A Gentleman Of Substance

Lucy glanced up from her book. “Troubling me? No…I mean, nothing. Nothing is troubling me. I am quite well. Whatever makes you think that?” Fortunately, Mrs. Sowerby’s cataracts prevented her from noticing the blush that smarted in Lucy’s cheeks.

The old woman chuckled. “Just because my eyes don’t work no more, doesn’t mean I can’t see what’s plain. I’ve counted seven times you’ve sighed since you last turned the page, and four times you’ve lost your place. Don’t try to fool Old Fanny that you haven’t got some’ut weighing on your mind.”

Lucy sighed for the eighth time. “I might as well tell you, Mrs. Sowerby. Everyone in Nicholthwait will know by tomorrow night. I’m getting married.”

“Is that so?” Mrs. Sowerby nodded over this information, and perhaps the marked lack of enthusiasm in Lucy’s announcement. “Anyone I know?”

Lucy nodded, then remembered her friend couldn’t see her. “Everyone knows him. I am to marry Viscount Silverthorne.”

Mrs. Sowerby’s knitting needles froze in midstitch. “His lordship? This is unexpected news. Most lasses would be singing it to the rooftops—a match like that.”

“It is a great honor.” Not to mention a great burden, sharing her life with the man she held responsible for Jeremy’s death. If she could have seen any other way to provide decently for her child, she would have taken pleasure in refusing Lord Silverthorne’s proposal.

“Oh, aye. A big estate. A title. A large fortune. Most lasses could ask naught more from a marriage.” The two women, sat silent for a moment. “Then again, you aren’t most lasses, Miss Lucy. I think you want more from a husband than his brass or his family name. You’d fancy a man with a ready smile and a way of saying your name that makes your heart beat faster.”

Lucy thought of Jeremy Strickland, his eyes as blue as the summer sky reflected in the glassy surface of Mayeswater, his golden hair ruffled by the upland wind. As her eyes began to water, she felt a pang of exasperation. She had always been of a sunny, optimistic nature. A sensible person, as the viscount so plainly put it. Lately it took nothing to make her weep. She hated having her emotions so out of control.

“Your description does not sound very much like Viscount Silverthorne, does it?” Lucy hoped Mrs. Sowerby would mistake the break in her voice for a chuckle.

“I suppose not. Nothing glib about his lordship, poor lad.”

“Nothing poor about his lordship either,” Lucy reminded her friend tartly. “They say he has the Midas touch.”

Mrs. Sowerby felt at her knitting to find where she’d left off. “As I recall, the golden touch didn’t make that Midas fellow any too happy.”

“You’re hinting at something, so you might as well tell me plainly. Why do you call Lord Silverthorne a ‘poor lad’?”

Now it was Fanny Sowerby’s turn to sigh. “Perhaps you should ask him, my dear. Let’s just say he had a childhood I’d not envy any lad.”

Something in Mrs. Sowerby’s tone gave Lucy a pang as she thought of her own idyllic girlhood, full of books and dreams and the small beauties of nature. The only passing shadows on those years had been the deaths of an infant brother and sister. Deprived of other children, her parents had lavished all their love on her.

Just then, Lucy noticed the long shadow cast by Mrs. Sowerby’s crab apple tree. Though she was curious to hear more about Lord Silverthorne’s unenviable childhood, she’d promised to meet him at the vicarage within the hour.

“I’m afraid I must be getting back home, Mrs. Sowerby. I’m sorry I was so distracted, and spoiled the reading for you.”

“Never you mind about that. I’m grateful for the company. Not many lasses would bother with a blind old woman.”

“That would be their loss.” Lucy stooped to bestow a gentle kiss on the woman’s weathered cheek.

Mrs. Sowerby dropped her knitting and caught Lucy’s hand. “I wish you and his lordship every happiness. He’s a fine man, for all he don’t say much. Once a month, like clockwork, I’ll hear him ride up to my gate. Never says a word, just checks to see how I’m getting on. Once he came by when it was raining, and my roof was leaking like a sieve. The next day a crew shows up from the big house with orders to rethatch it.”

Lucy could not think what to reply. Mrs. Sowerby’s story contradicted her lifelong perception of the stern autocrat.

“He needs a bit of happiness in his life,” Mrs Sowerby added. “Deserves it, too, with all he’s done for folks round here. If there’s a woman can make him happy, I fancy it’s you.”

“I’ll try, Mrs. Sowerby.”

The old woman waved Lucy on her way. Then, perhaps thinking her out of earshot, Mrs. Sowerby mused aloud, “And you might just be surprised at how happy he can make you, my dear.”

Lucy turned away, sighing for the ninth time that afternoon. She doubted it was in the power of any woman to make his lordship happy. And she was certain any chance of her own happiness had died on a Spanish battlefield with Jeremy Strickland.

At a wary distance from the vicarage, Drake sat on his horse trying to screw up his nerve for an interview with Vicar Rushton. He had made his initial marriage offer to Lucy in a momentary surge of moral obligation. Jeremy had used her abominably, and Drake felt it his duty to rectify the situation. He relished breaking the news to his family. Their opposition had only strengthened his resolve. During his ride to the vicarage, a host of doubts had risen to assail him.

Could he manage to put up with a wife underfoot all the time? He’d lived a solitary existence, apart from his years in school—years he’d hated. Ragged and bullied by highborn louts with no interests beyond their own pleasure, he’d fought hard for the simple right to be left alone. It went against his grain to surrender his hard-won privacy.

He wasn’t thinking only of himself, either. What kind of life would it be for Lucy and the child—mewed up at Silverthorne with a man temperamentally unsuited to marriage and fatherhood? Desperately as he wanted an heir to supplant Neville, he could not consign Jeremy’s son to a bleak, joyless childhood like he had suffered.

“It’s no good,” Drake muttered through clenched teeth.

“Do you not think so?” Lucy suddenly emerged from a wooded path nearby. “Most people would call this a fine day, after that dreadful storm. Or were you referring to the view?”

Drake looked down the lane to Saint Mawes vicarage, a cosy stone house, green with ivy and hemmed in by an inviting miscellany of trees and shrubs. Not merely a house, the vicarage looked like a home. The sight of it stirred a long-buried wistfulness in Drake Strickland’s practical, impervious heart.

“No, indeed.” He strove to sound impassive. “The view is very well.”

Planting herself squarely in front of his horse, Lucy looked up at him, a challenge glittering incongruously in the depths of her wide, soft eyes. “Then I must assume you are having second thoughts about marrying me?”

He fixed his gaze on a point just above the crest of her bonnet. “By no means, Miss Rushton.” Drake surprised himself with the ease by which he delivered this bold-faced lie. “I see clearly where my duty rests.” At least that part was true.

“How priggish you sound. As your wife, will I be subjected to daily sermons at the breakfast table?” Drake felt the sting of her rebuke. This was not the Lucy Rushton who had won his distant regard—the generous, unpretentious girl who read to Widow Sowerby and wandered the countryside with a book under her arm. That winter in Bath of which she boasted, had spoiled her completely. Turned her into one of those tart-tongued brittle creatures he despised.

“I can assure you, madam, I will subject you to as little of my objectionable discourse as appearances permit.”

“If that’s how you feel, perhaps we should call off this ridiculous charade.” With those bold words, her face went white and she swayed as though buffeted by a strong wind. Drake vaulted from his saddle, sending his startled horse skittering sideways. He caught Lucy just before she hit the ground.

It took a moment for her to recover, a moment during which Drake found himself torn by conflicting emotions. Part of him protested that it was most indecorous for the scion of Silverthorne to be kneeling in a country lane with a half-conscious woman in his arms. Even if she was his intended bride. Another part felt a passing qualm of guilt that he had subjected Lucy to an unpleasant exchange, in her delicate condition. An overwhelming sense of protectiveness conquered all other feelings.

So small and childlike in his arms, she needed him as much as any of his tenants or employees. But she was not a child—she was a woman. Through the light fabric of her dress, he could feel her delicious feminine curves. This whole arrangement would work better if he did not find her so dangerously attractive. All the same, Lucy and her baby were his responsibility. Though it might prove the most difficult undertaking of his life, he must do right by them.

“Where am I?” Her eyelids fluttered. “What happened?” She struggled to sit up.

“Easy now.” Drake gently restrained her. “Do let me know the next time you feel faint. You gave me quite a turn.”

She quit trying to get away from him, but her whole body stiffened, reluctant to yield. “I seem to make a habit of discommoding you, my lord. It’s a habit I am eager to break, I assure you.”

What a prickly temper! Drake frowned. Making any overture toward Lucy Rushton was like trying to engage a hedgehog. Were all expectant mothers like this? he wondered.

As he slackened his hold, Lucy pulled free of his arms. Jumping to her feet, she slapped the dust from her pale-blue dress. “Forget what I told you last night. I absolve you from any moral obligation to me.”

Drake unfolded his tall frame from the crouched posture in which he’d held Lucy. “That is the trouble with moral obligations—one can never quite absolve one’s self.” He tried to smile, to show he was partly in jest and hopefully to ease some of the tension between them. The muscles of his face didn’t seem to understand what he was asking of them. They could only manage a lopsided grimace.

“If you wish to reconsider your decision to marry me, that is your right. In fact, I urge you to weigh your options carefully before choosing the course that will best serve you.and your child,” he added almost under his breath, in case anyone should be within earshot of their conversation.

“Options?” She gave a bitter little laugh. “I have no options, Lord Silverthorne, as you are well aware.”

“Of course, you do. You must. If you choose not to marry me, I’ll still provide for you.both. I’ll give you money to go away until the child is born. If you choose not to keep him, I’ll secure him a good home.”

“That is very generous of you.”