The curtains were drawn and the sun was shining outside. What time was it? She squinted at the clock. Almost noon.
The knock rapped again.
“I’m still sleeping!” she called out, rolling to her side and curling up with a smile, gathering the covers into a ball and hugging them with her whole body.
“Are you all right, Clara?” It was Sophia. “You’re not ill, are you?”
No, I’m not ill. I’ve never felt so good in my life.
Clara sat up. “I’m fine. Come in.”
Her sister peered inside. “You missed breakfast and you’re about to miss lunch, too, if you don’t get your lazy bones out of bed.”
Clara waved her in. “I need to talk to you.”
Sophia shut the door behind her and moved fully into the room where Clara was sitting up in bed, smirking, feeling as if she might burst.
“What’s going on? You look like you know a secret.” Sophia sat down.
“I do, but if I tell you, you have to promise you won’t be angry, nor will you breathe a word to anyone. Not even James.”
“You know I don’t like keeping secrets from James.”
Clara hated asking her sister to lie, but she couldn’t let anyone else find out what she had done. More importantly, she didn’t want her brother-in-law—who had always been supportive of her despite her past mistakes—to think badly of her. She couldn’t imagine anything worse than disappointing someone she respected so much.
“I don’t want James to know because I don’t want to fall short of his generous regard. Besides, there would be havoc if he knew.”
“Havoc? What’s going on, Clara?”
Clara stared at her sister for a few seconds, hoping she wouldn’t be too shocked by what she was about to hear. “I...I did something rather impulsive last night.”
Sophia covered her face with a hand. “Oh, no.”
“Don’t worry, no one knows. I was careful.”
“What did you do?”
“I snuck out to meet Lord Rawdon.”
Sophia’s cheeks went pale. “You did what? How?”
“I sent him a note saying that I wished to see him, and in his reply, he told me his carriage would be out front at two a.m. I knew I had to take advantage of the opportunity, since the duke is expecting an answer today, so I was very quiet and went out a servant’s door. The marquess was outside, just as he said he would be. We didn’t go anywhere. We just sat in his coach and talked.”
“You talked,” Sophia said skeptically. “That’s all?”
“Well, no, but I’ll explain the rest in a minute. The point is that I’ve made up my mind about the Duke of Guysborough. I can’t marry him.” Clara continued to explain. “And after I talked to the marquess, I realized that we were right about him, Sophia. There is hope. His unconventional behavior makes perfect sense.”
“Why?”
“First of all, he was an exemplary child and model student, very well-behaved with excellent academic performance. It was only later in life that he began to live recklessly, and there is an explanation for it. You see, he fell in love with someone but was forbidden to marry her because his father considered her to be beneath him socially.”
“Interesting,” Sophia replied. “But I’m still waiting for the reason why you think there is hope.”
“Yes, I’m getting to that. The young woman was sent away to America by Lord Rawdon’s father, but she died when her ship sank halfway across the Atlantic. It’s tragic, I know. It was after that that the marquess retreated from society because he blamed its severe, restrictive rules for his heartache. The point is, he loved once before, Sophia, deeply and faithfully. He wanted to marry the girl, and the loss of her cut him so deeply, he has not yet gotten over it.”
“And you think this makes him more attainable?”
“Yes,” Clara replied. “If a man is capable of loving a woman once with that much devotion, he is capable of it again. He needs to be rescued and I can help him. I am sure of it. It’s in his nature to love.”
