Chapter 14 #2
Miss Bolt glanced away, pursing her lips. “There is no need to be vulgar. I suspect our friendship is at an end.”
Madeline swallowed hard, trying to analyze Miss Bolt’s expression. Was she disappointed? Hurt? Had she been in love with Tristan?
“You must have been fond of him,” she said carefully. The sentence was in the past tense, which the woman hopefully took as a hint.
Miss Bolt sniffed. “Fond enough. But I am not here to chat about our mutual friend. As I said, I am here to offer congratulations. However, I am a little surprised.”
“Surprised at the marriage?”
“No, no. Surprised that…” Miss Bolt hesitated pointedly and glanced around. “I am surprised that Tristan was careless enough to make a baby with anyone. After all he has said!”
Madeline blinked. “What? I don’t understand.”
Miss Bolt put a finger to her lips. Out of the corner of her eye, Madeline saw Charlotte hurrying over. Something like anger spread through Madeline’s chest. She lifted her chin, meeting Miss Bolt’s eye coolly.
“I believe it is His Grace to you, Miss Bolt. Not Tristan.”
Miss Bolt smiled. “Now, now, Your Grace, there’s nothing of the wallflower about you, eh?”
Madeline pressed her lips together. “I have no idea what you’re talking about, Miss Bolt. But we must be going.”
“Of course, of course. Your watchdog is here, after all,” Miss Bolt snorted, shooting a disdainful glance at Charlotte. “I shall let you continue with your walk. Good day to you both.”
Without another word, Miss Bolt turned on her heel and went marching away, her long legs carrying her across the ground easily. For the first time, Madeline noticed a drab woman of middle years, perhaps a maid, scurrying along behind her. That must be Miss Bolt’s nod to propriety.
“Well, I don’t think I like her half as much in person as I do when she is on stage,” Charlotte commented. “She was rather antagonistic toward you, Madeline.”
“She said she was a friend of Tristan,” Madeline murmured.
Charlotte stiffened. “Think nothing of it. Tristan’s reputation is not…”
“She said something ever so strange. She said it was odd that Tristan would be careless enough to make a baby with anyone. What on earth can she mean? She can’t be talking about Adam.”
A strange look came over Charlotte’s face. She hastily looked away, but not before Madeline saw a flash of some unspoken emotion in her eyes. Grabbing her arm, Madeline forced her friend to look her in the eyes.
“Charlotte? What is it?”
Charlotte let out a ragged sigh. “Oh, Madeline, sometimes I wish you would read the gossip columns. I wasn’t going to tell you, but there is a horrid piece of gossip going around at the moment.”
Madeline gulped. “About me? And Tristan?”
“Yes.”
“Well, what is it?”
“Can’t you guess?”
“I couldn’t possibly.”
Charlotte glanced around and passed a hand over her face.
“Well, there is talk that Adam is not Anthony’s child at all, but Tristan’s.
After all, nobody knew of the baby’s existence until he was conjured up from nowhere.
Or so it seems to some people. They find it suspect that he was apparently born out in the countryside and is now brought into a duke’s house. ”
“Why, it’s not odd! He is Tristan’s nephew!” Madeline exclaimed. “I don’t understand.”
Charlotte breathed out and met Madeline’s eye. “You don’t understand. Your swift marriage to Tristan has occasioned some questions. Some people believe that baby Adam’s sudden appearance and your marriage are… are connected.”
Madeline blinked. It took her a moment to understand what Charlotte was getting at.
“They think that Adam is my baby?” she gasped.
“Keep your voice down!” Charlotte yelped. “Yes, I’m afraid they do. There is talk that you went to the countryside to have the child, then left it with a family there until you could marry Tristan and make it all respectable.”
Madeline found her jaw hanging slack. “Well, that’s ridiculous,” she said at last. “Of course that isn’t true!”
“Naturally, it is not true, but that is the gossip, Madeline. I’m sorry to tell you this. I… I didn’t want to ruin our day.”
Charlotte looked genuinely miserable at this, and Madeline impulsively hugged her.
“You haven’t ruined anything,” she said fiercely.
“I am glad to see you, and I am glad you were honest with me. I understand why you did not want to tell me that. But surely nobody can believe this nonsense. I am respectably married, and Adam is Betty’s child.
I can just… just weather all of this, can’t I? ”
“I’m sure you can,” Charlotte answered, encouraged.
A pair of ladies stalked past, tall, willowy beauties in matching white pelisses, fur-lined.
They stared hard at Madeline to the point of rudeness and glanced hastily away when she looked back at them.
Almost as soon as they’d walked past, they lifted their hands, earnestly whispering to each other.
There was no question in Madeline’s mind that they were whispering about her.
Are they all wondering whether I had a baby in the countryside, then came home to marry a duke? She thought, bewildered. It didn’t seem fair.
“I… I think I would like to go home now,” Madeline managed at last, her voice catching. “I want you to come back for tea, Charlotte, but I’ve had quite enough of being in public now.”
“So have I,” Charlotte muttered, looping her arm firmly through Madeline’s. “I wish I hadn’t told you. There was no need for you to know something so awful.”
“No, I am glad you spoke to me. When I can, I’ll talk this over with the duke.
Tristan, I mean,” Madeline corrected herself, glancing nervously at her friend.
It felt silly to call her husband the duke.
Their marriage was one of convenience, but she had made Tristan promise that they would at least pretend to like each other.
However, if people believed that Madeline had given birth to Tristan’s baby in the countryside and then married him, they seemed to think they liked each other a little too much.
And then there was the business of Miss Juliana Bolt. In her mind’s eye, Madeline could see Miss Bolt and Tristan sitting side by side, her hand on her arm. How could she ever have forgotten Miss Bolt?
“Madeline?” Charlotte prompted. “You look preoccupied.”
Madeline cleared her throat, flashing a weak smile at her friend. “I’m just keen to get out of the park.”
They were passing more people now, ladies and gentlemen coming for the fashionable hour, and most of the people were gawking quite openly at Madeline.
It was getting harder and harder to ignore them.
In fact, Madeline felt like turning around and screaming at them, or perhaps throwing her parasol onto the ground and stamping on it.
That would give them something to look at, wouldn’t it?
Instead, she tightened her grip on Charlotte’s arm and walked faster.
“That woman,” Charlotte remarked slowly, “Miss Bolt… did I hear her say that she was Tristan’s friend?”
“Yes,” Madeline answered shortly. She could feel Charlotte’s eyes on her. “And I know what that means.”
“Oh, Madeline.”
“I don’t need pity. I am quite aware of Tristan’s reputation. He has had mistresses, and everybody knows it. It is not my concern. As I said, we do not have that kind of marriage.”
They finally passed through the gates of the park, and Madeline let out a sigh of relief. The crowds were thinner here, and soon they would dissipate altogether. And soon enough, she would be home, where she could shut the doors against the intrusive stares and simply forget it all.
It was not her business what Tristan did, or where he spent his time. Or with whom he spent his time. So long as he did not humiliate her, that was that.
Charlotte was still looking at her.
“This Miss Bolt,” she said slowly. “Are you jealous of her?”
“Jealous?” Madeline sniffed. “No, of course not. Why would I be?”
“Well, he is your husband.”
“Yes, but he is not my lover,” Madeline snapped, suddenly angry. She could not work out why she was angry, and she only knew that she was not angry at Charlotte. “Lovers and husbands are very different things, you know. They have different claims on each other.”
Charlotte was quiet for a moment. “But perhaps they should not be different things.”
Madeline swallowed, keeping her gaze fixed on the path ahead. Her vision was beginning to blur slightly, and she was suddenly afraid of the prick of tears.
“For you perhaps not,” she murmured. “But we are not the same, Charlotte. Our lives and destinies aren’t the same.”
“And that does not bother you? To have a life without love?”
Madeline kept her chin up and her shoulders straight.
“No,” she lied smoothly.