She smiled trustingly up at him, causing him to pause.
“There is more to this plan than I have yet said, Mary. I leave soon, and I will be gone for a lengthy period, if ever I do return.” He took both her hands in his, preventing an agitated display.
“But why?” she asked in an urgent whisper. “Why would you leave us? Neville will be gone, and good riddance! Treehill will be ready for you in spring. We will go on as always, but at peace and at our leisure.”
“Were it possible, I would will it so. But it is not possible. I have matters that must go forward and can no longer be shirked.”
Her face clouded and her look implored him to unsay his words.
“There now,” he said, releasing her hands, “you are playing your part, and doing it justice, I will add.”
“I do not care for my part,” she said petulantly. “I cannot abide your going and I will not believe you will not return erelong. You will miss us abominably!” This last she threw at him angrily.
“Were I to pine my heart out, it would not change my disappearance, Rabbit.”
She turned instantly imploring again. “But why? Where will you go? I do not understand! You have invested in Treehill and led us all to believe you would settle here. My father…Oh, good God, Robert! He will suffer it so…he dotes upon you!” Tears sprang to her eyes at the thought of it.
He leaned over her and said, “I told you that you would do this very well, child. Now, be off through the veranda and out to the little garden and Oscar will come to you in a flash. Be the rabbit and take him on a merry chase, my sweet.” He took her hand, pressed it warmly, and, with an instant turn of expression, stalked away in cold dislike.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
The rest of the business was as child’s play. When Neville did find her in the garden, she was genuinely weeping from a broken heart. But his arrival sobered her enough that she could blurt out that the Marquis of Denley had only ever wanted a dalliance, and that he had made her an unseemly offer that had overset her.
Appropriately aggrieved and angered, Oscar Neville had offered any service, any service at all, to his treasured friend.
“Oh, what can be done for me?” she wailed. “It will be a lace cap for me! There are no prospects and my father would only ever exert himself on the…on the…”
“On the expectation?”
Her eyes lifted to his, fully lit with the truth. “You must think me so very grasping to have set my cap at him.” Though no longer sobbing, tears still streamed down her cheeks.
“I think you ill-used and I hate him. If I could, I would marry you to seal the business and destroy his chances of ever importuning you again.”
“That is noble,” she sniffed, “but impossible. You would not want me. He certainly did not! He only wanted my dowry, which is respectable you know, and he is sunk and…and I hate him!” She stormed around the garden, while Oscar Neville hovered about, gradually bringing her close, and finally taking her in a strong and comforting embrace.
“You lie when you say I do not want you. I have harboured hopes. But when you would not deny him entrance to Greenly, I despaired.”
She cast him off angrily. “How can you make love to me when I am in such despair? Can you not see how they will talk?” She waved her arm toward the back of the assembly rooms. “He has all but paid his addresses publically. Now they will all laugh at me and say I was led-along and hoydenish, and leap to the worst conclusions!” There was much in this speech that struck Mary as likely. She sank to a bench and swayed, feeling faint.
“If I could…if I could only run away I would,” she said, breaking into a small sob.
Neville struck then, instantly sinking on to his knees. “Mary, let me take you. We will go to Gretna and do all that is proper, and we will live far away from these abominable people.”
She looked at him blankly. “You would marry me?”
He made all the right assurances; he would pay his addresses and ask for her hand from her papa, but for the certainty he would be denied. Mr. Fanley had wanted a Marquis for her, and he would hold out hope it could yet be arranged. And worse, all who witnessed her distress in the ballroom would think she had demanded marriage and received an offer as mistress.
“I am ruined,” she said hollowly, letting him take her hands and kiss them. She rallied. “Yes, I will go with you. How else can I go on?”
“You will not regret it: I am sure. Your papa will dower you, will he not, once he sees the thing is done?”
“Yes, yes. He will be glad to have me off his hands. But how is it to be arranged?”
While he seemed to be at a momentary loss, she began speaking listlessly.
“We will need a carriage and posting horses. There is one in at the livery in Greenly, you know, at the stables in the back. I think it is never used much.”
He promised to procure it and went so far as to ask her advice on the arrangements in general. Having thought the business through with Denley and her brother, she gave him a practiced recital of just what to do.
But when the tryst was arranged, Mary succumbed to a despairing attitude once again, crying that she was undone.
“You will learn to love me,” he assured her impatiently. “But now we must contrive to restore you to the ball without too much notice.”
“Oh, I have been gone beyond all appearances of propriety!”
He assured her he had all in hand, implored her to restore her looks to composure, and went to find Will Fanley and Clara Himmel, inducing them to join him in the garden, where they attended to Mary, who had become “overheated in the dance.” He then slipped out to toss Denley a packet, and returned to the assembly, where by twos and threes he enticed other young couples to retreat to the out of doors for a refreshing turn in the moonlight. When they re-entered, shortly, it was as a large, respectable group.
What remained were a few more turns on the floor with the Himmel brothers, the last formalities and a long carriage ride in which Mr. Fanley continued to repeat his mystification that Denley had left so early.
The ensuing period of activity had blunted Mary’s distress and restored much of her natural buoyancy. She spoke bracingly, as much to herself as to her father. “Do not worry, Papa. I am sure he has ridden to Greenly and you will find him sitting quite at his ease and unaware he should never fly out of a country party without eliciting comment.”
“But why did he leave?”
“Have I not said these noblemen are plagued with fits of restlessness?” Her manner was light enough, but in her heart she began to feel out of charity with the Marquis. That he had played his part so brilliantly as to provoke her to tears in a public place was a shocking cruelty. Of course he would never leave them! That was out of the question.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
They went along like this in the carriage, Will yawning and dreamy, Mr. Fanley fretting and pettish, and Mary by turns reassuring and noncommittal. Eventually, they did arrive at Greenly, finding Denley changed out of his finery into riding breeches, sitting with a long pipe by the fire. He instantly patched over Mr. Fanley’s bewilderment, saying, “I know it was abominable of me, but I’ve been to a thousand and one balls, sir, and once there I found myself chafed beyond endurance. I am left only to beg your pardon.”
“Well, if I had been half as smart I’d have ridden in a curricle myself, and dipped out afore you.” With that, Mr. Fanley wearily took himself off to his bed.
No sooner had he shut the door than Will seized Mary and gave her a rough kiss on the cheek. “I knew you were a great gun, Mary!” he exclaimed. “I could see by Oscar’s looks he was in high fettle.” Turning to Denley, he asked earnestly, “Did you get all your blunt, sir?”
“He is thoroughly hung and dried. Mary fetched a high price from him, I fear.”
“And now for the rest.” Will rubbed his hands together.
“Of which I’ve been meaning to say,” Denley said levelly, “that if you’ve a mind to do vio
lence, I will fail to consult your papa about your education.”
“I was counting on pinking him to the bone!”
“When you set him on the side of the road without a hope and a prayer, he will be pinked to the bone. Believe me, a wound would give the wolf leave to wear sheepskin, crying to everyone who would hear him how he was set upon, and sending down the law. Let fate be his judge.”
Resigned, Will suddenly slumped into his chair. “Well, I’m knocked up.”
“You have the most important part to play, so you’d best be off, but you will shake my hand and give me your word first.”
This was accomplished with passable resignation. “He will suffer abominably, won’t he?” Will asked.
“Beyond measure. Be content: yours will be a fatal blow.”
Once the door was shut, he turned his attention to Mary. She had taken off her necklace and was examining it by the light of the fire, in one of those aimless employments often used by the broken-hearted.
“Did he kiss you?”
She looked up and attempted to tease her tormentor. “He made violent love to me, but he was careful not to distress me.”
“Then he is a stupider person that I thought,” came the angry reply. He stood and brought her a package. “Here is your mama’s purse, Mary. See to its safekeeping.”
She held it in one hand, with her necklace in the other, and looked up at him forcibly. “Now,” she commanded, “you will tell me it was all a trick to get me to cry and make a believable scene. And it worked,” she said with animation, “because I was distressed beyond anything. Infamous! I could almost hate you, but for the fact I could never have done it without you putting me into such despair.”
He smiled sadly down at her.
“And…and,” she went on after swallowing and looking away from him, “you will leave us soon: you will be going to Treehill, and will be gone but one full night before my father and I ride over to pay you a morning call and invite you to a country supper…and that is how we will go on…forever…”
“That is a lovely story. I urge you to keep it for a few days, and then, after it loses a little colour, I want to think of you skipping down the lane in those abominable brown shoes, calling ‘halloo’ to everyone you meet, making larks and mischief and clipping the hairs off the nitwits that cross tongues with you.”
Two great tears crawled down her cheeks, but she made no reply.
“Oh, dear,” he said in his amused voice of old, “I sense I am about to lose yet another handkerchief.” He took a fresh lace and linen cloth from his pocket, dabbed it gently on her cheeks, and then placed it into her hands.
“Now, Rabbit, I need you to attend me. Put your necklace aside for now.” He placed a paper in her hand. “This letter is for your father. I trust you to know when to put it in his hands.” He pressed into her hand another letter. “This is for Eversham, if you will be so good as to send it express in the morning. And,” he lifted her chin, “I am going to ask you another favour.”
She was too distressed for speech, so he continued, pulling up a chair beside her. “I want you to have the care of Caesar.” Alert to her inevitable protest, he put a quelling finger on her lips. “Here are the papers to prove he is your beast. If you would ride him down the lane now and then I would be much obliged, but I own it will take two or three mounting blocks to put you up.” He smiled, sadly. “It is an evil gift. I am afraid he will eat you out of house and home. Can you bear the attack on your household economy?”
For once, Mary Fanley did not laugh. She simply crumpled into him and sobbed openly for a few moments. He soothed her and said, “You have been the greatest friend to me, Rabbit. I will never forget you, but you must forget me. I think once you have settled down from this adventure and seen Will off, you should consider Jack Himmel.”
She stiffened and sat up. “I hate Jack Himmel.”
“Well, that is too bad, because he was much struck by you tonight, though I dare say you were too full of yourself to notice.” She cast him a wrathful glare. “Fine,” he continued reasonably, “I see you do not care of the idea. It will have to be the rector. He is an intelligent man, though you will have a deal to turn around your father’s opinion.”
She forcibly dried her eyes. “I will never laugh again, and so you may quit your assault.”
“You are not so hen-hearted,” he replied, softly. A quiet knock on the door roused him, and he looked at her long and piercingly before he said, “Lofty, now my, girl. Do not let them see your heart. Let me alone be the one who knows you, Rabbit.” With that, he turned and strode quickly out of the room.
Mary sat in suspension for a moment, before flying to the window. The Marquis of Denley, in the company of the two mysterious men of his employ, said a few curt words, threw on his greatcoat and cast himself onto the back of a hired hack. Without so much as a backward glance, he rode away into the darkness.
Chapter Forty
His leaving killed her dead to the grave.
She removed to her bedroom; having been, in the space of hours, at the top of the trees and cast down to the earth, having wept and laughed and wept again, she slept through the night in the collapse of exhaustion.
For a dead creature, Mary survived the ensuing period very passably. The next day, the culmination of their scheme, was most particularly not a time for her to fall into a decline. Rising early and dressing in a simple blue frock with an India paisley shawl, she joined her father in the breakfast parlour. He sat there happily ruminating on his day, perhaps slightly weary from the prior night, but secure he would not be disturbed by any social doings for some time to come. He looked upon his daughter very charitably when she entered, and she immediately went to him. Putting Lord Denley’s letter in his hand, she said gently, “His Lordship sent his regrets as of last night sir. I believe an express came precipitously and called him away. He dashed this off for you and begs us not to expect him again for some time.”
Mr. Fanley, much shocked, only opened the letter and read it silently. In the end, he said in an offended tone, “It is as you say, Mary,” and handed her the missive.
She could not read it, instead sitting in comforting proximity to her papa and fortifying herself with coffee and milk. Long after her father took himself off, she sat in the parlour and stared out into the cold mist of ensuing winter. When Will arrived looking full of news she dismissed the serving maid and pinned her attention on her brother. He was in high agitation, and she exercised calm on him in all her assertions.
“Did you direct him to the carriage?” he asked anxiously.
“Yes, Will. He was ready to be told how to go on.”
This caused her brother to snort. “I can only hope that if I ever elope, I will not need the wench to help me go about it.”
“Of course you would be very commanding. And Mr. Neville has no spine, as we know. But he is evil and cunning, Will, and we must not fall off our guard.”
“So we can expect an afternoon call from him, I assume?”
“I am not inclined to see him. I will my send my lady’s maid to Blevington with a note to Clara, to congratulate her on her ball. He will be alert for it and she will linger pointedly enough. We will have an envoy then, for notes between the spurious lovers.”
This plan proceeded in accordance with Mary’s predictions. Upon reading Neville’s note of assignation, she suppressed revulsion over his assurances and felt satisfied that the coach and four had been obtained with sufficient complications to make him unsuspicious.
In her furtive answer, Mary also took the precaution of begging he not speak to her until they were past danger, as her resolution was hardly strong and would fail for any reason.
Indeed, sir, she wrote, I beg you will pardon me for poor spiritedness. I am much distressed to leave Greenly, and if I can be spared your notice until the moment of our nuptials, I will be sufficiently strengthened to be the bride your service to me deserves.
After much argument, the conspir
ators agreed that Lord Denley’s new maid, Molly Harper, would play the part of eloping lady, and as Denley had saved her from evil circumstances, she relished any danger he put her in. Mary was resentful at being denied a midnight flight and the opportunity to see firsthand Mr. Neville’s shock upon opening the coach door to be confronted with the business end of Will Fanley’s pistol. But Lord Robert had been abominably hard-headed on this point. With Will firmly entrenched against her, she relented.
Two nights after the ball, then, Molly came silently to Mary’s chamber, where she was dressed in a lady’s travelling dress, robed in a dark cape and her hair covered by a dark coloured velvet cap. Will came shortly after; bundled up in a copious cloak made for a stout woman; he looked like an uncommonly large maid.
“This will never do,” he said, casting a brooding eye at himself in the looking glass.
Mary disagreed. “It will serve. He is at the point he will believe what he wishes to believe, and I implored him to put the coach nearly in the hedgerow so I would not be seen to enter it.”
Chapter Forty-One
Oscar Neville was hardly pleased with Mary Fanley’s skittishness, thinking he would much prefer to take her willing into his arms and kiss her than be banished to the outside of her coach as if he were an unwonted scourge. But he bore with her Turkish treatment by considering how pleasant it would be to manage her fortune. That he had no clear idea how very large it was caused him an anxiety which he swiftly pushed aside. He assured himself instead that if the Marquis of Denley, a known hater of marriage, had fought so hard for her, the total of her wealth must be staggering.
The enormous antique coach lumbered into position a half hour before midnight, and his newly acquired stallion paced and huffed pettishly. This caused him to dismount and thrust the reins in the hands of the groom, who could manage the beast. He then paced fitfully around in the dust. He had warned Miss Fanley to be prompt, and, when the quarter hour had gone past midnight, he began to despair.
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