“Wouldn’t she? I know some very good doctors who would disagree with you and insist on locking her up.”
First shock and then fury seethed within her. Any thought she had of trying to reason with him vanished in an instant. “You can’t do that. I won’t let you.”
“But Portia, how can you stop me? Especially if you are embroiled in a scandal and the queen sends you away? Your mother will be left behind with us.”
He was threatening her! Arnold, whom she’d always thought of as a colorless and bland personality, was threatening her. Did he mean it? She looked into the pale ice of his eyes and knew that he did.
For a moment she felt like crumpling, sinking down into one of the overstuffed chairs, but she wouldn’t do that. They had no right to threaten her. Her life was her own, no matter how they tried to manipulate it.
“You are wrong,” she said. “Whatever I do or have done has nothing to do with you. You have no right to talk to me as if I was a child, and I forbid it.”
“You forbid it?” Lara said. “You, the parson’s daughter? No, Portia, it is Arnold and I who will give the orders here. We will make certain you are obedient, Portia. From now on there will be no breath of scandal attached to your name.”
“What?” Portia managed a laugh. “Don’t tell me you are going to be my prison guards?”
No one else laughed.
“We’re moving in with you for a little while,” Arnold informed her in that chilling tone of voice. “Just to keep an eye on things. You have been unwell, dear Portia, and naturally as your loving relatives we are concerned for your well-being.”
“My mother—”
“Your mother is a crazy old woman,” Lara said with scorn.
“As I said, I know several very prominent doctors,” Arnold went on. “A word in the right ear, Portia, and I could create enough doubt for questions to be asked at the highest level.”
Lock her up.
“That would never happen. I would not let it.” But she was feeling all the frustration of a mouse caught in a trap.
“Oh dear me, yes, Portia, it would. And it will if you do not do as you are told from this moment on.”
This time she didn’t answer, although she was certain he read her feelings in her eyes.
“Ah, you want to kill me, don’t you? You’re showing more spirit tonight than I’ve seen in you for a long while.”
“Arnold, let her go,” Lara said sharply.
Arnold paused, just to defy her, and then shrugged and stepped away from the door. “Go to bed, Portia. We will see you in the morning.”
Portia looked from one to the other. Lara didn’t return her gaze but stared fixedly at the drawing room clock, while Arnold kept his rigid smile. She supposed she could continue to argue. She could rant and rave like a madwoman, demanding they leave her home, but she was beginning to see that such tactics were useless.
Arnold meant what he said. He would have her poor mother locked up. Men had the power to do such things and she couldn’t pretend otherwise, as much as she wished it so. The day was yet to come when in England women were treated as equals to their menfolk.
The only way out of this was to be calm and reasonable, to convince them they were mistaken about her unreliability. She must show them that she was as eager as they to be seen as the perfect Lady Ellerslie. And then, when they relaxed their guard…then she would send them far away from her house and those she loved.
“As you wish,” she said lightly, rising to go to the door. “Good night.”
But as she climbed the stairs she felt the hot sting of tears in her eyes. Tears of anger and hurt and misery. How dare they! All her life she’d been told what to do by others, and she’d done it, but this time…Yes, she knew she shouldn’t have seen Marcus again, but she needed him. He helped make her feel alive. It was one thing for her to tell herself she was doing the wrong thing, it was another to be told by Lara and Arnold.
By the time she reached her bedchamber, the tears were pouring down her cheeks. Hettie was waiting for her, and when she saw that dear familiar face, she went into her maid’s plump arms.
“There, there, lieben,” Hettie soothed. “It’s for the best.”
It didn’t occur to Portia to wonder how Hettie knew; Hettie always knew. Instead she asked herself how something that hurt so much could possibly be for the best. She knew her duty, she knew what was expected of her, and she had chosen that life over Marcus. Wasn’t that enough? Did they have to punish her as well?
“Come now, let’s get you into bed,” Hettie was saying. “Everything will seem brighter in the morning.”
“They are going to stay here.”