by Amanda Quick
“Yes, a lovely treat,” Miss Bracegirdle said stoutly as she picked up her reticule.
The farewells came fast and furious after that. Emily stood at the door with a determined smile on her face while she fumed inwardly. Her father and brothers had ruined everything. Only Simon was delaying his departure.
Out in the hall wraps were hastily donned and bonnets were quickly tied. In a moment all of the ladies were being handed up into the carriage Emily had ordered to take them to their respective residences.
A cold, dangerous silence descended on the drawing room.
Bloody hell, thought Emily. She whirled to confront her father. “Well, Papa, to what do I owe the honor of this rushed visit?”
“Ask Blade. I expect he knows the answer to that.” Broderick Faringdon glowered at Simon, who was calmly finishing his tea. “What the devil do you think you’re about, sir?”
Simon’s brows rose slightly. “I should think that was obvious, Faringdon. I was invited to tea and I am enjoying a very fine cup of Lap Seng.”
“Don’t try to fob me off with that tea nonsense. You’re up to something, Blade.”
Simon smiled his coldest smile and put down his empty cup. Something that might have been satisfaction or triumph blazed in his eyes. “In that case, I will call on you tomorrow at three to discuss it.”
“The hell you will,” Faringdon snarled.
Emily was startled by the ugly red flush in her father’s face. Devlin and Charles were staring at her as if she had brought disgrace and ruin to herself a second time.
“Yes. I most certainly will.” Simon rose to his feet with lethal grace, taller than even the tall Faringdon men. “Until tomorrow, Faringdon.” He walked over to Emily, took her hand, and kissed it. His eyes gleamed at her. “Thank you for tea, Miss Faringdon. I enjoyed myself very much. But, then, I always do in your presence.”
“Goodbye, my lord. Thank you for attending our salon this afternoon.” Emily suddenly wanted to grab the tails of his beautifully cut blue coat and hold him fast there in the drawing room. She did not want to face her father and brothers alone. But there was nothing she could do.
A moment later Simon had collected his curly-brimmed beaver hat and York tan gloves from Duckett and sauntered out the front door to where the Gillinghams’ curricle waited. There was a clatter of hooves and wheels and he was gone.
Emily clasped her hands in front of her and glared at her father and brothers. “I hope you are all satisfied. You have quite ruined my tea. We were having a wonderful time until you burst in here without so much as a by-your-leave.”
“I told you, this is my home, girl. Don’t need to ask permission to walk into my own drawing room. Devil take it, Emily, what’s going on here?” Broderick Faringdon faced his daughter, his hands on his hips. “I had a letter from Prendergast telling me you were being courted by the Earl of Blade, for God’s sake.”
“I am. I should think you would be pleased and proud, Papa.”
“Proud?” Devlin poured himself a glass of claret from a bottle that had been set out for Simon. He shot a pitying look at his sister. “Have you lost your wits, Em? You know what will happen when Blade finds out about the Incident. What made you lead him on in the first place? You know how it’s going to end.”
Charles shook his head. “How could you let things come to such a pass, Em? Bound to be an embarrassing scene now. All the old mud will be dredged up and you’re going to feel like a prize fool.”
“He already knows about the scandal,” Emily shouted, her hands clenching into small fists. “He already knows and he does not care. Do you hear me? He does not care a fig about it.”
There was an acute silence. And then, with a weary air, the senior Faringdon helped himself to a glass of claret.
“So that’s his game,” Broderick said quietly. “Knew he was hatching some vicious scheme. Man’s bloody damn dangerous. Everyone in London knows it. I wish to God he’d stayed out there in the East Indies. Why in hell did he have to come back?”
“What scheme?” Emily demanded. “What are you talking about, Papa? The man is going to ask for my hand in marriage. He knows I am socially ruined but he loves me anyway.”
“Emily, my dear. You are so bloody naive.” Broderick threw himself down onto the sofa and gulped his claret. “Men like Blade do not marry women such as yourself. Why should they? With his title and the fortune he has made for himself in the East Indies, Blade can have his pick of the pretty little virgins that come up in the marriage mart every Season. Why should he take soiled goods?”
Emily flushed, fighting back the old humiliation. “He does not seem to care about such things, Papa.”
“Every man cares about such things,” Charles told her with brotherly ruthlessness.
“Is that so?” Emily flashed furiously. “Then why do you go to such lengths to seduce every poor, wretched female you can find and turn them into soiled goods?”
“Here, now,” Devlin snapped. “Charles and I are gentlemen. We don’t go about seducing innocent young women of quality.”
“Just the innocent young women of the lower classes? The ones who have no choice? I suppose you think their inferior social status makes it all right?”
“Enough!” Broderick Faringdon roared. “We stray from the subject. Emily, I will be blunt. You have gotten all of us into a very serious situation and I am only just now beginning to suspect what it will cost us.”
“Why will it cost us anything?” she shouted back. “I am going to be married. What is wrong with that?”
The glass in her father’s hand hit the table with a loud crack. “Damn, girl, don’t you see what’s up here? Blade don’t intend to marry you. Not for a moment.”
“Then why is he going to offer for me?”
Broderick Faringdon went quiet for a moment. He was a man who had grown very adept at reading the intentions of his opponents in high-stakes games. “What he’ll no doubt offer is a trade.”
“Damn. You’re right, Father.” Charles poured himself more claret.
“Hell and damnation. Of course. Should have seen it coming,” Devlin muttered.
Emily stared at her father. “A trade? Papa, what on earth are you talking about?”
Broderick shook his head. “Don’t you get it yet, girl? Blade don’t want to marry you. What he intends to do is threaten to run off with you unless I give him what he wants.” He cast a brooding eye around the elegant drawing room. “And I think I know what he will demand in exchange for doing us the great favor of getting out of our lives.”
Devlin looked at him sharply. “What does he want, Father?”
“St. Clair Hall.” Broderick swallowed the remainder of the claret in his glass in one gulp. “Bloody bastard hates me. He’s waited twenty-three years to get his vengeance and now he’s finally found a way to do it.”
Emily felt dazed. She sank stiffly down onto a brocade chair, her eyes never leaving her father. “I think you had better explain, Papa. Now.”
Broderick surveyed his three offspring for a long moment and then sighed heavily. “Wish your mama was still with us. She always used to handle this kind of unpleasantness. Had a way about her. I could leave it all up to her.”
Devlin glanced at Charles and then looked directly at his father. “Charles and I understand part of this. We know Blade is trying to use Emily somehow. But what is this about St. Clair Hall? Why would he want it in exchange for not running off with Em? Man’s rich as Croesus. He could buy a dozen houses as fine as this one.”
Emily clenched her fingers tightly together. “He said this was his home at one time,” she said slowly. “He lived here as a boy.”
Broderick wore a hunted expression. “He told you that?”
“Oh, yes, Papa. We are very close.” Emily narrowed her eyes defiantly behind the lenses of her spectacles.
“How close?” Devlin demanded abruptly. “Intimately close? For God’s sake, has that bastard already seduced you, Em? Is that why he
thinks you’ll run off with him?”
“The earl has been a perfect gentleman,” Emily informed him proudly.
“Well, at least we can be grateful the man’s got some shreds of a conscience left,” Broderick observed wearily. “Doubt they’ll do me much good, though.”
“Papa,” Emily said sharply, “You will explain all of this and you will do so now.”
The elder Faringdon nodded glumly. “You will have to know all of it sooner or later. Blade has made certain of that, the damn bloody bastard. The long and the short of it is, I did not purchase St. Clair Hall after a particularly good run of luck, as I once told you. I won it and the bulk of the Traherne fortune directly from Blade’s father in a card game twenty-three years ago. The earl paid his debt like the gentleman he was.”
“And?” Emily scowled at him. “I know there is more to this, Papa.”
“And then the fool came back here and put a bullet through his head.”
Emily closed her eyes in horror. “Dear God in heaven.”
Charles spoke up. “I fail to see the problem. It was a debt of honor and the man paid. The fact that he committed suicide later is no concern of ours.”
Emily shuddered. “How can you be so callous? Don’t you realize what must have happened?”
Broderick swore heavily. “There’s not much more to the tale. The young boy and his mother vacated the house and went to live somewhere in the north. The mother never made another appearance in Society as far as I know. She died several years back, I understand.”
“What about Blade?” Devlin asked. “What happened to him?”
“Some relative—an aunt, I believe—eventually scraped together enough blunt to buy him a commission. Probably did it to get rid of him. Blade went to the Peninsular Wars for a couple of years. Then he sold out and headed for the East Indies.”
“Because he had no fortune of his own,” Emily put in fiercely. “You had stolen his inheritance, stripped him of his rightful lands and property. After his father killed himself, Simon and his mother were thrown out of their home, penniless. They became dependent on the charity of relatives. How Blade must have hated that. He is so proud. How could you have done such a thing, Papa?”
Broderick shot her a fulminating glance. “I won everything in a fair game and don’t you ever forget that, Missy. That’s the way of the world. A man’s got no business playing if he can’t afford to pay.”
“Papa.”
“In any event, Blade’s done all right for himself. Word in the clubs is he lived like a pasha out there on some island. Did some favors for the East India Company and they rewarded him with a slice of the tea trade. He’s got a fair-sized fortune of his own now. God knows, he don’t need anything from us.”
“But he feels you owe him St. Clair Hall?” Devlin asked.
Broderick nodded. “Vengeful bastard. I’ve only seen him a couple of times over the years. He looked me up before he left for the wars and again just before he sailed to the East. Both times all he said was that someday I would pay for what I had done to him and his family. He swore my family would suffer as much as his had. He also vowed to get St. Clair Hall back. I thought it was all bluster.”
“And now he thinks he’s found a way to force you to give him the house,” Charles said, glowering at his sister. “But if he’s so rich, why don’t he just offer to buy it back?”
“Expect it’s the principle of the thing. He thinks I owe it to him. I told you, he wants vengeance. And he probably knows I would not sell it, even if he made a decent offer.”
“Why not?” Charles demanded impatiently. “We’re hardly ever in residence, anyway. Except for Emily, of course.”
Broderick looked around again, savoring the furnishings of the beautiful room. “This is the finest home any Faringdon has ever owned, by God. Finer than anything my father ever acquired or my grandfather or the baron himself, the stingy bastard. I’ve done better than any of ’em. First Faringdon to ever amount to something. And this house proves it.”
Devlin shot a narrow glance at Emily’s white face. “This could get very nasty, indeed. Blade ain’t the type to bluff. Emily, you surely ain’t been so stupid as to lose your heart to Blade?”
“’Course she has,” Charles muttered. “Look at her. Thinks that son of a bitch really wants to marry her. And that’s what he’ll tell her when he invites her to run off with him. She’ll believe him, just like she believed Ashbrook. Christ, what a mess. We’ll have to lock her up.”
“Do not be idiotic,” Emily said. “I could escape from any room in this house.” She drew herself up proudly, rage pouring through her veins like red fire. “But you will see. Blade is going to ask for my hand and I am going to marry him.”
“He don’t want you, girl. Not for his wife. Ain’t that clear enough?” Charles shook his head in exasperation. “He ain’t going to offer for you tomorrow at three. He’s going to blackmail Father, instead.”
“He bloody hell will make a respectable offer,” Emily retorted, her voice high and tight with tension. “I know him, damn you.”
Broderick sighed heavily. “No, Emily, you do not know him. No one knows Blade. You have not heard the talk in the clubs. The man is cloaked in mystery. Bloody powerful, too. They say even men like Canonbury and Peppington are under his thumb. All anyone is certain of is that he is both very rich and very dangerous.”
“Do not tell her such things, Father,” Devlin muttered. “You will only make him sound more intriguing to her. You know her romantic imagination.”
“Listen to me, Emily, you’re a sensible girl when it comes to managing finances,” Broderick said in cajoling tones. “I expect you to be sensible about this matter, too. This is not some damn romantic novel. This is real. Your future is at stake. Blade’s game is an old one, although I’ll grant you ’tis not one usually played by men of his rank. The usual routine is for some impoverished scoundrel to offer to drop his suit for the daughter of the house in exchange for a large sum of money.”
“The only difference here,” Charles said, “is that Blade ain’t impoverished.”
“I am convinced you are wrong,” Emily said through her teeth. “The earl’s offer will be a valid one and I am going to accept it, even if you do not give your permission, Papa. You cannot stop me.”
Broderick massaged his temples. “Remember that disaster five years ago, m’dear. You cannot be wanting to go through that humiliation and heartbreak again. You pined for days.”
“It is not the same,” Emily cried. “The earl will marry me.”
“It is the same, damn it all,” Broderick shot back. “And Blade will never marry you. But by the time you figure that out, we’ll all be—” He broke off abruptly.
“You’ll all be what, Papa?” But a sudden realization had just struck Emily. When it came to financial matters, she was rarely blinded by romance. Her eyes widened in comprehension. “Ah, I think I am beginning to perceive the full extent of the earl’s threat. He is very clever, is he not?”
“Now, Em, don’t go worrying your head about the details here,” Charles said quickly. “Let Father handle this.” He traded a worried glance with Devlin, who was frowning darkly.
“It is not just the threat to my reputation that worries you, is it?” Emily said slowly. “After all, you’ve already suffered that trial once before. No, the real risk is that Blade might indeed take me away for some time. Months, perhaps. Even a year or two. And once deprived of my financial skills, all three of you would lose St. Clair Hall and everything else soon enough at the tables.”
“Damme, Emily, that ain’t it at all. It’s you I’m worried about, girl. You’re my only daughter. D’you think I want to see you ruined for a second time?” Broderick glared at her.
Emily crossed her arms under her breasts and nodded in satisfaction. “Very clever, indeed. I’ll wager that without me to repair your fortunes periodically on ’Change, you three would not be able to keep this house, or your expensive bloodstock
, or much else for more than a year, at most.”
“That ain’t true,” Charles snapped. “It’s you we’re concerned about. Your reputation and happiness are what’s important here.”
“Thank you,” Emily said dryly. “So kind of you.”
“Now, see here, Em—” Devlin began furiously.
“Do you know,” Emily mused thoughtfully, “the most interesting question here is how the earl came to understand just how crucial I am to your financial status, Papa.”
“Damn good question,” Broderick muttered as he poured himself another glass of claret. “Which ain’t to say your brother ain’t right,” he added quickly. “I am concerned about you, girl. Very concerned.”
“So are we,” Charles assured her. “The money ain’t got anything to do with it.”
“I am relieved to hear that,” Emily murmured. “So nice to know one’s family cares about one.” She got up and walked out of the room.
Behind her Broderick Faringdon poured himself the remainder of the claret. He and his sons sank into a gloomy silence.
• • •
Emily went straight to her sanctuary, the library. There she sat behind the big mahogany desk and stared unseeingly out into the gardens. For a long while she did not move. Then she opened a drawer and removed the beautiful box that contained the carefully bound stack of Simon’s letters.
It was time to step out of the romantic haze in which she had been living for the past several days. Her father had been right about one thing: Her whole future was at stake. It was time to do some serious thinking about the problem that confronted her.
It was time, in fact, to apply the same razor sharp intelligence she normally brought to bear on financial matters to the situation in which she now found herself. Emily opened the first letter in the bundle. She had read it countless times and could have quoted it from memory.
My Dear Miss Faringdon:
I take the liberty of introducing myself through the post because it has come to my attention that you and I have some intellectual interests in common. I have heard that you have an interest in certain poems that were recently published by a bookseller named Pound. Mr. Pound was kind enough to give me your direction …
