Nicholas went to the window, opened it, and looked down into the garden. He could just see Dougless below. “I would spend my life with the Montgomery woman,” he said softly.
Lady Margaret slammed the window shut and glared at her son. She had eyes that could pierce a man. “You cannot. The dowry for Lettice Culpin has been accepted and part of it spent to buy sheep. The woman brings land with her and a good name. Your children will be related to the throne. You cannot throw that away for this woman who is nothing.”
“She is all to me.”
Lady Margaret glared at him. “She is nothing. Two days ago the rider returned from Lanconia. There is no Montgomery king. This Dougless Montgomery is no more than a fast-tongued—”
“Say no more,” Nicholas said, cutting her off. “I have never believed her to be of royal blood, but she has come to mean more to me than bloodlines and property.”
Lady Margaret groaned. “Do you think you are the first to love? When I was a girl, I loved my cousin, so I refused to marry your father. My mother beat me until I was willing.” She narrowed her eyes at Nicholas. “And she was right. Your father gave me two sons who lived to manhood, while my cousin gambled his fortune away.”
“Dougless is not likely to gamble my fortune away.”
“Nor will she increase your fortune!” Lady Margaret calmed herself. “What ails you? Kit is to marry a fat child, while you are to marry one of the great beauties of England. Lettice is much more beautiful than the Montgomery woman.”
“What do I care for money and beauty? Lettice has a heart of stone. She marries me, a younger son, only for my connection to the throne. Let her find another who will overlook her lack of warmth and will see only the perfection of her face.”
“You mean to unkiss this bargain? You will break your betrothal?” Lady Margaret was aghast.
“How can I marry one woman when another owns my heart?”
Lady Margaret gave a derisive snort of laughter. “I did not raise you to be a fool. Keep the Montgomery woman after your marriage. Make her a maid to your wife. I cannot believe Lettice will mind that you do not go to her every night. Get Lettice with child, then go to your Montgomery woman. It was an arrangement my second husband had, and I did not mind. Although he gave his woman three children and me only one and that one died,” she added bitterly.
Nicholas turned away from his mother. “I do not believe Dougless would agree to such an arrangement. In her country I do not believe such things are done.”
“Her country? Where is this country of hers? It is not Lanconia. Where does she get these games and amusements? Where do these strange implements she carries come from? She adds on a machine. She has pills that are magic. Is she from the devil? Do you wish to cohabit with one of the devil’s own?”
“She is no witch. She’s from—” He stopped and looked at his mother. He could not tell her the truth about Dougless. Dougless had made a remark about the household loving her now because she had saved Kit, but that it would soon cease.
Lady Margaret glared at her son. “Do you sell yourself to her? Do you believe whatever story she tells you? The woman is a liar and . . .”
She hesitated. “She interferes too much. She has you drawing houses like a tradesman. She has the girl Kit is to marry dressing like a peasant. She takes children from the nursery. She teaches the servant children to read and write—as though that were needed. She—”
“But you have encouraged all of this,” Nicholas said in astonishment. “I was the one who preached caution when she came. You took the tablet she offered.”
“Aye, I did. I was much amused by her at first. And I would be amused now were not my youngest son thinking himself in love with her.” Lady Margaret softened and put her hand on Nicholas’s arm. “Love God, love your children when they are grown if you must, but do not give your love to a lying woman. What does she want from you? What does she want from all of us? Listen to me, Nicholas, beware of her. She changes too much in our family. She wants something.”
“No,” Nicholas said softly. “She wants naught but to help. She has been sent—”
“Sent? She has been sent here by whom? Who sent her? What can she gain?” Lady Margaret’s eyes widened. “Kit said men tried to pull him under when he nearly drowned. Did the Montgomery woman arrange to have him drowned, then pretend to save him? Such a trick would gain her much in our family. Or mayhap she meant for him to die. Twere Kit dead, you would be earl and she has you in her palm.”
“No, no, no,” Nicholas said. “Her character is not like that. She did not know about Kit because I had lied to her about the door at Bellwood.”
Lady Margaret’s handsome face showed her confusion at his words. “What do you know of her?”
“Naught. I know naught bad of her. You must believe me, the woman wants only good for us. She has no evil intent.”
“Then why does she want to prevent your marriage?”
“She does not,” Nicholas said, but turned away. When he had first met Dougless, she had said several derogatory things about Lettice, but lately she had said nothing. Nicholas realized his mother’s words were making him doubt Dougless.
Lady Margaret moved to stand before her son. “Does the Montgomery woman love you?” she asked softly.
“Aye, she does,” he answered.
“Then she will want what is best for you. And Lettice Culpin is best. The Montgomery woman must see that she can bring no dowry to the marriage. She has lied about having an uncle who is king, so I doubt if she has any relative who matters. What is she? The daughter of a tradesman?”
“Her father teaches.”
“Ah,” Lady Margaret said. “The truth at last. What can she offer the Stafford family? She has nothing.” She put her hand on Nicholas’s arm. “I do not ask you to give her up. She will stay in this house with you, or go with you and your wife. Breed with the woman. Love her. Make free with her.” Her face became stern again. “But you cannot make her your wife. Do you understand me? Staffords do not marry the penniless daughters of teachers.”
“I understand full well, madam,” Nicholas said, eyes dark with anger. “I, more than anyone, feel the weight of my family’s name on my shoulders. I will do my duty and marry the beauteous, coldhearted Lettice.”
“Good,” Lady Margaret said, then lowered her voice. “I should hate for something to happen to the Montgomery woman. I have grown fond of her.”
Nicholas stared at his mother for a moment, then turned and left the room. He stalked angrily to his bedchamber, and there, alone, he leaned against the door and closed his eyes. His mother’s words had been clear enough: do your duty and marry Lettice Culpin or “something” will happen to Dougless. Even as he thought the words, he knew how Dougless would react to his marrying another woman. Dougless would not remain in his household to wait on his wife.
To lose Dougless and gain Lettice, he thought. To trade Dougless’s eyes of love for Lettice’s cold, calculating eyes. The first time he had met Lettice, he had been taken with her beauty. Dark eyes, dark hair, full red lips. But Nicholas had been around enough beautiful women that he was soon able to see beneath her beauty. She walked about the Stafford household, her eyes on gold vessels, tallying them, her mind like a scale, weighing how much gold the Staffords owned, how much silver.
Nicholas had tried to seduce the woman, but had failed. He had failed, not because Lettice was unwilling, but because she was uninterested. Kissing Lettice was like kissing warm marble.
Duty, he thought. His duty was to marry the woman who had more money, the woman with the bluest blood. “Dougless,” he whispered, then closed his eyes.
Tonight he must tell her, he thought. Tonight he had to tell Dougless of his impending marriage. He could put it off no longer.
THIRTY - ONE
You can’t marry her,” Dougless said quite calmly.
“My love,” Nicholas said, walking toward her, his hands outstretched.
He had asked her to go riding with him, then had taken her to a neighboring estate where there was a mature maze in the garden. The hedges were twelve feet tall, and the way in and out was complicated. He knew she didn’t know her way out of the maze and therefore she was less likely to run from him when he told her what he had to.
“I must marry her,” Nicholas said. “It is my duty to my family.”
Dougless told herself to remain calm. She told herself that she had a job to do, and that she must explain to Nicholas why he couldn’t marry Lettice. But when faced with having the man she loved tell her he was going to marry another, logic fled.
“Duty?” she said through her teeth. “No doubt it’s a great hardship for you to marry a beautiful babe like Lettice. I’ll just bet you’re dreading it. And I guess you want me too. Is that it? A wife and a lover? Only I can’t be your lover, can I?” She glared at him. “Or maybe I can be. If I went to bed with you, would that keep you from marrying that evil woman?”
Nicholas was moving toward her, trying to take her in his arms, but he halted. “Evil? Lettice is greedy perhaps, but evil?”
Dougless’s fists were clenched at her side. “What do you know of evil? You men are all alike no matter when you were born. All you can see is the outside of a person. If a woman is beautiful, she can have any man she wants, no matter how rotten she is inside. And if a woman is ugly, nothing else matters.”
Nicholas dropped his hands; his eyes were angry. “Aye, that is all that interests me. I care naught for duty or family or for the woman I love. Tearing the clothes from Lettice’s divine body is all that interests me.”
Dougless gasped, feeling as though he’d slapped her. She wanted to leave the maze, but she knew she didn’t know the way out. She turned back to him. Anger was holding her upright, but, quite suddenly, the anger left her. She collapsed on a bench, her face in her hands. “Oh, God,” she whispered.
Nicholas sat beside her and pulled her into his arms, holding her while she cried against his chest. “The marriage is something I must do. It has been arranged. I do not wish it, not now, not since I have you, but it is what I must do. Were something to befall Kit, I would be earl and it is my duty to produce an heir.”
“Lettice can’t bave chilled,” Dougless said against his chest.
He pulled a handkerchief from inside his slops. “What?”
Dougless blew her nose. “Lettice can’t have children.”
“How do you know of this?”
“Lettice was the one who caused your execution. Oh, Nicholas, please don’t marry her. You can’t marry her. She will kill you.” Dougless was calming somewhat, and beginning to remember what she must tell him. “I was going to tell you, but I thought we would have more time together. I wanted you to trust me more before I told you. I know how much you love Lettice, and—”
“Love her? I love Lettice Culpin? Who has told you this?”
“You did. You told me she’s one of the major reasons you wanted to return to the sixteenth century, because you loved her so very much.”
Pulling away from her, he stood up. “I came to love her?”
Dougless sniffed and blew her nose again. “When you came to me, you’d been married to her for four years.”
“It would take more than four years to make me love that woman,” Nicholas muttered.
“What?”
“Tell me more of this love I bore for my wife.”
There was a knot in Dougless’s throat, so she had difficulty speaking, but she did her best to explain all that he’d said to her. He questioned her thoroughly, asking about their last days together. Dougless held on to one of his big hands with both of hers while she answered his questions.
At last he put his fingertips under her chin and lifted her face. “When I was with you before, I knew I must return. Perhaps I did not want to cause you pain when I left. Perhaps I meant to prevent your loving a man who would not stay.”
Dougless’s eyes widened, tears sparkling. “You said that,” she whispered. “On our last night together, you said you wouldn’t touch me because I’d grieve too much for you.”
Smiling at her, he smoothed a damp tendril of hair away from her face. “I could not love Lettice were I to live with her a thousand years.”
“Oh, Nicholas,” she said, then threw her arms around his neck and began kissing him. “I knew you’d do the right thing. I knew you wouldn’t marry her. Now everything will come out right. You won’t be executed because Lettice won’t have any reason to try to kill you or Kit. And she won’t get hooked up with Robert Sydney because Arabella hasn’t had your baby. Oh, Nicholas, I knew you wouldn’t marry her.”
Nicholas pulled her arms from around him and held her hands, his eyes locked with hers. “I am pledged to marry Lettice, and I shall leave for the marriage in three days’ time.” When Dougless struggled for release, he held her hands firmly. “My way is not yours. My time is not the same as yours, and I have not the freedom you have. I cannot marry to suit myself only.”
He leaned closer to her and put his lips to her cheek. “You must understand me. My marriage was arranged years ago, and it is a good alliance. My wife will bring property and relatives into the Stafford family.”
“Will this property and these relatives help you when the axman removes your head?” she asked angrily. “Will you go to your death thinking how good this marriage was?”
“You must tell me all. What you tell me will help me prevent an accusation of treason.”
She jerked out of his grasp, then walked to the far side of the grassed area at the heart of the maze. “You’ll be able to prevent your execution as well as you could have prevented Kit’s drowning. If I hadn’t been here, your brother would be dead and your lovely Lettice would be marrying an earl.”
A smile twitched at the corners of Nicholas’s mouth. “Were I the earl, I would not marry Lettice. No doubt my mother would marry me to your fat Lucy.”
“You did marry Lettice after you became the earl. Maybe you owed her something and had to marry her.”
“Ah, yes, the sheep,” Nicholas said, smiling.
“You can laugh at me if you want, but I can assure you that when you came to me, you weren’t laughing. Facing an executioner’s ax doesn’t make a person feel jovial.”
Nicholas sobered. “Nay, it would not. You would tell me of Lettice? Tell me all that you know?”