Madeline steeled herself. “And you said yes?”
“Of course. I already sent my reply. You’ll be leaving on the next ship out of Scarborough in five days. I’ve arranged for you to travel with a family from Helmsley.”
Nausea welled up inside Madeline.Five days?She would be leaving Yorkshire forever and crossing an ocean infive days?
She tried to focus on the shock of that and only that, rather than the fact that her father could be so cavalier about never seeing her again.
She swallowed hard and sat up straighter. “You still haven’t told me his name.”
“His name?” Her father cleared his throat as if he were nervous about revealing it. She wished he would just spit it out and end this debilitating dread. “His name is Adam Coates.”
Adam Coates?
Madeline’s heart stumbled and took a high-flying leap.
“But as I said,” her father continued, “you probably don’t remember him. It’s been a long time.”
Remember him? How could she not? She’d been overwhelmed by the sight of him the first moment he rode into their yard fifteen years ago on his big black horse, to call on her older sister, Diana. Diana had been eighteen and devastatingly beautiful, while Madeline had been a rather willful child of seven who refused to go to her room when her sister’s suitor came calling.
It had been the first time Madeline had ever seen a man so handsome he’d sent the clouds dashing right out of the sky. He’d hopped down from his horse, made a great sweeping bow in front of her and said, “Who is this beautiful young lass? A princess, surely!”
Years later, when she began to think about men in a romantic way, her dream suitor always seemed to have Adam Coates’s handsome features. For he had been the prince charming of her dreams, the gallant hero who had come to rescue a little princess locked in a tower.
All the sounds in the room retreated into some kind of garbled bubble while Madeline sat there in disbelief, staring blankly at her mumbling father.
She interrupted him. “But what about Diana? Why didn’t Mr. Coates ask forherhand? He loved her once, and she’s a widow now.” Good God, her voice was shaking.
Her father removed his spectacles and set them on his lap. “He didn’t mention Diana. I suspect he doesn’t know she’s been widowed. Besides, Diana is better off here with me.”
You mean her inheritance is better off here with you.
Madeline’s foot began to tap beneath her skirts as if it had a will of its own.Adam Coates?
“I thought he was married,” she said as casually as possible. “He had four children, if I recall.”
“Ah, so you do remember him.”
Vividly,she thought.
“Vaguely,” she replied.
Her father put his spectacles back on. “Well, yes, he did marry someone, quite soon after Diana married Sir Edward. Too soon, I think. A young woman from York, who already had a son. I don’t believe she gave him an easy time, but that’s all in the past now. She passed away before Mr. Coates left for Nova Scotia.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Madeline said softly.
Her father stood and gestured for her to stand also. “I know, my dear, that after what happened at Stanley Hall, you’d resigned yourself to spinsterhood, but you can not afford to pass up on this offer. The man has made a success of himself. He’s as wealthy now as any aristocrat and he knows nothing about the scandal. With any luck, he won’t find out until after he’s wed you. Lord knows you’d never get such an offer from anyone here, so mind what I say and go without kicking up a fuss and try to make the best of it, will you? From what I hear, it’s a different world over there. Perhaps you can make a fresh start and live a respectable life.”
She nodded politely. “Yes, Father.”
He took a step back. “Yes, Father?That’s all you’re going to say? Heavens above, I expected a full-blown battle over this. I don’t think you’ve ever saidyes, Fatherto me about anything in your entire life!”
She lowered her gaze, careful not to give away any of what she truly felt. “If I’m to leave here in five days, I would very much like our time together to be agreeable.”
His shoulders slumped visibly. “Well, that’s long overdue. Now off you go, and think carefully about what you want to take with you. I can only spare two trunks.” He sat down again, waving her off. “And Mr. Coates requested that you bring a bushel of wheat for seed—yellow Kent and Hampshire brown—and that you lay it under your head like a pillow during the crossing, to prevent it from getting wet.”
That last request sailed over her head, pushed aside by all the other thoughts and dreams that were circling around her like a hurricane. Adam Coates. It hardly seemed possible.
After Madeline left the room, her father rested his head against the high back of the chair and drummed his fingers upon the armrest. What should he do with the letter still in his waistcoat pocket? he wondered.
