‘I should have known you’d have a strategy.’ She sighed. ‘I don’t suppose that strategy involves walking away from the fortune. You don’t need it and I don’t need it, in case you were thinking of taking it for my sake. I am comfortable enough with what your father left me. Who knows? I might even remarry at some point should the right man present himself, then you wouldn’t need to worry over me at all.’ It was a distinct possibility. His mother was still a handsome woman at fifty. This afternoon, she was dressed in a blue-and-silver gown of summer cotton that matched the drawing room decor, her still-dark honey hair coiffed in an intricate collection of braids. Her posture straight.
Sutton stopped pacing and leaned against the white Carrara marble mantel, imported from Italy and expensive, a further reminder that the Keyneses didn’t need the money. They lived well enough on their own, Sutton’s own father having made a fortune in the south-east Asian trade. Sutton shook his head. ‘You know I can’t just turn that money over to Bax.’
‘It’s not your job to save the world from him,’ his mother argued the temptation that had crossed his mind in Barnes’s office. He could walk away and it certainly made things easier. He could forgo a hasty, dramatic bridal search and retreat to the comfort of life as he knew it. But that was neither socially responsible, nor was it the honourable thing to do.
‘“All it takes for evil to prosper is for good men to do nothing,”’ he quoted. ‘I have to do my part.’ Sutton paced the length of his mother’s drawing room, pushing a hand through his thick hair. He blew out a breath. ‘The last girl Bax “importuned” killed herself last week. She washed up on the shores of the Thames with stones in her pockets.’
‘Good lord.’ His mother blanched. ‘Will no one stop him?’
‘He’s too powerful. He owns too many secrets. But we can mitigate him and, in time, I can work against him and others like him. He’s not alone in his corruption or his brand of it. For now, I can rob him of excess funds.’
‘By making a scandal of a marriage?’ his mother scolded, a furrow creasing her brow. ‘A race to the altar can be nothing less than a spectacle.’
‘Certainly it can’t be less than a spectacle, but it can be more.’ That was the plan anyway.
‘I like the sound of that.’ His mother held up the Wedgwood teapot in question. ‘Tea, darling? While you lay out your grand plan?’
‘No, no tea.’ Sutton quickly waved away the pot. He’d had enough tea today to last him all week. ‘Here’s what I am thinking. If my marriage must be a spectacle, I want to make it one worth watching. I control if it becomes a scandal or not. I want to make it a grand event, create the perception of a whirlwind romance, love at first sight.’ But it would be quite the exacting experiment beneath that frothy surface.
His mother smiled. ‘You want to make it a fairy tale. I like the idea. It certainly softens the edge of scandal. You invite all the eligible girls to a house party at the Newmarket estate. Let them have a taste of the luxury that could be theirs. We’ll put out the best china and polish the good silver to impress the mothers. We’ll lay in champagne and French wine to impress the fathers. Hartswood always shows at its best in the summer. The girls can stroll and pose in their pretty dresses for you in the gardens while their fathers fish the river.’
Sutton laughed. ‘You make it sound so easy.’ He wished he had his mother’s confidence when it came to his marriage. Some of the burden eased with the relief of having a partner in this. His mother did not challenge his decision, she simply got behind him and lent her considerable energies. ‘I’m afraid it needs to be a bit more involved than pretty poses in the garden. I don’t want to select a wife based on how she looks in a dress. I tried that once, a deviation from the norm, and a failure of an experiment, if you recall.’ The disaster of Miss Anabeth Morely had been years ago in his youth, but he had no desire to repeat it.
Sutton moved on, refusing to dwell on the memory. ‘We’ll need a full slate of a variety of activities. I want to arrange to have time with each of the girls, to observe them in different settings, with different people, and with me. At the end of the house party, we’ll hold a ball and I will announce my choice at midnight, the perfect ending to the fairy tale we’ll create.’
‘So, the party is to be your microscope? You’ll be putting them under the lens of your scrutiny,’ his mother surmised aptly.
‘Yes. I suppose it is. But I am not the first to use a house party to such ends. There is no scandal in the setting I propose. It’s quite traditional, really.’ And it was efficient. He could gather everyone in a single space for his consideration.
‘A setting and a task torn straight from the pages of a fairy tale,’ his mother agreed. ‘When is the party to be?’
‘In five days. I don’t think I can spare any more time than that if I’m to meet my uncle’s deadline. Can you do it?’ It wasn’t the idea of the party that he doubted, it was the implementation. They had to act quickly, but extravagant entertainments took time. ‘Can you arrange the activities, the details, the guests?’ He was counting on her for this. His days would be taken up with paperwork and other legal details. Even so, he didn’t know the first thing about planning a party of this magnitude.
‘In five days’ time? You want the impossible, but I think we can manage.’ Her eyes danced, energised by the challenge. ‘It’s a mother’s job to know how to arrange these things. If you are set on this, then I will help see it done.’ She smiled softly. ‘My son is getting married. Goodness knows you’ve made me wait long enough. I should start planning the wedding while I’m at it since time is of the essence.’
‘Thank you, Mother.’ He was an only child, out of poor luck in that department. His mother should have had legions of children to command: daughters to march out on the marriage mart, sons to organise into professions. Instead, she’d got him, a gentleman scientist who preferred his camels and horses to the social whirl. His one foray into that world had not recommended it. Some experiments didn’t bear repeating.
There was one last piece to discuss. ‘As to the guests, I am aware the Season is slowing down and so many of the girls are spoken for.’ Sutton thought of the tea heiress, Pavia Honeysett, married now to his friend, Cam Lithgow. She would not have fit his uncle’s criteria but she, a girl of mixed birth and not title, had caught the eye of a marquis before her marriage, general proof that girls had been swept up early this year and the competition for well-born wives was fierce.
‘There’s always someone to marry.’ His mother was unbothered by his concern. ‘People are looking for something new now that Ascot and the Regatta are behind us. I’ll post an announcement in The Times and London will converge on Newmarket in five days.’ She gave him a reassuring smile. ‘Everyone will want to come.’ Her eyes twinkled. ‘And we’ll let them; let them vie for your attention. London will wait upon your favour. You needn’t beg, not with your good looks and the promise of that fortune.’
That’s what he was worried about. He didn’t want to limit his choices to the dregs, to wallflowers and fortune hunters, but he kept his thoughts to himself. There was only so much of the situation he could control, thanks to his uncle’s stratagems. It wasn’t the house party that would draw them, it was the mere presence of the fortune. Whether he was in Newmarket or in London wouldn’t matter. At least in Newmarket he could control who he spent his time with. Here in London he’d be at the mercy of other people’s guest lists. He bent to kiss his mother on the cheek and took his leave. He needed the sanctuary of his club, a drink and time to think. Who would want him, just him, now? Who would even see him, the man, standing there behind the fortune? In that regard, he’d just have to trust to luck that he’d be able to throw the net wide enough. But he was a scientist.