by M C Beaton
Compared to her idea of men—lustful, hot, grasping, panting satyrs—Sir Percival’s foppery was like a cool drink in a hot desert. But Mr. Flanders, with his boyish ease and friendliness, with his harmless conversation devoid of the double entendre or the hot raking look, had given Lucinda a new idea. Perhaps men and women could actually be friends! The Marquess of Sunningburgh had offered friendship, but how could one be friends with a man who produced such an odd physical effect on one’s body?
Her grandmother was also pleased with Mr. Flanders’s offer of companionship. The old countess had liked him on sight. Mr. Flanders had tactfully made it clear that he was only standing in for Sir Percival for the day. And it would give her an excuse to stay at home in bed. The last murder had fatigued her, but her conscience no longer bothered her. She was grateful to that scoundrel Gotobed. To have murdered again—and got away with it—gave her a heady feeling of power. She felt justified in what she had done because it had protected Lucinda from distress. It had also made the murder of the earl unreal. She was quite convinced now that he would have fallen to his death, anyway. A little helping push on the way did not count as murder.
Lucinda, as usual, said she did not wish to stay for the opera ball, and so they returned home without seeing the marquess or Mr. Flanders again that evening. Mr. Flanders was to call for Lucinda at noon. Barges were to take the party up the Thames to Richmond where the fête champêtre was to be held on the lawns of Lord Barnstable’s mansion.
Alexander, the butler, opened the door for them when they arrived in Berkeley Square. Lucinda looked at him curiously. There was a nervous tic in his left eyelid and his fat, white face was covered with a thin sheen of perspiration.
“I wish to speak to you, my lady,” he said to the countess, “about a certain matter.”
The countess leaned heavily on her cane. She looked so very old and so very tired that Lucinda said sharply, “I do not think Lady Lemmington wishes to be troubled this evening, Alexander. If you have anything to discuss, discuss it with me.”
The countess waved her hand, the heavy lace at her wrist falling back. “Leave us, my pet.” she said wearily. “It will, I am sure, only take a few minutes. Follow me, Alexander.”
The butler followed the slowly moving figure of the countess into the drawing room.
“Go and get me brandy before you begin,” said the countess.
He nodded and went down to the pantry belowstairs, his mind racing. The fact that he had just disposed of a dead body and only been paid five hundred pounds for his pains had struck him as soon as the countess and Lucinda had departed for the opera.
His brain might not have been so active had he not found himself in trouble. He had forced his attentions some time ago on one of the scullery maids. She had become pregnant and he had supplied her with some quack medicine that had killed her. The other servants suspected, but did not know, the reason for her death. One of them had written anonymously to the girl’s father, who had arrived that evening threatening to kill the butler and had to be forcibly ejected. But Alexander feared the man would return. It was time to disappear for a bit and he now knew he could probably bleed the countess for as much as he wanted. He never for a moment thought she had killed Gotobed herself but had assumed she had hired a cutthroat who had hidden in the room. He was not a very intelligent man and believed the countess had prepared for Gotobed’s visit by having this paid accomplice hide somewhere in the house while she was at the masquerade. That he had any reason to be afraid of being alone with her never crossed his mind. She was so wizened and so very old.
The countess studied him when he came into the room carrying the decanter of brandy and a glass on a tray.
“I suppose I should be glad you have not—at least not yet—the insolence to bring a glass for yourself,” she said.
He poured her a glass of brandy and waited silently while she tossed it off. The way she first held the glass at arm’s length and then brought it forward to her lips, somehow flicking back the lace at her wrist as she did so, without spilling a drop, brought back a faint memory of an earlier, more liberal age.
The countess set down her glass on the tray with a little click. “Go on, Alexander,” she said. “What is it?”
“My lady, I performed a service for you this afternoon and you were good enough to pay me the sum of five hundred pounds. But on calm consideration, I feel I have risked my life for an insufficient sum. My nerves are bad. Every sound outside makes me jump. I think the Runners are coming for me. And so …”
“And so,” said the countess in her surprisingly youthful voice, “you want more.”
“Exactly, my lady.”
“And if I give you more, you will take yourself off and I shall never hear from you again?”
“Just so, my lady.”
“How much?”
“Two thousand pounds.”
“You are out of your wits. I could get the king murdered for that!”
“Perhaps. But it is my neck that is now at risk, my lady, and I consider two thousand pounds a fair price.”
But you will be back, thought the countess. And back. I know your sort. You will take to drink, and drink will loosen your tongue.
Aloud she said, “Let me think.”
Alexander stood there for what seemed to him a very long time, indeed. At last, he cleared his throat as the countess continued to sit very still with her eyes closed. He feared she had gone to sleep.
She opened her eyes and looked up at him, her pale gaze very steady.
“I do not have that sum of money by me,” she said. “I shall send a servant to my bank in the morning. I do not see why your demands should interfere with my pleasures. I have a mind to go to a fête champêtre tomorrow. You will accompany me. We leave by boat from Westminster.I shall give you the money sometime during the day.”
Alexander let out a slow breath of relief. “Thank you, my lady.”
Sir Percival Magnus sauntered along to Berkeley Square at noon the following day. He was much put out to find Mr. Tommy Flanders and the Marquess of Sunningburgh waiting for Lucinda.
Mr. Flanders cheerfully explained that he was a substitute escort.
“No need for that,” said Sir Percival huffily. He flicked a scented handkerchief pettishly in Mr. Flanders’s direction. “I am here now and my fiancée needs no other escort.”
At the moment, Lucinda entered the room with her grandmother behind her. The three gentlemen rose to their feet.
She was wearing a pink muslin gown that was tied under her bust with pink silk ribbons. The skirt of the dress ended in three deep flounces. She wore rose-colored kid gloves, and on her head she wore a shepherdess straw hat decorated with silk roses.
“My love!” cried Sir Percival. “Here’s a pretty kettle of fish. This fellow says he is to escort you, but I am now here, so there is no need for his presence.”
“Fiddle,” said the countess crossly. “The more the merrier. Don’t fuss!”
Lucinda could only be glad her grandmother had answered for her. She was much too taken aback by the sight of Sir Percival Magnus. A lifetime of emotion seemed to have passed since she had last seen him. Her wondering gaze roamed from Sir Percival’s beautiful face, to the Marquess of Sunningburgh’s virile and challenging looks, to the open, ingenuous friendliness of chubby Mr. Tommy Flanders.
Sir Percival’s clothes, set against the marquess’s under-studied elegance, looked ridiculous to Lucinda’s eyes for the first time. Did he have to wear a waistcoat emblazoned with pink silk stripes on scarlet wool? He had recovered his aplomb and was asking the marquess his opinion on the waistcoat, Sir Percival claiming it had been made to his own design.
The marquess leveled his quizzing glass at it and then smiled. “I am beyond words, Magnus,” he said.
The insult was obvious to everyone but Sir Percival, who preened while Lucinda flushed with annoyance.
Outside in the street, an argument started up about who would travel with
whom.
Normally easygoing, Mr. Tommy Flanders dug in his heels and insisted loudly that Lady Lucinda should travel in his carriage since she had accepted his escort. He had taken Sir Percival in dislike, and that dislike had added fire to his usually easygoing manner.
Lucinda, bewildered by her feelings and by the loud argument, found herself being handed up into the Marquess of Sunningburgh’s open carriage. She went unresistingly. “Much better this way,” he said cheerfully. “The only way to cope with embarrassing situations is to drive away from them as quickly as possible.”
When they were threading their way through the traffic, the marquess asked curiously, “How is it you have anytime to go on these jaunts? I would have thought, with your wedding imminent, that life would be full of fittings for your bride’s gown, and writing endless letters thanking members of society for their presents.”
“I rise very early,” said Lucinda. “The rest of society sleeps until two in the afternoon. I have plenty of time during the mornings to have my fittings, go shopping, and write letters. It is to be a very quiet wedding, only immediate family. But one thing is troubling me greatly. I have received so many presents from people I have never even met.”
“It is the way of the world,” he said easily. “You are London’s new beauty and an heiress. Many hope to ‘buy’ an invitation to the wedding by sending you a present.”
“What should I do, my lord?”
“When writing to accept a gift from someone you do not know, sound gratified and say that it is to be a very quiet wedding but you hope to have the pleasure of entertaining them after your honeymoon. Then I suggest you have a rout and cram them all in and get it all over with in one evening. You are having a honeymoon?”
“Of course,” lied Lucinda, wondering why Sir Percival had not mentioned any such arrangements.
“And where do you go?”
“It is a secret.”
“Probably Paris,” he teased. “There must be about ten thousand British visitors in that city at the moment. I am surprised there are so many of us still left in London to attend these ridiculous outings.”
“If you think this outing ridiculous, why do you go?”
“To be near you,” he said lightly.
“I must remind you, sir, I am to be married.”
“And I must remind you that you are betrothed to me.”
“You do not mean to try to hold me to that ridiculous agreement?”
“Hardly, with you so soon to be wed to another. I must say, if I may be so bold, that your choice surprises me.”
“You may not be so bold, my lord. Pray talk of something else, or I shall have to ask you to set me down!”
The marquess good-humoredly began to talk about the opera. He felt elated by her company. She did not seem at all mad or deranged. He was determined to enjoy what he could of her presence and to forget about her wretched wedding.
Lord Barnstable had two huge ornate and highly decorated barges waiting at the pier for his guests. An orchestra was already playing on each. Both boats were draped with hangings of black and gold. Lucinda thought the drapings made the barges look like something in a description of a Venetian funeral she had once read about.
Sir Percival Magnus joined her before they went on board. He looked hot and angry. The very fact he was showing any emotion whatsoever warmed Lucinda toward him again.
The marquess and Mr. Flanders, observing the way Lucinda smiled up at Sir Percival and how she took his arm, decided, with different degrees of disappointment, that Lady Lucinda was well satisfied with her Bond Street fribble.
“I do wish Grandmama had not, for some odd reason, brought our butler, Alexander,” said Lucinda when they were seated on board. “I never did like that man. And why, pray, bring one’s butler when there are footmen?”
“I do not know,” said Sir Percival amiably, his ruffled feathers smoothed by Lucinda’s unwavering attention to him. “Old ladies sometimes have strange fancies. You will meet some of my elderly relations at our wedding. None of them is, however, as old as the Countess of Lemmington. In fact,” he said, “I do not think I know anyone as old as your grandmother. How old is she, exactly?”
“I do not know,” said Lucinda. “My father was in his late fifties when he died. My poor mama was considerably younger than he, I believe. I have never asked you this, Sir Percival, but are we going anywhere on our honeymoon?”
Sir Percival frowned. He had not planned to take Lucinda anywhere at all because he would have to pay for it. All he looked forward to was the joy of staying in town and settling with a few of his more pressing creditors before throwing a series of magnificent parties. Arrangements for a honeymoon would entail a certain amount of money paid out in advance.
“I thought we would stay in town, my sweeting,” he said. “There are to be the grand victory celebrations in Hyde Park in August. You would not want to miss those.”
“But my home, Partletts … you have never seen it. I had thought we might go there and begin alterations.”
“It’s an old place, ain’t it?” demanded Sir Percival, his normally well-modulated accents becoming almost vulgar. “Don’t want to go sporting the blunt on a ruin.”
Lucinda clasped her hands and looked at him beseechingly. “Oh, Partletts could look so beautiful with just a little effort,” she said. “I have always dreamed of making it a real home.”
“But no one who is anyone is going to be in the country,” he said, appalled. “And as my wife, you’ll have to do what suits me. I say, is this demmed barge never going to start? We’re bouncing and rocking, and my stomach is a delicate organ.”
“I think we are waiting for someone,” said Lucinda. She felt shocked at his high-handed attitude. Could it be that Sir Percival was not going to be the beautiful and amiable husband she had imagined? She had dreamed of them having a pleasant life together at Partletts. She had envisaged the old mansion refurbished with fresh paint and colorful hangings while they entertained safe, ordinary people from the local county.
“Do you think we are waiting for Prinny?” asked Sir Percival anxiously. “That would make this rocking motion bearable. He might notice my waistcoat.”
Lucinda turned to her grandmother, who was seated next to her with Alexander standing at attention behind her chair. “Do you know why we are waiting?” she asked.
“I think we are waiting for Mr. Brummell.”
Sir Percival began to turn a delicate shade of green. Beau Brummell, that famous arbiter of fashion, had often amused himself and his friends by making game of Sir Percival’s coats and cravats.
Although the day was sunny and warm, it was very windy, and nasty, choppy, little waves rocked the barge up and down.
The arrival of the famous beau coincided with the rebellion of Sir Percival’s delicate organ. He was dismally sick over the side of the barge. He was given sal volatile; he was given brandy. Lucinda bathed his temples with eau de cologne. But nothing could rally him. Before the boat set off, Sir Percival decided that since he was not going to live, he would rather die in the comfort of his own bed. He was carried ashore and placed tenderly in his swan-necked phaeton while his tiger took the reins and slowly moved away from the pier with Sir Percival moaning and retching beside him.
Mr. Flanders saw the vacant seat beside Lucinda and hurried to claim it. But the barge moved away from the pier at that very moment and gave a dip and a lurch. He clutched a lady next to him to save himself, and by the time he had apologized profusely to her and looked across, it was to see the more surefooted marquess already seated next to Lucinda.
Mr. Flanders was still determined to join them, but the lady he had clutched was laughing up at him and complaining about the blustery wind. He looked at her impatiently and realized she had dark curls under a fetching bonnet and a pair of sparkling brown eyes in a dimpled little face. What made her suddenly appear enchanting was the fact that she was actually smaller in size than Mr. Flanders, who found the novelty of
looking down at a young miss very refreshing. He began to laugh as well and signaled a footman to bring them champagne. Several glasses later, he had discovered her to be a Miss Jessop, the daughter of a rich city merchant. Several more glasses, and he had forgotten about Lucinda.
Lucinda was reflecting that if anyone had told her that the mere proximity of a man could cause such distressing physical reactions, she would not have believed it. She was ashamed of her own body. It felt swollen and heavy, and yet, when she looked down, it was to find her figure as slim as ever.
“It’s too windy here,” she heard her grandmother say. “Help me to the back of the boat, Alexander.”
No one, except the countess, appeared to want to move. The barge was still bucketing up the Thames and most of the company had decided to stay safely where they were until quieter waters were reached. And so Lucinda, who would normally have been besieged by admirers, was left alone with the Marquess of Sunningburgh.
He tried to say something, but she shook her head helplessly. The orchestra was gamely sawing its way through Handel’s Water Music, trying to make up in volume what it lacked in style. The awnings were cracking and flapping, and chilly champagne lurched and spilled in glasses.
Lucinda began to feel almost as sick as Sir Percival had been. She felt that the physical discomfort of her body would be eased if she could speak to the marquess or even—but that was almost unthinkable—lay her hand on his arm. Some contact, she felt, as she put a hand to her brow, might channel some of this raging mixture of feelings away from her body, as electricity was said to be channeled through a galvanizing machine.
His lips were moving, saying something, but she could not hear the words and shook her head and shrugged, looking at the noisy orchestra.
He leaned toward her. He meant to put his lips close to her ear and ask her if she were feeling ill, but the treacherous boat lurched and so his lips ended up pressed hard against her ear. She jumped in fright and shrank away. But the barge rolled in the wash from a passing boat and threw her back against him. No one noticed. There were shrieks of dismay and protests from the other guests who had been thrown about as well.
