The Makeshift Marriage by Sandra Heath

shadows to the dazzling blue water. There was magic in the air; diamonds flashed in the wavelets and the sky was the color of pale sapphires; even a barge piled high with red apples seemed to be carrying rubies. Color was sharper, sounds more clear, and Laura herself more acutely aware of Venice, of Nicholas, and of life itself than she ever had been before.
    He leaned back on the black leather seat beside her, smiling just a little. “Did you know that in Venice the occupants of a felze are always assumed to be lovers?”
    “No.” She hoped that she wasn’t blushing.
    He laughed. It was an easy laugh, quite unforced and natural. She looked away toward the Rialto Bridge. He was treating her with an intimacy that only the night before would have been unthinkable. It was as if they had known each other for a lifetime, not merely for a week or so, and the feeling was good. She had so longed to know him like this, but even now she knew that it was only circumstances that brought about this change. How he must be longing for his Augustine and wishing that she sat with him, not Miss Laura Milbanke.
    He glanced at her. “I hope that you do not really mind me asking you to spend the day with me, for on reflection it does seem rather a lot to ask of you.”
    “No,” she said quickly. “No, I don’t mind at all.”
    “I thought you seemed a little reserved —”
    “I was only wishing that I could be your Miss Townsend for today.”
    He looked away then. “Well, maybe it’s just as well that you aren’t.”
    “Why do you say that?”
    “Because I came here to think about decisions I have to make, decisions which will not meet with her approval in the slightest.”
    “Forgive me if I appear unduly inquisitive —but why will she not approve?”
    “Do you really wish to be bothered with my financial adversities?”
    “I shall not mind at all if you wish to talk about them.”
    The breeze ruffled his hair as he removed his top hat and tossed it on to the seat. The wash from a passing barge made the gondola sway and he reached out to take Laura’s hand, steadying her for a moment until the gondola was level once more. Studying her face for a moment, he released her hand. “Perhaps you are right, Miss Milbanke; it would do me good to discuss my problems. My difficulties stem from one thing —my estate, King’s Cliff in Somerset.”
    “King’s Cliff? When you introduced yourself to me the name meant nothing, but now it seems familiar… . ”
    “No doubt on account of the famed King’s Cliff hunt.”
    “Yes, of course, that is it! Even my Uncle Hazeldon extolled its virtues!”
    “Oh, that damned hunt is quite the thing with the beau monde, from royalty down.”
    “You do not like hunting?”
    “It does little for me, I fear —is that not an admission from a gentleman? It is tantamount to high treason, I fancy. But I am no rakehell, no demon of the gaming hells, no devotee of luxurious vice, and certainly no hunter, shooter, or fisher! I believe there is more to life than that. Oh, do not think I wear a halo, for I have indulged in my fair share of riotous living and will never aspire to sanctity, but I will also never see the point of an existence which leads inevitably to ruin.”
    “I don’t understand.”
    “I have but recently inherited King’s Cliff, Miss Milbanke, and years of mismanagement and extravagance by my foolish father, Sir Jasper Grenville, and similar years of avaricious aiding and abetting by my disagreeable cousin, James, Earl of Langford, have left me with accumulated debts which put King’s Cliff on the verge of bankruptcy.”
    “Surely not —”
    “The estate is vastly overstaffed; it has been run on a lavish scale which it cannot support; its farms are poor and mostly unproductive as they have been managed to suit the hunt and little else. And on top of all that, my father raised mortgages, acquired monumental gaming debts, and resorted to one of the most notorious moneylenders