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“Ridiculous costume, is it not?” Chuckling amiably, he flipped one lacy cuff. “I always wonder whether other people are sending a message with their costumes or if, like me, they simply put on whatever their valet laid out. I am terrified of upsetting my valet, in case I find myself one day dressed as the back end of a horse.”
Ah, that self-deprecating wit. How charming he was. And how commanding and courteous, for he had summoned a footman, bearing drinks. Sculthorpe swept up two glasses of wine and handed her one. Between his fingers was one of his thin cigars, a habit he had picked up while fighting in Spain during the Peninsular Wars and which he never allowed etiquette to restrain. Another servant appeared at his side, proffering a flame. With a wave of his lit cigar, the servants disappeared.
“And, if you do not mind my saying so,” he added, in a more intimate tone, smoke puffing out the side of his mouth, “you will also make an excellent baroness.”
I’ll make an even better widow, Arabella didn’t say.
No. She did not have the luxury of speaking her mind. She must parrot the right words, or lose everything. One did not vex the man who held one’s future in his hands.
“You are too kind,” she did say.
Over his shoulder, Arabella spied her mother, ostensibly in conversation with a friend, but one eye on Arabella and Sculthorpe.
Dear Mama, so lovely in her ermine-trimmed Queen of Hearts costume, her face serene under the red-and-gold turban perched on her dark hair. Arabella didn’t want to disappoint her parents, or scheme and manipulate and lie. She didn’t want to stay unmarried. She asked only to be granted her birthright, and to choose her own husband, someone who respected her for what she was, in contrast to those who criticized her for what she was not.
Then she would pretend, she decided. She would pretend that Sculthorpe was not Papa’s choice. And as for Sculthorpe’s whisper during a waltz a few months ago, those words that made her skin crawl so she could scarcely bear to think of them? Perhaps she had misheard or misunderstood. It was one thing to pride herself on solving her own problems; it was quite another to invent problems that were not there.
“You were speaking with Lord Hardbury,” Sculthorpe said. “You know that he and I do not get along.”
“I am aware,” Arabella replied. “But it seemed preferable that Lord Hardbury and I deal with our history immediately, that we might leave it in the past.”
“Admirable,” he said. “You are a very admirable…”
He paused, as though seeking the right word. Arabella’s breath caught.Don’t say it, don’t say it.
“…lady,” he finished.
He hadn’t said it. She was mistaken.
“Your mother was telling me that your hobby is producing books,” Sculthorpe went on amiably. “A publisher here in London prints them at your commission.”
“It is very satisfying. I began by creating my father’s ornithology journals when I was sixteen.”
“As she said. Every bird-fancier in the world is familiar with your father’s journals, but I had not realized it was you who edits and compiles the convention papers. You truly are an accomplished…”
Don’t say it.
“Lady,” he finished. “What are you working on now?”
“My first color book:An Illustrated Guide to the Vindale Aviaries. Papa’s aviaries have become famous, and we receive many visitors and requests for information.” After a pause, she added, “I have a fondness for reading essays, and mean to commission writers on a variety of topics for future books. It is my belief that every lady should engage in a worthwhile pastime.”
“I agree. I look forward to whatever books you publish in the future.”
There. Sculthorpe would not be an interfering husband. She studied her wineglass, turning it between her fingers. Her forearm still bore traces from the ribbon, the lingering sensation of Guy’s callused thumb soothing the pink lines.
Something caught her eye: the end of Sculthorpe’s cigar, falling to the grass. He ground it out under one boot heel. When she lifted her head, she found herself looking right into his eyes, blue-gray and flicking back and forth.
“Miss Larke, you will forgive my directness, but I am a direct man, and you are a practical lady, and neither of us is given to foolish sentiments. I am too modest to make a scene in public, and too impatient to wait until we can be alone. Might I ask if my hopes are to be realized, and you will do me the honor of becoming my wife?”
As proposals went, it was what she might have expected. She did not want him, but neither did she want to lose everything. So, ignoring the sick hollow in her gut, Arabella looked her fate right in the eye, and said, “Of course, my lord.”
He lifted her knuckles to his lips. Arabella let him do it. She did not throw her wine in his face, or smash her glass over his head, or punch him in the jaw. She was doing very well.
Without releasing her, he twisted toward Mama, who looked at him right away.
Lord Sculthorpe bowed to Mama.
Mama glanced at Arabella.
