Scandal's Heiress

by Amelia Smith

  “My grandmother, my mother's mother, was a famous courtesan. Her early life... well, it was simply unspeakable. Later, she became the paramour of a man she calls Bereford.”

  “That must be the current earl's father, or grandfather,” Georgiana mused.

  “I know nothing about him, not really,” Hyacinth said, “only that he left my grandmother with a cottage. Through investments or selling jewels or possibly gambling, she ended her life with an estate and five tenant farmers.”

  “Where is this estate?” Georgiana asked.

  “In H—shire. I don't know anything more about it.”

  “It's not a bad dowry. I don't see why Lady Talbot is so set against it.”

  “She doesn't know about the estate, only that my grandmother...”

  “Was the exact opposite of everything she has striven to be,” Georgiana said.

  Hyacinth nodded. “Apart from her devotion to fashion,” she said. “I only saw my grandmother once, when I was about the age that Sophie is now, but she was stunning. She eclipsed Aunt Celia, who drove her away the moment she stepped in the door. I think she would have set out armed guards to drive her off, if she'd known she was coming.”

  Georgiana snorted. “I can't say I'm surprised. Celia dislikes competition.”

  Hyacinth sighed. The clouds above them seemed to be growing darker. “What would you do?” she asked Georgiana.

  “I suppose I would see to my estate, first,” Georgiana said.

  “I wouldn't know where to begin. I don't even know how to get there, let alone how to manage an estate,” Hyacinth said. “Aunt Celia is determined to keep me under her watch―"

  “Except when there are eligible louts in the room,” Georgiana interrupted.

  “Yes. I've only barely managed to escape getting mauled by that Viscount Whitley, and getting out to see my solicitor required scheming and subterfuge. I have no idea how I will get to the bank.”

  “A visit to the bank can be arranged,” Georgiana said.

  They had reached the end of the park. Sophie, with the Pently children and their governess, waited by the gates. A few snow flakes drifted down through the air, only to melt the moment they touched the muddy ground.

  “We will go shopping tomorrow,” Georgiana told Hyacinth, loudly. “I'm sure your aunt will approve,” she added, a bit more quietly.

  Hyacinth was not entirely convinced. “She might approve, or not,” she whispered, “but she won't snub you; I'm sure of that.”

  Georgiana laughed. “No, she won't. It's a pity...” she trailed off, shaking her head, and turned away from the younger people. “It's not my business, but I don't mind helping you,” she whispered. “I think it will be rather better for you to have your own income, as Thomas has his.”

  “Thomas? What does he have to do with any of this?” Hyacinth said.

  “You see,” Georgiana said, “you've had your secrets, too, and he, as Mr. Smithson, became quite the nabob. Even if he doesn't become a duke...”

  “Do you think he won't?” Hyacinth asked.

  “Come on, Aunt Georgie!” one of the boys called.

  “Coming!” Georgiana called back. She pursed her lips. “I don't know,” she said to Hyacinth, “but there's a chance he'll be only Sir Pently of Lawton, and that estate is... not so much of a burden. So you might have your Mr. Smithson nearly back.” With that, she rode up to the others and entered their midst.

  Hyacinth gaped. Did Georgiana want her to court Thomas? She pulled her horse into line behind the others as they left the park, trying not to fall too far behind. She liked Georgiana, not only because she played the pianoforte better than anyone she'd ever heard before, or that she was still independent and unmarried. She seemed intelligent, too, and for all her talk of fashion with Aunt Celia, she seemed to be not entirely a creature of appearances.

  As they approached Aunt Celia's house, the snow began to stick to the rooftops and railings, a lacy dusting of white. It was really quite wonderful in its cold, delicate way, so much so that Hyacinth nearly forgot her cold fingers.

  Georgiana dropped back to ride beside her for a few paces as they approached the house.

  “You ought to forgive him, I think,” she said. “He only wanted to escape, even more than you want to escape your aunt now. I can't blame him for trying to shirk his duties. No one ever expected he would be heir.”

  Hyacinth looked away. “He wasn't being honest. I like honesty.”

  “He was only trying to be himself. It's hard to do with the whole clan breathing down your back.”

  “I wouldn't know. I don't have a clan,” Hyacinth said.

  “Then we will find you one,” Georgiana decided. “And go shopping for bonnets tomorrow afternoon!” She clicked to her magnificent gelding and trotted away.

  #

  Georgiana's response to his plight had not been encouraging, Thomas thought. Three days seemed like an eternity. She'd quizzed him about Hyacinth's character and situation. When he revealed that he knew next to nothing about her connections, her intentions, and her family, she brushed him away. He could not be serious, she said, and still know so little about the lady whose regard he seemed to care for so much. He would forget her, she declared. First, though, he had it on good authority that she'd visited Lady Talbot, and, by consequence, Hyacinth.

  He decided to write to her anyway.

  #

  Hyacinth watched Georgiana go with mixed feelings. There was something frivolous, even dismissive, about the way she'd decided to take on Hyacinth's clandestine mission, sweeping her out from under Aunt Celia's nose.

  “Come on inside, Hyacinth,” Sophie called. “I could eat two breakfasts!”

  The boy from the livery stable was stomping his feet to keep them warm, waiting to take her intractable mount. She turned away from the retreating Pently party and dismounted.

  “Mama has already gone out,” Sophie reported as she entered the house, “and there's post for you! Two pieces of post. From gentlemen, I think.”

  Sophie handed her the post, and Hyacinth nearly laughed. One of them was a thin letter from George. “That one is not from a gentleman,” she said, “only from... a boy.” She wished she could tell Sophie about George.

  “A boy?” Sophie asked.

  “He is nine years old, and I tutored him in Gibraltar,” Hyacinth said, hoping that would be enough to satisfy Sophie's curiosity. Then she looked at the second letter, closed with an intricate seal. It was from Thomas.

  “You mean you worked as a governess?” Sophie asked.

  “Well, not exactly, but close enough,” Hyaicnth said. Aunt Celia's butler helped her with her coat and led the two young ladies to breakfast.

  “Is he very clever?” Sophie asked.

  “Who?” Hyacinth said.

  “The boy you tutored in Gibraltar, of course!”

  “Clever enough,” Hyacinth said.

  “Do you think I'm clever?”

  “What a vain question!” Hyacinth laughed. “I do think you're clever, but without education...” She couldn't go on. Aunt Celia would have her head. “Oh, never mind. Let's eat.”

  “But...” Sophie began.

  “But it is a matter for your mother to decide,” she sighed. Unfortunately, in Sophie's case. That was enough to hold off further conversation on that topic, and Sophie turned to talking about the Pently cousins' ponies, and their stern-looking governess. Hyacinth's letters were forgotten.

  After breakfast, Hyacinth retreated to her room and rang for Maria. She waited. Maria usually came quickly, but now Hyacinth found herself pacing and fretting, wondering what was keeping her maid away. She looked at the two letters in her hand. She wanted to share George's note with Maria, but not the other one. She hid Thomas's letter under her pillow and paced some more. She kept going back to the pillow, then dragging herself away, walking back again, until finally she drew out the letter.

  She studied the seal's curls and flourishes, tracing them with her finger. She ought to s
end it back. After all, he could ask his cousin how she fared, if he wanted to know. He must know that she and Georgiana had been riding together that morning. She didn't want to send it back, though. It had swum through the post and arrived with George's letter, and if it weren't for Mr. Smithson, she would not have George's letter at all. She wished they were all back on the Whistler.

  Hyacinth went to the door, listened, and when she heard no footsteps approaching, opened the letter.

  My dear Miss Grey,

  It seems that I have miss-stepped, again, and again I beg your pardon. I understand that my cousin has come to visit you. Georgiana is not at all like most of my other relations. If they were all like my Aunt Penelope and Georgiana, I might have stayed in England, and never known the heartache of India.

  As you have heard, I now stand in line to inherit my uncle's title, provided he does not sire an heir in his dotage, but as vile as he can be, I doubt he would sink to murdering his aged duchess in order to get a younger one, still able to bear an heir.

  When I neglected to tell you all of this, I was still Mr. Smithson, the person I have been for all of my life as a man, a person of no family connections, just another youth gone East to find his fortune. I had been free for ten years, and was not ready to relinquish that freedom any sooner than I needed to. That included taking back my family name. If I deceived you by omission, it was a matter of wanting to believe in myself as I have been, not as I might become, in the situation awaiting me here in England.

  Will you pardon me, and may we begin again?

  Yours Sincerely,

  Thomas Smithson Pently

  Hyacinth jumped as a knock sounded on the door.

  “Come in,” she said reflexively. She still had the letter in her hand, and hurriedly tucked it into the desk drawer, crumpling it a little. She felt sorry for him. Almost. It was hard to feel sorry for a man who had won so much wealth in trade, and had also won it by birth. Besides, if she could tolerate Aunt Celia, then surely he could muster the courage to face his own father. However, Hyacinth didn't know what Thomas's father was like, and if he thought his uncle nearly capable of murder, then perhaps there was something to justify his running away and wanting to escape them until their noose settled on his own neck – not that being a duke was a death sentence.

  Hyacinth composed herself as Maria entered. When she looked up, Maria had bent over to remove a piece of straw from the heel of her boot. Her cheeks were flushed, as if she'd run all the way up from the back of the garden. Possibly, even, from the stables.

  Hyacinth reached back into the desk, looking for George's letter.

  “What took you so long?” she asked Maria, to cover her own embarrassment.

  “I am sorry,” Maria said.

  “Never mind,” Hyacinth said. “I just wanted to show you that we have a letter from George. If only I can find it now!” She rustled through the pages. Thomas's letter kept finding its way to the top, and she shoved it back again and again. Maria was still busy checking her boots for stray bits of straw. Hyacinth finally found George's note, which she must have knocked to the back of the drawer in her haste to hide the other letter.

  “Here it is!” she announced. “Let's sit.”

  They drew their chairs up to the cold grate, and Maria took the tinder to light the fire.

  Dear Sister,

  Mrs. Portnoy says I should take the early coach for London on Saturday, and I will arrive by midday. I will walk to Bloomsbury if you send directions.

  Yours,

  George.

  “Directions!” Hyacinth said. “Can he know how large London is?”

  Maria shook her head. “No, of course not. He cannot walk alone. I will ask Harold where the Portsmouth coaches arrive. He will know, I think?”

  “Yes, do,” Hyacinth said. “We will go to meet him.”

  Maria looked at her. “Do you think you can get away?”

  “No. Probably I won't be able to escape the house, or whatever expedition Aunt Celia has planned,” Hyacinth sighed. “Where will he stay?”

  “Don't worry,” said Maria. “I will arrange it.” She winked, and Hyacinth thought that she blushed again. Yes, Maria and her new beau would arrange it. Maria and the coachman. No one could object to that match, not on grounds of rank. Hyacinth sighed. She was going to have to deceive her aunt yet again, first by going “shopping for bonnets” with Georgiana, then some other subterfuge to meet her own brother. London was thick with deception.

  #

  Chapter 12: Family Matters

  Maria reported that Georgiana had told Lady Talbot that her niece had expressed a wish to surprise her with a gift. She'd offered to help Hyacinth find something that would meet Lady Talbot's exacting standards. She arrived in the Pentlys's town coach to collect Hyacinth and Maria for a tour of some of the most fashionable shops, or so she said.

  “But what will I buy her?” Hyacinth asked, as they pulled away from Aunt Celia's house.

  Georgiana laughed. “This.” She produced a striped hat box from underneath the blankets and handed it to Hyacinth.

  Hyacinth peeked inside. It was a gaudy confection of yellow fabric flowers on a dark blue velvet ribbon. The hat itself was hardly noticeable beneath its decorations.

  “You wanted to buy something in primrose blue,” Georgiana told Hyacinth, “but I informed you that Lady Talbot doesn't like pale colours.”

  “On herself,” Hyacinth said. “I had noticed that.”

  “You may not have to concoct much of a story at all, then,” Georgiana said, “but at least give me credit for approving of your choice.”

  Hyacinth picked the hat out of its box. The work was very fine. She would not have chosen it for herself, but she could see that it would suit Aunt Celia very well.

  “Was it very expensive?” Hyacinth asked, after a while. She knew that Georgiana was wealthy enough to pay for the hat, but didn't want to be a charity case.

  “I suppose it might have been,” Georgiana said, “but I didn't buy it. It was a gift from an admirer of mine. It doesn't suit me, and if he sees it on Lady Talbot, he will know what I think of his gifts.”

  Hyacinth nodded. “So this suits your purposes, too.”

  “It does,” Georgiana said.

  Maria sat quietly in the corner of the carriage. She kept her eyes on the street outside, but Hyacinth knew she'd been listening.

  “Does your maid speak English?” Georgiana asked.

  “Yes. Maria speaks English and Spanish well, and a little French, too.”

  Georgiana assessed Maria. “How do you find London?” she asked.

  Maria blushed. Hyacinth was fairly sure that Aunt Celia had not addressed her directly since they'd arrived at her house. “It is colder than I am used to, but I like it, the... how do you say it, bustle? I think I would like to stay here.”

  Hyacinth had imagined Maria following her to the country, to her grandmother's estate, wherever it was, but if this romance with Aunt Celia's coachman continued, if Maria were to marry―

  Georgiana's voice interrupted her thoughts. “What was the name of your bank?”

  “Lyon's,” Hyacinth said. “I don't know where it is.”

  “Ah, but I'm sure our coachman does,” Georgiana said. She tapped on the roof of the coach and put her head out to tell the driver where they were going. The man responded with a “Yes, m'lady.” The horses snorted and protested as they turned in the street, the coach heaving a little as they reversed direction.

  “Now,” Georgiana said, once they had settled into their new route, “what do you propose to do with this fortune of yours?”

  Georgiana was a duke's daughter, fabulously wealthy, well-spoken, and an accomplished musician. That was all she knew of her new ally. She was independent, or so it seemed, and for some reason she had taken up Hyacinth's cause, whether out of boredom or because Thomas had piqued her interest in his shipboard friend.

  “I have been thinking of starting a school,” Hyacinth said. “F
or girls. Girls like my grandmother was, thrown out on their own resources, when they have none. I don't know what else I can offer, but I know that I can teach, and if a few could become governesses, or even housekeepers, rather than dying in the stews... well, maybe that would honour my grandmother's memory.”

  Georgiana thought a moment before replying. “But your grandmother did quite well in the stews, it seems.”

  “Only by the barest of chances. It was not, I think, the life she would have chosen, if she'd been given a choice.”

  “And you,” Georgiana said, “would you be happy to spend your life as a maiden schoolmarm?”

  “Why not?” Hyacinth said. She felt sure, now, that Georgiana would report back to Thomas. “And what of you? Are you happy to spend your life as a maiden fashion icon?”

  At that, Georgiana laughed. “There are worse fates. There are certainly worse fates.”

  #

  Georgiana offered to lend her support to Hyacinth's proposed school, but Hyacinth wanted to go into the bank without her.

  “Are you quite sure?” Gerogiana asked.

  “I think so. I must know for myself what I have in hand. I must sit with it alone, to think.”

  “Very well then, I will go bonnet shopping by myself. It would be strange to come back with only one, don't you think?”

  Hyacinth shrugged. “I trust your judgment in that.”

  Maria had been silent in the coach, but as soon as they were away from Georgiana, she spoke.

  “Do you trust her?” she asked.

  “I don't know, entirely,” Hyacinth mused, “but I like her, and I need to escape Aunt Celia's clutches somehow. At least she can't want any of my money, because she has so much of her own. Why not trust her?”

  Maria pursed her lips. “It is only that she seems... frivolous.”

  “I am starting to think she only wants people to believe that,” Hyacinth said. The bank doors loomed before them. “But enough of Lady Georgiana. Let's go in.”