“Venus,” she answered, and looked up at the man standing beside her.
His eyebrows rose at such an oblique answer. “The goddess of love? What makes you think of Venus?”
“Did she ever arrange marriages between mortals?”
His eyes narrowed with suspicion. “Are you planning to fight my marriage to Lady Sarah and arrange for me a better one? Pray desist, Viola, for you know my feelings on this.”
“No, no.” Viola stopped playing long enough to wave one hand carelessly in his direction, then resumed her music. “You have made your choice, and I know when it is futile to attempt to change your mind. I suppose,” she added with a sigh, “that when one looks at it in a prudential light, it is the best decision for you. You are the Duke of Tremore, after all, and should marry high for duty’s sake, even if your choice is without love and affection. No, I have moved on to arranging a possible match for someone else, a match that provides me a far better chance of success. Daphne’s.”
“Daphne?” He frowned. “I do not recall—”
“Miss Wade.”
He stared at Viola as a vague vision came to his mind of brown hair raked back in a bun, spectacles, dreary dresses covered by heavy work aprons, and an inability to speak without stammering.
“You intend to arrange a marriage for Miss Wade?” he asked, astonished.
“If I can persuade her to go to Enderby with me, I shall introduce her to some eligible young men, and we shall see what happens.”
“You will do no such thing.”
The vehemence of his tone rather startled Viola. She stopped playing again and looked at him, wide-eyed. “Why, Anthony, you sound quite heated. I had no idea you would mind so much.”
“I do mind. Miss Wade has work to do here, vital, important work. I won’t have her go off gallivanting about Chiswick and London with you. What happens to my museum and my excavation?”
“That excavation is all you think about these days. There are some things in this world that are more important than your Roman villa.”
“Nothing can be more important than uncovering history.” He could hear the passion he felt for the excavation in his own voice as he spoke. “Viola, this site is one of immense historical significance. It is the best site of Roman ruins ever uncovered in Britain, and it is on my estate. We are learning things about life in Roman Britain that we never knew before. The artifacts we uncover here will be of tremendous benefit to scholars and historians, and the museum in London will allow all British people to learn about their heritage. This is a piece of our history.”
“I am not concerned with history, dear brother,” Viola said, with no understanding at all of what he was attempting to achieve. “I am concerned with the life of a young lady of good family who has been forced by circumstance to seek employment, is allowed no life of her own, and has had no amusements or society in her entire life. Why, she does not even know how to dance. It is appalling how neglectful her father was of her comfort and care.”
Viola paused for a quick breath, but before Anthony could point out that history and serious antiquarian study were far more important than dancing, she went on, “And now, Daphne is forced to earn her living. A young lady working herself to exhaustion scrubbing mosaics and piecing clay pots back together like a servant. Worst of all, she has no future prospects for her life except more drudgery.”
Anthony frowned, displeased by the accusatory note in his sister’s voice, as if Miss Wade’s so-called drudgery were his fault. “The work Miss Wade does for me is crucial to the success of this project, and she is paid quite well for her efforts.”
“Her future seems precarious to me.”
“Hardly. The museum in London will be open in mid-March, but it will take far longer than that to finish the villa. She has employment here for the next five years, at least.”
“And after that is finished? When your museum is complete and your excavation is done, what happens to her then?”
“She finds a new position, I suppose.”
“By which time she will be nearly thirty, an age which virtually eliminates her chances of ever marrying. Did you know she is the granddaughter of a baron?”
“That is absurd. Her father had no such relations.”
“I am talking of her mother’s father. She knows no other details about him, or if she does, she did not wish to impart them to me. I do not believe she intended to tell me anything at all, but that bit about her grandfather slipped out. Why she should wish to keep it a secret, I do not understand. Pride, perhaps.”
“Or a need for privacy. Some people do value their privacy, Viola,” he pointed out. “In any case, her future is her own affair.”
“I am making it my affair.” Before he could reply, she went on, “This is no sort of life for a baron’s granddaughter, even if she has been left in virtual ignorance of her own background. Since she knows so little of her relations and she has no friends to help her—”
“She seems to have found a friend in you.”
“Yes, she has. I like her, and we have become friends. In fact, I am envisioning her as a sort of protégée. I should like to introduce her into society, help her make new acquaintances, and perhaps even secure her matrimonial future. I know quite a few young men to whom I should like to introduce her. She might take a fancy to one of them, and nature will take its course.”
“Poor girl.”
