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  THE MARRIAGE GAMBLE

  BY

  MARINA OLIVER

  Luke, Earl of Frayne, is determined to recover Frayne Caste, even if it means marrying the present owner, Damaris Hallem, a girl he has never met.

  Luke's father, an inveterate gambler, lost the Castle fifty years earlier to Damaris's grandfather, an innkeeper. As it is the first estate his family obtained Luke wants to regain it.

  Damaris, unwillingly obeying her grandfather's wishes, comes to London for the Season with her friend Mary, Lady Gordon, and her two young children. She will be twenty-one in July, and is looking forward to controlling her inheritance, which has been in the charge of a distant cousin, Humphrey Lee. Damaris is convinced he wants to marry her. She doesn't want any husband, who would deprive her of such control.

  Her first encounter with Luke is disastrous, but she soon finds a way out of the dilemma.

  The Marriage Gamble

  By Marina Oliver

  Copyright © 2011 Marina Oliver

  Smashwords Edition

  The moral right of the author has been asserted

  Cover Design by Debbie Oliver

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or distributed in any form, including digital and electronic or mechanical, without the prior written consent of the Publisher, except for brief quotes for use in reviews.

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  See details of other books by Marina Oliver at

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  AUTHOR NOTE

  I have used the theme of gambling in some of my other Regency novels (available from Regencyreads.com under the pseudonym Sally James).

  Regency men and women would gamble on anything, whole estates changed hands on the turn of a card, and men in particular lost vast sums.

  THE MARRIAGE GAMBLE

  BY MARINA OLIVER

  Chapter 1

  Luke, the fourteenth Earl of Frayne, put down his copy of The Times with relief, and waved to Francis Willett. At last, someone to talk to. White's, this evening, was full of boring old duffers who could only talk of their exploits forty years back in America. He wanted news of what was happening in the Peninsula, and Captain Willet, injured at Bussaco, was on extended sick leave.

  'Unfortunately for me, I've had to have weeks of treatment on this damned leg, and won't be fit for duty for a couple of months, so I decided I might as well toddle up to London and see part of the Season,' Willett said, then gave an exhaustive account of the Peninsular campaign accompanied by several glasses of port. 'What of you, Luke?'

  'Ah, I'm getting leg-shackled this year,' he said, a mixture of satisfaction and resignation in his voice. He didn't know whether to be looking forward to this event or be apprehensive at the coming change in his life. But, he reminded himself, once the knot was tied nothing else in his life need change except what he planned would be for the better.

  'So you've been caught at last? That will disappoint all those who've laid bets on your continuing freedom. Who's the clever lady?'

  'Miss Damaris Hallem.'

  'Hallem? Don't think I know anyone called Hallem. When am I going to meet her?'

  'When she comes to town. Next week, I hear.'

  'You mean she's not here yet? Where did you meet her? At some country assembly? That's not like you, Luke, to be honouring those.'

  'Oh no, I haven't met her yet. Never seen the girl.'

  Willett stared at him for a moment, then shook his head.

  'Seems to me you're dicked in the nob. How can you get married to someone you've never met?'

  Luke grinned. This wasn't something he'd admit to anyone else, but Frank was one of his closest friends, someone he'd known for most of his life.

  'She's a nobody, her family were cits or worse, and at twenty she's almost on the shelf. I'm the Earl of Frayne. Can you see her refusing me? I'm not as wealthy as Golden Ball, but I have sufficient, and I'm not ugly, or dissolute. I have no guilty secrets – '

  Willett gave a shout of laughter that caused a couple of elderly men, snoozing in their chairs, to glance up in annoyance.

  'Have you forgotten the delectable Catherine?'

  'I've paid her off, and she already has another protector. She was only back on the prowl for a couple of weeks before she found Stanton.'

  Willett shook his head.

  'You'll have to explain. My wits appear to have gone begging.'

  'It's simple enough. She's inherited Frayne Castle.'

  'I see,' Willett said slowly. 'But Luke, if you've never seen her, how can you contemplate marrying the wench?'

  'I can do anything to recover Frayne.'

  'But you've plenty of other houses. And your father lost Frayne fifty years ago, long before you were born. You've never lived there, not even seen it.'

  'Fifty-two. And I saw it, the outside, anyway, ten years ago. I went to a meet there.'

  'Couldn't you find anyone to show you around?'

  'The old devil never left it, so I couldn't bribe the housekeeper, and he never entertained. Not that he'd have invited me.'

  Luke refrained from mentioning the only occasion, six years earlier, when he had met old Mr Hallem. He'd never told anyone about that encounter, and never would. He preferred to forget his humiliation.

  'No, I can see that.'

  'The Fraynes owned it for centuries. It was our first estate. I swore I'd get it back within fifty years, and I'm two years overdue. This is the only way to do it, but the wretched girl hasn't been to town before. She's been in mourning for her damned grandfather, then something else prevented her, and last year she was ill. I can tell you, Frank, I've been getting deuced impatient. I began to feel lady luck was against me as much as she was against my father.'

  'I wish you better fortune this time, and I'll enjoy watching. I hope she isn't an antidote or a bluestocking.'

  'What if she is? She'll be all the readier to fall into my bed. Fortunately I won't have to look at her in the dark, and I can easily find consolation elsewhere. The Castle will be adequate recompense for my sacrifice.'

  *

  Damaris stared out of the coach window. London seemed to have expanded since she was last here, ten years ago, when her grandfather had sent her with her governess to visit museums and art galleries.

  'Miss bluestocking Drayton says it's essential culture,' he'd growled. 'Why anyone needs to go looking at old paintings and listening to squawking fiddles, I don't know, but I'm just a simple innkeeper.'

  The memory brought a tear to Damaris's eye. Her grandfather might have started out in life as an innkeeper, but he had also been a very astute man of business. He'd married an heiress, and by good management of his father-in-law's merchant interests and the Frayne estate had doubled his fortune. After her parents died he'd been everything to her. She'd been devastated when he himself died. Now she was, reluctantly, obeying one of his last commands.

  'All gals have to have a proper come out,' he'd said. 'You've been brought up a lady, so that's what you'll do.'

  She had no desire to indulge in pointless parties, or purchase clothes she did not need, but she confessed she was intrigued by the idea of watching the ton at play. A month or two in London might be amusing. The more eminent local Yorkshire families had snubbed her and her grandfather because of his origins, and she had ne
ver wished to know them. The occasional assembly in York or Ripon had been enough to convince her she found such affairs insipid. As she had no intention of hunting for a husband, which was the main purpose of the Season from what she had heard, she would simply observe and be amused.

  'We'll be in Cavendish Square in half an hour,' Mary, Lady Gordon, said.

  She and Damaris got on well together. Lady Gordon was a slender woman with delicate features, honey-gold hair, and was always elegantly dressed, even when travelling. She had offered to bring Damaris out, give her a Season in London, an offer which had been gratefully accepted by old Mr Hallem. They had been friends for years. Lady Gordon's father had been Rector at Frayne, and her sister Damaris's governess, and for the past few years her companion.

  'I am exhausted, longing to get out of this coach,' she went on. 'I must say it's more comfortable than a chaise, but it's slower. We could have been here yesterday if we'd posted.'

  'Sir Thomas didn't want you or the children to be uncomfortable.'

  'At least little Amelia is old enough to play games and listen to your stories.'

  Damaris thought of how she had racked her brains for new games and stories to keep the little girl, three years older than her brother, amused. Tommy with his blond curls, looked angelic, but frequently was not, while the dark Amelia had a wicked grin that made people suspect her of mischief even when she was being perfectly docile.

  Lady Gordon sighed.

  'He has no notion of how difficult it is to keep a two-year-old happy for three days in a coach.'

  'I think he does,' Damaris murmured, and suppressed a grin.

  It wasn't really necessary for him to remain in Yorkshire an extra two days, she thought. Tactical, though. He had been a soldier before his marriage and men were notoriously prone to disappearing when domestic affairs became tedious. Travelling with two young children on such a long journey was bound to be tedious.

  'Well, I've been glad enough of your help. Why their nurse had to contract the measles the day before we set out I can't imagine. I just pray Amelia and little Tommy don't develop it. The first thing I must do tomorrow is hire a new nurse.'

  Damaris nodded. She knew from people in the village near Frayne Castle that children invariably caught any infection around. She had urged her friend not to travel, to wait in Yorkshire where the children could be nursed in comfort in their own home, should they be ill, but Lady Gordon had been unpersuadable.

  'No, my dear, if we have to stay here, and then wait while one of them is ill, if they are, which I hope not, you will never get to London. Besides you could be sure only one of them would catch it, then the other weeks later, and it would be months before we could travel. There are excellent doctors in London, should one of them succumb, and I feel so guilty that it was Tommy's birth which deprived you of your Season two years ago. Just think, if you had come then, you might have been married and with a baby of your own by now.'

  Damaris suppressed a shudder. She did not object to children, indeed found them much less complicated to deal with than adults, but she did not wish to marry. Ever since her grandfather had died and she had inherited his fortune she had been aware she might, if she permitted it, be besieged by importunate suitors. She even suspected that her cousin Humphrey Lee, who had been left her guardian, and who had managed the estate for her since her grandfather had died, was hoping to marry her. He had been most reluctant to agree to this visit to London, warning her she would be at the mercy of all the fortune hunters in town.

  'But I can depend on you to send them away,' she had said, and smiled inwardly at his solemn nod. Of course she could, if he had designs on her fortune himself. Not that she would need his help. She was quite capable of sending any suitor about his business.

  Humphrey was staid, becoming plumper every year, but refusing to acknowledge it, so that his breeches strained over his ample thighs, and his coats always seemed about to pop the straining buttons. He seemed much older than five and thirty, and was inclined to disapprove of her whenever they met. This, she was thankful, was not often, as he claimed he could not leave his business in the hands of others for long. No one, so far as she could understand his thoughts, could ever be better than Humphrey, and this pompous self-satisfaction soon drove her to impotent frustration, though she recognized the care he had taken with her inheritance, and was grateful.

  Soon afterwards they entered Cavendish Square and drew up before the Gordon town house. A flurry of footmen and maids emerged, and the children were borne up to the nursery floor by Lady Gordon's own maid.

  'Kate is a real treasure, offering to look after the children until I find a new nurse. I shall have to borrow your Netta to help me dress, my dear.'

  'Of course, and if I can help please ask.'

  Damaris soon found herself in a large drawing room, overfull, to her mind, of mahogany pieces balancing on slender legs, square, straight-sided chairs and tables, their plainness relieved by a profusion of brass decoration. She was thankful there were none of the imitation Greek and Roman styles, like some she had seen in the York house of a wealthy merchant whose wife prided herself on embracing every passing fashion.

  After partaking of tea and some delicious small almond cakes Damaris was shown to her bedroom on the second floor. Her maid Netta, who had travelled post with Lady Gordon's maid in order to be there early, had already unpacked and was shaking out a pale pink gown.

  Damaris sat at the dressing table and began to brush her hair.

  'Pin up your hair or you'll wet it,' Netta commanded. 'They'll be bringing the water for your bath in a minute.'

  'Bliss! I'm aching all over.'

  'Will this gown do for dinner tonight, Miss Damaris?'

  'Anything, Netta! I wish I could go straight to bed and sleep till morning. I cannot imagine how a child of two can have twice the energy I have. He never slept, did not keep still for more than two minutes at a time, and after three days I'm worn to the bone.'

  Netta, who had been her mother's maid, and was forty, plump and comfortable, chuckled.

  'It's over now, Miss. There are others here to take care of him. Kate even enjoys it. Is it all right if I go and help her ladyship while you have your bath? There's no one else for dinner, Cook says.'

  'Thank heavens for that.'

  'But Lady Gordon sent invitations out for a dinner party tomorrow. Two of her mother's friends, I believe, and their sons.'

  Damaris groaned.

  'She's determined to take her duties as chaperone seriously, introducing me to eligible young men straight away. Why will no one believe I have no intention of getting married?'

  'That's what you say. You haven't met the right man yet.'

  Damaris brandished her hairbrush. She had no secrets from Netta, who had looked after her all her life, and still treated her as if she were a child.

  'Don't you start, or I'll throw this at you!'

  There was a knock on the door and two maids carrying cans of water came in. Soon Damaris was soaking in a hot soapy bath, fighting the temptation to go to sleep, and wishing she were back at Frayne Castle. The sooner the Season was over the better.

  *

  On the following morning Lady Gordon insisted on taking Damaris to her favourite modiste's.

  'Madame de Courcy is an excellent person to advise you, and knows exactly what is à la mode. Your gowns are all very well for Yorkshire, my love, but if you are to attract the right attention you need to be fashionable. Now I will leave you in Madame's charge while I go to interview prospective nurses for the children. I will return in an hour or so.'

  Damaris had given up protesting that she did not wish to attract any attention, and submitted meekly. It would take her far less than an hour, she was sure, to make her selection, but she was as anxious as Lady Gordon to find a nurse for the children. She even bore the modiste's rather disparaging comments about her Yorkshire gowns and hair style with no more than an inward wince. Her gowns had been made by one of the best Harro
gate modistes, but some time ago, and she knew how rapidly fashions changed.

  'Now let me see,' Madame de Courcy said, walking all round Damaris and eyeing her from head to toe. 'It's a pity you are neither dark nor a blonde. If you had been either, selecting the right colours to enhance your looks would have been easy. But brown hair, straight too, without even a hint of gold or auburn, is so difficult. You will have to have it cut in a more fashionable style.'

  'Surely, Madame, brown hair ought to mean I can wear any colour?' Damaris said, her tone innocent. She would not have been surprised if Madame had told her she was plain, and no amount of fine feathers would improve her looks. But perhaps fashionable London modistes relished the challenge of making the best of unpromising material. 'But I do not want insipid pastels. I had my fill of them while my governess chose my gowns.'

  'Oh, Mademoiselle, you must wear white for some of the time. All young girls do, they will be considered, how you say, fast, if they do not.'

  Damaris had been looking at the rolls of material on the shelves. Madame's comments made her want to show her independence. Opposition normally had that effect on her, she knew, and had learned how to counter it firmly, without showing any annoyance. She walked across to the shelves and pointed.

  'I will have silk or satin gowns of that colour, scarlet, and this emerald, and this lovely bright peacock blue. And this russet colour is delightful, as well as the orange. Now please show me some patterns.'

  Madame, she was amused to see, was struggling between dismay at her choices and cupidity at the size of the order.

  'You must have some muslins too,' Madame said faintly. 'These brighter colours will do, I suppose, for evening wear, but in the daytime, muslins are best.'

  Damaris shivered.

  'But it's still cold, even though it's April,' she protested. 'Wasn't the Thames frozen over only a few months ago?'

  'Every young girl wears muslins. You can have a warm pelisse for outside, and shawls indoors if the rooms are cold, but Lady Gordon will not allow that, I'm sure.'