Marriage Alliance: A charming Regency Romance Read online

  MARRIAGE ALLIANCE

  Mira Stables

  © Mira Stables 1975

  Mira Stables has asserted her rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

  First published in 1975 by Robert Hale Limited.

  This edition published in 2018 by Endeavour Media Ltd.

  For Tom and Molly Gyte.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter One

  “AM I required to express appreciation for the courtesy of this visit?” demanded Lord Blayden acidly. “It cannot be more than two months since I sent an express to your lodging, saying that the matter was urgent.”

  Such a greeting would have intimidated most men, but Marcus was inured to his father’s ways. Indeed, his friends occasionally told him that his resemblance to his sire was too close for comfort. Moreover, he was perfectly well aware that it was no more than a month since his father had sent for him. He did not even blench. “I have been out of Town,” he said indifferently. “As soon as I had your letter I came post.”

  “And think to hang the expense of it to my account,” snapped his lordship, “your pockets being, if I mistake not, wholly to let, as usual.”

  His son smiled but did not answer. When his father was in this mood it was better to let him vent his feelings unchecked.

  “And it means nothing to you,” Lord Blayden continued, “that in the meanwhile I have been obliged to tolerate the encroachments of an impudent upstart of a tradesman who, in a better organised state of society, would never have ventured to approach me.”

  Now this was a new departure. Marcus knew that his father’s pride of race was insufferably inflated. In Lord Blayden’s reckoning there were not half a dozen members of the nobility who could match him in terms of pedigree. Nor, indeed, in the extent of his debts, thought his only son wryly, unless it be the late Duchess of Devonshire. Nothing would ever persuade him that society did not owe the ninth Baron Blayden a life of effortless comfort, whatever his financial standing. And to do him justice, his tastes were almost ascetic. He ate sparingly and drank surprisingly little in an age of heavy drinking. His appearance was neat rather than modish. But everything about him, from his handkerchiefs to his horses, must be of the first quality. A foible that his estate could easily have supported had it not been for his passion for gaming.

  In his early manhood he had been, reputedly, a devil for the petticoats, but that had come to an end with his marriage. He had been a faithful husband and a just parent, even if a stern one. Nor had the loss of his wife at the birth of their daughter driven him to seek consolation in the arms of a mistress. Instead he had sought distraction in cards and dice and racing, plunging ever more deeply, with varying fortune and little sign of emotion whether he won or lost.

  When it was discovered that the puny baby who had been hastily baptised Deborah would go lame all her life because of a hip injury sustained at birth, Lord Blayden received the news with unimpaired calm. The brat was being fed and tended. It might or might not survive. Neither then nor later did he show any sign of affection for the sickly infant who had been the unwitting cause of his loss, but then, neither had he shown any for his only son. He plunged once more into his over-riding preoccupation and was rarely to be found at home.

  So it was that Marcus came to develop a fiercely protective tenderness for his little sister. Left so much to the care of servants, the two lonely children had clung to each other. When Marcus went to school, Deborah cried herself into a fever. Eagerly they looked forward to the holidays. For each of them the other signified all that they knew of home.

  Maturity brought longer separation. Marcus inherited a small Kentish manor from the uncle who had been his godfather. The place was too small to justify the employment of a steward and he came to spend a good deal of his time there whenever his other engagements permitted, discovering in himself, rather to his surprise, the makings of a true countryman, wholly absorbed in the nurturing of his acres. Deborah, now a schoolgirl in charge of a succession of governesses since her delicate health made boarding school ineligible and no one would stay long in the isolation of Blayden, was perforce left behind. But the old affection still linked the two. They corresponded regularly, and when his father’s peremptory summons had finally reached him, Marcus had obeyed it the more willingly because now he would see Deb again. If she could be pronounced strong enough to endure so long a journey, his father might even consent to her returning with him to pay a visit to Dakers, his Kentish home, which she had never seen.

  Meanwhile it behoved him to enquire into the cause of that summons, since his father seemed to be in no hurry to enlighten him and was still animadverting bitterly on a state of society which permitted gutter-bred chits to rub shoulders with noblemen of countless quarterings just because they chanced to be gold inlaid, while undutiful sons lingered over their own pleasures, thus exposing their sires to all the unpleasantness of toad-eating, crude attempts at patronage and insufferable boredom.

  Marcus preserved a grave front in the face of this catalogue of hardship. “I will spare you my sympathy, sir, since it would be ill-informed,” he said gently. “Who is this gentleman who has put you to such discomfort? I do not recall the presence in the neighbourhood of anyone answering to this description when last I was at home.”

  “Gentleman!” snorted his fulminating progenitor. And then, remembering his situation and his plans for meeting it, made a visible effort at a more temperate tone. “As to that,” he said stiffly, “being an older man, I daresay he would not have come much in your way, though he has rented High Barrows these ten years past. And now that underbred whelp, young Vernon, has sold to him. Says it’s to meet his father’s debts,” he concluded in an unwilling grunt.

  Instinct warned Marcus that they were approaching delicate ground. The Willerbys of High Barrows were one of the few families whom his father accepted as near equals. Old Robert Willerby had died a year past, having exceeded man’s allotted span in spite of a career given over to every form of extravagance and excess. It was not in the least surprising that his son should find himself compelled to sell High Barrows — and lucky if the proceeds of that sale paid off the load of debt. He himself would almost certainly have to sell Blayden — unless, indeed, his father was compelled to do so first. Two seasons in London under the aegis of a parent who had felt it to be his duty to sponsor his son into the ‘ton’ had left Marcus with no illusions about the possible value of his patrimony. If the older man had been deliberately bent on dissipating his fortune he could not have been more ruinously reckless. Marcus had a pretty good notion that the sudden summons to present himself in Cumberland had its impetus in financial difficulties. Probably he was to be asked to consent to the breaking of the entail. The wealthy merchant of whom his father had spoken so disparagingly might well be a prospective purchaser for the faded grandeur that was Blayden, though what he could want with it when he already had High Barrows was something of a puzzle. Perhaps he needed some of the outlying farms to round out his estate or even to create a park. Such trappings of gracious living were much valued by the newly rich, he understood. Honest farm land would not c
ontent a man of that type. He composed himself to listen with what patience he might.

  But it was not until after dinner, a meal served to the two of them in lonely state since Deborah was confined to her room with a migraine headache, that Lord Blayden brought himself to embark upon his disclosures. Sliding the port decanter towards his son and glancing keenly at him under knitted brows, he said abruptly, “Leg-shackled yet? Or in the way of it?”

  “Good God, no, sir! What should I want with a wife — even if I could afford such a luxury, which I can’t. Believe me, I go on very comfortably without.”

  There was the faintest discernible relaxation in his father’s pose.

  “Then I’ve a proposition to put to you,” announced Lord Blayden. “Not to wrap things up in clean linen, it’s low tide with me. In fact, it’s worse than that — it’s a damned drought. The devil’s been in the bones of late — cards, too. I shall come about, of course. It’s just a matter of raising the ready until the luck turns, and that’s where you can help me, if you’re agreeable.”

  Quite illogically, Marcus was moved to faint pity. It must have cost the old man a deal of effort to get that out. “The entail?” he asked. “I’m quite willing to compound with you. Settle things just as you think best.”

  This generous response met with a sad rebuff. “Break the entail?” demanded his father incredulously. “Are you mad, boy? What good would that do? Even if I’d consider it — which I never would. The place is mortgaged to the hilt. The price it brought would be swallowed up immediately and I should be left without a feather to fly with. No. The scheme is better than that.”

  He fell silent. Marcus watched him closely. They were approaching the nub of the matter and he scented danger.

  “This fellow Pennington,” said his father slowly.

  “The new owner of High Barrows?” asked Marcus quietly.

  Lord Blayden nodded. “Devilish plump in the pocket,” he jerked out. “Able to buy an abbey — or a husband of rank and breeding for his grand-daughter.”

  It was out in the open now, and worse than Marcus had imagined. His lean, hard-bitten face, so like his father’s, was normally schooled to a tolerant imperturbability, but for once revulsion was written plain about the lines of the harsh mouth, disgust clouded the heavy lidded grey eyes.

  His father said, “It’s not the kind of match I’d have planned for you. But you’re not in the petticoat line — said so yourself, just now. And Pennington would come down mighty handsomely, apart from making the wench his heiress. The blood’s common — no use denying that. Yeoman stock on the sire’s side, which is bad enough, and some finicking French musician or dancing master on the dam’s, which is worse. But there’s wealth enough to gild the pill.”

  Marcus could scarcely believe that he had heard aright. His father’s affairs must be in a shocking state if he was even considering such an alliance. But one thing was sure. So far as he was concerned, he would have none of it. He was quite unsentimental about it. The marriage of convenience was part of the social fabric in which he had been reared and he saw a good deal to recommend it where there was community of interest and background and a degree of liking between the contracting parties. But such a match as his father proposed was a very different matter. Marry an unknown female of plebeian origin — for he was sufficiently his father’s son to curl up his high-bred nose at that — simply in order to finance his father’s gaming? No! Not even to save the home of his ancestors would he consent to such degradation. He strove to master his sense of outrage so that he might couch his refusal in such terms as should not cause a permanent breach between them.

  Lord Blayden had not expected instant acceptance of his preposterous proposal, but he was determined that it should not be rejected out of hand before he had pointed out all the advantages that would accrue from its achievement. He did not give his son a chance to speak.

  “If you can bring yourself to accept the blood lines, you’ve swallowed the worst,” he swept on imperiously. “The rest is simple. The girl is young and has been reared to strict obedience and submission. Her husband will have no trouble with her. There is nothing in her appearance or her manners to give you a disgust of her and she seems to be healthy and well-formed.” He had almost described her as being apt for breeding, but something in the frozen distaste on his son’s face warned him to go warily. He hurried on, to avoid any possibility of interruption, “But there can be no delay. It seems that the girl’s mother — the Frenchwoman — is still alive. Pennington is obsessed with the notion that she may yet turn up to claim the wench and interfere with his plans for her. So he is determined to have her safely tied up in wedlock without loss of time. Which is why I wrote to you that the business was urgent,” he concluded.

  Marcus was aware of a brief flash of pity for the unknown girl, a helpless pawn in the hands of strong-willed and unscrupulous men. It seemed to him unbelievable that her own grandfather was prepared to bestow her on a man of whom he knew nothing save that he would inherit a high sounding — and empty — title. Of his own father’s conduct in the business he preferred not to think. Cold-hearted he had always been, but Marcus had not dreamed that he could be so callously selfish.

  He roused himself to break the strained silence that had fallen as his father’s voice ceased.

  “What made you imagine that I would lend myself to such a scheme?” he said quietly.

  Lord Blayden took this for encouragement. At least it was not the immediate and downright refusal that he expected.

  “Necessity,” he said bluntly. “I have realised all my disposable assets, pared my expenses to the bone. Only a desperate remedy will serve to redeem the situation now.”

  Marcus accepted the statement as truth. “Put the place up for sale, then,” he urged again. “Cut your losses. There is still the Town house. In any event, you already spend most of your time there. And if Town air doesn’t suit Deb, she can come to me.”

  “And how do you propose to support yourself and your sister? By your agricultural endeavours?” demanded Lord Blayden brutally. “Your allowance — a mere pittance, I am aware, but useful none the less — derives from Blayden’s rent-roll. It will cease when Blayden goes under the hammer. Your place in Kent is little better than a farm. I doubt if it is adequate to support you, let alone a sickly girl who must be cosseted and sheltered from any hardship.”

  There was truth in that, too, harsh, unpalatable truth. For himself he could make shift to live on the fruits of his labours, even if he must forego the allowance that his father had always made him. But he could not take risks where Deborah’s health and comfort were concerned. Dakers was beginning to thrive under his fostering care, but it had been long neglected and it would be two or three seasons yet before it would be really soundly established. He could sell it, he supposed. But to do so would only briefly stave off the inevitable, while throwing away all hope of future security.

  They seemed to have reached point non plus. But he was still determined that neither necessity nor persuasion should win his consent to his father’s scheme.

  “Such a marriage as I propose need not affect your present way of life,” pursued Lord Blayden. “You may leave your wife here. Your little manor could not house her fittingly, you will explain, and she will be a companion for your sister. You may go your own way with an easy mind. Pennington will not complain. As I judge it, he cares nothing for the girl save as a means of establishing that foothold in society of which her father cheated him.”

  Marcus swallowed his disgust at the heartless words. “Her father?” he raised an enquiring eyebrow.

  “Oh! He was to have been the corner stone of the Pennington rise to social eminence. The father is quite unlettered, but he had had the boy well taught and got him into one of the mercantile banks. Money, you see, will pave most paths. But he disobligingly fell tail over top in love with this Frenchwoman — a penniless refugee. Married her secretly — afraid of his father — and died of the lung fever whe
n their brat was still in the cradle. It all came out then, of course. As I understand it — though I paid scant heed to the fellow’s maunderings — he pensioned off the mother and undertook to rear the child. Now he is wholly set on seeing her wedded to the future Lord Blayden — and willing to pay handsomely for the privilege.”

  “If that is all he requires, let him content himself with the present holder of the title,” said Marcus shortly. “You are a free agent, sir. Marry the wench yourself.”

  “And I gave you credit for a degree of common sense,” sighed Lord Blayden with weary patience. “How would that serve the fellow’s purpose? If I were to marry the girl and, perchance, gets brats on her, you still stand to inherit the title.”

  Marcus had had enough. “Then Mr Pennington had best set about seeking some other title for his heiress,” he said curtly. “If he is so wealthy, he will have little difficulty. Indeed, I wonder at it that he should have been content to settle for a mere barony. An earldom at least should be his goal. For my part, I had rather die unwed — and the title with me.”

  There was a painful silence. Lord Blayden’s expression was inscrutable as ever. Presently he said, almost idly, “Your last word?”

  Marcus inclined his head.

  His father shrugged slightly, and spread his hands in a gesture that would have done credit to Pontius Pilate. “A pity. When you are older you may be a little less nice in your requirements. Ah well! Nothing else for it. It will have to be Deborah.”

  Marcus’s dark head came up with a jerk. “Deb?” he exclaimed. “How does she come into it?”

  “She doesn’t,” said his father. “But I must find some way out of my difficulties and since you are in no mind to be helpful, Deb is the answer.” There was a brief, pregnant pause. Then “Maxwell has offered for her,” he finished gently.

  If Marcus had sickened at his father’s proposals anent his own marriage, this suggestion filled him with murderous fury. Despite himself, his fingers curled to a stranglehold, his eyes blazed pure hatred. Maxwell! The fellow’s name was a byword for every form of lechery and vice. Older by several years than Lord Blayden himself, he had buried three wives and the count of his lights o’ love was legion. There were darker murmurs, too. Hints of perversion and cruelty so vile that the simpler folk made the sign against the evil one when they chanced to cross his path. Maxwell — and his fragile little sister!