Louise Allen - Married to a Stranger

‘I expected that,’ Callum said. ‘I had not realised it was quite that bad, however. Be assured that I will take care of all of it.’

She would get by far the better part of this bargain, for she would bring Callum nothing but herself and she could not pretend that she was much of a bargain. This was the answer to her prayers. Why, then, was every fibre of her being revolting against it? It was an excellent match and any well-bred and delicately brought-up young woman would expect nothing more than what Callum was offering her. Most would snatch at it, deeply grateful to have a second chance.

But she was not anyone else, she was herself and she ached for a meeting of minds and for companionship and for love. Her heart told her to refuse, politely and firmly and put an end to this humiliation, but her head held her back from an irrevocable decision.

‘I must think about it,’ she found herself saying.

‘What is there to think about?’ Callum seemed genuinely baffled by her prevarication. ‘Is it your mother? You must have planned for her future when Dan returned. Surely there is a relative who would make a congenial companion for her.’

‘Well, yes, Cousin Lettice would be delighted to move here, it was always the intention.’

He nodded. ‘Excellent.’

‘How can you not mind that I was betrothed to your brother?’ She stretched out her hands as if she could somehow reach him through the glass wall of practicality he was erecting between them. ‘Would I not remind you of Daniel?’

Callum stared at her hands without taking them. ‘I have told you how I feel. I have come through the grief and I do hope I would not be so foolish as to be jealous of your feelings for him,’ he said eventually. ‘If you tell me that you cannot marry me because of those feelings …’ He left the sentence hanging. Her escape route.

But it would be a lie and the escape would be into deeper debt, misery for herself and Mama, difficulty for Mark. Sophia shook her head. ‘No, it is not that. I know he is … I have accepted that he is gone. It is just that this is so sudden, so unexpected. I need time.’

‘Time is not on your side. It is not as though you are a widow who has children already,’ Callum said with such flat practicality that it did not hit her until several seconds later that he was warning her that she was letting her only chance of motherhood slip by. ‘It will help you decide if you saw where you will be living. There is the town house, of course, but there are also two estates to choose from for when we are out of London. We could drive over and see them together and decide which to live in and which house to rent out.’

‘Choose?’ Everything was going too fast. ‘But Long Welling was always yours, was it not?’

‘It was managed by my father and then by Will. I have been in India, remember, and in London for six months. I have no great attachment to it and both houses are vacant at the moment.’

The house where she would live with this man. An insidious little voice was murmuring that Callum’s arms would be strong around her body and that he would always stand by her. She could experience physical passion at last. He would give her children. Security. But was it right?

‘You need time to think it over,’ he said and she realised he had hat, gloves and whip in his hands. She had been so deep in her thoughts that she had not noticed him move. ‘I will return tomorrow morning. Goodbye, Sophia.’

‘Goodbye,’ she said. ‘Callum—’

‘Of course, how remiss of me.’ He bent his head and kissed her, firmly but fleetingly, on the mouth. ‘Is that what you wanted?’

‘I don’t know.’ Sophia stared at Callum, somehow managing not to run her tongue over her lips to taste him. ‘I have no idea what I want. What I ought to want. You have turned my world upside down.’

‘Excellent.’ He strode away across the lawn without looking back.

Sophia gave way to the urge to lick her lips. There was a faint trace of something alien and disturbing overlain with coffee. Excellent? ‘Oh, you stubborn, impossible man! Were you listening to me at all?’

Sophia sat in the front parlour the next morning and tried to work through a muddle of thoughts. There was resentment at the way that Callum simply made assumptions about what was best for her—and the fact that he was doubtless right did not help. There was respect for his sense of duty and loyalty to Daniel and the nagging consciousness that her own duty to her family lay in making a good marriage. This marriage.

If only they had a little money and she had room to think. Her mind kept running over and over the lack of money like a dog in a turn-spit wheel. Tradesmen had been understanding about the settlement of bills since her father’s death, because of her betrothal to a son of the Hall. But for the past six months they had known that was not going to happen. Nor, unless she married well, would her brother have the influence of a great family behind him to help his career. And if she did not marry Callum, who could she marry?

The prospects locally were hardly promising—some yeoman farmers much older than herself, the curate, a widower or two, none of whom had shown any particular interest in her. There was no denying that marriage would widen her world very greatly. Mama would be happier if she was well married.

And there was the uncomfortable awareness that she found Callum Chatterton physically attractive. She could not even summon up the will to feel shocked at this, only a conviction that if he actually tried to make love to her she would be stricken with shyness. Duty and a scarce-understood desire said Marry him. Every emotional fibre of her being, coupled to pride, said, No, not when he has no feelings for me and is only offering out of a sense of duty to a man I had not even the constancy to love until death.

The crunch of gravel under wheels brought her out of her brown study as undecided as when she had drifted into it.

‘Mr Chatterton,’ the maid said and closed the door behind Callum. In buckskin breeches, boots and riding coat he should have looked every inch the English country gentleman. Instead he seemed faintly exotic, dangerous even. Perhaps it was the remnants of the tan and the way it made his hazel eyes seem green. Or perhaps it was the sense of focus about him. He was a hunter and she was the prey: all for her own good, of course.

‘Good morning, Sophia. I have the curricle—shall we drive? It is a pleasant day and we will be more able to say what we mean, perhaps, if we are free from the risk of interruption,’ he said. ‘I thought you would like to see the two houses.’

Don’t be missish, she told herself. She was never going to decide whether to marry this man if they met only to have stilted conversations in the parlour.

‘Very well. I will just go and fetch my hat.’

In the hall she said, ‘I am driving out with Mr Chatterton, Lucy. I do not wish to disturb my mother; please tell her where I am if she enquires. I may not be home for luncheon if Mr Chatterton decides to call in at the Hall on the way back.’

‘Yes, Miss Langley.’ The maid’s eyes were wide with speculation. ‘I’ll take pains not to disturb her.’

Oh dear, now she thinks she is assisting in a love affair. I just wish I did know what this was. Am I wrong to encourage Callum? But I do want to be married, to have children. If the man was someone I could like and respect. If I did not think I was imposing on him to an outrageous extent.

She was weakening, she could feel it. She could certainly respect Callum Chatterton’s achievements. He was intelligent, hard working and courageous. But could she like him? What was he like under the emotionless carapace that seemed only warmed by disturbing flickers of sensuality? Perhaps he was as cold and hard and logical as this all the time. He admitted to finding it hard to feel for other people now. I think I want him. I certainly need him. But perhaps not as a husband.