Chapter 3
Chapter Three
“My Lady, please you must dress for the day.” Biddy, Dahlia’s lady’s maid, raised the gown she had prepared for her to wear.
“What for?” Dahlia groaned against her pillow. “It’s not as if anyone will be calling for me. I am disgraced; do you not remember?”
“Dahlia, for heaven’s sake!” Her mother, Teresa Hill, Marchioness of Bolton, marched into her only daughter’s bedchamber. She stopped directly by her bed and pulled her daughter up. “We must not aggravate the situation any further! Put on that gown. Your father awaits you in his study.”
“Mama, what am I to do? I am ruined!” She gestured towards the pile of morning papers that she had, in a fit of near hysteria, gathered earlier that day.
“Every gossip column has my name in it. Even the Duke of Ice, with his frightful ways, could not deter the gossips. I shall spend my life in this very room! Biddy, you must be my constant companion; to be sure, from now on, you will be my only companion!”
“Dahlia, how you carry on, my dear. It’s not the time for your dramatics.”
“I beg to differ, mother; it’s the perfect time for my dramatics!”
A half hour saw Dahlia sitting in front of her father’s desk. Her mother, who paced the floor of the study, was wringing her hands.
“I cannot fathom what was on your mind, Dahlia.” Her father, Andrew Hill, Marquess of Bolton, was normally a very congenial man. At present, he wore the most serious expression that she had ever seen him wear. “And bringing Benson in on this scheme! I have a mind to dismiss him right now!”
“No! Papa, you must not! I gave him no choice on the matter. I am entirely to blame.”
“He could have refused you!”
“Then I would have done it on my own; I would have hired a hackney. Benson knew this, and so he did as I asked for my own safety.”
“Oh, Dahlia,” her mother went to her. “What on earth possessed you to do this? It is so unlike you; you have always been so agreeable, so-so—”
“Unproblematic? Simple?”
“What you have done, Dahlia, is damaged your future with this authoress business!”
“Surely that is less of a scandal than being found in a most compromising position with the Duke of Icedale!”
“Oh, heaven help us, we must close Bolton House; let us retire to Cosgrove. The country will do us all good until this dies down,” her mother said.
“A scandal such as this will not be forgot so quickly, not in a mere few months. As long as those novels are in circulation—indeed, as long as they exist, this will not be forgot!” exclaimed her father.
“Must we burn all the novels then?” Dahlia replied, still somewhat annoyed at the notion that her being an author was more notorious than her scandal involving a man.
“We must emigrate to the Colonies! I have been hearing some rather good things about the Americas. Dahlia can start anew there!” Her mother’s eyes looked almost wild.
“The Americas! Surely you jest, Mama!”
Exhaling deeply, Andrew beckoned Teresa to come to him. When she did, he reached for her hands and kissed them. They had always been like this, Dahlia knew.
Theirs was a love match, indeed, most of the couples in her family were love matches. To see them display their feelings was not a new thing, indeed, more often than not, they were so wrapped up in each other that they forgot about Dahlia.
But it was witnessing this devotion that spawned her idea of the one.
Her one true love. The one who would be perfect for her in all aspects, just as her parents were for each other.
She would settle for nothing less. Had she not waited for four seasons now?
She would not regret the suitors who had come and gone over the years, for they were not he.
“My love, it shall not come to that.” Andrew stood up and caressed his wife’s cheek with his hand. “There is a solution to Dahlia’s predicament. It is simple but difficult at the same time.” At this last line, her father became silent as he looked intently at his wife.
Teresa nodded. She looked at her daughter and moved to her.
“Papa?” she looked at her father, suddenly wary.
“My darling daughter, you must marry.”
“What?” Dahlia stood abruptly. “But I haven’t found the one yet! I cannot marry!”
“Of course, you can. You have no choice, my dear; your actions must have repercussions.”
“Surely, there is another way! Surely marriage will not solve the Penelope Lovelace scandal; how can it? Neither is connected to the other! That scandal is, after all, what concerns us the most, is it not?”
“When you marry, all will be forgiven, for a married woman is given more latitude than an unmarried one. Provided, of course, that you remain on your best behavior henceforth.”
“But-but, what about love? What about devotion? What about the bond?” Dahlia felt tears forming in her eyes, her every ideal, her every image of a perfect mate, was slowly being erased by practicalities.
She ran the through the faces of her current suitors—there were three at the moment. She considered each one and knew even as she considered, that they, all of them, were not the one.
“We must now be practical, Dahlia,” her father spoke softly but firmly. “You have run out of time.”
“‘It’s the only way daughter, this or ruin.” Her mother embraced her.
Dahlia buried her face in her mother’s shoulder. Her tears came hot. After a while, she straightened and nodded.
“I understand, Papa.” She wiped at a runaway tear. “I shall make a serious study of my suitors, and then, I shall give you a name by this evening.”
“Suitors?” her father and mother both said, surprised.
“Well, yes. Had you not wanted me to choose?”
“There is no need to choose, Dahlia. There is only one name. Surely, you did not consider any other?”
Dahlia stood for a moment, trying to grasp her parent’s meaning. She stumbled back as the answer came to her.
“No! Surely not!” Her eyes were wide with alarm. “The Duke of Ice?”
When her parents remained silent, Dahlia clutched at her chest. That man! That beastly, cruel man!
“But he is such a man, Papa! He is cold, arrogant, controlling! Oh, how he can order people about! I have observed him, have you forgotten? I have been in close company with him!”
Teresa closed her eyes at this. In her agitation, Dahlia forgot that reminding her parents of that scenario would not help her at all. She changed tactics.
“Nothing untoward happened in that carriage ride, Mama.” She conveniently skipped the part where the Duke and she wrestled for the manuscript. “Our appearance was due to the hijacking; I’ve told you this before!”
“Dahlia.”
Are they in earnest? Can they possibly know what they ask of me?
There were low moments in Dahlia’s life when she questioned her parents’ love for her; indeed, she wondered if they even liked her at all.
It certainly feels that way now. How can they ask me to marry the Duke knowing all that I have told them? Knowing all that I feel towards him. Can they not understand? Perhaps they simply do not care, so long as this scandal goes away.
Very rarely did Dahlia go against her parents’ wishes; pleasing them had always been paramount to her, but this was different. This time, she could not simply accept their wishes.
“Oh, I shall never be happy. He is such an impossible man!”
“My dear.”
“And he is most definitely not the one! The Duke is tall and handsome, he seems intelligent enough—I grant you that—and he did help rescue me, but that is all. Those are the only points he has to even come close to being him! He is the last person in the world who could ever make me happy, and I rather doubt that I could make him happy either. Can you not see how ill-suited we are?”
“Ahem.”
Their butler, Mr. Tipping, stood by the study door. Not one of them had noticed that he had been patiently waiting for them for the past few minutes to acknowledge him. When they all stopped to face him, he proceeded, “His Grace, The Duke of Icedale.”
Peter’s lips formed a thin line on his face.
Cold, arrogant, controlling, can order people about, most definitely not the one, the last person in the world who could ever make her happy.
He counted them off in his head. Six points against him.
Oh, but there is also tall, handsome, seems intelligent enough, and I did rescue her.
Four points for him. By this count though, he would not succeed in his business this afternoon.
His thoughts went back to the night before. He remembered her every expression, most of all her determination. Frowning, he muttered under his breath, “She is Penelope Lovelace.”
The thought invoked both wrath and reluctant admiration. He remembered as well how she refused to be cowed by him.
Matrimony was not in his plans as of yet, but circumstances had steered him there. And so, if he must marry, then it might as well be to someone he could admire.
The sudden silence from within the study told him that the family was now aware of his presence.
“The Marquess will see you now, Your Grace.”
Inside the Marquess of Bolton’s study, Peter saw all the faces that matched the voices he had heard while waiting to be announced. They all displayed varying degrees of shock.
“Your Grace.” Displaying the least shock, the Marquess bowed. Following him, in both facial expression and action, the Marchioness curtsied. Peter trained his eyes towards Dahlia. Being the most shocked, she curtsied last.
“Please have a seat.” The Marquess gestured to the chair that Dahlia had earlier vacated. “I had not expected a call from you, Sir.”
“Had you not?” Peter sat down. He could feel the ladies’ eyes on him—Dahlia’s, most particularly, he imagined were as sharp as daggers.
“Well…”
“Let us not waste time, My Lord.” He spoke directly to the Marquess with a businesslike tone.
“We all know that last night’s happenings have resulted in a series of events which cannot—should not—be ignored.
” He quickly glanced at Dahlia. “As a gentleman, I am bound by honor to do the right thing by your daughter, Lady Dahlia Hill.”