Nicola Cornick - The Notorious Marriage

Eleanor stripped off her cloak and hung it over the back of a chair. Needless to say, she had underestimated the power of rumour. One salacious story had led to another, each more deliciously dreadful than the last. The gossips said that she had eloped with Kit Mostyn to avoid a forced match; that he had deserted her on her wedding day because he had discovered her to be no virgin; that she had told him to leave because she had discovered he was a brute and a satyr who indulged in perverted practices…Eleanor sighed. The gossip had caused a scent of disrepute that hung about her and had the rakes sniffing around and the respectable ladies withdrawing their skirts for fear of contamination. Worse, she was not blameless.

Despite her mama’s strictures that a lady always behaved with decorum, Eleanor had decided to scorn the gossips and fulfil their expectations. Just a little. At the start of the Season her off-white reputation had actually seemed rather amusing, much more entertaining than being a deadly dull débutante or a devoted wife. And in a complicated way it was a means of revenge on Kit, and she did so desperately want revenge. So she had flirted a little, encouraged some disreputable roués, even allowed a few rakes to steal a kiss or two. She had planned on taking a lover, or even two, perhaps both at the same time. The possibilities seemed endless for an abandoned bride whose husband clearly preferred to take his pleasures elsewhere.

The idea had soon palled. Eleanor had known all along that she was not cut out to be a fast matron. The liberties were disgusting, the kisses even more so. All the gentlemen who buzzed around her had the self-importance to assume that she would find them attractive and did not bother to check first. Their attentions had become immensely tedious, their invitations increasingly salacious and their attempted seductions, such as the present one, most trying. In the space of only six weeks Eleanor had had to slap several faces, place a few well-aimed kicks in the ankle or higher and even hit one persistent gentleman with the family Bible when he had tried to seduce her in the library. And she was miserably aware that it was her own fault.

Eleanor sat down by the meagre fire and tried to get warm. Now she had to deal with Sir Charles’s importunities. If she had found it difficult to decide whether to live up or down to her reputation previously, she knew now beyond a shadow of doubt that she was not cut out for some sordid intrigue. There was enough scandal already attached to her name without some indiscreet dalliance in a low tavern with a man she found boring. Besides, she inevitably compared every man she met to Kit and found them wanting. It was curious but true—he had left her alone to face the scandal of their marriage and she had not heard a word from him since, yet still she found other men lacking.

In the five months since Kit’s defection, Eleanor’s childish infatuation had turned to anger and misery. When her mother delighted in passing on another snippet of gossip about Kit that had been garnered from her acquaintance, Eleanor hardened her heart a little more each time. However, it did not prevent the memory of her husband from overshadowing every other man she knew.

But that was nothing to the purpose. Eleanor smoothed her dress thoughtfully as she tried to decide what to do. She could appeal to Sir Charles’s better nature but that was probably a waste of time as she suspected that he did not possess one. She would not be here if he did. She could play the innocent and scream the house down if matters turned nasty, or she could act the sophisticate, then run away when she had lulled Sir Charles into a false sense of security. Eleanor frowned. She was not entirely happy with either option. There was plenty of room for error.

She could hear voices getting closer—Sir Charles was quoting Shakespeare in the corridor. Oh dear, this was going to be very tiresome. The door opened. Sir Charles came in, followed by the innkeeper bearing a tray with two enormous glasses of wine. Eleanor raised her brows. That was not in the least subtle and somehow she had expected better of a poet. She really must rid herself of these false expectations.

‘There you are, my love!’ Sir Charles’s voice had already slipped from the respectful courtesy of their previous exchanges to an odious intimacy that made Eleanor’s hackles rise. ‘I hope that you are warm enough—although I shall soon have you wrapped up as cosy as can be, upstairs with me!’

The innkeeper smirked meaningfully and Eleanor looked down her nose haughtily at him. No doubt he was warmed by the size of the bribe Sir Charles must have slipped him to connive in so dubious an enterprise. She wondered whether Sir Charles had always spoken in rhyme and why on earth she had not noticed it before. It was intensely irritating.

‘The inn is adequate, I suppose,’ she said coldly, ‘but I do not anticipate staying here long, sir. Surely there is someone who could carry a message to Trevithick House? The others will be almost back by now and will be concerned to find me missing…’

‘Oh, I do not believe that you need trouble your pretty little head about that, my love,’ Sir Charles said airily. He struck a pose. ‘Why, I sense a verse coming over me!’ He smiled at her. ‘My heart leads me to wed when I spy your pretty head, as you lie in my bed…’

‘Pray, sir, restrain your imagination!’ Eleanor snapped. ‘I do not believe that an inclination to wed forms any part of your plans! As for the rest of your verse, I like it not! A work of folly and vivid imagination!’

Sir Charles did not appear one whit put out. Evidently it would take more than plain speaking to deter him. He came close to the fire, rubbing his hands together. Eleanor found herself hoping uncharitably that his ruffled sleeves would catch alight. His dress was very close to that of a macaroni, with yards of ribbons, ruffles and lace, and she was sure he would go up like a house on fire.

‘Alas, my dear Lady Mostyn, that you are married already, otherwise I would show you my affections were steady!’

Sir Charles fixed her with his plaintive dark eyes, behind which Eleanor could see more than a glimpse of calculation. ‘You must know that my love and esteem for you know no bounds—’

‘As does your effrontery, sir!’ Eleanor interrupted, before he could finish the rhyme.

Sir Charles pressed a glass of wine into her hand and downed half of his own in one gulp.

‘You know that your relatives will not reach home for a half hour at least, sweet Eleanor, and will not start to worry about you for another hour after that, by which time it will be dark…’ His eyes met Eleanor’s again, carrying the implicit message that no one would be coming to help her. Eleanor noted wryly that he could speak plainly enough when he chose. ‘But have no fear! You are safe with me here!’

Eleanor bit her lip and turned her head away, hearing the innkeeper’s laugh as he went out and closed the door behind him. There would be no help from that quarter.

Sir Charles nodded towards her wine. ‘Drink up, my love. It will fortify you.’ He suited actions to words, gulping the second half of his wine in one go, wiping the excess from his chin. ‘This is a charming opportunity for us to get to know each other a little better. Most opportune, my rose in bloom!’

‘Or most contrived!’ Eleanor said coldly. She looked straight at him, noting that he was nowhere near as good-looking as she had once imagined him to be. His pale brown eyes were too close set to look trustworthy, and taken with his long and pointed nose they gave him the appearance of a wolfhound. Who was it had told her never to trust a man who looked like a hunting dog? It could only have been her aunt, Lady Salome Trevithick, and Eleanor wished she had paid more attention.