A bit of mist kissed her cheek. “Better return to the house,” she declared as she picked up her pace. “Cook was right once again.”
She was nearly at a run when she reached the door. Thankfully, Mr. Wharton opened it before she caught the latch. “I should have listened to Cook’s warning,” she said as she shook out her damp shawl.
“Yes, my lady,” Wharton said with a small smile.
“I mean to change my clothes,” she announced as she adjusted the seams of her day dress.
“His Lordship wished to speak to you, my lady. He is still at his breakfast,” Wharton informed her.
Freya frowned. “Speak to me?”
“I told him you had gone for a short walk, and Lord Cunningham said he wished a word with you when you returned,” the butler explained.
Her father’s voice could be heard from the open door of the morning room. “Freya, come here.”
She attempted to disguise her dismay, but Freya fooled no one. She hurried to answer her father’s bidding. “Yes, my lord,” she said as she stepped into the room. Freya was surprised to discover her mother had not come down to breakfast, which meant Lady Cunningham was hiding from the awful truth her husband meant to announce to their daughter. Freya’s spine stiffened.
Her father motioned her deeper into the room. “I wished to tell you that I have entered negotiations with Sir Patrick Hodge, Dickerson’s cousin, who has asked for your hand in marriage. Naturally, Hodge cannot consider an actual marriage until his year of mourning for the late Lady Hodge ends after the turn of the new year. In March, though I am not confident of the exactdate, but I will look again at our correspondence. The baronet is thinking June or July, not too soon so as to raise objections, but soon enough.”
“Sir Patrick is twice my age,” Freya protested before she could swallow her protest.
“I am eight years your mother’s senior,” her father reasoned.
“And Sir Patrick must be nearer to your age than mine!” Her voice rose in protest.
Her father ignored her concerns. “I have told Sir Patrick that you have always been an obedient daughter and will be an obedient wife and mother to his two daughters. The man will require an heir to his baronetcy. I would not wish my fate on another.”
Freya realized there was no hope to argue against this new reality, for her father’s word was final. No one would assist her in her cause to know true affection. Her mother’s life was one she would be required to replicate. No exchange of ideas. No give and take in how to raise her children or even to decorate the house in which she would spend the remainder of her days. Her mother’s life and her sister’s life would soon be the model for hers.
Chapter Three
Early January 1813
Freya rapped onthe door of Beaufort House. She suspected that the Beauforts had not yet returned to London, for the knocker was still removed, but she wished to leave her card. She was running out of time to thwart her father’s plans, for Sir Patrick would exit his mourning period in mid-March and would officially begin courting her by April, with the hope of a proposal and a marriage by the time Parliament broke in mid- to late July.
“Yes, miss,” a very proper butler responded with a frown of disapproval.
“Good day, sir,” she said with a well-placed smile. “I am Lady Freya Cunningham, a friend of the new Lady Beaufort. I was with her when she married His Lordship.” Theoretically, she was not in attendance on Lady Annalise’s wedding day, but Freya did not think Her Ladyship would object to the exaggeration. “I simply wanted to leave my card. If you would pass it on to Lady Beaufort and let her know I am also in London, I would greatly appreciate the kindness.”
“The master does not expect to return until after the sixteenth,” the butler explained, “I suspect it will be on Monday;however, I will leave the card for Her Ladyship’s notice. Anything else, my lady?”
Freya wanted to ask if Lord Graham also meant to return after the fifteenth, but she swallowed her curiosity. She knew Graham and Lady Annalise were to stand up with Graham’s brother, Lord Thompson, at the man’s wedding, and they would return soon to prepare for the event. Freya had a plan—a desperate plan—but a plan, nevertheless.
16 January 1813
“There you are,Freya,” her mother called as Freya attempted to reach her quarters before either parent noted her return.
“Good day, Mama. I did not know you searched for me,” she said dutifully. When she was young, Freya had always thought her mother would protect her from her father’s manipulations, but over the last few years, Freya had come to realize she was very much on her own. Both her mother and elder sister obediently did what they were told. She sometimes wondered why she was the only one who could see how much harm Lord Iain Cunningham enacted upon his family. He had never raised a hand to any of them, at least, not of which Freya held knowledge, but he had berated and belittled the life out of all of them. She had hoped she could reach her majority before he turned his insensitivity on her, but her father meant to marry her off, or, at the very least, have her engaged before the early days of summer.
“Yes, I must call upon Mr. Sustar’s auxiliary establishment in Cheapside, and I do not wish to travel alone to that part of London. You are much more attentive to those about you than is Mrs. Marlowe.”
“I did not realize Mr. Sustar had opened another shop,” Freya remarked as she bent to kiss her mother’s upturned cheek.
“Yes, I have recommended Sustar’s services to several of my friends. Thanks to me, Mr. Sustar has had to hire an additional staff, though I do not understand why the women had to move to Cheapside. Working overnight and out of sight of the young clerks who are employed in the shop during the day should not be such a great encumbrance.”
Freya kept the frown from her features. Back in Scotland, her mother was the sweetest creature alive, but when they came to London each year for the Parliamentary session, her mother changed, always worrying about being judged by the English aristocracy. In Freya’s opinion, Maeve Cunningham should simply live her life and ignore the critics, real or imaginary. “I suspect it would be hard on a woman with family to work the nighttime hours,” she suggested diplomatically.
“I suppose,” her mother said with a shrug. “I wanted to have new drapes made for Imelda’s sitting room at her London home.”
