by Mary Balogh
“Yes,” she said. “It will not take care of the meting out of full justice, it is true. We may need another plan for that when the time comes. But it will be a very public humiliation if it is well enough orchestrated. It will be talked about for the next decade. Gabriel and I will take care of that.”
“Oh,” Estelle cried, “why should you have all the fun, Jessica?”
And there she went again, Jessica thought, blushing to the roots of her hair and to the ends of her toes, though that was not what Estelle had meant.
“They will not, Estelle,” Aunt Matilda assured her, sounding quite militant. “Not when there will be Avery and his quizzing glass and Alexander with his magnificent height and looks. And Thomas and Colin and Marcel and Charles. And Bertrand and Boris and Peter too. And that is to name only the men. Then there will be us.”
“All of which,” Grandmama said, “will be worth nothing, Matilda, if Lady Farraday does not send that man an invitation and if he does not attend the masquerade.”
“Mama,” Aunt Mildred said, sounding incredulous. “You surely do not doubt that we can make absolutely sure both those things happen.”
“Who will come with me tomorrow afternoon to call upon Lady Farraday?” Aunt Viola asked.
“I will,” Elizabeth and Wren said together.
“I will go too,” Jessica’s mother said, “even though it will be Sunday. I will go separately from the three of you. Matilda, you must come with me. You too, Mildred. I believe we make a somewhat intimidating trio. The Westcott sisters.”
“I daresay,” Grandmama said, “half the ton will call upon Mr. Rochford and his wife next week. They will, after all, be the sensation of the hour. They already are. Edith and I will call upon them on Monday.”
“Charles and I will call too, Mama,” Aunt Matilda said.
“And Marcel and I,” Aunt Viola said. “With Estelle, if she is willing. She will be an inducement for the man to come to the masquerade, after all, and to bring his son with him. Not that Mr. Anthony Rochford has ever been reluctant to attend any entertainment, though he may be nursing a broken heart if he has discovered that Jessica has married Gabriel. It will be in the morning papers on Monday, I suppose?”
“I am almost as grand a prize as Jessica, however,” Estelle said. “Daughter of a marquess and all that. Yes, I will go with you and Papa, Mother. I would not miss going for worlds.”
“I believe,” Anna said, “we will all wait upon the Rochfords on Monday. Avery normally avoids morning or afternoon calls rather as he would the plague, but I can dare predict he will make an exception on this occasion.”
“And when we go, we will all express the fond hope that his future lordship will be at the masquerade with his wife,” Wren said. “Before his cousin is declared officially dead, that is, and his grief keeps him from all grand entertainments.”
Grandmama made a sound of contempt that was not quite a word, but she seemed to sum up everyone’s feelings. They subsided for a few moments into a satisfied silence.
Oh, Gabriel had indeed married into a whole family yesterday!
Gabriel! For a moment Jessica’s thoughts wandered. He had gone to find his lawyer, even though it was a Saturday and the man might not be amused to have his day off disturbed. Then they were going to dine together and compare notes and . . .
Well.
* * *
* * *
Gabriel had been looking forward to getting back to his hotel and to Jessica returning from her meeting with the women of her family. He had looked forward to dining privately with her and to retiring early to bed with her. Last night had been one of broken sleep. Not that it was just to catch up with missing sleep that he hoped to retire early tonight, of course.
Bedtime did not come as early as he had hoped, however. Neither did they end up dining alone.
Jessica was in the middle of telling him all about the meeting at her aunt’s house while he removed her bonnet and kissed her throat, and she accused him of trying to distract her, when they were both distracted by a knock on the door.
They waited for Horbath to emerge from the bedchamber to open it. They listened to the discreetly hushed murmur of voices.
“I beg your pardon, sir,” Horbath said with a deferential bow, leaving the door slightly ajar while he came to report to Gabriel. “There is a Mr. Simon Norton belowstairs wishing to have a word with you.”
Norton? Here? Not back at Brierley? He must have assumed that his job there was completed now that Manley had come to London. Or perhaps he had come to bring that news.
“Have him shown up,” he said. He smiled ruefully at Jessica. “I am sorry. Will you mind? He is the man I sent to Brierley to find out a few things for me. I will get rid of him as soon as possible.”
“Of course I do not mind,” she said.
But when Norton was admitted, he did not come alone.
He had Mary with him.
Nineteen
So this was Mary Beck.
The woman for whom Gabriel had come back from America, leaving behind him the life he had made for himself there, his home and his business, his friends and his neighbors. For more than six years he had resisted the allure of an earl’s title and all the honor and respect it would bring with it as well as a stately home and estate and a fortune. He had not been interested. He had been happy where he was.
She was tiny, perhaps not even quite five feet tall. She appeared to have a bit of a hump on her back and one twisted arm. She limped heavily. She wore a long, shapeless coat and no hat. Her hair, a drab mixture of faded brown and gray, was scraped back over her head and sat on her neck in a small, tight bun. She had a long, plain face. She was probably in her fifties, though that was only a guess.
And Gabriel had spoken her name with warm affection and bent over her to hug her close. He held her for a long time, his eyes tightly closed, his arms noticeably gentle.
“Gabriel, Gabriel,” she said over and over in a deep, almost manly voice, patting his upper arms. She laughed softly. “Look at you. You are all grown up.”
The man Jessica assumed was Mr. Norton stood just inside the door, which Gabriel’s valet had closed quietly before disappearing back to the bedchamber.
“You came all this way?” Gabriel asked rhetorically, moving back far enough to look into her face, though he kept his arms about her. “Mary? What were you thinking?”
“I heard that Mr. Rochford had come here,” she said. “And I was afraid he would have you thrown in jail, Gabriel. I was afraid they would . . . hang you before I could stop them. So I went to find Mr. Norton and persuaded him to bring me. Don’t chastise him for coming, even though you had not given him orders to leave his post. I threatened him. I told him if he did not bring me, I would come alone on the stagecoach and you would not like it and blame him. And I meant it. I have a letter with me from Ned Higgins.”
“Ned Higgins?” He frowned. “But Mary, never mind that just now. Let me take your coat and make you comfortable and introduce you—”
But Mary was not to be deterred. If she had been able to talk without stopping for breath, she would surely have done so. “Ned is the young groom who brought me that little fawn and stayed outside the cottage while you and I set its broken leg,” she explained. “Not so young any longer either. He has a wife and three children, two of whom like to come and pick flowers from my garden for their mother when I pretend not to be looking. Ned is still squeamish about animals in pain, bless his heart. I wrote the letter for him, Gabriel, because he can only barely read and write. I asked Mr. Norton to be there, though, so that he could watch and make sure that I wrote only what Ned said and that I did not prompt him at all. Ned did read it over when I was finished, and then he signed it. Mr. Norton witnessed it with his signature. Something I did not know before then was that after Ned left the cottage on that day—you were still there with me—h
e came upon a cluster of men gathered about the dead body of that poor young man. Ned watched while he was taken up by a few of them to be carried home to his father. So. They are not going to hang you, Gabriel, or throw you in prison. I won’t let them.”
She was breathless by the time she finished. And the whole of her focus was upon Gabriel.
“Mary,” he said, “thank you. Thank you for all this. Thank you for coming, though I am vexed that I made it necessary for you to travel all the way to me when I ought to have gone to you. Thank you for the news, for bringing the letter, for caring. But come and be comfortable. Let me introduce you to someone very special. To Jessica. She did me the great honor of marrying me yesterday.”
He turned her toward Jessica and released his hold on her.
And they looked at each other, the two special women in his life.
“Jessica.” Mary’s hands, one terribly twisted, came up beside her face, palm out, and her face lit up with a smile. “But you are lovely.”
And Jessica realized something that made no sense from the point of view of her eyes. Mary Beck was beautiful. It was something to do with her face—her plain face—and her eyes. She had heard it said that the eyes are the window to the soul. But Mary’s eyes . . . No. One could not see her soul through her eyes. One could see it in her eyes and beaming out from them to light and to warm the whole world. Mary was a living soul. Which was a bewilderingly foolish thought. Especially upon an acquaintance of mere moments. It was true, though. Surely it was.
Jessica reached out both hands, and Mary set hers in them. Jessica clasped the twisted one very gently. “How very happy I am to meet you, Mary,” she said, and kissed the older woman on the cheek.
Travel over English roads must not have been comfortable for her. And that was probably a great understatement. She had not even had the luxury of Avery’s carriage to travel in.
“I beg your pardon, sir,” Mr. Norton was saying to Gabriel. “But I judged you would want me to accompany Miss Beck rather than stay put, especially as Mr. and Mrs. Rochford were gone. I’ll turn around and go back up there, with your permission, and see if I can find Mrs. Clark.”
“It is already done,” Gabriel told him. “And you did the right thing, for which I thank you. Go home, Norton—on full pay. I will send for you when I need you again.”
“Thank you, sir.” Mr. Norton let himself quietly out of the room.
Mary meanwhile seemed aware of her surroundings for the first time. She looked around in something like awe and then, beaming happily, turned her attention back to the two of them.
“Yesterday,” she said. “You were married yesterday. Two beautiful people. And I can see that you were made for each other.”
“You just missed our wedding,” Jessica said. “What a pity that is. But you must come and sit down. It will be dinnertime soon. Gabriel will send Mr. Horbath to arrange for the table to be set for three.”
“Oh no, no, no,” Mary said, holding up her good hand in protest. “I did not come to impose my company upon Gabriel. Even less so upon Gabriel and his bride. We can talk another time. I will remain in London—my, my, what a vast place it is—until I am quite certain you are not going to be thrown in jail, Gabriel. Mr. Norton—what a very polite and gentlemanly person he is—has recommended a women’s boardinghouse to me. I will ask one of the kind porters downstairs to give me directions and . . . Well, perhaps I will ask him too if he will call me a—hackney cab, do you call carriages for hire here? Then I will be able to take my bag with me. It is downstairs. That very courteous manager promised Mr. Norton that he would keep it for me.”
“Mary,” Gabriel said, “don’t be ridiculous.”
She looked at him in some surprise, saw that his eyes were twinkling, and laughed her deep laugh. “Well,” she said, “perhaps you will come downstairs and make the arrangement for me, Gabriel. I confess to being a bit overwhelmed. I will not keep him from you for more than a few minutes, Jessica. Oh, you are a lovely young lady. And a kind one.”
“Mary,” Jessica said, smiling. “Sit down. On that chair beside the fireplace. It is the most comfortable. And that is an order.”
Mary threw up her hands again and laughed.
“Jessica was Lady Jessica Archer before I married her,” Gabriel told her. “Sister of the Duke of Netherby, a most formidable aristocrat, Mary. He could reduce you to a dithering heap with one look through his quizzing glass. Jessica could do the same thing—if she carried a glass.”
“I could indeed,” Jessica said. “Come, Mary, and sit down. Gabriel will go in person to arrange for dinner and to secure you a room here at the hotel. And you shall have Ruth, my maid, to keep you company and prevent you from being too bewildered. Just do not expect her to talk. She is a woman of few words.”
“Words are not always necessary, dear,” Mary said as Gabriel helped her off with her coat and she sat obediently in the most comfortable chair, which came close to swallowing her up. She looked about her again. “What a very pleasant room this is. And how lovely to have arrived. And, I must confess, to be staying here. Though I would not for the world make a nuisance of myself.”
“As if that were possible,” Gabriel said, pouring her a glass of lemonade at the sideboard as Jessica sat down beside her.
“You must tell us about your journey,” she said. “Was it a very uncomfortable experience, Mary? How brave of you to come all this way virtually alone.”
“Well, I did have Mr. Norton with me,” Mary said. “He made me feel very safe. And he insisted upon hiring a private parlor for me last evening even though I protested at the extravagance.”
Gabriel handed her the glass and stayed for a few minutes before going to make arrangements for a room and for an extra place to be set at the table. It was very clear to Jessica that these two were indeed very fond of each other. He hesitated for a moment when he did get to his feet and looked thoughtfully down at Mary while she beamed back at him.
“Mary,” he said, “have you ever wanted to go to a masquerade?”
* * *
* * *
Masquerades, or costume balls, as they were often called when they were given by members of the ton (and were therefore assured of precluding any so-called riffraff who gave the public masquerades at the opera house such a disreputable name), were always more popular than almost any other entertainment the Season could offer. They gave grown men and women a chance to dress up, to spend a whole evening playing a role and a guessing game at the same time, though most disguises were easily penetrated, it was true. They gave an extra burst of excitement as the evening grew old, when midnight brought with it unmasking time and they could all discover whether their guesses had been correct. They gave everyone a chance to behave in somewhat less inhibited a manner than a more formal ball allowed. Young debutantes might dance with rakes and older matrons with handsome young blades. A Roman emperor might take the floor with a milkmaid, and a harlequin with Good Queen Bess.
Lady Farraday’s masquerade ball was looked forward to with even greater than usual anticipation. For Mr. Manley Rochford, so soon to be the new Earl of Lyndale, had made his anticipated arrival in town just in time to attend, and attend he would with his wife. Lady Farraday had confirmed that fact by calling upon them in person the very morning of the ball, following the note she had sent late in the afternoon of the day before. She did not add, when she boasted of this considerable coup to various guests, that she had been urged to do so by no less illustrious personages than the Duke of Netherby and the Dowager Countess of Riverdale, to name but two. Everyone who had not been at St. George’s on Sunday was eager to catch their first glimpse of the soon-to-be earl, and even those who had been there anticipated pursuing a closer acquaintance with so distinguished-looking a gentleman.
But there was even more reason for excitement.
For the morning papers had carried notice of the unex
pected marriage of Mr. Gabriel Thorne, that American gentleman who had so aroused the ton’s interest and curiosity over his recent, unexplained return to England after an absence of several years. And he had made nothing short of a brilliant marriage, his bride being Lady Jessica Archer, daughter of the Dowager Duchess of Netherby and sister of His Grace of Netherby.
The news would have been sensational enough even without one additional factor. But there was an additional factor, for it had been generally believed among the ton that Mr. Anthony Rochford, soon-to-be heir to the earldom of Lyndale, had been in hot pursuit of Lady Jessica and that she had favored his suit. And who could have doubted that? The gentleman, even apart from his prospects, was gorgeously handsome—all the ladies were agreed upon it. His smile! And exceedingly charming besides. Again, his smile! Yet Lady Jessica had confounded all predictions and married Mr. Thorne, who had rivaled Mr. Rochford in the contest for favorite of the ton but had never quite equaled him. Mr. Thorne, after all, was not about to become heir to anything, least of all an exalted title.
And both men were attending the masquerade—Lady Farraday confirmed it to all who asked. Indeed several members of Lady Jessica’s family, not to mention Lady Vickers, seemed downright eager to pass on the information to anyone who would listen, even to those who had not asked for it. Both men were to attend the masquerade. So was Lady Jessica, of course.
Who could resist all the potential drama inherent in a love triangle? How would Mr. Anthony Rochford react to his first sight of Lady Jessica as a married lady? And how would he react to the sight of his rival for her hand? The man who had bested him.
And would he recognize them before midnight?
Would anyone?
Would anyone recognize Mr. Anthony Rochford himself?
Even those few people who had accepted their invitations but had half decided that they would not go to something that was sure to be a sad squeeze decided that after all they must attend.
