A Rake to the Rescue

by Elizabeth Beacon

  ‘It will serve as well as any scheme I can come up with for the next few weeks and would get us safely away from London. You are right—any houses for hire for the summer will be of poor quality if they are still vacant by now. Playing the tourist is as good a way as any for us to pass the time until we can go back to real travelling.’

  ‘Real travelling?’ he echoed as if she had insulted his country.

  She ought to be more tactful about a place she would probably have to live in while Toby went to school, but she wasn’t ready to tell him all her intentions quite yet. She needed to remember she was an independent woman and he would walk away from her as soon as his father’s murderer was caught.

  ‘That was badly said,’ she said with another sigh. ‘Although I will admit the Heath has been a pleasant surprise to me, despite all the dramas.’

  ‘I shall nobly ignore that sneaky caveat and there’s a great deal more of your homeland for you to see yet and I have never been bored by travelling around it. To walk from one new wonder to another and linger where I fancy is my idea of heaven, especially during a summer like this one when any sane body would choose to be out of London.’

  ‘You sound as if you do so quite often,’ she said, intrigued by that glimpse of a very different man to the Honourable Magnus under the skin.

  ‘I like to walk and it is a good way to avoid summer house parties and overcrowded fashionable resorts. One set of people believe I am with the other and vice versa, so I can please myself for weeks on end with nobody much the wiser.’

  ‘You should be a poet,’ she pretended to mock him, but deep down she wondered if he wasn’t ideally suited to the task, with those brooding looks and hints of a tragic past to gild him even more in the eyes of his besotted female fans.

  ‘Maybe I should, if I had any talent for versifying. I could stride about the hills and dales brooding about my sins instead of doing it in my mother’s dining room.’

  ‘And get fresh air and exercise while you are about it,’ she suggested, picturing him doing it anyway and feeling that wicked tug of attraction as she decided the role would become him even if he wasn’t a poet.

  ‘To get back to the subject we are meant to be talking about, you don’t object to my company on your journey, then?’

  ‘Why should I? To paraphrase your words to Toby, you don’t smell and you are good enough company and might even frighten off a potential attacker with one of your frowns, so why turn down such a stalwart escort when I need one?’

  ‘Because I feel as if you are on the edge of rebelling against your father’s ordering of your life and might think I want to walk in his footsteps.’

  ‘No, you are a very different man and I never was one to cut off my nose to spite my face. My son has been a target for ruthless men who want to frustrate my father’s work since the day he was born and it has made a realist out of me whether I like it or not.’

  ‘I am sure Sir Hadrian is concerned about your welfare as well as his grandson’s safety and well-being.’

  ‘Maybe, but Toby is the joker in his pack. Papa knows he only has to play it and I will agree to whatever he decides will keep Toby safe from his enemies this time.’

  ‘And if not for your responsibility to him you would dive head first into any mystery that intrigued you without a second thought, wouldn’t you?’ he challenged her disguise of the meek daughter and he really was dangerous, wasn’t he?

  ‘Possibly,’ she replied with a thoughtful sideways look to wonder how he knew there was a daredevil streak in dull and respectable Mrs Champion she managed to hide from everyone else, even after that epic trek to catch up with her father when Toby was a baby because she refused to be taken over by her grandmother or her late husband’s relatives and told what to do for the rest of her life. ‘If not for him, my whole life would be different, but so much less.’

  ‘So, you would stay out of your father’s darker projects for your son’s sake, even if he did not blackmail you into it then, wouldn’t you?’

  ‘Yes,’ she agreed, surprised he already knew her so much better than her father seemed to. ‘I married Brandon Champion because I wanted a life of seagoing adventure, but he only wanted a domesticated little sparrow who would stay quietly out of the way while he got on with real life. Now there’s no Bran to tell me what to do or where to go, he has left me with the biggest reason I could ever have not to take part in Papa’s adventures even if I have been able to live in countries most ladies can only imagine and Toby has a broader view of the world than most schoolboys can even dream about. How Bran would laugh and say it served me right for not being the grateful little miss he thought I was when he married me if he had known my father would hobble me with a promise I made to him when I was desperate to escape from England. But you are right. I shall always put Toby first and he will be safer and happier touring your precious country than he would be in some shabby lodging in a quiet town with not very much for him to do except long for this puppy he is so obsessed with.’

  While I try to find a place to live while he’s at school that doesn’t fill me with dread for the boredom and misery of being without him for at least five days out of every seven with nothing much to do to fill the time with, she added in her head.

  She would not confide in him how she hated the idea of living for any weekends her son wanted to spend with her as Toby got more and more absorbed with new friends and adventures she truly wanted him to have.

  ‘As well Champion is not here, then, as I would bloody his nose for being so harsh to a wife he obviously didn’t even try to understand. I never liked him much and I’m sorry he led you such a dance, but I wish you would make peace with his brother, Hetta. Marcus isn’t in the least bit like his younger brother under those gilded Champion looks that must have made you think he was the next pea in the pod. Mark and his wife are fine people and well worth knowing and it would be good for Toby to know they are very ready to welcome you both.’

  ‘They were not very eager to meet me when Bran was still alive.’

  ‘And I know how sad they were his wife refused to meet the rest of the family. Mark thought Brandon must have set his bride against them since he was always so jealous of Mark inheriting the title and estate when neither of them could help the order they were born in.’

  ‘Bran said the Champions could never forgive me for eloping with him when they had a much more suitable bride picked out for him. He said his family and the girl he was meant to marry were furious with me.’ Hetta paused for a moment, thinking of all the untruths Bran had told and wishing he had been different. He was frail and all too human under those angelic looks and easy smiles. Best if she refused to dwell on his sins now he would never have a chance to make up for them. ‘Are you telling me about them to distract me from the journey you seem to have been planning all night?’

  ‘No, and if we do set out it will be in your hands where we go and what we do next. Please don’t say the prospect of even that much freedom isn’t tempting you because I will know you’re lying and it’s really my company you can’t stomach.’

  Yet he is the most tempting part of this scheme and never mind freedom to go where I want and the open road, wicked Hetta whispered in Mrs Champion’s ear.

  ‘It seems an appealing idea to wander wherever the fancy takes us,’ respectable Mrs Champion admitted warily and ignored her inner fool as best she could.

  ‘I hope you will see the true beauty of your own country without either your grandmother or your late husband pushing you from pillar to post and not consulting you about any of it,’ he said, tactfully leaving out Papa’s ordering of things ever since she’d tracked him down in Spain all those years ago.

  ‘You make me sound as if I don’t have a mind of my own, Mr Haile.’

  ‘Heaven forbid, Mrs Champion,’ he said with a wry smile. ‘You must have a will of iron to have managed to get your Toby this f
ar in relative safety.’

  ‘That’s not what you said at Dover,’ she reminded him lest she get too giddy about his backhanded compliment.

  ‘I said a lot of stupid things that day,’ he said gruffly.

  She hoped, for his sake, that he meant he was ready to go on with his life now Lady Drace had set him free to be his own man again, but from the familiar frown she suspected his thoughts were with his child again and that was a loss he would never quite put behind him. He would be a lesser man if he could and she didn’t want him to be one of those, so any woman who wanted to love him would have to love that part of him as well, she supposed. Luckily, she didn’t want to love him, so that wasn’t a problem for her to solve.

  Chapter Twelve

  ‘I am not complaining, you understand, but I still don’t quite know how this happened,’ Hetta said to Lady Aline Haile two days later as their comfortable travelling carriage pulled away from the latest stop to change horses and Peg was already nodding in her corner of the carriage.

  ‘I am not quite sure either, but at least Master Tobias here is an improvement on the pampered darlings Lady Warner thought I could make into young ladies without any effort on their part. He is objectionable in his own right, of course, but he doesn’t want to paint fans or cover the land in whitework,’ her new friend said and at least the reason for her brief stay at Carrowe House to meet a potential employer was out in the open now and Aline seemed happy with Toby as an alternative pupil to Lady Warner and her fluffy-minded daughters.

  ‘I don’t suppose the Misses Warner do either,’ Hetta pointed out even so.

  ‘Maybe not, but I never did have any patience with useless so-called accomplishments, so I do not know how to do any of them, even if I wanted to teach them to anyone else.’

  ‘Then I cannot imagine why you wanted to be a governess in the first place! You are far better off with us. I can safely promise my son isn’t the least bit interested in ladylike skills and preoccupations. Toby, get your head back in here and out of the way this instant, before it gets chopped clean off by one of those shop signs,’ she ordered her son, who was busy gawping at the narrow streets and perilously overhanging buildings of the ancient city they were passing through.

  ‘The builders would have to know how much load and counterweight was safe for those floors to carry them that far out into the streets, Mama. One inch further and the whole lot would have ended up falling down on top of passers-by. I wish I could meet one of them and find out how they did it and if they planned it that way or just learned how from trial and error.’

  ‘Considering the carpenters and masons have been several hundred years in their graves by now, I can’t say I share that wish, my son.’

  ‘I expect there are apprenticeship records and guild standards, so we could look them up when we are in London next time,’ Aline offered as if she was every bit as interested in such details as Toby. ‘Of course, they might not have survived the Great Fire since the Guilds suffered so badly. A good many of them lost everything and had to begin again as best they could,’ she added, and the two of them discussed air currents and wind directions and flashovers and who saw what when during that terrible time and invented all sorts of intriguing details of a huge blaze that had, thankfully, been over for nearly a hundred and sixty years.

  Hetta sat back to watch the town thin out into mellow countryside and was glad she didn’t have to imagine the terror of watching so much of the old city being eaten up by fire for Toby this time when the loss of life and homes filled her with horror. Hiring Lady Aline as her companion and Toby’s teacher for the summer had been right for all three of them, but it was still annoying for her to have to admit two Haile men were right at the same time. At least she had insisted on visiting Lady Carrowe and her youngest daughters before they went on to find grander and more remote scenery further along the southern coast of England. She wanted to thank the lady for letting her stay at Develin House and reassure her she intended to treat Lady Aline as a friend and travelling companion rather than a paid employee. And they all needed to prove to managing Haile males that ladies were not a set of puppets to be moved about at will.

  * * *

  I have missed my chance to secure the package you speak of and agree it would make it far easier to control our man and scotch this enterprise before it gets out of hand.

  The carefully worded letter read as if the sender was half-expecting a third party to read and puzzle over it before it reached its addressee, or a very wary person indeed. The recipient frowned at the dull and dusty landscape beyond the open window and tapped restless fingers on the desk. This place was halfway between nowhere in particular and somewhere else, but at least it had seen a mop and broom in the last month or so.

  M. has put himself in the way all the time since then and keeps the package very close indeed. I will watch and wait, but there may not be another chance to secure the parcel.

  I intend to find another way to control the hunt, but I cannot follow that particular avenue without giving away my intentions to scotch this business for good.

  ‘Fool,’ the reader murmured into the sticky air. ‘Must I always think for you and do everything myself?’

  * * *

  Even Toby had seemed overawed by the scale and atmosphere of the ancient cathedral at Winchester. Hetta had felt her feet complaining about the acres of stone floors she seemed to have walked over already, so she was glad to stand and gaze at the brightly painted round table said to have belonged to Arthur and his Knights. She had wondered if it was such a good idea someone insisted it was repainted thirty-odd years ago and if they had blotted out an ancient past by making it more pristine for the modern age. They had a stimulating argument about whether Arthur and his Round Table existed outside legend over an excellent dinner that night, before Hetta felt oppressed by the silliness of the gossips when Magnus pretended to leave for a night at another inn, lest anyone think poorly of Mrs Champion for not employing an older chaperone than his sister to keep them quiet about this stately progress along the south coast. She fumed every night as they made their way through Hampshire and Dorset and the pretence continued and he really spent every night in the stables or some barn nearby where he could catch out any stealthy predators on their tail and keep her coolly respectable at the same time. Her wicked thoughts about all the mischief she might like to get up to with him, if only he would let her, were private and nothing to do with anyone else.

  Apart from that burr in her boots, this leisurely exploration of her native land was far more interesting than she feared it might be when they set out to hide in plain sight. She was beginning to be convinced by the age and interest and sheer beauty of this generous country. The sky might be grey and the sea as muddy looking as a town puddle now and again, but then the clouds or sea mist would disperse, and the sun shone, and she didn’t think she had ever seen the sky as clear and washed as clean a blue as it was here on the best of summer days. She watched and listened for the rush of speed and sharp wings as swifts flew over their heads, squealing with the joy of going where no man could and all the while martins and swallows swirled for insects as if their faster cousins were not even there. There were flowers of such minute and delicate beauty they seemed even more of a marvel than their lush cousins further south. Magnus Haile even knew where to look for the last of the orchids to show Toby their exquisite and sometimes quirky beauty. Then there were lush valleys where the buzz of bees and less welcome, but at least not deadly, insects gave away the quieter blossoms of the hedgerows now the full rush of spring was apparently over.

  Even the towns in this part of the world seemed to have dreamed their way through what seemed more like thousands than hundreds of years with history undisturbed in their cellars and attics. Except apparently this whole coast had been deep in the smuggling trade for almost as long, so it wasn’t quite as peaceful and innocent as it seemed even now. Among sheep-cropped cli
ffs and sturdy cattle in their lush pasture, Magnus said there were hidden ways so deep and out of the way lines of pack ponies could work their way through them in broad daylight and a stranger would never be any the wiser. Best not to go looking for them, he warned Toby as interest sparked in his bright blue gaze and, to Hetta’s amazement, her son nodded and looked manly, as if keeping her out of trouble was his life’s work instead of the other way around.

  Toby loved the odd and sometimes eerie Chesil Beach under a summer fog near the inn they were very comfortable in for nearly a week, even as his mother felt a prickle of unease walking out on the flat expanse of pebbles as if she was being watched again by unseen eyes. When the mist cleared to reveal another beautiful sunny day, her son ran whooping with joy across the wide sands at Weymouth beach and out into the sea without even bothering to take off most of his clothes. Glad to shake off the odd mood of this morning, now such fancies seemed folly in the brilliant sunlight, Hetta stood by and smiled to see her son so carefree and full of excitement and told herself it didn’t matter if Mr Magnus Haile was as benignly detached from her as if he really was only here to keep a watch out for villains and other hazards. So, they meandered along the coast at a leisurely pace, and apart from her ridiculous awareness of Magnus Haile at every second step, she began to see what he meant about their native land. This land was green and beautiful under the summer sun—how could she have dismissed it as grey and dull when she lived in London, then Lyme? She supposed grief for her mother and her lonely life under Lady Porter’s stern roof was followed by the gradual realisation she had made a huge mistake in eloping with Bran, which explained a lot, she allowed, as she let her much younger self off one or two idiocies.