CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
MORDECAI HAD TOLD Eleanor Wrotham that he trusted her judgment, and he did—but that didn’t stop him being hugely relieved when he saw her waiting in the private parlor. “How was the cathedral?” he asked, as they sat down to eat luncheon.
“Very handsome,” she said politely, serving herself from the platters laid before them.
He glanced at her face. “Were you bored?”
She glanced up, met his eyes, and nodded.
“I’m sorry.” Mordecai served himself: slices of cold sirloin, mustard, bread-and-butter.
“Did you have any trouble in West Quarter?”
“Not much.” Mordecai gave a grunt of amusement. “Walter fell victim to a fogle hunter.”
Eleanor’s eyebrows lifted. “A fogle hunter? What on earth is that?”
“A stealer of handkerchiefs.”
Her eyebrows rose even higher. “There are people who make their living stealing handkerchiefs?”
“Among other things,” Mordecai said, and applied himself to his food.
They ate for a moment in silence, and then Eleanor said, “I take it you had no luck with the midwives?”
“I found them,” Mordecai said. “But none of them have seen your sister. They gave me four more names, though. That should keep me busy this afternoon.”
“I’m sorry,” Eleanor said.
“What for?”
She put down her cutlery. “It should be me looking for Sophia, not you. It should be me tramping all over Exeter finding midwives, not you. I hate that I can’t and that you have to do it instead, and it’s taking all your time and costing you money—”
“I’m happy to help,” Mordecai said firmly. “I want to help.” He reached across the table and took one of her hands. “There’s nothing I’d rather do than help you find your sister.”
He thought that her eyes filled with tears briefly, and then she blinked several times and looked down at his hand holding hers, and her fingers moved, so that she was holding his hand just as much as he was holding hers.
Mordecai’s heart seemed to roll over in his chest. His throat tightened.
They sat in silence for several seconds, holding hands across the table, and then Eleanor raised her gaze to his face. “If I’d been betrothed to you and not Roger when Sophia ran away, would you have ended our engagement?”
“Of course not.”
“Would you have helped me find her?”
“Yes.”
“Would you have made the soldier marry Sophia?”
Mordecai shook his head.
Her eyebrows twitched together. “Why not?”
“A hasty marriage might have scotched the scandal, but I doubt it would have brought your sister happiness. No man of good character would run off with a fifteen-year-old.”
“What would you have done when you found them?”
Castrated the bastard, Mordecai thought. “First, I would have married you. Then, I would have brought your sister to live with us.”
“And brought ruin on yourself?” She shook her head. “Your father wouldn’t have allowed it.”
“He wouldn’t have liked it,” Mordecai corrected her. “But there’s nothing he could have done to stop it.”
“He could have disinherited you.”
“He wouldn’t have. He loved me.”
“And it would have broken his heart to see you lose your entrée to Society!” Eleanor shook her head firmly, and removed her hand from his clasp. “I wouldn’t have allowed it. I wouldn’t have married you.”
Mordecai recaptured her hand. “Then I would have found another solution. I would have . . . I’d have set her up in a house of her own, as Father did with my mother.”
“In Shoreditch?”
“Not in Shoreditch,” Mordecai said. “Somewhere more pleasant.”
Eleanor was silent for a moment, studying him. “Do you think your mother would have been happier if she’d lived elsewhere?”
Mordecai considered this question, and shook his head. “I think that if Father had given her a house in Mayfair—even if he’d married her—she’d have been unhappy. Because it was her nature to be unhappy.” He tightened his grip on her hand. “But all this is irrelevant, Nell. It doesn’t matter what might have happened, because it didn’t.”
“I know.” Her gaze fell to her plate, where half a slice of cold sirloin lay uneaten. “I think Sophia would have been happy even in Shoreditch. It’s her nature to be happy.”
“Then she’s very lucky.”
“Yes.” Eleanor’s gaze lifted again. “I used to envy her,” she said, with the air of someone making a terrible confession. “I used to wish I was happy all the time, too, and that people loved me as much as they loved her.”
I love you just the way you are, Mordecai thought, tightening his grip on her hand.
“Sometimes I’d get so cross and so . . . so impatient with all the things I wasn’t allowed to do—and I’d get cross with Sophia, too, for being so amiable, and for not being bothered by all Father’s rules.” She grimaced, a brief twist of her lips. “I’m not a very nice person,” she said gruffly.
“I think you are.”
Eleanor shook her head. “You’ll like Sophia more than you like me. Everyone does.”
“I doubt it,” Mordecai said. “I’ve never placed much value on amiability. I much prefer spirit.”
Eleanor looked at him uncertainly, as if she didn’t believe him.
Mordecai smiled at her and released her hand. “Finish your luncheon, Nell.”
Eleanor eyed him for a moment, then picked up her knife and fork again.
Mordecai thought about the special license in his pocket and wondered whether now would be a good time to ask Eleanor Wrotham to marry him. It felt as if it might be.
He took a deep breath, and said, “Will you marry me?”
Her gaze flew to him. She was silent for a long time, her knife and fork poised above her plate, so long a time that he began to hope she’d changed her mind, and then she said, “I told you last night, no.”
Mordecai released his breath, released his hope. “So you did.”
But he didn’t feel defeated as he picked up his own cutlery. One day when he asked, she’d say Yes. He knew it.
AFTER LUNCHEON, MORDECAI went up to his bedchamber and dug through his portmanteau, looking for the novels Tompkin had packed for him to read. One was called Sense and Sensibility, the other Summer in St. Ives, both bound in three volumes. Mordecai put Summer in St. Ives back; it was not the sort of thing one would offer to an innocent young lady. And then he took it out again. He’d told Eleanor Wrotham that he didn’t want to cage her, that he wanted to set her free, which meant that he was not going to censor her reading.
He went down to the parlor. “Here,” he said, placing the volumes on the table. “For you to read this afternoon if you wish. Novels.”
“Novels?” Eleanor picked up the topmost book, opened it, found the title page. “The author is anonymous?”
“They’re both anonymous,” Mordecai said. “I’ve heard that Sense and Sensibility is a charming novel, whereas Summer in St. Ives is . . . well, let’s just say that it’s not something your father would have allowed you to read.”
Eleanor gave a tiny snort. “My father never let me read any novels.”
“What?” Mordecai said, incredulous. “You mean . . . you’ve never read a novel? Ever?”
“One, when I was staying with the Dalrymples.”
“Did you enjoy it?”
Her lips tilted up. “Yes. It was quite absurd. Full of ghosts and fainting heroines.”
“I don’t think you’ll find either of those in these novels,” Mordecai said. “Sense and Sensibility is meant to be quite realistic, and Summer in St. Ives is, well . . . it’s rather risqué. You won’t find it in any bookshops.”
She looked at him, her eyebrows lifting. “Then how did you purchase it?”
“Subscription,” Mordecai said. “The publisher knows the kind of books I like. I haven’t read this one yet, so I can’t speak for its content, but the others by this author are . . . let’s just say that she has a talent for writing novels that are amusing and titillating.”
“She?”
“I believe the author is a woman.”
“Oh,” Eleanor said, her eyebrows lifting again. She looked down at the volumes on the table.
“You would be safest to read Sense and Sensibility,” Mordecai said.
Eleanor glanced at him. “Safe?” It was one word only, but her tone held a hint of distaste.
“Read whichever novel you wish,” Mordecai said, opening his hand in a do as you will gesture. “Just be aware that one of them may shock you.” He picked up his hat and gloves. “I’ll be off. Enjoy your afternoon.”
At the door, he paused and looked back. Eleanor was examining the books, her lips pursed thoughtfully.