Chapter 9 #4
His lips were tight and his eyes cool. “Yes, it was unwise, wasn’t it? If you fight me, Elizabeth, you will lose and be hurt into the bargain. You can hardly expect me to be concerned about your sensibilities.”
“What happened to our truce?” she asked with quiet intensity.
“It holds as long as you behave yourself.”
Beth bit back angry words and faced forward again. Her situation, she thought bitterly, reminded her of a forlorn hope, when soldiers facing defeat without chance of survival, charged bravely, foolhardily, at the enemy. She could be compliant and enslaved, or she could fight and be defeated.
She could at least die with honor. A flaming row was out of the question and so, as they took their seats, she took up more subtle weapons. “I promise,” she said sweetly, “to be exactly the kind of bride you deserve, oh noble one.”
The marquess, after a brief startled moment, assumed a similar loverlike manner, raised her hand, and placed a warm and lingering kiss upon it. A ripple of laughter and sentimental looks greeted this action and set the tone for the meal.
“‘Use every man after his desert,’” he murmured, “‘and who should escape whipping?’”
Beth raised her brows. “I do not recollect any member of the peerage being tickled at the cart’s tail recently. And yet,” she continued amiably, “doesn’t the Bible say, ‘Whatsoever a man soweth, so shall he reap’?”
“But I’m a lily of the field,” he countered. “I neither sow nor reap.”
“Aha!” she exclaimed. “You’ve mixed your verses, my lord. The lilies of the field toil not, neither do they spin. It’s the fowls of the air who do not sow and reap. I thought,” she queried gently, “you did not wish to be considered any species of fowl.”
“Very clever,” he said with a smile which acknowledged her victory. But then his smile became a triumphant grin and Beth waited warily. “And so you reduce me to a cock? Unwary lady….”
Even Beth was aware of the rude meaning to which he alluded, and she turned pink. But she knew as well that there was a warm stirring inside her at his words and the almost sultry look in his eyes. She fought it.
“Every cock is proud on its own dungheap,” she shot back in an attempt to drag the contest back into safer waters.
Mirth glittered in his bright blue eyes. “As in upstanding?” he asked.
The contest had passed out of Beth’s control and beyond her true understanding, but she knew she had to retreat. She grabbed the first quotation that came to mind. “Small things make base men proud,” she declared and directed her attention firmly to the soup which had somehow arrived before her.
She found it difficult to swallow the first spoonful. There was something dangerous emanating from her left.
She slanted a wary glance in his direction. He was in control and his face was politely amiable but outrage glittered in his eyes. Beth ran the words back through her mind, seeking the unintentional offense. Oh, heavens. Base. That was it. He thought it was a reference to his birth.
“I am sorry,” she said, trying to sound sincere while keeping her tone and manner light for the sake of those nearby. “I didn’t mean … I didn’t mean anything … personal, my lord.”
Her words appeared to anger him more. “So you do realize what you were implying,” he commented in the same light tone but through tight teeth. “You must tell me your opinion of my endowments when you have more personal experience.”
Beth hadn’t the slightest notion what he meant but took the only wise course and addressed her soup.
By the time six types of fish were being offered Beth had nerve enough to direct an innocuous comment to him and he was restored enough to answer it.
Knowing silence would be cause for comment they began to converse and even slowly returned to playful flirtation.
But now it was a careful, wary business, despite their smiles.
The marquess threw insincere flattery at Beth and Beth reciprocated. Gradually, despite their discord, Beth went from satisfaction in holding her own to pleasure in matching wits. But she was careful—as careful as a person can be when walking over ground set with invisible traps.
She thought she saw genuine amusement in the marquess’ eyes now and then, but it wasn’t the unguarded warmth of their earlier exchange. At one point when she capped his praise of her eyes with a positive laudation of his, he murmured, “It would be more ladylike just to simper, my dear.”
Beth, by now outside three glasses of wine, simply opened her eyes wide and said, “Really?”
He bowed his head and laughed. They received yet more indulgent looks. Beth thought his humor was genuine. But then he had been draining his wine glasses with regularity, too.
The whole company was relaxed by good food and wine, and when the speeches started, wit, both coarse and fine, began to fly. The Regent was toasted and all the royal family. The soldiers and sailors received their due.
Then the duke rose. “My friends. This is a joyous occasion indeed for us, and we are pleased to share it with you today. It is not often a family is so fortunate as to welcome within it a bride who is so like a daughter.”
Beth could feel her eyes open wide and resisted with difficulty the temptation to look at the marquess with alarm. He laid a hand over hers in what would look like fondness but was, she hoped, reassurance. If not, it was control.
“The duchess and I had wondered when Arden would choose a bride. So many young men these days seem to find no need for one, to their great loss. We would have been happy to welcome any young woman who found favor in his eyes, but thank him sincerely for choosing our dear Elizabeth.”
Everyone joined in the toast and then the marquess rose to reply.
“Some young men,” he said with pointed looks at his friends, “do indeed seem to think a bride a low priority in life. I can assure them they are wrong. Does Euripides not say, ‘Man’s best possession is a sympathetic wife’?
” Beth stiffened at the word possession, knowing it had been deliberately employed, but she maintained her smile.
“Euripides was right. I have already found my life enlivened by my bride-to-be, and I look forward with confidence to yet greater delight.”
The words were without offense and yet something in the delivery caused titters and guffaws.
Beth knew she was turning pink, and it was one part embarrassment to three parts anger.
Why did society ordain that the men make all the speeches?
She would delight in an opportunity to land some clever shots of her own.
“The heir to a great house,” he continued, “cannot choose the single life, but I felt no urgency to seek a bride. You can see then that Elizabeth caught me quite unawares. We make no secret of the fact that she brings no fortune or proud bloodlines to this match, and I am pleased by this. For how can anyone doubt that we are joined by the strongest compulsion….”
The emphasis he placed on the word sent a shiver down Beth’s spine. It seemed an age before he added, “Love.”
She looked up and their eyes clashed. “There is something inexpressibly charming in falling in love,” he added blithely. “I recommend it to all you lonely bachelors.”
Beth looked down at her plate, wondering how many would recognize that quotation from Moliere, which went on to say that the whole pleasure of love lies in the fact that love is soon over.
But at least she and the marquess need not fear the loss of something they did not have.
She realized she was missing some of his speech, but if that was the style of it she did not regret it.
“I ask you,” said the marquess in conclusion, “to drink again to Elizabeth. And to families. And to love.”
Everyone did this resoundingly, and Beth could detect no ambivalence in the smiling faces. Perhaps people heard what they expected to hear. Or perhaps, as Shakespeare had it, “All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players…”