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‘I am not sure, I must ask your brother, but I imagine only a skeleton staff, and he will doubtless wish to retain them and move them to one of his other establishments.’
‘My brother? You mean Charlie is selling you a house?’ Marina’s brow furrowed, then cleared. ‘Then he must be selling Knightshaye. I had no idea it was not entailed like everything else.’
‘It used to be in my family. Your father acquired it, I am retrieving it.’ Marina shivered. Lord Mortenhoe’s voice was pleasant and unemotional, yet she felt a sudden frisson of danger as though a blade had been drawn hissing from its sheath.
‘That is good for all of us, I am sure,’ she commented, more for something to say than anything else.
‘Indeed? Do you dislike it so?’
‘I have never been there—in fact, I do not believe Charlie has either. No, I meant it is good that you have been able to get it back and that Charlie has realised money on it.’ His profile looked somewhat forbidding, so, in an effort at lightness, she added, ‘I shall have to tease a new pair of dining-room curtains out of my brother on the strength of the sale.’
‘I should imagine you could tease rather more than that out of him should you try, Miss Winslow. Your brother strikes a hard bargain. But the deal has not yet been concluded.’
Was that resentment in his voice? No, not that, more a wry admiration. Perhaps that was why she had sensed so much tension on his first visit—Charlie had set too high a price and they were still negotiating. But the thought of what realising the value of a large mansion would do for the shaky family fortunes was thrilling—just so long as Charlie did not promptly gamble it away. Why on earth have Charlie and Mama not mentioned it?
‘Have you ever been there?’
‘It was my home until three weeks after my eighth birthday.’
‘Then it must have a most sentimental attachment for you,’ she said warmly. ‘I am so glad you are regaining it. Is it as you remember it? I always find that going back to places I knew as a child is most disconcerting—they either seem bigger or much smaller than I recall.’
‘I have never been back.’ He seemed to hesitate, then added, ‘I swore as we drove away that I would never return until I owned it again.’
‘What a very determined little boy you must have been.’ She smiled at the thought of the childish resolution.
Justin turned to look at her and she almost drew back at the look in his eyes. There was the ghost of pain there, overlaid by an iron-hard will. ‘And now I am a very determined man,’ he remarked evenly. Then, with a smile that transformed his face, ‘But I do not want to bore you with business, Miss Winslow. Might I hope to find you at home tomorrow afternoon if I called to take you driving in the park?’
‘So soon?’ His eyebrows rose in sharp interrogation and Marina had the fleeting thought that she had said something to surprise him. ‘I mean, I may not have assembled all the details of the agencies you will need by then.’
‘But that is not why I invited you to drive with me.’ His smile was producing the most extraordinary sensations, as though her skin was suddenly too hot, or someone had drawn a piece of velvet across it. Once again she had the illusion that they were alone in the room. I really must stop looking at his mouth.
‘It is not?’ Can he be flirting with me? Surely not, not with Priscilla Hinton, lovely, sophisticated and very willing to engage in such an activity, only an arm’s reach away. No, he was simply being kind to the sister of the man with whom he was doing business.
‘No. I only had the desire to drive in pleasant company. Has anyone ever told you that you are a most soothing companion, Miss Winslow?’
‘Soothing? Why, no.’ And why, even if she did possess this quality, would a fashionable gentleman wish to seek it out? Marina was mystified. ‘I think you are teasing me again, my lord.’ Soothing, now she came to think about it, sounded somewhat staid.
‘I have said the wrong thing; perhaps a young lady does not wish to hear she is soothing. Possibly I should have said lovely, charming...’
A gurgling laugh escaped Marina’s lips. ‘Now I know you are talking fustian! Here is the tea tray. Please excuse me, Lord Mortenhoe, Mama will wish me to pour.’
‘Might I assist you?’ He was on his feet before she could answer.
‘Oh...thank you.’ Marina poured tea and handed him two cups. ‘For you and for Mrs Hinton. Do you take milk or lemon?’
‘Lemon, thank you.’ In the face of two tea cups almost thrust into his hands Lord Mortenhoe carried them across to Priscilla Hinton and, as Marina hoped, was invited with a pretty smile to sit beside her.
Marina dispensed the rest of the tea and came to rest next to Mr Philpott, with whom it was possible to carry on the most comfortable conversation without the slightest discomfiture. Mr Philpott, a serious but kindly man, neither flirted nor teased but spoke in measured tones on dull and unexceptional subjects of interest that allowed one to survey the room and ensure that the company was all provided with refreshment and suitably entertained.
Mama, to Marina’s surprise, was regarding her with a less than approving expression. When she had her daughter’s attention, she swivelled her eyes to focus on Mrs Hinton’s sofa and produced a frown.
Marina responded with the slightest of shrugs. She was more than happy to see their two most distinguished guests amusing themselves, although, now she was watching them, it did seem rather fast of Priscilla to be popping a morsel of her almond cake between Lord Mortenhoe’s lips. There was nothing he could be expected to do about that, of course, other than accept it with good grace.
He seemed to sense her gaze upon him and turned his head to meet her eyes, holding them with his own as he slowly licked a crumb of cake from his lower lip. Marina felt herself drawn in as though she had risen to her feet and taken a step towards him. Her skin was hot again with that strange velvety sensation and she broke eye contact with a shiver of alarm.
She sipped her tea, marvelling at her own lack of propriety in reacting so. But no one has ever flirted with me before, not like this. I do not know what to do.
No, that was not strictly true. Gauche young men had attempted to flirt with her when she was equally gauche and just out, but, with neither liking nor aptitude for it, she soon found herself eclipsed by more confident, assured and beautiful young ladies such as her friend Priscilla Wilde, now Mrs Hinton. The trouble was, she realised, that either she had not liked the young gentlemen enough to suspend her natural reticence or she found the posturing and play-acting funny, but could find no one with whom safely to share the joke.
But Lord Mortenhoe did seem to be a man who would know immediately what the joke was, and was also someone who could make flirtation rather stimulating. Probably it was the fact that he was older than those callow youths and simply more experienced.
Just how experienced? Marina wondered, watching him over the rim of her tea cup while listening with every appearance of attention to Mr Philpott speaking about the health of the King. Had Charlie introduced her to a rake? The thought made her smile; in the safety of her own home a rake seemed more interesting than alarming. The gentleman in question looked up as she did so and answered the smile with one of his own, a fleeting look of warmth and communication.
Bunting entered, a footman with fresh hot water on his heels. Goodness! Was that the time? It only seemed moments since she had poured the first cups. Marina glanced round hastily, half-expecting to see her guests looking reproachfully into empty teacups. But no one appeared to have noticed her abstraction. With a murmured excuse to Mr Philpott she rose and refreshed the teapot, then began to circulate around the room, checking to see who would like another cup.
This time, much to her surprise, her cousin got to his feet and helped ferry the drinks to and from the tea table. ‘Why, thank you, Hugh.’ Marina tried not to sound too surprised at his thoughtfulness.
‘Thank you, Cousin Marina,’ he responded as they stood together at the table. ‘Papa has been thinking about what Lord Mortenhoe said, and says that he wonders he never thought of horse breeding himself. And he says he will send me to Ireland, to a friend of his with a stud out there so I can buy my first horses with his guidance.’ Hugh’s normally sullen countenance was transformed by a broad grin he appeared quite unable to control and Marina’s heart warmed to him. ‘My own horses—think of it!’
‘Do not thank me—it is all due to Lord Mortenhoe’s suggestion. Why do you not tell him yourself? Here, take the cups for him and Mrs Hinton.’ The youth hastened over to the seated couple, his grin replaced with a frown of concentration as he attempted not to spill the tea. As he approached, Priscilla Hinton got to her feet, waving Lord Mortenhoe back into his seat and, taking her cup from Hugh, strolled over to join Marina.
‘My dear! I had no idea, you sly thing.’
‘What do you mean?’ Marina checked that the other guests were comfortable and steered Priscilla to a distant corner. ‘Don’t be provoking, Pris.’ Despite being as dissimilar in most things as they could be, the two young women had been fast friends for years, ever since they had shared a piano teacher and dancing lessons.
Priscilla was an elegant blonde with fine blue eyes, an open and spontaneous manner and a love of frivolity, luxury and fun. Marina could never get her to take anything seriously other than the acquisition of a rich husband, a duty Pris took with the utmost earnestness as being the passport to all the things she enjoyed most.
By great good luck she found a man who was not only rich but who adored her and whose chosen profession of diplomacy gave his young wife the perfect showcase for her charm, looks and love of entertaining.
Now she turned her aquamarine gaze on Marina and said reproachfully, ‘It is you who is being provoking, Mar! Here I am, your oldest friend, and you keep the most incredible news from me.’
‘What news? I cannot think of a thing that has happened since we went shopping last week that you would be remotely interested in.’
‘Lord Mortenhoe, of course! You attach an eligible suitor and do not breathe a word. Honestly, Mar, I feel positively hurt.’
‘Suitor?’ Marina regarded her friend with alarm. ‘He is no such thing, Pris, we only met yesterday. He is doing business with Charlie, buying some property.’ She took a deep breath—it was suddenly very important to disabuse Priscilla of this ridiculous misunderstanding. ‘I assure you, Lord Mortenhoe has no more interest in me than I have in him. In fact—’
She broke off at a sharp jab in the ribs from Mrs Hinton. ‘He is coming over.’
His lordship was indeed coming towards them. Marina found herself looking at him through her friend’s eyes: a powerful, assured, very masculine gentleman with looks that turned foolish female heads. And it seemed she was no more rational than the rest of them, for her heart was beating very strangely and she could feel the colour rising in her cheeks.
‘Ladies.’ He came to a halt just in front of them. ‘I must bid you goodnight. Mrs Hinton, it was a pleasure to meet you. Miss Winslow, I hope two o’clock will be a convenient time for me to call for our drive?’
‘Yes, perfectly convenient, my lord.’ It came out sounding squeaky, but at least it was a coherent sentence.
‘Then, until two tomorrow. Thank you for a delightful dinner party.’ He bowed slightly, turned and strolled over to take his farewell of Lady Winslow, his elegant figure tracked across the room by two pairs of eyes, one blue, the other grey.
‘Well?’ Priscilla demanded. ‘What did I say? And you still maintain he has no interest in you?’
Chapter Four (#ub7ce7f01-2d02-5e90-ade4-0c7dc70e01f1)
‘Yes,’ Marina said firmly. ‘He is merely being courteous because he and Charlie are negotiating some business and he will doubtless be in and out of the house for a while. That is all.’
‘Mar, there are times I utterly despair of you!’ Priscilla looked set to continue, but the clock struck the hour and she jumped to her feet with an exclamation of annoyance. ‘Look at the time—and I promised darling Henry I would be home before he got back tonight, poor hard-working lamb that he is.’ She looked down at Marina, biting her lip. ‘There is nothing for it, you need taking in hand, this is an emergency. I will cancel all my appointments and will be with you by ten tomorrow morning. Now, whatever you do, get a good night’s sleep, dearest.’
She bent, kissed Marina’s cheek and began to walk away, turning after a few steps to stare at her friend’s hair. ‘I wonder if I can get Monsieur Lamerre at such short notice?’ It appeared to be a rhetorical question, for she hastened off to her hostess and in a few moments was gone, along with the Philpotts.
Marina stared rather blankly after her, long after the door had closed, unconscious of the bustle surrounding the Thredgolds making their way off to their lodgings.
‘Miss Marina?’ It was Bunting, checking for any last orders or comments on the evening.
‘Thank you, Bunting, everything was delightful. Please thank the staff and especially Mrs Leeming. That was an excellent dinner, and at such short notice.’
Marina made her way over to where her mother and Charlie were chatting by the fireside, Charlie nursing a bumper of brandy between his palms.
‘I think I will go to bed now, Mama.’ Her parent smiled at her and nodded. Marina bit her lip, then added, ‘Lord Mortenhoe has invited me to drive with him tomorrow afternoon.’
‘That is nice, dear,’ Lady Winslow remarked comfortably. ‘Goodnight, my love.’
‘Goodnight, Mama. Goodnight, Charlie.’
Marina had reached her bedroom before anything about that exchange struck her as odd, but, as she sat in front of her dressing table while her maid removed the pins and bushed out her hair, she frowned at her reflection.
Why was Mama so unconcerned that she was going driving with a gentleman who was virtually unknown to her? Surely she should be in as much of a tizzy as Pris was? Had she known already that Lord Mortenhoe was going to ask her?
Then common sense took over her jumbled thoughts. It was Pris who was acting oddly by being so excited about it. Mama and Charlie put exactly the same construction upon the matter as she herself had—it was a polite invitation to the sister of a man with whom he was doing business and nothing more need be read into it.
This was so obviously the case, Marina decided as she tied her nightcap ribbons, that it was ridiculous that she had considered anything else even for a moment. After all, she was twenty-six years of age, the virtually dowerless daughter of a baron, of no beauty and with no talent other than for housekeeping. Justin Ransome, Earl of Mortenhoe, must be one of the most eligible bachelors in London.
If he was a bachelor. That had not occurred to Marina, but a moment’s thought assured her it must be so. Mama would not countenance her driving about town with a married man.
Satisfied that she had the matter aright now, she climbed into bed and blew out her candle. A good night’s sleep, then she must fit in time to make a list of the most suitable domestic agencies to recommend to him before Pris descended upon her.
Half an hour later, a wide-awake Miss Winslow slipped out of bed, pulled on her robe and padded downstairs to the library to consult the Peerage.
In the master bedchamber of a distinguished town house a few minutes drive away, the peer in question lay back against his pillows and examined his conscience.
His first reaction when Charles Winslow had stipulated his outrageous condition had been to reject it out of hand. He had then, Justin acknowledged to himself, capitulated with very little struggle—and therein lay the rub. Why had he given in to what his instinct told him was wrong?
He wanted Knightshaye. Regaining it had been his single purpose for twenty years, during eleven of which he had been in the position to work single-mindedly to amass sufficient funds to do so. Most of the family income had been tied up in the great house and estate, and what he had inherited from his father had been but a fraction of his former fortune. Which in itself was a puzzle—surely even as dedicated a gambler as Charlie Winslow could not have worked his way through the rents or the income of the Home Farm? On the other hand, there was nothing to have stopped him selling off parcels of farmland locally.
Justin pushed this new worry to the back of his mind and resumed the even less pleasant exercise of examining his motives. Was he really so obsessed that he would have married anyone to obtain Knightshaye? No. His long, lean frame jerked as he hauled himself upright in rejection of the thought. He had his name to consider. But it was more than that. To marry a woman for whom he could not feel liking and respect was to create a hollow sham, as cruel to her as it was repugnant to him.
But he was uncomfortably aware that he had agreed to court Marina Winslow, knowing nothing about her other than that she had beautiful eyes, a sense of humour, considerable grace and made him feel calm. That was not enough. He should have become better acquainted with her before agreeing to Winslow’s condition.
Restless now, Justin swung his legs off the bed and began to pace, still in his shirtsleeves and evening knee breeches. At least now he knew his first impressions of Marina were borne out by closer contact; on longer acquaintance he believed he could come to like her very well. Was that enough to be fair to her?
Moodily, Justin regarded himself in the cheval glass in the corner. Brought up almost exclusively by a trio of old friends of his grandfather, he had never been encouraged to think too highly of his natural attributes, only to value what hard work and the application of his intelligence won him.
He supposed he cut a well-enough figure. His tailor and valet both appeared satisfied and ladies less strictly brought up than Miss Winslow were not reticent in admiring his height, length of leg, breadth of shoulder and ability to avoid standing on their toes on the dance floor. The fortune his hard work had brought him was more silently valued.
Moving closer, he narrowed his eyes at his reflection. Black hair that would never conform to a fashionable crop, even if he could be persuaded to try one. A nose that contrasted disappointingly with the aloof features of the classical bust standing on a column next to the mirror—but then the model for that had presumably never got himself into a fist fight with the blacksmith’s son at the age of eleven. A mouth that he considered too wide and had had to learn to keep absolutely in repose when playing cards because, as his last mistress was fond of saying, ‘It is so expressive, darling,’ and those dark-fringed hazel eyes that would change colour so betrayingly with his emotions.
Your dangerous expression. Justin grinned at himself. Marina Winslow could speak her mind when she wanted to. In fact, he had a suspicion that behind that well-bred reticence she harboured all sorts of thoughts and opinions and that it would be interesting to explore them.
So... He prowled back to the bed and resumed his supine position on it. So, he liked Miss Winslow and she appeared to have the intelligence and strength of mind to suit him. So, he reasoned further, he was not being hypocritical in courting her. But, and here was the rub, what did she want and what did she make of him, given that she had no inkling of his intentions?
‘She can always refuse me.’ Justin considered his own words. Was that likely? He had a shrewd idea of the pressures that would be put on a young lady by her family if an offer to marry an earl came along, years after they had given her up as an old maid. ‘So...I had better make sure she does not want to refuse me.’ And do it without lying and pretending a love he did not feel.
What was it she had said any woman wanted?
‘I think that all women would want to feel wanted, needed, to have a loving family and to know that they are useful in whatever way they can be.’ And what else? ‘To have enough money to indulge in little luxuries is very pleasant, of course.’
And he had asked about rank and status and her response had been that they would bring great responsibility and yet have a certain allure.
She was not then averse to the wealth, the title and the position he could give her. He could certainly make her feel needed, hopefully give her the family she desired. Could he make her feel wanted? Justin was certain she had no intention of referring to physical wants—her clear grey gaze had been innocent and perfectly serious.
It was an important consideration. Justin had no intention of maintaining a mistress once married, whether he was in love with his wife or no, and it would be hard to be leg shackled to a woman for whom one felt little desire. And just at the moment the only way of describing what he felt for Marina Winslow was friendship. That in itself was a novelty. Brought up in a series of masculine households, carefully introduced both to the haut ton and the world of expensive pleasures for sale, women had simply never entered his orbit as friends.
At least he felt that he could now look his conscience in the eye, if only after a somewhat shaky start, but he felt no further forward in how, honourably, to advance his courtship of Marina after tomorrow’s promised drive in the park.
Restless again, he got up, threw on a robe and ran downstairs to the study. Pulling out a portfolio of suggestions from his agent for property acquisitions in the newly expanding area of St Mary-le-bone, he began to study them with close attention. Having enough money to buy back Knightshaye was one thing, to restore it and support a wife meant he could not rest on his laurels.
Back in Cavendish Square his proposed bride was also sitting poring over documents, although in Marina’s case it was a pile of her household account books and notes which she was scanning in an effort to recall which domestic agencies had been most effective in providing the Winslow household with staff.
Having satisfied herself by careful study of the Peerage that Lord Mortenhoe was indeed a single man, she had then taken herself to task for even thinking it important to check. Ten minutes later she had been alarmed to find herself still sitting at Charlie’s desk, her chin cupped in one hand, brooding on the puzzle of why he seemed so interested in her company.
By then she was too awake to make bed seem at all attractive, so, despite the clock chiming one o’clock, she took herself off to the morning room, which served the ladies of the house as their private sitting room, and found her notebooks.
Half-an-hour’s work produced a respectable selection of agencies. Marina took another sheet of paper and began to draft a list of what servants might be thought necessary for a house the size of Knightshaye. That Lord Mortenhoe might think it presumptuous of her to do such a thing did occur to her, but her perusal of the Peerage had shown neither mother, sisters nor sisters-in-law to perform such a service, so she decided to keep it aside and produce it if further conversation showed a need for it.
The night watchman crying the hour outside jerked her out of her thoughts. Two o’clock. Yawning, Marina folded the papers, picked up her chamber stick and made her way upstairs, reflecting sleepily that it was satisfying to do something that, hopefully, would be a service to a friend. That she was thinking of Justin Ransome in those terms did not even occur to her as strange.
* * *
Priscilla swept into the Cavendish Street house at ten on the dot, her maid at her heels clutching two hat boxes and a portmanteau. She took one look at Marina, who had been conning her accounts in the morning room, and let out a faint shriek of horror.
‘What have you been doing? You have bags under your eyes and you are positively sallow.’
‘Good morning, Priscilla. You are looking delightful as always.’ Marina refused to rise to the bait.
‘Do you think so?’ Priscilla eyed herself in the mirror as she untied her bonnet strings. ‘Well, this is a prodigiously pretty hat. Susan, run upstairs and find Miss Marina’s woman and show her what we have brought.’ She sat down in a ruffle of skirts and peered at Marina more closely. ‘A brisk walk around the Square will bring your colour back, but you look as if you hardly slept last night. Do you have any cucumber in the house? Because, if not, you must send out for one—it is the only thing for your eyes.’
‘I expect we have.’ Marina pushed her books to one side. ‘But there is really no need to fuss, Pris, I am only going for a carriage ride.’
‘With one of the most eligible men in London! I despair. And what is worse, I could not persuade Monsieur Lemerre to cancel his appointment with the Duchess of Porton, so we will have to manage your hair as best we can.’
‘I have done my hair for the day,’ Marina said firmly. ‘I mean it, Pris—I am not going to get into a tizzy about a simple invitation from a friend of Charlie’s.’
