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Arabella’s chest was rising in shallow breaths and her eyes were shiny. She was struggling to untie the bow in her bonnet. “That all rather depends.”
Her voice was higher than usual.
Caroline twisted the corner of the page, which held the long-ago list of potential suitors she had written up for Betsy. She didn’t think any of them would ask for her hand now.
“Depends on what?”
“I received a marriage proposal today.” Arabella fought the knot apart and snatched the bonnet from her head, clutching it so tight that she ruined the straw brim.
“Congratulations.” Caroline felt the words like arrows to the heart and refused to show the mortal wounds they left.
Arabella’s eyes narrowed. “Congratulations? What is this, Caroline? What are we?”
“Friends,” she said as crisply as she could muster. “The very best of friends, Bell.”
Caroline scratched out a name on the list. This was what she needed to focus on. Her family.
She couldn’t give Arabella what she deserved. She should be feted and applauded by everyone who saw her work. What could Caroline offer her instead? Infrequent lovemaking whenever shechanced to be back in Inverley? If she married, she would have to go wherever her husband dictated. Her stomach churned. Even if she married James, he only spent the summer in Inverley, and the rest of his time in London.
“Which is why you should marry Mr. Worthington.” Caroline supposed she ought to work on adding some enthusiasm in her voice, but what was the use? Arabella would know that it was false.
She gaped at her and dropped her bonnet. “However did you know?”
“I went looking for you after you ran away at the assembly. I found you on the terrace with Mr. Worthington and heard him ask for your hand.”
Caroline had felt like she turned to jelly when she heard the words. She had mustered enough energy to wobble back to her sisters and tell them that she was unwell before stumbling home to bed.
The proposal was the best outcome that Arabella could have for her artistic prospects. But Caroline hated the thought of it.
Arabella’s eyes were round and large behind her spectacles. “Yes, Mr. Worthington asked for my hand. But I don’t want to marry him.”
Caroline sat back and gazed at Arabella, awash in a lifetime of memories.
The girl who had cried on her shoulder when her parents dismissed her artwork.
The adolescent who dreamed atop the bluffs of the big world that awaited them as soon as they were older.
The young woman who was so excited to go to Bath, and so withdrawn when she came back.
The spinster who had settled in with her brother after her parents moved away, and established a career for herself with her seascapes.
That woman was made of grit and determination.
She had worked hard for every success that had come her way, and now she was finding her path to fame through her portraiture work.
Arabella deserved this opportunity.
“Think of what Mr. Worthington can offer you, Bell. You should say yes.” The words tasted worse than sea tonic on Caroline’s lips.
“You’re as dictatorial as Betsy ever accused you of being,” Arabella shot at her, and the words hit home.
She wasn’t dictatorial. She was in love. Caroline wanted to tell her that this was the biggest sacrifice that she had ever made, more so than taking responsibility for her siblings, more than finding a man to take her hand in marriage.
It was the loss of Arabella that was sure to cause her sleepless nights ahead.
But it didn’t matter how much it hurt. What mattered was that Arabella was going to have a good life, even if Caroline had to force her to the altar to accept it.
Every tear that gathered in Arabella’s eyes felt like a fresh dagger to her foolish heart.
