Barely a Bride

Weymouth Hall, London

  April 1810

  “You sent for me, sir.”

  Griffin, seventeenth Viscount Abernathy, stood facing his father, the sixteenth Earl of Weymouth, in the study of his father’s London town house. He was separated from his father by a wide expanse of dark, polished mahogany and a much darker, wider gulf of doubt brought about by age, familial differences, and the inherent conflict between a man and his heir.

  “I sent for my heir,” the earl snapped.

  Griff inhaled, counted to twenty, then slowly expelled the breath. “I am your heir, Father.”

  “Not for much longer.”

  So that’s how it was to be. As an only son and an only child, Griff was quite accustomed to his father’s repeated attempts to use guilt as a means of manipulating him. His father’s methods were tried and true, but Griff had long ago grown weary of the tactics. It would be nice to think that his father had sent for him because he wanted Griff’s company. Just once.

  “And why is that? Are congratulations in order?” Griff asked. “Have I an older brother I’ve never met?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous! If I had another son, you’d be the first to know about it.”

  “I would rather think that Mother would be the first to know about it.” Griff gave his father a slight smile. “Or your mistress.”

  Lord Weymouth failed to find the humor in his son’s remark. “However much we might like it, your mother is not increasing.”

  “I am disappointed to hear it.”

  “It isn’t for lack of trying,” the earl continued. “I can assure you of that. And of the fact that I have no need of a mistress. Your mother keeps me quite busy and quite satisfied in that regard. But no matter how often we try or how creative we become, we fail to accomplish our goal. Ours has never been a prolific family, and it seems that Lady Weymouth and I were quite fortunate to produce you.”

  “I am delighted you feel that way.” Griff struggled to maintain a neutral countenance. His father had many admirable traits, but a sense of humor wasn’t counted among them.

  The Earl of Weymouth was a brilliant man, but careful and methodical. He was quiet and observant, paid enormous attention to detail, and rarely deviated from his planned course of action.

  Griff had never heard his father mention the possibility of having intimate relations with his mother or with any other woman. Oh, he knew that his parents had had intimate relations at least once. The consummation of their union had, after all, resulted in his birth, but like most offspring, Griff didn’t want to hear the details, nor could he begin to imagine his father as a lover, creative or otherwise. He blocked the mental image that threatened to ruin his perception of his parents and turned his attention back to what his father was saying.

  “We are delighted”—Lord Weymouth used the same word Griff had used, proving to his son that he did have a fully developed sense of irony, if not a fully developed sense of humor—“enough with your presence on earth and in our lives that we’ve no wish to see it extinguished prematurely.”

  “You heard?”

  “Of course, I heard. Did you expect that I wouldn’t?” Lord Weymouth picked up a heavy ledger and slammed it upon the desktop.

  The loud crack of leather against wood echoed through the quiet room. Lord Weymouth frowned, then pushed away from his desk and stood up.

  His size was intimidating. Standing head and shoulders above almost every man he knew, Weymouth used his size to his advantage, but that tactic no longer worked with Griffin. The boy hadn’t so much as flinched at the sound of the ledger hitting the desk or displayed any hint of childish emotion when his father stood up from behind his desk. Weymouth recognized the fact that his son was a grown man. Griff had sprouted up and filled out while away at university and was now able to look him in the eye. In truth, his son looked down in order to look him in the eye, a fact of which Lord Weymouth was inordinately proud. It was quite clear to Lord Weymouth that even in his stocking feet, Griffin easily bested his height by a good inch or so.

  Except for age and the difference in height, the two of them were very much alike physically. Griff had his mother’s brilliant blue eyes and hair a lighter shade of brown, but there was no denying that he was his father’s son. His shoulders and chest were equally broad, and the earl found, much to his chagrin, that Griff was more fit. His waist was trimmer, and his hips and thighs were well muscled from hours spent in the saddle instead of behind a desk.

  The earl fought to keep from grinning from ear to ear. His son was a man he could be proud of. Was proud of. But that didn’t keep him from wanting to throttle him. Imagine his only son and heir choosing—choosing—to take up a commission as a major in the cavalry.

  “I knew you’d hear about it,” Griff admitted. “I just didn’t expect you to hear about it quite so soon.”

  “So soon?” Weymouth came perilously close to shouting. “You accepted that commission a sennight ago. I only learned of it this morning.”

  “I did ask that my decision be kept quiet until I had a chance to discuss it with you,” Griffin offered.

  “And when did you intend our discussion to take place?” The earl’s tone had taken on a biting edge, a biting edge that had been known to quell far greater men than his son.

  “If you’ll check your appointment calendar, sir, I believe you’ll find your secretary assigned me the hours between four and six tomorrow at White’s.”

  Weymouth reached over, flipped open his appointment book, and discovered that his son’s name had, indeed, been duly noted for the hours of four to six at White’s on the following afternoon. “You could have discussed this with me before you accepted the commission. Or did you keep it secret because you feared I would withhold my approval?”

  “I have reached my majority,” Griff reminded his father. “I don’t fear your displeasure or require your approval.”

  “You are my heir,” the earl replied. “My only heir. Have you no sense of duty?”

  “England is at war. Father,” Griffin said.

  “I know England is at war!” Weymouth barked. “I see the results of it every day at the War Office, and I’ve no wish to see my heir’s name added to the casualty lists.”

  Griff straightened his shoulders and stood at attention. “I had hoped that you would be pleased that I had decided to serve my country in her time of need.”

  “Pleased?” Weymouth snorted. “I’d be pleased if you would forget this nonsense. I’d be pleased if you’d sell your commission to someone else and let them serve in your place.”

  “So the Earl of Weymouth’s heir can be spared? So someone else’s heir’s name can appear on the casualty lists?” Griff glared at his father.

  Weymouth glared back. “Yes, dammit! Better theirs than mine.”

  “Have you so little confidence in my ability to survive?” Griffin asked.

  “I have every confidence in your ability to survive,” Weymouth said, “as long as you stay home where you belong. We’re not talking about fox hunting or stalking stag or hunting expeditions spent traipsing across the wilds of Scotland with your friends. We’re talking about war.”

  “I know what war is, Father.”

  “Do you?” Weymouth mused. “I wonder. I wonder if anyone who hasn’t experienced it knows what war is.”

  “Then let’s just say that I know where my duty lies.”

  “Your duty lies with your family, with tending and preserving what your mother and I have tended and preserved for you.”

  “And what of Bonaparte and the threat he poses to England and to our way of life?”

  “What of it?” Weymouth demanded. “Bonaparte is more of a threat to our family and our way of life if you go to serve against him than he would be if you stayed home and watched him conquer the whole of England.”

  Griff recoiled, shocked to the core by his father’s words. “I cannot believe you would forfeit your country so willingly.”

  “I am a great deal more w
illing to forfeit my country than I am to forfeit my son.”

  “You mean your heir,” Griff corrected.

  “I mean my son, dammit!” Weymouth glared at that son, daring him to contradict. “And I cannot believe that you would willingly forfeit your future and your family’s future in order to become cannon fodder for the French.” He ran a hand through his hair. “Cavalry. Bloody hell. I could understand the navy. I could even understand a commission as one of Wellesley’s aides. But the cavalry…” He shook his head. “It’s foolhardy. It’s vainglorious. It’s the most dangerous—”

  “It’s my strength,” Griff said softly. “I sit a horse better than any man you know.”

  Weymouth nodded. “You sit a horse better than any man I’ve ever seen or ever hope to see.”

  “The army needs cavalry officers.”

  “Yes,” the earl agreed. “And the reason the army needs cavalry officers is because we have more than our share of idiot generals who insist on getting them shot to hell. You’re tall enough to be a grenadier. And you’d have a better chance of staying alive.”

  “I intend to serve my country,” Griff said. “I mean to help defeat Bonaparte, and I have to go with my strength in order to succeed.” He looked at his father, silently begging the earl to understand. “I’ve spent my entire life playing at soldiers, memorizing military tactics and stratagems. I may be tall enough, but I don’t fancy a position in the grenadiers, lobbing grenades at the enemy lines until some sharpshooter picks me off. I prefer to take my chances with the cavalry. It’s what I know best. If you were twenty years younger, what would you do?”

  Weymouth nodded. “I would do exactly what you’re going to do.” He met his son’s gaze. “I would provide for the future of my family name and line by finding myself a suitable bride and getting myself an heir on that bride before I go off to war. And if I were you, I’d begin right away.”

  “You must be joking!” Griff exclaimed.

  “On the contrary,” the earl replied. “As you are quite aware, I have a considerable reputation for not having been born with a sense of humor. This isn’t a joke.”

  “But, Father, be reasonable—”

  “I am being reasonable,” Weymouth snapped. “Far more reasonable than you are being. I, at least, would tend to the details of the family. I, at least, would provide my parents with a grandchild to take my place as heir to the family land and tides in order that they not become extinct should something happen to their only child.”

  “But to marry some poor girl and get her with child in order to leave her a widow—” Griff broke off as the magnitude of his decision and the possibility of his not returning home from war suddenly became a reality.

  “I’m not suggesting you marry a poor girl or that you leave her a widow,” Weymouth told him. “An heiress will do just as well. And as long as you’re going to be a husband and a father, you might as well return from the war alive and healthy and whole.” He smiled at his son for the first time since Griffin arrived. “It’s the least you can do for your family.”

  “You aren’t serious.”

  “I thought that we had established that I am quite serious. I suggest you start the quest for your bride at Lady Cleveland’s soiree this evening.” Weymouth flipped through his appointment book as he spoke. “You only have two weeks.”

  “I’m not going to spend my remaining fortnight attempting to locate a bride.”

  “You will if you expect to be married before you leave,” his father countered. “You only have a fortnight plus four days before you’re scheduled to report to your regiment. It will take at least a day to negotiate the wedding settlement and another two days to plan and execute the wedding and a wedding breakfast for a hundred or so of our closest friends.”

  Griffin stood his ground. “I am not getting married.”

  “Fine,” the earl agreed. “Sell your commission and turn your attention to Abernathy Manor. It is desperately in need of upkeep. The house and the lands are on their way to ruination.”

  “Abernathy Manor will have to endure a bit longer without my attention,” Griffin said. “I’m joining His Majesty’s Eleventh Blues.”

  “Then you’ll want to choose a bride.” His father’s tone of voice and the look of steely determination in his eyes brooked no argument. “Otherwise, I shall be forced to select one for you.”

  “You can select a wife for me, but you can’t make me repeat the vows.”

  “I won’t have to,” Weymouth said grimly. “You will repeat your wedding vows willingly, or you will find yourself summarily cashiered out of the Eleventh Blues. You’ll be dishonored, disgraced, and disowned.”

  “You can’t disown me,” Griffin reminded him. “You have no other heirs.”

  “Then I’ll cut you off without a penny.”

  “Fine,” Griffin replied. “I’ll make my own way.”

  “You do that,” Weymouth told him. “You’re young and strong and smart; you can earn a living for yourself. But that task might not be so easy for the three hundred souls at Abernathy Manor who find themselves dependent upon your income—”

  “You would close the manor and turn everyone out?”

  “I would tear down the manor and put sheep on the place without batting an eye,” Weymouth promised. “It’s less costly and a much more efficient use of the acreage.” He glanced at his son, gauging Griff’s reaction. “What do I need with another manor house? I have Weymouth Park, the London town house, and a hunting lodge in Scotland to keep up.”

  “That’s blackmail.”

  “Of course it is,” the earl agreed. “And the reason it’s used so often is because it’s effective. Don’t look so glum,” he advised his son. “While it’s true that you’ll be giving up your bachelor ways, you’ll be able to rest easy in the knowledge that in addition to acquiring a bride and an heir, your noble sacrifice has secured the livelihoods of three hundred or so deserving souls.”

  “I’ll have your word that Abernathy Manor and all its inhabitants will be well taken care of,” Griffin demanded. “Whether or not I return from the war.”

  “You have my word…so long as you take a bride and get an heir on her before you leave.”

  “What if I take a bride but fail to leave her with an heir? I can’t promise I’ll be able to fulfill that duty in a few days’ time.”

  Weymouth looked his son in the eye. “The sooner you find a bride, the more time you’ll have to work at it.”

  “I could still fail,” Griff reminded him. “You’ve failed to produce another child. And, as you said, not for want of trying.”

  “You’ll have to do better than your mother and I have been able to do.”

  “What if I succeed, and the child is a girl?”

  “Ownership of Abernathy Manor reverts to me. Our letters patent make no allowances for firstborn females.”

  “You could have the letters amended by parliament.”

  “I could,” the earl said. “But I prefer that my son return to England and fulfill his duty to his family.”

  “Even if that means returning from the dead?”

  “Whatever it takes to accomplish the deed,” Weymouth pronounced. “I will accept nothing less from my son and heir.”

 

  Chapter Two

  “Since I’ve no wish to marry, I’ve decided to ignore the fuss of the London season and devote my energies to improving the gardens here instead. I’ve designed four new flower beds already, and I wish to experiment with the application of varying strengths of fertilizer from the stables.”

  —Lady Alyssa Carrollton, London, 1810

  Grosvenor Square Mews

  Three blocks away