Lord Loxley's Lover by Katherine Marlowe Read Free Book Online Page A

pleasure to make your acquaintance, Miss Meriwether.”
    “They’re all in the drawing room taking tea,” Lucy told them. “I wouldn’t go in there if I were you, but then, I’ve only just escaped .”
    “I’m afraid I’m already quite resigned to my fate,” Lord Loxley said.
    Miss Lucy grinned and darted past them out the door.
    Feeling rather bewildered by the encounter, Lord Loxley stared after her. “She was lively.”
    Mr. Rochester grinned very slightly, and the two of them went in to tea.
    After the small hurricane they had encountered in the front hall, the drawing room was exactingly decorous and very quiet. The solemn tick-tick of the clock was near deafening in the silence.
    Lady Mathilda Loxley sat at the table, asking the occasional firm question, which made the encounter more of an interview than a conversation, despite the other ladies’ polite efforts to pretend otherwise. Accompanying her were two women who must be Miss Sarah Meriwether and her mother. Miss Sarah Meriwether was a pretty brunette with a very well-practiced polite smile, which managed to almost convincingly present the falsehood that she was enjoying Lady Mathilda Loxley’s company, and her mother was a petite and plump woman with an earnest face. All three of the women looked up at the gentlemen’s arrival.
    There were two empty chairs at the table, a fortuitous situation which had resulted from Miss Lucy having excused herself. Lady Mathilda Loxley must have realized the problem this presented almost as quickly as Lord Loxley recognized the opportunity, as she promptly gave the two of them a stern, warning frown.
    “Good day, Aunt Mathilda,” Lord Loxley said, greeting her with his most charming smile as he took the chair next to his aunt.
    “Fitzhenry,” Lady Mathilda Loxley said, as Mr. Rochester took the second empty chair, next to Mrs. Meriwether. “May I introduce to you Mrs. Elizabeth Meriwether and her daughter, Miss Sarah Meriwether. Mrs. Meriwether, Miss Meriwether, this is my great-nephew Lord Fitzhenry Loxley.”
    She paused. Lord Loxley guessed that she was considering whether to sharply reprimand her gentleman guests for their presumption, or to save face and conceal the fact that her guests were dining with a valet.
    “And Mr. Miles Rochester,” she finished, giving Lord Loxley a steely glare that promised he would regret this, “son of Baron Rochester.”
    The Meriwethers expressed their sincere pleasure to meet Lord Loxley and Mr. Rochester.
    Throughout tea Miss Sarah Meriwether was very quiet, offering only occasional reserved commentary on topics brought up by her mother or Lady Mathilda Loxley, or answering in the affirmative when Lady Mathilda Loxley prompted her on different parts of her upbringing and education. It seemed that Miss Sarah Meriwether was very capably educated, fluent in French and German, and a great help to her parents’ management of the household.
    Afterward the group retired to a nearby parlor, where Miss Sarah Meriwether and Lord Loxley were stranded on a small couch at one end of the room while Lady Mathilda Loxley and Mrs. Meriwether chatted at the other end of the room. Lord Loxley was fairly certain that the idea was to give the young people a measure of privacy in order that they might deepen their affection for one another, but the two of them simply sat in awkward silence, with only the occasional stilted effort at conversation. Miss Sarah was almost as discouraging of conversation as Mr. Rochester, although she was at least more polite about it.
    Mr. Rochester himself hovered nearby, which didn’t help, although he was perfectly quiet and unobtrusive as he stood by the wall in some blend of valet, friend, and chaperone to Lord Loxley. Shortly thereafter, Miss Lucy returned from wherever she had gone, and came to stand by Mr. Rochester, mimicking his posture in a way that made all of the young people cough and bite the insides of their cheeks to fight laughter. Lady