The Earl's Love Match: A Sweet Regency Romance Read online

  “You have met him before?”

  “Not personally,” Jane admitted. “But he was a the very best of friends to someone I once knew.” She tailed off. She could not say any more without giving her own background away. With a kindly backward glance, she followed the duke and Lady Faith from the room.

  When they reached Calder Hall, Jane was not surprised to note that the staff were scurrying around like ants, trying to get the family’s belongings packed up into the carriages and coaches, so they might leave in time to reach Winchester before supper. Duchess Calder swept past them all into the drawing room where she would wait until she was informed that everything was ready for their departure. Faith followed her mother meekly, knowing that if she did not that there would be ructions she did not wish to face.

  Jane had noted that Duchess Helena often seemed to not even notice what was being done for her benefit. It was as if she did not see her servants, or consider the processes required for her to live her life in the manner that she did. This was certainly one of those times. Jane heard her ringing a bell to call for tea. She wanted to laugh out loud. Every single member of the household was busy pressing gowns, wrapping them carefully in lengths of velvet or packing them into trunks. Then they had to be loaded onto the carriages, that had been cleaned to a gleaming shine, with horses that had been groomed and made ready for the journey. Nobody was sat idly by waiting to be beckoned to serve tea.

  Jane could not suppress the chuckle that had been welling up within her when she saw the housekeeper, Mrs Rawlins, roll her eyes as she heard the ringing bell. But she schooled her features and moved swiftly towards the drawing room to receive Duchess Helena’s orders. She emerged a few moments later and beckoned to one of the younger maids who disappeared down the back corridor, presumably heading down the back stairs to the kitchens.

  The duke was more appreciative of those who worked for him. He began to direct his footmen and thanked the maids for their hard work giving them all warm smiles and making them feel valued and important. Jane rather liked him for his genuine affection for those who served him. He was not afraid to roll up his shirtsleeves and help them, either, though such behavior often garnered little but a stinging rebuke from his wife. Now, he moved to pick up the rear end of a trunk with the butler, Timmins, and the two of them took it outside and handed it up to the footman on the roof of one of the coaches to fasten it tightly.

  It clearly took more than Jane had ever believed necessary to be prepared for a few days in Winchester, to attend a wedding. She herself was taking only two gowns. Her plain blue day to day one and a pretty pink silk that Faith had lent to her for the wedding itself. Other than her hairbrushes and clean undergarments, she needed little else. But it seemed that the Calder’s required that much of the entire house be packed up and taken with them when they travelled even the ten miles into Winchester that this wedding required.

  Chapter Two

  The benches inside the stagecoach were tightly packed, rough and splintered. Elliot fidgeted a little, trying to get comfortable, but given the coach was full was unable to do so. He could hardly wait until they reached the next coaching inn along the roadside, so he could get out and stretch his cramped legs and ease the numbness in his behind. He had not ever been subjected to such uncomfortable travel in his life, but his own carriage had slipped a wheel over fifty miles back and there had been no suitable vehicles for hire in the tiny village where he had left it to be mended with the local wheelwright.

  Elliot had made a solemn promise to his godfather, Viscount Andrew Hawthorne, that he would not miss his wedding and he was not prepared to break that promise no matter what amount of his pride and personal comfort it might cost him.

  The people around him were jovial enough, despite the hardships. A young woman sat opposite him, clutching her infant son tightly as she tried to avoid leaning against the rather rotund gentleman to her left. He had a florid complexion and was fond of a nip from a silver hunting flask that he kept tucked away inside his waistcoat pocket. He seemed to not notice the discomfort, and had fallen asleep more than once, giving off loud snores and flatulence in equal measure. A prim looking older woman was on the man’s other side and was also trying her best not to be leant upon, so had crammed her body right up against the side of the carriage. Beside Elliot, a pastor and his wife sat, their young daughter perching between them, staring at everyone and giggling each time the fat gentleman passed wind.

  “Do you travel far?” Elliot asked the young woman.

  She nodded. “We go to Winchester. My father is unwell and needs someone to mind his shop.”

  “I am for Winchester, too,” Elliot said. “What sort of a shop does your father run?”

  “He is a milliner, sir,” the young woman said. “He serves the very best of Winchester Society.”

  Elliot smiled at her eagerness to impress upon him that she was a respectable woman, with a hard-working husband and a place in society, however tenuous. Elliot knew that his fellow travellers must all be wondering why a man in such elegant attire as himself might be travelling amongst them, and he wondered if perhaps they were all being a little more circumspect than usual because of his presence. “I am sure that he does. And what is this fine young gentleman’s name?” he asked, leaning over and chucking the infant on his chubby cheeks.

  “He is named Owain,” she said. “For his father.”

  “A Welshman?” Elliot asked. His family held property in Wales and it was a place he was mightily fond of.

  “Indeed, sir,” she said with a cautious smile. The Welsh were not always greeted with affection in England. “Conwy. He is a fisherman, but he owns three boats and we look to buying our fourth in the New Year.”

  “I am sure he is a fine fisherman and provides for you right well,” Elliot said, utterly entranced with the way her child was staring straight at him with his bright blue eyes. “I know the harbor there well as my family has a house not far away at Penrhyn.”

  “It is a beautiful part of the world,” she agreed. “I was scared at first when I moved there to be wed, but it has become my home and I am more than content there.”

  “If I may be so bold as to ask, how did a young woman from Winchester meet a Welsh fisherman?” Elliot asked, genuinely curious. His own kind often married those they had never met and young ladies often had to travel to live in places many hundreds of miles from their place of birth, but he had not been aware that those of the lower classes often did so too.

  “You may, it is a story I never tire of telling,” the young woman said, a slight flush coming to her cheeks. “It was very romantic.”

  Elliot laughed with her as her son reached out for him. Elliot took the boy from her and set him upon his knee where the lad immediately began to pull at his watch chain. “I am sorry, sir,” she said. “He is too curious.”

  “Nonsense,” said Elliot firmly. “A boy should be curious. And he is most welcome to play with my watch, or fiddle with my shiny buttons. If I did not wish them to draw attention, I should not wear them at all.”

  “You are kind.”

  “Now, tell us all your romantic tale,” Elliot said, leaning back a little and shifting the boy’s weight so he was more settled.

  The young woman looked around the carriage. Everyone was leaning a little towards them, so they might hear. She giggled. “I have never had so many people hang on my every word,” she said. “Well, my Owain, he is a fisherman, as I have said. He fishes the waters along the entire coast of Wales, from Conwy up as far as Liverpool sometimes, and often down to the Bristol Channel. I was in service as a girl at a fine house in Clevedon. I often used to go down to the sea when my mistress gave me time off. I have always loved it, though I had never seen it until I took up my place there. It is so powerful and always different.”

  “It is that,” Elliot agreed, though his own affection for the ocean was much more limited than this young woman’s. He had taken more than his share of sea voyages and had yet to make
a crossing without a storm coming up, causing half the men on board to suffer the most dreadful seasickness. There was nothing worse than being aboard a vessel that stank of saltwater, fish and vomit. But on a fine day, he could agree that there was nothing better than looking out over the horizon and feeling the breeze in one’s hair as you watched the seabirds swoop overhead.

  “I was sat there, by the sea, one day not long after a storm had passed over. I saw that a small boat had foundered on the rocks nearby. I hurried to see if I might help. Owain was there, dragging the boat off the rocks with his men, then they pulled it up onto the beach so they might mend it. All of them had cuts and bruises. I insisted they let me tend to them.”

  “And as you did so, you looked into his eyes and knew he was the man for you?” the plump gentleman asked eagerly.

  Elliot could not help thinking that the man had read too many romance novels, such an occurrence was not something that Elliot had ever known to happen. Whatever the case, the rotund gentleman was so wrapped up in the young woman’s story that he had gone a full half an hour without taking a sip from his flask, which could only be a good thing, in Elliot’s mind. He had rarely known an amiable drunk, they could be relied upon to turn at the most minor of slights.

  “Not entirely. I thought he was an angry and rude fool to begin with,” the young woman said, smiling as she recalled the incident. It was clear to Elliot that she had long since forgiven her husband of any ill-mannered behavior he might have made upon their meeting. “He would not let me look at his wounds – though he was clearly the worst hurt. He is full of pride, even now – though I remind him each day that his pride almost lost him his chance with me.” She laughed, and everyone in the coach joined her. Elliot liked that she was not a woman to be cowed by a man’s intransigence. She knew her worth, and he was sure that their marriage was the better for it.

  Nonetheless, Elliot could not help but feel a pang of jealousy. This young woman had so obviously found true love and genuine affection within her marriage. She spoke so fondly of her husband, and all Elliot could think was that he had lost the one chance at love he had ever known because he had been too afraid to stand up to his mother, all those years ago – another woman who knew her own worth, though Mother had been one to dismiss the worth of others as she set about ruling her domains. He doubted that this young woman before him now would ever be so callous.

  “But he did finally relent?” the elderly lady by the door asked, clearly as fascinated by the young woman’s tales as everyone else was. It was the first time she had spoken throughout the long journey. She had a soft, sweet voice. Elliot found himself thinking that if she sang that she would have a very true and clear soprano voice.

  “He did, but only once he was sure that all of his men – and his boat – were not badly damaged,” the young woman said. “Owain walked me back to the house that night and offered apologies to the housekeeper for my tardiness. I do not know how he did it, because she was quite the dragon, but he had her eating out of the palm of his hand with that broad Welsh accent of his and his soft brown eyes. She did not chastise me at all.

  “I never expected to see him again. After all, he was Welsh and a fisherman. But he kept coming back. Every Sunday afternoon he would be there, where we had first met, waiting for me. He asked me to marry him on the third visit.”

  “And you have never regretted it?” the pastor asked her.

  She shook her head. “Not for even a moment,” she said fervently. “I shall miss Owain dreadfully whilst I am tending to my father, but I cannot leave my Da alone when he is sick.”

  As she finished her tale, everyone in the coach was smiling. They were enjoying themselves so much that they barely noticed the time passing, and the miles being eaten up by the fleet-footed horses, that they were actually shocked when the coach pulled up outside the last coaching inn before Winchester.

  Elliot leapt out first, noticing once more his tight legs and numb posterior, but ignored them as he helped the young woman and her son down, then the others, from the solid old vehicle and paid for everyone to have a fine luncheon. The pastor tried to object, but Elliot would not take his no for an answer. He had noticed that many of his fellow travellers had not eaten breakfast at their last stop – and the prim old lady with the sweet voice had not even had supper the night before. He could easily afford to pay for them all, and he was grateful for their genial company.

  The last stretch of the journey passed just as quickly, and Elliot disembarked in Winchester with the young woman and her son outside the Wykeham Arms after dark. Leaving his trunk at the inn, he walked her to her father’s shop and waited until she was inside safely before he made his way back to the coaching inn. His trunk had already been taken up to his chamber and Elliot was pleased to see that a pitcher of hot water had been left beside the ewer on the washstand. He poured the water into the bowl and splashed his face, before stripping down to his breeches and washing his body with the lavender soap that had also been left out for him.

  A knock on the door announced his supper. A young lad, no more than eight, stood in the hallway with a pewter plate crammed with bread, cheese and ham, and a tankard of ale. Elliot took them gratefully and sat on the edge of his bed to enjoy them. Once he had eaten his fill, he shoved the plate onto the chest of drawers by the bed and lay back against the pillow. Within minutes he was fast asleep.

  The bells of the cathedral nearby were chiming loudly when he awoke. The peal rang out across the town, announcing a wedding was being held. Elliot washed and dressed quickly, hurrying out of the inn and making his way towards the magnificent edifice. The vast stained-glass windows and the spectacular stone carvings made the façade of the grand building beautiful and awe-inspiring. But it was the man pacing anxiously by the door that had made Elliot hurry to be here.

  Viscount Andrew Hawthorne was dressed in a fine suit of bottle green velvet with a plum waistcoat and cream breeches. His weather-worn face spoke of his love of hunting and his years at sea. Elliot rushed to his side, holding out his hand to shake Andrew’s – only to have his godfather unexpectedly fling his arms wide and embrace him in a bearhug. “I did not expect you to make it. I received your message that your carriage had to be left behind. I am so glad to see you, my boy,” the older man said, kissing Elliot’s cheeks as if he were a beloved son.

  “I could not miss your wedding, Andrew,” Elliot said, immediately cheered by this man’s infectious ebullience and affection. “You have always been there for me, especially since Father died. I had to be here.”

  “I cannot imagine how you managed to get the stagecoach to get you here on time,” Andrew chuckled. “Have you used all of your quarterly allowance to bribe the driver?”

  “Not all of it. I saved a little so I might play a hand or two of piquet at the club when I return to London,” Elliot said with a grin. They both knew that Elliot was no gambler. He had always been a most cautious man – too cautious Elliot now believed, given the opportunities he had let pass him by because of his inability to take the risks he had so longed to embark upon.

  “We should go inside,” Andrew said, gesturing that Elliot should go ahead of him. Elliot walked by the man’s side to the altar then turned to take his seat. “Stay with me,” Andrew asked him. “I need to know you are at my side.”

  Honored, Elliot stood proudly at his godfather’s right hand, awaiting the arrival of his bride. He had never met Lady Annabelle Greyshotte but had heard that she was a handsome young woman with a fine inheritance and generous dowry. Many men would have been proud to have made her their wife – Andrew had approached her with a mind to a match between Elliot and herself. She would have been an ideal bride. Her father’s lands in Shropshire abutted those of his own in Powys and the estate she would one day inherit in Dorset was near to Andrew’s family lands. Andrew had often told Elliot that as he had no sons to inherit, that those lands would one day be his and so it would make for a goodly estate for him in Dorset someday, too.


  But that idea had been banished almost before it had even been considered, when Andrew had met Lady Annabelle and decided that it was time for him to be wed once more himself. He had been smitten with the pretty young woman, and despite all manner of friends and family counselling him against such a reckless match, he had courted Lady Annabelle and won her hand for himself. Elliot had been unsure about the match, but he wanted Andrew to be happy – and Lady Annabelle seemed to have made his godfather happier than Elliot had ever known him.

  The bridal party began the long walk down the nave. Lady Annabelle was dressed in a fine gown of white lace, a long veil trailing behind her. She smiled at Andrew as she approached him and Elliot felt his heart lift and the remaining few nagging doubts that he had possessed over the match dissipate into mere vapor. Just the way she looked at Andrew, their eyes meeting and locking so intently, told Elliot that she clearly held his godfather in great affection, even if this was not a love match on her part, as it was for Andrew.

  But it was not Annabelle whose beauty entranced Elliot most as he glanced around the nave of the cathedral. All manner of fashionably dressed men and women filled the pews, dukes and duchesses, Earls and Viscounts. But they held no interest for Elliot, either. Behind Annabelle and her father, the pretty blonde maid of honor slipped into the front pew. She whispered into the ear of the exquisite creature to her left and the pair giggled silently as the priest called for the attention of the congregation. Elliot’s breath stopped in his chest, his heart began to beat fast and so violently that Elliot feared it might escape the confines of his ribs.

  It could not be her, not after all this time, could it?

  Chapter Three

  During the service, Jane found herself unable to join in the hymns, or even to whisper the Lord’s Prayer. She barely heard the couple at the altar state their vows. She simply could not tear her eyes from the man stood at the altar, beside the delighted-looking groom.