Annabelle lowered her face until her forehead rested on her knees. “Yes, I do,” she said. “I had settled my mind to it. Mama and Papa and Grandmama and Grandpapa want it, and Lady Wetherby wants it. And he is a kind and an amiable gentleman, even though he is eleven years older than I. Yes, I want to accept. I have been feeling at peace with myself.”
“Have been feeling?” Rosamund said. “But are not now?”
Annabelle did not say anything for a long time. “Joshua says I am making a mistake,” she said.
“Josh?” Rosamund frowned and felt her stomach turn over. What had Josh been saying to the girl?
“He says I do not have to say yes,” Annabelle said. “He says all it would take is a little courage and I could be free for almost the first time in my life. I was only nine years old, you see, when I knew that the Earl of Wetherby would eventually be my husband.”
“But do you feel unfree?” Rosamund asked. “Having a marriage arranged for you, falling in with the wishes of your parents and grandparents does not necessarily mean that you are oppressed. Sometimes parents do know best, Annabelle. Looking back now I can see that your father had good reason for opposing my marriage. I was seventeen and marrying a man of forty-nine. The chances were very strong that I would have been unhappy. It was a miracle, in fact, that I was not, especially as I scarcely knew your uncle when I married him.”
Annabelle was looking at her. “Yes, that is true, isn’t it?” she said. “I should not let Joshua discompose me at the very last moment like this.”
Rosamund hesitated. Her niece was so young and impressionable. It was important to give her the wisest advice she was capable of giving. But before she could form her thoughts into words, the girl spoke again.
“Aunt Rosa,” she said, “were you ever in love with someone, obsessed with someone, unable to let go of your feelings no matter how hard you tried?”
Rosamund swallowed. “Is that how things are with you?” she asked.
“Yes.” Annabelle was looking at her with large, wary eyes.
“And does he love you?” Rosamund asked.
“Oh, no, of course not,” the girl said. “I have been promised to Lord Wetherby since I was a child. No one would even think of falling in love with me. I will recover from it, won’t I? When I am married and have a new home to run and children?”
Rosamund closed her eyes, Oh, poor Justin.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t know, Annabelle. But Josh is right, you know. However high everyone’s expectations are, it is still possible for you to say no. Once you have said yes, you will be committed for all time. Do think carefully. Don’t feel bound by a promise you have not yet made. But on the other hand, don’t allow other people to undermine your confidence at a time when you must be feeling uncertain anyway.”
Annabelle’s forehead was on her knees again. “I don’t know what to do,” she said. “I must think first and foremost of his lordship. Will I be able to make him happy, Aunt Rosa? He is so much older and more experienced than I.”
“Your Uncle Leonard was thirty-two years older than I,” Rosamund said. “And he used to say I was the delight of his life.”
“I don’t think I could be the delight of anyone’s life,” Annabelle said.
“Oh, Annabelle,” Rosamund said, “yes, you could. You are sweet and gentle and sensible. You think of other people, not just of yourself. I believe you are capable of deep love. And you are capable of making this decision for yourself.”
There were tears in Annabelle’s eyes when she looked up. “But there isn’t any decision to make,” she said. “Except that I cannot make Lord Wetherby happy unless I can forget ... Aunt Rosa, why is there not always a right and a wrong answer to every question? Why can’t we always know what is right?”
“It’s called growing up, I’m afraid,” Rosamund said.
“Being able to make one’s own decisions. It is so much easier just to accept the decisions of our elders when we are children, and grumble about what tyrants they are, isn’t it?”
Annabelle was frowning in thought. “If I say yes,” she said, “that is just what I will be doing, isn’t it? Accepting what Mama and Papa have always told me is right for me? But if I say no, it may just be a pointless act of rebellion against them. Oh, dear.”
“Well,” Rosamund said cheerfully, “if you didn’t have a headache when you came in here, Annabelle, you must certainly have one now. I’m sorry Aunt Rosa could not simply take you in her arms and solve all your problems for you.”
“But you have helped,” Annabelle said. “You have helped me see that I am not a puppet on a string, though sometimes it is easier to be just that.”
She threw the bedclothes aside and climbed out of the bed. She kissed Rosamund on the cheek, wished her a good night, and was gone.
And Rosamund was left sitting on the bed and staring at the candle and half-wishing that she had been unscrupulous enough to give the advice she had ached to give.
But she would not allow her mind even to begin to hope. For when all was said and done, she was only the almost impoverished widow of an almost obscure baronet and he a wealthy earl with more than one large and prosperous estate. And however briefly, she had been his mistress. Gentlemen did not marry their mistresses.
Her only hope—if she would allow herself to begin to hope—could be that he would invite her to a longer-term affair, one that would last until one of them grew tired of the other. That would be until he grew tired of her—perhaps six months, perhaps a year. Perhaps even longer. But not forever.
But for however long or short a time it might be—if a lot of ifs became certainties and if she would allow herself a glimmering of hope—it would not do. She might indulge in a very brief affair with a man if circumstances made him almost impossible to resist, but she would never deliberately become a man’s mistress.
