Autumn Rain

by Anita Mills

  "A word with you—it will not take long," Arthur told him. Looking to Elinor, he added, "You go on to bed, my dear—there is no need to wait up for me."

  Exhausted, Elinor dispensed with everything but undressing, then slipped between cool sheets to lie listening in the dark. Oddly, there was no sound of an argument— only footsteps on the stairs, a slammed door down the hall, and finally nothing. For once, she was torn between dreading Arthur's Wednesday night visit and a need to know what he had done.

  Finally, when she had decided that he did not mean to come to her, she heard the door creak inward, then close. She rolled over to see him, his nightcap drawn down over his wispy hair, his nightshirt hanging past his knees. He was carrying a candle, its glow heightened by a brass reflector. When he saw she was still awake, he set the candle on a table near the bed.

  "I told you you did not need to wait up for me."

  "I was too tired to sleep."

  "I'm afraid I was too blind to see it. I should have known after Vauxhall. He would live in your pocket, if you let him."

  "He is but a boy—it's calf-love, Arthur. Think on when you were twenty," she said softly.

  "I was making my way." He sat on the edge of the bed, then leaned to blow out the candle. "I did not go to Harrow—nor Oxford—nor Cambridge—nor anywhere else. My father could not afford to send me. What I have learned, I have taught myself."

  "You did well."

  "And I had none to thank for it. My grandson, on the other hand, would play me false with my wife, forgetting what I have done for him."

  "It's but the first pangs—the beginning of his salad days, if you will," she pleaded. "Arthur, it will pass, and we shall but be amused by his youthful foolishness."

  "I am not amused, Elinor."

  "No doubt next month he will have thrown his hat over the windmill for someone else," she persisted. "He is too young to know his own heart—there will be dozens of imagined passions before—"

  "No." The bed creaked as he lay down beside her. "Next month I expect he will be on his way to Spain." Turning away from her, he pulled the covers up over his thin shoulders. "He's had his way, you know—I am buying his colors." His voice was flat, toneless. "He would be a dragoon like Longford."

  Alarmed, she sat up. "Arthur, he is too young! Do not punish him for a passing fancy—he will outgrow it!"

  "He can outgrow it elsewhere. I'd not be laughed at while he makes a cake of himself."

  She reached to touch his shoulder. "What if he perishes? You cannot—"

  He pulled away. "Your concern is suspect, Elinor," he said coldly. "Mayhap the dragoons will do for him what I cannot—mayhap they will make him grateful for what I have given him."

  "Arthur—" She took a deep breath, then let it out slowly. "You cannot be jealous of Charles. He is your grandson—your heir—your own flesh and blood."

  "Mayhap I am. And if so, there is no use for more than one jealous fool here."

  It was no use. He would not change his mind, and any argument she offered now would only make it worse for Charles. A new loneliness washed over her—and an acute fear. While she did not think she cherished a tendre for him, she knew she genuinely loved Charles Kingsley like a brother, and Arthur was sending him off to war because of her.

  She lay still, listening to the ticking of the ormolu clock on the mantel, hearing the Earl of Longford's words echo in her mind. The last thing we have need of is more idealistic fools, for they seldom survive. Arthur was buying a commission in the dragoons—the cavalry that led the charge into battle. Every week, the papers listed those who had perished, citing their bravery, lauding their sacrifice.

  Longford would know of that, for he had served with them—was going back, in fact. She thought of his medal—it was because he had survived, because he'd lived, he'd said. But Longford was cold, Longford was hard, and Charles was not. Charles was kind, light-hearted, and too young. He would believe that he would make a difference in whether Napoleon ruled or not.

  She recalled his almost worshipful adulation of the earl—and Longford's attempts to dampen it. Longford. In the darkness, her mind seemed to race ahead of rational thought. Longford was an officer—he could perhaps see that Charles did not get sent to the front. If she sought him out, if she spoke with him, he could perhaps see that the boy was safe in someone's train at the rear.

  She lay there, almost afraid to breathe lest Arthur somehow would know of her preposterous plan. But he was snoring softly at her side. Sometimes she wondered if he ever doubted anything he did.

  CHAPTER 13

  Lucien was enduring a final fitting of his new uniforms when the unwelcome news came up that Diana waited below. Peering into the cheval mirror, he adjusted the braid-trimmed epaulets.

  "Tell her I am not receiving," he ordered brusquely. Turning to the tailor, he wondered, "Not that it matters on the field, but does it seem that they are even?"

  "Precisely, my lord—I measured them myself. It's the gorget that sits askance."

  Lucien adjusted the symbol of his rank over his collar, then nodded. Extending his hands, he checked the length of his sleeves. "Much better, I think. Fellow in Spain had them half over my hand." Satisfied, he shrugged out of the jacket and waistcoat, then nodded to his batman. "Pay the man." Perceiving that the lower footman still waited, he frowned. "I thought I told you to tell her I would not come down, Tompkins."

  "Before I came up, she insisted she would not leave-she asked that I tell you she is prepared to remain until hell freezes." He coughed apologetically. "I did not think you would wish her forcibly removed, my lord."

  "The devil I wouldn't," Lucien muttered.

  He was in no mood to face her, not after the last hearing, but there was no help for it, he supposed. No doubt she'd come to beg now that the court had ruled the child was not his. Leighton had suggested then that perhaps the way to be rid of her was simply to pay, but he'd be hanged if he'd do it. Let her bleed the brat's father.

  He'd been exonerated, absolved, and he wanted no discourse, nothing that could maintain any tie between them. But it always seemed that just when he'd thought he'd severed everything once and for all, she managed to tie a knot, tangling the threads of his life again.

  "She said she'd set up a screech if I was to lay a hand on her."

  And she would. This time when she'd come back to London, she'd played the wronged woman with the art of a Siddons. And while she was generally cut, there had been a couple of Whig wives who seemed inclined to support her, decrying the laws that let a man discard even a promiscuous wife. And the presence of the child had gained her a great deal of sympathy, even from those who pretended shock at the scandal.

  "Do you want me to try, my lord?" the fellow asked. "I suppose me'n' Burdette could push her out the servants' door."

  "No." He sighed his displeasure. "I'll tend to the matter this time."

  He did not bother to don his coat, choosing to show his contempt for her by his shirtsleeves. After all that had passed privately and publicly between them, it was unthinkable that she would be there, waiting for him in his own house. Taking the carpeted stairs almost silently, he crossed the hall into the front saloon. She was standing with her back to him, but as he closed the door, she spun around.

  She had obviously dressed with great care, wearing her best gown, the same one she'd worn to court, trying to hide her now straitened circumstances. But there was a hardness to her eyes, a brittleness to her beauty that betrayed the harshness of her exile. She forced a smile when she saw him.

  "Madam," he acknowledged curtly.

  She licked her lips nervously, then spoke. "You look well, Luce."

  "I've not aged much since last week. I believe you sat at the table across from me, did you not?"

  "No—no, of course not." Clasping her hands before her, she moved closer. "You always were a handsome devil, you know. Had you been at home, there'd have been no need..." Her husky voice trailed off.

  "What do you want?"
he interrupted harshly. "I leave Monday and there's little time."

  In the face of his coldness, her composure slipped briefly, then she recovered. "I was your wife, Luce. Can we not be civil?"

  "Was—and no. If you are come for money, you waste your time—it was settled in court long ago, and nothing has changed that I am aware of."

  "We did not mean to hurt you," she said softly.

  "It was done before that. I don't care about Bell—I don't care if you've been with a hundred fools since."

  "You loved me once," she reminded him. As she spoke, she loosened the ties of her bonnet, letting it slip to the floor. "You know you did."

  "No. The choice wasn't mine," he reminded her bitterly.

  Her fingers worked the small buttons at her breast, revealing the creamy skin beneath. "We don't need to part enemies, Lucien. I—"

  His hands caught her arms, holding them above the elbows, forcing her back. "When I want a whore, I'll find one."

  "Lucien, I shall starve! And—and Papa will not keep Lucy for me!"

  "Lucy!" he snorted. "Clever choice of a name, but it did not work, did it? You'd have been better advised to name the brat Belle, don't you think?"

  "She isn't Bell's."

  "She isn't mine."

  "Luce—"

  "We both know she could not be, don't we?"

  Tears welled in her eyes and spilled for effect onto her cheeks. "Lucien, I have nothing! Have pity—Mad Jack—"

  "Mad Jack be damned! Leave him out of this!"

  "He would not have wanted—"

  "I don't care anymore what he wanted—do you hear?— I don't care! Don't you see?—I have never forgiven him!" He caught himself and lowered his voice. "In any event, it's over—all of it."

  "He was dying, Lucien, else he'd not have done it." Her lower lip quivered. "He loved me."

  "Humph! Jack loved no one." He swung away and went to stare out the window. "I owe you nothing, Diana."

  "I tried to be a good wife to you, but you would not let me." She spoke hollowly, flatly now. "We could have put that behind us—we could have—well, I am not the first wife to take a lover. Sally Jersey—Lady Oxford— everyone—"

  "There was no heir."

  "I tried, Luce! But I could not get one by myself!"

  "I was not prepared to take my father's leavings," he retorted coldly.

  "I know you do not credit it, but I loved him." She came up behind him to touch his shoulder, but he shook her off. "I would not have done it else."

  "You lied to him, and he lied to me. There was no babe!"

  "Lucien, I am telling you that I have nothing—that I can scarce feed my daughter!"

  "Sue her father—or was it the groom—or the lower footman?" he asked sarcastically. "It must have been someone you could not bleed."

  "He's dead."

  "A likely tale."

  "At Talavera." As he turned around, she nodded. "If you tell it, I shall deny it, of course, but it was Rothesay."

  "My wife the whore," he muttered. "How many others laughed to my back?"

  "I don't have to answer that—I only know I could not stand your coldness. But I pray you will not tell me to go to Lady Rothesay, for she did not know of it."

  One corner of his mouth went down. "How very considerate of you to protect her, my dear."

  "Is everything a jest to you?" Her voice rose as the tears began to course freely. "Have you no heart? Can you not forgive a youthful mistake?"

  "Mistakes," he reminded her brutally. "And quite a lot of them, if the servants can be believed."

  "If you aid me, I shall go away."

  "Where?"

  "I don't know—the Indies—Canada—somewhere. I know I cannot stay here, for Lucy will never be accepted. Indeed, but Papa will not even speak to me now."

  "Find a generous lover," he advised. "You still have your looks."

  "As if any of them want a small child! She is of a difficult age, when she will not be still."

  "Then you ought to have foisted the brat onto Town-send."

  "She is dark—like you."

  The pain he felt when he looked at her had little to do with what she had done, he told himself. She was merely the instrument of his destruction, the chalice of gall he had been forced to drink. But when she was not around, when there was no gossip of her, he could forget what his father had done to him. Despite all his public words to the contrary, if he truly believed she would go away, he could almost count it worth the money. That—and if he did not have to acknowledge her child. When he had an heir—or heiress—he wanted it to carry his blood.

  "How much?" he asked finally. "To go away forever—how much?" .

  "I—I need an allowance, Luce. I cannot manage large sums of money."

  "Obviously."

  "A thousand pounds per year would—" She stopped, aware that he glowered. "Well, I cannot live on much less—Jack would not have wanted me to! He—"

  "I told you—leave him out of it!"

  She swallowed. "But—"

  He didn't want to grant her an allowance. He didn't want anything that had to be renewed, that had to remind him. But after a time, he nodded. "Your passage—and five hundred pounds paid annually through my solicitor— and a public acknowledgment that the child is not mine, that you concede what the courts have ruled." Even as he said it, he was angered with himself for giving her anything.

  "Lucien!"

  "Take it or not." Not wanting to prolong the audience, not wanting to hear her plead for more, he turned to leave. "If you choose to accept, you will be paid on the last day of each year. And if you come back, if you so much as attempt to contact me again, all payments will cease. Good day, Diana."

  "You weren't always so cold to me!"

  He did not stop. "My mistake, wasn't it?"

  "You have no heart!" she flung after him. "It's not a wonder that you are called Lucifer! I hate you—do you hear—I hate you!"

  "Four hundred pounds, then. And if you continue shouting like a fishwife, I shall have to reconsider that."

  "Lucien!"

  His hand was on the doorknob. "Do you want me to say three?"

  She had not a doubt that he would do it. Choking back the tears, she bent to collect her bonnet lest he change his mind altogether.

  Furious with her, furious with himself, furious with the world in general, he started the climb up the stairs. He was nearly to the top when he heard her slam the saloon door. Damn her! Damn Jack! Damn the both of them! Voices floated upward—her loud sobs, the murmur of his butler and someone else, then the front door closed after her. Oddly, he could still hear Burdette's apparent denial, and for a moment, he stopped to listen.

  "His lordship is not at home, I'm afraid," the butler declared stiffly, sniffing his disapproval.

  "But I must see him! Perhaps I could leave a card-no—no, of course that will not do, for he cannot return the call." She hesitated, then blurted out, "Perhaps if you would tell him it's Lady Kingsley—he will remember me, I think."

  "Madam—"

  Afraid she would lose her resolve, she forgot her manners. "And I know he is in, for I collect he received the lady who was leaving."

  "You are mistaken, Lady Kingsley," Lucien said coldly from above. "Diana is not a lady."

  "Diana—?" For a moment, she was nonplussed, then she recalled the name. "Oh—your wife."

  "No. The encumbrance exists no more."

  His eyes raked over her, taking in her expensive walking dress, her Norwich shawl, the exquisite bonnet that framed her face, the almost fiery hair that peeped beneath it. He considered telling her to go on, that she ought not to be there, but she was incredibly lovely—and he did not doubt for a minute that she sought a bit of diversion from her elderly husband, that their earlier encounter at the market had encouraged her. She would not be the first bored female to throw herself at him, after all. Indeed, but it seemed that they all had a certain fascination for the forbidden, for the dangerous—and for all her beauty
, Lady Kingsley was apparently no better than the rest.

  "You are better advised to seek out Bell, for he plays the game more correctly than I."

  "Bell—?" For a moment, her eyes widened innocently—a clever ploy—then she appeared to make the connection. "Oh—I collect you mean Lord Townsend." She found him singularly unencouraging, and she began to think she'd made a mistake. Clasping her reticule tightly, she tried to speak calmly. "I have come to seek a favor of you, my lord."

  He'd given her her chance to flee, and she'd been too much the fool to take it. And there was no denying she was beautiful, making him the greater fool if he turned her away. Even as he looked at her, she set his pulse to racing. And in five days he would be leaving, perhaps to perish in a brutal war halfway across Europe. No, if she were rash enough to offer, he was rash enough to take. It had been a long time since he'd lain in the arms of anyone half so lovely as Elinor Kingsley.

  Coming down the wide, curved staircase, flanked by portraits of a rather imposing collection of ancestors, he seemed even bigger than she had remembered him. It was perhaps that he wore no coat, that his shirt lay open at the throat, showing dark hair beneath the curved gold bar that hung across his neck. Or was it the effect of buff breeches so carefully tailored that they did not crease over muscular legs? Or possibly the tall, highly polished boots that covered his calves to his knees?

  When he stopped before her, his black eyes were so intent that the pupils were barely discernible from the irises. And yet she could not help noting that his black hair was rumpled, giving him a boyish look totally at variance with the faint, familiarly derisive smile that played at the corners of his mouth. There was something about the contradiction that made her afraid.

  "I should not have come," she ventured nervously.

  "No, you should not," he agreed. "But you seem to be here, don't you?" he added softly.

  Suddenly shy, she did not know how to broach the matter of Charles to him. She took a deep breath, then ran her tongue over parched lips. "I—uh—I'm afraid I did not thank you properly for yesterday," she began lamely. Looking up, she saw his butler's interested expression. "Er—do you think—that is—is there some place where we may be more private? There is a matter of some delicacy I should like to discuss."