Page 134 of A Gentleman's Wager
Louisa
The three weeks following Wakefield’s return during which the church banns were read passed uneventfully. Winter crept with increasing determination over the landscape, bringing morning frosts and a biting north wind. It whipped about the women’s skirts and sent the fallen, decaying leaves scuttling over the Lauwine’s pathways like gangly spiders.
Louisa relentlessly continued her morning walks. They helped keep her thinking straight, and there was much to contemplate, with wedding plans afoot, and a summons for Wakefield to re-join his regiment. She’d been prattling on for a good half an hour about it all to Bella who had accompanied her that morning, when it dawned on her that her friend seemed rather glum. A quick look at her confirmed as much.
“I’m sorry,” she apologised, giving Bella’s hand an affectionate squeeze. “I have been going on rather a lot. Is there something you wish to talk about? You seem troubled.”
“I’m fine.” Bella forced a smile, but it rapidly vanished. “It’s probably the change of season. Let’s head into the grove. I’m freezing up here in this wind.” She pulled her pelisse tight about her shoulders and they carefully scurried down slope, but her woe seemed to follow along. Whatever it was Bella was holding tight to it, and as to the cause, Louisa couldn’t fathom it. It was hard to unravel the emotions of those others who remained at Lauwine, when she was so wrapped up in her own happiness. While she still had the odd twinge of worry about her aunt and the outstanding bills, she could honestly say that being ruined was the best thing to have happened. Frederick made her far happier than any inheritance, and if they could never quite forget about how they had hurt one another, then that only spurred them to work harder on making what they had now a success.
“Is it Lord Marlinscar?” she asked. Lucerne’s days seemed to revolve around time spent with Vaughan, and in ways that naturally excluded Bella. “Is there no sign of him—”
The thunder of hooves drowned out her question as Lucerne came charging past astride his stallion, Vaughan in pursuit. Bella’s face lit with sudden interest. She tugged on Louisa’s sleeve. “Let’s see what they’re about.”
They ran quietly up to the edge of the river. The two men had splashed through the stream and dismounted. They appeared to be embroiled in a heated exchange, Pennerley roughly shoving Lord Marlinscar against a tree.
“Bella, I’m not sure this is a good time to intrude.”
“Shh,” her friend hissed, tugging her out of sight behind a bush, but then peeping around the edge herself.
Foliage thinned by the season; Louisa peered through the leaves. She could not see much, but it appeared the two men were now wrestling. They crashed hither and thither, finally crumpling to the hard ground, Lucerne astride the marquis, who squirmed like an eel.
“Bella, might we not go back inside.”
“You go if you wish. I mean to stay a little longer.”
“So that you might spy?”
“It’s not spying, we’re allowed to be here. Can I not be entertained by a little wild horseplay?”
If she had a sense that’s what this was then that would be fair enough, but there was the sort of yearning in her friend’s face that suggested something quite different lay behind her interest. It prompted Louisa to kick a rock into the steam. The resulting splash sent the men slipping into the bushes out of their view.
Bella turned to her ireful. “What did you do that for?”
“Oh, Bella, because you are punishing yourself and it make no sense to do so. I suppose it must be difficult that they spend so much time together when you should like him to spend that time with you. Ought I to scold him for you, for being neglectful?”
“I pray you don’t.” Bella stalked away from her, heading back towards the house as if she could not conceive of a worse proposition.
Louisa hurried and caught up with her. Linking her arms with Bella’s as if they had not just squabbled. “I do hope he has not delayed in asking for you, so as not to overshadow the approach of mine and Freddy’s happy day.”
“Why are you so set upon matching me with Lucerne?” Bella’s waspish tone caused Louisa to goggle at her in bafflement.
“Is that not what you want? I thought—”
Bella scratched at the back of her neck. “Of course, it is.”
But was it? The shadow of doubt infiltrated her friend’s eyes. “It’s only that Pennerley makes it so very difficult, and if Lucerne and I wed, he would be there always. How should I stand that, Louisa? You know how I despise the man.”
“He is not so very bad.” She had made her peace with the marquis. Actually, she found him rather charming. He’d grinned when she’d had the audacity to thank him for his lessons in lovemaking a few evenings back and reminded her to sit astride Wakefield’s chin if he ever gave her any grief. He’d also said some other things that she couldn’t rightly add up to make sense, but made her suspect his impromptu visit to Richmond had contributed to Wakefield’s return to Lauwine.
Bella snorted. “He’s the scoundrel who wagered upon his ability to bed us. He is precisely as horrid as I believe him. What is incredible is that you have forgiven him so readily that savagery.”
The jealousy that she could inspire in Wakefield and his subsequent determination to be the best of man for her, far outweighed any grudge she might hold over the wager. “I have not forgiven him, for there was nothing to forgive.”
“There you go again, as if he didn’t treat you abominably.”
“He treated me precisely as I desired him to.” Had he been heavy-handed in his approach? In a sense, but his reasons for bedding her were equally as ignoble as hers in agreeing to it. “I do wonder why it is you are so sore over it all. Did he force himself upon you, Bella?”
Her friend chewed the inside of her cheek, confirming what Louisa already knew in her heart, that it had not been coercive.
