Lord Clifford's Dilemma Read online

'So has she, wordlessly, accepted your wordless declaration?'

  Sir Henry flushed even redder, and Lord Clifford felt a pang of sympathy for him, but really, he deserved a set down. Then the boy drew himself up to his full height and took a deep breath.

  'My lord, you jest! I want to marry your ward. I know I am not of age, but I will be in a few months. I will then have possession of Markby Court, and a respectable income.'

  'Then you are a fortunate young man. I congratulate you. But are you a suitable husband for my ward? I know little about you. Let me see, what questions should a guardian ask in such a situation? Money, I suppose, and whether you can support a wife in comfort. How much annual income do you expect to command?'

  Sir Henry hesitated.

  'I cannot say precisely, my lord, but in the region of five thousand, I am given to understand.'

  'Very respectable. And out of that no doubt you will need to support your mother and sister, as well as your wife?'

  'Mama has her jointure, and Elizabeth was left money by her godfather. She is independent. Naturally I shall permit Mama to use the town house whenever she wishes, and of course she will have the Dower House at Markby Court,' he said, and Lord Clifford grinned.

  He had not met Lady Markby, but had heard she was a demanding woman who traded on her supposed frailty to keep her spinster daughter tied to her apron strings. Somehow he doubted the young man before him would be able to dislodge his mother from any house she was determined to occupy.

  'I will need to speak to my ward,' he said, his manner changing from the slightly mocking tone. The poor lad was serious. 'I will call on Lady Markby in a few days, when I have had time to consider your proposal. You are aware, I imagine, if you have discussed it with Miss Kirkland, that she has no fortune, just a small income that barely keeps her in hats and bonnets, of which she is inordinately fond.'

  'That does not concern me. I have sufficient not to need to wed an heiress.'

  'Or will have, when you come of age.'

  'Well, yes, of course.'

  After a few more civilities Lord Clifford rang the bell, and grinned when Dawson promptly appeared to show out the visitor. When Sir Henry had gone he sighed, and cursed fate and the early death of his father which had left him in charge of Annamarie. The girl was a nuisance, and it had been a mistake to imagine Lady Palgrave would be able to govern her. As she grew older her misdemeanours became more serious, and as yet he did not know how to manage her. Would be it honourable to pass the problem over to a young and inexperienced husband?

  *

  Elizabeth met her brother outside the house. He was perspiring heavily, his high, starched shirt points wilting and his cravat in some disarray. She had been to match some silks for Lady Markby, who had, in her usual capricious fashion, suddenly decided to resume some embroidery laid aside a year before.

  'You look hot,' she remarked.

  'So would you be hot if you had to deal with a sarcastic, supercilious fellow like Lord Clifford! How Annamarie endures his guardianship I cannot imagine.'

  Elizabeth led the way into the house, and sent for a jug of cool lemonade.

  'Let me take these silks to Mama, and then tell me all about it.'

  By the time she returned to the drawing room Henry had poured and drunk some lemonade, and torn off his cravat. His flushed cheeks had cooled, and he was sprawled on the sopha.

  'You went to ask his permission to marry Annamarie?' she asked bluntly. Somehow she had not expected him to pluck up sufficient courage quite so soon.

  'Yes. Of course. I have had every intention of asking him, when I had time. He, well, he is much older, in his early thirties, I judge, and he tried to treat me as an impertinent schoolboy, but I soon showed him I was nothing of the kind, up to snuff and all that. I think he was agreeably surprised at my income, my expectations.'

  'Did he agree to your proposal?'

  'He means to, I can tell, though he had to pretend to have time to consider it. After all, Annamarie has almost no money of her own, he is no doubt paying all her bills, so he must be thankful to give her to someone who can provide her with the life she deserves. Lizzie, you cannot know what a sweet, unaffected girl she is! She assures me she does not in the least care for my fortune, it is me she loves. Please, support me when Mama kicks up a fuss, as she is bound to do.'

  Elizabeth privately considered Annamarie far too astute not to have been aware of Henry's prospects.

  'She will deem you both too young, as I do.'

  'She thinks I am a schoolboy still, and wants to keep me tied to her side, as she does you. You lost your chance of escaping years ago, you'll never be able to leave her now.'

  'If ever I wish to leave, I will, Henry. A paid companion could do all I do for Mama. In fact, it would be someone she could command more easily than she does me.'

  'Perhaps, but although you are unlikely to wed, for face it, you are five and twenty, on the shelf, Mama can pay for any companion out of her own income! Or if you desert her, you can pay. Your income is the same as mine, even greater except when you waste it teaching servants to read. Why Papa's friend had to leave everything to you I will never understand.'

  Perhaps he saw already that you were not to be trusted with money, Elizabeth thought, but bit back the comment. If she were to have any success in preventing this imprudent marriage she could not afford to antagonize Henry.

  *

  'Send Miss Kirkland to me as soon as she comes in,' Lord Clifford told Dawson when he had shown Sir Henry out.

  Dawson bowed, and only half an hour later showed Annamarie into the library.

  Lord Clifford suppressed a sigh. His letter would never be written, and it was a complicated set of instructions for changes he was making at Crossways, the Tudor mansion which was his main home. His father had been too absorbed in his classical studies to be interested in a house less than two hundred and fifty years old. If it had been a Roman villa, or a Greek temple, or even an Egyptian tomb, he would have paid it far more attention. And since he had taken over he had been far too busy restoring the estate and the farms to prosperity after years of neglect to have time for the house.

  The chit looked apprehensive, and when he bade her sit down she perched on the edge of the chair, poised as if for instant flight.

  'Sir Henry Markby has been to see me. I understand he wishes to marry you. Is that correct?'

  She gulped, and nodded, and essayed a timid smile, which moved him not at all. He was only too aware of her ability to dissemble when she thought it would serve her interests.

  'And do you wish to marry him?'

  'Oh, yes, indeed I do, Crispin! And you need not be afraid, he is perfectly eligible! He is of excellent family, and quite rich.'

  'Unlike some of your other conquests. He has a title and an adequate income to support a wife, I agree. And is only four years older than you. But I cannot approve of his engaging your interest before speaking to me. It was not honourably done, which speaks ill of him. Nor was your behaviour in encouraging him either honourable or sensible.'

  'But, Crispin, we love one another!'

  She gazed at him, her eyes filling with tears, though, as he cynically observed, none actually fell. It was a trick she had employed on earlier occasions, whenever he denied her what she wanted.

  'You have thought yourself in love before, many times, may I remind you.'

  'I was never in love, not properly, before. I was just a child, playing with love,' she whispered soulfully, and he wondered from which of the novels she devoured she had culled this notion.

  'Why is it different now?'

  She opened her eyes as wide as they would stretch, and heaved a sigh, tilting her head in what he knew she thought a winsome pose.

  'This time I know it is true love, really I do. I'm not a child any longer, unable to distinguish the dross from the gold.'

  He swallowed a laugh.

  'You have met very few suitable men as yet. That was why I was intending to give you a
Season next year. Then you would have a far bigger choice of possible suitors. Despite your lack of a fortune, you are pretty enough to attract offers.'

  'Yes, I know,' she said seriously, and he suppressed a grin. The chit had no false modesty.

  'Then would it not be sensible to wait?'

  'But then Henry might meet someone else, and forget me! And you must admit he is the most eligible man I have yet met.'

  'You think he might forget you, even though you both declare this is true love?'

  'Well, men do change their minds,' she said seriously. 'I am confident Henry won't, but I would rather not take that risk. Please Crispin, agree to our becoming betrothed. Henry is concerned we might have to wait until he is of age before we can wed, but he thinks he can persuade his sister, who for some obscure reason controls his money, to let him have enough to keep us, and to finance a wedding trip to Italy, which I would like above all things, until he can have all of it.'

  'Nine months, until he reaches his majority, does not seem a long time to wait.'

  'It's an age!'

  'I will have to speak to his Mama. Now run along, but send Lady Palgrave to me.'

  That lady, he decided grimly, would have some explaining to do, if she wished to retain her position. How had she so neglected her duties that her charge had been able to contract such an alliance? Then he shook his head. Annamarie was devious, deceitful even, but clever. She needed a much stronger and more astute woman than poor Lady Palgrave if her behaviour was to be properly supervised.

  *

  Chapter 2

  Lord Clifford, surprised at being received by a young lady, rather than Lady Markby herself, walked across the room and bowed.

  'Miss Markby?' he asked.

  She was, he judged, in her mid-twenties. He knew there was an unmarried daughter, but had not expected to find one so fashionably attired, or one who quite unconcernedly was cradling a tiny black and white kitten, permitting it to chew on her finger while she stroked it gently with her other hand. She nodded, and with cool condescension bade him be seated. He was a trifle put out. Did she know anything about his errand? If so she was remarkably self-possessed.

  'I was hoping to see Lady Markby,' he said curtly as he took the chair she indicated.

  She herself sat with her back to the window and her face was in shadow, so that he could not see it clearly, but he could judge how slender she was, and how her pale gold hair gleamed in the sunlight. Her gown of blue silk, the colour of bluebells, and, he suspected, matching her eyes, was the latest fashion, and she wore a single strand of pearls, some of the finest he had ever seen.

  'Yes, I dare say you were, if what I suspect is correct. I'm sorry, but my mother is not well,' she replied, 'and has been ordered by her new doctor to bathe twice a week. It is her morning to do so. He is not of the school of medicine which believes sea bathing is effective only when the water is getting colder, fortunately, or she would no doubt contract an inflamation of the lungs, which would rather negate any benefit to her other ailments.'

  Was she being flippant? He caught a gleam of amusement in her eyes and decided she was. An interesting female, Miss Elizabeth Markby, and much more intelligent than her brother.

  'You do not join her? I am told it is invigorating exercise.'

  Though not, he thought, one in which he intended to indulge.

  'Then you have not yourself sampled it, my lord?'

  'I am healthy and prefer to remain so.'

  Suddenly she chuckled, and he smiled in response.

  'As do I, but my mother believes her new doctor. To stand in the sea, unable to swim, prevented from falling over in the waves by the attendants, does not appeal to me.' She shuddered. 'Besides, the water does not look clean. I cannot believe there is nothing worse than seaweed to encounter. If I swim, I prefer to do it in the lake at Markby Court.'

  He had a sudden mental vision of her slender form, clad in a clinging wet gown, and told himself to keep to the matter in hand. It was not to begin having fantasies about unknown young ladies, however pretty, that he had come here.

  'Perhaps I should return another day.'

  'There is no need to take that trouble, my lord. I can give my mother a message, but I think I should warn you, she leaves all household arrangements to me. She has been a semi-invalid for many years.'

  He was not sure he appreciated being dismissed in such a fashion, by such a young woman.

  'And she delegates control over your brother to you as well? I understand you know of this betrothal between him and my ward?'

  'I do. Though I should tell you I do not consider it a firm betrothal, simply an expression of their wishes. But Mama does not know anything about it, yet. It would discompose her. I wish to spare her feelings.'

  'You quibble over semantics. Tell me, Miss Markby, do you approve of the match?'

  'Of course not! I have nothing against your ward, sir, I have met her but the once, but Henry is far too young to wed. They both are. I understand Miss Kirkland is barely sixteen. She has seen little of the world, met very few men, cannot know her own mind.'

  He grinned.

  'There you underestimate my enterprising ward. She has met a goodly number of men, and formed passions for the most unsuitable ones. Your brother is by far the most eligible she has yet encountered.'

  'He is only twenty!'

  'She was only thirteen when she told me she had a lasting attachment to the vicar's son. Luckily he was about to enter the university and escaped. So she transferred her attentions to James, my youngest footman. I grant he was handsome fellow, tall and with excellent legs. He looked most impressive in his knee breeches and white stockings.'

  He suppressed a grin when he saw her glance briefly at his own legs, which he knew bore comparison with those of James, even though he wore pantaloons and top boots.

  'A footman? What in the world did you do?'

  She sounded intrigued as well as shocked.

  'Fortunately I did not have to do anything. James had the good sense to find alternative employment.'

  She laughed, and her laugh, like her voice, was clear and pleasing to the ear.

  'Then I commend your choice of footmen. Were these all her attachments?'

  'By no means. The next was the local butcher's son. He was inclined to swoon at the sight of blood, and had a yearning to become a watchmaker. I was able to obtain an apprenticeship for him with my own watchmaker in Clerkenwell.'

  He saw her lips twitch.

  'Then I see you are well able to discourage unsuitable attachments.'

  'Unsuitable ones, yes. I took her away from school when she formed a passion for the music teacher. By great good fortune, the only man who was eligible, by birth, but not by fortune, for he was as poor as she is herself, was killed at Waterloo.'

  'You call that fortunate, my lord!'

  'For me, yes.'

  'But hardly for him! My lord, I am sorry to have to tell you you have no heart!'

  He was startled by her bluntness.

  'You don't have to obey your compulsion to tell me. It could be considered polite to keep your opinions to yourself.'

  'Perhaps it is not polite, but someone ought to be honest with you!'

  He decided to abandon this topic.

  'I have a ward to settle appropriately.'

  'And you consider my brother appropriate? There, my lord, I cannot approve of your wisdom.'

  She rose impetuously to her feet and began to stride about the room, hugging the tiny kitten to her as if for comfort. Now he could see her properly, instead of just her profile, he decided she was as lovely in her face as her figure. She moved with unconscious grace, and her gown brushed against her legs, showing them to be slender but shapely. A connoisseur of females, he decided she was one he meant to know better.

  He had risen to his feet too, and now leaned against the mantlepiece, enjoying watching her. She was magnificent when she was angry.

  'He's by far the best prospect she has set h
er heart on to date,' he said thoughtfully. 'Would you have her wed one of my tenant farmers? He was a widower, and wanted a mother for his six children. She was deeply offended when he married a widow of his own age, forty at least. Can you not agree your brother is better, being closer in age?'

  'That is not the only consideration! Girls mature more quickly than boys, and Henry is still a boy. He is not fit to take on the responsibilities of marriage, or of a wife such as your ward.'

  'Such as my ward?' he asked softly. 'And what, pray, do you mean by that, Miss Markby?'

  She was by no means intimidated by the sudden cold steel in his voice, but turned to face him, her bosom heaving, and he had difficulty in raising his gaze to her face.

  'I have met your ward, sir, and seen how she tries to twist people round her little finger. Henry is putty in her hands. She is older than he is by a decade or more.'

  'I prefer her to marry a young man. It is an important consideration with me. Now she has begun to fix her aspirations onto older men, like my farmer, I fear she may fall prey to one of Prinnie's cronies.'

  'Then it was hardly wise to bring her to Brighton, my lord!'

  He admired her temerity in chastising him, and felt a mischievous desire to tease her.

  'I have business here, I could hardly leave her at home – '

  'For fear of her forming unsuitable attachments while you cannot monitor her friendships?'

  'Without my knowledge, yes. I am quite capable of deterring unsuitable men when I know about them. But your brother, you must admit, is highly suitable. Not just in age. He has a title, and considerable wealth – '

  'When he comes of age, sir! That is several months away.'

  'Oh, yes, of that I am aware. But can you not see how it would be far preferable to have her settled, married to a man of substance, before she commits some imprudence such as running away with a man old enough to be her father? Not that she will fall into the clutches of a fortune-hunter, for she has but two hundred pounds a year.'

  The kitten, clutched closely, must have been squeezed, for it gave a squeak of protest, and she immediately bent her cheeks to it and whispered consoling words. He could see her, underneath, fuming with anger, and suppressed a smile. She really was delectable when her eyes blazed and her cheeks were flushed. When the kitten was once more purring loudly, she looked up at him.