The Sherbrooke Bride - Catherine Coulter [68]
“I don’t assume you’re a bad person, but I am leaving your brother, just as your mother obviously wishes, just as your brother wishes, just as, doubtless, the backstairs maids wish. I cannot be responsible for you. Goodness, I don’t even know you or you me! You must go about your business. Would you please get out of the carriage?”
Sinjun found this complication profoundly interesting. So this was marriage in the making. It was far more engrossing than any of the Greek plays she’d read by candlelight at midnight in Douglas’s library. It was closer to the Restoration plays she’d read by Dryden and Wycherley. Though she didn’t understand all the speeches of the plays, she understood enough to laugh herself silly. She also knew enough not to tell Douglas that she’d read them. She had this feeling he wouldn’t be at all amused.
“Why are you leaving Douglas?”
“Please, get out.”
Instead, Sinjun waved to the other coachman and the carriage rolled away. Alexandra’s mother-in-law was still looking out the window back at her. There was a look of confusion mixed with hopefulness on her face. She didn’t attempt to halt the carriage.
“Now there is no choice unless you want me to walk. No, I didn’t think you would. You must talk to me.”
It was simply too much. Alexandra merely shook her head, opened the door, grabbed her valise, and stepped to the ground. She looked up at the homely appalled face of John Coachman. “Take her home, if you please.”
“I can’t,” the coachman wailed. “His Lordship would feed my innards to the pigs. I can’t! Please, my lady, don’t ask me to do that. I can’t leave you. ’Twould mean my throat being slit, my hide being whipped off my back!”
“I had not believed the earl so very vicious and unfair. It matters not. It is no longer my problem. In truth, I don’t care what you do. Remain or return to Northcliffe. I will be the one to leave.” She swung away and began walking. The valise was heavier than she’d believed. She would make do. She wouldn’t stop and she wouldn’t let her shoulders stoop.
Sinjun was soon at her side, humming under her breath as if she hadn’t a care in the world, as if they were out for an afternoon stroll with nothing more on their minds than the varieties of butterflies they would see. The carriage was soon following some paces behind them.
“This is absurd,” Alexandra said, so frustrated she was nearly shrieking. She whirled about to face Sinjun. “Why are you doing this to me? I haven’t ever done anything to you that I know of. As I said, I don’t even know you.”
Sinjun cocked her head to one side and said simply, “You’re my sister. I’ve never had a sister, only three brothers, and I can tell you it’s not at all the same thing. Douglas has obviously upset you. He is sometimes a bit autocratic, perhaps even stern and forbidding. But he means well. He wouldn’t strap John Coachman, believe me.”
“He means well toward you but I am perfectly nothing to him. Go away now.”
“Oh no, I shan’t leave you. Douglas would feed my innards to the pigs too. He has very firm ideas about protecting ladies. A bit old-fashioned, but nonetheless, he is the head of the Sherbrooke family and takes his responsibilities very seriously. There are scores of us, you know.”
“He doesn’t take his marriage seriously. Go away.”
“I did hear that he wasn’t expecting you, but I paid no attention to that. Tony would never serve him up a pig in a poke, if you know what I mean. I’ve never seen Melissande but everyone says she is the most glorious creature in southern England, perhaps even in western England as well. But I can see Douglas quickly becoming very morose had Tony married her to him rather than to himself. I don’t mean to insult your sister, but Douglas wouldn’t deal with a female who knew she was beautiful and expected everyone to recognize her beauty all the time. Tony did the right thing, though I do hope he knows what he’s doing. But what I don’t understand is why—”
Alexandra stopped