Jane Feather - Charade

by Unknown

  The Earl of Linton was seen going in and out of the house on Half Moon Street at all hours of the day and night and the little de St. Varennes could lose her complacence and join the ranks. How could an eighteen-year-old chit expect to hold the interest of a thirty-five-year-old who had been on the town for seventeen years? The sooner she gave Linton an heir and settled down in resignation, the happier she would be. A nursery full of brats would keep her occupied and take her mind off such frivolous nonsense as a love match.

  Danielle struggled in grim silence. She was as bright and cheerful as ever, publicly as happy in her husband's company as always. Only in private did Justin notice the withdrawal which was almost always followed by a passionate hunger that for a while slaked his growing unease. His brat was growing up, he told himself firmly whenever she had a reason for not participating in a treat he had planned, or preferred to take tea with a group of matrons rather than ride with him. It was right that she should do so, cease

  to be the giddy exuberant girl; his outrageous brat of the sharp tongue and quick impulses. But in the constant presence of Danielle, Justin missed Danny.

  * * *

  It was a beautiful April night when the last nail hammered into the coffin and Danielle gave up the pretense. She had retreated, overly full of lemonade, to the retiring room at Almack's where she was in the process of wrestling with her skirts and the commode behind a worked screen, when two elderly dowagers entered the room to collapse on a sofa before the open window and fan themselves and, incidentally, the smoldering fires of Danielle's confusion.

  "Pon my soul, Almera, but I was like to swoon when I heard news of that marriage." The dowager duchess of Avonley tried to adjust her stays, which were pinching like the devil. "Just fancy Linton takes the mother as mistress and the daughter to wife. I wonder whether it was the Rockford or the de St. Varennes that appealed." She wheezed with laughter and Danielle froze behind the screen.

  "Louise was beautiful." Lady Almera sighed in fond reminiscence. "She had not an easy time of it with the de St. Varennes. No one could blame her for taking pleasure when it came."

  "Nor young Linton." The dowager fanned herself vigorously. "D'ye think the child knows, Almera?"

  "Linton's a man of sense," her companion answered as if such a question were ridiculous. "What's it to the chit, anyway?"

  "Why nothing, of course. She cannot expect a man seventeen years older than herself to be without a past . . . but her own mother! 'Tis monstrous amusing, Almera, d'ye not think?"

  Clearly Lady Almera did, judging by the cackle of laughter that reached Danielle, rigid behind the screen. She straightened her skirts and with head held high moved into the room. "Good evening, your grace, Lady Almera." She paused for a moment to check her coiffure in the mirror, threw them both a tiny smile, and returned to the ballroom.

  "Jules, I do not feel quite the thing. Will you escort me home?" The request was whispered but none the less urgent and Lord Julian looked at his cousin-in-law with concern.

  "Immediately. Do you have the headache?"

  "A little." She smiled wanly. "It is too hot, Jules."

  "Devilish hot," he agreed. Since when had Danny found a ballroom to be too hot? "I will procure your carriage."

  When he set her down outside Linton House she refused his escort inside, pleading the headache that she must instantly take to bed and Julian, perforce, was obliged to agree. It was but eleven and Linton would not return for some time. He had said he was dining with friends but Danielle, in a world turned topsy-turvey, no longer knew what to believe. It was rumored that her husband was again the lover of Margaret Mainwairing and she had just heard from people who had no knowledge of her presence that he had been her mother's lover. There had been ample opportunity for him to tell her that and he had not done so. How could she then trust?

  Danielle found that she had no difficulty accepting the fact that her husband and her mother had once been lovers. She lay in her darkened chamber and thought. It was a peculiar circumstance, certainly, but no more than that. Justin must have been barely a man at that time and she herself a nothing in eternity—unconceived and unthought of. But he had not told her and if he could not tell her such a fundamental fact how much more would he keep secret?

  When Justin came home he found his wife apparently asleep, her breathing even in the dark room. She had been looking fatigued just recently and was in sore need of an undisturbed night. He tiptoed from the room to seek a lonely bed next door. As the door closed, Danielle buried her face in the pillows, muffling the sound of her sobs.

  * * *

  She awoke the next morning after a few broken hours of sleep, quietly determined. If Justin chose to play Society's game then would she also. She would be his wife, his hostess, would manage his households, but she would be no willing playmate. She would not refuse him her body when he required it, but neither would she offer it. He could take his pleasure from Margaret Mainwairing.

  Danielle sipped her hot chocolate, propped up against a fluffy mountain of pillows and read the billets doux scattered over the satin spread. Ordinarily, the effusive notes would have amused her and she would have shared their contents with Justin, calling through the connecting door as he attended to his morning toilette. This morning she pushed them aside with a desultory hand and concentrated instead on her plans for the day. There was work to be done with a family lodged near St. Paul's and she was in fair mood to wage battle.

  "I will get up," she announced to Molly, throwing aside the bedcovers. "A riding habit, I care not which one."

  When Justin appeared, expecting to find his wife pink and pearly beneath the covers ready to exchange accounts of their separate evenings, he found only a brisk lady in riding dress who proffered her cheek

  for his morning salute, laughed brightly, and said she was already late for her appointment. He bowed

  her from the room and returned to his own chamber to exchange the brocade dressing gown for morning dress, a deep frown creasing his brow.

  Things went from bad to worse. Danielle suffered from an inordinate number of headaches that necessitated her early retirement of an evening and Justin, faced with the pale face, smudged eyes, and clearly effortful smile, could not doubt her excuse. After the second week he probed gently and received only a listless response. There was nothing the matter with her, only she would be glad when the Season was over. But when he suggested they go to Danesbury for a se'enight she was full of protestations. How could they miss the Duchess of Richmond's ridotto? And besides she had a host of other engagements ...

  He had capitulated with apparent serenity and attempted to court his wife, arranging elaborate surprises, on one occasion waking her at five o'clock in the morning to tell her to don her britches because they were riding to Richmond where they could gallop without fear of prying eyes and sharp tongues. She had complied, but with such lack of enthusiasm that Justin felt as if he had received a glove in his face. After that, he left her alone. She was always polite, never turned him from her bed, but he found he had no stomach for the passive body beneath him, obedient to her conjugal duty. Reassuring himself that Danielle was going through a period of adjustment that had been inevitable—her past experiences bore no relation to her present and she must at some point reconcile the two—Justin made the biggest mistake of his life and countenanced her withdrawal.

  They became polite strangers, meeting by accident on the staircase, exchanging small talk over the dinner table. Justin returned to his bachelor existence and his wife played her part, surrounded by admirers, the very soul of gaiety, except that she was becoming thin and the brown eyes huge in the small face. She was also seen much in the company of D'Evron.

  More often than not, though, she ventured alone into the backslums to deal, with an icy tongue and a handful of guineas, with the exploiters. The Countess of Linton was now well known and urgent notes reached her daily, scribbled in hasty French on scraps of paper with the blunted end of a quill pen. Danielle
responded to them all and by so doing managed to push her marital problems into the background. She had a job to do and a purpose to fulfill and the triviality of London's Season rapidly lost all appeal. Nevertheless, she took her part in the round of balls and assemblies, ever gay, ever flirtatious, never a crack showing in the public facade.

  Justin endured in stolid silence, certain that he was doing the right thing. The child and the woman would come together eventually, and he must stand aside. He ached with loneliness but kept the ache well concealed.

  Early one rainy afternoon, returning from his club with a piece of scurrilous gossip that he hoped might amuse Danielle, he was informed that My Lady had not left her bedchamber today. Much puzzled he mounted the stairs and entered his wife's room without ceremony. At first it appeared empty as well as cold and dismal. There was no fire in the grate, no lighted candles, and the rain beat desolately against

  the windows.

  "Go away," a voice muttered peevishly from the bed. Danielle was visible only as a small curled mound, just the tip of her wheat-gold head appearing above the coverlet.

  "What is it, Danny? Are you ill?" He crossed anxiously to the bed.

  "No. Go away. I just want to be alone," the same voice grumbled crossly.

  Justin pulled the cover away from her face and laid a hand on her brow. She seemed quite cool. "Do you have the headache again?" he asked gently.

  "No."

  "Well, if you will not tell me what is the matter, I must send for the doctor."

  "I don't need the doctor." Danielle thumped onto her side facing away from him. "I just have the bellyache. It's quite normal and will go away if you'll leave me in peace." She twitched the covers overhead again.

  "Oh, I see." Justin frowned. It had been nearly four weeks then since he had last shared her bed. He was usually so attuned to her body that her monthly cycles were as well known to him as they were to Danielle. His lack of awareness on this occasion served only to emphasize the lonely estrangement of their lives. Well, he was not going to accept his dismissal this time. "Come," he said briskly. "You may have the bellyache but that is no reason to suffer in misery. Why do you have no fire and no light? It is a wretched day and this room is as cold and dark as a tomb."

  "I like it like that," Danny said petulantly. "I feel miserable and it suits my mood."

  Justin smiled slightly. This Danny he could deal with. "Well, it does not suit mine, child." He tugged on the bellpull and when Molly appeared a minute or two later she saw His Lordship kneeling by the grate, setting a taper to the kindling.

  "My lord, please," she gasped in horror. "I will do it."

  "It's done," he said tranquilly, rising to his feet. "I suggest you light the candles and draw the curtains."

  "I... I am sorry, my lord," Molly stammered, twisting her hands. "I would have done so before but my lady said . . ."

  "I understand completely, Molly," Justin reassured. "I know exactly how stubborn Her Ladyship can be."

  A muttered expletive came from the bed where Danny now lay on her back, the covers pulled down to her nose as she regarded them balefully.

  "You will feel a great deal better, my love, when you have washed your face and brushed your hair," Justin told her, pulling the heavy gold drapes across the long window, shutting out the dark, rain-sodden afternoon. The room had undergone a complete transformation; the fire blazed cheerfully and the soft candlelight illuminated the gold, cream, and white of the furnishings. Only Danielle remained untransformed.

  "Now, Molly, you will be pleased to fetch your mistress some broth."

  "I do not wish for any broth," Danny wailed.

  "Would you prefer gruel, then?" her husband asked cheerfully.

  "I loathe gruel!"

  "Then it had best be broth. See to it, Molly."

  "Yes, my lord." Molly bobbed a curtsy and made haste from the room.

  The water in the ewer was cold, but Justin decided that the chill might have a salutory effect and wrung out a washcloth.

  "What are you doing with that?" Danielle demanded warily.

  "I intend to wash your face, brat. You are looking rather grubby and disheveled. I am persuaded you

  will feel more the thing when you are tidy."

  Danny's arms flailed in protest, but her husband just laughed and caught both her wrists in one large hand. "You will not succeed in preventing me, Danny, so I suggest you submit with a good grace."

  Danielle snuffled and snorted under the vigorous application of the washcloth, but with her eyes unglued and her cheeks tingling, she did feel a little less cross.

  Justin brushed her hair until the bright curls shone again, but his movements were tender and caressing and Danny found herself leaning back against his shoulder automatically, with all the old trust and comfort. Justin felt it, too, and his heart leaped. He toyed with the idea of taking advantage of the moment and attempting again to discover what had been troubling her in recent weeks, and then he dismissed the idea. If she withdrew from him, he would lose this moment and it was too precious. There would be other opportunities and all the more so if he played a casual game, rebuilding their love brick

  by brick, unobtrusively.

  "There, that is a great improvement," he announced, f plumping up the pillows and settling her against them. "Now, you shall take a glass of port for your ache and eat some broth and I shall tell you a very funny story that will quite chase away the megrims."

  Danielle chuckled. "You are skilled at nursing, milord. Even more so than my old nurse. She used to weep when I was ill, you see, and that did not help matters at all."

  Justin touched the tip of her nose with a light forefinger and went to his own parlor for the port. If only

  he could have her defenseless and in need of comfort for more than the hour or so afforded by this monthly inconvenience, he could get to the bottom of whatever it was.

  Danielle required little encouragement to eat the steaming bowl of broth, rich from the ever bubbling stockpot belowstairs. She found Justin's story hilarious and choked violently on a toast crumb which led the earl to observe, as he patted her back and mopped up the slurped soup, that she was still as much of an urchin as ever. The remark was intended in jest, but it brought so many painful memories of those early good times when he'd cared for her, scolded her, and loved her and she had accepted it all in youthful trust and naivete, that Danielle stiffened in sadness and the impudent retort that rose so naturally to her lips was swallowed.

  "What is it, Danny?" Linton asked involuntarily.

  "Why nothing at all, Justin." She laughed, that brittle laugh that he had come to dread. "I think I will sleep for a little while and then I shall be quite restored."

  "I will leave you then." He rose from the bed and took the tray, placing it on the dresser. "Do you care to stay home tonight, my love? We haven't played chess together this age."

  How easy it would be to say yes, to eat dinner together in his parlor as they had used to do, play chess and talk companionably and then to bed, to sleep in the circle of his arm. But the image of her mother

  and then of Margaret Mainwairing, eagerly awaiting Linton's footfall, was engraved on the retina of her mind's eye. "Have you forgotten, my lord, that we are promised to the Wesleys' this evening? There is

  to be a recital—a harpist as I recall."

  "I had forgotten, I must confess. You could, perhaps, plead your sickbed as excuse." It was a last, desperate attempt, but he saw in her eyes, now strangely blank, that it would not do.

  "There is nothing the matter with me that an hour's rest and a bath will not cure, Linton," she said briskly. "And it will be a most interesting soiree, I dare swear."

  "Indeed, my love," he concurred dryly. "If my absence will not disturb you, I should prefer to spend the evening at Watier's."

  "But of course, my lord. We do not need to live in each other's pockets, after all."

  Linton bowed his acquiescence and left her chamber, desolation twisting lik
e serpents in his belly. He

  had married a loving child—a child grateful to him for his help, a child who, from the depths of her inexperience, had perhaps mistaken gratitude for love. For a few months they had lived an idyll until Danielle had lost her naivete as she took her place in the world of sham and pleasure. If she no longer loved him, then they faced a bleak future. He could have married any number of eager eligible young damsels who would have born his children, acted as his hostess, run his households competently if not with Danielle's devastating efficiency, but Justin in his foolishness had waited for something else, and he had found it in the mercurial Danielle. He could not now imagine his life without her, but he was beginning to imagine his life without her love. While she did not say the words he dreaded, he could still hope, still plan a campaign whereby he would woo the woman as he had never needed to woo the child.