The Marriage Bargain Read Online Free PDF Page B

joke?”
    “I assure you, it is not,” Livingston replied.
    “Oh… I have swooned…” Lady Thornby murmured, regaining consciousness.
    Beckett crouched down beside her, assisting Hartley as he struggled to raise Lady Thornby to a sitting position.
    “Mother, are you alright?” Beckett asked, daintily adjusting her lace cap from where it had fallen over her eye.
    He was rewarded with a hearty slap across the cheek. Well, he thought, as he rubbed the stinging flesh, at least his mother was feeling better.
    “I am not alright, Beckett,” Lady Thornby said haughtily. “Thanks to you and your disgraceful shenanigans.”
    The portly lady rose to her feet with much grunting and groaning, slapping at the hands of those who tried to help her.
    Lady Thornby pointed her finger at her son and brought it and her pinched face slowly in front of his. “I want to know one thing.” She paused for effect, her eyes growing as wide as saucers. “Who is that woman?”
    Beckett knew how utterly absurd his reply was going to sound, but he took a deep breath and said it anyway. “I don’t know.”
    “This is no time for your silly games. Explain yourself!”
    “It’s no game, Mother. Alfred and I found her outside the Goose and Gunner last night and brought her home with us. That’s the truth of the matter.”
    “Oh!” Lady Thornby exclaimed. “Of all the—”
    “It’s not what you think.”

    “I saw a half-dressed hussy in your bedchamber—what should I think?” Her lips compressed into a thin line as she waited for a reply.
    “The opposite of what you are thinking,” Beckett said dryly.
    Lady Thornby’s voice lowered to a harsh whisper. “To let your own servants see you with a—a trollop like that! Shameful.”
    “I told you; she is not a trollop, Mother. The girl was ill. Alfred and I brought her home and we took her straight to bed—I mean, put her straight to bed. I went to sleep in my sitting room, but I must have returned to my own bed without realizing.”
    “Ha! That is not in the least convincing,” his mother huffed.
    Beckett ignored her remark. “She was unconscious when we found her, so I don’t know who she is. But I’m sure of one thing, she’s no strumpet. She obviously doesn’t live in the street or her feet would not have been cut and bruised so by the cobblestones. And her dress was not in tatters. It looked quite finely made… merely soiled.”
    “That only proves that she’s new at the profession and she has a good seamstress,” Lady Thornby replied peevishly.
    “You’re wrong, Mother, and I won’t apologize for my actions. She most certainly would have died if we had left her in the street. You know I can’t abandon a creature in need.”
    “You want me to believe she’s another one of your strays?” Lady Thornby shrieked, disbelief in her eyes.
    “I am getting old, but my brain is far from addled. I saw what I saw. And what’s worse, Mr. Livingston saw it as well.”
    “Well, I’m sure that Mr. Livingston can be trusted to keep this quiet.” Beckett gave a meaningful look to the solicitor. “And now that I’m the earl of Ravenwood, what does it matter how many strays I take in—or if they happen to be animal or human?”
    “Actually, my lord, you aren’t the earl quite yet,” Livingston said.
    “But you said that I was the heir.”
    “So you are, my lord, but there is a stipulation in the sixth earl’s will, which is quite standard.” Livingston cleared his throat and continued. “The will specifies that the heir must be married at the time the will is executed, or the estate will immediately pass to your cousin, Mr. Coles of Dorset-shire. In fact, I have already received a letter from his solicitor. As per the earl’s instructions, the will is to be executed tomorrow. Since Mr. Coles is already married, my lord, I would hasten to find yourself a bride.”
    Lady Thornby grabbed her son’s arm. “I’m sure the Honorable Miss Cordelia Haversham will take