Free The Pride of Lions by Marsha Canham Page B

walked angrily out into the courtyard. There were still some guests lingering in the mist-shrouded lantern light, talking excitedly among themselves, replaying every detail of the duel. They fell instantly silent when they saw Montgomery with his escort of dragoons, and most of them, picking up the scent of a new scandal, moved hurriedly to follow them into the manor house.
    Once inside, Sir Alfred’s much shorter legs had toscramble considerably faster to overtake the merchant and lead the way up the stairs and along the corridor to his library. He flung the doors wide and waited for Montgomery, Colonel Halfyard, and a dazed and disbelieving Damien Ashbrooke to enter before closing them again, leaving crisp orders with the dragoons that no one was to enter or leave without his express permission.
    The library was a dark and somber place with its wood paneling and ceiling-to-floor bookshelves. A single three-pronged candelabra had been lit and set on the enormous gumwood desk, supplementing the less than enthusiastic flames that licked fitfully at the charred logs in the fireplace. Harriet Chalmers sat on a red damask settee and sobbed quietly into the shreds of her handkerchief. The Reverend Mister Duvall, invited as a guest to the party, looked both bewildered and uncomfortable as he waited by the hearth, his hands worrying the pages of a Bible.
    Lady Caroline Ashbrooke sat on a leather chair near the reverend, and fussed with nonexistent wrinkles in her skirt. She was a beautiful woman, straight-backed and slender, whose fine, delicate features had been luminously duplicated in her daughter. Her hair was still a soft honey gold beneath the layers of rice powder, her complexion smooth and pure enough to disdain the use of paints and washes. Her eyes were a deeper shade of violet than Catherine’s, but where her daughter’s were bright and vibrant, sparkling with life, Lady Caroline’s were dull, as indifferent to her surroundings as twenty years of a lackluster existence could render them. Her affairs were no secret to anyone in the immediate family, not even her husband, who had taken his own mistress three weeks after their marriage.
    She looked up now as Raefer Montgomery’s arrival caused the air in the library to fairly crackle alive with tension. Harriet stopped sniffling long enough to cast a shocked glance in Damien’s direction—a glance thatwas interrupted by Sir Alfred summoning the reverend forward.
    “We have arrived at an amenable arrangement, Mr. Duvall. Mr. Montgomery is more than willing to accept the hand of my daughter in marriage.”
    The reverend cast a helpless glance toward the deeper shadows beside the window embrasure. “And, er, Mistress Catherine?”
    She had been standing there so still, so utterly motionless, neither Damien nor Montgomery had noted her presence when they entered the room.
    “Catherine!” Sir Alfred held out his hand, indicating she was to join them by the hearth. “You will oblige your mother and me by coming out of that damned corner at once. We have the means at hand to repair at least some of the damage you have brought about tonight. Catherine— do you hear me? ”
    The minister trembled visibly at the violence in Sir Alfred’s command. “R-really, Lord Ashbrooke, I don’t think—”
    “Precisely. Do not think. Simply read the blasted ceremony and say the right words.”
    “B-but the legality—”
    “I am quite prepared to pay generously for any special dispensation you may require. In fact, I am willing to pay for a complete new roof for the chapel, if that is what it will take to dispense with any further delays.”
    “It … it isn’t that, Your Lordship. It’s just …”
    “It’s just what? God’s blood, speak up!”
    “You cannot force your daughter into a marriage by threats and coercions. It would not be morally legal.”
    “Poppycock! It’s been legal, morally and otherwise, for centuries gone by. That’s the root of most of