last of her father’s friends. When that was over, she followed her mother back into the drawing room where Mr Redwood and the lawyer were unrolling a parchment on the table. Uncle Bernard was sitting in the chair closest to it, looking very pious.

“I, uh, I can stay, can’t I?” James said from the door. “I’m not family — but should I stay?”

Mr Redwood looked to Mrs Follet, who seemed incapable of making a decision.

“He can stay,” Emma said, before Grace could say that he couldn’t. “He’ll be family soon enough.”

James took a seat near the door, and the lawyer began to read the will. It was, to Grace, not entirely comprehensible. Mr Follet had arranged for a great many little parcels of money to be given to a great many people. But many of those people were already dead, or had married, or had otherwise disqualified themselves from Mr Follet’s good opinion, which left the little parcels of money chasing around to other people. Mr Redwood explained things to Mrs Follet in a low voice at intervals, quelling the anxious look that arose on her face every time a parcel of money did something unexpected.

The real blow came at the end, when Uncle Bernard shuffled forward in his chair and sat up, and the lawyer read out in solemn tones that the house in Richmond was to be left in whole and without caveat to Mr Follet’s brother Bernard.

There was no changing of direction here. Uncle Bernard’s success in the law did not disqualify him. His marriage to a wealthy heiress did not disqualify him. His having two sons full grown did not disqualify him. His having three nieces born and raised in the house did not disqualify him. He was the owner of the house.

“That’s not fair!”

Grace spoke far too loudly in her anguish. Everybody stared at her. Her cheeks flamed.

“She’s a little over-strung,” Uncle Bernard barked. “Poor chit. Someone get her a glass of wine.”

“I have hartshorn,” Mrs Follet said. “Are you faint, dear?”

Grace wished she was. She stood up, so abruptly her chair tumbled backwards to the floor, and ran blindly for the door. She hit a warm, hard body and someone’s arms came around her — James, muttering her name.

She shoved him away. “Don’t touch me!”

She fumbled for the door and slipped through. When she was halfway up the stairs, Alice and Emma caught her up.

“If it’s not hartshorn,” Emma said anxiously, “a little bit of shortbread or some pudding never fails to make me feel better.”

“I’m not you, Emma.”

“I second the wine,” Alice said. “Now, really, Grace—” she slung her arm around Grace’s shoulders “—I actually admire you. It is unfair, and you’re the only one who dared say it.”

“It’s our house!”

“I know, but you get to marry James, who has his own. It’s me and Emma who ought be worried.”

“James!” Grace shook Alice’s arm off. “That man!”

“What did he do?” Emma asked. “He was so kind today. I didn’t know he could be like that.”

The echo of her own voice came back to Grace — Love him!? Never! — and the memory of the shocked look on James’s face as he had heard it. Had she never loved her father? Perhaps not. Had she hated him? Right now, she thought she still did. And James knew.

The thought filled her with white-hot shame and fury. “Just leave me alone! I don’t want to speak to anyone!”

---

It was nearly midnight when James and his father left the Follets’ house, having said goodbye to everybody except Grace, who would not, Alice said, emerge from her room. In the coach on the way home, Mr Redwood said, “The wedding must be postponed six months.”

James, thinking of the haunted expression that had not left Grace’s face all day, hardly heard.

“Did you hear me?” his father said. “You cannot marry Grace so soon after her father’s death. People will think it indecent. It will have to wait until spring.”

“Right.” James shook Grace from his mind. “A stay of execution then.”

“Don’t be so disrespectful,” Mr Redwood snapped. “A man died. A friend of mine. Your bride’s father.”

James’s cheeks warmed. “I’m sorry.” He was. He had cared nothing for Mr Follet, nothing except a faint, persistent dislike, but he ached for Grace, who was so obviously wounded and, like a wild animal, wished to hide alone with her pain. At the same time, he could not help but feel relieved that he was not to be married so soon after all. Spring was a long way off yet.

Mr Redwood watched him with narrow eyes. “You were good to Grace today, so I suppose you mean it.”

James shrugged. After a moment, he added, “You might have warned them about the will.”

“It would have been very improper of me to do so. Besides, they must have known Follet would never leave his property to his daughters. He provided for them very well otherwise. His wife has a comfortable annuity and his younger two daughters significant dowries.”

“And Grace?”

“Grace is already provided for by her engagement to you.”

“But what about her dowry?” James asked. “Mr Follet didn’t settle it already, surely?”

“No, he did not. Our agreement is that I will match the portion he had saved for Grace and settle it on her upon her marriage. He dissolved her dowry weeks ago and absorbed it into his capital. Don’t look so shocked, James. You must have known I had to give him strong incentive to agree to the match.”

James felt sick to the pit of his stomach. “Do you mean that if we don’t end up marrying — if I die, or if Grace turns me down — she has nothing?”

Mr Redwood raised his eyebrows. “That will not happen.”

But it has to happen, James thought. I can’t marry Grace. I can’t.

__

A/N 2021-07-12: So basically I had the story fairly well drafted up til halfway, and from this point on my draft is basically scrambled up scenes and bits of scenes and needs a ton of editing, so any semblance of an update schedule is off the table. I’ll be updating as soon as I’ve got a chapter ready instead.

Chapter Twenty: What Grace Wanted

Grace made no effort to sleep that night. She paced her room like a caged animal, sometimes stopping by the window to stare out over the darkness of the street, sometimes throwing herself facedown upon her bed, before restlessness overtook her once more and she found herself compelled to move.

In the early hours of the morning, she began to feel hungry. She left her room and crept downstairs, hoping to find some of the funeral supper to finish off. To her surprise, a light still glowed from Mr Follet’s — no, Uncle Bernard’s study now. She crept closer and heard her mother’s low, anxious voice. Of course, she and Emma would have stayed up late talking about the funeral. For once, Grace wanted to be a part of those mother-daughter confidences. She opened the door then stopped short. Emma was not there. It was Uncle Bernard who sat with her mother by the fireplace. Mrs Follet broke off mid-sentence and they both turned to her.

“Why, Grace dear,” Bernard said. “Are you feeling better now?”

“What are you still doing here?”

“Your mother and I had matters of business to discuss.” Bernard took out his pocket watch. “My! Past two already! How we have nattered on.”

Mrs Follet rose to her feet. “I didn’t realize it was so late! You can’t possibly drive home at this hour — besides, I think it is raining.”

Grace went to the curtains and pulled them back. Raindrops glistened on the other side of the window-glass but she could hear no patter of rain. “It has been raining,” she said, “but it has stopped now.”

“But with the clouds there will be no light, and the roads will be dangerous.” Mrs Follet furrowed her brow in Bernard’s direction. “I did not think to have the spare bedroom made up this morning. Give me but a minute and I will do it now.”

“No need,” Bernard said. “Archie’s room will do me. We shared a bed often enough as children.”

Mrs Follet’s mouth dropped open. “Oh. Oh, if that is what you wish.”

“I’ll be off to bed then.” Bernard yawned. “We can continue this discussion in the morning. There’s no hurry. Goodnight, Nelly. Goodnight, Grace.”

He prised himself out of the armchair and lumbered to the door. He had none of Mr Follet’s height or thinness. Too many rich dinners had left a permanent flushed cast to his cheeks. And despite that, Grace thought bitterly, it was not Uncle Bernard who died first.

When he had left the room, Mrs Follet gave Grace a pitying look. “He doesn’t mean to hurt.”

“He didn’t have to stay the night. Couldn’t he have left us alone for a few days at least, gone back to London? Does he have to take everything from us?”

“Grace dear.” Mrs Follet came closer and tentatively touched Grace’s shoulder. “He is only trying to help. And he has assured me that we are welcome to stay on here as long as we need, until we can find a new place to live.”

“Did he? Has he put it in writing?”

Mrs Follet rubbed the bridge of her nose. “Sometimes you are very like your father, dear.”

“I wish people would stop comparing me to you and father!” she exploded. “Just tell me, has he put it in writing?”

“No, he has not. But, really, what need? He is your uncle, Grace. You need not mistrust him.”

Grace moved away from her mother and went to the dying fire. “What will we do after we leave this house?”

“We will rent somewhere. Uncle Bernard has promised to help us find a place.”

“Somewhere small and pokey no doubt, on what Father has left us!”

“He has left us comfortable,” Mrs Follet said mildly. “Besides, Grace, you will marry James soon enough and be in London with him.”

Grace felt sick at the thought. James alone knew that she had not loved her father — she could not have, or she would feel sad now, and she didn’t, she was only very surprised that he was dead and very angry that he had left most of his earthly spoils to Uncle Bernard. She could not bear the thought of living with a man, being intimate with a man, who knew such an ugly thing about her. And besides, she had only agreed to marry him to get away from her father. Well, she was away from him now. She didn’t need James.

“Grace? What’s wrong?”

“I’m not sure I will marry him.” Grace shivered. “I’m not sure I want to now.”

Mrs Follet looked surprised. “I thought… I do think that he cares for you, dearest. Not that I wish to persuade you against your heart, of course, but I do think… well, sometimes he looks at you.”

“It would be surprising if he never did.”

“No, of course. But it’s the way he looks at you. Even before you went to Ellen’s, I think, he was… but then, I’m not good at noticing these things, am I? I might be imagining it. And I saw him hold you when you were crying, which made me think things had progressed, but then, when someone is crying, it’s natural to hold them, isn’t it? Or even if he did mean something by it, that doesn’t mean you do. I only want you to be happy, dear, and if he does not make you happy then I wouldn’t want you to marry him, but… but I did wonder if… well, anyway, I might be very wrong about it. I am not sure I ever understood you as well as I should have.” Mrs Follet blinked away a sudden brightness in her eyes. “But I really do think you should not make a decision so quickly. It’s all been a terrible shock. Give yourself a little time to be quite sure, won’t you?”

Grace poked the dying fire, but the coals were too far gone to do more than fizzle. It was useless, attempting to confide in her mother. Mrs Follet only dithered about with maybes and perhapses, and Grace was quite certain she could not bear to marry James. Not now. Not ever.

“I wasn’t asking your permission to break the engagement, Mother. I was informing you that I am.”

Mrs Follet looked hurt, which only served to anger Grace more. “I’m just saying, dear, that you should give yourself time. You are grieving. Besides, there is no hurry to end the engagement. You are in mourning. The wedding must be put off until spring at least. What harm in waiting? You might feel very differently in six months.”

“I have made up my mind. You will not convince me otherwise. No one will.”

“I didn’t mean to try. I just meant…” She sighed heavily. “Never mind. I should not have spoken. You always were strong-minded. I sometimes wished… but it takes all types to make a world.”

“You sometimes wished I were meek and wilting?”

“No. I sometimes wished I were more like you.”

Again, guilt lent fire to Grace’s anger, but she bit it down. “I’m sorry,” she said gruffly. “I don’t think I’m good company tonight.”

“I think we should both go to bed.” Mrs Follet gave Grace a hesitant, one-armed hug and kissed her cheek. “Rest will do us both good.”

She left the room, but Grace stayed behind until the fire died out completely and she was left in darkness. She would have to tell James — but she dreaded the thought of seeing him again.

---

James was not a man easily given to regret. He did not deny that he had made mistakes in life, but he did believe that mistakes, once made, were best forgiven and forgotten, particularly when he was the one to have made them.

It was a novel sensation to him now to find his conscience pressed. He should never have agreed to marry Grace if he did not intend to see the engagement through. It was dishonest of him, deceitful, and he had achieved nothing but to hurt her. After a night of sleepless self-recrimination, he came to the conclusion that the best he could do by her now was support her in her grief and try to make up the harm that he had done her in whatever way he could.

The day after the funeral, he went to her house to begin his quest. When he entered, the butler informed him that Miss Follet was in her room and if Mr Redwood would wait in the drawing room, he would send for her. In the drawing room, Bernard Follet sat alone by the fire reading a newspaper which he cheerfully abandoned to tell James how accomodating and pleasant poor Mrs Follet and the girls were being despite — his voice dropped to a hoarse whisper — the tragedy that had visited them. James agreed that it was very unfortunate indeed. Unfortunate, declared Bernard, did not begin to describe it. He proceeded to describe it himself, with mournful magniloquence. James checked the clock impatiently. At last, Grace entered, interrupting Bernard mid-platitude.

James halfway crossed the room towards her, stopping when he saw her draw back. “Grace. I hoped I could keep you company today.”

“You understand that we are a house in mourning, Mr Redwood,” she said, not meeting his eyes. “We cannot be expected to entertain you.”

Bernard shook his head sadly. “You must forgive Grace. She is at the mercy of her emotions, poor child, and they are quite merciless, I am afraid.”

James ignored Bernard. “I’m not here to be entertained, Grace. I’m here in case you need anything.”

“There is nothing I need of you.” Her bottom lip trembled and she bit it hard. “It would be easier if you were not here right now. I’ll speak to you tomorrow. Or perhaps the day after.”

“Grace would rather be alone,” Bernard said. “She has been in her room all morning. I invited her  to play whist with me and her sisters, but as she refused we had to play dummy. It is much better to let her be, Redwood.”

Grace flicked her uncle a snake-like glare but remained mute.

“Your mother was with you?” James asked.

“No, Nell was with the vicar’s wife,” Bernard said. “The parish is really coming together in aid of our little family. We’ve received so many baskets of provisions from friends — the most delectable apricot jam this morning.”

Again, Grace’s eyes flicked to her uncle, and again she said nothing.

“Where are Emma and Alice?” James asked. “Where is Mrs Follet now?”

“They are all at the vicarage,” Bernard said. “There was the matter of…” He waggled his fat fingers in the air. “…bombazine? Bonnets? Bombazine bonnets, perhaps?”

Then Grace was entirely alone, except for her boorish uncle and the servants. James could not leave her. Yet, she stood still and silent by the open door, patently wishing he would go. He sighed inwardly.

“Would you like a cup of tea, Grace?” he asked. “Or chocolate?”

“I’d love a cup of chocolate,” Bernard said. “Why don’t you ring for it, Gracie?”

Mutiny flickered behind her eyes, but she went to the bell-cord and rang for the servants.

“Are you going to have anything?” James asked.

“I’m not hungry,” she said.

It seemed a waste to make chocolate just for Bernard but James said nothing. They remained standing in silence until a servant entered and Grace gave the order. The servant departed without Grace having asked James if he wanted anything. He knew it to be a deliberate oversight. He came close to her and spoke low in her ear, “If you tell me to go, I will go, but otherwise I am staying with you until your mother and sisters return.”

She turned away from him, almost flinching, and James knew he was about to be dismissed. Before she could speak, Bernard chortled, “What are you whispering about? Young love — how very sweet!” and Grace’s eyes bulged with sudden fury.

“I want to go for a walk,” she said.

James looked out the window. “It’s raining.”

“We will take an umbrella.”

James thought it best not to argue with her. He went to find an umbrella while she went upstairs to get her cloak. The moment they left the house, she exploded, “I hate that man!”

“He’s a fat old oaf,” James said placatingly, pulling her closer to him so the umbrella covered them both. “Where are we walking?”

“I don’t know.” She pushed him away. “Why are you walking so close?”

“Because it’s raining and we have only one umbrella.”

The resistance in Grace’s arm, linked through his, softened. “I had to leave the house.”

“I know.”

“Everything he says makes me want to scream.”

“You can scream if you like, but I can see curtains twitching, so you will definitely be heard.”

Grace made a sound half-laughter and half-sob. James wondered if she had slept. She looked very pale, paler still for the black mourning gown she wore.

“We could go to my house,” he said. “We don’t have to talk. You could rest, sleep even.”

“I don’t want to.” Grace stopped as they reached the crossroads. One road led towards Kew Gardens, the other towards the shops and church. “This way.” Her pace quickened. “Uncle Bernard is acting as though he owns the house. Sleeping in Father’s bed, ordering about the servants, eating our jam.”

“He does own the house, Grace.”

“He doesn’t need to move in immediately!”

“I know. He’s a blundering ass.” James was relieved she was unbending towards him, even if it was only because she was angrier with someone else. “Do you know where you and your family will go? How long will he let you stay there?”

“Let!” Grace laughed bitterly. “He says he will not send us away, but it is clear he wants our home for himself — as though he doesn’t have a perfectly good place in Chancery!”

“He will quit the law?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t asked.” She stomped on through the rain, sending spatters of mud over James’s boots. “I don’t care. It doesn’t matter. Why don’t you work?”

The abruptness of the question surprised James. “I read law at Cambridge.”

“I know. Why don’t you work at it? Don’t you get bored with nothing but gallivanting to occupy your time?”

James had been asked that question before by other women, but never in a tone of such belligerence. “Less bored gallivanting than I was reading law. Don’t you get bored with embroidery?”

“Yes.” She scowled. “It’s alright when there’s some purpose in it, when I’m mending stockings or something, but embroidering little flowers on bits of muslin for no purpose other than to prove that I can — it’s like Penelope sewing at her carpet only to undo it every night.”

“There was purpose in that.”

Grace shot him a dirty look. “You know what I mean.”

“I would never dare assume.” James took the risk of baiting her. If she was not in the mood to be comforted, having a target for her anger might give her some relief.

Her cheeks coloured faintly, but she gave no reply. Then, abruptly, she stopped. James stopped with her. They were at the gate which led to the church graveyard. Slowly, Grace unlatched the gate and pushed it open. James followed her in. She walked down the rows of gravestones until she came to her family’s plot. The earth lay in a dark rectangle where Mr Follet had been buried.

“There’s no stone.”

“The earth has to settle, Grace.”

“How long does it take?”

“I’m not sure. A long time, I think.”

She stared at the black earth as though she was thinking of digging it up again. James touched her hand and, when she did not shrink away, clasped her fingers lightly in his own. For a few moments, they stayed like that, then she slowly, deliberately pulled her hand away. The patter of the rain almost drowned out her next words:

“I don’t want to marry you.”

James stared at her, but she looked resolutely at her father’s grave. Had he misheard? “I beg your pardon?”

“I don’t want to marry you.”

She meant it. He raised his face skywards and let out a long, deep breath. It was over. He was free. He could return to his old life, to independence in London, to the knowing smiles of safely married women and dalliances that began with the ending already determined. Relief swept over him; it was with great difficulty he restrained himself from laughing.

He lowered his gaze and met Grace’s sad, anxious eyes. The impulse to laugh died.

“I’m so sorry,” she said.

“Don’t apologize. You’ve done nothing wrong.”

She nodded but looked no less anxious. A gust of wind sent a shower of needling rain under the umbrella. James looked up. The sky was black with racing clouds and the rain was growing steadily heavier around them.

“You picked a wonderful day for a walk,” James said, shivering. “Let’s take shelter in the church until the storm passes over.”

At this time of day, the church was empty and distinctly gloomy. Muddy light filtered in through the stained glass windows and a chill dampness hung in the air. Their footsteps echoed as they made their way to a pew and sat down.

“I could walk home,” Grace said after a while. “I don’t mind getting a little damp.”

“I mind.”

“You don’t have to walk with me.”

“I mind you getting damp,” James said. “Drenched, rather. Half-drowned.”

“You don’t need to worry about me anymore. We’re no longer engaged.”

“Just be patient, Grace. The storm will blow over soon.”

James leaned on the back of the pew in front of him and stared into the vague shadow of the altar. Next to him, the umbrella dripped steadily, faintly onto the floor. His wool coat smelled like wet dog. Above that, rose the scent of something citrusy and floral — Grace’s soap. Sassafras, perhaps, or bergamot? Unusual. Young women usually smelled of roses or lavender. It suited Grace, somehow. She had hidden spice.

“Why don’t you want to marry me?” he asked.

“We don’t suit.”

“We never did. You never minded until today.”

The pew creaked as she shifted in her seat. “I did mind. I just didn’t say.”

For a long time, there was silence but for the dripping of the umbrella and the dull roar of the rain outside.

“You’re so rude sometimes,” Grace said abruptly. “Obnoxious. Insulting. Embarrassing. Vain.”

James winced. “Do go on.”

“I know you sometimes say things just to offend me. Particularly when we’re in company.” Her voice trembled. “It’s cruel. And it’s stupid.”

It was. Despite the chill in the air, James’s cheeks were warm.

“And when it comes down to it, I’m not in love with you. I don’t even like you. And I suspect you don’t like me. So why should we marry? It’s nothing other than a financial arrangement my father made. Now he’s dead… there’s no reason for it to stand.”

Except for the three thousand pounds Grace ought to have had as a dowry.

“The trouble is, Grace—”

“Now that we’re no longer engaged,” she interrupted, “you can start calling me Miss Follet again.”

“The trouble is, Miss Follet…” James stopped. His heart was pounding and his cheeks were hot. He was getting what he wanted. It had been easy in the end. Why should he feel guilty for it? It was what Grace wanted too. She had said as much.

And just yesterday had been her father’s funeral. And she had not slept. And she would not cry. And she was full of pain she was trying not to let anyone see.

He would be taking advantage of her if he took her at her word now.

“The trouble is, Grace, I do like you.”

She stiffened. “It’s Miss Follet.”

“No. It’s Grace. I like you far too much, you see, to break our engagement so easily. Your father just died. You’re grieving. You’re in no state of mind to make such a decision, so I cannot accept it.”

“What?” Her tone was steely. “Do you think I’m deranged? I know what I want, Ja— Mr Redwood. I know how I feel. You have absolutely no right to tell me otherwise. The— the arrogance of it. Of all the… condescending, supercilious… arrogant nerve!” She jumped to her feet and snatched the umbrella from beside him. “You will regret this, Mr Redwood.”

“I have no doubt,” James said politely. “Better me than you.”

__

A/N 2021-09-04: screams into pillow

Chapter Twenty-One: A Spasm of Grief

Perhaps, James thought as he followed Grace through the rain, he could have approached the matter with greater delicacy. He had made Grace angry. Every time he came close to her, she swatted at him with the umbrella. It was still raining quite heavily too. His hair was plastered flat over his head and his coat was soaking through at the seams.

On the other hand, the anger might be good for her. It had certainly brought some colour to her cheeks and fire to her eyes.

When they reached the crossroads, Grace took a different path, not the one back to her home. James trotted closer, dodging the swipe she aimed at him.

“Where are you going?” he asked.

“Don’t talk to me,” she snapped. “Don’t say another word.”

James retreated beyond reach of the umbrella. “My boots are wet through,” he said. “They’ll probably shrink.”

“You deserve it.” Grace marched on through the rain, her sodden skirts clapping stiffly around her ankles. Traces of dye were leaking from her dress onto her stockings and gloves.

“Your dress is running,” he said. “You’d really best go home and get into something dry. We’ll probably both catch a cold.”

“Just be quiet!”

Grace splashed on through a puddle. James picked his way after her. The rain was starting to slow, and sunlight was burning through the clouds on the horizon. People would be emerging from their homes soon, going for walks or running errands. He did not so much mind looking like a fool himself, but he didn’t wish for anyone to see Grace as she was now. Her cloak covered up any indecency the rain might have made of her dress, but her hair was in a bedraggled knot halfway down her neck and her skirts were losing more dye by the minute. Appearing like this in public, particularly when she was supposed to be in mourning, would make her the subject of ridicule and scorn.

“Please let’s not go to the village,” he said. “If it’s your mother you want to speak to, we’ll go home and I’ll send for her.”

“We’re not going to the village.” Grace turned down a side street as she spoke. “We’re going to your father.”

That silenced James. He had not considered what his father might have to say about this.

They reached his house just as the rain slowed to a drizzle. Grace pushed through the front door and strode straight up the stairs to the drawing room, dripping purple dye in her wake. Mr and Mrs Redwood were having tea and biscuits together by the fire, cocooned against the draught by tall screens.

“You’re dripping!” Mrs Redwood said. “James, step away from that couch! It’s silk.”

Now that they were here, Grace seemed not to know what to say. She stood in the middle of a growing puddle on the carpet, breathing heavily and glaring from James to Mr Redwood and back again.

“I think you had best call for more tea and biscuits, Margaret,” Mr Redwood said. “And some towels. Why don’t you sit down, Grace?”

Mrs Redwood set her teacup down and left the room. James pushed forward a chair before Grace could sit on the silk couch. She sank down into it, her hands shaking. He thought perhaps she was going to cry, but she clenched her hands and appeared to pull herself together.

“He won’t accept that I won’t marry him,” Grace said. “The man can’t refuse to accept that. It’s not… it’s not done.”

Mr Redwood looked surprised. James had to give Grace credit for that. In all of twenty-seven years, he had not managed to surprise his father once.

“And why, my dear, do you wish to break— but no. To wish it is enough. I must not overstep.” Mr Redwood raised an eyebrow in James’s direction. “You know very well that a man accepts a woman’s word in this circumstance.”

There was, in the steel of his tone, perfectly controlled fury. James knew it must incense him to have to say that when he was, of everyone involved, the one who most wished for the marriage to take place. But Mr Redwood would never do what was not correct. As for James, he neither wished to offend Grace nor to aggravate his father further. He picked his words carefully.

“Grace is very naturally over-wrought right now, Father. I believe that now, in such a state of emotion, she should not be making such decisions.”

“Don’t treat me like a child. Don’t treat me like an incompetent. I know what I am asking for, James.”

Mr Redwood looked from Grace to James and back again, his lips pursed to one side. While he was still thinking, Mrs Redwood returned carrying two towels, a maid following behind her with a tray of cups and biscuits.

“Dry yourself off,” she chided, giving one towel to James and another to Grace. “I can’t think why you came in like this — or went out in such a downpour.”

“Thought it was a nice day for a walk,” James said, setting to work with the towel. “You had better take your cloak off, Grace. It’ll dry better by the fire.”

She shot him a resentful glare but pulled her cloak from around her shoulders. Mrs Redwood gathered it up and hung it over one of the screens by the fire. With his hair half-dry, James became aware of an unpleasant squelchiness in his shoes. He kicked off his boots, peeled off his stockings, and sat down in a chair to dry his muddy feet. Grace stared then looked hastily away, the tip of her nose pink. There was something endearingly innocent about it. James bit back the half-dozen teasing remarks that came to mind. They would only offend her.

“Now what is this all about?” Mrs Redwood demanded.

Mr Redwood winced. “To my great sorrow, it seems that Grace will not be our daughter-in-law after all.”

Mrs Redwood’s eyes turned to black, glittering slits. “James!”

James sighed.

“It’s not his fault,” Grace said in a thin voice. “I don’t want to marry him. That’s all.”

“And why on earth not!?”

“Don’t badger her, Mother.”

“But all I want to know is why she has changed her mind. It’s not too much to ask. I’m interested in this engagement too. She is going to be— she was going to be the mother of my grandchildren.”

James’s cheeks burned, and Grace’s were scarlet too. Thankfully, Mr Redwood stepped in.

“Let it be, Margaret,” he said. “We must respect Grace’s choice.” He looked at James. “And you.”

“I do respect Grace.” James paused uneasily, remembering some of his past behaviour. “I don’t do this to offend her.” He turned to her. “I’m sorry to hurt you. But I think I would be hurting you more if I accepted your decision. A week ago, you were content to marry me. Nothing has changed between us since then. Your father dying did not change the way you feel about me.”

“It made my feelings clear.”

Had it? Was he wrong about this? Was she really speaking with a clear mind and an unclouded heart? But the look in her eyes was exactly like that of a wounded animal snapping at anyone who came close.

Mr Redwood cleared his throat. “I mean no attempt to dissuade you by this, Grace, but I have found grief to be a black fog, not a guiding light.”

“You simply don’t know what you speak of, dear.” Mrs Redwood laid a bony hand on Grace’s shoulder. “In time—”

“Please don’t touch me.” Grace flinched away. “I know what I want. I’m sure.”

“Now, all you need is—”

“Mother, let her be.” James caught Mrs Redwood’s hand and tugged her away from Grace. He ached to hold Grace himself, but he knew very well she would hate it. You could not rush a wounded animal. You had to let them come to you.

Mr Redwood leaned back in his chair and regarded Grace thoughtfully. “Why don’t you have some tea, Grace? You’re wet through.”

That distracted Mrs Redwood. She poured tea for Grace and James, putting in liberal quantities of milk and sugar and slipping a biscuit on each saucer. When Grace got the biscuit, she crammed it in her mouth and swallowed in two bites.

“Might I point out,” Mr Redwood said, very gently, “that the wedding is, in any case, postponed for six months, so bringing an end to the engagement need be a matter of no urgency?”

Grace took a deep gulp of her tea. “It is ended. It is over. I will not marry him. I came here only so that you would make him… make him…”

“You came here to get me in trouble,” James said. “Let me assure you, you have succeeded. But my father is going to be polite and wait until you’ve left the room before he skins me.”

“We will have words,” Mr Redwood said.

“And the words will have sharp teeth.” James set his tea down on the tray; it was far too sweet for his taste. “Look, Grace, I can’t make you marry me, but as far as I am concerned, we are still engaged. Nothing my father says will change my mind. You are the one who has to convince me.”

“Is nothing I have said today enough?”

“Nothing.”

“You make it impossible!”

“I don’t. I told you: you can convince me. But today you did not. Shall we try again tomorrow? I can call at the same time.”

Her eyes glittered with anger. She whipped around to look at Mr Redwood. “What do you have to say about this?”

“My dear, I don’t know what to say. If you are asking me to force James to relent, I cannot. It is beyond my power. If you wish for my opinion, I regret to confess it is that James, however inelegantly he expressed himself, may have caught the tail end of the truth in this matter.”

Grace’s lips pushed in and out without letting slip a sound. She bent her head and stared at her lap. James watched her carefully.

“I’d like to go home now,” she said at last, in a quiet, shuttered voice.

“James can drive you,” said Mrs Redwood. “It is still raining.”

“No. I don’t want him to.”

James sighed. “You had better send for the coach, Mother.”

“Very well. It will take a few minutes to ready it. Come, Grace. You must arrange yourself before you leave. Your hair has come undone.”

They left the room without Grace looking at James once. James eyed his father warily. There was a coldness about his eyes. Tail-end of the truth or not, he was not happy with James.

Mr Redwood leaned back in his chair and clasped his hands on his knees. “If you had treated that woman with due kindness, she would be falling to you right now, not running away.”

“I’m trying to make up for past mistakes.”

“With great tact, I can see.”

“I tried being gentle. She liked it less.”

Mr Redwood’s cheek twitched. “I understand, James, that there is a certain… satyric streak in you, but I always believed it to come from a partiality to womankind, not an animus against it. The former is merely a peccadillo. The latter is contemptible folly.”

“You can call me names all you like. Grace did not want my kindness today.”

“Because she has not received enough of it in the past to believe it when she sees it.”

“What did you expect, Father? I never wanted to marry anyone, let alone her. You forced me into it. What kind of man would be kind to the woman under the circumstances?”

“A decent one.” Mr Redwood’s voice was like ice. “Which is what I thought you were, despite your manifest vices.”

James clenched his shaking hands into fists. “I am trying to do the decent thing by her now. I don’t believe she really wants to cry off. I think it’s a spasm of grief. Nor is it what she needs. You told me about her dowry. What can we do if she breaks the engagement? Give the money to her? It would humiliate her. She would never accept it.”

Mr Redwood watched James narrowly for several long moments before looking away. “It is an unwinnable situation, James, to attempt to do what is in a woman’s best interests by refusing her sincere wishes. She is not a child.”

“Then I cannot win.” James shook his head. “I ought to have known that from the moment I became engaged to her.”

James thought that Grace would soften within a day or two. He visited her the next morning, intent on winning her over. To his annoyance, the footman said that Miss Follet was not at home. Well, thought James, I’ll give her some time to cool down.

He gave her another day. She was still not at home. Nor was she there the third day, nor the fourth, nor the fifth.

On the sixth day, he went to London in a fit of pique, enveigling the use of the coach and horses from his father by telling him he needed to check on the townhouse. He did, in fact, drop by his townhouse, where he picked up some letters, but his first step after that was to his club where played several games of billiards and lost fifteen shillings out of them. That was when he decided to cut his losses and retreat to the parlour to drink ale and read his letters. There was a long one from Locke, the first that James had had from him in some weeks. It was a surprise for James to find himself criticized in the letter — Locke thought the scheme to rid himself of Grace cruel and dangerous and told James to be honest with her and his father. Well, that was salt in the wound. Of some balm was the postscript, a rather sheepish confession from Mrs Locke that they anticipated a small addition to the family circle, followed by a clarification from Locke’s Aunt Georgiana that Mrs Locke was not talking about puppies, and finished by Locke grumbling that the women had explained the matter between them and so left him with nothing to say about it.

Sensing shades of disappointment in Locke’s postscript, James carefully filled a page with nonsense about kittens, saying all that could possibly be said about kittens and their effects upon the family circle, and pointing out that now that he had exhausted the subject, Locke might wish to write about something other than kittens in his next letter, though what James could not suggest.

He started a new page and turned to the matter of his own predicament. He admitted, without pride, that he had been wrong in trying to rid himself of Grace. He outlined his efforts and Grace’s resistance to them. Then he spoke of Mr Follet’s death and the effect it had had upon the problem — he had to marry Grace, or he was damning her to poverty. Here, self-pity overcame him:

So, here I am, forced to persuade this sorry creature to marry me against her own stubborn will and against my every sincere wish — when until now I have been trying and failing to do quite the opposite. But I will succeed this time — it is merely an hysteria of hers — and suffer every day the rest of my life for it, no doubt. She is miserable, irrational, spiteful, and not nearly pretty enough to begin to make up for it. It is self-sacrifice in the extreme, to marry such a vixen, but I have…

As he wrote, a shadow fell over the page and he looked up. Mr Oliver was standing behind him, leaning over his shoulder and reading the letters.

“Not very polite,” said James.

“Not at all,” Oliver said. “But you were deep in thought. I did not wish to interrupt. So Locke got the new woman with child. How very amusing. It did not take him long.”

“I have been led to believe that it takes, on occasion, as little as ten minutes,” James said acerbically.

“Well.” Oliver fiddled with the penknife. “Once is enough, so I have heard.”

James wished he would go away. Instead, he picked up the penknife and began to trim the fraying cuffs of his suit, sniplets of threads falling over James’s letters.

“Mr Follet is dead,” Oliver said.

“He is.”

“And so you will marry his daughter out of pity — such a stupid emotion. If I were you, I’d take her at her word and run.”

“But you’re not me.” James drummed his fingers on the table. It was coming to him, suddenly, that a plan of which Oliver had approved could not be a good one. Moreover, he was ashamed of his letter, which was very cruel to Grace and certainly not entirely true of his feelings about her. With a scowl, he rolled the second page into a ball and threw it at the fireplace. It missed, bouncing off the grate and onto the hearth. Before he could get up, Oliver went over, picked it up, and dropped it into the flames.

“It struck me,” Oliver said, moseying back towards James, “that you’ve put yourself in rather a bind. I might be able to help you out of it.”

“I doubt that.”

“But really. I saw the spoke in the wheel, Redwood, when you came up with the idea. If you didn’t succeed in making her cry off, you’d have to marry a woman who hated you.

“And you said nothing of it.”

Oliver shrugged. “I thought you would succeed. As a matter of fact, you have. You could take her at her word and walk away.”

“I cannot. She does not mean it and she would lose a great deal of money.”

“Ah, but there are men who would marry her without money.”

“Not you, if you’re offering.”

“Not I, certainly. But it strikes me that old flames may yet burn bright.”

James stared at Oliver. “You mean Benson?”

“I do. He is in London, you know. And his wife is dead. I think he wants a replacement.”

“I know. I’ve met the cur.”

Oliver laughed. “Cur? I always had him pegged for more of a cat — a sleek, overfed house cat, fond of his comforts.”

“A man fond of his comforts would not marry a woman with no money.”

“But cats are prideful creatures. They do not like being denied what they covet. And she denied him all those years ago. I could help you bring them together again. With a little setting of the stage, a little prompting, we could make him take her off your hands.”

James shuddered. “Absolutely not.” He stood, gathering his letters from the table. “I wouldn’t do that to her, even if I thought I could.”

“Then buy me a drink and I’ll come up with a better idea. How about a cousin? Does she have a cousin?”

“Buy your own damn drink for once,” James snapped. “Don’t you get tired of sponging upon others?”

“Quite — but it does require a great deal more exertion when one cannot sponge upon one’s own father.”

James was all the more annoyed for knowing it was true. “Your father left you a small fortune,” he said. “It is not my fault you squandered it on cupidity and vice.”

Oliver’s dark eyes glittered with sudden anger, then he laughed and it faded — James had never seen him lose his temper, no matter the provocation. He gave an elegant, one-shouldered shrug. “Very well, I will find another friend.”

At least he was not a sore loser, James thought as he walked away.

__

10/10/2021 A/N: I slightly edited the last few paragraphs of the last chapter to change the ending just a bit, so if you haven’t seen that, you may want reread just the last little bit because this follows directly on from that.

Chapter Twenty-Two: Being Fooled

Grace sat upstairs in the small room at the front of the house that Mrs Follet used as a sitting room. It was little more than a nook, really, with four rickety chairs at a rickety table and a wooden bench under the window with its hardness poorly disguised by threadbare cushions. Detritus from other parts of the house collected here: pell-mell mallets, a broken umbrella, a collection of very old magazines, an unfinished embroidery sampler, a frayed deck of cards, and, for some reason, several empty boxes of tooth powder. It was a cold, uncomfortable room, but it had the advantage that Uncle Bernard never set foot in it. He preferred the drawing room, with its greater fire and softer chairs. Over the past week, Grace had sat in here a great deal. It gave her time alone to think, and through the window she could watch James arrive on his daily call and then watch him leave, rejected, a few minutes later.

Today, he was late. It was past noon, and still he had not arrived. Yesterday, he had not come at all, but his absence had been explained when Mrs Redwood came by the house in the evening to give them a fruit cake she had made herself — he was in London for the day.

He would come soon. Perhaps he had slept late after his journey. And when he did…

“He’s not coming.”

Grace jumped and turned the door. Alice stood there, holding a plate of fruit cake.

“Do you want some?” she asked through a mouthful. “It’s quite bad, but it grows on you.”

“Fine.” Grace got up from the bench and took a slice of cake. “It’s all the better if he doesn’t come. I don’t want to see him.”

“Which explains why you watch so devotedly at the window.” Alice set the plate down on the table and flipped through the pile of magazines. “June 1818. December 1816. March 1806 — goodness, what queer hats men used to wear.” She dropped the magazine and regarded the pell-mell mallets quizzically. “I wonder if we can play pell-mell in mourning?”

“I hate pell-mell.”

“Of course you do.” Alice took another slice of cake. “I wish I had a lover to scorn. I think I’d be good at it. And it does seem fun.”

Grace nibbled at the cake. It tasted overpoweringly of brandy. She put her slice back on the plate. “It’s not a game. I wish James would leave me alone.”

“I wish he would too,” Alice said. “I think you’re better off without him. He always was a princock.”

Grace coughed. “A what?”

“A princock. The cook says it about the stableboy.”

“Which is probably reason enough not to repeat it.” Grace tested the cake again and found it no more to her liking. “What does it mean?”

“The stableboy is always cheeking the cook and trying to pinch the scullery maid.”

“James isn’t like that at all. He’s brash, and vain, and downright foolish sometimes, but he’s not—” Grace broke off as the doorbell rang. “That must be him. But I won’t see him. He must learn that I meant what I said.”

Alice raised an eyebrow but said nothing.

A few moments later, footsteps sounded on the stairs and the footman appeared in the doorway.

“Mr Benson to call upon Miss Follet,” he announced. “Is Miss Follet at home?”

“Mr… Benson?” A shiver of unease ran down Grace’s spine. “I’m not— No, send him up.”

Alice looked warily at her. “What’s he doing here? You’re not scorning two lovers are you?”

“Don’t be silly.” Grace checked her reflection in the window and flattened a stray lock of hair. “Stay here while he talks to me.”

“And what if he has lover-like things to say?”

That was exactly the point. But he wouldn’t. No. He could not feel that way after all this time. Perhaps he never had. “Just stay, Alice.”

Footsteps sounded in the passage again, and the footman led Mr Benson into the room. It felt instantly too small and cramped, but Grace did not wish to move to the drawing room where Uncle Bernard was snoozing by the fire. She gave Benson a brief curtsy. Alice did not move from her chair. Benson gave her a reproving glance but said nothing of her rudeness; he always had been a little afraid of Alice.

“Good morning, Miss Follet.” He took a short breath. “Miss Alice.”

“Oh good morning, vicar,” Alice said sweetly.

Benson plucked at his collar. “I deliberated at length before making this call. I did not know whether my presence would hurt or heal. But as one who — used to be — a very close friend, I wished to offer my sincere condolences in this difficult time.”

He had come to give sympathy. Grace let out a small sigh of relief. “Thank you, Mr Benson. Your condolences are appreciated.”

Having said that, the conversation might well have been politely concluded, but Benson made no move to leave. His gaze wandered curiously around the room, taking in the embroidery sampler and tooth-powder boxes, then lingering on the fruit cake. Alice moved the cake plate silently into her lap.

Benson looked at Grace, meeting her eyes in silence. After an awkward moment, none too long, his gaze drifted sideways. He seemed at a loss for what to say, but equally lost as to the direction of the door. Eventually, he placed a hand over the black band on his arm.

“I, too, understand what it is to lose one dear to one’s heart,” he said. “The sorrow, the grief, the… sadness.” He sighed deeply. “But it was your father’s time. He was called to God. You must take solace in that. Indeed, there is joy to be found in the reflection that in departing this mortal world, our dearest have gone to God.”

Alice rolled her eyes. Grace tried to think of a polite way to get rid of him. But Benson was warming to his theme. He parted his feet and looked down his chin at her, as he might while standing on the pulpit and addressing his congregation.

“And I hope it will give you some peace to know that even though I personally have no reason to love your esteemed father, I have been unsparing my prayers for him and for your family. And you of course. I may no longer have the liberty of calling you dear to me, but that does not mean I would wish to spurn you God’s aid in your trials. Indeed, those who have wounded me most are those for whom I must beg the most mercy.”

“That is most magniloquent of you,” Grace said.

“I should hope to be.” Benson stroked his throat, watching her. “Pray tell me, how did he die? It was rather sudden, wasn’t it? Rather a shock?”

“The doctor said it was his heart.”

Benson shook his head. “Dreadful, dreadful. He was not very old. And now he leaves you, and your poor young sisters, quite unprotected in the world.”

“Our mother is still alive,” Alice said sweetly. “She’s probably upstairs.”

Benson coughed. “I mean, unprotected by a male, quite at the mercy of the world. What a tragedy it is that Mr Follet did not leave behind a son to look after his daughters.”

“I suppose it is lucky, then, that we have two brothers-in-law, and that I am engaged,” Grace said.

“As far as I’m concerned, we’ve a surplus of men,” Alice said.

Benson shot her an uncertain half-smile. “It can feel so, yes, indeed I think it can, when the one you wish most to be here never shall be again.”

“Or when you simply wish—” Alice broke off as a knock came at the door. It was the footman again.

“Mr Redwood is here for Miss Follet,” he said.

Benson stiffened, and Alice grinned. Grace faltered; she could not refuse to see James in front of Benson. Not after she had just called herself engaged.

“Please bring him up,” she said.

“Mr Redwood is a pillar of support amidst the storm of your tragedy, I suppose?” Benson said.

“Oh, he calls every day,” said Alice.

Grace thought that Benson might leave, but he only moved to face the door, his back against a wall. When James entered, he stared at Benson, then looked enquiringly to Grace. Everybody seemed to be looking at her, and the room felt very small and overcrowded. A wave of dizzying heat rushed over her. If only James hadn’t called. If only Benson would leave. If only Alice wasn’t grinning like that.

Embarrassment compelled her to break the silence.

“James,” she said. “James.” That seemed highly inadequate, and Benson was watching her the way a cat watches a bird in a cage. She could not let him suspect how she felt about James. She crossed the room and took James’s hand with both of hers. “You’re here.”

He looked at her through narrow blue eyes, then at Benson and Alice. “We are all here, it seems.”

His tone was chill. Benson looked rather smug and knowing. Grace took a deep breath and played with James’s fingers in what she hoped was a lover-like fashion. He was wearing gloves, so it did not feel lover-like, but perhaps it would look it to Benson. James watched her hands then raised his gaze to hers, looking troubled. He looked down again, then raised her hand to his lips and kissed it. It surprised Grace entirely, and, as it is with surprises, her heart skittered.

James let her hand drop. “I remember you. Benson.”

Benson raised his eyebrows. “I am surprised. Given the state you were in when we met, your recollection must be clouded.”

“Not at all. It is clear as crystal. But now is not the time to reminisce.” James crossed the room in two steps and picked up the broken umbrella standing in the corner with the pell-mell mallets. “You can borrow this one, Benson.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Well, it is beginning to rain. Did you ride, or have you a cart?”

“As it happens, I walked from the inn. My carriage is there.”

“Walking is very healthful,” James murmured. “I fancy it would do my calves good to take the stairs once more. I will see you out.”

Benson looked to Grace. She felt overwhelmed and suddenly very tired. “Yes, thank you for your condolences, Mr Benson,” she said. “I will pass your kind thoughts on to our mother. Goodbye.”

Alice fluttered lazy fingers in his direction. James looked pointedly at him. Benson hesitated, then slipped past James and out into the hall. James followed, carrying the umbrella. Grace sank down onto a chair, while Alice went to the window and looked out.

“That was rather sporting of James,” she said reluctantly. “I suppose he’s not all bad. But what for does a man go speaking of his calves in public?”

“What does James do anything for?” Grace said wearily. “You can leave, Alice. I don’t want you here when James and I talk.”

Alice pressed her face to the glass. “I want to see Benson leave. I want to know he’s gone. He was rubbing salt in our wounds. And I used to like him.” She fell silent for a few moments. “They’re taking a long time to get to the front door. Do you suppose they’re fighting over you? Who would win? —No, here is Benson. He’s walking very fast. That umbrella is missing a spoke. Alright, I’m off. You can enjoy James on your own.”

Grace buried her face in her hands. She would not be able to avoid James now. Sure enough, shortly after, there was a step and he entered the room. Grace lifted her face. He was leaning against the door, looking displeased.

“I take it you haven’t actually changed your mind, and the display of hand-mangling was only for Benson’s pleasure?”

“I didn’t want him to suspect.”

James stripped his gloves and shoved them into his pocket. “Well, at least you’re speaking to me.”

“I’m not marrying you.”

James sighed and sat down on the bench. “One day, I’m going to teach you how to hold hands properly.”

The remark made Grace’s hand tingle where James had kissed it. She rubbed at the spot furiously, feeling betrayed by herself. Her hand had been kissed by dozens of men. James was no different. And it had only been a display anyway.

“I suppose you’re jealous of Benson,” she said.

“Not at all. It was clear you wanted to get rid of him even more than you want to get rid of me.” James ruffled his forelock; it was getting too long and hung rather in his eyes. “What happened between the two of you?”

“We were engaged. And then I decided… we should not marry.”

James crossed his legs and looked thoughtfully at her. “Tell me about it.”

“You’re just curious.”

“Am I not allowed to be curious about you now? I am. I can see you don’t love him, but you clearly feel something strongly for him — not anger, no.” James shook his head. “That’s all on his side, isn’t it? He didn’t take kindly to you turning him down.”

Grace’s cheeks flamed. “He was a perfect gentleman. He did not call every day against my wishes.”

“Should I leave?” James got to his feet. “I will go now if that is what you wish. But I will be here again tomorrow. Every day, until I am sure you are speaking from truth and not from grief.”

He stood there, waiting for an answer. Grace looked away, unable to speak.

“Very well then,” James said after a long silence. “Until tomorrow.”

“No.” Her fingers trembled. “Stay.”

Slowly, James sat down again.

“Do you think Benson hates me?” Grace asked.

“Not hate, no. He’s angry. I think you hurt his pride gravely when you sent him away. Or perhaps you still hurt his pride in some way. Men are prideful creatures.”

His tone was soft but frank. Grace rested her cheek on her palm and looked at him. There was something about the set of his mouth that reminded her a little of the night they had become engaged, something guarded about his eyes.

“I’ve hurt your pride,” she said.

“It was due for a pricking.”

It was unexpectedly gracious of him. Grace rubbed her cheek. If it came to it, she was not without her own pride. Benson would not be able to make her feel as ashamed and uncertain as she did if she had just a little more natural humility.

“Benson was always so sweet to me,” she said quietly. “I was so sure he loved me.”

James looked surprised. “But now… you’re not sure?”

Grace shrugged. She turned her gaze to the cake plate and ground a brandy-sodden crumb flat into the china. “My father said George wanted to marry money.” Her voice wavered but did not break. “As though any of us want to marry poor.”

“He forbade you from marrying Benson.”

“No.” Tears pricked her eyes. “He did no such thing. He only told me that I was a… a blind little fool to believe that George loved me, and not my dowry. And I was sure my father was wrong. At first, I was so certain, because I loved George so much.” Now her voice broke and she had to swallow several times. “But then I began to see that my loving him was no proof that he loved me.”

“Did you ask him?”

She shook her head. “How could I? Would I even have believed what he had to say? No. I could not be certain of him, so I sent him away.” She wiped her eyes. “What really hurts is that I still don’t know what is true. I don’t know if my father was right, and Benson played me for a fool, or if he was wrong, and I turned away a man who truly loved me.”

She risked meeting James’s eyes and found that he was watching her with an expression of intolerable pity on his face. She shuddered to see it.

“What do you think?” she demanded. “Did he love me, or was my father right?”

“I can’t possibly know.”

“You must have an opinion. I know you do.”

James hesitated. “Your father was a hard man to fool, Grace.”

Grace’s lip trembled. She bit down hard on it. “He might have been wrong.”

“He might have been.”

It did not sound like James believed it. Grace buried her face once more in her hands and held her breath to keep from sobbing. She did not believe it either, not anymore. Perhaps she had never believed it. But she wanted to.

A touch at her shoulder told her that James was standing over her. He stroked her hair. She managed to breathe out slowly. Tears were leaking hotly through her fingers and running down her wrists. She did not want James to see them, even though she knew he already must have, because she felt that he would understand if he did that they were not tears for her father, nor even tears for Benson, but tears for herself for having been fooled, and that seemed more shameful, even, than the act of being fooled.

“Please go,” she whispered through her hands. “Please. Leave me.”

His hand froze on her crown. “Are you sure?”

“Yes. Go.” She cleared her throat. “Now, please.”

“As you wish.” He stepped away from her. “I’ll be back again tomorrow, of course.”

“I may not see you.”

“I know. I’ll be here anyway.”

His footsteps moved away, then the door opened and gently shut again. Grace raised her head and went to the window in time to see him trot out down the garden drive, blurred by her tears and by the rain on the window. He did not look back at the house as he left, but she had noticed he never did.

__

A/N 16-11-2021: I’m not even sure how long updates are taking me right now, frankly… I don’t wanna know!! D: but there is progress, however slow, behind the scenes. I promise.

Chapter Twenty-Three: A Dog Collar

James left Grace’s house feeling thoughtful and just a little hurt. He had known that there had been some history with Benson, something beyond the ordinary sort of history that might be expected of an ex-lover. He had not suspected the truth would be so plain and simple: Benson had been a fortune-hunter, Mr Follet had seen through him, and Grace had been so hurt by the discovery that even now she had not recovered, even now, she hoped to believe the best in Benson.

James was not so kind: while walking Benson down the stairs and out the front door, he had had a terse, quiet conversation with him. Opera singers had been mentioned. As had locks on balconies, unwritten laws of gentlemanly conduct, and, quite casually and half-truthfully, the number of hours James spent each week at the boxing club. Benson had been smiling and opaque: Mr Redwood must be misremembering, Mr Redwood must have quite mistaken the matter, Mr Redwood surely could not think so of a humble country vicar. Every denial he had uttered had made James only more certain that he was a liar. Now that James knew his true history with Grace, he wished he had given in to temptation and kicked Benson down the front steps instead of only warning him off.

He was so angry with Benson that it almost took the sting away from the hurt he felt at Grace’s behaviour. It was one thing for her to scorn him for days on end — that he well understood — but he could not like that she had held his hand so obviously only to prove something to Benson. Yes, he had played along, but only for the sake of her pride. Feigned affection made him uncomfortable. He had rather be honestly disliked by a woman than be subject to false, soft touches. And he had not suspected Grace to be capable of such deception.

At dinner that night, he told his parents that Grace had, at last, deigned to see him.

“She must be feeling a little better then,” Mr Redwood said. “Did she look well?”

“She looked thin and angry. And she told me that she will not marry me.”

“Then you must change her mind,” said Mrs Redwood.

“It is not that easy, Mother.”

“Have you tried giving her flowers?” Mr Redwood asked.

“No, I have not.”

“I don’t see the point in flowers,” Mrs Redwood said. “They’ll be dead in a week. He needs to give her something real, preferably something expensive.”

“I doubt I can buy her affection — and if I could, I would not want it.”

“It is not to buy her affection,” Mr Redwood said. “It is to prove your affection for her.”

“I think there is better proof,” James said.

“And what would that proof be?” Mr Redwood raised an eyebrow. “James?”

He trailed his fork through his carrots and gravy. He cared for Grace. He was sorry for her. He suspected she knew that already. He suspected she did not care.

“James?”

“I just don’t think giving her presents is going to improve the situation.”

“You won’t know unless you try it,” Mrs Redwood said. “Personally, I think something practical would be best, like very nice soap.”

James shuddered. “I give you soap for Christmas every second year.”

“And it is a very good present.”

“But what one gives one’s mother as a matter of course is hardly likely to persuade a woman to romance,” Mr Redwood said. “I should as soon recommend James give her a tobacco pouch.”

“That would be very silly,” Mrs Redwood said. “But if you must have it your way, how about a neat little work box?”

“Grace already has one,” James objected. “And she does not find embroidery amusing.”

“But it can be very practical.”

“I believe the object for a present is to be impractical and enjoyable,” Mr Redwood said. “Which is why I suggested flowers.”

“Very well,” James said. “I’ll pluck her a bunch of nettles from the hedgerow.”

He did, in fact, find some pretty spear thistles blooming by the roadside on his walk to Grace’s house the next day, and he plucked them for her. Once again, however, she refused to see him, and as he walked home he flung them back into the ditch from which he had plucked them.

Two weeks passed, and Grace remained as stubbornly unapproachable as ever. Some days, she deigned to speak to James, to inform him that she would not marry him no matter how many times he came grovelling, or to rant about her Uncle Bernard who had still not left the Follet’s house even though it meant travelling for an hour to get to his office in the Temple every day. Most days, she refused to see him at all. One of those days, James was surprised, upon returning home, to find his father waiting at the front door with a horse saddled and ready for him.

“I want you to go to London for me, and collect something I have purchased from Schiaparelli’s.”

Schiaparelli was a well-known jeweller. James looked suspiciously at his father. “What is this something?”

“A dog collar.”

“I don’t think you’ve got the neck for it. Too scraggy.”

“It is for Grace.”

“Mother will be jealous.”

“Mother approved.” Mr Redwood raised his cane and tapped James gently on the chest. “We have tried it your way and it has not worked. Let’s try it mine.”

James kicked his heel on the step. “I really don’t think it’s a good idea.”

“I have paid for it and arranged everything already. All you need to do is to collect the necklace and bring it home. And if it doesn’t work, and she rejects it, you will have lost nothing and I will have lost forty pounds.”

“Forty pounds? Father, that’s beyond extravagant!”

“I have saved a great deal from cutting your allowance,” Mr Redwood pointed out. “Besides, it will be worth it if Grace forgives you.”

“I don’t want a woman to forgive me for forty pounds,” James grumbled. “It puts an ugly taste in my mouth.”

“Then you are free to hope she does not.” Mr Redwood passed the horse’s reins to James. “But you will go and collect the necklace regardless. I would go myself, but my rheumatism has been very bad of late.”

At least it was an excuse to go to London. James was beginning to feel hemmed in at home. He looked down at his fawn trousers. “Just let me change into riding clothes first.”

Halfway to London, it began to rain. James reached the jewellery shop on Bond Street bedraggled and wet. When he introduced himself to a clerk, Mr Schiaparelli himself went to get the order and showed it to James.

It was no mere dog collar. It was a delicate band of whorling gold shaped like vines and set at intervals with little pale yellow stones in the shape of flowers.

“Please tell me those aren’t diamonds,” James begged.

“Citrine, sir,” Mr Schiaparelli said reproachfully.

That did not sound as expensive as diamonds, even if it looked it.

“Is the necklace satisfactory?” Mr Schiaparelli asked.

“Oh it’s quite beautiful,” James said, disgusted. Too beautiful really — and he did not think it suited Grace. She had simpler taste. There was a four-stranded collar of red coral in the display case that would look rather sweet on her. But James had no money for such a present, and, even if he did, he would not have bought it for the purpose of gaining Grace’s affection. Affection bought was not affection at all.

Mr Schiaparelli carefully arranged the necklace in a velvet box, then wrapped that in brown paper. The whole arrangement took a great deal of time, and much more paper and string than James had imagined. He leaned against the counter, eyeing the red coral necklace and wondering if Grace would have liked it. The bell rang as another customer entered the shop.

“—a moment!” she called to someone outside. “Now, that charming— why, James!”

James started and turned around. The voice had not been instantly recognizable to him, but the pretty, round-cheeked face it belonged to was: Martha Bertram, an old lover of his, on-and-off, whenever she grew bored of her husband. She came close and presented her gloved hand for him to kiss. He bent politely over it, aware of Mr Schiaparelli watching them.

“I haven’t seen you in simply forever,” she said. “I hear that you’re engaged.”

“I am.”

“Congratulations.” She laughed. “Caught at last.”

“In a matter of speaking.” James was aware of Mr Schiaparelli’s unnerving eye still upon them. “I say, is that parcel finished yet?”

“Of course, sir.” Mr Schiaparelli gave him the parcel with a slight bow. “That necklace seems to have caught your eye. Would you like to see it more closely?”

“No, I would not,” James said firmly. “Thank you.” He went to the door, nodding at Martha. “Good day, Mrs Bertram.”

“But wait!” Martha trotted after him as he left the shop, pausing in the doorway out of the rain. “Now, really, James. I want to know all about your engagement.”

“There isn’t much to know.” James struggled to squeeze the parcel into his breast pocket. It was too wide. He stuffed it inside his waistcoat instead and took up his horse’s reins from the lamppost he had tied them to. “Good day, Mrs Bertram.”

“Is that for her?” Martha asked, immune, as always, to a snub. “You never bought me anything. Oh, come home with me and tell me all about her. You can rest your horse in my stables. It’s dreadful weather for riding. And I want to know about your engagement.”

There was nothing in her voice but friendship, and it was raining rather hard. James closed his ears to the quiet voice inside his head that told him this was a bad idea. He needed company. Company that wasn’t Grace, or her miserable sisters and mother, or his parents. He needed a friendly ear.

“Very well then. I’ll follow along behind your carriage.”

When they arrived at the Bertrams’ house and settled down in the drawing room with tea and cakes, James found that Mr Bertram was out. He had gone to Bath until Christmas, Martha complained.

“Leaving me alone with the baby,” she said bitterly, “and taking Eddie and Charlotte with him to visit his mother.”

Eddie and Charlotte were Martha’s two eldest children, of ten and twelve respectively.

“You’ve another baby,” James said. “Then you deserve congratulations too.”

Martha gave a rather wobbly smile. “I only came out of confinement last week. It was very difficult this time. I was so sick with the baby all through spring that I couldn’t enjoy the season at all. Then I was confined early — I was quite unwell. I’ve hardly spoken to a single soul since August who doesn’t say ‘ga-ga’ or ‘yes, ma’am’. Which makes it so cruel of Bertram to go and visit his mother and take the children with him. He might at least have left me Charlotte. I went shopping just to speak to someone human. I’m so glad I found you.”

“I don’t know what good I’ll be,” James said. “I’m in a foul mood too, truth be told.”

“Really?” Martha sat forward on the couch, perking up. That was one thing James liked about her. After a violent discontent, she was always immediately prepared to be cheerful again. “Do tell.”

Somehow, James found himself telling her the story of his engagement from the beginning — how he had been set upon by some unknown ruffians and beaten, how his parents had seen fit to engage him to Grace, who did not suit him at all, how after a month of stifling courtship her father had died, leaving Grace grieving and angry with him, and how his father had arranged for the ridiculous necklace to buy her affection back.

“My goodness,” Martha said. “That’s such a sad tale, darling.”

“It’s unfortunate,” James said, a little unsettled by the casual darling.

“But, no, really, to be set upon like that by ruffians — who hired them?”

James shrugged. “It has long ceased to matter. No one has claimed responsibility. It’s not surprising. Having attacked me in such a cowardly manner, they would not.”

“But you might have been killed!” Martha placed a hand over her heart. “The thought of it!”

“I was not,” James said.

“Still!” Martha sighed deeply. “And that poor woman — I do pity her, but she doesn’t have to take it out on you.”

“She has reason enough to be angry with me. I wasn’t good to her.” James felt suddenly embarrassed. He had not told Martha about his efforts to rid himself of Grace. He was too disgusted with himself to speak of it, even though Martha, always ready with sympathy, would be unlikely to condemn him for it.

“You really don’t like her?” Martha said musingly. “You ought to break the engagement then — I know men are supposed to be honour-bound not to, but, James, really, you’re not the kind of man who could suffer an unhappy marriage. I mean, Bertram and I, we get along well enough at intervals and ignore each other the rest of the time, but you’re not like that. You’re so romantic you can’t abide the idea.”

“I’m not romantic!”

“You most certainly are. I remember the time you gave me a rose carved from ice so that it would melt and Bertram would never know — and that was in summer! I never knew how you managed it.”

“I bought a block of ice from an ice man and had my cook carve it.”

“It was still very romantic. You can’t marry her.”

There was something vaguely irritating about told he couldn’t marry Grace, something almost more irritating than being told he must. James shrugged.

Martha leaned back on the couch and regarded him from under her lashes. “James,” she said. “You’re frowning, and I don’t like it when you frown.”

“I beg your pardon then.”

“Why don’t you come to bed with me, like the old times, and forget about Miss Follet for a while?”

The quiet voice of doubt that James had earlier ignored now said, very loudly, I told you so. James stared at Martha. For a heartbeat, he was disgusted by her, by her guileless blue eyes and the frothy white lace of her dress about her plump, eager body. The blood pounded in his head and he felt sick. It wasn’t her. It was him. He knew exactly who she was and what she wanted from him, and he had come here anyway.

“My god,” he said. “What am I doing here?”

“James?”

He stumbled to his feet and almost ran to the door. “I can’t do that to Grace. I should not be here. I should never have come.”

“She’ll never know,” Martha said.

“I’ll know.” James took a deep breath. “Dear, dear Martha, once upon a time, I loved you. Or something close enough to it, for the both of us. But things have changed and I… I just can’t do that to Grace. Or to me.”

Martha bit her bottom lip, perplexed. “Well if that’s how it is,” she said indifferently. “I wish you happy, James. I wish both you and Miss Follet as happy as you can be.”

James couldn’t tell if she meant it or not. He bowed and left the house. He was halfway to Richmond before his head cleared enough to remember the necklace, bumping against his chest. He turned around and headed back towards the jewellery shop. Mr Schiaparelli looked at him in surprise when he entered.

“I want to return this,” James said, dropping the necklace on the counter.

“But your father ordered it specifically.”

“I want to return it,” James said firmly.

“Why, sir?”

“It doesn’t suit.”

The old man slit open the carefully wrapped paper and took the necklace from the box. He examined it very carefully in the light. “It looks in order,” he said reluctantly. “But your father is the man I do business with. You are just the courier, as far as I am concerned.”

“It is a present for my future wife,” James said. “And I tell you, it does not suit. I do not want it. I will not give it to her. I am not taking it.”

__

A/N 2020-01-06: Wait, it’s 2022 already? Did I start this one in 2021 or 2020? It feels like I’ve been writing it forever. Anyway, I’m going to finish it this year, quite definite. Hopefully soon.

Chapter Twenty-Four: The Ends of the Earth

While James was returning the necklace to Mr Schiaparelli, Grace was pacing the floor of her mother’s sitting room, strangely discontent. Alice and Emma were playing pell-mell outside in the drizzle. Uncle Bernard had gone to London for the day to attend to business. The house was quiet and peaceful. Yet she was not at peace.

She tried to read a book, found she could not concentrate, and gave up. Tried to mend some shifts, found she was bored, and stopped. The sound of laughter and thwacking mallets came floating through the window, disturbing her thoughts. She was not sure it was proper to play pell-mell in mourning. Had Mother said it was alright? Did she even know?

Listlessly, Grace trailed around the house looking for her mother. She found her in the study, hunched over a pile of papers at Mr Follet’s desk. Mrs Follet was so absorbed in her task that she did not even hear Grace come in.

“Mother?”

Mrs Follet jumped and looked up. “Oh! Yes, dear?”

Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes strangely bright. Grace had never seen her mother cry before, and at first was too confused and embarrassed to know what to say.

“Are you… crying?”

“No. Not really.” Mrs Follet rubbed her face. “I’m fine, dearest.”

“I can tell you’re crying.” Grace came closer and leaned over the desk. “What is it?” She flicked through the papers. “Letters about houses?”

“Yes, and I’m afraid I just don’t know what to do.” Mrs Follet’s voice shook. “Your father used to make all the decisions for us. I never had to do this kind of thing.”

Grace could think of nothing to say and, awkwardly, patted her mother’s hand.

“Uncle Bernard tries to help,” Mrs Follet said. “He went through all the sums with me, to find what I could afford. And he gives me very good advice. But I just don’t think… I’m just not quite sure he understands how I feel.”

“All of his advice is to suit his own purposes.”

“Your uncle is a good man, Grace.”

“He may be a good man, but he will not baulk to take this house and send us all away.”

“As is his right, dear. No, I must be grateful to him. He has recommended me a cottage in Kent, which he says a friend of his will let at a good price.” She gave Grace a faint smile. “He says it is near the sea. Wouldn’t that be nice?”

“Kent. That’s the other side of London. How far would we be from everyone we know?”

Mrs Follet faltered. “I think it must be some thirty or forty miles. A great distance, to be sure, but I think James could make it in a day.”

“I was not thinking of James.” Would he really come so far only to be sent away? She shook her head. “I don’t understand why Uncle Bernard gets the house. Father could have left it to you. It is not a grand estate, but it is our home.”

“I wouldn’t know what to do with it, Grace.”

“You’ve been doing it for thirty years.”

Mrs Follet was quiet for a long moment. “It does not matter. Your father didn’t leave it to me.”

“But why not?”

“He was not that sort of man. He believed that women and men moved in different spheres. Managing property is outside a woman’s sphere.”

“But he wasn’t…” Grace bit her tongue. “He could not have thought what would happen, he could not have imagined he would die.”

“I believe he thought that it was wisest to leave it to his brother,” Mrs Follet said gently. “And really, Grace, I don’t mind. I trust Bernard to help us. This house in Kent is within my means. It has an orchard. I’m sure… I’m sure if Uncle Bernard says it is good, it must be.”

Grace watched her mother carefully. The thin line was between her brows and her eyes were still bright. Alice or Emma might have hugged her and taken that brightness away, but Grace had never quite been on those terms with her mother somehow.

“Perhaps.” Grace pushed herself away from the desk. “I’m going for a walk.”

She slipped out the back gate and crossed the fields as a misty rain struck up in the breeze. She knew where she was going but took a circuitous route to get there, reversing her course several times down long, lonely roads. When her legs were tired, when the sky was dark and her body cold, she drew up shivering at her destination and knocked on the door.

“Can I speak with Mr Redwood?” she asked the footman who opened it.

“Mr James is not at home,” he answered.

That made it easier. “It’s, um, that’s not the Mr Redwood I wish to speak to. It’s his father.”

The footman looked briefly surprised but crossed directly to the door just off the front hall, knocked, and opened it.

“Who is it?” came Mr Redwood’s voice.

“Miss Follet, sir. To see you.”

There was a brief silence. “Well, let her in then.”

The footman beckoned Grace forward and she rather shyly entered the room. Mr Redwood’s study was very different to her father’s. The curtains were open to let the last of the dying light inside. A cheerful fire burned in the grate. Rather than severe ancestors, paintings of landscapes and prints of political cartoons lined the walls. Mr Redwood was at his desk, smoking a pipe and playing solitaire.

“This is a pleasant surprise,” he said. “Please, sit.”

Grace sat down in the nearest armchair, which was very lumpy and shabby, and full of cushions. It was impossible to sit upright in it. The divots and lumps caved in beneath her, sending her sliding back against the cushions. She pulled herself forward and perched uneasily on the very edge of the seat.

Mr Redwood prised himself to his feet and hobbled to the fire, where he knocked out his pipe into the grate. “Does the smoke bother you? Should I open a window?”

“No, no. Not at all.”

“Would you like some tea?”

“No, thank you.”

“I think I’m going to have coffee. Are you sure you won’t join me?”

“Oh. Um. Alright, then. Thank you.”

Mr Redwood went to the door and gave a brief order to the footman. Grace found herself slipping back in the armchair and pushed herself up to the edge again. It was a sleeping armchair, she thought; someone had slept in it so much that they had left a hollow where their body had lain, and now it was no longer right for sitting. But it might look strange if she were to move to a different chair, and she did not want Mr Redwood to think she was strange.

Mr Redwood came back and lowered himself into the other armchair opposite her. He sank back into it a little, but he was taller than she and managed not to look ridiculous. “Now that we are both comfortable,” he said. “What brought you here, Grace? Is it about James?”

“No, it’s not him.” Grace swallowed. “It is Uncle Bernard, sir. He inherits the house so we must leave. And he says that he has found my mother and sisters a nice cottage in Kent and I do not trust him. I do not think it right that my mother accepts his opinion on the matter without… without any kind of check and… And I just wish… I wish she would stand up to him.”

She found herself slipping back in the chair and leaned on the armrests to stay upright. Mr Redwood was frowning at her as though displeased. She wondered if she had been wrong to come here.

“I may be worried about nothing,” Grace said. “I may be making a fool of myself—”

“Nonsense,” Mr Redwood said. “You’ve every right to be concerned.”

It was a relief, somehow, to hear it.

“Has he given your mother any idea about when he expects you to vacate the house?’

“He did tell us that we were free to stay as long as needed. But at the same time, it is very clear to me that he wishes us to go. I think he has made Mother nervous about it.” She shook her head. “I know he has. But it is this cottage that bothers me the most. He says a friend of his will let it to us cheaply, but all we know of the cottage is what his friend has written about it. And we are strangers to Kent. We know nobody there.”

“I’d like to see the particulars myself,” Mr Redwood said. “I can advise your mother on any matter of business. Do tell her that.”

“She has put it all in my uncle’s hands. And I do not trust him.”

“Why not?” Mr Redwood asked. “He seemed a rather genial fellow.”

“Oh, he is,” Grace said bitterly. “He never loses his temper. He’s too lazy to bother to be angry about anything.”

“Hm. I see. Not the type of man I would wish to be looking after my affairs. We must do better.”

It was such a relief to hear this that Grace lost her grip on the arms and sank backwards into the pile of cushions. A smile hovered about Mr Redwood’s eyes. She strongly suspected she looked ridiculous.

“On the first matter, you know, your mother must not accept that house without knowing what it is truly like. I will send James to look over it. He can leave tomorrow.”

“Where am I going?”

Grace jumped, and slid even further back in the chair. James stood in the doorway in damp breeches and muddy boots, looking tired and cross.

“Kent,” Mr Redwood said.

“In this weather?” James scowled.

“The matter is urgent. Either I go, or you do.”

James rubbed his face. “And so I go.” He sounded annoyed. He turned, as if to leave, but a maid carrying a tray slipped past him into the room. He pivoted on a heel and followed her. When she set down the tray on a table near the armchairs, James sprawled himself expectantly on the floor nearby like a dog. “Another cup, please, Jenny.”

“Get a chair, James,” Mr Redwood said, leaning forward to pour the coffee.

“She’s in mine.” James turned his scowl to Grace. “You’ll push the lumps out of where I want them.”

A moment ago, Grace would have taken any excuse to leave. Now, she wriggled up towards the edge of the seat so she could take her cup of coffee. “You were not here. It needs reupholstering.”

“I like it the way it is.”

Mr Redwood shook his head helplessly. “Meanwhile, Grace, I will call upon your mother tomorrow, and your uncle if he is there. I will impose upon them both the folly of making rash decisions at a time like this.”

“Thank you. Thank you so much, Mr Redwood.”

“It is quite alright. Your father was a very close friend of mine. I should have done more before now to look out for you. Unfortunately, I was preoccupied with other matters.” His gaze flicked to James then back again. “I want you to know, Grace, that regardless of what happens between you and James, I will always be available should you need assistance or advice.”

It was obviously meant to be kind — it was kind — but it only made Grace feel unpleasantly obligated to James. Even if she had broken their engagement, it was only because of their engagement that Mr Redwood was offering her help now. She sipped her coffee unhappily.

The maid returned with another cup for James and he poured his own coffee and drank. He did not seem in the mood to talk. He kept darting sullen glances at his father and clenching his jaw. There was something going on between them, Grace realized, but she was too upset to spare any thoughts for it. Now that her immediate fears were relieved, she had to concentrate quite hard not to let herself cry. The coffee helped.

Mr Redwood looked at his watch. “We have dinner in half-an-hour. Would you like to dine with us, Grace, or would you like to go home?”

She shook her head. “I want to go home, thank you.”

“Then James will drive you.”

Grace might have refused, but she caught the exasperated roll of James’s eyes and saw personal insult in it. Besides, it was black outside now, and she could hear the faint patter of rain.

Mr Redwood called for the curricle and they drank more coffee while they waited for it to be readied. James asked his father what he was to do in Kent, and Mr Redwood explained the matter briefly, leaving Grace free to concentrate on not crying.

“When are you going to take care of the other matter?” Mr Redwood asked at the end. “Not tonight, I think. But do not delay it too long.”

James drained his second cup of coffee as a groom appeared at the door. “Later, Father. We’ll talk about that later. I’ll take Grace home now.”

Grace struggled out of the armchair and said goodbye to Mr Redwood then followed James to the carriage. James didn’t say a word to her as he helped her up and directed the horses out into the road. The silence grated at Grace. It demanded filling.

“I’m sorry you have to go to Kent,” she said.

“It doesn’t matter.” James sounded as though it did matter very much indeed.

“Of course, I did wonder, if I moved to Kent, if you would ride there to visit me, the way you do now.”

“If you wanted me to, I would.”

She was stuck then. She could not say she did not want him to, because she was afraid he would take her at her word, and she could not say she did, because it was as good as agreeing they were still engaged. Perhaps she had done that already by coming to Mr Redwood tonight. Or even by getting into the curricle unchaperoned with him. It was careless of her.

“Even if you go to Kent about the house,” she said, “it doesn’t unbreak our engagement.”

James clicked his tongue. “Grace. The only reason I’m going to Kent is because as far as I’m concerned we are engaged.”

“You would not do it for a friend?” she challenged.

“Oh, I would.” James pulled up the horses and the carriage jolted to a stop. “I would go to Kent for a friend. I would go to the ends of the earth for a friend. But can I call you a friend when you refuse to speak to me six days out of seven and insult me on the seventh?”

“Because you won’t accept that I won’t marry you!”

“Because I don’t believe you really mean it!” James’s face twisted with anger. “I wish you did! God knows, I never wanted to marry you!”

The words echoed into the night. Grace stared at James. She knew it was true — knew it had been true since the night of their engagement. Knew it had never stopped being true. And she knew, too, that she had always known it, deep down, unvoiced within her. But it had not mattered. Not til now.

“Then don’t,” she said. “Don’t.” She pulled up her skirts and scrambled down from the curricle into the rain. “I’ll walk home from here.”

“I can’t let you walk home alone.”

“I don’t want to walk with you.” She looked up at him. “All I want is for you to leave me alone, James. Really. And since it’s what you want too, we should both be happy.”

__

A/N 2022-01-17: Grace really likes walking in the rain. Fortunately, she is a Regency heroine, not a Victorian one, so she will not catch chill and die.

Chapter Twenty-Five: Never Had a Chance

Grace was quite certain that she was not engaged now. James had followed her home in the curricle and then left without a word as soon as she was through the front door. Her mother had been waiting for her, tearful and anxious. All throughout dinner, she had been unable to stop exclaiming what a long walk Grace must have had, while Uncle Bernard teased Grace about her escort home. He had seen James through the window and got the wrong idea.

The next morning, Mr Redwood was as good as his word and called at eight o’clock, when Mrs Follet was barely dressed and Uncle Bernard barely awake. He took them both into the study and shut the door. The door remained shut for a long time. Even when breakfast was laid and ready, the door did not open. After breakfast, Grace, Emma, and Alice sat on the stairs, listening to the murmur of indecipherable voices from within.

“What do you think they’re talking about?” Alice asked in a hushed whisper.

“Kent,” Grace said. “I asked Mr Redwood for his help about Kent.”

Emma gave a long sigh. “It’s so nice to have a man on our side. Or men, I suppose, since you’ve got James.”

Grace rubbed her throat, where a lump was forming. “I don’t. We’re not engaged.”

Alice snorted. “How long are you going to keep him hanging, Grace? It’s cruel.”

“I’m not keeping him hanging. Last night he—” Her voice caught. “He made clear what he thinks of me.”

Alice looked surprised and Emma looked pitying. Grace turned away from them both.

“Well,” Emma said after a while. “I’m sorry.”

There was nothing else to be said, not even from Alice. As the hall clock struck eleven, the study door opened and Mr Redwood came out, Mrs Follet and Uncle Bernard behind him. Uncle Bernard looked like he had eaten something very bad but still had to compliment his hostess on her meal. The vertical line was gone from between Mrs Follet’s brows.

“You won’t stay for breakfast, Mr Redwood?” she said. “I know it’s late, but I’m sure Cook could fry some quick eggs.”

“Thank you, but I’ll be on my way. I’ve stayed longer than I intended.” He saw the girls on the stairs and bowed to them. “Good day, Mrs Follet. Remember, my door is always open.”

He hobbled out, leaning heavily on his stick.

Uncle Bernard cleared his throat. “I’ve got to get to the office,” he said. “I think I’ll stay in London tonight. Don’t expect me back.”

“Tomorrow then,” Mrs Follet said.

“Or perhaps the day after.” Uncle Bernard looked embarrassed. “I’m off then. Bye, Nell.”

He left without even mentioning the breakfast he had missed, which was very unusual for Uncle Bernard. The girls came down the stairs and crowded expectantly around Mrs Follet. She smiled at them.

“Do you know, I’m hungry. Did you eat breakfast? Is there anything left?”

There wasn’t, but Emma went to arrange for a plate and some coffee to be brought up while Alice and Grace questioned Mrs Follet.

“What is to happen about Kent?” Grace demanded.

“Oh, we’re not going to Kent.” Mrs Follet shook her head. “We’re not to leave Richmond. Mr Redwood had quite a lot to say about that. We’re to stay here and lease the house from Uncle Bernard at a very good rate until you are all married.” Her two front teeth appeared in what might have been a grin. “It is in writing.”

Grace was so relieved she had to sit down. “And Uncle Bernard won’t live here?”

“Not at all. He is only to return to take his things away. Mr Redwood pointed out that it was not really fair to crowd us in our mourning. And he said that Aunt Mary could not be happy with her husband so absent.”

“I bet she’s happier than she’s ever been,” said Alice. “Well, it’s her or us, and I’d rather it be her.”

It was a mark of Mrs Follet’s good mood that she made no attempt to reproach Alice. Grace did not remember her looking this happy very often when Mr Follet was alive. Even her dowdy black mourning could not dull the sparkle in her eyes or colour in her cheeks. Father wasn’t very good for her, Grace realized. Alice and Emma had known all along and tried to protect her, but somehow Grace had been blind to it. Even James had known. He had said something about it, the night Mr Follet died. But Grace had dismissed it, too preoccupied with her own feelings about her father to care. But perhaps she, too, had not been good for her mother. Or good to her. There had been times when she had secretly agreed with Mr Follet’s jocular criticisms of her.

Guiltily, Grace busied herself fetching a cup and saucer from the sideboard and pulling a chair out for Mrs Follet. Emma came back with the coffee pot, and Grace commandeered it from her to pour. Activity seemed more manageable than words. Perhaps Mrs Follet recognized the silent apology in it; she squeezed Grace’s hand when Grace gave her the coffee.

“Cook’s sending the rest up,” Emma said. “Is everything going to be alright now?”

“It’s going to be perfect,” said Alice. “Uncle Bernard’s going back to London and we’re going to stay here until we’re all married.” Her eyes sparkled. “I’m never going to marry.”

Emma’s eyes went wide. “Mr Redwood must have been very persuasive.”

“He used to be a barrister. I don’t think Uncle Bernard had a chance.” Mrs Follet sighed over her coffee. “Bless Mr Redwood. And bless you, Grace dear, for asking him. I never would have dared myself. I never would have even thought of it.”

---

James left for Kent that morning, before Mr Redwood had returned from the Follets, choosing to leave without speaking to Grace. There was little, he thought, that he could say. Besides, he was tired of everything and everyone, and wanted to get away, even if that meant a three-day, rainy, uncomfortable journey to Kent.

The moment he saw the cottage, he knew it would not suit. It was low-roofed, dark, and damp, more farmhouse than cottage, sprawling between fields of salt-stunted fruit trees. He left and made his muddy journey home, arriving hungry and cold on Wednesday morning. He went straight to his room to change his clothes, not even stopping to say hello to his parents in the breakfast room. To his surprise, as he was halfway through changing his shirt, he heard the thump of his father’s stick on the stairs and a moment later Mr Redwood entered the bedroom.

“The house in Kent is unsuitable,” James said, pulling his shirt over his head. “Damp, dark, overpriced.”

“Mrs Follet has decided against moving to Kent,” Mr Redwood said. “She believes that it is in the best interests of her youngest daughters to remain in Richmond, and she will wait until she can find a suitable place here. Bernard Follet, in the meantime, has returned to London.”

James wondered how long it had taken Mr Redwood to persuade Mrs Follet to it. But she was a persuadable woman. It would have been Uncle Bernard who had been the problem — but no match for Mr Redwood, certainly. He lazily decided against a coat and pulled on a dressing gown instead. “Then my journey was for nothing.”

“It was.” Mr Redwood did not look sympathetic. “Where are you going?”

James paused in the doorway, tying his dressing gown. “Breakfast. I’m hungry.”

“It can wait.”

There was steel in his father’s voice. James recognized the warning sign and slowly shut the door. “What is it?”

“Mr Schiaparelli called yesterday. He came to return a deposit I sent him for Grace’s necklace.” Mr Redwood’s eyes were cold. “He explained that you had refused to take it.”

James had almost forgotten the necklace. “Yes. I decided the necklace was not appropriate.”

“Why?”

“Because it wasn’t from me. It didn’t feel right.”

“And the young lady with whom you left the shop had nothing to do with it?”

James had forgotten that. “Oh.”

“But do go on,” Mr Redwood said acerbically. “I am sure ‘oh’ does not begin to explain your actions.”

“Nothing happened, Father.”

“You went to the lady’s home, did you not?”

“Yes, but I didn’t do anything.” James leaned wearily against the door, wishing only to end the conversation so he could go and eat breakfast. “It was a mistake for me to go with Martha, but I committed no indecency with her. I promise.”

“You promise?” Mr Redwood looked at him through narrow eyes. “But does it even matter if you are innocent? You went with her. You were seen with her. What would Grace think if she knew?”

James’s stomach jumped unpleasantly. “No. You can’t tell her.”

“The fact that you say that, James, proves that you know you have done her great wrong.”

“Nothing happened! But if you tell Grace, you’ll be needlessly hurting her. And proving nothing.”

Mr Redwood prised himself out of his stoop to stand at his full height and looked down at James. There was a heavy, unpleasant set to his mouth. “Enough has been proven already.”

“Proven? You don’t believe me.” James stared at his father. “You think I’m lying to you — have I ever told you a bald lie?”

“Yes, many times.”

That was, unfortunately, true. James kicked his heel against the door frame. “Do you think me such a coward that I would deny what was true?”

Mr Redwood lifted one shoulder in a shrug.

James looked away, feeling lost and sick. He felt that he should apologize, that that was what his father wished for. But he was too hurt to apologize. He had not done what he was suspected of. And to apologize would be accepting guilt.

“Are you going to tell Grace?” he asked at last.

“I would not. To you alone I will confine my opprobrium. I had thought that a nice, sensible, quiet girl like Grace would bring out your better nature. Now I see, James, that all I have done in my meddling is force that girl to suffer the man I am ashamed to call my son.”

By the fire in his father’s eyes, James could tell that Mr Redwood wished for the words to hurt. He was too wounded already to feel them. To be disbelieved was more hurtful than any condemnation. He met his father’s eyes without flinching.

“You were meddling,” he said. “You are still meddling. And you’re wrong. You were wrong in the beginning, and you’re wrong now.”

He yanked the door open and left the room, too upset to be hungry, too upset to care that he was still in his dressing-gown over an open shirt. His feet led him automatically down the stairs and past the open dining room door. His mother called out to him but it was only when he was through the front door that he registered it, and he realized he didn’t care. It was drizzling outside, but even a downpour would not have halted him. As it was, he had to restrain himself from running out the front gate and down the road. He maintained a brisk stride, his dressing-gown flapping at his feet and mud splashing through his slippers. After a time, he became aware that he must look ridiculous and be making a spectacle of himself, but he was too angry to care.

It did not take him long to reach Grace’s house. He went up the path and, after knocking at the door, tried it and let himself into the hall. The footman was just coming up the passage.

“I need to speak to Grace,” James said.

“I will see if Miss Follet is at home.”

There was no doubt she was there then, for the footman would have said if she were not. James ran up the stairs two at a time and went straight to the sitting-room. Grace was there, sitting at the window, a basket of mending by her side. She stood up, startled, when he burst in.

“What are you— why are you— you’re not dressed,” she said.

James shut the door behind him. “What does that matter? Aren’t we engaged?”

“I… I don’t think so. Why did you come?”

James ran his hands through his hair then rubbed his face. The ache and weariness of six days’ hard riding sank over him all at once. He was hungry, too, and cold. And he was not sure, now, why he had come here — perhaps he had just been running away. This had seemed the only place to run to.

Something pushed against his backside and he opened his eyes. The footman was peeping through the crack in the door.

“He came up before I could stop him. Should I take him away, Miss Follet?”

“No. No, it’s fine, Mark. Why don’t you sit down, James?” Grace put her hand on his arm and pushed him towards a chair. “You’re getting mud all over the carpet. Oh! You’re not even wearing shoes!”

James slumped into the seat. “I know. I’ve two stones in one slipper and three in the other.”

Grace gave him a prim, disapproving look then turned and left the room. She was not gone long. When she returned, she carried a pair of clean men’s house slippers and a small towel. She dropped them in James’s lap. He stared at the slippers. A.F. was embroidered on the toes.

“They were your father’s?”

“He does not need them now.”

“Is it alright for me to wear them? You won’t mind? Your mother won’t?”

“No one will mind. What on earth are you doing here? Why aren’t you properly dressed?”

No other woman James knew would greet him like that if he turned up on her doorstep in a dressing gown. Except perhaps his mother. Only his mother’s eyes wouldn’t have had that shadow of worry to them and her tone would have been more angry than confused.

James peeled off his damp slippers and dried his feet. “I’ve just come back from my useless expedition to Kent. The house there was awful, by the way. If we’re not engaged, you owe me for that. You owe enough to give me breakfast.”

“You went to Kent. I thought you were avoiding me.”

“I did. I was.” James put aside the towel and, rather uneasily, pulled on Mr Follet’s slippers. “Eggs and ham?”

“Coffee and bread.” Grace pulled the bell cord. “Uninvited, unexpected guests can’t ask more than that. You still haven’t explained what you’re doing here.” Her gaze went to his open shirt collar then darted away. “In your dressing gown with no cravat or waistcoat.”

James raised his hand to the collar of his dressing-gown to pull it closer then paused. There was the suggestion of a blush on Grace’s cheeks, and it intrigued him. He dropped his hand. Anger and hurt still pounded in his belly, but the blush was a pleasant distraction from them. It belied the severity of her words. Mrs Booth, now, she would have been all useless sympathy and pale cheeks. This was much more interesting — and somehow more appealing.

James sat up straighter. “I come here wounded, Grace. I come here to seek the comfort of a sympathetic woman.”

The corner of Grace’s mouth tightened, like she was suppressing a smile. “I’m afraid my mother is occupied just now.”

“She’s not the one I’m seeking.”

Grace’s faint colour deepened. James waited to see what she would say — some sharp condemnation? Some half-flirtatious joke? — but she said nothing until a maid opened the door, and then she only ordered coffee and rolls with butter. When the maid left, Grace resumed her seat by the window and carefully folded her mending away. James waited in silence. Had they lost the moment? Had he misjudged it?

“You must have left home in a hurry,” Grace said at last. “What happened, James?”

“I fought with my father. I had to get away.”

She had a ball of half-ravelled wool in her hands and was slowly, rhythmically winding it. “I know that feeling. I normally wait to be dressed before I indulge it.”

“All the greater my misfortune.”

Grace dropped the ball of wool. It rolled slowly across the floor, unwinding as it went. James stooped and picked it up and began to rewind it, very careful to keep his eyes averted from Grace. He was beginning to flirt. He did not know where the urge came from. Grace had encouraged none of it, certainly. But there she was, neither sympathetic nor carping. Slight combative, perhaps, but not in an unkind way. It was vexingly provocative.

James tried to check the provocation by speaking rationally. “It was a pretty bad argument, actually. My father accused me of doing something I did not do, and would not believe me when I told him so. In my anger, I came here. God knows why. The last time we spoke, we argued. I’ve a habit of burning bridges, of late.” He came to a snarl in the wool and tried to jiggle it out. “Will you let me mend one? I’m sorry.”

Grace was silent. James risked raising his eyes to look at her. She was playing with another ball of wool, sinking her fingers into it and releasing them the way a cat kneads a cushion.

“Grace?”

“You said that I was not your friend,” she said slowly. “Did you mean it?”

“Did I? I did, didn’t I?” The snarl in the wool came loose and James finished winding it, tucking the loose end under. It would be easy to lie, to tell her that he had not meant it, that he had only been tired and speaking out of temper, but somehow James was in no mood for even half-lies. “I want to be friends with you, Grace. I’ve been trying, lately, but you’ve responded to my attempts with coldness and anger. Perhaps I started trying too late. Perhaps we can never be friends. That night, I said what I felt.”

The colour deepened in her cheeks. “Then you meant it.”

A silence took over the room. James had the feeling again that he had misjudged the moment. Misjudged Grace. He was forever misjudging her, it seemed. After all this time, he barely understood her at all. But he wanted to. He hesitated, then plunged forward.

“I would be happy to be proved wrong.”

Grace stared at her mending basket as though she had never seen it before in her life and could not comprehend its purpose. James suppressed the urge to speak further and press his point. Even if he could persuade her to be friends — or more — against a native reluctance, he did not want to. That wasn’t true friendship. She had to want it too.

Several long moments passed in silence. At last, Grace pushed her mending basket aside and slid off the seat. She stood over him, her brow furrowed, considering. Then, slowly, she held out her hand.

“Friends?” James asked.

“Trying.”

James took her hand in his and, instead of shaking it, gently kissed it. “Thank you.”

The colour lit in her cheeks again, warm and uncertain. There was a quivering about the lips, a brightness of the eyes. Don’t flirt with her, James warned himself. It’s not what it means. She’s just shy. But his limbs seemed to have a life of their own as he stood, still holding her hand, and looked into her eyes. They were close enough that she might have pulled away.

“So we’re trying to be friends,” he said. “But are we engaged?”

She bit her lip. “We’re— no. No, we’re not.”

“That settles that.” He still did not drop her hand. Instead, he stepped closer, until he could feel the warmth radiating off her body. “My trouble is that I’ve always liked women more when I’m not married to them.”

“When you can’t have them.” There was challenge in her tone, but it was belied by the trembling of her lips.

“Exactly.” He watched her carefully, seeking any sign of an invitation. “I never had a chance with you.”

She tilted her face towards him, her eyes half-lidded, but the challenge still in them. “Never.”

He meant the kiss to be innocent, chaste, even, but her lips parted at his touch and her hands found their way, somehow, to the back of his neck. And there was hunger behind it, too, loneliness, and sorrow, and hope. On both sides. He had wanted to do this more than he had known, and from the way her body melted at his touch, so had she.

Some indefinite time later, James distantly registered the sound of a door opening and a gasp. Then he understood the sound and pulled urgently away from Grace, opening his eyes. A maid stood in the doorway, carrying a tray of bread rolls and coffee, openly gawking at them.

“I forgot I ordered coffee,” Grace said faintly. “Put— put it down on the table, Eloise.”

With a sideways glance at James, the maid came forward and set the tray down on the table. She backed out of the room without a word and shut the door behind her. Grace stared at the door, then looked at James.

“She will tell Mother.”

“And Mrs Follet will be scandalized?” James stroked Grace’s cheek. “It was only a kiss.”

“No. It wasn’t.”

James’s heart fluttered in a peculiar, not unpleasant, fashion. “You’re right,” he said. “It wasn’t.”

He bent his head and kissed her again. Too soon, they were interrupted again by a hasty knock at the door.

“Grace?” Mrs Follet called. “Grace, are you in there?”

Grace pulled back from James. “We might be engaged,” she said in a soft, uncertain voice.

“Might?”

Grace shook her head. “I’m not sure—”

Mrs Follet knocked again. “Grace?”

“Yes, Mother.” Grace smoothed down her dress. “We’re in here.” She glanced at James. “I’m not sure we will marry, but for now—”

The door opened, and the rest of the sentence went unspoken.

__

A/N 2022-04-11: Grace! Make up your mind! Commit!

Chapter Twenty-Six: Terra Incognita

It was convenient for Grace to be engaged to James over the winter. She was still not convinced she wished to marry him — she was not entirely sure what she wished — but she enjoyed being courted by him, if it could be called that. It started strangely, with stumbling, uncertain conversation, as though the gilt had worn off his silver tongue. It was probably not helped by the fact that for several weeks they had no chance to be alone. Mrs Follet made sure of that. The little sitting room at the front of the house was shut up — not comfortable for guests, Mrs Follet declared — and Grace received James in the drawing room where it always seemed that Emma was practicing piano or Alice was reading a novel or Mrs Follet was just sitting down to tea. A few times, James suggested a walk, but Mrs Follet always fretted about the rain being too heavy or invented errands for Alice and Emma to run that would see them walking the same way.

At last, Grace brought the matter up with her mother.

“We are engaged,” she said, one morning after James had left. “Engaged couples are normally granted a little privacy.”

“I don’t mean to intrude,” Mrs Follet protested, “but, my dear, I do worry — a man who comes to call in his dressing gown…”

“That was only once,” Grace said. “He has always been properly dressed since.”

Indeed, she was beginning to see in James’s dress shades of the man she had known from a distance for many years. No pink waistcoats made an appearance, but nor was he dressed in winter drab. Indigo velvet and copper-coloured silk were more likely. He was always freshly shaved too, and smelling of cedar-oil soap.

“Y-yes…” Mrs Follet said, hesitatingly. “I had noticed that.” A thoughtful pause. “He does go to rather a lot of effort for you, doesn’t he? I remember Robert Langley used to cinch himself into twenty-six-inch waistcoats when he came to call on my sister. He couldn’t sit down. She was ever so impressed.” Mrs Follet sighed. “Your father never did such a thing for me. He was too sensible. He knew I would say yes.”

It pleased Grace to think that James’s effort was for her. She looked away to hide her smile. “I’ve already said yes, Mama. You might let us have a little privacy.”

“I didn’t like the shut door either,” Mrs Follet said, a quaver coming into her voice as always when she tried to be firm. “Not that I don’t trust him, my dear. I do believe he really cares for you. But… sometimes that makes a man do… unwise things.”

Grace blushed. “It was only a kiss, Mother.”

“Behind a shut door.” Mrs Follet was pink too. “It’s not that I don’t want you to marry him, Grace. I’m really ever so happy the two of you made up. But I do want you to be careful. Even engagement does not protect against all scandal.”

“I’ll be careful,” Grace said. “I won’t shut the door again. But, please, let us have a little space.”

The next time James came to visit, Mrs Follet made a conspicuous excuse to leave the drawing room. James looked perplexedly after her.

“That’s new,” he said. “Have I frightened her?”

“She’s giving us some privacy,” Grace said. “We’re not to shut the door.”

“Kind of her.” But James didn’t sit down, or even come near Grace. He moved about the room instead, fiddling with the miscellany of everyday objects that lay about it. “My father’s got sciatica again,” he announced, rather indifferently, as he flipped through the music sheets that lay on top of the piano.

“Is he alright?”

“He’s in pain, but no danger. I don’t think he’d mind a call, if you can put up with his temper.” James picked up a bowl of potpourri and sniffed it. “I couldn’t.”

“I’ll come by tomorrow afternoon.” Grace watched as James went to the fire and poked it. “Are you cold, James?”

“No. Not at all.” James put away the poker and came to sit down opposite her. “What are you reading?”

Grace looked at the novel in her lap, which she had dropped when he came in. “The Memoirs of Emma Courtney. I’m reading the marginalia, really. Emma has underlined all the heart-rending speeches and Alice has written scornfully over the top of them.”

“Of course.” He reached over and took the book, his fingers brushing Grace’s. “Hm. But one way to make me happy and a thousand to make me miserable! Alice: Beggars should be no choosers.” He laughed. “I see Alice has never been in love.”

He passed the book back to Grace. She set it aside again. She was confused by James. She had thought, somehow, that the moment they had any privacy he would kiss her again. Apparently such behaviour needed encouragement. Well, she had encouraged him last time, sure enough, but he had started it, and he wasn’t starting it this time. Mrs Follet might not have left the room at all.

“They’re saying it’s going to be a miserable Christmas,” James said. “Sleet and rain, but no snow.”

“I had heard. After the autumn we’ve had, I suppose it’s only to be expected.”

“Actually my mother was thinking that you and your family might like to come to dinner with us on Christmas Day. It would be very small and quiet. Just our families. Nothing unsuitable for a house in mourning.”

“That’s very kind of her.” It did not escape Grace’s notice that the invitation had come from Mrs Redwood, not James himself. Of course, Mrs Redwood would be proper enough to ask, and Mr Redwood kind enough to think of it. “We’ve already arranged to visit my sister Harriet in London.”

“Oh. Well, that’s alright. Probably more fun than our house.”

“We always spend Christmas with Harriet,” Grace said. “At least, normally she comes over with her children but this year we are going to her instead.”

“I’ll tell Mother. I think she wants you all over for dinner soon anyway. Now that we’re properly engaged again.”

Grace glanced at the clock. Mrs Follet would not stay away forever. Perhaps a quarter of an hour. Yet five minutes had passed and James hadn’t so much as shaken her hand. How did you work up to a kiss? The trouble was, she had never been good at flirting. When a man started it, she could carry along well enough, if she liked him, but she needed the man to start it. And she’d seen James flirt — she’d seen all manner of pretty compliments drop off his lips at the slightest provocation. She had even been on the receiving end, just a little. Why wasn’t he flirting now?

She let out a deep sigh.

“Is something wrong, Grace?” James asked.

Grace felt her cheeks heat. If she just asked him to kiss her, he probably would. But she didn’t dare, and besides, it seemed somehow unromantic to merely ask. She shook her head. “It’s just that… Harriet’s house is so cramped and hectic. There’s always one child crying and another one teasing the cat. And I have to share a bed with Mother. I’d much rather… could I spend Christmas with you?”

James frowned. “I’d love you to come, but I don’t want to spoil your mother’s plans. And, besides, I’m not sure about the correctness of having you to dinner alone.”

“We are engaged.”

“It would raise eyebrows. For a woman to dine apart from her family on Christmas day, practically unchaperoned — my mother hardly counts — and then, I suppose, you might even be going back to an empty house. Or have to stay the night, if the weather were bad. No.” James shook his head. “It would be impolite and indiscreet.”

“That’s rather fastidious, coming from a man who makes calls in his dressing gown.”

James smiled wryly. “Touché,” he said. “And it was damned foolish of me, Grace. I should think as my…” He paused, looking cautiously at her. “…friend you would not be afraid to tell me when I am being a fool.”

“As I recall,” Grace said, stiffening, as she felt this conversation was going in the wrong direction, “I was not.”

“And as your friend, I feel I have a certain obligation to guard you from your — very rare — flights of foolery.”

“Never mind,” Grace said. “It was just a thought.”

She took up her book again and pointedly turned a page. James leaned back in his chair, tilted his head to the side, and watched her. She kept her gaze upon her book but was keenly aware of his watching figure in the corner of her eyes.

“Your hackles are up,” James observed as she turned another page.

“I’m not a cat.”

“I have put my foot in it, clearly,” James said. “Is this a game, Grace, where I must tease and cajole you into a good mood, or is this a real fit of temper, and must I apologize? And if so, what on earth for?”

Tears pricked Grace’s eyes. She knew perfectly well she was being unreasonable. He was right that it was incorrect to spend Christmas with him alone. And it was she who had put her foot in it, really. If she had any artifice or charm, she could have got him flirting of his own accord. Quite easily, too. It was James, after all, not stodgy Mr Montague or pious George Benson. And at the thought of that, more tears pricked her eyes.

“It’s not a game,” James said softly, moving to the couch next to her. “Grace dear, what’s wrong?”

She let the book fall to her lap again and wiped her eyes. “It’s nothing. Really.”

“Really?” James touched her hand then, hesitatingly, slipped his arm around her shoulder. “Well, sometimes it is, isn’t it?”

She turned her face into the shoulder of his coat, the scent of cedar oil and his soft, woodsy perfume rising over her. He was warm and solid, and she yearned for him to hold her — closer, with heat.

“I’m sorry,” she said into his coat lapel. “I thought it would be different now you’ve kissed me.”

“Did you?” his breath stirred her hair. “It is different, Grace. I don’t know where to step next.”

She raised her face to look him in the eyes. “Did you ever?”

“With you?” The ghost of a smile flitted over his lips. “Now that you mention it… I’m not sure I did. You’re terra incognita. Terra periculosa.” His eyes went dark with sudden want. “I’m going to kiss you again.”

He did so, with an urgency that caught Grace off-guard. His arms were like steel around her — he was stronger than she had imagined — and despite that she had the impression that he was trying to restrain himself. She felt the pressure of his teeth on her bottom lip but did not taste blood and let her lips part to allow him in. And then she was quite weightless but for his arms around her, and quite blind and deaf too, consumed wholly by the sensation of touch.

After some time, he moved, his kisses journeyed over her cheek, her ear, her hair, and sound and sight were restored to her, and with them speech. Nonsense, whispered, breathless speech, which could not be called flirting because flirting had wit and this did not. James didn’t seem to mind. Between kisses, he was saying much the same things. And then he found her mouth again, or she found his, and the conversation, or what there was of it, ceased. The silence in the room was, in fact, so deep and suspicious that it brought Mrs Follet back earlier than she would have been otherwise, and she felt the need to announce her presence by knocking over a chair in the hallway. Slowly, confusedly, as though the sense had been kissed out of her, Grace disentangled herself from James and made the effort to straighten her limbs and skirt and back. Following the lightness she had felt in his arms, her body now felt heavy and dull. He moved quicker than she and was back in his own seat when her mother entered the room, albeit in a state of pink-cheeked, bright-eyed dishevelment.

After that, their courtship moved into a new phase. The words were still not quite there. They seemed to be constantly stepping on each other’s toes and having to apologize for it. Grace began to see in the suppression of the corner of James’s mouth or the subtle narrowing of his eyes the small hurts she gave him, the discomfort he sometimes felt with her. But what they could not fluently say in words was communicated much more easily with touch — in public, the brush of her fingers across his or the pressure of his hand at her waist; in private, deep, long kisses and soft, exploring caresses. To Grace, it all came as a dizzying revelation. She had stolen a few kisses in her girlhood, or had them stolen from her, and shared a few yielding embraces with George Benson. They had been nothing like this. There was a sensuality about James that stunned her, a sense of a powerful hunger within him for her, contained — but barely — and its containment sparked within her the ruinous desire to make him break his control and see it released.

Though then she would have to marry him.

And some days, that did not seem like a burden, but a blessing.

__

A/N 2022-06-09: It’s very hard to write their relationship. I should have invented someone different for James. Ah well. I’m committed now, so I just keep on shoving them into situations where eventually they might discover something good about each other.

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Give a Dog an Ill Name

Over the course of that winter, James sometimes caught himself wondering what he really felt for Grace. With other women, he had always been so very sure about his feelings. Each time he had been in love, it had been as though a spark had been lit in his heart at first sight. When he had merely been dallying, his affections had risen to no more than the level of goodwill and appreciation. With Grace, there had certainly been no spark, but goodwill and appreciation were too cold to describe the growing warmth of his affection towards her.

Perhaps it was loneliness affecting his senses. James had always been close to his father, in an odd, silent sort of way, but after their argument about Mrs Booth, things had not been the same. James was hurt his father did not believe him, and Mr Redwood was angry, and anger made him cold. James felt an absence of someone who understood him. His closest friend was in France, and the spare few other young men whom he trusted were equally out of reach, scattered about England now that London was sleeping for the winter. To be sure, James had other friends in London, but they were friends to have a good time with, to play cards and billiards with, to drink and carouse with, to race and gamble with. There was no intimacy there. Sometimes, there was hardly even liking. Grace was the closest thing he had to a friend all winter. But the affection he felt for her was quite different to what he felt for his male friends. Which was perhaps natural, James argued with himself, as she was not a man, but her sex seemed an inadequate explanation for the warm ache of joy he felt on making her smile. He had made a hundred women laugh a hundred times without feeling that way.

He tied himself in knots trying to untangle the problem. He was more certain about what she felt for him: she was not in love, but she was attracted to him, wanted him, even. She was hungry for his physical intimacy while still skittish of the emotional. It was hardly a solid foundation for a marriage, but, then, as she sometimes told him when she was upset, they were only engaged.

It was an engagement growing more certain as winter passed. Certain practical steps had to be taken before they could marry, after all, and their parents were speedily attending to them. Mrs Follet took Grace to London to order new gowns. Mrs Redwood sent for a book of wallpapers and textiles and squabbled with Grace and James about which they should choose. Mr Redwood commissioned for the London townhouse to be repainted and repapered, and had the upper floors, used for storage, cleared out and cleaned. James went to visit it with Grace one day, and they wandered about the rooms, their footsteps echoing in the emptiness, hardly daring to speak. It was very strange to think they would be living together. Perhaps. They were only engaged, after all.

There was another matter to be attended to. James knew it was coming, and delighted in not mentioning it to his father, so he wouldn’t have any opening. One evening in early March, just as James was about to leave the table after dinner so that he wouldn’t have to drink brandy in the company of his father’s disapproving silence, Mr Redwood called him back.

“Wait a moment, James. We have something to talk about.”

“Do we?” James said lazily, sitting down again and leaning back in his chair. “Alright. Pass me the brandy then.”

Perhaps Mr Redwood was trying to offer up an olive branch by pouring the brandy himself, but James, eyeing the shortness of the measure, would not have bet upon it. He swirled the glass and watched his father, determined not to speak first and make it easy for him.

Mr Redwood sipped his own brandy slowly, but he was not given to prevarication or side-stepping. After a minute, he said mildly, “It has come to my mind that Grace will desire a coach.”

“Has she taken up driving?” James said. “How spirited of her.”

Mr Redwood raised a single, unimpressed eyebrow. “Don’t be flippant, James. I refer to your coming marriage. A daughter may beg use of her father’s — or mother’s — conveyance, but a bride expects her husband to have his own.”

“I did,” James said, “until you stole it.”

“A curricle is not a coach. Regardless, we do not need to revisit that discussion. The present issue is a new town coach. You might consider it in the light of a wedding gift to Grace.”

“I think past issues have relevance. If Grace were to do something of which you disapproved, would you sell the coach from under her?”

“Grace would not do something of which I disapproved.”

“Then what about me? I am certain to. Perhaps Grace would better have hired a coachman than found herself a husband. A coachman can always be replaced, after all, when he becomes disagreeable.”

A hard light came to Mr Redwood’s eyes. “I have long since abandoned hope of approving everything you do, James. Nor am I fool enough to think that I can check you from your worst impulses merely by tightening my purse strings. So you will forgive me if I think primarily of your future wife’s convenience in this matter. I have a duty to her and her father to ensure that as a married woman she will have material comfort. Your duty you may yet confine to the emotional. You will, I hope, prevent yourself from becoming disagreeable to her. Or, at the very least, prevent her from feeling any great disappointment in her choice of husband.”

James grimaced and knocked back his brandy like it was blue ruin. “Give a dog an ill name!” The brandy burned in his throat and settled uneasily in his belly. “Spare me the after dinner sermon, please. It gives me indigestion.”

“Yes, I should save my breath,” Mr Redwood agreed coldly. “The practicalities only, and the sooner dealt with, the better. I will go to Tattersall’s tomorrow to buy a pair, and after that to Tilbury Coaches. If you wish your opinion to be consulted in the matter—”

“I certainly do!”

“—then you may accompany me.” Mr Redwood’s voice grated with displeasure. It was clearly permission, not invitation. “I leave at eight, and I will not be delayed on your account, so be ready.”

James found that last comment too pompous to bear, so he stood and offered his father a curtsy. “With bells on, sir.”

The next day, James took pleasure in readying himself early so he could wait in the hall ostentatiously checking his pocket watch as his father came down the stairs. Mr Redwood pretended not to notice and sailed past him in silence to the door. The silence continued for the remainder of their journey to London. James wished he had thought to offer to drive the coach instead of sitting inside with his father; it was a clear, cool morning, with the scent of spring in the air. By the time they reached Tattersall’s, the courtyard was already overflowing with buyers, sellers, browsers, and mere spectators. James quickly broke away from his father and lost himself in the crowd. He spotted friends and acquaintances from a distance, but such was the bustle and noise that he could not seem to catch their eye. While observing the horses being led around the courtyard before the auctions, however, he found himself near a tall, slender, very elegant blond man with his face half-hidden behind an extravagant gold lorgnette he held to his eyes, and pushed past a pair of beery jockeys to get next to him.

“Delacroix?” James said. “Have you gone blind?”

The blond man slowly lowered his lorgnette and blinked at James before smugly raising it again. “Oh. Redwood. I didn’t see you there. Rather beneath my notice, eh?” To illustrate the point, he rested his arm on James’s shoulder. “Where have you been all winter? Everybody was wondering if you were dead.”

“I was at home,” James said. “Which in some ways is similar. What’s the point in coming to the sales if you can’t see a thing?”

“I come to be seen, not to see,” Delacroix murmured. “Why are you here?”

“To buy a town coach and pair.”

“I would have thought a phaeton more to your taste.”

“It is.” James wistfully eyed a pair of frisky grey thoroughbreds. “I am here because” —his cheeks warmed— “I must have a town coach for my wife.”

Delacroix’s elbow slipped off James’s shoulder and he pulled himself up with a start. “You are never married!”

“Not yet. In May, I believe it will be.”

Delacroix sniggered. “You jest, surely. Of all men— and of all times— No. This is a splendid joke, Redwood, but I have caught you at it.”

James bristled. “It is no joke. I am engaged to be married.”

Delacroix choked on his laughter. “…But really? Ah, I comprehend. Her father is dragging you to the altar at the point of his sabre, no doubt.”

“Her father is dead,” James said curtly, offended by the implication. “And his ghost would have no such complaint.”

Delacroix’s mouth dropped open. He made a show of wiping his lorgnette on the cuff of his sleeve. As his sleeve was a frothy profusion of lace, this did nothing but smudge the glass. He put it to his eyes again anyway and blinked sightlessly in James’s direction.

“Might I enquire as to the good lady’s name?” he said.

“Grace Follet. Do you know her?”

“I do not. Indeed, I do not recall ever hearing the name.” Delacroix looked perplexed. “But this is a surprising development, Redwood. I think all of London will be struck quite dumb at the news. It is altogether unexpected. I must say, I… I rather expected differently of you.”

“To remain a bachelor to the end of my days?” James’s eye was caught by a pretty, dappled grey Norfolk trotter. “Yes, I rather thought so too, but…” He was mindful, suddenly, of the risk of being overheard in a crowd like this and inspiring any unpleasant gossip about his engagement. “…Miss Follet persuaded me otherwise. Do you think there is another horse here to match that grey? It is very fair, isn’t it? Quite unique.”

Delacroix lowered his lorgnette. “Hm. Not impossible, I suppose, but expensive. So Miss Follet persuaded you. When no one and nothing else ever could.” Delacroix laughed, rather coldly. “There is one lady in rural seclusion who will be very offended to hear that, Redwood. Have you not thought of her?”

For a moment, James could not think who Delacroix meant. Then he recalled, with discomfort and embarrassment, that Lady Mosrow had fled to the country after her public breakdown last year. But she could hardly still be in love with him after all these years, and certainly her hopes could not have stretched to marriage without also extending to bigamy. “Time heals all wounds,” James said. “She will survive.”

Delacroix smiled thinly and removed his lorgnette to scan the crowd. “I see a friend of particular interest,” he said. “Excuse me.”

His long, thin figure swayed away through the crowd. James stared, puzzled, after him, then turned his attention back to the horses. Delacroix always had been an eccentric.

The grey would have been too expensive, indeed, but there was a pair of small, pretty bays that James liked, and he went to find his father to give his opinion. Mr Redwood was not opposed, and when the pair came up at auction James opened at forty pounds. He was not surprised to be outbid immediately, but his father had authorized him to spend up to a hundred-and-eighty pounds on the pair, so he waited until the other interested bidders, a fat farmer and a peaky lawyer, started to flag at around a hundred pounds before outbidding the farmer to a hundred and eight. The farmer rather doubtfully offered a hundred and ten, but when James jumped to a hundred and fifteen, he lowered his hand and fell silent. The auctioneer called it twice and was just raising his hammer when a new bidder shouted out twenty. James raised it five again and looked around, annoyed, for his competitor. He was a broad, solid man of late middle age, dressed severely in black, which only made him seem broader and more solid still. He held an ebony cane tightly in one hand, not resting on the ground, but level, as though he wished he could hit someone with it. This was the hand he raised when he outbid James again. He glared at James, as though it was a personal challenge.

Why not, James thought, and bid again with a smile.

From there, the bidding climbed steadily, and a crowd began to gather to watch. James’s competitor had an annoying habit of waiting until the last call before bidding and glaring at James all the while. James quickly realized his competitor was determined not to let him win and must have the capital to prevent it. Had the man not had such an aggressive stare, James might have withdrawn. Instead, annoyed, he kept bidding until at last his competitor shouted eighty and James bowed out.

“The beasts are yours, sir,” he said. “And you have paid only fifty pounds more than they are worth. Quite the bargain.”

He made to move away, back to the courtyard, but the ebony cane swung out and blocked his path.

“Catherine gave birth two weeks ago,” the man said, his voice like granite. “To a son.”

James stared at him. “I… congratulate you, sir?”

The scowl on the man’s face became molten fury. “How dare you!” he hissed. “How dare you speak so! How dare you stand here bartering for horseflesh while Catherine nurses your child.”

The meaning of the words registered, but they made no sense. James was too confused to do more than push the cane aside. The crowd that had gathered during the auction was watching them, full of whispers. The auctioneer was ringing his bell, trying to get attention to start the next auction, but no one was paying attention. James saw his father pushing his way through the crowd.

“I beg pardon,” James said, “but who are you, sir?”

“I’m William Balley,” the man choked. “Sir William Balley, whose daughter you seduced and abandoned last spring.”

Several men in the crowd laughed, while others whistled. Mr Redwood pushed through them, his face white with fury. James could only shake his head, trying to clear his thoughts.

“I don’t understand,” he said.

“Like hell!” The cane came up again, brandished over James’s head. “You seduced my daughter and abandoned her when you learned she carried your child.”

At last, slowly, James untangled his thoughts. Catherine Balley, the woman who had had to leave London last summer and break her engagement because she was pregnant. David Demery, the cuckolded would-be husband who had not believed James when he said he was not the father. Sir William Balley, her father, and…

“So it was you who hired men to thrash my son on the street last year?” Mr Redwood said in a snakelike tone. “You— you fool. You almost killed him. You almost killed the wrong man.”

Sir William lowered his cane until it pointed at Mr Redwood’s feet. “My daughter gave his name. She told me what he did.”

James tried to speak but found he had no breath for it while everyone was watching him. His heart was skipping what felt to be a dozen beats a minute and he felt sick. He knew only that he was innocent, and that it was useless to say so. He remembered, with a wave of nausea, his conversation with Delacroix earlier: Her father dragging you to the altar. A lady in rural seclusion. And Delacroix’s abrupt departure when he said time healed all wounds. He must have thought James abominably cruel. How long had these rumours been spreading? He had been absent from London all winter; he would have heard nothing. How long had people been talking, whispering, with no one to protest the deception? And it put rather a different light on all the friends he had seen today who had not seemed to see him. They had been giving him the cut direct. At least Delacroix had still thought enough of James to return his greeting. How many friends did James have left in London? How many true friends had he ever had?

“Your daughter lied,” Mr Redwood said. “The father was not James. And like a coward, you could not even face him yourself, you could not even ask him. You hired men to do your brute work for you. Stupid, cowardly fool.”

Sir William, a decade or two younger and a great deal stouter than Mr Redwood, clutched his cane like he intended to brandish it again. James pulled his father back.

“It was not me,” he said. “It cannot have been, for I never met your daughter, sir. I’m sorry for what happened to her, but it was not my doing.”

“Catherine does not lie,” Sir William spat. “I have never known that child to lie. It was you, Redwood, and your reckoning shall come. If not on this earth, in the next one.”

“As will yours,” Mr Redwood said, raising his own cane.

James hastily slipped between the two men. “Yes, well, fisticuffs didn’t solve it last time, and they won’t this,” he said. “Father, I think it’s time to go home.”

“James—”

“Please.”

“Always the coward,” Sir William shouted as James ushered his father through the crowds. “You wouldn’t duel Demery, and you won’t stay and face me! Coward, villain, Redwood!”

Nobody will believe I didn’t do it, James realized, looking at the sneers and smirks on the faces of the spectators. Why, why had Catherine Balley given his name?

They left Tattersall’s without uttering a word to each other. James was too shocked to speak, and Mr Redwood too angry. Now that James knew of the gossip, he noticed how eyes seemed to follow him, before darting away when he tried to meet them. It was a relief to climb into the closed coach and pull the curtains shut against the world. His heart was still racing and he could not seem to keep a straight thought in his head. Only when they were halfway back to Richmond did his thoughts settle. He rubbed his face and looked at his father, who was still frowning, though no longer pale with anger.

“How did you know she lied?”

“I saw your face.” Mr Redwood ran his thumb over the brass handle of his cane, as though regretting he had not the chance to wield it against Sir William. “Besides, I know you. It takes a particular breed of cowardice to deny a child, and a particular breed of cruelty to abandon a woman so compromised. You are libertine, lazy, philandering, and fickle, James, but you are neither cruel nor a coward. You did not do it. But there, Sir William will continue to believe his daughter, and I will continue to believe my son, and so this matter will never satisfactorily be resolved.”

“It won’t,” James said quietly. “No one will believe me. Not if she named me. Damn that woman!”

He slid back in his seat and stared at the ceiling of the coach to hide the tears pricking his eyes. Then his father thought him all those things—and he was—but not a coward, not cruel. Only he had been, hadn’t he, towards Grace? Towards other women too, at times. Perhaps he deserved what the world thought of him. But the rumour would stain his entire family, even his friends, his…

James shot up straight. “What will happen to Grace?”

–

A/N 2022-07-03: I know it’s been more than a year since I posted the first chapter, but this explains why James starts the story beaten up in bed and who was secretly behind it all.

Chapter Twenty-Eight: A Bad Habit

While James was being publicly denounced by Sir William, Grace was sitting on a bench in the churchyard where her father had been buried and thinking very quietly. It was the first really fine day of the year, and she had gone for a solitary walk before somehow ending up here. The last time she had been here, she had been able to recall none but the most unpleasant, angry memories of her father. Now, oddly, she found it hard to remember much about him at all. She sat there for a long time, trying to remember, until eventually she realized her mother would be getting worried, uncurled from her seat, and went home.

She was taking off her gloves and bonnet in the hall when the maid Eloise came down the stairs and saw her.

“If you please, Miss Follet, they’ve all gone off to Mr Redwood’s,” she said. “They went half-an-hour ago. Mr Redwood sent his coach for them. I was to tell you as soon as you got home.”

“Thank you, Eloise.” Grace started to unclip her cloak. “Could you send me up some tea?”

“No, Miss. I mean, you’re to go after them. Mrs Follet left a note.”

Now, Grace saw the folded letter on the entry table. It was quite brief, and written by Alice, not her mother.

G.

Mr Redwood summons us to conference. “A crisis has eventuated and requires expedience in its management.” What a way of saying a pot’s over-boiled! Mother is too of a fret to put hand to pen, so I write for her. She has told the groom to keep the horses ready and wants you to follow us to the Redwoods’ — with expedience.

A.

Grace wondered what the problem was — money, she thought vaguely. Or perhaps, since Emma and Alice had been summoned as well, something to do with the wedding party. She sighed, put on her gloves and bonnet again, and went out to the stables.

When she knocked on the door of the Redwood’s house, she was led straight up to the drawing room. The moment she entered, she knew that something was very wrong indeed. Everybody was there — Mrs Follet, Emma and Alice, Mr and Mrs Redwood, and James, though at first she did not see him, because he was hunched motionless in a chair, his head in his hands.

“What’s wrong?” she said. “James?”

He looked up, his face so pale that his blue eyes seemed almost black, and shook his head.

“I told you!” Alice said, her own cheeks scarlet. “I told you when you first got engaged to him! You wouldn’t listen!”

“It’s not true,” said Emma. “You can’t possibly believe such a horrible thing!”

Alice merely looked contemptuous, then her gaze slid to Grace and faltered to the floor.

Grace looked helplessly at Mr Redwood. “What is happening?”

Mr Redwood, sitting upright in a hard chair, his stick held across his knees, gestured to a tray of glasses and a decanter on the table. “First, would you like some sherry, Grace?”

“What is happening?” Grace repeated. She ignored the sherry tray and went instead to James and touched his shoulder. “What isn’t true?”

He took her hand in both of his, almost pleadingly. She had never seen him look so hurt before. It made her own heart ache.

“I was at Tattersall’s today.” His voice was hoarse. “There was a… I found out… In front of everyone, Sir William Balley accused me of— of fathering his daughter’s illegitimate child.” He shook his head helplessly. “She gave him my name, Grace. Catherine Balley says it was me — I’ve never met her.”

Grace stared down at him, paralysed by confusion. For a moment, she did not understand, and when she did, she could not see why it mattered. Perhaps James read doubt in her face. He pulled her hand to his heart.

“I don’t understand why she did it,” he said. “But they believe her. From what I saw at Tattersalls, the rumours must have been growing all winter. All of London thinks I fathered a bastard on a virgin and walked away.” He pressed his face into her hand. “I’m sorry.”

She stared down at the back of his head and the lean muscles of his neck, tense and rigid. “I don’t understand.”

“James has been slandered,” Mr Redwood said. “Grossly slandered by malicious liars and a ravening fool. His reputation is likely beyond repair.”

“He didn’t do it,” Mrs Redwood said, “so I don’t see it matters what people think. The right people will think rightly, and the wrong will think wrongly. It has always been the way.”

“Yes,” said Mr Redwood. “And when the wrong outnumber the right, injustice is done.”

James shivered.

Grace sank slowly down onto the arm of his chair. She still did not quite understand. Catherine Balley had named James the father of her baby. It was too absurd to be understood. Why would Catherine Balley have done such a thing?

Out of the blue, the memory came to her of the scene in James’s room in Ellen’s house. Demery — that tall, gloomy-looking man — had challenged James to a duel, accused him of fathering a bastard with the woman Demery would have married, and James… James had…

“You didn’t tell him it wasn’t true. You didn’t tell Demery you didn’t do it.”

James laughed weakly. “I don’t think it would have made a difference, Grace. The woman herself named me the father.” He sat up a little straighter and met her eyes, half-afraid. “You don’t…”

“I believe you. Of course I do.” She reached for his hand. “You would never.”

James’s fingers laced through hers. “No one outside this room will believe me.” His gaze went to Alice. “Not even all inside this room.”

Alice poured another glass of sherry and would not look up.

“It doesn’t matter,” Grace said. “These rumours don’t make a difference to me, James.”

“But they do.” He pulled his hand from hers. “Today, I was given the cut direct by half-a-dozen men I would have called my friends. Society scorns me, Grace. It damns me and scorns me. It will do the same to my wife.” He looked away. “Your sisters, even.”

“No.” Grace shook her head. “No.”

“That is, indeed, the crisis we find ourselves in,” Mr Redwood said. “Until now, Grace, I would have said that our respective interests were in accord, that marriage would be advantageous for you both. Now, the advantage must be all on James’s side. He will recover some small measure of respectability through marrying you, and you will gain his blackened name. Your sisters also will be stained by the connection. Their future prospects will be narrower.”

“I don’t believe it can be all that bad,” Mrs Follet said bravely. “Alice is very pretty, and Emma… I am quite sure that Emma’s sweetness of temperament will make only the most right of men fall in love with her, and such a man would not be put off by false rumours.”

Emma flushed until her spots stood out white against the red of her cheeks. “I can’t help my looks.”

“And there is nothing wrong with my temperament,” Alice said haughtily. “I never saw the sense in being shy and retiring.”

“I meant no insult,” Mrs Follet said hastily. “I mean only to say that… that Grace need think only of herself in this decision.”

“In what decision?” Grace said. “There is no decision to be made. This scandal will make no difference, except that…” Her heart fluttered, but anger gave her the spirit to overcome fear. “Except that we must marry quickly. Before it gets worse.”

James sat up straight for the first time since she came in. “Do you mean that?”

“I am quite sure.”

Mr Redwood leaned back in his chair and regarded Grace through narrowed eyes. “It has not been five months since your father’s death. You are not yet out of mourning, my dear. But I suppose you would not be the first bride to marry in a mourning gown. That will hardly be what will raise eyebrows.”

“It is not… not quite ideal,” Mrs Follet said. “But if that is what you believe, Grace, then I would not stop you.”

“Far better to marry quickly,” Mrs Redwood agreed. “Marriage ever has been the safest protection against scandal.”

“We are shutting the stable door after the horse is bolted, I am afraid,” Mr Redwood said. “However, it would do some repair, I believe.” He drummed his fingers on his bony knee. “I have one apprehension, Grace, which I am sure your mother feels too, even if she does not speak of it.”

“What is it?”

“Your father, were he alive, would no longer approve of this marriage.”

That was true. Grace looked down at James, then, with a long sigh, went and poured herself a glass of sherry. She looked back at James’s pale face, poured a second glass, and brought it to him. He muttered his thanks and drank it in two swallows. Some of the colour came back to his cheeks. Grace sipped her own more slowly. It settled uneasily in her belly, perhaps because of the guilt she felt thinking of her father. Mr Redwood was right: Mr Follet would not have approved. Had the scandal broken while he was alive, he would have done his best to end the engagement. He was too cynical to have believed James. He probably would have suggested James marry Catherine Balley and put things right.

Grace’s guilt sharpened into sudden anger. “Were my father alive, I would not let him stop me. I can be even less expected to bend to a dead man’s wishes.”

Mrs Follet looked shocked, and Grace’s anger subsided into guilt again.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m sorry. But it makes no difference. I must either marry James or not, and knowing that he is innocent, I must marry him.”

Mr Redwood nodded slowly. “I cannot say I am not relieved. It is not only for James’s sake; I would be very sad were I unable to call you my daughter-in-law.”

Mrs Follet tried to smile. “Yes, dear. I am happy only to see you happy.”

Alice scowled and Emma looked unsure. James stood up, with such abruptness that Grace jumped.

“I need to speak to you alone,” he said. “Come with me.”

She followed him into the passage. As soon as the door was closed behind her, he put his hands on her shoulders and looked her intently in the eyes, searching for something.

“Thank you,” he said. “You didn’t have to say that.”

“I’m not just saying it. If I marry you, a little of the damage will be undone. Marriage will make you look a little less disreputable. And I believe that the truth will one day be known, James. Not everyone will believe this slander. Not if you tell them otherwise.”

James shook his head. “You didn’t have to say it. You don’t.” He trailed his grip down her arms to her hands. “I don’t want to rush you, Grace. I don’t want you to marry me tomorrow because you think it’s best for me.” His eyes were strangely bright. “I want you to marry me because you want to be my wife.”

She held his hands, her heart trembling. If he kissed her now— If he touched her—

Instead, he spoke, very softly:

“I told you, didn’t I, that I’ve a bad habit of falling in love?”

Grace’s heart leapt in alarm. “James. Don’t. I— I can’t.”

His hands, in hers, went stiff. He slid them from her grip and took a step away. She knew by the look on his face that she had wounded him. She hadn’t meant to, and she wished to say sorry, but she could not speak, because her heart was racing so fast that the thoughts in her head would not settle into tangible speech.

At last, James said, “Very well. I won’t.”

Grace’s heart continued to race. She did not know why she was so afraid. Not afraid of James, no. A little nervous of marrying him, yes. But terrified of the words he had almost said.

“It’s not fair on you,” he said in a low voice, looking anywhere but at her face. “These past few months, we’ve been growing closer, but I can see you’re not sure about me. You shouldn’t have to marry me before you are. You don’t have to. The world will not end if we remain engaged a few months longer. Even a year. As long as you need.”

Grace’s heart slowed at his words, but she shook her head. “It will be worse for me too, if we do not marry. Either I show my support for you by marrying you, tell the world that I do not believe these lies, or I break the engagement and as much as admit I believe them. And I don’t believe them.” She took a deep breath. “And I don’t want to break our engagement. I am quite sure about that.”

James looked conflicted. “That’s hardly a resounding yes.”

“Fine. I want to marry you.” The words were out, a little stumblingly, but out all the same. “It always was a marriage of convenience, James. That we’re… growing close doesn’t change that. And for matters of convenience, we should marry quickly, rather than wait until I am out of mourning.”

James winced. “Yes. Of course. I… I’m afraid I was beginning to forget that.” He gave her a rueful look then held out his hand to her. “Come here. Let me kiss you.”

She came, and he wrapped his arms around her and kissed her hair and brow. He didn’t seem to want more than that right now, but the warm ache pooled between her thighs in response to his touch anyway. Her cheeks grew hot.

“I do want to marry you,” she said, softly and not stumbling this time. “It is not all convenience, James. But I can’t… I’m not…”

“I know.” He kissed her hair again. “Darling, I know.”

__

2022-07-17 A/N: Ah, James, you’re scaring her off! You gotta go slow with those emotions!

Chapter Twenty-Nine: The Death of Scandal

Things happened very quickly, after that. A coach, second-hand but little used, was bought from one of Mr Redwood’s old friends and a pair was found to match it. Half-made bridesmaids’ dresses were hastily finished. The townhouse was not to be used until Grace came out of mourning, so two extra rooms were prepared in the Redwoods’ house to give Grace and James some space and privacy in the early weeks of their marriage. In summer, they were to take a tour of the northern country, as something approximating a honeymoon, before returning to London at last. And, of course, the Banns were read.

It was very odd for James, sitting in church that next Sunday, to hear them. He had thought he would feel nervous, or even afraid. After all, he had been trying to avoid the marriage for so long. Instead, he felt flustered, very aware of eyes turning to him and whispers breaking out behind prayer books and — when Grace met his gaze across the pews — conscious of an absurd sense of jealousy. What right did anyone have to look at her and whisper? The feeling passed, leaving James uncomfortable. He had never felt jealous before. He had thought the emotion beneath him.

Before the wedding, James made efforts to repair what he could of his reputation. He spent time in London, at his club or at the houses of those few friends who still deigned to speak with him, and convinced some of them that Catherine Balley had lied. He hoped they would spread enough doubt on the story that others might begin to doubt it too. He even wrote to Sir William, offering an interview to clear up the misunderstanding, though he expected, and received, no reply.

The night before his wedding, he held a small dinner at his club. Sebastian Delacroix, whom he had been able to convince of his innocence, was there, as were a few other young men who believed him. So too was Mr Montague, who had come down with Ellen for the wedding, and Grace’s cousins, Harry and Francis, who had been invited out of gratitude for the fact that Uncle Bernard’s family refused to believe the rumours, though all they wished to talk about was the possibility of James suing Sir William for slander.

There was a funereal quality to the dinner. James’s young friends were of a similar ilk as he. Or, he corrected himself, as he had been. They did not understand why he was getting married. Their toasts were full of pathos. They drank deeply of them and slumped into pools of silk velvet in their chairs, mumbling about silk nooses and golden yokes. James encouraged Grace’s cousins — his cousins, now — to drink too. The more slurred and incomprehensible their words grew, the easier he found it to tolerate their conversation. In his efforts, he found himself drinking more than he had planned — he had wanted to keep a clear head for the morning. As his senses dulled with wine, emotions he had been suppressing swelled. Unease, guilt, even sorrow. They were going into this all wrong. They should have met like a normal couple, and courted like a normal couple, and married because of the courting. But they had met, hadn’t they? She had said they had, and he had not even noticed her until his father brought her to his attention. What a fool he had been.

And she was not yet comfortable. She could not be, if she would not let him say he loved her. Perhaps she did not trust him not to lie. She had been lied to before on that matter, and scars like that ran deep.

It should have been different. They shouldn’t have had to marry under shadow, but had they not weathered such shadow together, they probably would not be getting married at all.

That thought demanded another sad toast.

Towards the end of the evening, as the cousins were falling asleep on the table, there came an insinuating knock at the door. At first James did not hear it, but then Sebastian, who was facing it, said snidely, “The cat dragged in,” and pointed.

James turned. Herbert Oliver stood in the doorway, an ingratiating smile on his face. James thought he was dressed in the same coat he had seen him in last. There were now more stray threads coming off at the cuff. It was beginning to have a fringe-like appearance.

“What are you doing here?” James said curtly. “You weren’t invited.”

“Nor was the evil fairy. Though I’m more forgiving than she. I come to congratulate you upon your engagement, Redwood.” Oliver slipped into the room and snaffled a slice of cheese from a plate. He nibbled it through overlong teeth. “Or commiserate, as ’twere. Never did manage to get rid of her, did you?”

James glanced uneasily at cousin Harry, but he only emitted a perplexed burp. Cousin Francis was already snoring with his head on a dirty plate. No one else in the room seemed to pay any significance to the words. Several of his guests had already taken their leave for the night, and those who remained were in a stupor, except for Delacroix, who was boring a fish knife into a lamb bone, staring pointedly at Oliver, and Montague, who was chewing on his fingernails. He had scarcely said ten words all night, except to remark on a painting of a racehorse on the wall. He had hardly touched a drop of wine, either. Certainly Ellen would hear of it if Oliver said anything suspicious. And Ellen would tell Grace.

“Congratulations suffice,” James said, hoping Oliver would take the hint and leave.

Instead, of course, Oliver sidled closer to the wine bottle. “Shall I drink to the bride’s health? A toast to Miss Follet?”

“I’ve had enough of toasts. I have to wake up early tomorrow.”

“Not drowning your sorrows then?”

“I’ve none to drown.”

“Then let me drown mine.” Oliver took a dirty wine glass from the table and poured himself a generous portion. “And I’ll drink to your wife’s health in the while.” He took a sip — not hungrily, or greedily, but with particular concentration — and swallowed slowly. “Oh, that is very good. This is good wine, Redwood. I will make another toast. To the death of scandal. May it never come soon enough.” He took another focussed sip and licked his lips. “Marrying Miss Follet will be another nail in its coffin. Though perhaps not the final one. A bastard child is a rather lively scandal, after all.” His eyes glittered with cruel humour. “You might have told a friend. I had a wager on.”

“You’re not a friend,” Delacroix said pointedly.

“And I’m not the father.”

Oliver drank more wine, this time, deeply. “Hard for people to believe that now.”

“Slander,” Cousin Harry declared. “Vile slander.” He hiccuped. “We sould shue.”

Oliver raised a disdainful eyebrow and drained his glass. “Yes, suing for slander ever does quiet it.” He moved around the table to a plate full of cheese scraps and nibbled at a bit of rind. “Though of course, an innocent man might wish for retribution, I suppose.”

“I’ve no wish for retribution. I don’t want anything to do with her.”

“Oh. I see.” Oliver found a date that had been missed and sucked on it. “But as you cannot prove your innocence, you can at least throw suspicion on another.” He spat out the pip. “Who will you choose? I’ve heard her father is very good friends with Lord Torenbury, and he’s a town-bull if ever there was one.”

“I’m not going to sue,” James growled. “It would only make things worse. Let Miss Balley be a liar and her lover be craven. I’ll marry Miss Follet and live quietly and never think about them.”

Oliver laughed. “And thus, a confirmed bachelor loses his third leg to the shackle. For now, at any rate.”

James grimaced. “None of that talk, thank you. May I remind you, you were not invited.” But Oliver was a gossip, and despite his debts and general depravity, there were still those in London who opened their houses to him. If he repeated that James was innocent, some might believe him. “Have some more wine, if you like,” he said begrudgingly. “Sit down.”

Oliver did not sit down, but he did pour himself another glass of wine. “But you are among friends tonight, Redwood,” he said. “Let out your cares. Loosen your tongue. Does Miss Follet now please you better than she did on first acquaintance? I seem to remember you were not well pleased with her. But that was some months ago. Your feelings may have changed.”

At the end of the table, where it had seemed he was not listening, Mr Montague raised his head from contemplating his untouched glass of wine.

“They have,” James said, his cheeks warming. “I would not be marrying her if they had not.”

“Would you not? I thought perhaps reasons of convenience might have convinced you. It is not just this malicious scandal. I seem to remember something a sense of obligation towards Miss Follet… money matters, was it not?” Oliver bit his bottom lip in a disconcertingly feminine fashion. “And quite against your wishes. The phrase, if I remember correctly, was ‘self-sacrifice in the extreme’.”

Mr Montague’s large, rather cow-like eyes were suddenly quite alert.

“You are quite mistaken,” James said shortly. “I have never said such a thing of Grace.”

“Oh no, you wrote it.” Oliver smiled disarmingly.

For a moment, James was only confused. The sentiment seemed so at odds with how he felt right now that he could not imagine he had ever thought it. Then he remembered, with a sickening feeling, the last time he had been in this club, writing a letter, and Oliver had read it over his shoulder. He had written about Grace, hadn’t he? But he had not sent it. He had burned it.

Oliver was still smiling. But the letter had burned — James had seen it disappear into the flames.

“I never wrote such a thing,” he said, thinking flat denial safest. “My feelings towards Miss Follet are exactly what any bride would hope from her groom.”

“Quite,” Delacroix said. “It made us all quite sick to hear them, earlier the night, when he was the worse for the wine.”

That was true enough, James supposed. He was sober enough now to feel just a little embarrassed about some of what he had said earlier. He had moped, and he despised mopers.

“Are they?” Oliver sipped his wine, eyes glittering with some savage good humour. “And I thought it never would take, with you. But be careful, Redwood, not to give your heart away to an unworthy female.”

“Grace is worthy of more than me,” James said.

“Benson once thought that too,” Oliver murmured.

“And he was certainly right.”

Oliver let out an elegant laugh. “Maybe so. Maybe so. Though he was in such despair when she cried off. And so surprised. He had given her a compelling reason to keep it, you see.”

His head still clouded with wine, James did not realize the implication until Mr Montague stood up, very tall and broad, at the end of the table. Then James stood up too, clumsy enough with anger and wine that in doing so he tipped back his chair and sent it clattering to the floor.

“You’ve said enough. Get out.”

Oliver sidled around the edge of the table, away from James. “Ah. But did you think her worthy?”

“I know her to be worthy,” James said, circling around after Oliver. “And I will not have you suggesting otherwise.”

Oliver chuckled to himself and slid around the corner of the table, but he was near Montague now, who stepped forward and blocked his path.

Oliver smiled up at him. “I don’t believe we’ve met.”

“This is Morgan Montague,” James said. “He’s Miss Follet’s brother-in-law.”

The smile faltered on Oliver’s face and he took a step back. Now he was stuck between James, Montague, and the table.

“What was that compelling reason, sir?” Montague said, in a low, mild tone.

Oliver licked his top lip. “Of course it is only what Benson told me. There is no reason to believe him.”

“Then there can be no reason to repeat him,” said Montague.

“Or to invent fictions,” James said. “Which is what Oliver is doing now. He’s that kind of man, Montague.”

“Oh. Is he?”

There was something very intimidating in the mildness of Montague’s tone, all the more so because he was well over six feet and with the breadth to match. Oliver backed away, closer to James. James tapped Oliver on the shoulder and he turned.

“Mr Montague would never hit a man,” James added blithely, “but I would. Do you keep up with your boxing, Oliver? No, I forgot. You never were a boxer.”

He held up his hands like a prize fighter and feinted a hit. It was only a feint, but it had the effect of making Oliver shriek and sending him diving under the table. James squatted unsteadily on his heels and watched as Oliver crawled away from him over the drunken cousins’ feet.

“Elegant,” James observed. “I see you in your native habitat, Oliver. Under the table with the rats begging crumbs.”

“I abhor violence,” Oliver said primly. “But what can I expect of a man like you?”

“If I wanted to hit you, I would have. You’re not worth bruising a knuckle on. Besides, no one believes your lies.”

With his chin held high, his head bumping the underside of the table, Oliver crawled towards the door. James met him there and aimed a kick at his backside as he darted through it. He had the satisfaction of hearing Oliver squawk when it connected, but the nip was gone out of Oliver and he only scurried down the stairs.

“Who was that man?” Montague asked. “A friend?”

“I should think not!”

“And yet not a man you wish to have as your enemy,” Delacroix said. “Better to have hit him, Redwood, than merely have threatened it. He has his own peculiar pride.”

James shrugged. “And I’ve got mine. Besides, I wouldn’t want to turn up to my own wedding with swollen knuckles.”

Sebastian raised his eyebrows. “Or a black eye.”

“From him? Hardly likely.” James poured himself a glass of wine.

“Or a pounding headache,” Montague said.

James pushed the wine aside. “That, I accept. I’ll order tea. It might wake up my new cousins, who will certainly be looking very green tomorrow.”

__

2022-07-31 A/N: I’m working so hard to finish this story now, before the Watty’s deadline of August 19 (enter, guys, if you can!). There’s only a few chapters left. To be honest, in my hurry, I think I left some typos and mistakes in this chapter. If you find any, let me know :)

Chapter Thirty: Disillusioned

While James was in London with her cousins and brother-in-law, Grace was at home with her sister, Harriet, having a coze. Ellen and Mrs Follet were occupied with the more practical task of ensuring arrangements for tomorrow were in order, so Harriet was playing the role of the emotional confidante. It was safer for Grace to let her play that role than allow her anywhere near the bridesmaids’ dresses or wedding breakfast. Chaos followed in Harriet’s wake. As she walked into the entry hall on arrival, she knocked a vase off a table and shattered it into pieces. Harriet apologized profusely, insisted she had been nowhere near the vase and did not know how it had fallen, and cut her fingers trying to pick up the pieces. Nevertheless, once her hand was bound and she had been herded up the stairs to Grace’s room, Harriet recovered her composure to tell Grace some Very Interesting Things about the married state, much of which Grace was sure could not be true, and to ask probing questions about the nature of true love. Harriet was a romantic.

“I am not a romantic,” Grace said. “I like James more than adequately, and when you meet him, I am sure you will agree he is handsome. But it is a marriage of convenience. It always was.”

“You would not marry only for convenience,” Harriet said. “Besides, Mother told me about the long silences that occur when you and James are alone. Scandalous, Grace!”

Grace’s cheeks warmed, but she affected a careless shrug. “We sometimes talk very quietly, when it is just us two alone.”

“Yes, I like to talk quietly with Mr Underton too.” Harriet’s dimples appeared as she grinned. “I think James sounds like a nice young man. You won’t say you’re in love with him, of course, but you always were cagey about your feelings — as though there’s any danger in showing the world that you’re happy!”

“Of course I’m happy,” Grace protested. “But I’m not in love with James. And he…” She remembered how he had almost said he loved her. “I suspect he feels more for me than I do for him, but I am not sure that he really loves me. Perhaps a man who loves as easily as James can never love deeply.”

“Mother says he adores you. She rarely gets these things wrong.”

That made Grace’s heart flutter. “He is quick to affection. A double-edged sword, I think.”

“But no real danger unless he is inconstant too.” Harriet patted Grace’s knee. “I am disposed to like James. I can’t wait to meet him tomorrow. And if he is not handsomer than you have described I will be surprised.”

Grace drew her legs up under her and hugged a pillow. “Part of me wants to run away, Harrie.”

“I felt the same way. I think most women do. But I was also excited, you see, that I would finally have Mr Underton all to my own, in my own house.” Harriet’s eyes danced. “And my own bed.”

“You speak of that quite differently to Ellen. The way she described it, it was a chore.”

“Yes, but the poor dear is married to Mr Montague, isn’t she? I don’t think she quite understands.” Harriet patted her hair and looked pleased with herself. “I am glad you did not marry that sleek little curate. He reminded me of a water rat, you know, sort of damp and plump and beady-eyed. I don’t think he would have made you happy. You will know what I mean, tomorrow night.”

Grace shuddered. “Don’t talk about Benson. I am almost sure that he only wanted me for my money — what little there was of it. How he singled me out as a woman who could be tricked with sweet lies, I don’t know.”

“Because men like that always do know. It’s an instinct, with them.” Harriet gave Grace a consoling pat. “You know James wants you for who you are. It may be a marriage of convenience, but there is no pretence about it. Except perhaps the pretence that you feel for him less than you do.”

“I don’t pretend to feel nothing for him,” Grace said. “I am fond of him.”

“Oh, fond! That’s a pleasant word! I am very fond of Mr Underton’s mother.”

Grace laughed. “You can’t tease me into pretending I feel more than I do. I am happy to be marrying him. Is that not enough?”

She was, too. She was so happy she dared not express her true feelings. It felt as though speaking of her happiness might break it. Of particular anticipation was the prospect of tomorrow night, though she would sooner die than admit it to Harriet. After months of James drawing back just as things were getting interesting, she was aching with curiosity to know what happened next. Perhaps Harriet was right about it. Certainly, Grace no longer believed Ellen’s description of love-making.

Perhaps her face showed her thoughts, for Harriet smiled. “I can see you are happy. And I’m happy for you. You deserve—”

A knock at the door interrupted her and she flushed pink.

“Come in,” Grace said.

The door opened, and the maid slipped through. “Excuse me, Miss,” she said. “A letter came for you. Hand-delivered. The gentleman would not take no for an answer.”

Was it James? No. He would have come up to see her himself, even if it was the night before their wedding. Grace took the letter curiously. A half-forgotten hand met her eyes when she slit it open and her heart fell.

“Speak of the devil,” she said to Harriet. “Thank you, Eloise. You may go. There will be no reply.”

The letter was short though not to the point.

Dear Miss Follet,

Much time has elapsed since I had the honour of calling you my beloved, and I am unsure now if I even have the privilege of calling you my friend. However, I must trespass upon your magnanimity and beg an audience of you. There is information I have recently discovered of a highly disagreeable nature about James Redwood. After solemn reflection I have come to believe it is my duty to impart this information to you before the event of your wedding.

Tomorrow morning at seven I will be waiting in the lane behind your house.

Sincerely Yours,

G. B.

Grace passed it to Harriet silently, who read it and raised her eyebrows.

“James will be jealous.”

“Furious, rather. I have an idea he warned Benson off, shortly after Father died. But I won’t tell James about it, and I’m certainly not going to meet him.”

“You aren’t at all curious?” Harriet poked Grace in the waist. “He might be planning to make an impassioned declaration of love and beg you for your hand.”

“I would hope not!” Grace crumpled up the note and tossed it at the fire. “Though I doubt it. The very ink bleeds malice.”

“Well, I will be thinking about it all day long, wondering. It is all so very mysterious.”

“I won’t spare a moment to think about Benson at all,” Grace said. “I will be thinking only of James.”

“And you say you don’t love him!” Harriet laughed then looked thoughtful. “What if I meet Benson in your stead?”

“What good would that do?”

“It would satisfy my curiosity. Besides, if he is planning on making trouble on your wedding day, it would be better to know in advance. It would be dreadful if he were to appear in church. I doubt he would do anything more than mope darkly in a backwards pew, but it would rather spoil the mood.”

Grace shuddered. “He had better not.”

“Then let me go and I shall warn him off.”

Grace hesitated. The last time she had seen Benson he had done nothing more than wound her with cruel words. She had no doubt that his message now was for the same purpose. On the other hand, if she did not give him the chance to hurt her, he might attempt to attend the wedding or the breakfast after. She did not want to expose herself — or James — to that embarrassment. And she did not believe anything he could say could hurt her. Not when she was guarded against him. Not when she was so happy.

“I will go,” she said, “but I want you with me. I don’t wish to speak to him alone.”

The next morning, shortly before seven, Grace slipped a dressing gown and cloak over her nightgown and met Harriet on the back stairs. They made their way silently downstairs and out into the garden. It struck Grace that this was where she and James had first agreed to get married, on that cold and windy night. This morning, the garden appeared very different, full of spring blossom under sunlight and blue skies. A sudden rush of happiness swept over Grace and she stopped.

“This is silly,” she said. “We should not speak to him. He has nothing to do with me anymore.”

“Then tell him so,” Harriet said. “Tell him that you never wish to see him again.”

“Not seeing him is the best way to do that.”

“He will persist. Such men always do. They need to be given a firm message.”

Grace shook her head. “I don’t want to see him.”

“Then let me tell him off and send him away.” Harriet drew herself up to her full height of five feet. “I’ll make sure he never bothers you again.”

“Fine. Get rid of him. But I am not seeing that man on my wedding day.”

With a military nod, Harriet strode through the wooden gate into the lane. Grace remained in the garden. After a few moments, she heard Harriet’s raised voice, interspersed with the hushes of Benson’s soft replies.

“…Not to know where you’re not wanted! You had your chance years ago and lost it, young man… Older than me! But not wiser! Now, get away with you! …No, I won’t listen to such nonsense! It’s the stuff of beer and blue cheese! …What do you mean, proof?”

And a hush again, this time longer. Harriet’s footsteps, her slippers flapping in the dirt, then her long nose poking around the gate.

“Grace,” she hissed. “He’s got a letter for you.”

“I don’t want it.”

“It’s from James.”

“James would not send Benson to give me a letter.”

“No. It’s not to you. It’s about you.”

“Tell him to— No. I’ll do it myself.” It was a mistake to have sent Harriet in the first place. Harriet never could manage things.

Pulling her cloak tighter around herself (it had not slipped her mind that beneath it she was not properly dressed) Grace went out into the lane. Benson bowed very low when he saw her.

“I don’t want it,” Grace said as he held out a letter towards her. “I came to tell you that I know now that you never loved me, George. You only wanted me for my dowry — and for my foolishness in believing your affection to be true. I’m no longer a fool. Your lies have no coin with me.”

Benson shook his head. “Miss Follet, you wound me. Were it not that your heart were already given to another, I would protest the truth of my past affections.” He sounded hurt. “But time heals all wounds.”

“A mercy I, too, have reason to be grateful for. My heart — and my pride — are quite recovered the wounds your venality did them.”

“I cannot convince you of my innocence. I do not try. No, I am here to warn you, Miss Follet, of another’s deception. Your husband-to-be—”

“Say no more,” Grace said. “I will not hear you speak a word against James.”

“Then read the words he wrote himself.” Benson thrust the letter towards Grace, but she ignored it and turned away. “You accuse me of not loving you, Miss Follet, of pretending to so that you would marry me. Your accusation is levelled at the wrong man. It is Redwood who is all artifice and pretence. Not I.”

Grace laughed. “What fool trick is this? Harriet, let’s go. I must get dressed for my wedding.”

But Benson pressed the letter into Harriet’s hand and she flicked a glance at it, her eyes widening. “Is this really James’s handwriting?” she asked. “It cannot be. No decent man would say such things about any woman. And surely Father would not have arranged this marriage on such precarious financial…” Harriet tilted her head to one side. “…Actually that does sound rather like Father.”

Grace scoffed and snatched the letter. “It’s not his—”

James’s elegant, fine script, in the blue-green ink they used at his club met her gaze. The usual long tails on the g’s and y’s, the half-closed o’s. The letter was crumpled, as though it had been balled up and later flattened, and the ink was smudged, but it was still legible.

“I only wish you to know the truth,” Benson said softly. “A friend told me. As the letter says, Redwood did not wish to marry you, but was unable to refuse his father. He treated you cruelly to make you break the engagement. It was a widely known plan. Half of London has a wager on your marriage. But when your father died, Redwood realized that if he did not marry you, you would end up impoverished. So he had to persuade you to remain his bride. You can see what he thinks of that.”

Grace did not want to believe it, but it explained too much. No wonder James had been so awful when they were first engaged — so stupid and vain and clumsy. She had thought she had liked him more as she got to know him better. No. He had only given her a different kind of lie. And the kisses — had they been to persuade her? To seduce her into forgiving him? Humiliation flooded Grace.

“Poor Miss Follet,” Benson murmured. “You have my sincerest pity.”

Those words snapped Grace out of her humiliation. Anger rose above it. Benson did not have the right to pity her. James did not have the right to pity her. She was no man’s

object of pity. And with her anger came clarity.

“Half of London has a wager on this, have they?” she said.

“I believe so. Mr Redwood was not discreet about the matter.”

“And I suppose the friend who gave you this letter has bet against my marrying James? And that his object in giving this to you was to prevent my marriage?”

“You are too cynical, Miss Follet.”

“I can see, where men are concerned, that I have never been cynical enough.” Grace tore the letter in two, then four, and kept tearing until it was tiny fragments, scattering in the breeze like dandelion seeds. “You may tell your friend that he has lost his wager. I am marrying James Redwood.”

“But surely your feelings—”

“Are none of your concern. Farewell, Benson. I hope we never meet again.”

With her chin held high, Grace marched back through the gate into the garden. Her heart ached and her chest was tight, but her head was perfectly clear. Harriet trotted after her.

“What do you mean, Grace? Is it true? Did James write those things?”

“He did.” Grace saw a shred of the letter on her cloak and brushed it off. “I told you it was a marriage of convenience. My heart is not involved and never was.” Her heart ached as though the blood within it had been frozen solid. “The letter changes nothing. Except now I am disillusioned a little earlier than I otherwise would have been.”

---

James did not see Grace that morning until the wedding ceremony. It was such a quiet, solemn, formal occasion and he was so overwhelmed by his own emotions that he did not realize she was upset until they were in the carriage driving back to his parents’ house. They were alone but for the groom in an open coach under a sunny spring day. As soon as they were out of sight of the church and their well-wishers, James tried to pull Grace close and kiss her. She stiffened in his arms.

“Grace?” He tickled her cheek. “My darling wife?”

“I’d rather you didn’t say that.”

“Call you my wife?”

“Your darling.” Grace pushed him away. “I never know if what falls from your lips is a lie or a truth.”

“What?” James cast a glance at the coachman, but the roads were dry and hard and the horses’ hooves were making too much noise for him to overhear if they spoke in low voices. “Grace, what is this? What are you saying?”

“I spoke with Benson this morning. He gave me a letter that you had written about me.”

James had been nervous all morning, but at her words he felt quick sick. That stupid letter! And Oliver had quoted it last night — what a fool he had been not to see the strangeness of it! What a damn fool to have written it in the first place!

“Perhaps you have forgotten writing it,” Grace said sweetly. “Shall I refresh your memory?”

“No. Please. I know the letter you speak of. Grace, I was upset when I wrote it. I was letting out my feelings. It was not true then. It is quite the opposite of truth now.”

“I know quite well the insults are not true. Not of me, at least. I would not defend you against claims of spitefulness, James.”

“Grace. Please.” He tried to take her hand but she snatched it away. “Benson is trying to hurt you.”

“I know. And were it only a cruel letter, I might only be hurt.” Grace’s voice wobbled, then she gave a full body shudder and spoke with cold determination. “But you tricked me, James. That I cannot forgive. It was an indecent gambit, to play the fool and the cad so that I would break our engagement. A coward’s gambit. Any man of courage or decency would have refused to become engaged to begin with.”

“Do you think I did not tell myself the same thing? I planned to break our engagement, Grace. The night your father died, I was going to do it. Then… everything changed.”

“I know. You found that I had lost my dowry to my father’s scheming. Poor James. You felt guilty. No, you had to make up for it. You had to rescue me from the consequences of your chicanery. You had to pity me. But, James, you misjudged me. You misjudged my family. They would never let me fall into poverty. I was not yours to rescue.”

“I didn’t mean it that way— I wanted to make up for what I had done.”

“You wanted to appease your guilt.”

“I didn’t want to ruin you!” James reached out to her then stopped himself, knowing touch would only anger her. “Grace, please. I did wrong. I did wrong from the beginning. But for a long time now I’ve been trying to make up for it and be the man you deserve.”

Grace kept her gaze angled away from him, looking towards his house further down the road.

“We are married,” James said pleadingly. “You married me anyway, even though you knew this morning.”

“Yes.” Her voice was like granite now. “I thought about ending it. It was my last chance to get away from your tricks and your lies. But then it occurred to me that if I did, your reputation would never recover. If I were to leave you at the altar, everybody would take it as confirmation of the rumours. You are in my debt, James. It is I who rescued you. I will not touch a penny of your money, even if I have every right to as your wife. I leave for London with Harriet this afternoon.”

“Grace. Don’t.” They were drawing up in front of the house now, some of their guests already waiting on the steps. “Let’s talk about this.”

“No.” She looked at him at last, and he knew by the lack of tears in her eyes that he would never be able to persuade her. “I will make no scandal, James, but I will give you no more chances. You have wasted more than you deserved. Thank god, at least, that I never loved you.”

They drew to a stop in front of the house. Grace smoothed her lace gloves. “Now let us thank our guests and eat cake.”

__

2022-08-08 A/N: I’m desperately trying to finish this story in time for the Wattys. For those that don’t know, the deadline is next week August 19. If you have a complete story over 50k words it may be eligible. Check it out at the Watty’s Profile @TheWattys

Chapter Thirty-One: A Debt Owing

Mrs Redwood called it a lover’s tiff. Mrs Follet hesitatingly suggested Grace should not be too quick to judge. Neither of them knew the full truth, and Grace was not going to tell them. Not yet, anyway. It was less painful to go to London with Harriet and lick her wounds in private. Once her initial anger faded, there was a lot of hurt. She had cared for James more than she dared admit. Over the early days of her empty marriage, she tormented herself by thinking back over the past months and trying to decipher the pretence and seduction from the truth. Had he meant that first kiss, or had it just been a ploy to soften her to him? Had he meant any of them, when she had been liquid in his arms, his touch bringing fire to her veins? There had been times they had almost gone too far but he had always pulled back. If he had really felt for her — really loved her, as he had almost said — he would not have been so self-controlled.

It was better not to think about him. Thankfully, Harriet’s house was too noisy and chaotic to give much opportunity for clear thought. In seven years of marriage, the Undertons had had six children. The oldest was six years and the youngest six months. There was always trouble afoot, a problem for Grace to occupy herself with, or for Harriet to fret about. Only at night was there enough quiet to think about James, and then Grace muffled her tears in her pillow.

After Easter, Mrs Follet thought it appropriate to allow Alice and Emma to attend small dinners and parties again, as it had been very nearly six months since Mr Follet’s death. Several times, they were invited somewhere in London, and Grace acted as chaperone for them, feeling uncomfortable in her new duty. Nothing had really changed in her marriage that never was. She was no more knowledgable about men or marriage than her younger sisters were. Perhaps less, as she was so easily fooled. They could not look to her for guidance.

Alice was in need of no guidance anyway. She was pretty and bold, which brought her to the attention of male admirers and female friends, while being too cynical to ever need protection from unsuitable acquaintances. Emma was shyer and spent more of her time with Grace. It gave Grace the chance to hear a little about James. He was still living with his parents in Richmond. Emma met him sometimes, riding his horse or walking about the village.

“He doesn’t seem happy,” she said. “He asks after you.”

“What do you tell him?”

“That he should come and ask you himself.”

“He won’t come. I told him not to bother me. I am done with men. Even my husband. There is not a man I have— have known who has not disappointed me.”

It had been on the tip of her tongue to say loved. She had thought of her father and Benson. But she had not loved James. She had been mistaken even in liking him.

One night in late April, Grace found herself at a dinner party seated next to another man who had disappointed her expectations, and love had not even been required there. It was David Demery. She was slightly afraid to be near him, but it seemed he did not recognize her. After a few polite attempts at conversation, he gave up and turned his attention to the woman on his other side, who seemed more than grateful for it. He was handsome, Grace supposed, though he might have been handsomer if his smile ever reached his eyes.

Grace thought that was the beginning and end of a slightly awkward situation, but she was mistaken. After dinner, once the men returned to the drawing room for coffee, Demery approached Grace again, under the guise of looking at a painting on the wall that she was examining, and spoke.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I did not recognize you before, Miss Follet.”

“It is Mrs Redwood now.”

“Of course. You married… him.”

Grace made an indeterminate sound and started to move away.

“Wait, please,” he said. “I would like to say something.”

Reluctantly, Grace stopped.

“When I last saw you,” Demery continued in a low voice, “I hit you. It was not my intention, but it was my fault. I would like, if you would be so gracious, the chance to apologize for my behaviour.”

Grace was too surprised by his purpose and the dispassionate, manners-book mode of his expression to at first respond. She tried to choose words as elegant as his. “It does not require much generosity to grant you it.”

“I know this must be more than slightly embarrassing,” Demery said. “You are the wife of the man who… But his misdeeds are his alone, and I was careless and violent to have involved you in my ill-conceived essay for justice. My actions must have shocked you, and I hurt you. I am sorry.”

Grace might have found it easier to accept had it been a little briefer. She was uncomfortably aware that people were staring at them. “I thank you, Mr Demery. The matter is forgotten.”

But not quite forgiven. Perhaps Demery suspected so from her tone. He bowed and moved away, back to the woman who had engaged his attention at dinner. Grace watched them out of the corner of her eye. She did not think the woman had much chance. Mr Demery was all polite smiles and distant eyes. When somebody started to play the piano and a space was cleared for dancing, he ignored the hint boldly. Another man asked the woman to dance, and she went away with him.

Alice found a partner and Grace gave her permission to dance, but Emma was less lucky and sat with Grace by the wall.

“I wouldn’t mind it so much,” she said in a quiet voice, “if Alice wasn’t always asked first. I’m twenty-two. I think in four years I’ve had fewer dances than Alice in the past one — and for half of it she’s been in mourning.”

“Alice is an incorrigible flirt,” Grace said. “If a man does not ask her, she asks him.”

“I would not dare. Though I wish I did.” Emma tugged at a drooping curl which had been achieved only through the art of curling papers and the science of a hot iron. Alice’s came naturally. “I really thought I looked pretty tonight.”

“You do,” Grace said. “Look.” She ran her gaze around the room and noticed Demery still sitting on the couch, watching the dancers without seeing them. “Would you dance with that man? I know him a little. He is a friend of Mr Montague.”

Emma bit her lip. “You were talking with him earlier. You did not look pleased.”

“He’s not a friend of mine ,” Grace said. “He will not be a friend of yours either. But if he dances with you, some other young man might become interested, and he is neither dangerous nor reproachable. And I think he will dance with you, if I ask.”

“Alright. Thank you.”

Grace crossed the room to Mr Demery and sat next to him. He looked at her, rather confused.

“I’d like to ask you a favour, Mr Demery,” she said. “I believe you owe me one.”

“Is it even a favour then?”

“Very well. I’d like you to pay a debt owing.”

He smiled, though it did not lighten the sadness in his eyes. “What is the favour?”

“I would like you to dance with my sister. She cannot find a partner.”

Demery glanced across the room toward Emma. “I am afraid I would not be an elegant partner tonight.”

“Emma would be grateful for any partner.” Grace saw that Demery still looked reluctant. “She is a very pretty dancer, Mr Demery. If she stands up, I am sure she will catch the eye of other men. The difficulty lies in finding a man who would stand up with her to begin with. Which is why I have asked you, because you are somewhat in my debt. It is only one dance, Mr Demery, and all will be forgotten.”

Demery’s jaw tensed. “Are you always so forceful in your dealings with men?”

“I often find it necessary with your sex.”

To her surprise, the tenseness lightened as he gave what was not quite a laugh but perhaps an amused sigh. “Very well. I will dance with her, Mrs Redwood.”

“Thank you.” Grace caught Emma’s eye and nodded, but remained on the couch by Demery. There had been some stiffness to the way he said Redwood that rankled at her. She should not interfere. Mr Demery struck her as the type of man who resented interfering women, and, besides, any interference would probably do little good anyway. Nor was James deserving of any kindness from her. But…

There were none who could overhear them, and everybody was watching the dance. “It was not James, Mr Demery.”

“What do you mean?”

“James is not the father of Miss Balley’s baby.”

“He would naturally tell you that.”

She shook her head. “My husband lies, but he would not lie about his own child. He has never even met Miss Balley.”

Demery’s expression darkened, but his tone was quite civil when he replied. “Why are you telling me this now?”

“Because everybody believes it is James. Everybody who does not know him, that is. They all think he seduced and abandoned Miss Balley. I cannot persuade the rest of London that he is innocent, but you might believe me. You might at least do me the grace of questioning the situation.”

Demery shook his head. “Why would Catherine lie about the father of her child?”

“I don’t know.” Grace noticed Demery’s upper lip curl and added quickly, “Perhaps she was frightened of telling the truth. Perhaps the truth, whatever it was, was far worse than naming an innocent man.”

Demery looked at the carpet and rubbed the toe of his shoe gently back and forth across the weave. The dance was coming to an end. Grace hoped she had not just ruined Emma’s chances.

“How do you know that Redwood didn’t lie to you?” he asked quietly, not looking up.

“Because I know every one of his past lovers was a married woman. And I know him. He may be a coward and a fool.” Grace’s voice wavered. “And a thoroughly awful man. But he would not abandon his own child. He is not irresponsible. He knows where his duties lie.”

“Why would Catherine blame a man she never met?” Demery spoke almost to himself. “Why would she do such a cruel thing?”

“Because James has a reputation to support the accusation, perhaps.”

“That is not what I mean. Why, Mrs Redwood, would she lie? Did she not trust me? Her father?”

Grace waited in silence, unwilling to tell Demery that very often women did not.

“Are you sure that I have done Redwood wrong?” Demery asked after a moment.

“I am certain.”

“Yet I think, by your tone, that he has hurt you?”

“I never said he was a good man. Indeed, some days I think him the worst of men, but he does not deserve to be believed guilty of a crime he never committed.”

“You have damned him in every possible way while standing up for his innocence.” Demery smiled faintly and very sadly. “If you love him, can you not forgive him?”

Grace’s fingers trembled. She looked ahead very determinedly, the movement of the dancers and the glowing lights and shadows of the drawing room suddenly blurred with tears. “I might ask the same of you and Miss Balley.” The music ended and the dancers stopped. “Now, sir, do you not owe my sister a dance?”

__

2022-08-12 A/N: I am feeling that Watty deadline breathing down my neck. One chapter and an epilogue to go.

Chapter Thirty-Two: Until Tomorrow

Mrs Redwood urged James to seek out Grace and make up to her. Mr Redwood said nothing but exuded silent disappoint. They both thought James was to blame, and in this case, James thought, they were not wrong.

He could not bear the thought of going to London, where people were still gossiping about him and Miss Balley. Besides, he might see Grace, and his wounded heart could not bear the thought. The words, ‘Thank god I never loved you,’ seemed branded into his soul. She had never loved him then. Now, she never would. He had always feared marrying only for it to break apart. Now, he had married into something broken in the first place. And it was all his own fault.

James occupied himself by going for long, morose walks around the countryside, or riding his horse out to far flung, quiet villages where no one knew him, where he could sit at a table in an alehouse drinking and not talking to anybody, except for commonalities on the weather or compliments about a horse or hound. Sometimes he would desire even more solitude than that gave him, and find quiet woods where he could sit down under trees and not think about Grace for hours on end. It took a great deal of his energy not to think about her.

One morning, he returned home from one of his long, quiet, not-thinking rides to find there was a visitor waiting for him in the drawing room.

“It is a Mr Demery,” his father said, drawing James aside in the hall. “I told him you were not at home, and he said he would wait. He has been waiting for two hours. He will not say what he wants.”

“Does he look… angry?” James asked.

“He has the face of a tombstone,” Mr Redwood said. “If you think it prudent, I will ask him to leave.”

It probably was prudent, James thought, but he was restless and felt reckless. A tussle might improve his mood, and he would not go easy on Demery this time. He smiled. “I am sure he has only come to clear the air.”

He entered the drawing room prepared to dodge a blow. Demery, however, only stood up and bowed. There was no glove thrown. No sabre drawn. Indeed, his gloves were shoved in his pocket and he had no weapon on him.

“Mr Redwood,” he said.

“Mr Demery. How very unexpected. Do you bring your own pistols, or I will I have to provide? I can’t, I’m afraid. I don’t have any.”

Demery’s sun-worn face darkened, not with anger, but with embarrassment. “I did not come to pick a fight.”

Bother, James thought. He leaned against the back of an arm chair and sighed. “Then to what do I owe the pleasure?”

Demery did not answer. He paced to the window, looked out, then paced back again.

“Sir?”

“Yes, yes.” Demery cleared his throat. “I… I know my visit must be unexpected, even unwelcome, but I felt it important to come.”

James grunted.

Demery waited a moment, as though expecting a more thoughtful reply, then continued, “I have been made to understand that I did you a great wrong last October. I accused you of a crime you had not committed. I used violence against you. I challenged you for your life and would have taken it.” He bowed low. “Apologies are not enough, but I offer you my deepest anyway.”

This was not merely unexpected, it was profoundly awkward. James stared at Demery’s bent back. The formality of Demery’s apology made it impossible to reply to. If he did not reply, would Demery remained hunched over in his drawing room forever? The man had not released his bow.

Demery rose, slowly, his face reddened. “Mr Redwood?”

“Yes, I heard you,” James said. He found he was rather annoyed with the whole situation. Demery was a stiff, pompous fool. James cared as much for his apology as his company. “I’m just confused by this change in your manner. Did your lady tell you the truth? Is she going to tell everybody else and clear my name.”

“She is not my lady anymore.” A sudden coolness came over Demery’s voice. “It was your lady who convinced me.”

“Grace.” A strange, giddy feeling came over James. “You saw her?”

“She accosted me at a dinner party and protested your innocence. She was very persuasive. She left me with no moral recourse other than apology.”

“She did?” James’s heartbeat quickened. “What did she say?”

“Enough to persuade me.” Demery shuffled his feet. “Apology is insufficient recompense, I can see. Is there some way I can make up for what I have done?”

“What? No, no. It’s alright. Sometimes a man has to let his anger out. No harm done.”

“I wish I could help dispel the rumours.”

“You can’t,” James said. “It doesn’t matter. Give it five or ten years. People will forget.” Rumours seemed very unimportant right now. Grace had defended him. He felt light as a feather.

“You are very generous, sir.” Demery bowed again, briefly this time. “You have set my heart at ease and I thank you.”

He crossed the room to leave, but James stopped him by tugging at his sleeve.

“Just tell me one thing,” James said. “Did Grace look well?”

“In fine health, I would say.”

“Happy?”

“Not happy, not exactly. But she looked well.”

“Not happy.” James drummed his fingers against his thighs. “Am I cruel for being relieved? But she never was a very happy person— it may mean nothing.”

Demery gave him a thin, diplomatic smile. James realized he was overstepping the boundaries of polite conversation. He shook himself.

“Thank you for your apology,” he said. “I appreciate it.”

Demery held out his hand, and James shook it. “I’m glad we could settle our differences.”

“Yes.” James saw him to the front door and opened it. “By the way, did Grace— No, never mind.”

Demery paused on the front steps. “She said you were the worst of men.”

“To her, I have been.”

“Yet she did not deny that she loves you.”

James’s heart leapt. “She— did she really say that?”

“In as many words.”

“No. She can’t have. She never loved me.” James shook his head. “She told me so. And she might have loved me, if I weren’t such a fool. But I ruined it. I might have actually been happy with her, if I hadn’t broken her trust.” Again, he was overstepping the bounds of polite conversation, but when he had been trying not to think these thoughts for three weeks, it was difficult to stop them spilling out as speech now. Especially when his heart was alight with the idea that Grace loved him — but she could not. She had said she did not. But did he have a chance? He tapped his foot against the top step. “Do you have your carriage? Are you going to London?

“I do and I am.”

“Then there’s something you can do for me after all. You can take me with you.”

They arrived in London in the early afternoon. When they got there, James realized he did not know the address of the sister with whom Grace was staying. Luckily, Demery knew Mr Underton and diverted his carriage to the address. James leapt from the coach with barely a word of thanks or goodbye — but then Demery was probably glad just to be rid of him. James had spent the whole journey explaining the course of his relationship with Grace and asking Demery his opinions and thoughts. It was a relief to talk to somebody about it at last, even if that somebody was far too diplomatic to give anything more than the vaguest of reassurances and sympathies.

When he rang Mrs Underton’s doorbell, a footman answered the door and informed him, with a doubtful look at his boots, that Mrs Underton was receiving. James looked down at himself. He was still in his muddy riding clothes. It would embarrass Grace and her sister if he walked in like this.

“It’s only Mrs Redwood I wish to speak to — my wife. Is she here?”

“She is upstairs. Perhaps you would care to wait in the—” the footman looked sadly at James’s muddy boots “—morning room?”

James would have waited in the scullery if it meant seeing Grace. He followed the footman into the house and down the hallway to an over-cluttered and fussy room, at this time of day, fast losing the light. James almost tripped over a small chair as he entered and, to save face, caught it and sat down upon it. The footman politely did not remark upon it and disappeared back into the hallway. James was alone in the room, and now that he was alone, he was beginning to feel nervous. Grace had been quite firm in wishing to live apart and have little to do with him. She had not precisely said she never wished to see him again, but the implication had been there.

There was a soft footstep at the door and she entered. He stood up, his heart pounding. She looked well. She wore a very pale pinkish lilac gown of diaphanous layers which shifted smokily around her hips as she moved. The expression in her eyes was wary.

“Is there something wrong?”

“Yes— no. I just… I just wanted to see you.” He had been mistaken in coming. He knew it by the tone of her voice. He should have waited longer, given her more time to forgive him. But he was here now, and he could not bring himself to leave. Besides, time might not be enough. “Demery spoke to me. He said you persuaded him of the truth. Thank you.”

“You need not to thank me.”

“I want to.”

They fell into silence. On the drive over, James had imagined what might happen when they saw each other. He had expected that she would slap him, or that he would kiss her, or perhaps that she would begin to cry. Instead, she stood quietly by the door with her hands clasped in front of her. The diaphanous dress moved a little in the breeze through an open window.

“Is that a new gown?” James asked.

“It was one of the ones ordered before our marriage.”

His hands ached to reach through its smokey folds and find the form her body within. She was his wife now. It was no longer forbidden. Except by the coldness of her gaze, which made it impossible. He clasped his hands together and shivered.

“When Demery came to see me, I… I felt I had to speak with you. There is much we left unsaid on our wedding day.”

“I thought it for the best not to say too much. What we had to speak of would only be painful.”

“Can I not have the chance to explain myself?”

“Do you think an explanation will change anything?” Her eyes were suspiciously bright. “You tried to trick me out of an engagement, and then you tried to trick me into one, and now I’m sure you’re trying to trick me into… into something! The whys and wherefores don’t matter. I don’t want to be tricked. I don’t want to be lied to.”

“Then let me tell you the truth. I… I…” He could not say he loved her. He was on the precipice of it, but he had not fallen. Would not fall as long as they lived separate lives. And even if he did, he could not promise her he would not crawl back out. “…I want you with me.”

“I don’t trust you, James. How can I live with a man I don’t trust?”

“How can I earn your trust if we live apart?”

Grace’s lower lip trembled. James wanted to kiss it. She clamped it firmly shut. “Perhaps you can’t.”

“Then what happens? Are we forever broken?” He shook his head. “I don’t want that. We are married. I don’t want to be another of those married couples that don’t talk to each other, don’t care for each other, aren’t even friends with each other. I never wanted to marry at all but…”

“But you thought you had to because of my dowry.”

“But you began to change my mind. You began to make me believe we’d be happy together. And then…” He shrugged helplessly. “So we are married, and we are broken apart, what happens next?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, what do you envision will become of us? If you never trust me, never forgive me, but… do not, I think, hate me.”

She shook her head. “I never hated you.”

“And cannot live with me.”

“No.”

“But we can talk.”

“We can talk.”

There was faint hope then. She was not shutting him out, as she had after her father’s death.

“If I were to move back to London, we could talk more often?”

“We might find ourselves in the same social circles.”

“And if we were to find ourselves at a ball, we might dance?”

“I think we might.”

“And I might hold your hand. Or your waist.”

“It sometimes happens, when dancing.”

“And if I invited you to dinner sometimes, alone, at my house, you would think about accepting it?”

“I would consider it.”

“And since it is also your house, now, you might wish to stay the night sometimes?”

Her eyes went very large and she gave a brief nod.

“Then… then with all those mights and woulds and maybes… would you consider accepting what I owe you as a husband?”

“I don’t want your money.”

“I wasn’t thinking of money.” He touched her cheek. “I miss you, Grace. Will you let me love you?”

Her eyes were dark and huge. “James…”

“To be honest, it won’t matter if you deny me permission. If you talk to me, dance with me, dine with me, sleep with me, I will fall in love. I’ve already started. You can take this as a warning that I’m going to finish it. My question is can I speak of it to you, or should I keep it quiet?”

The colour shifted across her cheeks. “Not yet. Please.”

“I don’t love you… yet.”

“Perhaps… ask again when you do.”

It was more than he had hoped for. More than he deserved. She was giving him a chance. Joy and sorrow warred within him. She might not love him, as Demery had said, but she was not denying the possibility of it ever happening.

He gave in to temptation and reached out to run his hands through the gossamer folds of her dress. “You look beautiful, Grace.”

“Thank you.”

“Can I kiss you?”

She raised an eyebrow. “Only if it’s goodbye.”

“Until we meet again,” he corrected.

“Until we meet again.”

“Which will probably be tomorrow.”

Grace could not quite suppress her smile. “Until tomorrow then.”

He kissed her cheek. “Until tomorrow.”

2022-08-19 A/N: It’s a bit of a bittersweet ending, but the epilogue is still to come to, er, sweeten things up a bit.

Epilogue

— Six Weeks Later —

It was very late and the dinner plates were empty but for the barest crumbs. They had stayed at the table talking and drinking wine. The past few weeks had been a lot of talking with James. It was almost like being courted by him again, with the exception that she was married to him. They had danced, gone for rides in the park, attended plays, and visited galleries, and at the end of it, always, she had returned to Harriet’s house. She had been nervous of accepting James’s invitation to dinner, and had put it off several times. But it had been quite wonderful, really, having him all to herself with no one to overhear or interrupt anything they might say — or observe what they might do. And now they had fallen into silence, and James had loosened his cravat and was staring into the distance as he twisted his wine glass idly in his hands. It was nearing midnight. It was probably time for Grace to go back to Harriet’s.

“It’s getting late,” Grace said reluctantly.

“Right.” James glanced at the clock. “I suppose it is. I lost track of time.”

“I, uh, ought to be getting back.”

James gave her a wry smile. “I’ll call for the carriage.”

He stood and, on his way to the bell-pull, stooped and kissed the top of her head. Grace’s heart shivered at his touch. She watched as he went on to tug at the bell. She had thought he might try to seduce her tonight, or persuade her to stay, but he had given her no affection beyond a bare few kisses and the warmth of the expression of his eyes.

“Wait,” Grace said. “I— I can stay a little longer.”

James paused at the bell-pull. “Whenever you’re ready then.”

“Actually, I… I was thinking I could stay the night.”

James tried to speak and choked on his own words. He coughed to clear his throat. “Beg pardon?”

“It would be a pity to disturb you servants to send me home.”

“Indeed.” James cleared his throat. “But they will have to make your bedroom up. Won’t they?”

Grace’s cheeks warmed. “I don’t think that will be necessary.”

“Oh.” James’s own cheeks were red. “I— I’m tired. I’m thinking of going to bed now.”

“It’s probably time to turn in.”

He helped her to her feet and when she was standing kept his hand in hers. Together, they went up the stairs to the second floor. On the landing, James pulled her close and kissed her, his lips tasting like wine.

“I just want to make very sure,” he said. “Are you asking me to bed with you?”

She nodded and twisted her arms around the back of his neck. “I want you to… to make me your wife.”

“You are my wife.” He kissed her again. “I’ve been trying to avoid—” he kissed her “—seducing you into—” again “—forgiving me.”

“Forgiving you?” She drew back and stroked his hair, trembling with sudden uncertainty. “James, I still… hurt. But I want this. I want to know what it is. I want you to show me.”

“You do?” He looked searchingly at her eyes. “I’ll show you. Come with me.”

He pulled her down the passageway to his bedroom and led her to the bed, where he kissed the inside of her wrist and pushed her gently down on top of it. She lay back against the pillows, her heart racing with anticipation as his delicate hands removed her shoes and stockings and his kisses made their way up her calves to her thighs.

“James, what are you doing?” she asked, confused.

“Showing you.” His breath was warm between her thighs and his hands were searching up beneath the folds of her dress, roving over her hips and waist like a pianist finding the right keys with his eyes shut. “There are many ways to begin, dear.”

Grace had not known that. She also had not known kisses could go where his kisses were going. She gasped and twisted her hands around the bedpost to control the writhing impulse in her hips.

“James! Oh!”

He was occupied in a manner that prevented him replying. But she was incapable of intelligible speech anyway. She was incapable of anything more than gasping his name as his hands and mouth explored the most private parts of her and pleasure rose over her body. And then the pleasure reached a peak and broke, leaving smaller ripples of pleasure behind. Grace collapsed backwards into the pillows, her breathing coming in rags. As her heart rate slowed, James kicked off his shoes and stockings, slipped out of his coat, and crawled up beside her, one hand still playing under her skirts.

“James,” Grace said confused, “am I still a virgin?”

“I’m not quite sure.” His hand charmed its way between her thighs. “But I promise you by the end of the night you will not be.”

He made good on his promise within the next hour, and then again twice more before morning. When Grace woke to the sunlight streaming in the window, she was sore and covered in the dried salt of their sweat, but strangely content. She prodded James until he woke.

“Mph.”

“I need a bath.”

“I’ll come.” He rolled over and opened his eyes half-way. “I’m very good at baths.”

“You’re still asleep.” She poked him again. “I need a bath and I’ve got no clothes.”

That woke him. He sat up slowly and rubbed his face.

“The no clothes part does not worry me,” he said. “In fact, I find it very pleasant.”

“James!”

“No, I am going to flirt with you.” He gave her a crooked, sleepy smile that took her breath away. “I think I’ve earned that right. If I haven’t, I am stealing it. How do you feel, dearest?”

“Dirty.” She threw a pillow at him. “And naked.”

“And yet you’ve never been better dressed.” He pushed the pillow aside. “Grace. Darling. I’ll call the servants and attend to things. But you can hardly rush off. It’s barely dawn.” He drew her into his arms and settled back on the pillows with her. “We’ve a matter to attend to.”

Grace’s heart quickened with anticipation. “What kind of matter?”

“Not that.” He stayed her straying hand by closing his own over it. “That can be later. First…” He kissed her shoulder. “First I have to ask a question of my beautiful, charming, very naked wife.”

“What question?” She nestled into him.

“The question.” He met her eyes. “Will you live with me?”

She shifted a little, growing nervous. “I like living with Harriet, and spending time with you.”

“I know. You have all the privileges of marriage, and none of the burdens.” He smiled wryly and kissed her hair. “I won’t push you, Grace. I’m only asking. I want you with me. In my house. In my bed. I want you to be my wife in every way, and one day the mother of my children.”

“What if I need more time?”

“Then you have it.”

Grace turned over so that she was lying on top of him with her face pressed into the crook of his neck and his flesh warm against hers. It was pleasant to hear that she was wanted. And if she were honest with herself, she wanted James too. And Harriet would no doubt be worried when she returned home because she had been out all night. There were certain inconveniences to living with Harriet. A lack of necessary privacy, for one.

“It might be a good idea,” she said.

“Mmm.” James stroked her hair. “And I’ve another question, Grace.”

“What?”

“Am I allowed yet to speak of what I feel for you?”

Her heart skipped a beat. “That depends what you have to say.”

“Everything I said last night, but with words instead.”

She shivered and held him tighter. “Is that what it all meant?”

“That. And more.”

“Then perhaps… perhaps tell me one more time — without the words — and maybe then I’ll be ready for the words.”

“Ah.” James kissed her shoulder. “Then listen, my darling, listen.”

The End

2022-08-20: A bit more bittersweet and unresolved than others, but I have hopes for James’s and Grace’s future together.