The Scottish Companion Read Free Page A

was silent, Arabella studying, and Gillian engaged in her embroidery.
    A very proper, if boring, existence, and one that was about to drastically change.
    How odd that she missed it already.
    She knocked on the door to Arabella’s sitting room, waited a moment, and opened the door. It would bea waste of time waiting for Arabella’s response. She neither welcomed nor forbade Gillian to enter. She simply ignored her.
    Gillian entered the room and closed the door behind her. Without a word, she went to the chair beside the window, sat, and picked up her embroidery. Arabella didn’t turn from her position at the desk.
    Long moments passed while Gillian stared out the window, wishing she could be anywhere but here. Perhaps on the moor, standing among the heather. A hardy plant, it scarcely seemed to need anything. Instead, it just planted its roots into the ground, impervious to wind or rain or sun. Would that she could be like the heather.
    She turned her head and regarded Arabella. Her head was bent, intent on the notes she was writing. The sun was bright today, and seemed to add gilt to the girl’s blond hair.
    “Your father wished to speak to me,” Gillian said.
    Arabella didn’t stop writing.
    “About your coming marriage.”
    Arabella’s head came up, but she didn’t turn. She only stared at the drawers of her secretary in front of her.
    “I told him you would object.”
    “Did you?” Arabella asked.
    “He said it was quite an honor to marry an earl.” Those weren’t his exact words. Dr. Fenton was a bit more avaricious than that, but the gist was the same.
    “You really do not have a choice, I’m afraid,” Gillian said. “Your father is set on the match. I have to agree that it seems very advantageous.”
    Arabella glanced at her, her mouth curved in a smile. “What would an earl want with me?”
    Did the girl not ever look in the mirror? She was perhaps the most beautiful creature Gillian had ever seen. She looked like an angel from a medieval painting with her heart-shaped face and striking green eyes. There was nothing about Arabella out of place, not one imperfection. Of course an earl would want her for his wife.
    “He says you can continue your studies. Did your father tell you that?”
    Arabella nodded. “I don’t believe him, of course.” She returned to her notes. “Most people say things they don’t really mean to make you do what they want.”
    “How horribly cynical,” Gillian said. “Surely you don’t actually feel that way?”
    “I do. My own father is not averse to the technique.” She glanced at Gillian again, looking supremely bored by the subject as if they were not discussing her future.
    “What if he were telling the truth?” Gillian asked. “Would you consent to the union?”
    Arabella smiled again.
    “Regardless of what I feel, Gillian, I haven’t a choice. I may rail and protest and shout to the rooftops, but in the end my father and the earl will make it come about. We women have no say in our lives, not truly. When a man asks you what you want, it is only a waste of time. If you tell him, he’ll quickly dismiss everything you’ve just said out of hand.”
    She turned her attention to her notes, but she didn’t begin writing. “I don’t want to be married, Gillian, but I shall be. I have no choice in the matter. I’m like a trapped animal, and no amount of prettying it up will change that fact.”
    “You might find love, Arabella. It might be possible to find love in such a union. If not, a measure of contentment. No, we do not have a choice, I agree, but in some matters you do. You could choose to be happy, in some way. The earl has said you might practice medicine. Surely you could find some contentment in that?”
    “How silly you can be, Gillian. You’re such a child in so many ways.”
    Stung, Gillian could only stare at her.
    “Sometimes, the price for contentment is too high. He will touch me. He will bed me. I think I shall die if that