“Percy, can’t you see that this match is impossible? You were there last night. You heard him at nuncheon. I can’t even begin to tell you what could have happened if Edmund hadn’t come to find me in the gardens. How can you let this marriage go ahead?”
“Because I have to, Diana!” Percy snapped. “What you say, or Edmund, or Jacob, come to that doesn’t matter. Andrew isn’t the man you or I would have chosen for you, but this is a longstanding family commitment and we must keep it for Father’s sake.”
“I cannot vow to love, honour, and obey that man, Percy. I can’t ever share his bed. Can’t you see that?”
“You should speak to Aunt Henrietta. She can explain all this far better than I can. We each have a duty to our parents, and marrying Andrew is your side of that duty. Once you’re married, your duty will be to him. My duty is heading the household as our father would have done if he were able.”
“I don’t believe that if Father were well, he would allow this.”
“Diana! Don’t…” Percy half shouted and half pleaded. “Aunt Henrietta already told me that you imagined Father spoke to you. There’ve been so many false alarms. He’s not going to wake up. He’s not going to speak. We have to accept that now just like she says!”
“You’re a fool, Percy Arnold!” Diana shouted. “A completely willing fool who will be taken advantage of by every ill-intentioned individual he ever meets. And you’ll deserve it too.”
Turning on her heel, she ran back to the house, heading for the back door and the servants’ quarters in case the Birks’s carriage had not yet departed.
* * *
“They’re asking for you downstairs, My lady,” Elsie said after knocking on Diana’s locked bedroom door for a second time. “The dinner’s all set.”
“Please, would you tell them I have a headache, Elsie? I don’t want to be disturbed before morning.”
“Very good, My lady.”
Alone in her room, Diana spent the next few hours thinking over her limited options.
She could go along with this marriage, temporarily placate Percy and her aunt, and presumably her parents, but be locked into lifelong misery with Andrew.
The obvious alternative was for Diana to refuse the marriage outright. It was certainly her legal right, and no one could drag her to the altar and make her speak those vows. But this option would entail disappointing Henrietta, who had already invested so much time and energy in the match and the planning of the wedding.
Diana knew how hard it was to refuse anything to this woman of such deep kindness and sympathy. After all that Lady Birks had done for Diana’s family, it would be a betrayal impossible for her aunt to understand or accept.
Aside from filling her with guilt, shame, and self-loathing, what could the family really do to her if she refused to marry her cousin? Diana didn’t know, but she suspected that even an unpleasant, restricted and resentful life amongst angry relatives would be better than being shackled to a man like Andrew.
A third option, of course, would be to take all her jewelry and run away somewhere, like the characters did in books. Or as girls sometimes did in real life and then were never spoken of again, except in hushed whispers. But they were girls who ran away with men.
What if she ran away to her old governess, Miss Spring, in Bath? Would she still be considered respectable then? And how would it affect Miss Spring and the small school for girls that she had recently founded in that city? No, she could not drag Miss Spring into this nor cause such worry to her mother while her father lay so ill.
What should she do? What did she really want? Diana asked herself these questions again and again, exhausting herself without making any practical decision.
It was after eleven o’clock at night that she finally readied herself for bed and sat down at her dressing table in her white cambric nightdress to brush her hair.
“What do you want, Diana?” she said wearily to her reflection.
Without thinking, she pulled open the drawer of her dressing table that held the now-faded crown of daisies woven by Edmund’s hands. Looking down at it, Diana recalled again the warmth of his lips, the gentle knowingness of his hands and the security of his embrace. The sensation was almost like a euphoric drug, especially after the memory of Andrew’s unpleasant roughness.
Thinking about Edmund now could only be a distraction from the serious decisions she must make but dismissing him from her mind was easier said than done. There were far too many feelings tied up with thoughts of Edmund for her now.
As well as the pleasure of his touch, Diana remembered the discomfort she had felt when he talked to Kitty, the sadness when he seemed to be avoiding her in the house, and the warmth of his support against Andrew’s conduct.
Diana closed and then opened the drawer again, her fingers lightly touching the semi-dried flowers. She wanted Edmund, but she could not have him. It came to her that the only way to clear her mind was to tell him this.
Scooping up the flowers and ignoring the late hour, she quietly unlocked her bedroom door.
ChapterEleven
“Diana!” Edmund exclaimed in a whisper, genuinely shocked. “What are you doing…?”
Without finishing his sentence, he stepped past her into the corridor outside his bedroom and looked left and right quickly before drawing her inside and locking the door.