In her wake, the footman hired that morning stepped out of an alcove behind the stairs. The glimpse he had of her delicate ankles brought a grin so broad to his face it bent the tip of the fake nose he’d puttied over his own.
What a sweet little ladyship she was, first to tell him her name and now to serve him the Duke of Braxton on a silver platter. Bit long in the tooth he was for her, but Quality was odd that way. And here he’d thought she’d taken a fancy to that upstart devil in the black mask.
Mayhap her little ladyship couldn’t lead him to him like he’d thought, but the Dowager would pay thrice what the wretch had taken from him. And he’d find him yet. He would, just to settle the score.
“Eleven sharp, eh?” Smythe chuckled, and pinched his disguise back into shape.
Chapter Fifteen
“Are you perchance feverish?” The duchess demanded of Lesley, as he leaned to kiss her. “It’s barely nine of the clock!”
“I’m practicing,” he replied, touching his lips to her smooth brow, “for I do not wish to be late to my wedding.”
“Indeed?” Her Grace remarked, nonplused. “So you are reconciled to it?”
“Oh, quite.” Lesley moved to the window and looked out at the street; he felt nervous yet excited, wondering what color gown Amanda would wear, how she would dress her hair. “She’s charming, really. I believe we’ll get on very well together.”
“I’ve known that all along,” his mother replied archly, “for you are alike as two peas shelled from the same pod.”
“What a charming simile.” Lesley grinned at her. “Have you always thought me a vegetable?”
“Only when you do witless things like adopt a cane and then neglect to lean upon it,” the duchess sniffed. “Did you think to elicit Amanda’s pity or her disgust?”
“The latter, actually,” he admitted, “but I failed.”
For she held him in utter loathing rather than mere disgust; but he would rectify that at midnight, he vowed, and drew back the drape in time to see Lord and Lady Hampton descend their carriage. A footman shut the coach behind them, and Lesley frowned, watching the lamplight gleam on the hem of the countess’s gown as her husband led her across the flagway.
“You did include Amanda in your invitation, Mother?”
“Of course I did. What a silly question.” But a moment later, when Denham announced the Gilbertsons and they entered the drawing room sans their daughter, she blurted, “Where is Amanda?”
“Regrettably indisposed,” said her father. “She sends her sincerest apologies, Eugenia. And her best wishes to you, my lord.”
Lesley knew better, but kept his voice neutral as he moved away from the window. “I trust it’s nothing serious.”
“Mostly bride’s nerves, I suspect,” Lord Hampton responded easily.
And smoothly enough, Lesley supposed, but Lady Hampton, whom he’d not seen in a number of years, flushed to the roots of her rich brown hair as Lord Hampton presented him. Her fingers trembled, and when he straightened from bowing over her hand, her head was tilted at an angle which suggested she’d been trying to peer behind him.
“Dear Hampton believes a turn in the country would be just the thing for Amanda,” she said nervously, unable to decide who or what to fix her gaze upon.
“It’ll pluck her up in no time, I’m sure,” Lord Hampton agreed.
Still smoothly, but the word pluck and the toothsome smile that “dear Hampton” gave him roused Lesley’s suspicions.
“You’re sending Amanda to Hampton Hall, then?”
“Bright and early on the morrow.”
“I should like to see her beforehand. How early?”
“Very early,” Lord Hampton emphasized, then added under his breath, “Later, over our brandy, eh?”
No, now if you please, Lesley thought to demand, but Denham appeared to announce supper, and he was called upon to escort Lady Hampton while the earl squired his mother to the dining room. It was best to be agreeable, he decided, since he might have to call upon Lord Hampton to intercede on his behalf with Amanda. So he strove to be charming and not to appear agitated—though he was—during the parade of courses laid before him.
“We rather thought to see Charles this evening,” Lady Hampton commented, once the meal was done and Lesley rose to assist her.
“Why in heaven’s name,” his mother queried, “did you expect to see Charles?”
“Randall said he called this afternoon while we were he—er—out,” Lord Hampton hastily corrected himself. “I thought it odd Andrew didn’t mention it before he left this evening. Or that Charles didn’t leave his card.”
“He forgets to carry them,” the duchess explained, glancing worriedly at Lesley. “Do you suppose he’s gotten lost again?”
“Charles is never lost, Mother,” he replied bemusedly. “Bewildered, perhaps, but—”
“Oh, Bennett!” Lady Hampton said on a sharply indrawn breath. “I’ll wager that is why Amanda was in such a pout! Marie must have told her Charles called, or mayhap she was listening at the keyhole! She does that, you know, when you lock her in—”
“Oh my, Cornelia,” Her Grace cut in, “is that a spot on your gown?”
“Is it?” The countess looked down her nose at her bodice. “Oh dear!”
“The brandy is in the library, Lesley.” His mother swiftly lifted Lady Hampton’s elbow from his hand. “Do pour some for Lord Hampton. Come along, Cornelia.”
Still peering at the front of her gown, the countess stumbled along behind her as the duchess all but dragged her from the room, and Lesley faced his flustered father-in-law to be.
“I take it Amanda is not in your favor.”
“Well—no,” he admitted. “I suggested she rest this afternoon, looked a bit wan, I thought, and I’m—er—rather afraid I had to insist.”
“You don’t think missing Charles’s call overset her?”
“Oh, no, nothing of the sort,” Lord Hampton replied jovially, but his gaze shifted fractionally. “Can’t think why it would.”
Unfortunately, Lesley could.
“If you’ll excuse me, my lord.” He made a slight bow. “I’m sure you can find your way to the library.”
Turning sharply on one heel, he quit the dining room and his mother’s house, noting as he strode along purposefully that it was nearly the stroke of eleven. He had an uncanny feeling time was of the essence, and regretted his decision not to stow his breeches, shirt, rapier, and Teddy’s mask in the carriage, and have Tom follow along with Lucifer as he’d done the night before. To make up for it, he climbed into the box and took the reins from Reston.
While Lesley drove at breakneck speed toward Mayfair, Amanda paused on the balcony to look back at the note she’d pinned to her pillow. She was not so heartless to leave without a word and hoped her father would not blame Marie, who was fast asleep in a comfortable chair in the corridor when last she’d peeped through the keyhole.
Closing the French doors without a sound, Amanda moved to the railing and looked down into the garden. The Duke of Braxton stood beside a coachman who was holding a half-hooded lantern, which threw light enough to show Charles motioning for her case. She tossed it to him, then tucked her skirts in her waist sash, climbed onto the rail, and moved into the tree.
Just as Lesley reached Mayfair and sprang from the box into the house, shouting for Packston and for Tom to saddle Lucifer, Amanda dropped from the lowest branch of the oak onto the top of the wall. Charles was there to help her down and into the hired carriage. It smelled musty, but in the dim glow of the coachman’s lantern, appeared reasonably clean.
“Let’s be off, then,” Charles said in a low voice to the driver.
“Right you are, Mr. Smith, sir.” He nodded, removed the steps and shut the door.
“Mr. Smith?” Amanda queried with a raised brow.
“I could scarce use my title or my name,” Charles replied with a grin, “so we are in disguise.”
And so was Lesley
by then, leaping onto Lucifer’s back with only a mild curse at his abrupt landing in the saddle. The stallion burst out of the yard at a dead run, his hooves striking sparks on the cobbles, just as a closed hackney rolled out of an alleyway near the Gilbertson house and fell in behind the hired coach.
The clock in the duchess’s drawing room was just striking the quarter hour when Lesley reined Lucifer so sharply next to the capped brick wall that the stallion snorted and sat back on his haunches. The faint light burning in Amanda’s room gave him courage, despite the rattle of the uppermost branches of the oak tree in the stiff wind that had risen. A handful of leaves sifted earthward, one or two snagging in Lucifer’s mane as Lesley kicked his right foot free of the stirrup and swung his leg to the stallion’s left side.
“Wait right here, old boy.” He patted Lucifer’s muscled neck and reached for the wall. “If I fall, do at least please try to catch me.”
The stallion snorted again and laid back his ears, but otherwise stood motionless as Lesley gained the top of the wall, left his rapier there, and started up the tree. Fixing on the light, he climbed toward it, slipping only twice on the long way up. His heart banging, he dropped onto the balcony, wiped his clammy palms on his shirt, and rapped lightly on the French doors.
There was no response. He rapped again, a bit louder, and waited what he thought was ample time for Amanda to don a wrapper before trying the handle. It turned easily in his hand, and he eased the door inward to behold the shambles she’d left in the wake of her packing.
Portmanteaus stood open but empty, gowns were thrown upon the chairs, shoes littered the floor, but there was no sign of Amanda. A candle burned on the table beside the bed, the shadow of the flame flickering on the square of paper pinned to the pillows. Slipping noiselessly past the door, Lesley crossed the room, snatched it up, and read: “Dearest Mama and Papa, I have chosen this course, for you leave me no other. I cannot marry Lord Earnshaw, for I love someone else. Do not worry, for I shall be safe with Charles. Your disobedient but loving daughter, Amanda.”
Lesley’s first impulse was to crush the note in his fist, but he replaced it on the pillow. The linens smelled like the lavender soap Amanda used on her hair.
So she’d be safe with Charles ... and married to him by morning unless he could stop them. And he would, if he could, for this was no way to become a duchess. Why in blazes hadn’t Welsey told him it was Charles she loved?
Would he take her to Gretna, or would he have a special license? The latter, Lesley decided, for Charles loathed the cold and damp of Scotland. Slipping back onto the balcony and closing the French doors, he used the rail to lever himself into the tree, and tried to decide, as he climbed down, where Charles would take her.
Braxton Hall was out of the question ... he doubted his brother had even the faintest idea where the lesser Earnshaw estates were located... ah, their father’s hunting box. Of course! It was the perfect place to hide themselves until the scandal of their elopement was forgotten.
He’d considered taking Amanda there himself, Lesley thought bitterly, but pushed the thought aside as he dropped from the tree to the wall and from there to his saddle. Refastening his rapier at his waist, he gauged the quickest route out of the city and dug his heels into Lucifer’s flanks.
No more than twenty minutes ahead, the carriage bearing Amanda and Charles was moving at a leisurely pace through the outskirts of London. The open road lay ahead, a thin gray ribbon silvered by the moon, the city behind them a dark smudge against the night.
As the coachman shifted in the box, he caught sight of the hackney trotting along in their wake. He goaded his team with a single lash, looked again and saw the smaller conveyance keeping pace. He noticed too, in a bright patch of moonlight, the well-bred look of the horses pulling it. Frowning, he rapped the floor of the box to draw Charles’s attention.
When he leaned out the window, his hair blown back by the rushing wind, the driver shouted, “We’re bein’ followed!”
Craning his neck to look, Charles saw, by the gleam of the coach lamps, the hackney bearing down on them with its own lamps unlit. Highly suspicious, he thought, as well as highly dangerous.
“What is it, Charles?” Amanda rose on her knees on the banquette to poke her head outside. “Highwaymen?”
“In a hackney? Doubtful.” Charles twisted around to shout at the driver, “Can we outrun them?”
“We c’n try, Mr Smith!” He laid the whip to his team, and the chase was on. The coach horses gave it their best, but they were bred for endurance not speed. Amanda and Charles (wishing he had his wind device with him), bobbed out the window, watching the hackney swing out from behind them and draw effortlessly alongside.
And ever closer, Charles noticed, as the wheels, their spokes a blur in the moonlight, inched nearer. They mean to force us off the road, he realized, and glanced at Amanda, her hair streaming around her small, heart-shaped face. Praying their pursuers were only highwaymen, he bellowed at the coachman, “Faster!”
The lash cracked, the carriage leaped ahead, and the hackney nudged closer. Aware now of the intent, the coachman flailed his whip at the box, but the other driver did not yield. He crowded even closer, bumping the carriage as the two coaches plunged in tandem over the crest of a low hill. The jolt caused the team to break stride, and sent Amanda tumbling backward on the banquette.
“Enough!” Charles shouted, springing from his seat to catch her. “Pull over!”
With his horses off stride, the coachmen had little choice but to pull back on the leads and ease them onto the verge. The driver of the hackney cut his own horses in front of the carriage, threw back his cape, and leaped from the box. He pulled a pistol from his waistband, the barrel gleaming a dull blue black in the flicker of the coachlamps.
“Be still and keep down,” Charles whispered to Amanda, and kicked the door open.
He jumped to the ground, drew himself straight and declared imperiously, “You, sir, are a madman!”
“And good evenin’ t’you, Yer Grace.” The hackney driver bowed, then wheeled on the coachman. “Git down ‘ere.”
I know that voice, Amanda realized, and sprang into the open doorway behind Charles. “Smythe!”
“Evenin’, yer little ladyship.” He nodded to her, then turned to the coachman as he climbed down from the box. “This is fer whippin’ me.” He brought the pistol down sharply on the side of his head, and the driver crumpled.
“You beast!” Amanda shrieked.
“You know this reprobate?” Charles muttered over his shoulder.
“Yes,” she whispered angrily. “His name is Smythe and he’s a thief. He usually has two accomplices—”
“Damnit, ‘Arry!” came Jack’s muffled voice from inside the hackney. “Git off me!”
“I’m—oompf! —tryin’, Jack!”
Swearing under his breath and aiming his pistol at Charles’s breastbone, Smythe backed to the hackney and fumbled behind him for the latch. He found it, tripped it, and flung open the door to reveal Jack and Harry in a tumble on the floor.
“What in bloody hell ‘er you doin’ down there?” Smythe yelled furiously. “Yer s’posed t’have the ropes out an’ be trussin’ these two up!”
“Might ‘elp if ye’d tell a cove you was gonna throw on the brake s’bloody quick!” Jack panted from beneath Harry. “Git this oaf offa me, will ya?”
Keeping one eye and the pistol on Charles, Smythe held out his free hand. Jack grasped it and grunted, Smythe pulled and cursed, while Harry, turned on his back like a turtle on its shell, tried to roll himself over.
The barrel of the pistol wavered, and so did Smythe’s attention. Seizing the opportunity, Charles whispered to Amanda, “Get down,” then reached behind him to catch the edge of the door.
She ducked, and he gathered himself to spring, just as the pistol steadied, and Smythe’s gaze swung back to him.
“I wouldn’t, Yer Grace.” He drew back the hammer with a click. “I doubt yer m
a ‘ud pay much to get y’back with a hole in yer chest.”
“So that’s your game,” Charles remarked derisively. “Kidnapping and ransom.”
“Aye.” Smythe gave a final tug and Jack tumbled onto the ground with a grunt. “Git up an’ git the ropes.” He gave him a kick, and as Jack scrambled to his feet, he smiled at Charles. “Clever, ain’t it?’’
“My father,” Amanda declared, popping up defiantly behind the duke, “won’t pay a single farthing for me!”
But he might, she thought, after hearing she’d not only run away but managed to get herself kidnapped in the process, pay any amount Smythe demanded if he promised not to return her.
“Never thought t’ransom you, m’lady,” Smythe told her. “It’s ‘Is Grace what’ll fetch the blunt. Yer just along to cook fer us.”
“I can’t cook!” Amanda retorted indignantly. “I’m a lady!’’
With a loop of stout rope over his arm, Jack was starting toward them. Harry, rubbing the back of his head, was lumbering out of the hackney. They bumped into each other, and then into Smythe.
“You damned loobies!” he shouted, grabbing Harry’s shoulder and pushing him forward. “Tie up the coachman first before he comes round!”
“A sad lot, aren’t they?” Amanda whispered to Charles.
“Mmmm,” he agreed, wondering how best to use Harry’s ineptness to their advantage. “Where do you mean to take us?”
“To yer old dad’s hunting box,” Smythe replied.
“How do you know our plans?” Amanda demanded.
“I was listenin’ through the door, m’lady. Got meself hired as footman this mornin’ by your Randall. Seemed the smart way t’find yer friend in the black mask, since ever’ time I see you, I end up seein’ ‘im, an’ ‘e ends up with my loot.”
“Our loot, y’mean.” Jack straightened beside the coachman’s prostrate form to glare at him.
“‘Course it’s our loot,” Smythe snapped at him, then grinned smugly at Amanda. “Pity your masked friend ain’t here now, ain’t it?”
“What masked friend?” Charles inquired of her incredulously, just as Harry, squatting beside Jack and the coachman, raised his head to ask, “Is it thunderin’?”
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