Page 56 of Lady Like

Emily promised she would give Harry her answer in five days’ time.

But five days come and go, and Harry has walked the varnish off Collin’s floorboards with her pacing, Havoc always on her heels, mooing in supportive distress.

“There is a reasonable explanation, I’m sure,” she tells Collin on the morning of the sixth day. “As she said she’d come no matter what she chose.”

Collin, whom Harry liberated from the Marshalsea the same day she met their father at Longley, is stretched out on the sofa looking like he’d very much like to take a nap if only Harry would stop sniveling. “Perhaps something came up with her cousin and she’s been delayed.”

“Perhaps,” Harry says. “Or perhaps she decided she’d had enough of me.”

“That seems unlikely.”

Harry throws herself into a chair across from Collin, fingers knit together behind her head. She feels the strain in her shoulder. “How are you feeling?”

Collin raises his head and looks around, as though she might be asking someone else. “Who, me ? I thought I was only here to offer you reassurance.”

“My apologies,” Harry says, resisting the urge to roll her eyes at him. “I’ve had much on my mind lately.”

Collin drags his hands down his face with a sigh. “I feel like a bit of a goosecap, I suppose.”

“I was more inquiring after your health.”

“Ah.” Collin lets his head fall back against the arm of the sofa. “Of course.”

“You had a fever when you came home—”

“Well in that regard, I’m well.”

“But we can talk about your…” Harry balls her hands into fists around the knees of her trousers. “Sensitivities. If you want to.”

Collin drops an arm over his face. “Pay me no mind.”

“No, tell me.” Harry scoots her chair closer to the couch. “Why do you feel silly?”

Collin sighs, then says, “Because I made a bad bet on a bad man. I trusted the wrong person and spoiled things for you and Emily. And I was an ass to you.”

“All true.”

Collin chuckles.

“Everyone trusts the wrong person at some point,” Harry says. “Alexander fooled us both.”

“I know,” Collin says. “I’ll just have to let it ruin my life for a bit longer before I allow myself to be forgiven.”

“Try not to linger upon it. The best thing to do is allow yourself to move forward.” Harry lets that sit between them for a moment before she asks, “Is it going to ruin your life further if you marry Emily for me?”

“No, no,” Collin says. “I like Miss Sergeant quite a lot. She and I will be well matched. I never expected to marry for love, even before the prince got involved.”

“And if she and I keep carrying on?”

“We’ve known couples with more unorthodox arrangements,” Collin says.

“I don’t mind her affairs if she doesn’t mind mine.

” He raises his head and says seriously, “But you know it will be easier for me. Not just because you’re both ladies together, but because it’s always easier for men and their dalliances. ”

“I know.”

“I know you do. And I know she does. But just be absolutely certain this is what you both want.”

“Do we have any other choice?” Harry slumps in her chair, feeling suddenly gelatinous.

“Though it may not be my choice if Emily never comes. What if she’s lying dead in a ditch somewhere?

” she says just as Collin closes his eyes again.

“What if she was struck by a cart or took a fall or got lost and is wandering around the city calling out my name?”

“You’re so dramatic.” Collin rolls over, face away from Harry. “Just go to her.”

“What if this silence is my answer and she’s chosen to leaveme?”

“From what I know of Miss Sergeant, she wouldn’t go back on her word. Go to see her at her cousin’s.”

“I can’t.”

“Why?”

“Is that not a bit…” Harry sticks a nail between her teeth. “You know. Pathetic?”

Collin sits up and glares at her. “You’re concerned because you care for her. What’s pathetic about that?”

Harry wants to pull out her own hair by the fistful.

How can she feel so shy over seeing someone whose gigg she had recently licked in excess?

Surely they were past the point of embarrassment and doubt.

“Why have I lost my ability to be cool and aloof? I used to be so good at that when it came to women.”

“Because you love her,” Collin replies. “And the only way to attain love is by embarrassing yourself deeply and asking for it. No great love story ever began with two people being rational and calm around each other.”

Harry watches as Collin pulls up a pillow around his ears. Since Harry is no longer pacing, Havoc rests his head on the cushion next to Collin’s knees, then starts to heave himself atop him on the sofa.

“Damnation.” Harry pushes herself to her feet, slapping the back of Collin’s head lightly as she passes. “You are tiresome.”

“Where are you going?” Collin calls, and Harry shouts in return, “To embarrass myself!”

—

Harry rings the bell of Violet’s house, then resists the urge to knock as well, in case the bell wasn’t heard.

Nothing is amiss, she tells herself, struggling for a new reassurance with each toll of the bell.

It does not mean she has left you.

Or forgotten you.

Or that her feelings do not run as deep as yours.

She reaches for the bell cord again just as the door opens. Martin, as sour-faced as he had been when they had previously crossed paths, glares at her across the threshold. She’s certain he recognizes her, but can’t quite remember from when or where, which is probably to her benefit.

“Mr. Palmer.” Harry takes off her hat. “Good morning. I’ve come to see Miss Sergeant. Is she at home?”

“Miss Sergeant is not available to callers.”

Harry’s heart sinks. Emily’s absence had been a sign after all— How stupid to pursue her! “Any callers?” she asks. “Or just me?”

“She’s occupied with preparations for her departure.”

“Departure?” A different sort of dread floods Harry’s heart. “Where is she going?”

“She’s returning to Sussex,” Martin says, then adds—with savage pleasure, or is that just her imagination?—“with her fiancé.”

Robert Tweed is here. He has come for Emily. Harry wants to thump Martin over the head so she can dash past him and into the house. It was not her pursuit that had been foolish—it was that she hadn’t come sooner.

“Please,” Harry says. Martin starts to shut the door, but Harry sticks her boot in the frame, stopping its progress. “Let me see her.”

“Leave my home this instant, or my hand shall be forced.”

Martin pulls on the door, but Harry is taller and stronger and manages to shoulder it open and push past him. “Intruder!” Martin hollers as she charges across the entryway.

“Is that your forced hand?” Harry asks. “Hollering for reinforcements?”

“Martin!” Harry and Martin both freeze as Violet appears on the stairs, glaring at them as she takes her skirt in her hand and hurries down. “What the devil is going on?”

Martin points to Harry. “An intruder! In our home!”

“Oh calm yourself.” Violet takes Harry by the arm, a quick squeeze calming Harry enough that she allows herself to be led from the entryway. “I’ll see her out the back,” Violet calls over her shoulder to Martin, as she steers Harry through the house.

Violet stops when they reach the kitchen and turns to Harry, who wastes no time in demanding, “Where’s Emily?”

“Out with Tweed purchasing their bishop’s license,” Violet says.

“I tried to send you word—so did Emily, but Tweed’s been a tyrant about our communications, which inspired the same in Martin.

He tried to order me to wear blue this morning.

Can you imagine?” She flicks the sleeve of her pink dress. “These men.”

“Emily can’t marry Tweed,” Harry says. “We have to do something.”

Violet’s lips purse. “I don’t know what we can do to stop him.”

“I’ll take her away. She can marry my brother.”

“Under what licensure? Have the banns been read? Will a hasty wedding by the end of the day fall under your father’s idea of moral uprightness?”

“Why did Tweed come for her? Why now?”

Violet rolls her eyes. “Apparently my husband had moral concerns about Emily’s behavior and felt it his duty to send a report to her betrothed that inspired him to come himself.”

“Oh for God’s sake.”

Violet takes Harry’s hands and squeezes them hard. “She loves you. Know that.”

“I do,” Harry replies. “I wish it was enough.”

“Only in stories,” Violet replies with a sad smile.

They’re interrupted by the sound of the front door opening, followed by men’s voices in the hall. Violet glances over her shoulder, then says to Harry, “Wait here,” before she turns on her heel and leaves the kitchen.

Harry waits, afraid to move lest she reveal herself. Snippets of conversation, mostly Violet’s voice, float into her from the hallway. “Gone, yes…Luncheon soon…I have to see to the baby, Emily could you make us some tea?”

Footsteps across the stones, and Harry realizes what’s happening a moment before Emily appears in the kitchen doorway in a gray dress, her hair pinned back so tightly cheekbones cast shadows. She looks like herself cast in wax, skin pale and her eyes red rimmed.

When she sees Harry, she throws a hand over her mouth to muffle her gasp. Tears flood Harry’s eyes, and she opens her arms to Emily, who falls into them, burying her face in Harry’s coat.

“I should have gone with you when I could,” Emily says. “I was so foolish.”

“You still can.”

“Not now that he knows. Now that he’s here.

I should have agreed to marry Collin as soon as you proposed it.

” Emily’s voice breaks. Harry can’t see her face, but she can feel Emily’s tears soaking through her shirt.

“How silly to think I had a choice. Silly to come to London at all and think I could change anything.”

“Stop.” Harry takes Emily’s face in her hands and kisses her on the forehead. “You cannot let despair overtake you.”

“It’s not despair—it’s realism. I’m being honest about my lot for the first time since…maybe my whole life.” Emily rests her chin on Harry’s chest, looking up at her. “Thank you, for everything.”

“Emily—”

“I love you. I always will.”

Emily pushes herself up on her toes and kisses Harry. Her lips taste of salt, and Harry cups the back of Emily’s head with a gloved hand, the other on the small of Emily’s back. She wants to lift Emily into her arms and carry her away.

“It sounds as though you’re saying goodbye,” Harry says.

“Aren’t I?”

“Please, we can find a way—”

“Miss Sergeant,” says a voice from the kitchen doorway, and too late, Harry and Emily step apart, “do not forget I do not take my tea with—”

The man in the kitchen doorway is stocky but broad shouldered, with a weak chin and crooked nose, like someone had tried to draw Napoleon from memory.

Emily wipes her face quickly with the back of her hand, taking another step away from Harry, but it’s too late.

He saw them. He stalks into the kitchen with a heavy stride, just as Violet hurtles in behind him, a moment too late.

“So,” says the man, striding toward Harry. “You are the knave who has been fucking my betrothed.”

“Mr. Tweed,” Violet says. “Do not be crass in my home.”

“Do you know that this whore is promised to me?” Tweed jerks his chin in Emily’s direction. “Do you know what happened to the last buck who bedded her? I would not take the risk if I were you. She needs a firm hand.”

Harry wishes she had brought Havoc. If ever there were a moment to let slip the dogs of war. “She is not yours,” she says. “Nor mine. She belongs to herself.”

Tweed laughs, then says to Emily, “Miss Sergeant, come here.” Harry watches in helpless horror as Emily, head bowed, crosses to his side. “Tell this swain you’ll have no more of him,” Tweed says, jamming a finger in Harry’s direction. “Say it!”

“Harry,” Emily says quietly. “Please, you should go.”

“Emily,” Harry says, and the name wilts on her tongue like a plucked petal.

“You said she belongs to herself,” Tweed says. “And now she has made her choice. If you are a gentleman of any kind, you will cease your attempts to coerce her and leave.”

“If you are a gentleman,” Harry snaps in reply, “you will realize that when a lady runs to London to escape her intended, that is not the start of a happy marriage.”

“This is not your concern.”

“It is,” Harry says. “Because I love her, and I want her to be happy, even if it’s not me she’s happy with. And by God, I won’t let you ruin her life.”

“How dare you.” Tweed rips off his glove and flings it at Harry. It falls short and flutters to the ground between them. “I challenge you.”

“Do you?” Harry raises her chin. “A duel?”

“No, don’t,” Emily says at the same time Violet shrieks, “Are you mad? You’ll both be killed!”

“A duel indeed!” Tweed ignores Violet and grabs Emily by the arm, pressing her to his side. “Epping Forest. Pistols at dawn.”

“Harry,” Emily cries. “Don’t! Please, just go!”

“At the Cuckoo’s Oak!” Tweed cries before Harry can reply, dragging Emily after him as he stalks from the kitchen. “Make peace with your God, sirrah!”