Virtue's Reward (4 page)

Richard jammed his hat on his head and strode off down a path through the trees. She could not marry Nigel Garthwood. The thought revolted him as clearly as what he had found at Madame Relet’s in Paris. So why not marry her himself? If he was to achieve his dream of domestic tranquillity, he had to marry someone. And something about Miss Trethaerin was deeply attractive.

How many ladies would have allowed that little stretch of silence, or thought to retreat into the cool of the summerhouse? His headache had ebbed away in her company as absolutely as if she had reached out with her long fingers to smooth it away. It was a little disconcerting that his pain had been so transparent, but it only meant that she was perceptive—and considerate.

And she was lovely. Fair, fine-boned, graceful. The line of her chin and nose shone as clear as porcelain. Her neck was enticing, slender and delicate. Her hands moved in a tracery of—

The thought—the word he wanted—was simply this:
desire
.

He desired her with every facet of his being—and not only her slender body and winsome face—he desired
her
. He desired her intelligence and humor and that deep undercurrent of passion. But above all, he desired her overriding habits of serenity and control.

He had no doubt that Miss Helena Trethaerin could bring him the peace that he craved.

Yet how he could persuade her to accept him?

* * *

Helena walked steadily back toward the summerhouse. She had taken off her bonnet and was swinging it in one hand. Wisps of hair tickled her cheeks. She stopped to brush them back and saw him striding toward her. Sunlight and shadow played across his broad shoulders, glimmered over his strong jaw and chin.

She waited quietly and watched him approach, then gave him a rueful smile.

“I’m sorry, Captain Acton. I know you meant nothing but kindness. I was ungracious. But you are constantly springing the most extraordinary statements on me. I am honored by your proposal, but you must see that it’s impossible.”

He turned and fell into step beside her and they walked on.

“I see that it’s impossible that you marry Garthwood.”

“Yes, I know. I admit I don’t like him. But I can hardly accept an offer from you when it is based on nothing more than charity. In fact, it would be villainous to do so.”

“Why?”

“Captain Acton, surely you’re not serious?”

“I have never been more serious in my life. Listen, Miss Trethaerin. I have spent the last seven or eight years in constant turmoil, and it’s time that I settled down. I want to live a normal life, here in England. I need to marry. My father wishes it strongly, among other things. There is no other lady who has engaged my affections. You are eligible, you require escape from a situation that is intolerable, and I am sworn to provide for you. We can help each other. I need a bride. You need security. We are both reasonably well mannered, I trust, and you seem intelligent and levelheaded. Why shouldn’t we form an alliance?”

She fought to stay calm. “But I know nothing about you.”

His eyes shone with humor. “I thought you knew that I was a paragon of virtue?”

“You’re not the only officer that Edward wrote to me about.”

“Yes, but I’m the one who’s here and offering you my hand and heart. Don’t you trust me?”

Helena blushed, her discomfort sinking deep to the bone. From the impression that her cousin had given her, there was no man on earth more deserving of trust. All the more reason she could not accept his extraordinary charity.

“Edward was rather impetuous as a boy and easily impressed. You knew him these last years better than I. You think I should credit his judgment?”

“I shan’t beat you, at least not with a stick thicker than my thumb.”

As he smiled at her again, her heart turned over. When he forgot his shadows, there was something overwhelming about his attraction. Something very far beyond the obvious good looks.

“I’m to be reassured by that?”

“I trust that you will not have too much reason to complain, though obviously I have my faults. And neither of us can claim that it would be anything other than a marriage of convenience. I have never expected anything else, and if your relationship with Edward was as you have described, neither have you. I see no reason why we shouldn’t be able to rub along.”

“You know nothing about me.”

“What is there to know? You were educated in Exeter at a young ladies’ seminary. I may assume that you have the usual accomplishments. Isn’t one young lady much like another?”

There was a distinct quirk at the corner of his mouth. How deeply was he teasing? She had no way of knowing.

“And, of course, you were Edward’s cousin,” he added with wry gravity. “He was a good soldier and an honorable man. That surely is enough?”

Helena glanced around at the trunks of the trees. Every one was as dear to her as a friend.

“Do you have a home, sir?”

“Of course. And I have sufficient funds.” Helena blushed scarlet as he stopped and turned her to face him. “I can keep you in perfect comfort.”

She pulled away from him and walked on. What on earth had made her weaken for a moment?

“This whole conversation is absurd, Captain Acton. However much I may have heard about you from Edward, we are still total strangers.”

They had come out onto the grass and were approaching the house. A gentleman came out to meet them. It was Nigel Garthwood. His long mouth seemed to be curved into a secret smile, but he bowed politely.

“Captain Acton? Charmed to see you again, sir, before you leave.”

“My pleasure, sir.”

Garthwood reached a hand toward Helena, as if to usher her back into the house.

“May I wish you a safe journey home, Captain?”

At which point, to her complete astonishment, Helena slipped her hand through Captain Acton’s arm.

She had not known until that moment what she was about to do. She did not think herself normally an impulsive person, but to stay one more day under Garthwood’s power was intolerable, and somehow that had just been made very clear.

Captain Richard Acton had offered for her for all the wrong reasons, but the drowning don’t question motives when clutching at straws.

“You may wish me a pleasant journey also, if you would be so kind, Mr. Garthwood,” she heard herself say. “I shall be accompanying Captain Acton to London.”

She felt her savior’s body go rigid next to hers and fought to keep her hand from shaking.

Garthwood paled and clenched his fists. “Am I to have no other reply to my offer, ma’am?”

Helena took a deep breath. “I am very sensible of the honor you have extended to me, sir. It pains me to reply so precipitately and when we are not private, but I have just accepted Captain Acton’s proposal. He and I are to be married.”

The muscles in Captain Acton’s arm flexed hard under her fingers, as if ready for action. She glanced up at his profile. His nostrils were flared like those of a war-horse.

Garthwood merely smiled and bowed. “Then please accept my felicitations.” The men shook hands. “I wish you both very happy. Let us go in and drink to your health.”

Helena followed the two men inside. She looked around at the familiar room with its faded rugs and solid furniture. She would never see this house again—nor her father, nor Edward. The pain gripped and twisted. Her father had died, Edward had died, leaving her lost in darkness, haunting her home like a wraith, while calling it tranquillity.

Whatever happened now, whatever her future, at least she had come back to life.

Garthwood went to the fireplace and rang the bell.

“Champagne, I think?” he said as the footman entered.

They duly partook of a ritual drink. Captain Acton seemed totally bereft of words, so Helena filled the silence with a dutiful chatter.

At last Garthwood rose. “When do you leave, sir?”

Helena glanced at the stranger she had just promised to marry. Would he spurn her, after all? Leap up and stride away now, leaving her here with Garthwood to face the consequences?

But he spoke calmly, as if it were all already decided between them. “I must order a carriage and Miss Trethaerin will need to pack some things. I thought perhaps tomorrow morning?”

“I can be packed in three hours, sir,” Helena said firmly. “And there’s a chaise for hire in Penzance. We can send Rogers for it. So there’s no reason we can’t leave this afternoon.”

Now that her decision was made she didn’t dare allow time for reflection.

“Of course,” he said.

Garthwood shook him by the hand, then he raised Helena’s fingers to his lips and kissed them briefly.

“Then this is good-bye, ma’am,” he said, and was gone.

Helena sat suddenly on the sofa.

“Oh, heavens,” she said. “A lady probably never either turned down nor accepted a proposal of marriage in such a ramshackle way. You will think I am wanting most dreadfully in decorum.”

“Not at all,” he said. “I think you didn’t want to face him alone with a refusal. I don’t blame you. In fact, you’re afraid to remain here at all now, even for one more night.”

“He has never given me the least cause to fear him, Captain Acton. Since he arrived at Trethaerin, Mr. Garthwood has been nothing but generous and correct. His offer of marriage can hardly be blamed. It’s not his fault that Edward didn’t leave a will and that he was the closer heir.”

And to her own astonishment, she burst into tears. For a moment she thought Captain Acton would sit next to her and take her in his arms, but instead he walked to the window and looked out at the roses.

“The man is cruel,” he said. “Every instinct can tell you that.”

Helena wiped her eyes and smiled at him. “Yes, and I am an abject coward, to use you for protection and force you to be witness to my rejection of his offer. Even Nigel Garthwood did not deserve that humiliation. You really don’t need to marry me, you know.”

“But I want to. Are you sure of your decision?”

“If you really mean it, I most gratefully accept your proposal, sir.”

“Of course. I don’t go back on my word.”

“Then it would seem that we have agreed to marry each other.”

He smiled. “If we’re to leave today, you had better pack.”

Helena stood up. “Captain Acton, I must thank you.”

He came over to her and took her hands, then lightly kissed her fingers.

“No, ma’am. It is you who have honored me with your acceptance. Now, let’s send a man for that carriage.”

* * *

The chaise was stuffy inside and smelled faintly of fish. Helena leaned back against the red velvet cushions and closed her eyes. There was a thump and the ancient carriage swayed as the hired men strapped on her box. She had brought every one of Edward’s letters, folded and tied with white ribbon, that storehouse of anecdotes and funny stories from the Peninsula—and her first portrait of Captain Richard Acton. Yet she could not bring a maid. All the servants at Trethaerin were local people with family in the village or the surrounding countryside, and none of those fresh-faced girls would make much of a London lady’s maid.

What had she done? She had just agreed to marry a perfect stranger. What possible reason could he have to go through with a marriage to a woman he had known for only two days? Perhaps he would ravish or abandon her?

The door to the chaise opened.

“Good heavens,” Captain Acton said lightly. “It’s like being Jonah in the belly of the whale. I thought I would join you. Bayard will follow tied on behind willingly enough.”

“Of course.” Helena did her best to match her tone to his. “But never having been on the sea, I can’t say whether Jonah would have felt at home in our distinctly piscine equipage or not.”

He stepped athletically into the carriage and took the seat opposite her. “You mean to tell me that you spent your life in Cornwall and never ventured out on a boat?”

“I had a very uninteresting upbringing, Captain.”

“Yet if the books in your father’s library are anything to go by, you did not lack for mental stimulation.” He smiled as she gave him a surprised look. “Forgive me,” he said. “I nosed around shamelessly while you were packing. Did you read all that stuff?”

Helena was forced to laugh. “Most of it! There was nothing else on long winter evenings.”

“Good God!” he said with a grin. “I’m marrying a bluestocking.”

“I refuse to believe that you haven’t read the classics yourself, sir.”

“Yet I ran away from school several times, and a knowledge of Ovid and Homer wasn’t in the least use in my later career.”

At last, the opening she wanted. “Have you always been a soldier?”

The black eyes surveyed her with considerable amusement. “Like Jonah, fishing? No, I have not, but I have always retained an appreciation for Homer.”

And he adroitly turned the subject to a discussion of poetry.

As they traveled into the long summer twilight, Helena discovered that Captain Acton could be an extremely fascinating companion. Little by little, she became more entranced. He was more than widely read—he put her knowledge of literature to shame. They were debating the merits of Lord Byron’s work, when he suddenly leaned forward and rapped on the panel. Instantly the carriage swayed to a halt.

“Why are we stopping?” Helena asked.

“Because the sun is setting, dear Miss Trethaerin.”

He leaped from the coach and held open the door for her. Helena stepped down. The highway ran along the high central spine of Cornwall. Open moor and stone-fenced fields dropped away on both sides of the road. In the west, in a glory of blazing color, the sun was sinking over the horizon.

Captain Acton laughed. It was a sound of pure delight, with no hint of that underlying shadow. He grasped the brass handles at the side of the carriage and swung himself up to stand beside the astonished coachman. He stood for a moment, silhouetted against the sky, a slight breeze ruffling his bright hair. Helena gazed up at him. Something strange and dangerous twisted at her heart.

The coachman climbed down to stand at the horses’ heads.

“Come,” Captain Acton said, reaching a hand down to her. “It’s stunning from up here.”