Page 2 of A Marriage is Arranged

“Listen to what I’m saying, Gareth,” said the older lady, her silver blond hair covered by a very becoming lace bonnet.

“I am listening, Gran,” said Gareth Wandsworth, fourth Earl of Shrewsbury, sitting uncomfortably in a chair in his grandmother’s elegant drawing room, his powerful legs thrust out in front of him, his heavy eyebrows pulled together in a frown, “just as I’ve listened to you on this subject often before. It’s not that I don’t want to marry, it’s just that I can’t find a woman I can bear to face at the breakfast table for the next fifty years!”

“I’ve told you before! Do not call me by that low name! And you mean not one of them can bear the idea of facing you over the breakfast table!” replied his granddam tartly. “If your grandfather hadn’t been so idiotic as to die when he did, there might have been some hope for you. You’ve never been what anyone could call good-looking, but when you became the Earl every girl of marriageable age buzzed around you like a bee to a honeypot. Your response was to get on your high horse and glower at them, so it’s no surprise they all backed away.

“Then your addiction to the low sport of boxing has made your shoulders too… too large . You look positively frightening! What a pity you didn’t take up fencing! That’s the sport for a gentleman! I said at the time you were far too young to be in control of your fortune. I suppose you couldn’t help being the next Earl, but it’s a pity you didn’t learn to be a little more conciliating. ”

“But Gran….”

“Do NOT call me that! And you know perfectly well what I mean! I hear nothing of you but your association with That Woman and She Will Not Do! We need an heir produced by an acceptable woman. You surely don’t want the title to go to Percy and his bloodless offspring.”

Her grandson had a vision of his second cousin, a weak-willed individual whose slack, doughy body was sign enough of his lack of resolve. He had been snapped up by a sharp-faced woman a few years older than he. It was she who ruled both him and her timid son. If he inherited, it would be his wife who became Earl in all but name.

“Oh God.” he muttered, “Anyone but Percy, or should I say Alicia?”

“Precisely. Find a sensible, well-bred young woman to be the mother of your sons, not Diane Courtland!”

“You know perfectly well I have no intention of marrying Diane, but I don’t think any woman, well-bred or otherwise, could guarantee me sons,” he retorted. Then he sighed. “The trouble is, the sensible, well-bred ones are all so dull! I swear I can hardly stay awake when I hear, just so, my lord , of course, you are right my lord , or, by way of a change , I really couldn’t say, my lord. Doesn’t a single one of them have an opinion on anything?”

“Of course not,” replied his grandmother smartly. “They are not bred to have any opinion other than their father’s and then their husband’s. Besides, you alarm them too much with that scowl of yours. You have to find a woman who’s not afraid of you.”

But his lordship was tired of the same discussion they’d had many times before. “Look,” he said, “if you really want me to marry one of this year’s crop, put their names in a hat and pick one out. It’s all the same to me. They are all equally lovely, equally accomplished, equally well-bred, and equally a dead bore. I promise I’ll try not to frighten her.”

“Don’t be ridiculous! And if that’s the way you feel about it, you may as well marry the girl your Papa pledged you to when she was born.”

“What girl? What pledge?” The Earl sat up straight for the first time and looked at her intently. “This is the first I’ve heard about it!”

“I knew nothing of it either until I received a letter from the girl’s mother the other day. That’s why I asked you to come and see me.”

She drew in her breath. “This is how it was. Your papa had a very good friend at Oxford, a Peter Grey. I remember him well. He came here often. A very pleasant, good-looking young man. In fact, your papa’s chief objection to going to manage the family tea business in China was that that they wouldn’t be able to run around together as they had been used to. But your grandfather needed him to go, and off he went.

“As you know, he came back to marry your mama, then returned to China, where you were born. What Peter Grey and he said to each other on that occasion I don’t know, but when Grey subsequently married and his wife gave birth to a girl, they apparently exchanged letters agreeing that the two of you would be married. You were about seven at the time. It was just before you came home to go to Eton.”

She stopped for a moment and put her lace handkerchief to her eyes. “But then, of course, your poor papa and mama were killed in that terrible way. We never knew the story, but it was something about payments and money. I could never forgive your grandfather for sending them there! Thank God you were already here! You would probably have perished too.”

She was silent for a moment, lost in her memories, then continued. “Anyway, Grey’s wife wrote to me quite recently to say her husband had passed away and telling me about the old promise. She has your Papa’s letters agreeing to the match. The girl is eighteen now, but they couldn’t bring her out while they were in black gloves and now they’ll have to wait till the next season. In any case, it seems she’s been away somewhere at school and cares nothing for society. According to her mama, she’s very quiet and ladylike.”

“Sounds perfect,” said the Earl ironically. “Another dead bore. But she can’t be any worse than the rest. Though,” he said, as another idea struck him, “she may be a good deal better. If she cares nothing for society she won’t mind staying at home building the nest while I go my own way, and if she’s as well-bred as you think, she won’t subject me to any scenes. I’ll go to see her, and so long as she’s passable, she may as well be the one.”

He kissed his grandmother on the cheek and strode towards the door.

“If she’ll have you, you mean,” said his grandmother. But he was gone.