Regency Collection 2013 Part 1. Louise AllenЧитать онлайн книгу.
well, I will do my best.’ Lily felt Jack’s eyes on her and struggled to find a topic for small talk. She had never had the slightest problem in talking to him before. Now, when they were supposedly behaving in a manner that should have put all embarrassments behind them, she felt more awkward than she had ever done.
‘Did your business prosper this afternoon?’ she enquired, sounding to her own ears just like her prosiest cousin, Frederica.
‘Thank you, yes. And I called at your agent’s office to return that item you had forgotten.’
‘I am grateful, I hope it was not out of your way.’ What was the matter with her? After the silliness of trying to make themselves respectable in the hackney carriage had subsided, a pall of stultifying shyness seemed to have fallen on her. Lily kept her gaze on her clasped hands, and after a moment picked up a journal and began to flick through it.
No such constraint had fallen on Caroline. ‘Lily and I think we should be finding you a wife, Jack,’ she remarked chattily. Lily dropped the journal and scrabbled for it on the floor while she tried to cover her confusion.
‘Do you, indeed? How very kind of you both.’ Lily did not have to raise her eyes from desperately smoothing out crumpled pages to know exactly what Jack’s reaction was. One dark eyebrow would be raised and he would be managing to do that while looking down his nose at the same time.
‘Yes,’ Caroline said complacently.
‘No!’ Lily interjected, looking up at last to meet a very sardonic gaze.
‘Yes, you did, Lily, you said that Jack would make an excellent father and we both agreed that we should find him a charming bride. Don’t you remember? When we were getting out of the carriage when we arrived home?’
In the face of this convincing detail Lily could hardly deny that she had said some of this. ‘I might have said something like that,’ she agreed feebly, waiting for the explosion.
But Jack was unnaturally calm about it. ‘Do tell me, Caro—have you anyone particular in mind? A shortlist, perhaps?’
‘Of course,’ his sister said, with an expression of smug complacency. ‘Miss Willoughby—George’s elder sister, if you recall.’
‘Dull.’
‘But very worthy and industrious, which I am sure is what is needed. Or there is Louisa Carfax.’
‘Is that the one with the giggle? Certainly not.’
‘Lady Georgiana Foster? Now she does not giggle and she is a most handsome girl.’
‘She has the brains of a peahen.’
‘But, Jack, we are all agreed you need a wife, and here I am doing my best and you are not being at all helpful! If you are going to be so fussy about our local ladies, then you had better do as we suggested the other evening and go back to London to find a rich wife.’
‘Caroline!’ Jack’s snapped warning came too late to stop the tide of colour flooding into Lily’s face. How could Caroline be so tactless? But perhaps she had no idea how wealthy Lily was. She felt ready to sink, and had to force herself to speak.
‘Perhaps Lord Allerton has scruples about marrying someone simply because of their wealth,’ she managed between stiff lips. ‘No doubt he is waiting to find someone for whom he can feel regard and affection.’
‘I do not see how being wealthy excludes a woman from being those things to him,’ Caroline persisted, apparently completely insensitive to her friend writhing miserably beside her and her glowering brother. ‘Jack could very well find a rich lady to fall in love with and in that case he would have to be a complete blockhead to let her money stand in his way.’
‘Caroline—’ It was a warning growl this time. Then Jack was getting to his feet as his mother and younger sisters came in, and Lily found she was dragging air into her lungs as though she had been holding her breath for an hour. ‘Mama, what a very dashing confection on your head! You are going to reduce all the local ladies to blatant envy when we next entertain.’
‘I think it is not so bad,’ Lady Allerton agreed, patting her curls with a touch of complacency. Jack sat again, not in his previous chair, but beside Lily, who found her fingers were clenched on the journal.
‘I shall strangle my sister,’ he remarked, low-voiced.
‘She can have no idea … Please, do not make anything of it.’ Lily forced herself to a semblance of composure. ‘I do not regard it, I promise you.’
‘Do you truly think I would make a good father?’ Lily risked a sideways glance and found Jack was frowning over the question.
‘I beg your pardon—it was perhaps an impertinent observation. I merely thought that the way you are with Penelope shows a charming affection.’
‘Lily, are you all right? You sound so unlike yourself.’ She sounded strange to herself—Cousin Frederica appeared to be taking over.
‘I am fine.’ Lily forced a smile, ‘I am trying, for once, to heed my chaperon’s strictures and to sound more ladylike.’
‘Well, please do not! You do not sound like my Lily at all.’
His Lily? Lily turned abruptly, but Grimwade had just announced dinner and Jack was already getting to his feet. His friend Lily, with whom he had shared some highly improper adventures, that is all he means by it. It is all he can mean.
‘Peter Coachman tells me it will be a fine day tomorrow,’ Lady Allerton remarked. ‘He is considered quite a weather prophet,’ she added for Lily’s benefit.
‘How useful. Presumably you consult him before undertaking all kinds of agricultural procedures, such as ploughing?’ Lily asked with an innocent smile at Caroline and Jack. Caroline, already caught out in her deceit, merely smiled back, but Jack’s cheekbones were just touched with betraying colour. So, he did know that Caroline was fibbing and yet he said nothing and so I stayed here. Why?
‘Shall we go riding tomorrow?’ Susan suggested, happily oblivious to undercurrents. ‘Do you have a riding habit, Lily? I expect Caro can lend you one.’
‘I would enjoy that, thank you. And I have packed a habit.’
‘The sea-green one?’ Jack enquired. He had regained his composure and was watching her with an air of innocence she deeply mistrusted.
‘No,’ Lily replied repressively. ‘A black one.’
‘No frogging?’
‘None. And a very sensible hat,’ she added for good measure.
‘Miss France might care to borrow Chaffinch,’ Lady Allerton offered graciously. ‘My own mare, Miss France; I think you will be pleased with her.’
Lily thanked her hostess and the remainder of the meal was taken up in a prolonged, and apparently familiar, argument amongst the Lovell siblings about their destination and route.
‘Along the Aller Valley,’ Jack said firmly as the dessert plates were removed. ‘Lily will not want to look at miles of moorland, however starkly romantic you find it, Susan.’ Penelope tried to interject and he added, ‘And definitely not to the pit head, Penny. That is no place for ladies.’
‘Don’t worry, I will take you,’ Caroline whispered as the ladies rose to leave Jack to his solitary consideration of the decanter. ‘Jack is being very stuffy this evening—look how unreasonable he was about finding a wife. I mean, I am his sister and you are a good friend—why should he object to our efforts?’
‘Perhaps he feels pressured? Or embarrassed?’ Lily hazarded. ‘I do not think we should tease him about it any more, do you?’
‘Mmm.’ There was a steely glint in Caroline’s eyes which Lily recognised with a sinking feeling. ‘I think he needs throwing together with some young ladies. I