The Gilded Web by Mary Balogh Page B

several years. It is pleasant, is it not, to give oneself up to pleasure and to have nothing else to worry about for weeks on end? I suppose one would not wish to have a lifelong diet of such entertainment, but a moderate portion can be quite refreshing.”
    â€œPerhaps if one has nothing else to make life meaningful,” Mr. Purnell said, “this is as good a way to pass one’s life away as any.”
    His voice was quiet and far more refined than Madeline had expected. Her interest in hearing his voice for the moment obscured the words he had spoken. When she did comprehend his meaning, she flushed.
    â€œAny new experience of life is worth having,” Miss Purnell said, looking with reproachful eyes at her brother, “whether it be serious or frivolous, enjoyable or painful. We grow only by the variety of our experiences.”
    The anger disappeared from her brother’s face, Madeline noticed. It was replaced by a brooding look. He watched his sister.
    And then Madeline saw Edmund in the doorway, his hands behind his back, surveying the occupants of the room. She felt a surge of relief, though she did not know quite why. He represented no escape from the awkwardness of her situation. Mr. and Miss Purnell seemed quite ungrateful for the notice she had taken of them. And how was she to extricate herself?
    She met her brother’s eyes across the room and he smiled.

T HE EARL OF AMBERLEY STOOD IN THE DOORway of Lady Sharp’s drawing room, looking about him. He had been very reluctant to come even though his mind had been made up all day and even though he had not really expected to see Miss Purnell. With the gossip still fresh on everyone’s lips, it was more than likely that she would remain at home for at least a few days.
    But there was the chance that he would see her either here or at the Higgins rout. And so he had braced himself for the encounter. He would not, of course, be able to speak privately with her in such a public setting, but he must speak with her, prepare the ground somehow for the visit he must make to Lord Beckworth the following day.
    He was definitely reluctant, however. He had always planned to marry by the time he was thirty, or soon after. But he had not expected ever to be pressured into a marriage not of his own free choosing. He had his title and his lands, and he was a wealthy man. He believed that he was reasonably attractive. He had planned for years the type of woman he would choose to marry when the time came. He would not be overly concerned with beauty or youth, and certainly money would not have anything to do with the matter. He would look for companionship more than anything else. He frequently felt lonely despite the presence of an affectionate family. And his wife must be intelligent, sensible, and reasonably well-informed.
    But he had also planned to marry someone for whom he could feel affection. Someone with whom he could share the innermost depths of his life. Love! He wanted to love his wife deeply, with every fiber of his being. It was not necessarily a passionate physical love that he craved—he thought that Eunice had probably been wrong about that. He had no longing to be
in
love, to go about with his head in the clouds and stars in his eyes. But he wanted a wife who would be as dear to him as the very air he breathed. He had been a dreamer.
    He had been contented with Eunice. She did not ignite him with passion, though he always found their beddings quite satisfactory, but she was the sort of person with whom he felt thoroughly at home. Being with Eunice was almost like being with any of his male friends at his clubs, except that there was the added attraction that she was a woman and willing to satisfy his physical need for a woman’s body.
    And now he must marry a stranger, a young lady whom he did not find physically appealing, and whose character and intelligence were quite unknown to him. And he must offer her the whole of