A Scandalous Secret Read Free

serious.’ Dorinda looked quite shocked.
    Elizabeth came to join her in the window embrasure. ‘If only you would learn not to meddle, dear sister,’ she said.
    ‘But his pursuit of you has been so marked,’ Dorinda protested. ‘Sally Jersey herself wrote to me that all the news from London is of your approaching betrothal. I made sure you were ready to accept him.’
    Taking Dorinda’s hands in her own, Elizabeth gave a rueful smile. ‘You ought not to believe everything you hear, Dorrie. Particularly from Lady Jersey, who may be well-meaning but is hardly a bosom friend of mine and not at all acquainted with my desires or plans. Oswald has indeed been pursuing me - a necessary consequence of my fleeing from him. But it seems impossible to escape what has become a form of persecution, with my own sister deserting to the enemy camp and conspiring to entrap me.’
    ‘I cannot understand it,’ Dorinda declared. Her countenance reflected blank confusion. ‘He is so very handsome. Even you cannot deny that, Lizzy. Such a figure! Such an air! How can you remain insensible of his attraction?’
    Elizabeth laughed outright at this panegyric. ‘It seems that you are the one who has conceived a decided tendre for this Apollo. Alastair had best beware.’
    ‘You are the most vexatious creature!’ the other cried, obviously much put out. ‘I was so certain that I had found the perfect man for you. Any other woman in your position would be in ecstasy.’
    ‘No sensible woman would be for long - if she made the mistake of marrying him.’
    Dorinda stood up rather stiffly. ‘He is quite charming, Lizzy, but you will not allow yourself to admit it.’ She stopped, placing one hand lightly on her sister’s shoulder. ‘My dear,’ she went on more gently, ‘I know your experience of men and matrimony has not been a happy one. But you must endeavour to put that behind you now and look to the future.’
    ‘With Lord Maples?’ Elizabeth asked, catching the hand and rising herself, the two of them framed in the afternoon sunlight shining through the window behind. ‘Believe me, Oswald is not the man to tempt me to marriage again. He is handsome enough, I grant you, but he is also conceited, arrogant, unctuous and stubborn.’
    ‘Surely you exaggerate?’
    ‘No,’ she insisted, adding, ‘Nicky does not like him either, you know. So there is no question of anything between us but the most tepid of friendships.’
    Dorinda looked grave. ‘Would you allow Nicky to prevent you from marrying where you choose?’
    ‘Why not?’ Elizabeth smiled. ‘My son is an excellent judge of character. In this case, however, I am following my own inclination. I am certain that Oswald would make a most disagreeable husband.’
    Dorinda sighed, but appeared to be resigned. ‘I fear,’ she said slowly, ‘that you will never permit any man to breach those walls you have built around your heart, my dear. Gerald is dead and should be forgotten.’
    On that note, she quit the room. It was only after she was gone that Elizabeth recalled that Dorinda had given her no satisfactory explanation for Alastair’s absence. It was altogether an unsettling beginning to her visit.
    The two ladies were the first to go down for supper. Elizabeth had seen that Nicky was taken care of and had promised to look in on him before retiring. Her maid, Janet, had done an excellent job tonight, and Elizabeth knew that she was looking her best in a blue silk gown with a lace collar cut low across the bosom. Her golden curls were arranged a la Venus. She hoped that Oswald would not construe this as an attempt to impress him, but doubted that his vanity was capable of supposing anything else.
    ‘Lord Maples is a trifle tardy,’ Dorinda remarked, tapping her slippered foot impatiently on the elaborately patterned carpet. She was well turned-out herself in salmon pink and carrying a pretty silver fan.
    ‘He is probably undecided as to which method of tying his