He gave her a sideways glance. “Our place in society is nowhere near the upper echelons, Miss Sinclair. This situation does not even begin to compare.”
“No, it does not, of course. Forgive me. It was a foolish remark.” Miriam rose also, beginning to feel as if she was begging for marriage. It was suddenly belittling. Shameful, even. “I do understand your reservations, Mr. Barton, truly I do. My proposal is beyond unreasonable and, that being so, please think no more of it. Thank you, sincerely, for your gracious consideration, but I believe I shall take my leave of you while I still have some pride left.” She forced yet another smile, shrugged off his coat, and handed it to him. “I wish you well, sir.”
Mr. Barton frowned, but said nothing, and as Miriam turned away, there remained, within her, the same sliver of hope. Hope that he would speak, telling her to halt, to wait. That he had agreed to submit to chance, to take her as his wife, and tosave her from utter destitution. But only silence followed as she walked away and her remaining hope dissolved with every step.
Numb with despair, Miriam paused at the chapel exit, readying herself to step through the drenching curtain of raindrops, and go… where? “Thank you for trying, Mama,” she whispered. “Please thank Alice, as—”
“May I ask your age, Miss Sinclair?”
Startled, Miriam turned to see Mr. Barton approaching, his coat slung over his arm. “Sir?”
“Your age, Miss Sinclair.”
“I am nineteen, Mr. Barton.”
“Hmm.” He appeared to ponder for a moment. “At nineteen, you will need consent from your guardian in order to marry, will you not?”
Did she dare hope? Was he reconsidering? Miriam’s teeth chattered as she suppressed a shiver. “Silas is not my legal guardian, sir. I do not have a legal guardian.”
“I see.” His gaze traveled over her, head to toe. “Do you trust me, Miss Sinclair?”
Her heart leapt. “Yes, sir, of course I do.”
“Implicitly?”
She nodded. “Implicitly.”
“Good.” He placed his coat over her shoulders again and gently touched the bruise on her jaw. “Wait here.”
Miriam blinked back tears and tugged Mr. Barton’s coat tightly around her. It was like a hug, warm and comforting, giving her reason to hope again.
Chapter Four
Daniel kept waitingfor a sudden twinge of regret, or to hear a little voice whispering in his ear, telling him he’d lost his mind and that he’d live to regret all of this. So far, though, he’d experienced none of these things.
Having summoned a cab at the cemetery, he’d taken Miss Sinclair back to his house, shepherded her up the stairs, and instructed her to remove her wet clothes. All perfectly innocent, of course. Although the cloth bag she’d brought with her contained some extra clothing, Daniel gave her his winter dressing-gown to wear. “You’ll be more comfortable,” he said, when she’d weakly resisted. Now, a little over an hour later, they were seated beside a cozy fire, each with a bellyful of hot beef stew.
Daniel, having just confessed the truth about his dreams, was enjoying the wide-eyed look of shock on Miss Sinclair’s face.
“In your dreams,” she said, setting her empty plate in the hearth before settling back in her chair. “You saw me in your dreams.”
“Every night for a fortnight,” he replied. “If you recall, you might remember my initial reaction to you the first time we met.”
Miss Sinclair, buried in the woolen folds of Daniel’s dressing-gown, appeared to ponder a moment. “I remember you being startled. As was I when you first appeared out of the fog.”
“If I was startled, it was because I found myself gazing upon a familiar face,” he said. “Yourface. The one in my dreams.”
“Why didn’t you tell me this before?”
Daniel grimaced. “It’s not exactly an easy thing to admit, not even to myself. I actually began to question my own sanity.”
A smile appeared. “And there was I, worried that you’d never believemystory.”
“Still having a bit of trouble with it, to be honest,” Daniel replied. “Not so much the part about your mother’s spirit speaking through this medium, but the fact thatmymother appears to have played a part in it as well. It implies that the two of them conspired with each other to arrange all this, which still beggars belief.”
“I confess, it’s not a tale I would tell all and sundry for fear of being locked away,” Miriam said. “Perhaps we should simply accept it and carry on.”
“I agree,” he replied, the warmth growing inside him not entirely due to feast and flame. Miss Sinclair had a touch of color in her previously pale cheeks, and a light in her eyes that had not been there that morning. Daniel struggled with an urge to gather her in his arms and carry her to bed. Not that he would ever submit to such a temptation. At least, not until she was his. “Are you feeling better, Miss Sinclair?”
