Virtue's Reward by Jean R. Ewing Read Free Book Online Page A

you think?”
    “I’m to meet your parents? Today?”
    “Of course, what did you imagine? That I would hide you away? I do have a family, you know.”
    He must have, of course. In her hurry at Trethaerin, she hadn’t even thought to ask him. And then he had not been exactly forthcoming about himself after that.
    “Aren’t we going to London?” she asked faintly.
    He looked mildly surprised. “Later, perhaps. First I intend to show my father that I have done my duty and entered holy wedlock.”
    Her new husband handed her up into the curricle, then swung in beside her and took the ribbons. Bayard was tied on behind and they set off.
    It was a clear, beautiful day. As they left Devon and crossed into Somerset, she was entering a part of England she had never seen before. The landscape was steadily becoming softer and greener. The village houses began to be roofed in thatch, instead of the gray slate of her native Cornwall. There was no hint of the sea in these mellow lanes and snug cottages. The fields boasted thick thorn hedges. There were no more drystone walls and windblown gorse bushes.
    Just after Ilminster, they left the turnpike and began to travel south. The road took another sharp turn east and the curricle swept through a pair of iron gates flanked by huge stone pillars. The gatekeeper gave them a gap-toothed grin and doffed his cap as they passed. The gatehouse alone was large enough to serve as any respectable gentleman’s country seat.
    The horses trotted on up a driveway that passed between rows of perfectly manicured laurel and rhododendron.
    “For heaven’s sake, sir,” Helena said. “What on earth is this place? Is your father some kind of potentate?”
    “Of course not. He’s the Earl of Acton.”
    “What? Your father is an earl?” Helena’s hand flew to her heart in a vain attempt to steady its wild beating. She felt almost faint. “How could you not have told me?”
    He gave her an odd smile. “Would you have turned me down if you had known?”
    “Good heavens, sir! I thought we were to be honest with each other. Don’t you think I had the right to know?”
    She knew he was prevaricating when he replied. “To be truthful, I didn’t even think of it. I suppose I owe you an apology. Does the thought discompose you?”
    “It strikes terror into my very soul. How dared you not make this clear? You are a younger son, I trust?”
    “I’m sorry to disabuse you. I am, alas, the heir. You will be a countess someday.”
    Helena did her best to steady her voice. “Are you also an only child?”
    Richard was gazing straight ahead over the horses’ ears. “I have a gaggle of younger siblings who are variously scattered among schools and colleges. Should anything happen to me, Henry could come down from Oxford and make a perfectly good earl, if he ever gets sober enough. Should he also be struck down before his time, however, then John will do just fine. There are also enough little sisters to rattle anybody. They attend a select academy for young ladies near London.”
    His voice was perfectly controlled. Was it just her imagination that she detected some trace of bitterness or sarcasm there?
    The shrubbery opened up and King’s Acton lay before her. Helena ruthlessly crushed her uprising of panic. Row upon row of tall windows marched across an endless white façade. A battalion of ornamental stone spires punctuated the skyline in matching order. Carved stone medallions paraded below them, each engraved with some heraldic symbol. The front entrance would have been dwarfed by its crenellated portico had there not been an equally imposing flight of stone steps leading up to the door. Surely they were not going to live here?
    “My grandfather had delusions of grandeur,” Richard said dryly. “What do you think of his fantasy?”
    She felt faint. “I suppose it’s magnificent.”
    “You are trying without success to be tactful, my dear. When it becomes mine, I might well burn it