Rose Lerner - In for a Penny

Penelope looked up from her well-thumbed copy of Sense and Sensibility when she heard the great front door swing open. But as no one came to announce a visitor, she decided that it must be one of her father’s business acquaintances. Or perhaps it might be the post; she was hoping for another letter from Edward. She had reread the last one this morning, but somehow it had not told her anything new.

Poor Edward! He sounded lonely in Paris, and always busy working and learning the French that would help him sell his employer’s woolen goods on the Continent. She wished he had been sent to France the following year, so that she might have gone with him-for surely by then Mama would have given over hoping for a lord for her. Mama could be romantical and talk of noble lords and Grand Passions and ancestral art collections all she liked, but Penelope didn’t care for any of that. Mutual esteem and warm affection were good enough for her.

She had to admit it was partly Edward’s own fault. Her parents might have been willing to consider the match if Edward hadn’t left the brewery to work for a northern industrialist. She herself had wished that Edward would stay in her father’s company; she had little desire to live so far from town.

But she was willing to make the sacrifice for Edward’s sake. In the meantime, she would wait patiently, and if Mama wanted her to accept the invitations to ton affairs that Penelope still sometimes received from old schoolfellows, well, there was no real harm in it.

She wished her mother could be made aware of how very out of place they were at the ton’s social occasions-or rather, made to care how out of place they were, for her mother was aware of it. Dear Mama; she thought it a great joke how everyone looked at her, and with true maternal loyalty refused to see that everyone looked at her darling Penny in exactly the same way.

Mrs. Brown had nearly burst with pride when Penelope attracted the attention of a viscount a few weeks ago-waving away Penelope’s most forceful representations that Lord Nevinstoke had merely walked with her for a few moments before sprinting out of the house as if the hounds of Hell were after him. Penelope had not had the heart to tell her mother of the improper way he had looked at her-at least, she was sure from the way it had made her feel that it must have been improper.

Nor had she had the heart to mention that she had seen him a week later at Vauxhall, well on his way to being drunk as a wheelbarrow, and with a woman Penelope would have wagered a hundred guineas was his mistress. A very pretty woman. Penelope had seen her in a production of Twelfth Night the previous month, and she had been a charming and talented actress.

There was no use her mother feeling the pain of disillusion that must follow.

His image rose again before her eyes. There was, to be sure, nothing out of the common way about him. A perfectly ordinary-looking young man, Penelope insisted to herself. He was of middling height, his shoulders neither slim nor broad. His hands were not aristocratically slender-there was nothing to set them apart from the hands of any other gentleman of her acquaintance.

His hair was a little too long, and she thought its tousled appearance more the result of inattention than any attempt at fashion; it was neither dark nor fair, but merely brown-utterly nondescript save for a hint of cinnamon. His face too would have been unmemorable if it were not for a slight crookedness in his nose, suggesting it had been broken. His eyes were an ordinary blue, of an ordinary shape and size.

So why could she picture him so clearly, and why did the memory of his smile still make her feel-hot, and strange inside?

But it was his voice that stayed with her the strongest; the timbre of it was imprinted on her ear, and there was nothing ordinary about it. It was rich and mellow, and there was something graceful in the careless rhythm of his speech.

So strongly had she conjured up Lord Nevinstoke’s image that when the door opened, Evans spoke, and that same gentleman entered the room, it was a moment before she was quite convinced he was real.

He was in every particular as she remembered him, save that he was dressed from head to toe in black, and his blue eyes were anxious and grave. She realized that Evans had not announced him as Lord Nevinstoke, but as Lord Bedlow.

She stood without thinking, and her book fell to the floor. In an instant he had stepped forward, bent down, and returned it to her. She was conscious that her fingers closed too tightly on the book; he was very close, an odd expression in his eyes. His nearness affected her, alas, just as she remembered.

“Has something happened to your father, my lord?”

He looked away and stepped back. “You are very perceptive. My father was killed Wednesday before last.”

“You mean-the day after I saw you at Vauxhall?”

He smiled. “You remembered me.”

She had been so shocked by his news that at first she had forgotten to listen to his voice. Now she experienced the full effect of the pure vowels and husky overtones; her pulse sped up. “I am so sorry to hear about your father.”

“Thank you,” he said, then stood silent. “Dash it, this is awkward.”

“I own I am a little surprised to see you.”

“I suppose I had better out with it. My father had run into debt before he died. A great deal of debt.”

Penelope’s heart plummeted into her boots. She struggled for composure. “I see.”

“The long and short of it is, I’ve come to ask you to marry me.”

Though she had been half expecting it, the world seemed to stand still a moment; then it started again, with a stutter. “I beg your pardon?”

“You heard me correctly, I assure you.” He ran a hand through his hair, confirming her impression that its disorder was unfeigned, then took a few steps back. “Do you-do you think we might be seated?”

She chastised herself for a poor hostess. “Of course.” Resuming her seat, she gestured to him to do the same.

She had meant for him to take the chair placed conveniently a few feet off, but he, misreading her gesture, seated himself beside her on the window seat. He leaned forward, his elbows on his spread knees and his hands clasped.

“I’ve no intention of offering you Spanish coin. I need your money, very much-oh, how much! I don’t know how I’m to manage without it.” His mouth twisted. “I never thought about money till I hadn’t got it, you know. And now there’s candles and black gloves and ink and my sister’s dowry”-he had begun to tick these off on his fingers as he went; it had the air of a familiar pattern of thought. But he caught himself and shook his hands, ending with, “oh, and a thousand other things I never gave a moment’s thought to! How do people contrive who haven’t money?”

Penelope had never had to contrive without money; she had still been a babe when her father began to make his fortune. But she knew how it was done. “With tallow and small dowries, I’m afraid.”

He flushed. “I daresay I look a regular wastrel to you.”

He did, and Penelope hated insincerity. Nevertheless, the words flew to her lips without her thinking them. “Oh, no!”

He gave her a rueful smile. She tried to ignore its effect on her. “You’re a sweet girl. And that was what I meant to say. I can’t deny I need your money, but I still wouldn’t offer for you if I didn’t feel we could rub along tolerably well together.”

His words warmed her more than they should, but that didn’t mean she had lost all sense. “We’ve spoken together for all of five minutes in our lives, my lord. How can you possibly know we could rub along well together?”

“I can tell.” He hesitated for a moment; then he slid closer to her on the window seat, tilted up her face to his, and kissed her.