Jane Feather Read Free Page B

appalling inconvenience it was going to cause everyone else. But she was resolute. She would just have to wait until Duncan ran out of steam. She wished Esther was here though, but Esther had nobly volunteered to make the social rounds of the family members already in London for the Season and break the news to them before they saw the notice in the Times .
    “You have to go and see Charles,” she continued. “It’s your job, Duncan. You’re head of the family now, and you have to go and inform Charles formally that the wedding is canceled. And you have to insist he sends a notice to the Times for the morning, just as you must do.”
    “If I’m head of the family, then I can forbid you to do this,” he said sullenly and without conviction.
    Imogen couldn’t help laughing. “No, my dear, you couldn’t. For a start, I’m no longer a minor and definitely not under your jurisdiction, and secondly, I have my own financial independence and am in no way beholden to the family coffers.” She came over to him, taking both his hands in hers, swinging them lightly as she used to do when he was a small child and out of sorts. “Dearest, you know you have to do this however much you don’t wish to. Just bite the bullet and go to Charles now and get it over with.”
    “Am I supposed to challenge him to a duel for dishonoring my sister?” Even Duncan saw the absurdity in this and bit his lip on an involuntary quiver of amusement.
    “That’s better,” Imogen encouraged, even though she had never felt less like smiling herself. “Charles will be civilized, I can assure you, but the formalities have to be gone through. No one is going to hold it against you, I promise. And once it’s all taken care of, Esther and I will leave town for Beaufort Hall and remain there until society has something else to occupy its tongue.”
    Slowly Duncan nodded. He had never been a match for either of his sisters and didn’t think he ever would be. And he knew he had no choice but to fulfill his social and familial obligations. “I’ll come back when I’ve spoken to Charles.”
    “Thank you, dearest.” She kissed his cheek. “And since you’ll be dining in tonight, I’ll ask Mrs. Windsor if she’ll make apple fritters.”
    “I’m not still in the nursery, Gen,” Duncan muttered. “I don’t have to be promised sweets as a consolation prize.”
    “Nevertheless, you’d still enjoy them, wouldn’t you?”
    “Yes,” he agreed reluctantly. “I was engaged with a party to go to . . .” He let the sentence fade. This was not going to be an evening when the Carstairses would be seen on the town. He left the salon, wishing his father were still alive.

    Charles was at home in his spacious lodgings on Upper Brooke Street. He had a modest independence, sufficient to permit him to maintain a married household, although there was no denying that Imogen’s significant personal fortune would make for a luxurious lifestyle he couldn’t manage on his own resources. He was well aware of this discrepancy, and equally well aware of the whispers that always attended marriages where the fortunes were unequal and the balance was in the lady’s favor.
    Since the Married Woman’s Property Acts, women did not automatically lose possession of their property on marriage as had always been the case hitherto. Legally, a married woman now had the same rights over her property, capital, and investments as a single woman, but there was still an unspoken assumption that the wife’s fortune became a joint asset to which a husband had the same rights as the wife. Imogen had her own views on how her fortune would enrich their lifestyle, and Charles, much less accustomed to wealth, had a more frugal view on the matter. It didn’t suit his pride to be dependent upon his wife, and as his own legal practice grew more lucrative, he could see the point at which his wife’s private means would no longer be necessary.
    Imogen had simply shrugged the