As the days passed into weeks, James realized he had underestimated Miss Follet. He had noticed very frequently a particular, scornful look to her eyes, but as far as he could tell even his best efforts had done no more than irritate her. She was always cool and composed, no matter how rude or embarrassing he was. He began to see that he would need a change of tactics. Mere bad manners would not dissuade her. It would take something deeper.

It was his mother who gave him both the idea and the opportunity. At breakfast one morning, just as James was about to take his first sip of coffee, Mrs Redwood barked, "Have you kissed Grace yet?"

James spilled coffee all over his plate. "I beg your pardon!"

"It was a simple question, James."

"Grammatically it may have been, but morally it is not!"

"I do not see why. You have been engaged three weeks. There would be nothing immoral in a kiss."

"I did not know morality was simply a question of time. If I must know a woman one minute to dance, and two days to walk, and three weeks to kiss, then I suppose after I have known her four months I may take all manner of liberties with no regard at all for notions of fondness or marriage."

"Do not be flippant, James! And answer the question. Your avoidance is suspicious."

James felt his cheeks heating, which was an extremely novel and unpleasant sensation for him. He busied himself in mopping up the spilt coffee with a napkin.

"James?" Mrs Redwood said icily.

"No," James said. "I have not."

Mr Redwood laughed wheezily. "The boy has come over shy, Margaret. Look, he is blushing."

"I am not blushing!"

"He has no need to be shy," Mrs Redwood said. "He is engaged to the girl. Besides, having had a dozen or more indecent dalliances, he certainly cannot claim to be naive. He must take the part of teacher, and help ready her for what is to come later."

James breathed in through his teeth. "Mother. This is not a good conversation."

"On the contrary," Mr Redwood said, "I find it a capital one. Look up, boy. Look up. Hah! Your cheeks are scarlet!"

James hastily gulped down his coffee. "I am feverish. Unwell. I cannot see Miss Follet today. I might give her a cold and she might die."

"That would be a tragedy," Mr Redwood said cheerfully, "but I fancy it would do you good to be unwell in front of her. It might encourage her to be more tender towards you."

"They do not get on as warmly as they should," Mrs Redwood said. "The girl must be shy. You must make more effort to attract her, James. I know you know how."

James ripped his bread roll to pieces. "There is to be no question of my being attracted, is there?"

"You have in the past proven yourself capable of being attracted to women," Mrs Redwood said. "I don't see why Grace should be any different."

There was no way for James to explain to his mother exactly why Miss Follet was certainly very different. He remained silent, focused upon ripping his bread roll to pieces.

"Anyway," his mother said. "You will make more effort with Grace. It would not be fair for her to be entirely surprised on her wedding night."

"Mother!"

"I am only being practical about this, James. Her mother certainly has not prepared her as she should."

"I've never known Mrs Follet to hold any concern closer to heart than that of her daughters' comfort. I think we can trust in her preparations." James rubbed his cheeks, trying to dispel some of the heat lingering in them. "And I will say and hear no more on this subject!"

Unfortunately, Mrs Redwood was not (of course) to be so easily put off. That very afternoon, she summoned Miss Follet to the house on the excuse of wanting to teach her to play piquet. James made flaccid conversation with Miss Follet while she floundered through two deals and lost nearly every trick. At the beginning of the third, Mrs Redwood stood abruptly and said, "Excuse me, both of you, I have suddenly recalled a matter I must attend to."

On the way out she shut the door behind her, which, James thought, was quite unnecessary.

The room fell into silence. Miss Follet seemed to feel no need to fill it. She sat at the card table, running one finger idly back and forth along the edge where the baize met the wood trim. James could have come up with any number of topics to talk about, if he so pleased, but he did not.

"Is your mother coming back?" Miss Follet asked after a while.

"I fancy she is not," James said. "I believe she has determined that for our courtship to progress towards intimacy we are in need of a certain amount of privacy."

Miss Follet shot him an uneasy glance. James understood it too well. He went to the door and opened it wide. The hallway outside was empty, which gave him the relief of knowing that his mother was not obtuse enough to stay and eavesdrop to make sure he was kissing Miss Follet. He left the door open and returned to the card table.

"In case you feel the need to flee my passionate advances," he said, dragging his chair another two feet away from her and sitting back down.

"But you're not..." She looked doubtful. "That's not an advance."

"That's very observant of you." James crossed his legs and tilted his chair back. "We are not married and I would never dare be improper with an unmarried lady."

Miss Follet let out a small sigh of relief. "Thank you."

It irked James that she would thank him. He was just as uncomfortable with the situation as she was, but he did not wish to admit it. And he certainly did not want her to feel grateful to him. From gratitude it was but a short step to affection, and she deceived herself into believing she had any affection for him, he was quite lost.

"I mean I can be improper," he said slowly, another idea coming to him. "You have heard some of the rumours."

"I pay little heed to rumour."

"Then I suppose I should inform you. Hardly appropriate for you to come into our marriage not knowing who I really am."

"I know you well enough."

"You cannot. In the course of our acquaintance, stretching back, you say, some years, but as far as I remember, only three weeks, we have not spent more than a full day together. The depths of my character, be you ever so perceptive, cannot be plumbed in a mere twenty-four hours."

The corners of Miss Follet's mouth turned up slightly, aggravatingly, as though she did not believe it. "Perhaps not. But I do not need to know everything about you, James, before our marriage. Nor even, I expect, after."

"There are some things you must know. I would be taking advantage of you if I left you ignorant. You see, Miss Follet, I have taken lovers."

Her half-smile faded. "I am aware of the rumours surrounding Lady Mowbray and of your general reputation."

"The rumours that you pay little heed to?"

She sucked her bottom lip.

James righted his chair and leaned closer so he could speak in a low voice. "Five."

"Pardon?"

"The number of my lovers, real lovers, not mere flirtations."

Her eyes widened, then she gave an almost imperceptible sigh, which might just have been relief. Had she thought the number higher?

"And my flirtations are numberless," he added.

"Now I know then."

James examined her fingers, loosely clasped and untrembling in her lap, her lips, slightly pressed but not tight, and her cheeks, quite the usual bloodless whiteness. She was not shocked, not hurt, seemingly not affected by his confession at all.

He looked at the door. From what he could see of the hallway, it was still empty. Nor had he heard any footsteps. His mother had probably gone to her sitting room to plot more evil deeds. Well, let the biter be bit. He would take advantage of the enforced privacy to say things he would dare not in others' presence.

"My history of debauchery began when I was twenty," he said. "With the charming Mrs— but I must not kiss and tell. Let us call her Mrs P. Poor woman. Married to the most terrible old bore, the sort of man who thought women weren't worth talking to. But I talked to her, and I listened to her, and she..." James laughed softly to himself at the memory of an old joke. "She had the most wonderful sense of humour. She could make me laugh for hours on end. I felt so sorry for her, for being married to such a man."

"You did not feel sorry for the man, for having married such a woman?"

"My dear Miss Follet, she was worth her weight in gold and he hadn't the wit to see it. I feel sorry for him not at all. If a man is stupid enough not to know a good woman when he meets one, he deserves everything he gets."

Miss Follet's eyes widened in surprise. "Did you love her?"

"Yes. I hope that doesn't bother you, not being the first woman I've loved. Not even, I should guess, the tenth."

He hoped it did bother her, but she shook her head. Then again, he thought cynically, it was not as though her heart was involved. Only her purse.

"Men have a certain nature," she said distantly. "Or so I have heard."

James snorted. "You haven't heard the least of it. Mrs P... educated me. The way, I suppose, I will have to educate you. After we parted ways — she broke my heart in sending me away — I found I could not return to what I had been. Flirtations might sustain my soul, but not my body. In a state of starvation, I was rescued by Mrs F."

"I do not need to know the details of your love affairs, Mr Redwood."

"These are not the details. This is merely the table of contents. Mrs F was my second chapter. She was my own age, but married to a man old enough to be her father. Dreadful idea — May-December marriages, I mean."

"My sister Ellen married a man fifteen years her senior."

"That's May-September at best. Though still not ideal. I suppose your father arranged the thing for money, like he did with you."

"You suppose quite wrong. He lost three thousand pounds in the bargain."

From anybody else, James would have thought that a joke. From Miss Follet, in her flat, unsmiling tone, it only confused him. Perhaps she was getting angry, and meant it in the way of a witticism.

"Anyway," James said after a minute. "It was only natural that Mrs F would seek affection and understanding outside her marriage, if she could not get it within. And I was... well I was there. And she was very pretty."

He waited some time to see if Miss Follet would comment upon this, but she said nothing, intent, it seemed, on examining the tricks she had lost in piquet.

"Mrs F and I parted ways after a few months," James said. "I thought it prudent to quit before our affections could be engaged too deeply."

"More prudent not to have started."

James shrugged. "We are not all blessed with your wisdom, Miss Follet. Now, Chapter Three brings us to... Mrs O, it would be. I was twenty-three by then, and I believed myself a deal more knowledgeable about the world than I truly was. In my ignorance, Mrs O took advantage of me."

"Took advantage of you?"

"Indeed. She attracted, beguiled, seduced me for no reason other than to hurt her husband." Even four years later, it still stung his pride. Now, too, with the benefit of hindsight, it pricked his conscience. James should have known better. "And hurt him she did."

Miss Follet's fingers froze on the cards. "I don't want to hear any more of this, James."

"No, no. This is to be a full accounting of my sins. You must know who it is you are marrying."

"I know enough. I don't need to know these... ugly histories."

"Not even the truth about Lady Mowbray? Aren't you curious about the rumours?"

Miss Follet shook her head.

"I'm curious. I can't imagine what possessed her to blazon our folly in front of hundreds at a ball. Three years ago we were madly in love. Three years ago. I've hardly seen her since, and only by accident. Yet out of the blue..." James bit back his anger; whatever the consequences, Lucy had not done it for the purpose of wounding him. "I'd like to know why she did it. That's all."

Miss Follet was very quiet for some time. James thought she was reflecting with some disgust upon his history and remained quiet so as to let her.

"Madly in love?" she said at last.

"You doubt me," James said reprovingly. "Do you think that I have loved many women makes me incapable of loving? I think it quite the opposite. It is the heart that has never loved that is incapable of it. Which is why," he said with a heavy sigh, "I fear you never shall love me."

"Not your kind of love, no," Miss Follet said. "I have not that in me. But I am sure, with time, I will grow accustomed to you."

"That is quite possible," James said. "But growing accustomed hardly makes one love. In fact, I think it is quite the opposite. I know far too many couples who find they have grown too accustomed to one another, and seek novelty outside their marriage."

Miss Follet's upper lip curled. "I can assure you that I am not like that."

"You believe you are not, but I am still a novelty to you. No, I believe most people would be much happier if nobody married at all, or if we all married whomever we liked whenever we liked and quit the bond when it started to chafe."

"I would not be happier. I quite like marriage the way it is."

James laughed. "Yet you know nothing of it."

"I know as many married people as you do."

"But not as many marriage beds."

Miss Follet flushed and stood up abruptly. She took three paces to the door then stopped. James watched her carefully, wondering if he had broken her, but instead of leaving the room, she turned back and went to the window to look out at the garden, one palm resting against the glass, trembling slightly.

"That must be true," she said. "I think it must always be true when a spinster marries. But your quarter of experience as ill-qualifies you for judging the merits of marriage as my inexperience does me. You have only seen the black side of marriage. It has prejudiced you against the matter altogether."

"Not altogether. I did consider marriage once, properly," James said. "Not to you, I mean. Last year, I fell in love with a young lady, a girl, really, in but her first season in London. It was the gentlest of flirtations, not even a kiss on the cheek, and yet I was more in love with her than I'd ever been in my life."

"Why did you decide against her?" Miss Follet asked, still facing away from him.

"One day, I realized that she had a very affected laugh. And after that... I could never feel the same way about her. Now imagine if I had discovered that after I had married her? Imagine what I will discover about you or what you will discover about me after we are married."

"In our case, James, we have no illusions to begin with."

"You never know it's an illusion until it breaks, Miss Follet." James could see that she was recovering from her earlier shock and was annoyed. "Mrs N — who I was in love with for all of a week — was under the illusion that me being in love with her meant I was ready to run away with her. I only wanted to go to bed with her. When I shattered her illusion, she took it very badly. She did not go to bed with me, and I did not run away with her, though I confess that I did run away. A woman brandishing her husband's duelling pistols has that effect upon me."

Miss Follet remained by the window, silent.

"That," James added, "was three weeks before I became engaged to you."

"Disgusting," she said under her breath. "Have you no shame?"

"None." James watched her closely. It was the first time she had expressed such open disgust in him; he was close to pushing her over her limit of tolerance. "I doubt I will learn shame after our marriage either, my dear. My trouble is, I do get bored of women, and you're not the most, shall we say, vivacious to begin with. I should think a few months—"

"—Stop it! I don't want to hear it. None of this. I don't need to hear it. Do whatever it is that men like you do, but don't tell me of it! I don't want to know." She turned to him at last, her face white and pleading. "You will be the man you are. I will not attempt to change you. When we are married no doubt you will continue your misadventures. I just beg of you, Mr Redwood, don't tell me about them. I would much rather remain ignorant."

James stared at her. She was clearly disgusted by him yet still she was resigned to marrying him. Had she no pride? No sense of self-preservation?

"But your ignorance—"

"Don't! Enough!"

James bit his tongue to suppress the apology that rose automatically to his lips. Miss Follet's hands were clutched to her throat, trembling. Two high spots of colour had risen on her cheeks, giving sudden unexpected animation to her face. James wondered if her eyes ever went that bright with laughter. Had she been any other woman, he would have been tempted to find out.

There was a sound at the door and James turned to see his father standing there, brows knit. "I heard raised voices," he said. "Are you alright, Grace? Did he hurt you?"

"No." Miss Follet's flush deepened. "I am sorry, Sir, I... We were talking."

"There is no need for you to apologize. It is most certainly James's fault." Mr Redwood raised his eyebrows at James. "James?"

James bit his lip. If his father developed even a whisper of suspicion about his plan, it would not matter if he succeeded in it; his income would never be returned. "I apologize, Miss Follet. My tongue ran away with me."

"Your apology is accepted," she said stiffly.

"Perhaps it is time for Grace to go home for the day," Mr Redwood said. "I will call for the carriage; it is beginning to rain."

He left again. James met Miss Follet's eyes, wondering if he had pushed her over the edge. She was emotional, certainly, her cheeks were white and her foot was rubbing back and forth on the carpet like she was trying not to flee. There might even be tears in her eyes. There were. She was blinking them back, trying to swallow them down.

James felt it then, against his will, the heavy, uncertain feeling in his belly. Guilt.

"Miss Follet— Grace..." He patted in his pockets for a handkerchief. "I didn't mean to shock you—"

"You did." Her voice trembled. "You meant to, and you succeeded."

He found the handkerchief and held it out to her. "Very well. I did. But you must know that I am not... the sort of man you deserve to marry. You deserve much better, Grace."

She ignored his handkerchief and wiped her arms on her sleeve. "Then you'll have to learn to be better, James. Because you're the only man I've got."

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A/N 2021-06-01: Updates will now be one every two days rather than one every day. This was another of the chapters I had trouble with. I did, in fact, have trouble with most of the chapters of this story.