Dancing on the Wind (The Regency Intrigue Series Book 8)

by M C Beaton

  “I shall see you settled at the dower house and introduce you to the servants,” the marquess was saying, as the carriage moved forward again. “You shall take supper with me this evening and then I feel confident I can leave you to your own devices.”

  Polly nodded while her mind raced. Servants! She had not thought of coping with servants by herself. But then she began to relax a little. She was not alone. Drusilla would know what to do.

  The dower house stood about half a mile away from Hand Court, hidden from the drive by a shelter belt of evergreens. Polly had imagined something like a country cottage; once again she had that feeling of dismay and dread when she looked up at a large house which could rightly be called a mansion were it not set against the palatial spread of Hand Court.

  A wizened caretaker answered the door and stood with head bowed while the marquess rapped out orders. A footman and three housemaids, a parlor maid and a maid of all work were to be sent to the dower house immediately. The ladies would join him for supper and stay at Hand Court for one night, then move into the dower house the following morning after it had been warmed and aired.

  The marquess’s carriage had been sighted on its approach to Hand Court and when they arrived, the great army of servants which serviced the stately home was lined up in the hall.

  Polly and Drusilla were introduced, Polly copying Drusilla’s formal manner as well as she could. Then the housekeeper led them upstairs to their rooms.

  When they were at last alone in the bedroom allotted to her, Polly said, “How terrifying all this is. I do hope the servants do not take me in dislike.”

  “They would hardly do that,” said Drusilla soothingly. “They are too much in awe of Canonby. Come, we must change for supper. I shall be your maid this evening. You must admit, all is most prettily arranged.”

  But Polly found the vast bedchamber intimidating with its huge four-poster bed and massive furniture. She meekly let Drusilla undress her to her shift and stood like an obedient child while Drusilla slipped a powder gown over her head and led her into the powder closet to arrange her hair.

  “There are so many powders,” said Drusilla. “Do you want the lavender or the pink?”

  “White, please,” said Polly.

  Drusilla picked up the powder bellows and began to puff a cloud of scented white powder over Polly’s hair after she had curled and arranged it.

  Polly was then led back to the bedchamber and dressed in one of the gowns the marquess had bought her after the hanging.

  It was one of the finest she had in her wardrobe. The gown was a sack dress made of kincob, very rich embroidered brocade imported from China. It was worn over a large hoop which cleared the ground to show a little of the ankle. The stomacher was of richly embroidered white silk, and the sleeves reached to the elbow and were finished with full pinked ruffles. The back of the gown consisted of two large box plaits which hung out over the hooped skirt. The square neckline was cut very low but Drusilla dissuaded Polly from using a kerchief, saying that low necklines for evening wear were all the fashion and were not considered immodest.

  Drusilla herself wore a plain round gown of a drab brown watered silk. Polly protested that she must have something finer to wear, but Drusilla, who had been well schooled as a companion, pointed out that richly dressed companions brought discredit to their mistresses.

  Drusilla then rang the bell and, when a footman answered its summons, asked to be conducted to the drawing room.

  With head held high, Polly followed the footman through the expensive hush of the great house with its multitude of portraits and statuary, down the shallow marble steps of the main staircase and across the white and black tiles of the hall. The footman threw open a pair of double doors and they walked into the drawing room. It was an immense room which seemed to go on forever, a desert of carpeted elegance with little oases of tables and chairs dotted about at intervals. The marquess was standing by the fireplace at the far end of the room when they entered. He watched their approach. Polly stumbled and knocked over a chair, blushed, bent to pick it up and banged heads with a footman who had rushed to do the same thing, sending a cloud of scented hair powder flying up into the air.

  Quite demoralized, Polly let Drusilla lead the way.

  Again, Drusilla made most of the conversation. Polly felt miserably like a child who has gate-crashed an adult party. They began discussing a new novel, The Gentleman’s Folly, which Polly had read and enjoyed very much. But the marquess did not even seem to notice her as he listened politely to Drusilla discourse on the book’s merits.

  “I did not like it one little bit,” said Polly loudly and suddenly. “I thought it was a most stupid book!”

  “My dear Miss Peterson,” said Drusilla, using Polly’s alias in case some servant should be listening, “I am so sorry to hear that. Which part of it offended you most?”

  Polly had enjoyed all of it. She felt trapped. “I said I didn’t like any of it,” she said sharply. The marquess raised his thin eyebrows, and Polly blushed and scowled fiercely at the pattern on the carpet.

  Oh, dear, thought Polly. I am become jealous of Drusilla, and yet if Drusilla did not converse with the marquess, we would all sit in silence for, somehow, I am become too frightened to speak.

  The agony went on at supper. Overawed by the vastness of the dining room and the great army of liveried servants, Polly hung her head and picked at her food. In vain did Drusilla try by every means she could think of to bring Polly into the conversation. Polly sat in agonies. She wanted the marquess to look at her. The minutes were flying by. Soon supper would be over and in the morning she and Drusilla would take up residence in the dower house. She tried and tried to think of something bright and witty to say, and no sound would come out. By the end of the meal, she had a blinding headache.

  Drusilla, for all her crushed-down life with Lady Comfrey, had been brought up to be accustomed to stately surroundings. Polly desperately envied her ease of manner and the way she did not even seem to notice the existence of the servants. Twice, when a footman handed Polly a dish at supper, she smiled up at him warmly and thanked him, and then blushed beet-red at her mistake. The marquess’s town house seemed a very hovel compared to all this courtly magnificence. The first time she had stayed at the house in St. James’s Square, she had been served her meals in her room by the town servants, and yet that had not troubled her. She supposed that when someone has just escaped with their life, they are not apt to be bothered with social niceties. The second time, the marquess himself had attended her. In retrospect, St. James’s Square now seemed like a paradise: a paradise where she had had him all to herself.

  It was time to retire. The marquess bowed, raised Polly’s hand to his lips, and kissed the air an inch above it.

  “What a manner Lord Canonby has,” sighed Drusilla when they were alone again. “So elegant, so restrained.”

  Polly remembered the marquess falling on top of her in the bed, holding her, kissing her. That was the way she wanted him, she thought in cold shock. But she wanted the real thing. Not a show of passion to trick Colonel Anderson. She wanted the marquess of Canonby to burn in her arms, not to drop mock kisses somewhere in the region of the back of her hand.

  But none of this could she tell Drusilla. Drusilla was a lady, and ladies did not burn and sweat and ache with passion, that much Polly knew. Only women of cracked reputation lusted after men.

  But tomorrow was another day; a day in which she would be witty and charming and not the least overawed.

  But late next morning, she and Drusilla were conducted to the dower house by the servants. The marquess, they were told, had gone out on estate business, but would call on them in the afternoon.

  Polly tried to force herself to enjoy settling in. It appeared a pleasant, manageable house after the grandeur of the stately home. The furniture was pretty and unpretentious. There were a pleasant parlor, a morning room and a dining room downstairs, all leading off a vestibule. Upstairs wer
e four apartments, each consisting of bedroom, powder room, and tiny sitting room. Nothing to be afraid of here, Polly told herself sternly.

  The servants were efficient and courteous, and Polly found herself regaining all the old ease and friendship she had experienced with Drusilla in the prison yard.

  But when the marquess called in the afternoon and agreed to join them over the tea tray, he looked so remote and handsome in riding dress and top boots that Polly once more fell silent. Cannot you see I wish to be alone with him? her mind screamed at Drusilla. But had she voiced such a thought aloud, Drusilla would have been shocked. No young virgin was allowed to be alone in the company of any man. Drusilla did not know of the enforced intimacy of Polly’s stay at the town house. She had never burned with the fires of lust and passion herself and would have been horrified and upset had she been able to guess at one fraction of the hot emotions which were coursing through Polly’s wanton body.

  At last the marquess yawned and stretched and as he did so, the muscles of his thighs rippled against the cloth of his breeches. Polly stifled a groan. “I must go,” he said. “Pray call for a carriage should you wish to go to the nearest town. I shall have people calling to see me, but I will put it about that you are a distant relative, Polly, and no questions will be asked. You will have callers yourself, of course, the vicar and some of the local county, but I can trust Miss Gentle to deal competently with them.” He stood up, he smiled, he waved, and then he was gone.

  In the days that passed, Polly did receive a few callers, some of the neighbors and the vicar and his wife. She was treated with all the deference due to a relative of the marquess, and Drusilla was always on hand to add elegance to the conversation. Polly reflected wryly that the hideous Lady Comfrey had indeed lost a treasure. But she copied Drusilla’s manner and ease of conversation as assiduously as she had once taken lessons from her in Newgate. The marquess had not called again, but Polly was determined that when he did, he would not find her tongue-tied.

  But the reason for his absence startled her. A Mrs. Castle, a hard-featured lady whose estate was on the other side of the valley, had conceived a fondness for Polly and called several times. It was as she was taking her leave after one of her visits that she said, “I suppose I had better call at the house and present my compliments to the Ponsonbys, although I cannot precisely say I like them. But Mary Ponsonby and I were friends a long time ago and she will think it odd if I do not call.”

  “The Ponsonbys!” exclaimed Polly. “Then he must mean to marry her after all!”

  “If you mean Joan Ponsonby, it’s she who is setting her cap at Canonby, rather than the other way around,” said Mrs. Castle. “They arrived without being invited, you know. Said they guessed he had moved to the country. Of course, Joan is flying high. She is very beautiful, but when a very beautiful woman gets to the age of twenty-seven and is still unwed, one wonders why.”

  “Perhaps she was waiting to fall in love,” said Polly.

  Mrs. Castle laughed loud and long. “You are a wit, Miss Peterson,” she said, and she was still laughing when she left.

  “What did I say that was so funny?” Polly asked Drusilla.

  “People of the Ponsonbys’ rank do not marry for love,” said Drusilla, putting neat stitches in a piece of embroidery. “Only very common people do that.”

  “But why not grand people?”

  “If they find love, they are very lucky. But a true lady knows what is due to her family and marries suitably.”

  Polly fell silent. What was going on at Hand Court?

  “I am going out for a walk,” said Polly suddenly.

  “Very well.” Drusilla put down her embroidery and stood up.

  “No, Drusilla, I wish to go alone.”

  “That will not do,” said Drusilla firmly, “and you know it.”

  Polly could not bring herself to say she meant to creep up to Hand Court and spy on them. She crossly went to fetch her cloak.

  Her steps, however, turned toward the great house.

  “I would not go too near Hand Court,” said Drusilla. “Miss Ponsonby saw you when you were dressed as a footman and she might recognize you.”

  Drusilla’s good sense was beginning to cause Polly intense irritation. If only there were some way to shake her off.

  The day was warm and misty. Little drops of moisture hung like pearls on the trees and bushes. Polly looked at the sky. “I think it is going to rain, Drusilla, and it is a trifle muddy underfoot. Would you be so good as to return and fetch my pattens?”

  Drusilla concealed her surprise. Polly was treating her like a servant. But, she reflected, Polly did look out of sorts and was probably not aware of what she was doing.

  “Very well,” said Drusilla. “I shall not be long.”

  Now that was wicked of me, thought Polly, watching Drusilla’s drooping figure. But I shall not order her around again.

  She picked up her skirts and hurried toward the great house, glad of the mist and the shelter of the trees.

  She had just reached the edge of the wood which bordered the lawns in front of the house when the marquess and Miss Ponsonby came into view. They had been out riding. The marquess dismounted first and then held up his arms to assist Miss Ponsonby from her horse. She fell into them and laughed up at him, pouting her full lips in open invitation.

  Polly clutched a thin branch so hard that it snapped between her fingers as the marquess bent his mouth to that inviting one so near his own.

  She knew she should turn away, but she stood there, watching, wretched, miserable.

  And then the marquess raised his head and looked down at Miss Ponsonby with a puzzled look. Miss Ponsonby had gone quite white. As Polly watched, she took out a small handkerchief and scrubbed her mouth, and then walked off into the house.

  The marquess stared straight at where Polly was standing. She was sure he could not see her but she backed away so hurriedly that she tripped over a fallen branch and sat down heavily on the wet grass.

  “So it was you,” said the marquess, standing over her. “I had this feeling I was being watched and then I heard a twig snap. You silly girl. Miss Ponsonby saw you at the ball and might recognize you. You must stay away from the house until she is gone.”

  He helped Polly to her feet.

  “And when will that be?” asked Polly in a low voice.

  “Today, if I have played my cards aright.”

  Polly’s eyes flew up to meet his. “I do not think that hugging and kissing her is a way to get rid of her,” she said harshly.

  “The best way. I rather took Miss Ponsonby in dislike when I found her waiting outside Newgate to view the path of your escape. Such vulgarity does not appeal to me. She is an enchanting female and led me on, and yet I suspected her secret, and so moved in to frighten her.”

  “I do not understand.”

  “No normal female would. Let us just say that Miss Ponsonby does not like men.”

  “If she does not like men, then why did she pursue you into the country?” said Polly, exasperated.

  “She did not pursue my face and figure but rather my title and fortune. Do not ask me any more questions.”

  “When you kiss someone, my lord, can you tell if they don’t like men as opposed to just not liking you?”

  “I told you not to ask questions. If you go on I shall be forced to silence you in the way I silenced Miss Ponsonby.”

  A wicked gleam entered Polly’s eyes. “Tell me about women who do not like men?” she pursued.

  He looked down at her, half amused, half irritated. She was wearing a simple, unhooped gown. Her hair was unpowdered and tied at the nape of her neck with a ribbon. Pearls of moisture gleamed in the heavy tresses of her hair. Her skin was white, almost translucent, and her large eyes fringed with sooty lashes were full of laughter.

  He bent to drop a playful kiss on her nose, but she raised her mouth and he kissed her lips instead, lips that were soft and clinging. A yielding and pliant body was
molded to his own. He could feel the firmness of her breasts pressed against his chest. He could smell the faint perfume of flowers from her hair.

  The passion that took hold of him was so unexpected and so violent that he buried his lips deeper in hers while one strong hand came up to cover her breast.

  “Miss Peterson!”

  The couple broke apart. Polly looked dazed, the marquess furious with himself.

  As Drusilla came hurrying up, holding a pair of wooden pattens, the marquess bowed. “Forgive me, Miss Gentle,” he said. “Such behavior will not happen again.”

  He strode off toward the house. Polly started after him, but Drusilla caught her arm and drew her back just as Mrs. Castle and Mrs. Ponsonby appeared on the front steps.

  “Have you gone mad?” whispered Drusilla, her lips trembling.

  “I want him,” said Polly flatly.