Chapter 8
“Open your curtains, Cathy. The room is starting to smell of dust and resignation. These things are beneath you.” Lady Marlow had a way of waking even the dead; even her voice resembled chimes rather than a crack of the whip.
She paused by Cathy’s bed to say, “Besides, I doubt anyone would be peeking in through your window. You have always been too high up for the common gossip to reach without their trusty ladder.”
Cathy groaned. Even as she doted on her eldest granddaughter, Lady Marlow had a way of reminding Cathy of why she was called Miss Priggish.
The ton’s new pariah had stayed mostly under her heavy duvet for three days.
During those days, she tried to block out everything else.
She had food served in her room, and she barely did anything else, not even read.
It was too difficult to focus on anything.
In her mind, the events at the chapel were enough to torture her for the rest of her life.
Being alone in her bedchamber was torture enough.
In the darkness, the memories were even more vivid.
She could smell the lilies and the burning wax, and feel the heat of the Duke’s hand on her arm.
Then came his voice, telling her he could not marry Miss Longrove.
These were false hopes that she tried to scrub away.
She was no fool, and yet, she continued to circle back to the events.
It will all go away. Hopefully. Someday.
“Go away, Grandmama!” She huffed into the silk. “Consider me not here. Kathleen Quinten no longer exists within the borders of polite society. Cathy is here to do whatever she pleases. Right now, she wants to sleep.”
“Nonsense! Look at you. You are far too tall not to exist. I can see the tip of your toes past your duvet!”
“You do not!”
The heavy curtains were yanked open with one violent swing.
Sometimes, Cathy wondered how her grandmother could still be so strong, whereas she currently had no will to live.
Light rushed into her bedchamber, stinging her eyes.
It was then that she realized that her grandmother was not alone.
Could her sisters be that stealthy, or was she so lost in her own world?
Behind Lady Marlow, her three younger sisters stood in a nervous semicircle.
Madeline looked exhausted; her usual positivity had dimmed.
Instead of a smile, she could only give a quiet nod as a greeting.
That moved her even more than her grandmother’s yelling.
Portia, aged nineteen, clutched a leather-bound volume of Virgil.
She seemed to think that it was her strength at that very moment or at any moment.
Whenever she did not understand anything, she would go to her books.
On the other end stood their youngest, Selina, aged seventeen, whose ethereal beauty could make men trip over their feet.
Even she did not look ready to see anyone.
She no longer looked like someone who would be a debutante in a few months.
It also looked like she did not bother with her usual hundred brush strokes before bed.
The Quintens were mourning. Cathy spent a few days in bed, and everyone was acting as if she had died.
“Cathy, please,” Madeline urged, sitting on the edge of the mattress. “I do not mean to put the pressure on you, but let us say I will. Cook threatens to leave. The rest of the staff seems uneasy that you are not on duty. Papa is not exactly reliable and...”
Not exactly reliable!
That sounded light for what he was doing at the moment. She could not even wallow in her misery without being reminded of why there were other reasons she should be on her feet right now.
“Perhaps it is better if I am not involved in these things, Maddy,” she croaked.
“What we need is a miracle. You do not want a spinster with a reputation in tatters to be associated with you anymore. It is best that Grandmama banishes me so that I will no longer be linked to you. I am responsible for the humiliation of all of you. I am hoping people forget about me soon.”
“There does not seem to be any hope for that,” Selina chimed in, her voice sounding musical.
What was it with her youngest sister? “Do not be too quick to think that His Grace is back in Miss Longrove’s arms. A friend of mine told me that a friend of hers told her that he looks devastated as of late. ”
Cathy’s heart leaped at that, but she gave the treacherous jolt a hush.
She reminded herself that they were talking about the Duke of Baxter, not some clergyman or a man who was swooning at first love.
This was the man who could make anyone swoon, even with his hair disheveled.
Of course, she could not fool herself into thinking that she was the only one who had ever seen him in such a state.
He did have his ways of persuasion. He was right about that.
The way his eyes had searched hers in the library had made her believe in his sincerity.
How sincere could rakes be? The rational Miss Priggish reared her head, though, letting her remember just how dukes did not normally marry the daughters of drunkards with no titles.
I was merely a conquest to him. Nothing more.
“He is a rake, Selina. The only reason he would marry was for additional wealth and to strengthen alliances. If he could not find anyone who could give him that, he would ruin women left and right for sport. Do you think I have money and alliances to give him? No. I have ledgers to balance and a family to manage. We are on the brink of being sent to the poorhouse.”
“Since you know that so well,” Lady Marlow said, her tone shifting quickly from a grumble to a persuasive lilt, “Get out of bed now, my brilliant girl. The Marlows do not hide. That part of your heritage still exists, does it not? As for the Quinten side...”
The baroness sniffed into the air, making it even clearer what she thought of her son-in-law.
“All right, then,” Cathy sighed.
It took one hour of scrubbing and brushing to make Cathy look like a civilized member of the ton once more. In fact, the whole process probably made her look just about human if nothing more. She had to scrub her skin raw to make it happen, as if hot water could wash away all her troubles.
When the steam rose from her bath, she nearly thought it resembled a sacrifice.
She dressed in her darkest gray wool, just a shade shy of funeral attire.
After all, she was recalling her last few days—or perhaps years—of mourning, to be more precise.
Then, she wrapped her hair into the tightest bun, feeling the harsh pull against her scalp.
It was an act of contrition. However, she knew the ton was not exactly forgiving, even when Miss Priggish looked like a grumpy governess.
This was just armor. Inside, she was falling apart.
The armor shattered as soon as she set foot on the ground floor.
The house was in complete disarray. Two footmen struggled to carry some furniture out the door.
One appeared to be her father’s expensive mahogany desk.
Empty crates were scattered throughout the hallway, with no particular order.
Meanwhile, Cathy could feel a draft entering the house as the front door stood wide open.
The crisp air carried the scent of damp earth from a recent rain.
Her entire life, on the other hand, felt like a constant flood.
The removal of some items was not just about selling belongings but also about dismantling her childhood spent in that house.
“What is the meaning of this?” she demanded, her voice echoing through the halls.
Speaking of halls, where were some of the paintings? Cathy was an intelligent woman, and everything was starting to fall into place.
“At whose order are the furnishings being moved? Grandmama!”
A few more steps led her to the drawing room, where the baroness was sitting pale and furious. She was too proud to cry. It certainly reminded Cathy of who she had gotten that trait from. The old woman’s shoulders were shaking violently, though.
“That coward,” she mumbled, almost like someone casting a wicked spell. In the case of Lady Marlow, it was merely aristocratic fury.
“What is happening? Did Grandpapa do something?” Cathy asked, still confused and disoriented from leaving her room. She glanced left and right for her grandfather.
“I am speaking of someone spineless and thieving, Cathy,” her grandmother corrected. “Who else could it be but your father?’
“What has Papa done this time?” Cathy sighed.
“He left us! He left with some of the furniture, and some are even on the way out!” Lady Marlow shouted, aristocratic fury be damned. “He is even too much of a coward to stand by and watch while the meager furnishings he was contributing were being hauled away.”
“W-what? Where is he off to? Why would he be gone?” Cathy asked, although she already suspected what her father had been up to. “I swear I heard him singing in his room last night.”
At that moment, Cathy’s younger sisters rushed into the drawing room. Each one wore a certain degree of panic on her face.
“What was he, then? Celebrating his departure?” Madeline asked. “Perhaps he has found a new business opportunity he wants to assess.”
“The servants told me about an hour ago,” Lady Marlow replied. “He packed his trunks, what was left of that battered leather. Then, he took his horse with him all before dawn. He truly left like a thief in the night, with no word for me or even for you, his daughters!”
“Papa would not do that!” Madeline protested, the sunshine in her heart rushing back in.