by M C Beaton
“Liar,” he said softly. He placed his hands on her knees and leaned forward and put his mouth gently against her own. Amanda sat very still, willing herself to feel nothing.
At last he drew back, a puzzled, intent look on his face. “Let us go.” He rose abruptly, and Amanda jumped to her feet and stumbled, knocking the light gilt chair he had been sitting on flying.
She caught hold of his shoulder to steady herself and he put an arm about her waist and looked down at her.
She was wearing the sea-green gown in which he had first seen her. Her eyes were wide and green and gold.
He quite suddenly kissed her again, this time fiercely and insistently until he felt her response, felt her answering surge of passion, felt her lips begin to part beneath his own. He gave a little groan in the back of his throat and held her more tightly.
There came the high, petulant sound of a female voice outside, saying, “Perhaps he is in here. I’ve looked everywhere else.”
He drew back quickly, but not quite quickly enough.
Lady Mary opened the door in time to catch the sense of withdrawal between the guilty pair.
“I have been looking everywhere for you,” she said, her eyes fixed and glaring. “Have you forgotten our dance?”
“My apologies, Mary. Miss Colby received an unfortunate proposal of marriage and I had to turn her suitor down.
“Why, pray? You are not her kin.”
He went forward and took her arm and tucked it in his and smiled down at her. “I know, Mary, but under the circumstances, I see myself in the light of guardian to the young Colbys.”
Lady Mary gave a laugh, slightly reassured, but her eyes still went to where Amanda stood.
“Are you coming, Miss Colby?” said the viscount over his shoulder.
“Later,” said Amanda.
For a long time Amanda stood and lectured herself. Lord Hawksborough was not behaving like a gentleman. Was she to let him kiss and caress her anytime he pleased? If he cared one rap for her, he would endeavour to cancel his engagement. She knew it was almost impossible for a gentleman to cry off once the date was set and the invitations sent out. But if he loved her, he could surely manage somehow.
But common sense told her he did not love her; he was attracted to her, but not enough to wish to wed her. Then, the Colbys were not aristocracy, only gentry, so he would not ally his name with that of such an undistinguished family.
Lord Hawksborough’s elevation to the peerage had been of recent date, but the Fitzgeralds belonged to the untitled aristocracy and were considered too grand to have ever even bothered scrambling for a title.
At last Amanda raised her chin and marched into the ballroom. She would flirt with Mr. Carruthers and see if that might give his philandering lordship something to think about.
Lord Hawksborough was tired. He had had a long day at the Foreign Office, and was about to gather the party together and suggest they go home, when his hostess, Lady Crompton, fluttered up to him, her prominent eyes bulging ever more with excitement.
“Well,” she exclaimed, “so Boney escaped just as you said he would!”
“I do not recall saying such a thing,” said Lord Hawksborough.
“But of course you did. Lady Mary told all of us. ‘Charles saw Napoleon on Elba, actually talked to the monster,’ that’s what she said, and she said you had told the government he would escape but they would not listen to you.”
Suddenly and vividly Lord Hawksborough remembered telling Amanda about his visit to Elba and how Lady Mary had surprised them but had sworn she had not heard a word.
“I think you must be mistaken,” he said stiffly. “I told Lady Mary no such thing.”
His hostess’s attention was caught by another guest. Lord Hawksborough immediately went in search of his fiancée and taxed her bitterly with spreading dangerous gossip and with listening at doors.
He was savagely glad to have something to blame her for. Normally he was the one who was always being made to feel guilty.
“But you told that Colby creature,” said Lady Mary, opening her eyes to their widest. “I assumed you would tell me too, and when you did not, I gathered you had merely forgotten. Why, after all, would you confide such intelligence to a virtual stranger if it were a secret?”
Without being rude, Lord Hawksborough felt he could not truthfully reply to her question—the truth being he instinctively knew Amanda would not gossip, just as he had instinctively known Lady Mary would.
“Let us go home,” he replied instead. “I’ll be glad when this evening is over. Miss Colby can be very taxing.”
Lady Mary smiled warmly at him. “You will soon have children of your own to worry about, Charles,” she murmured. “You are too softhearted. You must let me handle things. As soon as we are married, I will send the taxing and tiresome Miss Colby packing.”
Lord Hawksborough opened his mouth to reply, but she had moved off in front of him and was already making their adieux.
It was a grim journey home. Susan was furious with Amanda for “stealing my beau,” as she hissed in an undertone; Lady Mary now decided that Amanda Colby was a dangerous girl and hated her accordingly; and Lord Hawksborough was emanating worry and tension. He was worried because he had told Lady Mary about Lord Box’s proposal to Amanda. He hoped Lady Mary would not tell Aunt Matilda. He would warn her as soon as he got her alone.
Aunt Matilda and Mrs. Fitzgerald, who had stayed to keep her company, were waiting up in the Red Drawing Room. Aunt Matilda very much rouged and wearing a new cap. Her face fell when the party entered.
“Why did you not bring my dear Lord Box back with you?” she cried, while Mrs. Fitzgerald smiled indulgently.
“Your dear Lord Box proposed marriage to Miss Colby and was refused.” Lady Mary laughed. “Quite right, too. Wicked old rip. Pretending to be courting you, Miss Pettifor, when he was after younger game.”
Aunt Matilda’s mouth fell open.
“Oh, no,” whispered Amanda.
Aunt Matilda suddenly jumped to her feet, two red spots of colour burning on her cheeks. “You!” she said to Amanda. “You tried to steal him. He loved me. Me!”
“Oh, Miss Colby prefers other ladies’ gentlemen,” teased Lady Mary, enjoying herself immensely.
“Yes, she does that,” sneered Susan. “She advised me to drop Dalzell and then she stole him herself.”
Poor Amanda started to protest incoherently, “I didn’t. I wouldn’t. I couldn’t. I can’t bear it.”
Mrs. Fitzgerald arose with a sort of massive dignity. “Come with me, Miss Colby,” she said.
“I think I can explain,” protested Lord Hawksborough.
“No,” said Mrs. Fitzgerald with awful hauteur. “On this occasion I will deal with matters myself.”
Amanda followed her from the room, praying for an earthquake to shake the house to pieces, for a tidal wave to come roaring up the Thames, for anything to help her to escape from the confrontation about to begin.
“Sit down,” barked Mrs. Fitzgerald.
“Thank you. I prefer to stand,” said Amanda.
“Very well. Now, listen to me. You are in this house simply because you are Matilda’s niece. Her welfare comes first. To go and break her heart by taking away her beau is the outside of enough.”
“I did not know Aunt Matilda’s affections were seriously engaged,” replied Amanda, trying to keep her voice from trembling. “I would never dream of trying to annex the affections of any gentleman who—”
“Fustian. I know what has been happening. You have been casting languishing looks at my son. Aye, well you may blush! That sweet child Lady Mary told me it was sad to see the way you dote upon him. He has no interest in you. Charles has always flirted, but until he met Lady Mary, he never had any serious intentions towards any female. There is no danger of your taking his affections away from dear Lady Mary. What I am complaining about is that you are trying to do so. My servants tell me you have been closeted with him alone on
several occasions, once even in his bedchamber. His bedchamber!” repeated Mrs. Fitzgerald, her eyes flashing. “Now, I do not know what free-and-easy manners you may have adopted in the country, but here you are expected to behave like a young lady.… Are you still a virgin?”
“Of course!” squeaked Amanda, putting her hands up to her flushed face.
“For the sake of your aunt, I am prepared to overlook your behaviour. But should I find you flirting with my son, with any of Susan’s beaux, or with anyone your aunt shows a tendre for—since age seems to be no barrier in your case, miss—I will send you packing.”
“Why do you assume the fault is all on my side?” cried Amanda. “Lord Hawksborough has…” She bit her lip. To tell this stern matron that her son had passionately held her in his arms would only make matters worse.
“Do not try to place the blame elsewhere.” Mrs. Fitzgerald thrust her jaw forward. “It does not become you. From now on, wherever you go, you will be strictly chaperoned. And you will no longer ride with Susan in the Park. I do not think you fitting company for my daughter.”
“Mrs. Fitzgerald,” said Amanda desperately, “you must understand, I am not the monster you would have me.”
“Your future behaviour is the only thing that will make me change my mind,” snapped Mrs. Fitzgerald. “I think the company will excuse you. Please go to your room.”
And Amanda meekly went. It was horrible, it was unfair. She had only meant to do things for the best. It had been for Richard’s and Aunt Matilda’s sakes as much as her own that she had encouraged Lord Box in his attentions. She felt a superstitious shudder run through her. Perhaps this was divine retribution for the highway robbery. Perhaps these mistakes and humiliations would go on and on until she confessed.
She sat beside the fire in her bedroom, listening to the dreary call of the watch, marking the half-hours, wishing she had the courage to run away.
If only she and Richard had been born into a lower social station, then they would have been trained to work. Richard would find work eventually, but his studies at the university had only just begun, and it would be a shame if he had to forgo them.
The door opened and she looked up in surprise as Mrs. Fitzgerald entered the room. Amanda cringed in her chair, and then got to her feet and stood as stiff as a ramrod in front of the fire. Had Mrs. Fitzgerald come to give her another lecture? Enough was enough.
But Mrs. Fitzgerald said mildly, “Sit down, Amanda. I am not going to lecture you anymore.”
Amanda looked at her anxiously and then did as she was bid. Mrs. Fitzgerald sat down opposite and sighed.
“I do not know quite how to begin,” she said awkwardly, looking as shy as a massive domineering woman can ever look. “I have been talking to my son, or rather, he has been talking to me. He has confessed that he has behaved towards you in a manner unbefitting a gentleman—in short, he has been flirting with you. He says you did not encourage him in the slightest, in fact, that you did not need to.”
Amanda felt quite weak at the knees.
“He, by rights, should terminate his engagement to Lady Mary. But he cannot. It is a point of honour, you see. Furthermore, he believes Lady Mary to be deeply in love with him, although she has done several things since your arrival that seem to have disillusioned him about her completely.”
“Lady Mary has never been married before?” asked Amanda, thinking of that lady’s twenty-eight summers.
“No. It is a sad story. She was engaged twice. The first gentleman was killed in a duel; the second ran away to the Continent a day before the wedding. Charles did not learn of this until a week ago. So you see, she will not release him. She has little money of her own, and my son has a considerable fortune.”
“Then she cannot love him!” exclaimed Amanda.
“I think she does.” Mrs. Fitzgerald smiled. The smile transformed her whole face. “But you should not be too hard on her. Charles tells me you were prepared to marry Lord Box in order to secure a future for Richard and your aunt. He explained to me that you were unaware your aunt’s affections were seriously engaged, thinking us older people too withered to indulge in the headstrong passions of youth.”
“How is my aunt?” asked Amanda in a low voice.
“She is still in great distress. Charles says cynically he thinks she is beginning to enjoy the drama and that may be the case. What I am come for, Miss Colby, is to proffer my apologies. But, I beg of you, avoid my son. It will not make his lot easier to bear. As a man of honour and a gentleman, he is honour-bound to marry Lady Mary.”
“And if he were not?” asked Amanda in a voice barely above a whisper. “Would he marry me?”
“That I do not know, and it is useless to speculate thereon. Perhaps your attraction for him lies simply in the fact you are forbidden fruit. Gentlemen always lust after what they should not have.”
Amanda hung her head and Mrs. Fitzgerald looked at her with a certain sympathy.
“Has Charles shown any actual love for you?”
Passion, Amanda thought, a certain teasing mockery, a certain warmth. But love?
Slowly she shook her head.
“Then it should make your task easier,” said Mrs. Fitzgerald. “Goodness knows, I have my hands full with Susan. I do not think telling her lies about how attractive she looks has done the slightest good at all.”
“It is better than constantly telling her she is plain,” flashed Amanda. “Forgive me, ma’am,” she added in a contrite voice, “but I fear Susan’s clumsiness and gaucheries came about because she was accustomed to thinking herself plain.”
“I will decide how to bring up my daughter, if you please, and I am not in need of advice from a chit like you,” said Mrs. Fitzgerald tartly, reverting to her former manner. “I was a great beauty in my youth. Susan takes after her father.”
Lady Mary removed her ear from the other side of the door and slid off quietly along the passageway. She was consumed with rage and jealousy. She did not give a rap if Lord Hawksborough married her reluctantly, just so long as he did marry her.
Lady Mary had put considerable work into securing him. She had adopted a free-and-easy and open manner which she instinctively knew would sit well with him. She could not risk being jilted again. She was extravagant and coveted Lord Hawksborough’s money to buy beautiful gowns and jewels. Her first fiancé had been killed in a duel after he was accused of cheating at cards. Her second had complained she was out to send him into the River Tick since she had already started to make inroads in his fortune before the wedding.
And then he had run away. Her face still burned as she remembered the shame of that day. The engagement to Hawksborough had proved to the Polite World that she was an attractive woman. She had seized the prize from under the pretty noses of so many. She did not love Lord Hawksborough. But she was determined to keep a close guard on him until the day of the wedding.
Amanda Colby must be removed. There must be some way to discredit her. Lady Mary sat down to plot and scheme.
8
The Season seemed to be hurtling towards Amanda at a tremendous rate. Mrs. Fitzgerald had secured vouchers for both Susan and Amanda to Almack’s—those famous assembly rooms which were the high temple of London fashion.
Relieved that the repercussions over her marriage proposal were not nearly so great as she had feared, Amanda began conscientiously to look for a beau. Having said she loved young Mr. Carruthers, she decided he would do as well as anyone. He was a cheerful, unaffected young man of twenty-three. He was not possessed of any great degree of intelligence, but he made up for it by being unflaggingly good-natured. He seemed happy to accept the role of Amanda’s beau, although he had no serious intentions of marriage. He supposed he would become married sometime in the vague future, but for the moment he was content to squire the vivacious and undemanding Miss Colby anywhere she wished.
Lady Mary had been unexpectedly friendly. Amanda did not trust her, but was prepared to accept her surface character,
since she still felt guiltily that there had been some truth in Mrs. Fitzgerald’s original lecture: she had been casting languishing eyes at Lord Hawksborough.
Richard came down from Oxford for a weekend and paid court to Susan, which quite restored that young lady’s amour propre, and she graciously agreed to resume her rides with Amanda in the Park.
Aunt Matilda had not quite forgiven Amanda and had returned for a while to her old habit of sleeping too much. She was convinced her lover had been stolen from her. The whirl of London fashion had rather gone to her head, and in a mildly crazy way, she regarded her niece as a rival.
But a few bullying and bracing words from Mrs. Fitzgerald at least got Aunt Matilda back on her feet and out into the world again.
Amanda was out riding early one morning with Susan and Mr. Carruthers. They were hailed by Colonel John Withers, the Hussar officer who had been of the party the evening they had gone to see Kean in Othello. He engaged Susan in conversation, leaving Mr. Carruthers to ride side by side with Amanda a little way ahead.
