The Earl's Marriage Bargain Read online

  Daphne seemed to shrink into herself. ‘When he fell... I laughed. What if they say that at the inquest?’

  ‘Hysteria,’ Ivo said firmly.

  ‘What did you say to your husband?’ Jane asked. ‘What might the servants have heard?’

  Please do not let her be guilty or Ivo will blame himself. Let her just be a foolish, headstrong girl who is in no danger of hanging. In no need of rescue.

  ‘That I hated him. That I wished he was dead. That he had deceived me and only wanted my money. I said that I would tell Ivo I was unhappy and he would come and kill him.’

  ‘At least you did not threaten to kill him yourself,’ Ivo said. He sounded weary.

  ‘I might have done,’ Daphne said. ‘I cannot really remember. It was awful.’ Her lower lip trembled and tears began to trickle down her cheeks again.

  ‘When is the inquest?’ Ivo asked.

  ‘Today.’

  ‘But you will have been called as a witness, surely?’

  ‘It would be horrible, I was frightened and there wasn’t anyone to help me. The aunts hate me.’

  ‘No, they do not, they—’

  ‘There is only you, Ivo.’ She looked so tragic and lovely sitting there that Jane almost wanted to paint her. Almost. ‘I was so sad that you abandoned me, but I forgive you. Can you not forgive me?’

  ‘You had him beaten by your grooms,’ Jane said. ‘Four of them. He could have been killed, maimed. Is that what you call forgiveness?’

  Daphne turned her wide, tragic gaze on Jane. ‘Oh, no! But that was not me—how could you believe it of me? Clement came home and the servants told him that Ivo had been there and had just left so he was furious, said he would deal with it. I thought he meant he would send Ivo a letter and tell him to stay away from me. Ivo, were you badly hurt? I could not bear that, I am so sorry.’

  She got shakily to her feet, reaching for him, but Jane was there first. ‘You must come and lie down, you will make yourself ill, Lady Meredith.’

  ‘Do not call me that. I should never have married him, but I was so unhappy.’

  Jane took her arm and steered her towards the door, suddenly conscious that she was wearing her own half-finished wedding gown.

  She is not going to weep all over this and mark the silk, she thought distractedly.

  ‘Come along, Daphne. Your chamber will be ready now.’

  She handed the other woman over to the care of her own maid, closed the bedchamber door and leaned back against it, trying to find enough calm to go back downstairs to Ivo.

  Daphne could ruin more than my wedding gown, she realised, looking up and catching sight of her reflection in the long glass opposite.

  Daphne was beautiful, truly lovely. She was frightened, fragile and in need of help and Ivo had loved her. Must still love her, because he had always evaded the question when Jane had asked him about her feelings.

  He had a guilty conscience about neglecting Daphne, he had not even been able to remove that old graffiti, and now she denied having set those men on him.

  I could go downstairs, tell him that I release him. It will be an awful scandal... Or perhaps it will not be so bad if I call off the wedding now. He could not marry Daphne for at least a year because she will be in mourning. What could be more natural than that the two old sweethearts came together after all?

  Jane’s knees felt strangely wobbly and she realised that she was beginning to slide down the door, that she was shivering. Pride got her on to her feet again. She was not going to collapse here where anyone might see her.

  I am not going to collapse anywhere, she thought, stiffening her spine and pushing away from the panels.

  The man she loved was now free to marry the woman he loved. She had two choices: fight and insist on the wedding going ahead so she could spend the rest of her life knowing he loved another woman whom he could have married, or give him up so that he could be happy.

  There did not seem to be much choice. First she was going to take off this gown and send away the seamstresses, then she was going to talk to Ivo. And break her heart.

  * * *

  ‘You want to do what?’ Ivo demanded. ‘You are jilting me?’ He resisted the urge to pinch himself. This was not a nightmare, this hellish day really had become very much worse.

  Jane sat down on the other side of the desk. She had found him in the midst of composing letters to the coroner and the magistrate responsible for the district around Meredith’s home, promising that Lady Meredith, despite being prostrate with grief and shock, would return the next day to attend the inquest which must have been adjourned in her absence. He had just explained that Lady Meredith had fled to his grandfather, an old family friend, as she had no one else to turn to, when Jane had walked in.

  She looked pale, but composed and quite rational. Certainly not hysterical or drunk—either of which would have been excusable, he thought.

  ‘You want to marry Daphne, I want to be an artist,’ she said. Her voice was wobbly, but he could understand that. It had been an effort to hold the pen straight. ‘We planned to marry to avoid a scandal and because Daphne was lost to you, but now there is no need. I will break off the engagement and, if anyone wants to know why, then I will tell them that I simply do not feel fitted to the responsibilities of such rank: no one will be surprised at that. They will recognise that you did the honourable thing in offering for me. You will have to wait until Daphne is out of mourning, of course.

  ‘Meanwhile you will lend me sufficient funds to establish myself in a popular resort—Scarborough or Brighton, I think. I will change my name and pay you back as my business grows.’

  ‘I thought—forgive me if this sounds arrogant—but I thought you were more than reconciled to marriage with me,’ Ivo said, amazed to find himself in control of his voice. ‘I thought that you had recognised that setting up in business was not something you wanted after all.’

  ‘I like you very well and I am sure we would have rubbed along together most amiably. But we do not have to.’ She leaned forward, earnest and intent. ‘We can both have what our hearts desire now. There is no need to compromise. If you will lend me money, then it will be much easier for me, I am sure I can make a success of it.’

  ‘Jane, think what you are doing. You know you can paint after we are married, you know I will not stand in the way of your art.’

  ‘Yes, but do you not remember that I said I never wanted to marry unless it was for love? Now I do not have to because we have this way out.’ She stood up and Ivo stood, too.

  He wanted to reach for her, but that would be like begging and he made himself stand still, absorbing the fact that she had not been reconciled to the marriage, that she was happy to have found a way out as she put it.

  Jane was still talking, quite calm and determined. She seemed to have thought it all through. ‘Now I am going to write to Mama and Papa and Cousin Violet and my bridesmaids and tell them that I have decided we will not suit. I fear poor Mr Ranwick will be busy tomorrow cancelling all the invitations and the arrangements.’

  Ivo did not go and open the door for her, that was too much like helping her to go. As it closed he sat down again and tried to think. What had he done to make Jane believe that he still loved Daphne? Because he did not, he knew that with bone-deep certainty now and the knowledge had been creeping up on him for days. Had he ever loved her—or had he been dazzled by her loveliness, infatuated by her adoration?

  He made himself finish the letters and went out to find Ranwick. ‘See that these go off express,’ he said, then went back to the study, pacing. He needed to do something, something physical. Get on a horse and gallop, chop wood—take a hammer and chisel to that damn sentimental carving. He had meant to do that and had forgotten it, now at least he could erase the thing and then, perhaps, he could begin to think clearly.

  The tool shed beside the wood s
tore supplied what he needed and he strode down to the ha-ha, his mind incapable of thinking about anything but the fact that Jane wanted to leave him.

  The door to the hermitage stood ajar and he went in, then stopped. The dusty floor was marked with footprints: his and, overlapping here and there, the mark of much smaller shoes. The dirt he had scattered over the window ledge was not as he had left it either. He had smoothed it perfectly, now there were the marks of slender fingers raking through it.

  Jane. Jane had seen this, read his words, known for certain that he had loved Daphne. And now she was setting him free.

  He attacked the soft stone of the ledge with the tools, obliterated the inscription until all that remained was a ragged hole. The controlled violence was calming, he realised as he left, pulling the door closed behind him. Jane was wrong about his feelings for Daphne, but he could not be sure of her own motives. Was this gallantry of a kind he had not realised women possessed, or was she glad of the excuse to be free of him?

  * * *

  Jane was coming down the stairs, letters in her hands, when he came in and he had to stop himself covering the distance between them in long strides, taking her in his arms.

  ‘Ivo, could you give these to Mr Ranwick? I’m afraid I... I would rather not have to explain everything to him.’

  ‘Yes, of course.’ He took them from her cold fingers and returned the faint smile she gave him before she turned and ran back upstairs. Then he walked slowly down to Ranwick’s office, shuffling the sealed letters as he went, studying her writing as though there was some clue there.

  And then he realised that there was and, for the first time since Daphne had burst through the front door, he knew what he was going to do.

  ‘Ranwick.’

  ‘My lord?’

  ‘I am going to need your help.’

  Chapter Eighteen

  Who was going to tell the Marquess that there would be no wedding? Jane supposed it should be her because she was the one breaking off the engagement. It was much easier to focus on that, on what to say, on how she would react to the things he was likely to say in response, than it was to think about losing Ivo. She had told him that they could each have what they wanted now, what their hearts desired, but it was not true. She wanted Ivo first and beyond everything—except for his happiness.

  Jane curled up in the window seat of her sitting room and tried to unravel her own thoughts and feelings. Now she would be free, with the resources to paint, unfettered by husband or parental authority, was it what she wanted?

  No, she admitted to herself. She had accepted Ivo because she wanted him and there had been no conflict because she trusted him when he said he would never interfere with her art.

  It was the act of creating that she craved, the possibility to grow as an artist that drove her, not the desire to be a businesswoman where time and energy must be devoted to making a living. Time and energy expended on making a life together with Ivo was one thing, but wrestling with landlords and builders, enticing clients, fighting prejudice—no, he had understood her so well. Even with money behind her, it would grind her down, take the joy out of her art.

  Of her friends it was Melissa who had a burning ambition, not simply to write but to turn society on its head. Votes for women, equal rights in marriage, control over money, the right of women to be doctors and lawyers—all those impossible things for their sex were on Melissa’s list of the reforms she wanted to see in her own lifetime, and the fervour she put into the debate only fuelled her novel writing. Jane knew that the fight would crush her because she did not have the limitless optimism that her friend possessed.

  ‘Your vision is too close to hand,’ Melissa had once said to her in the middle of a heated debate. ‘You will fight, but only for the people you can see, the things you can experience. You will seek compromise and peace.’

  And that was true. She had seen Ivo and had fought for him in Kensington and on the road to Bath. She had fallen in love with Ivo and had determined, somehow, to make the marriage work and hoped that he might come to love her, too. Now she must compromise again, seek peace of a kind for both of them. If only it did not hurt so much...

  ‘Jane, I need your help.’ Ivo’s voice was so unexpected that she jumped, banging her elbow on the window frame.

  ‘Ivo?’

  ‘I am sorry I startled you, I did knock.’

  ‘I was thinking that I must tell your grandfather,’ she said.

  Ivo waved away the rest of the sentence. ‘He’s gone over to the Farringdon estate, said he would probably stay the night. He and the earl have a scheme involving breeding foxhounds, I believe. I have to take Daphne home now—the longer we leave it, the worse the situation becomes. But I cannot take her by myself—think how that will look. Will you come, too? I will leave a letter for Grandfather.’

  It took a moment for what he was asking to sink in through the general fog of misery. ‘You want me to chaperon her?’ But Ivo was right—if Daphne had been heard telling her husband that she wanted Ivo to save her, then the fact she had run to him was damning enough. If they travelled back alone, then it reinforced the suspicion that she had an even stronger motive for murder than a desire to be free of the baronet—and it possibly implicated Ivo in some kind of plot.

  She took a deep breath. ‘Very well. I can see that would be necessary.’

  ‘I am very grateful. Thank you,’ he said. ‘I have asked for an early luncheon. We should set out as soon as possible and travel through the night.’

  He looks grim, she thought. Daphne’s situation must be so worrying. And whose fault is that?

  It was an effort to try and be fair, to suppress the suspicions that were, surely, fuelled by jealousy.

  ‘And, Jane, I do not think we should tell anyone outside this house about our decision not to marry. Not yet. I have seen Ranwick and he will not send out any announcements yet.’

  ‘Of course.’ Her presence as Ivo’s betrothed would be an even clearer indication that he and Daphne were not conspiring together. She supposed that Ivo thought that, as she had no feelings for him, that she would not mind doing this. Her stomach felt as though she had swallowed pure vinegar. From somewhere she found the strength to stand up and speak briskly. ‘I will go and tell my maid what to pack.’

  * * *

  Daphne, Ivo realised, was Being Brave. Had she always play-acted like this and he had been too besotted to notice? As the carriage turned out between the lodge gates and on to the highway she had her chin up, her expression set in tragic lines, her handkerchief grasped firmly in one hand.

  Jane, he was relieved to see, had her small sketchbook with her and was drawing rapidly, although he could not see what her subject was. She was determined on rescuing him again, he was certain, although enough of a small, niggling doubt remained for him not to show his hand yet. If she truly would prefer to be a professional artist instead of a countess—his countess—then he was going to have to let her go, just as she was determined to free him. But he knew her well enough now to sense her true emotions behind whatever façade she had erected and she was not happy. He did not want to hurt her, never that, but some part of him hoped that he was right, that this was as hard for her as it was for him.

  * * *

  ‘I have sent express letters to the coroner and the magistrate, Daphne,’ he said after the silence had dragged on for half an hour. ‘They should arrive a little before we do and may help. I have explained that you were so distressed that you fled to the Marquess because he, a neighbour from your childhood, was the nearest person to a grandfather that you have.’

  ‘But I came to you,’ Daphne said, reaching out her hand and he took it because she was swaying towards him on the seat.

  Jane looked up from her sketchbook. ‘Excellent,’ she said crisply. ‘Say that if you want to show everyone what an excellent motive you had for murdering your husband.�
�� She was making no attempt to hide her exasperation.

  ‘Oh.’

  Ivo let go of Daphne’s hand and she pouted.

  You came to me because you wanted to heap more guilt on my head, Ivo thought.

  ‘You were distressed and confused and needed male guidance,’ he continued, receiving an incredulous look from Jane whose views on male guidance were abundantly clear to him. ‘Naturally my grandfather sent you straight back with me as escort and with Miss Newnham as chaperon.’

  Daphne brightened up. ‘If a marquess tells the coroner that it was an accident he will have to believe it.’ She went back to gazing out of the window. Or possibly, admiring her own reflection in the glass.

  Was she always this self-centred? He did not think so. But she had been spoiled and indulged because she was so pretty and her aunts were, as they were now ruefully realising, completely inexperienced in rearing a wilful girl. Perhaps he was the only person who had not given her what she wanted, when she wanted it.

  * * *

  They reached Kensington, and the Meredith house, at eleven the next morning, stiff, travel-worn and weary, but they went directly to the magistrate and then to see the coroner. To Jane’s relief even Daphne was too subdued to complain when Jane took her arm, detaching her from Ivo for the duration of the interviews. Ivo, thank heavens, had too much sense to let Daphne cling to him, however much he wanted to support her. She had seen the way they had clasped hands in the carriage.

  ‘That went better than I had hoped,’ Ivo said when they finally arrived back and sank into chairs in the drawing room.