Sherri Cobb South

by French Leave

  “Pin money?” echoed Lisette, brow wrinkling at the unfamiliar term.

  “Discretionary funds to spend as you see fit.”

  Lisette’s eyes sparkled with sudden interest. “And I can buy with this ‘pin money’ anything I like?”

  “Anything,” declared Lord Waverly, thankful to have the conversation turned to a more seemly topic.

  When the curricle at last rolled to a stop before Lord Waverly’s sketchily refurbished Park Lane town house (which had been spared from foreclosure only by virtue of its being entailed), the earl ushered his countess into her new home, introduced her to its senior staff, surrendered her to the housekeeper for a brief tour, and promptly set out for White’s. This cavalier treatment was not lost on his bride, but as her fertile brain had begun to form a plan, his absence suited her purposes very well.

  It was obvious to the meanest intelligence that her new husband had a marked preference for wicked women; therefore, she determined, a wicked woman he should have. She had no very clear idea how to achieve this admirable goal, but the chance encounter with Madame Hutchins had at least shown her a reasonable place to start. Lisette’s understanding of the English monetary system was rudimentary, but she was reasonably certain that the pin money of which the earl had spoken was insufficient for the purchase of an equipage such as Madame had driven. However, that lady’s kohl-rimmed eyes and rouged lips should not be beyond Lisette’s means to reproduce. With this end in view, she made discreet inquiries of the housekeeper, and set out for Piccadilly and the new Burlington Arcade, a veritable cornucopia of shops where, the housekeeper assured her, a lady might find anything she desired in the way of beauty aids.

  She wandered among these for some time, wishing she knew if the unspecified pin money would stretch to cover this branch of artificial roses, or that length of ribbon. Until she could be sure, she felt it was best to restrict her purchases. And so, with a small sigh of regret, she laid aside a pretty painted fan and selected instead a small pot of kohl and a somewhat larger one of rouge. These she gave to the shop’s proprietor, along with instructions as to remuneration.

  “You will please to send the bill to Lord Waverly,” she said in her lilting accent, as her purchases were wrapped in brown paper.

  “Pardon, mademoiselle,” interrupted a masculine voice as she bade the shopkeeper farewell. Lisette turned and saw a dark-haired young man doffing his hat in an elegant, if somewhat exaggerated, bow. Even if he had not addressed her in her native tongue, she would have known at a glance that he was French. Small and wiry of build, he displayed the fashionable extravagances of the Incroyables: in this case, a pair of billowing Cossack trousers in a salmon color, topped with a green cutaway coat boasting wide lapels. “I perceive from your speech that you are French. May a fellow traveler welcome you to these shores?”

  “Merci, monsieur,” replied Lisette with a smile, collecting her bundle from the counter before turning away.

  “Wait! You will allow your fellow countryman to relieve you of your burden, oui?”

  Lisette, looking down at a package which might easily have fit inside her reticule, had she thought to provide herself with one, had to laugh. “Mais non, monsieur, I would not so trouble you. It is not at all heavy.”

  “But you will allow me to escort you home,” persisted the Frenchman.

  “Merci, monsieur, mais non.”

  “You are too cruel, mademoiselle!.”

  While Lisette could not deny that it was pleasant to be admired by a personable young man, his importunings were beginning to attract an embarrassing degree of attention. Seeing that he might cause a scene if not given some rôle in her return to Park Lane, she offered a compromise.

  “You may not escort me home, monsieur, but you may call for me, how do you say, a hackney, if you will be so kind.”

  “You have only to say the word, mademoiselle, and Étienne Villiers, he will see that it is done!”

  With this declaration, M. Villiers all but hurled himself into the street, calling for a cab with great gusto and much Gallic gesticulation. In no time at all Lisette was settled within, the order was given, and the horses whipped up. Lisette bade farewell to the obliging M. Villiers, and whiled away the short journey in blissful dreams of her husband’s surprise and delight when he beheld his bride’s transformation.

  Alas, it must be said that these fell woefully short of her expectations. When the dinner gong sounded at eight o’clock, Lisette arose from her dressing table and made her way to the drawing room where the earl awaited her. Remembering the behavior of Mrs. Hutchins, Lisette paused just inside the door, flinging her shoulders back and thrusting her small bosom skyward. Her eyelids drooped languorously and her lips were slightly pursed, allowing him to experience the full effect of rouged mouth and kohl-ringed eyes.

  “Bon soir,” she murmured huskily.

  “Good God!” exclaimed Lord Waverly, when he could speak at all.

  Much encouraged by this utterance, Lisette closed her eyes in expectation of his passionate embrace. Great, therefore, was her surprise when she found her hand seized in a rough grasp and her person propelled none too gently from the room. She hastily caught up her skirts with her free hand as Waverly started up the stairs, all but dragging her behind. He did not release her until he reached her bedchamber on the floor above. Without a word, he crossed the room to the washstand and poured fresh water from the pitcher into the basin. He withdrew his handkerchief from the breast pocket of his coat, then plunged it into the basin, wrung it out, and, taking Lisette’s chin in his hand, very deliberately began to scrub off every trace of her painstakingly applied toilette.

  Lisette submitted to this procedure meekly enough, only asking, crestfallen, “You do not like it, milord?”

  “I think you look like a damned raccoon,” he informed her.

  Lisette’s eyes opened wide. “What is a damned raccoon, s’il vous plait?"

  “A raccoon is a small forest creature native to America. As for the other, it is a word you must not say.”

  “Why not?” demanded Lisette.

  “Because if you do, the raccoons will nip off your nose,” the earl replied without hesitation.

  “C’est absurde! How can they, if they are in America?”

  “Not all of them are there. As a matter of fact, I believe there is one in the menagerie at the Exeter ‘Change.”

  Lisette squirmed eagerly, forgetting for the moment that she was too old—and far too wicked—to take pleasure in such childish pursuits. “I think I would like to see this raccoon. Will you take me, milord?”

  “Perhaps, someday—but not if you insist upon painting yourself up like a Covent Garden strumpet! Be still now, and close your eyes.”

  Lisette complied, and Waverly dabbed the last of the black kohl from her eyelids. Her skin glowed from the force of his scrubbing, and Lord Waverly, studying his handiwork, was seized with a sudden urge to kiss her upturned face. Lisette, opening her eyes at just that moment, knew nothing of his inner struggle. She saw only his frowning countenance and ferocious expression.

  “I—I am sorry, milord,” she stammered. “I thought it would please you.”

  “I would love to know what I have done to give you such an idiotic notion,” replied the earl unsympathetically.

  Lisette’s remorse vanished in an instant. “You said yourself that I might buy whatever I wished!” she reminded him.

  “I spoke no less than the truth. You may certainly buy all the rouge you like; you may not, however, wear it.”

  “Bah!” cried Lisette, stamping her foot in vexation. “C’est absurde! What good is it that I should purchase cosmetics if I am not allowed to wear them?”

  “What good, indeed?” commiserated the earl, unmoved by this outburst. “I trust you will ask yourself that question next time you visit the Burlington Arcade.”

  “You are unreasonable, milord!”

  He looked down at her in mild surprise. “No, why? Because I prefer my wif
e’s face unadorned?”

  Lisette’s ire evaporated in an instant, and her luminous eyes grew soft. “Do you?”

  “Infinitely.”

  “I think that is the loveliest thing anyone has ever said to me,” she said unsteadily.

  “And I think you have led too sheltered a life, ma petite,” he replied. “Come now, let us go downstairs before our dinner grows cold.”

  Smiling mistily up at him, Lisette placed her hand on his proffered arm, and together they descended to the dining room in perfect charity with one another.

  * * * *

  While the earl and his countess sat down to supper in Park Lane, a short distance away in a hired lodging in Clarges Street, a very different pair sipped their after-dinner port. Upon emptying his glass, one of these, a personable if somewhat foppish young man, reached into his pocket for his snuffbox and addressed his companion in French.

  “Tell me, Raoul, what think you of this blend? I bought it today at a little shop in the Burlington Arcade.”

  Raoul pushed the enameled box away petulantly and responded in the same tongue. “I am pleased to know you are amusing yourself so well, prowling about the local shops. Me, I have business to attend to.”

  “Perhaps you work too hard, mon ami. You should take time for the small pleasures.”

  Raoul’s only reply was a snort of derision.

  “And the great joy of these pleasures,” continued his companion, unfazed, “comes of their being so many times unexpected. What do the English call it? Serendipity! Yes, that is it. Why, only today I met a young lady—”

  “And you call this unexpected? I would be more surprised, Étienne, if you had not met a young lady.”

  “Ah, but this lady, she was French. And so young! Her hair, it was dark, and her eyes—”

  Raoul seized him by the sleeve. “You have found my cousin Lisette!”

  “Alas, she did not give her name,” Étienne admitted mournfully.

  “But you know it was she!”

  “If the lad we saw in Amiens was indeed your cousin, then it was very probably she.”

  “Did you follow her?” Raoul asked urgently. “Where did she go? What was she doing?”

  “Why, shopping, of course. That is what one does at the Burlington Arcade.”

  “Squandering her inheritance, no doubt,” Raoul said bitterly.

  “Mais non! Only purchasing le maquillage for her toilette. After a slight pause for dramatic effect, he added, “And this she did not pay for herself, but told the shopkeeper to send the bill to Lord Waverly.”

  “Waverly? The English aristo in Amiens?”

  Étienne nodded. “It would seem likely.”

  “What did she do next?”

  “She would have left, but I detained her. She would not accept my escort, but did allow me the honor of summoning for her a hackney. She instructed the driver to take her to Park Lane. To my infinite regret, I did not catch the number.”

  “It is not important, at least not yet. It is too fine a neighborhood for a young French girl in a strange city, n’est-ce pas? Depend upon it, the aristo has set her up as his fille de joie.”

  “I feared as much,” Étienne said with a heavy sigh. “And so all your plans come to naught.”

  “Mais non.” Raoul, forgetting he had no patience with such mundane matters, reached for his companion’s snuffbox and helped himself to a pinch. “I do not begrudge her, mon ami. The Englishman will tire of her soon enough, and then she will beg me to make an honest woman of her.”

  “You would wed a woman who has lost her virtue?”

  “Naturellement. After all, it is her forty thousand English pounds I wish to marry. As for the rest, it matters not.” He picked up the half-empty bottle and refilled the glasses. “Come now, let us drink a toast to my success, and on my wedding day you shall have five thousand English pounds for your able assistance.”

  Étienne needed no urging. The two men lifted their glasses and drank deeply.

  Chapter 7

  So court a mistress, she denies you;

  Let her alone, she will court you.

  BEN JONSON, The Forest

  Lady Helen, along with her two closest friends, sat on a bench in Hyde Park, making small talk and watching from a distance as her children cavorted under their nurse’s watchful eye. Little Charles clapped his hands in delight as ten-year-old Lord Randall, the son of Lady David Markham by her first husband, sailed a toy boat in the Serpentine. Charles’s brother William, not content with such passive amusement, did his utmost to tumble headfirst into the water, and was thwarted in this ambition only through the frequent intervention of his long-suffering nurse. A second nurse, more fortunate in her assignment, pulled the two infant girls along in a perambulator, accompanied by Lady David’s infant daughter in the charge of her own nurse.

  “You must both promise to visit me as soon as the Season ends,” insisted Lady Tabor, who alone of the three ladies had no children as yet, and whose fashionably high-waisted walking dress concealed, at least for the nonce, the slight swell of her abdomen. “Tabor Hall is rather remote, and I shall be starved for company.”

  “Of course we will come,” declared Lady David warmly. “But are you quite certain you will feel up to having all of us at once?”

  “Why not? We have the room, and Aubrey might as well learn to accustom himself to the pitter-patter of little feet.”

  “But not six pairs at once, surely!” Lady David protested laughingly. “Even Lady Helen and Sir Ethan limited themselves to two at a time!”

  Lady Helen smiled absently, but made no reply. Polly, Lady Tabor, had once had all Brighton at her feet. Now her life seemed to revolve around her husband and the birth of their first child. Is that what has happened to me? Lady Helen wondered. Have I become too domestic? Has he grown bored with me?

  Somewhere in the distance a clock chimed the hour, and Lady Tabor leaped to her feet, red-gold curls bouncing beneath a fetching gypsy hat. “Oh, is it two o’clock already? I promised to meet Aubrey’s mama in half an hour. She has had the Inglewood christening gown sent down, and wants to show it to me. Aubrey wore it, and it means a great deal to her that his child should do so as well. But I must not stand here talking! Do give my best to your husbands, and tell them they are to bring you to Tabor Hall for the summer.”

  “Give my love to the dowager, and Ethan’s as well,” Lady Helen said with a mechanical smile as Lady Tabor hurried away.

  Lady David Markham waited until their distracted friend was out of earshot, then turned to fix Lady Helen with a knowing look. “What, pray, is troubling you? You have said hardly a word all afternoon, and even when you did, it was obvious your mind was elsewhere. Have people been unkind about Sir Ethan’s knighthood? For if they have—”

  “No, no,” Lady Helen said hastily. “That is, there will always be a few who—but their opinions do not trouble me.”

  “Then what does?”

  Lady Helen hesitated for a moment, undecided as to whether or not to air her private pain, before the need to share the burden won out. She took a deep, steadying breath. “Ethan has taken a mistress.”

  “Nonsense!”

  “It is not nonsense, Emily, I assure you! I saw them together. He—he was leaving her house.”

  “Pray do not jump to conclusions,” cautioned Lady David. “There may be some other explanation for his presence there.”

  “If there is, I should love to hear it!” declared Lady Helen.

  “Perhaps he was there on someone else’s behalf. I believe it is not unusual, when a man wishes to make an offer of that sort to a woman, to have a third party negotiate the terms. It is quite possible that someone enlisted him in this capacity. After all, no one can question Sir Ethan’s business acumen.”

  “No, indeed! And I daresay Ethan and Mrs. Hutchins were so pleased with the bargain that they elected to seal it with a kiss, right in the middle of Green Street!”

  “Oh, dear,” said Lady David, somewha
t daunted by this revelation. “That does put rather a different complexion on things.”

  “Believe me, Emily, if there were any other interpretation to put upon what I saw, I would have seized upon it!”

  Lady David patted her friend’s hand in sympathy. “Try not to mind it so very much. Difficult as it is to understand, men do not seem to feel about these things the same way women do. The fact that a man has a mistress often has very little to do with his feelings for his wife. My first husband, you know, had a marked predilection for opera dancers, even though in all else he was quite devoted to me.”

  Lady Helen found devotion a poor substitute for love, and did not hesitate to say so.

  “Yes, but men appear to take mistresses for reasons that have nothing to do with the tender passion,” Lady David pointed out. “The fear of growing old—”

  “Old? Ethan?” scoffed Lady Helen. “At two-and-thirty?”

  “—The need to demonstrate one’s virility—”

  “It seems to me that any man who fathers—” Lady Helen, turning pink, broke off in confusion. “Dear me! I forgot what I was going to say!”

  Her friend laughed. “You were going to say, and quite rightly, that any man who sires four children in as many years need have no doubts as to his virility! But I shan’t tease you.”

  “Oh, Emily, what shall I do?”

  “Speaking from my own experience, it is usually best to turn a blind eye,” Lady David advised. “Not very satisfying, I know, but if devotion and affection cannot hold a man, it is unlikely that tears and recriminations will do so. There is really nothing else to do—unless you choose to retaliate by taking a lover of your own,” she added, only half in jest.

  “I could never do that,” declared Lady Helen.

  The following morning saw Lady David’s precipitous departure from London, her husband having received in the night an urgent missive from his sister-in-law informing him that her husband and his elder brother, the marquess of Cutliffe, had broken his neck in a riding accident. Lord David departed at first light, both to comfort his brother’s widow and to assume the duties of the marquisate which would now fall to him, his brother having left no sons. Lady David not unnaturally accompanied him, but the seed she had inadvertently planted was left behind to take root.