Welshman's Bride by Bancroft Blair

Author:Bancroft, Blair
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: gothic, regency romance, regency historical, historical gothic, regency gothic
Publisher: Blair Bancroft

Chapter Fifteen

All too willing to hide from the world—for the slightest thought of what people were saying stained my cheeks scarlet!—I remained confined in my bedchamber and sitting room. To my astonishment, and bone-deep hurt, Rhys did not come to me at all. Naturally I had vivid visions not only of his disgust with me but of his enjoying Eilys’s charms to the full. And who, after all, could fault him for straying? I did not like me much either.

Stupid idiot female to plunge myself into such a fix!

The hardest moment, though, came the day after my incarceration, when Alice opened my door to Lady Aurelia, who held out both hands to me as she crossed the sitting room with the stately grace that was so much a part of her. “Oh, my dear child,” she said softly as our hands touched, “what have you done?”

I burst into tears, a torrent as impossible to stop as water cascading over a cliff. I clung to her hands, sobbing bitterly, pausing only long enough for great gulps of breath before once more giving full rein to my anguish. And then we were sitting side by side on the sofa, her arms tight around me, my head burrowed in her bosom, my tears gradually slowing to hiccups, My hand, I discovered, was damp from clutching Lady Aurelia’s now thoroughly soaked handkerchief.

“My poor dear child,” she said, continuing the comforting words she had been whispering to me for some time. “I have had the whole from Rhys, and you have been abominably used. Yes, you might have acted more wisely, but you are young and unaccustomed to dealing with people who mean you harm. Including that rapscallion Dawnay. He knew better than to set off on such a venture, even if you did not.”

“But it was not his fault—”

“It is always the gentleman’s fault. Remember that, dear.”

“But he did not cast the boat adrift—”

“He put you both on that island, giving free rein to mischief.” Lady Aurelia’s tone brooked no argument.

“Do you . . . do you think Liliwen might have done it? Do you know if she can row a boat?”

“Liliwen not know how to row a boat?” Lady Aurelia said with mock horror. “She might well be struck off the role of proper Welshwomen.”

“And I suppose there are any number of persons who might have helped her,” I ventured before huffing a sigh.

“Oh dear me, yes.” Lady Aurelia’s face revealed considerable sympathy as she added, “Dilys, like Liliwen, is green-eyed over Dawnay’s interest in you, even though she is his senior by a decade. And, of course, no one wishes you gone more than Eilys. And then there is Trystan, who is always anxious to curry favor with Gwendolyn—he wishes her to sponsor him in the Eisteddfod, you see. And he also rather enjoys Liliwen’s flirtations, though his inclinations tend to lie in a quite different direction.”

Even in Birmingham we had heard of the revival of the ancient festival of poetry and

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