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“That sounds hardly sporting of you,” John managed, attempting desperately to comprehend this new information.
“Pah.There is no room for sport in matters of love,mon Cheri. And yourPèredid not count himself so ill-used. He was pursuing that Elaine creature only from a sense of duty. He was a very dutiful man.”
“So you have said.”
“And as you know, he needed to marry an heiress just as you do yourself. Perhaps, I was not so great an heiress as she, and had no great title or English blood, but he recognized very quickly that our hearts were made for each other.”
“Ah, so romantic,” Madeleine sighed. “I thought I should die from envy of you, Collette.”
“Now my darling Jean must find love for himself, and a fortune as well. You do know that all Frenchmen are lucky in love do you not,mon Cheri?” His mother asked.
Sir John was not sure that was true and shook his head in the negative.
“Oh yes,” his mother assured him. “When you find love for yourself you shall understand what a maddening, thrilling ride passion promises.”
“Maddening, to say the least,” Sir John agreed dryly. “I do not know what to do.”
“When the time comes, you shall know,” his mother professed. “Then, you shall love her as fully and completely as your father loves me.”
“Loved,” John corrected her English, automatically. “It’s loved, not loves.”
“Non,” Collette shook her head emphatically. “Your Père. He loves me still, as I love him,” she said. “Love does not just disappear. Love never stops, mon Cheri.”
John remained with his mother and her companion through the following day, but when he left he still felt that his head was fairly reeling. His father hadnotmarried his mother for her fortune, nor out of desperation. Rather than pursuing her with calculation in order to solve his financial woes, he had been pursued by her. Sir Richard had, in fact, turned down a proper English lady with a greater fortune in order to wed Collette. And his mother had remained loyal to his father after all these years.
Love seemed to be the only explanation that made any sense in light of these new facts. If his mother did truly feel love for his father and he for her, perhaps the emotion was as Lord Edward suggested; only very rare. If that was so, then how was John to know if what he felt for Lady Charlotte was that rare emotion or merely a passing infatuation? Worse, how could he be certain Lady Charlotte felt the same? Especially now, that he had manipulated their whole relationship? Sir John returned to London less certain than he had ever felt before in his life.
He spent his return journey, and all of the next day alternately brooding over the new perspective on his own parents’ relationship and his recurring thoughts of Lady Charlotte. Everything seemed to lead his mind inexorably back towards his new found feelings for her in a most alarming manner. ‘Love never stops,’ his mother had said, and surely his thoughts of her did not seem to have any notion of stopping.
Finally, unable to resist his desire to see her again, he roused himself to recall what fashionable activity Lady Charlotte and her family would be most likely to be participating in this afternoon. They were nowhere to be found at the garden party he chanced, and in his frustration Sir John returned to his own home to change for his next best guess.
* * *
15
Lady Charlotte felt undeniably restless despite the soaring music of the concert. Even the slightest things seemed to get on her nerves this evening, the heat of the crowd, the rustle of gowns, the snap of fans, all of it. She told herself time and again to stop scanning the audience for a sign of Sir John Ashbrooke, but it was in vain. It had been six days since he had made an attempt to see her, and she was left wondering about his intentions all over again.
Perhaps, he had only been interested in her fortune, after all, and he had found some other less wild heiress to call upon. Some more demure girl who would be unlikely to race through Hyde Park. Mother was right. She should not have been so forward. Randolph had soothed her saying if Sir John could not accept her as she was, she was better off without him. Of course, Charlotte agreed, but her heart would not obey. “I do not care,” she muttered, snapping her own fan shut viciously and attempting to cultivate a feeling of indifference.
“Is that your Sir John?” asked Jane suddenly, interrupting Charlotte’s angry thoughts. “How late he is. The concert is very nearly over; there can hardly be any point in his coming now.”
“I would not say he ismySir John,” Charlotte muttered mutinously, but she could not resist sneaking covert glances where Jane indicated. It was Sir John Ashbrooke, looking rather pale and harried.
Lady Charlotte was immediately concerned. She was a terrible person castigating him in her mind when he was apparently indisposed.
“Goodness, I wonder if he has been ill,” Helen murmured. “He looks rather unwell.”
“Oh. I never thought of that.” Charlotte gasped. “Do you really think so?”
“Appearances would certainly indicate it,” Jane said, suppressing a smile at Charlotte’s transparency. “Besides, whatever else could be his reason for being absent from Society for nearly a week? And now he has dragged himself to this concert, I am sure for no other reason than to see you, when he is not even fully recovered.”
“Oh, what a beast I have been,” Lady Charlotte said contritely. “I have just been thinking such dreadful things about the poor man, without stopping to think that there are other circumstances in his life besides myself. I am so hideously self-centered.”
“Charlotte, I will not hear you say such things about yourself,” Helen chided. “You are one of the least selfish people I know. It is only natural to wonder why he has not visited after being so very markedly solicitous up until now. But doubtlessly, he will manage an opportunity to speak with you before we depart.”
“Doubtlessly,” Charlotte murmured, attempting to study Sir John Ashbrooke’s distant profile with some semblance of discretion. Hedidlook as if he had been ill, terribly drawn and with such shadows beneath his eyes.
Sure enough, Sir John made a point of lingering by the entrance of the concert hall, and Lord Keegain, obedient to his wife’s prompting, stopped their party to speak with him.
