A Waltz to Remember

Bertrand Lamarr, Viscount Watley, slouching comfortably, if somewhat inelegantly, in his favorite leather chair, his legs stretched out before him, his feet propped on the hearth and crossed at the ankles, lowered his book. The library at Elm Court, his home in Sussex, was his favorite room. His father, the Marquess of Dorchester, owned the house, but he lived with his second wife at Redcliffe Court in Northamptonshire, the home and estate he had inherited with his title thirteen years ago after his uncle died without direct male issue. Bertrand had lived there too for several years, but after completing his studies at Oxford, he and Estelle, his twin sister, had returned here.
The library looked cozy in the light of the lamp that stood on the table beside him and the flickering flames of the fire in the hearth. Heavy velvet curtains were drawn across the window, shutting out the darkness and the raw chill of the late autumn evening and hid the cushioned window seat, where Estelle had often sat, sideways so she could see both into the room and out across the lawn and flower garden, her knees drawn up before her, an open book propped against her thighs.
She had married Justin Wiley, Earl of Brandon, two years ago gone to live with him at Everleigh Park in Hertfordshire. Bertrand had spent a few weeks with them earlier in the year after the premature birth of their first child. He had stayed with them through the weeks of anxiety that had followed. David had fit inside his father’s hand at the beginning, and they were all horribly aware that early babies rarely thrived. But David had stubbornly clung to life and begun to grow, and after a few weeks Bertrand had felt able to join Owen Ware, his old friend from Oxford, on a planned visit to Ravenswood in Hampshire, principal seat of the Earl of Stratton, Owen’s elder brother. soon after returning home from there, he had gone to spend a week with Jane and Charles Morrow, his maternal aunt and uncle, who had raised him and Estelle following the death of their mother before they were even one year old. Their father had fled from home in the extremity of his grief and not come back, except for the occasional fleeting visit, in more than sixteen years. Though then, of course, it had been to Redcliffe he returned, not here.
The whole summer had been busy and emotionally draining in more ways than one. He was very happy to be home again with no one to answer to except himself. He enjoyed company, but he did not crave it.
He returned his attention to his book. Reading had always been one of his greatest pleasures. He could lose himself in a book for hours at a time, totally absorbed, unaware of his surroundings. This evening, however, he was finding it difficult to concentrate. He liked to read the ancient classics in their original language, Greek in this case. Literature, he felt, always lost something in the translation. He determinedly focused his mind upon the page open before him, but after another minute or two of staring at it, he snapped the book shut, let it drop to his lap, and drummed his fingers on the arms of his chair.
God, but he was so damned lonely.
It was a thought that shook him. When anyone asked, knowing he lived alone, he always explained that there was a world of difference between solitude and loneliness. He liked solitude and reveled in it when life became too busy with other activities, as it sometimes did. He was never ever lonely, he had always asserted.
But he was lonely now.
Estelle had raised the possibility with him while they were strolling in the parterre gardens in front of the house the day before he left Everleigh Park.
“Do you remember the conversation we had the day before I met Justin?” she asked him. “We were sitting in the library at Elm Court and you asked me what I was looking for in a husband.”
“I do remember,” he answered. “You told me you were looking for someone perfect.”
She laughed. “But the first time I saw Justin,” she said, “I considered him the most abominable man I had ever met. Taciturn and rude and over-large and ugly too. It was an opinion that grew more intense with subsequent meetings.”
“Until you fell in love with him,” he said.
“Until then,” she said, squeezing his arm as they both laughed. “And I fell hard. But what about you, Bert? Do you miss me? Are you lonely? What are you looking for in a wife? You could not answer the question when I asked it at the time.”
“Yes, I miss you,” he said. “And no, I am not lonely. And I still have no answer for the other question. Besides, who says I am looking for a wife?”
“I do,” she had said. “I have absolutely no intention of having a curmudgeonly bachelor of a brother for the rest of my life. Not that you are that yet. But we are not so very far off thirty, are we? Soon we will be a pair of ancients. Bert, is there no one?”
“No one,” he said so quickly that she looked at him suspiciously.
“There is someone, then,” she said.
“Do you not listen, Stell?” he said, exasperated.
“Oh, I will not allow you to deny it,” she said. “This is your twin here, remember? Do tell. Is she someone you met in London before you dashed up here after David was born? One of the newest young beauties with which the Season always abounds, perhaps?”
“No,” he said quite truthfully.
He spent a few weeks of the spring in London almost every year. He enjoyed wandering about the galleries and museums and historic buildings and attending the theater and the opera. He liked the energy of the social Season and the company of friends and relatives he would not see much otherwise. He even enjoyed the balls and picnics and soirees and private concerts and other entertainments with which the Season teemed, provided he was not obliged to attend too many of them. But he could not imagine finding a bride there, a lifelong companion and friend and soulmate. There would be no chance in the frenzied atmosphere of the great marriage mart to develop the sort of relationship that would give him sufficient assurance of lifelong contentment, even happiness. Besides, he had never been more than mildly attracted to women who were simply beautiful, the sole criterion by which most men seemed to make their choice, unless they were compelled to marry money.
No, he had not met anyone in London.
But Estelle had not trusted his denial. They were not identical twins, of course. Nevertheless, there was a bond between them far closer than that shared by most brothers and sisters of Bertrand’s acquaintance. They could not exactly read each other’s mind, but they could sense things about each other without having to be told. Things that went deeper than the mind itself.
“Who is she?” she asked, tipping her head to one side and continuing to look at him as they wandered through the parterres.
“She is nobody,” he said. “There is nobody.”
“Oh, there is somebody, you provoking man,” she said with a sigh. “But keep your secret if you must. I will be patient. Not, it seems, that I have any choice.”
And of course, she was right. There was someone. Correction. There had been someone when they spoke. By the time he returned home from Ravenswood a month or so later, there no longer was.
Quite the opposite, in fact.
He wished he could simply erase the memory of what had happened there.
He had never had any close acquaintance with Lady Stephanie Ware though it was eight years since he first met her at Ravenswood when he was twenty and still at university and she was seventeen and still in the schoolroom. He had gone then too to spend a couple of weeks of the summer with Owen. He had been warmly welcomed by the whole of the Ware family, whom he had liked immensely. All of them, that was, except Owen’s younger sister, who had avoided him and scarcely spoken to him the whole time he was there. He would have thought her simply shy had it not been for the fact that she did not seem to be shy with anyone else.
It was a couple of years later before he saw her again at a ball in London he was attending with Estelle. She had been there with her brother and sister-in-law, the Earl and Countess of Stratton, and the dowager countess, her mother. He had been delighted to see them again and had taken his sister to meet them. They had all been pleased too—except Lady Stephanie, who had greeted them both with the barest civility. He had not asked her for a dance and had not seen her again in the days following the ball. Eventually, he learned from Owen that his elder sister, Philippa, Duchess of Wilby, was increasing and not feeling at all the thing what with morning sickness and all that stuff women had to go through, poor things. Wilby had abandoned his duties as a member of the House of Lords to take her back to the country, and Stephanie had gone with them to give her sister her company for what remained of her confinement.
Bertrand had seen Stephanie a few times in the years since then, but never for long enough to get to know her. He had never forgotten her, however. He had thought of her after Owen invited him to spend a couple of weeks with him at Ravenswood again. He had been thinking of her while he was staying with Estelle and Justin and hoping he would not have to cancel the plans he had made with Owen.
There was to be a village fete during his stay there, and he had remembered from a previous summer how very jolly those day-long events could be, packed as they were with varied activities and contests for all ages from the opening ceremony in the morning to the ball and late supper in the evening.
The house had already been packed with guests, both family and friends, by the time Bertrand arrived. He had been particularly delighted to find that Camille Cunningham was there with her husband, Joel, and their nine children. Camille was the elder daughter of Viola, Bertrand’s stepmother, and was therefore his stepsister though they had not grown up together. Her family was at Ravenswood because Joel, a portrait painter of growing renown, had been commissioned to paint the Dowager Countess of Stratton’s portrait but had been reluctant to abandon his family after a lengthy absence from them in London during the spring. The Earl of Stratton had promptly invited Joel to bring his family with him.
Camille had greeted Bertrand, as she always did, like a long-lost beloved brother, with hugs and warm smiles.
But he had had an additional motive for going to Ravenswood, apart from the simple pleasure of spending time with Owen, attending the fete, and being one of a large, amiable party of house guests. He had wanted to see Stephanie Ware again.
He could not quite understand why her image came to his mind whenever he thought about marriage. And he had been thinking about it lately, having grown aware, not only of his advancing age and his responsibility to produce heirs of his own, but also of the void left in his life by the marriage of his twin. Stephanie had kept coming to his mind, though really he hardly knew her, and she had never shown the slightest interest in him. Quite the opposite, if anything.
Was that perhaps the attraction?
He remembered her as a pretty young woman, with a round, fresh-complexioned face and a lovely smile, enhanced by white, even teeth. She had healthy-looking skin and golden blond hair worn unfashionably in a thick double plait about her head. She had not been of slender build, though he had been surprised when Owen had remarked to him once that she saw herself as fat and ugly. She was neither, though she would probably never be one of the slender beauties of fashionable society. That was of no significance whatsoever to Bertrand. He had always liked her looks. She looked real to him, whatever he meant by that. He rather thought he would like her too if she would give him the chance to get to know her and allow herself to get to know him. She seemed to like everyone else, after all, and she was well liked generally.
There was the suggestion of sunshine about her—except, perhaps, in a London ballroom, where she did not excel. Though admittedly, he had seen her in that setting only the once.
Perhaps this year would be different, he had thought. She was older, after all, and presumably more mature. And she was still single even though she must be twenty-five by now.
His thoughts were interrupted now by the arrival in the library of a servant come to remove the empty dishes from the table beside Bertrand and shovel more coal onto the dying fire and ask if his lordship needed anything else.
“No, nothing, thank you,” Bertrand said. “The fire will be good now until I go to bed. Good night, James.”
He had gone to Ravenswood with the express intention of becoming better acquainted with Stephanie Ware and perhaps beginning a courtship. Surely she would not reject him outright, not, at least, if he did not press his attentions too aggressively upon her. He had gone there with a certain degree of optimism.
And he had been enchanted from the beginning. She had looked much the same, but with an indefinable difference. She was indeed more mature, more self-assured, more vibrant. She was friendly with everyone and wonderful with all the children at the house, with whom she was always ready to play, even when the game was energetic and left her breathless and flushed and laughing. And sometimes even slightly disheveled.
There had been too many people at Ravenswood to allow him as much opportunity for personal conversation with her as he had hoped. She had not avoided him entirely, however, as she had on previous occasions. He had been rather happy by the day of the fete, though he was aware that his visit was drawing to a close and he was running out of time to make his intentions clear.
On the morning of the fete, everyone from miles around converged upon the village green for the opening ceremony outside the church and all the activities that followed: shopping at the numerous booths with their tempting offerings about the perimeter of the green; the children’s races; refreshments at the inn; a display of maypole dancing on the green by a group of dancers who practiced diligently every week of the year. Their display was followed by lessons for anyone who wished to try their skill with the ribbons to the accompaniment of the lively music of two fiddles.
Many people had so wished and had had to be divided into groups.
Bertrand had found himself in the one that included Stephanie. She had been bright-eyed and flushed and laughing—and light on her feet. She had saved him once from bringing disaster upon the whole group—and jeers from some of the spectators surrounding the maypole—when he would have taken himself and his brightly colored ribbon under rather than over her arm. She had laughed with him and looked both genuinely amused and exuberant.
She had sung with the choir inside the church after that. She even had a solo part. She had a sweet, pure soprano voice. When everyone, participants and audience alike, had dispersed after the concert to hurry up to Ravenswood for the afternoon events, Bertrand had hung back to ask if he might accompany her up to the house. She had raised no objection, and they had conversed amiably as they walked until he judged the moment to be right and asked if she would reserve a dance for him during the evening, specifically a waltz.
He had expected her to agree. There seemed, after all, no reason why she would refuse. But when she had answered him, that was exactly what she had done. She had said no.
He had covered his surprise by suggesting that if she did not have a waltz free, perhaps she would reserve a different dance for him. But she had interrupted him even before he was finished.
“No,” she had said curtly. “I do not wish to dance with you, Viscount Watley. I wish you would leave me alone. I wish you would not assume that you can have whatever you want whenever you want it. I do not wish to dance with you, this evening or ever.”
He was pretty sure those were her exact words. They had lashed about him at the time and seared themselves upon his brain.
He had been horribly embarrassed. He seemed to recall apologizing to her and assuring her he would never bother her again. He definitely remembered wishing he could just disappear, leave Ravenswood without further ado, never to set eyes upon it or her ever again. Or even Owen.
None of it had been possible, of course. There were proprieties and courtesies to be observed.  Somehow he had got through the rest of the day and the days after that until it was time to leave.
It was only after he left, relieved and licking his wounds in the privacy of his carriage, that he had felt the injustice of her words. He was not as arrogant as she had suggested, surely. Washe? Did he ever assume he could have whatever he wanted whenever he wanted it? He supposed there might be a grain of truth there. People always seemed only too delighted to cater to his every whim, and he could not swear that he had never taken advantage of that fact. But not to the point of actual arrogance, surely? But his confidence in himself had been severely eroded. And all because one woman had refused to dance with him at a country ball. It seemed ludicrous when put that way.
He had not been in love with her, after all.
Had he?
He was not in love with her now.
Was he?
But to that second possibility at least he could say a firm no. If he never saw Lady Stephanie Ware again, it would be too soon. And yes, sometimes clichés said it all.
In the weeks since then, he had grown angrier. She had humiliated him for no good reason. She had behaved badly. Would it have hurt her to dance with him? It was not as if he had asked her to marry him. There would have been countless other sets to be danced with men whose company she did not abhor.
Far from loving her, he actively disliked her.
So here he was at home alone, living with the prolonged solitude he had always imagined would be paradise. Until he had it, that was. Then the loneliness, unnoticed and unbidden, had crept in to tarnish the dream.
The solution was not to be found out there, however, either outside this home or outside his person. And paying extended visits to family and friends or seeking company among his neighbors, though he did both with some frequency and pleasure, would not erase his essential loneliness. Nor would brooding or endless introspection. Or reading a Greek tragedy—in Greek.
He needed—damn it all to hell!—he needed a wife. A companion and friend, a bed partner, a mother for his children. He needed a family, a noisy, boisterous group of children, both boys and girls, to make him long for peace and solitude again. And to gladden his heart.
Oh God, he needed love.
Both given and received.
The sudden, desperate wanting left him a bit shaken.
He did not want much, did he? Just the sun and the moon and all the stars to go with them. He chuckled mirthlessly into the blazing fire.
But Estelle had found love. His father had found it, though his children had been almost grown up at the time. Even niece Winifred Cunningham had found it.
But that was a thought that brought no great comfort, delighted as he was for Winnnie herself. She was going to marry Colonel Nicholas Ware, Owen’s elder brother, just before Christmas in Bath, and everyone from both families was invited and would undoubtedly be there since celebrating landmark events together seemed to be a trait shared by both the Wares and Winnie’s larger family, the Westcotts. And he, God help him, had been embraced by the Westcotts as one of their own as soon as his father married Viola. She had once been married to the head of the family—until, that was, her husband had been exposed after his death as a bigamist and Viola’s marriage had been rendered null and void, her children illegitimate. The Westcotts had flatly refused to disown her
Bertrand would attend the wedding, of course, because his father and Viola were going, and so were Estelle and Justin. He could hardly not go without attracting unwanted attention and dooming himself to spend Christmas here alone.
And yes, that was the worst detail of all. Camille had organized her daughter’s wedding close enough to Christmas so the family could stay in Bath and celebrate Christmas together too. But the family to Camille now included that of her soon-to-be son-in-law as well as the Westcotts. The Wares would stay for Christmas too. It was a mad idea by any standard. Camille and Joel’s house in the hills above Bath would be bursting at the seams. And two of its occupants during what was usually a joyful occasion would be Bertrand and Lady Stephanie Ware.
Her words to him on the day of that fete had implied that she hated him as much as he now hated her. Though that was a disturbing word. He did not deal in hatred. Or never had before this year.
And they were to spend Christmas together, that festival of peace and light and joy and goodwill.
Bertrand sighed and set his book down on the table beside him.
Perhaps he would have better luck with sleep than he had had with reading this evening.