“She wasn’t happy after you left,” Jasper said, scowling at him.
“Wasn’t she?” Durward was slightly ashamed of the wistfulness of that. He cleared his throat. “Did she leave no message for me?”
“None.” Jasper stared at him. “Any reason why she should?”
“I told her I would come back. I thought she knew...”
“Knew what?”
Durward shifted in his chair. “Look, remind yourself where she went. I’ll go and explain to her...” Explain what? What if she’d gone to escapehim? Appalling thought, but he had to know. He had to see her. Hewouldsee her...
“Will you bring her home?” Jasper asked eagerly.
Another fraught question, for Durward’s plans involved taking her further away, if only she’d come... At the same time, Jasper could not be abandoned. A solution would have to be found that did not leave the man lonely and friendless in a town that had learned to despise him.
Durward brewed tea and made the captain laugh. He left that night, aware he had adopted another responsibility. But he had also acquired the name of Carina’s employer. Lady Grandison. And he knew exactly where to find her.
AS THE WEDDING GUESTSbegan to arrive at Grand Court, it grew harder to focus the children’s attention on their lessons. As they grew more excited, however, the bride began to lookpaler, more remote, and even, at odd moments, desperate. This worried Carina to the point that when Harriet accompanied her and the children on a walk, she hung back a little until she and Harriet could not be overheard.
“Miss Cole, are you quite well?”
“Oh, yes, of course!” Harriet replied with a quick, distracted smile.
“Forgive me, but you seem to have lost your...serenity.”
“Have I?” Harriet cast her a startled glance. “I suppose I have much on my mind.”
“Well, a wedding is a huge matter.”
Harriet’s breath caught on a laugh that didn’t quite work. “Isn’t it just?”
“You must speak,” Carina blurted. “This is your whole life, your siblings’ lives, all given over to your husband. If you dislike this marriage, if you are not certain, you must postpone—”
Harriet stopped in her tracks, blinking at her. “But I don’t dislike the marriage. I want more than anything, ever, to be his wife.”
Carina, with the wind whipped out of her sails, blushed furiously. “Then I hope you’ll forgive my presumption in bringing—”
“Not presumption,” Harriet said quickly, taking her arm and walking on. “The truth is that while I look forward to my marriage, the actual wedding seems to have grown to monstrous proportions, with arms and legs and slavering teeth ready to bite us all. Between ourselves, I would rather marry him quietly with just the children and the Grandisons present.”
“Would Lord Sanderly not understand that?”
“Yes. But he wants this forme. You see, we are not of the same station in life, and you might call our courtship...unconventional. Sanderly knows to his cost the damage of gossip and rumour, and so he makes this wedding amassive Society event. His point is pride in me before all these well-born witnesses who will now never cut me, either for my own comparatively lowly birth, or for being married to him. His reputation is the result of malice and lies—and perhaps his own pride—and he will not allow me to be touched by that.”
Carina frowned. “So he is doing all this foryou? And you are putting up with it, although you hate it, forhim?”
Harriet smiled. “Mad, is it not? It will be over soon, and then we can just be together. And in the meantime, all of this is good for me. I am to be a countess, after all. I should get used to the social demands.”
“Does he know how you struggle?” Carina asked, very conscious that there was nothing she could do to help.
Harriet smiled. “Yes. And he knows it will be best in the long run. So do I. For the children, too. Although I must admit I am happier leaving them now that I know you will be there. In fact, we were wondering if you would consider staying on with us when we come home? Alex will need a tutor, of course, and he will go away to school, but the girls will need you for some time...”
“Thank you,” Carina said with difficulty. “You are most kind...” She frowned, looking about her. “Where have the children vanished to?”
Although Harriet’s offer was exactly what she had hoped for, it didn’t make her as happy as she had imagined. Durward’s reckless, handsome face swam into her mind once more and was ruthlessly banished. It never seemed to go far, though, always lurking in the background, a loss, a grief that would not be comforted.
THE FOLLOWING DAY,a visitor came to the schoolroom, a fashionable young matron perhaps in her late twenties, wholooked vaguely familiar. Her gaze darted around the room and came to rest on Carina.
“Can I help you, ma’am?” Carina asked, straightening from her position bent over Orchid’s slate. “Are you lost?”
