Chapter Five

B y now, George suspected Belle might be right that they would do better to simply forget about his ill-planned proposition. To say he felt like a fool would be a massive understatement. He felt like the King of Fools. Worse, he vaguely felt that he’d behaved badly, though he could not have said how. Clearly this had all been a colossal mistake. Why had he listened to his sister in the first place? Caro must not understand Belle as well as she thought she did.

But much as he would have liked to pass the blame for his blunder onto Caro, George knew he was the one who’d decided to act on his sister’s suggestion. She might have given him bad advice, but he was responsible for acting on it.

“Listen, Belle, I am very sorry to have...” He waved his hand in an ineffectual gesture. “To have mucked things up so much. I do hope you will forgive me.” Even if he didn’t entirely understand why he needed to be forgiven.

“Yes, of course.” Arabella rested her hands in her lap and stared off into the distance. This bench provided a good view of the roses in the center of the garden, but she did not seem to be looking at them. “I am sure you did not mean to... to...” She closed her lips tightly and turned her face away.

He wanted to ask “to what?” but he remembered that Belle could not be rushed. If she had trouble articulating something, pushing her would only make the problem worse. So he waited patiently, pretending that he found the garden fascinating. In reality, he might just as well have been staring at a patch of weeds for all the attention he paid to it.

But the moment Belle said his name, he flicked his eyes back to her. She looked much calmer now, and she met his gaze unflinchingly. When she spoke, her voice was low but firm.

“George, back there, you said that you were ‘not asking much.’ I don’t understand how you could think that! You’re asking me to make a commitment that would bind me for the rest of my life.”

He opened his mouth to protest, to remind her that he didn’t expect her to be his wife in any but a legal sense. She forestalled him with a raised hand.

“Let me speak, please.” She waited until he nodded his acquiescence before continuing. “Don’t you see what I would have to give up in order to help you win this inheritance? If I marry you, I can never marry someone else. Even if I found the love of my life, I would have to watch him marry someone else, since I would be legally bound to you . I could never have a real husband, or children of my own. I might play the role of Mrs. Kirkland for only a few weeks, but all my own dreams would be gone forever. How could you ask me to do that?”

To his horror, her voice broke, and tears glistened in her eyes. George’s heart sank. Feeling like he’d been the greatest ass imaginable, he hung his head in shame. “Belle, I’m so sorry. I never knew you wanted those things.” The excuse sounded flimsy even to his ears.

“You never knew I wanted those things? But why wouldn’t I want them?” She did not raise her voice, but she spoke so fiercely that he cringed. “Why wouldn’t I want everything other girls want? Other women my age have homes of their own, husbands in their beds, and babies in the cradle. Is it so surprising that I might want all that too?”

George’s eyes widened. It was not like Belle to speak so plainly. When they were children, she had let the others decide what games they would play, or where they might ramble on their walks. She usually insisted that it was all the same to her. If she had desires, she hid them well. Perhaps that was why he’d expected her to agree to his plan.

He fumbled over his words, attempting to explain himself. “It’s just that, well, you came out of the schoolroom nearly five years ago, and in all that time, you never made a match. You are three-and-twenty and still unmarried, so I thought...” I thought you were on the shelf , he finished silently. He squeezed his eyes shut, knowing his words would only give her more pain.

“So you assumed I would never marry, is that it?” Belle’s voice was hoarse with unshed tears. “I am no longer in my first bloom, I should jump for joy at any proposal that comes my way, even if it’s for a fake marriage?”

George flinched at the bitterness in her voice, but he could not deny a word of what she said. It was true. He had assumed she must not be interested in matrimony, why else would she still be unmarried? Belle was the daughter of a baronet, she had a comfortable dowry, and she was pleasing to the eye. If she wanted to marry, surely she would have done so by now.

“Were there never any suitors, then?” That baffled him. Belle had spent at least two Seasons in London. The Cannings regularly attended local balls and assemblies and traveled to more distant house parties. Belle must have had many opportunities to meet young gentleman far more eligible than George.

She shook her head and blinked her eyes rapidly, setting her lovely golden eyelashes fluttering. “There were suitors,” she admitted, “but none of them seemed to understand me at all. They were interested in the girl they thought I should be, not the one I actually was. No one has ever wanted me for who I actually am.”

Then, to his horror, the tears standing in her eyes spilled down her face in a slow, sad trickle.

Hellfire and damnation! George dug around in his waistcoat pocket for a handkerchief, but when he pulled it out, he discovered it was filthy. He’d soiled it trying to clean mud off his coat. And he had no other handkerchief. For a brief and frantic second, he considered unwinding his cravat and offering that to Belle. But he didn’t think starting to undress in front of a proper young lady would make this situation any less awkward.

Instead, he wiped Belle’s tears away with his thumb: first her left eye, then her right. She closed her eyes. When he finished, she leaned her cheek against his hand.

“I’m sorry,” he said, though he knew that couldn’t even begin to make up for the pain she’d just displayed. “I didn’t know. Of course, you deserve everything other women want! I—” He froze before he could complete the sentence, shocked at what he had been about to say. I could give you those things, Belle. If you married me.

George closed his mouth and tightened his lips, frightened by his own impulsivity. He didn’t really mean that! Did he? He swallowed uneasily, then gently drew back the hand cradling Belle’s face. Touching her seemed like a bad idea, the feel of her soft, warm cheek against his hand made him want to trespass further. A comforting touch might easily lead to an affectionate caress, and who knew where that would end? He’d best keep his hands to himself, lest he do something he would later regret.

Belle blinked again, and her eyes widened. She shifted back further on the bench, as if she had only now realized how close together they sat. She wiped her eyes and audibly sniffed. Then she forced her lips into a stiff smile.

“You needn’t worry about me, George. I am all right now. I suppose we had better go back inside.” She stood up, but he caught her hand before she could walk away. She looked back over her shoulder, surprised.

“Wait, please,” he begged, though he had no idea what he was going to say next. He always produced his best writing under the pressure of a looming due date, and he hoped the very different social pressure of this situation might inspire his words now.

Belle sat back down and wrinkled her brow in confusion. “Really, George, there is nothing more you need to say.”

He shook his head. “Yes, there is. You see, I was wrong and you were right.” In George’s experience, it was easier to reconcile after a quarrel if one began with those words. Most people liked being told that they were in the right.

Belle’s eyes widened, but she did not interrupt him, for which he was grateful. It gave him the confidence to keep talking. “You were right to say that marriage is permanent. Of course it is. I should have realized how steep the cost would be for you... and for what reward? The marriage would only benefit me!” The more he said, the worse he felt. How could he have been so selfish?

“It is all right. I forgive you.” She patted his hand, then left her gloved hand resting over his. “We need talk no more of this. I am sorry I cannot help you win the cottage, though. It must matter a good deal to you.”

“Yes. I mean, no. I mean, it does matter, but not as much as you. As your friendship does, I mean.” Every word he uttered made the situation seem more ludicrous.

“We are still friends.” She squeezed his hand reassuringly, but the deepening line between her eyebrows hinted at her concern. “I think you are fretting yourself unnecessarily over this. Would it not be best if we went back into the house?” She looked down at his soiled clothes and wrinkled her nose. “You might wish to change out of that clothing.”

George sighed. “Yes, you are right. We ought to go back inside and pretend none of this ever happened.” For one dizzying moment, he had toyed with a different possibility, wondering what would happen if he proposed to Belle in earnest. But after the fiasco of his proposal, he thought it best to say nothing more. There were some decisions that ought never be made on an impulse.

He trudged back to the house alongside Belle, trying to talk himself into a happier state of mind. If her rejection disappointed him a little, that was undoubtedly because he’d lost his chance to win Dogwood Cottage. Ah, well. C’est la vie , no? It wasn’t as if he needed a cottage in Lancashire. In fact, he probably wouldn’t like living so far away from London’s publishing world.

No, his only regret was that Augustus or Benedict wouldn’t fully appreciate Dogwood Cottage. But the cottage was only stone and mortar. A house didn’t care whether it was loved or merely used. And those apples really were inedible.