A Match for the Rebellious Earl

by Lara Temple

  ‘You there, is this the Hesperus?’

  An equally muffled voice answered from the deck. ‘And what will you be wanting with the Hesperus, my fine cock?’

  Kit smiled at the surly Kentish tones of his bosun, Brimble. He suspected people rarely, if ever, addressed Julian Carrington with that degree of disdain.

  He nudged Benja. ‘Do me a favour and fetch that fine cock and bring him to my quarters, Benja.’

  Benja leaned over the bulwarks to get a better look and clucked his tongue. ‘I don’t like it. He looks like a Borgia. You know him?’

  ‘I do. That, amic, is one of the two men at the top of the very long list of those who would like to see me feeding the fish at the bottom of the ocean.’

  ‘You wish to invite your enemy on board the Hesperus?’

  ‘He’s worse than my enemy, Benja. He’s my cousin.’

  * * *

  ‘Huh. Looks expensive. Are those rubies real?’

  Kit watched as Julian held the filigreed music box to the lamp, turning it under the light. His cousin might be something of a wastrel, but he clearly had a good eye for value. Kit wondered if he’d have to do an inventory once his cousin left the ship.

  ‘Of course they are real. I keep all my forgeries in the false hold, in case any excise officers decide to come calling.’

  Julian replaced the box with the same swift, charming smile Kit remembered from his childhood. And had mistrusted just as long.

  ‘Yes, I’ve heard you’ve turned respectable of late, Cuz.’

  Kit sat down by the wide wooden table, fingering the edge of the map of the Mediterranean spread out on it.

  ‘And I’ve heard the opposite of you, Julian. We neither of us should believe everything we hear.’

  ‘Or read, apparently.’

  Julian sat on the other side of the table and pulled out a folded sheet of a newspaper from his pocket and tossed it across the table.

  There was nothing particularly informative written on it—merely broad hints that the new Lord Westford had not even been invited to his own half-sister’s ball, so as to spare the family’s blushes.

  Kit didn’t know whether to be annoyed or amused. There was something juvenile about the whole archly told tale—like children whispering behind a hedge.

  ‘I knew you were a favoured target of the gossip columns, Julian, but I didn’t know you read them.’

  ‘I don’t. This was brought to my attention by Marcus. He is part owner of the Gazette and he plans to have a sharp word with the author of this piffle. But that is hardly the point. The point is that they have a point.’

  ‘Of course they do. I’m an uncouth, low-born pirate and our grandmother would as soon spit at me as be in the same room with the black sheep of the family. That is hardly a newsworthy revelation and I don’t see why it should bother you. In fact, I would think you would be delighted to see me reviled. You’ve done it often enough yourself.’

  ‘In private. However, family gossip is bad for business.’

  ‘What business?’

  ‘Our business,’ Julian said flatly.

  Kit went to fetch a bottle of wine, pouring out two glasses.

  Julian sniffed at his, his dark brows rising. He drank and gave a surprisingly happy sigh. ‘The rumours are not completely wrong, then. Your taste in wine is impeccable. Where is this from?’

  ‘A day’s ride from Rome.’

  ‘What a happy life you lead, Lord Westford.’ Julian’s voice was light, but as acid as a third-rate vintage.

  ‘Why have you come tonight, Julian? The last time we saw each other you called me everything short of Beelzebub himself. Now you’re here, on enemy territory, complimenting my wine and showing a completely disingenuous concern for my reputation. What is it you want? Money?’

  Julian’s hand tightened on the glass, his handsome mouth twisting. Strange, thought Kit, that his cousin looked far more like Kit’s father than he himself did. If he hadn’t had the Carrington eyes, Kit had little doubt his cousins would have thrown the slur of bastardy at him, as well as low birth.

  ‘I’m no happier coming here than you are to see me, believe me,’ Julian said at last. ‘I admit our last encounter was unfortunate. It was very bad taste to air old grievances when your father had just been buried.’

  ‘I appreciate the near apology. But, since I am certain you still haven’t told me the reason for your presence here, I’ll reserve judgement.’

  ‘You always were a suspicious bastard, Kit.’

  ‘And you always were a devious one, Julian.’

  ‘You should be grateful I’m employing those skills in your favour at the moment.’

  ‘Are you?’

  ‘Yes. You asked why I’m here... I’m here to determine if you’re presentable.’

  ‘If I’m...what?’

  ‘Presentable. To polite society. Our last encounter was inconclusive. None of us was at our best. Except poor Charlie—but then he was always the only ray of light among the heathens, as Grandmama would have said.’

  ‘I wouldn’t insult heathens by comparing them with the cursed Carringtons. And as for presentability—I don’t see why it matters. The only society I plan to encounter is the family of Emily’s betrothed in Hampshire, and they, unlike London society, apparently do deserve the epithet polite.’

  ‘Damn, I’d forgotten you talk like a book when you’re angry. Just like your father. My point is that it won’t do. You can’t hide here in the fog while everyone knows you’re in Town and practically on their doorstep. If you’re so concerned for Emily and Mary, it would have been far better for them if you’d docked somewhere else entirely and sneaked up to the wedding and away again without anyone being the wiser. By the time the ball comes round they’ll have you painted as a misshapen ogre holding pagan rites at the rise of the new moon—if you could ever see any moon through the sludge they call air down here.’

  ‘Aunt Mary never said anything about gossip when I met her only yesterday.’

  ‘That’s because she’s Mary. She’s been putting a smile on things ever since her family sold her to our grandparents to take your father’s mind off your mother’s death. She wouldn’t risk scaring you off, in any case, would she? You can always sail away, but she has to live with the old bat. Oh, and I doubt she appreciates you still calling her Aunt Mary as you did as a boy. It might have been a fine compromise when you refused to call her Mama back then, but she’s only a few years older than you, and it’s a tad aging to have your grown stepson calling you Auntie.’

  Kit felt a sharp twinge in his jaw and realised he was grinding his teeth. Damn, he hated his cousins.

  Julian’s mouth quirked into a smile. ‘I daresay your sweet stepmother didn’t even meet you at Carrington House, did she?’

  ‘That was at my suggestion,’ Kit said, aware that he was sounding defensive. ‘I don’t wish to see my grandmother any more than she wishes to see me.’

  ‘Well, once the festivities begin, either leave Town until she returns to Dorset, or do your bit for the family.’

  Kit smiled, slowly. ‘Are you ordering me to leave London?’

  ‘That was my intention when I came aboard, but I’ve changed my mind. I think you should come to the ball.’

  ‘Is this some new attempt to make my life hell?’

  ‘At least in this instance, making you miserable isn’t my primary objective. I’ve been asking around, and it seems you haven’t been trading in contraband recently. Is that because you aren’t, or because you’ve bribed the excise officers?’

  ‘If you’re asking whether my trade is above board, it is. Whatever sins I’ve committed, I’ve kept them far from England. In any case, I’ve become tediously respectable in the last few years.’

  ‘Good—it would put a damper on the festivities if you were hauled out in the middle of
the ball for smuggling, or worse.’

  ‘I’m not coming to the damned ball. Putting me in the same room with Lady Westford is a recipe for disaster. Doing it in front of the whole of the London Ton, which is only waiting for the stain of my birth to out, is a recipe for the apocalypse. I don’t want Emily’s wedding tainted by scandal.’

  ‘Well, it’s a little late for that. As you can see, now the inhabitants of our little social swamp know you’re in Town their cauldrons are bubbling with cackling conjecture. And a ball is the perfect place for the two of you to face each other across the green, since that’s the one occasion she’ll not risk showing her true face. You want the rare experience of Grandmama holding her tongue? That’s practically the only time you’ll find it, Pretty Kitty.’

  Kit tightened his hand on his glass, breathing carefully.

  ‘Oh, I forgot you didn’t like your pet name,’ Julian said with his most disingenuous smile. ‘Marcus and I never meant for it to reach your school. Bad luck that. If you hadn’t been such a pretty little thing it likely wouldn’t have stuck. Still, I think it was rather extreme of you to force everyone to stop calling you Kit and call you Christopher instead.’

  Kit was very tempted to show Julian precisely how he’d forced everyone to stop echoing his cousins’ epithet. The only benefit of their mischief was that he’d learned to defend himself at a very young age, but for years he’d allowed no one to call him Kit other than Mary and Emily.

  To everyone else he’d become Christopher Carrington.

  And now, unfortunately, Lord Westford.

  He sighed impatiently.

  ‘If you’re done drinking my wine and trying to goad me into losing my temper, Julian, you can take yourself off.’

  Julian laughed. ‘Foiled. You used to be so much more susceptible once. But don’t let your dislike of me dissuade you from coming to the ball. I’m curious to see how you and Marcus rub along. At least I think Marcus will be there. He also has no intention of attending, but no doubt Genny will find a way of twisting his arm.’

  ‘Genny?’

  Julian stood and gave Kit a quizzical smile. ‘Serena’s sister—Genevieve Maitland. You’ve been away a while, but don’t tell me you’ve forgotten Charlie’s widow and her sister? The granddaughters of your old commanding officer General Maitland?’

  ‘No, but what have they to do with any of this?’

  ‘Since they live with Lady Westford, they will obviously be at the ball.’

  ‘I didn’t know they were living with our grandmother.’

  ‘Where else would they be? Since Grandfather swore after the umpteenth time Charlie invested in some ill-fated agricultural venture that he’d not give him another chipped farthing, Serena has been left with all his debts, poor woman. And of course Genny wouldn’t leave her to face Grandmother’s bludgeoning alone.’ He drained his wine and went to the door. ‘Don’t forget you promised me a case of that wine.’

  Kit didn’t bother to point out that he’d promised no such thing. Still, a case of wine was cheap compared to the funds Julian had received from the Carrington coffers over the years.

  He was standing as the door closed and was still staring at it when Benja entered.

  ‘Well, Capità?’

  ‘Not well at all, Benja. In fact, I’m afraid I shall have to visit a tailor. My wardrobe does not stretch to acceptable evening wear.’

  Benja clucked his tongue morosely.

  ‘I knew it. The Borgia—they always bring bad news.’

  Chapter Three

  So far, so good.

  Genny stood by the musicians’ dais at the end of Carrington House’s crowded ballroom and surveyed the product of her plotting. She didn’t know what was more impressive: the fact that Emily’s ball looked set to be one of the Season’s successes, or that Lady Westford was actually smiling.

  She was most pleased to see that Mary and Serena were occasionally leaving the matrons’ corner to dance, and that even Marcus and Julian were behaving. Thus far. Well, Marcus was his usual reticent self, but Julian’s easy charm was fast convincing many ambitious matrons that perhaps his lack of funds might be overlooked after all.

  There was only one fly in the ointment, and she very much hoped it didn’t transform itself into a whole hornets’ nest.

  One of the chief reasons the Ton had thronged to Carrington House tonight was not because of the Carringtons who were present, but because of the one who was absent.

  For the past few weeks the gossip columns had continued to jab their poison pens into the enigmatic figure of Lord Westford as he’d lurked in the London docks. Genny had been particularly impressed with one of the engravings, depicting a cloaked and masked hunchback skulking along a darkened dock as brawny sailors scattered in fear before him. The text was hardly any better. An improbably salacious tale of his misdemeanours interlaced with what the Ton would probably consider even more scandalous facts about his origins and occupation.

  They might smile at Lady Westford, but behind their fans they clucked their tongues because the once respectable Carrington name was now in the hands of a man whose maternal grandfather might well have been a bastard, whose mother had been not only a shopkeeper’s daughter but an actress, and whose only protection from gaol and transportation might be the title he had never been meant to inherit in the first place.

  It was all simply too delicious.

  And Genny might curl her lip at the Ton’s avid prurience, but she had to appreciate its effect—the ballroom was full to bursting. So long as the cause of that gossip kept himself to himself, Genny was content.

  Still, she kept a close watch on the circling of the vultures, and was just beginning to relax her vigilance when the buzzing began—like a swarm of wasps shifting direction across the dance floor.

  She knew that sound—it was the sound of gossip rippling across the fetid pond of London society, and it usually boded ill for someone. She had little doubt that this time it boded ill for the Carringtons.

  It was at times like this that she wished she were taller.

  She pasted a cool smile on her lips and worked her way towards the centre of this rising swarm. It was a bevy of eligible young women, many of whom were on her list of possible brides for Julian and Marcus. If either of them was fomenting trouble, this would be a good place to hear of it.

  The girls had gathered in one of the alcoves that lined the ballroom wall, where weary dancers could rest between sets. Each alcove was flanked by tall Doric pillars which provided ample cover for Genny’s eavesdropping.

  ‘I’m telling you, Papa recognised him,’ said Lady Sarah Ponsonby. ‘Just as we stepped out of the carriage, we saw him walking up the street.’

  ‘Is he truly a hunchback?’ This excited whisper sounded like Lady Calista, the Duke of Burford’s youngest granddaughter.

  ‘Heavens, no. He looks nothing like the illustrations in the newspaper. In fact, he is by far the handsomest man I have ever seen. Far handsomer than Lord Byron.’

  ‘No!’

  ‘He is also far more scandalous...’ whispered another voice.

  ‘They say he’s a pirate!’ Lady Calista contributed again.

  ‘Not a pirate—a privateer,’ clarified Calista’s sister Lady Sophronia, with a careful little cough. ‘Though there are tales that he has engaged in...smuggling.’

  ‘Well, I heard the men on his boat are escaped prisoners, even murderers.’

  A hiss of satisfied gasps rippled through the small group.

  ‘And I heard he has a harem on board.’

  ‘What is a harem?’ asked a timid voice. ‘Is it some kind of animal?’

  ‘Animals. Plural,’ answered Lady Sophronia. ‘It means women, Miss Caversham. Not respectable women.’

  ‘He sounds dreadfully exciting. It is such a pity Grandpapa wouldn’t approve of him,’ said Lady Calista,
and sighed.

  ‘Why not?’ Lady Sarah demanded, a trifle defiantly. ‘He might be all those things, but now he holds the title and the estate he is bound to put all that behind him and settle down.’

  ‘There is, however, the issue of his...birth.’ Lady Sophronia lowered her voice and there was a swishing of skirts as the group huddled closer. ‘His maternal grandfather was not only a foundling and a shopkeeper, but he trod the boards. There is some talk his mother did the same.’

  ‘She trod on what?’ asked the timid Miss Caversham as the others gave a gratifying gasp.

  ‘She was on the stage,’ Lady Sarah Ponsonby said impatiently. ‘An actress.’

  ‘And she was five years older than his father. They say she bewitched him. Truly! They eloped and set out to sea, and the present Lord Westford was born on a ship. That is how he became a pirate—just like Captain Drake.’

  ‘Ooh! How thrilling!’

  ‘Thrilling’ wasn’t the word Genny would employ.

  She left the safety of her pillar and headed towards the entrance to the ballroom. Halfway there she was intercepted by the head footman, Henry, his face carefully devoid of expression.

  ‘Mr Howich wonders if you could be spared for a moment, Miss Maitland.’

  Genny followed him into the hall and Henry closed the door behind them, muffling the rumbling rush of human noise.

  ‘What is it, Henry?’

  ‘His Lordship, Miss Maitland. He is here.’

  This was said with such a portentous tone Genny couldn’t help smiling. Henry would have made a fine chorus for a Greek tragedy.

  ‘Here...where?’

  ‘In the library, miss. He asked for Mrs Carrington, miss, but she’s in the lady’s retiring room with Miss Emily, who’s gone and torn her flounce, so Mr Howich sent me to fetch you, miss.’

  ‘Very good, Henry. You needn’t wait.’

  Henry nodded and hurried off, rather in the manner of someone being released from a cage shared with a prowling lion.

  Genny entered the library, thinking fast. She had not gone to all this trouble to bring Serena back into the land of the living only for Lord Westford to waltz in and scupper all her efforts. There was too much at stake.