Now that both men were gone, Juliet couldn’t help but ask herself: Was she totally addled to continue believing such a bird-witted plan held the answer? Entrusting the fates of herself and all those relying on her on the outcome of one lone, beetle-headed advertisement?
Pushing past Wivy with a confidence she was far from feeling, Juliet stretched her legs, with some measure of difficulty, across the expanse of her sitting room. Brought up to breed an heir and little else (proficiency at French, watercolors and selecting complementary lengths of yarn for embroidery projects notwithstanding), Juliet had neither the training nor the knowledge to return her late husband’s exhaustive grounds back to their former glory. Not without funds or a strong man at her side. It seemed creditors and, sadly, her own tenants distrusted even the most heartfelt of assurances and expressively disliked following instructions from a woman when there wasn’t a man behind her to back them up.
She and the few servants who remained had outrun the most persistent creditors, retreating first to one neglected property then another until landing here: the most dismal home she now had the misfortune to own, where half the windows were boarded over to avoid the dreaded window tax. More importantly, where she hoped to conduct her interviews with a modicum of peace.
Peace? Hah!
There’d been little enough of that because time grew ever shorter, the portions on their plates ever smaller, and the leaks overhead, as the second bucket brought into her bedchamber could attest, ever larger. A far-off rumble of thunder punctuated her thoughts.
“We’re doing the right thing, depend upon it.” The only thing, given how she refused to put herself at the mercy of another titled gent ever again. If she dragged her feet, um foot, much longer in this regard, her overbearing father was sure to arrive on her doorstep with preacher and picked-out pompous peer in tow. And that would never do.
“No…” She slowed her thumped pacing and returned to her place as Wivy again arranged the elaborate divider, masking her presence. “The men answering my advertisement are desperate in their own right. They wouldn’t face wedding a complete unknown otherwise.” There’d been third and fourth sons, a military man or two and several accomplished trades-men in their ranks. But there hadn’t been a single one she’d remotely considered choosing—not yet. “If neither of these last men come up to snuff, I’ll have Mr. Hastings start scheduling another batch of interviews. Fear not. It’s simply our job to weed through the chaff and discover the toff most likely to nurture the grounds until they again bloom and prosper.”
There now, Juliet congratulated herself. She’d sounded appropriately certain. But after the unexpected setback stemming from last week’s Injurious Mishap (though Wivy claimed it was more along the lines of a Canine Catastrophe) and her inability to find a suitable candidate by now, Juliet dreaded, deep inside, that she might have set herself on a losing course. “It’s been a long several days, I know, but let us see this through.” For I know not what else to do. “Only two more. Did you not say so yourself?”
Pray God, one of them was her future husband.
Jacks poked his head in the doorway. “That bleedin’ mort didn’t leave any lasting marks, did ’e?”
“Bleeding?” Wivy asked, her voice rising.
Through the crewel-worked screen, Juliet saw Jacks’ smile widen. “’E is now.”
One could take a boxer from the ring, Juliet mused, biting her lip against a reluctant grin, but couldn’t take the fight out of him. She might not have many servants left, but the ones who’d remained were unfailingly loyal. “We’re both in a fine twig,” she called out, “owing to your swift intervention. My sincere appreciation! Now, do please send in our next man.”
“Before ’Enry can lick ’is ear,” Jacks promised, smacking one fist into the opposite palm. “And you can bet I’ll be right outside the door like always. Just in case another tries getting orn’ry.”
“Speaking of Henry,” Juliet wondered out loud, “where’s he off to?” She hadn’t seen tail nor whisker of her beloved tomcat all day.
“Like as not,” Wivy answered with asperity, “he decamped upstairs to the bedchambers once today’s applicants started arriving. That or the kitchen. And who can blame him, after last week’s Currish Calamity?”
There was that. Juliet’s leg twinged in sympathy.
Attempting to arrange her skirts around the wooden chair that took up most of the cramped space, she looked beyond the embroidered scene that hid her presence. In front of her but angled so Juliet could see the room, Wivy situated herself at the desk.
“Ready to have another go?” Juliet whispered.
Wivy took a deep breath and released it on a loud sigh. “Two more,” Juliet heard her murmur. “Two more, then the blessed respite of the weekend.”
Juliet knew this marriage scheme had been hard on her friend. For years, she’d been the one constant in Juliet’s life. If it weren’t for Wivy's companionship, Juliet's betrothal to Lord Letheridge at sixteen—with Papa refusing to grant her the opportunity of a season, much less the chance to meet any other gentlemen—might’ve been her undoing.
As it was, by the time their extended engagement elapsed and the pompous ceremony held at St. George’s as her dear mama insisted (her mother’s dying wish, else Juliet had no doubt Papa would’ve disregarded it as he had all her others), old Leth’s determination had dwindled, his winkle had waned, and though Juliet couldn’t bring herself to in any way welcome his persistent attempts at bedding her, she’d tolerated them in good stead as she’d been taught a dutiful wife ought.
Yet she remained untouched, in the extreme intimate sense, to this day. Hence, part of her unfailing resolve to have a say in her next spouse. And bed partner.
After all, other young ladies
