“We’re going to Scotland as soon as Lord Baderston convinces his mother to come along,” Viola said.
Lord Darden blinked. “As usual, I am entirely lost.”
After Viola hadsaid a very long goodbye and good luck to Lord Baderston at the front doors, Conbatten drove him home to speak to the dowager.
Viola joined her family in the drawing room, where Lord Darden was apprised of the goings-on of the day.
“So it is to be a family elopement?” he asked.
“Of sorts,” the earl said. “I’ve sent a note to my solicitor so we might draw up the papers for the marriage contract.”
“It all hangs on Lord Baderston’s mother though,” Viola said. “He must convince her to accompany us.”
“Well,” Lord Darden said, “he strikes me as a determined sort of chap.”
*
Roland found hismother sitting in the drawing room. It was odd to see her so, as she was generally on the move—going somewhere or directing the servants about something. If she were sitting, she worked on her sewing or played the pianoforte. Just now, though, she was entirely unoccupied and had her hands folded in her lap.
“I suppose you will send me off to Dorset to live quite alone after I have expressed my displeasure with your recent actions,” the dowager said. “You can hardly want me scowling at the wedding breakfast.”
“Actually, I want you take a trip, but not to Dorset.”
The dowager laughed bitterly. “Oh I see, now I am even thrown from the dower house? Where am I to be shipped off to? My cousin Ada’s cottage in Brighton, I suppose? I know you can make her take me in, as you pay all her debts.”
“I have no intention of shipping you off anywhere. I want you to come to the wedding, which will be in Scotland. All the Benningtons are going, and there are quite a lot of them. I wish you to represent our side.”
“Scotland?”
“Yes, Scotland. We wish to set off as soon as possible, but Lord Westmont says the idea is off if you do not consent to come.”
“Does he say that?” the dowager said skeptically.
“He does, and he knows you do not like him. Though, he said he would not presume to speak for you. I would know the cause of your dislike.”
The dowager sighed and much to Roland’s surprise, she looked a little defeated. “Very well, if you must know it and I will thank you to never repeat it. I have told you of the earl that I preferred and that he married another.”
“It was the Earl of Westmont,” Roland said. He should have known. He had briefly wondered about it when she’d told him that his father was second choice, but he’d dismissed it.
“It was he. There, now you know it. I suppose that now he is a widow, that Miss Mayton will get her claws into him.”
“Miss Mayton?” Roland said, laughing. “I rather think not. That lady has been on the premises for nearly seventeen years. If the earl had a preference for her, I think he would have mentioned it by now.”
“Seventeen, you say?”
“Indeed. She’s been there since the countess died in childbirth.”
“I did not realize it had been so long.”
“I really do not think it would matter if she’d only been there for an hour,” Roland said. “She is a remarkably flighty woman.”
“Yes, she is, is she not?”
“I cannot imagine they would be at all suited.”
“No, the earl is certainly not flighty himself.”
“You will come, then?” Roland asked. “I think your feelings against the earl might undergo a thawing and I think you will learn to love Lady Viola. She will not be as pliable as you might prefer, but she could be a friend and she has been rather undaunted by your treatment of her.”
