Chapter 7 #2
“Drop them down,” he murmured, coaxing them into position with light pressure. “And pull them back slightly. It lifts your chest. These dresses are designed to hang like so.”
He circled back to her front, noting the furious blush on her cheeks but pretending not to. “Better. Walk to the window and back.”
She did so, not quite stomping this time, but stiff and jerky.
“Glide,” he said. You’re supposed to float. You are serenity and grace.”
A snort of angry laughter came from the heavenly vision, and she turned to look at him over her shoulder. “If you’re betting on my being any of that, I’m afraid to say you’ve just lost your wager.”
He only smiled, beckoning her to walk back to him. He looked her up and down, perhaps a little more than was strictly necessary. The dress fitted perfectly; he’d seen that the moment she walked into the room.
“Very good. Go and try on the next, and then we can decide which one is best for Wednesday.”
“Yes, my lord.”
She dropped him a sarcastic curtsy, and he took a turn standing at the window as she went upstairs again.
It wasn’t much of a view, as far as views went.
The house opposite was being refaced in Portland stone, labourers and tools all over the pavement and dirty water, grey with mortar and stone dust, trickling into the road.
Above, the sky was about as pretty as skies ever were, but hardly remarkable.
Somewhere above his own head, Mrs Ardingly would be stepping carefully out of the delicate dress.
Was her chemise as old and patched as he suspected, something a maid would scarcely use as a rag?
They were becoming a habit, these lascivious thoughts about the widow. One day soon, he’d have to broach the subject of an arrangement, before things became unmanageable.
He traced a line in the dust of the window ledge, lip twisting at the two dead flies in the corner.
He hadn’t lain with a woman of any class in almost a year, not wanting to risk bringing any disease to the marriage bed.
Whether his wife-to-be was taking the same precautions, he had small hope.
And he hadn’t, yet, the authority to command otherwise.
But the widow would be safe. He was certain that, for her, it had been nine years.
He’d like to wake her up again. She might hate him, but she’d responded to his touch. She felt his presence.
Rubbing the dust from his fingertip, he frowned.
He hadn’t been this hungry for a woman in…
well…as long as he could remember. He didn’t count his schoolboy days, when he’d been stiff as a flagpole fifteen times a day.
All boys lived through that curse, ridiculous creatures.
How embarrassing to have been one of them.
How embarrassing to find himself little better at this very moment.
It had been easy to stay celibate for a year; he’d prided himself on his moderation, his control. He had his uncle to thank. He’d been inured to all excesses early in life. Nothing tempted a man onto whom everything had already been forced and nothing but restraint forbidden.
But the widow—
The door opened. Mrs Ardingly walked into the room, one hand behind her back, the other at her chest.
“I…I forgot my maid had the morning off. The first dress fastened at the side, but I cannot reach these…”
The dress was even more heavenly than the first, light as gossamer, twinkling here and there with subtle stitching in gold.
“Of course,” he said smoothly, stepping forwards. She turned her back, taking her hand away from where she’d been clutching the gaping fabric together.
Her chemise, its back lower than that of the dress, revealed a short expanse of spine and pale skin, a small freckle here and there.
It was plain, clean, neat muslin, not a rag at all—of course it wasn’t.
His fingers worked at the tiny buttons, slowly covering it up and then her spine, hiding it from sight even as his fingertips brushed the secret skin.
She was very still, a hand clutching the dress to her front though there was no danger of it falling now.
His fingers stopped, the final button done, and he paused, eyes on the tendril of hair that curled softly there, just above.
No. He couldn’t touch. Couldn’t wrap it in his finger and tug, so very softly, to make her turn.
Not yet.
“Walk to the window. And glide, remember.”
The smile in his voice was deliberate, easing the tension from the room. Not yet, not yet… And not even soon.
The realisation was irritating. He couldn’t proposition the widow until his wager was won. It would complicate things too much, and the task was already tricky enough.
She walked back to him, chin up, shoulders down. Her step was light and measured; the fine fabric swayed around her thighs, just as intended.
Despite her earlier protest to the contrary, it was clear she could move with elegance if she wanted—it was like all the other things, the wit and the cleverness and the face that could have made her a success. She had every ingredient except money and name. But most of all, she lacked the will.
She chose not to please society. Everything that he’d so carefully cultivated and honed…she simply chose not to do.
A waste, when society was full of boors and crying out for quality.
“Very good.” The imagined feel of her silky hair around his finger still lingered. Not yet, not yet. “This is the dress. Wear it on Wednesday. I’ll have a bonnet sent to match.”
He left her shortly afterwards, supposedly going to meet some friends. Instead, he went to his club. He would sit with a newspaper and a glass of something and remind himself that if he could pride himself on anything, it was his control.
Measured, strong-willed, rational, and discerning. Any one of his acquaintances would describe him so. He could wait a month. He could wait two.
At White’s, he perused the betting book for a moment, smiling at finding his own wager entered in Handley’s awful, blocky script. Several other names had joined the fray, not part of the original agreement but betting between themselves on the outcome.
There were even, he was amused to find as he turned the page, some additional wagers being made.
Lord Cotereigh marries Lady Frances within twelve months of now had been entered, as had the opposite, by Mr Warde.
Lord Cotereigh marries no one within two years.
Mr Warde was a fool. He could say goodbye to his hundred guineas.
Lord Leighton had taken that bet. He would be the winner there.
And then, underneath it, a stake signed with Leighton’s name: The Pretty Pariah to wed by Michaelmas, ￡1000.
Sebastian raised an eyebrow. A dozen people had taken that bet, probably thinking it a sure win. But Leighton was no flat, he seldom lost, and Sebastian stayed looking at the entry for a moment, the page held between finger and thumb. Mrs Ardingly to wed…
He supposed it might be a natural consequence of her being out more in society and better regarded, better dressed.
Which meant it would largely be his doing.
A half-smile twisted his mouth. Well. Michaelmas was months away.
Plenty of time to make a mistress of her before someone else made her a bride.
He sat down to his paper, exchanging greetings with a few men who passed nearby. But, restless, dissatisfied, he left White’s and set off again, walking once around the block before being annoyed enough at his own aimlessness to finally head home.
A footman hurried through the hallway as Sebastian stood in the marble-flagged space, stripping off his gloves.
Following behind the harried-looking footman was his father’s valet, Daniels, a familiarly grim expression on his face.
He met Sebastian’s eye, his silent frown saying everything Sebastian had already guessed.
“How bad is he?”
“I’ll clean him up, my lord, and get him back to bed.”
“Doctor needed?”
“Not this time, thank the Lord.”
The two servants continued towards the stairs, but Sebastian called, “Leave it. I’ll do it myself.”
“Sir…” The footman hesitated. “If you’re sure, sir…”
“Just send up the water.”
He bowed and hurried away to the kitchens. Daniels looked at Sebastian a little longer. This silent battle of wills was familiar too. Whose duty was the greatest? Common sense and society said one thing, Sebastian’s own personal god another.
With a sombre bow of his head, Daniels subsided and went after the footman. Sebastian slowly climbed the stairs, letting out a long breath.
Again. It had only been a week since the last time. It had only been twenty years since the first time…
He opened the door to his father’s bedchamber, hit by the familiar stench.
The man was on the floor near his dressing table, from which all the objects had been swept to scatter across the floor.
His thin white legs poked out from his vomit-spattered nightgown.
The stains were dark. Port and claret, probably.
It looked like blood. But there was also the acrid smell of stronger spirits too, as well as the acid smell of his stomach contents and the rank stench of piss.
Well. Here was a lesson in control, was it not? To stand here, yet again, looking at his father covered in reeking filth and not grimace or heave or shout or bully or weep…but just…do what needed to be done.
Sebastian shrugged off his coat and waistcoat before he picked his father up as one picks up a sleeping child. He had been a tall man, but he was wasted to nothing. Bones and despair and self-destruction.
In the adjoining room, where men hurried to fill the copper tub with hot water, Sebastian stripped him then washed him. He dried him and dressed him in a fresh nightgown, and then he carried him back to his bed, grateful to find the sheets changed and the stained rug rolled up and removed.
His father had barely stirred, unconscious and oblivious. It was about the only mercy—that the earl didn’t know, didn’t remember.
But I remember everything…
Those were the widow’s words, weren’t they?
Sebastian tucked his father into bed, the earl restored to what little dignity he had left. Then he went to the window and opened it, letting fresh air chase out the foul.
One more glance at the bed, and then Sebastian left to clean himself and to change for dinner.