Chapter 18 #2
James Dinsmore didn’t want to die, any more than she did.
She’d been walking the bridge, tempting death to take her, because she didn’t know what else to do with her life.
They’d been unfairly parted by her brother’s impulsive behavior.
A duel, in this day and age! But now…now…
She’d bet James was doing the same by going to France.
He would most likely deny it. He was accustomed to denying—his desire for responsibility, his ducal title, the estates that went with it, his desire for her.
She drummed her fingers on the dressing table in a gesture reminiscent of her brother’s.
She’d always believed the world of rakes was divided into two sorts.
There were men like her late father and her brother George, who became bored with life because they’d tasted too much of its pleasures, and then there were men like James, who had become resigned to the notion that they would never truly taste those pleasures.
James Dinsmore was blindfolded on a bridge of his own making, and it was time, Elizabeth decided, that someone brought him down to earth.
She pushed aside bottles of perfume, brushes, and pots of powder, clearing a space.
Reaching into a drawer, she pulled out several sheets of pink stationery, a sharp quill, and a bottle of nearly fresh ink.
She dipped her quill, and then sat for several moments more, tapping it against the rim of the bottle. And then she began to write.
“And so you see,” Elizabeth said the following morning as she sat at the breakfast table with Rafe, Alix, and Louisa, “you simply must allow me to pay a visit to Arabella at Hartsdale. Read the letter.” She gestured with a bit of toast.
“Elizabeth.” Louisa tsked. “One really shouldn’t point with food.”
“I’m sorry, Mama.” She put the bread down.
“I just want Rafe to see how anxious I am to go. You all have been terrific, really. And I’m sorry, truly I am.
I should have listened when each of you tried to warn me about the consequences of my behavior.
” She glanced earnestly about the table, her eyes meeting Rafe’s last. “I’ve learned so many lessons since London. ”
He raised an eyebrow. “Such as?”
She caught her breath. In the speech she’d practiced last night, she’d expected her brother to be moved, not skeptical. “So many lessons,” she began, stalling for time. “I hardly know where to begin.”
It was Alix, surprisingly, who came to her rescue.
“Rafe,” she said gently, “we all know how Elizabeth has suffered and what she has undoubtedly learned from the experience. I hardly think it necessary to grill her over breakfast. And you were saying just the other day you thought a visit with Arabella might do her good.”
“I had in mind for Miss Norcroft to come here…”
Elizabeth leapt at this opening. “And I should have preferred her to visit at Moreham Hall as well. But as you can read in the letter, her sister is lying in and her mother wishes the family to be at her side…”
“Yes, well, I suppose that’s understandable,” he muttered, eyes sliding over Alix’s expanding shape.
“Arabella will be so bored and I…”
“Have been bored buried here in the countryside as well,” he finished.
“That wasn’t what I meant to say.” Elizabeth flushed, swept by a wave of guilt for what she intended to do.
But if it works, she told herself, if things turn out to plan, or even if they turn out very wrong, at least the family will be relieved of the burden my behavior has placed upon them.
“It’s been quiet here and I’ve had a great deal of time to think.
But it would be nice to spend some time with someone my own age. ”
“Alix is not so much older than you,” Rafe reminded her.
It was Louisa, this time, who came to her aid. “Their ages are close, but you must admit,” she said, eyes shifting ever so slightly down to Alix’s hand with its jeweled wedding band, resting on her belly, “their interests have diverged.”
“I suppose,” he said reluctantly.
“Oh, do say yes, Rafe.” Elizabeth reached into her lap and pulled out the letter she’d written and sealed the night before.
“I have penned a response in the hopes you might agree. Only say the word, and let me send a footman to catch the mail coach as it passes through town.” She dropped her head slightly and peered up at him with wide eyes. “Please, Rafe?”
His lips twitched.
“Only think of how quiet it will be here without me, Alix by your side, Louisa puttering about the garden. The weather turning warm, the flowers coming into bloom.” She resisted the urge to add, Jervis no longer tasked with following me about.
His lips twitched again. “I know you, Elizabeth Harcrest. You’ve not only written the letter, but prepared the speech, and I wouldn’t be surprised to discover ordered the maids to begin packing your bags.”
“You know me too well,” she confessed, thinking it unwise to tell him her bags were, in fact, already packed. She didn’t expect to need very many things where she was going.
“Indeed, I do,” he said firmly. “Which is why I shall expect regular correspondence from you while you are away.”
“You’re the best brother in the world.” Elizabeth cast a brilliant smile at him as she raised her right hand as if swearing an oath.
“And if it’s regular correspondence you require, regular correspondence you shall have.
” And a challenge it will be. The first of many, she reminded herself, offering a silent prayer that they’d all be so easily resolved.
She’d need to add a postscript before she sent her letter off to Arabella.