Page 17 of Love’s Refrain at Roslyn Court (Noble Hearts #2)
Seventeen
ISAAC
I saac slid his back down the trunk of the old tree at the side of the garden until he was sitting on the ground and let his head fall into his hands.
He had hardly seen Sophia for two days, despite residing in the same house as her.
She was not present at meals, nor was she to be found in the parlours or the music room, where he had often chanced upon her before.
At first, he wondered if she was avoiding him after his episode—he could think of no other word for it—after the day at the Ashburtons.
When he asked after her, however, the truth of the matter became known.
Lady Poole might have declared her intentions to host the great social reception in his honour, but it was Sophia who was to do all the work to make it the event of the year.
Nor had he quite understood before just how much toil this entailed.
Only when he found himself alone in the gardens with Louisa, an occasion carefully orchestrated by Lady Poole, did he discover it.
“Poor Sophia,” Louisa tutted, shaking her blond ringlets. “She has hardly eaten since Mama set all that work before her.” And then Louisa began to enumerate the multitude of responsibilities and duties that his friend was beholden to undertake.
His offers of assistance were flatly refused by his hostess. He was the guest of honour; it would be quite shameful for him to lift so much as a finger. It was quite out of the question; better to walk the gardens or take a tour of the lake with Louisa instead.
He did not waste the breath to ask why Louisa was not pressed into service. Lady Poole’s objectives were clear: to keep Sophia busy and out of his path, and to forward his supposed suit with her daughter.
In one respect, her scheme was successful, for it did send Isaac and Louisa into each other’s company, but their intention was not wooing, but lamenting Lady Poole’s plans.
“Better to have her think we are developing some affection for each other,” Louisa had suggested as they strolled along the path towards the arbour. “It might lighten Sophia’s load, if she thinks you are falling in love with me instead.”
Isaac had objected at once. “No! What can she be thinking? I… I admire your cousin greatly, but I have quite decided never to marry. I have told you this. I am not fit to be a husband.”
But Louisa had simply given him an arch look and continued speaking.
“It also diverts her attention from Jeremy. She knows nothing, but she might suspect, for she is always speaking ill of him.”
Consequently, while the two imaginary lovers made no announcements, neither did they work to disabuse others of any fancies they might have.
They had just now been walking together in the gardens, and Isaac had decided to remain there when Louisa returned to the house.
He had expressed his dissatisfaction once again with Sophia’s enforced absence, and was feeling quite disaffected.
One of his low moods was hovering, and the music that he felt would raise his spirits was not to be found.
That was when he noticed, through the open window of the room where he knew Sophia to be hard at work, somebody enter. Not Lady Poole this time, but a man… and he knew that man!
What in blazes was Bladestock doing here?
He certainly had not come to pay a call on another gentleman of a similar age, for nobody had come in search of Isaac, the only such person in the house at present. Nor had he come to offer Louisa a ride in his phaeton or to visit Sir Neville, for then he would not be sitting in Sophia’s office.
As Isaac watched, the other man shooed Sophia from her desk and took the seat that she had, until moments ago, been using. Whatever was going on? Why was Bladestock being sought to offer his assistance to Sophia, where Isaac himself was expressly forbidden from so much as seeing her?
Could it be that Sophia had particularly requested his help? Had she begged Lady Poole to summon Mr Bladestock?
Or—worse—perhaps his first thought had been the correct one, and Sophia really was hoping to avoid him.
Had she requested to take on the duties of planning the reception so as to remain out of his company?
Was that the reason behind Lady Poole’s rejection of his offer—a specific plea from Sophia to keep him away?
How long he sat there against the tree, Isaac did not know. The shadows moved and danced around him, and the sun continued its relentless march across the late spring sky, but time was meaningless.
All he saw was Bladestock, there where Isaac wanted to be.
He was in her office, in her chair… was he also in her heart?
And then, when he began to wonder if she were even there in the office, she walked into view, coming to stand behind Bladestock at the desk, leaning over him as they perused some document or list. He could not quite see through the window what her expression was, what her hands were pointing at, but from this distance, at least, she looked pleased. Comfortable. At ease with him.
Not for the first time, Isaac cursed the mental infirmity that he had contracted, that stood in the way of pursuing this young woman whom he had come to care for. But while she could help him, she could not save him. She deserved better.
Blast it all. How he wished he had left when first he intended to do so.
There was some chance then of escaping before his heart was entirely lost. But he had dallied, and now he was obliged to remain for this accursed reception, quite unable to run off, and he would suffer.
For just as it had every day since he felt himself falling in love with Sophia, the agony of unrequited ardour grew harder and harder to bear.
Isaac soon abandoned his post by the tree, knowing nothing good could come of watching Sophia and Bladestock through the window. Nevertheless, he did manage to be present when that gentleman took his leave some time later.
He did not know Bladestock very well yet.
They had only recently met, and one can hardly get a full impression of a man during a house party when one’s own eyes are shuttered by jealousy.
Yes, Isaac knew himself well enough to understand this, and did not wish to cast aspersions on another man simply because he might succeed where Isaac himself would not even attempt to go.
It could do no harm to befriend this fellow; if Sophia were to marry him (and how he leapt to that conclusion so rapidly), he hoped to remain her friend, and that meant being on good terms with her husband.
He called to Bladestock as he was walking to the stables. His rival spun around at once and answered Isaac with a broad smile.
“A pleasure to see you. I had not known you were here.”
“Nor I you,” Bladestock replied. “Lady Poole suggested you were occupied elsewhere. I am sorry to have missed you. I offered Miss Bradley my assistance instead. She has a mountain of chores to wade through for this party of yours.”
“No,” Isaac said, hoping it came out as a laugh, “not mine. I am merely its victim.”
That elicited a genuine laugh from Bladestock.
“I am walking as far as the village, perhaps a bit further,” Isaac said, “if you care to lead your mount for a way.”
This was deemed quite acceptable, and in a few minutes, the two men and one horse were walking down the lane.
“What onerous undertakings has Miss Bradley commanded you to do, if I may ask?” Isaac said after a while. “I have been banned from her office.”
“Nothing terribly trying; it is the sheer quantity of her responsibilities that is so taxing. No, I was merely writing out invitations. Tomorrow I shall return to offer what assistance I can in some other office.”
“You have, I suppose, an elegant and flowing hand, the sort the ladies talk about when the men are not present.”
“Ah, those long hours under the whip of the tutor, practising upstrokes and downstrokes, perfecting the width of the line of ink and the ideal angle of the letters, was all for a good cause. For how else would I be able to write out Lady Poole’s invitations?”
Isaac now gave a genuine chuckle. Despite his antipathy to the man, it seemed Bladestock was not such a bad sort.
“Perhaps it is for good, then, that I am forbidden from helping, for my writing is utilitarian at best. Oh, it is neat enough, but we were drilled for legibility and efficiency, rather than style. Yes, I was always destined for the army. I shall find being a gentleman of leisure quite challenging. I have so much to learn, and shall never really be one of them, no matter what title I may one day bear.”
Bladestock sent Isaac an odd look from the corner of his eye.
He trudged forward a few paces, his horse trotting obediently beside him.
Then, almost too quietly to hear, he said, “What a strange pair we are, perfect opposites. You, raised for the military and fated to be a nobleman; and I, raised for the nobility and not even adequate to be a foot soldier.”
Isaac slowed his steps. “I do not quite understand you,” he replied.
“Oh, it is quite simple, and sadly ironic. My father expected to be the heir to his uncle’s title and estate—a mere baron, mind you—until that man married late in life and promptly produced three healthy sons.
My father had saved nothing and spent a great deal, and put nothing aside for his children, with the plan of my older brother one day succeeding to the title and my sister and I benefiting from the wealth of the estate.
“As it was, our rather insignificant estate is all my brother will receive, and the rest of our minor fortune became my sister’s dowry.
My brother is all the man my father is not, and the estate will do well enough when he takes it on.
My sister is properly wed to a good gentleman of respectable name and means.
And I? There is not much for me. I have not the head for law, nor the stomach for the army, and I would be a dreadful clergyman.
I would very much enjoy being a music tutor or a performer.
I do believe I am as accomplished at the ’cello as any band member in London, and I do not boast.”
Isaac nodded. “I have heard you play. I cannot doubt that. Better, I believe, than most. You would be welcome on the stage. I would certainly enjoy hearing you.”
“My family, alas, is less encouraging. They would cast me out entirely were I to attempt anything like that. A musician. A common entertainer. And a teacher of young, dripping-nosed, spotty children. They would disown me. And so, with no fortune and no career, I must try to make my way in the world as best I can.”
“We are opposites, indeed.” This was not what Isaac had anticipated hearing from his unwitting rival. “How do you live, then?”
“By my wits and the goodness of my friends. Is that not something shameful? I have a meagre allowance, enough to let me look the part, enough for respectable clothing and the means to travel if I exercise due economy. But I quite rely on a month here with this old schoolmate and two with that. Ashburton has been my saviour more than once. I do not know how he stands me, but his dear wife always has a room available for me. No, there is nothing untoward there, in case you wondered. We play music together. That is all either of us wants from the other.”
How to respond to an admission like that? It certainly showed this man in a different light, and Isaac felt a great deal of sympathy for him.
“The fate of younger sons is a cruel one, sometimes. You honour me by telling me all this.”
“It is no secret. My wish to be independent can only be achieved by marrying an heiress, and since I have little to offer in return, that is not something all too likely. Therefore, my only other hope in life is to be useful. This is one reason why I am so happy to help Miss Bradley. Now, here we are at the village, and I must be on my way. My presence is requested for a performance of some sonatas this evening. Thank you for your company, Major.”
“The pleasure is mine,” he replied.
And it was.