Martha Barwood
Regency Romance Author
A ConvenientBride's Dilemma
The Extended Epilogue
Two Years Later
Hayes School For Young Ladies
“Do you have any idea how to convince a pack of young ladies that they need to learn Latin?” the harried schoolmaster asked. “You always managed so well before, but I don’t seem to be having any luck.”
“Well, there is your problem,” Clara said, carefully levering herself out of her seat, one hand placed protectively on her rounded belly. “You must show the girls the application. They’ll never be considered seriously at any of the universities if they cannot speak and write Latin.”
The schoolmaster sighed. “I shall do my best.”
“Are they not learning quickly enough?”
“No, no, the girls learn quicker than any boy I have ever taught, once they can be made to see why they should learn,” he gave a huff of laughter. “It’s a challenge, I do admit. My colleagues thought I was mad for accepting this position. Why teach girls, they said, when you could teach boys? I tell you, though, in a few years, these ladies are going to be way ahead of those boys. Do you truly think that females will be accepted at institutions of higher education one day, Lady Hayes? I have daughters of my own, and I should like to think that they have prospects.”
“I think so,” Clara said decidedly. “Progress is slow, but it is coming along, slowly but surely.”
The schoolmaster nodded. He made a bow and slipped out of Clara’s study.
Wincing a little at the pain in her back – she could not wait to give birth and get the pregnancy over with – she waddled over to the window, which looked down into the courtyard.
Hayes School For Young Women was thriving. It had been open for a year and a half, and of course, it was early days yet. However, there were a good amount of pupils so far, of varying ages. These were girls and young women whose families wanted them to have a proper education, something that could not be found in a finishing school. They were not interested in dancing classes and ‘accomplishments’ – although one could learn to sing and play musical instruments here, if one wished – or even a light polishing of manners. No, these girls were here for a real education.
The Hayes School For Young Women taught geography, physics, chemistry, languages, mathematics – including trigonometry and algebra – Latin, history, writing, and much more. It was every bit as extensive as the education a boy might receive at school.
Of course, there was some backlash to the school. Some parents complained that it gave their girls ‘ideas’, by which they presumably meant something beyond marriage and babies. Others argued against the school as a matter of principle, as part of the growing movement of women’s emancipation, which seemed to be gathering strength with each passing year.
Who could tell what the future held? Still, Clara felt that it looked very bright. Very bright indeed.
In the courtyard below, a class of younger girls were playing a game, something complicated involving a ball, a hoop, and copious amounts of imagination. One of the teachers – Miss Somerson, Clara recalled – was leaning against a nearby wall, watching the children with an indulgent smile.
The girls were laughing and hooting, shouting out to each other and making suggestions to improve the game, not a single one of them worrying about being ladylike or thinking about what sort of husband she would have. They were just being children, discovering what they liked to do, what subjects they would study, and where their life might take them.
There would be plenty of time for marriage and husbands later, if that was what the women wanted.
I don’t regret marrying at one and twenty, Clara thought, but I hope that one day, a woman who is not married at twenty will no longer be considered old, or a spinster. Or perhaps a spinster won’t have the cruel connotations it has now.
Perhaps. Still, that was a long way in the future, and Clara had time now to consider.
Behind her, the door creaked open. She glanced over her shoulder and smiled at her husband, tiptoeing into the room.
“Are you well?” he asked anxiously. “Are you tired? Sick? Why don’t you sit down?”
“My back is hurting terribly, I think I’d like to stand for a while,” she responded.
He came to stand behind her, arms sliding around her waist, palms flattening out on her stomach. She closed her eyes, leaning back and resting her head on his shoulder.
The baby had taken a long time in coming. A year and a half had gone by before she realized she was with child. Some women might have been worried, and some husbands annoyed, but it had not bothered Clara and Greyson very much at all. After all, there was so much work to be done in setting up the school.
She couldn’t even recall how they came to decide on the school, only that replies had flooded in, responding to her essays on female education and the importance of proper education for girls. Some replies had been from worried parents, but the majority were from girls, girls who wanted a real education, and who wanted more from life than marriage and a family. Often, they wanted marriage, a family, and something else, but no options beyond a husband were ever provided. They were confused, frightened, and often felt as though they were the ones in the wrong.
And then they read Clara’s essays, and their eyes were opened, in a way.
It made Clara prouder than she could put into words.
“Lady Beatrice wrote to me today,” Greyson said, voice low and soothing in her ear. “She wants almost daily news on you and the baby. She wanted to know if we were coming to London this Season. I think it might be a good idea, you know.”
Clara sighed. “I don’t know. London is so poisonous, and I’m not just talking about that foul-smelling fog that hangs over the street’s half of the year. I’m a little too used to the clear air of the countryside. And let us not forget, you and I are still a scandalous pair.”
“Are you afraid I’ll return to my rakish ways?”
She chuckled. “Not particularly. Are you afraid?”
“No. It’s just that Frederick is getting married, and I rather wanted to be there for that.”
Clara patted his hand. “Why didn’t you say so? Of course we’ll go back for Frederick’s wedding. I can see Adelaide and Margaret’s babies, too.”
“I thought we could… you know, engender a little more interest in the school.”
“Why? We already have plenty of students.”
“Yes, but shouldn’t girls of all classes know that there are options?”
Clara considered this. “I suppose you’re right. A lot of parents send their daughters to finishing schools, where they learn conversational French, watercolours, and how to be fascinating. How to catch a husband, in other words. I’m not sure how they would take anything else.”
“We’ll never know unless we try. Indeed, Clara, if you truly don’t want to go to London, we won’t go. I mean it.”
He took her hand, lacing their fingers together, and pressed a kiss to her temple. Clara closed her eyes, leaning against him.
Their two years of marriage had had problems, of course. No two people were perfect, and therefore no marriage union was perfect. For the most part, however, Clara had known nothing but happiness. Greyson was still the man she loved, the one she thought about each morning when she woke and the last one at night, as she fell asleep. A reformed rake, indeed. He scarcely touched alcohol, and gambling, not at all. After their marriage, he had thrown himself into studies, concentrating on philosophy, history, and other vital subjects.
With his help in setting up the school, Clara had been able to still devote some time to her writing. Her essays were still regularly printed in True Thoughts Of A Woman, and she was even writing a novel.
The details of the novel, of course, were quite secret.
“I want to go to London with you,” Clara said, reaching up to pat her husband’s cheek. “To be frank, I think I ought to see Mama and Papa. Mama especially. I know she’s visited here once or twice since we moved to the country, but that is not very much. I should work harder. I told her that I wasn’t holding any resentment against her forcing me towards Lord Tinley, but the more I think about it, the more I think that I have.”
“It’s alright to be angry at her, you know,” Greyson said quietly. “She might have meant well, but if her plan had come through, you would be married to Lord Tinley and thoroughly miserable by now. And although this isn’t strictly relevant, I would be miserable and heartbroken.”
She had to smile at that. “You are right, but the fact is, things worked out well, and Mama saw the error of her ways. She writes to me often and asks about you and the school. Before, she would have had an apoplexy to hear that I was opening up a school for ladies that took proper subjects. And now, she thinks it’s a wonderful idea. She even confided in me that she is reading True Thoughts Of A Woman. I could hardly believe it. I had to read that passage twice to make sure I had read it right.”
Greyson chuckled, pressing a kiss to her cheek. “Your mother is about to reform, just as I did. I think you are right, though. She’s so keen to have a part in our little one’s life. She’ll be a grandmother after all.”
“She is already a grandmother, what with Margaret and Adelaide’s babies.”
“True, but this will be our baby. We should let her see him.”
Clara twisted to look up at him, eyebrows raised. “Him?”
Laughing, Greyson raised his hands in surrender. “Only intuition, my dear.”
“You would like a boy, would you?”
“It would be nice to meet the future viscount, yes.”
“And what if it is not a boy?”
“Then I will be equally thrilled to meet our first child, no doubt a tireless campaigner for the rights of all, just like her mama.”
“So I hope,” Clara chuckled. She turned back to the window, and Greyson put his arms around her again, resting his chin on her shoulder. For a few moments, they stood there in companionable, comfortable silence, watching the children play in the courtyard below. A bell rang somewhere, and Miss Somerson set about marshalling the girls into formation, herding them back into the school to resume their lessons.
“My mother would have loved this place,” Greyson murmured, sadness tinging his voice. “She would have been thrilled. She would have loved you, you know. And she would have been so excited about the baby. She would be full of suggestions, full of ideas, full of things to do once the baby was born.”
“Oh, Greyson. I’m sorry.”
“It’s alright, these are happy tears, I promise. Anyway, have you given any thought to a name?”
Clara bit back a smile. “Actually, I have. And I should tell you now, I think this baby is going to be a girl.”
“Oh?”
“Yes, I do. I can’t tell you how I know, it’s just intuition. A feeling that I have, you know? But there it is regardless, and I am entirely convinced that our first child will be a girl.”
Greyson chuckled, smoothing his palms over her rounded belly, the warmth from his hands seeping through the material of her gown.
“I am thrilled to hear it, my darling. And a name? You’ve thought about a name?”
“I have, and I do think you’ll laugh. If we have a girl, my dear, I think we should name her Sophia.”
The End