Her arm was caught up again, and Edmund directed the party towards the less controversial tents where lady’s goods were offered. “Yes.”
Arabella let out an exasperated sigh.
Ignoring the watching eyes of his sisters, Edmund put his hand to where her fingers rested upon the nook of his elbow. “Far be it from me to question the intentions of a noble woman. Just promise me you won’t try to run away with their circus.”
Laughing, Arabella shook her head. If he only knew... “Now you are teasing too much. I am not one of your sisters.”
His voice dropped lower, Edmund agreeing wholeheartedly. “I do not think of you as I would think of a sister.”
Unsure how to respond to the tone or implication—unsure if there was an implication—Arabella blushed.
He could not actually be pursuing her, or flirting—if he was even flirting. She had no fortune, no land, and her dower would cease the instant she married. He had to know that.
Eavesdropping, a supremely pleased Lizzy grinned.
This would not do.
Looking for a sharp change of topics, green eyes flicked back towards the colorful tent Edmund thought to lead her from—a place where a few young women of the lower classes lingered while working up the courage to go inside.
Arabella knew what waited inside those fabric walls, and from the small red string she’d seen tied around Lilly’s left wrist, Miss Jenkins knew too. “You wear a love knot, Miss Jenkins. What mysteries did the seer reveal to you?”
“Lilly!” Edmund barked at his sister, dropping Arabella’s hand to deal with the issue at hand.
Lilly blanched.
Arabella saw her chance. “Oh hush, Mr. Jenkins. All the girls sneak off to the tent. It’s part of the fun of a fair... And clearly she was very discreet if even her well-meaning and attentive older brother did not notice. Do not ruin the day for her because you are male and do not understand.”
It was obvious the man wanted to rail at his sister. Reaching out a gloved hand, Arabella squeezed Edmund’s forearm. “It is just silliness, I will prove it.” Brushing past the family, leaving Mary to Payne’s care, Arabella openly approached the colorful fortune telling tent and pulled the drape. The panel fell, the baroness concealed in a dark room rich with the scent of herbs and tobacco smoke.
She took the single waiting chair.
A blind crone wrapped in shawls called, “Welcome, honored mistress.”
Looking into rheumy eyes, coins were handed over, her glove removed, and the game began. Gnarled fingers, traced the shape of her poor, silver ring, of her calluses from labor and the holding of reins, and from that alone placed her class and distinction below her station. For five minutes, the woman cooed out the same nonsense she told all the other girls who entered the tent. A script she knew herself.
When the fortunetelling ended, Arabella did not rise from the seat. She leaned closer, taking a grip of the old woman’s hand while whispering in their shared language. “I will marry no farmer. There will be no six children or eternal happiness—though the tale was lovely.”
The seer stiffened, nervous. “Who are you?”
Arabella’s voice caught. “A baroness.” Lifting the old woman’s hand to the small ringlets at her temple, Arabella let the gypsy finger the strands and then the multitude of feathers in her hat. “But before my father sold me to an Englishman as wife, I was once like you.”
Withered hands moved to trace the lines of her face, arthritic fingers stinking of tallow following the shape of her nose. “And your husband?”
“Three years dead.”
“A woman without a husband is incomplete.”
“Is that what I am?” Utter contempt saturated Arabella’s every word. “If I am incomplete then what are those who turned me away from their fires when I begged them to save me from a man who beat me—a man who let his friends use me? I wonder what it makes you and all Romani.” Curses were a very real, and Arabella was tired of carrying hers alone. “It makes every last one of you in debt to me.”
Before the old woman could respond, Arabella stood. “I have a proposition for your people and will bring gold to your fires tonight... a great deal of gold. In exchange, I’m going to ask for very little.”
The crone’s voice held fear. “What is it you want?”
“To be able to sleep at night.” Arabella had nothing else to say. She left the tent as abruptly as she’d entered.
As if nothing was amiss, the baroness went straight to her friends, smiling beautifully. “As you see, Mr. Jenkins, I am unscathed. Though, I now know that I will marry the King of Prussia.”
Lizzy laughed behind her hand, even Lilly’s lips twitched, but it was Edmund’s reaction that mattered. The man sighed. “Where is the string for your wrist?”