Page 2 of The Trouble with a Dare

“Sterling! Where have you been?” Ma asked, a familiar note of frustration in her voice as she carried a large bowl over to the dairy. “I’ve been waiting this age for you to come and help.”

Sterling pushed open the gate and shut it behind him.

“Sorry,” he said. “But I fetched you these. Aren’t they pretty?”

His mother set down the bowl just inside the dairy and turned. Her hair was dark, not golden like a field of wheat, and it was tied tight back in a neat bun. She scowled on seeing the beautiful flowers.

“Lord above!” she said, snatching the posy from his hand. “You’ve not been near the sheep with these, nor the pigs?”

“N-No,” Sterling shook his head.

“That’s ragwort and larkspur, you little fool! They’re poisonous. You might have killed yourself, never mind the animals. What the devil do you think you’re playing at? Can you eat these for your supper? Or burn them when the weather gets cold?”

“I-I… N-No, but they… they make ladies happy, ’cause they’re pretty. I like them too,” Sterling added with defiance, though his stomach felt odd, just like when he ate too many plums.

His mother clipped him around his ear. “This is your father, isn’t it? Filling your head with nonsense again, I don’t doubt. He’ll ruin us like my father ruined himself, always buying more land, and more and more. Ideas above his station, he’s got. Well, don’t you regard it, Sterling. You hear? There’s no good that comes from looking for more than you need, it only brings dissatisfaction. We don’t need a grander house and walls full of pictures, or more books than a person can read in a lifetime. I certainly don’t need you wasting time fetching posies. Good Lord, whatever next? Get on with you. I’ll deal with you later and teach you what’s what. You’re neither use nor ornament, and that’s a fact.”

Sterling watched as she flung the posy over the gate into the road. They landed with a soft splash in a puddle, mud flecking the colourful blooms.

“Afternoon, Mrs Oak!” called Mr Parish as he drove his dog cart past the farmyard. The old man, with his bristly salt and pepper beard, waved as he passed, the wheels of the cart crushing the flowers as he went by.

Sterling frowned.

“Sterling!” his mother shouted impatiently as she hurried into the dairy. “Get about your work or there’s no supper for you, as well as getting your hide tanned, my lad. I’ll have no more shilly-shallying, I’m warning you.”

Sterling chewed at his lip, staring at the flowers for a long moment, and then hurried indoors.

Chapter 1

Dear Elspeth,

You do indeed sound like Great Aunt Maud, and I have heard too much from her of late. How unfair that you let your husband’s friends come and stay and not your own sister. Your twin, no less! I think you are very unkind to me. You know how tiresome it is when we must visit fusty old relations like Maud. She’ll spend the entire time furious because Mother makes her wild, and she’ll disapprove of me merely for breathing the same air. I shall go mad, and it’s all your fault!

―Excerpt of a letter from Miss Greer Cadogan to her sister Elspeth Kelburn, Viscountess Roxborough (daughters of Mrs Bonnie and Mr Jerome Cadogan).

1st of September 1839, Holbrook House, Sussex.

Grace took a deep breath. This time, she would say the words. She would. She had been trying all morning and now it was growing late. Mr Oak would be here soon to ask her father for her hand in marriage, and she must tell them before he arrived. It was just so… so dreadfully difficult. Her heart was thudding in her chest, so fast she felt giddy and disorientated. She curled her fingers into the silk-covered arm of the sofa, the edge of which she perched upon as if ready to flee. Her mother and father were standing together by the window, admiring the view as they always did when they visited Holbrook. Well, it was a very fine view, and worth admiring.

Oh, get on with it, you coward!

“Mama? P-Papa? There’s s-something I need to tell you.”

Her parents turned towards her. Her father was still an imposing man, an old soldier with a heroic army record. Baron Rothborn’s bearing was as upright and proud as ever, despite the cane he walked with to bolster his injured leg. His arm was about Mama’s still slender waist, and she stared up at Papa as if she were a new bride, still besotted after all these years. Grace had wanted that, to look at her husband with such adoration, but she had thrown her chance away on a man who had turned out to be shallow and faithless. Her own fault. She had no one else to blame, therefore she would not complain or make a fuss.

“Yes, love?”

Her father smiled at her, his expression so full of warmth that she faltered, her eyes burning. Grace swallowed as her throat closed and she blinked to hold back the tears, but it was impossible. Her father’s smile dimmed, and Mama hurried to sit beside her.

“Grace, what is it? Are you unwell?”

“Oh, Mama, I-I….” The tears fell, a hot slide of shame and regret pouring down her cheeks. “I c-cannot….”

How could she tell them, how could she admit to her stupidity, her reckless idiocy?

“Grace.”

She looked up at once, hearing the tone of her father’s voice and reacting to it.