To Peter, as always
Love, Erica
CHAPTER 1
Haverly Manor
Oxfordshire, England
January 1, 1814
HE SUPPOSED THAT someday he would have to forgive the child for being a girl.
Marcus Haverly took one look at the squirming pink bundle in the nurse’s arms and sighed, the weight of the world threatening to push him into the ornate rug beneath his Hessians. He set down the book he’d been reading, his appetite for the written word evaporating as reality set in.
His mother dragged into the study, her shoulders slumped, her hands lax.
Who was more disappointed? He would hate to have to live on the difference. He rose, put his hands into the pockets of his breeches, and went to stand before the window, staring out into the night. Frost rimed the edges of the panes, and in the distance, black trees lifted skeletal arms toward the moon.
“How is Cilla?” he asked.
“The accoucheur has just gone. He says everything went well but that she needs rest.” Mother’s voice sounded as if she spoke from the bottom of a pit. “I can’t bear it. A girl.”
Marcus glanced over his shoulder in time to see her sink into a chair, the very picture of despair. The poor woman. All her hopes dashed in a split second.
The child squeaked and snuffled, drawing his attention. He should at least go and look at his niece. After all, he’d been anticipating the birth for months.
The birth that was supposed to set him free.
She had a tuft of dark hair atop her round head. An impossibly tiny hand lay next to her full cheek, the nails minute and faintly blue. Sparse lines of color indicated where her eyebrows would be someday.
He didn’t know if he’d ever met a baby as fresh as this one. Though he searched her features, he could find no resemblance to either of her parents. Overall, she looked a bit like an old man. Though he would never say so to Cilla. She was much too frail a flower to accept even the mildest of teasing.
Looking at the baby’s helpless little face, as innocent as a person could be, he felt a stirring somewhere in his heart. He would do his duty by her. He owed that much to Neville.
“Take her to the nursery. See that she has everything she needs.” He nodded to the nurse, a woman nearly twice his age, thoroughly interviewed and scrutinized by his mother a month ago and passed as acceptable.
When she had departed, Marcus went to the desk … his desk now, he supposed. It was all his. The desk, the study, the house, the grounds … and the responsibilities. What a way to start the new year.
“What are we going to do now?” Mother eyed him from under the black lace trim on her black cap, her iron-gray curls clustered about her face. Lines of strain showed around her eyes and mouth. “This is an unmitigated disaster.”
Marcus jammed his thumb and forefinger into his eyes at the bridge of his nose and breathed in. Why was there no air in this place? A cannonball lodged in his chest, cold and heavy. First his father and brother, and now this? Every event bound him to his burdens with more chains and hawsers than a frigate to the dock.
Mother sniffed, and he lowered his hand, digging for his handkerchief. He needn’t have bothered. She had one and dabbed her eyes with the black scrap of linen.
I’m surprised there’s a dry square of cloth left in the house. The amount of weeping that has gone on this last six months would fill the Serpentine in Hyde Park.
He chided himself for being unfeeling. She had suffered both great loss and now a great calamity. He should make allowances.
Though it seemed he’d been making allowances for the woman for most of his life.
Her dress seemed to swallow the light from the fireplace and wall sconces. Still wearing black bombazine from head to foot, though the time of deepest mourning had passed months ago. He continued to wear a black coat out of deference to her feelings, but much to his mother’s dislike, he’d taken to wearing his buff deerskin breeches and a gray waistcoat. Every time she noticed he’d had his tailor remove the black cloth-covered buttons on his jackets and return the brass originals, she would pucker her lips and let a pair of tears form on her lower lashes.
“I suppose I have no choice but to accept it, but it seems God has been most cruel to me. I feel as if I am Naomi from the Bible. You might as well call me Mara.” More sniffs and eye wiping. “That’s what she said, wasn’t it? When everything had been taken from her … that her name now meant ‘bitter’? I’m just empty. How can this be happening? I didn’t plan for any of this.” Her voice vacillated, as if she didn’t know whether to feel angry or just victimized.
“A son with higher expectations than mine of his relationship with his mother might take offense. You lost your husband and your eldest, but I still remain, and your daughter, and your widowed daughter-in-law. Not to mention a new grandchild.” Marcus kept his voice bland, as he always strove to do in her presence. He was who he was, no more, no less, born in the order God had chosen. As a second son, he no longer resented the affection lavished on his elder brother. Though his parents had three children, only one had mattered when it came to the succession. Sophie, his younger sister, had been attended and sponsored and chaperoned, but his father had purchased a major’s commission for Marcus the moment he’d earned his sheepskin from Oxford. He was the spare, not the heir.
He had ceased to let it rankle years ago.
For the most part.
“I have a grandchild, yes, but not a grandson.” Mother sat up. “I wanted a grandson.”
“And I wanted you to have one, but God had other plans.”
And God’s plans had put paid to Marcus’s own. Life would be so much easier if God would stay confined to Sunday worship and evening prayers instead of encroaching on Marcus’s carefully laid arrangements.
“God has abandoned our family. Or He’s punishing me for something. Why else would He treat me this way?” She put her hand to her throat, the tears thickening her voice. “Oh, it’s all such a mess. Still, I suppose we’ll have to move forward. We have no choice. Tomorrow we’ll begin packing for London.”
“London?”
“Of course. Now that your circumstances have changed, we must begin the search.” A fortifying breath lifted her shoulders.
“The search?” He sounded like a parrot. “For what?”
“Well, for a suitable bride for you. I made inquiries last Season, but I wasn’t aiming high enough, I suppose. I was looking for a baronet’s daughter, or a squire’s, but now I’ll have to start over.”
The hawsers tightened around his chest. “I’m in no rush. After all, it’s only been a few months since our bereavement and barely an hour since it all became official.” A wife was the farthest thing from his mind right now. His life up to this point had been carefully ordered, everything divided, kept separate, and tidy. Work, society, family, God. Adding the responsibilities of a dukedom left little room for a wife.
“You might not be in a rush. In fact, I’ve never known a time when you were, but I am. We’ve learned, much to our regret, how quickly circumstances can change. You must marry soon and set up your nursery. It’s your duty to this family and to the memory of those we’ve lost.” Her backbone stiffened, and for the first time in months, a gleam entered her eyes. “I shall make a list and begin my inquiries … or …”