‘And yet still you would consider marrying him? My God. You would throw your life away on nothing? Well, I shall not, Sephy. When I marry it shall be only for love. I swear it.’
Lust. Desire. Love. What pathway had Maria taken that she herself had missed? Where had her younger sister found these ideas that were so very...evocative?
‘I shall marry a man who would risk his life for me, a man who is brave and good and true. Money shall be nothing to me, or reputation. I shall make up my own mind without anybody telling me otherwise.’
‘There are stories about St Cartmail that are hardly salubrious, Maria.’ Sephora hated the censure she could hear in her words, but made herself carry on. ‘A good marriage needs a solid basis of friendship and trust. Like Mama and Papa.’
‘They barely talk to each other any more. Surely you have noticed that.’
‘Well, perhaps not lately, but...’ She made herself stop. Further along the river three men were walking towards them, three handsome men and one taller than the rest.
Lords Douglas, Montcliffe and Wesley, Francis St Cartmail’s hair jet black against the light of day. He had not seen them yet standing against the sun and she debated whether to stay or to flee.
All Sephora felt was sick, caught here between truth and falsity, skewered in the teeth of both hope and horror. She did not want this suddenness. She liked things orderly and controlled. This was all so wildly unexpected and so very worrying, but it was too late now to do anything other than brave out the encounter.
He hadn’t written back. Would she see the distaste he felt for her upon his face?
‘Smile, for God’s sake.’ Her sister’s hard whisper broke through fright and she did, pinning a ludicrous grin across her grinding teeth and beating heart.
‘Ladies.’ It was the Earl of Wesley who spoke first, the urbane smoothness of his words propping up all the pieces that were scattering. Sephora regathered her logic and straightened.
‘Lord Wesley.’ Her voice. Normal. She did not look at the Earl of Douglas. Not even once, but she felt him there, strong and solid.
‘It is only by good chance that we wandered this way.’ Gabriel Hughes looked smug as he said this. ‘Montcliffe wished to have a view of the river.’
Aunt Susan, her father’s sister, had caught them up by now, arriving from a good ten yards back with her maid and a severe countenance. She gave the impression of a mother goose about to do battle, but also sensing the high standing of its opponents.
Daniel Wylde, the Earl of Montcliffe, unexpectedly took her aunt’s hand into his own and led her off to the side a little. Wesley seemed most intent on asking her sister questions about the weather of late, a topic she was certain he held no abiding interest in, which left her alone with Francis St Cartmail.
‘I must compliment you on your letter, Lady Sephora. I have seldom been thanked with such profuse gratitude.’
His patronage made her prickly given he had not written back. ‘Well, my lord, I have never been rescued with such valour and gallantry.’
‘A stellar state of affairs then for us both, such a mutual admiration.’ He smiled and the mirth touched the hazel in his eyes, lightening the darkness.
At his jesting, Sephora blushed a bright red, the colour sweeping into her cheeks and down onto her neck where no doubt it clashed violently with the pastel pink of her day dress.
She had always been so certain in every social situation, so very good at small talk and mindless repartee. For the four years since her arrival in society she had been measured and polite and self-effacing. She had never uttered a wrong word or a hurtful reply to anyone before. She had been careful and godly and good. But not today. Today some other part of her long hidden surfaced.
‘Are you teasing me, my lord? Because if you are I should like to say the incident for me was beyond frightening. I thought I should not survive it, you see, and although I waited and hoped for a reply you failed to send one.’
Oh, my goodness, why had she blurted that out? She could even hear a note of pleading in her tone.
‘I am certain your mother would not approve of any correspondence or indeed the—’
He stopped and she imagined it was Richard’s name he was about to utter, but the conversation of the others came back to encroach upon theirs. Aunt Susan was giving her goodbyes and, seeing such intent, St Cartmail did the same, walking on amongst the greenery without looking back.
‘Well, I have to say that was a lovely surprise, would you not agree, girls. I knew Lord Montcliffe as a young boy, you understand, as his mother and I were good friends, God bless her soul. I thought he may not have remembered me, but...well.’ She smiled. ‘He certainly seemed to.’
Maria squeezed Sephora’s hand and they dropped back from the company of their aunt and her maid as soon as they were able.
‘St Cartmail made you blush in a spectacular way...’
‘Shh. Do not say a thing to Mama about this, Maria, or about my talking to the Earl of Douglas.’
‘A bit late for that I think, sister dear. Aunt Susan will probably self-combust with the news the moment we reach home.’
‘But if Mama asks you...’
‘I will say we met their party purely by chance and enjoyed a quick and formal greeting.’ Her eyes glanced down. ‘Richard has not replaced your lost ring?’
Sephora shook her head and closed her hand across the lack of it, glad that her intended had not as yet noticed it missing. Something stopped her from simply marching into Rundell’s and seeking a replacement herself for she had a good deal of personal money at her own disposal. But she hadn’t. She had not wanted to feel the ring there with its physical promise of forever winding about her finger. The troth of being bound to a man whose anger seemed to be rising monthly and who seemed more and more demanding of setting an earlier date for their wedding was also disturbing. The only true emotions she felt now for her big day were harried and scrambled. She was glad it was still so far away.
* * *
Richard was waiting for her when they arrived home, his smile giving Sephora more than a frisson of guilt. He looked tired today, heavy shadows beneath both eyes and the lines on each side of his mouth marked.
‘I had hoped to walk with you, my angel, but was held up.’ The endearment she had once liked now only sounded foolish and feeble and she had to stop herself pulling away as he took her hand in his and brought it to his lips. ‘But I must say the exercise seems to have brought colour to your cheeks and you are looking even more beautiful than you usually do. I hardly deserve such fairness.’
Maria’s laugh was not kind and Sephora was glad when her sister excused herself and disappeared upstairs.
Richard observed her departure. ‘Maria is often morose, I fear, and I am glad you hold none of her countenance. I cannot even imagine how she will find a husband who could abide such dourness.’
The laughing, teasing truth of her sister came fully to mind as Sephora pulled away. Dour and morose were the very last words she would have used to describe Maria.
