That evening, Gervase entered his library-cum-study and headed directly for the tantalus. As he poured himself a brandy, the latter events of the day scrolled through his mind.
Reaching the mill, he’d discovered the frustrated miller about to commence the laborious task of dismantling the grinding mechanism to see why “the damned thing won’t budge.” Asking him to wait, Gervase had gone outside to where the huge waterwheel sat unmoving in the narrow stream. His sisters knew nothing about gears and axles; there was no evidence they’d even entered the mill. Whatever they’d done to cripple the mechanism had been simple and ingenious-and something three schoolgirls, two of decent height and strength, could physically achieve.
The stream had been bubbling and gurgling along, covering the lower third of the wheel. After squinting into the rippling water, Gervase had called the miller and his sons to lend a hand; they’d managed to turn the wheel- enough to expose the gaps where three paddle blades ought to have been, and the anchor, doubtless purloined from the castle boathouse, that had held the wheel so that the jostling of the stream hadn’t shifted it. With the three blades missing, the water rushed freely through the gap, providing no force to turn the big wheel.
John Miller had stared at the gaps, at the anchor, and had sworn.
They’d found the blades, which for ease of replacement simply slotted into grooves in the wheel’s inner sides, tucked out of sight among some bushes. A matter of minutes had seen the anchor removed and the blades replaced-and the millstone grinding once more.
His sisters’ latest misdeed righted, he’d returned to the castle and had closeted himself in the library until dinnertime.
He’d contributed little to the dinner table conversation; the few exchanges had been of a general nature, of local affairs and local people. No one, however, had mentioned Madeline Gascoigne.
When, with Sybil, his sisters had risen and retreated to the drawing room, he’d watched them go, and then come here. Lifting his glass, he carried it to a well-padded armchair, sank down into the cushioning leather, and sighed.
He sipped, then put his head back and closed his eyes.
Despite their careful silence, his sisters were watching him like hawks. Demanding creatures. He’d made a promise, and they expected him to keep it.
And, of course, he would.
Opening his eyes, he raised his glass again, and refocused on the issue never far from his mind, his principal and continuing problem-his lack of a wife.
When he’d resigned his commission late last year, he’d had a vague notion that now peace was established and he was free to become the Earl of Crowhurst in more than name, then getting himself a wife ought to be his next step.
When a group of close comrades-six others who like him had spent the last ten and more years working behind enemy lines under the orders of the secretive individual they knew only as Dalziel-had proposed banding together and creating a private club to guard against the marauding mamas of the ton, he’d thought it an excellent idea. The Bastion Club had indeed proved useful in facilitating the search for suitable wives-for most of the others.
So much so that as of a day ago, there were only two of the original seven club members still unwed. Christian Allardyce, Marquess of Dearne, and Gervase himself.
Christian, he’d realized, had some secret that was holding him back. Some reason why, despite, of them all, having spent the most time in the ballrooms and being the most comfortable in that milieu, he seemed unable to summon any interest in any lady, not even in passing.
There was some story there, some excuse for Christian remaining detached and consequently unwed.
He, however, had no excuse. He wanted to wed, to find the right lady and establish her as his countess. As his sisters had so bluntly enumerated, there were multiple reasons he should, not least among those being them and their futures. He’d set out to find his bride in February. Nearly six months had passed and he’d achieved precisely nothing.
The failure nagged. His was a nature that thrived on achievement. He was constitutionally incapable of accepting failure.
News of the trouble with the mill had reached him just after he’d arrived at Paignton Hall in Devon to witness the nuptials of one of their small band, Deverell, and his Phoebe. So afterward, rather than returning to spend a last week or so in London in the hope that among the few tonnish families lingering in the capital he might discover his future wife, he’d had to hie back home instead. The continuing frustration, even if it had been entirely outside his control, had only exacerbated his already abraded patience-and an irrational sense of time running out and him still not having found his bride.
Courtesy of what he’d now discovered to be his sisters’ machinations, he’d spent no more than a few consecutive days in London, not since the Season had commenced, but rather than making his failure to find a wife easier to accept, the knowledge that he’d had no real time to look had only given his restless dissatisfaction a keener edge.
Six months, and he’d got nowhere. He hadn’t even managed to develop any, as Annabel had termed them, relevant skills.
And he wouldn’t get anywhere in the next three months, either.
Draining his glass, he forced himself to face that fact. To accept it, set it aside, and turn to the matter at hand, the one he could actually do something about.
The Honorable Miss Madeline Gascoigne.
He’d made his bargain with his sisters but, of course, he’d left himself an escape route. He’d slipped the loophole in between “temperament” and “beauty.” The other criteria he’d listed were ones others-his dear sisters, for example-could judge for themselves, but “compatibility” was entirely his to define.
Just as well he’d been so farsighted; Madeline qualified on all other counts.
She was, he’d calculated, twenty-nine or close to it; her father had died eight years ago and she’d been twenty-one at the time, that much he knew. A trifle long in the tooth perhaps, and she doubtless considered herself well and truly on the shelf, but as he was thirty-four, her advanced years weren’t something anyone would hold against her.
Indeed, he’d prefer a wife with more rather than fewer years in her dish, one who had weathered a little of life. God knew, he had. A young young lady would be extremely unlikely to fix, let alone hold, his interest.
And as the daughter of the late Viscount Gascoigne, Madeline unquestionably possessed birth and station appropriate to the position of his countess; there was no fault to be found there.
Although he hadn’t stipulated fortune, she was possessed of that as well, having inherited a sizable sum from maternal relatives, and the Gascoignes were wealthy, so she’d doubtless be well dowered, too.
As for temperament, he couldn’t imagine any lady more competent, more calm and capable, one less likely to enact him any tragedies or fall into hysterics. Indeed, he couldn’t imagine any occurrence that might throw Madeline into hysterics, not after some of the exploits she’d dealt with in bringing up her brothers.
His last stipulation had been “beauty.” Considering that point, he frowned. Although he had an excellent visual memory, especially for people, when it came to Madeline…he knew she was handsome and striking rather than pretty, but beyond that it was hard to decide how he rated her appearance. How he reacted to her as a woman- because he didn’t, because he didn’t think of her in that way. The years of dealing with her as a surrogate male, as the de facto Gascoigne, had dulled his senses with respect to her, yet he suspected she’d pass any “beauty” test.
Which left “compatibility” as the one criterion on which he could rule her “not suitable.”
He’d promised on his honor to actively pursue any suitable lady, and the girls would expect to see him doing just that. So he would; he’d spend a little time with Madeline, enough to establish just why he and she weren’t compatible, enough to make his declaration of incompatibility credible.
Time together shouldn’t be difficult to arrange. Now he was fixed for the summer at the castle, there were any number of issues on which his and Madeline’s paths would cross-or could be made to cross.
He felt the brandy working its way through his system, relaxing, warming, easing as it went.
His next steps didn’t seem too onerous. Not even vaguely problematic. He’d just spend some time with Madeline, and all would be well.
Or as well as things could be, until he could return to London and find himself a wife.
