Scandal in Spring Read Online Free PDF Page B

with sudden rage.
    Daisy immediately regretted telling her. The family physician had advised that Lillian must not be upset as she approached the last month of her pregnancy. She had become pregnant the previous year and had miscarried early on. The loss had been difficult for Lillian, not to mention surprising given her hardy constitution.
    In spite of the doctor's assurances that she was not to blame for the miscarriage, Lillian had been melancholy for weeks afterward. But with Westcliff's steadfast comfort and the loving support of her friends, Lillian had gradually returned to her usual high-spirited self.
    Now that Lillian had conceived again she was far less cavalier about the pregnancy, mindful of the possibility of another miscarriage. Unfortunately she was not one of those women who bloomed during confinement. She was splotchy, nauseous, and often ill-tempered, chafing at the restrictions her condition imposed.
    "I won't stand for this," Lillian exclaimed. "You're not going to marry Matthew Swift, and I'll send Father to the devil if he tries to take you away from England!"
    Still seated on the floor, Daisy reached up and settled a calming hand on her older sister's knee. She forced her lips into a reassuring smile as she stared into Lillian's distraught face.
    "Everything will be fine," she said. "We'll think of something. We'll have to." They had been too close for too many years. In the absence of their parents' affection Lillian and Daisy had been each other's sole source of love and support for as long as they could remember.
    Evie, the least talkative of the four friends, spoke with a slight stammer that appeared whenever she was nervous or moved by strong emotion. When they had all met two years earlier, Evie's stammer had been so severe as to make conversation an exercise in frustration. But since leaving her abusive family and marrying Lord St. Vincent, Evie had gained far greater confidence.
    "W-would Mr. Swift really agree to take a bride not of his own choosing?" Evie pushed back a gleaming red curl that had slipped over her forehead. "If what he said was true— that his financial situation is already s-secure— there is no reason for him to marry Daisy."
    "There is more to it than money," Lillian replied, squirming in her chair to find a more comfortable position. Her hands rested on the ample curve of her belly. "Father has made Swift into a substitute son, since none of our brothers turned out the way he wanted."
    "The way he wanted?" Annabelle asked in puzzlement. She flopped over to kiss the baby's tiny wiggling toes, eliciting a gurgling chuckle from the infant.
    "Devoted to the company," Lillian clarified. "Efficient and callous and unscrupulous. A man who will put business interests ahead of everything else in his life. It's a language they speak together, Father and Mr. Swift. Our brother Ransom has tried to make a place for himself in the company, but Father always pits him against Mr. Swift."
    "And Mr. Swift always wins," Daisy said. "Poor Ransom."
    "Our other two brothers don't even bother trying," Lillian said.
    "But wh-what of Mr. Swift's own father?" Evie asked. "Does he have no objection to his son becoming someone else's de facto son?"
    "Well, that's always been the odd part," Daisy replied. "Mr. Swift comes from a well-known New England family. They settled in Plymouth and some of them ended up in Boston by the early seventeen hundreds. Swifts are known for their distinguished ancestry, but only a few of them have managed to retain their money. As Father always says, it takes one generation to make it, the second to spend it, and the third is left with only the name. Of course, when it's Old Boston one is talking about, the process takes ten generations instead of three— they're so much slower about everything— "
    "You're drifting, dear," Lillian interrupted. "Back to the point."
    "Sorry." Daisy grinned briefly before resuming. "Well, we suspect there was some kind of falling-out