The Dutiful Rake by Elizabeth Rolls

safe option—tell her too late for a family deputation to descend upon him. Which meant he’d have to forgo having Jack as his groomsman. It would be the outside of enough to write and ask Jack to come and not tell Di. She was going to be hurt anyway; there was no need to make it worse for her.

Chapter Five
    F our weeks later Marcus St John Evelyn Langley, Eighth Earl of Rutherford stood before the Vicar of the parish, listening to the Reverend Andrew Parker marry him to Miss Marguerite Fellowes. The bride, after her four weeks’ recuperation in the care of Agnes Barlow under the Vicarage roof, looked to be well on the road to recovery. She had lost the dark shadows under her eyes, her brown hair was alive with golden lights and a flush of delicate colour glowed in her cheeks.
    Marcus, after securing Meg’s agreement to marry him, had ridden into the village to find the Vicar and arrange to have the banns called as fast as possible. He considered applying to the Bishop of York for a special licence, but on consideration thought that, since Meg needed time to recover from her illness and get used to the idea of becoming a countess anyway, he might just as well have the banns called. Besides, he could think of no better way of flinging back Mrs Garsby’s insults in her teeth. To hear them called three Sundays in a row would tip her a settler she would not forget in a hurry. And a special licence would give credence to any tale that a hasty marriage was essential.
    The Reverend Andrew Parker, a mild scholarly widower in his late fifties, had been extremely upset at the story Marcus laid before him and had immediately offered to house Meg until the wedding if Agnes Barlow would act as her chaperon.
    ‘I should have taken her in at once if my wife were still alive,’ he explained apologetically. He was conscious of a most unchristian desire to give Mrs Garsby one in the eye and was positively looking forward to calling the banns the following Sunday. A sermon too…Surely he could find a suitable text or two that would give Mrs Garsby pause…that old testament story of Susannah and the Elders might serve his turn…and what about ‘Let he who is without sin cast the first stone…’ No, probably not. Madam Garsby was so convinced of her own moral superiority that it would have no effect whatsoever; besides, he didn’t want to suggest that Meg and Lord Rutherford were guilty as charged. The good Samaritan would do very nicely instead.
    Once Meg was safely established at the Vicarage, Marcus flung himself into action to provide everything he thought his bride ought to have. A two-day visit to York enabled him to discover a surprisingly skilled modiste. By dint of laying down a positively shocking sum of money and promising to support Madame Heloise in every possible way in her projected move to the capital, he had succeeded in persuading her to make the journey out to Fenby in two post chaises to fit Meg for her wedding gown and trousseau. The second chaise was piled high with bolts of cloth and several awed assistants. Madame Heloise, after dismissing her first conviction that his lordship was escaped from Bedlam, had decided that lunatic or not, he was possessed of enoughof the ready to make any effort expended on behalf of his bride well worth her while.
    Indeed, after making Meg’s acquaintance and finding out through the inevitable village channels the true circumstances of her betrothal, Madame Heloise was much inclined to regard his lordship as being straight from the pages of one of Mrs Radcliffe’s romances and one whom she was more than happy to oblige.
    Mademoiselle Meg, she quickly realised, was a young lady who, with a little confidence and inspired dressing, would blossom into a beauty. And not just in the common way. Her tall, slender grace, waving dark hair and blue-grey eyes with their expression of wistful abstraction would admirably become the prevailing classical modes. The raised waists and straight