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“Heaven preserve me from my own idiocy!” she muttered, tossing aside her brush and swiping at her eyes.
A soft voice called from the doorway. “Ellie? Whatever is the matter?”
Turning, Eleanor tried to put on a brave smile for Rowena’s sake, but it was no use. Such was her misery that it could not be hidden. “If you must know, I’m not looking forward to tonight.”
“Why not? Are you unwell?”
She considered saying yes, but Rowena’s alarmed expression stopped her. Given her delicate condition, Eleanor could not in good conscience deliberately cause her distress. “Oh, no. Nothing like that. I—I fear I’ve made a terrible mistake.” At Rowena’s askance look, she elucidated. “I promised to help…someone…make a match this Season, and now I’m not certain I can go through with it.”
“Has Caroline been causing trouble again?” asked Rowena, her voice turning sharp.
“Not at all.” Eleanor looked at her and made a decision. “It’s Sorin. He asked me to help him select a bride.” Rowena’s brows rose in evident surprise. “I told him I would. And now…well, now I’m forced to keep my promise, despite…despite…”
To Eleanor’s mortification, the tears she’d thought under control escaped to run down her face. Grabbing a handkerchief, she rushed to blot them before they could spot her gown. “Oh, Rowena! He trusts me to help him, and I simply cannot.” Gentle arms closed about her shoulders, and she sagged against them. “Whomever I choose will be all wrong for him, I’m certain of it. I don’t want to be responsible for his happiness.”
“You know, the man has some say as to whom he offers his hand,” answered Rowena, her tone wry. “But tell me, why do you assume you’ll err? Do you not know him better than anyone else, save perhaps his mother?”
“There are times I think I do, but then he says or does something that proves me wrong. He can be so frustrating at times!” Feeling utterly wretched, she dashed away more tears.
“Then he is no different from any other man,” said Rowena, laughing a little. “Charles drives me absolutely mad on a daily basis, yet I love him to distraction. He knows it, too.” She paused, and then, “I believe Lord Wincanton knows how deeply you care for him, Ellie, else he would not have singled you out to ask for help. He trusts you, because he knows you would never want him to be anything less than perfectly happy.”
Yes, and it was making her perfectly miserable! “I know, and that makes it even more difficult. I don’t think anyone can possibly be good enough for him.” Though I would have tried my best… She buried her face in her hands. “What am I to do?”
Rowena sat silent for a long moment. “Let us approach this from a standpoint of logic. What particular qualities does he seek in a wife?”
She thought back. “He never actually listed them,” she blurted, blowing her nose with vigor and not caring that it made a loud, honking noise like that of an angry goose. Sorin would certainly not have approved. And there’s one answer. “He’s always been most adamant that a lady’s manners and sense of propriety must be beyond reproach.”
“A good place to begin,” said Rowena with a thoughtful nod. “You ought to be quite the expert at judging such things, given that he himself often instructed you in comportment.”
So I should, she told herself bitterly. Manners and propriety! What good had they done her? Her thoughts turned to that paragon of virtue, Saint Jane. “And…I suppose she must be biddable, compliant, and meek of temperament.”
This earned her a doubtful frown. “Are you certain? Look at the women closest to him. Neither you nor his mother are any of those things, if you’ll pardon my saying it. You are both strong-minded, and I doubt he has ever described either of you as being ‘meek’.”
It made her smile, as doubtless intended. “Lady Wincanton is quite a force of nature. But a man might not want to marry a woman so like his mother.” Like me.
Pursing her lips, Rowena nodded slowly. “Perhaps, yet it seems to me he prefers the company of strong women.”
“Not so when it comes to his bride,” she replied sadly. “His first choice, Jane, was—according to him—‘perfection’, and he always described her as the most temperate of women.”
“The choices made in one’s youth are not always the right ones,” answered Rowena. She folded her hands in her lap. “I met her, you know. Jane. She was lovely and sweet, but I remember very clearly thinking she was all wrong for him. Timid to a fault, she was. Constantly needing reassurance. I recall hearing him once tell her not to be so fearful of everything.”
“He’s never said such a thing to me,” Eleanor responded with a grimace. “If anything, he’s always adjured me to have more caution and curb my impulsivity.”
“And yet I’ve always heard him praise your courage,” mused Rowena. “He cares for you a great deal, you know.” Again, she paused as if debating what to say next. “Enough that at one point, I actually thought of proposing a match.”
Hearing this only made Eleanor feel worse. But he does not care for me the way a man cares for a woman he wishes to marry. Oh, how she wished he did! And not just so she could stay in Somerset. She longed for him to see her as a woman. But it was not meant to be. “It would never have worked,” she said aloud, her chest constricting. “He looks on me as a sister.”
Rowena’s eyes took on an expression of deepest compassion. “And…how do you view him?”
The question brought Eleanor up short. In her mind’s eye she pictured Sorin, his mouth quirked in a gentle smile, the sun on his hair, the light in his hazel eyes as he laughed. He is everything I want and cannot have. The shock of realization prickled across her flesh like a thousand stings. She didn’t just want someone like Sorin—she wanted him. All of him. His heart, his mind, his tall, lean body—with a ferocity that shook her to the very seat of her soul.
Her mouth formed very different words, however. “He is ever my dearest friend.” She dredged up a watery smile. “Worry not. I will help him, as I promised. I’m sure there must be someone worthy of his good name.”
A knock saved her from having to answer any more uncomfortable questions. Fran informed her that Lord Ashford was awaiting them downstairs.
Eleanor avoided Rowena’s eyes, took up her accoutrements, and trudged out and down the stairs, her feet leaden. Her cousin greeted them with a grunt, a frown creasing his brow. He was alone.
“Is Lord Wincanton not here?” she asked him, almost afraid to hear his answer.
