Clarissa on the track of truth was like a terrier with a rat.
"I expect Theo means that the earl kissed her," Emily said with the same knowledgeable air as before. "It's perfectly proper between engaged couples… It's not at all indiscreet."
"But perhaps Theo means the earl kissed her before they became engaged," Clarissa said with a gleam in her eye. "Now, that would be indiscreet, wouldn't it?"
"Oh, be quiet, both of you!" Theo pulled off her nightgown and went to the dresser, bending to splash cold water on her face.
"Well, did he?" persisted Clarissa.
"If you must know, he did a great deal more than that," she said, her voice muffled by the towel as she dried her face.
"Theo!" exclaimed Emily.
"What did he do?" demanded Clarissa, regarding her sister's naked body with a new interest.
"I'm not saying." Hastily, Theo grabbed her chemise and pulled it over her head.
"Well, of course the earl is quite old," Emily observed judiciously. "A lot older than you, and much more worldly, I'm sure."
"Well, he would be – he was a soldier," put in Clarissa.
"But so is Edward."
"And I'll lay odds Edward's a lot more worldly now than he used to be," Theo said, glad to turn the spotlight away from herself. She rummaged through the armoire for a dress… something as plain as she could find. When she told Stoneridge she'd made a mistake, she didn't want him to remember what had led to the mistake.
"Have you told Mama yet?"
"No… It only happened a few hours ago. Everyone was asleep."
"You had an assignation in the middle of the night?"
"Not exactly… It wasn't an assignation… it was an accident." She pulled a hairbrush through her hair before deftly plaiting it. "In fact, this whole damn business has been one mistake after another."
"That's a bad word, Theo."
The three sisters whirled to the door. "Rosie, you really must learn not to creep up on people," Clarissa scolded.
"I wasn't. What's a jilt?"
"How long have you been hiding there?" Theo demanded, her mind racing backward, trying to remember what they'd been saying. It definitely hadn't been suitable for the child's ears.
"I wasn't hiding. I was just standing here," Rosie protested. "Is anyone going to come and catch butterflies with me?" She flourished the white net she held.
"No, not at the moment," Emily responded distractedly. Like Theo, she was trying to remember exactly what they'd said.
Rosie came into the room, hitching herself onto the bed. "So what's a jilt? Is Theo going to marry the earl?"
"One of these days those big ears of yours are going to get you into deep trouble," Theo threatened, scowling fiercely at her little sister.
"Is this a private party, or can anyone join in?" Elinor appeared smiling in the open doorway. "I was wondering why I was breakfasting alone. How are you feeling, Theo, dear?"
"I haven't been ill, Mama," Theo said.
"No, she's going to be a jilt," Rosie said. "But they won't tell me what that is… Oh, and she's going to marry the earl."
Her elder sisters sighed; their mother frowned. "Theo isn't marrying anyone, child, without my permission. And since there's been no discussion in my hearing on the subject, you may assume you misheard. Is that understood?"
"Yes, Mama." Chastened, Rosie slipped off the bed. "I just wanted someone to catch butterflies with me."
"Off with you." Her mother shooed her out the door before turning to the others. "Clarissa, Emily, I'd like to talk to Theo in private." The two exchanged a quick look with Theo and made themselves scarce, closing the door behind them.
Elinor sat on the window seat, regarding Theo gravely. "Now, perhaps you'd like to tell me what's going on."
Theo sighed and flopped onto the bed. "It's a mess, Mama…"
Elinor received a greatly edited version of the previous night's events, but if she guessed at the missing pieces, she gave no indication.
"So in the cold light of day you've changed your mind?"
"Yes," Theo said baldly.
"Then you'd best explain that to the earl with all dispatch," Elinor said, rising to her feet. "It's a most unpleasant thing to do to anyone under any circumstances, and you owe it to Stoneridge not to leave him in ignorance of the true state of your regard another instant."
"You're vexed," Theo stated.
Her mother turned at the door. "I simply wish that you had managed things with more principle, Theo. To agree to marry a man in one breath and withdraw it in the next smacks of an indelicacy that I find hard to accept in one of my daughters. I'm not going to imagine what went on between you and the earl last night, but if it gave him permission to believe you held certain feelings for him, I trust you will find it very uncomfortable to disabuse him."
She went out, leaving Theo ready to weep with frustration. Her mother had put her finger on the problem with disturbing accuracy… And why was Elinor so set on this match? Theo was in no doubt that her mother was on the earl's side and had been from the first minute.
So it was going to be uncomfortable telling him. But better to endure even excruciating embarrassment for a few minutes than a lifetime of misery. Her face set, she went downstairs in search of Stoneridge.
Foster hadn't seen his lordship. He didn't believe he'd breakfasted as yet, although it was nearly ten o'clock, and his lordship was known to be an early riser.
Puzzled, Theo went back upstairs, pausing outside the closed door to the earl's bedroom. It opened as she stood there in frowning indecision, her hand half-lifted to knock.
Henry came out, closing it softly behind him. "Can I be of assistance, Lady Theo?"
"His lordship…," she said. "I need to speak with him urgently. Could you ask him to spare me a moment?"
"His lordship is indisposed, Lady Theo," Henry said. He'd known the worst the moment he'd entered the earl's bedchamber at sunrise. As he'd moved to open the curtains in his customary fashion, a thread of voice had spoken from the darkness of the bed curtains: "No light, Henry." It would be many hours before the Earl of Stoneridge was fit to talk with anyone.
"Indisposed?" Theo blinked in surprise. Men didn't become indisposed… at least not strong, powerful men like Stoneridge. Indisposition was for gouty old men like her grandfather.
"That is so, Lady Theo," Henry reiterated, politely but firmly indicating that he wasn't about to expand on the statement. "If you'll excuse me." He bowed and slid past her toward the stairs.
Theo stared at the closed door. What abominable timing! Why couldn't he have become indisposed… or whatever it was… an hour or two later?
She went downstairs to the breakfast parlor to discuss the earl's puzzling condition with her mother and sisters.
Stoneridge lay in the merciful dimness, fighting the nausea that increased with each knife of pain slicing through the right side of his head. Retching exacerbated the pain to an intolerable level, so that if he had the strength, he would scream, would bang his head against the bedpost – anything to divert the agony. But already the insidious weakness was in his limbs, even though they could find no rest, and the debilitation would get worse until uncontrollable tears would squeeze between his eyelids.
The door opened and Henry padded softly to the bed. "Will you take some laudanum, my lord?"
"I'll never keep it down," Sylvester said. It worked only if he could take it the minute the warning signs appeared, but this morning he'd awakened, as so often happened, when the attack was well established, and there was nothing now that he could do except endure.
"Lady Theo wished to speak with you, sir," Henry said, laying a cloth soaked in lavender water over his temples. "She said it was urgent."
Sylvester lay still; for a second the throbbing eased. He knew it merely heralded renewed violence but was pathetically grateful for the tiny respite. Why would Theo need to speak to him urgently? Second thoughts?