"And so I'm afraid I shall have to tell you the truth," said Basil, quite calmly.
Panic swept through her. "Papa," she pleaded, "he's going to tell some lie. Make him go away."
"What truth? What lie?" the baronet demanded, glaring from one to the other.
"Nothing!" Alexandra shrieked.
"She's ruined," the calm voice went on. "I ruined her. Last night. In the li—"
"No!"
"Ruined her!" the baronet roared. His face contorted, turning nearly purple, as he launched himself at Mr. Trevelyan. "I'll kill you!" he screamed. But he found he couldn't kill the wretch because his exasperating daughter had thrown herself in the way.
"No, Papa. Stop please!" She stood in front of Basil, shielding him. "The servants will hear you. Of course it's not true. You mustn't let him provoke you. He's only made this up to blackmail me, Papa." She went on babbling protestations, which was monstrous difficult when Mr. Trevelyan's finger was tracing a lazy path down her back. She sprang away when she felt a slight pressure at the base of her spine. "Stop it!" she hissed.
Luckily, Sir Charles was no longer looking at them. He was glowering at the carpet, shaking his head. "If it is a lie," he growled, "I shall call him out."
"I see your point, sir. Perhaps, then, I was exaggerating. Perhaps she isn't ruined. Still, the circumstances were exceedingly compromising—"
"Basil!"
Sir Charles considered for a moment. He looked from his daughter whose cheeks were very pink to Clementina's dreadful nephew whose colour had also deepened.
"I see," he said slowly. "I am not such a fool as all that. Why," he demanded, "would any rakehell in his senses tell your father such a thing, truth or not? Only," he answered himself, "if he was set on marrying you. If that's the case, you'd better have him, Alexandra. Either way he'll make your life a misery, but married to him you can return the favour. I wish you joy of each other, indeed I do. It's just as you deserve."
He nodded to himself with grim satisfaction, deaf to his daughter's continued pleadings and protestations.
"No, madam," he said as he absently patted the hand clutching his sleeve. "I don't want to hear any more of it. You have tired me half to death for the past six years. Now you have my leave to tire him for the next sixty. Let him worry about your admirers and infatuations from now on." He shook off his daughter's hand and marched to the door.
When Basil stepped aside to let him pass, she attempted to slip out as well.
"No," said the baronet. "You had better remain and reconcile yourself to your affianced husband. You will marry him, Alexandra—and so I shall inform your godmother. I daresay it's no news to her, the interfering jade. When you join us—both of you—I expect you to conduct yourselves with some decorum for once. I’ve had enough scenes for this millennial, I think." With surprising dignity, Sir Charles took himself out of the room.
When the door had closed on her Papa, Miss Ashmore turned on her latest fiancé, her green eyes blazing. "I hate you," she said. "I shall always hate you. And I will never—never, do you hear me?—marry you."
"No, you don't, and yes, you will," he answered composedly. "Now come, Alexandra, say something kind to me, for you've hurt my feelings dreadfully." He moved to take her in his arms, but she spun away out of his reach.
"How dare you say such things to Papa?"
"At this point, I'd dare anything. Do you think I mean to let my aunt take you back to London, where you can acquire another set of beaux for me to dispose of? I should think not. Even I would like a bit of rest now and then. I should vastly prefer resting with you in my arms," he added, very tenderly.
This brought forcibly to mind some rather delicious moments when she'd been nestled in his arms. As she felt herself weakening, she grew correspondingly cross. She moved away to take up her post before the fireplace again and frowned into the grate. "That's the worst way of offering for a woman I’ve ever heard," she told the grate.
"If I'd asked in the normal way, would you have accepted me?"
Yes, she thought, because I'm a fool. "No," she answered. "I couldn't. I can't."
"Why? I mean, besides the fact that you solemnly promised ages ago to jilt me."
She shot him an exasperated glance, but his horrid self-assurance was replaced by a bleak look that knocked all her angry retorts out of her. "It doesn't matter," she said.
In a few steps he crossed the room to stand at her shoulder. "It does matter. Tell me why. And tell me the truth, for once."
She was silent for a moment. There was an ache in her throat, a terrible ache. Really, it should not be so very painful, this process of sparing oneself future pain. Nonetheless, the tears welled up and trembled on her lashes as though to keep the ache company.
"Why?" he asked again. "You might do me the courtesy of telling me why you're so determined to make me wretched."
"You? It's you who'll make me wretched," she blurted out past the ache and the tears. "Because there'll always be one temptation or another you can't resist. Oh, Basil, maybe now you think you want me, but in time you'll be bored. How am I to bear that?"
"I see. You're fully convinced that I should make a thoroughly unreliable, unfaithful, neglectful husband."
She nodded miserably.
"Whereas you, on the other hand, would be the ideal wife. Sweet and biddable, never thinking of manipulating her besotted spouse to get her own way. The very soul of honesty who'd scorn to tell her husband even the smallest fib. Certainly he need never worry about all the eager gentlemen clustered about his wife. Your spouse would never have to live in your pocket, for fear of other gentlemen's dishonourable intentions.''
Her eyes, still fixed on the grate, opened very wide.
"No, really," he continued, "there's nothing at all daunting in the prospect of marrying the most desirable woman in England, not even though she happens to be dreadfully clever and manipulative besides. Not at all. I'm certain Napoleon's Grand Army might have managed such a business if, that is, they kept well together."
"What," she asked fiercely as she turned to him, "are you implying?"
"I wasn't implying anything. I was telling you straight out. The idea of marrying you frightens me out of my wits. Unfortunately, I'm so desperately in love with you that I must or shoot myself."
Love. He'd spoken tender words last night, the sweet words that came so easily to him, but he'd never uttered a syllable about love.
He was still speaking. "I offer you my very small, very vulnerable, fragile, nearly breaking heart. You trample on it, and remind me that I'm a villain. Well, so what if I am? I'm the villain who's compromised you—not once but several times— and I'm the one who loves you." He pulled her to him. "And I’m the one you're stuck with, because your Papa says so. I wish you'd stop quarrelling with me and kiss me." He must have thought better of it, because he kissed her instead.
Recognising that the odds were against her, Miss Ashmore very sensibly yielded to her opponent. In the true British spirit of good sportsmanship, she returned his kiss with enthusiasm. His victor generously returned hers, so she was obviously obliged to return his. So it continued for some minutes until the two found themselves in danger of committing a great impropriety. To her credit, Miss Ashmore became conscious of the peril in time and pulled away from him.
He swore under his breath. "What a curst business this is," he muttered. "Why did I have to fall in love with a proper young lady and be doomed to these furtive escapades in other people's houses? Halls. Libraries. Studies. What next? Shall we rendezvous in the kitchens after midnight? Or will you meet me in the stables?"
"The stables?" she repeated, greatly indignant.
"Sorry. I wasn't thinking. Or I wasn't thinking what I ought. The trouble is, I paced the library all night, and it was cold and lonely without you. I missed you horribly. Then I had to wait ages before your Papa was up. The waiting was horrible. I nearly hung myself."
She'd been about to read him a lecture about his fiancé not being a commo
n lightskirt to be tumbled about in hayracks. The lecture flew out of her head as she gazed up wonderingly into those beautifully wicked amber eyes. "Were you lonely for me, Basil? Really?"
"Good God. For such an intelligent woman you can be remarkably stupid, my love. Did you think I wanted you to leave?"
"You were very abrupt, Basil, and you did push me out the door."
"The only way I know to resist temptation is to remove it. That should have been obvious. If it wasn't—well, I take back what I said earlier. You are stupid. You're the stupidest woman it's ever been my misfortune to fall in love with." To emphasise the point, he kissed her once more very lingeringly. As this promised to bring them both into difficulties again, she pushed him away.
"We can't stay here all day," she warned, as she stooped to gather up her wayward hairpins. "Papa's expecting us to join him and Aunt Clem."
Basil relieved his feelings with a few more quiet oaths as he helped her find her hairpins and restore herself to a semblance of respectability. Finally, the two went forth to face his aunt.
Whatever story was told to Lady Bertram and Sir Charles must have been satisfactory. In another hour, host, hostess, and guests were gathered in the drawing room, listening as Sir Charles—with fiendish relish—informed one and all that his daughter and Clementina's nephew were to be shackled for the rest of their natural, or unnatural was more like it, lives.
Lord Tuttlehope was so astonished that he forgot to blink. "Marry her?" he said to his wife. "Is that what he says?"
"Yes, dear," Alicia answered with a giggle. "Isn't it delicious?"
Evidently her husband didn't think so, for when he later offered his congratulations to his friend, Lord Tuttlehope's speech had the lugubrious ring of condolences.
"You might look a little more cheerful when you wish me happy Freddie," said Basil biting back a grin. "I'm not going to be hung, you know—only married."
Lord Tuttlehope appeared to think it was quite the same thing. He manufactured an awful smile. "But Trev. You? Can't believe it. Sorry." Distractedly he put out his hand. "Happy. And all that."
Mr. Trevelyan returned the handshake with all due solemnity.
"But Trev. Thought you hated her."
"Well, I don't. That wouldn't be a very promising way to commence wedded life, would it? Come, Freddie, don't look so tragic. You're married and happy, aren't you?"
"Course I'm happy. But you're different, Trev," Lord Tuttlehope noted mournfully.
"Yes," Basil agreed. "So is she."
Lord Arden, for other reasons, looked equally pitying.
“Poor fellow,'' he said, clapping Basil on the shoulder. “You should have heeded your own advice, I think.'' He glanced past his erstwhile rival towards Miss Ashmore who was surrounded by a group of happy ladies, including his irritating sister. "Still, it's a beautiful trap for all that. Indeed, I do wish you the best of luck, Trev." His gaze turned back to Basil, looking, he thought, rather feral. "You'll need it, you know. Just as you said. Do not be surprised if you see me in my hunting pinks." With that and a brief, mocking bow the marquess left to offer his best wishes to me bride-to-be.
Mr. Trevelyan smiled easily enough as he turned to his cousin who had joined him, champagne bottle in hand. "What a troublesome business this marriage business is, Edward. I'm not even wed yet, and the gentlemen are already announcing their designs on my wife."
"Very gracious of them it is, I must say," was the dry reply. "Will takes his defeat philosophically enough. I'd have thought he'd rather put a bullet through your scheming brain. But tell me," the earl went on, dropping his voice as he refilled his and his cousin's glasses, "what did happen when you met up with him? Did you treat him to one of your gypsy fortune-teller performances like the one you used on my wife? One of your twisted tragic tales?"
"Cuz, you cut me to the quick. I simply told the man the truth, plain and unvarnished."
"Did you now? Well, it was what he wanted after all. He didn't need even to wring it out of you, did he? Still, I do wonder how you managed to convince that lovely, intelligent girl to trust her future to you. But why do I ask? ‘Thou hast damnable iteration, and art indeed able to corrupt a saint.'"
"How you flatter me, my lord."
"For the first and I hope the last time. Well then, cuz," said Lord Hartleigh, raising his glass, "here's to your damnable iteration or the truth or whatever it is. And though you don't deserve it a bit, I do wish you happy."
Chapter Twenty
A month later a newlywed couple sat in a large bed in the most luxurious bedroom of a select, outrageously expensive inn some miles from London. The groom, still partially dressed, leaned back against the pillows inspecting the ring on his wife's finger. She sat watching him, her chestnut curls all unpinned and tumbling in gay abandon about her face.
"I have a wife," Basil said at last, softly and wonderingly. "How very odd."
She looked a little anxious as she asked, "Is it, dear? I know you never meant to have one."
"Didn't I? Well, how stupid of me, to be sure. When I think what might have happened if you hadn't managed to seduce me that night in the library—"
"I did not," she interrupted indignantly, "seduce you."
"You would have, if I hadn't such a scrupulous regard for my virtue. You knew I was exhausted, and therefore in a vulnerable condition, and you attempted to take selfish advantage of my weakness."
"Oh, I see. And which weakness was that? You have so many it's hard to tell."
"A weakness," he said, bringing the hand he held to his lips, "for naughty chestnut curls that will not stay properly pinned. A weakness for green eyes." He kissed each fingertip in turn.
"What a shallow fellow you are, sir. Any woman might have seduced you—and no doubt will, in future."
"Oh, ye of little faith. To speak so, after you’ve done everything possible to enslave me utterly." Abruptly he dropped her hand, got off the bed, and picked up his coat from the floor.
"What are you doing, Basil? You're not leaving—"
"Hardly." He fished out a much-creased letter from the coat pocket and carried it back to the bed with him. As his wife watched with growing impatience, he settled himself comfortably again.
"Well?"
"Well." He dangled the folded letter before her eyes. "Do you know what that is?"
"Whatever it is, it appears to have been rather knocked about. What is it, Basil? A love letter from one of your high flyers?"
"You might say that."
As he slowly unfolded the sheets, she gasped. "That's my writing," she cried. "What is it?"
"'My dearest Aunt Clem,'" he began, "'I am so sorry to trouble you with this absurdity, but matters here have, I think, got out of hand—'" He broke off as his wife tried to snatch the letter from him. "Oh, no," he told her, holding it out of her reach, "I haven't kept it so safely and tenderly all this time that you might tear it to pieces, my darling. Besides, I know it by heart."
"Where did you get that?"
"It was sent me. By my dearest Auntie."
"Aunt Clem sent it to you? When?"
"When I was in Greece."
Though she was a married lady of some hours, Alexandra could still blush. Recalling some of the comments in that letter, she did so now. "In Greece," she echoed faintly.
"Yes. Aunt Clem is monstrous underhanded, you know. Anyhow," he went on, allowing the letter to drop gently to the floor, "I read it and was lost utterly. Your brutally comic description of Randolph and his odious family. As you listed everything that you'd tried and failed with your Papa—well, I felt rather a kinship with you, you know. And then I saw you, dirty and bedraggled in that crowded room. You were so beautiful in spite of it. You knew immediately what I was about and played your part so well. You acted to admiration, my love. I very nearly believed my own lie. Naturally, when I kissed you, I sealed my fate. What could be more romantic?"
His beloved was staring at the bedpost. "You don't mean to say that Aunt Clem delib
erately—but no, how could she? How could she possibly guess—”
"Oh, she didn't guess, my love. She knew we were meant for each other. Aunt Clem sees all, knows all. And knowing her, she had Maria in it as well. My precious," he cried as he flung himself back upon the pillows, his hand clutched to his breast, "we're the victims of a conspiracy. You and I—as wicked a set of connivers as ever walked this great island—the innocent victims of an unscrupulous pair of matchmakers. Matchmakers, Alexandra. How lowering."
The bride transferred her gaze from the bedpost to her groom. "Lowering? I should say so. I never had the trace of a suspicion. Good grief. And your aunt let me go through all that horrendous business."
"Hasn't a conscience, dear. Runs in the family."
"Is that so?" The green eyes narrowed. "Just how long have you known about this?"
"If you keep on looking at me like that I shall scream. It makes my blood curdle. Really it does." He maneuvred himself into more comfortable proximity to his lovely wife. "I assure you I feel as stupid as you do. It never occurred to me. In all my frenzy of jealousy and scurrying hither and yon and plotting, there was no room in my brain for my aunt. Once again she has triumphed over me. I suppose I shall have to endure it, just as I endured my gloomy exile." In proof of this stoic determination, he dropped several lingering kisses upon his wife's creamy shoulder.
"Poor Basil. It was none of your doing, was it? But all these wicked females taking advantage."
He murmured an unintelligible reply from the nape of her neck.
"It was I who trapped you, was it? Caught you in my wicked toils? Compromised you?"
"Well, I helped," he admitted. "Because I'm so gallant, you know."
"Oh yes, poor dear."
"At any rate, thanks to Aunt Clem, I've had a month to become reconciled to my fate. We could have had a perfectly acceptable ceremony the next day. Edward had only to use his influence for a special licence. But no. A big wedding, says my aunt, is the only recompence for not giving you a proper comeout."
"It has been a very long time," said his wife. "I’ve nearly forgotten what it was like exactly. Compromising you, I mean."