Marriage Made In Hope

‘Well, there was some silence, too.’

‘The stunned silence of Perseus falling in love with the drowning Andromeda?’ Gabriel’s tone held a good deal of humour in it that Francis ignored.

‘She fell off a bridge, for God’s sake. She was not chained to a rock waiting to be devoured by sea monsters.’

‘Still, one must feel a certain connection when a soul is saved. I would imagine something along the lines of the life debt in honour-bound cultures, so to speak.’

‘A heavy price, if that’s the case? I did not see such in the eyes of Sephora Connaught, though they are surprisingly blue.’

Gabriel nodded. ‘And young men have written sonnets about those orbs. The number of her suitors is legendary, though she has turned each and every one of them down.’

‘For the marquis?’ He didn’t want to ask the question, but found himself doing so.

‘Winslow fancies himself as something of an example others should be copying in both dress and manner, I think. He is said to be somewhat pompous and arrogant in his dealings with people.’

‘Well, he looks fairly harmless.’ Glancing across the room to where the young lord stood, Francis saw that Sephora Connaught was tucked in beside him.

‘Harmless but controlling. See how he positions himself at her elbow. Adelaide said that if I were to ever constantly hover like the Marquis of Winslow does, she would simply shove me in the ribs.’

‘Perhaps Lady Sephora enjoys it?’

‘I think she allows it because she has never known differently.’

Sephora Connaught’s profile was caught against the light—a small turned-up nose, sculptured brow and cheekbones that were high. Her pallor was almost white.

‘From all accounts Winslow congratulated himself quite heartily on his organisation at the riverside, but his bride-to-be does not look quite herself tonight. Perhaps she does not concur to the same opinion. Perhaps she wishes he had thrown caution to the wind and made the more solid gesture of self-sacrifice by jumping in after her.’

‘Stop teasing, Gabe.’ Adelaide swiped her husband’s arm. ‘It was a scary and dangerous situation and I am certain everyone tried to do their best. Even the marquis for all his pedantic and fussy ways.’

But Francis was not so sure. ‘No, I think Gabe has the gist of him. Winslow sent me a card the next day. While he made an art form of thanking me for my help, he also implied that further correspondence with Lady Sephora would be most unwelcome. He did not want her bothered by any maudlin recount of the incident, he stated, and hoped I had put the whole nonsense behind me because he certainly had.’

‘So you are now to be an inconsequential saviour? A man to be barely thanked?’ Gabriel looked like he wanted to go over and knock Allerly’s head off his shoulders.

‘Winslow’s father is ill so perhaps that is weighing heavily upon him.’ Adelaide frowned as she added this to the conversation. ‘It is, however, hard to imagine what a woman like Sephora Connaught might see in such a man.’

‘She grew up with him,’ Gabriel said. ‘Both families are friends with strong ties and all adhere to the expectations of old tradition, so I am sure the parents are more than pleased with their daughter’s choice of husband.’

As they watched, Sephora’s well-endowed mother, Lady Aldford, towed her away and he observed those around giving their greetings. What was it in the young woman that intrigued him? She was the ton’s favourite daughter, a woman who had managed to snag one of the loftiest catches of the Season without even a hint of criticism from anybody. People admired her. She was everything that was good and true and honest and she was beautiful along with it. Cursing, Francis turned away and was pleased when a passing footman offered around a new tray of drinks.

Chapter Four (#ulink_24bd0adc-4e89-528a-b391-dd8d110b7a35)

An hour later Francis was standing by one of the tall and opened windows at the less crowded end of the room. He wished he could have gone outside to enjoy a cheroot, but oft-times at other balls he had been waylaid in the gardens by women wanting to share more than a word with him. Tonight he did not wish to chance it.

A hand on his arm had him turning and Sephora Connaught stood beside him, a look of pleading on her face and her voice low.

‘I am glad to have this small fortune of finding you alone, Lord Douglas. I have written you a letter, you see, which I should have given you before when we spoke. The marquis let me know he had sent a card with our thanks, but I wanted the same chance myself.’

She bent to extract a paper from her reticule and handed it over. ‘Don’t read it until you are home. Promise me.’

With that she was gone, tagging on the back of a group of giggling women walking past, her mother to the other side of the procession.

The older lady caught his glance at that moment and held it, steely anger overlying puzzlement. Tipping his head at her, Francis turned, the letter from her daughter held tightly in his hand.

* * *

Sephora hoped she had done the right thing by giving him her missive. Please God, do not let him show it to his friends so that they might all laugh at her, she prayed, as her mother’s arm came through hers and Richard joined them.

She had not been able to leave Francis St Cartmail’s bravery to the ministration of Richard’s thanks. She owed him some sort of personal expression of her gratitude and her relief.

The fact that she hoped he might reply, however, made her squeeze her jaw together and grimace. It was the look in his eyes, she thought, that had convinced her to approach him, that and the blazing scar upon his cheek. He’d been hurt badly and she did not wish that for him. Even the scratches she had placed there herself were still visible.

Unfortunately she knew her mother had seen her speaking with the earl, but Elizabeth would say nothing of it within Richard’s hearing distance. Maria was chattering away and laughing and Sephora was so very glad for her sister’s joy in life. She wondered where her own joy had gone, but did not at that particular moment wish to dissect such a notion.

Over against the pillars on the other side of the room the number of beautiful women around Francis St Cartmail seemed to have multiplied. She recognised Alice Bailey and Cate Haysom-Browne, two of the most fêted debutantes of this Season, and both were using their fans with the practised coquetry of females who knew their worth.

‘Have you enjoyed the night, Sephy?’ Her father was beside them now and his pet name for her made her smile.

‘I have, Papa.’

‘Then it is good to see you happy after your awful fright.’

Just a fright now? She frowned at his terminology, thinking her parents had no idea of the true state of her mind.

‘The marquis has decided to stay on for a while, but we thought to head for home. Richard has people to connect with, I suppose, now that his father is sick.’

‘You saw the duke a few days ago. How does he fare?’

‘Not so well, I am afraid. He and your Aunt Josephine are retiring to the country. I hope that he will at least get to experience the occasion of his only son’s wedding in November before...’

He stopped at that and a constricting guilt of worry tightened about Sephora’s throat. Uncle Jeffrey was a good man and he had only ever been kind to her, but she did not wish to shift her nuptials to Richard forward six months so that his father might live to see it. The very thought made her feel ill.

It was as if she stood on a threshold of change and to cross over it meant that she would never ever be able to come back. She was also unreasonably pleased that Richard would not be accompanying them homewards in the carriage this evening. Such a thought gave her cause to hesitate, but she could not explore the relief here in the glittering ballrooms of the ton.

Her mother was watching her closely and further afield she saw the wife of Lord Wesley, Adelaide Hughes, looking across at her with interest.

The cards of her life were changing, all stacked up in random piles, the joker here, the king of hearts there. A twist of fate and her hand might be completely different from the one that she had held on to so tightly and for so very many years.

The water beneath the Thames had set her free perhaps, with its sudden danger and its instant jeopardy. Always before this her life had flowed on a gentle certain course, barely a ripple, hardly a wave.

She was glad she had given Francis St Cartmail her letter, glad that she had mustered up the courage and seized the chance to do something so very out of character.

The Connaught wraps were found by the footman in the elegant entrance hall of the Hadleigh town house and moments later they were on their way home.

* * *

Francis poured himself a drink and opened the windows to one side of his library. Breathing in, he shut the door and reached for the pocket inside his jacket before sitting down behind his wide oaken desk.

The parchment was unmarked and sealed with a dab of red wax. There was no design embossed into it and no ribbons either. He brought the paper to his nose. The faint smell of some flower was there, but Sephora Connaught had not perfumed her letter in any way. It was as if the sheet of paper had simply caught the fragrance she wore and bore it to him.