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Jack entered the noisy, brightly lit salon in no very good temper. It was beginning to dawn on him that this business of marrying to secure his lands and then beginning to use his title was not going to be the straightforward process he had thought it. His reception here had been a case in point. He’d had to ask a favour of a friend to secure an invitation and it was clear that Lady Dalesford was doubting her own judgement in sending one.
He could feel the curious stares like fingers poking him between the shoulder blades, hear the whispers. Some people looked away when he caught their gaze, a few matrons glowered at him. He knew what they all thought—he’d heard it enough, after all. He was a traitor to his class—he was as good as saying that a title did not matter. He was probably being blamed for the actions of every radical writer of seditious literature, every mill owner in Manchester who wanted the vote and said so at the top of his vulgarly accented voice, every beggar who spat when a crested carriage passed, splattering him with mud.
It was a while since he’d deliberately put himself in a position where he had to deal with this. Now he was going to have to come to terms with these people if he wanted to use his title, return to society, bring up a family who would be accepted in this world.
He was not going to grovel and apologise, that was certain, but somehow he was going to have to negotiate his return to the fold and keep his temper at the same time. And how, exactly, did he let it be known that he would answer to Dersington? It was hardly something that one announced in the press or stood up and shared at a social gathering. He could tell his closest friends and tell them to spread it about, he supposed, grudgingly aware of just how much talk that would cause. There would be less if he let it be known before his marriage, but that went against the stubborn principle that had kept him from using it in the first place. No lands, no title.
So, wed first and start a whole new life as the married Earl of Dersington? There was still time to decide, but now where was his intended? Slightly behind him, he heard someone murmur, ‘It’s Lackland’, and felt the social smile harden on his lips. It seemed he was no longer able to shrug off that particular slur so easily. He turned, identified the young Viscount who must be the one who had spoken, then turned away when the man dropped his gaze from the challenge in Jack’s eyes.
And there was Madelyn, sitting beside Lady Macclesbourne and her three pretty daughters. Tall, clearly ill at ease and managing to look dowdy even in what was clearly a very expensive gown. And she had been foolish enough to attempt to counter her natural pallor with lavish amounts of rouge. With those limply dangling ringlets it made her look like a wooden Dutch doll, he thought irritably as he got closer.
Surely he had found her more attractive when they first met? He distinctly recalled a feeling of attraction, a desire to kiss her. He had been too angry over the changes to the house to really notice her appearance the other day, now his mood darkened further at the thought of tying himself permanently to this eccentric, stubborn woman. He had thought Madelyn had style, a certain strange elegance, but he must have been in a state of shock at the revelation that she held all his lands and so he had seen what he wanted to see. Perhaps that garden had drugged his senses. Or maybe he had fallen into a fairy story and been bewitched.
Bewitched or not, he had agreed to marry her, he had given his word and, however little was left to him of his inheritance, he was still a gentleman. Jack rescued a smile as he arrived in front of the seated ladies. ‘Lady Macclesbourne, Miss Macclesbourne, Miss Daphne, Miss Caroline. Miss Aylmer.’
‘Mr Ransome, good evening.’ Lady Macclesbourne looked as though she had bitten a lemon, unflattering little lines appearing all around her lips. ‘You know Miss Aylmer?’
‘We met in Kent,’ Jack said, deriving some enjoyment from Lady Macclesbourne’s uneasiness at his presence. In the past he had flirted a little with Miss Caroline and knew the last thing her mother wanted was her fixing her interest on a landless man who did some kind of unspecified but doubtlessly dubious work for a living. Teasing her by paying attention to her daughter would repay a number of slighting remarks in the past, but he could not be so careless of Madelyn’s feelings.
‘Would you care to take a turn around the room, Miss Aylmer?’
She looked so taken aback by the suggestion that for a moment he thought she would refuse, but she rose from her chair and took his proffered hand. ‘Thank you, Mr Ransome. Excuse me, Lady Macclesbourne.’
‘How are you enjoying London society?’ Jack enquired, attempting to ignore the fact that quite the tallest lady in the room was stiff and unspeaking by his side and that they were the subject of some interest, very little of it kindly. Any other young woman would be flirting by now, sending him intimate glances, smiling. Not Madelyn Aylmer, chin up, lips pressed together, holding herself as though he was leading her to the stake. A glance told him that the high colour in her cheeks was natural and wondered what she was blushing about. Perhaps she was one of those unfortunate girls who turned bright red when too warm. At least that long nose had not gone pink.
‘Enjoying myself?’ she echoed. ‘Why, not at all. But then I did not expect to.’
Chapter Eight
‘Why do you dislike this so much?’ Jack was conscious of a shock that was not so much disapproval as interest that Madelyn should feel no need to pretend, even if it was only to him.
‘I feel awkward, uncomfortable, out of place and I dislike the clothes,’ she said with devastating honesty.
‘Why?’ Jack asked, equally blunt as he steered her towards the nearest footman. He nodded to the man who came forward with a tray of glasses. ‘Champagne?’
‘Thank you.’ She took the glass, still frowning over his question, sipped, sneezed. ‘This is remarkably peculiar wine.’
‘Persist, you may come to enjoy it,’ Jack suggested. Perhaps alcohol would help Madelyn relax. ‘You were telling me what is wrong with the clothes.’
‘They are indecent. My ankles show, the fabric is as flimsy as cobwebs, the bodice—such as it is—is about to slide off my shoulders and the stays pinch.’
Stays? Jack took an incautious sip of champagne and choked. ‘Pinch?’
‘And poke apart and push up. How one is supposed to breathe I have no idea. Are you laughing at me? Because you can have no idea of the discomfort of the beastly things.’
‘I am glad to say I have not.’ Jack managed to get his amusement under control. Madelyn might not flirt, but she certainly knew how to take the wind out of a man’s sails. ‘I should point out that men wear them, too. No, not me!’ he protested as she cast him a dubious glance. ‘Those inclined to corpulence, like Walgrave over there. See? In the navy-blue waistcoat and the ridiculously long tails.’
‘I imagine that he creaks,’ Madelyn observed dispassionately. ‘He is fat. I am not.’
‘I would suggest that the garment you are wearing would feel even more indecent without th
em,’ he suggested. It would certainly look it. He got a firm hold on his imagination and discovered, to his surprise, that he was in a much better mood. Although what Lady Dalesford would say if she knew he was carrying on a conversation about ladies’ underwear in the middle of her salon he shuddered to think.
Beside him Madelyn sighed, then stopped dead. ‘I hate this gown.’ They were facing one of the long mirrors that hung on the rear wall of the room to echo back the windows opposite. Their reflections faced them, a man in fashionable clothes and a tall woman, awkward and uncomfortable.
‘Do you want to go back on our agreement?’ Jack asked. ‘Because I can promise you that styles are not going to revert to the Middle Ages and corsets are not going to vanish.’
