“I hope not,” Lily said, true distress in her voice. “If you don’t take care, he will seduce you. Surely you don’t want to wind up like Mama, falling under the spell of a charmer, lusting after a man to the detriment of your entire family?”
The notion struck Arabella like a blow.
“Has it come to that, Arabella?” Roslyn said more quietly. “Are you letting your heart overrule your head, like Mama did?”
Arabella shook her head earnestly. “My heart is not involved. I have known Marcus barely a few weeks. That is too short a time to develop any lasting ardor.”
“You may not be able to help yourself,” Lily asserted. “Doubtless he is counting on your feminine weakness, trusting that he can make you fall in love with him. He is playing on your physical desires-and he is clearly succeeding.”
Arabella couldn’t refute the charge; she had warned herself of the same thing countless times. She raised a hand to her temple. “I won’t deny that I feel a physical attraction for him, but it is only passion I feel.”
“Then you had best keep away from him entirely,” Roslyn advised. “Passion is not a sound basis for marriage. Passion can burn out quickly, and then what is left?” Roslyn hesitated, gazing at her sympathetically. “It might be different if there were any chance you could come to love each other.”
Roslyn’s advocacy of love was not surprising. She was not set against marriage as Lily was; she just felt strongly that love must come first if a union was to have any chance of truly prospering.
“There is little chance of that,” Arabella replied. “He doesn’t want a love match. He only wants a marriage of convenience with a proper wife to breed him heirs.”
“Then you should end your courtship now.”
“Yes,” Lily seconded. “You don’t dare risk falling in love with him, Belle. Love can turn you into an utter fool, blinding you to all else.”
Arabella nodded in agreement. Roslyn was the wisest of the three of them and could be counted on to analyze the situation rationally. Lily, on the other hand, was speaking from sheer emotion. Despite her hoydenish ways, she was the most sensitive Loring sister and had been hurt most by their mother’s abandonment.
Yet Arabella shared Lily’s feelings in this instance. Love made a woman much too vulnerable and susceptible to lunacy. She well knew the pain love could cause, both from her own experience and from her mother’s. Victoria Loring had fallen in love and destroyed her family because of it…
“You are right, of course,” Arabella murmured.
Evidently Lily wasn’t convinced of her sincerity. “We can try to help you resist him, but only you can crush your feelings for him before they go too far.”
“I know.” She couldn’t-
“Hang the blasted wager!” Lily declared. “You have to call it off immediately. It is not worth the risk.”
She couldn’t call off the wager now. Not when she was so close. She had her sisters to think of as well as herself. Their independence was also at stake. If she lost the wager, Lily and Roslyn would suffer for it.
Taking a deep breath, she gazed solemnly back at them, filled with new resolve. “No, truly. I promise I will keep away from Marcus from now on. No midnight trysts…no trysts of any kind. I won’t allow myself to be alone with him ever again.”
It was a promise she was determined to keep, Arabella vowed to herself. The reminder of their mother’s behavior had had a chilling effect-and she had absolutely no intention of losing her heart the way her mother had done.
She managed to hold to her promise for the better part of the next day. Knowing Marcus had an afternoon appointment in London on a political matter but not wanting to risk encountering him beforehand, Arabella eschewed breakfast and left Danvers Hall early with her sisters to take refuge at the academy. There, she distracted herself the entire morning by listening to musical performances.
The afternoon passed much more slowly, since it was Saturday. With only a half day of lessons scheduled, the young ladies were allowed the afternoon free to do whatever they pleased. Most chose to go shopping in the village, which left the school unusually quiet.
Despite Arabella’s best intentions and her sisters’ attempts to divert her, Marcus occupied her thoughts far too often. Thus, she accepted readily when Roslyn and Lily suggested they take an early tea with Jane Caruthers, the spinster who ran the school’s daily operations. When Tess Blanchard elected to join them, the pleasant interlude became reminiscent of the early days before they opened the academy, when the five of them had regularly gathered to discuss plans.
Afterward, the ladies repaired to the dining room, where their pupils were partaking of their own tea. They had barely settled when Jane was summoned away by the housekeeper, Mrs. Phipps.
A short while later, Arabella also found herself approached by Mrs. Phipps, who whispered urgently, “Forgive the interruption, Miss Loring, but Miss Caruthers asks to speak with you in private.”
“Very well, where is she?” Arabella asked.
“The dormitory. Miss Newstead’s room.”
When Arabella eventually mounted the stairs to Sybil Newstead’s bedchamber, she found Jane wringing her hands.
“Sybil has disappeared,” was Jane’s immediate pronouncement, “and I fear she has left the grounds.”
Arabella frowned. Sybil had not come down to tea, but that in itself was not alarming, since one of her schoolmates had claimed she had taken ill and was resting in her room. But obviously the girl was not in her bed.
Tess joined them as Arabella asked Jane, “What makes you believe she has left the grounds?”
“Her bandbox is missing, along with several of her best gowns. And the maid we set to watch her has disappeared as well. No one but Caroline Trebbs has seen Sybil since this morning.”
Arabella’s frown deepened. The two girls shared this bedchamber, and Caroline had been the one to report Sybil’s illness.
“I think we had best talk to Miss Trebbs,” Arabella said, “before we draw any rash conclusions.”
She kept her voice calm but felt a niggling uneasiness in the pit of her stomach. Sybil Newstead was capable of most any indiscretion, although why she would have run away was puzzling. As for the maid, Sybil could possibly have bribed the servant to look the other way, although it would be worth her position-
“Do you think she might have eloped?” Tess asked, clearly worried.
Arabella’s uneasiness turned to alarm. “Dear heaven, I hope not.” But that would be one rational explanation for Sybil’s disappearance.
When Jane went to fetch Caroline Trebbs from the drawing room, Arabella waited with Tess impatiently. Her mind raced as she tried to recall observing any unusual behavior from Sybil recently-an exercise in futility, Arabella knew. She had paid little attention to any of her pupils this past week, she had been so busy being wooed by Marcus. But for an elopement, Sybil would have to have a suitor-
Her alarm twisted into a knot of dread as the answer struck her:
Arabella’s whirling thoughts were interrupted when Jane returned with Caroline. Miss Trebbs was a plump, plain-looking girl. When she entered the bedchamber with obvious reluctance, the guilty look on her face spoke volumes.
Arabella didn’t waste time with polite queries. “Caroline, we need you to tell us where Sybil has gone.”
Bowing her head, the girl mumbled something unintelligible.
“She took you into her confidence, didn’t she?” Arabella pressed, striving for patience.
“Y-yes, Miss Loring… But I promised not to tell. Sybil said she would cut out my tongue if I b-breathed a word to anyone.”
Arabella drew a slow breath. “We won’t let her harm you, Caroline. Please, we need you to tell us what has
