a little more worldly-wise and certainly heart-whole. An involuntary sigh escaped her. Whether or not she would be able to say the same by the end of the summer was a different matter entirely.
Without the least warning she experienced it yet again: that sudden surge of blind panic. Why, oh why, hadn’t she flatly refused when the suggestion had first been put to her? Why had she allowed herself to be persuaded into accompanying the Dowager to Brighton, when she had in her heart of hearts known from the very first that what Lady Exmouth truly wanted was not a young companion for herself, but a biddable little wife for her son?
Abandoning the packing entirely now, Robina slumped down on the bed, not for the first time cursing herself for not being a little more assertive on occasions.
It wasn’t that she had taken the Dowager’s son in dislike. Nothing could have been further from the truth. Lord Exmouth was a very personable gentleman. If he was not quite the dashing, handsome hero of storybooks, he was certainly most attractive, blessed with a good physique and noble bearing. Just because he happened to be the wrong side of five-and-thirty was not such a drawback either, for older gentlemen, she had been reliably informed, tended to be rather more dependable.
That he rarely smiled, had more often than not a cynical glint in those very attractive dark brown eyes of his, and frequently relapsed into periods of brooding silence were traits, she didn’t doubt, to which she would grow accustomed in time. What she knew she could never reconcile herself to, however, was always figuring as second best in the eyes of any man she agreed to marry. And that, she very much feared, would be precisely her fate if she was ever foolish enough to consent to a union with Lord Daniel Exmouth!
A sympathetic sigh escaped her this time as the many rumours concerning the very personable widower filtered through her mind. If half the stories circulating about him were true then the poor Baron was a mere shadow of his former self.
His heart, according to many, had died with his first wife in that tragic accident eighteen months ago. Many believed that, because he had been tooling the carriage when it had overturned, killing both his wife and the nephew of a near neighbour, the combination of both grief and guilt had changed him from the most companionable of gentlemen into a die-hard sceptic who now attained scant pleasure from life. Yet, for all his brooding glances and frequent periods of self-enforced solitude, he could still on occasions be both affable and charming. Sadly, that didn’t alter the fact that whoever agreed to become his second wife would always live in the shadow of the beautiful Clarissa, who, many believed, had taken her husband’s loving heart with her to her grave.
Her mother’s unexpected appearance in the bedchamber put an end to these melancholy reflections, and Robina automatically rose to her feet to continue her packing.
‘Great heavens, child! Haven’t you finished yet? What on earth have you been doing all this time? You know full well that Lady Exmouth’s servants will be here at noon to collect your trunk.’
Robina cast a glance in her mother’s direction, not for the first time wishing that she were more able to assess her moods. The tone she had used had been mildly scolding, but her expression betrayed no hint of annoyance.
Would now be an appropriate moment to admit that she, too, would much prefer to return to Northamptonshire at the end of the week? Could she possibly succeed in making her mother, who was not always the most approachable of people, understand her grave misgivings about spending the summer in Brighton? Or had she foolishly left it rather too late?
‘Mama, I have been having second thoughts about accompanying Lady Exmouth,’ she said in a rush, before she could change her mind. ‘I should much prefer to return with you to Abbot Quincey at the end of the week.’
The seconds ticked slowly by while Robina scanned her mother’s face in the hope of glimpsing some visual reaction to the belated confession, but as usual Lady Elizabeth’s expression remained as inscrutable as ever.
‘Why this sudden change of heart, child?’ Once again there was just the faintest hint of impatience in the beautifully cultured voice. ‘Not so very long ago you were overjoyed at the prospect of spending the summer weeks by the sea. No pressure was brought to bear when the suggestion was first put to you. It was entirely your own decision to accept Lady Exmouth’s very kind invitation.’
Robina could not argue with this. She had never made any secret of the fact that she had liked Lady Exmouth from the first moment they met, and the prospect of extending the period of frivolous enjoyment by spending several weeks as the guest of that delightful and highly sociable lady had been just too much of a temptation for the country parson’s daughter, who had discovered that she had rapidly acquired a taste for the finer things in life. It was only when she had paid that short visit to Hampshire to be amongst the select few who attended the small party to celebrate the engagement of the Duke of Sharnbrook to Lady Sophia Cleeve that grave doubts had begun to assail her.
‘In that case we shall not be seeing each other again until the autumn,’ her good friend Sophia had remarked, after Robina had casually divulged her intention of spending the summer in Brighton as the guest of the Dowager Lady Exmouth.
They had been standing outside the glorious ducal mansion, bidding each other a final farewell, and there had been an unmistakable teasing glint in Sophia’s eyes as she had added in an undertone, ‘So, do I congratulate you now, or wait until the announcement is officially made, you sly old thing?’
Even now Robina could recall quite clearly gaping like a half-wit at her lifelong friend. ‘I—I do not perfectly understand what you mean, Sophia. You are the one to be congratulated, not I.’
‘At the moment, yes,’ she had laughingly agreed, ‘but it is quite obvious to anyone of the meanest intelligence that it will not be too long before you also are sporting a splendid betrothal ring on your left hand.’
Robina clearly recalled also her friend’s teasing laughter before she had gone on to add rather tauntingly, ‘Why, you cannot possibly go about refusing reasonable offers of marriage, while encouraging the attentions of a certain party, and happily accepting an invitation to spend the summer with that favoured gentleman’s mother, without causing a deal of speculation. Surely you don’t suppose that people haven’t already put two and two together and realised that your affections are engaged! I have fallen desperately in love myself, and so am able to read the signs, my dear. But if you would prefer that I wait a little longer before offering my heartfelt congratulations, you only have to say so.’
Robina had been too stunned to say anything else at the time, and had been prey to the most guilt-ridden reflections and fearful conjecture ever since.
Had she in truth actively encouraged Lord Exmouth to suppose that a proposal of marriage from him would not be unwelcome? She had asked herself that selfsame question time and time again in recent days, and even now wasn’t perfectly sure that she knew the answer.
She couldn’t deny that, up until she and her mother had paid that short visit to Hampshire, she had not once refused to stand up with Lord Exmouth whenever they had happened to be attending the same party. Which, she now realised, had occurred far too frequently to have been mere coincidence. She could only marvel at how credulous she had been for supposing that pure chance had brought them together so often, and not, as she now strongly suspected, the designs of their respective mothers.
If her suspicions were correct then the Dowager believed that in the quiet and undemanding vicar’s daughter she had found the ideal person to care for her two motherless granddaughters, and make the life of her heartbroken son more bearable, without demanding too much of him in return. It was also fairly safe to assume that her own mother was of a similar mind, and that she had every expectation
