Regency: Innocents & Intrigues: Marrying Miss Monkton / Beauty in Breeches

Can’t or doesn’t want to bother, Charles thought furiously. ‘Now why is it,’ he mocked, pacing the floor in exasperation, ‘that letter doesn’t surprise me? I had my doubts about him travelling to Dover, which would have been a true test of his merit. I can only thank God that he had the foresight to inform us, otherwise we might have been kicking our heels here for a week, waiting for him to arrive.’

Maria read Henry’s brief note. It would appear she would have to remain under Charles’s protection a while longer, and Henry was sure Sir Charles wouldn’t mind seeing her safely to London where they would be reunited and married right away.

With a strange feeling of relief that she had been handed a reprieve, Maria folded the letter and handed it back to Charles. ‘I’m sorry, Charles. It looks as if you’ll have to put up with me a while longer.’ She expected the news that he would have charge of her for a while yet to get a reaction, but except for a muscle that began to twitch in his jaw, there was none. She sensed a change in him. His manner and the way he was looking at her was in sharp variance to what she had become used to.

Charles thought Maria looked very small and forlorn and as he looked at her his heart softened. Absently she smoothed a lock of hair from her temple. She had twisted the heavy black tresses in a large knot at the nape of her neck, which emphasised the perfection of the delicate features and oval contours of her face. Hers was a soft and rare beauty that would remain ageless for many years to come.

He wished that he didn’t feel so responsible for her. It was an absurd feeling and it irritated him, for there was no reason for it. But the truth of it was that at the very beginning he had felt obligated to protect Sir Edward’s daughter, and knowing the nature of her betrothed, he had made it his duty to try to prevent her marrying Colonel Winston when the time came.

‘I’m sorry, Maria. I know how bitterly disappointed you must be feeling.’

Maria looked at him. His eyes were fixed on her with a frowning intensity. Her lips curved in a cynical smile. ‘If there’s anything I’ve learnt over the years, it’s that life is full of disappointments. One has to learn to bear them.’

She looked up at him, at his taut features, and it became apparent to her how Henry’s tardiness affected him also. Suddenly she was overwhelmed with a loneliness that wrenched her heart. Until now she hadn’t realised how much she had come to depend on Charles for both his strength and his protection. Parting from him was going to be harder than she had realised.

‘It is you that concerns me, Charles. I have no doubt that you hoped to discharge your duty where I am concerned and be about your own affairs. This must have come as a blow to you. I have no wish to be a burden to you so perhaps if there is a conveyance that will take me to Gravely—’

‘No,’ he said sharply. ‘I will not hear of it.’

‘I recall you telling me that you had made your own arrangements once we reached Dover.’

He nodded. ‘My home, Highgate, is in Kent. It was my intention to go there.’

‘I’m so sorry. But—you don’t have to change your plans. If I cannot go to Gravely, I am quite capable of going on to London alone.’

He shook his head, rejecting her suggestion. ‘I will not allow it. I arranged for my own coach and driver to meet me here. As soon as they arrive, if you don’t feel too bruised from your journey to Calais and in need of rest, we can leave as soon as we have eaten. Highgate is close to Canterbury. We can break our journey there.’

Still seated in the window recess, Maria raised her eyebrows, her look one of admiration as she watched a splendid coach, its body lacquered a gleaming black, drawn by four identical grey horses, the coachman turned out in formal bottle-green livery, arrive.

Charles, who had been pacing the floor impatiently, suddenly came to a halt.

‘Here he is. Very soon we shall be on the road.’

Maria stared at him. ‘You mean—that fine-looking carriage belongs to you?’

‘It does—and I am sure you will find it a good deal more comfortable than the conveyance we travelled in to Calais.’

When the horses had been rested and fed, the coachman put up the steps and closed the door, and with scarcely any sensation of motion, the well-sprung travelling chaise glided along the road behind the four prancing greys.

Maria glanced about her, admiring the crystal lamps and the heavy silver door handles and the soft dove-grey upholstery. Luxuriating in the unexpected comfort of the spacious conveyance, she looked across at her companion, who had his legs stretched out and crossed at the ankles. He was gazing morosely out of the window. Immediately she was filled with contrition. What a nuisance all this must be for him and how he must be cursing Henry for not coming to Dover to meet her.

‘I hate inconveniencing you like this, Charles,’ she said softly. ‘Will you stay long at Highgate?’

He flicked a glance in her direction. ‘I haven’t made up my mind. It depends what I find when I get there. Hopefully things will be as they were when I left for France. I have to go to London anyway. I have pressing matters and important people to see.’

‘Has it anything to do with you being in France?’ she dared to ask, expecting a rebuff.

She was surprised when he fixed her with a level look and said, ‘To satisfy your curiosity, Maria, now it is safe to do so I can tell you that I went to France on the request of some members of the government to see and report on the general order of things in Paris. Like everyone else in England, the government is horrified about what is happening—the massacres and the burning of properties. Those with a vested interest in the social order are seriously worried that revolutionary ideas will spread to Britain.’

Maria stared at him wide-eyed in astonishment. ‘Good gracious! So you are a paid spy in the employ of the British government. How exciting—though highly dangerous,’ she finished on a more sombre note.

His eyes hardened and a thin, cynical smile curved his lips. ‘You needn’t appear so surprised, Maria. You had me cast in the role of spy from the first.’

‘In all truth I didn’t know what to think. I’m just relieved things have turned out the way they have—that France is behind us. What will happen in the end, do you think?’

‘That depends on what you mean by the end.’

‘When all the rioting and burning of noble houses and the killing has ended. Will France get her republic?’

‘I believe it will.’

When he made no attempt to converse further with her, Maria sensed that he was grappling with some sort of weighty problem, and she let the silence continue, content to watch the passing scenery roll past the windows.

Arriving at Highgate they were admitted through the tall gates of the estate where Charles lived. The warm mellow brick manor house stood proudly against a backdrop of sprawling parkland as they drove up the gracefully curving drive.

Maria looked around in approval. ‘What a lovely house.’

‘I agree—but then I would. It’s been in my family for generations.’

They stepped out of the carriage and climbed the wide flight of stone steps to the massive door. Before they reached it it was opened by a stiff-faced man dressed in dark blue and gold livery. His face relaxed with pleasure when he saw who had arrived.

‘Sir Charles! It’s good to see you back.’

Charles lifted a hand in an invitation for Maria to precede him. ‘Thank you, Jesson,’ he said, striding past him and nodding at Mrs Moor, the housekeeper at Highgate. ‘It’s good to be home. How is my mother?’

‘Lady Osbourne left for London last month, Sir Charles. She was quite well when she left. She said she was tired of the country and was missing her friends.’

‘I see. Then I shall see her there. We are on our way to London. When we have eaten and the horses have rested we’ll continue with our journey. Is there anything I need to attend to while I am here?’

‘I don’t think so, sir. Mr Parry has everything running like clockwork. There is some private correspondence that needs attending to.’

‘I’ll take it with me and deal with it in London. Mark Parry is my bailiff,’ Charles explained to Maria. ‘He is highly competent and I don’t know what I’d do without him. Have cook prepare a meal for us, Mrs Moor—and if you could, show Miss Monkton to a room. I’m sure you would like to freshen up before we eat,’ he said, looking at Maria. His gaze passed over her attire and his expression became one of distaste.

‘I think it’s time you disposed of that dress. I’m sure Mrs Moor can find you something else to wear. My sisters both have dresses stashed somewhere. I think Georgina is more your size. There’s bound to be something that will suit. For safety’s sake, Miss Monkton was forced to leave everything in France in a hurry,’ he explained to his housekeeper.

‘Which is why I appear before you dressed as a peasant,’ Maria said, looking with mock dismay at her dismal attire. ‘I assure you I don’t normally look like this.’

Mrs Moor faced Maria with a cheery smile. ‘Come with me, Miss Monkton. I’ll see what I can find.’

And she did. Attired in a delicate lemon gown, the long tresses of her hair pulled from her face and left to fall down her back beneath trails of lemon ribbon, Maria entered the drawing room like a fresh breeze, sweeping in through the door.

Seated by the window flicking through some correspondence, Charles quickly came to his feet in appreciation of her dazzling beauty. His gaze slid boldly over her, from the top of her shining head to her swelling breasts beneath the bodice of her gown and right down to her feet. Maria was accustomed to the admiring glances of gentlemen, but there was nothing gentlemanly about Charles’s lazy perusal of her body.

‘Are you quite finished?’ she asked tersely.

His unhurried gaze lifted to her eyes and a wry smile quirked his stern lips when he heard the exasperation in her voice. Perhaps she resented him suggesting she shed her unflattering black gown that had seen better days on her maid. ‘I was merely admiring the transformation, Maria. You look quite radiant.’

She had been lovely before, but he hadn’t expected her to blossom into a full-fledged beauty simply by changing her gown. When she reached London she would dazzle society’s gentlemen. And therein lay his problem, for she was a complete innocent, an inexperienced innocent in his charge, and for whom he was responsible. The image of himself as guardian of her virtue—not forgetting her fortune—was so ludicrous it was laughable. But that was the role he would be forced to play when Maria had sent Henry Winston packing—which she would, when she laid eyes on his gross bulk, and she was truly alone.