Charming Artemis by Sarah M. Eden
Chapter Four
“When I first saw you, I thought you’d stabbed him.” Persephone rubbed at her temples. “I’m not certain that wouldn’t have been better.”
“I would be willing to stab him now.” Artemis tossed a smile at Adam. Her brother-in-law was always in the mood for a violence-based jest.
But he didn’t nod in agreement or acknowledge her jest in any way. He simply sat at his desk, hands steepled in front of him, his fingers tapping tensely. He’d said very little since stumbling upon Artemis and Charlie attempting to address a laundering emergency. He and Persephone, along with Lord and Lady Lampton, had managed to shoo the crowd away without making the situation seem dire. It had been embarrassing but, thank the heavens, not a disaster.
“Who is overseeing the remainder of the ball?” Artemis asked. All the hosts, after all, were in the bookroom.
“The Duchess of Hartley,” Persephone said.
An excellent choice. She was universally considered an impeccable and capable hostess.
“She will do a fine job,” Persephone said, “and will give no one further reason for whispers.”
Artemis shook her head in amusement. “The ton never needs reason for gossiping.”
“They have ample reason now,” Adam muttered.
The servant’s entrance to the room opened quickly. Rose, who was more than Artemis’s abigail—she was also a mentor and friend—slipped inside. She moved directly to Adam. He watched her with silent anticipation.
“Discussions of this have reached the mews. It is impossible to believe it will not be all over London by morning and beyond that very soon thereafter.”
Adam nodded slowly, his expression not lifting. “And what is the nature of the various reports?”
“That Miss Lancaster and Mr. Charlie Jonquil were discovered in a state of undress in an abandoned room of the house.”
Oh bother.While there was a tiny degree of truth to that version of events, it was an exaggeration, and a condemning one at that.
“The whole thing was ridiculous,” Artemis said. “He spilled raspberry shrub on himself, and it soaked clear through everything. He was trying to salvage his clothing; I was trying to help since I bumped into him and was somewhat to blame for his state. We really were only trying to salvage his clothing.”
“I know,” Persephone said. “And we believe you. But reality is of far less import at the moment than perception. And perception is decidedly against you.”
“But Adam will take my part. He can override any perception.”
Adam rose from his desk with a look of weariness she didn’t often see on his face. “Even I can’t fix everything, Artemis.”
“What the blazes does that mean?” Worry was beginning to creep over her.
Adam ignored her use of questionable language and, instead, addressed Rose. In the almost two years Rose had been among them, Adam had come to respect her deeply. That had always pleased Artemis. She adored Rose but had worried how she would manage in what could sometimes be a difficult household. As an Indian woman, Rose had faced prejudice and maltreatment in the years since she’d come to England. Artemis did not want to be party, however unintentionally, to any further unhappiness.
“Are the whispers significant and damaging enough to warrant drastic action?” Adam asked Rose.
“To be perfectly blunt, Your Grace, even drastic action isn’t going to entirely undo this.” Rose was not one for dramatics; her evaluation could be taken as unvarnished truth. “The discussions I’ve heard in just the last half hour are the sort that would follow a person for years. Given a few days, what happened will be twisted into something far more ruinous.”
Persephone joined Adam, standing beside his desk. “I know what you are pondering, love. But would it work?”
“With the combined efforts of everyone involved and an inconvenient amount of playacting, perhaps.”
Artemis waved Rose over. “What remedy are they speaking of?” She had a horrible suspicion she knew. Oh, how she needed reassurance that there was an explanation she wasn’t thinking of.
“You are not simpleminded. You know the answer.” Rose was direct and often unflowery in her speech, but she was not unkind. The bluntness was both painful and merciful in that moment. Artemis did not have to guess at the answer she had been given, no matter the horridness of it.
The bookroom door opened, pulling all their eyes in that direction. Charlie and his oldest brother stepped inside. Both looked entirely put together and not the least like they’d been stabbed or shot or otherwise mortally wounded. Charlie had changed his clothes, but when and how?
Rose, apparently, saw Artemis’s confused surprise. “He is nearly of a size with the Duke of Hartley. A change of clothing was obtained from their home, which, conveniently, is only a few doors down from here.”
Ah. “Which would have been a far easier way to address the problem than how we went about it not an hour ago.”
Rose simply nodded.
“My wife sends her regrets,” Lord Lampton said to Persephone. “Your housekeeper very kindly showed her to a guest chamber, where she is currently resting.”
Persephone nodded. “If she does not feel equal to making the return journey to your home, you are both welcome to remain, of course.”
“And you, Mr. Jonquil”—Adam looked to Charlie—“what are your plans for the remainder of the evening?”
“My plan is to do whatever Your Graces deem the situation requires.”
Adam didn’t look away, didn’t change his stern expression. “Are you aware of the extent of damage that has been done?”
“I am, Your Grace. My brother, sister-in-law, and I have spent our time since leaving this room searching for an answer to this debacle, and there appears to be but one. However, if you and your wife have determined otherwise, I will bow to your authority and wishes.”
They sounded so businesslike and unemotional, as if discussing the exchange of carriages or the hoped-for arrival time at a house party.
“We cannot truly be considering this,” Artemis said.
They all looked at her.
Lord Lampton spoke first. “I assure you, Miss Lancaster, we have considered everything else. My wife, in particular, pressed for any less drastic solution, but the whispers we are hearing outside of this room that have already begun to spread through Town are worse than even we feared. This is a scrape that cannot be brushed aside. The damage is extensive. Only an enormous plaster will allow it to heal.”
She had never before heard Lord Lampton speak without even the tiniest hint of jesting or theatricality. Persephone looked sad, which she seldom did. Adam wore an expression of resignation, completely out of character for him.
Artemis met Charlie’s eyes. Of everyone in this room, he would agree with her and insist everyone was being utterly and completely ridiculous.
“If it makes you feel any better, I would rather you had shot me,” he said.
Blast and boil. “You are not seriously entertaining this . . . ‘solution,’ are you?”
“There are no other options available to us, Artie.”
“Do not call me Artie.”
His jaw tightened. “At the moment, you are fortunate that is the only thing I am calling you.”
Lord Lampton sighed. “Heaven save us, they’re going to kill each other.”
“Miss Narang, did you hear any conjectures in the gossip that might offer us another option?” Adam asked. “Anything at all.”
Rose shook her head. “All the conjecture is that either the two will be married or ruined. I heard no anticipation of anything else.”
Married or ruined.“We cannot truly mean to move forward this way.” Artemis’s concern was growing to panic. “It was a misunderstanding.”
“Artemis, dear,” Persephone said, “that misunderstanding involved a very private location and removal of clothing. It doesn’t overly matter that those missing pieces were not more intimate than a jacket and waistcoat. It is shocking and will be bandied about without a great deal of mercy.”
Artemis rubbed the palms of her hands against her forehead. “This is absurd.”
Adam walked past her. “You should have considered that before pouring a bottle of vodka all over a gentleman’s discarded clothes.”
“That was not the nature of the situation at all.” She could not keep her deep frustration hidden.
No one heeded her.
The gentlemen stood near each other, their postures identically stiff.
“There is no real choice left to us,” Adam said to Charlie, “but I still need to know what your situation is. Artemis, of course, has a significant dowry, but I’d rather you not have to live exclusively on that.”
Artemis began pacing, hardly believing what she was hearing.
“I have some income from my father’s estate, Your Grace. My intention was to become a don at Cambridge, but a don cannot be married. I confess I am a bit at sea as to how to move forward with that so suddenly snatched away. There is the possibility of publishing papers and offering lectures for hire.”
Adam nodded slowly. Persephone stood at the window, clearly listening but not watching the discussion. Rose had taken a seat in a quiet corner. She would be listening as well; she missed very little.
“Artemis’s father made his living the same way,” Adam said, “and it was far from sufficient. I cannot like the possibility of Artemis returning to that level of poverty.”
“Our father provided generously for his younger sons,” Lord Lampton said.
“I do not doubt that he did,” Adam said.
“Charlie will not be wealthy, by any means,” the earl said, “but that income supplemented with what he can obtain academically will not leave them in dire straits.”
This cannot be happening.
“Further, amongst the Lampton holdings is a small estate in Cumberland. As it is designated for the use of the heir to the title during the period between his coming of age and his inheritance and my son has only just turned one year old, the estate will be empty for the next twenty years. Its upkeep is seen to by the Lampton estate. I’ve offered its use to Charlie for the foreseeable future.”
Now they were speaking of houses and decades of domestic arrangements. Artemis clasped her hands and pressed them to her lips. She was too upset to even pace. A forced marriage. To Charlie Jonquil, of all people. This simply could not be her reality. It could not.
“I believe you are speaking of Brier Hill,” Adam said. He turned and looked to Persephone. “It is within a day’s journey of Falstone Castle.”
That brought Persephone’s gaze to Artemis. “You’ll be nearby.”
“And married to a gentleman who only just declared that he wished I had murdered him rather than be in our current predicament.”
“In fairness,” Adam countered, “you said the same thing.”
She threw her hands up. There was no denying this was an absurd plan, but no one was backing away from it.
“Lampton, you and Charlie call on me here in the morning. Since your brother is still, by law, underage, you will have to negotiate on his behalf.”
Was this a means of escape? “If Charlie is not old enough to marry—”
Adam didn’t allow her to finish the objection. “He is too young to marry without permission from his family or to negotiate marriage contracts on his own. He is not, however, too young to marry at all.”
Merciful heavens.
“We’ll announce the betrothal as soon as possible,” Adam said, “work out the contracts, and obtain a license so they can marry within the fortnight.”
Artemis blinked back hot tears, struggling to breathe through the fear growing inside.
“This is where the playacting comes in.” Adam eyed them all in turn. “We must give the impression we are all pleased with this. Miss Narang”—he looked to Rose—“put it out amongst the servants that we are anticipating these nuptials with pleasure.” He looked to Lord Lampton. “Ask your Wilson to wield his influence also.”
Lord Lampton agreed with a nod. The earl was known for flamboyance and dramatics. Artemis still had seen none of it during this discussion. Not even a hint, and that scared her.
Adam turned his attention to Artemis and Charlie. “The two of you will pretend from this moment until you leave London for Brier Hill that you are quite pleased with this arrangement. You needn’t make a show of being in love or ecstatic about the engagement, but it is crucial you do not add to the gossip surrounding you by making it obvious you are doing this under duress.”
Artemis shook her head over and over again, her mind struggling to comprehend what her heart was crying out over.
“Once you reach Cumberland, you are welcome to shoot or stab or otherwise murder one another, but not until then.”
She crossed to Adam and tugged him away from the others. “Please don’t force this on me. Please.”
His usually hard expression softened in a way she seldom saw. “I cannot save you from this.”
“He doesn’t love me,” Artemis whispered. “All the rest of the family married for love.”
“Persephone and I didn’t,” Adam said. “Mr. Jonquil’s parents didn’t.”
“I cannot speak for the late earl and the dowager, but I do know you and Persephone didn’t hate each other, so it is hardly the same situation.”
“Regardless, it is your situation. And it cannot be avoided.” He sounded sincere but also unmovable. He wasn’t going to help her.
None of them were. A lifetime of abandonment ought to have taught her to stop expecting anything else.
Artemis had often imagined herself a newlywed bride, her days filled with warm glances and overtly romantic gestures, torrid embraces, and a deep, abiding passion worthy of the most gothic of novels. It had been easier to believe in something more literary than literal. The sort of realistic, unwavering, reassuring love she saw her siblings share with their spouses had always felt out of reach. Utterly so now.
She took a shaking breath. She set her shoulders in the hope that she appeared more composed than she felt. “At least at some point, tell me which chapel to arrive at.” She spun about and walked not to the main door but to the servants’ entrance. She could avoid the remaining guests that way. She didn’t look back as she left the room. None of them would be given the opportunity to see her pain.
The servants’ stairs weren’t abandoned, by any means, but they were safer. Few people crossed her path. Fewer still made their study of her overly obvious.
She arrived in her bedchamber and closed the door with a snap. This was a nightmare. After years of imagining herself building a home somewhere with someone who loved her, with the blessing of her beloved Papa, anticipating a future where she was valued and wanted and embraced, she was back to the horror she’d lived as a child.
Once more, she would be living with a man who despised her in a home where she would never be wanted, living far away from Heathbrook and London, where she might have had some hope of finding her Papa, knowing that there would never, ever be anyone in her life who loved her the way she’d always wanted to be loved.
“Best keep to the light, Princess.”
But she felt no light in that moment, no promise of escape. Through the shadows of her room, she crossed to her bedside table and pulled out of the drawer the one thing she needed most in that moment: her Papa’s handkerchief.
“I cannot keep to the light, Papa. There isn’t any.”
With the precious square of linen clasped in her hands, she crumbled onto her bed and wept.
