Mad Dogs and Englishmen
Автор
Andreona C Garlid
Прочтений
168K
Глав
50
Every maiden in the realm is summoned to a grand estate for a fortnight of glittering revels, where a titled man—rich, reclusive, and rumored to be mad—must choose a bride. Whispers of strange deaths swirl through candlelit halls, but the promise of power, passion, and danger keeps hearts racing. Beneath the silk and smiles, everyone hides something. As the games of charm and deception unfold, one question burns brighter than the chandeliers: who will survive the Lord’s choice—and what will it cost to win his hand?
All Eligible Maidens Must Attend
“But he is rumored to be mad! You cannot seriously intend for us to go to this event, Stepmother—you simply cannot!” Charlotte was near to tears of frustration due to the impenetrable lack of reason that was her stepmother.
“I dare say if he wasn’t rumored to be somewhat insane, he’d be married by now to some noblewoman or other from a neighboring hamlet! But his madness is our chance! My daughter could be Lady Edenmorrow by the end of the month.” Mrs. Church squealed with delight.
Helena, her daughter, squealed as well and clapped her slender hands. Her golden curls bounced about her face as she practically vibrated with excitement.
“An entire fortnight of balls, hunts, dinners, and entertainments at the manor with His Lordship! And surely he will pick one of us! Why, our family is closest to being nobility after all. It’s not as if Abigail Flagg or Lucy Smith has any chance.” Helena curled a ringlet around her finger and sighed dramatically. Dramatic sighs were perhaps her greatest talent.
Charlotte pressed her fingers to her temples in frustration. She wondered for the thousandth time why she loved her stepsister so much. The girl had about enough brains to fill a spoon. Not a very large one either. The delicate kind you would use to stir your tea in a fine china cup.
“HE IS MAD! A madman has invited twelve maidens to spend a fortnight in his manor for ‘a festival of pleasures’ before deciding to marry one of them…only one. How many of those maidens do you think will leave as maidens? And is the one who is to be his bride going to be any luckier? Espoused to an insane lord whose ailing father might die at any moment and leave her utterly at the mercy of his deranged son?
“This is truly the most irrational I have ever seen the two of you behave, and I have seen you squander the entirety of my father’s fortune on frivolities and ribbons. You are incomparable!” Charlotte finished…instantly aware that she had gone too far.
Mrs. Church pursed her lips. “I see that you are jealous of Helena and are therefore trying to put her off attending this advantageous event! You know that as a high-minded and outspoken twenty-two-year-old maid, you have little or no chance against your much younger and more good-natured seventeen-year-old stepsister.
“You just can’t bear it that she shall be your mistress and have all the prestige whilst you spend your spinsterhood in this house alone. No man wants to marry a girl—a woman—with a tongue like a razor blade.”
Mrs. Church took Helena’s golden head to her chest. “Don’t you pay any mind to your stepsister. That redheaded creature is merely jealous of how sure you are to win his heart. I am convinced he is a perfect gentleman and the rumors are merely that! Don’t fret, my dear one.”
Charlotte raked her hand through her tousled hair. “Well, in that you are correct. Helena is prettier and gentler of nature than I and will no doubt secure a better match. That is the very reason that I wish to protect her. I would not wish my sister…”
“STEP-sister—my Helena shares no blood of yours, you imp,” injected Mrs. Church with great insistence. She regarded Charlotte then with great scrutiny. Was Helena prettier? Charlotte was tall—too tall—her gaze could meet many a man eye to eye.
Her hair was a deep auburn that glowed red in the candlelight, and her steely gray eyes had an intensity of intelligence in them that was frightening. Charlotte was a great beauty, but like a coiled viper is a great beauty.
If her father hadn’t insisted on over-educating her and treating her as a son all those years, she might have had a hope of being rid of her! But every suitor she had brought in for Charlotte had been left dumbfounded by the girl’s defiant nature.
Charlotte thought herself better than the plowman or the farmer’s son and had asked the poor men (who couldn’t even read) their thoughts on Shakespeare and the Iliad.
His lordship would surely prefer the doe-eyed gaze of her daughter to the melting stare of her stepdaughter. There could be no harm in letting Charlotte attend…provided she not be furnished with any particularly attractive dresses.
And if Charlotte was right about his lordship having unwholesome intentions toward the girls he intended to reject—then perhaps it was best if Helena did attend with a protector of sorts.
“Yes—she is my stepsister. But as she was a mere babe when she came to live with me, I doubt I could care for her more if she were of my father’s blood.” Charlotte saw deep resentment and anger cross her stepmother’s face. In a quiet and placating tone, she added, “I see that I cannot dissuade you from insisting that we go.” Charlotte sighed.
Mrs. Church inclined her head slightly in the smallest of nods, acknowledging her stepdaughter’s point in the merest of ways.
“You will go—with open eyes. Now go collect that wedding ring of your mother’s you keep in your upper drawer. Don’t think I don’t know you still have it wrapped up in a handkerchief up there. It must be sold. Helena needs a new hunting gown and a new ball gown. It would never do to have her seen twice in the same one, and you are to be there a fortnight!” Charlotte’s eyes widened in surprise.
“Please don’t! That is the most private and important thing in my possession. You cannot have the ring—you simply cannot. I refuse.” Her stepmother seemed to grow and stretch with her fury.
“You live under my roof, and you will do as I say! Get me the ring, or I shall throw you out and be done with you for good!” her stepmother shouted, looking purple and liverish like a Punch and Judy hand puppet. Helena put her hands to her mouth.
“Oh please, Mother, don’t! Don’t throw her out! You’ll give her the ring, won’t you, Charlotte?” Helena turned her eyes to Charlotte imploringly.
Charlotte turned on her heel and left the room, pulsating with anger. Helena needed fourteen days of hunting dresses and ball gowns. Charlotte had three of each and two day dresses…all several years out of season.
Helena would leave the house with four trunks of over thirty gowns. The expense was ludicrous. She doubted even the Princess of England had as many gowns and fripperies as her spoiled stepsister.
Every room of their house was a mausoleum of stark empty walls and carpetless halls from her stepmother’s spendthrift ways. She came slowly down the stairs and set the ring in her stepmother’s hand.
“There now, that wasn’t so hard, was it? It was either that or sell you off into indentured servitude to foot the bill.” She pocketed the ring with a malicious grin.
Charlotte gave her a furious glare and walked out of the house without speaking. She had learned that when she was overcome by a fit of temper, it was best not to speak, or she would surely get herself into more trouble.
The undersides of her arms bore all the hidden bruises and pinch-twist marks her stepmother enjoyed giving her when she spoke up for herself. And she’d already gone two days without food from her past remarks about this ball, and she’d begin fainting if the starvation punishment continued much longer.
“Have you ever seen such rude and ungrateful behavior? I didn’t have to care for her after her father’s death! I could have sent her away or simply given her to the nearest orphanage—for that is what she is! But no—she would rather have you sent off to meet his lordship looking like a pauper than part with a silly little ring she will never wear. Temper like that doesn’t find a husband.”
“But Mother…,” Helena began feebly. Then stopped.
There would be no use in arguing.
Someday, there would have to be a reckoning for this woman. Charlotte could only hope she’d be the one to give it.
