‘Lady Lucinda Fairfax is a far superior match. Her debut season, Caleb, and she is appearing radiant with potential…’
‘Mother, I thought you were cold?’ Caleb frowned at the fan.
Anne’s eyes flicked from the fan to his face, challenging him.
‘You risk loosening your headdress with such agitation,’ Caleb warned, not actually caring one bit about her turban.
His distraction technique was successful, as she instantly stopped fanning herself. ‘Sally!’ she shrieked down the corridor and the scurrying footsteps of her long-suffering lady’s maid could be heard farther off down the hall.
Caleb nodded curtly just once and advised ‘I shall gather Emmeline.’
With that, a cheerful gust of energy whisked its way down the staircase, in the form of Caleb’s younger sister, Lady Emmeline Exley.
‘Am I exquisite?’ she laughed as she arrived on the bottom step and performed a twirl in her Grecian style pastel pink dress. It flowed out around her in a swirl, following her giggles.
‘Simply divine, dear sister,’ Caleb allowed a small smile to tweak the corners of his lips. His smiles were reserved exclusively for his sweet sibling, who seemed perpetually predisposed to infuse levity into any situation.
‘Where is Mother?’ Emmeline completed her twirling and Caleb, noticing how she had unbalanced herself slightly, held out an arm for her to steady herself.
She held on to his forearm gratefully and leaned in with a whisper.
‘Has she been stomping in the vein of a child, twiddling her pearls in the fashion of an impatient queen, or fanning herself in the manner of one who is entirely superior to the predicament laid before her?’
Caleb’s mouth twitched in amusement and he cleared his throat before answering ‘Fanning.’
‘We cannot be saved now!’ Emmeline dramatically threw the back of her palm to her forehead in jest. ‘Immediately to the capital gesture of objection! Brother, I would not stand in your coat-tails for all of Montwood Estate!’
‘How fortunate for you then, to be born a girl,’ he replied sardonically, then stilled as he considered this for the possibly first time. How different his life would have been, had he not been born a boy and not inherited such a wealth of responsibility.
Upon hearing his Mother’s footsteps returning from having retrieved her fur, he began walking towards the front entrance where the footmen stood, awaiting their attendance.
‘Your Grace,’ the footmen both bowed as he approached. Caleb nodded to them both in greeting and turned to ensure his family was following.
Anne fussed with the fur about her neck.
‘That girl Sally adorned me incorrectly. It is too much puffed up at my neck. I shall be uncomfortable and stifled for the entirety of the journey,’ she complained.
‘At least it is not far, Mother…’ Caleb placated her, standing by to allow her to pass.
‘And you have your fan…’ Emmeline added sarcastically as she shot her brother a cheeky grin. Emmeline often managed to undermine her Mother in a way only she and Caleb recognised. Anne would be furious if she made it her business to take note of her daughter’s comments – it worked in Emmeline’s favour that her Mother disregarded her so.
‘I hear shepaints,’ Anne stopped in the doorway, causing the footmen to turn back from their preliminary steps toward the waiting carriage. They were primed to open the doors and assist the ladies inside but upon realising the Duchess still had business inside the house, resumed their places by the door.
Caleb furrowed his brow, feigning ignorance.
‘Of whom do you speak, Mother?’
‘Of the girl, of course,’ Anne replied haughtily.
‘Sally?’ Emmeline interjected, playing along with Caleb’s game.
‘Heavens,’ Anne’s face contorted in impatience. ‘Lady Hannah Haworth. I believe it is obvious whom I speak of. Shepaints.’Anne spat the last word with an equal measure of distaste had she been claiming the Lady danced in her underwear.
‘Does she?’ Caleb posed it as a rhetorical question, but as his gaze spun over the reception hall, he caught a brief glimpse of his reflection in an ornate gilt-framed mirror hung upon the wall. His face betrayed the apprehension he thought he had successfully masked. His pallor was slightly grey, his green eyes darkened by his heavy set brows bearing down, his jaw tense and pulsing as he considered this woman he was contracted to take as his wife.
At the very least he had hoped she would be mild and passive. He could keep her comfortable and engage minimally. She was aPainter– this inspired in Caleb’s mind somebody more spirited; a woman with more to say and more likelihood to push boundaries. He had to admit to himself that this filled him with a sense of trepidation he had not previously entertained.
His beloved father had made this arrangement with Lord Vincent Haworth years back. It had apparently begun as a business transaction which developed into a friendship. There was some vague situation -of which the details had not been dispensed to Caleb -where his father had gotten into some sort of a business difficulty and Lord Haworth had put his own reputation at stake to help the Duke out. It had happily been neatly rectified – which was, Caleb supposed, the reason he had not been made privy to details. The notion remained, however. Lord Haworth had saved his father by some generosity of spirit and so when the Haworths had a daughter and Caleb was just ten, the Duke had suggested the match and the two men shook on it.
