“We never stayed afterward. It seemed a common music salon to me.”
“Very common. We can only hope that your costumes obscured your identity and that no one who meets you in the future recognizes you from this last week. It is scandalous for a woman to sing on a stage of any sort, but one like that, painted and frilled as you are . . .” He made a gesture toward her gown, her face, her wig.
“My mother sang onstage, Mr. Duclairc, and these are her costumes.”
“I’m sure that she was a lovely singer,” Penelope inserted quickly.
“Stop humoring her, Pen. That may be acceptable in the United States, but not in England, Miss Kenwood.”
“Since I am not English, that doesn’t bother me. I think it would be best if we avoided any social connection so that you are not embarrassed by my performances, don’t you?” She forced a smile, to encourage him to accept the undeniable logic of it. “Since you have executed your duty by assuring that I am safe, please return Jane and me to our lodgings now.”
“You will remain here tonight. Your belongings will be sent for, and I will have the proprietor of the gaming rooms informed that your performances have ended.”
“I must decline your offer, Mr. Duclairc. I will not impose on your sister, and I intend to continue my employment. As a singer, I need experience with audiences and—”
An autocratic slice of his hand cut her off. “No. Absolutely not. You will not live independently of mature chaperons, nor will you parade yourself on a stage. While you are here you are my responsibility, and you will conform to the behavior expected of a young lady.”
Bianca glared back at the intractable, towering viscount. That an old miser, whom she had never met, could complicate her life with a few scratches of a pen struck her as intolerable. She hadn’t expected the viscount to find her so quickly. She hadn’t planned to have this conversation until she was ready for him.
Vergil crossed his arms over his chest. The pose made him look very tall and powerful. It was the sort of stance a king might take when he ordered someone’s head chopped off.
“Tomorrow my sister will accompany you and your maid to the country,” he intoned, stating the lord’s will. “You will not speak of this experience, not even to the other members of my family. As far as the world is concerned, you were met at the ship and have been in our protection from the start.”
“If you take me out of London, you do so against my will. As you noted earlier, that is abduction. I, too, can complain to the Justice of the Peace.”
He faced her coolly. “It is legally impossible for me to abduct you, Miss Kenwood. I am your guardian. Until you turn twenty-one or marry, you are under my complete authority. Pen, have the housekeeper show Miss Kenwood and Miss Ormond to their chambers.”
Dismissed like a naughty schoolgirl, Bianca found herself and a drowsy Jane handed over to a woman in the corridor. Vexed that her plan had failed, and confused by this stranger’s determination to take up a responsibility he surely could not want, she followed the woman up the stairs.
Something about the end of their confrontation troubled her. It wasn’t until she reached the top landing that she found the vital omission. Until you turn twenty-one or marry, you are under my complete authority.
Or until she left England, of course. Right?
“Don’t you think that you were a little too firm with her?” Penelope asked.
“Not at all.” Vergil watched Bianca Kenwood tottering up the stairs on her dainty silk mules. The snow shower of foreboding had turned into a blizzard.
What a disaster.
“She is a stranger here, Vergil. Ignorant of our proprieties. No doubt, behavior is less formal in America.”
“Don’t believe it, Pen. She knew precisely what she was about.” Which was doing exactly what she wanted, and guessing that the doing of it would induce him to wash his hands of her, so she could go on doing it.
He turned away, thinking that a glass of port was in order before he left. He needed to plan how to prepare his brother, and how to curb Miss Kenwood so that even a rake wouldn’t be shocked by her.
Penelope touched his arm, stopping him. “It was kind of you not to say anything about how she addressed you, to understand it was only her naivete. All of those Mr. Duclaircs. She was embarrassed enough as it was, and you were quite generous. I’ll explain it to her tomorrow.”
Is that what Pen had seen in those big blue eyes? Naivete? Embarrassment? Normally his older sister was more astute than that, despite her good-natured optimism.
“Explanations won’t be necessary, Pen. I will wager one thousand pounds that Miss Kenwood knows full well the proper way to address a viscount.”
chapter 2
Vergil threw his soaked hat to his valet and tore at the knot of his cravat. “Whisky for both of us, Morton. After that journey, we need it. Then show Hampton up when he arrives.”
Within ten minutes Morton had not only produced the spirits but also some cold fowl and cheese, built a low fire in the library, and gotten Vergil dry and presentable. Not that there was anyone to present himself to. Only a few rooms in the expansive London house were open anymore and, in addition to Morton, there were only two servants.
Nor did he have to be presentable for Julian Hampton. The family solicitor had seen him most unpresentable before. Still, the life he lived here in London demanded that appearances be maintained.
He sat by the fire, sipping his whisky with two ledgers on his lap. He already knew what these documents would show and what Hampton would say. The Duclairc family finances were not healthy. Only Vergil’s careful stewardship this last year had prevented a total fall.
Recently, however, he had not had as much time to devote himself to such things. Other matters, more pressing and also more interesting, demanded his attention. Matters such as the one he had just attended to up north.
And now, of course, he needed to deal with the new matter of Bianca Kenwood. The potential complications that she presented made him close his eyes.
Her image flashed behind his lids, as it had too often the last two weeks. He saw her sitting in Pen’s drawing room in that absurd costume, with one slender leg dangling down the front of the chaise longue and the silk mule arching her little foot just so. She had been most unpresentable. Also irredeemable and impertinent and sly and fascinating . . .
Fascinating? What a peculiar thought. Wherever did it come from?
“Mr. Hampton,” Morton announced.
Julian Hampton entered, wearing his solicitor’s face. He always did that when they met for business reasons. Since he was an old friend it was probably necessary, especially when it came time to discuss bad news. Vergil had seen that expression a lot in the last year.
“Have you studied them?” Hampton asked, gesturing to the ledgers as he took a chair and accepted a glass from Morton.
“I expect that little has changed.”
“A bit. Solvency beckons. If your sister would live at Laclere Park—”
“I cannot ask her to be that dependent.”
“Or if Dante would live within his allowance—”
“He never has, so there is no hope there.”
“You could consolidate the farms and lease the land.”
“This is an old litany, Hampton, and you know my answers. My father and brother did not displace those families, and I will not, either.”
“Well, at least you no longer live on the brink.”
They were closer to the brink than even Hampton knew, in ways these ledgers would never reveal. However, Vergil had a plan to deal with that. Unfortunately, an essential part of the plan might cause trouble. The part named Bianca Kenwood.
Hampton smiled. That was never a good sign, especially when he had on his solicitor’s face. “You might improve things the easy way. The traditional way.”
“Yes, I expect that Fleur’s father would be very generous. I should be grateful that my value has risen so much with my brother’s death. With
time, I expect that I will agree to marry. Right now, however, other entanglements make that impossible.”
Hampton was not an expressive man, so the light of curiosity and concern that flickered in his eyes let Vergil know that he had said too much. “Can I be of assistance? I have some experience in negotiating my clients out of entanglements.” He stressed the last word in a way that alluded to problems of a romantic nature.
The entanglement that Vergil found himself in would take more than Hampton’s skill to unravel. “You are unsurpassed at that, and I would hand mine to you if I thought it would help. I can only imagine how you convinced the earl to release my sister.”
“All men have secrets that they want to hide. The Earl of Glasbury simply had more than most. How is the countess faring?”
“She is happy enough, and has come to prefer those social circles that accept her.”
“Her fall would have been far worse if not for you.”
Vergil knew that. Through ostentatious correctness he had managed to blunt the impact of Pen’s separation from the earl, and of Dante’s various sins, and even partly rectified the age-old reputation of the Duclaircs for unconventional behavior and ideas. Instead of his family pulling him down, he had managed to keep them afloat. Barely.
“Are we done?” Vergil asked, lifting the ledgers.
“It appears that you are.”
He dropped them on the floor. “You can explain the sad details another day. Tell me what you have been up to, besides advising fools like myself.”
“If all my clients were so foolish as you, I would starve.”
Hampton’s expression dropped its seriousness and he became the friend whom Vergil valued.
It turned out that he had been up to very little. Hampton did not seek out society much, and participated on the periphery when he did. Women thought him brooding and mysterious, and men considered him proud and dull. With his dark hair and sharp, perfect features, Hampton looked like a figure drawn in pen and ink by an illustrator. The problem for most people was that no captions came with him.
“St. John has come up to London,” Hampton said. “Burchard and I are meeting him at Corbet’s tomorrow. Witherby and the others will probably come too. Since you are back from wherever it was you went, why not join us? The Dueling Society will be whole again.”
He was referring to the group of young men who had been meeting in Hampstead at the Chevalier Corbet’s fencing academy for five years now. Vergil had not partaken of that sport or company in months.
His absence was all the odder because he had been the hub that had brought all those spokes together. He had known Hampton since boyhood, and become friends with Cornell Witherby while at university. Adrian Burchard, an earl’s son, had been found in the circle of the peerage. Even Daniel St. John, the shipper, had been appended to the Dueling Society through Vergil because of St. John’s friendship with Penelope.
“I wish that I could, but I must find Dante and bring him to Laclere Park. There are matters to attend there.”
“Burchard will be disappointed. He has been looking for you, to discuss something that he will not divulge. I assume that means it is political.”
If Adrian Burchard was looking for someone, he would soon find the man. Adrian was the last person Vergil wanted curious about his activities. “I will write and invite him down to visit. I expect to be there for several days.”
“Why not invite Witherby as well? The prolonged absence of the countess from London has turned him melancholy.”
“Perhaps it will inspire him to write another ode. Witherby will have to bide his time. Miss Kenwood has arrived in England, and Penelope has taken her to the country for a long visit.”
“Any trouble there?”
It wasn’t clear whether Hampton referred to Bianca Kenwood or the way Cornell Witherby had been dancing attendance on Penelope. Although the former promised nothing but trouble, Vergil could also do without the latter. Having a good friend develop a passion for your older sister, especially when that sister was estranged from her husband and lonely and vulnerable—it was the kind of situation that could ruin a friendship.
“No trouble at all. Miss Kenwood is a delight. I look forward to your meeting her.”
That was how entangled his entanglements had become. He was lying to a man he had known half his life.
Hampton turned the conversation to politics. As they talked of Whigs and Tories, of violent demonstrations and of the adjustments still occurring after the death of the last Foreign Minister, Vergil’s mind dwelled on the private matters waiting in the country.
Over and over there appeared in his head the image of a young woman dressed like a French queen, challenging him with too much self-possession, and of a pretty leg dangling below a hem that had been hiked improperly high.
“I still don’t understand your impatience,” Dante said. He flicked cigar ash out the coach window. “No reason to drag me back from Scotland. She doesn’t come of age for almost a year.”
That was an eternity by the way Dante calculated his calendar with women. Normally he would court, seduce, bed, and discard two mistresses in that time. Vergil studied his younger brother’s beautiful face and limpid eyes and dark brown hair. Dante’s history with females had almost been inevitable with features like that. Vergil had seen ladies of the highest breeding lose their breath when Dante approached.
“The season starts well before her birthday, and with Charlotte coming out, we can hardly leave Miss Kenwood here while we all pack off for town. You need to be married before then, not just engaged.”
“Why? Do you think some fortune hunter will cut me out?” Dante’s tone implied the notion was preposterous.
No, I think that if she is married we can prevent her from going up to London at all, if necessary, Vergil thought. The very notion of Bianca Kenwood in polite society, calling dukes and earls “Mister,” and announcing that she intends to study performance opera, was enough to ruin his spirits on this late August day.
But Dante’s question also pricked at the foreboding that had continued plaguing him since he had left Penelope’s house that night. It might be best for Dante to get this over while the field was clear.
Dante looked him squarely in the eyes. “We are almost there. Don’t you think that you should tell me now?”
“Tell you?”
“You haven’t said much about this Miss Kenwood, whom I am expected to marry. I find that suspicious. After all, you have met her. We both know that I have no choice except to agree to this, but if warnings are in order, you are running out of time.”
“If I have not described her in detail it is because it would be indelicate to do so. This is not one of your racehorses.”
“You have not described her at all.”
“Very well. She is of middling height and slender, with blue eyes.”
“What color hair?”
Damned if he knew. What color hair had been hidden by that ridiculous wig?
“Just how bad is she?”
Vergil had fully intended to warn Dante, but had failed to come up with the right approach. A tinge of guilt colored his reflections while he debated the appropriate one now. After all, he had practically forced his brother into this. Not that Dante had resisted much once he learned that over five thousand a year came with her.
“It is not her appearance. Her manner, however . . .”
“Is that all? Just like you to get stuffy about a few faux pas. What did you expect? She is an American. Pen will shape her up in no time.”
A few faux pas did not do Bianca Kenwood justice, but he let it pass. “Of course. However, even so, she is . . . distinctive.”
“Distinctive?”
“One might even say unusual.”
“Unusual?”
“And perhaps a bit . . . unfinished. Which can be remedied, of course. Pen has her in hand even as we speak.”
Dante peevishly looked out the coach window at the passing Sussex countrysid
e. Vergil hesitated continuing, but they were almost there and he was running out of time. “She may need a strong hand. She is a bit independent, from what I could tell.”
His brother’s gaze slid back to him. “Independent, now.”
“She has certain notions. It is her youth, and they will pass.”
“It would help immensely if you would balance some of this by adding how beautiful she is.”
No doubt. The problem was, he didn’t know if she was beautiful. He only remembered big eyes, interesting because of that intelligent and spirited spark in them.
What else could he offer? All that stage paint had been obscuring. The possibility of a lovely complexion, but who could be sure until he saw her washed? A nice form, but that may have been the costume. The suggestion of an underlying sensual quality . . . not something one noted about a brother’s future bride.
“Damn it, if she is vulgar I won’t go through with it, Vergil. Nor should you want me to. Aside from the fact that she would reflect on me and this family, I could hardly avoid her completely once married, even living in town and leaving her out here, which is how I plan to arrange things. And until you marry Fleur, which you are taking your damn sweet time doing, and set up your nursery, I am your heir and this American could end up the Viscountess Laclere.”
Vergil did not need his younger brother to list the pitfalls dotting this path. Pits much deeper and more numerous than Dante imagined. A honeycomb of them. If he could think of an alternative, he would use it, but two weeks of debating options always led him back to the same conclusion. Bianca Kenwood needed to be bound to this family with unbreakable chains.
Dante bit his lower lip and again looked out the window from beneath heavy lashes. “The income from her funds will be mine? As trustee, you will not interfere? And my allowance continues until the wedding, enhanced as we agreed?”
“Of course. I also promise to continue management of the financial investments, as you requested. The income from the funds is secure, but the others require occasional oversight, and I know that you hate such things.”
The Saint Page 2
